The Orion, or Researches into the Antiquity of the Vedas c8.29.1

c8.29.1

There appears to be no express passage in the Vedic works, which states that Mṛigashiras, like the Kṛittikâs was ever the mouth of the Nakshatras. But what is so lost may still be discovered, in the words of Prof. Max Müller, “hidden in the secret drawers of language.” Mṛigashiras may not be specifically described as the first of the Nakshatras; but the word *Agrahâyaṇî* which Amarsinha (i. 3. 23), gives as a synonym for Mṛigashiras, and which supplies, according to Pāṇini, a derivative word for the month of Mârgashîrsha tells the same tale. *Agrahâyaṇî* literally means “commencing the year;” and the question is how did the Nakshatra come to be so called? In explaining the formation of this word all native lexicographers begin by assuming that the full-moon in the month of Mârgashîrsha was the first night of the year, hence called *Agrahâyaṇî*, and as this full-moon occurred in the month of Mârgashîrsha the month itself was called *Agrahâyaṇika*. There is no grammatical inconsistency so far. But when these lexicographers further tell us that the Nakshatra itself was called *Agrahâyaṇî*, as Amarsinha has done, because the full-moon in the vicinity of that Nakshatra commenced the year in old days,[*] one feels that there is something wrong in this explanation. The ordinary course is to name the full-moon or any other day after the Nakshatra, as *Chaitrî*, *Pausham*, *Paushî*, &c (Pan. iv.