Indo-European cosmogony

Although some thematic parallels can be made with Ancient Near East (the primordial couple Adam and Eve), and even Polynesian or South American legends, the linguistic correspondences found in descendant cognates of *Manu and *Yemo make it very likely that the myth discussed here has a Proto-Indo-European (PIE) origin.

[1] Hermann Güntert, stressing philological parallels between the Germanic and Indo-Iranian texts, argued in 1923 for an inherited Indo-European motif of the creation of the world from the sacrifice and dismemberment of a primordial androgyne.

[15] Yemo may have become the King of the Otherworld, the realm of the dead, as the first mortal to die in the primordial sacrifice, a role suggested by the Indo-Iranian and, to a lesser extent, in the Germanic, Greek and Celtic traditions.

[19][4] Trito first suffers at his hands, but fortified by an intoxicating drink and aided by a helper-god (the Storm-God or *Haner, 'Man'),[4][20] together they go to a cave or a mountain, and the hero finally manages to overcome the monster.

[30] The myth has been variously interpreted as a cosmic conflict between a heavenly hero and an earthly serpent; as a depiction of the male fellowships' struggle to protect society against external evil; or as an Indo-European victory over non-Indo-European people, the monster symbolizing the aboriginal thief or usurper.

[33] Cognates deriving from the Proto-Indo-European First Priest *Manu ('Man', 'ancestor of humankind') include the Indic Mánu, legendary first man in Hinduism, and Manāvī, his sacrificed wife; the Germanic Mannus (from Germ.

[43] Many Indo-European beliefs explain aspects of human anatomy from the results of the original dismemberment of Yemo: his flesh usually becomes the earth, his hair grass, his bone yields stone, his blood water, his eyes the sun, his mind the moon, his brain the clouds, his breath the wind, and his head the heavens.

[5] The traditions of sacrificing an animal before dispersing its parts following socially established patterns, a custom found in Ancient Rome and India, has been interpreted as an attempt to restore the balance of the cosmos ruled by the original sacrifice.

[14] This divergence may be explained by the cultural differences between the Indo-Iranian and European branches of the Indo-European family, with the former still strongly influenced by pastoralism, and the latter much more agricultural, perceiving the cow mainly as a source of milk.

[53] Although his realm was originally associated with feasting, beauty and happiness, Yama was gradually portrayed as a horrific being and the ruler of the Otherworld in the epic and puranic traditions.

Discussing the advisability of incest in a primordial context, Yamī insists on having sexual intercourse with her brother Yama, who rejects it, thus forgoing his role as the creator of humankind.

The original myth of creation was indeed condemned by Zarathustra, who makes mention of it in the Avesta when talking about the two spirits that "appeared in the beginning as two twins in a dream ... (and) who first met and instituted life and non-life".

The story, giving a central position to the new religious leader, is once again probably the result of a Zoroastrian reformation of the original myth, and Yima might have been seen as the ruler of the realm of the dead in the early Iranian tradition.

[59] Both the Rigveda and the Younger Avesta depict the slaying of a three-headed serpent by a hero named Trita Āptya or Thraēta(ona) Āthwya for the recovery of cattle or women.

[33] In the Younger Avestan, the stolen cattle was replaced with his two beautiful wives (vantā), said to have been abducted by the serpent Aži Dahāka and whom the hero Thraētona ('son of Thrita') eventually wins back after confronting the monster.

[62] Although Thraētona was aided in his quest by several deities, the pre-Zoroastrian warrior-god *Vr̥traghna ('Smasher of Resistance') appears to be the most probable helper-god in the original Iranian myth, since it was the name borrowed as Vahagn in the Armenian version of the story.

In a version of the myth, Rōmulus himself is said to have been torn limb-from-limb by a group of senators for being a tyrant,[64] which may represent a reflex of the gods who sacrificed the twin giant in the original motif.

[13] Like in the Proto-Indo-European myth, the sacrifice of Remus (Yemos) led to a symbolical creation of humankind, represented by the birth of the three Roman 'tribes' (the Ramnes, Luceres and Tities), and to the enthronement of his brother as the 'First King'.

[66] Some scholars have proposed that the original motifs of Yemo, the Proto-Indo-European sacrificed twin ancestor and ruler of the dead, have been transferred in Greek mythology to three different figures: Kronos, Rhadamanthys and Menealos.

[33] Roman versions of myth, which relied on earlier Greek texts, have been remodelled around an opposition between Hercules and a fire-breathing ogre named Cācus, who lives in a cave on the Aventine.

After Óðinn and his brothers killed him, they made the earth out of his flesh, the mountains from his bones, the trees from his hair, the sky from his skull, and the sea and lakes from his blood; and from his two armpits came a man and a woman.

98 AD), Tacitus reports the existence of a myth involving an earth-born god named Tuisto ('Twin') who fathered Mannus ('Man'), the ancestor of West Germanic peoples.

[41][75][33] Another reflex may be found in the Norse legend of the giant Hymir who employed an ox head to capture the serpent Jǫrmungandr with the help of the storm-god Thor.

[86] Ranko Matasović cites the existence of Jumala as a female counterpart and sister of Jumis in Latvian dainas (folksongs), as another fertility deity,[87][88] and in the same vein, Zmago Smitek mentioned the pair as having "pronounced vegetational characteristics".

[89] Jumis, whose name can also mean 'double ear of wheat', is also considered a Latvian chthonic deity that lived "beneath the plowed field",[90] or a vegetation spirit connected to the harvest.

[91][92] Following Puhvel's line of argument, Belarusian scholar Siarhiej Sanko attempted to find a Proto-Baltic related pair, possibly named Jumis ("twin") and Viras ("male, hero").

[105][106] This name may have left traces in other Nuristani languages: Waigali Yamrai,[107] Kalash (Urtsun) imbro,[108] Ashkun im'ra, Prasun yumr'a and Kati im'ro – all referring to a "creator god".

[109][110] This deity also acts as the guardian to the gates of hell (located in a subterranean realm), preventing the return to the world of the living - a motif that echoes the role of Yama as the king of the underworld.