operated by two women, one on each side to pass the shuttle back to the
other.^94 The goddesses Night and Day fit neatly into this role. If we now recall
the ancient theory attested in the Vedas, and perhaps by the Trundholm
sun-disc, that the sun travels to and fro across the sky, bright by day and
dark by night (pp. 209 f.), it becomes obvious that this corresponds to the
shuttle that the two sisters pass between them, drawing the alternate white
and black threads. With this insight the whole weaving image becomes sharp
and coherent. Of this beautiful prehistoric vision only fragmented echoes
remain in the Rigveda and the other traditions at our disposal.
(^94) Cf. E. J. W. Barber, Prehistoric Textiles (Princeton 1990), 84, 105 f., 113, 251; ead., The
Mummies of Ürümchi (London 1999), 77–9.
374 9. Cosmos and Canon