JOURNAL 



OF THE 



ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



Part I.— HISTORY, LITERATURE, &c. 



No. IV.— 1870. 



On the Funeral Ceremonies of the Ancient Hindus. — By Bdbu 



Ra'jendrala'la Mitra. 



[Read November, 1870.] 

 Two elaborate papers have already appeared on the funeral cere- 

 monies of the Hindus. The first, by H. T. Colebrooke, was publish- 

 ed in the Transactions of this Society about seventy years ago,* and 

 an abstract of it was soon after issued in Ward's History of the 

 Hindus. It contains the modern ritual as given in the Suddhi Tatt- 

 va of Raghunandana and other current works on the subject. The 

 second, entitled Die Todtenbestattung bei den Brahmanen, appeared 

 in the 9th volume of the Zeitschrift of the German Oriental Society. 

 Dr. Max Miiller, its author, gives in it the whole of As'valaya- 

 na's Sutras on the ancient ritual, and quotes largely from the Rig 

 Veda Saiihita and the aphorisms of Katyayana. A portion of it, 

 that bearing on the sepulchral ceremonies, has since been rendered 

 into English, by that learned scholar, and published by Professor 

 Wilson as a part of his Essay " on the supposed Vaidik authori- 

 ty for the burning of Hindu widows."! Dr. Max Miiller is of 

 opinion that — " These burial ceremonies have been described 

 in detail by As'valayana only, and it is possible that the burial was 



* Asiatic Researches, VII. pp. 232—285. Essays, I. 155. 

 t Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, XVI, pp. 201-214. 



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