Page 337 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

122 SAMAGRA TILAK- 2 • THE ARCTIC HOME

when the sun remained above the horizon or went below it for a
number of 24 hours; and we have also seen that the ~ig-Vedic
texts describe these things as events of a bye-gone age. The next
question, therefore, is-Do we meet in the Vedas with similar
traces of the Arctic condition of seasons, months or years ? It is
stated previously that the calendar current at the time of the Vedic
Samhitas was different from the Arctic calendar. But if the ances-
tors of the Vedic people ever lived near the North Pole," we may"
as observed by Sir Norman Lockyer with reference to the older
Egyptian calendar, " always reckon upon the conservatism of the
priests of the temples retaining the tradition of the old rejected
year in every case." Sir Norman Lockyer first points out how the
ancient Egyptian year of 360 days was afterwards replaced by a
year of 365 days; and then gives two instances of the traditional
practice by which the memory of the old year was preserved. " Thus
even at Philea: in later times," says he "in the temple of Osiris,
there were 360 bowls for sacrifice, which were filled daily with milk
by a specified rotation of priests. At Acanthus there was a per-
forated cask into which one of the 360 priests poured water from
the Nile daily. "* And what took place in Egypt, we may expect
to have taken place in Vedic times. The characteristics of an Arctic
year are so unlike those of a year in the temperate zone, that if the
ancestors of the Vedic people ever lived within the Arctic regions,
and immigrated southwards owing to glaciation, an adaptation of
the calendar to the altered geographical and astronomical condi-
tions of the new home was a necessity, and must have been effected
at the time. But in making this change, we may, as remarked by
Sir Norman Lockyer, certainly expect the conservative priests to
retain as much of the old calendar as possible, or at least preserve
the traditions of the older year in one form or another especially
in their sacrificial rites. Indo-European etymological equations
have established the fact that sacrifices, or rather the system
of making offerings to the gods for various purposes, existed from
the primeval period, t and if so, the system must have undergone
great modifications as the Aryan races moved from the Arctic to

• See Lockyer's Dawn of Aslronomy, p. 248.
t See Schrader's" Prehistoric Antiquities of the Aryan Peoples"
Part IV, Chap. XIII, translated by Jevons, p. 421. Cf. Sans. ynf; Zend
Yaz; Greek a::omczi, agio;. See 01iun Chap. II.