Atharva-Veda Samhita/Book VI/Hymn 54
54. To secure and increase some one's superiority.
[Brahman.—āgnīṣomīyam. ānuṣṭubham.]
Found also in Pāipp. xix. Used by Kāuç. (48. 27), in a sorcery, with vii. 70, with the direction ity āhitāgnim pratinirvapati; vs. 2 appears also in the parvan sacrifice (4. 19), with an offering to Agni and Soma. And vs. 2 appears in Vāit. (3. 4), in the parvan sacrifice, with a silent offering to the same gods.
Translated: Griffith, i. 275.—He entitles it "Benediction on a newly elected King."
1. Now do I adorn this man as superior to his fellow, for attainment of Indra; do thou increase his authority, his great fortune, as the rain the grass.
The first half-verse is very obscure, and the rendering given only tentative; it implies the emendation of tát in a to tám, or else of idám to imám (as antecedent to asyá in c), and the understanding of yujá as for yujás, instead of yujé, which the pada-text gives for it both here and in 2 d; to read further índra (voc.) in b would much lighten the difficulty here, and also furnish a subject for the appeal in the next line. A dative with uttara is a construction perhaps unknown elsewhere. The comm. comfortably explains yuje as a verb "= yojayāmi." Ppp. reads yujaṁ (probably a mere error of the transcriber); and, for b, the corrupt yene ’ndraṁ çumbhā nv iṣṭaye; in c it has yasya for asya. The Anukr. seems to allow the contraction vṛṣṭir ’va in d. ⌊Roth's collation gives yugaṁ in a, and yuga in 2 d; but it may be a mere omission of the accent by which he distinguishes the palatal sonant (g′ = our j) from the guttural sonant (g).⌋ ⌊Plate 45317 reads yugaṁ.⌋
2. For him, O Agni-and-Soma, maintain ye dominion, for him wealth; in the sphere of royalty make ye him superior to his fellow.
Two or three of our mss. have in b the bad reading dhārayatām; and, in c, even the majority of them give -vargre (as Bp. at iii. 5. 2, and B. Kp. at xi. 2. 4: but SPP. reports nothing of the sort in his authorities). Ppp. has yasya for the first asmāi, and asya for the second, and vardhayatas for dhārayatam in b; also aho for imam in c.
3. Whoever, both related and unrelated, assails us—every such one mayest thou make subject to me, the sacrificer, the soma-presser.
The first half-verse is also 15. 2 a, b, above; the last half-verse is also 6. 1 c, d. Ppp. has, for b, yo jāto yaç ca niṣṭyaḥ; it further puts d before c, in the form sarvaṁ īvaṁ rīradhāsi naḥ.