The Aryan God of Lightning

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AMERICAN
JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY

Vol. XVII, i. Whole No. 65.

I.— THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING.

I have suggested in the Proceedings of the American Philo-
logical Association for 1894, 1. x, that one of the Vedic descriptions
of the fire-god Agni, viz. Apam Ndpat ' water's son,' an epithet
of the god as lightning, is reflected in Latin Nept-z/wmj (<IVept
' son ' + *udnos : Sk. udnds ' of the water ') and in Greek Tlor-x-Sav
for *Ne-5roT-i8aW 'son of the *iSa's'; and I explained *i8a as equal
to Sk. i(La 'a sacrificial food of ghee,' in gradation with Horn.
e'Sap 'food,' noting that Agni is called in RV. iii 29. 3 iddyds
putrdli 'son of Ida,' the personified ghee, with 4 f° r ^because of
the adjective idya 'worshipful' (: sjld), a very frequent epithet,
reserved almost exclusively for Agni. The root was idh 'kindle,'
with a by-form id in the neighborhood of nasals (cf. Sk. indu
' sparkling drops, sparks '). In eiSap ' food ' (for *7fiap) [first the
butter-food of the sacrifice ?] x there has been contamination with
?8o). It is to this el&ap, perhaps, that we owe the vocalization in the

1 For this meaning of eldap I can cite no literary instance, but its r/n-
inflexion hints at its having been once a liquid. We must also compare Tdr/,
which I take to have meant originally ' pine < -mount >' (cf. E 287), though it
passed over into the sense of ' timber' in general. • Possibly "iSauv is directly a
gen. to Mr) in the sense of 'kindling,' just as we use 'pine' in the southern
part of the U. S. as short for 'kindling-wood,' and as the Romans used taeda.
A comparable semasy is offered by Sk. ghrtd 'ghee' as compared with Gk.
Xoproc 'fodder,' but, specifically, 'straw-yard.' The primary meaning was
something like that in Sk. \/ghr 'drip, besprinkle' (cf. tifa -f- \/str 'sprinkle
sacrificial fat'), but in Eng. strew is used only of solids. I note, in passing,
that Germ, streu probably owes its abnormal vocalization to being one of a
group with heu, spreu (cf. Mod. Lang. Notes, XI 22S).

2 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

common form Uoauhav, but in that case we must put the affection in
the primitive Greek period, as indeed we should have to put there
the semasic alienation of Abap (cf. supra, footnote i). As the sense
of the compound was shifting between 'son of the kindlings' and
' lord of the waters,' the form xioaoihdv came into use by association
with oiS/ua ' wave.' These changes must have taken place before
the composition was felt: thus starting with *Notot idaav 'son of
the kindlings,' the next stage was *n«tot *et8aav, contemporaneous
with the change from *t8ap to ddap just assumed ; the. next step
*Ne7roT *ot8aa>v 'son of the waves,' with a final shift from 'son' to
'lord' of the * Ida's, whence *N«ror- gave way to nor . 1 A coin-
cidental motive may well have been an association of Uonbdav with
noTa/idr 'river-god' (cf. 'Qiccavos <jioTapAs> Y 7) and Uomos 'sea.'

Against the explanation I have offered Corinthian noreioa/Wi
(Cauer, Delectus 2 , No. 81) may be brought forward. This form
is not, however, to be received without suspicion. I compare the
two inscriptions (1. c, Nos. 6, 7) :

Stfiiov p.' avi8tK.e Jlore(i)bdFov\i fdvaKTt]
. . ov fi av(6[^ejKe UoTc(t)8avi fdv[aKTi~\.

Of these the first is a perfect hexameter, and the second is not,
to look at the writing merely, and yet the verses are evidently
the same. There is undoubted metrical intention in the writing
of the first. We may assume that the Homeric form n<xr«oaa>et
was in the mind of the verse-maker, but whence the f? It may
have been due to a false etymology; but yet I note the form
Aafyofios in a list of Trojan names (Cauer 2 , 78), and we must
suppose that this is for Homeric AtfcpoPos, primitive *AaFi°. See-
ing that ftitdpa is in the same inscription, we cannot say that the F

'On the general subject of aphaeresis in proper names I refer to Baunack,
Rhein. Mus. XXXVII 477 sq., and to Bechtel's objections, B. B. XX 243 sq.
It seems to me a defect in the latter's argument that he seems to deny the
possibility that the full and shortened forms continued in contemporaneous
existence, as if, say, 'Lizzie' or 'Bessie' were to altogether crowd out ' Eliza-
beth.' Or are we to deny all exceptions to aphaeresis ? I add a little list of
English instances : Augusta \ Gussie, Amanda || Manda || Manna, Elizabeth ||
Lisbeth || Lizzie | Bessie, Irene | Rena, Henrietta ] Rietta || Etta, Selina | Lena,
Eleanor j Lenore I Nora, Janet [ Nettie, Isabella J Bella [ Belle ; Robert, Al-
bert J Bert ; Anita. Juanita | Nita ; Ezekiel || Zeke, Abijah | Bijah, Elijah |
Lije, Matthias || Thias (in Adam Bede). Many of the possessors of the abbre-
viated names get them in baptism, and never have any right to the long names
at all.

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 3

in UoTthafovi is not Corinthian. Still, the verse-writer may have
known that many Homeric cases of hiatus had (by survival) in his
own dialect an intervening F, and have inserted one here on general
principles. Or he may have etymologized on the name from the
standpoint of Aafav 1 (Cauer 2 , No. 394), a name preserved among
the Thessalians. But the variation may, after all, be a graphic
one, an attempt to represent the pronunciation of the rounded a
resulting from contraction of 5 + o>, or anticipative rounding of
the lips before a, producing a labial spirant as a passing tone.
As a graphic device this can be illustrated from the Ionic
dialects. Thus, for av there are in Ionic dialects two orthog-
raphies of sporadic occurrence — one is ao and the other afv (cf.
Smyth, Greek Dialects, I, §243). In line with this is the repre-
sentation of 5" (or ^>) by afa. 2

But even if the / be original, no great shift needs to be made
to maintain the sense of my comparison, for Agni is not only
idayah putrdh, but is also iddvdn 'possessing ida' (RV. iv 2. 5). 3

What seemed to me to be absolutely cogent for the identifica-
tion of these divinities, taken along with their very considerable
phonetic agreement, was the connection each has in his respective
cosmogony with the creation of the horse. Their creatorship of
the horse I explained as due to a primitive confusion of the stems
ekwe- 'horse' and aqa- 'water'* in the Aryan period, with the
added semasic interpretation of both stems by 'run,' a nomen
agentis to the stem ak 'sharp, swift.' 5

I have since 6 learned that the same comparison of the Aryan
words for horse and water had been previously made by Sibree

1 AdFav: ydap 'burn,' and so perhaps specially liable to association with
Hooeidav. Note also below, p. 19, on Aa/iarqp (for *Aafu [tarti/i).

2 1 note also a as an orthography for av in Ionic (Smyth, 1. c, 244).

3 1 prefer the explanation of "tdaov as gen. plur. because of the combination
with *Ne7ror into one word. This would not so naturally occur with the adj.,
I think. Neither is ndpat without a modifying genitive usual, though it
possibly occurs twice, RV. x 15. 3 b and ii 35. 14 (cf. the author, 1. c). Objec-
tion cannot hold that iddvdn is a -vant stem, for -van and -vant are used side
by side, e. g. in the Agni-epithets svadh&vat- and svadh&van-.

4 Or perhaps *akwa. The Celtic treatment of %w seems not to have differed
from that of q, according to Brugmann (Gr. I, §435), and so Miillenhoff's
objections to this base from the Celtic side are not cogent (cf. M. cited by
Feist, Got. Etym., s. v. ahvd).

5 For the symbol a (in the Aryan period) I refer to my ' Agglutination and
Adaptation,' Am. Jour. Phil. XV 425.

6 From the Bibliography of I. F. Anz. Ill 66.

4 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

in the Academy (Nos. 1018, 1052) ; his examples are taken, all
but exclusively, from the names of rivers, and are therefore liable
to some suspicion, viz. Sk. afvavaii 1 ('water-possessing') and
afvapartyi ('water-winged'); Persian river-names preserved in
Greek sources, e. g. Hyd-aspes, Zari-aspes, Cho-aspes, etc.; for
Greek, MfXav-jirn-toi/ ('little black water'), hyav-hnr) (' great spring ')
and Euhippa (' fair-water,' Pliny). I believe, however, that I can
offer more convincing examples than any of these. I cite first
from a hymn to Vdyu, a wind-god, RV. viii 26. 24 :

tvam hi supsdrastamam nr§ddane§u humdhe
gravdn,am nafvapr§tham manhdnd?

Ludwig translates this by "dich den iiberreichen an trefflicher
nahrung, rufen zu der menschen sitzen wir, | der wie ein stein
von rossriickenbreite an reichlichkeit." This is a forced literal
translation and does not suit the °pr§tha compounds, which are
of two sorts in RV: 1st, like ghrtdpr§tha l 'with ghee on its
back'; 2d, like vltdprstha 'smooth-backed': dfvapr$tha ought to
mean 'with dfva on its back.' Grassmann's translation of the
third pada is, "Dem steine gleich, der reichlich scharfen soma
tragt," a rendering based on the conjectural reading nafiiprqtham
("start des unpassenden nfrfva , etc."). That the soma-press 4 is
meant by gravdnam nd is, I take it, indubitable, and in dfva-
prqbham (for afvd°? b ) I see the Aryan word for water, i. e. 'run,
stream'; I therefore translate this pada: 'like a press-stone
stream-backed right generously,' a translation identical with
Grassmann's when we observe that soma is connoted by
'stream.'

1 This name is in perfect accord for semasy and form with sdrasvati.

2 Cf. the author in Proc. Am. Or. Soc, Dec. 1894, clxxii.

3 Of this type RV. shows si!ma°, mddhu" and (tmd-prstha ('soma , honey" and
blessing-backed'), in addition to the instances in the text.

* I note sdma-prsthasas used as an epithet of the press-stones (ddrayas) at
RV. viii 63. 2.

6 It is not necessary to regard the feminine as the invariable gender of this
stem for water, especially if the word meant primitively 'run,' cf. Lat. imber
and Grk. 6fif3poc ' rain,' both masc. The fem. gender of aqtia is probably due
to its being a woman's work to procure this (cf. the author, Am. Jour. Phil. ,
XV 436, and Mason, Woman's Share in Primitive Culture, p. 25). If we can
accept Sibree's interpretation of 'Ayavi-irtj as 'great water,' we might interpret
the sister spring "Iinrov Kprjvr; in the same sense, i. e. 'water- well.'

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 5

In the afvatth& x -tree (ficus religiosd) we have perhaps another
instance of dfva- 'water.' It is characteristic of the fig genus 'to
abound in milky juice'; it can be inferred that the afvatthd-irze
shares in this characteristic when we note that caoutchou is made
from its juice (Encyc. Brit. 9 , s. v. fig).

Assuming for the present that Indra and Agni as lightning-
wielders are one and the same, RV. x 73. io 2 may be further
cited for df vd- ' water ' :

dfvdd iyayUi ydd vddanty
djaso jdtdm utd many a enam
manydr iyaya harmy^u tasthau
ydtah prajajiid indro asya veda

' When they say : "he came from dfva "
Why so I am minded that he is born of djas
From manyti he came ; in our dwellings he hath taken his place.
Whence Indra was born (Indra alone) knows that.'

It is fair to note that this stanza is of the riddling sort 3 : dgvdd
iyaya is repeated in manydr iyaya, and the intermediary term is
djaso jdtdm. Ludwig defines manydr by 'eifer,' and djas by
' starke.' We may assume that the words were intended to be
synonymous. Keeping to the ordinary definition of the words,
the birth of Indra is ascribed to a horse, might, zeal; but I
propose to render dgvad by 'water' (cloud), while djas may be
here connected with Grk. lypos ' moist,' Lat. umor ' water,' with
-r/-w-inflexion (cf. the author, Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1895, 2. lii),
to which djas shows the parallel -^-stem, like Sk. dhas || dhar
beside dhan- (cf. Noreen, Urgerm. Lautlehre, §53, Anm. 1). Nor

1 Popular etymology doubtless was at work upon the word ; acvatthd ['horse-
stall' (?), cf. Kuhn in K. Z. I 467] is for *acvd-dhd 'water-giving' perhaps, or
in acva-tthd -tthd is a ptc. of \fdhd modelled on -ltd, ptc. of \/da. Kuhn's
explanation of "ttha- as for "stha cannot win belief so long as we have go-sthd
'cow-stall'; there is besides a clear tradition in RV. (i 135. 8) that the
afvait&d-tree was a source of soma (cf. Proc. Am. Or. Soc, Dec. 1894, clxxiii)
— which corresponds precisely with the interpretation given in the text for
dfva-prstha (cf. Kuhn, 1. c, 468).

2 For this and the next stanza see also the author in Proc. Am. Or. Soc, 1895,
ccxxxiv.

3 On the Vedic riddle or brahmodya, I refer to Bloomfield, Jour. Am. Or. Soc.
XV 172 sq.; of value as 6xing the riddling nature is asya veda, cf. Bloomfield,
1. c, 174, footnote.

6 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

is this comparison one of reconstruction entirely, for Yaska, the
Vedic interpreter and collector of glosses, defines the word in this
sense. I take this occasion to remark that Yaska deserves to be
treated with as much respect as a critic as Aristarchus, say, and
his glosses are at least as valuable for the linguist as those of
Hesychius. As to Indian glosses in general, the discovery of
V stigh in the Maitrayanl-Samhita, known before only by the
tradition of the Dhdtupdtha, but worthy of belief already because
of oT€t'xa>, should have taught Occidental scholars greater rever-
ence for Hindu tradition. The relation of djas 'water' to djas
'strength' need not concern us now, save so far as we see in
manyd 'zeal' a repetition of djas 'strength,' by way of double
entendre on the part of the writer. To the translation of dfvdd
by 'water' the preceding stanza seems to point:

cakrdm ydd asydpsv a ni§atiam
utd tad asmdi m&dhv ic cachadydt

prthivyam dtiqitam ydd udhdh

pdyo gd$v ddadha d$adhl§u.

This I translate :

' When his cakrd has gone down into the dpas (clouds, waters),
Why then it will seem honey to me (asmdi) :
What time the udder released o'er the earth
Hath set milk in the cows and in the herbs.' 1

This stanza of thanksgiving for rain obviously applies to Indra as
a rain-bringer, and is appropriately followed by dfvdd ' rain.'

In Homer a quite certain case of wrm; 'water' seems preserved
in A 500 :

or 01 Af$v866a> r/KBe nap imrt&v aiKtidav,

which I translate : ' who came to him from Abydos, from beside

1 My translation differs from both Grassmann's and Ludwig's, and accounts
for the accented ddadha (which Ludwig would explain as due to its construc-
tion with two locatives, as if it were gd»u <adadha> , ddadha dgadhisu). I have
taken asmdi as a demonstrative of the 1st pers., like Lat. hie, Sk. td- (Wh. 2 ,
498). This does not seem to me daring, when we consider the plural stem
asmd- 'we' (which, after all, need not be for *n-s-md, cf. Lat. nos). Further,
(the 2d pers.) tvd- is used enclitically as a 3d pers. demonstrative (Wh. 2 , 503 b).
The truth is that the 'personal' pronouns are but specialized demonstratives
(cf. the author, Am. Jour. Phil. XV 411-14).

2 1 note Homer's epithet of rivers, aKvpooc 'swift-flowing.'

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 7

the swift waters ' The preposition napd with the genitive can
hardly mean anything but 'from beside,' and it seems jejune to
translate ' from beside his swift mares,' for Democoon, the person
in question, is not otherwise described in the Iliad save in this
passage, and so there is no point in mentioning his horses ; but
to take the words in the way I have suggested as a further
description of Abydos on the Hellespont gives them a very
definite appropriateness indeed.

The stem to which these substantives belong, represented in
Sk. dftl, Grk. o>kvs 'swift,' has other forms in which the sense of
' water' may be plainly seen : I cite Sk. dfii used as an epithet of
soma (e. g. RV. i 4. 7) ; and I further explain Grk. 'Qxeavos ' ocean-
stream, river-god ' as the result of a syncretism of two genitives,
*<ok(F or and *wicFnv6s (>*<»ic(iO<u'os),this last with the r/«-inflexion :
in the phrase 6e6s 'Qxeavos 'god of the water' the original genitive
received interpretation as a nominative. Further possible Greek
derivatives of this stem are lK-p.ds 'moisture' and l^ap 'blood of
the gods, serum,' with x due to the lost gen. *U-vos (>*lxvos, cf.
Curtius, Grdzge. 5 , p. 502, on kv>\v). But these last words may
belong in one group with Sk. V sic ' sprinkle,' with a loss of the
initial aspiration in ix&p. On the other hand, tmrt] has such an
abnormal aspiration. Can it be that this was borrowed from a
primitive *U/xas (i^sic) 'moisture' standing alongside of *tmrii
'water'?

But the initial vowel in the Greek representatives of Latin
equus, aqua is in any case abnormal. How is it to be accounted
for? We might refer it to the just-mentioned association with
*Upds. A further way to account for it would be to set beside
Aryan *ekw-os 'swift' a stem *ekw- in gradation with axis. 1
This is possibly retained for us in rftriaKos 'chill, nightmare
(? night-sweat),' which 1 take to be akin to Aquilo 'north-wind,'
i. e. 'rain-storm-wind,' 2 though, after all, the \]° may be Attic-

1 There is still a third vowel-shade in Latin acupedius, I cite from Paul. ex.
Fest. (p. 9, Muller) : dicebatur cui praecipuum erat in currendo acumen pedum.
Note further aci-fiter (acci°) 'swift-wing.' On the relation of the vowels I
refer to my ' Agglutination and Adaptation,' Am. Jour. Phil. XV 425.

2 Cf. horrifer Aquilonis stridor molitur nives (Att. ap. Cic. Tusc. I 68) ; stri-
dens Aquilone procella (Verg. Aen. I 102) ; hiems Aquilonibus asperat undas
(ib. Ill 285). I suggest that Sk. jidanc 'northwards' developed along the
same lines from uddn ' water.' It is any way not easy to see how ud ' out, up'
got this meaning; we should expect a 'left' to balance the 'right' of ddksina-.
I suggest in this connection that in Grk. ijirsipos (Aeol. Uneppocj) ' mainland '

8 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

Ionic. However, beside a base *ekw- there was probably an
Aryan doublet ikw-, a phonetic relation resting on the assumption
that Aryan close e alternated with i (cf. the author, Am. Jour.
Phil. XVI 5 sq., and v. Rozwadowski, B. B. XXI 154). I am
about to offer, I believe, a proof that in Sanskrit also we have
a trace of this vocalization.

I. — I now approach Agni's epithet Matarigvan. This term
had been very early subjected to popular etymology: thus in
RV. iii 29. i\ ci we read: mdtarifvd [sc. ucyate] ydd dmimlta
mdtdri \ Vatasya sdrgo abhavat sdrlmani, which, translated con-
servatively, means something like ' mdtarifvd, when he was fash-
ioned in his mother | became a gust of wind for howling.' 1 But
possibly the popular etymology went thus: 'When mdtarifvd
had roared 2 in his mother,' and took the compound as mdtdri+
fva ('dog'), and thus the epithet would be understood of the
howling storm -winds or roaring thunder attendant upon the birth
of the lightning, Apam Ndpdt, in the clouds. This explanation
is entirely concordant with the sense of pada d. Back of the
popular etymology, however, I would see a *mdtar-ifvd-n- (with
-n- taken up from dtharvan, a closely related attribute of Agni —
see below, p. 22) 'bellowing-cloud,' 3 a description of the thunder
attendant on lightning. If this conception be right, then ifva-n
has the same vocalization as (W17 ' water.'

(that north and east of Corcyra /car' e^oxr/v) we have a development of meaning
on similar lines to that in Aqirilo. This association with the stem akw- ' water '
lightens the comparison with Germ, ufer (cf. Prellwitz, Etym. Wort., s. v.

i/TTetpog),

a Thus I translate sdrlmani; cf. Lat. sermo 'talk,' disertus 'talkative': the
root was ser ] s<°en and, by contamination, s w tr, cf. Sk. svar \ svan ' sound.' On
s«>° by 'anticipative rounding' cf. the author, Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1894, 1. ix>
footnote.

2 This is to connect the form dmimita with \/ma ' roar' ; it must be remarked,
however, that this root in its twelve occurrences and six forms in RV. has no
other middle.

3 1 note RV. i 38. 8* b vdfre'va vidyiln mimdti \ vatsdm nd math sisakti 'the
lightning bellows like a cow, like a bellowing <mother> {matt) follows her
calf.' It is to be noted in passing that it was perhaps from matdr- 'bellowing
<mother>' that the child-word mama \ma passed over into matdr- 'mother,
whence the agential suffix in general for nouns of relationship. The roaring
of thunder in the clouds is frequently expressed as 'bellowing' in the classic
languages: Ppovrr/ fivKJ)<mfievq (Aristoph. Nub. 292), j3poi>-i/s fivKq/ia (Aesch.
Prom. 1062), hxi> napa/xvKarai Ppovriji; (ib. 1082) ; further, Homer describes the
roaring of the river Scamander by the words ^udkoc vvtc ravpoc ($ 237), and
Vergil (Aen. VI 256) uses mugire solum of the rumbling earth.

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 9

II. — I proceed to indicate a trace of the popular etymology
assumed above, viz. in the name of the Greek god ndv. The
background was *kFo.v 'dog'; the source of the F is 'anticipative
rounding' (cf. p. 8, footnote i), and the vowel-color corresponds
with that of Lat. cams (cf. cano 'sing'). Germ, hahn 'cock' is a
precisely similar formation, and it is evident that the primary
meaning was something like ' crier.' ' The animal nature of the
god Pan is well known. 2 He is usually associated with the goat
because of the epithet Atyi-B-o'Srjr, interpreted as 'goat-footed,' but
the meaning may be, after all, 'with flashing foot,' cf. alyit of the
flashing shield of Zeus, but also (Aesch. Cho. 592) of a hurricane. 3
Pan was the god of strange noises, and shared with Apollo (infra,
p. 21) the gift of prophecy : both of these characteristics may be
traced to a primitive connection with the thunder. Pan was god
of the shepherds : what is more likely than for shepherds to
worship a divine dog ? Further, Pan is the son of 'Ep/«ias, whose
equivalence with the Vedic Sarameya, one of the dogs of the
underworld, is, I take it, certain (cf. Kuhn, Z. f. D. A. VI 125 ;
K. Z. II 314; the author, Class. Rev. VII 61). It is surely an
easy step to identify Pan, son of Hermes, with a Vedic locution
like fva Sarameydh. I find a strong proof of the canine nature
of the god Pan in his epithet of AvKeior, which I refer once more
to Xvkos 'wolf: no other etymology will account for the Latin
name of Pan, Lupercus.

1 In Greek also the same word was applied to singing birds, viz. in ak-nvuv,
the bird whose song was tik — that is to say, who trilled /'s (?). In Lat. alcido
we are to see a primitive *al-cen, like os-cen, affected by the -don | -dn suffix of
hirundo to akedo, with the previous vowel long as in lubido and other words of
its type where a rhythmic lengthening arose comparable, I suggest, with that
in Grk. ootyaripos, from an aversion to four successive shorts — what is known as
De Saussure's 'Loi Rythmique'; compare cupidinis, but cupidus, and (?) facil-
limus (i. t.facllimus), but facilis. There seems no doubt of the genuineness
of alcedo (cf. also Curtius, Grundzg. 5 , 132) ; but see Noreen, 1. c, p. 180.

2 In this connection I call attention to the word irav6qp t which I interpret as
the 'roaring animal' nav-dtip. The young panther is specially noted, like the
puppy, for its whine. I note also from Tennyson's Oenone : " in the dark
morn The panther's roar came muffled." It is possible that vdv and 8tjp
were first inflected as two words; then if *irav- 'roarer' were confused with
the neuter xav 'all' in its inflexion, and so became *iravr-, we could account
by this association for the participial inflexion of Mav, the roarer by pre-
eminence, as due to analogy with this *vavT-. At any rate, 6fip is specially
associated with the lion in Homer (cf. L. and Sc, s. v. dijp), while Euripides
(Here. Fur. 465) uses Bypbc . . . asoptoc.

3 See below, p. 25, for the further etymology of alyic

IO AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

Perhaps it was from the compound mdtar-ifvan, misinterpreted
as mdiari-fvan, that the dog 1 got into the circle of the original
nature-deities, though, to be sure, this compound cannot be
demonstrated for the Aryan period. 2

III. — Another of Agni's epithets in the Veda is t&nu-ndpdt,
which has the traditional interpretation of 'self-son,' a recognition
that fire is the seed of fire, and perhaps this etymology is not too
rechercM to allow even to a primitive people. I venture, how-
ever, to suggest in its place a less metaphysical one. Exception
can also be taken to the prevailing explanation from the stand-
point of the accent of the compound : tdnu-ndpdt, but tanu
'body, self.' We may not assume a regular accentual change
from tanundpdt because of mitrav&ruyd. Now, the double
accent implies a dvandva compound. I compare jtspdti 'family
and master' with jaspati 'lord of the family.' I therefore inter-
pret tdnu ndpdt as tdnu and n&pdt — that is to say, ' thunder and
lightning.' In tdnif we have the 'dual' form of dvandvas, 3 lost,
however, in °ndpdt (for °ndpdtdu) because the entire compound
is an epithet of the singular Agni (Apiim Ndpdf).

In general semasic support of this proposition I note that
Jupiter, the lightning-wielder, had among the Romans the epithet
of Tonans 'the thunderer.' The primitive Aryan root was tar ||
tan 'thunder.' The Scandinavian divinity Thor warrants the r-
form, 4 while in O.H.G. Donar we have a syncretic form. In
Latin tonitru we have both the r- and w-forms in reduplication.
It may be urged against this conception of tdnu° that there is no
Sanskrit *tdnu- in simplex : true, but there is no Sanskrit *tanar
either. We might infer, however, a simple w-stem from the stems
TAN«yz'-TN-z/, tanyatil (for *tanyatrii1), tanyil; we have besides
tonitru in Latin a tonus 'thunder,' and this we must suppose is an
original word, and not identical with the loan-word tocos 'tone';
and, in fact, this seems almost implied in the passage that is our
authority for this word: antiqui autem tonitrum dixerunt aut
tonum (Senec. Q. N. II 56). I note further from RV. the word

1 For the Indiranic dogs in mythology, one of which was, in all probability,
identical with Greek Kepfiepog, I refer to Kaegi's Rig-Veda, notes 274, 274 s ;
these dogs of the underworld are also known in Roman, Celtic and Germanic
mythology (cf. e. g. Ladewig on Verg. Aen. VI 257).

2 But the two parts of the compound are to be found in the legend of
Demeter Erinnys (infra, p. 19).

3 On these compounds cf. the author in Am. Jour. Phil. XV 430.

4 On this interchange of r/n in roots, cf. the author, Am. Jour. Phil. XVI 22.

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. II

stdmii 'roaring, thundering,' which may be compared with Grk.
arofta ' mouth ' (with w-infiexion), o-ra/xu-Xor ' chattering.' The root
was s>tam, to which our root sytan 1 was doubtless a by-form.
In view of all the -w-stems given, we can hardly go amiss in the
reconstruction of a Sanskrit *s> tdnu ' thunder,' warranted by the
dualic compound tdnundpdt ' thunder and lightning.'

IV. — A third epithet of Agni is nardfdfisa, which Grassmann
interprets hesitatingly as "der Manner Lob." I note that this
compound, like tdnundpdt, has two accents and a dualized first
term; I would therefore interpret it as 'ndra and fdnsa.' To
this interpretation the Veda itself leads us, for in RV. x 64. 3 we
have the two terms separated, ndra vd fdhsam. This compound,
though used pre-eminently of Agni, is also used of Pu$an. These
divinities agree as dispensers of light ; further, Agni is the seer
(kavi) kot i£oxr)v and Pusan is a divine guide on earth and, like
Hermes, to the place of the dead (^t^o7ro/xjros) ; we may therefore
regard them as variant personifications of the same divinity. 2 It
is further to be noted that fdnsa is the name of a divinity asso-
ciated with Bhdga, and this latter is of frequent association with
Pusan. There is no reason for us to separate fdnsa from V fans,
which Grassmann defines by ' feierlich aussagen'; I therefore
propose for our epithet the rendering ' prophet.'

Let us turn how to the first half of the compound ndra" : Agni
enjoys with Indra, for both are the lightning, the epithets nf-t-ama
'manliest' and nr-t-il 'dancing,' epithets ultimately akin to V nr \\
nr-t- 'dance <the war-dance>' and nr 'warrior' (cf. the author,
Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1894, vii). With these I would connect
ndrd° and define by 'leaping,' a characterization of the lightning,
as fdfisa- 'prophesying' is a characterization of the thunder; the
compound ndra fdnsa is thus resolved into 'lightning and thunder,'
or, more simply, 'leaping and roaring.'

In support of this explanation of ndrd° I bring forward the
Greek god-name Ni/pew. This divinity, the son of Uovtos 'the
deep,' spoke sooth and recked of justice (Hes. Theog. 235 sq.),
qualities that clung to him perhaps from his associate fdnsa ' the
prophetic voice of the thunder.' The part lightning plays with

1 Sk. \/lan [ stan ; I note the additional M-stem ttandthu. In Greek we seem
to have the -r-form of the root in orepoiry and aorpcnrq, the latter with the
weakest grade of the preposition iv as its prefix; cf. Lat. intonare.

2 According to Henry (on AV. vii 9), Pusan is unquestionably a solar god,
the wandering sun.

12 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

primitive people as a manifestation of the divine will is too well
known to require discussion. From the standpoint of the form
the agential ending -eis, so common in proper names, has affected
in Greek the god-name "Ap^s to "Aptvs. The r\ of N^peOy is not a
representative of the Sk. a, but has been lengthened by de Saus-
sure's 'loi rythmique' to suit the exigencies of the hexameter
verse: this lengthening doubtless took place first in the masc.
patronymic *Nijp6i8at along, say, with NijX«8ao (* 652), and in
Hesiod we have, in fact, as a v. 1. (Vatic. 1409 in marg.) the fern,
patronymic NrjpetSes for Homer's N^pjjiSer.

Ni/pev? is palpably but another name for Upareis, the other old
man of the sea, who also speaks sooth (8 384 sq.). The Romans
have a corresponding deity in Portanus (with suffix like that of
Neptunus), interpreted by popular etymology as the 'harbor-
god.' The Aryan base of both words is *pf-to, Grk. n-pSro? 'first.'
In the Rig- Veda, too, the epithet prathama-ja 1 'first-born' shows
traces of association with Agni {Apam ndpat~)?

We ask ourselves now why the term 'first' came to be applied
to the god of lightning. The answer to this question is furnished
by the god Tritd Apiyd (<*npt-ya-), a descendant of Apam
ndpat. With this parentage Trita invites identification with
Tpi7w, son of Poseidon. The story of how Triton aided the
gods in the battle with the giants by blowing on his conch is
comparable with the services rendered by Trita to Indra in battle
(cf. e. g. RV. x 8. 8), and with his service in blowing up the fire
(Agni) like a blacksmith (RV. v 9. 5). This suggests that Trita
is the thunder, and we may therefore see in Tpirw an intensive
form from sj tan with reduplication in reversed order to that of
Lat .tonitru : an example of this variation is furnished by Grk. <ap-
KiW)(Lat. can-cer 'crab.' The Aryan form *tr-ton- was confused

x Cf. further purdhita of Agni, which means 'set-before'; this sense is also
inherent in. Agni : \/aj 'lead' (infra, p. 24). I call attention to RV. i I, I Agnim
ilepurdhitam 'Agni I worship, the leader; etc.

2 The epithet is used twice of Agni (x 5. 7; 61, 19); once of the ipas devts
(x log. 1); once of Brhaspati (i. e. Agni?) as the thunderer and sender of
lightning (vi 73. I) ; once of Vayu (= Aptm sdkha) as the bringer of rain (x
168. 3) ; once in a riddling hymn (i 164. 37), where the application to Agni is
probable; once of Brahman (iii 29. 15); and twice, in one phrase, of the
dragon whom Indra slew for holding back the waters (i 32. 3-4). It is thus
shown that the word never went far beyond its application to Agni as Aphm
ndpat.

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 1 3

in the primitive period with *tri-to- 1 'third.' The result of this
confusion 2 was a series of numeral divinities that crop out here
and there in the derived languages. Thus we have in the Vedas
a Dvitd ' second ' to balance Tritd ' third,' and Agni was, as we
have seen above, prathamaja 'first-born.' In the old Norse
mythology Odhin bears the epithets of Thridhi 'third' and
Tveggi 'second.' In Greek, in addition to 'Xpi-rav 'third,' we
have npnreis 'first,' while in Latin we have Portunus 'first.'
Possibly we have in Latin Dis, a name of Hades, an original
'second'; Dvitd is in the Rig -Veda (v 18. 2) an epithet of Agni,
who, like Hades, is lord of all wealth. 3 It is perhaps more than
a coincidence that "AiS^r ('Ai'Sijr by popular etymology) is called
Tpiraros by Homer (o 188), and is inferentially n-pwroy in Hesiod
(Theog. 455). "Atbrjs (without the 'pietistic' 4 rough breathing)
may be etymologically connected with Lat. aedes 'sacred fire'
(: V indh || ind) and with Sk. idd (cf. supra, p. 1).

From TpiTav we are able to fix the character of Pallas Athene,
who has the epithets Tp7-ro-y«Veia 5 and ' A-rpv-rap-r]. On the latter
epithet the etymological talent of the Greeks has been at work,
either popularly or in the person of the Homeric diaskeuasts. I
would see in this epithet a composition of the preposition *q (the
weakest form of <-V, cf. Sk. a) and V tan as in Latin intonare ' to
thunder'; the change from x (cf. Tpnrav) to v (i. e. it) is not

1 The Aryan r-vowel was doubtless about what we have in the first syllable
of our English ' pretty.' The Sk. roots in -r make passive in -ri-, e. g. mriydte :
\'mr, which is, I take it, orthographic for *mryate. The l of TpTruv is like I

in the Sk. intensive stem var-l-vrt-, while I in Lat. ton-i-tru is like the i in Sk.
tar-i-tr-.

2 Macdonnell takes the numeral literally in his Mythological Studies (J. R.
A. S., July, 1893, 419 sq.), so far as I am able to infer from the citation in I. F.
Anz. Ill, p. 224 : " We thus find that the cumulative evidence of the Rig-Veda,
of comparative mythology, and of the Avesta combine to prove that Trita in his
original nature was the third or lightning form of fire. This was his character
in the Indo-Iranian period . . . possibility of Trita having been the name of
lightning even in the Indo-European period . . . Odhin bears in the old
Norse mythology the epithet Thridhi, the third — as well as Tveggi, the second."

8 We should expect, of course, bit- in Latin (<dvit-), but there is doubtless
association with the stem divit- \ dlt- ' rich.' Note, however, the preposition
di- 'apart' (Lindsay, Lat. Lang., p. 582).

4 Cf. infra, p. 24.

6 One of the myths makes Athena the daughter of Poseidon and Tritonis,
and from this connection with Poseidon her relation to the fire-divinity is
rendered more probable.

14 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

difficult phonetically, and took its start perhaps from a-rpvros
'indefatigable.' The brandished spear of UaXkas (cf. wdXXo 'bran-
dish' and Arist. Av. 1714 naKXav nepawov 'brandishing a thunder-
bolt') was a figure to describe her as the lightning-wielder.
Latin Minerva has perhaps a similar semasy and may be com-
pared with minari ' to threaten.' In 'h6apa I see a Greek epithet
of Pallas meaning 'immortal' and related to dSavaros. 1

I have explained (in Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1894, 1. vii) Indra
as a cognate of Ares and Mars 2 (for *Nars), all deriving from
V ' nr-t- 'leap.' Indra is therefore to be connected with ndra°.
Greek and Roman mythology have given to Zeus and Jupiter the
control of the lightning, and so Ares and Mars seem rather pale
in this respect as compared with Indra ; but, besides general
considerations (cf. Buchholz, Horn. Realien, III 150), the epithets
SPpifios 'mighty' (opppos 'rain,' cf. Grassmann, K. Z. XII ai) s and
'EvvdUos? 'the rainer' (Jv + va> 'rain on' ?) testify perhaps to the
original state of things.

One might expect on a-priori grounds a connection between
Indra and Agni (Apam Ndpaf). I note as a general consider-
ation that in the hymns to the so-called dual-divinities, those to
Indragnl are commonest, 4 and I call especial attention to the fact
that Indra and Agni are in one place (RV. i 109. 4) called
Acvins 5 : these last I shall presently discuss.

But I return to the compound Ndrd-fdnsa to seek for etymo-
logical kin of the last member, turning first to the Italic field.
One of the earliest Roman traditions was that of the Rape of
the Sabines : this event took place at a feast to Neptunus Equester

'For the etymology of a8avarof cf. the author, Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1894,
I. ix, footnote 2.

2 Cf. further the author, 1. c, 1895, lxviii.

3 1 cannot agree with the comparison of Sk. agrimds (Prellwitz, s. v. dfipifwe)
' voranstehend ' : this cannot be separated from \/aj ' drive,' ayu. I note that
the paled-out meaning of 'powerful' in 6/}pifwc beside op./3po{ 'rain' is paral-
leled in djas 'power' and 'rain' (supra, p. 5) and in Sk. ugrd- 'powerful'
beside iypdf ' moist.'

* The statistics are: Indra and Agni, n; Indra and Varuna, 7; Indra and
Soma, 3 ; Indra and Pusan, 1 ; Indra and Visnu, 1 ; Soma and Rudra, 1 ; Soma
and Pusan, 1 ; and Agni and the Maruts, 1. It is noteworthy that in all the
hymns but three, Indra is the first member of the compound, and this would
imply that the term had an original adjective value (cf. the author on Mitra
and Varuna, Am. Jour. Phil. XV 430, footnote 2).

5 The horsemen ; cf. on Agni's relation to the horse, p. 3, and on Indra's
P- 5-

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 1 5

called the Consualia (Liv. I 9): we get from other sources the
name Consus for the god of this festival. There can be no objec-
tion, from the phonetic point of view, to equating Consus directly
with the Vedic fdnsas and with the latter half of JVdrd-fdnsas,
and I again note that Apam napat = Nept-««z« is a perfect
semasic equation, 1 and a perfect phonetic one so far as Ndpat is
concerned.

But we have this epithet in Greek also, in the name of one of
the Dioskouroi, K<ior<»p (<*K«o-rop-). It needs no argumentation
to prove a legendary and functional similarity between the Dios-
kouroi and the Afvins (cf. e. g. Kaegi's Rig-Veda, n. 171, and
the literature there cited) ; it only remains to get at the verbal
connection: Kdorap is an agential noun to \/kans 'proclaim,' used
of the prophetic voice of the thunder. The character of the
Dioskouroi as horsemen is as well established as that of the
Afvins, and if the relation of *ekwe- 'horse' to *aqa- 'water' be
established, we are prepared to see in these horsemen 'cloudmen,
storm-clouds,' the attendants of Apam Ndpat, the lightning. In
Kda-Tap, therefore, the tamer of horses (clouds), we see the thunder,
and in noXvSsiKtjs, who was famed as a boxer, the lightning-stroke.
As to the separate names of the Afvins, the Veda does not inform
us, 2 and no reliance can be placed in Caunaka's statement (Brhad-
devata, vi 33) that they were called Nasatyas and Dasras, for he
merely adapts two epithets of the Acvin-pair from Rig-Veda.
Similarly the Greek n \v8eiia)s very nearly reflects an epithet of
the Afvins, viz. puru-ddhsas-, which has been compared with
7ro\v8rjvr)s ' jtoXu/SouXos. The earliest authority for TroXu&jvijr is the
Hesychian gloss noXvSfjvea ' nokifiovkov. We may, however, com-
pare TioXvfcvKrjs with Puruddnsas-, after the following fashion:
°dansas- may be for *dangas-, with an assimilation of spirants
which is almost the rule in Sanskrit (cf. Wackernagel, Altind.
Gram., §197). Now, if we operate with *dafif-as- this would
correspond to *8eyx-es- in Greek. Can y»e (i. e. mk) give vk ?
J. Schmidt (Vocalismus, 1 181) distinctly maintains that the group
vowel + nasal + cons, results in a v diphthong, say ai»k gives auk
(reported by Bezzenberger, B. B. IV 350). In favor of this
phonetic treatment is aux>> ' throat,' Aeolic Sufav, which belongs
with &yxa 'choke,' cf. O.Pruss. w-insus 'throat,' Goth, hals-agga.

'Objection will not hold on account of the order, for at RV. ii 35. 11 we
have ndflur apfim.

2 Unless indeed they are Indra and Agni ; cf. above, p. 14, and footnote 5.

l6 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

Another example is £av66s 'tawny,' which alternates with £ov86s
' tawny.' Bezzenberger (1. c, 352) objects that in aixyv we have
the 'velar' and in O.Pruss. w-insus the 'palatal,' but the inter-
change of 'velars' and 'palatals' is simply undeniable (cf. Noreen,
Urgerm. Lautlehre, §55, and Bartholomae, Grundriss d. iran.
Philologie, I, §54). As to £av86s \\ £ov86s y Bezzenberger makes a
point on ou instead of av. To me the confusion of ou and au in
the primitive Greek period seems the easiest of all things to
grant. I note oJr 'ear' : Lat. aur-is, ol-a>v6s 'bird' (<Vi-(oto?) :
Lat. av-is. Here there has been, either in Greek or in Latin, a
confusion of au with ou. Such a confusion I suppose to have
taken place in %ov86s for *£av86s. It seems to me that the testi-
mony of aixhv and £ov86s cannot be fairly rejected, and so *-BeyK-
may have given -6W-, in some Greek dialect at least. Granting
this, we can ascribe °SevK-er- and Sk. °dans-as- to a base *denk-es.

One word needs to be said concerning Sk. *danf-as- : it will
belong with the verb-stem dagasy- 'hulfreich sein.' Thus, at
RV. viii 5. 23 it is said of the Acvins : yuvdm kdryvdya . . . fdfvad
iltir dagasyathali 'ye two always bestow help on Kanva';
while puruddnsas- is defined by Bohtlingk 'reich an wunderbaren
wirkungen.'

The explanation of Kaorap as the prophetic voice of the thunder
leads us to interpret KaoraXLa as the 'spring of the prophetic
muses.' Here we can compare Lat. Casmena || cdmena 'muse'
(<*c?smena?).

Possibly we have the entire compound Ndrdf&fisa in Greek,
but with its members in reversed order, in the name of Kaav&v&pr],
the prophetic daughter of Upiapos \_<.*priymmos = Lat. primus
'first' (?), cf. supra on Upwrtvs]. We can but regard this as
another form of Kavnavtipa, the name of one of the wives of Priam.
In Kao-<r° I see a development out of *Kn<ny-> while °ap8pr) || "aveipa
is a feminine doublet to aviip (supra, p. ). To justify this notion
from the semasic point of view, it is essential to note that Cassandra
was a twin with Helenus. Just so the Dioskouroi were of one
birth with Helena. Are these names also to be explained as
epithets, originally at least, of the fire-divinity ?

V. 'EXtVij, "EXeror. — By way of reinforcement to the suggestion
just made, I note that e'XeVij is cited by Hesychius in the sense of
' torch,' a sense that may be reconciled with the literary value of
' basket ' by considering that both are made of splinters of wood.
If we have here an original light-divinity, then there must be

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 1 7

connection with Lat. sol 'sun' and O.H.G. sun-na (with inter-
change of r 2 (/) and n; cf. Noreen, Urgerm. Lautlehre, §53, 1,
and the author, Am. Jour. Phil. XV 432). 1 In Sanskrit the form
is svdr, where the v is, I take it, parasitic (supra, p. 9), and the
primitive stem may be written Sar \\ s w an and, by contamination,
s"ar. With the stem in this condition, the relation of SeX^ij
'moon' becomes clear: the relation of 'EXe«j to StXijw; is just that
of Is to avs. We have in Sk. svdrai},a- 'shining' the precise
stem.

But 'EXfVij as sister to the Dioskouroi suggests a more definite
mythological connection. Spite of differences in the suffix, 2 she
seems identical in many important mythic points with Saran-yu,
mother of the Acvins. This mysterious divinity is known to us
by a pair of isolated stanzas in RV. (x 17. 1-2), which seems to
be of the nature of a riddle (brahmodya, cf. Bloomfield, Jour.
Am. Or. Soc. XV 172 sq.). These run [in Bloomfield's transla-
tion (1. c, 173)]: "Tvastar is instituting a marriage-pageant for
his daughter: at this news <all the people of> this earth come
together. Yama's mother, while being married, the wife of
mighty Vivas vant, disappeared. They hid away the immortal
woman from the mortals ; making a sdvarnd (a like one, double
entendre ; one like Saranyu in appearance, and like Vivasvant in
character, or caste), they gave her to Vivasvant. Moreover, when
that had taken place, she bore (? carried) the two Acvins ; she
abandoned, you know, two pairs — Saranyu." As additional
detail to this (which Lanman, Notes to -Reader, p. 381, pro-
nounces "a braw story, but unco short") Yaska tells us (Lan-
man's translation, I.e.) : "Tvastar's daughter, Saranyu, bore twins
(Yama and Yaml) to Vivasvant. She foisted upon him another
female of the same appearance (sdvartidm), and, taking on the
form of a mare, fled forth. Vivasvant took on the form of a
horse, followed her, and coupled with her. From that were born
the two Acvins or 'Horse-men.'" Of the savarojd was born
Manu. Now, in the myth of Helen almost every single one of
these incidents has a correspondence. 1st, Tyndareus made a
marriage for his daughter and to this all the princes of Greece

1 For the relation of the two significations of swar || swan ' shine ' and ' sound,'
cf. Bloomfield, I. F. IV 76, footnote, and the author, Am. Jour. Phil. XVI 25.

2 This suffix difference is precisely comparable with mani \ manytl ' wrath,'
prtana \prtanyii 'enemy,' turdna || turanyti 'hastening,' etc. See also the next
footnote.

1 8 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

came; 2d, both the women eloped; 3d, in one of the Helen
stories, not the true Helen, but 'one just like her,' fulfilled the
elopement with Paris, while the true Helen was detained in
Egypt by none other than King Proteus! 4th, Helen was not
captured till her husband, among others, got into Troy by means
of a wooden horse which he had been directed to make by
Helenus — a detail for which we can now gain a sensible explana-
tion for the first time ; 5th, both women are associated with the
Dioskouroi =; Acvins, Helen as twin-sister (quartuplets, in two
pairs) and Saranyu as mother ; 6th, there is a further story that
Paris deceived Helen by taking the precise form of Menelaus. I
submit that these correspondences are enough to establish the
identity of the two tales.

There are also more etymological correspondences than that
between Sarafy-ya and 'EXeVTj. In Tva§\ar I see an agential noun
to \j s>tar || fan (>t w ar), a primitive *(s~>)twn-s-tar 'thunderer,'
while back of TwSdpeos I posit a *tyn-tr-, whence *tund-r-. In
'Ep^-idi/ij, the name of Helen's daughter, we have perhaps, in its
last part, Yami (-101/17 <*|ya#y a), an d tne nrst part of M«/e'-Xaos is
possibly akin to Manu ; but on these points I do not insist. For
the possible equivalence of UokvSevKris and purudahsas see above,

P- J 5-

As to the suffix, 'e\«»ij would correspond to a Sk. *Sarand,
which might have a by-form *Sararfl. In the sole Vedic form
Sara7j,yu-s we may have *Sarani affected by vadhii-s 1 'bride'
(note that vahatiim 'wedding' occurs in the passage) ; but on the
relation of the -a and -_yz/-sufnxes see last page, footnote 2.

The only obstacle to this comparison from the mythological stand-
point lies in the Greek goddesses, the Erinyes. Kuhn (K. Z. 1 439)
compared ''Epivvs with Sararyyii,. The phonetic objections to his
comparison are not, in my opinion, insuperable, viz. the loss of
the rough breathing, and the abnormal vocal color of t. For the

1 In RV. -» is a not infrequent suffix for the names of goddesses and women.
I note Krkadaffl 'a demon,' Gungil 'a goddess' (named along with Sdrasvati,
and probably a variant form of Gdngd), agrfl ' maiden,' $va$rti- ' mother-in-law.'
Other -6-stems show a connection with words for 'water': cam-6 'drinking-
vessel,' kadr-ii 'brown soma-vessel,' mehatn-tl 'river,' nabhan-il 'spring,' the
two first being probably affected by Juhil 'ladle' and the two last by Gungfo,
The Greek divinities in -» (infra in the text) are sea-divinities, and Saranytl
is, by the terms of the supposition, a relative of Ap&m ndpat; furthermore,
Saranytl as ' mare ' would possibly be affected by aftl ' swift, horse.'

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 1 9

Erinyes in their character as avenging deities there is no mythical
connection worth mentioning. Kuhn, however, reports from
Pausanias (VIII 25) a story of Demeter Erinnys, to whom there
was a temple at Thelpusa in Arcadia: 'While in search of her
daughter Poseidon was following her to enjoy her, and she turned
herself into a mare ; Poseidon thereupon became a horse and
coupled with her ; at first she was angry, but afterwards cooled
off by bathing in a river, and hence she received the name
Erinys, because ipivitiv means among the Arcadians "to be
angry." Thereupon she bore a daughter and the horse Areion,
whence Poseidon received his epithet of Hippios.' Later (ch.
42) Pausanias tells us that, according to another tradition, 'she
had borne no horse, but a daughter known as Despoina ; in her
anger at Poseidon and grief for the loss of Persephone she put on
mourning and concealed herself for a long time in a hole ; drouth
and famine resulted, and Zeus finally had to send and beseech
Demeter to return among the gods ; the hole where the goddess
hid was consecrated, and a statue of her with a horse's head set
up there.'

Now, as to the epithet 'Eptpis, we have no right to reject the
derivation of Pausanias; and I would therefore stick by the
connection with epis 'strife,' for this suits the character of the
Erinyes perfectly. The ending -vvs is capable of having orig-
inated on Greek soil. I note 'Ej-u-<o 'goddess of war' and 'Evv-
d\ios 'god of war': 'Epiwi-s is perhaps in special relation with this
pair, and meant 'begetter of strife' (<cpiv + v-a, Sk. nj su- 'bring
forth'); but, in any case, there is ample warrant in Greek, as in
the Veda (supra, p. 18, footnote), for god-names in -v-s, e. g.
6 $6pKvs and f/ Tr/dis.

VI. Demeter. — But, even though we explain away the epithet
'Epiwvs of Demeter, there still remain points of similarity between
the myth cited and the Saranyu-story. To the explanation of
this resemblance I now address myself. If we regard this epithet
'Epivvis as sufficiently accounted for by its relation to ipivlw ' be
angry,' we can find in the name of Aip/i^p a special reason for the
legend. I infer from the short name Ai/o> that °p.r)Tr)p is but an
epithet, and from Aa/iarr/p we can perhaps infer to *Aafi> (cf.
Thess. Adfav, Cauer, Delectus 2 , No. 394) : V ddv 'burn.' Thus
we can account for the Aeolic form AapAnjp (with a short form
A<os, according to the MS reading of Hymn. Horn. V 122) by
assuming a contraction from *AaFa>-, as we have the right to do

20 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

in Aeolic where f followed a long vowel. 1 If we conceive this
goddess as a fire-divinity 2 also, then in < V aT W we can see a part
of the epithet Matar-igvan (supra, p. 8), while the story that
she turned to a mare may have been suggested by the last part
of the compound ° -if van (nom. "ifvd = Grk. in-?nj 'mare') before
its loss in Greek. Her pursuer was Poseidon (Apapi Ndpaf),
another form of the fire-divinity. The conception of Demeter
shows traces of a connection with fire in her attribute of a torch,
for she was said to have lighted torches to go in search of her
lost daughter Persephone. Some special correspondences may
be made out between the Agni myths and the Demeter myths.
The goddess in her wrath withdrew from earth, and famine came
upon it, until Zeus finally sent Hermes to propitiate her. So
likewise Agni withdrew from the gods and hid, and had to be
won over to return by Varuna, for, as the sacrificer, his absence
was causing distress to the gods (cf. RV. x 51). Demeter's
function as goddess of civilization reminds, further, of the legend
of Agni Vaicvanara (£at. Brah. i 4, 1, 10-18).

Popular etymology had, however, been at work on the name,
and Arj-firjTrip was felt as rij p-fop : the latter divinity was a special
antithesis for Zevs iraiyp, Mother- Earth)(Father-Sky. It is natural
to believe that Ai)/x>)T7jp is thoroughly mixed in her attributes with
ri) p.f)Trip. Of course, when °pdTT)p 'roaring' was understood as
'mother' (cf. supra, p. 8), the divinity became feminine.

I state now in brief outline the processes involved in the origin
of the myth of Demeter Erinnys and Poseidon. The lightning-
god, Poseidon (Apftm ndpaf), had, let us suppose, a primitive
Greek epithet *mdtar-ik w d 'roaring cloud,' or 'possessing a roar-
ing cloud.' This epithet was also attached to *ddv-o 'fire (=

l The contraction of au to a in Aeolic is not proved by Hoffmann, Dial. II
296, 293. The fem. gen. plur. in -dv for -aouv (?) is suspicious, for the con-
sciousness of gender may have been felt. TlooeiSav falls by my explanation of
-idauv as gen. plur. to *ida under the same conditions (cf. supra, p. 3). More-
over, as XloosiSav and Uav are names of the same divinity perhaps, it may well
be that they have been assimilated in their final syllables. It is not absolutely
necessary, however, to regard the variant syllable Aa- 1[ Aa-p&Ttjp as a contrac-
tion of *AaFa-jiaTijp ; it may be simply the result of some capricious choice of
vowels in shortening the dissyllable to a monosyllable. So in Attic Atinyrrip
we have no contraction, but simply a choice of the vowel 5 out of Aafa-.
Here we must reckon with popular etymology : the Ay- in Attic-Ionic At/fir/rj/p
may be charged to Tij ' earth ' ; while Aw- of Aufiari/p may be due to dafta ' house.'

2 1 note especially Arji-avupa, the wife of Hercules, who ' burnt her husband'
alive, and who had the short name Ayi> (Smyth, Grk. Dialects, I, p. 630).

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 21

lightning),' whence, finally, by fresh composition and decompo-
sition, Aafiarrjp Imrr) ; thence came a story describing the bawler
(°ndT>]p) as furious ('Epiwis 1 ).

VII. Apollo. — Schroeder has, I take it, proved the substantial
correspondence of Apollo and Agni in point of original functions
(K. Z. XXIX 193 sq.). I cannot believe, however, in the kinship
of the name ' A-noWav with Sk. saparyenya, a hapaxlegomenon
vocative epithet of Agni in RV., for the suffixes are too dissimilar
and the meaning of the epithet, 'one to be honored,' is rather too
pale. A suspicious circumstance to me is the loss of the rough
breathing (infra, p. 24). Apollo and Poseidon are both individ-
ualizations of epithets of Agni. Associations of Apollo and
Poseidon in Greek mythology bring light upon this point : they
were, for example, co-founders of Troy, and Poseidon preceded
Apollo in the possession of the oracle at Delphi (cf. also above,
p. 11, for the prophetic character of Poseidon's doubles, XipcuTeis
and Ni/ptis). It is right to mention here that the first possessor of
this oracle was Tata (rff) prjTrjp, confused perhaps with Aapdrrip as
explained above.

I find in RV. two epithets of Agni that may lie at the base of
the name 'AnoXXav. The first of these is aptiir, defined by Grass-
mann as 'gesch'aftig,emsig,'and translated by Ludwigas 'Wasser
erbeutend.' The latter is, in my opinion, the more exact render-
ing. I take the epithet to have belonged originally to the light-
ning as rain-bringer, and to this the statistics of usage conform.
The term is used in RV. once of Agni, twice of Indra (= thrice
of the lightning) ; once of Indu (i. e. Soma) and thrice of Soma
(=fozir times of the heavenly Soma, i. e. rain) ; once of the
Vicve Devas along with a petition translated by Ludwig "sollen
eilig zum Safte kommen " ; once of the eagles of the Acvins (cf.
dfvd 'water,' supra, p. 3). There is further one occurrence of
the abstract aptiirya, used of Agni and Indra. Now, if we
operate with aptiirya as an adjective stem like apttir, and take
North Thessalian "An-Xow-i into account, along with 'AirSXXav, we
can account for *AttoXXo- as *AiroXyo (for AwToXy <*Aptlyo-), with

1 Kuhn (1. c, p. 467) connects with this epithet ip%ve6( 'the wild fig-tree,'
and brings into the comparison the story of how Agni hid himself once in
a fig-tree (the afvatlkd), after having turned himself into a horse. But
Matarifvan is the name of the Vedic Prometheus who brought the hidden
Agni out of the kindling sticks by rubbing, and one of these sticks was of
a^vatthd wood, which amply accounts for the Hindu legend.

22 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

loss of t because of AuXou- (for *AnrX<»yo-). The addition of -n
to the stem would be an affection from UoaeMav. If we see in
°tur of apttlr Aryan °trr„ then we can account for the graded
forms 'hviXkav, etc., by noting how gradation acted in the agential
suffix °trr v Cyprian 'A7r«i'Xo>i/-i, if genuine, makes for the assump-
tion of the extension of the stem by -yo. Another point in favor
of this explanation is that it possibly accounts for the varying
quantity of the initial syllable ('ar°, i. e. <ott°). I note also that
Athena has the epithet 'OnriXeViy, which is perhaps to be compared
with aptiir.

But there is another Vedic personage with whom 'AttoXXoji/ is
possibly to be identified, viz. Atharvan, a mythic person 'who
came from heaven, fetched fire to the earth, honored the gods
and slew evil things' (cf. Grassmann, s. v.). In Avestan we have
two forms of this name, dprava with a case-form a\aurune. Like
the first of these forms is "Kt?\ow (_<*ar\ofov; for T X>n-X cf. the
author, Am. Jour. Phil. XIII 463 sq.; Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, for
1892, xxiii sq., 1894, 1. ix), while 'AwoXXcok is for *cmo\Fov, with n for
t, from the form "AjrXovi', and so corresponds with Sk. atharvan.
We nowhere have, however, any forms showing \F or X with com-
pensative lengthening, and the Cyprian form ' AirtiXav-i seems to
demand a stem *a7reXjyo-. But this form is of doubtful genuine-
ness, for in inscriptions from the same locality of an earlier date
the form 'AwoXXcaw is found (cf. Joh. Schmidt, K. Z. XXXII 328),
and, indeed, on an earlier portion of the same inscription.
Apollo's character as a ' terrible god of death, sending virulent
pestilences and dealing out destruction to men and animals by
means of his unerring arrows,' allows us to reasonably assume
that there was popular association with an-oXXv/H. Touching the
variation of t and in this stem, I believe Joh. Schmidt has given
the right explanation when he attributes it to the infection of a
vocative *"Aire\\ov to 'An-oXXoy, an influence due to the of the
final syllable (K. Z., 1. c.) This vocative form in the primitive
Greek period was associated with dnoWv/u, and so, even if we
assume a primitive nom. *ATreKfa»>, it is fair to suppose that under
the influence of "AnoWov (which had been affected by anoXKv/jn) it
reached the stage 'A7r<-'XX<»K. We may assume, however, that Xf
fell out because of the form 'AirXow, as explained above. On the
warrant of the Avestan forms taken in comparison with Sk.

1 For a discussion of Sk. \/tr and the Aryan r % , I refer to my articles in Am.
Jour. Phil. XIII 463 sq., and Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1892, xxiv, and 1894, 2, ix.

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 2$

Atharvan, we have a right to believe that the word was liable to
gradation (cf. Prellwitz, B. B. IX 330).

On the legendary side there is everything to say in favor of
identifying the fire-god Apollo with Atharvan, a manifestation of
the Vedic Agni. The description of Atharvan cited from Grass-
mann might in fact be taken as a brief ' argument ' for the Homeric
hymn to Apollo.

One of the puzzling epithets of Apollo is 'A^rap (I 404),
explained as the 'archer' (d#tij/u) or, by the scholiast, as the
'prophet' (from the so-called d copulaiivum + faiii). Why can
we not explain it as the 'kindler' and connect with dipt) 1 'a
kindling,' d<j>da 'polish' (='make bright'), airre> 'kindle' (?), all
of which belong to Aryan d~>a§h 'burn' (for the abnormal rough
breathing cf. the next number) ?

VIII. "A<pcuoTor. — The legends of this divinity are also in close
touch with the Vedic legends of Agni. Thus, according to one
story, he was so lame and ugly that his mother flung him into the
sea, where he was tended by the Oceanids, a legend which is
quite plainly only a variant of the tale of Agni hiding in the
waters. At the base of all the legends lies this fundamental
notion that fire first came down from heaven in the form of
lightning. There is possible etymological relation also between
*A<paKJTor and Agni. The root would be d>a$k-* 'burn,' which,
before nasals (cf. Noreen, Urgerm. Lautlehre, §51, 2 s ), had a

1 'A.<$ also means 'grasp' and ebrra 'fasten': the semasy is similar to that
shown by eXevy above (p. 16) : kindlings and fastenings were equally made of
twigs. We have the same semasy in Lat. fa-c-s ' torch ' and fa-sc-is ' switch >
('withe'). I refer on the -«/-.r«-suffix to my 'Agglutination,' etc., Am. Jour.
Phil. XV 435.

2 The root-vowel is a; cf. Germ, abend 'gloaming' (the author, Mod. Lang.
Notes, IX, col. 269), Grk. a/xap 'day' (*a a -«- with »-inflexion), Lat. amane
'dawn' (<<j 8 »-, cf. the author, Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1894, 2. Hi). In Lith.
d'egti ' to burn ' beside ddgas ' harvest ' we seem to have the e/o-gmde, but in
Lith. the e/o and a/a-grades became e/a and a/o, and along the common term
a there was doubtless passage from the less common to the more common
series (cf. the author on such transitions, Am. Jour. Phil. XIII 478). In Lith.
ugnis 'fire' (for *agni-) there has been confusion with usnls 'Brennessel' (cf.
the author, Mod. Lang. Notes, XI 229). In Lat. ignis for *emnis (cf. the
author, Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1894, 2. Hi), there was either association with
lignum ' fire-wood' (ib., 1. c, Hii) or, more probably, with ictus (infra, p. 25).

8 But, as we shall presently see, Agni can be explained as belonging to yaj
' drive,' and thus be, along with ahan ' day,' the source of the inconstant d of
yd>agA (cf. the author, Mod. Lang. Notes, IX, col. 267, and Hopkins, Proc.
Am. Phil. Assoc, 1892, p. clxxvi).

24 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

by-form dha% with anticipative aspiration and a contaminated form
*dha§h} "A<l>aicrTos is congeneric with <rara>. The abnormal rough
breathing had its origin in the name of the god. Greek was
endowed with stems &y- (: Sk. sjyaj ''sacrifice') 'sacred' and dy-
(Sk. agas 'sin') 'accursed,' meeting in a common ground 'sacer.'
The former stem was of frequent application to the names of
divinities, and a pietistic feeling carried the rough breathing (an
awed whisper perhaps) over to names of divinities with vowel-
initial (cf. the author, Am. Jour. Phil. XVI 7). This was subse-
quent to the loss of the Greek feeling against aspirates in two
successive syllables ; thus rj-cpai-vros, but e-x<». The name rj^aurros
is compound: rjcfr + alaros, the latter belonging with aX6a> 'burn,'
Lat. aedes 'sacred hearth,' and, before popular etymology had
set in (supra, p. 13), with "Ai&js.

But the myth of "Atjuwrros can be shown to have very definite
connection with a mythological personage of the Vedas, viz. Ajd
ikapdd, and from the name of the latter we are able to gain a
closer view of the name of Agni. The most marked character-
istic of "Atpaiaros is his lameness, and Ajd ikapad'vo the 'limping
driver.' This personage is mentioned six times in the Rig-Veda,
in every instance in a hymn to the Vifve Devas 'All Gods.'
That he had to do with storms is every way clear, for he is
always mentioned in a group of storm-gods. At ii 31. 6 Trita
'Thunder' (cf. supra, p. 12) and Apam Napat 'Son of the
Waters' (cf. supra, p. 1) are grouped with him, the latter also
in vii 35. 13, while at x 65. 13 and x 66. 11 tanyattis 'thunder'
and the Apas 'Waters' are mentioned; Samudrah 'Ocean' (=
Apas) is associated in vi 50. 14 and vii 35. 13. At x 64. 4 Kavis
Tuviravan 'Seer loud-raging' (= £ahsa, supra, p. n) is men-
tioned. The identification of these two limping lightning-
divinities seems to me unavoidable.

I turn to consider Ajd as a lightning-god. In the Rig- Veda
Indra drives at (t/a + aj) Vrtra, the cloud-demon (v 37. 4);
drives together (sam + t/ aj) his enemies (vi 25. 9 and vii 32. 7).
Moreover, at iii 45. 2 Indra is endowed with the epithets Vrtra-
khadd valaihrujdh purtm darmd apam ajdh ' Vrtra-slayer, Vala-
breaker, cloud-splitter, water-driver.' Now, if it be a fair assump-

1 This is how I explain to myself the roots with double aspirates, and it
justifies the phonetics of %vy-o.Tr)p in Greek, without recourse to Bartholomae's
'law'(K. Z. XXVII 206). For our present root Ad<pvr/ 'Morning-glow' (cf.
Max Miiller, Oxford Essays, 1856, p. 57) seems to demand a base da % h-, not
dhdah'.

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 2$

tion that the storm-god Ajd ikapad is a form of lightning, then
Ajd may be an etymological congener of Agni. The name of
Agni has before now been associated with V a j 'drive,' and Grass-
mann defines by "das Feuer, als das bewegliche aufgefasst."
Instead I would make Agni the lightning, a driver of the waters,
like Indra, Apam Ajdh.

But as Agni became a common word for fire it was doubtless
associated with *dakan || *akan (Eng. dawn : Ger. abend, cf. the
author, Mod. Lang. Notes, IX, col. 269), with inconstant d> (cf.
supra, p. 23, footnote 3). Thus there grew up a root *dh>agh,
illustrated in Greek by &n-a> 'kindle' (supra, p. 23) and by rd$os
'funeral (cremation), astonishment (burning-of-the-heart).' 1

The corresponding Greek group shows abnormal phonetics. I
compare with Sk. ajd-s 'goat' a?| (gen. aly-6s), with Ajd-s 'storm-
god' aly-is 'Zeus's flashing shield (i. e. lightning), hurricane' (cf.
iiratyifa, Horn., used of a stormy wind), and with agni-s 'fire'
017X17 'radiance.' All three Sanskrit words I refer to \j aj 'drive.'
The objection will hold that agni-s has a 'velar' (cf. O.Blg. ognis
'fire'), but we have already seen (supra, p. 16) how 'velar' and
' palatal ' interchange.

It is very curious that the Greek words I have cited all show
the same phonetic abnormality. The source of this I would trace
to aly-is, aiy\t] where there is alliteration (fore-rhyme) with aWo
'burn,' I suggest. Inasmuch as Armen. aic 'goat' corresponds
in its vocalization with <u£, we shall probably have to refer the
rise of the abnormality in these words to the primitive period.
Greek retains, however, traces of the normal forms, viz. in dy-Xaos
'shining' (beside myXrj), where the stem is in the same stage as in
ag-nis 'fire.'

Very curious, too, is the fact that the Vedic storm-god Ajd
JSkapdd means, by double entendre, 'goat one-footed,' while Xlav
AlyiKovs is a 'goat-footed storm-god,' and the epithets are phonet-
ically absolutely identical save in the variation of the guttural
between surd and sonant.

In Latin also it is perhaps possible to trace the connection of
ignis with agere? We should expect for ignis *emnis, according
to my proposed law, Italic #?«<Aryan gw (Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc,
1894, 2, Hi, and, for e, ib. 1894, 1, x). The abnormality of ignis
is due to association with ictus, ptc. of iacio 'throw' in origin, but
subsequently associated with icere, to which the ptc. ictus had

1 Proc. Am. Phil. Assoc, 1895, 2, liii. 2 Cf. also Mod. Lang. Notes, XI 229.

26 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

given rise, just as in English the ptc. told, in the phrase 'the knell
was told,' has given rise to the verb to toll, with, in this case, a
new ptc. tolled. We can make pretty sure of the idiom iacere
(icere) ignem from Cic. ad Att. XV 26. 2 interdum iacit igniculos
viriles. Beside this we can put Ennius's line (Vahl. V 93) : exin
Candida se radiis dedit icta foras lux, ' then the clear dawn was-
struck -alight (icta), and put herself forth with her rays.' Other
passages are Cic. Har. Resp. 45 ut vos iisdem ignibus circum-
saepti me primum ictum pro vobis et fumantem videretis, and
Ov. Met. 15. 348 ea (sc. materia) concipit ictibus ignem.

The best proof, perhaps, of this locution is to be got from
iacere fulmen and ictus fulmine (Cic. Div. II 45 and I 16). Here
fulmen has ousted ignis, we may suppose ; as in English ' strike
a light' and 'strike a match' represent 'strike a flint.' In the
specific sense of lightning I can find no very early instance of
ignis, but Vergil's ignes (Aen. IV 167) may well be an archaism,
seeing how surely Agni means 'lightning' in the Veda. Lucre-
tius (VI 309-16) uses ignis and ictus three times each within a
single sentence, in describing the lightning.

These examples may be held, I think, to demonstrate that a
connection had been made by the Roman mind between ignis
and ictus. We can also come at the semasic connection between
ignis and agere by noting Lucr. II 675 scintillas agere 'shoot out
sparks,' beside ignem iacere in the previous line.

IX. Tryanlkd. — This word is a hapaxlegomenon at RV. iii 56.
3, and is, like purvanika (five times in the voc, exclusively of
Agni), probably an epithet of Agni. So Grassmann takes it, but
Ludwig, after Sayana, ascribes it, incorrectly I believe, 1 to Indra.
It is defined 'three-faced.' Lat. acies in its varied senses pretty
exactly covers the range of meaning shown by dnika. I would
translate by 'three-edged,' 2 and refer the epithet to the lightning
in the hand of Agni or of Indra. Cognate with dni-ka is Grk.
alvos (<.*anyo-'), defined usually as 'dread,' but definable also by
'sharp,' and mainly used of words referring to battle: the super-

1 The epithet belongs to vr&abhdh ' bull,' a common epithet of Agni (24
times in RV.) ; the three goddesses (tisrd mahir) of the previous stanza are
Agni's nursing-mothers (cf. Grassmann, Wort., s. v. Ma 4, 5) ; the reference in
the following stanza to the waters' giving way reminds of Agni's hiding in the
waters (cf. Lanman, Notes to Reader, p. 394), and Agni seems to be alluded to
in the next stanza but one {viddthem samr&t ' ruler at the sacrifices').

5 The word dnika is specially used of the sharp point of an arrow or axe (cf.
Grassmann, s. v. 8).

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 2"]

lative is restricted to Zeus, the lightning-wielder par excellence.
But Poseidon was also a god of storm. In Homer he raises the
winds (\ 400, 407), the waves (o> no): he has his seat on a
mountain-top (n 12), while in another place (Y 150) he puts a
cloud about his shoulders. 1 He also assists Zeus to raise a storm
(Y 56). With this conception 1 would bring Poseidon's trident —
Tpiaiva — in touch, comparing it with the epithet tryanikd.

As against this explanation I mention Brugmann's (I. F. Ill
261), who works out on the basis of 6pim£ 'three-pronged-hoe' a
stem *Tpi-Ai-v-aK-, basing *ki-v-aK on Sk. sena 'dart.' Touching
the phonetic development of 6phag he says: "In der letzteren
Form musste bei der Kontraktion der beiden 1 die Liquida durch
Antizipation des h tonlos und infolge davon t zur Aspirata
werden, vgl. <ppoi8os aus *irpo 680s." This reasoning is not, in my
opinion, cogent. In any case there must have been a transfer
of the aspiration before contraction could take place, and if we
have a stage *Tptipag, why not also *rpiaiva ? I am quite willing
to admit, however, that an intervocalic h fell away in Greek at an
earlier stage between identical vowels than it did between dis-
similar vowels (cf. Lat. nil, nihil). But 6p~iva£ lets itself be con-
nected directly with Sanskrit words of nearly equivalent meaning.
I note the adjective dhrqnil ' bold,' for which the sense ' sharp ' may
be vindicated by citing the compound dhr$i}ii$ena 'with a sharp
dart': this facet of meaning is also shown by dhr§dj : 'hero,' with
the epithet tigmd ' sharp.' I note also dharnasi (for *dharzna-
si ?), used prevailingly as an epithet of Soma (cf. dfii- and tigmd-
'sharp,' both Soma epithets), but used also of the thunderbolt
(vdjra-~) and of the vision (cdkqatya-). I would therefore explain
6piva£ from *dkrzno + ak ' sharp-point,' whence 6piv-aK-. In Bp^vadr),
the Odyssey name for Sicily (?), I would see the sense 'land of
sharp promontories.' In gradation with 6plva£ as thus explained
would be 6piy-K-6s 'projecting coping.' That the 6plva£ was not
necessarily a three-pointed instrument, though popularly so inter-
preted, the following passage from Aristophanes seems to show
(Pax 567 sq.) :

ai re Bpivants fiiaoTiX/Souct npbs tov ij\tov.

&<tt cyay rj8t) iri6vfiS> Kavros e\0civ els aypov

(cat r piaivovv rij due e XX 17 81a \povov t6 yybiov.

1 So, however, do other gods quite commonly, but we have seen how many
of them seem to be individualizations of epithets of fire.

28 AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHILOLOGY.

Here the SUeWa (' bidens ') is equivalent to 6pha£, and both have
been alike associated, as the verb shows, with rplawa.

With this group we may compare Lat. fuscina ' trident' <
*dhrs-ci-na, or perhaps from *dhrsn-ica 'having sharp points,'
with 'skipping' from */usnica to fuscina.

The root to which I refer (rpi-)aiva is am, Grk. apda> 'reap,' Sk.
V am 'injure,' amd 'Andrang — der Geschosse,' etc. This root
had a by -form an, originating from *m-s-i (>*»«), Lat. en-s-is,
Sk. a-s-i 'sword'; cf. aop (<*a-o-op) with a different suffix. For
the kinship of the rplaiva and aop I cite 3 385, where Poseidon is
pictured as follows :

Setvov aop ravvr}K€s e~)(aiv iv x il 9 l 7ra X et ??
tUfkov do-reporrrj,

comparing with it 8 506 :

avriK erreira rplaivav e\ap x f P°"' ortfiapjjo-iv.

In the former of these passages Poseidon's character of Apam
Ndpat comes out very clearly : ' for he had a dread sword in his
hand like the lightning.'

I am aware that I have equipped the lightning-divinity with
many names and personalities in the foregoing essay. But so
have the Vedic hymn-writers. Indra is puni-naman 'many-
named' (RV. viii 93. 17) and punl-varpas 'many-figured' (ib. x
120. 6), while Agni {Apam Ndpaf) and Indra are puru-rupa
'many-formed' (Agni thrice and Indra once), and Agni is besides
purvantka (Jive times). But for the many-named Agni I can do
no better than cite RV. iii 20. 3*" :

Agne bhurl^i tavajatavedo
diva svadkdvo 'mrtasya nama;

'Agni, thou art manifold, thou Jatavedas
Thou divine Svadhdvan 1 in thy immortal names.'

It is obvious also that my explanations, notably of Apollo,
substitute lightning-myths for sun-myths. Indra, Zeus and

1 It occurs to me that possibly Svadhavan, which is pre-eminently used of
Agni, belongs to \/dhu 'kindle' (cf. hat./timus 'smoke'), and was originally
understood, like the traditional explanation of tdnu-ndpdt (supra, p. 10), as
'self-kindling.' So °dhavan would be ultimately (cf. Noreen, 1. c, §51, Anm.
1, and the author, Am. Jour. Phil. XVI 2, footnote 3) kindred with Ai?u (supra,
p. 19).

THE ARYAN GOD OF LIGHTNING. 29

Jupiter, the highest deities in their respective cosmogonies, were
clearly personifications of the lightning. In Greek and Latin
certainly the myths of the sun pure and simple (iJXios and Sol)
are quite insignificant in comparison, though this is not the state
of the case in the Vedas.

For my own part, I think a lightning-cult has a-priori a simpler
origin than a sun-cult. Lightning impresses by its suddenness ;
lightning is a visible and sensible messenger from the Invisible
Above to the visible below, being now and then a vast agent for
destruction sent upon man out of the Unknown. On the other
hand, the sun moves on, calm and irresistible, with only an occa-
sional eclipse to strike man with the awe that springs from the
unexpected. Storms interfere, to be sure, with the sun's course,
but all that is terrible in storm is lightning-flash and thunder-roll.
On these grounds I have no hesitation in substituting lightning-
myths for sun-myths.

Washington and Lee University, EDWIN W. FAY.

March 8, 1895.