A History of Sanskrit Literature c10.5

c10.5

Two schools of the *Sāmaveda* are known—the Kauthumas and the Rāṇāyanīyas, the former of whom are said still to exist in Gujarat, while the latter, at one time settled mainly in the Mahratta country, are said to survive in Eastern Hyderabad. Their recensions of the text appear to have differed but little from each other. That of the Rāṇāyanīyas has been published more than once. The earliest edition, brought out by a missionary named Stevenson in 1842, was entirely superseded by the valuable work of Benfey, which, containing a German translation and glossary besides the text, came out in 1848. The *Sāmaveda* was thus the first of the Vedas to be edited in its entirety. The text of this Veda, according to the recension of the same school, together with the commentary of Sāyaṇa, was subsequently edited in India. Of the Kauthuma recension nothing has been preserved excepting the seventh *prapāṭhaka*, which, in the Naigeya subdivision of this school, forms an addition to the first *ārchika*, and was edited in 1868. Two indices of the deities and composers of the *Sāmaveda* according to the Naigeya school have also been preserved, and indirectly supply information about the text of the Kauthuma recension.