The present edition of the Rig- Veda translation is merely a reprint of the first edition prined in 1850 and thereafter. The translation of the late Prof. Horace Heyman Wilson was the first English translation of the Rig-Veda. It has specialities of its own and these will keep its value for a long time. The Rigveda or Rig Veda is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (sūktas). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (śruti) known as the Vedas. The Rigveda is the oldest known Vedic Sanskrit text. Its early layers are among the oldest extant texts in any Indo-European language. The sounds and texts of the Rigveda have been orally transmitted since the 2nd millennium BCE. Philological and linguistic evidence indicates that the bulk of the Rigveda Samhita was composed in the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent. The text is layered, consisting of the Samhita, Brahmanas, Aranyakas and Upanishads. The Rigveda Samhita is the core text and is a collection of 10 books (maṇḍalas) with 1,028 hymns (sūktas) in about 10,600 verses (called ṛceponymous of the name Rigveda that were composed the earliest, the hymns predominantly discuss cosmology, rites, and rituals and praise deities. The more recent books (Books 1 and 6) in part also deal with philosophical or speculative questions, virtues such as dāna (charity) in society, questions about the origin of the universe and the nature of the divine, and other metaphysical issues in their hymns.
Horace Hayman Wilson (1786 – 1860) was an English orientalist who was elected the first Boden Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford University. He became deeply interested in the ancient language and literature of India, and was the first person to translate the Rigveda into English. In 1813 he published the Sanskrit text with a free translation in English rhymed verse of Kalidasa's lyrical poem, the Meghaduuta, or Cloud-Messenger. He prepared the first Sanskrit-English Dictionary (1819) from materials compiled by native scholars, supplemented by his own researches. This work was only superseded by the Sanskritwörterbuch (1853–1876) of Rudolf Roth and Otto von Böhtlingk, who expressed their obligations to Wilson in the preface to their great work. He was interested in Ayurveda and traditional Indian medical and surgical practices. He compiled the local practices observed for cholera and leprosy in his publications in the Medical and Physical Society of Calcutta.
I PUBLISHED, in 1866, the fourth volume of the late Professor Wilson's translation of the Rig-Veda, which professed to follow mainly the interpretation of the Hindu Commentator Sayana. The printing of the fifth volume was soon afterwards commenced; but it was stopped by the discovery that the original MS. of the translation ended abruptly in the middle of the 44th hymn of the eighth Mandala, and that although there was a more or less complete translation of the tenth Mandala, only rough notes remained of that of the ninth. I subsequently completed the translation of the eighth Mandais independently, and it was printed: but my engagements at that time, in connection with my duties as Professor of Sanskrit in the University of Cambridge, rendered it impossible for me to continue the work; more especially as the original MS. of the translation of the ninth Mandala was in a very imperfect state, and required a great deal of careful revision before it could be sent to the press. A long interval elapsed during which the translation lay in abeyance; but Messrs. Trübner & Co. were always anxious to have it completed, and Mr. Nicholas Trübuer retained to the last his earnest interest in the work. At last, my friend and old Cambridge pupil Mr. W. F. Webster. undertook to carry and complete the interrupted task. He has continued the editing of the ifth volume, which is now published after its long suspension.
**Contents and Sample Pages**
Vedas (1164)
Upanishads (494)
Puranas (623)
Ramayana (741)
Mahabharata (360)
Dharmasastras (165)
Goddess (492)
Bhakti (243)
Saints (1508)
Gods (1273)
Shiva (373)
Journal (184)
Fiction (66)
Vedanta (359)
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