Hindu Polity: A Constitutional History of India in Hindu Times c37.20

c37.20

‘People’ (विश्) according to Āpastamba, Baudhāyana and Kātyāyana (Śrauta Sūtras quoted by Sāyaṇa) means ‘Nation’, e.g. the ‘Bharatas’, the ‘Kurus’, the ‘Pañchālas’. Kātyāyana explains ‘the People’ by the word Jāti. He speculates that territory was not (originally) fixed (अनवस्थिता ‘fluctuating’), hence *viś* (the people) was used. In place of ‘the People!’ the Taittirīya Saṃhitā (I. 8. 10) of the Krishna Yajurveda gives ‘O Bharatas’ [ **एष वो भरता राजा** ] which shows that the explanation of the Śrauta-sūtra-kāras is correct. The Yajurveda or the Veda of Rituals (formulæ) was evidently composed in the land of the Bharata monarchy (Delhi-Agra).