India: What can it teach us? Part 16

[Footnote 171: See Muir, iv. p. 24.]

[Footnote 172: Homer, Hymn x.x.x. 17.]

[Footnote 173: ?a??e ?e?? ?t??, ????' ???a??? ?ste??e?t??.]

[Footnote 174: Euripides, Chrysippus, fragm. 6 (edit. Didot, p. 824):

Ga?a e??st? ?a? ???? a????, ? ?? ?????p?? ?a? ?e?? ?e??t??, ? d' ????????? sta???a? ??t????

pa?ade?a??? t??te? ??at???, t??te? d? ????, f??? te ?????, ??e? ??? ?d????

?t?? p??t?? ?e???sta?.]

[Footnote 175: Dionysius Halic., vol. v. p. 355; Muir, v. p. 27.]

[Footnote 176: Rig-Veda I. 22, 15.]

[Footnote 177: See "Lectures on the Science of Language," vol. ii. p.

468.]

[Footnote 178: Rig-Veda I. 160, 4.]

[Footnote 179: L. c. IV. 56, 3.]

[Footnote 180: L. c. VIII. 6, 5.]

[Footnote 181: L. c. III. 30, 5.]

[Footnote 182: L. c. III. 34, 8.]

[Footnote 183: L. c. III. 34, 8.]

[Footnote 184: L. c. VIII. 36, 4.]

[Footnote 185: L. c. X. 54, 3.]

[Footnote 186: Cf. IV. 17, 4, where Dyaus is the father of Indra; see however Muir, iv. 31, note.]

[Footnote 187: Rig-Veda VI. 30, 1.]

[Footnote 188: L. c. I. 131, 1.]

[Footnote 189: L. c. IV. 17, 2.]

[Footnote 190: L. c. II. 40, 1.]

[Footnote 191: L. c. X. 121, 9.]

[Footnote 192: L. c. X. 190, 3.]

[Footnote 193: L. c. X. 81, 2.]

[Footnote 194: Rig-Veda VI. 70, 1.]

[Footnote 195: Rig-Veda X. 75. See Hibbert Lectures, Lect. iv.]

[Footnote 196: Vivasvat is a name of the sun, and the seat or home of Vivasvat can hardly be anything but the earth, as the home of the sun, or, in a more special sense, the place where a sacrifice is offered.]

[Footnote 197: I formerly translated yat v_g_an abhi adrava_h_ tvam by "when thou rannest for the prizes." Gra.s.sman had translated similarly, "When thou, O Sindhu, rannest to the prize of the battle,"

while Ludwig wrote, "When thou, O Sindhu, wast flowing on to greater powers." Va_g_a, connected with vegeo, vigeo, vigil, wacker (see Curtius, Grundzuge, No. 159), is one of the many difficult words in the Veda the general meaning of which may be guessed, but in many places cannot yet be determined with certainty. Va_g_a occurs very frequently, both in the singular and the plural, and some of its meanings are clear enough. The Petersburg Dictionary gives the following list of them--swiftness, race, prize of race, gain, treasure, race-horse, etc. Here we perceive at once the difficulty of tracing all these meanings back to a common source, though it might be possible to begin with the meanings of strength, strife, contest, race, whether friendly or warlike, then to proceed to what is won in a race or in war, viz. booty, treasure, and lastly to take vaga_h_ in the more general sense of acquisitions, goods, even goods bestowed as gifts. We have a similar transition of meaning in the Greek ?????, contest, contest for a prize, and ?????, the prize of contest, reward, gift, while in the plural t? ???a stands again for contest, or even the place of combat. The Vedic va_g_ambhara may in fact be rendered by ????f????, va_g_asati by ????s???.

The transition from fight to prize is seen in pa.s.sages such as:

Rig-Veda VI. 45, 12, v_g_an indra _s_ravyyan tvaya _g_eshna hitam dhanam, "May we with thy help, O Indra, win the glorious fights, the offered prize" (cf. ??????t??).

Rig-Veda VIII. 19, 18, te it v_g_ebhi_h_ _g_igyu_h_ mahat dhanam, "They won great-wealth by battles."

What we want for a proper understanding of our verse, are pa.s.sages where we have, as here, a movement toward va_g_as in the plural. Such pa.s.sages are few; for instance: X. 53, 8, atra _g_ahama ye asan a_s_evah _s_ivn vayam ut tarema abhi va_g_an, "Let us leave here those who were unlucky (the dead), and let us get up to lucky toils."

No more is probably meant here when the Sindhu is said to run toward her va_g_as, that is, her struggles, her fights, her race across the mountains with the other rivers.]

[Footnote 198: On _s_ushma, strength, see Rig-Veda, translation, vol.

i. p. 105. We find _s_ubhram _s_ushmam II. 11, 4; and iyarti with _s_ushmam IV. 17, 12.]

[Footnote 199: See Muir, Santkrit Texts, v. p. 344.]

[Footnote 200: "O Marudv_ri_dha with Asikni, Vitasta; O ar_g_ikiya, listen with the Sushoma," _Ludwig_. "Asikni and Vitasta and Marudv_ri_dha, with the Sushoma, hear us, O ar_g_ikiya," _Gra.s.sman._]

[Footnote 201: Marudv_ri_dha, a general name for river. According to Roth the combined course of the Akesines and Hydaspes, _before_ the junction with the Hydraotes; according to Ludwig, the river _after_ the junction with Hydraotes. Zimmer (Altindisches Leben, p. 12) adopts Roth's, Kiepert in his maps follows Ludwig's opinion.]

[Footnote 202: According to Yaska, the ar_g_ikiya is the Vipa_s_.

Vivien de Saint-Martin takes it for the country watered by the Suwan, the Soanos of Megasthenes.]

[Footnote 203: According to Yaska the Sushoma is the Indus. Vivien de Saint-Martin identifies it with the Suwan. Zimmer (l. c. p. 14) points out that in Arrian, Indica, iv. 12, there is a various reading Soamos for Soanos.]

[Footnote 204: "Chips from a German Workshop," vol. i. p. 157.]

[Footnote 205: Va_g_inivati is by no means an easy word. Hence all translators vary, and none settles the meaning. Muir translates, "yielding nutriment;" Zimmer, "having plenty of quick horses;" Ludwig, "like a strong mare." Va_g_in, no doubt, means a strong horse, a racer, but va_g_ini never occurs in the Rig-Veda in the sense of a mare, and the text is not va_g_inivat, but va_g_inivati. If va_g_ini meant mare, we might translate rich in mares, but that would be a mere repet.i.tion after sva_s_va, possessed of good horses. Va_g_inivati is chiefly applied to Ushas, Sarasvati, and here to the river Sindhu. It is joined with va_g_ebhi_h_, Rig-Veda I. 3, 10, which, if va_g_ini meant mare, would mean "rich in mares through horses." We also read, Rig-Veda I. 48, 16, sam (na_h_ mimikshva) v_g_ai_h_ va_g_inivati, which we can hardly translate by "give us horses, thou who art possessed of mares;" nor, Rig-Veda I. 92, 15, yukshva hi va_g_inivati a_s_van, "harness the horses, thou who art rich in mares." In most of the pa.s.sages where va_g_inivati occurs, the G.o.ddess thus addressed is represented as rich, and asked to bestow wealth, and I should therefore prefer to take va_g_ini, as a collective abstract noun, like tretini, in the sense of wealth, originally booty, and to translate va_g_inivati simply by rich, a meaning well adapted to every pa.s.sage where the word occurs.]

[Footnote 206: Ur_n_avati, rich in wool, probably refers to the flocks of sheep for which the North-West of India was famous. See Rig-Veda I.

126, 7.]

[Footnote 207: Silamavati does not occur again in the Rig-Veda. Muir translates, "rich in plants;" Zimmer, "rich in water;" Ludwig takes it as a proper name. Saya_n_a states that silama is a plant which is made into ropes. That the meaning of silamavati was forgotten at an early time we see by the Atharva-Veda III. 12, 2, subst.i.tuting sun_ri_tavati, for silamavati, as preserved in the _S_ankhayana G_ri_hya-sutras, 3, 3. I think silama means straw, from whatever plant it may be taken, and this would be equally applicable to a _s_ala, a house, a sthu_n_a, a post, and to the river Indus. It may have been, as Ludwig conjectures, an old local name, and in that case it may possibly account for the name given in later times to the Suleiman range.]

[Footnote 208: Madhuv_ri_dh is likewise a word which does not occur again in the Rig-Veda. Sya_n_a explains it by nirgu_n_di and similar plants, but it is doubtful what plant is meant. Gu_n_da is the name of a gra.s.s, madhuv_ri_dh therefore may have been a plant such as sugar-cane, that yielded a sweet juice, the Upper Indus being famous for sugar-cane; see Hiouen-thsang, II. p. 105. I take adhivaste with Roth in the sense "she dresses herself," as we might say "the river is dressed in heather." Muir translates, "she traverses a land yielding sweetness;"

Zimmer, "she clothes herself in Madhuv_ri_dh;" Ludwig, "the Silamavati throws herself into the increaser of the honey-sweet dew." All this shows how little progress can be made in Vedic scholarship by merely translating either words or verses, without giving at the same time a full justification of the meaning a.s.signed to every single word.]

[Footnote 209: See Petersburg Dictionary, s. v. virap_s_in.]

[Footnote 210: "Among the Hottentots, the Kunene, Okavango, and Orange rivers, all have the name of Garib, _i.e._ the Runner."--Dr. Theoph.

Hahn, _Cape Times_, July 11, 1882.]