India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c8.s6.9

c8.s6.9

(ii) *Bhakshya* and *Miśrī-karaṇa*. For the rest of the *Ashṭādhyāyī* Pāṇini has distinguished *bhakshya* (II.1.35) from *anna* (food in general, II.1.34), and it is, therefore, right to take it as denoting *khādya* (eatable or solid) articles only. Pāṇini's own examples of *bhakshyas* as given in *sūtra* VI.1.128 are (1) *palala* (meat), (2) *sūpa* (pulses) and (3) *śāka* (vegetables), which are compounded with words denoting relish-giving articles of diet like *ghṛita*, *guḍa*, etc. According to *Kāśikā's* gloss on VI.2.154 (*Miśraṁ chānupasargam asandhau*) *guḍa*, *tila* and *ghṛita* are examples of *miśra* articles. It follows that for improving the taste it was permissible to have any suitable combination with the principal *bhakshya* food. The process of *miśrīkaraṇa*, mixing therewith, is the same as *saṁsṛishṭa* (IV.4.22). The *sūtra Saṁsṛishṭe* provides that the suffix *ṭhak* is added to a word when the sense is 'mixed therewith.' According to Pāṇini *chūrṇa* (IV.2.23) *lavaṇa* (IV.2.24) and *mudga* (IV.2.25) are ingredients which are used in 'mixing therewith.' Kātyāyana, perhaps too subtly, thinks that there is something wrong in salt being considered as an article for ‘mixing,’ since it is not an eatable by itself but an adjunct of food (*guṇa*) being one of the six *rasas*. (Cf. Kātyāyana on IV.4.24; II.330). But Pāṇini understands salt not merely as a *rasa*, but to be a *paṇya* or material commodity (*cf.* *lāvaṇika*, a dealer in salt, IV.4.52), and therefore a mixable article with food.