पृष्ठम्:बृहद्देवता.djvu/२४

xxviii] SUMMARY OF CONTENTS [Introduction A fair number of Vedic words are used, such as krntatra (ii. 60), bisa (v. 84), astri (viii. 68), käru (ii. 22), kirin (iii. 96), krpanyu (ii. 27), tamasvati (iii. 10), vadhuya (vii. 134), vidvanga (iii. 147), vrktaharhis (i. 65), syari (iii. 8), suna (=sūnā: iv. 29); visva (ii. 134), sukra (vi. 144); katha as an adverb (ii. 98); the verb ribh, 'to praise' (iii. 96). The use of such words, how- ever, is not always an independent one, as they sometimes occur in passages which are only adaptations of the statements of the Rg-veda ¹. The Brhaddevatã also contains a few words which have not been noted elsewhere kuntya, pratipurvaka, praiga (adj.), yüjamāna (adj.), nänänrya, samnomitriya; vi-sokaya, 'to console' (vii. 36), has been borrowed by the Sarvānukramaṇī (x. 33). 14. Summary of the contents of the Brhaddevatā. The contents of the eight Adhyayas of the Brhaddevatã do not correspond in any way to the eight Aştakas of the Rg-veda. Thus the enumeration of the deities of the hymns does not begin till near the end of the second Adhyāya (ii. 126). Each Adhyaya contains about thirty vargas of generally five ślokas. The division into Adhyayas and vargas is quite mechanical, as it often cuts into the middle of a dis- cussion or a story (e. g. the end of vi, the seventh varga of viii). The Brhaddevata begins with a long introduction embracing the whole of the first Adhyāya, and twenty-five vargas of the second. This intro- duction consists mainly of a classification and enumeration of the Vedic deities, in connexion with Prajapati as representing them collectively, and with the Vedic triad of Fire, Indra or Väyu, and Sun, as representing respectively the gods of the three worlds. Seven vargas at the end of the introduction contain an interesting grammatical discussion, closely related to the Nirukta, and dealing with particles, prepositions, nouns, pronouns, compounds, and the analysis of words, together with a criticism of Yaska's errors in dividing words 2. The main body of the work, commencing with the twenty-sixth varga of the second Adhyāya, is, for the most part, concerned with stating the deities, their successive order, for the hymns and stanzas of the Rg-veda. It is, however, by no means a mere index of deities, such as the Devatänukramanī doubtless was. considerable amount of other matter, notably about forty legends, meant On the contrary, it contains a to explain the circumstances under which the hymns they are connected 1 With the above irregularities, cp. those collected from the Rgvidhana by Meyer in his edition, pp. viii-xi. This grammatical part of the Introduction has been printed by me, with translation and notes, in the Album-Kern, pp. 333-34⁰.