THE SUN-WORSHIP IN ANCIENT EUROPE
Dr. N.GANGADHARAN

   This paper makes a fresh insight into the age-old theory that the worship of the Sun was prevalent all over the world and especially in Europe before the spread of Christianity. We are familiar with the hymns in the Rigveda glorifying the Sun as the soul of both mobile and immobile things. The worship of the Sun (Mitra) in his well-known name Mithra, in the Middle East and west dates back to 1400 B.C. Mithra worship was flourishing and spreading well in the European countries in the first centuries after Christ until the victory of Constantine and the vision of Christ that Julian, the avowed Mithraist, had. It was the turning point. The Mitra worship was banned and Mitra priests were massacred. This was around 400 A.D. The decline of Sun worship in Europe started with this. Numerous Mitra monuments that had survived destruction still bear testimony to the once widely prevalent Mitra cult in Europe.
 
 

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