Historical Development of Indian Music: A Critical Study c8.40

c8.40

In the *Saṅgīta-Darpaṇa*, the ‘highway’ music is called as ‘*mārga*’, because it was followed by Śiva or Druhina and practised (*prayuktam*) by Bharata. In Dhanañja’s *Daśarūpa* (I.15,) dancing has been called as ‘*mārga*’, as it displayed the meaning of words by means of gestures. In the *Śatapatha-Brāhmaṇa* (III.2.4), sacred music has been mentioned as distinct from profane music, in connection with the seduction of Vāk ‘who is won over from the Gandharvas by the Devas’. Dr. Ananda K. Coomaraswamy says: “Now the word mārga, rendered above by ‘highway’ derives from mṛg, to chase or hunt, especially by tracking. In the Ṛgveda it is familiar that what one hunts and tracks by its spoor is always the deity, the hidden light, the occulted Sun or Agni, who must be found, and is sometimes referred to as lurking in his lair. This is so well known that a very few citations will suffice. In Ṛv. VIII.2.6 men are said to pursue (mṛgayante) Indra, as one pursues a wild beast (mṛgam na), with offerings of milk and kine (which may be compared to bait); in Ṛv. VII.87.6, Varuṇa is compared to a ‘fierce beast’ (mṛgas tuviṣman); in Ṛv.X.46.2 the Bhṛgus, eager seekers after Agni, track him by his spoor (padaiḥ) like some lost beast (paśun na naṣṭam). Mārga is then the creature’s ‘runway’, the ‘track to be followed’ (padaviya) by the vestigium pedis. One sees thus clearly what values are implied in the expression mārga, ‘Way’, and how inevitably that which is mārga is likewise vimukti-da, since it is precisely by the finding of the Hidden Light that liberation is effected”.