Page:Atharva-Veda samhita.djvu/139

Rh makes similar reference to book xvi. (see p. 792, ¶4, to p. 793), and speaks of our xvi. 5 as ādya, that is, 'the first' of the second group (p. 793). Moreover, the treatment of books xv. and xvi. by the makers of the Pāipp. text (see p. 1016, line 12) would indicate that the anuvāka is here the practically recognized unit subordinate to the kāṇḍa. As for the bearing of this grouping upon the citation of the text concerned and upon the summations, cf. p. cxxxvii, top, and p. cxlv, table 3, both forms⌋

⌊'''The division into sūktas or 'hymns. ' '''—The hymn may well be called the first considerable natural unit in the rising scale of divisions. Of the hymn, then, verses and pādas are the natural subdivisions, although single verses or even stock-pādas may also be regarded as natural units. Book and hymn and verse are all divisions of so obviously and equally fundamental character, that it is quite right that citations should be made by them and not otherwise. However diverse in subject-matter two successive sūktas may be, we rightly expect unity of subject within the limits of what is truly one and the same sūkta. It is this inherent unity of subject which justifies the use of the term artha-sūkta (below, p. cxxxiii) with reference to any true metrical hymn; and our critical suspicions are naturally aroused against a hymn that (like vii. 35) fails to meet this expectation. The hymn, moreover, is the natural nucleus for the secondary accretions which are discussed below, at p. cliii.⌋

⌊The hymn-divisions not everywhere of equal value.—It is matter of considerable critical interest that the hymn-divisions of different parts of our text are by no means of equal value (cf. p. clx). Thus it is far from certain whether there is any good ground at all for the division of the material of book xiv. into hymns (the question is carefully examined at pages 738-9). And again, the material of book xviii. is of such sort as to make it clear that the hymn-divisions in that book are decidedly mechanical and that they have almost no intrinsic significance (see p. 814, ¶6, p. 827, ¶2, p. 848, ¶8). The familiar Dīrghatamas-hymn of the Rig-Veda has been divided by the Atharvan text-makers into two (ix. 9 and 10), and doubtless for no other reason than to bring it into an approximate uniformity in respect of length with the hymns of books viii.-xi. (p. clvi). As Whitney notes, hymns xix. 53 and 54 are only two divided parts of one hymn: so 10 and 11; 28 and 29.⌋

⌊'''The division into ṛcas or 'verses. ' '''—This division is, of course, like the division into books and hymns, of fundamental significance. It is maintained even in the non-metrical passages; but the name is then usually modified by the prefixion of the determinative avasāna, so that the prose verses in the paryāya-hymns are called avasānarcas (p. 472).⌋