Hymn to Soma Pavamana
Rigveda IX.38 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 9 of the Rigveda, one of the 1,028 hymns organized within the ten books of the oldest Veda. The Rigveda was composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE in Vedic Sanskrit and preserved through oral transmission across millennia.
This is a Good Works Translation produced for the Good Works Library from the Sanskrit of the Śākala recension.
1. This same bull, this chariot, streams through the sheep's fleece, going toward the thousandfold prize.
2. The maidens of Trita drive this tawny one on with the pressing stones — the drop, for Indra to drink.
3. This same tawny one — the ten tawny fingers, busy at their work — polish him; by them he is made bright for exhilaration.
4. This same one settles among the human clans like a falcon, going like a lover to his woman.
5. This same intoxicating sap, child of heaven, looks down — the drop that has entered the fleece.
6. This same tawny one, pressed for drinking, flows on, strong and steadfast, roaring toward his dear womb.
Translator's note: "the ten [fingers]" (daśa haritaḥ) in verse 3 refers to the pressers' fingers that work the soma stalks, personified as tawny maidens, paralleling "the maidens of Trita" in verse 2. The epithet dharṇasiḥ in verse 6 (root dhṛ, "to hold/sustain") is rendered conservatively as "strong and steadfast." "Fleece" (vāra) throughout refers to the sheep's-wool filter through which the pressed soma is strained.
Colophon
Rigveda IX.38 is drawn from the Śākala recension of the Rigveda, composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE. This is a Good Works Translation rendered verse by verse from the Sanskrit text printed below. Prepared for the Good Work Library by the Tianmu Anglican Church with AI-assisted translation.
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Source Text: ṛgveda IX.38
Sanskrit source text from the Aufrecht edition (1877) via GRETIL (Van Nooten & Holland input). Presented here for reference, study, and verification alongside the English translation above.
eṣa u sya vṛṣā ratho 'vyo vārebhir arṣati |
gacchan vājaṁ sahasriṇam || 1 ||
etaṁ tritasya yoṣaṇo hariṁ hinvanty adribhiḥ |
indum indrāya pītaye || 2 ||
etaṁ tyaṁ harito daśa marmṛjyante apasyuvaḥ |
yābhir madāya śumbhate || 3 ||
eṣa sya mānuṣīṣv ā śyeno na vikṣu sīdati |
gacchañ jāro na yoṣitam || 4 ||
eṣa sya madyo raso 'va caṣṭe divaḥ śiśuḥ |
ya indur vāram āviśat || 5 ||
eṣa sya pītaye suto harir arṣati dharṇasiḥ |
krandan yonim abhi priyam || 6 ||
Source Colophon
Sanskrit text of the Rigveda, Śākala recension. The standard scholarly edition is the Bombay Oriental (Vishva Bandhu, 5 vols., 1963–66). IAST transliteration available from GRETIL (Göttingen Register of Electronic Texts in Indian Languages) and Vedaweb (University of Cologne). Both sources are open access. IAST transliteration from the Aufrecht edition (1877) via GRETIL (Van Nooten & Holland input, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).