Vedic Mythology c5.s3.t2.41

c5.s3.t2.41

Though *agni* is an Indo-European word (Lat. *igni-s*, Slavonic *ogni*), the worship of fire under this name is purely Indian. In the Indo-Iranian period the sacrificial fire is already found as the centre of a developed ritual, tended by a priestly class probably called Atharvan; personified and worshipped as a strong, pure, wise god, giver of food, offspring, intellectual power, fame; friendly to the house, but a destroyer of foes; probably even thought of as having different forms like lightning or the fire produced from wood⁴⁵. The sacrificial fire seems to have been an Indo-European institution also⁴⁶, since the Italians and Greeks, as well as the Iranians and Indians had the custom of offering gifts to the gods in fire. But the personification of this fire, if it then existed, must have been extremely shadowy⁴⁷.