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The aim of this article is to look at the Satapatha Brāhmaņa's version of the tale of "Urvas! and Pururavas" as more than a textual commentary on the Vedic fire ritual, and see it as a remnant of a Proto-Indo-European folk narrative, specifically by viewing the story as a regional version of what folklorists call type 425a on the Aarne-Thompson-Uther index of folktales. First, the article will present a short introduction to religion and folklore, and how the two phenomena relate to each other through definitions by Dan Ben-Amos and Emilé Durkheim. Afterwards, it will introduce the narrative of the Satapatha Brāhmaņa's version of "Urvas! and Pururavas" and point out the differences in narrative and motif between this version and the dialogue concerning the same characters found in Rgveda X. 95. However, the main argument will be a comparative analysis of the Satapatha Brahmana version of "Urvas! and Pururavas" and the two European folktales "Cupid and Psyche" and "East of the Sun, West of the Moon", where it will be argued that the narrative and motif in the Vedic tale are similar to the two European tales and thus, could be considered a folk narrative. Finally, the article will argue that the division between religion and folklore can be unsustainable in narrative-studies, and why detangling folk narratives from the religious sphere may contribute to the overall research into how Indo-European narratives have evolved and adapted throughout Indo-European cultures.
What is religion, and what is folklore?
Juxtaposing folklore and religion can be challenging since the complex nature of both phenomena make them difficult to define and explain. Folklorist Dan Ben-Amos presented one of the more influential definitions of folklore in his essay "Towards a Definition of folklore in Context" 1971). In this essay, he focuses on the context of folklore, namely, the knowledge which unites all the different aspects of folklore. As Ben-Amos explains, folklore is both mobile, manipulative, and transcultural, while also being an organic phenomenon shaped by the culture in which it is present (Ben-Amos 1971: 4). It depends on social context, whether it be geographical, linguistic, or ethnic, and it is never something entirely new. Its context or form is always known to the audience and has passed through time via oral...