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518
HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
Stanza 1. Repeated with variants at RV. VIII, 11, 10; Tait. År. X, 1 (st. 69). In Pâda c Sâyana with these texts reads piprayasva (sarîram ... půraya) for piprayasva. The meaning of the latter is at any rate in doubt, either' delight' (from root prî) or fill' (from root pra ).
Stanza 2. For the character of the constellations syeshthaghni (thus, not gyaishthaghni, the MSS.) and vikritau, see Weber, Nakshatra, II, pp. 292, 310, 374, 389 ; Zimmer, 1.c., pp. 356, 392. In Pada b (formulaic, see VI, 112, 1 b) the expression mûlabárhanat plays upon two alternate names of the vikritau, namely, můla, and mûlabárhanî?. The name vikritau is here felt to be entanglers, ensnarers ;' elsewhere in the AV. and in other texts, the word is rather regarded auspiciously, they that loosen the bonds of disease,' and the like. See the note on II, 8, 1. The change of person in the second hemistich is noteworthy, but Agni seems to be the subject in both.
Stanza 8. For vyāghreshni, cf. vyāghráu dántau VI, 140, 1. The tiger, thus early, typifies danger to life, as even to this day he claims thousands of victims annually in India.
VI, 111. COMMENTARY TO PAGE 32. The hymn is one of the three måtrinâmâni (sc. suktàni), 'hymns that contain the names of the mothers,' Kaus. 8, 24. They are II, 2 and VIII, 6 in addition to the present, and appear to have been so designated because they contain the words ápsaras (II, 2, 3. 5; VI, 111, 4), and mâtár (VIII,
So Whitney, doubtfully, in the Index Verborum, p. 195 b (cf. also 382). The form piprayasva is not quoted in the same author's Roots, Verb Forms, &c., either under prâ and prî (p. 102), or under pri (p. 100).
? Cf. also the foot-note on VI, 112, 1 a, b.
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