Atharvaveda

The Atharva Veda (Sanskrit: अथववेदः, Atharvavedaḥ from Atharvaveda

atharvāṇas and veda, meaning "knowledge") is the
"knowledge storehouse of atharvāṇas, the procedures for
everyday life".[4] The text is the fourth Veda, but has been a
late addition to the Vedic scriptures of Hinduism.[5][6]
Four Vedas
[7][8]It is a collection of 730 hymns with about 6,000 Information
mantras, divided into 20 books.[8] About a sixth of the Religion Hinduism
Atharvaveda texts adapts verses from the Rigveda, and
except for Books 15 and 16, the text is in poem form Language Vedic Sanskrit
deploying a diversity of Vedic matters.[8] Two different Period c. 1000–900 BCE[1][2]
recensions of the text – the Paippalāda and the Śaunakīya – Chapters 20 kāṇḍas
have survived into modern times.[9] Reliable manuscripts of
the Paippalada edition were believed to have been lost, but a Verses 5,977 mantras[3]
well-preserved version was discovered among a collection of
palm leaf manuscripts in Odisha in 1957.[9]

The Atharvaveda is sometimes called the "Veda of magical formulas",[4] a description considered incorrect by
other scholars.[10] In contrast to the 'hieratic religion' of the other three Vedas, the Atharvaveda is said to
represent a 'popular religion', incorporating not only formulas for magic, but also the daily rituals for initiation
into learning (upanayana), marriage and funerals. Royal rituals and the duties of the court priests are also
included in the Atharvaveda.[11]

The Atharvaveda was likely compiled as a Veda contemporaneously with Samaveda and Yajurveda, or about
1200 BC – 1000 BC.[2][12] Along with the Samhita layer of text, the Atharvaveda includes a Brahmana text,
and a final layer of the text that covers philosophical speculations. The latter layer of Atharvaveda text includes
three primary Upanishads, influential to various schools of Hindu philosophy. These include the Mundaka
Upanishad, the Mandukya Upanishad and the Prashna Upanishad.[13][14]

Contents
Etymology and nomenclature
Dating and historical context
Text
Recensions
Organization
Contents
Samhita
Surgical and medical treatment
Charms against fever, jaundice and diseases
Remedy from medicinal herbs
Spells and prayers to gain a lover, wife
Speculations on the nature of man, life, good and evil
 Prayer for peace
Brahmana
Upanishads
Mundaka Upanishad
Mandukya Upanishad
Prashna Upanishad
Manuscripts and translations
Influence
Medicine and health care
Literature
See also
References
Sources
Further reading
External links

Etymology and nomenclature

The Veda may be named, states Monier Williams, after the mythical priest named Atharvan who was first to
develop prayers to fire, offer Soma, and who composed "formulas and spells intended to counteract diseases
and calamities".[15] The name Atharvaveda, states Laurie Patton, is for the text being "Veda of the
Atharvāṇas".[4]

The oldest name of the text, according to its own verse 10.7.20, was Atharvangirasah, a compound of
"Atharvan" and "Angiras", both Vedic scholars.[16] Each school called the text after itself, such as Saunakiya
Samhita, meaning the "compiled text of Saunakiya".[16] The "Atharvan" and "Angiras" names, states Maurice
Bloomfield,[16] imply different things, with the former considered auspicious while the latter implying hostile
sorcery practices. Over time, the positive auspicious side came to be celebrated and the name Atharva Veda
became widespread.[16] The latter name Angiras which is linked to Agni and priests in the Vedas, states
George Brown, may also be related to Indo-European Angirôs found in an Aramaic text from Nippur.[17]

Michael Witzel states the etymology of Atharvan is Proto Indo-Iranian *atharwan "[ancient] priest, sorcerer",
and it is cognate to Avestan āθrauuan "priest" and possibly related to Tocharian *athr, "superior force".[18]

The Atharvaveda is also occasionally referred to as Bhrgvangirasah and Brahmaveda, after Bhrigu and
Brahma respectively.[16]

Dating and historical context

The Atharvaved is dated by Flood at ca. 900 BCE,[1] while Michael Witzel gives a dating at, or slightly after,
c. 1200/1000 BCE.[2]

The ancient Indian tradition initially recognized only three Vedas.[9][19] The Rigveda, the verse 3.12.9.1 of
Taittiriya Brahmana, the verse 5.32-33 of Aitareya Brahmana and other Vedic era texts mention only three
Vedas.[6] The acceptance of the Atharvanas hymns and traditional folk practices was slow, and it was accepted
as another Veda much later than the first three, by both orthodox and heterodox traditions of Indian
philosophies. The early Buddhist Nikaya texts, for example, do not recognize Atharvaveda as the fourth Veda,
and make references to only three Vedas.[20][21] Olson states that the ultimate acceptance of Atharvaveda as
the fourth Veda probably came in the 2nd half of the 1st millennium BCE.[19] However, notes Max Muller, the
hymns of Atharvaveda existed by the time Chandogya Upanishad was completed (~700 BCE), but were then
referred to as "hymns of Atharvangirasah".[22]

Frits Staal states that the text may be a compilation of poetry and knowledge that developed in two different
regions of ancient India, the Kuru region in northern India and the Pancalas region of eastern India.[9] The
former was home to Paippalāda, whose name was derived from the sacred fig tree named Pippala (Sanskrit:
प पल). This school's compositions were in the Rigvedic style.[9] The Pancalas region contributions came from
composer-priests Angirasas and Bhargavas, whose style was unlike the metric Rigvedic composition, and their
content included forms of medical sorcery. The Atharvaveda editions now known are a combination of their
compositions.[9]

The core text of the Atharvaveda falls within the classical Mantra period of Vedic Sanskrit, during the 2nd
millennium BC - younger than the Rigveda, and roughly contemporary with the Yajurveda mantras, the
Rigvedic Khilani, and the Sāmaveda.[23] There is no absolute dating of any Vedic text including the
Atharvaveda.[24] The dating for Atharvaveda is derived from the new metals and items mentioned therein; it,
for example, mentions iron (as krsna ayas, literally "black metal"), and such mentions have led Michael Witzel
to the estimate that the Atharvaveda hymns were compiled in the early Indian Iron Age, at, or slightly after, c.
1200/1000 BCE.[24][2] corresponding to the early Kuru Kingdom.[25]

The priests who practised the Atharvaveda were considered to be the lowest tier of Brahmins, in comparison
to the priests who practised the Rigveda, Samaveda, or Yajurveda. The stigma against Atharvaveda priests has
continued in Odisha well into the modern day.[23]

Text
The Atharvaveda is a collection of 20 books, with a total of 730
hymns of about 6,000 stanzas.[8] The text is, state Patrick Olivelle and
other scholars, a historical collection of beliefs and rituals addressing
practical issues of daily life of the Vedic society, and it is not a
liturgical Yajurveda-style collection.[26][27]

Recensions

The Caraṇavyuha, a later era Sanskrit text, states that the

Atharvaveda had nine shakhas, or schools: paippalāda, stauda,
mauda, śaunakīya, jājala, jalada, brahmavada, devadarśa and
cāraṇavaidyā.[28]

Of these, only the Shaunakiya recension, and the more recently

discovered manuscripts of Paippalāda recension have survived.[9] The
Paippalāda edition is more ancient.[29] The two recensions differ in A page from the Atharva Veda
how they are organized, as well as content.[29] For example, the Book Samhita, its most ancient layer of
10 of Paippalada recension is more detailed and observed carefully text.
not doing a single mistake, more developed and more conspicuous in
describing monism, the concept of "oneness of Brahman, all life
forms and the world".[30]
Organization

The Atharvaveda Samhita originally was organized into 18 books (Kāṇḍas), and the last two were added
later.[31] These books are arranged neither by subject nor by authors (as is the case with the other Vedas), but
by the length of the hymns.[27] Each book generally has hymns of about a similar number of verses, and the
surviving manuscripts label the book with the shortest hymns as Book 1, and then in an increasing order (a
few manuscripts do the opposite). Most of the hymns are poetic and set to different meters, but about a sixth of
the book is prose.[27]

Most of the hymns of Atharvaveda are unique to it, except for the one sixth of its hymns that it borrows from
the Rigveda, primarily from its uull10th mandala.[27][31] The 19th book was a supplement of a similar nature,
likely of new compositions and was added later.[27] The 143 hymns of the 20th book of Atharvaveda Samhita
is almost entirely borrowed from the Rigveda.[32]

The hymns of Atharvaveda cover a motley of topics, across its twenty books. Roughly, the first seven books
focus primarily on magical poems for all sorts of healing and sorcery, and Michael Witzel states these are
reminiscent of Germanic and Hittite sorcery stanzas, and may likely be the oldest section.[33] Books 8 to 12
are speculations of a variety of topics, while Books 13 to 18 tend to be about life cycle rites of passage
rituals.[33]

The Srautasutra texts Vaitāna Sūtra and the Kauśika Sūtra are attached to the Atharvaveda Shaunaka edition,
as are a supplement of Atharvan Prayascitthas, two Pratishakhyas, and a collection of Parisisthas.[34][35] For
the Paippalada edition of Atharvaveda, corresponding texts were Agastya and Paithinasi Sutras but these are
lost or yet to be discovered.[36]

Contents
The Atharvaveda is sometimes called the "Veda of magical formulas",[4] an epithet declared to be incorrect by
other scholars.[10] The Samhita layer of the text likely represents a developing 2nd millennium BCE tradition
of magico-religious rites to address superstitious anxiety, spells to remove maladies believed to be caused by
demons, and herbs- and nature-derived potions as medicine.[37] Many books of the Atharvaveda Samhita are
dedicated to rituals without magic and to theosophy.[10] The text, states Kenneth Zysk, is one of oldest
surviving record of the evolutionary practices in religious medicine and reveals the "earliest forms of folk
healing of Indo-European antiquity".[38]

The Atharvaveda Samhita contains hymns many of which were charms, magic spells and incantations meant
to be pronounced by the person who seeks some benefit, or more often by a sorcerer who would say it on his
or her behalf.[31] The most frequent goal of these hymns charms and spells were long life of a loved one or
recovery from some illness. In these cases, the affected would be given substances such as a plant (leaf, seed,
root) and an amulet.[31] Some magic spells were for soldiers going to war with the goal of defeating the
enemy, others for anxious lovers seeking to remove rivals or to attract the lover who is less than interested,
some for success at a sporting event, in economic activity, for bounty of cattle and crops, or removal of petty
pest bothering a household.[31][39][40] Some hymns were not about magic spells and charms, but prayer qua
prayer and philosophical speculations.[41]

The contents of the Atharvaveda contrasts with the other Vedas. The 19th century Indologist Weber
summarized the contrast as follows,
 The spirit of the two collections [Rigveda, Atharvaveda] is indeed widely different. In the
Rigveda there breathes a lively natural feeling, a warm love for nature; while in the Atharva there
prevails, on the contrary, only an anxious dread of her evil spirits and their magical powers. In the
Rigveda we find the people in a state of free activity and independence; in the Atharva we see it
bound in the fetters of the hierarchy and superstition.

— Albrecht Weber, [42]

Jan Gonda cautions that it would be incorrect to label Atharvaveda Samhita as mere compilation of magical
formulas, witchcraft and sorcery.[10] While such verses are indeed present in the Samhita layer, a significant
portion of the Samhita text are hymns for domestic rituals without magic or spells, and some are theosophical
speculations such as "all Vedic gods are One".[10][43] Additionally, the non-Samhita layers of Atharvaveda
text include a Brahmana and several influential Upanishads.[44]

Samhita

Surgical and medical treatment

The Atharvaveda includes mantras and verses for treating a variety of ailments. For example, the verses in
hymn 4.15 of the recently discovered Paippalada version of the Atharvaveda, discuss how to deal with an
open fracture, and how to wrap the wound with Rohini plant (Ficus Infectoria, native to India):[45]

Let marrow be put together with marrow, and joint together with joint,
together what of the flesh fallen apart, together sinew and together your bone.
Let marrow come together with marrow, let bone grow over together with bone.
We put together your sinew with sinew, let skin grow with skin.

— Atharvaveda 4.15, Paippalada Edition[45]

Charms against fever, jaundice and diseases

Numerous hymns of the Atharvaveda are prayers and incantations wishing a child or loved one to get over
some sickness and become healthy again, along with comforting the family members. The Vedic era
assumption was that diseases are caused by evil spirits, external beings or demonic forces who enter the body
of a victim to cause sickness.[46] Hymn 5.21 of the Paippalāda edition of the text, for example, states,

Heaven our father, and Earth our mother, Agni the men-watcher,
let them send the ten days fever far away from us.
O fever, these snowy mountains with Soma on their back have made the wind, the messenger, the
healer for us,
Disappear from here to the Maratas.
Neither the women desire you, nor the men whosoever,
Neither a small one, nor a grown-up weeps here from desire of fever.
Do not harm our grown-up men, do not harm our grown-up women,
Do not harm our boys, do not harm our girls.
You who simultaneously discharge the balasa, cough, udraja, terrible are your missiles,
O fever, avoid us with them.
 — Atharvaveda 5.21, Paippalada Edition, Translated by Alexander Lubotsky[47]

Remedy from medicinal herbs

Several hymns in the Atharvaveda such as hymn 8.7, just like the Rigveda's hymn 10.97, is a praise of
medicinal herbs and plants, suggesting that speculations about the medical and health value of plants and herbs
was an emerging field of knowledge in ancient India.[48] The Atharvavedic hymn states (abridged),

The tawny colored, and the pale, the variegated and the red,
the dusky tinted, and the black – all Plants we summon hitherward.
I speak to Healing Herbs spreading, and bushy, to creepers, and to those whose sheath is single,
I call for thee the fibrous, and the reed like, and branching plants, dear to Vishwa Devas,
powerful, giving life to men.
The conquering strength, the power and might, which ye, victorious plants possess,
Therewith deliver this man here from this consumption, O ye Plants: so I prepare the remedy.

— Atharvaveda 8.7, Shaunakiya Edition,[49]

Spells and prayers to gain a lover, wife

The contents of Atharvaveda have been studied to glean information about the social and cultural mores in
Vedic era of India.[50] A number of verses relate to spells for gaining a husband, or a wife, or love of a
woman,[51] or to prevent any rivals from winning over one's "love interest".[52]

May O Agni!, a suitor after our own heart come to us, may he come to this maiden with fortune!
May she be agreeable to suitors, charming at festivals, promptly obtain happiness through a
husband!

As this comfortable cave, O Indra!, furnishing a safe abode hath become pleasing to all life,
thus may this woman be a favourite of fortune, beloved, not at odds with her husband!
Do thou ascend the full, inexhaustible ship of fortune;
upon this bring, hither the suitor who shall be agreeable to thee!

Bring hither by thy shouts, O lord of wealth, the suitor, bend his mind towards her;
turn thou the attention of every agreeable suitor towards her!

— Atharvaveda 2.36, [53]

Speculations on the nature of man, life, good and evil

The Atharvaveda Samhita, as with the other Vedas, includes some hymns such as 4.1, 5.6, 10.7, 13.4, 17.1,
19.53-54, with metaphysical questions on the nature of existence, man, heaven and hell, good and evil.[54]
Hymn 10.7 of Atharvaveda, for example, asks questions such as "what is the source of cosmic order? what
and where is planted this notion of faith, holy duty, truth? how is earth and sky held? is there space beyond the
sky? what are seasons and where do they go? does Skambha (literally "cosmic pillar",[55] synonym for
Brahman[54]) penetrate everything or just somethings? does Skambha know the future? is Skambha the basis
of Law, Devotion and Belief? who or what is Skambha?"[56]
 The wonderful structure of Man

(...) How many gods and which were they,

who gathered the breast, the neck bones of man?
how many disposed the two teats? who the two collar bones?
how many gathered the shoulder bones? how many the ribs?
Who brought together his two arms, saying, "he must perform heroism?"
(...) Which was the god who produced his brain, his forehead, his hindhead?
(...) Whence now in man come mishap, ruin, perdition, misery?
accomplishment, success, non-failure? whence thought?
What one god set sacrifice in man here?
who set in him truth? who untruth?
whence death? whence the immortal?

— Atharvaveda 10.2.4 - 10.2.14, Paippalāda Edition (Abridged),[57]

The Atharvaveda, like other Vedic texts, states William Norman Brown,[54] goes beyond the duality of heaven
and hell, and speculates on the idea of Skambha or Brahman as the all pervasive monism.[54] Good and evil,
Sat and Asat (truth and untruth) are conceptualized differently in these hymns of Atharvaveda, and the Vedic
thought, wherein these are not dualistic explanation of nature of creation, universe or man, rather the text
transcends these and the duality therein. Order is established out of chaos, truth is established out of untruth, by
a process and universal principles that transcend good and evil.[54][58]

Prayer for peace

Some hymns are prayer qua prayer, desiring harmony and peace. For example,

Give us agreement with our own; with strangers give us unity

Do ye, O Asvins, in this place join us in sympathy and love.
May we agree in mind, agree in purpose; let us not fight against the heavenly spirit
Around us rise no din of frequent slaughter, nor Indra's arrow fly, for day is present !

— Atharvaveda 7.52, [59]

Brahmana

The Atharvaveda includes Gopatha Brahmana text, that goes with Atharva Samhita.[60]

Upanishads

The Atharvaveda has three primary Upanishads embedded within it.[61]

Mundaka Upanishad

The Mundaka Upanishad, embedded inside Atharvaveda, is a poetic-style Upanishad, with 64 verses, written
in the form of mantras. However, these mantras are not used in rituals, rather they are used for teaching and
meditation on spiritual knowledge.[62] In ancient and medieval era Indian literature and commentaries, the
Mundaka Upanishad is referred to as one of the Mantra Upanishads.[63]
The Mundaka Upanishad contains three Mundakams (parts), each with two sections.[64][65] The first
Mundakam, states Roer,[64] defines the science of "Higher Knowledge" and "Lower Knowledge", and then
asserts that acts of oblations and pious gifts are foolish, and do nothing to reduce unhappiness in current life or
next, rather it is knowledge that frees. The second Mundakam describes the nature of the Brahman, the Atman
(Self, Soul), and the path to know Brahman. The third Mundakam continues the discussion and then asserts
that the state of knowing Brahman is one of freedom, fearlessness, liberation and bliss.[64][65] The Mundaka
Upanishad is one of text that discuss the pantheism theory in Hindu scriptures.[66][67] The text, like other
Upanishads, also discusses ethics.[68]

Through continuous pursuit of Satya (truthfulness), Tapas (perseverance, austerity), Samyajñāna

(correct knowledge), and Brahmacharya, one attains Atman (Self, Soul).

— Mundaka Upanishad, 3.1.5[68][69]

Mandukya Upanishad

The Mandukya Upanishad is the shortest of all the Upanishads, found in the Atharvaveda text.[70] The text
discusses the syllable Om, presents the theory of four states of consciousness, asserts the existence and nature
of Atman (Soul, Self).[70][71]

The Mandukya Upanishad is notable for inspiring Gaudapada's Karika, a classic for the Vedanta school of
Hinduism.[72] Mandukya Upanishad is among the oft cited texts on chronology and philosophical relationship
between Hinduism and Buddhism.[73]

Prashna Upanishad

The Prashna Upanishad is from the Paippalada school of Atharvavedins.[74]

The text contains six Prashna (questions), and each is a chapter with a discussion of answers.[75][76] The first
three questions are profound metaphysical questions but, states Eduard Roer,[76] do not contain any defined,
philosophical answers, are mostly embellished mythology and symbolism. The fourth section, in contrast,
contains substantial philosophy. The last two sections discuss the symbol Om and Moksha concept.[76]

The Prashna Upanishad is notable for its structure and sociological insights into the education process in
ancient India.[77]

Manuscripts and translations

The Shaunakiya text was published by Rudolf Roth and William Dwight Whitney in 1856, by Shankar
Pandurang Pandit in the 1890s, and by Vishva Bandhu in 1960–1962. The first complete English translation
was made by Ralph T.H. Griffith in 1895-96,[78] followed shortly by Maurice Bloomfield's translation of
about one third of the hymns in 1897.[79] These were followed by a full translation with textual commentary
by William Dwight Whitney, published in 1905, which is still cited in contemporary scholarship.[80][81]

A corrupted and badly damaged version of the Paippalāda text was edited by Leroy Carr Barret from 1905 to
1940 from a single Kashmirian Śāradā manuscript (now in Tübingen). Durgamohan Bhattacharyya
discovered palm leaf manuscripts of the Paippalada recension in Odisha in 1957.[9] His son Dipak
Bhattacharya has published the manuscripts. Thomas Zehnder translated Book 2 of the Paippalada recension
into German in 1999, and Arlo Griffiths, Alexander Lubotsky and Carlos Lopez have separately published
English translations of its Books 5 through 15.[82]

Influence

Medicine and health care

Kenneth Zysk states that the "magico-religious medicine had given

way to a medical system based on empirical and rational ideas" in
ancient India by around the start of Christian era, still the texts and
people of India continued to revere the ancient Vedic texts.[83] Rishi
Sushruta, remembered for his contributions to surgical studies, credits Rishi Caraka (above), the author of
Caraka Samhita credits Atharvaveda
Atharvaveda as a foundation.[84] Similarly, the verse 30.21 of the
as an inspiration.[83]
Caraka Samhita, states it reverence for the Atharvaveda as follows,

Therefore, the physician who has inquired [in verse

30.20] about [which Veda], devotion to the Atharvaveda
is ordered from among the four: Rigveda, Samaveda,
Yajurveda and Atharvaveda.

— Sutrasthara 30.21, Atharvaveda[83]

The roots of Ayurveda – a traditional medical and health care practice in India—states Dominik Wujastyk, are
in Hindu texts of Caraka Samhita and Sushruta Samhita, both of which claim their allegiance and inspiration to
be the Vedas, especially Atharvaveda.[85] Khare and Katiyar state that the Indian tradition directly links
Ayurveda to Atharvaveda.[86]

Wujastyk clarifies that the Vedic texts are more a religious discourse, and while herbal health care traditions
can be found in Atharvaveda, the purely medical literature of ancient India are actually Caraka Samhita and
Sushruta Samhita, these two are the real roots of Ayurveda.[85][87] Kenneth Zysk adds Bhela Samhita to this
list.[83]

Literature

The verse 11.7.24 of Atharvaveda contains the oldest known mention of the Indic literary genre the
Puranas.[88]

The 1st millennium AD Buddhist literature included books of magico-religious mantras and spells for
protection from evil influences of non-human beings such as demons and ghosts.[89][90] These were called
Pirita (Pali: Paritta) and Rakkhamanta ("mantra for protection"), and they share premises and style of hymns
found in Atharvaveda.[89][90]

See also
Ayurveda
Charaka Samhita
Sushruta Samhita
 Upanishads
Vedas
Merseburg charms
Zagovory

References
1. Flood 1996, p. 37.
2. Witzel 1991, p. 6.
3. https://sites.google.com/a/vedicgranth.org/www/what_are_vedic_granth/the-four-
veda/interpretation-and-more/construction-of-the-vedas?mobile=true
4. Laurie Patton (2004), Veda and Upanishad, in The Hindu World (Editors: Sushil Mittal and
Gene Thursby), Routledge, ISBN 0-415215277, page 38
5. Carl Olson (2007), The Many Colors of Hinduism, Rutgers University Press, ISBN 978-
0813540689, pages 13–14
6. Laurie Patton (1994), Authority, Anxiety, and Canon: ys in Vedic Interpretation, State University
of New York Press, ISBN 978-0791419380, page 57
7. Parpola 2015, p. 131.
8. Maurice Bloomfield, The Atharvaveda (https://archive.org/stream/atharvaveda00bloouoft#page/
n5/mode/2up), Harvard University Press, pages 1-2
9. Frits Staal (2009), Discovering the Vedas: Origins, Mantras, Rituals, Insights, Penguin,
ISBN 978-0143099864, pages 136-137
10. Jan Gonda (1975), Vedic Literature: Saṃhitās and Brāhmaṇas, Vol 1, Fasc. 1, Otto
Harrassowitz Verlag, ISBN 978-3447016032, pages 277–280, Quote: "It would be incorrect to
describe the Atharvaveda Samhita as a collection of magical formulas".
11. Parpola, Asko (2015), "The Atharvaveda and the Vrātyas", The Roots of Hinduism: The Early
Aryans and the Indus Civilization (https://books.google.com/books?id=_eykCQAAQBAJ),
Oxford University Press, Chapter 12, ISBN 978-0-19-022692-3
12. M. S. Valiathan. The Legacy of Caraka. Orient Blackswan. p. 22.
13. Paul Deussen, Sixty Upanishads of the Veda, Volume 2, Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 978-
8120814691, pages 605–609
14. Max Muller, The Upanishads, Part 2, Prasna Upanishad, Oxford University Press, pages xlii–
xliii
15. Monier Monier Williams, Sanskrit English Dictionary, Oxford University Press, Entry for
Atharvan, page 17
16. Maurice Bloomfield, The Atharvaveda (https://archive.org/stream/atharvaveda00bloouoft#page/
6/mode/2up), Harvard University Press, pages 7–10
17. Brown, George William (1 January 1921). "Note on Angarôs, in Montgomery's 'Aramaic
Incantation Texts from Nippur' ". Journal of the American Oriental Society. 41: 159–160.
doi:10.2307/593717 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F593717). JSTOR 593717 (https://www.jstor.or
g/stable/593717).; For the text Brown refers to, see: Aramaic Incantation Texts from Nippur, By
James Alan Montgomery (https://books.google.com/books?
id=qg0TAAAAYAAJ&pg=PAPA196), p. PA196, at Google Books, pages 196, 195–200
18. Michael Witzel (2003), Linguistic Evidence for Cultural Exchange in Prehistoric Western
Central Asia (http://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp129_prehistoric_central_asia_linguistic
s.pdf) Sino-Platonic Papers, No. 129, page 38
19. Carl Olson (2007), The Many Colors of Hinduism, Rutgers University Press, ISBN 978-
0813540689, page 13
20. Frits Staal (2009), Discovering the Vedas: Origins, Mantras, Rituals, Insights, Penguin,
ISBN 978-0143099864, page 135
21. Alex Wayman (1997), Untying the Knots in Buddhism, Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 978-
8120813212, pages 52-53
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mode/2up) Oxford University Press, page 39
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Sources
Flood, Gavin (1996), An Introduction to Hinduism (https://archive.org/details/introductiontohi000
0floo), Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-43878-0
Witzel, Michael (1997), "The Development of the Vedic Canon and its Schools: The Social and
Political Milieu" (https://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/canon.pdf) (PDF), in Witzel,
Michael (ed.), Inside the Texts, Beyond the Texts: New Approaches to the Study of the Vedas,
Harvard Oriental Series, Opera Minora; vol. 2, Cambridge: Harvard University Press
Witzel, Michael (2001), "Autochthonous Aryans? The Evidence from Old Indian and Iranian
Texts" (http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/EJVS-7-3.pdf) (PDF), Electronic Journal of
Vedic Studies, 7 (3): 1–115

Further reading
Alexander Lubotsky, Atharvaveda-Paippalada, Kanda Five, Harvard College (2002).
Thomas Zehnder, Atharvaveda-Paippalada, Buch 2, Idstein (1999).
Dipak Bhattacharya, Paippalada-Samhita of the Atharvaveda, Volume 2, The Asiatic Society
(2007).

External links
Ralph Griffith, The Hymns of the Atharvaveda (http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/av/index.htm)
1895-96, full text
Maurice Bloomfield, Hymns of the Atharva-veda (https://archive.org/stream/hymnsofatharvave0
0bloouoft#page/n7/mode/2up), Sacred Books of the East, v. 42 (1897), selection
Śaunaka Recension, "Atharva Veda Saṁhitā" (https://web.archive.org/web/20150611075751/
http://titus.uni-frankfurt.de/texte/etcs/ind/aind/ved/av/avs/avs.htm) [Sanskrit]. Published at Titus
Project. Accessed, 14 April 2014.
William Whitney, Index verborum to the published text of the Atharvaveda Vedas (http://hdl.han
dle.net/2027/mdp.39015024644596), University of Michigan
Madhav M Deshpande, Recitational Permutations of the Saunakiya Atharvaveda (http://www.h
up.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674009394), Harvard University Press, based on six
Atharvaveda manuscripts found in Pune, India
The Kashmiri Paippalada Recension of the Atharvaveda (http://www.lib.umich.edu/database/lin
k/11829), Images of 16th century birch-bark manuscript of Atharvaveda (University access
rights required)
George Bolling and Julius Negelein, The Parisistas of the Atharvaveda (http://jhir.library.jhu.ed
u/handle/1774.2/33462), Johns Hopkins University (with downloadable PDF file)
Listen to the Audiobook version of Atharvaveda on Pocket FM (https://www.pocketfm.in/show/2
a15936e7b2b6d1f97e65538abe6cd78cf7f5708).

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