Journeys into Vedic Thought
Long-form, researched essays on the deities, language, ritual and history of the Rig Veda. All free to read.
No articles match your search. Clear →
A World Without Blue: Colour Words in the Rig Veda
The Rig Veda has rich words for bright, ruddy and golden, but no settled word for 'blue.' A sourced look at Vedic colour vocabulary and what it does and does not tell us about perception.
The Spoked Wheel: How Chariots Help Date the Rig Veda
The Rig Veda is full of fast, light, spoke-wheeled chariots. That single piece of technology is one of the strongest clues to when and where the hymns were composed.
The Dog Who Talked Back: Sarama and the Panis (RV 10.108)
Before any human messenger, the Rig Veda sends a dog. In RV 10.108 Sarama crosses a river for Indra and argues with the cattle-thieving Panis. A sourced reading of an overlooked myth.
The First to Die: Yama and the Vedic Afterlife (RV 10.14)
Yama was the first human to die, and so became king of the dead. A sourced reading of the Rig Veda's funeral hymn, the two four-eyed dogs, and the bright world of the fathers.
Varuna and the Order of Things: Sin and Rita in the Rig Veda
Varuna watches through unseen spies, binds the guilty with his noose, and guards rita, the order of the cosmos. A sourced reading of the Rig Veda's most moral god.
The Maruts: A Storm Set to Verse
The Maruts are the Rig Veda's storm-troop, a band of young gods who shake the mountains and bring the rain. A sourced reading of their hymns and their poetics of weather.
The Cow as Currency: Cattle and Wealth in the Rig Veda
In the Rig Veda the word for a battle can literally mean 'a search for cows.' A sourced look at cattle as wealth, measure and metaphor in the Vedic economy.
When Speech Speaks: Vac and the Devi Sukta (RV 10.125)
In RV 10.125 the goddess Vac, Speech herself, talks in the first person and claims to hold the gods together. A sourced reading of the Vedic philosophy of language.
Dice, Debt and Ruin: The Gambler's Hymn (RV 10.34)
One of the Rig Veda's strangest poems is the confession of a ruined gambler. A sourced reading of RV 10.34 as social history, addiction, and an early warning against the dice.
The Ashvins: Divine Twins and the Vedic Idea of Rescue
The Ashvins ride a chariot ahead of dawn, mend an amputee's leg with iron, and pull a man from a drowning sea. A sourced look at the Rig Veda's twin physicians.
Seven Rivers: The Geography of the Rig Veda
Sapta Sindhu, the Nadistuti (RV 10.75), and the lost Sarasvati: how the Rig Veda's rivers map the Vedic world onto the northwest.
Soma: The Pressed God of Mandala 9
A whole book of the Rig Veda is about a drink. Soma as plant, ritual and deity, and the long argument over what the plant actually was.