The Lahore Dayanand College Research Department published in 1922, under the editorship of Ram Gopal Shastri, a critical edition of Atharvavediya-Brhat-Sarvanukra-manika. The text was based on a comparative study of original manuscripts and transcripts.
As the above-mentioned edition had since long ceased to be available and, further, as the same suffered from serious defects in many respects, the V. V. R. Institute under-took in 1963 to bring out a thoroughly revised edition.
For the purposes of the Present Edition, practically, all the manuscripts and transcripts, as described in the sequel, which had been utilised in the preparation of the previous edition were secured once again and closely studied afresh. Our efforts to find out some new basic materials, however, could not meet with any success. Anyway, the intensive study which has since been made of the said previously used materials themselves has been very fruitful in that the text as now reconstructed differs, quite considerably, from that of the old edition. Indeed, it can be said that almost one-third of every new page is different from its previous counterpart.
No information is available as to where, when and by whom this work was written. It seems that Sayana did not know this work nor did he have access to any other traditional text touching its subject-matter. Otherwise, it is not clear why in his commentary on the Atharvaveda 'which in the division of its text into separate hymns (suktas) was very much of a piece with the Rgveda, he should not have specified, as he had done in this commentary on the latter, the names of the connected seers, deities and metres from sukta to sukta,
This work treats of the Atharvaveda in two apparently separate units. Its Patalas I-X deal with the Kantas 1-XIX and its Patala XI with the Kanda XX of that text. The iterative entries of the seer names Bhrgvangira(h) Brahma at the end of the Patala X and Medhyatithih at the end of the Patala XI, respectively, mark off the separate compilation of each of the said two units, probably, at the hands of two different authors. This is indicated by the record of the colophon (puspika) at the end of the Patala X in the MS মা which formally ends the work there. On the other hand, a similar but shorter colophon (puspika) occurs at the end of the Patala XI and not of the Patala X in the MSS भा¹ and बी which in this way represent the tradition that recognised the Patala XI as the last chapter of the work. The method of treatment in each of the two units is also distinct. Thus, full sentences like: तत्र प्रथमं 'ये त्रिषप्ता' इति त्रीणि (AV 1, 1-3) सूक्तान्यथर्वाऽपश्यत् (1, 4) are used throughout the first unit comprising the Patalas I-X and only formulic listing like 'आा याहि' (AV XX, 3), इरिम्बिठिः, ऐन्द्रम्, गायत्रम्" (XI, 1) is found, in general, in the second unit comprising the Patala XI. It is also interesting to note that the first unit alone quite conspiquously preserves the fossil-like occurrences of the so-called grammatically irregular verbs अप्रार्थयत् at about 60 places (I, 5; 6 etc.) as against 3 places (I, 7 etc.) of प्रार्थयत् and अप्रैषीत् (IV, 24), the ancient dialectic vogue of which finds a reminiscence in the grammarians' alternative traditional dictum पूर्व हि धातुरुपसर्गेण युज्यते पश्चात् साधनेन ।
compiled the Patalas I-X purview the Kanda XX of The original author who seems to have excluded from his the Atharvaveda, probably, on the ground that its entire contents except the Khilas called the Kuntapa hymns (127-136) had been originally read in the Rgveda and as such had already been dealt with in the Rgveda-sarvanu-kramani. In the MS भा, however, a postscript treating, in just a few lines, of the Kanda XX in a very incomplete and desultory manner is found added, may be, by some other hand at the end of the aforesaid colophon (puspika).
This postscript makes a strange statement at the outset, to wit, that the entire Kanda XX has Atharvangirah as its seer, Indra and Agni both as its deities and Gayatri as its metre pre-contradicting what follows thereafter in connection with a number of hymns of that Kanda. The Khilas entitled the Kuntapa-suktas (127-136) are ascribed therein to the seer (muni) Aitasa.
Later on, another author, evidently, conversant with the Rgveda tradition according to the Asvalayana school (sakha), composed the Patala XI of the present work on the basis of the so far untraced Rgveda-sarvanukramani of that school towards listing the names of the related seers, deities and metres of the originally Rgveda-read mantras of the Kanda XX of the Atharvaveda. It was, apparently, on this account that while he could not supply any information regarding the aforesaid Kuntapa-suktas beyond the bare statement that these were Khilas, he copied out from his basic work the full story relating to the Rgvedins' traditional difference of opinion regarding the name or names of the seer or seers of AV XX, 79 being RV VII, 32.
Incidently, some information should also be gleaned from the Patala XI of the present work regarding the difference in the names of the seers and the deities which were traditionally remembered in the schools of Asvalayana and Katyayana in relation to the several suktas and mantras of the Rgveda. Thus, for example, I, 57 was ascribed to Gotama in the former and to Savya Angirasa in the latter school, VII, 97, 10 to Krsna in the former and to Maitra-varuni Vasistha in the latter school and VIII, 101, 11; 12 to Bharadvaja in the former and to Jamadagni in the latter school.
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