AGNI

AGNI

"It was as though his body had been suddenly transformed into one of those many-limbed and many-headed effigies sculptured in Indian temples, and he contemplated the aggregation in a bewildered attempt to discern which was the original and which the additions—if indeed (supremely monstrous thought) there were any original as distinguished from other embodiments."

H.P. Lovecraft & E. Hoffman Price, Through the Gates Of the Silver Key 

"Apart from such individual preferences, the god Agni can perhaps be identified as one of the first gods to acquire a human form. Even in pre-Vedic time the sacrificial fire was an important religious practice, and this survived into the Vedic period with its many sacrificial rituals. This sacrificial fire was embodied in Agni, who lived among mortals as an immortal god and served as a messenger between man and the gods by 
carrying the sacrifices to heaven."

 "Agni is depicted with two arms, two heads and three legs. In each head he has seven fierty tongues with which he licks up the sacrificial butter. His attributes are an axe, torch, prayer beads and flaming spear, although he is also depicted with other attributes."

Eva Jansen, The Book of Hindu Imagery: Gods, Manifestations and Their Meaning