THE CHARIOT OF THE DAWN. 231 "The Dawn rushed off from her crushed car, fearing that Indra, CHAP. the bull, might strike her. "This her car lay there, well ground to pieces. She went far away." More commonly, however, she is beloved by all the gods, and the Asvins bear her away triumphant in her chariot. II. But it is to the phrases which speak of the dawn under the name Sarama. of Saramâ, that we must look for the germ of the great epics of the western Aryans. It is indeed only the germ, and no fancy can be more thoroughly groundless than that which would regard the Hellenic representative of Saramâ as derived from the dawn-goddess of the Hindu. Identity of names and of attributes can prove nothing more than the affinity of legends, which, as differing not only in local colour but also in the form of thought, must point to some common source in a past yet more remote. Whatever may be the precise meaning of the name, whether Saramâ or Saranyû be taken to denote the storm-cloud or the morning, there is no doubt that the root of the word is sar, to creep or go, which we find in serpent as well as in the Greek Erinys and Sarpêdôn. In the Rig Veda, Saramâ is especially the guardian of the cows of Indra, and as his messenger she goes to the Paņis, who have stolen them away. She, too, like Ushas, is said to be the first to spy out the cleft in the rock where the Panis, like Cacus, had hidden the plundered cattle, and, like Heraklês, she is the first to hear their lowings. Like Ushas also, she walks in a straight path: but when she comes to the stronghold of the Panis, a conference follows in which we see unmistakably the dawn peering about through the sky in search of the bright clouds, and restoring them in all their brilliance and beauty to the broad pastures of the heaven. "The Panis said, 'With what intention did Saramâ reach this place? for the way is far, and leads tortuously away. What was your wish with us? How was the night? How did you cross the waters of the Râsa?' "The Panis: 'What kind of man is Indra, O Saramâ, what is his look, he as whose messenger thou comest from afar? Let him come hither, and we will make friends with him, and then he may be the cowherd of our cows.' "Sarama: 'I do not know that he is to be subdued, for it is he himself that subdues, he as whose messenger I came hither from afar. Deep streams do not overwhelm him; you, Papis, will lie prostrate, killed by Indra.' AR. V. iv. 30. BOOK II. The cows of Indra. "The Panis: 'Those cows, O Saramâ, which thou desirest, fly about the ends of the sky, O darling. Who would give them up to thee without fighting? for our weapons too are sharp.' "Sarama: "Though your words, O Panis, be unconquerable, though your wretched bodies be arrowproof, though the way to you. be hard to go, Brihaspati will not bless you for either.' "The Panis: That store, O Saramâ, is fastened to the rock, furnished with cows, horses, and treasures. Paņis watch it who are good watchers; thou art come in vain to this bright place.' "Sarama: 'Let the Rishis come here fired with Soma, Ahasya (Indra), and the ninefold Angiras: they will divide the stable of cows; then the Panis will vomit out this speech.' "The Panis: Even thus, O Saramâ, thou art come hither driven by the violence of the gods; let us make thee our sister, do not go away again; we will give thee part of the cows, O darling.' “Saramâ: "I know nothing of brotherhood or sisterhood: Indra knows it, and the awful Angiras. They seemed to me anxious for their cows when I came : therefore get away from here, O Panis, far away. "Go far away, Panis, far away; let the cows come out straight, the cows which Brihaspati found hid away, Soma, the stones, and the wise Rishis.'"1 This hymn, seemingly so transparent in its meaning, becomes unintelligible if interpreted of any other being than the Dawn in her struggle with the powers of darkness: and hence it seems a superfluous task to show that all the essential features of Ushas reappear in Saramâ; that like Ushas Saramâ is followed by Indra, and that walking first she reveals the treasures which had been hidden away; that both alike go to the uttermost ends of heaven; that both break the strongholds of the Panis; both are the mothers and deliverers of the cows; both drive forth their cattle to the pastures; both walk in the right path and bestow wealth and blessings upon men. Every phrase tells us of some change in the heaven from the time when the sun sinks to sleep in the west to the moment when his face is first seen again in the east. As the light of evening dies away, the power of the darkness is restored, and the Panis extinguish the bright-coloured clouds which have looked down on the death of the Sun, or in other words they steal the cows of Indra, the cattle which Phaethousa and Lampetiê feed in the rich pastures of Helios. During the weary hours of night they are shut up in the demon's prison-house; but at length the messenger of the day comes to Max Müller, Lectures on Language, second series, 465. THE DEFEAT OF THE PANIS. II. 233 reclaim her children. With a faint flush she starts slowly from the CHAP, doors of the east. Her light, creeping along the dark face of the sky, seems to ebb and flow like the sea-tide; and so might Saramâ be said to hold parley with the Panis who refuse to yield up their plunder. But the Dawn is only the messenger of one far mightier than herself, and if they will not yield to her, they shall feel the force of the arm of Indra; and the conference with the Panis, which answers to the spreading of the Dawn, ends in their overthrow, as soon as Indra appears in his chariot-in other words, when the Sun is risen. In the Rig Veda, Saramâ steadily refuses the bribes offered to The fidelity of her by the Panis. Another turn was given to the tale when the Sarama. faithfulness of Saramâ was represented as not invincible. Saramâ, we are told in the Anukramanika, was sent as the dog of the gods to seek for the strayed or stolen herds, and when she espied them in the town of Vala, the Paņis strove to make her an accomplice in their theft. But although she refused to divide the booty, she yet drank a cup of milk which they gave her, and returning to Indra denied that she had seen the cows. On this Indra kicked her, and the milk which she vomited up gave the lie to her words. Here, then, we have in its germ the faithlessness of the Spartan Helen, who in name as in her act is Saramâ, and who was supposed to speak of herself as the dog-eyed or dog-faced, although by none else was the name applied to her.1 Thus the Greek carried away with him the root of the great Trojan epic from the time when he parted from his ancient kinsfolk, he to find his way to his bright Hellenic home, they to take up their abode in the land of the seven streams. For him, Helen and Paris, Brisêis and Achilleus, were already in existence. For him Phoibos already dwelt in Delos, and Sarpêdôn ruled in the land of the golden river. So, again, it makes but little difference whether the Sarameya, sometimes but rarely mentioned in the Rig Veda, be definitely the son of Saramâ, or whether the word. remained a mere epithet for any one of the gods who might denote. the morning. The name itself is etymologically identical with that of Hermes; and the fact that he is addressed as the watchdog of the house may have led to the notion which made him in later times 2 The first word in the compound KUVIS is the same as in Kynosarges, Kynossema, Kynosoura, none of these having any reference to dogs. -Bournouf, La Legende Athénienne. 2 Professor Müller notices that in a hymn of the seventh book of the Rig Veda, Vastoshpati, the lord of the house, a kind of Lar, is called Sarameya, BOOK II. Saranyû. Erinys. the hound which served as the messenger of the gods, and which in the story of Prokris reappears at the feet of Artemis.1 Another name from the same root which has furnished those of Saramâ, Helen, Hermes, and Sarpêdôn, is found in Saranyû (a feminine of Saranyu), in whom some discern the dark and impetuous storm-cloud. The phrases employed when the poet addresses her all seem to point in another direction. Like Ushas, she is spoken of as the mare, and as the mother of a twin. The male Saranyu is in like manner called a horse, and the goddess herself is the mother of the twins Yama and Yami, and again of Nasatya and Dasra, the twin Asvins or steeds, who represent the Dioskouroi. The persons with whom this dualism connects her indicate at once her real nature, and with Saranyu she takes her place by the side of the two Ahans or Dawns, of Indrâ, the two Indras, of Dyavâ, the double Dyaus, of Ushasau, the two mornings, of Agni, the two Agnis, of Varunâ, the two Varunas. 8 But as Saramâ is Helen, so Saranyû is Erinys; and here too the seed, which in the East sprang up only to wither away, shot up in the West to a portentous growth. It was certainly no euphemism which. spoke of the Erinyes as the gentle beings or Eumenides, and there was no incongruity in giving the name to the Dawn-mother Dêmêtêr. Hence in spite of all the failure of memory, and of the fearful thus conceived are brought out with verses: "When thou, bright Sarameya, openest 1 This dog of the morning is promi- time that she sent the dog it was just about the time the dawn begins to peep. The old myth could not be retained with greater fidelity. 2 Roth, quoted by Professor Max Müller, ib. 404. The name itself, as in Hermes, Saramâ, and spun, may express any motion, slow or rapid. The Vedic hymn-makers tell us distinctly that the horses of these Asvins are the rays of the sun. When they do this, it seems as difficult to deny that they made this comparison as to call in question the interpretation which the witch herself gives in one of the Russian stories of Afanasieff. The girl in this tale sees, as night comes on, a black horseman who disappears underground, at dawn a white horseman on a white horse, and, as the sun rises, a red horseman on a red horse. She is told by no less an authority than the witch that the black horseman is the dark night, the white horseman the clear dawn-light, and the red horseman the young red sun. 4 Professor Max Müller seems to see in Dêmêtêr, not the earth, but the dawn-mother, Dyâvà Mâtar, corresponding to Dyauspitar.-16. 517. ERINYS AND SARANYÛ. character which Erinys had assumed, the poet who tells the terrible tale of Oidipous could not but make him die in the sacred grove of beings who, however awful to others, were always benignant to himin groves which to the storm-tossed wanderer were the Hyperborean gardens into which grief, and fear, and anguish could never enter. The change which converted the beautiful Saranyû into the avenging furies of Æschylos has excited the wonder of some who hesitate on this account to believe that Erinys and Saranyû can come to us from a common source. It is more than probable that their scepticism arises from the notion that comparative mythologists derive the Greek from the Sanskrit deity. It is enough to say that they do not. II. 235 The change itself is one which could scarcely fail to be brought The Harpies. about. The Harpies, who in our Homeric poems are the beautiful daughters of Thaumas and Elektra, appear in the Æneid of Virgil as foul monsters, who do the work of vultures. The Ara, or prayer of the longing heart,' became more and more the curse which the weak uttered against their tyrants. Indra and Phoibos, who, as the sungods, see and hear all things, become almost more dreaded for their destructive power, than loved for their beneficence. As representing the day with its searching light, Varuna and Indra are the avengers of all iniquity; and in this sense it could not fail to be said of evildoers that Saranyû would find them out. The old phrase survives with its clearness scarcely dimmed in the Hesiodic Theogony. Night there is the mother of Strife (Eris), and of all the evils that come of Strife; but she is also the mother of righteous recompense (Nemesis). In other words, the evil deeds done in the night will receive their reward when brought to light in the day; and thus, according to Æschylos, the Erinyes also are daughters of the Night, who, like the Drukhs, the Vedic Atê, track out the sins of men. It was in truth impossible that, the germ once given, its developements should fail to be modified by time and place, by power of imagination and failure of memory. The Atê of the Iliad is the spirit merely of mischievous folly, and as such, she is hurled by Zeus from Olympos, for postponing the birth of Herakles to that of Eurystheus; the Atê of Æschylos is the sleepless doom which broods over a house until the vengeance for the shedding of innocent blood has been exacted to the uttermost farthing. There is nothing wonderful therefore in the process which changed the lovely Saranyû of the Veda into the awful goddesses of Athens; and if the Erinys of the Iliad is called hateful, · ἀρὴν ἐποιήσαντο παῖδα γενέσθαι. Herod. vi. 63. Hes. Theog. 226. |