[196] Vivasvat is a name of the sun, and the seat or home of Vivasvat can hardly be anything but the earth, as the home of the sun, or, in a more special sense, the place where a sacrifice is offered.
[197] I formerly translated yát vãgân abhí ádravah tvám by "when thou rannest for the prizes." Grassman had translated similarly, "When thou, O Sindhu, rannest to the prize of the battle," while Ludwig wrote, "When thou, O Sindhu, wast flowing on to greater powers." Vâga, connected with vegeo, vigeo, vigil, wacker (see Curtius, Grundzüge, No. 159), is one of the many difficult words in the Veda the general meaning of which may be guessed, but in many places cannot yet be determined with certainty. Vâga occurs very frequently, both in the singular and the plural, and some of its meanings are clear enough. The Petersburg Dictionary gives the following list of them—swiftness, race, prize of race, gain, treasure, race-horse, etc. Here we perceive at once the difficulty of tracing all these meanings back to a common source, though it might be possible to begin with the meanings of strength, strife, contest, race, whether friendly or warlike, then to proceed to what is won in a race or in war, viz. booty, treasure, and lastly to take vâgâh in the more general sense of acquisitions, goods, even goods bestowed as gifts. We have a similar transition of meaning in the Greek ἁθλος, contest, contest for a prize, and ἁθλον, the prize of contest, reward, gift, while in the plural τἁ ἁθλα stands again for contest, or even the place of combat. The Vedic vâgambhara may in fact be rendered by ἁθλοφὑρος, vâgasâti by ἁθλοσὑνη.
The transition from fight to prize is seen in passages such as:
Rig-Veda VI. 45, 12, vãgân indra sravãyyân tváyâ geshna hitám dhánam, "May we with thy help, O Indra, win the glorious fights, the offered prize" (cf. ἁθλοθἑτης).
Rig-Veda VIII. 19, 18, té it vãgebhih gigyuh mahát dhánam, "They won great-wealth by battles."
What we want for a proper understanding of our verse, are passages where we have, as here, a movement toward vâgas in the plural. Such passages are few; for instance: X. 53, 8, átra gahâma yé ásan ásevâh sivãn vayám út tarema abhí vâgân, "Let us leave here those who were unlucky (the dead), and let us get up to lucky toils." No more is probably meant here when the Sindhu is said to run toward her vâgas, that is, her struggles, her fights, her race across the mountains with the other rivers.
[198] On sushma, strength, see Rig-Veda, translation, vol. i. p. 105. We find subhrám sūshmam II. 11, 4; and iyarti with sūshmam IV. 17, 12.
[199] See Muir, Santkrit Texts, v. p. 344.
[200] "O Marudvridhâ with Asiknî, Vitastâ; O Ârgîkîyâ, listen with the Sushomâ," Ludwig. "Asiknî and Vitastâ and Marudvridhâ, with the Sushomâ, hear us, O Ârgîkîyâ," Grassman.
[201] Marudvridhâ, a general name for river. According to Roth the combined course of the Akesines and Hydaspes, before the junction with the Hydraotes; according to Ludwig, the river after the junction with Hydraotes. Zimmer (Altindisches Leben, p. 12) adopts Roth's, Kiepert in his maps follows Ludwig's opinion.