Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 6 (Indian and Iranian).djvu/140

96 INDIAN MYTHOLOGY spirits, of whom Vastospati ("the Lord of the House"), Ksetrasya Pati ("the Lord of the Field") Sita ("the Furrow"), and Urvara ("the Ploughed Field") are the natural divinities of a villager. Yet the place of plants and trees is still very slight, though the Atharvaveda uses plants freely for medicinal and magic purposes and ascribes a divine character to them, and the blessing of trees is, as we have seen, sought in the marriage ritual, while offerings are made both to trees and to plants. In the Buddhist scriptures and stories special prominence is, on the other hand, given to tales of divinities of plants, trees, and forest. A distinct innovation is the direct worship of serpents, who are classified as belonging to earth, sky, and atmosphere, and who doubtless now include real reptiles as well as the snake or dragon of the atmosphere, which is found in the Rgveda. The danger from snakes in India is sufficient to explain the rise of the new side of the ritual: the offerings made to them, often of blood, are to propitiate them and reduce their destructive power, and Buddhism is also supplied with charms against them. Isolated in comparison with the references to the snakes are those to other vermin, such as worms or the king of the mice or ants, all of which occasionally receive offerings. A serpent-queen appears as early as the Brdhmanas and is naturally enough identified by speculation with the earth, which is the home of the snakes. Not until the Asvaldyana Grhya Sutra (II. iv. i), however, do we hear in the Vedic religion of the Nagas ("Serpents"), who are prominent in the epic. A new form of being in the shape of the man-tiger is also found, but not the man-lion. The boar is mentioned in cosmogonic myths as the form assumed by Prajapati, who is also brought into conjunction with the tortoise as the lord of the waters. The cow is now definitely divine and is worshipped, but she is also regarded as identical with Aditi and Ida. Tarksya, the sun-horse, is named here and there, and Aristanemi, who occurs in connexion with him, is a precursor of Aristanemi as one of the Tirthakaras of the Jains.