The History of Indian Literature c7.10

c7.10

⁴ One of the Vedic Ṛishis, asserted to be Vatsa, of the family of Kaṇva, extols, Ṛik, viii. 6. 46–48, the splendid presents, consisting of horses, cattle, and *ushṭras* yoked four together—(Roth in the St. Petersburg Dict. explains *ushṭra* as ‘buffalo, humped bull;’ generally it means ‘camel’)—which, to the glory of the Yádvas, he received whilst residing with Tirimdira and Parśu. Or have we here only a single person, Tirịmdira Parśu? In the Śáṅkháyana Śrauta-Sútra, xvi. 11. 20, at least, he is understood as Tiriṃdira Páraśavya. These names suggest Tiridates and the Persians; see *I. St.*, iv. 379, *n.*, but compare Girard de Rialle, *Revue de Linguist.*, iv. 227 (1872). Of course, we must not think of the Persians after Cyrus: that would bring us too far down. But the Persians were so called, and had their own princes, even before the time of Cyrus. Or ought we rather, as suggested by Olshausen in the *Berliner Monatsberichte* (1874), p. 708, to think of the Parthavas, *i.e.*, Parthians, who as well as Párśas are mentioned in the time of the Achæmenidæ? The derivation, hitherto current, of the word Tiri in Tiridates, &c., from the Pahlaví *tír* = Zend *tistrya* (given, *e.g.*, by M. Bréal, *De Persicis nominibus* (1863), pp. 9, 10), is hardly justified.