The translator’s English as printed (Hermann Oldenberg & F. Max Müller). The original-language text is not held; names are romanised as the translator printed them.
Probably they were celebrated in simple unadorned fashion;
x - GRIHYA-SOTRAS.
what the person making the offering had to say was doubtless limited to short, possibly prose formulas, so that these ceremonies remained free from the poetry of the above-mentioned families of priests’. We think that the character of the verses given in the Grzhya-sitras, which had to be repeated at the performance of the different ceremonies, justifies us in making these conjectures. Some of these verses indeed are old Vedic verses, but we have no proof that they were composed for the purposes of the Gvzhya ceremonies, and the connection in which we find them in the Rig-veda proves rather the contrary. Another portion of these verses and songs proves to have been composed indeed for the very Gvihya ceremonies for which they are prescribed in the texts of the ritual: but these verses are more recent than the old parts of the Rig-veda. Part of them are found in the Rig-veda in a position which speaks for their more recent origin, others are not contained in the Rig-veda at all. Many of these verses are found in the more recent Vedic Samhitds, especially in the Atharva-veda, a Samhita which may be regarded in the main as a treasure of Grihya verses; others finally have not as yet been traced to any Vedic Samhita, and we know them from the Grthya-sitras only. We may infer that, during the latter part of the Rig-veda period, ceremonies such as marriage and burial began to be decked out with poetry as had long been the case with the Soma offering. The principal collection of marriage sentences? and the sentences for the
2 It is doubtful whether at the time of the Rig-veda the custom was established for the sacrificer to keep burning constantly a sacred Grvhya fire besides the three Srauta fires, There is, as far as I know, no express mention of the Gvzhya fire in the Rig-veda ; but that is no proof that it had then not yet come into use. Of the Srauta fires the garhapatya is the only one that is mentioned, though all three were known beyond a doubt. (Ludwig, Rig-veda, vol. iii, P- 3553 in some of the passages cited the word garhapatya does not refer to the garhapatya fire.)
2 Rig-veda X,85. It is clear that what we have here is not a hymn intended to be recited all at once, but that, as in a number of other cases in the Rig-veda, the single verses or groups of verses were to be used at different points in the performance of a rite (or, in other cases, in the telling of a story). Compare my paper, ‘Akhy4na-Hymnen im Rig-veda,’ Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft, vol. xxxix, p. 83.—Many verses of Rig-veda X, 85 occur again in the fourteenth book of the Atharva-veda.
INTRODUCTION, x1
Compare my paper, ‘Akhy4na-Hymnen im Rig-veda,’ Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft, vol. xxxix, p. 83.—Many verses of Rig-veda X, 85 occur again in the fourteenth book of the Atharva-veda.
INTRODUCTION, x1
burial of the dead? are found in the tenth Mazdala of the Rig-veda, which, for the most part, is known to be of later origin than the preceding portions of the collections*. If we look into the character of the verses, which these long Grihya songs are composed of, we shall find additional grounds for assuming their early origin. A few remarks about their metrical character will make this clear ®. There is no other metre in which the contrast between the early and later periods of Vedic literature manifests itself so clearly as in the Anushfubh-metre*. The Anushfubh hemistich consists of sixteen syllables, which are divided by the caesura into two halves of eight syllables each. The second of these halves has as a rule the iambic ending (v — v ¥), though this rule was not so strictly carried out in the early as in the later period’. The iambic ending is also the rule in the older parts of the Veda for the close of the first half, i.e. for the four syllables before the caesura °. We know that the later prosody, as we see it in certain late parts of Vedic literature, in the Pali Pitakas of the Buddhists, and later in the great epic poems, not only departs from the usage of the older period, but adopts a directly contrary course, i.e. the iambic ending of the first pada, which was formerly the rule, is not allowed at all later, and instead of it the prevailing ending is the antispast (v -—). It goes without saying that such a change in metzical usage, as the one just described, cannot have xii GRIHYA-SOTRAS,
1 Rig-veda X, 14-16, and several other hymns of the tenth book. Compare the note at Asvalayana-Grihya IV, 4. 6.
* Compare my Hymnen des Rig-veda, vol. i (Prolegomena), pp. 265 seq.
* Compare the account of the historical development of some of the Vedic metres which I have given in my paper, ‘ Das altindische Akhy4na,’ Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlindischen Gesellschaft, vol. xxxvii, and my Hymnen des Rig-veda, vol. i, pp. 26 seqq.
* The Trishfubh and Gagatt offer a much less promising material for investigation, because, so far as can now be made out, the departures from the old type begin at a later period than in the case of the Anush‘ubh.
* Compare Max Miiller’s introduction to his English translation of the Rigveda, vol. i, pp. cxiv seq.
* To demonstrate this, I have given in my last-quoted paper, p. 62, statistics with regard to the two hymns, Rig-veda I, 10 and VIII, 8; in the former the iambic ending of the first pada obtains in twenty out of twenty-four cases, in the latter in forty-two out of forty-six cases.
62, statistics with regard to the two hymns, Rig-veda I, 10 and VIII, 8; in the former the iambic ending of the first pada obtains in twenty out of twenty-four cases, in the latter in forty-two out of forty-six cases.
xii GRIHYA-SOTRAS, taken place at one jump. And accordingly a consideration of the Vedic texts reveals a transition period or rather a series of several transition periods between the old and the new standpoints. The first change is that every other ending of the first pada is allowed by the side of the iambic ending. The two forms of the ending, the one prevailing in the earliest, and the one prevailing in the later period of the prosody, the iambic (uv — uv “) and the antispastic (v ——*), are those that occur most frequently in the intermediate period, but besides them all other possible forms are allowed 1.
This is precisely the stage of metrical development which the great Grzhya songs of the tenth Mazdala of the Rigveda have reached. Let us consider, for instance, the marriage songs and the marriage sayings, X, 85, and see what kind of ending there is at the end of the first pada. Of the first seventeen verses of this Sdkta sixteen are in Anushtubh metre (verse 14 is Trish¢tubh); we have therefore thirty-two cases in which the metrical form of these syllables must be investigated. The quantity of the syllable immediately preceding the caesura being a matter of indifference, we have not sixteen but only eight a priori possible combinations for the form of the last four syllables of the pada ; I give each of these forms below, adding each time in | how many of the thirty-two cases it is used :
--—-vU-~ wv ¥ -—-—u--¥ vuvF ~vuvur vu-&
—-u-& luo aan we
32 * Compare the statistics as to the frequency of the different metrical forms at the ending of the first pida, p. 63 of my above-quoted paper, and Hymnen des Rig-veda, vol. i, p. 28, I have endeavoured in the same paper, p. 65 seq. to make it seem probable that this was the stage of prosody prevailing during the government of the two Kuru kings Parikshit and Ganamegaya.
INTRODUCTION. xiii
We see that all the possible combinations are actually represented in these thirty-two cases, and accordingly the metrical build of this Sdkta shows that it belongs to a period to which only the latest songs of the Rig-veda collection can be referred, but the peculiarities of which may be often noticed in the Atharva-veda and in the verses scattered throughout the Brahmaza literature!.
A hasty glance suffices to show that those verses of the Grthya ritual which do not appear in the Samhit4s, but which are quoted at full length in the Grzhya-sitras, are also in the same stage. For instance, the seven Anushfubh verses which are quoted Sankhayana-Grzhya I, 19, 5. 6, give us the following relations, if we investigate them as we did those in Rig-veda X, 85:
U--¥ —-vu-¥ v-u* -uuw vuve --vUYX —--—--—_¥
Hee DP ROR
p. 14
Probably they were celebrated in simple unadorned fashion;
x - GRIHYA-SOTRAS.
what the person making the offering had to say was doubtless limited to short, possibly prose formulas, so that these ceremonies remained free from the poetry of the above-mentioned families of priests’. We think that the character of the verses given in the Grzhya-sitras, which had to be repeated at the performance of the different ceremonies, justifies us in making these conjectures. Some of these verses indeed are old Vedic verses, but we have no proof that they were composed for the purposes of the Gvzhya ceremonies, and the connection in which we find them in the Rig-veda proves rather the contrary. Another portion of these verses and songs proves to have been composed indeed for the very Gvihya ceremonies for which they are prescribed in the texts of the ritual: but these verses are more recent than the old parts of the Rig-veda. Part of them are found in the Rig-veda in a position which speaks for their more recent origin, others are not contained in the Rig-veda at all. Many of these verses are found in the more recent Vedic Samhitds, especially in the Atharva-veda, a Samhita which may be regarded in the main as a treasure of Grihya verses; others finally have not as yet been traced to any Vedic Samhita, and we know them from the Grthya-sitras only. We may infer that, during the latter part of the Rig-veda period, ceremonies such as marriage and burial began to be decked out with poetry as had long been the case with the Soma offering. The principal collection of marriage sentences? and the sentences for the
2 It is doubtful whether at the time of the Rig-veda the custom was established for the sacrificer to keep burning constantly a sacred Grvhya fire besides the three Srauta fires, There is, as far as I know, no express mention of the Gvzhya fire in the Rig-veda ; but that is no proof that it had then not yet come into use. Of the Srauta fires the garhapatya is the only one that is mentioned, though all three were known beyond a doubt. (Ludwig, Rig-veda, vol. iii, P- 3553 in some of the passages cited the word garhapatya does not refer to the garhapatya fire.)
2 Rig-veda X,85. It is clear that what we have here is not a hymn intended to be recited all at once, but that, as in a number of other cases in the Rig-veda, the single verses or groups of verses were to be used at different points in the performance of a rite (or, in other cases, in the telling of a story). Compare my paper, ‘Akhy4na-Hymnen im Rig-veda,’ Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft, vol. xxxix, p. 83.—Many verses of Rig-veda X, 85 occur again in the fourteenth book of the Atharva-veda.
INTRODUCTION, x1
Compare my paper, ‘Akhy4na-Hymnen im Rig-veda,’ Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlandischen Gesellschaft, vol. xxxix, p. 83.—Many verses of Rig-veda X, 85 occur again in the fourteenth book of the Atharva-veda.
INTRODUCTION, x1
burial of the dead? are found in the tenth Mazdala of the Rig-veda, which, for the most part, is known to be of later origin than the preceding portions of the collections*. If we look into the character of the verses, which these long Grihya songs are composed of, we shall find additional grounds for assuming their early origin. A few remarks about their metrical character will make this clear ®. There is no other metre in which the contrast between the early and later periods of Vedic literature manifests itself so clearly as in the Anushfubh-metre*. The Anushfubh hemistich consists of sixteen syllables, which are divided by the caesura into two halves of eight syllables each. The second of these halves has as a rule the iambic ending (v — v ¥), though this rule was not so strictly carried out in the early as in the later period’. The iambic ending is also the rule in the older parts of the Veda for the close of the first half, i.e. for the four syllables before the caesura °. We know that the later prosody, as we see it in certain late parts of Vedic literature, in the Pali Pitakas of the Buddhists, and later in the great epic poems, not only departs from the usage of the older period, but adopts a directly contrary course, i.e. the iambic ending of the first pada, which was formerly the rule, is not allowed at all later, and instead of it the prevailing ending is the antispast (v -—). It goes without saying that such a change in metzical usage, as the one just described, cannot have xii GRIHYA-SOTRAS,
1 Rig-veda X, 14-16, and several other hymns of the tenth book. Compare the note at Asvalayana-Grihya IV, 4. 6.
* Compare my Hymnen des Rig-veda, vol. i (Prolegomena), pp. 265 seq.
* Compare the account of the historical development of some of the Vedic metres which I have given in my paper, ‘ Das altindische Akhy4na,’ Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlindischen Gesellschaft, vol. xxxvii, and my Hymnen des Rig-veda, vol. i, pp. 26 seqq.
* The Trishfubh and Gagatt offer a much less promising material for investigation, because, so far as can now be made out, the departures from the old type begin at a later period than in the case of the Anush‘ubh.
* Compare Max Miiller’s introduction to his English translation of the Rigveda, vol. i, pp. cxiv seq.
* To demonstrate this, I have given in my last-quoted paper, p. 62, statistics with regard to the two hymns, Rig-veda I, 10 and VIII, 8; in the former the iambic ending of the first pada obtains in twenty out of twenty-four cases, in the latter in forty-two out of forty-six cases.
62, statistics with regard to the two hymns, Rig-veda I, 10 and VIII, 8; in the former the iambic ending of the first pada obtains in twenty out of twenty-four cases, in the latter in forty-two out of forty-six cases.
xii GRIHYA-SOTRAS, taken place at one jump. And accordingly a consideration of the Vedic texts reveals a transition period or rather a series of several transition periods between the old and the new standpoints. The first change is that every other ending of the first pada is allowed by the side of the iambic ending. The two forms of the ending, the one prevailing in the earliest, and the one prevailing in the later period of the prosody, the iambic (uv — uv “) and the antispastic (v ——*), are those that occur most frequently in the intermediate period, but besides them all other possible forms are allowed 1.
This is precisely the stage of metrical development which the great Grzhya songs of the tenth Mazdala of the Rigveda have reached. Let us consider, for instance, the marriage songs and the marriage sayings, X, 85, and see what kind of ending there is at the end of the first pada. Of the first seventeen verses of this Sdkta sixteen are in Anushtubh metre (verse 14 is Trish¢tubh); we have therefore thirty-two cases in which the metrical form of these syllables must be investigated. The quantity of the syllable immediately preceding the caesura being a matter of indifference, we have not sixteen but only eight a priori possible combinations for the form of the last four syllables of the pada ; I give each of these forms below, adding each time in | how many of the thirty-two cases it is used :
--—-vU-~ wv ¥ -—-—u--¥ vuvF ~vuvur vu-&
—-u-& luo aan we
32 * Compare the statistics as to the frequency of the different metrical forms at the ending of the first pida, p. 63 of my above-quoted paper, and Hymnen des Rig-veda, vol. i, p. 28, I have endeavoured in the same paper, p. 65 seq. to make it seem probable that this was the stage of prosody prevailing during the government of the two Kuru kings Parikshit and Ganamegaya.
INTRODUCTION. xiii
We see that all the possible combinations are actually represented in these thirty-two cases, and accordingly the metrical build of this Sdkta shows that it belongs to a period to which only the latest songs of the Rig-veda collection can be referred, but the peculiarities of which may be often noticed in the Atharva-veda and in the verses scattered throughout the Brahmaza literature!.
A hasty glance suffices to show that those verses of the Grthya ritual which do not appear in the Samhit4s, but which are quoted at full length in the Grzhya-sitras, are also in the same stage. For instance, the seven Anushfubh verses which are quoted Sankhayana-Grzhya I, 19, 5. 6, give us the following relations, if we investigate them as we did those in Rig-veda X, 85:
U--¥ —-vu-¥ v-u* -uuw vuve --vUYX —--—--—_¥
Hee DP ROR
p. 14
Part II of the Grihya-Sûtras — and the volume Oldenberg promises in Part I, where he undertakes to give his proofs "in the General Introduction to the Grihya-sûtras which will be given in the second volume of these translations". Part I's introduction is the Sânkhâyana one; the general argument about the class was deferred to here.
is promised in The Grihya-Sûtras: Rules of Vedic Domestic Ceremonies, Part I — SBE Vol. 29 (trans. Hermann Oldenberg, 1886)