The hymn belongs to the class of Apri hymns, which were classed by the ancient arrangers of the Samhita among the Agni hymns. The Apri hymns, consisting of eleven or twelve verses, were destined for the Prayaga offerings of the animal sacrifice (comp. H. O., Zeitschrift der D. Morg. Gesellschaft, XLII, 243 seq.). They were addressed, verse by verse in regular order, partly to Agni, partly to different spirits or deified objects connected with the sacrifice, such as the sacrificial grass, the divine gates through which the gods had to pass on their way to the sacrifice, &c. The second verse was addressed by some of the Rishi families to Tanunapat by some to Narasamsa; in some of the hymns we find two verses instead of one (so that the total number of verses becomes twelve instead of eleven) addressed the one to Tanunapat, the other to Narasamsa. Bergaigne (Recherches sur l'histoire de la Liturgie Vedique, p. 14) conjectures that some of the Rishi families had only seven Prayagas. This opinion is based on the identical appearance of four verses (8-11) in the Apri hymns of the Visvamitras (III, 4) and of the Vasishthas (VII, 2), and on the diversity of metres used in two other Apri hymns, IX, 5 and II, 3. To me this conjecture, though very ingenious, does not seem convincing.

With the text of the Apri hymns should be compared the corresponding Praishas of the Maitravaruna priest, i. e. the orders by which this priest directed the Hotri to pronounce the Prayaga invocations. The text of these Praishas is given Taitt. Brahm. III, 6, 2.

Comp. on the character and the historical and ritual position of the Apri hymns, Max Muller, Hist. Anc. Sansc. Literature, p. 403 seq.; Roth, Nirukta, notes, p. 121 seq.; Weber, Indische Studien, X, 89 seq.; Ludwig V, 315 seq.; Hillebrandt, Das Altindische Neu- und Vollmondsopfer, 94 seq.; Schwab, Das Altindische Thieropfer, 90 seq.; Bergaigne, Recherches sur l'histoire de la Liturgie Vedique, 13 seq.

Verse 1.

Note [1:13:1:1]1. Comp. Delbruck, Syntactische Forschungen, I, 97.

Verses 2, 3.