Satapatha Bramhana Part 02

SR No.: 007678
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Julius Eggeling
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1885
Total Pages: 2521
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 44 MB

Page 2132

xxxvi
GRIHYA-SÓTRAS.
Sloka Pada for the later period u--4, which, for instance, in the Nalopåkhyana of the Mahabharata covers precisely five-sixths of all the cases, occurs in Sankhayana in thirty cases out of thirty-nine, that is in about three quarters of the cases 1; Sankhāyana has still twice the ending u-uy which is the rule in the Rig-veda, but which is forbidden by the later prosody: prahutah pitrikarmanâ, uktvå mantram sprised apah'. It may be observed that a similar treatment of the Sloka metre appears also in the Rig-veda Prátisakhya of Saunaka. Here too the modern form of the ending of the first pâda dominates, although sometimes the old iambic form is preserved, e. g. II, 5 antahpadamvivrittayah, III, 6 anudattodaye punah.
It seems evident that we have in this Sloka form of the Sätra period, the last preparatory stage which the development of this metre had to traverse, before it arrived at the shape which it assumes in epic poetry; and it is to be hoped that more exhaustive observations on this point (account being especially taken of the numerous verses quoted in the Dharma-sätras) will throw an important light on the chronology of the literature of this period lying between the Vedas and the post-Vedic age.
We add to these remarks on the Slokas quoted in the Grihya-satras, that we come upon a number of passages in the midst of the prose of the Satras, which without being in any way externally designated as verses, have an unmistakable metrical character, being evidently verses which the authors of the Satras found ready made, and which they used for their own aphorisms, either without changing them at all, or with such slight changes that the original form remained clearly recognisable. Thus we read in Åsvalâyana (Grihya I, 6, 8), as a definition of the Rakshasa marriage: hatva bhittvå ka sîrshani rudatîm rudadbhyo
The few verses which are found in Gobhila preserve the same metrical standard as those quoted in Sankhayana ; it follows that in Gobhila IV, 7, 23, asvatthâd agnibhayam brüyât, we cannot change brûyêt in ka, as Prof. Knater proposes. The supernumerary syllable of the first foot is unobjectionable, but the form --- of the second foot should not be toached.
. Both passages are to be found in Sänkhayana-Gribya I, 10.
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