Page:Atharva-Veda samhita volume 2.djvu/415

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natural order, the forming of a human figure with the bones (Kāuç. 85. 25). If the latter use be the correct one, then the acts that go with vss. 53 and 54 (covering bones with palāça and stones) form a reasonable sequel to it; although, to be sure, they also form a sequel to vs. 36 (besprinkling of the bones), both naturally and in the text of Kāuç. If I am right in understanding vs. 55 to accompany the patting of the grave-mound (see under 55), then the piling thereof (with vss. 66 and 67) must intervene between 54 and 55. Vs. 56, a symbolical taking of his hereditament by the oldest son, must belong to an earlier stage of the proceedings. One use of 57 is in the viaticum ceremony (described under vs. 16); the other is in the much later piṇḍa or cake ceremony. Here too, if anywhere (but see under 58), belongs the group 58-60; and the group 61-65, with 68, seems to belong also to the same cake ceremony (61, cake-sprinkling; 68, strewing the barhis to receive the cakes; 62, strewing of sesame on that barhis; 63, dismissal of the Fathers; 64, offering of grains with the pot-offering noticed below under Part VI.; 65, the "withdrawal of the fires," apparently the ultimate act in this connection). Vss. 66 and 67 (mound-piling) were mentioned above; and so was 68, which clearly suits the action immediately preceding that of 62. Vs. 69 accompanies a much earlier act, the expiatory bath taken just after the cremation. Vs. 70, which has no use in Kāuç., seems to me to be put here because, like 69, it contains a prayer for release from the bonds of Varuṇa.

Part VI., verses 71-87.—All this passage of unbroken prose (but see p. 869, ¶5) belongs to the piṇḍapitṛyajña. The comm., p. 241$9$, aptly notes that offerings to the gods are announced with svā́hā and váṣaṭ and those to the Fathers with svadhā́ and námas. This Part falls naturally into 5 subdivisions, each with its own manifest unity:


 * Subdivisions 1 and 3 accompany the ceremony of strewing three handfuls [of grain? trīn adhomuṣṭīn, Keç.], and they dovetail each into the other in such wise that they are used (Kāuç. 87. 8) thus: 71, with 78; 72, with 73 or 79; 74, with 80. Thus the second handful is strewn while the liturge repeats idaṁ "somāya pitṛmate svadhā" (72) either with pitṛbhyaḥ somavadbhyaḥ (73) or else with pitṛbhyo antarikṣasadbhyaḥ (79). The appropriateness of the linkage in each of the three cases is palpable. The second use of the mantras of subdivisions 1 and 3 is with the pot-offering (Kāuç. 88. 1-4).—-Then comes (88. 11) the offering of the cakes with subdivision 2 (piṇḍapradānamantrā evam āmnāyante: comm.). These first three subdivisions are clearly triplets; and their symmetry is marred only by vs. 73, which is simply an alternative of vs. 79, awkwardly interjected after vs. 72 for lack of a better place.—Subdivision 4 consists of doublets (5 in all): to wit, 8 ascriptions of homage to the Fathers' various attributes, 4 expressed by nouns and 4 by substantival relative clauses, and a final doublet (85) with námas and svadhā́.—Subdivision 5 consists of 2 entirely symmetrical 4-membered mantras, the prior one relating to yonder world, the latter to this.

Translated: as AV. hymn, by Ludwig, pages 488-493; Weber, Sb. 1896, pages 277-294; Griffith, ii. 247-258; also the occasional RV. verses by the RV. translators. — Weber's analysis etc., p. 277-8, may be consulted.