Indian Antiquary Vol 58

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Charles E A W Oldham, S Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarka
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 177

SEPTEMBER, 1929 ]
VEDIC STUDIES
VEDIC STUDIES. By A. VENKATASUBBIAH, M.A., PH.D. (Continued from page 158.)
9. Ukhacchid.
The word ukhacchid is found used in one verse only, namely in RV. 4, 19, 9: vamribhih putram agruvo adanam nivesanád dhariva & jabhartha 1
163
vy andho akhyad ahim âdadáno nir bhûd ukhacchit sam aranta parva||
which is addressed to Indra and contains allusions to some deeds of his that were regarded as wonderful. The first half-verse means 'O thou with bay horses, thou didst bring out from the resting-place the son of the unmarried woman who was being eaten by ants.' The situation referred to here is obscure : Ludwig (RV. V, 84) thinks that the reference is to the saving of a child that was rogarded as dead and abandoned on an anthill, Geldner (Kommentar, p. 69,, that the situation is the same as that referred to in 4, 30, 16; 2, 165, 7 and 2, 13, 2 and similar to that referred to in 1, 112, 8, while Hillebrandt (Lieder des RV., p. 47, n. 1) suggests that the situation may have reference to the custom of confining in stocks or of burying. However that may be, there is no uncertainty about the meaning of the half-verse which does not offer any exegetical difficulty.
It is otherwise with the second half-verse in which the hapax legomenon (ukhacchid) occurs. This word was explained as 'brüchig wie ein Topf; Morsch' by Roth (in PW.) and by Kaegi (70 Lieder). Windisch, however, in Festgruss an Böhtlingk, p. 115, pointed out that the distich vy andho akhyat is similar to the second half of 8, 79, 2; prem andhab khyan niḥ śrono bhût, that the healing of the blind man and of the cripple is elsewhere too in the RV. (2, 13, 2; 1, 112, 8; 10, 25, 11) mentioned together, and hence suggested that the word ukhacchid here has some reference to lameness, that it is formed from ukhd which occurs in the gana kroḍâdi mentioned in P. 4, 1, 56 and which is explained as sphik in Vardhamana's vrtti on his Ganaratnamaḥodadhi (1, 43), and that it means 'one who is suffering from a fractured hip.' This view has found favour with Oldenberg (RV. Noten, 1, 283) and Geldner (l.c.) who therefore agree with Windisch in thinking that the second half of 4, 19, 9 refers to the same incidents as are alluded to in 8, 79, 2; 2, 13, 12 and 10, 25, 11. It has on the other hand been dissented from by Hillebrandt (1.c.) who, concerning the words vy andho akhyad ahim âdadanaḥ in the third pâda, makes reference to Pischel's view (Ved. St., 1, 183; n. 1) that they refer to a story similar to that related in the Pañcatantra, Bühler-Kielhorn's ed., V, p. 66, and who thinks that the fourth pada is concerned with some kind of ordeal of which the breaking of a pot, ghata-sphota, formed part. Hillebrandt therefore interprets ukhacchid as 'the pot-breaker' and parva as ukhâparva or pieces of the broken pot and translates the second distich as "Der Blinde wurde Sehend als er die Schlange fasste. Der Topfzerbrecher wurde frei: es fügten sich die Glieder zusammen."
Now the verse 4, 19, 9 differs from the verses 2, 13, 2; 1, 112, 8; and 10, 25, 11 referred to above in that its second distich mentions a detail, namely, that the blind man was taking or about to take a serpent, which is not alluded to in these verses; and this fact, as also the further fact that this distich has three finite verbs (and not two) lead me not only to agree with Pischel in his view referred to above, but to go further and to think that the fourth pada too refers likewise to other incidents of the same story.
This story, briefly told, is as follows: In a town named Madhupura in the north ruled a king named Madhusena. To him was once born a girl-child with three breasts (tristani). Hearing of this inauspicious event, the king had some learned Brahmanas called and asked them what he should do in the circumstances. The Brahmanas said that a girl with three breasts would bring death to any one who married her and also to her father as soon as he looked at her. They therefore advised the king not to see his daughter, but to have her reared in a secluded place and when she was grown up to give her in marriage to some one and then send her out of the kingdom,