The Rishis of the Atharva Veda

The Atharva-Veda is the fourth of the four Vedas, the oldest sacred texts of India, composed in Vedic Sanskrit and traditionally dated to about 1200–900 BCE. Unlike the sacrificial hymns of the Rig-Veda, much of it is made up of charms and spells: prayers for healing and long life, incantations against disease, demons and rivals, blessings for kings, households and cattle, and spells of love and reconciliation. Its verses are traditionally attributed to the priestly families of the Atharvans and the Angirases.

The poets are anonymous and the attribution to the families is traditional, so the archive credits them as a group. The English text is Ralph T. H. Griffith's verse translation, The Hymns of the Atharva-Veda (two volumes, Benares, 1895–96), and each hymn carries Griffith's own descriptive heading. Books 1 to 14 and 17 to 19 are included (Books 15, 16 and 20 are omitted: the first two are prose, the last is almost wholly Rigvedic and already in the archive); a few hymns are still missing.