A History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, so far as it illustrates the Primitive Religion of the Brahmans c9.s2.13

c9.s2.13

We possess the Brâhmaṇa of the Bahvṛichas, in the Śâkhâs of the Aitareyins and the Kaushîtakins. The various readings of other Śâkhâs, quoted by the commentator on the Aitareya-brâhmaṇa, show evidently that there were other Śâkhâs of the Bahvṛichas, which differed but little in the wording of their Brâhmaṇas. But even the Brâhmaṇa of the Kaushîtakins which has been preserved to us as a distinct work, different from the Brâhmaṇa of the Aitareyins, can only be considered as a branch of the original stock of Brâhmaṇa literature, current among the Bahvṛichas. Its arrangement differs considerably from that of the Aitareya-brâhmaṇa. The sacrifice described in the beginning of the Aitareya-brâhmaṇa forms the seventh Adhyâya of the Kaushîtaki-brâhmaṇa¹, and most of the other sacrifices are equally displaced. Others which are discussed in the Aitareya-brâhmaṇa are altogether wanting in the Kaushîtaki-brâhmaṇa, and must be supplied from the Sûtras of the Śânkhâyana-śâkhâ, a subdivision of the Kaushîtakins. But whenever parallel passages occur, it becomes clear that the coincidences in the description of sacrifices and the wording of legends cannot be accidental.