It may not come amiss briefly to recount the circumstances, in which the present work was undertaken. Svami Dayananda Sarasvati had breathed his last in 1883 after having carried on in North India for over eighteen years an altruistic and patriotic campaign of socio- religious regeneration of his countrymen. His dynamic personality, full of great enthusiasm and sincere fervor as it was, had produced a feeling of general regard for India's glorious past with special emphasis on the importance and sanctity of Vedas as being by virtue of their high teachings the panacea that ill-adjusted humanity so much needed.
It was against this background that Svami Visvesvarananda and Svami Nityananda started, some ten years after his death, their joint, selfless mission of following in his footsteps in propagating Vedas and their teachings. 'Keen as they were on popularizing the study of Vedas, they very much felt the need of a comprehensive Vedic dictionary being brought within the easy reach of those interested in this line. Seeing that there did not exist any previous work, which could satisfactorily serve this purpose, they announced in 1903 their decision to devote themselves to the task of producing a new one. They published in 1907-8 the four Vedic word-indexes (cf. Intro. I, e, 2, tiff), with a view to base their Dictionary on the same. After the death of Svami Nityananda in 19l3, Svami Visvesvarananda carried on the work alone till, two years before he passed away, the present writer, in compliance with his desire, took charge of it as a labor of love in 1923.
It so happened that a consolidated list of non-verbal entries in the four Vedic word-indexes, at two at), had been prepared in the form of basic reductions. In the portion relating to eat, meanings from the commentaries of Sayana, Uvata, Mahidhara and Dayananda had been entered, interspersed with citations of etymological bearing from Aitareya, Satapatha and Taittirtya Brahmanas, an anthology of such citations up to the end of vowels having been compiled specially for this purpose. As the work had progressed further, details of Paninian frame-work as well as meanings from Griffith's and Whitney's translations had also been added. It was felt that the situation demanded considerable overhauling both in the matter of completion and extension of the scheme. Accordingly, it was decided that the Dictionary should be re-written from the beginning so that it could include entire verbal, declinable and indeclinable vocabulary as relating to all available Samhitas along with meanings from all known commentators, ancient as well as modern and, also, such other useful side-help towards Vedic interpretation as could be culled from extant Brahmanas, Aral),yakas, Upanisads, Angas and Upangas. In view of this decision, previously collected materials began to be checked, amplified and supplemented.
Besides, a programme was started, in accordance with which full use was to be made of the existing indexical reference books as mentioned in the Introduction to Vol. II of this work (pp. xxiiiff ) as well as here in their proper place below (cf. Intro. I), and text-editions such as those of Maitrayana "and Kathaka Sarnhitas and many Srauta-Sutras that had been mutually correlated or supplied with vocabularies. When this scheme had been worked on these lines for about five years, its result was published in 1929 under the title, 'Vaidika-Sabdartha- Parijata', or, 'A Complete Etymological Dictionary of the Vedic Language as recorded in the Samhitas, Fasciculus I'.
(a) VEDIC NIGHA~TAVAS
Yaska, in a passage which has since assumed classic importance, succinctly indicates the process of advancement of Vedic lore in ancient days, Says he, "first came the Seers who had direct vision of reality (Dharma), They initiated their lesser associates, who themselves did not possess direct vision, in the secrets of their heart (Mantras) by means of word of mouth (Upadesa). And, these, in their turn, feeling a strong urge further to impart knowledge, compiled Veda and Vedangas that the same might be mastered in their fullness".' While Siksa and Chandas aided right pronunciation and recitation of Veda, Vyakarana and Nirukta aimed at making it correctly understood. Vyakarana, presupposing familiarity with the general import of a word on the basis of its radical element as quite discernible from its ordinary pronunciation, helped the determination of the exact value of a particular form of it as used in relation to other words in a sentence. Nirukta, on the other hand, concerned itself primarily with the task of determining the original radical element in a word, ~which had become obscure through the complicated working of the natural phenomenon of phonetic decay with a view to justifying its meaning, if known from tradition, and to I guess it, if otherwise.
To facilitate a proper grasp of the teaching of Nirukta, which grew in importance as with the .passage of time, the Vedic language became more and more unfamiliar, it seems, different Vedic schools prepared several1ists of select words (Nighantavas)."
Only one of these, which bore the stamp of Yaska's editing" and was used as the basis of his commutative thesis, since known as Nirukta, has come down to us, though in three recessions. I A triple arrangement was followed in these lists in those synonyms, homonyms and denims were separated from one another. While synonyms and duonyms offered easy and clear sub-grouping meaning wise and region- wise, respectively, homonyms remained mixed up with residual vocabulary of obscure origin and, therefore, uncertain signification.
Having been designed as ready-aids to memories only such Vedic words as seemed noteworthy on account of their obscurity or importance otherwise, these lists did not contemplate exhaustive inclusion of the entire vocabulary of even a single Vedic text. " That the extant list of Nighantavas has to its credit only 24 entries from amongst the first 500 entries in the present volume may suffice to illustrate this point.
(b) CLASSICAL LEXICONS
Amara-sinha and other medieval masters of Sanskrit lexicography perfected the technique of the ancient Nighantavas in producing their well-known metrical works. Synonymic and homonymic arrangements were pointedly distinguished from each other by being treated in separate works. But these lexicons had no immediate function to perform in respect of the Vedic texts as such, classical Sanskrit alone being their primary concern. To illustrate from Amarakosa, which is admittedly the most popular work of this class, out of the 35 entries in it as corresponding to the first 500 entries in the present volume, while not one account for an exclusively Vedic word, the number of even those which are common to Veda and classical Sanskrit, does not exceed 25. It is interesting that towards the end of the seventeenth century, Bhaskaracharya seemingly made up this deficiency in the classical lexicons by adding to their number his Vaidika-kosa, being a metrical rendering of Vedic Nighantavas as explained by Yaska.
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Sanskrit Grammar (236)
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