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Açvins; while again the sun starts their chariot before Dawn, and as sons of Zeus they are invoked "when darkness still stands among the shining clouds (cows)."[109]
Husbands or brothers or children of Dawn, the Horsemen are also S[=u]ry[=al's husbands, and she is the sun's daughter (Dawn?) or the sun as female. But this myth is not without contradictions, for S[=u]ry[=a) elsewhere weds Soma, and the Açvins are the bridegroom's friends; whom P[=u]shan chose on this occasion as his parents; he who (unless one with Soma) was the prior bridegroom of the same much-married damsel.[110]
The current explanation of the Açvins is that they represent two periods between darkness and dawn, the darker period being nearer night, the other nearer day. But they probably, as inseparable twins, are the twinlights or twilight, before dawn, half dark and half bright. In this light it may well be said of them that one alone is the son of bright Dyaus, that both wed Dawn, or are her brothers. They always come together. Their duality represents, then, not successive stages but one stage in day's approach, when light is dark and dark is light. In comparing the Açvins to other pairs[111] this dual nature is frequently referred to; but no less is there a triality in connection with them which often in describing them has been ignored. This is that threefold light which opens day; and, as in many cases they join with Dawn, so their color is inseparable. Strictly speaking, the break of red is the dawn and the white and yellow lights precede this[112]. Thus in V. 73.5: "Red birds flew round you as S[=u]ry[=a] stepped upon your chariot"; so that it is quite impossible, in accordance with the poets themselves, to limit the Açvins to the twilight. They are a variegated growth from a black and white seed. The chief function of the Açvins, as originally conceived, was the finding and restoring of vanished light. Hence they are invoked as finders and aid-gods in general (the myths are given in Myriantheus).
Some very amusing and some silly legends have been collected and told by the Vedic poets in regard to the preservation and resuscitating power of the Açvins—how an old man was rejuvenated by them (this is also done by the three Ribhus, master-workmen
