English
SECONDARY USES OF THE CONCORDANCE 1 . It is a key to the liturgical employment of the mantras. —The above-mentioned uses are plainly the direct or primary ones for which a work like this is expected to serve. The nature of the subsidiary Vedic literature (Brahmanas, Sutras, etc.), however, and its intimate relation to the fundamental texts, are such that the Concordance may also be readily put to certain indirect or secondary uses, which are scarcely less important for the systematic progress of Yedic study. First, since the Concordance gives not only the places of actual occurrence of a given mantra in the Samhitas, but also the places where it is cited in the subsidiary works on ritual and household custom and the like, it furnishes the key to the liturgical or ritual employment of every mantra as prescribed by the ceremonial books. I hope that the Concordance will prove to be a most effective means of advancing our knowledge of the hymns and the ceremonies in their relations to one another. The hymn or prayer, and the ceremony that accompanied it, often serve mutually each as a commentary on the other. The subtle blend of song and rite makes a full knowledge of both necessary for the under¬ standing of either. 2 . It is virtually a finding-index of rites and practices. —As a corollary to the use just mentioned, I may add that, since a given prayer is liable to be rubricated in similar or identical rites and practices described in the large mass of Hindu ritual texts, the Concordance will incidentally serve, to no inconsider¬ able extent, as a helpful finding-index of similar or identical rites and practices. 3 . It is a tool for future editors of Vedic texts*— The future editor of a Vedic text will find in a com¬ plete assemblage of all the mantras an auxiliary of the very first importance. In the work of consti¬ tuting a Vedic text, the mantras are the most intract¬ able part of the material concerned, because they are written in a dialect which—differing, as it does, con¬ siderably from the later forms of Sanskrit—was im¬ perfectly understood by the scribes. Since much of the material of this kind with which the future editor will have to deal is quite certain, as experience shows, to be contained in the literature previously published, it is obvious that the Concordance will greatly facilitate the establishment of the new texts and the revision of some that have already been edited. Moreover, since, as lias been already said, parallel prayers are to a large extent imbedded in parallel ceremonies, the Concordance will not be without value in establish¬ ing the text of the liturgical books themselves. 4 . It is a repertory of the most archaic Hindu prose. —The Concordance presents, for the first time and in a form ready and convenient for systematic study, the prose mantras as distinguished from the metrical mantras of the Vedic hymns on the one band, and from the rest of the early prose on the other. It seems to me that these prose formulas are in a dialect or in a stylo that differs not a little from the narrative or descriptive prose of the Brahmanas and Sutras. The formulas abound, at any rate, in poetic or other archaisms that deserve to be collected and treated by themselves. There is also good reason to believe that the prose of the formulas is the oldest Hindu prose and so the oldest Indo-European prose. The study here suggested seems to me likely to prove to be a not unfruitful one. 5 . Miscellaneous uses. —It can hardly be doubted that the Concordance will he of service in the woi'k of determining the relations of the different Vedic schools or cakhas to one another. I am not sure but that the present time is just as opportune for this interesting and fundamental research as any that is likely to present itself within the next fifty years or so. And there are various other interesting questions that will suggest themselves to different scholars, according to their bent of mind and habits of inves¬ tigation, for the solution of which the Concordance can not fail to he a useful tool. For example, it may be noted that this Concordance assembles an enormous number of passages beginning with tho prohibitive adverb md, and that even a cursory examination of them reveals the interesting fact that only a very few contain verb-forms other than in- junctives or augmentless preterits. Or, again, the extreme frequency of mantras beginning with the name of a divinity has as its consequence that man- Preface] SCOPE OF THE CONCORDANCE IX tras concerning a certain deity are here, to a very large extent, grouped together. For instance, the mantras beginning with the name of Agni fill twenty- eight pages, and those beginning with the name of Indra fill twenty-three. Consequently, in this book will very often be found, most conveniently assembled, much of the material for the study of questions relating to Vedie mythology. Nor must I omit to say that the initial words of the mantras form by themselves a very considerable part of a word-index to the mantras. SCOPE OF THE CONCORDANCE 1 . Certain published texts not included. —Although the title claims that the entire published Vedic litera¬ ture is incorporated in this Concordance, yet the claim is made with certain reservations. The Paip- palada-Qakha or Kashmirian text of the Atharva-Yeda, to begin with, is in a sense published, being accessible to scholars in the chromophotographic reproduction edited by Professor Garbe and myself; but it is too corrupt to be incorporated here and compared with the rest of the material, and the birch-bark original still remains unfortunately the only one known to us for this text. We may hope that the Concordance will prove of great service in restoring this text so far as is feasible under these singularly distressing cireumstanees. Again, the edition of the Drakyayana- Qnluta-Sutra, promised, and in part, I believe, issued, by Dr. J. N. Reuter of Helsingfors, I have not as yet received. So, too, the Qanti-Kalpa, edited by Professor G. H. Bolling, in the Transactions of the American Philological Association , volume xxxv, appeared too late. I believe I have read all the later Upanisads and Smrti or Dharma texts which seemed likely T to be of interest in this connection ; but I have not thought it necessary to continue, among all kinds of late para- lipomena or pai'icistas, a pedantie search which might be indefinitely prolonged without commensurate results. Anything that may 7 come to light within the next twenty years or so may well await the day when the accumulation of new texts or of new editions of old ones shall render a supplement to the Concordance a profitable undertaking. Once more, the claim of the title-page calls for a word of explanation as to certain doubtful elements of late or less important published texts. What I have endeavoured to embody in the Concordance with absolute completeness is the following: all the stanzas and all the prose passages of formulaic character contained in the Samhitas, Brahmanas, Ara- nyakas, older Upanisads, Qrauta-Sutras, and Grhya- Sutras. On the other hand, in the ease of the later Upanisads or of the metrical Dharma-Qastras and Smrtis, or of such a text as the Rig -Vidhana, I have ) adopted a selective method. It would clearly be in¬ advisable to include in this Concordance all the stanzas that occur in the works last mentioned. From them, accordingly, I have culled whatever appeared to have Yedie form or Yedie flavor. Unerring judgment in such ehoice no one will expect: I do not believe that I have erred on the side of including too little. It is perhaps more likely that I have ineluded some things that might just as well or better have been left out. 2 . Unpublished texts included. —The Concordance, on the other hand, gives more than is promised by the title-page, in that it includes a very considerable amount of material not yet published. Of the four books of the Kathaka-Samhita only 7 the first has so far been actually issued by the editor, Professor Leopold von Sciiroeder of the University of Vienna: it is to me a source of peculiar satisfaction that I am able to give in this Concordance the mantra material from this highly important text entire. I made a special journey to Vienna, in 1902, for the express purpose of copying the material from the three un¬ published books, and the editor generously met my wishes by the loan of his manuscripts. From them, by the close and arduous labour of a month, I ex¬ cerpted the needed parts, and embodied them later in the Concordance. To Professor von Schroeder I owe an especial debt of gratitude. Again, hy the kind cooperation of Professor Friedrich Knauer of the University of Kiew, I have been enabled to present the mantras of the entire Manava-Qrauta- Sutra, an important text in eleven books of which only 7 five as yet are published. Professor Hanns Oertel, of Yale University 7 , has enriched the Con¬ cordance by the not too numerous, and unfortunately very corrupt, majitras contained in the Jaiminrya- or Talavakara-Brahmana. Finally 7 I should note that I have incorporated all the material from the so-called ‘ dedications ’ of the ritual of the horse-sacrifice or agvamedha, and human sacrifice or purusamedha . Not all of these are mantras in the stricter sense of the word ; but they T have been ineluded because they figure inthe Samhitas and because they sometimes interchange with real mantras of the same or similar import. General statement of the number and kind of works included.— It appears that one hundred and nineteen texts in all have been drawn upon for contributions to the Concordance.