The Music of Hindostan c15.61

c15.61

The verse, *āgna āyāhi* (*Ṛgveda* VI. 16. 10), is sung three times over to form a *stoma* (group); Burnell only gives two of the three, and they are arranged here under one another for comparison. Of the remaining nine verses of this particular hymn, eight are from the *Ṛgveda*, and the last, which forms a doxology, belongs exclusively to the *Sāmaveda*. Besides the first verse, the fourth and fifth also form *stomas*; the sixth, seventh, and eighth are sung twice, and the other four only once¹; in all, nineteen sections (*bhakti*). The usual number was fifteen. Mention is also made of nine and twenty-one *bhakti*; so that a basis of three or five or seven *stomas* is implied, varied probably in any particular case.