F98. God and the cow. 16.17.23.27.29.
A heavenly anthropomorphic deity descends to earth and converges with a cow.
Irish, Welsh, Sumer, Babylonia, Ugarit, Ancient India, Ancient Greece, Hittites, Kalmyks.
Western Europe. The Irish [Dagda is the main sun god, the master of knowledge; he met with the goddess Boand, the White Cow, who is associated with the moon; the Milky Way is her trail, she sprayed the sky with her milk this is how the stars appeared]: Roberts 2016:11-12; Welsh [He Gadarn ("Hu the Mighty" is a Briton hero and legislator who lives in the sun; his symbol is a wren with open wings; his symbols are Ceridwen's wives (in the 14th century. Cariadwen, Iolo MS, p. 79) is a boat and a cow; Hu is connected to the sun, his wife is connected to the moon (received the homage due to the Sun/Moon); the moon sickle is the emblem of the Ceridwen boat]: Trevelyan 1909:36-37.
Western Asia. Sumer [the marriage of Ox and Earth has a sacred meaning in ancient mythology, since the Ox is identified with the Life-Giving Heaven; the earth is therefore perceived as the Great Cow, and their combination (Enlil's marriage to Ninhursag, Nabu and Tashmet) generates life as such; all Earth's fertilisers - Ahn, Enlil, and Enki - are called am-gal, gu4-gal - "Great Tour" or "Great Ox"]: Yemelyanov 1999:69- 70; Ugarit [Motu tells Ba'lu to take everything he needs to the afterlife: clouds, wind and rain, as well as warriors and daughters. Explains to Ba'lu how to get to the world of the dead (same description as above when Messenger Ba'lu went to see Moth). There is a field before entering the afterlife; Ba'lu discovers a cow there. Ba'lu copulates with a cow many times, she becomes pregnant and gives birth to him a son. Copulation occurs 77 or 88 times. A lacuna. The messengers bring Il the news of Ba'lu's death: he lies dead on the field before entering the afterlife. Ilu cries for Ba'l, asks what will happen to people now, and says that since Ba'lu is dead, he will have to go down to the afterlife himself. Anat searches for Ba'la, finds his corpse on the field before entering the world of the dead, mourns Ba'la. She asks the sun goddess Shapsha to help and put her body on her shoulders; Shapsha helps, Anata drags the corpse to Mount Tsapana. Anata buries Ba'la and organizes a funeral meal. Then she goes to Ilu's home and tells Asirat that she can rejoice with her sons: Ba'lu is dead. Ilu: We must choose a new king of the gods. Asiratu suggests that it be Astara. Astara takes Ba'lu's throne, but it turns out that his legs do not reach the stand and his head does not reach the top of the seat. Then Astara renounces his tsarist status. Anat comes to Motu and demands that the deceased Ba'la be returned to her. Motu explains that he ate Ba'lu because he could not satisfy his hunger without meeting people). Then Anat stabs Mota with a knife, pierces him with a pitchfork, burns his body, grinds him with millstones, scatters ashes over the field, and birds peck him (Motu's paraphrase below says that she scattered the ashes over the sea) ]; Ugarit: Gordon 1977 [Baal defeats seven-headed Leviathan; Mot demands that B. appear before him in the Underworld; B. is frightened, nature becomes barren; before stepping into Underworld, B. copulates with a chick, she gave birth to him a bull-like son; sister B. Anat cuts through, burns, scatters M., sows his remains in the field; the sun goddess Shapsh finds B., who fights M. again, a new seven-year cycle begins]: 226-230; Ivanov 1977 [(similar episode in the myth of Aliyane Vaale)]: 291; Babylonia [(a similar episode in Akkadian mythology in connection with the moon god Sin)]: Ivanov 1977:291.
South Asia. Ancient India (arias): Erman, Temkin 1975, No. 3 [after becoming a bull, Rudra married Earth, having had seven sons three times; these are Maruts, the gods of the storm, Indra's squad]: 18-19; Elwin 1949 ( The Upanishads, Brihad-Aranyaka) [Atman divided himself into man and woman, got together with his wife; then incarnated as a bull, wife into a cow; etc. all animals from horses to ants; this is how all creatures appeared]: 282; West 2007 [in RV 1.160.3, Diaus and Parviti are described as a bull and a cow]: 184.
The Balkans. Ancient Greece [Ió was the daughter of Inach (or Pyren or Jas), the priestess of the goddess Hera; G. killed her with Zeus and he turned I. into a white cow, swore he did not agree with her; G. asked Z. for this cow, assigned it to the guard of the all-seeing Argos; he tied it to an olive tree in the Mycenae grove; Z. told Hermes to steal the cow; he killed Argos with a stone; Hera sent a horsefly to the cow, running away from whom Io traveled many lands and in Egypt, regaining her human form, gave birth to a son Epaf]: Apol. II.1, 3.
Caucasus - Asia Minor. The Hittites [The Sun God saw a cow below, he wanted to go down, met her; the cow gave birth to a boy, wanted to swallow him, but the Sun God did not allow him, took the child to heaven, said for birds to take him to the mountains; a fisherman found him there; told his wife to pretend to give birth; neighbors believed that it was a fisherman's son (text ends)]: Ivanov 1977:164-166 (Peled 2018:88); Kalmyks [U the lonely old man and woman who lived in the deserted steppe were a cow, but there was no bull. The old man makes contact with the cow himself. A boy with big horns is born. He goes to do things that could benefit all living beings. Seeing Hormust, the ruler of the upper world, in the guise of a white bull, fights against the evil lord Araha, who has taken the form of a black bull, the boy first injures a black bull and then kills the lord of evil forces. Araha's wife cuts the boy into seven pieces. Hormusta takes his remains to heaven, where they become the constellation Ursa Major]: Bicheev 2005:16; (cf. Karachays [there is an expression Zher Bugasy - yellow ("the bull of the earth is the wind")]: Dzhurtubayev 1991:68).