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. D. D. KOSAMBI
It may be objccted that a plurality of mothers may indicatc only polygamy, A moment's thought will make it clcar that in a polygamous gentile patriarchal sociсty, thic father's gens and the mother's narre become important; this is precisсly what we do find in the oldest Pali litcraturc.
Thc usage in question-a singic child with several mothers-is found cxplicitly in vii.2.5.: frürü sisum na mätari rihāne ; i.140,3: tarele abhi mailará Siśum ; and in viii. 99.6. The plural or dual'mothers' in the sense of parcuts is cxcluded, though cvcn this would be highly significant. Panini vi.3.33 : pilarāmātari ca chandasi only shows that the compound could be used in thc dual scnsc, as in Rv. iv.6.7 : na mätaräpilarā, to mcan parents. By itself, matarii as dual would at Icast indicate two mothers, which suffices for our purpose. Whcrc a specific intcrprctation is given (as occasionally by Siyana) we have the parents as the sky and carth : dyādi-pythivi; but both arc feminine and x.64.10) calls the great sky also a mother : ula mítá byhad-dive. The common Sanskrit appellation for ancestors is pitaraḥ, 'fathers', showing how natural patriarchal usage had hccomc. Correspondingly we have thic masculinc 'father sky dyaus-pitā (1.90.7;1.164.33 ctc.) as in Grech, and Latin. Why should this onc god common to all known branches of Aryan mythology appear as a mother so often in thc Rgveda ?
Soma had several mothers: lvām rihanti mätarah (ix.100.7 ; also ix.111.2). In fact he was born of seven mothers, ix.102.4 ; jajñānam sapla mälaraḥ who are sisters, . ix. 86.36 : sapla svasäro abhi mataraḥ Siśum navam jajilinam. These seven mothers are presurnally the seven rivcrs : (1.158.5) nadyo málslamáh ; i. 34.8: sindhubhiḥ saplamalsbhiḥ. The point is that they jointly hcar a singic child while there is no mention at all of the father in spitc of the patriarchal naturc of the society in which thesc hymns were chanted; notc again that the Greck rivers were masculinc. Further, though a river is very uscful to pastoral nomads, the superlative worship in ambitame nadītame devitame sarasvali (ii.42 16,“o most cxcellent of mothers, rivers, goddesses, Sarasvati'') scoms characteristic of the pre-Aryan riparian urban cultures. The connection betwecn. amba mother and ambu or ambhas for watcr is neither fortuitous nos to be cxplained psychoanalytically in this case but a fundamental attitude to be cxpccted among people wiose cntirc civilization owed its birth and its cxistence to the river. The primary sanctity of a river like the Ganges as a clcanser of sin belongs to a later period of Brahminism, though apparcnt cvcn in x.17.10. Thesc river-mothers might be mcant in the famous linc yahu flasya mālara*
*In this phrase, the dusal málará is taken on an night and Uras ini, 342.7 and v.5.6: the sky and carth in the remaining Chy, lyt without internal cvidctice in ix. 102.7 '17 is classical interprration chose its own inconsistcticy, strengther! Loy in.33.5 villich has the plural, along with the adjcctive
mi which is unique in the RV and may therefore indicalc conncction with special Brahmin culis. Further, Sayana gives ildukasya as an alternalive meaning, for flassa even on y, 1.15; vi, 17.7 x 9.4. which make it likely that the origin of the poliras not consuleration is actuallly in the cult of the diuer-mothics, perhaps of two rivers. By i1: clf, jahti ir ur:d in the sense of river. uuite un
whuis werd in the senec of river, quitrunarnbiguously in ii. 35.9 ; iii. 1.4,6,9: 1.72.8.-and even of the Leven rivers,
