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D. D. KOSAMBI
Sarasvat is variously given as son or consort* of the river goddess Sarasvati, just as Dakşa is both father and son of Aditi. The confusion, natural conscquence of development from matriarchal cults, suggests the identification of Tvaştp with Tvâştra, at Icast in principle. Gods with scveral hcads would bc associated with the cult of several conflucnt rivers. To continuc: rgvcdic Vişņu has a wife (sumajjānaye vişnave, i.156.2) and several mothers (iii.54.14) while viii.20.3 cquates him to Rudra and the much later Vişnu-smsti (1.56) calls him Saptabirşa without explanation. Both blocks of the firedrill can simultancously be mothers of Agni (v.11.3) Thus Agni or his hcavenly representative the sun (born of heaven and carth) is dvimālā in i.31.2;i.112.4;iii.55.6-7; he is thrcehcaded in 1.146.1 but morc naturally four-cycd in i.31.13 and divisīrṣa in the Sabdacandrikā. The clephant god Gancía is also dvaimītura (Amarakośa 1.1. 140). The BỊhadratha king Jarasamdha was born of two sisters, in two scpa. rate halves later joined together (Mbh.2.16.12-40), which rationalizes the twomother tradition. Rāma cmulatcs Indra and Thraciona in killing a threehcaded demon Tribiras (Raghuvamba 12.47; also Rāmāyana), The Sahdakalpadruma refers to Kālikāpurāna 46 where Hara is called Tryambaka for having been born of thrce mothers. Būhtlingk-Roth give Tribiras as an cpithet of Kubcra (whose thrcc lcgs relate him to the triskelis and the threestrider tripāda Visnu) as well as Siva who in turn is made four-headed in the Tilottamā cpisode (Mbh. 1.203.26) and known both to literature as well as inconography in a five-headed pañcamukha form. Nágas with two, five, seven heads occur in Mbh. 1.52.20, carrying us back to Mesopotamian seals. Even the old Aryan god Varuņa is oncc called four-faced (v.48.5 caluranīka), and again lord of his seven sisters (viii.41.9) thus substituting for somc prc-Aryan dcity ; Indra as saptahá (x.49.8) was too open an enemy (cf.viii.96.16) for this assimilatory treatment. The names Navagva and Dasagva, meaning of nine and ten parts respectively, give clcar indication of ancient Rigvedic groups of ninc or ten pricstly clans of cqual status with the oldest Angirasas (x.62.6; the Nayagvas arc against Indra in i.33.6?). Yet cach is used often in the singular as representing the conjoint group. This could casily arisc from or give risc to the many-headed representation, as for cxample the 'first-born' ten-headed Brāhmaṇa of AV.iv.6.1,or a seven-faced Daśagya Angiras in iv. 51.4. Tvaştr creates BỊhaspati from the essence of cverything (ii.23.17) and also crcates fire (x.2.7 ;x.46.9 ;i1.1.5); but the latter embryo is gencratcd by ten maidens (i.95.2) symbolizing the fingers that twirl the fire-drill, reminiscent of the Vestals. Agni is threc-hcaded and saptarasmi in 1.146.1, just as Tvāştra is in x. 8.8; Brhaspati is saplarasmi and saptāsya in iv. 50.4. As for mother-right, Namuci's army recruited women(v.30.9) to the derision of Indra. The Mothers join Skanda's army (Mbh. Vulgate, Salyaparvan), and have still to hc propitiated by his worshippers. The cow-mother Pęśni is mother of the Maruts, and in
*Qingu, taken as consort by Tiamat after the killing of Apal', scems also to be Tiamal's son (Lange don's translation of the Enuma Elif, ii.31. 1.41), Similarly Tarrauz and Lhtar.
