Forlong - Rivers of Life

308
Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
and force Pelasgians and others to “move on.” Rome was then an Etruscan city,
and those were then there who had to teach her arts, religion, and a certain amount
of culture, as eastern Aryans had taught Greeks. I have failed in spite of all that has
been said and written regarding the wide difference between Aryan, Turanian, and even
Shemitic races, to find any material divergence in their early religions; and it will
puzzle the wisest to show me this in the worship of Aryan Benares, and Dravidian Tripati,
or Konjeveram. The difference, I find, when carefully considered, is only in language
and nomenclature of the same gods, though not much in this; for if the Shemite caIled
his Lingam-God—Asher, the Sanskrit Aryan named him Eswer, Eshver, or Esh-wāra—
holder of the Esh or Ash; and the Ugriks, Turks, Finns, Etruscans, and such Turanians,
Æsar 1 or Es, that is Esh; he whom the Teutons called Æsir; most ancient Vedantists,
Asur or Asura; Siberians, Asa; Mongols, Es-an, and Yenseian, and most
ancient Ugriks, Ais, Eis, or Es, which in the language of India means sexual enjoyment.
The roots or words AM, LA, AL, AR, RA, EL, &c., are common to Egypt,
Arabia, and Asia; and the Lāt or pole of India, whence we have gained so much
knowledge is but the Lar of the Etruscan, by the light of which word Mr
Taylor helps us to read much. Lars, he thinks, in the most ancient times had
very masculine significations, but I fancy, like Sar the Sun, it was a dual god. Lars
and Larissa are names which old geographers show to have been not uncommon over
all the countries from Katch and Goojerat to the valleys of the Tigris, Euphrates, Nile,
and Tiber. Thus Mr. Taylor claims for the Etruacan Tatars—while tarrying on their
westward way from high Asia, on the upper lands of the Tigris—the founding of the
city of Resen or Rhesœna; Etruscans called themselves Rasennas, and it is clear
Ras had the signification of Lars, for this Rasen Xenophon calls Larissa, and so
we see that the city these Rasens founded afterwards on the Tiber—known to Roman
story as Vulturnum or Capua—was by Dionysius called Lariss. 2 It is clear that in the
very earliest times a dual or feminine deity was here in the very spot where Lars or
Lares and Penates were yet to be so famous; nay, that a Lars, Lares, or Larissa was
ruling some 4000 years ago, and at the same period on the Tigris and the Tiber. L,
says Mr. Taylor, quoting Kasem Bey’s “Turkish and Tatar Grammar,” “is the sign of
the passive in Tatar languages, 3 and we know that P or Pi always denotes
activity, fertilisation, or irritation. In Lukian inscriptions, says Taylor, La’da
rneams wife or lady, which with Etruscans was Larthia; the dead, quiescent spirits or
Menes were called Lemures, Larvæ, and Lares, a fact we would expect, inasmuch as
woman is the passive principle—Nox or Darkness. The Turks, who are also fo Tatar
origin, give us “Li-umm as signifying materity or maternal;” Larvæ we
know to be spirits of evil, and Lares, spirits of good ancestorys, the Etruscan root
Lar signifying great ones. It is clear that La is usually the feminine prefix, as P,
Pa, or Sa is the male, as we see in Sar, Sun, and Pader, father, &c. Lars is still a
personal name among Romans and Lapps, 4 and as l and j or dj are interchangeable,
1 2
See the Rev. Isaac Taylor’s Etruscan Researches, Lon., 1875. Do., p. 375
4
Klemm, quoted by Taylor, p. 123.
3 Do., p. 286.