Vedic Mythology c4.s1.4

c4.s1.4

There are also two minor applications of the idea of paternity in the RV. As in the Semitic languages, an abstract quality is quite frequently employed in a figurative sense (which is sometimes mythologically developed) to represent the parent of sons who possess or bestow that quality in an eminent degree. Thus the gods in general are sons (*sūnavah* or *putrāḥ*) of immortality¹ as well as sons of skill, *dakṣa* (8, 25⁵; cp. § 19). Agni is the 'son of strength' or of 'force' (§ 35). Pūṣan is the 'child of setting free'². Indra is the 'son of truth' (8, 58⁴), the 'child of cow-getting' (4, 32²²), and the 'son of might' (*śavasaḥ*, 4, 24¹; 8, 81¹⁴, his mother twice being called *śavasī*, 8, 45⁵. 66²). Mitra-Varuṇa are the 'children of great might'. Another application is much less common. As a father transmits his qualities to his son, his name is also occasionally transferred, something like a modern surname. Thus *viśvarūpa*, an epithet of Tvaṣṭr, becomes the proper name of his son. Analogously the name of Vivasvat is applied to his son Manu in the sense of the patronymic Vaivasvata (Vāl. 4¹).