This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
339
TRANSLATION AND NOTES. BOOK VI.
-vi. 78

1. The heaven hath stood; the earth hath stood; all this living world hath stood; on their base (āsthána) the mountains have stood; I have made the horses stand in their station.

The first half-verse is 44. 1 a, b, above; the second is nearly vii. 96. 1 c, d, below. But Ppp. is different in c, d, and partly illegible; tiṣṭha...ime sthāmann açvā ’raṅsata can be read. The comm. inserts 'thee, O woman' in d, and regards açvān as an incomplete comparison: 'as they bind vicious horses with ropes'! Prāt. iv. 96 prescribes the unchanged pada-reading atiṣṭhipam. ⌊Most of SPP's authorities have asthuḥ in saṁhitā.⌋


2. He who hath attained the going away, he who hath attained the coming in, the turning hither, the turning in—he who is herdsman, on him I call.

The first half-verse is nearly RV. x. 19. 5 a, b, and the second exactly ib. 4 c, d. RV. reads vyáyanam for parā́yaṇam in a, and parā́yaṇam for nyā́yanam in b. The comm. appears to read nyayanam.


3. O Jātavedas, cause to turn in; be thy turners hither a hundred, thy turners this way a thousand; with them get for us again.

Ppp. has, for d, tābhir enaṁ ni vartaya, thus defining the object of all this recovering action to be some male person or thing. The comm. interprets it all through as a woman who has escaped or wants to escape. RV. x. 19 is aimed at kine. Pādas b and c are found in VS. xii. 8, which also ends with púnar no naṣṭám ā́ kṛdhi púnar no rayím ā́ kṛdhi. Santi would be a better reading in b.


78. For matrimonial happiness.

[Atharvan.—1, 2. cāndramasyāu; 3. tvāṣṭrī. 1-3. anuṣṭubh.]

Found also in Pāipp. xix. ⌊and at MP. i. 8. 6, 7, 10⌋. Employed by Kāuç. twice (78. 10, 14) in the marriage ceremonies, with other passages, with anointing the heads of the married pair, making them eat together, etc.

Translated: Weber, Ind. Stud. v. 238; Ludwig, p. 371; Grill, 57, 166; Griffith, i. 287; Bloomfield, 96, 498; also, as part of the MP. hymn, by Winternitz, Hochzeitsrituell, p. 73.


1. By this actual (? bhūtá) oblation let this man be filled up again; the wife that they have brought to him, let him grow superior (abhi-vṛdh) to her by essence (rása).

Ppp. has bhūtasya for bhūtena in a, and inverts the order of words in b. Grill acutely suggests bhūtyena in a, 'for prosperity (bhūti),' and the comm. paraphrases it with samṛddhikareṇa 'prosperity-malting.' Abhi in d, and in 2 a, b, seems to have a meaning like that which it has in abhi-bhū. The comm. makes no difficulty of rendering the neuter vardhatām as if it were causative. Ppp. takes away the difficulty of the expression in this verse by the very different reading jāyāṁ yām asmā ’vidaṁ sā rasenā ’bhi vardhatām.


2. Let him grow superior to [her] by fatness (páyas), let him grow superior to [her] by royalty; by wealth of thousand-fold splendor let these two be unexhausted.