Divine twins
[2][3] Scholar Donald Ward proposed a set of common traits that pertain to divine twin pairs of Indo-European mythologies:[4][5] Although the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) name of the Divine Twins cannot be reconstructed with certainty based on the available linguistic evidence, the most frequent epithets associated with the two brothers in liturgic and poetic traditions are the "Youthful" and the "Descendants" (sons or grandsons) of the Sky-God (Dyēus).
[6][7][3] Two well-accepted reflexes of the Divine Twins, the Vedic Aśvins and the Lithuanian Ašvieniai, are linguistic cognates ultimately deriving from the Proto-Indo-European word for the horse, *h1éḱwos.
[8][9] Represented as young men rescuing mortals from peril in battle or at sea, the Divine Twins rode the steeds that pull the sun across the sky and were sometimes depicted as horses themselves.
[1] They are often differentiated: one is represented as a physically strong and aggressive warrior, while the other is seen as a healer who rather gives attention to domestic duties, agrarian pursuits, or romantic adventures.
In the majority of the stories where they appear, the Divine Twins rescue the Dawn from a watery peril, a theme that emerged from their role as the solar steeds.
[12][3] During the night, the Divine Twins were said to return to the east in a golden boat, where they traversed a sea[a] to bring back the rising sun each morning.
In what seems to be a later addition confined to Europe, they were said to take a rest at the end of the day on the "Isles of the Blessed", a land seating in the western sea which possessed magical apple orchards.
[26] The archetype is also partly matched by figures such as the Gallic sun god Belenus, whose epithet Atepomarus meant "having good horses"; Grannus, who is associated with the healing goddess Sirona (her name means "star"); Maponos ("Son of God"), considered in Irish mythology as the son of Dagda, associated with healing,[27][28] The Welsh Brân and Manawydan may also be reflexes of the Divine Twins.
[11] Comparative mythologist Alexander Haggerty Krappe suggested that two heroes, Feradach and Foltlebar, brothers and sons of the king of Innia, are expressions of the mytheme.
These heroes help the expedition of the Fianna into Tir fa Thuinn (a realm on the other side of the sea), in a Orphean mission to rescue some of their members, in the tale The pursuit of the Gilla Decair and his horse.
[58] In addition, according to scholar Elza Kokare, Auseklis belongs to a group of heavenly deities that take part in a mythological drama about a "celestial wedding".
[62] The Polish deities Lel and Polel, first mentioned by Maciej Miechowita in 1519, are presented as the equivalents of Castor and Pollux, the sons of the goddess Łada (counterpart of the Greek Leda) and an unknown male god.
An idol was found in 1969 on the Fischerinsel island, where the cult centres of the Slavic tribe of Veleti was located, depicting two male figures joined with their heads.
[65] During childbirth, the mother of the Polish hero twins Waligóra ("Mountain Beater") and Wyrwidąb ("Oak Tearer") died in the forest, where wild animals took care of them.
Mothered by Princess Madri, who summoned the Aśvins themselves in a prayer to beget her sons (thus them being called Ashvineya (आश्विनेय)), the twins are two of the five Pandava brothers, married to the same woman, Draupadi.
In the Mahabharata epic, Nakula is described in terms of his exceptional beauty, warriorship and martial prowess, while Sahadeva is depicted as patient, wise, intelligent and a "learned man".
[80] The pair of heroic brothers and main characters of the Albanian legendary epic cycle Kângë Kreshnikësh – Muji and Halili – are considered to bear common traits of the Indo-European divine twins.
[81][82][83] The mytheme of the Divine Twins was widely popular in the Indo-European traditions; evidence for their worship can be found from Scandinavia to the Near East as early as the Bronze Age.
[87][88] Literary approaches to the mytheme of the Indo-European Divine Twins can be found in Zeus, a Study in Ancient Religion (1925), by Arthur Bernard Cook.
The British scholar posited that some versions of The Dancing Water, the Singing Apple, and the Speaking Bird, collected from Greek and Italian sources, contained some remnants of Helen and her brothers, the Dioskouroi, in the characters of the wonder-children (triplets or two male/one female siblings) with astronomical motifs on their bodies.
[96] A similar imagery appears in the decoration of Fachhallenhaus, a type of Low German house: the point of the gables consists of carved wooden boards in the shape of (stylised) horses' heads, often serving to protect the edges of the roof from the wind.
