The Vedic fathers of geology

82 Tue Vuptc FATHERS or Gronoey.

For, the Vendidad says, “ Ahurmazda spoke unto Yima: “QO happy Yima Vivanhana ! Upon the world of animated beings, the evils of winter will come, and consequently a strong deadly frost.” (Vendidad. ch II. vide Dr. Hang’s Religion of the Parsees. Edition 1862. p. 204). And evidently, this hard winter or deadly frost was nothing more than the advent of the Glacial Period at the close of the Tertiary Epoch, of which we have given particulars in the fifth chapter.

Thus, both the Rrg-Vedic and the Avestic evidence, coupled with the scientific testimony derived from hard geological facts, sufficiently proves that our hoary Rig- Vedic ancestors lived during the Tertiary Epoch; that they were autochthonous in A’ryAvarta, had colonized the Arctic regions, and made extensive settlements there, as also. elsewhere ; that they had witnessed the Great-Ice-Age ; that at the advent of this Glacial Epoch, they were compelled to abandon the once genial Arctic colonies, owing to sheets of Ice and snow having capped the mountains and spread over the higher latitudes ; that it was then that the Indo-A’ryans, who belonged to, and were born in, A ‘ryavarta, and had also kept uninterrupted communication with this their Mother-Country, during their sojoum in