Ppp. makes vatsam and garbham change places, and reads īrayan; it also omits the refrain, as it has done in vss. 6 and 7. GB. (i. 1. 39) appears to quote the pratīka with garbham, or in its Ppp. form ⌊as conjectured by Bloomfield, JAOS. xix.2 11⌋. The comm. paraphrases garbhaṁ sam āirayan by īçvareṇa visṛṣṭaṁ vīryaṁ garbhāçayam prāpayan. The verse (8 + 8: 8 + 8 + 11 = 43) is ill defined by the Anukr.
3. Against wild beasts and thieves.
[Atharvan.—rāudram uta vyāghradevatyam. ānuṣṭubham: 1. pathyāpan̄kti; 3. gāyatrī; 7. kakummatīgarbho 'pariṭādbṛhatī.]
Found in Pāipp. ii. (except vs. 5, and in the verse-order 1-3, 7, 6, 4). Used by Kāuç. (51. 1) in a rite for the prosperity of kine and their safety from tigers, robbers, and the like; also reckoned (50. 13, note) to the rāudra gaṇa.
Translated: Ludwig, p. 499; Grill, 33, 118; Griffith, i. 133; Bloomfield, 147, 366; Weber, xviii. 13.
1. Up from here have stridden three—tiger, man (púruṣa), wolf; since hey! go the rivers, hey! the divine forest-tree, hey! let the foes bow.
Ppp. reads for a ud ity akramaṅs trayo; in c-d it gives hṛk each time for híruk, and for c has hṛg deva sūryas. The comm. understands híruk to mean "in secret, out of sight," and hírun̄ namantu as antarhitāḥ santaḥ prahvā bhavantu or antaritān kurvantu. The forest-tree is doubtless some implement of wood used in the rite, perhaps thrown in to float away with the river-current; it can hardly be the "stake of khadira" which Kāuç. (51. 1) mentions, which is to be taken up and buried as one follows the kine.
2. By a distant (pára) road let the wolf go, by a most distant also the thief; by a distant one the toothed rope, by a distant one let the malignant hasten (ṛṣ).
The latter half-verse is found again as xix. 47. 8 a, b. Ppp's version is parameṇa pathā vṛkaḥ pareṇa steno rarṣatu: tato vyāghraṣ paramā. The comm. naturally explains the "toothed rope" as a serpent; arṣatu he simply glosses with gacchatu.
3. Both thy (two) eyes and thy mouth, O tiger, we grind up; then all thy twenty claws (nakhá).
The majority of mss. (including our Bp.I.O.Op.K.D.) read at the beginning akṣāù, as do also Ppp. and the comm., but only (as the accent alone suffices to show) by the ordinary omission of y after ç or ṣ both editions give akṣyāù. All the mss. leave vyāghra unaccented at the beginning of b, and SPP. retains this inadmissible reading; our text emends to vyā́ghra, but should have given instead vyā̀ghra (that is, ví-āghra: see Whitney's Skt. Gr. §314 b). Ppp. reads hanū instead of mukham in a. ⌊Anukr., London ms., has akṣyāu.⌋
4. The tiger first of [creatures] with teeth do we grind up, upon that also the thief, then the snake, the sorcerer, then the wolf.
The conversion of stenám to ṣṭe- after u is an isolated case. The verse in Ppp. is defaced, but apparently has no variants.
5. What thief shall come today, he shall go away smashed; let him
