Satapatha Bramhana Part 03

SR No.: 007679
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Julius Eggeling
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1894
Total Pages: 2382
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 45 MB

Page 1214

XIX, 34. COMMENTARY.
671
sense, the first gangidó, 'wakeful,' being parallel with rákshitâ in the second Päda.
Stanza 2. a. The MSS. at the basis of Roth and Whitney's edition read gâgritsyas tripañkâsîh, and the editors, inspired doubtless by RV. X, 34, 8, have emended akshakrityás tripankâsîh, 'the sorceries with dice, fifty-three in number. But the parallelism of the Rig-veda passage is every way doubtful (Zimmer, Altindisches Leben, p. 284; Weber, Über die Königsweihe, Transactions of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences, 1893, p. 72 of the reprint); the bold emendation is at any rate not warranted by any too desperate condition of the text. The majority of the MSS. used in Shankar Pandit's edition (both Samhita and Padapâtha) have gâgritsyás, which the editor, with Sâyana, has changed to ya(1) grltsyas; this might mean the thieving female demons' (Sâyana, yâ gritsyah gardhanasila yâs ... krityâh); cf. gritsâh at Vâg. S. XVI, 25, and Mahîdhara's scholium. Notwithstanding that gritsyas is the unanimous lectio difficillima of the MSS., perchance yet destined to be sustained, I have restored simply yảh krityáhl; cf. for the juxtaposition of kritya and krityâkrlt (Påda b), AV. IV, 17, 4; V, 14, 3. 4. 5. 8. 10. 12. 13; X, 1, 6. 31; XIX, 45, 1. The Padapâtha divides tripañka-asih, 'devouring fifteenfold,' which would comport well with the reading grltsyas. The meaning consisting of fifty-three' assumed for pañkasá, 2. in the Pet. Lex., in our translation, and by Sâyana (tryadhikapañkâsatsamkhyâkâh), thus rests upon a fragile basis; perhaps the Pada pâtha is right; or, perhaps, the word means simply 'fifteenfold,' an adjectivised tripañka-sas, with the well-known adverbial suffix -sas, 'fold'
Sâyana describes the krityã concretely as a figure, or the like, made of mud, wood, &c., mriddârvadinâ nirmitapullalyâdi.
Cf. the Avestan fractional numeral adjectives thrishva- 'a third,' kathrushva-'a fourth,' &c., which, in our opinion, are adjectivised locatives plural, thrishu, &c., that which is in three.'
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