India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c9.s1.29

c9.s1.29

The sowing of mixed crops was also known, specially during the rainy season. Patañjali states that sesamum was sown with beans, but in such combining beans predominated as the main crop and sesamum was subsidiary, so that the ploughing was done according to the requirements of the main crop. The seeds of the minor crop were scattered at sowing (*Bhāshya* on VIII.4.13). The trend of Patañjali's discussion is that the mixing of *tila* with *māsha* is not obligatory for good germination, for if it were so, then both the crops would have to be considered as principal crops. Only when one is the principal (*pradhāna*) as *māsha*, and the other secondary as *tila* (in this case), can the sentence *tilaiḥ saha māshān vapati* be an appropriate example of *sūtra* II.3.19, *Sahayukte apradhāne* (*Bhāshya* on II.3.19).