Vedic Index of Names and Subjects v2.c4.s5.172

v2.c4.s5.172

Rasā is found in three passages of the Rigveda,¹ clearly as the name of a real stream in the extreme north-west of the Vedic territory. Elsewhere² it is the name of a mythic stream at the ends of the earth, which as well as the atmosphere it encompasses. It is reasonable to assume that, as in the case of the Sarasvatī, the literal is the older sense, and to see in the river a genuine stream, perhaps originally the Araxes or Jaxartes, because the Vendidad mentions the Raṅhā, the Avestan form of Rasā. But the word seems originally to allude merely to the ‘sap’ or ‘flavour’ of the waters,³ and so could be applied to every river, like Sarasvatī.