[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Reference works](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference) › [A Vedic Concordance](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906) › c5.s1 # A Vedic Concordance c5.s1: General Remarks on the Character of the Variants A Vedic Concordance c5.s1 - **Language:** English ### General Remarks on the Character of the Variants ### [c5.s1.1](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.1) No hard and fast line between truly variant and vaguely similar passages.—The similarities between related Vedic passages are of very varying degrees, and range from a likeness so close that one may be called a true variant of the other, to a likeness so slight or vague as hardly to be worth reporting. Nevertheless, if we take a few typical examples, the differences of character as between several of the many possible classes are palpable enough. ### [c5.s1.2](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.2) True variants.—Ūha-pādas.—Thus, if we take the two pādas occurring in the Rig-Veda and the Atharva-Veda respectively, ### [c5.s1.3](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.3) acitti yat tava dharmā yuyopima, and acittyā cet tava dharmā yuyopima, ### [c5.s1.4](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.4) it is plain that the latter is a true variant of the former. In this instance even the motive of the changes is plain: the Atharva-Veda transfuses the hieratic language of the Rig-Veda into its own more popular wording. Another well-defined, though not common, class of true variant passages includes the ūha-pādas, which consist of an otherwise identical phrase varied, for instance, by the substitution of the name of one deity for another. Such are ### [c5.s1.5](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.5) mām agne bhāginaṃ kuru, and mām indra bhāginaṃ kuru. ### [c5.s1.6](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.6) Variants in pādas other than the first.—It is important, next, to draw attention to the cases where the differences between two or more stanzas crop out in some other pāda than the first. Since, for the Concordance, the unit of comparison is the pāda and not the stanza, the Concordance reveals very many such cases which would of course never come to light in a mere index of pratīkas. For example, stanza 3 of the RVKh.10.127 is in part parallel to ArS.3.7; but the first three pādas of each stanza are so unlike those of the other that no index hitherto available could have brought to light the parallelism. Not until we come almost to the end do we find the correspondence. The fourth pādas are ### [c5.s1.7](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.7) viçvasya jagato niçām, RVKh., and viçvasya jagato rātrī, ArS., ### [c5.s1.8](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.8) a parallelism which the alphabetic arrangement of the single pādas in the Concordance makes apparent automatically. ### [c5.s1.9](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.9) Similarly the stanza RV.1.141.13 shares its second and third pādas with several Yajus texts (KS.7.12; ApÇ.5.9.10; MÇ.1.5.2.11), while in pādas one and four it is wholly different in subject-matter and diction. The RV. stanza reads: ### [c5.s1.10](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.10) astāvy agniḥ çimīvadhbir arkaiḥ sāmṛjāya prataraṃ dadhānaḥ, amī ca ye maghavāno vayaṃ ca miham na sūro ati niṣ ṭatanyuḥ; ### [c5.s1.11](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.11) while the Yajus stanza reads: ### [c5.s1.12](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.12) ut samudrān madhumān ūrmir āgāt sāmṛjāya prataraṃ dadhānaḥ, amī ca ye maghavāno vayaṃ ca iṣam ūrjaṃ madhumat sambharema. ### [c5.s1.13](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.13) Accordingly it is clearly worth while to consult the Concordance for every pāda of a given stanza, if such parallelisms are not to escape notice. ### [c5.s1.14](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.14) Essential similarity with wide divergence of wording.—Once more, it sometimes happens that the wording of one and the same stanza is so varied in the different texts that not one of the lines of the one text is quite like the corresponding line in the other. A striking illustration is afforded by AV.5.25.8 and ÇG.¹.19. The text of AV. reads : ### [c5.s1.15](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.15) adhi skanda virayasva garbham ā dhehi yonyām, vṛṣāsi vṛṣṇyāvan prajāyāi tvā nayāmasi ; ### [c5.s1.16](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.16) while the text of ÇG. reads : ### [c5.s1.17](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.17) abhi kranda vilayasva garbham ā dhehi sādhaya, vṛṣāṇaṃ vṛṣaṇ ā dhehi prajāyāi tvā havāmahe. ### [c5.s1.18](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.18) Of the fourteen words of the latter stanza, only five correspond in form and place with words of the prior stanza; and yet the two stanzas are beyond a doubt alike in their purpose and meaning, and they are in all probability two versions of an originally identical stanza. The like is true, for example, of SV.2.1059 and AV.6.36.2 (AÇ.8.9.7; ÇÇ.10.11.9). The SV. text reads : ### [c5.s1.19](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.19) ya idaṃ pratipaprathe yajñasya svar uttiran ṛtūn utsrjate vaçī ; ### [c5.s1.20](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.20) while the AV. text reads : ### [c5.s1.21](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.21) sa viçvā prati cākḷpe ṛtūn utsrjate vaçī yajñasya vaya uttiran. ### [c5.s1.22](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.22) \*\*Cases of partial correspondence: At the beginning; at the end; in the middle.\*\*—But so numerous are the cases of partial correspondence or minor parallelism between pādas or passages, that no amount of mere attentive observation can be expected to disclose them all. Set phrases, groups of two or three words—what Bergaigne used to call formulas—are, as every Vedist knows, the commonplace of Vedic technique. These set phrases may of course be located at the beginning or in the middle or at the end of a pāda or passage. Those at the beginning are revealed by this Concordance. Those at the end would be revealed by a reverse index (discussed above, in the Preface, at page x^b).¹ For those located neither at the beginning nor at the end, nothing short of a complete verbal index of the Vedic mantras, in which every pair or longer group of words should be placed side by side, could exhaust this important and interesting information about the texture of the mantras. ### [c5.s1.23](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1.23) ¹ As an interesting case of parallelism under this rubric, we may cite çataṃ te santv āvṛtaḥ (AV.) and agne aṅgiraḥ çataṃ te santv āvṛtaḥ (VS.). No less a personage than Pāṇini has made the acute observation (iii. 2. 66) that the stem havyavāhana occurs only at the end of a pāda. ## Linked texts (12) - [Atharvavedasaṃhitā](https://indike.org/pramana/in.veda.samhita.atharva.5.25.8) — Atharvan & Aṅgiras, Sanskrit - [Āpastambaśrautasūtra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.vedanga.kalpa.srauta.apastamba.5.9.10) — Āpastamba, Sanskrit - [Mānavaśrautasūtra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.vedanga.kalpa.srauta.manava.1.5.2.11) — Sanskrit - [Śāṅkhāyanaśrautasūtra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.vedanga.kalpa.srauta.sankhayana.10.11.9) — Śāṅkhāyana, Sanskrit - [Aṣṭādhyāyī](https://indike.org/pramana/in.vedanga.vyakarana.astadhyayi.3.2.66) — Pāṇini, Sanskrit - [Śāṅkhāyanagṛhyasūtra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.vedanga.kalpa.grhya.sankhayana.1.19) — Śāṅkhāyana, Sanskrit - [Kāṭhakasaṃhitā](https://indike.org/pramana/in.veda.samhita.krsnayajur*kathaka.7.12) — Sanskrit - [Ṛgvedasaṃhitā](https://indike.org/pramana/in.veda.samhita.rg.1.141.13) — Sanskrit - [Āśvalāyanaśrautasūtra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.vedanga.kalpa.srauta.asvalayana) — Āśvalāyana, Sanskrit - [Ṛgvedakhilāni](https://indike.org/pramana/in.veda.samhita.rg.khila) — Sanskrit - [Vājasaneyisaṃhitā](https://indike.org/pramana/in.veda.samhita.suklayajur*vajasaneyi) — Sanskrit - [Sāmavedasaṃhitā](https://indike.org/pramana/in.veda.samhita.sama) — Sanskrit --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.bloomfield-1906.c5.s1) · Pramāṇa