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Original Sanskrit Texts on the Origin and History of the People of India, their Religion and Institutions v2: Volume 2

Original Sanskrit Texts on the Origin and History of the People of India, their Religion and Institutions v2

Language
English

Contents

Volume 2

Front matter

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VOLUME SECOND.

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https://archive.org/details/originalsanskrit02muir_0

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ON THE

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ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE OF INDIA,

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THEIR RELIGION, AND INSTITUTIONS.

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Φάναι, ὃ ἂν μὴ γιγνώσκωμεν, βαρβαρικόν τοῦτ’ εἶναι. εἴη μὲν ἂυν ἴσως ἄν τι τῇ ἀληθείᾳ καὶ τοιοῦτον ἀυτῶν, εἴη δὲ κἂν ὑπὸ παλαιότητος τὰ πρῶτα τῶν ὀνόματων ἀνεύρετα εἶναι· διὰ γὰρ τὸ πανταχῇ στρέφεσθαι τὰ ονόματα ὀυδὲν θαυμαστὸν ἂν εἴη ἐἰ ἡ παλαιὰ φωνὴ πρὸς τὴν νυνὶ βαρβαρικῆς μηδὲν διαφέροι.
<p align="right">Plato, Cratylus, i. 421.</p>

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“We might say that the words which we did not understand were derived from the barbarians. Some of them might in reality be so; and it might also be the case that, owing to the lapse of time, the earliest forms were undiscoverable: for, as a result of the circulation of words in all parts of the world, it would not be at all strange if the ancient language, as compared with the modern, was in no respect different from the speech of the barbarians.”

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ON THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, THEIR RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS.

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COLLECTED, TRANSLATED, AND ILLUSTRATED,

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BY J. MUIR, D.C.L., LL.D., PH.D., CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE ROYAL PRUSSIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, AND OF THE AMERICAN ORIENTAL SOCIETY, HONORARY MEMBER OF THE GERMAN ORIENTAL SOCIETY, AND FOREIGN MEMBER OF THE LEYDEN LITERARY SOCIETY.

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VOLUME SECOND.

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INQUIRY WHETHER THE HINDUS ARE OF TRANS-HIMALAYAN ORIGIN, AND AKIN TO THE WESTERN BRANCHES OF THE INDO-EUROPEAN RACE.

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SECOND EDITION, REVISED.

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LONDON: TRÜBNER & CO., 8 AND 60, PATERNOSTER ROW. 1871. (*All rights reserved.*)

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PRINTED BY STEPHEN AUSTIN AND SONS.

Preface to the First Edition

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¹ [This Preface is now reprinted with hardly any alteration, excepting such as has been rendered necessary by the difference in the numbers of the pages in which the several topics are treated, and by some additions and omissions.]

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My primary object in this volume, as in its predecessor, has been to produce a work which may assist the researches of those Hindus who desire to investigate critically the origin and history of their nation, and of their national literature, religion, and institutions; and may facilitate the operations of those European teachers whose business it is to communicate to the Hindus the results of modern inquiry on the various subjects here examined.² The book (as will at once be apparent to the Oriental scholar) is, for the most part, either a compilation, or, at the least, founded on the labours of others; but while my principal aim has been to furnish the reader with a summary of the results of preceding inquiries, my plan has, at the same time, rendered it necessary for me occasionally to institute fresh researches in different directions for the further elucidation of particular points which were touched upon in the course of my argument. In this way I may have succeeded in contributing a small proportion of original matter to the discussion of some of the interesting topics which have come under review.

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² This peculiarity in the object of the treatise will account to the European scholar for the introduction of many details which would otherwise have been quite superfluous.

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The obligations under which I lie to the different authors, whose labours have furnished the chief materials of the volume, have been, in most instances, so fully acknowledged in detail in the following pages, that it is not necessary for me to allude to them here more particularly. I must, however, refer to the assistance which I have derived from the French version of the Rigveda by M. Langlois, which, with his index, has directed my attention to various important passages in the later books, which I was then enabled to study in the original.

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Though a small portion only of the present volume consists of "Sanskrit texts," which in some parts are altogether wanting, and in others but thinly scattered, (*apparent rari nantes in gurgite vasto*) I have not considered it necessary to abandon the old title, but it has been slightly modified.

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Although some idea of the object and contents of the volume may be gained from a perusal of the introductory statement of its plan (in pp. 1–3), and from the table at the close of this Preface, it may conduce to the convenience of those readers who, before entering on a perusal of the work, desire to obtain a more precise conception of the course of the discussion, and of the process by which I have sought to establish my conclusions, if I subjoin here a brief concatenated summary of the principal topics in order.

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The general object of the present Part is to prove that the Hindus were not indigenous in India, but have immigrated into that country from Central Asia, where their ancestors at one time formed one community with the progenitors of the Persians, Greeks, Romans, Germans, etc.³ In order to establish this result, I have sought to show that Sanskrit, the original language of the Hindus, exhibits undeniable marks of close affinity to the ancient languages of the other races just mentioned; and that the earliest religion, and mythology also, of India are connected with those of Persia by various points of contact and resemblance. Having adduced evidence on both these heads, and argued that these facts imply a common origin of the nations in question, and their subsequent dispersion from one common centre towards the different regions in which they ultimately settled; I endeavour to fortify the conclusions to which we are thus conducted by demonstrating that, in the earliest ages of their history, the ancestors of the Hindus appear to have occupied only the north-western corner of Hindustan; and that, while they were connected on the one hand by affinities of language and religion with the nations of the west, they were on the other hand distinguished, both by language and by institutions, from certain other tribes with whom they came into collision as they advanced across the north of India, and afterwards diffused themselves to the south of the peninsula: for if we find that the Hindus originally possessed only the Panjāb, the presumption (derived from other considerations) that they immigrated from the north-west, becomes strengthened; and if, again, on their advance to the south-east, they encountered tribes with a different language and religion, already in occupation of those tracts, the probability that they did not grow up in India, alongside of these alien tribes, acquires additional force.

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³ [This proposition has been so far modified in the second edition that I now only insist on at least one of the elements in the ancestry of the Hindus having belonged to the Indo-European stock.]

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In order to obtain a basis for carrying out the philological portion of this argument, viz., for comparing the original language of the Hindus with those of the Persians, Greeks, and Latins, it became necessary for me to prove that the Sanskrit, which is now a learned language only, was at one time spoken by the ancestors of the Hindus. This I have attempted to do in the First Chapter (pp. 4—214), by showing in detail that the original Sanskrit idiom has undergone a long series of gradual mutations, of which we now see the ultimate result in the modern vernacular dialects of the north of India. The method which I have adopted to exhibit this has been to begin (Section i., pp. 4—11) with the existing spoken dialects, Urdu, Hindī, Mahrattī, etc., and to show what the elements are of which they are composed, viz., (1) pure Sanskrit, (2) modified Sanskrit, (3) Deśya or aboriginal non-Sanskrit words, and (4) words derived from Arabic and Persian. The fourth element is the latest which they have acquired, and dates only from the Mahomedan invasion; while the second and third (in a more or less different form) are common to them with the Prākrits, or older vernacular dialects, out of which they grew.

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In the succeeding sections (ii.—vii., pp. 11—128) an account is given of these earlier vernaculars, viz. (1) the Prāḳrits, of which specimens are to be found in the different Hindu dramas, and which seem to have existed as spoken dialects, at least from the commencement of the Christian era, until they became merged in the modern vernaculars; (2) the Pāli, or sacred language of the Buddhist books of Ceylon and Burmah, which appears to represent one of the provincial dialects of northern India existing at the time when Buddhism began to be propagated in the sixth century B.C., and exhibits to us the popular speech of that region at a somewhat earlier stage than the dramatic Prāḳrits; (3) the dialects (nearly contemporaneous with the Pāli) which are employed in the rock and pillar inscriptions of Aśoka; and (4) the singular dialect or jargon employed in the Gāthās or metrical portions of the Buddhist chronicles of northern India. In this portion of the work some comparative tables are introduced, which exhibit (*a*) the relations (*i.e.* the points of resemblance and of difference) between the modern vernaculars, Hindī, and Mahrattī, and the dramatic Prāḳrits, and show how the two former have been formed by a modification of all the various elements of the latter, just as they (the older Prāḳrits) in their turn have sprung up (if we except a small non-Sanskritic residuum) from the gradual decomposition of the Sanskrit;

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(*b*) the forms which are common to the dramatic Prāḳrits, and the Pāli, as well as those points in which they vary, and which demonstrate that the Pāli diverges considerably less from the Sanskrit than the Prāḳrits do, and must consequently be more ancient than they; and (*c*) the relation in which the rock inscriptions stand to the Pāli. In Section viii. (pp. 128–144) the conclusion is drawn that, as the vernacular speech of India, as far back as we are able to trace it, has been undergoing a continual series of mutations, and as the older the form is in which we find it existing, the nearer it approaches to the Sanskrit in its words and its grammatical inflections,—it must at some period a little further back have entirely merged in Sanskrit, and have been identical with it. Thus Sanskrit having been once the same with the oldest language of northern India, must at that period have been a vernacular tongue. After some speculations on the history of the Sanskrit language and its mutations, some further arguments,—drawn partly from the parallel case of Latin (which though once a spoken tongue, was ultimately lost in its derivative dialects, Italian, etc.), and partly from certain phenomena in Indian literature, or notices occurring in Indian authors,—are adduced in Section ix. (pp. 144–160) in support of the position that Sanskrit was once a vernacular language, and that the Vedic hymns were composed in the same dialect which their authors habitually spoke.

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I then go on to argue further (Section x., pp. 161–214) that as Sanskrit was once a spoken tongue, it must in its earlier stages have been exposed to all the mutations to which all spoken languages are subject. That such has actually been the case, is clear from a comparison of the oldest Sanskrit, that of the Vedic hymns, with the form which it took in the later literature, and which (as it became exempt from further modifications by ceasing to be popularly spoken) it has continued ever after to retain. As, however, the distinction which is here drawn between the older and the more recent literature may be disputed by the Hindu student, I have considered it necessary to adduce proof of the assertion that the Vedic hymns are the oldest of all the Indian writings; and with this view to ascend by gradual steps from the most recent commentaries on the Veda, through the Nirukta, the Brāhmaṇas, etc., to the hymn-collections, pointing out that each of these classes of works presupposes one of the others to have preceded it in regular order, and that such methods were employed by the commentators for the interpretation of the hymns as to prove that much of their language was already obsolete or obscure, and that consequently their priority in time to the very oldest of their expositors must have been very considerable.

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To complete the survey of the subject, I further show that there is a difference in the ages of the several Vedas (the Ṛik, Yajush, and Atharvan) themselves, as well as between the different portions of each, as is distinctly evidenced by their contents (see also pp. 446, ff.). The superior antiquity of the Vedas to the other Indian writings is next proved by a statement of the differences discoverable between the religious systems of these two classes of works, the nature-worship of the Vedas supplying the original germ out of which the Puranic mythology was slowly developed with innumerable modifications. The greater age of the Vedas is then shown by comparing a number of their grammatical forms with those of the later Sanskrit. Finally, I revert to the conclusion before indicated, that the language in which the Vedic hymns were composed can have been no other than the vernacular speech which was employed by the ṛishis and their contemporaries, as it is quite inconceivable that in that early age, when the refinements of grammar were unknown, there could have existed any learned language distinct from the ordinary dialect of the people.

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Having thus shown cause for believing that Sanskrit, the original speech of the early Hindus (or Indo-Arians), was at one time a spoken language, and consequently liable, like all other spoken languages, to continual mutations in its earliest ages, and having by this means paved the way for proving that it is descended from one common mother with the ancient languages of the other Indo-European races, to which it exhibits the most striking family resemblance;—I proceed, in the Second Chapter (pp. 215–357), to produce the evidence which comparative philology furnishes of this resemblance, and to argue from the affinity of languages a community of origin between the different nations by which they were spoken. I then go on to bring forward the further grounds, supplied by comparative mythology and by other considerations, for supposing that the ancestors of the Hindus⁴ belonged to the same great family as the Persians, Greeks, Romans, etc., which had its original seats in Central Asia, and that, on the dispersion, in various directions, of the different branches of that ancient family, the Indo-Arians immigrated into Hindustan from the north-west. The following are some of the details of this process of proof: In Section i. (pp.

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217–228), a few simple remarks on comparative philology are premised, in which it is shown how, by a comparison of their roots and structure, languages can be distributed into different families, of which the several members have a more or less close affinity to each other, while they have little or no resemblance to the members of any other family. This is illustrated by a comparative table, in which it is shown that while Sanskrit has in many of its words a strong similarity to Persian, it has scarcely any to Arabic; and by some other particulars. Section ii. (pp. 228—267) supplies detailed evidence of the affinities of Sanskrit with the Zend, Greek, and Latin, consisting, first, of comparative lists of words belonging to those languages which correspond with each other both in sound and sense; and secondly, of illustrations of the resemblances between those languages in their modes of inflection, as well as in the formation of words.

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As, however, the mutual differences which these languages also exhibit, might be urged as disproving the inference of their derivation from a common source, it is shown how, in the course of time, different branches of the same original tongue have an inevitable tendency to diverge more and more from the primitive type, both by modifying their old elements, and by assimilating new: and it is further pointed out that it is precisely those parts of a language which are the most primitive and essential in which the different Indo-European tongues coincide, while those in which they differ are such as would grow up after the nations which spoke them had been separated, and had become exposed to the action of diverse influences, physical, intellectual, and moral. But as, admitting the resemblances between these languages, a Hindu might feel disposed to draw the conclusion that Sanskrit is the source of all the other kindred tongues, instead of being derived together with them from an older language, the common parent of them all,—to obviate this erroneous inference, it is next shown that the whole grammatical character of Greek and Latin is that of independent languages; that in this respect they differ entirely from the Indian Prākṛits (which have evidently resulted from the decomposition of Sanskrit), and that they even contain various forms which are older than those of the Sanskrit; while the greater part of their vocabulary is different.

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The same considerations apply, though not so strongly, to Zend. In Section iii. (pp. 267—278) the inference is drawn that affinity in language implies affinity in race;⁵ and that, therefore, the ancestors of the Hindus must at one time have lived in the same country, as a part of one and the same community, with the forefathers of the Persians, Greeks, and Romans. In such a case as is here supposed, those branches of the original nation which separated earliest from the others, would in aftertimes exhibit the fewest points of resemblance in language and institutions to the rest, while those which remained longest together would show in all respects the closest mutual affinities. In Section iv. (pp. 279—286) it is argued that there is no objection⁶ arising from physiological considerations, *i.e.* from colour or bodily structure, to classing the Hindus among the Indo-European races. Section v. (pp. 287—300) exhibits the grounds which exist for supposing that the ancestors of the Indians and Iranians (or Persians) continued to form one community after the other kindred tribes had separated from them, and departed to distant regions. These grounds are, first, the closer affinity which subsists between Zend, the language of the ancient Persians, and Sanskrit (of which some illustrations are furnished); secondly, the fact that both nations in former times applied to themselves the appellation of Ārya;

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and, thirdly, the nearer and more numerous coincidences which are discoverable between the early mythologies of the two peoples, of which some details are adduced. From this more intimate affinity between the Indians and Persians, independent as both are of each other in their origin and development (see also pp. 312—317), a strong confirmation is derived to the general conclusion (deduced mainly from language) of the common origin of all the nations called Indo-European. In Section vi. (pp. 301—306) the theory of Mr. Curzon, that India was the original country of the Indo-European races, from which they issued to conquer, occupy, and civilize the countries lying to the north-west, is stated, together with some of the arguments by which he supports it. The remarks of Mr. Elphinstone, who leaves it undecided whether the Hindus were autochthonous or immigrant, are also quoted. In Section vii. (pp. 306—322) I cite the opinions of Schlegel, Lassen, Benfey, Müller, Weber, Spiegel, Renan, and Pictet, who concur in the conclusion that the cradle of the Indo-European race must be sought, not in India, but, as Schlegel, Lassen, and Pictet argue, in some central tract, from which the different branches of this great family could most easily have diffused themselves towards the widely-separated countries which they eventually occupied; a condition which would not be fulfilled by supposing a remote and southerly region, such as Hindustan, to be the point of departure.

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Some of these writers draw the same inference from the relation in which the Indo-Arians stood to the aboriginal tribes whom they encountered in India. In opposition to Mr. Curzon, who represents the language and religion of India as the sources from which those of all the other kindred races issued, Professor Spiegel maintains that the Iranian language and mythology, though owning a common origin with, are in their development perfectly independent of those of, the Indians. In the same section it is further urged that as neither the languages nor the mythology of the Greeks and Romans are derived from those of the Indo-Arians, there is no ground for supposing that the former nations emigrated from India at any period whatever. Section viii. (pp. 322–329) contains the few passages I have been able to discover in the Indian authors which may be supposed to embody any reference (in no case, it must be confessed, other than a very obscure one) to the trans-Himalayan origin of their ancestors. The chief of these are the interesting paragraph of the Śatapatha-brāhmaṇa, which contains the legend of the Deluge in the oldest form in which it occurs in any Sanskrit work,⁷ and some texts relating to the northerly region of Uttara Kuru, the Ottorocorras of Ptolemy. In Section ix. (pp.

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329–334) I have quoted, according to the versions of Spiegel and Haug, the first chapter of the Vendidad, which contains the oldest tradition of the Persians relative to Airyana-vaejo, the supposed primeval abode of their forefathers. Section x. (pp. 335-341) discusses the route by which the Āryas immigrated into India.⁸ Schlegel and Lassen are of opinion that they must have penetrated into India from the west by the route of Kabul and across the Indus. Roth and Weber also regard the Panjāb as the earliest seat of the Indo-Arians in Hindustan. In Section xi. (pp. 341–357) I have endeavoured to show by quotations from the Vedas, that at the period when the hymns were composed, the Indians, though not unacquainted with the central provinces of northern India, were most familiar with the countries bordering on, or beyond, the Indus, and the north-western parts of Hindustan generally. From this fact, and from the testimony of later writers to their intercourse with tribes, apparently Arian in descent and language, residing in the Panjāb and on the other side of the Indus, I derive a confirmation of the view that the Hindus entered India from the northwest.

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⁴ [See note 3, p. ix.]

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⁵ [In this second edition, this proposition is modified. I only affirm now that affinity in language affords some presumption of affinity in race.]

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⁶ [This assertion is in the 2nd edition changed into an inquiry whether there is any objection.]

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⁷ [This passage has been omitted in the present edition for the reasons stated in note 96, p. 323.]

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⁸ [A sentence referring to an opinion of Professor Benfey subsequently altered, is here omitted.]

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In the Third Chapter (pp. 358–444) I have sought to adduce further arguments in support of the same conclusion, (1) from the distinction drawn by the authors of the Vedic hymns between their own kinsmen, the Āryas, and the tribes differing from them in complexion, customs, and religion, whom they designate as Dasyus; (2) from the accounts occurring in the Brāhmaṇas and post-Vedic writings, of the gradual advance of the Āryas from the north-west of India to the east and south; and (3) from the well-established fact that the south-Indian languages are fundamentally different from the Sanskrit, and imply a non-Arian origin in the people by whom they were originally spoken. Section i. (pp. 359—369) contains a selection of passages from the Rigveda, in which the Āryas and the Dasyus are distinguished from one another, and reference is made to the enmity existing between the two. In most (or at least some) of these passages, it appears, human enemies and not demons must be intended under the appellation of Dasyus, as I infer both from the tenor of the texts themselves, and because in later writings, the Aitareya-brāhmaṇa, the Institutes of Manu, etc., this word is always applied to barbarous tribes. Section ii. (pp. 369—396) supplies a further collection of Vedic texts bearing upon the relations of the Āryas and Dasyus, and the characteristics of the latter as degraded, dark-complexioned, irreligious, neglecters of sacrifice, etc.

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There are, indeed, other texts in which these Dasyus are regarded as demons, and this creates a difficulty. An attempt is made at the close of the section to explain, (1) from the original position of the Āryas, as an invading tribe in a country covered by forests, and from the savage character of the aborigines, as well as (2) from the lengthened period during which the hymns continued to be composed,—how the same appellations and epithets might come to be applied to different classes of beings, human, ethereal, and demoniacal, indiscriminately. In Section iii. (pp. 397—405) I quote the well-known passage from Manu's Institutes, which adverts to the superior sanctity of the country on the banks of the Sarasvatī (which is in consequence presumed to have been for some time the seat of the most distinguished Indian sages, and the locality where the Hindu institutions were chiefly developed), and defines the limits of the several provinces of Brahmanical India, as then recognized. I next adduce a highly interesting legend from the Śatapatha-brāhmaṇa, which narrates how the sacred fire (typifying, of course, the sacrificial rites of the Brāhmans) travelled from the neighbourhood of the Sarasvatī eastward, across the river Sadānīrā into Videha, or north-Behar. Section iv. (pp.

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405—421) presents a selection of passages from the great epic poem, the Rāmāyaṇa, descriptive of the Rākshasas or gigantic demons by whom the Brāhman settlers in southern India were oppressed and their rites obstructed, and whose monarch Rāvaṇa was vanquished and slain by the Indian hero Rāma, with the aid of an army of monkeys. In these poetic and hyperbolical descriptions, it is supposed (by some that) we can discern the indistinct outlines of a great movement of the Āryas from the Doab southward across the Vindhya range, and their conflicts with the aboriginal tribes of the Dekhan, the enemies of the Brāhmans and their institutions. The epithets applied to the Rākshasas in the Rāmāyaṇa correspond in many respects, it is observed, with those employed in the Rigveda to characterize the Dasyus, Rākshasas, and Yātudhānas. Section v. (pp. 422–423) contains some Hindu traditions regarding the tribes in the south of the peninsula, which, however, are not considered to throw any light on their real origin. Section vi. (pp. 423–438) supplies a variety of details, derived from Mr. A. D. Campbell's Telugu Grammar (including the important note by Mr. F. W. Ellis), and Dr.

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Caldwell's Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian languages, by which it is clearly shown that the Tamil, Telugu, Malayālim, and Canarese tongues (which are spoken by thirty-one millions of people), though, at different periods since the occupation of southern India by the Brāhmans, they have received a large infusion of Sanskrit words, are, nevertheless, originally and fundamentally quite distinct from, and independent of, that language, and that Tamil composition in particular is regarded by the native authors as pure and classical in proportion to its freedom from Sanskrit words. In the viiᵗʰ, and concluding Section (pp. 438–444), the results of the preceding sections are summed up. From the fact (established both by philological considerations, and by the testimony of the south-Indian grammarians) that the Dravidian languages are essentially distinct from Sanskrit, it is argued that the people by whom the former class of languages were spoken originally (*i.e.* before the Brahmanical invasion of the Dekhan) must have belonged to a race which had no affinity to the Sanskrit-speaking Āryas; and could not, therefore, as Manu asserts, have been degraded Kshatriyas. I then endeavour to show how the results obtained in this Chapter, viz., (1) that the Āryas, when living in the Panjāb, came into conflict with an alien race called Dasyus;

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(2) that the Āryas can be shown from their own books to have at first occupied only the north-west of India and then to have advanced gradually to the east and south, and last of all to have crossed the Vindhya range into the Dekhan; and (3) that the original languages of the south of the peninsula are distinct from Sanskrit,—how, I say, these results harmonize with, or corroborate, the theory that the Hindus, or Indo-Arians, are not autochthonous, but immigrated into Hindustan from the north-west.⁹

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⁹ [See note 3, p. ix.]

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The Appendix¹⁰ (pp. 445–488), and the "Additions and Corrections" contain some further illustrations of the subjects discussed in the body of the work, and in a few cases supply some modifications of the text which closer research has rendered necessary.

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¹⁰ [Portions of the Appendix and additions have now been incorporated in the earlier part of the volume.]

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In the notes towards the close of the Volume, and in the Appendices, the Sanskrit passages have been printed in the Italic character.¹¹ The system I have followed is nearly that of Sir W. Jones. The distinctions between some similar letters have not always been very carefully indicated; but the Sanskrit scholar will have no difficulty in determining the words which are intended.

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¹¹ [In the first edition the Sanskrit was printed in the Nāgarī character throughout the greater part of the volume.]

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Nearly all the Sanskrit texts in this Volume have been taken from printed editions. The quotations from those parts of the Rigveda which have not yet appeared in Professor Müller's edition, have been copied from the MS. copy in my possession, alluded to in the Preface to the First Volume. The quotations from Durgāchārya, in pp. 166 f. and 173, have been derived from a MS. belonging to the East India House. That in p. 204 was, I believe, extracted from a MS. in the Library of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta. The two passages from Bhāskara Acharya, pp. 161 and 178, were obtained from Pandit Bapu Deva of the Benares College.

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I owe it to the kindness of Professor Goldstücker that I am able to adduce the extracts from the Nyāya mālā vistara, in pp. 53 and 179.

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The work of M. Vivien de Saint-Martin, entitled: "Etude sur la Géographie et les Populations Primitives du Nordouest de l'Inde d'après les Hymnes Védiques" (which discusses many of the subjects handled in the present volume), has only now come into my hands, as the last sheet, containing part of the Appendix and the "Additions and Corrections," is passing through the press.

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The results at which this author has arrived in his valuable and ingenious dissertation, in regard to the origin of the Āryas, their immigration into India, and the direction of their movements within that country, correspond precisely with those which I myself had reached. His views on some points of detail on which I had adopted a different opinion, tell even more strongly than my own in favour of the general conclusions in which we both coincide.¹²

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¹² I allude to his conclusion that the Sarayu referred to in the Veda was a river in the Panjāb (in support of which he refers to Burnouf's Bhāg. Pur. folio ed. p. ii. 455) ; and that the country of the Kīkaṭas must, most probably, have been in Kos'ala or Audh, and not in Magadha, or South Behar.

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I am happy to learn from M. de Saint-Martin's work that he intends to prosecute further his researches into the ethnography of India.

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[Edinburgh, 1860.]

Preface to the Second Edition

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In preparing this edition for the press, I am reminded how much this volume is indebted to the labours of the different authors whose works are quoted in it, viz., Burnouf, Lassen, Cowell, Campbell, Ellis, Caldwell, Clough, Turnour, Fausböll, Rajendralal Mitra, H. H. Wilson, Weber, Müller, Goldstücker, Roth, Benfey, Bopp, Kuhn, A. W. Schlegel, Pictet, Spiegel, Haug, Whitney, Windischmann, Langlois, Renan, Curzon, and Elphinstone.

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To these names I have now to add those of Messrs. Beames, Childers, D'Alwis, Aufrecht, Curtius, Vullers, Schleicher, Fick, Crawfurd, Huxley, and G. Rawlinson, from whose writings or communications I have derived valuable assistance in augmenting my materials, or revising different portions of the work. My obligations to these scholars are acknowledged in the text.

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The improvements which have been introduced in this edition are principally the following: the Comparative Tables of Words in pp. 15, ff.; 76, ff.; 221, ff.; 230, ff.; and 287, ff.; as well as the statements of Gāthā and Vedic forms in pp. 117, ff., and 205, ff.; have been greatly enlarged.

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My conclusions regarding the value of affinity in language as a proof of affinity in race, and the effects of climate upon colour, have been so far modified that I no longer venture to pronounce positively that the Brahmanical Indians are of pure Indo-European descent ; but leave it an open question whether the blood of their Arian ancestors may not on their immigration into India have been commingled with that of darker tribes previously in occupation of the country.

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In the Appendix, Note B, pp. 446, ff., reference is made to a recent paper by Prof. Kern, in which he alleges the insufficiency of the proofs heretofore adduced of the posteriority of the Atharvaveda to the Rigveda ; and more detailed grounds in support of that opinion are adduced. Some remarks are also made in pp. 454, ff. on the views recently expressed by the same writer, and by Prof. Haug, on the antiquity of the caste-system.

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The Appendix and the Additional Notes contain further illustrations, or corrections, of various statements in the text.

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The volume has, further, been revised throughout ; but, with the exception of the alterations which have been just specified, it remains essentially the same as before.

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J. M.

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*Edinburgh*, 1871.

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| PAGES. | |
| vii—xxv. | PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. |
| xxvii.—xxviii. | PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. |
| xxix—xxxii. | CONTENTS. |
| xxxii. | ERRATA ET CORRIGENDA. |
| 1—3. | PLAN OF THE PRESENT VOLUME. |
| 4—214. | CHAPTER I. THE LANGUAGES OF NORTHERN INDIA : THEIR HISTORY AND RELATIONS. |
| 4— 11. | Sect. I. The North-Indian dialects, ancient and modern. |
| 11— 33. | Sect. II. The Prākṛit dialects employed in the dramas. |
| 34— 43. | Sect. III. On the origin and vernacular use of the scenic dialects. |
| 43— 53. | Sect. IV. Views of the Indian grammarians on the relation of the Prākṛits to Sanskrit, and on the other elements in their composition. |
| 53—103. | Sect. V. The Pāli, and its relations to Sanskrit and Prākṛit. |
| 104—114. | Sect. VI. The dialects of the rock and pillar inscriptions of Aśoka. |
| 115—128. | Sect. VII. The dialect of the Buddhist Gāthās, and its relation to the Pāli : Summary of the results of this and the preceding section. |
| 128—144. | Sect. VIII. On the original use of Sanskrit as a vernacular tongue ; on the manner in which the Prākṛits arose out of it, and on the period of their formation : views of Professors Weber, Aufrecht, Lassen

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161—214. Sect. X. Various stages of Sanskrit literature, and the different forms in which they exhibit the Sanskrit language: the later Vedic commentators: earlier expounders: the Nirukta: the Brāhmaṇas: the Vedic hymns: imperfect comprehension of them in later times from changes in the language: the hymns composed in the vernacular idiom of their age.

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215—357. CHAPTER II. AFFINITIES OF THE INDIANS WITH THE PERSIANS, GREEKS AND ROMANS, AND DERIVATION OF ALL THESE NATIONS FROM CENTRAL ASIA.

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217—228. Sect. I. Introductory remarks on comparative philology: affinities of the Sanskrit and Persian with each other.

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228—267. Sect. II. Detailed illustrations of the affinities of Sanskrit with the Zend, Greek, and Latin languages: the last three languages not derived from Sanskrit.

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267—278. Sect. III. That affinity in language affords some presumption of affinity in race: modes in which a greater or less diversity of language and institutions would arise in different branches of the same stock: Central Asia the birth-place of the Āryas.

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279—286. Sect. IV. Whether there is any objection arising from physiological considerations, to classing the Indians among the Indo-European races.

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287—300. Sect. V. Reasons for supposing the Indians and Persians in particular to have had a common origin.

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301—306. Sect. VI. Was India the primitive country of the Āryas and Indo-European races?

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306—322. Sect. VII. Central Asia the cradle of the Arians: opinions of Schlegel, Lassen, Benfey, Müller, Spiegel, Renan, and Pictet.

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322—329. Sect. VIII. On the national traditions of the Indians regarding their own original country.

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329—334. Sect. IX. Whether any tradition regarding the earliest abodes of the Arian race is contained in the First Fargard of the Vendidad.

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335—341. Sect. X. What was the route by which the Āryas penetrated into India?

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341—357. Sect. XI. The immigration of the Indo-Arians from the north-west rendered probable by the tenor of the Vedic hymns.

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358—444. CHAPTER III. THE ARIANS IN INDIA: THEIR ADVANCE TO THE EAST AND SOUTH.

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359—369. Sect. I. Distinction drawn between the Āryas and Dasyus in the Rigveda.

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369—396. Sect. II. Additional Vedic texts bearing on the relations of the Āryas and Dasyus.

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397—405. Sect. III. The Arians on the Sarasvatī, and their diffusion eastward and southward from that point.

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405—421. Sect. IV. Advance of the Arians from the Doab across the Vindhya mountains; and their conflicts with the aboriginal tribes of the Dekhan.

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422—423. Sect. V. Indian traditions regarding the tribes in the south of the peninsula.

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423—438. Sect. VI. Languages of the south of India, and their fundamental difference from Sanskrit.

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438—444. Sect. VII. Results deducible from the preceding sections.

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445—488. APPENDIX.

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446—466. Note B. Further grounds in support of the position that the Atharvaveda is more recent than the Rigveda; with some considerations in answer to the theory of Professors Kern and Haug, that the caste-system is more ancient than the Rigveda.

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466—467. Note C. Quotation from Schlegel’s Essai de l’origine des Hindous.

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467—468. Note D. Quotation from the Rev. G. C. Geldart’s paper “*Language* no Test of Race.”

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468—469. Note D\*. Spiegel on the old Iranian Dialects.

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| 469—476. | Note F. Quotation from Windischmann's Essay, Ueber den Somacultus der Arier. |
| 476—477. | Note G. Prof. Cowell's note in his edition of Elphinstone's History of India on that author's views regarding the origin of the Hindus. |
| 477—478. | Note H. Quotation from Spiegel on the question of the separation of the Iranians and Indians. |
| 478—479. | Note I. Quotation from Spiegel on the grounds of the separation. |
| 479 | Note J. Quotation from Ptolemy. |
| 480—481. | Note K. On the earliest abodes of the Arians. |
| 482—484. | Note L. Quotations from the Mahābhārata and Rājataranginī regarding the tribes of the Panjāb. |
| 484 | Note M. Quotations from Lassen and Wilson. |
| 485 | Note N. Quotation from the S'atapatha Brāhmaṇa, xiii. 8, 1, 5. |
| 485—488. | Note O. Stevenson and Caldwell on the different elements of the Indian population. |
| 489—493. | Additional Notes. |
| 494—499. | Metrical Translations. |
| 501—512. | Index. |

Errata et Corrigenda

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| Page 17, | line 15, for "*daliddāe*" read "*daliddadae*." |
| ,, 76, | line 12, for "*Saptaśalaka*" read "*Saptaśataka*." |
| ,, 94, | line 17, for "*baliddo*" read "*baladdo*." |
| ,, 192, | 4 lines from the bottom, for "*Panigins*" read "*Paingins*." |
| ,, 259, | last line, for "*Mahābbāshya*" read "*Mahābhāshya*." |
| ,, 332, | note 109, line 2, for "*Hyreania*" read "*Hyrcania*." |
| ,, 360, | note 3, line 5, for "*viii*. 226," read "*viii*. 22, 6." |
| ,, 361, | 7 lines from foot, for "*Vṛihad*" read "*Bṛihad*." |
| ,, 368, | line 29, for "*xviii*. 8, 22," read "*xviii*. 2, 28." |
| ,, 370, | note 30, line 3, for "*Vālākhilya*" read "*Vālakhilya*." |
| ,, 385, | line 17, and note 63, line 1, for "*Arjuni*" read "*Arjuna*." |
| ,, ,, | note 3, line 5, for "*i*. 103, 3," read "*i*. 104, 3." |

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Note.—Page 89, note, line 3, Prof. Weber suggests that "*kadraṇo*" in the works quoted is no doubt a misprint for "*kaiṇo*."

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VOLUME SECOND.

Plan of the Present Volume

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In the first volume of this work I have sought to collect, translate, and illustrate (1) the mythical accounts of the creation of man and of the origin of castes which are to be found in the Vedic hymns, in the Brāhmaṇas and their appendages, in the Rāmāyaṇa, the Mahābhārata and the Purāṇas; (2) the texts of the Veda, and Brāhmaṇas, which speak of Manu as the progenitor of the Āryan Indians; (3) the passages of the Ṛig and Atharva Vedas which throw light upon the mutual relations of the several classes of Indian society at the time when those works were composed; (4) the portions of the Brāhmaṇas, or of later books which relate the struggles for pre-eminence which appear to have occurred between the Brāhmans and Kshattriyas in the early ages of Indian history; (5) the opinions of Manu and the authors of the Mahābhārata and Purāṇas regarding the origin of the alien tribes dwelling within, or adjacent to, the boundaries of Hindustan; and (6) the Purānic descriptions of the parts of the earth exterior to Bhāratavarsha or India: and as a result of the whole inquiry I found that the sacred books of the Hindus contain no uniform or consistent account of the origin of castes; and that in consequence of this discrepancy the theory commonly received by that people of the original distinctness of the four classes, in virtue of their derivation from different portions of the Creator's body, is not established as the doctrine of Hinduism, even by a literal interpretation of its more popular writings.

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It will now be my endeavour to show by a series of proofs of a different description, derived from comparative philology, and from an examination of the earliest Hindu writings, the Vedas, that the people of India who belong to the principal pure and mixed classes were not originally divided into castes, or indigenous in India, but may, with the greatest probability, be regarded as forming a branch (not, however, perhaps, free from the intermixture of foreign elements,) of the great Indo-European family, of which the Persians, Greeks, Romans, and Germanic tribes were, or are, also members; and that while other branches of this great family (which seems to have had its primeval abode in some distant country to the north-west of India) separated themselves from the main stock and migrated to the westward, the progenitors of the Hindus travelled towards Hindustān, where they perhaps intermarried with some of the tribes which were previously in occupation of the country, and where their original religious ideas were gradually modified, and the system of castes and other institutions and tenets of Brahmanism were slowly developed.

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The process of reasoning by which I hope to establish these conclusions is the following. First, I propose to show, by an examination of the languages and literature of India, that the Sanskrit is not (as the Hindus appear to conceive) an immutable form of speech of divine origin, but is different now from what it was when their ancestors first came into India. This will be made apparent by a comparison of the archaic diction of the Vedic hymns with the more modern language of the Itihāsas and Purāṇas; and that this difference is the result of gradual development will be proved by a reference to the natural laws of speech, and to the analogous process which the tongues of other nations have undergone; by arguments drawn from the composition of such books as the Nighaṇṭu, and Nirukta, explanatory of obsolete words and phrases in the hymns, and from the existence of such liturgical commentaries as the Brāhmaṇas, and such speculative treatises as the Upanishads, which presuppose as already antiquated, or at least antecedent, the hymns which they quote, and the sense of which they explain and develope. The difference in age between the various Indian S'āstras will be further briefly adverted to, and established by pointing out the great discrepancy between the religious ideas, forms of worship,¹ and state of manners which they severally represent; the Vedic hymns being shown by all these various lines of proof to be the earliest of all the Indian books, and the others to follow from them by a natural course of growth and expansion. While the mutability and the actual mutations of the Sanskrit language are demonstrated by this historical outline of Sanskrit literature, I shall show in some introductory sections, how, through the action of the same phonetic changes as are found to have transformed most of the ancient languages of Europe into their several modern representatives, the older Sanskrit became gradually modified² into the Pālī and Prākrits, of byegone centuries, till, in combination with other elements,—not traceable in its classical literature, but forming, either an original part of the spoken dialect of the Āryan Indians, or a portion of it borrowed from alien sources,—it was ultimately broken down into the modern vernacular dialects of Northern India.

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¹ The detailed treatment of this portion of the subject is deferred to a later volume of this work, the fourth.

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² The objections which have been raised to this statement of the origin of the Pālī, etc., will be considered further on.

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Having thus shown the mutations which the Sanskrit has undergone since its introduction into India, I propose, secondly, to prove, by a comparison of that venerable language with the Zend, Persian, Greek, Latin, and other western tongues, that these forms of speech are all closely related to each other, both in respect of roots and forms of inflection; and this in such a manner as to show them to be sister-dialects, derived, by gradual modification, from some more ancient, and now extinct, parent-language. From these facts, and others derived from Zend and Greek mythology and literature, I shall proceed to argue the probability of a common origin of the different nations,—generally called the Āryan, Indo-Germanic, or Indo-European nations,—by which the above-mentioned languages have been spoken; as well as to evince the strong probability that the progenitors of the Hindus immigrated from the north or north-west into India.

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I shall then endeavour to fortify the latter of these conclusions by referring to the indications which are discoverable of a collision between the Indo-Āryans, after their arrival in India, and certain barbarous tribes, speaking a different language, and belonging to a different race, who occupied that country before their immigration, and by sketching a history of their advance to the south and east. These subjects will be illustrated from the data to be found in the Vedic hymns, the most ancient monuments of Indian antiquity, as well as in the other S'āstras of later date.

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THE LANGUAGES OF NORTHERN INDIA: THEIR HISTORY AND RELATIONS.

Sect. I.—The North-Indian Dialects, Ancient and Modern

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A SURVEY of the languages of Northern India reveals to us the following facts. We find, first, a polished and complicated language, the Sanskrit, popularly regarded as sacred, and in reality of very high antiquity; which is now, however, understood only by a few learned men, and spoken in their schools as the vehicle of discussions on grammar, theology, and philosophy, while it is totally unintelligible to the mass of the people. We find, secondly, a variety of provincial dialects which are employed both by the learned and the unlearned, viz., Bengalī, Hindī, Mahrattī, Guzaratī, etc., all bearing a close resemblance to each other, and all composed, in a great measure, of the same roots.

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The words of which these vernacular dialects are formed may be divided into four classes. First, such as are pure Sanskrit, as for example *īśvara* (god), *devatā* (deity), *svarga* (heaven), *strī* (woman), *purusha* (man), *jana* (person); secondly, words which, though modified from their original form, are easily recognizable as Sanskrit, such as *log* from *loka* (people), *istrī* from *strī* (woman), *munh* from *mukha* (mouth), *bhāī* from *bhrātri* (brother), *bhatījā* from *bhrātrija* (brother's son), *băhin* from *bhăgĭnī* (sister), *biyāh* from *vivāha* (marriage), *bhūīn* from *bhūmi* (earth), and innumerable others in Hindī; thirdly, words which have no resemblance to any vocables discoverable in Sanskrit books, and which we must therefore either suppose to have an origin independent of that language, or to have formed part of the colloquial, though not of the written, Āryan speech,¹ such as in Hindī, *bāp* (father), *bēṭā* (son), *pēṛ* (a tree), *chaukī* (a chair), *chūk* (a blunder), *khiṛkī* (a window), *jhagrā* (a dispute), *bakheṛā* (the same), *āṭā* (flour), *chaṭāī* (a mat), and a multitude of other instances. Fourthly, words derived from Arabic, Persian, or some other foreign language, as *ādmī* (a man), *‘aurat* (a woman), *ḥākim* (a ruler), *ḥăkīm* (a physician), *durust* (right), *roz* (day), *dariyā* (a river), *roshanī* (light), etc., etc.

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¹ This latter alternative supposition was suggested to me by Prof. Aufrecht. The same remark had been previously made by Mr. J. Beames, as will appear from a quotation which I shall make further on from his “Notes on the Bhojpuri dialect of Hindī,” in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for 1868, p. 499.

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Let us now see what is the history of these vernacular dialects. It is clear, for various reasons, that they cannot have existed for ever in their present form. When therefore, and how have they been created? What do history and the books of Indian grammarians tell us on the subject?

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If we begin with the Arabic and Persian words which the North-Indian dialects, such as Bengalī and Hindī, contain, we shall find it to be universally admitted that words of this kind have only been introduced into those languages since the time when the Musulmans began to invade India. Now it is well known that Maḥmūd of Ghazni made his first inroad into Hindustan between eight and nine hundred years ago. Before that time, and in fact till long afterwards, when the Mahomedans had penetrated from the north-west far into India, and taken possession of that country, there could have been scarcely any intermixture of Arabic or Persian words in the Indian dialects.²

First 110 of 2,228 passages. Read on

Cites (21)