Orion, The : The Antiquity of the Vedas

This ignored scientific research was by one of India's political warriors, who dared to confront the British occupation and British destruction of his homeland. Based on independent research, astronomical facts, and from the Vedas themselves, Tilak proves that these precious manuscripts were written around or in excess of 6000 years ago. Oddly enough this lines up with biblical interpretation that mankind started 6000 years ago...and that the Great Pyramid of Egypt, too was established on a certain position of Orion.

From the Preface

SOME explanation may be necessary for the publication of an essay on the antiquity of the Vedas by one whose professional work lies in a different direction. About four years ago, as I was reading the Bhagavad Gita, it occurred to me that we might derive important conclusions from fche statement of Krishna that ''he was Margashirsha of the months. "

This led me to inquire into the primitive Vedic calendar, and the result of four years' labour is now placed before the public. The essay was originally written for the Ninth Oriental Congress held in London last year. But it was found too large to be inserted in the proceedings wherein its summary alone is now included. I have had therefore to publish it separately, and in doing so I have taken the opportunity of incorporating into it such additions, alterations and modifications, as were suggested by further thought and discussion.

The chief res alt of my inquiry would be evident from the title of the essay. The high antiquity of the Egyptian civilization is now generally admitted. But scholars still hesitate to place the commencement of the Vedic civilization earlier than 2400 B.C. I have endeavoured to show in the following pages that the traditions recorded in the Rigveda unmistakably point to a period not later than 4000 B.C., when the vernal equinox was in Orion, or, in other words, when the Dog-star ( or the Dog as we have it in the Rigveda) commenced the equinoctial year. Many of the Vedic texts and legends, quoted in support of this conclusion, have been cited in this connection and also rationally

and intelligently explained for tho first time, tlius throwing a considerable light on the legends and rites in later Sanskrit works. I have farther tried to show how these legends are strikingly corroborated by the legends and traditions of Iran and Greece. Perhaps some of this corroborative evidence may not be regarded as sufficiently conclusive by itself, but in that case I hope it will be borne in mind that my conclusions are not based merely upon mythological or philological coincidences, and if some of these are disputable, they do not in any way shake the validity of the conclusions based on the express texts and references scattered over the whole Vedic literature.

I wanted to collect together all the facts that could possibly throw any light upon, or be shown to be connected with the question in issue, and if in so doing I have mentioned some "that are not as convincing as the others, I am sure that they will at least be found interesting, and that even after omitting them there will be ample evidence to establish the main point.