The History of Indian Literature c8.433

c8.433

The earliest mention of the Atharvan-songs occurs under the two names "Atharváṇas" and "Añgirasas," names which belong to the two most ancient Ṛishi-families, or to the common ancestors of the Indo-Aryans and the Persa-Aryans, and which are probably only given to these songs in order to lend all the greater authority and holiness to the incantations, &c., contained in them.† They are also often specially connected with the ancient family of the Bhṛigus.¹⁶³ Whether we have to take the "Atharvaṇas" in the thirtieth book of the Váj. Saṃhitá as Atharvan-songs is not yet certain; but for the period to which the eleventh, thirteenth, and fourteenth books of the Śatapatha-Bráhmaṇa, as well as the Chhándogyopanishad and the Taittiríya-Áraṇyaka (ii. and viii.), belong, the existence of the Atharvan-songs and of the Atharvaveda is fully established by the mention of them in these works. The thirteenth book of the Śatapatha-Bráhmaṇa even mentions a division into *parvans*,[^asterisk] which, as already remarked, no longer appears in the manuscripts. In the eighth book of the Taittiríya-Áraṇyaka, the *ádeśa*, *i.e.*, the Bráhmaṇa, is inserted between the three other Vedas and the "Atharváṅgirasas." Besides these notices, I find the Atharvaveda, or more precisely the "Átharvaṇikas," only mentioned in the Nidána-Sútra of the Sámaveda (and in Páṇini). The names, too, which belong to the schools of the Atharvaveda appear nowhere in Vedic literature,dagger with the exception perhaps of Kauśika; still, this patronymic does not by any means involve a special reference to the Atharvan.[^ddagger] Another name, which is, however, only applied to the Atharvaveda in the later Atharvan-writings themselves, viz., in the Pariśishṭas, is "Brahma-veda." This is explained by the circumstance that it claims to be the Veda for the chief sacrificial priest, the Brahman,¹⁶⁴ while the other Vedas are represented as those of his assistants only, the Hotar, Udgátar, and Adhvaryu,