To refer to this please cite it in this way :
- Douglas Frame, The Myth of Return in Early Greek Epic, 6: Evidence for the Meaning of the Indo-European Root *nes-, https://chs.harvard.edu/publications.sec/online_print_books.ssp/. Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington, DC. September, 2005
6. Evidence for the meaning of the Indo-European Root *nes-
1. Introduction
The purpose of this chapter is to explore the background of the Greek root nes-. In Greek itself three factors are involved: the meaning of the root, the interpretation of this meaning, and the presence of the root in the word nóos. These factors have been considered at length, and the problem now is to determine what in each case was inherited by Greek from Indo-European.
One can approach this problem only by means of the comparative method. In this chapter, therefore, I shall be concerned with attestations of the root nes– in languages other than Greek. The evidence to be considered bears, first of all, on the meaning “return to life” of Greek nes-; the cardinal evidence for this is provided by Germanic languages, which will therefore be considered first. As for the involvement in sun symbolism of the root nes-, the main evidence is provided by Sanskrit, although the meaning “return to light” seems to have been preserved in Germanic as well, and also in Albanian. Attention will therefore be paid to this in section 2, “Germanic,” and a brief section 3 will then be devoted to Albanian. In section 4, “Indic,” the context of sun symbolism will be explored more fully.
The final factor is the derivation of Greek nóos from nes-. In the Indic section a case will be made that this root already implied “intelligence” in Indo-European.
2. Germanic
The modern German word genesen, “get well, recover,” contains the Indo-European root nes-, and, by its meaning, still bears witness to the original meaning of the root. With only this word in mind one can understand what led Sigmund Feist to reconstruct the earliest Germanic meaning of nes– as “zum Leben zurückkehren (return to life).” [1] The correlation between this and what has been found in early Greek leads to the conclusion that the meaning “return to life” goes back to Indo-European times.
The discussion to follow will deal first with the forms from nes– in Gothic, secondly with those in West Germanic, and lastly with those in Nordic. In each case the original meaning “zum Leben zurückkehren” can still be seen, or at least inferred. In each case there is also a certain amount of evidence for an original meaning “return to light,” although the nature and strength of this evidence vary from dialect to dialect.
In dealing with Gothic one must take account of the problem that our evidence is contained in a translation of the Greek Bible. The context in which words appear is therefore predetermined. The element of choice, however, enters into the translator’s use of a particular word in a given context. In the case of the root nes-, this point has a kind of general relevance; for the Gothic forms from this root are used to translate such Greek words as s?zein and s?t?ría, which in the original text have to do with the specifically Christian notion of “salvation.” This notion, furthermore, implies a “return from death” to life everlasting. While it does not follow automatically from this that the Gothic forms from nes– imply a “return from death,” this possibility is at least distinctly present.
The same argument holds for the meaning “return to light.” At the center of Christianity there is a s?t?r, “savior,” who is called not only “the life,” but also “the light.” [2] The Gothic translation of s?t?r is nasjands, and as an example of a significant context in which the word appears, I quote the Greek original of 2 Tim. 1:10, which speaks of the “grace” conferred by Christ:
(χ?ριν) φανερωθε?σαν δ? ν?ν δι? τ?ς ?πιφανε?ας το? σωρ?ρος ?μ?ν (nasjandis unsaris) ?ησο? Χριστο?, καταργ?σαντος μ?ν τ?ν θ?νατον, φωτ?σαντος δ? ζω?ν κα? ?φθαρσ?αν δι? το? ε?αγγελ?ου
But it [grace] is now made manifest by the illumination of our savior Jesus Christ, who has nullified death, and has brought to light life and incorruption through the gospel. [3]
In the following I give the various Gothic forms and a sample context in which each appears. Most of the total occurrences of each form refer to Christian redemption, for which much is implied, but I will not limit myself to these, for other contexts as well can be revealing. [4]
The verb ganisan, which translates Greek s?zesthai, “be saved,” is intransitive and is composed of the root nes– in its Gothic form together with the perfective element ga-. [5] The verb demonstrates that the meaning “get well” of its modern German equivalent, genesen, is old; cf. Mark 5:23: ?να σωθ? κα? ζ?σ?, ei ganisai jah libai, “that she may get well and live.” For the context of Christian salvation, cf. 1 Cor. 5:5:
παραδο?ναι τ?ν τοιο?τον τ? Σαταν? ε?ς ?λεθρον τ?ς σαρκ?ς, ?να τ? πνε?μα σωθ? (ei ahma ganisai) ?ν τ? ?μ?ρ? το? κυρ?ου ?ησο?
To deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of our lord Jesus.
Based on ganisan is the feminine noun ganists, which is formed with the abstract suffix –ti-, and which translates s?t?ría. [6] Christian “salvation” is opposed to death in the following context, 2 Cor. 7:10:
? γ?ρ κατ? θε?ν λ?πη μετ?νοιαν ε?ς σωτηρ?αν (du ganistai) ?μεταμ?λητον κατεργ?ζεται, ? δ? το? κ?σμου λ?πη θ?νατον κατεργ?ζεται.
For sorrow which is according to God brings about repentance, steadfast unto salvation; but the sorrow of the world brings about death.
The verb nasjan is a causative formation and therefore has a transitive sense, translating s?zein, “to save.” Christian salvation is again opposed to death in the following phrase, Mark 3:4: ψυχ?ν σ?σαι (saiwala nasjan) ? ?ποκτε?ναι, “to save a soul or kill it.” The participle from nasjan is nasjands, “s?t?r,” which was discussed above.
The verb nasjan also appears as ganasjan, with the perfective element ga-. This verb translates s?zesthai, “be saved,” in the following interesting example; in Luke 8:50 the context involves a young girl presumed to be dead, concerning whom Christ says to her father: μ?νον π?στευε, κα? σωθ?σεται (jah ganasjada), “only believe and she will be saved.” The verb also translates iãsthai, “to heal,” and thus acts as a causative to ganisan in the sense “get well” of the latter; cf. Luke 6:19: κα? ??το π?ντας (jah ganasida allans), “and he healed all.”
Based on the verb nasjan is the feminine noun naseins, formed with the suffix –eins from original *-?-ni-, and translating s?t?ría and s?t?rion; the latter stands in the original of Luke 2:30 ff.:
?τι ε?δον ο? ?φθαλμο? μου τ? σωτ?ρι?ν σου (nasein þeina) ? ?το?μασας κατ? πρ?σωπον π?ντων τ?ν λα?ν, φ?ς ε?ς ?ποκ?λυψιν ?θν?ν
Because my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared before the face of all people, a light for the revelation of the Gentiles.
This completes the list of Gothic forms, the contexts of which must speak for themselves, and their cognates in West Germanic may now be considered. Here the meanings of Gothic ganisan, both “be saved” and “get well,” are closely reflected in Old English genesan (also nesan) and Old Saxon ginesan, “be saved,” and Old High German genesan, “be saved, get well”; similarly, Old Saxon and Old High German ginist means “salvation” and “recovery.”
The cognates of Gothic nasjan require more comment, for here there was, in part, a semantic development, reflected in the modern German cognate nähren, “nourish.” Nasjan itself simply means “save,” and this meaning was preserved in Old English and Old Saxon nerian; similarly, the participles neriend and neriand mean “savior” in the two respective dialects.
Before proceeding to Old High German, it is worth giving one example of Old English nerian, “save,” in which the sense “bring back to light” is at least implied by the context. The example occurs in Beowulf 569 ff., a passage in which the hero tells of the aftermath to his victory over the “nickers nine,” the sea-monsters he overcame one night in the ocean depths:
Leoht eástan com,
beorht beácen Godes,
brimu sweþrodon,
þæt ic s?-næssas
geseón mihte,
windige weallas.
Wyrd oft nere?
unf?gne eorl,
þonne his ellen deáh.
Light came from the east,
God’s bright beacon,
the seas grew calm,
so that the sea-nesses I
might see,
windy walls.
Fate often saves
an undoomed man,
when his valor avails.
“Salvation” in these lines, with their emphasis on the sun and the hero’s ability to see about him, seems intimately related to a “return to light.” [7]
In the Old High German forms nerian and nerren, the meaning “nourish” developed, as also in Old Frisian nera; alongside this new meaning, the old meaning “save” persisted even into modern High German, but today only the developed meaning “nourish” is current. [8] For the development of this new meaning, one might compare the Latin idiom corpus curare cibo.
The semantic development in Old High German and Old Frisian is of importance for the Nordic evidence, to which we now come. For it seems likely that the Nordic languages borrowed the German word in its developed meaning, and that this explains the origin of the following forms, all meaning “nourish”: Old and Modern Icelandic næra, Norwegian næra, modern Swedish nära, and Danish nære. [9]
From these forms, which are found in both East and West Norse, should be distinguished another set of forms, which are limited to West Norse. The latter forms appear to be inherited, and it is the meaning “kindle” of two of them in which we are interested. This is the meaning of Norwegian and Swedish-dialect nöra. [10] Beside the meaning “kindle” in Norwegian and Swedish-dialect, the meanings “stärken, erfrischen, ernährení (invigorate, refresh, nourish)” are attested in Old Icelandic nœra, modern Icelandic nœra, and Norwegian dialect nöra. [11]
Thus, West Norse appears to have had a verb with two separate meanings, “revive” and “kindle.” The formal evidence suggests by its distribution that the meaning “kindle” developed from a more basic meaning of the verb. But then the problem is to determine precisely what this basic meaning was. I do not agree with the suggestion [12] that the meaning “kindle” developed from the notion of “feeding” or “nourishing” a fire. There are two arguments against this. The first is simply semantic; it is difficult to see how the expression “feed a fire” could come to mean “light a fire.” But the second argument is more basic; it is not the set of forms represented by nöra, “kindle,” that has “nourish” as its primary meaning. This is, rather, the set of forms apparently borrowed from West Germanic. [13]
In order to determine the oldest meaning of the first set, which is native to West Norse, one must consider the evidence of Old Icelandic. It emerges from this that Old Icelandic nœra did not mean “nourish” at all, but still had the older sense of “revive, bring back to life.”
For the sake of comparison, let us first cite an example of Old Icelandic næra, “nourish.” These occurrences are few and late – thus the phrase níra sin hibýli, “to feed his family,” in the Konungs Skugg-sja (326B), a late translation of the Speculum Regale.
The meaning of nœra is quite distinct from this, as the following example will show. (In these examples I shall quote the spelling of the texts, which frequently have næra for nœra; the reason for this is that -æ- and -œ- have fallen together in modern Icelandic, thus obscuring the distinction in which we are interested; the meanings, however, will serve to identify the forms as coming from nœra.) An example that might at first seem to have to do with “feeding” but does not, is found in Fornaldar Sögur 3.571: hón dreypir víni á varrir þeim ok nærdusk þeir skjótt, “she dripped wine on their lips, and they brought themselves back to life again.” The meaning naturally cannot be “and they nourished themselves again.”
For nœra as “bring back to life,” one might also consider the following striking example, Fornmanna Sögur 6.353: nærdisk hón svá sem frá leid, “she brought herself back to life who had perished (i.e., swooned)”, where the context has nothing at all to do with “nourishing.”
These examples serve to show that the meaning “kindle” of Norwegian and Swedish dialect nöra has to do, not with “feeding,” but with “bringing back to life.” The association with fire is important, because it suggests that West Norse could have inherited the meaning “return to light” as well as “return to life” for the root nes-. The association with fire, furthermore, is old, to judge by the following Old Icelandic passage, Fornmanna Sögur 10.368; this passage concerns a queen who says that she has been so wasted by grief for her husband, at engi gneisti lífsins má nœra mik edr lífga, “‘that no spark (gneisti) of life may “kindle” me or bring me back to life.’” [14]
3. Albanian
One of the forms commonly cited as a derivative from Indo-European nes– is the Albanian verb kne?em, “erhole mich, werde wieder lebendig (I recover, come back to life).” [15] The derivation was first proposed by N. Jokl, [16] who saw in the meaning of this verb a clear correspondence to the Germanic forms discussed above. The verbal base of kne?em is to be segmented k-nel-, with k– a perfectivizing element like Germanic ga-. The element –nel– would then go back to *nes-l-, and the verb itself would derive from an adjective built on a formant –lo-.
If this derivation is correct, as the meaning of kne?em would argue, then it provides a useful piece of evidence. For “werde wieder lebendig” is only one of the meanings of the verb. For the total range of the verb, I quote the complete entry contained in a recent Albanian-English historical dictionary. [17] Use intransitively, the verb means: “recover, get well; thrive; (of light) brighten.” Used transitively, it means: “refresh, revive; make red-hot.”
Jokl was aware of the meaning “brighten” from an Italian dictionary of northern Albanian, which glossed kne?em with “divenire vivo e splendente, rischiararsi,” and he drew attention to Scandinavian nöra, “kindle.” He assumed that the similar meanings in the two cases resulted from an independent “pregnant” usage. [18] Based on the evidence of Greek, however, it seems more than likely that the Albanian “prägnante Verwendung für das Feuer oder die Sonne (pregnant usage for fire or the sun)” has been inherited from the same Indo-European source as the meaning “kindle” of Scandinavian nöra.
4. Indic
Sanskrit násate is an exact formal cognate to Greek néomai. But the meanings of the Sanskrit verb, “approach, resort to, join,” have developed too far to shed light on the meanings of the Indo-European verb. [19]
Both Sanskrit and Avestan have a neuter noun astam, “home,” which has been reconstructed as *?s-to-, with zero-grade of the root nes-. [20] This reconstruction is probable, and it indicates that the secular meaning “to return home” of Greek néomai goes back to Indo-European (cf. chap. 2, sect. 1, “The Semantic Development of ásmenos,” above).
For the sacred meaning of IE nes-, the crucial Sanskrit form is the proper name NÁsaty?. This name, which is in the dual, belongs to a pair of twin gods in the Vedic pantheon. The etymology of NÁsaty? has yet to be established with certainty, but the prevailing modern view is to derive the form from the root nes-. [21] The Vedic twins have the characteristic functions of “saving” and “healing” distressed mortals, and this has suggested a connection with the Gotic verb nasjan, “to save” and “to heal.” In the rest of this section I propose to show that NÁsaty? is indeed derived from nes-, and that the form contains precious comparative evidence for the sacred meaning of the Indo-European root.
Sanskrit NÁsaty? has equivalents in Avestan and Mitanni, and is thus known to go back to Common Indo-Iranian. Avestan N??haiθya, a singular form, designates a demon in the Zoroastrian system, and Mitanni Nasattiia(nna), a plural form, apparently designates the same twin gods as Vedic NÁsaty?. [22]
Since Sanskrit NÁsaty? originated at least as early as Common Indo-Iranian, it is probable that even the Vedic poets no longer knew what it meant. Later Indian tradition provides three distinct interpretations of the name, but all are based on folk-etymologies. One of these (n? = nar + satya, “true warriors”) is clearly impossible; [23] a second, found in P??ini (na-asatya, “not untrue”) has rightly been rejected on both formal and semantic grounds; [24] the third (n?s?-tya, “the nose-born”), although it has been defended in modern times by Herman Lommel, is equally to be rejected. [25]
The first to suggest a derivation from the root nes– was Brunnhofer. [26] The difficulty, however, has been to explain the morphology of the form, and for this Hermann Güntert is credited with the best solution. [27] Güntert began with the Indo-Iranian ancestor of Sanskrit násate, to which he ascribed the meaning “hasten to safety” on the basis of the Germanic evidence. He then posited a nominal derivative *nasati-, “salvation through hastening to the rescue,” on the parallel of vasatí-, “dwelling,” derived from vásati, “to dwell.” The name NÁsaty? would then be based on *nasati– just as the name ?dityá– is based on áditi-.
Güntert’s solution is possible, but the hypothetical abstact noun *nasati– is weak. One would have expected *nasti– in view of Gothic ga-nists, or even *asti– on the basis of Indo-Iranian astam. Given this weakness, I would propose a different solution.
Gregory Nagy, in a discussion of Old Persian xš?yaθiya-, “king,” has argued that the underlying form *kš?yatya– is perhaps a “nominalization (with v?ddhi) of an archaic syntagma *kšayati-ya, ‘he who has power.’” [28] Such a combination of third-person verb plus relative pronoun has parallels in Celtic and perhaps Italic, and the syntactic order is well attested in Indo-Iranian. [29] If Nagy is correct about the origins of *kš?yatya-, I propose that Indo-Iranian N?satya– is likewise a nominalization (with v?ddhi) of an archaic syntagma *nasati-ya, “he who brings back to life and light.” The verb *nasati would be an activized form, otherwise unattested, of násate, and as such would be parallel to the Homeric verb *nései that we have reconstructed in xviii 265. [30]
A singular verb *nasati would imply that NÁsaty? was also originally singular. Avestan N??haiθya provides comparative evidence for such a singular in Common Indo-Iranian, and even the Rig-Veda contains one instance of a singular “traversing N?satya-” in 4.3.6. [31] For the most part, however, the Rig-Veda does not make distinctions between the two twins but treats them as an identical pair. Hence we must begin with the notion of two NÁsaty?, who both “bring back to life and light.”
The two twins, as noted above, “save” and “heal” distressed mortals. They perform these functions in a series of archaic myths which the Rig-Veda refers to frequently. Three such myths, furthermore, provide explicit evidence that the underlying function of the two “saviors” and “healers” was in fact “to bring back to life.” The myths concern the mortals Rebha, Bhujyu, and ?y?va.
Rebha was bound, stabbed, and cast into the waters for nine days and ten nights before being saved by the twins. RV 10.39.9 says that he was “dead” (mam?vÁ?sam) when the twins “raised him up” (úd airayatam). [32]
Bhujyu was saved after his father or evil companions abandoned him at sea. RV 1.119.4 refers to the twins as “bringing (Bhujyu) home from the dead ancestors” (niváhant? pit??bhya Á). [33]
Little is known about ?y?va, to whom there are only two references in the Rig-Veda. [34] But one of these, RV 1.117.24, says that he was “split in three” (trídh? . . . víkastam) when the twins “raised him up to live” (új j?vása airayatam).
Not only do the twins “bring back to life,” but they also “bring back to the light.” To Bhujyu, who was “cast forth on the unsupporting darkness” (an?rambha?é támasi práviddham, 1.182.6), the twins gave “light-bringing help” (svàrvatÍr . . . ?t?r, 1.119.8). Rebha they “raised up to see the sun” (úd . . . aírayata? svàr d??é, 1.112.5), and likewise Vandana (ibid.). Vandana, who was buried in a pit when he disintegrated with old age, is also the object of a pair of similes which strikingly connect the ideas of “returning from death” and “returning from darkness.” RV 1.117.5 says that the twins restored Vandana “like one who had fallen asleep in the womb of the death goddess” [35] (su?upvÁ?sa? ná nír?ter upásthe), and “like the sun dwelling in darkness” (sÚrya? ná . . . támasi k?iyántam).
The twins, who were invoked at dawn, have a close connection with U?as, the dawn goddess. She is bidden to awaken them (8.9.17), they follow her in their chariot (8.5.2, etc.), they hitch their steeds when she is born (10.39.12), and their chariot is once said to arrive before her (1.34.10). [36] As their hour of invocation indicates, the twins have to do with a “return from darkness” in cult as well as myth. In three hymns the poet marks the time of invocation with the phrase “we have reached the other shore of this darkness” (át?ri?ma támasas p?rám asyá). [37] In another hymn the poet prays to the twins for “refreshment” (í?am) “which will deliver us across the darkness” (yÁ na? p?parad . . . támas tirá?, 1.46.6). The twins are called “darkness slayers” (tamohán?, 3.39.3), and their horses and chariot are described as “uncovering the covered darkness” (apor?uvántas táma Á pár?v?tam, 4.45.2). One hymn invokes the twins as “you who have made light for mankind” (yÁv . . . jyótir ján?ya cakráthu?, 1.92.17).
The Vedic twins, then, clearly have the function of “bringing back to life and light” in a context of solar mythology. Their connection with solar mythology, moreoever, is known to go back to Indo-European. The twins are closely associated with a female figure named S?ryÁ, a feminized form of SÚrya, the “Sun.” The twins are called S?ryÚ’s husbands and wooers, and she is frequently said to mount their chariot at dawn. [38] S?ryÁ is also called duhitÁ sÚryasya, “the daughter of the Sun,” [39] and this name corresponds exactly to Lithuanian Saul?s dukterys and closely to Latvian Saules meita. These two “daughters of the Sun” are associated with the Baltic counterparts to the Vedic twins, the Lithuanian Dievo sun?liai and the Latvian Dieva d?li. In Vedic the “daughter of the Sun” is the common wife of the two twins, while in Baltic she is their sister. In Indo-European she was probably both wife and sister simultaneously. [40]
Now that I have made a case for the two NÁsaty? as “they who bring back to life and light,” I return to the question of an originally singular form. I shall begin by considering comparative evidence having to do with the Greek Dioscuri. Like the Vedic twins, the Dioscuri are “saviors” and “healers” of distressed mortals, and their cult title and literary epithet, sÔt?res, “saviors,” has been compared with the Vedic name NÁsaty?. [41] Unlike the Vedic twins, however, the Dioscuri have preserved their internal oppositions, and from this perspective, only one of the twins is a “savior.” Since Polydeuces is immortal and Castor mortal, Polydeuces actually brings Castor “back to life.”
The crucial moment for the Dioscuri is their battle with Idas and Lynceus, when Castor is mortally wounded and Polydeuces gives up half of his immortality in order to save him. Our best source for the episode if Pindar’s Nemean 10. [42] In his introduction to the narrative, Pindar says that Polydeuces, given the choice of becoming entirely a god, instead “chose the life of Castor who had perished in battle” (l. 59):
ε?λετ’ α??να φθιμ?νου Πολυδε?κης Κ?στορος ?ν πολ?μ?.
In the narrative itself, Pindar says that Polydeuces “opened the eye, then the voice” of his fallen brother (l. 90):
?ν? δ’ ?λυσεν μ?ν ?φθαλμ?ν, ?πειτα δ? φων?ν χαλκομ?τρα Κ?στορος.
In Pindar’s account, the immortal Polydeuces clearly brings his mortal brother “back to life.” [43]
We cannot know for sure whether the immortal/mortal opposition which determines the actions of the Greek twins also characterized the Vedic twins, but this is a likely supposition. The Greek twins are so opposed because they have different father, the immortal Zeus and the mortal Tyndareus. [44] The Vedic twins also have different fathers, and one of these is Dyáus, the exact cognate of the Greek Zeús. This information comes from RV 1.181.4, the only Vedic text which explicitly distinguishes one twin from the other. The same text calls the other father Súmakha, “Good Warrior,” a figure who is unknown otherwise but who was almost certainly mortal like the Greek Tyndareus. The dual paternity of the Greek and the Vedic twins apparently goes back to the same Indo-European source, where one of the fathers was the immortal “Sky God” *Dy?us, and the other father, in all likelihood, a mere mortal. [45] If Sumakha was indeed mortal, then his son must also have been mortal, and it is hard to imagine how such a “mortal” twin could continue to exist unless his immortal brother brought him “back to life.”
As stated earlier, the Vedic twins are closely connected with sunrise in the Rig-Veda. But in addition to their well-attested morning ritual, the twins also had an evening ritual. The two times, evening and morning, are clearly paired and contrasted in three hymns of the Rig-Veda: do?Á . . . u?ási in 8.22.14, do?Ám u?Ása? in 10.39.1, and do?Á vástor in 10.40.4. [46] The evening/morning opposition which characterizes the twins’ ritual must also have characterized the twins themselves. A passage quoted by Y?ska (Nirukta 12.2) bears this conclusion out by stating that “one (of the twins) is called the son of night, the other the son of dawn.” [47] Now if only one twin was properly connected with sunrise, then only one twin can properly have had the function of “bringing back to life and light.” It is this twin who is to be connected with the name N?satya-.
To continue this investigation I now shift my attention from pre-Vedic to post-Vedic tradition. The Swedish scholar Stig Wikander has brilliantly shown that Sanskrit epic indirectly preserves old oppositions between the twins which the Rig-Veda ignores. [48] Two of the heroes of the Mah?bh?rata, the twins Nakula and Sahadeva, are depicted as sons of the divine twins, and, as Wikander has shown, are characterized in terms of their fathers’ archaic attributes. [49] But while Nakula and Sahadeva often act in common like their Vedic fathers, they are not an identical pair: rather, they are opposed to each other as “warrior horseman” to “intelligent cattleman.” These oppositions can be shown to be old, and Sahadeva’s attributes – both “cattle” and “intelligence” – are of great importance to the name N?satya-.
Wikander began his study of the epic twins with a survey of their characteristic epithets. What distinguishes Sahadeva absolutely from his brother is his characterization as “intelligent”: [50] he is called “wise” (vidv?n, 17.2.54), “intelligent,” (pr?jña, 17.2.56), “endowed with understanding” (buddhim?n, 14.72.2103), “learned” (pa??ita, 2.63. 2155), “clever” (matim?n, 3.269.15710), “acute” (nipu?a, 5.49.1838), and “clairvoyant” (cak?u?in, 6.75.3282).
Nakula, on the other hand, is “warlike” and possessed of a warrior’s “beauty.” [51] He is called “skillful in all forms of war” (sarvayuddhavi??rada, 7.165.7364), “good in war” (ku?ala? yuddhe, 7.98.3976), and, most characteristically, “fighting in a wondrous manner” (citrayodhin). [52] He is also called “beautiful” (dar?an?ya, 3.27.1020, 4.3.61, 5.49.1996), “the most beautiful in the world” (dar?an?yatamo loke, 2.78.2625), and “the most beautiful of heroes” (dar?an?yatamo n???m, 2.75.2555).
Wikander discussed two scenes in the Mah?bh?rata which underscore the opposition between Nakula’s “warrior beauty” and Sahadeva’s “intelligence.” [53] In the great dice game, Yudhi??hira, the twins’ eldest brother, characterizes both of them when he puts them up as stakes: Nakula he calls “dark, young, with eyes of flame, the shoulders of a lion, and huge arms” (2.63.2152), while Sahadeva “teaches justice and has acquired in this world a reputation for being learned” (pa??ita, 2.63.2155). Similarly, near the end of the poem, when the twins die, Yudhi??hira interprets their deaths as the result of peculiar moral flaws: [54] Nakula’s flaw was to think “there is no one equal to me in beauty” (r?pe?a matsamo n?sti ka?cid iti, 17.2.62); Sahadeva, on the other hand, “always thought that no one was as intelligent as himself” (?tmana? sad??a? pr?jña? nai?o ’manyata kañcana, 17.2.56). [55]
The second great opposition between the epic twins contrasts “horses” with “cattle.” Wikander discovered this opposition in the fourth book of the Mah?bh?rata, where the twins and their three older brothers all assume different disguises in order to spend their last year of exile at the court of king Vir??a. The twins both disguise themselves as vai?ya-s – members of the third caste, having to do with agriculture and production. This disguise is a reflection of their fathers’ archaic nature, for the divine twins had once been the vai?ya gods. [56] The disguise as vai?ya-s, however, also reveals an opposition between the twins that would not have been suspected otherwise: while Nakula disguises himself as a groom and takes charge of Vir??a’s “horses,” Sahadeva speaks warmly of his preference for “cattle” and becomes Vir??a’s cowherd. [57] This opposition between horses and cattle has been shown by Dumézil to be as old as Indo-European, [58] and it will prove crucial in my further analysis of the Vedic twins.
To correlate the oppositions between Nakula and Sahadeva with the Vedic twins, we begin with RV 1.181.4, which calls one twin the son of Dyaus and the other the son of Sumakha. The son of Súmakha, “Good Warrior,” is also called “conquering” (ji??ú) and “lordly” (s?rí), and, as Wikander has argued, [59] he plainly corresponds to the “warrior” Nakula. Sahadeva, then, corresponds to the son of Dyaus.
The crucial point, however, is to connect Sahadeva, the “intelligent cattleman,” with the name NÁsaty?. To do this we now take into account the fact that the Vedic twins actually have two names, both in the dual: they are not only the NÁsaty?, but also the A?vín?, the “Horse-Possessors.” As I will argue below, the Vedic names NÁsaty? and A?vín? function like the Greek names Dióskouroi, “Sons of Zeus,” and Tundarídai, “Sons of Tyndareus”: [60] each name refers properly to a different twin. Further, the name A?vin?, “Horse-Possessors,” corresponds to the “horseman” Nakula, and the name NÁsaty? corresponds to Sahadeva, the “intelligent cattleman.”
Wikander has also argued that the two dual names were originally singular, but he thought that both names belonged to the same twin, the father of Nakula. [61] Wikander’s own methodology, however, supports a different conclusion.
Following a suggestion of Geldner’s, Wikander noticed that certain of the twins’ dual epithets have a statistical tendency to occur in the same strophe with the dual name A?vín?. [62] Such co-occurrences, he argued, reveal old oppositions between the epithets in question and the name. [63] One of the epithets is divó náp?t?, “sons of Dyaus,” which, like Greek Dióskouroi, represents the extension of one twin’s title to both twins. In three of the five occurrences of divó náp?t? in the Rig-Veda, the name A?vína occurs in the same strophe. The ratio 3:5 bears out an opposition between the “son of Dyaus” and the father of the “horseman” Nakula which we have already seen indicated.
Wikander detected two further oppositions by this method. An opposition between A?vína and v???a?Á, “bulls,” is indicated by a ratio of 13:28, and an opposition between A?vín? and dasr?, “the miracle-workers,” in indicated by a ratio of 24:44. [64] Wikander failed to observe, however, that a comparable ratio of 32:100 indicates an opposition between A?vín? and NÁsaty?.
More important than the statistical count, however, is the evidence of one strophe which contains the NÁsaty?/A?vín? oppositions: in RV 2.41.7 this opposition is closely correlated with a further opposition between “cattle” and “horses.” The strophe is divided into three segments, the first two of which articulate the two oppositions in question. The first segment begins with the adjective gómad, “rich in cattle,” and ends with the vocative N?saty?, while the second segment begins with the adjective á?v?vad, “rich in horses,” and ends with the vocative A?vin?. The parallelism between these two segments makes it clear beyond doubt that “cattle” are associated with the name NÁsaty? and “horses” with the name A?vín?:
gómad ? ?ú n?saty?/ á?v?vad y?tam a?vin?/ vart? rudr? n?pÁyyam
Come quickly (? ?ú . . . y?tam) along the path (vart?) rich in cattle, you N?saty?; come quickly along the path rich in horses, you A?vin?; come quickly, you Rudr?, along the path which protects men (n?pÁyyam).
The evidence of RV 2.41.7, decisive in itself, [65] is further confirmed by RV 7.72.1. This strophe has two segments, and the adjectives “rich in cattle” (gómat?) and “rich in horses” (á?v?vat?) are again set in opposition to one another in different segments. Although the name A?vín? is omitted in this strophe, the name NÁsaty? is again plainly associated with “cattle” in segment 1:
Á gómat? n?saty? ráthena / á?v?vat? puru?candré?a y?tam
Come here (Á . . . y?tam) on your chariot (ráthena) rich in cattle, you N?saty?; come here on your chariot rich in horses and abundant with gold (puru?candré?a).
The evidence of RV 2.41.7, supported by that of 7.72.1, establishes conclusively that the names NÁsaty? and A?vín? originally designated different twins, and that the name NÁsaty? is to be correlated with the “cattleman” Sahadeva, while the name A?vín? is to be correlated with the “horseman” Nakula. It is also now certain that the son of Dyaus, the prototype of Sahadeva, had the name N?satya– in opposition to his brother. There is thus every reason to believes that this N?satya-, like the Greek son of Zeus, originally brought his brother “back to life and light.” The “cattle” and “intelligence” of Sahadeva establish beyond reasonable doubt that the name N?satya– derives from the root nes-, and that it originally signified “he who brings back to life and light.” [66]
We now return to take account of Wikander’s argument that a singular N?satya– originally designated the father of Nakula. Wikander based this argument on the dual compound name N?satyadasrau, which is applied to the divine twins in Sanskrit epic, and which names one of the twins N?satya– and the other Dasra-. [67] The name Dasra– comes from the twins’ dual epithet dasrÁ, “miracle working,” which Wikander’s statistical argument showed to be opposed to the name A?vín? (see earlier in this section). Since the epic compound opposes dasrÁ to the name NÁsaty?, Wikander concluded that the names A?vín? and NÁsaty? originally designated the same twin.
The problem with Wikander’s argument is his reliance on the epic compound, which cannot be old. Wikander himself admitted that statistics do not bear out an opposition between the duals NÁsaty? and dasr? in the Rig-Veda. [68] The two terms, in fact, have a tendency not to occur in the same verse. [69] Once again, however, specific texts are more conclusive than statistics. There are three more strophes in the Rig-Veda that contain an opposition between “cattle” and “horses,” and in these strophes dasrÁ actually takes the place of NÁsaty? on the “cattle” side of the opposition. This shows as clearly as possible that the terms NÁsaty? and dasrÁ, far from being opposed, are in fact isofunctional, and that the compound N?satyadasrau is secondary.
All three strophes contain the phrase gómad dasr? híra?yavat, consisting of the vocative dasr? and the neuter adjectives gómad, “rich in cattle,” and híra?yavat, “rich in gold.” In RV 8.22.17, the collocation gómad dasr? in the third segment of the strophe is clearly opposed to the collocation á?v?vad a?vin? in the first segment:
Á no á?v?vad a?vin? / vartír y?si??am madhup?tam? nar? / gómad dasr? híra?yavat
Come to us (Á no . . . y?si??am) along the path (vartír) rich in horses, you A?vin?; come, you who most enjoy the sacrificial drink, you heroes (madhup?tam? nar?); come along the path rich in cattle, you dasr?, rich in gold.
RV 1.30.17 contains the same opposition, but the syntax is varied on the “horse” side of this opposition, and the phrase gómad dasr? híra?yavat is appended loosely to express the “cattle” side:
??vin?v á?v?vaty? / i?Á y?ta? ?áv?ray? / gómad dasr? híra?yavat
Come here (Á . . . y?tam) with a surpassing wealth (i?Á . . . ?áv?ray?) rich in horses you A?vin?; rich in cattle, you dasr?, rich in gold.
RV 1.92.16 follows the pattern of the two previous strophes but omits the adjective á?v?vad altogether:
á?vin? vartír asmád Á / gómad dasr? híra?yavat / arvÁg rátha? sámanas? ní yachatam
Being of one mind rein in your chariot in this direction (segment 3), along the path toward us, you A?vin? (segment 1), which is rich in cattle, you dasr?, rich in gold (segment 2).
By comparing the three texts just examined with the two that were examined earlier (RV 2.41.7 and 7.72.1), we may conlude that the terms NÁsaty? and dasrÁ are indeed isofunctional. This conclusion, furthermore, provides a final, important piece of evidence for the etymology of NÁsaty?. The epithet dasrÁ, as stated, means “miracle-working,” and it relates to the twins’ function as “magic healers.” [70] Since the epithet is isofunctional with the name NÁsaty?, there is now every reason to connect this name with the root nes-, and with the “miraculous” function of “bringing back to life and light.”
The epithet dasrÁ also confirms that the name NÁsaty? has to do with “intelligence.” The epithet has an exact cognate in Avestan da?r?, which means “clever, skillful,” and the Indo-Iranian forms are in turn related to the family of Greek daÊnai, “to learn.” Sanskrit dasrá- must also have implied “intelligence,” [71] and this quality, which is so essential to the epic Sahadeva, is thus confirmed for his Vedic prototype as well.
It is at least highly probable that the name NÁsaty?, as derived from the root nes-, implied “intelligence” directly. The name is thus a precious comparison for Greek nóos, indicating that the root nes– had to do with “intelligence” already in Indo-European. [72]
κα? νιν ο?πω τεθνα?τ’, ?σθματι δ? φρ?σσοντα πνο?ς ?κιχεν.
Apollodorus 3.11.2, however, says that Idas “killed” (κτε?νει) Castor, and that Polydeuces refused immortality from Zeus “while Castor was a corpse” (?ντος νεκρο? Κ?στορος). Pindar’s word φθιμ?νου, “perished,” expresses the underlying reality of the situation, which is that Castor, as a “mortal,” had to “die.” Fragment 6 of the Cypria (Allen) expresses this reality in terms of Castor’s “fate”:
Κ?στωρ μ?ν θνητ?ς, θαν?του δ? ο? α?σα π?πρωται,
α?τ?ρ ? γ’ ?θ?νατος Πολυδε?κης, ?ζος ?ρηος.
Castor, on the one hand, was mortal, and a fate of death was allotted to him, but Polydeuces, scion of Ares, was immortal.
As a combination of immortal and mortal elements, the Dioscuri, even as a pair, experience a regular alternation between “life” and “death.” Such an alternation is precisely what characterizes the twins in our earliest evidence, Odyssey 11.302-04:
ο? κα? ν?ρθεν γ?ς τιμ?ν πρ?ς Ζην?ς ?χοντες
?λλοτε μ?ν ζ?ουσ’ ?τερ?μεροι, ?λλοτε δ’ α?τε
τεθν?σιν.
Obtaining honor from Zeus even beneath the earth, now they live, on alternate days, and now they are dead.
Iliad 3.243-44 is not inconsistent with this passage, although it is briefer, and Pindar Nemean 10.55-57 follows a similar tradition. back
?σσ? μοι υ??ς· τ?νδε δ’ ?πειτα π?σις
σπ?ρμα θνατ?ν ματρ? τε? πελ?σαις
στ?ξεν ?ρως.
You are my son; but as for this one, a hero afterwards let drip his mortal seed when he approached your mother as her husband.
?μφ? Δι?ς κο?ρους ?λικ?πιδες ?σπετε Μο?σαι
Τυνδαρ?δας. . . .
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