A History of Indian Literature v1.c8.s3.9

v1.c8.s3.9

The language and metre of the hymns of the Atharvaveda are in essentials the same as those of the Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā. Yet in the language of the Atharvaveda we find some decidedly later forms and some more popular forms: also the metre is not nearly so strictly handled as in the Ṛgveda. Apart from Book XV, which is wholly composed in prose, and Book XVI, the greater part of which is in prose, we occasionally find also other prose pieces among the verses; and frequently it is not easy to distinguish whether a piece is composed in lofty prose or in badly-constructed verses. It also happens that an originally correct metre is spoiled through an interpolation or corruption of the text.² In certain cases, indeed, the facts of language and metre indicate that we are dealing with later pieces. In general, however, no conclusions can be drawn from the language and the metre with regard to the date of the composition of the hymns, still less with regard to the date of the compilation of our Saṁhitā. For it always remains an open question, whether the peculiarities of language and the freedom of metre, by which the magic incantations of the Atharvaveda are distinguished from the hymn-poetry of the Ṛgveda, are based upon a difference in the period of origin or on the difference between *popular* and *priestly* composition. (*Cf.* above, pp. 53 f.)