Satapatha Brahmana Part III (SBE41), Julius Eggeling tr. [1894], at sacred-texts.com
5:1:2:11. He draws the Amsu 1 (graha), just for completeness’ sake, for it is therefor that he draws
the Amsu. After that he draws those recognised Agnishtoma cups 1 up to the Âgrayana.
5:1:2:22, He then draws the Prishthyas 2: and whatever the gods (Agni, Indra, and Sûrya) won by them, even that he wins by them.
5:1:2:33. He then draws the Shodasin: and whatever Indra won thereby, even that he (the sacrificer) wins thereby.
5:1:2:44. He then draws those five Vâgapeya cups (for Indra; the first) with the text (V. S. IX, 2), 'Thee, the firm-seated, the man-seated, the mind-seated! Thou art taken with a support 3: I take thee, agreeable to Indra! This is thy womb' (i.e. thy home): thee, most agreeable to Indra!' therewith he deposits it; for of these
worlds this one, to wit the earth, is the firm one: this same world he thereby wins.
5:1:2:55. [The second with,] 'Thee, the water-seated, the ghee-seated, the ether-seated! Thou art taken with a support: I take thee, agreeable to Indra! This is thy womb: thee most agreeable to Indra!' therewith he deposits it; for among these worlds that ether (mentioned in the formula) is this air: he thereby wins this air-world.
5:1:2:66. [The third with,] 'Thee, the earth-seated, the air-seated, the sky-seated, the god-seated, the heaven-seated! Thou art taken with a support: I take thee, agreeable to Indra! This is thy womb: thee, most agreeable to Indra!' therewith he deposits it; for god-seated, heaven-seated indeed is yonder world of the gods: the world of the gods he thereby wins.
5:1:2:77. [The fourth with V. S. IX, 3,] 'The waters’ invigorating essence, being contained in the sun,--that which is the essence of the waters’ essence, that, the most excellent, I take for you! Thou art taken with a support: I take thee, agreeable to Indra! This is thy womb: thee, most agreeable to Indra!' therewith he deposits it; for the waters’ essence is he that blows (or purifies) yonder (the wind), and he is contained in the sun, he blows from the sun: that same essence he thereby wins.
5:1:2:88. [The fifth with IX, 4,] 'Ye cups, of strengthening libations, inspiring the sage with thought,--I have gathered together the pith and sap of you, the handleless! Thou art taken with a support: thee, agreeable to Indra! This is thy womb: thee, most agreeable to
[paragraph continues] Indra!' therewith he deposits it;--pith means essence: it is the essence he thereby wins.
5:1:2:99. These, then, are five Vâgapeya cups he draws; for he who offers the Vâgapeya wins Pragâpati; and Pragâpati is the year, and there are five seasons in the year,--he thus wins Pragâpati: therefore he draws five Vâgapeya cups.
5:1:2:1010. He (the Adhvaryu) then draws seventeen (other) cups of Soma, and (the Neshtri) seventeen cups of Surâ (spirituous liquor), for to Pragâpati belong these two (saps of) plants, to wit the Soma and the Surâ;--and of these two the Soma is truth, prosperity, light; and the Surâ untruth, misery, darkness: both these (saps of) plants he thereby wins; for he who offers the Vâgapeya wins everything here, since he wins Pragâpati, and Pragâpati indeed is everything here.
5:1:2:1111. Now as to why he draws seventeen cups of Soma;--Pragâpati is seventeenfold, Pragâpati is the sacrifice 1: as great as the sacrifice is, as great as is
its measure, with that much he thus wins its truth, its prosperity, its light.
5:1:2:1212. And why he draws seventeen cups of Surâ;--Pragâpati is seventeenfold, Pragâpati is the sacrifice: as great as the sacrifice is, as great as is its measure, with that much he thus wins its untruth, its misery, its darkness.
5:1:2:1313. These two amount to thirty-four cups; for there are thirty-three gods, and Pragâpati is the thirty-fourth: he thus wins Pragâpati.
5:1:2:1414. Now when he buys the king (Soma), he at the same time buys for a piece of lead the Parisrut (immature spirituous liquor) from a long-haired man near by towards the south. For a long-haired man is neither man nor woman; for, being a male, he is not a woman; and being long-haired (a eunuch), he is not a man. And that lead is neither iron nor gold; and the Parisrut-liquor is neither Soma nor Surâ 1: this is why he buys the Parisrut for a piece of lead from a long-haired man.
5:1:2:1515. And on the preceding day they prepare two
earth-mounds 1, the one in front of the axle, and the other behind the axle: 'Lest we should deposit together the cups of Soma, and the cups of Surâ,'--this is why, on the preceding day, they prepare two mounds, one in front, and the other behind the axle.
5:1:2:1616. Now, when they take the Vasatîvarî water 2 (into the havirdhâna shed) by the front door, the Neshtri takes in the Parisrut-liquor by the back door. From the south they bring in the drinking vessels. The Adhvaryu, seated in front of the axle, with his face towards the west, draws the cups of Soma; and the Neshtri, seated behind the axle, with his face towards the east, draws the cups of Surâ. The Adhvaryu draws a cup of Soma, the Neshtri a cup of Surâ; the Adhvaryu draws a cup of Soma, the Neshtri a cup of Surâ: in this way they draw them alternately.
5:1:2:1717. Neither does the Adhvaryu hold the Soma-cup beyond the axle towards the back, nor the Neshtri the Surâ-cup beyond the axle towards the front, thinking, 'Lest we should confound light and darkness!'
5:1:2:1818. The Adhvaryu holds the Soma-cup just over the axle, and the Neshtri the Surâ-cup just below
the axle, with (V. S. IX, 4), 'United ye are: unite me with happiness!' Thinking, 'Lest we should say "evil",' they withdraw them again, with, 'Disunited ye are: disunite me from evil!' Even as one might tear a single reed from a clump of reed-grass, so do they thereby tear him from out of all evil: there is not in him so much sin as the point of a grass-blade. They deposit the two (cups each time on the mounds).
5:1:2:1919. Thereupon the Adhvaryu draws the Madhu-graha (honey-cup) in a golden vessel, and deposits it in the middle of the Soma-grahas. He then draws the Ukthya, then the Dhruva. And when, at the last chant (of the evening press feast 1), he has poured those Soma-grahas one by one into the cups of the officiating priests, they make offering and drink them. At the midday-pressing it is told regarding the honey-cup, and the cups of Surâ: thereof then 2.
5:1 Regarding this cup, or libation (consisting, it would seem, of imperfectly pressed Soma-plants in water), see part ii, p. 424, note 1. Here, and in the sequel, the author only refers to those points of ceremonial in which the performance differs from that of the ordinary Agnishtoma sacrifice, as described in part ii.
6:1 Viz. the Upâmsu and Antaryâma; the Aindravâyava, Maitrâvaruna and Âsvina; the Sukra and Manthin; and the Âgrayana. Part ii, pp. 256 seq.
6:2 That is, the three Atigrâhyas (part ii, p. 402, note 2), required for the Prishtha-stotras at the midday feast, when performed in their proper 'prishtha' form, as they are at the Prishthya shadaha, and at a Visvagit-ekâha with all the Prishthas. See IV, 5, 4, 24. The authorities of the Black Yagus adopt a somewhat different arrangement. The Vâgapeya cups are likewise called by them Atigrâhyas (Taitt. S. I, 7, 22; T. B. I, 3, 9), and these are apparently drawn by them immediately after the second of the ordinary three Atigrâhyas, the one belonging to Indra (T. S. vol. i, p. 996,--but see ib. p. 1955, where it is stated that they are drawn immediately after the Âgrayana,--that is, probably, if the ordinary Atigrâhyas are not required). Then follows (the third ordinary Atigrâhya?), then the Shodasin, and thereupon the seventeen cups for Pragâpati.--Sâyana remarks on our passage,--teshâm (atigrâhyânâm) prakritigatâ tritvasamkhyaiva sâkhântaravat samkhyântarânupadesât. MS. I. O. 657.
6:3 For an explanation of these notions, see part ii, p. 260, notes 1 and 2.
8:1 See I, 5, 2, 17, where the principal formulas used in making oblations are computed as consisting together of seventeen syllables. Pañk. Br. 18, 6 insists especially on the symbolic identity of Pragâpati and the Vâgapeya on the double ground that the Vâgapeya consists of seventeen stotras, and has for its characteristic mode of chanting the Saptadasa-stoma, or seventeen-versed hymn. That this is indeed so will appear from a glance at the chief chants. The Bahishpavamâna-stotra, which in the ordinary Agnishtoma is chanted in the trivrit-stoma, consisting of three triplets, or nine verses (see part ii, p. 310), is at the Vâgapeya made to consist of seventeen verses, by the insertion of eight verses (S.V. II, 180-82; 186-90) between the second and third triplets. Again, the Mâdhyandina-pavamâna, ordinarily chanted in fifteen verses (part ii, p. 333), here consists of seventeen, viz. II, 105-7 (sung twice in two tunes = six verses); II, 663 (one verse); II, 663-4 (sung as triplet, in two tunes = six verses); II, 663, in a different tune again (one verse); II, 821-23 p. 9 (three verses)--making together seventeen verses. Similarly, the Ârbhava-pavamâna (chanted at the Agnishtoma also in the Saptadasa-stoma, cf. part ii, p. 315; but here with modifications) consists of II, 165-7 (sung twice in two tunes = six verses); II, 42, 44 (two verses); II, 47-9 (in two tunes = six verses); II, 720-22 (three verses)--making together seventeen verses. For the similarly constructed Vâgapeya hymn see page 11, note 1. See also Lâty. Sr. VIII, 11, 15 seq., where the number of officiating priests, as well as that of the various sacrificial fees, is fixed at seventeen. Similarly, Âsv. Sr. IX, 9, 2-3 says that there are either to be seventeen dikshâs, or the whole ceremony is to be performed in seventeen days.
9:1 According to Sâyana, the difference between surâ and parisrut would seem to be that the former beverage is prepared from mature shoots (of rice, &c.), and the latter from such as are not quite ripe.
10:1 The mounds (khara) thrown up in the havirdhâna cart-shed, are used for placing the cups of Soma (and Surâ) after they are drawn, until they are used for the libations. See the plan of the sacrificial ground at the end of part ii; only that on the present occasion there is to be a second mound, for the placing of the Surâ-cups, under or just behind the axle of the southern Soma-cart (in the place where the Nârâsamsa cups to the Fathers were temporarily deposited at the Agnishtoma; see III, 6, 2, 25 with note). On this occasion a small door is also made in the southern wall of the cart-shed, by breaking through the hurdle.
10:2 Part ii, p. 222 seq.
11:1 The last chant (at the evening feast) of the Vâgapeya sacrifice is the so-called Vâgapeya-sâman, or Brihat-stotra (Sâmav. II, 975-7), chanted, to the Brihat tune, in the Saptadasa-stoma; the three verses being, by repetitions, raised to the number of seventeen.--'When he has poured . . . they offer it:' this is apparently a case of the absolute construction of the gerund in '-ya,' cf. Delbrück, Altindische Syntax, p. 108.
11:2 On these cups, or libations, see V, I, 5, 28.