Vedic Metre in its Historical Development c6.21

c6.21

81. It is only when other indications fail that a consideration of the subject-matter of the poems becomes necessary. There is clearly a presumption that ‘hymns’ in the strict sense, that is poems in which the praise of the gods is the primary object, belong to the Rigveda proper: but this presumption fails when the deity is not known to or not homogeneous with the Pantheon of the Rigveda. So there is a presumption that ‘charms,’ that is poems in which the profit of the suppliant or the harming of his enemy is the primary object, belong to the popular Rigveda: but even amongst the early hymns we find a few in which relief from pains of conscience or disease is the main theme. Mythological narrations and dramatic dialogues are not entirely wanting in the Rigveda proper, though they are much more common later: whilst the converse appears to be true of poems with liturgical and ceremonial subjects. Philosophical and cosmogonical poems, and those which contain proverbs or riddles, are generally late.