The Lithuanian Goddess Aušrinė was first mentioned under the name Ausca by Jan Łasicki in “Concerning the gods of Samagitians, and other Sarmatians and false Christians” or De diis Samagitarum caeterorumque Sarmatarum et falsorum Christianorum. That book was written at the end of the 16th century but first published in 1615. Łasicki says:
Ausca, dea est radiorum solis vel occumbentis, vel supra horizontem ascendentis.
According to whoever put this on Wikipedia (haven’t checked), there is a myth about Aušrinė (which was analyzed by the Lithuanian scholar Algirdas Julien Greimas in detail and) which:
“tells a story of Joseph who becomes fascinated with Aušrinė appearing in the sky and goes on a quest to find the ‘second sun.’ After much adventure, he learns that it was not the second sun, but a maiden, who lives on an island in the sea and has the same hair as the Sun. With advice from the Northern Wind, Joseph reaches the island, avoids a guardian bull, and becomes the maiden’s servant caring for her cattle. In the tale, Aušrinė appeared in three forms: as a star in the sky, as a maiden on land, and as a mare in the sea. After a few years, Joseph puts a single hair of the maiden into an empty nutshell and throws it into the sea. A ray from the sea becomes reflected into the sky as the biggest star. Greimas concludes that this tale is a double origin myth: the story describes the origin of Tarnaitis and the ascent of Aušrinė herself into the sky.”
What’s fascinating about this is that this, if true, is either the same story as that, or, at the very least is very similar to the story, of Jason and the Golden Fleece. For more on the idea of Baltic-Greek connections, you can see “The Baltic Origins of Homer’s Epic Tales.” Though some of its ideas are a bit wacky, others are interesting if you’re willing to go for the ride!
Finally, note too the Tacitan connection where in Germania we are told:
“They even believe that the female sex has a certain sanctity and prescience, and they do not despise their counsels, or make light of their answers. In [the emperor] Vespasian’s days we saw Veleda, long regarded by many as a divinity. In former times, too, they venerated Aurinia, and many other women, but not with servile flatteries, or with sham deification.”
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