Page:History of India Vol 1.djvu/218

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170
THE SACRIFICIAL RITES OF THE BRAHMANAS


SIVA SLATING KAMADEVA, OR CUPID.

accept it, together with thy sister Ambika!" In a celebrated passage in the Mundaka Upanishad, an Upanishad of the Atharva-Veda, we find Kali, Karali, Manojava, Sulohita, Sudhumarvarna, Sphulingini, and Visvarupi as the names of the seven tongues of fire. Finally, in the Satapatha Brahmana we are told of a sacrifice being performed by Daksha Parvati, and in the Kena Upanishad we find mention of a woman named Uma Haimavati, who appeared before Indra and explained to Indra the nature of Brahma. These are a few specimens of the scattered materials in the Brahmana literature, from which the gorgeous Puranic legend of Siva and his consort was developed.

In the Aitareya Brahmana and in the Satapatha Brahmana we are told the story of the gods obtaining from the Asuras the part of the world which Vishnu could stride over or cover, and thus they managed to get the whole world. It is in the concluding book of this latter Brahmana that Vishnu obtains a sort of supremacy among gods, and his head is then struck off by Indra. Krishna, the son of Devaki, is not yet a deity; he is a pupil of Ghora Angirasa in the Chhandogya Upanishad.