David H.

Sick

Dumzil, Lincoln, and the Genetic Model

Abstract
The genetic model, where one posits a derivation from a common ancestor in order
to interpret developments in the languages, religions, or other aspects of cultures
of related peoples, has been used in Indo-European studies since the inception of
the field. The application of this model is evident in both the work of Georges
Dumzil and his critic Bruce Lincoln. The difference in their respective methods of
application of the model begins to explain a basic element of their
disagreement.
By tempering the methods of application employed by Lincoln and Dumzil a
resolution of the disagreement is possible. An example of this tempered method of
application is provided: myths concerning the movements of the soul to a particular cosmologicaI structure described in Plato 's Phaedrus are compared with those
recounted about a similar structure in Vedic hymns.

T h e identifying of similarities in myths from several Indo-European (IE) cultures

in order to suggest a common heritage from one proto-myth is a fairly standard
method in the comparative study of IE myth. In other words, the investigator indicates that two, three, four, or any other number of myths are similar and thereafter
uses the similarities to establish the outline of an older myth from which the examined myths are assumed to have descended. The myth is termed >proto-< because it
is hypothetical; a perfect manifestation will never be found, since the era in which
it was to have originated is presumed to have been pre-literate, and, moreover, it
may never have existed as a distinct reality since the proto-myth may represent a
point in a fluid continuum of mythic discourse. Thus, when reference is made to a
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) myth we mean a myth whose content and even existence has been deduced by comparing myths from several IE cultures.
For the most part, this method for the study of IE mythology developed alongside the study of IE languages; the discovery of the relation of the IE languages
spurred the study of IE myths. Linguists of the nineteenth century and earlier noticed similar lexical items in languages as diverse as Sanskrit and Greek, Persian
and Gaelic. These similarities were explained by the proposition that the languages
involved were related, specifically that they all descended from the same parent
language.1 To take an oft-cited example, Sanskrit Vbhar-, Greek *-, Latin */er-,
1

The use of familial terms to describe the relations of IE languages goes back to the origins of
the field itself. In 1786 Sir William Jones gave a series of lectures describing the purposes of
the Asiatic Society of Bengal. In his discussion of the languages of Asia Jones commented

ZfR 6, 1998, 179-195

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David H. Sick

and Old English *ber- all come from PIE *bher- >bear, carry <. In the context of
linguistics the term Proto-Indo-European is used today in order to designate representations of the hypothetical language or group of languages from which all
extant, related IE languages derive. In a similar manner with regard to myth, if
cattle-raiding stories are told about Greek Nestor, Roman Romulus and Remus, and
Indian Indra, they might all descend from PIE *cattle-raiding myth A. This method
of searching for parental prototypes, whether in language or in some other component of a culture, from which the later examples derive is usually referred to as the
>genetic model. 2
The merit of the application of the genetic model in the study of IE language
precipitated a vigorous effort in its application to the study of IE myth; 3 yet the
early work in IE studies was subsequently rejected in the late nineteenth century
because of its close association with nature mythology. 4 Moreover, the whole field
upon the nature and origin of Sanskrit and first employed the now common familial terminology: ...no philologer could examine them all three (Sanskrit, Latin, Greek) without believing them to have sprung from one common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists;
there is similar reason, though not quite so forcible, for supposing that both the Gothick and
the Celtick, though blended with a very different idiom, had the same origin with Sanscrit,
and the old Persian might be added to the same family. The Works of Sir William Jones,
London 1807, 111.24. At several other points in his writings Jones refers to Sanskrit as the
sister of Greek and Latin. See G. Cannon (ed.), The Letters of Sir William Jones, Oxford
1970, 711, 727, 747, 780. There were, however, a few philologists who noted similarities in
the languages of the IE family before Jones; for their contributions, see B. Sergent, Les IndoEuropens, Paris 1995, 20-25; J. P. Mallory, In Search of the Indo-Europeans, New York
1989, 273, n. 1. For an introduction to the history of the field of IE linguistics, see Sergent,
R. S. P. Beekes, Comparative Indo-European Linguistics, Philadelphia 1995; Th. V.
Gamkrelidze; V. V. Ivanov, Indo-European and the Indo-Europeans, translated by Johanna
Nichols, New York, 1995; W. P. Lehmann, Theoretical Bases of Indo-European
Linguistics,
New York 1993; O. Szemernyi, Einfhrung in die vergleichende
Sprachwissenschaft,
Darmstadt 1990.
2

For an investigation of how of this essentially linguistic model is applied to other aspects of
cultures, see C. S. Littleton, Georges Dumzil and the Rebirth of the Genetic Model: an
Anthropological Appreciation, in: Myth in Indo-European Antiquity, Berkeley 1974, 16970: ... one of the most significant and far-reaching implications of Dumzil's work for my
field [is] the extent to which the genetic model can fruitfully be applied beyond the narrow
confines of historical linguistics. 173: The genetic model is by no means new [...] it has
been the fundamental model for the historical relationships among languages since the inception of historical linguistics at the beginning of the nineteenth century [...]. Now, thanks
primarily to the efforts of Professor Dumzil, this long-neglected model - neglected, that is,
by anthropological folklorists and mythologists - has received new luster.
Particularly among the German romanticists; see B. Feldman; R. D. Richardson, The Rise of
Modern Mythology, Bloomington, IN 1972, 349-364. Even in the studies of Jones himself IE
languages and myths were intricately intertwined; see his On the Gods of Greece, Italy and
India, in: The Works of..., with an excerpt in Feldman and Richardson, 270-275, and the introduction to his translation of the laws of Manu, where he posits a common origin for Manu
and Minos, the Cretan king, lawgiver, and judge of the dead: Institutes of Hindu Law, London, 1796, viii-xi. The application of the genetic model in the study of myth predates the
discovery of the IE family of languages because of scholarly attempts to prove the derivation
of humanity through the single human of Genesis, Adam, or the single family of Noah after
the flood. See Feldman and Richardson, 71-78; L. Poliakov, The Aryan Myth, translated by
Edmund Howard, New York 1974; M. lender, The Languages of Paradise, translated byA.
Goldhammer, Cambridge, MA 1992.
F. M. Mller used his knowledge of Sanskrit to make comparisons with the classical languages thereby formulating a comparative philological argument for his theory of a solar
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of IE studies fell into disrepute because of its close association with the attempt to
prove the cultural and racial superiority of the Aryan peoples by the National
Socialists, their predecessors, and their allies.5
IE studies in general and the genetic model in particular were then revived in
this century by the work of the French linguist, philosopher, and social scientist
Georges Dumzil. Dumzil recognized a threefold division of human social groups
in many of the myths from IE societies; IE cultural items tend to organize humans
into three categories with distinct characteristics: the first is concerned with sovereignty, be it juridical or religious; the second with force, particularly that of the
warrior, and the third with production, be it natural or mechanistic. This division
extended into the representation of deities as well. Dumzil believed that the myths
which demonstrated this tripartite structure were validating a set of ideological
principles or fonctions, to use Dumzil's term, by which IE speaking peoples
have tended to organize their societies theoretically. Although Dumzil's proposal
of les trois fonctions indo-europennes is far from universally accepted, the
genetic model which he reintroduced to the study of IE mythology continues to be
used. 6

mythology. For the relationship of IE linguistics to nineteenth century naturalistic theories of

myth, see C. S. Littleton, The New Comparative Mythology, Berkeley 1982, 32-42; R. M.
Dorson, The Eclipse of Solar Mythology, in: American Folklore 68, 1955, 393-416, reprinted in: Th. A. Sebeok (ed.), Myth: a Symposium, Bloomington, IN 1974, 25-63; J. de
Vries Theories Concerning Nature Myths, in: The Study of Religion, translated by Kees
W. Bolle, New York, 1967, reprinted in: A. Dundes (ed.), Sacred Narrative: Readings in the
Theory of Myth, Berkeley 1984, 30-40.
A basic error of thinking committed by some early Indo-Europeanists that allowed for the
perversion of the field was to consider language, culture, and ethnicity as coequivalent in
human groups, that is that those who share a common linguistic heritage also share a social
and biological heritage. Such an assumption of course allowed for the division of modern
peoples along spurious lines and in ultimately destructive ways. Mller reacted against this
fallacy late in his career; see, for example, F. M. Mller, Thought Thicker than Blood, in:
Three Lectures in the Science of Language, Chicago 1899, 43: As a negro may learn English and become, as has been the case, an English bishop, it would seem as if language by itself could hardly be said to prove relationship. That being so, I have always, beginning with
my very first contribution to the Science of Language [...], warned against mixing up these
two relationships - the relationship of language and the relationship of blood.
On IE studies and fascism, see most recently B. Lincoln, Rewriting the German War God,
in: HoR 37, 1998, 187-208. Also Sergent, Les Indo-Europens..., 37-41, L. Poliakov, The
Aryan Myth, and M. lender, The Languages of Paradise...
Dumzil's inaugural lecture upon his appointment to the chair of IE Civilizations at the
Collge de France neatly sets out his methods for an audience of educated non-specialists
and argues why a shared heritage is the best explanation for the common features found in
the myths of the IE-speaking peoples: Notons aussi que cette explication des concordances
par une parent gntique, ainsi prcise en explication par un >hritage commun< se trouve,
d'avance, permise, mme recommande, par le fait que les socits dont les civilisations
seront compares parlent des langues issues d'une mme langue mre... G. Dumzil, Leon
inaugurale, Paris 1950, 12-13.
Dumzil was a prolific writer, and it is thus probably best to start with his introductory work,
L'idologie tripartie des indo-europens, Brussells, 1958; a comprehensive review of his
work done by C. S. Littleton, New Comparative..., although written by a non-lingist, is a
useful overview and contains complete bibliography up to its point of publication. A number
of collections of essays have appeared in the last twenty years to honor/review Prof.
Dumzil's work toward the end of his long career; most contain introductions. See G. J. Larson, Introduction: the Study of Mythology and Comparative Mythology, in: Myth in IndoBrought to you by | provisional account
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David H. Sick

T h e r e are two potential problems in the use of the genetic model to which I would
draw the reader's attention. Just as linguists posit a proto-language which is essentially separated from time and space because of its theoretical nature, so also is the
proto-myth devoid of the context of a particular societal setting. Although we can
deduce certain characteristics of PIE society through the determination of its lexicon and give it a very rough date by estimating the time needed for the distinction
of the separate IE languages and by comparing the technologies present in the lexicon with the concrete remains of cultures, since we deduce the very existence of
PIE society through the comparative genetic method, we will never find the evidence which allows us to determine unquestionably what people(s) spoke the PIE
language or what people(s) told the stories contained in PIE myths. 7 This is a much
greater problem for myth than for language; although particular words can be

European Antiquity, Berkeley 1974, 1-16, and Edgar Polom's introduction to Homage to
Georges Dumzil, Washington 1982, 5-15. Also, Symposium: the Achievement of Georges
Dumzil, in: Journal of Asian Studies 34, 1974, 127-167; J.-C. Rivire (ed.), Georges
Dumzil la dcouverte des Indo-Europens, Paris 1979; J. Bonnet (ed.), Georges Dumzil,
Paris 1981; Aspetti dell'opera di Georges Dumzil, in: Opus 2, 1983, 329-421; Histoire
des religions et comparatisme: la question indo-europenne, in: Rhr 208, 1991, 115-228.

Dumzil has been criticized for his connections to political organizations of the far right
throughout his life; it has been alleged that Dumzil's politics have at times effected his
scholarship.
See B. Lincoln, Rewriting the German War God..., for complete bibliography in all these
matters.
Without taking up the entire question of the search for the PIE homeland, we should try to
support the claim that the PIE homeland and the society associated with that homeland will
never be found. A fairly simple argument can be made: the existence of a PIE society has
been hypothesized through linguistic comparison. Connecting the linguistic data to a specific
set of archaeological remains to the exclusion of any other set of archaeological remains
from the same time period is almost impossible. Scholars in looking at the linguistic evidence have proposed places as diverse as the North Pole and South Africa as possible homelands. Even when we discern a PIE word, attaching that word to a real item in a specific
geographic environment is still difficult. Take for instance PIE *bhgo- >beech<; since the
Latin and Greek reflexes, fgus and , do not even refer to the same type of tree, how
are we to determine the species of the PIE prototype?
A careful review of the question is offered by J. P. Mallory, In Search..., 145; he writes: ...
for the Indo-Europeans, there can be nothing resembling a singularity. Only by assuming the
preposterous notion that the Proto-Indo-European language originated simultaneously with
human speech itself can we imagine it to have been anything other than a segment of the
overall continuum of human speech in Eurasia. The PIE homeland is essentially the spatial
expression of a vaguely defined temporal division of that linguistic continuum.
Dumzil himself seemed to be aware that the PIE ideologies which he was reconstructing
could not be connected to a particular society at a particular place and time. In his Leon inaugurale he wrote, 5-6: Mais sur aucune cramique, sur aucune pice de char ou de barque,
sur aucun objet de bronze exhum par les prhistoirens, nous ne mettons le mot >Indo-Europen<, and again ils [linguistes] savent que la reconstruction vivante, dramatique de ce
qu'tait la langue ou la civilisation des ancstres communs est impossible, puisqu'on ne
remplace par rien les documents... (7). In fact, in this lecture he claims that he is not interested with the Proto-Indo-Europeans at all, but with the ultrahistoires (25) of the descendent
peoples, that is the pre-histories of the Romans, Indians, Germans, etc. G. Charachidze,
Hypothse Indo-Europenne et Modes de Comparison, in: Rhr 208, 1991, 203-228, argues
that, just as the linguistic entities compared using this model are symbolic of a point in time
and space in a continuum of language and were not actual, spoken phonemes, Dumzil's
functions should not be interpreted as a reality in the social history of the IE people(s).
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affected by societal norms and constraints, they are never affected as greatly as
myths are, since myths by most definitions are stories meant to validate societal
structures or to explain phenomena from the perspective of a society. By positing a
proto-myth for a proto-society which we can know very little about, we are, in
effect, removing means vital to the interpretation of the myth.
Secondly, the genetic model can lead to extreme conclusions if it is applied
incorrectly. Specifically, it should not be used to move beyond the determination of
a PIE myth to answer questions about the function of the reflexes of the myth in
descendent IE societies. An explanation of this warning is in order. The conclusion
may be reached that myths from several IE cultures are similar because they
descended from the same proto-myth. One might then secondarily deduce that certain elements are present in a certain story because they are derived from the protostory. On one level this secondary conclusion can be true: the posited PIE myth can
provide a cause for the presence of the elements, where cause is a matter of result,
but if the same method is used to find a function or purpose, a fallacy enters the
argument through multiple definitions of cause, one pertaining to result and one
pertaining to purpose.
A n example might be helpful. One might ask the question, Why are cattle and
the sun present in the proem to Homer's Odyssey? This question can be answered
with two different understandings of >why<. First, where why = >what function do
they serve, < the answer might be, because they represent examples of human folly
and absolve Odysseus of guilt; yet, where why = >as a result of what<, the answer
might be, because cattle and the sun represent important elements in some other
historical IE discourse which is no longer extant. The determination of a function
can provide the answer to the result question, that is, once a function is determined,
the agency of the poet or text provides an answer to the result question. As a
result of what are cattle and the sun in the proem to the Odyssey? Because >the
poet< put them there in order to achieve purpose x. Or if we wish to remove the
problem of personal agency from the discussion, we could rephrase the answer as,
because they serve function in the text. On the other hand, a result cannot
provide a purpose or function; an obviously incorrect formulation would thus be:
For what purpose are cattle and the sun present in the proem to the Odyssey?
Because cattle and the sun represent important elements in some other IE discourse which is no longer extant. It is thus perhaps best to maintain distinctions of
result and function/purpose when researching the causes for phenomena in ancient
texts. 8
Given this distinction between purpose and result, one might think that the
work being done by those comparativists using the genetic method could comple8

The problem is perhaps put more succinctly by C. S. Littleton in George Dumzil and the
Rebirth..., 170: It should be pointed out that the several models discussed in this paper,
including the genetic model, do not in themselves provide causal explanations - in the Aristotelian sense - of the features whose similarity has been noted. Rather, their application to a
given body of cross-cultural data is a necessary first step toward such an explanation. They
form, as it were, the analytic frameworks within which these data may be ordered so as to
understand the character of their temporal and/or spatial relationships to one another.
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David H. Sick

ment the work of those searching for specific purposes or functions to textual or
cultural characteristics. This sadly is not the case. Part of the problem lies with
Dumzil's own tendency to assign a greater importance to the PIE ideological
structures than to formulations which specialists or other researchers might provide
to explain certain elements in IE discourses. Dumzil, in referring to the three PIE
functions, wrote in Les dieux des Indo-Europens:
... l'esprit humain est essentiellement organisateur, systmatique, il vit de
multiple simultan, en sorte que, toute poque, en dehors des complexes
secondaires qui s'expliquent par des apports successifs de l'histoire, il
existe complexes primaires, qui sont peut-tre plus fondamentaux dans
civilisations, et plus vivaces. 9
The three functions are examples of complexes primaires which recur in IE societies. An example of a complexe secondaire would be the specific cultural setting
in which the three functions are embedded. Yet, even taking into account these
comments, there would still seem to be room for cooperation between
comparativists and specialists. Comparativists might concern themselves with the
complexes primaires and specialists with the complexes secondaires and the
apports successifs, although the specialists and other non-structuralists are left with
material which is less fundamental and less enduring in Dumzil's own
estimation. 10 It is this sort of almost qualitative statement about these complexes
which is problematic, especially since it is from the secondary complexes and the
successive historical contributions from which purposes must be sought.
By assigning this sort of eternal nature to the ideological structures of the
Proto-Indo-Europeans, Dumzil seems at times to have overvalued these structures
and undervalued the explanations for cultural phenomena to be discerned in the
specific societal settings of the secondary complexes. For example, Dumzil finds
an occurrence of the PIE tripartite structure in three colors used to organize the
teams and spectators in Roman chariot racing. He does provide significant evidence for his argument: he cites examples of social classes organized by color from
India, Iran, and Anatolia, and in the Anatolian example the classes are even represented by horses dressed in certain colors. He furthermore uses a Byzantine source
which specifically states that the Roman colors were taken from colors used to rep-

9 G. Dumzil, Les dieux des Indo-Europens, Paris 1952, 80.

10 According to Daniel Dubuisson, Dumzil, with the publication of Les dieux des Indo-Europens in 1952, more often began to attribute the presence of the three functions in IE cultures to an autonomous mode of thinking in IE speakers; see D. Dubuisson, Contribution
une pistmologie Dumzilienne: l'idologie, in: Rhr 208, 1991, 123-140. Yet, Dumzil is
perhaps not a structuralist in the most specialized sense of the term. He did not prescribe to
the Lvi-Straussian idea of a fundamental quality of the human spirit which tends to organize
cultural phenomena in certain ways. According to Dumzil, the three ideological functions
are the result of historical processes of a certain historical group - the Indo-Europeans. See
C. S. Littleton, >Je ne suis pas ... structuralistes Some Fundamental Differences between
Dumzil and Lvi-Strauss, in: Journal of Asian Studies 34, 1974, 151-158.
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resent the Roman tribes. 11 It is not my intent here however to evaluate the accuracy
of this formulation; I am more concerned with the value of it.
B y citing the colors of the Roman chariot-racing teams as a manifestation of a PIE
ideological structure and by saying that these PIE structures are plus fondamentaux and plus vivaces, Dumzil leaves his readers with the impression that this
Roman cultural phenomenon occurred because a PIE one did earlier. Now the use
of colors to represent PIE social groups may in fact be true, but the importance and
continual existence of chariot racing at Rome has almost nothing to do with a PIE
ideology. Again it is a matter of purposes/functions and results. The functions of
chariot racing in Roman society were so much more important to its existence than
any prototype from a very distant PIE social structure could have been. There are
many social phenomena worthy of consideration in the spectacle of Roman chariot
racing: the propaganda mechanisms of the emperors and empire, the distaste of the
senatorial class for the races, the constant threat of rioting by the lower classes, the
possibility for slave-charioteers to earn income and freedom, etc. The designation
of three groups of racers and their fanatic supporters as an example of the PIE tripartite structure, when there were for the greater part of Roman history four such
groups, contributes little if anything to our understanding of the phenomenon. In
some small way the Roman cultural phenomenon may result from the PIE one, but
without examining all the functions of chariot-racing in the society, we are left
with a very skewed understanding of it.12 Moreover, since PIE society is by definition hypothetical, if we use the Roman material to interpret the proto-society, we
are again in effect interpreting a non-entity. On the whole, the designation, whether
true or false, is theoretical only. 13
11 An abbreviated version of the argument occurs in L'idologie tripartie..., 26-27, 53-54, but
the argument is given in full at Albati, Russati, Virides, in: Rituels Indo-Europens
Rome, Paris 1954, 45-62.
12 I am not saying, as some have, that Dumzil's work is of no value to the study of ancient
Roman or other Indo-European cultures. One must consider the PIE precedents in conjunction with the specific societal setting in order to avoid a skewed perception, and, of course,
at times, particularly with the oldest extant cultural items, a comparative IE context is the
most significant context which can be applied to an item. For this criticism see A. Momigliano, An Interim Report on the Origins of Rome, in: Journal of Roman Studies 53, 1963,
113-114; Premesse per una discussione su Georges Dumzil, in: Opus 2, 1983, 329-341,
and Dumzil's response in L'oubli de l'homme et l'honneur des dieux, Paris 1985, 312-313.
13 This tendency to overemphasize the complexes primaires led Dumzil and his followers, I
am convinced, to find tripartite structures in places very far removed from the ancient IndoEuropeans. C. S. Littleton, New Comparative..., 232, suggests that the three branches of the
United States government may be attributable to the three functions of the Indo-Europeans.
A. Yoshida, La mythologie japonaise. Essai d'interprtation structurale, in: Rhr 160, 1961,
47-66; 161, 1962, 25-44; 162, 1963, 225-40, believed that the tripartition of the Japanese
pantheon was due to contact between Japan and nomadic Scytho-Samartian tribes. I suggest
that these observations tell us very little about the societies of Japan or the United States and
can easily lead to misinterpretations of those institutions in their respective cultural settings.
Dumzil himself wrote: ce n'est sans doute pas un hasard si quelques-unes des grandes
russites ou des grands efforts de puissance, jusque dans la plus moderne histoire [my italics] de notre Europe, reposent sur des reviviscences claires et simples du vieil archtype
(l'idologie tripartite). The examples given come from pre-Revolutionary France, the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany. The quotation appeared first in L'hritage indo-europen
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David H. Sick

Dumzil's overemphasis of the complexes primaires may have contributed to a

misuse of the genetic model, but an overemphasis of the complexes secondaires
can also lead to problems. One scholar who has chosen to concentrate on the complexes secondaires is the historian of religions and cultures, Bruce Lincoln, whose
early work was concerned with IE myth. 14 At a later point Lincoln questioned the
value of this work and made the following comments about the study of myth in
The Two Paths, an essay that described a turning point in his intellectual development:
Studies of myth, I am convinced, ought to be attentive to the multiple competing voices that find expression in the differing variants, and to the
struggles they wage in and through mythic discourse, a position that derives more from Gramsci than from Lvi-Strauss. Beyond this, I believe one
must relate any discourse to the tensions characteristic of that society in
which it circulates. 15
It is from the Dumzilian secondary complexes that one can relate any discourse
to the tensions characteristic of (a) society, and it is, of course, very difficult to
relate the myths of the Proto-Indo-Europeans to their society. Lincoln followed the
methodology of Dumzil in the early part of his academic career, noting similar
patterns in texts from various IE cultures and then determining prototypes. 16 He
abandoned this method in the late eighties, explaining that the search for PIE
prototypes may actually obscure much of what is most fascinating and important
in myth 17 and went on to take the anti-Dumzilian position given above.
In The Two Paths, Lincoln describes how the unsatisfactory resolution of an
investigation of a particular theme in various IE discourses led to his abandonment

14

15
16

17

Rome, Paris 1949, 241, and then was repeated in L'oubli de l'homme..., 323. Dumzil gave
further examples of remnants of the three functions in modern society in Entretiens avec
Didier Eribon, Paris 1987, 186-189. See also Charles Malmoud's discussion in volume 208
of Rhr devoted to Dumzil 1991, 118-121. These sort of statements about archetypes certainly make Dumzil appear to be a structuralist, despite his own declarations to the contrary. (See note 10 above.)
A large number of the IE myths concerning cattle were collected and analyzed by B. Lincoln
in his work Priests, Warriors, and Cattle, Berkeley, 1981. Portions of this book appeared
with revisions and expansions in History of Religions: The Indo-European Cattle-Raiding
Myth, in: HoR 16, 1976, 42-56 and The Indo-European Creation Myth, in: HoR 15, 1975,
121-157. Other early works of Lincoln concerned with IE studies include Myth, Cosmos, and
Society, Cambridge, MA 1986, and Death, War, and Sacrifice, Chicago 1991.
B. Lincoln, The Two Paths, in: Death, War, and Sacrifice..., 124.
See B. Lincoln, The Two Paths..., 120: Normally [...] one looks for shared traits in the
various sources - >correspondences< - on the strength of which a prototype may be posited.
The prototype is then taken to be both logically and historically anterior to the attested data,
among which some exemplars or >reflexes< are seen to derive more faithfully and others with
ever greater transformations of the prototypical pattern. More specifically with regard to his
work on cattle, see B. Lincoln, Priests, Warriors, and Cattle..., 11: Thus, the demonstration
that a given feature exists in both India and Iran will be taken to prove that it was present in
the Proto-Indo-Iranian period unless there is strong reason to suspect that it was transmitted
directly from one group to the other at a later date. Demonstration that the feature exists in
other IE groups will indicate that it was present even earlier, dating back to the PIE period.
B. Lincoln, The Two Paths..., 123.
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of the genetic method. In this investigation he noted that the image of separate
paths for the dead-one for the good and one for the evil-was a central feature in
the descriptions of the afterlife in many IE texts. Lincoln was not however able to
determine a uniform set of criteria for the discrimination of the good and evil.
For as consistent as the sources are in their description of these two paths,
they are equally inconsistent in their description of the principles that
determine which of the dead come to travel the preferable path and enjoy
the preferable post-mortem fate, while others are consigned to an alternate
route and destination,18
Our earlier distinction between result and purpose may be useful in accounting for
this difficulty and thereby may allow students of comparative myth to use Lincoln's early work with greater confidence. Lincoln, I believe, was essentially
searching for purposes in the comparative material and was thus destined to frustration. We would not expect the PIE selection criteria for the afterlife to be retrievable from those IE discourses where descriptions of the afterlife are found.
The selection criteria are more likely to be explained by the functions of the discourse which contain the images of the afterlife.
A n example will help to prove my point. Lincoln cites a number of passages from
Plato as evidence of the PIE two path theme. 19 Whatever the PIE selection criteria for the afterlife were, one would not expect Plato to have subscribed to them
unless they conformed to his own agenda. In Plato's view, the rewards of a blissful
afterlife would certainly go to those who heed the Platonic and/or Socratic exhortations for the pursuit of knowledge and truth; any PIE selection criteria would not
have concerned him. Let us ask the same sort of questions about the Platonic texts
that we asked about the proem to the Odyssey: As a result of what is the theme of
two paths for the dead present in certain Platonic texts? Because the two paths
theme was an important element in early IE descriptions of the afterlife. For
what purpose is the two path theme present in certain Platonic texts? In order
that Plato might provide additional incentive to those who complied with his
exhortations about the proper conduct of life. Again here the answer to the question of purpose could be used to answer the question of result but not vice versa. If
indeed Plato was using an old IE theme as means of incentive for his fellow philosophers, for the incentive to be effective, the philosophers must be given the
reward, not the chariot-driving, semi-nomadic tribes of the hypothetical ProtoIndo-Europeans. We could, of course, transfer our analysis of the Platonic example
to the examples cited by Lincoln from other IE cultures. Lincoln's search thus
provides example of an incorrect application of the genetic model; he did not find
similar principles by which the dead were discriminated because the agents of each
discourse would have brought their own principles and purposes to the theme. It is

18 B. Lincoln, The Two Paths..., 1*20.

19 Gorgias 523A-524A, Phaedo 107E-108A, and Republic 614B-C.
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by the principles and purposes of the agents or functions of the text that the discrimination of the dead would have been organized.
Should then the inability of the genetic model to answer questions of function
or purpose necessitate a rejection of the model itself? If the genetic model were to
have no other useful application, the answer to this question might be, Yes, but,
as we have already indicated, the genetic model when correctly applied can demonstrate how certain literary or even cultural phenomena result from other earlier
phenomena. Just as the genetic model works for the study of language by tracing
the development of lexical items and syntactical structures with one resulting from
the next, it can work for the study of other aspects of cultures. It cannot tell us to
what purpose words are changed, if indeed there is a purpose, but it can describe
the changes; likewise it can tell us which cultural phenomena result from which
other cultural phenomena, but it cannot tell us to what purpose or to serve what
function, if any, these changes take place.
It is because of this ability to outline the progression of cultural phenomena
that I believe Lincoln sells the genetic model and his own application of it short. If
you will recall, Lincoln claimed that the genetic model may actually obscure
much of what is most fascinating and important in myth, but if we look at his own
work, we will not find this to be the case, and in fact the opposite may be true. In
The Two Paths, he was able to discern the functions or purposes present in the
texts of Plato, Snorri Sturluson, Zarathustra, and the poets of the Vedas. It seems to
me he was able to do so by using a modified version of the genetic model. By juxtaposing similar themes and structures in texts from various IE cultures, Lincoln
was able to note the differences more easily. The proto-theme or proto-structure
becomes a pattern by which to describe the differences, and thus when Lincoln
looked at the texts which contained the two path theme, the discrepancies with the
prototype were easily noted. Plato's moral philosophy, the influence of Christianity
on Snorri Sturluson, the form of gnosticism particular to Zarathustra, and the
priestly prescriptions of the Vedas, jump out at the researcher because of the effect
each has upon the two path theme, and, as it turns out, these purposes and agendas
are most obvious in the selection criteria for the afterlife. Therefore, this sort of
genetic approach, instead of obscuring what Lincoln considers to be fascinating
and important in myth, may actually elucidate it. It allowed Lincoln himself to note
important features in mythic discourses from particular authors or social groups
and the struggles they were waging in modifying an inherited theme to fit their
own agenda. In this example it was the differences in the selection criteria which
were seen to be significant, but one could focus on the similarities also and attribute significance to them.
It should be noted that the method outlined in the previous paragraph is indeed a
modified version of the genetic model, where the emphasis is not so much on the
PIE prototype but on the comparison of similar themes in IE cultures, with the
thought that by making comparisons one can provide insights to particular cultural
phenomena in particular cultural settings. Thus, in this modified genetic model,
one can adhere to Lincoln's admonition to relate any discourse to the tensions
characteristic of that society in which it circulates. In this admonition I agree with
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Lincoln. It gains us very little to reconstruct proto-myths to study a proto-society

which by its very nature we will never know very much about.
At this point I would like to provide a specific example of the use of a modified
version of the genetic model and describe how in the application of this modified
model specific societal concerns become evident. I will point out a number of
similarities in a myth about the movements of the soul after death which occurs in
Plato's Phaedrus at 246A and certain Vedic ideas about the movements of the soul
found in the Rg and Atharva Vedas. The similarities are striking in and of themselves; in fact, both the Platonic and the Vedic descriptions of the movements of
the soul center on a comparable heavenly structure with a semantically identical
name, that is, >the back of heaven<. More importantly, by comparing the application of the mythic material in the two cultural settings, Vedic India and Classical
Greece, the varying functions applied to the PIE paradeigm will become evident.
Since there is a greater abundance of material describing the back of heaven in
the Vedic hymns, let us start by reviewing these descriptions and then turn to the
myth as told in Plato. The poets of the Vedas use two terms, nkasya prsth- and
divs prsth-, which may roughly be translated as >the back of heaven<. We can
fairly surely translate prsth- as >back< and div- as >heaven< or >sky<; the translation of naka- is more difficult; it is usually rendered as >vault<, but I find this
translation somewhat misleading for a number of reasons among which is the improbability that the Indians of the Vedic era could create an architectural vault. 20
Thus, I will simply transliterate naka- for the purposes of this discussion. In the
two phrases nkasya prsth- and divs prsth-, we have >back of the div-< or >back
of the naka-<, with nkasya and divs in the genitive case; when talking about the
two in common, I will refer to them as the >back of heaven<.
T h e s e two terms designate a figure of similar structure and function, namely a
barrier which separates the visible universe from the invisible universe. In other
words, in the Vedic understanding of the cosmos, another universe exists on the
other side of these barriers which is not visible to the humans who inhabit the
earth. The barrier has a twofold purpose in the heavens beyond its simplest use as a
wall separating the visible from the invisible: into the side of the barrier nearer the
earth, the stars, the sun, and other heavenly bodies are fixed; while the far side, the
side not visible from the earth, serves as a base for the invisible universe, which is
usually described as a realm of endless light. The organization of the Vedic
universe has been thoroughly outlined in Heinrich Lder's Varuna,21 but it would
be perhaps helpful here to provide one example from the Vedas as evidence of the

20 See the proper entries in H. Grassmann, Wrterbuch zum Rig-Veda, Leipzig 1936 and
M. Mayrhofer, Kurzgefates etymologisches Wrterbuch des Altindischen, Heidelberg 1956.
A connection between naka- and Greek / >skin, pelt< as a sort of >skin of heaven<
was suggested in J. Pokorny, Indogermanisches etymologisches Wrterbuch, Mnchen 19491969; for the implications of this hypothesis, see D. H. Sick, Cattle, Sacrifice, and the Sun:
a Mythic Cycle in Greece, Iran, and India, University of Minnesota, Ph. D. Dissertation
1996, 149-169, 170-196.
21 H. Lders, Varuna, Gttingen 1951,1.57-78.
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use of the back of heaven as a base for the invisible universe, since this function
will recur in Plato:
The ones having ascended into the sky, shining, have found a world on the
back of the nka-. 22
Now that we have an idea of the basic formal structure of the back of heaven in the
Vedas, we need to look at a number of capacities which it serves. First, it acts as a
residence for beneficent humans, usually after death. More specifically, those
humans who provide the proper sacrifices during their lifetime will attain a place
with the gods on the back of heaven after death. Such a situation is described at RV
1.125.5 where the sacrificer, here referred to as the contributor, goes to the back of
nka-. Here the poet seems to understand going to the back of the nka- to be
equivalent to going to the gods:
having been fixed upon the back of the nka-, he remains there; he who
contributes goes among the gods.23
Although this verse does not make it absolutely clear that the beneficent humans
are dead when they enter upon the back of heaven, AV 18.4.14 does so:
he who has sacrificed has now ascended to the piled fire soon to fly up
from the back of the nka- to heaven.24
Here we find a more specific reference to the sacrificer (jn- < lyaj- >to sacrifice<) on the back of heaven, but the allusion to cremation through the mention of
the >piled fire< allows us to be certain that we are dealing with a metaphysical experience.
We can use these same verses to point out another trait of the back of heaven to
which we have already made allusion. The back of heaven serves not only as a
residence for humans who have conducted the proper sacrifices but also as a residence for the gods, and we can begin to understand the interconnection between
the gods, sacrificers, and the back of heaven by looking at one more verse. AV
4.14.2 describes a very similar situation to RV 1.125.5 (above), but here the sacrifice itself is positioned on the divs prsth

22 AV 18.2.47: t dym udtyavidanta lokm nkasya prsth dhi ddyanah//, reading ddyanah
along with H. Lders, Varuna..., 1.75. See also AV 7.85. and KV 1.25.5.'
23 nakasya prsth dhi tisthati srit yh prnati s ha devsu gacchati/; see also RV 8.103.2; AV
7.85.1.
24 ijans citm aruksad agnm nkasya prsthd dvam utpatisyan/ see also RV 1.125.5; AV
7.85.1; 9.5.10; 18.4.4; 18.2.47. This verse somewhat contradicts our earlier statements about
the place of the back of heaven in the Vdic cosmos, since the dead man flies from the back
of the naka- to heaven and does not end his flight upon the back of the nka- itself but
somehow goes on into the div-. If, however, we remember that the world of light is located
above the back of heaven, we can view the dead man as flying up into this world of light
from the back of the naka-, with div- representing here the world of light.
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Bearing burnt offerings in your hands, stride with Agni to the naka-/ when
you have gone to the back of the dv-, to the light of the sun, sit together
with the gods.25
It is unclear whether the sacrificer or the sacrificed is addressed in this line; in
either case the reference to burnt offerings (khya-) proves that the sacrificial victim, not just the sacrificer goes to the back of heaven.
We can now see the central place of sacrifice in this cycle of Vedic hymns. The
sacrifice itself is transferred to the gods on the back of heaven where it is consumed by the gods; moreover, those who properly perform these sacrifices during
their lifetime can take their place with the gods on the back of heaven after death.
Finally, the sacrificers themselves must undergo a form of sacrifice before their
transference to the back of heaven, in that the their bodies must be burned on the
funeral pyre.
W h e n we turn to the Greek material, we find that the back of heaven, called ;
26 in Plato, in addition to having the same formal structure,
serves the same functions with regard to the gods, good humans, and sacrifice,
although we must remember that Plato will have his own goals in using this mythic
raw material, and we should expect changes in emphasis. In the Phaedrus, when
Plato through Socrates tells several myths about the immortal nature of the soul, he
explains how the souls of those trained in philosophy can escape the trials of the
corporeal world by floating up into the heavens; there they may pass into the world
of the pure virtues.
... but those () which are called immortal, whenever they are able to
reach the top, they travel outside and stand upon the back of heaven; the
rotation (of the heavens) drives them around, and they see the things outside of heaven.21
The first thing to notice beyond the use of the phrase >back of heaven< is Plato's
reference to the >things outside of heaven< ; ; such an expression can only make sense in the context of a layered universe where refers
not to the entirety of the cosmos but only a part. Thus, in the Phaedrus as in the
Vedas, the back of heaven serves to separate regions of the cosmos, and moreover
it specifically separates the invisible heavens from the visible. Here too in Plato the
25 krmadhvam agnina nkam khyan hstesu bbhratah/
divs prsthm svr gatva misr devbhir ddhvam//
26 A similar phrase does occur in a few other Greek sources. See, for example, Euripides,
Fragment 114, at Aristophanes Thesmophoriazusae
1065:
' ' '. blessed night,
how you hurry your great chariot, driving upon the starry back of the blessed aether through
majestic Olympus. We must depend on the scholiast's comment here to identify the line as
taken from Euripides.
27 247C: ' ,
,
.
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region above the back of heaven cannot be seen with human eyes, as Socrates
directly tells us at 247C2-3:
None of the poets here has ever sung worthily about the region above the
, nor will they ever [...] for a colorless, formless, and intangible
essence holds this region [...] visible to the mind alone.2S
Thus we see a very similar formal structure for the back of heaven in the Greek and
the Indian texts, and, of course, the presence of the soul after death is an obvious
link. In looking still further into the myth told by Socrates, we find the same associations with the gods and sacrifice. The Greek gods, like their Vedic counterparts,
spend a great deal of time on back of heaven; a few lines before the reference to
the flight of the soul, Plato divulges that the gods themselves travel to this same
structure for banqueting and feasting:
Yet whenever they (the gods) go for a banquet and for a feasty they travel
upwards to the top, to the rim which sits upon the ... 29
From this point in the myth the philosopher goes on to explain that only the gods
and those souls toughened by the training of philosophy can move beyond this
>rim upon the < to >the region above the heavens<
(247C2) - the term which Plato uses to describe the region
above the back of heaven. 30 So, although he uses here a different phrase to designate the barrier between the two regions of the universe, he still seems to be using
the same system of organization for the cosmos, with back of heaven or rim of
heaven, as the case may be, acting as dividing wall for the visible and invisible
regions of the universe. In any event, the gods go to this barrier whenever they
wish to banquet or feast.
Plato does not return to the allusion to banqueting and feasting, however, and it
is left for the reader to interpret. Why is it when the gods wish to have a banquet
that they travel to this region? The Vedic evidence combined with a knowledge of
Greek culture allows us to answer this question, or, to apply the methodological
terminology: by noting the complexe primaire in its specific cultural setting, we
will reveal its function in tha't setting. In Greek society, a banquet or feast could
only properly take place after a sacrifice. Every animal had to be sacrificed if it
28 247B:
' .,. x a l .,.
...
29 247: . , , ,
The text here is in state of disorder. I am following the reading of
D. H. Sick, Cattle, Sacrifice, and the Sun..., 171-172.
30 Plato's discussion here is somewhat difficult to follow since he moves back and forth between comments about the gods and the soul without distinction. The other question is the
exact meaning of . is often translated here as >vault<, but since real
vaulting was not invented until the Hellenistic era, vault js not a technically correct translation. can also refer to the rim of the wheel; my translation is further influenced by the
Vedic practice of using the parts of the wheel to depict various parts of the universe.
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was to be butchered and distributed in a communal celebration. 31 In fact the term

which Plato uses here, , might be translated as >sacrificial feast<; moreover, it
is little used outside of Homer where it is more certainly a term for a banquet
which follows a sacrifice. 32 This information, combined with evidence from the
Vedas which shows that the sacrificial victim is transported to the gods on the back
of heaven, helps to elucidate Plato's comment about feasting. The gods go to the
back of heaven to receive their portion of the sacrifice; the elements of the sacrifice
thus provide them with an opportunity for banqueting there. 33 By not mentioning
sacrifice per se, Plato undermines these associations between sacrifice, the gods,
and the back of heaven, but, given Platonic and/or Socratic attitudes about the
gods' omnipotence and the unnecessary nature of the sacrifice, this undermining is
understandable. 34 Moreover, in the Vedic hymns it is the conduct of the sacrifice
which allows the souls of the beneficent to attain the back of heaven; Plato has removed this prerequisite as well and added the new qualifications of proper philosophical training.
In conclusion let us review this application of a modified genetic model. We have
pointed out a general similarity of usage of a nearly identical semantic phrase
>back of heaven< in the sacred cosmologies of Plato and the Vedic hymns. We
moreover noted the change in the function of sacrifice in the myth found in Plato, a
change which was more easily recognizable since we knew the mythic antecedents
Plato was drawing upon and since we did not expect the philosopher to use these
myths to the same purposes as his ancestors. We have not, however, proven conclusively that these similarities stem from a PIE antecedent. In fact at times other
conclusions have been reached.
It is tempting here to take up old questions of Plato and the East, reviewing the
numerous anecdotes about Plato's travels to Egypt and Phoenicia and searching for
the origins of Pythagoreanism or Orphism. We could then go on to claim that Plato
was exposed to various ideas from Iranian or Indian religion by a figure such as

31 See M. Detienne, Culinary Practices and the Spirit of Sacrifice, in: The Cuisine of Sacrifice Among the Greeks. translated by Paula Wissing, Chicago 1989, 1-20. Detienne writes:
In sacrifices directed toward commensality, the mageiros is usually slaughterer as well as
cook; and the congruence of these two roles indicates to what extent the offering of the sacrificial victim is regarded and enacted as a way of eating together. The authority of this system can be seen in the fact the butcher's actions must conform to those of a sacrificial killing. In other words, all comestible meat must result from a sacrificial killing (11).
32 See, for example, Iliad 24.68-69, where Zeus explains his fondness for Hector:
', for my altar was never lacking in an
equally-apportioned feast or in libations or sweet odors.
33 As further support of our claims about banqueting and the back of heaven, it should be noted
that the Vedic gods also hold celebrations there. See AV 7.80.1, where the sacrificer joins
the gods on the nkasya prsth- for a bit of celebrating: May we delight in drink (sam is
mdema). At AV 6.122.4, the soul of the sacrificer departs to the third naka- for drinking
and feasting: May we, O Agni, invited, beyond old age, take delight in the convivial feast
on the third nka- (pa hth agne jarsah parstat trtye nke sadha mdam mdema//).
34 Socratic/Platonic ideas about the gods and sacrifice are outlined at Euthyphro 14B and following.
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Eudoxus of Cnidus. 35 The link between India and the Phaedrus is made even more
obvious because of the presence of the analogy of the chariot and the soul which
recurs in a very similar version at Katha Upanishad 1.3.3-9.36 It is thus possible
that the genetic relationship between the mythic texts in the Vedas and Plato is not
that of siblings but of parent to child. Although it has been argued elsewhere for a
PIE origin of these themes, 37 the ultimate origins of the precedent do not matter for
this application, since we are concerned not with the proto-society but with the
application in context. It is also possible that two texts might be similar for reasons
other than a common origin, but the remnants in Plato, the use of the term and
the unexplained presence of the gods on the back of heaven, argue that the philosopher is making modifications to a pre-existing paradigm, and these enigmas
were solved by first noting the more striking similarities.
As far as Lincoln, Dumzil, and the genetic model are concerned, the relationship seems most recently to have inverted back upon itself. In Lincoln's article
concerned with Dumzil's reconstruction of a German war god, Rewriting the
German War God, one will find a chart which provides the common elements of a
proto-Germanic myth thought to validate the PIE ideological structure posited by
Dumzil; 38 this chart recalls the methodology which Lincoln adopted at an earlier
stage of his career, a methodology consistent with that of Dumzil before him.
Now, however, the focus is no longer on the complexe primaire; in fact the complexe primaire is of interest to Lincoln only as a means to reconstruct the apport
successif\ which in this instance is the work of Dumzil itself. Lincoln has reconstructed the proto-myth in order to note an idiosyncratic interpretation of the

35 For the ancient accounts of Plato's own journeys to the East, see Plutarch, Life of Solon 2.8
and Diogenes Laertius 3.6. He is also reputed to have had contact with a certain Chaldean
who appears on the list of students at the Academy as well as Eudoxus of Cnidus who traveled to Egypt and had some knowledge of the ideas of Zoroaster (Pliny, NH 30.3). The bibliography on Plato and Eastern thought is quite large. Among those who believe Plato borrowed his ideas from the East are J. Bidez, Eos, ou Platon et l'Orient, Brussels 1945; E. R.
Dodds, Plato and the Irrational, in: Journal of Hellenic Studies 65, 1947, 16-25;
J. Duchesne-Guillemin, The Western Response to Zoroaster, Oxford 1958; M. L. West,
Early Greek Philosophy and the Orient, Oxford 1971. Arguing for the independent development of Plato's thought are A. B. Keith, The Religion and Philosophy of the Vedas and
Upanishads (Harvard Oriental Series 32) Cambridge, MA 1925, 11.601-613; W. J. W.
Kster, Le mythe de Platon, de Zarathoustra, et des Chaldeens, Leiden 1951; J. Kerschensteiner, Platon und der Orient, Stuttgart 1945. For Plato and Indian thought in particular, see
West as well as E. J. Urwick, The Message of Plato, London, 1920, and A. S. Chousalkar,
Social and Political Implications of Concepts of Justice and Dharma, Dehli 1986.
36 Some of the earlier scholars who noticed the parallel include F. M. Mller, The Upanishads
(Sacred Books of the East 15) Oxford 1884, 11.12. A. B. Keith, Religion and Philosophy...,
11.555, 613. Later L. Rocher, De Katha-Upanishad II, in: Dialoog 2, 1961, 106. The analogy itself starts at verse three: Know the soul as riding in a chariot and the body to be the
chariot; know the intellect to be the charioteer and the mind to be the reins. (tmnam
rathinam viddhi sariram ratham eva tu / buddhim tu srathim viddhi manah pragraham eva
ca //) The analogy continues in a manner similar to that of the one in the Phaedrus, equating
good and bad horses with controlled and uncontrolled senses. See also AV 4.34.4 where the
one who correctly performs the oblations becomes a charioteer and flies beyond the div-.
37 See D. H. Sick, Cattle, Sacrifice, and the Sun..., 121-169.
38 See B. Lincoln, Rewriting the German War God..., 201. Lincoln's deconstruction of
Dumzil started earlier with the publication of Death, War, and Sacrifice.
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Germanie god Tyr used by Dumzil. Lincoln's reconstruction of the proto-Germanic myth allows him to elucidate the political objectives, conscious or unconscious, of Dumzil which led to the erroneous interpretation of Tyr. According to
Lincoln, Dumzil failed to fit Tyr into the secondary function of his own reconstruction, because the patriotic Frenchman wished to separate German militarism
from his conception of PIE ideology, in effect, decrying the saber-rattling of the
Nazis against his own country, France. In essence, Lincoln has used a method
which he inherited from IE studies, a discipline which he himself set aside, to construct a proto-myth in order to show that the construction of a similar proto-myth
by the great Indo-Europeanist Dumzil was influenced by his own specific societal
setting.

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