In Hinduism, Apām Napāt is the god of fresh water, such as in rivers and lakes.
Apām Napāt is sometimes (for example in Rigveda book 2 hymn 35 verse 3) described as a fire-god who originates in water (see: Agni). Apām Napat is Sanskrit and Avestan for "grandson of waters", see Ap). Sanskrit napat "grandson" is cognate to English nephew, but the name Apām Napāt has also been compared to Etruscan Nethuns and Celtic Nechtan and Roman Neptune.
The reference to fire may have originally referred to flames from natural gas or oil seepages surfacing through water, as in a fire temple at Surakhany near Baku in Azerbaijan (Jivanji Jamshedji Modi 1926).[dubious ] There is a conjecture that the word "naphtha" came (via Greek, where it meant any sort of petroleum) from the name "Apam Napat".[1]
References
External links
- Apâm. Napât, Dîrghatamas and the Construction of the Brick Altar. Analysis of RV 1.143 in the homepage of Laszlo Forizs
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