Page 118 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

ORION AND HIS BELT 105
There are other traditions which point out the position of
Orion in the course of the year. The cosmical setting of the con-
stellation was believed to be an indication of stormy weather and
the constellation was called imbrifer or acquosus in the same way
as the Shwi in the Vedas is said to commence the year, while
Shunastrau are invoked along with Parjanya for rain. The German
traditions are, however, more specific, and I take the following
abstract of the same by Prof. Kuhn communicated to the late Dr.
Rajendralal Mitra and published by the latter in his ' Indo-
Aryans,' Vol. II, pp. 300-302 :-
" Both in our ancient and modern popular traditions, there
is universally spoken of the Wild Hunter, who sometimes appears
under the name of W odan or Goden, and was, in heathenish
times, the supreme god of the ancient German nations. This god
coincides, both in character and shape with ancient Rudra of
the Vedas (vide p . 99 ). Now there is a class of traditions in which
this ancient God is said to hunt a stag and shoot at it, just as
R11dra in the Bn1hmapas is represented as shooting at the ri1hya
and rolrit. The stag in German mythology, is the animal of the
god Freyr, who, like Prajapati, is a god of the sun, of fertility,
etc., so that the shot at the stag is to be compared with
Rudra's shooting at the ri1hya- PrajApati. I have further endea-
voured to show that some indications exist in the medieval peni-
tentials of Gemiany and England, which give us to understand
that at the close of the old year and at the beginning of the new
one ( we call that time ' diezwolften ' or the twelve ·days, dvdda-
shaha of the Indians ) there were mummeries performed by the
country people, in which two persons seem to have been the prin-
cipal performers, the one of whom was disguised as a stag while
the other was disguised as a hind. Both represented a scene, which
inust have greatly inter.ested and amused the people, but very
much offended ·the clergy, by its sordid and hideous character;
and from all the indications which are given in text, communi-
cated by me ( pp. 108-180 ), ,we may safely suppose that the
chief contents of this representation was the connection of a stag
'and a Jtind ( or of an old woman ), which was accompanied by
the singin&.<?f unchaste songs. From English customs at the New
Year's Day, we may also infer that the hunter's shooting at this
pair was even: a few centuries ago, nay, is. even now, not quite
forgotten. Now as the time of the 'twelve days' was with our