Page:Atharva-Veda samhita.djvu/119

Rh gives the sigla used by Whitney, but with some marks (a, b, c, ′, ″) added for convenience of reference to or from the preceding table. The second column shows which books any given ms. contains. The third gives the numbers of the mss. as they stand in Weber's Catalogue; and the fourth gives the old numbers assigned to those mss. when they formed a part of the collection of Sir Robert Chambers. The right-hand column shows what book or group of books was transcribed by Whitney from the original ms. named in the same line.

⌊Manuscripts used by Whitney before publication of the text.—The following descriptions were written out by Whitney in such form as to require almost no changes.⌋

Bp. Under this designation are, for convenience's sake, grouped two Berlin pada-manuscripts, making together a complete pada-text to books i.-xviii. The first manuscript, Bp.2 (Chambers, No. 8; Weber, No. 332), is described on pp. 82-83 of Weber's Catalogue of the Berlin Sanskrit mss. It contains books i.-ix., written in a clear but rather rude hand, quite fairly correctly, and accented throughout in a uniform manner. At the end of book ii. is a colophon (given in full by Weber), stating the date as A.D. 1593-4; but this is probably copied from the scribe's original. At the end of the fourth book was perhaps another colophon; but, if so, it is lost, with the last word of the last verse in the book, by the omission of a leaf (leaf 125). The second manuscript, Bp.b (Chambers, No. 108; Weber, No. 335: see Weber's Catalogue, pp. 83-84), containing books x.-xviii., is defective at the end, lacking the last two verses of xviii. (except the first word of 4. 88), and of course also the colophon. It is written in three different hands, with fair correctness (Weber's note, "by the same hand as 334," is a mistake). It is accented in the same manner as No. 332.

Bp.2 This designation also applies to more than one manuscript: the first manuscript, Bp.2a, contains only book i. (Chambers, No. 117; Weber, No. 331: Cat., p. 82), is handsomely and very accurately written, and is quite independent of Bp. It is dated A.D. 1632. Its mode of accentuation changes soon after the beginning (see below, p. cxxi). The second