Professor Ben fey translates this verse by, 'Kopfüber flohn sie alle vor dir;' but it may be rendered more literally, 'These lawless people fighting with the pious turned away their heads.'

X, 144, 6. evá tát índrah índunâ devéshu kit dhârayâte máhi tyágah.

Indeed through this draught Indra can hold out against that great attack even among the gods.

X, 79, 6. kím devéshu tyágah énah kakartha.

What insult, what sin hast thou committed among the gods?

In these two passages the meaning of tyágas as attack or assault is at least as appropriate as that proposed by Professor Roth, estrangement, malignity.

There remains one passage, VI, 3, 1. yám tvám mitréna várunah sa-góshâh déva pâ´si tyágasâ mártam ámhah.

I confess that the construction of this verse is not clear to me, and I doubt whether it is possible to use tyágasâ as a verbal noun governing an accusative. If this were possible, one might translate, 'The mortal whom thou, O God (Agni),

[paragraph continues] Varuna, together with Mitra, protectest by pushing back evil.' More probably we should translate, 'Whom thou protectest from evil by thy might.'

If it be asked how tyágas can possibly have the meaning which has been assigned to it in all the passages in which it occurs; viz. that of forcibly attacking or pushing away, we can only account for it by supposing that tyag, before it came to mean to leave, meant to push off, to drive away with violence (verstossen instead of verlassen). This meaning may still be perceived occasionally in the use of tyag; e. g. devâs tyagantu mâm, may the gods forsake me! i. e. may the gods drive me away! Even in the latest Sanskrit tyag is used with regard to an arrow that is let off. 'To expel' is expressed by nis-tyag. Those who believe in the production of new roots by the addition of prepositional prefixes might possibly see in tyag an original ati-ag, to drive off; but, however that may be, there is evidence enough to show that tyag expressed originally a more violent act of separation than it does in ordinary Sanskrit, though here, too, passages occur in which tyag may be translated by to throw, to fling; for instance, khe dhûlim yas tyaged ukkair mûrdhni tasyaiva sâ patet, he who throws up dust in the air, it will fall on his head. Ind. Spr. 1582.

Muk, too, is used in a similar manner; for instance, vagram mokshyate té mahendrah, Mahâbh. XIV, 263. Cf. Dhammapada, ver. 389.

Verse 13.

Note 1. Sámsa, masc., means a spell, whether for good or for evil, a blessing as well as a curse. It means a curse, or, at all events, a calumny:

I, 18, 3. mâ´ nah sámsah árarushah dhûrtíh prának mártyasya.

Let not the curse of the enemy, the onslaught of a mortal hurt us.

I, 94, 8. asmâ´kam sámsah abhí astu duh-dhyãh. May our curse overcome the wicked!

III, 18, 2. tápa sámsam árarushah.