Note 40 — Chapter III

Müller's Ancient Sanskrit Literature, page 569. He adds the following remarks: "There is nothing to prove that this hymn is of a particularly ancient date. On the contrary, there are expressions in it which seem to belong to a later age. But even if we assign the lowest possible date to this and similar hymns certain it is that they existed during the Mantra period, and before the composition of the Brâhmanas. For, to spite of all the indications of a modern date, I see no possibility how we could account for the allusions to it which occur in the Brâhmanas, or for its presence in the Sanhitâs, unless we admit that this poem formed part of the final collection of the Rig-veda-Sanhitâ, the work of the Mantra period."