The Sun and the Sun-Mother
The sun’s heavenly journey and a mother’s embrace
The sun is a beautiful youth. He lives with his mother far away, at the edge of the world, in a magnificent palace of blue marble. The palace stands at the centre of twelve courtyards. Each courtyard is arched on all four sides, with a pool at its centre fed by a spouting fountain. There are no trees, no greenery, no animals, no birds, no living creatures. By day a deep silence reigns there, and in that stony stillness, thousands upon thousands of stars lie sleeping beneath the arches of the courtyards.
Above the pool of the central courtyard stands a golden pavilion, within which the sun's pearl-adorned bed is spread. In one corner of the pavilion, bathed in light, sits the radiant, luminous Sun-Mother, awaiting her son's return. And then, weary from his daily journey, the blazing sun returns to his palace. He steps into the pool and bathes, while the stars awaken, rise, greet the sun, and ascend into the sky. The Sun-Mother embraces her son, lifts him from the water, lays him upon his bed, and nurses the eternally youthful, ever-young sun. He sleeps and rests, so that the following morning he may once again set out upon his eternal course.
The sun's bathing pool is also Lake Van. At dusk, wearied by the day's circuit, the sun enters Lake Van, bathes, is cleansed, and descends to the lake's floor, where his bed is spread upon the foam; he lies down, sleeps, and rests. The crimson or snow-white layered clouds in the west are the veil and curtains of his bed.
Before dawn, the angels raise the sun from his bed, clothe him in garments of fire, and make his bed. The sun washes his face, and the water sprays in all directions, covering mountains and plains with dew. All the birds are roused from sleep by the scattering dew, wake, take flight from their nests, and begin to sing and twitter. From beneath the great mountain in the east, the sun's twelve bodyguards emerge first — all of them coal-black Arabs bearing radiant whips like rays of light — and they strike the mountain, which bows and sinks. All the other mountains, one after another, bow their heads before the sun. Suddenly, from behind the mountain peaks, the sun's golden head and fiery hair appear, and he rises into the vault of heaven.
Early in the morning, when the sun emerges from the sea and is still very close to the earth, his fierce heat could burn the earth to ashes. But at that moment, a colossal bird rises to meet him and, spreading its mighty wings, shelters the earth from the sun's scorching rays. At midday, when the sun reaches the middle of the sky and draws away from the earth, his heat diminishes and the danger passes. By then the bird's wings have been scorched, and it falls into the sea exhausted and half-dead, cools itself, and heals its wings. The following morning, restored to strength, it rises once more to meet the sun, spreads its protection over the earth — and so it continues, without end.
The sun also ascends the sky mounted upon a lion; he races swiftly across the vault of heaven, and in the evening goes to rest in his mother's embrace. The lion that carries the sun holds in his paws an enormous sword, with which he defends the sun against the Kajk.