"Varuṇa is the first one of the twelve Ādityas, “suns”, also named the “charioteers of ṛta”. He is iconographically depicted as sitting on a makara, a sea monster that in different contexts may be a dolphin or a crocodile. Makara happens to signify Capricorn in the Hellenistic zodiac (rāśicakra), meaning the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year, when the sun’s northward course (uttarāyaṇa) sets in, the Hindu equivalent of the Yuletide. Prehistorical woodhenges and stone circles with astronomical alignments teach us that it was the principal feast of the year worldwide."