Rezension

The bulk of this volume consists of eight papers presented at the panel ´Studien zur Paippaläda Säkhä des Atharvaveda´ (Studies on the Paippaläda branch of the Atharvaveda) and organized by the first of the two co-editors, Arlo Griffiths, at the 29. Deutscher Orientalistentag held in September 2004 in Halle. It is supplemented by two contributions that were not part of the panel (by Kei Kataoka and Alexis Sanderson). The contributions cover a wide variety of issues in the research of the Paippaläda recension of the Atharvavedasamhitä (hereafter abbreviated as PS), the second most ancient text of the Vedic tradition, dated to the beginning of the lst millennium BC.The volume opens with short ´Prefatory remarks´ by Arlo Griffiths, introducing the scope of the book and summarizing the content of the papers.The contribution by Philipp Kubisch, ´The metrical and prosodical structures of Books I-VII of the Vulgate Atharvavedasamhitä´, is a pioneer study of the Atharvavedic metres. While the Standard Vedic metres, as attested foremost in the Rgveda (RV), were well-described more than 100 years ago in the seminal works of Hermann Oldenberg, Edward Arnold, and other Vedic scholars, little attention was paid to the metrical patterns found in the Atharvaveda. The numerous deviations from the Rgvedic meters, typically qualified as mere irregularities, may in fact represent peculiar metrical schemes. Thus, the author notices heptasyllabic verses with trisyllabic (catalectic) cadence alongside the regulär octosyllabic demeters such as gäyatri and anustubh, hybrid tristubh-jagatl (T/J) pädas (= ´Tristubh-pädas [that] can be scanned as Jagati-pädas by means of restoring a syllable in the last place but one´ tp. 9f.]). Kubisch offers a highly sophisticated and complex apparatus of several dozens of meters, which can serve as a useful tool in the metrical analysis of the Atharvaveda. Alexander Lubotsky (´PS 8.15. Offense against a Brahmin´) offers an exemplary critical edition, accompanied with a,philological and grammatical analysis and translation of the Paippaläda hymn 8.15. The hymn is dedicated to quite a rare topic, abusing a Brahmin. On the basis of the fact that the hymn is two stanzas longer than most hymns of book 8, the author arrives at the plausible conclusion about the secondary character of two stanzas (2 and 6)—probably later additions. He offers Solutions for many textual difficulties, greatly contributing to our understanding of this hymn and leaving virtually no obscure passage without clarification. Werner Knobl, in his excellent lexicographic study of two hitherto unknown Vedic words (´Zwei Studien zum Wortschatz der Paippaläda-Samhitä´), offers convincing Solutions for a number of obscure PS passages. He explains the word +jatravya- (at PS 7.15.7b, edited in editio princeps as manayo yaksmäd ^datkravyäf^) as ´[yaksma-disease] of collarbone´ and abhlll- (attested in PS-Orissa 20.62-20.63, based on the compound verb abhi-lT ´adhere, cling´—i.e., literally, ´adhering´) as the term for a peculiar skin disease affecting primarily the face. On his way to the final Solutions, the author leaves virtually no relevant topic untouched, finding convincing arguments for his interpretations on both grammatical and philological grounds. His short excursuses represent exhaustive elaborations of several relevant issues, being, in fact, mini-papers on (1) the meaning and uses of the word mani-´jewel; necklace´ (p. 43); (2) nominal formations in -avyä- (derived with the suffix -yä- from -M-stems) (p. 45-7); and (3) the meaning of the medical term jatrü-´collarbone´ (p. 47-53).Yasuhiro Tsuchiyama´s paper, ´On the meaning of the word rästrä: PS 10.4.71´, is an interesting study about the Status and content of the notion of kingdom, or royal power (jästrä-), in the times of the Atharvaveda and about the ancient Indian social history, in general. In connection with this topic, Tsuchiyama takes a closer look at the Paippaläda hymn 10.4, as well at some other passages from book 10, which, according to Witzel (1997), is a ´thematically compact collection of royal hymns´. Whilst the first four papers mostly concentrate on linguistic and philological analysis of the Paippalädasamhitä proper, the next three contributions bring to scholarly attention some younger texts belonging to the Paippaläda tradition. Timothy Lubin (´The Nilarudropanisad and the Paippalädasamhitä: a critical edition with translation of the Upanisad and Näräyana´s DTpikä´) offers a study of the Nilarudropanisad, which is dedicated to Rudra. This text is tentatively dated by the author to AD 800, and its origins are located in western India. Lubin draws Special attention to the importance of the manuscripts of the Nilarudropanisad for the study of the PS, since they quote a number of Paippaläda verses and may be relevant for better understanding of the corresponding passages. The edition of the text, accompanied with a translation and meticulous text-critical analysis, is followed by the edition and translation of the indigenous commentary, Näräyana´s DTpikä. In his paper ´The ancillary literature of the Paippaläda school: a preliminary survey with an edition of the Caranavyühopanisad´, Arlo Griffiths offers a useful overview of the texts belonging to the Atharvavedic tradition (and still available in Orissa, the only remaining locus of this Vedic säkhä), accompanied with an edition of another Atharvavedic (Paippaläda) Upanisad, Caranavyühopanisad, the main purpose of which ´seems to give an overview of the Atharvavedic canon´ (p. 179). Alexis Sanderson´s paper (´Atharvavedins in Tantric territory: the Ängirasakalpa texts of the Oriya Paippalädins and their connection with the Trika and the Källkula. With critical editions of the Paräjapavidhi, the Parämantravidhi, and the *Bhadrakäl Tmantravidhiprakarana´), which is the most voluminous contribution to the book (nearly 120 pages), deals with an even less known class of texts associated with the Atharvavedic tradition, tantras (attributed to Ängirasakalpa). After a short introduction to the Ängirasakalpa rituals, the list of available manuscripts, and a survey of the corpus of texts, Sanderson offers critical editions and translations of three tantric texts (or text fragments) dedicated to the goddess Parä. These texts belong to two tantric traditions, the Säkta Saiva Systems of the Trika and the Källkula, both associated with Kashmir.The following two papers are dedicated to the Atharvavedic tradition in Kashmir. Kei Kataoka (´Was Bhatta Jayanta a Paippalädin?´) argues that the 9th Century Kashmirian scholar Bhatta Jayanta was an Atharvavedin of the Paippaläda tradition. Walter Slaje, in his paper "Three Bhattas, two Sultans, and the Kashmirian Atharvaveda´, concentrates on the social and political context which could Surround the emergence of the famous Tübuingen (Kashmirian) Paippaläda manuscript, the Codex ´archetypus´ which is tentatively dated to the year AD 1419 (Slaje adds an extensive postscript, providing additional evidence for this date). On the basis of a variety of data, ranking from the political history of the region to palaeographic evidence from the Kashmirian manuscript, the author arrives at the convincing conclusion that the Paippaläda tradition (which existed in Kashmir from the 701 Century AD on) was reimported to Kashmir from ´Karnataka´ but had no Chance to survive. Annette Schmiedchen (´Epigraphical evidence of the history of Atharvavedic Brahmins´) bring to scholarly attention some new epigraphic records which are relevant for the history of the Atharvavedic tradition in India and point to Gujarat, northern Bengal, and Orissa as mediaeval centres of this säkhä. The book concludes with an index. The volume under review offers a good representation of current studies on the Paippaläda recension of the Atharvaveda—nowadays, when large parts of the Paippalädasamhitä have become or are becoming available to Vedic scholars, one of the most vivid branches of classical Indology. It should be of great interest both for Vedic scholars and for all Indologists concentrating on the study of both ancient and mediaeval India and the traces of the Vedic traditions in modern South Asia.