*H₂éwsōs

The dawn rising on the Ukrainian steppes (1852), by Alexei Kondratievich Savrasov.

Hausōs (Proto-Indo-European: *h₂éwsōs; also *hₐéusōs; lit. "the dawn") is the reconstructed name of the Dawn-goddess in the Proto-Indo-European mythology.

Hausōs is believed to have been one of the most important deities worshipped by Proto-Indo-European speakers due to the consistency of her characterization in subsequent traditions as well as the importance of the goddess Uṣas in the Rigveda.

Her attributes have not only been mixed with those of solar goddesses in some later traditions, but have subsequently expanded and influenced female deities in other mythologies.

Name

Etymology

The reconstructed Proto-Indo-European name of the dawn, *h₂éwsōs, derives the verbal root *hₐ(e)wes- ('to shine, glow red, a flame') extended by the suffix -ós-. The root also underlies the word for 'gold' (*hₐeus-om 'glow'; compare with Latin aurum, Old Prussian ausis, Lithunian áusas 'gold').

A derivative adverb, *hₐews-t(e)ro- ('east'), was also preserved in the Latvian àustrums ('east'), Avestan ušatara ('east'), Italic *aus-tero- ('towards the dawn'; compare with Latin auster 'south wind, south'), Old Church Slavonic ustrŭ ('summer'), and Germatic *austera (compare with English east, MHG oster).

Epithets

A common epithet associated with the Dawn is *Diwós Dʰuǵhₐtḗr, the 'Daughter of Dyēus', the Sky-god. Cognates stemming from the formulaic expression appear in three traditions: 'Daughter of Heaven' in the Rigveda (as an epithet of Uṣas), 'Daughter of Zeus' (a Homeric title associated with Ēṓs), and 'Daughter of Dievas' (an epithet transferred to a Sun-goddess in the Lithuanian folklore).

Depiction

Birth

The Dawn-goddess is sometimes portrayed as unageing and her coming as an eternal rebirth. She is ἠριγένεια ('early-born', 'born in the morning') in the Iliad, and the Rigveda describes Uṣas, the daughter of Dyáuṣ, as being born from the harnessing of the Aśvins, the divine horse twins driving the chariot of the sun.

Colours

A characteristic generally given to the dawn Hausōs is her 'brilliance' and she is generally described as a 'bringer of light'. Various cognates associated with the dawn-goddess indeed derive from the Proto-Indo-European root *bʰeh₂-, meaning 'to glow, shine'. The Vedic Uṣas is described as bhānty Usásah ('the Dawns shine'), the Avestan Ušå as uši ... bāmya ('shining dawn') and the Greek Ēṓs as φαινόλις ('light-bringing'), or λαμπρο-φαής ('light beam[ing]'), attested in an Orphic hymn to the Dawn.

Hausōs is usually associated with the natural colours of the dawn: gold, saffron-yellow, red or crimson. The Dawn is 'gold-coloured' (híraṇya-varṇā) in the Rigveda, 'the golden-yellow one' (flāua) in Ovid's Amores, and 'gold-throned' (krysóthronos; χρυσόθρονος) in a Homeric formula. In Latvian folk songs, Saulė and her daughter(s) are dressed of shawls woven with gold thread, and Saulė wears shoes of gold, which parallels Sappho describing Ēṓs as 'golden-sandalled' (khrysopédillos; χρυσοπέδιλλος). Ēṓs is also 'saffron-robed' (κροκόπεπλος) in Homeric poems, and Uṣás described as a red dawn shining from afar, and 'red, like a mare', she shoots 'ruddy beams of light', 'yokes red steeds to her car' or 'harnesses the red cows' in the Samaveda. Saffron-yellow, red and purple are also colours associated with the Dawn by the Latin poet Ovid. The Baltic Sun-goddess Saulė has preserved some of the imagery, and she is sometimes portrayed as waking up 'red' (sārta) or 'in a red tree' in the morning.

Movements

Hausōs is also described as dancing: Uṣas throws on embroidered garments 'like a dancer' (nṛtūr iva), Ēṓs has 'dancing-places' (χοροί) around her house in the East, Saulė is portrayed dancing in her gilded shoes on a silver hill, and her fellow Baltic goddess Aušrinė is said to dance on a stone for the people on the first day of summer.

The spread hand as the image of the sun's rays in the morning may also be of Proto-Indo-European origin. The Homeric expressions 'rose-armed' (rhodópēkhus; ῥοδόπηχυς) and 'rosy-fingered Dawn' (rhododáktylos Ēṓs; ῥοδοδάκτυλος Ἠώς), as well as Bacchylides' formula 'gold-armed' (khrysopakhús; χρυσοπαχύς), can be semantically compared with the Vedic formulas 'golden-handed' (híraṇyapāṇi-; हिरण्यपाणि) and 'broad-handed' (pṛthúpāṇi-; पृथुपाणि). They are also similar to Latvian poetic songs where the Sun-god's fingers are said to be 'covered with golden rings'. According to Martin L. West, "the 'rose' part is probably a Greek refinement."

Dwelling

Another common trait of the Dawn goddess is her dwelling, situated on an island in the Ocean or in an Eastern house. In Greek mythology, Ēṓs is described as living 'beyond the streams of Okeanos at the ends of the earth'. In Slavic folklore, the home of the Zoryas was sometimes said to be on Bouyan (or Buyan), an oceanic island paradise where the Sun dwelt along with his attendants, the North, West and East winds. The Avesta refers to a mythical eastern mountain called Ušidam- ('Dawn-house'). In a myth from Lithuania, a man named Joseph becomes fascinated with Aušrinė appearing in the sky and goes on a quest to find the 'second sun', who is actually a maiden that lives on an island in the sea and has the same hair as the Sun. In the Baltic folklore, Saulė is said to live in a silver-gated castle at the end of the sea, or to go to an island in the middle of the sea for her nocturnal rest.

Role

Opener of the doors of Heaven

Hausōs is also depicted as the opener of the doors or gates of Heaven: the Baltic verse pie Dieviņa namdurēm ('by the doors of the house of God'), which Saulė is urged to open to the horses of the Son(s) of God, is lexically comparable with the Vedic expression dvā́rau ... Diváḥ ('doors of Heaven'), which Uṣas opens with her light. Another parallel could be made with the 'shining doors' (θύρας ... φαεινάς) of the home of Ēṓs, behind which she locks up her lover Tithonus as he grows old and withers in Homer's Hymn to Aphrodite.

A similar poetic imagery is present among Classical poets, although some earlier Greek source may lie behind these. In Ovid's Metamorphoses, Aurōra opens the red doors (purpureas fores) to fill her rosy halls, and in Nonnus' Dionysiaca the Dawn-goddess shakes off her sleep and leaves Kephalos' repose in order to 'open the gates of sunrise' (ἀντολίης ὤιξε θύρας πολεμητόκος Ἠώς).

Other reflexes may also be present in other Indo-European traditions. In Slavic folklore, the goddess of the dawn Zorya Utrennyaya open the palace's gates for her father Dažbog's (a Slavic Sun god) journey during the day. Her sister Zorya Vechernyaya, the goddess of dusk, closes them at the end of the day. In a passage of the Eddas about Dellingr, a Norse deity of light, a dwarf utters a charm or incantation in front of 'Delling's doors' (fyr Dellings durum), which apparently means "at dawn".

Bringer of Light

In Indo-European myths, Hausōs is either depicted as a reluctant bringer of light for which she is punished, or as a victim saved by her brothers the Divine Twins from a watery peril in the eastern sea. This theme is widespread in the attested traditions: Ēṓs and Aurōra are sometimes unwilling to leave her bed, Uṣas is punished by Indra for attempting to forestall the day, and Auseklis did not always rise in the morning, as she was said to be locked up in a golden chamber or in Germany sewing velvet skirts.

The Dawn is often described as driving some sort of vehicle, probably originally a wagon or a similar carrier, certainly not a chariot as the technology appeared later within the Sintashta culture (2100–1800), associated with the Indo-Iranian peoples. In the Odyssey, Ēṓs appears once as a charioteer, with two swift horses named Lampos and Phaethon, and Bacchylides calls her 'white-horsed Dawn' (λεύκιππος Ἀώς). Uṣas yokes red oxen or cows, probably pictorial metaphors for the red clouds or rays seen at morning light.

The vehicle is portrayed as a biga or a rosy-red quadriga in Virgil's Aeneid and in classical references from Greek epic poetry and vase painting, a shining chariot drawn by golden-red horses. Saulė, a sun-goddess syncretized with the Dawn, also drives a carriage with copper-wheels, pulled by untiring horses, or a 'pretty little sleigh' (kamaņiņa) made of fish-bones.

Evidence

Aurora (1621) by Guercino.

Cognates stemming from the root *h₂éwsōs and associated with a dawn-goddess are attested in the following mythologies:

• PIE: *hₐ(e)wes-, meaning "to shine, light up, glow red, a flame",
  • PIE: *h₂éws-ōs, the Dawn-goddess,
    • Indo-Iranian:
      • Vedic: Uṣás (उषस्), the goddess of the dawn, and the most addressed goddess in the Rigveda, with twenty-one hymns,
      • Avestan: Ušå, honoured in one passage of the Avesta (Gāh 5. 5), and Ušahina, the special Angel of the time separating midnight from the moment when the stars become visible.
    • Hellenic: *Auhṓs,
      • Greek: Ēṓs (Ἠώς), a Titaness and the goddess of the dawn, and Aotis, an epithet used by the Spartan poet Alcman and interpreted as a dawn goddess.
    • Italic: *Ausōs > *Ausōs-ā (with an a-stem extension likely explained by the feminine gender),
      • Roman: Aurōra, whose attributes are a mirror reflection of the Greek deity; the original motif of Hausōs may have been preserved in Mater Matuta,
    • Slavic: Auroras, name of the two primordial stars, the Morning and the Evening Stars,
  • PIE: *h₂ws-s-i, locative singular of *h₂éwsōs,
    • Armenian (Proto): *aw(h)i-, evolving as *awi̯ -o-, then *aygo-,
      • Armenian: Ayg (այգ), the Dawn-goddess.
    • Germanic: *Auzi-wandalaz, a compound used as a personal name,
      • Old Norse: Aurvandil, husband of the seeress and sorceress Gróa,
      • Old English: Earendel, meaning "dawn, ray of light",
  • PIE: *h₂ews-rom (or *h₂ews-reh₂), "matutinal, pertaining to the dawn",
    • Balto-Slavic: *Auṣ(t)ro,
      • Baltic: *Aušra,
        • Lithuanian: Aušrinė, personification of the Morning Star (Venus), said to begin each day by lighting a fire for the sun,
        • Latvian: Auseklis (ausa "dawn" attached to the derivative suffix -eklis), personification of the Morning Star, and a reluctant goddess of the dawn,
    • Germanic: *Austrōn, goddess of the springtime, also at the origin of the word "Easter",
      • Romano-Germanic: matronae Austriahenae, a name present in votive inscriptions found in 1958 in Germany.
      • Old English: Ēastre, personification of Easter,
      • Old High German: *Ōstara, personification of Easter (also Ôstarmânôth, Ôst(a)rûn; Modern German: Ostern).

Epithets

The formulaic expression "Daughter of Dyēus" is attested as an epithet attached to a dawn-goddess in several poetic traditions:

• PIE: *diwós dʰuǵhₐtḗr, "Daughter of Dyēus",
  • Vedic: duhitā́r-diváh, "Daughter of Heaven", epithet of Uṣas,
  • Homeric: thugátēr Diós, "Daughter of Zeus", epithet of Ēṓs,
  • Lithuanian: dievo dukrytė, "Daughter of Dievas", epithet of the Sun-goddess which likely took the attributes of Hausōs.

The Sanskrit epithet dyotaná ("The Light Bearer") is also used once in reference to Ushas in the Rigveda.

Poetic and liturgic formula

An expression of formulaic poetry can be found in the Proto-Indo-European expression *hₐ(e)ws-sḱeti ("it dawns"), attested in Lithuanian aušta, Avestan usaitī, or Sanskrit ucchāti. The poetic formula 'the lighting dawn' is also attested in the Indo-Iranian tradition: Sanskrit uchantīm usásam, and Young Avestan usaitīm uṣ̌ā^̊ŋhəm.

Other remnants of the root *h₂éwsōs are present in the Zoroastrian prayer to the dawn Hoshbām, and in Ušahin gāh (the dawn watch), sung between midnight and dawn. In Persian historical and sacred literature, the personal name Aûshbâm also appears in the Chapter XXXI of the Bundahishn, translated as "the dawn".

A special carol, zorile ("dawn"), was sung by the colindători (traditional Romanian singers) during funerals, imploring the Dawns not be in a hurry to break, or begging them to prevent the dead from departing this world. The word is of Slavic origin, with the term for 'dawn' attached to the Romanian article -le.

Legacy

According to linguist Václav Blažek, the Albanian word (h)yll ("star") finds a probable etymology in the root *hₐews- ('dawn'), perhaps specifically in *hₐus-li ('morning-star'). Scholars have also argued that the Roman ethnonym Aurēlius (Ausēlii, from Sabine *ausēla 'sun') and the Etruscan sun-god Usil, probably of Osco-Umbrian origin, may be related to the Indo-European word for the dawn.

The word for the dawn as a meteorological event has also been preserved in numerous Indo-European cognates: Welsh gwawr ('dawn'), Lith. aušrà ('dawn'), OCS za ustra ('in the morning'), Old Irish fāir ("sunrise"), or Skt uṣar-búdh- ('waking at dawn').

Influences

The Japanese goddess of the dawn Uzume, revered in Shintoism, was probably influenced by Vedic religion. It has been suggested by anthropologist Kevin Tuite that Georgian goddess Dali also shows several parallels with Indo-European dawn-goddesses.

A possible mythological descendant of the Indo-European Dawn-goddess may be Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and lust. Scholars posit similarities based on her connection with a sky-deity as her father (Zeus or Uranus) and her association with red and gold colors. In the Illiad, Aphrodite is hurt by a mortal and seeks solace in her mother's (Dione) bosom. Dione is seen as a female counterpart to Zeus and is thought to etymologically derive from Proto-Indo-European root *Dyeus.

Bibliography

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• Martirosyan, Hrach K. (2008). Etymological dictionary of the Armenian inherited lexicon. Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-17337-8.
• Martirosyan, Hrach K. (2014). "An Armenian theonym of Indo-European origin: Ayg 'Dawn Goddess'". Armenian Journal of Near Eastern Studies. 8: 219–224.
• Massetti, Laura (2019). "Antimachus's Enigma on Erytheia, the Latvian Sun-goddess and a Red Fish". The Journal of Indo-European Studies. 47 (1–2).
• Shaw, Philip A. (2011). Pagan Goddesses in the Early Germanic World: Eostre, Hreda and the Cult of Matrons. Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 978-0-7156-3797-5.
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Further reading

• Jackson, Peter. "Πότνια Αὔως: The Greek Dawn-Goddess and Her Antecedent." Glotta 81 (2005): 116-23. Accessed May 10, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/40267187.

External links

• Media related to Hausos at Wikimedia Commons