Ratha

Krishna, Arjuna at Kurukshetra, 18th- to 19th-century painting.

Ratha (Proto-Indo-Iranian: *Hrátʰas, Sanskrit: रथ, rátha, Avestan: raθa) is the Indo-Iranian term for a spoked-wheel chariot or a cart of antiquity.

Arranged alphabetically by author or source:
A · B · C · D · E · F · G · H · I · J · K · L · M · N · O · P · Q · R · S · T · U · V · W · X · Y · Z · From Hindu texts · See also · External links

F

• Having a word to designate the war chariot does not mean that they invented it.
  • p. 802 Fussman G. Entre fantasmes, science et politique. L’entrée des Āryas en Inde. Annales Histoire, Sciences Sociales. 2003;58(4):779-813.

I

• The consciousness is like a chariot yoked to a team of powerful horses. One of them is breath (prånå), the other is desire (våsanå).
  • B.K.S Iyengar, quoted in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

K

• So right from the start, even according to the AIT scenario, even as the Aryans (allegedly) arrived, they fashioned cars from the wood of native trees; they did not bring chariots from abroad!
  • N Kazanas, Indigenism And The Collapse Of The Aryan-invasion-theory. The Adyar Library Bulletin. 2014-15

• The only real-life, not mythological, ratha in a race we know is mentioned in 10.102 and this is pulled by oxen. Nowhere in the 1000 hymns of the `Rgveda is there one single mention of a real-life battle with horse-drawn rathas... The scholars of the 19th century translated the Rigvedic ratha (or anas) as “chariot” thinking of Greece and Rome, and the notion stuck.
  • Kazanas N, Open Letter to Prof. M. Witzel, quoted in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

• The unique forms and the early appearance of carts in the Indus valley region suggest that they are the result of indigenous technological development and not diffusion from West Asia or Central Asia as proposed by earlier scholars.
  • Kenoyer, J. M. 2004. “Culture Change During the Late Harappan Period at Harappa: New Insights on Vedic Aryan Issues.” in : Varas and Dragonslayers: Rethinking the Indo-Iranian Expansion

M

• The rite is often considered a ‘ship’ or a ‘chariot’; it is a means of communication, of bringing closer the two shores, that of the hither or terrestrial realm, and that of the beyond, or godly realm.
  • Jeanine Miller, in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

S

• The reconstructed picture of the Vedic ratha is not yet complete. A number of technical terms are not fully or not at all understood... The Rgveda, in fact, offers countless examples of such metaphors, where the chariot stands for the word, the well-composed hymn of praise, the ritual ceremony or the sacrifice as a whole.
  • Dr. Sparreboom, 1985, in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

T

• In the total of nine passages in the Rigveda in which the words √vah, rátha, and ásva occur together, the ráthas are imaginary, heavenly vehicles, drawn by imaginary, heavenly ásvás. Parpola’s specific translation “war-chariot” for rátha is misleading. In none of these passages is the rátha a vehicle of war. All but three of them describe dawn and her attendant deities.
  • Thomson, K. (2009). A still undeciphered text: How the scientific approach to the Rigveda would open up Indo-European studies. Journal of Indo-European Studies, 37(1-2), 1-72. quoted in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

• Given the current frantic search for evidence of ‘spoked wheels’ in the remains of the Indus Valley Civilization, the translation [of the word arati as 'spoked wheels'] could even be considered irresponsible.
  • About the new interpretation of the word aratí as 'spoked wheels' in Jamison’s and Brereton’s new translation of the `Rgveda.
  • Karen Thomson quoted in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

• The Early Mandalas contain no references to technological innovations like ‘ara’ (spokes) which appear only in late Mandalas.
  • S. Talageri 2001. Michael Witzel – An Examination of his Review of my Book (2001)

W

• Something of this fear of the horse and of the thundering chariot, the "tank" of the 2nd millennium B.C. is transparent in the famous horse 'Dadhikra' of the Puru king Trasadasya ("Tremble enemy" in RV 4.38.8) ……..The first appearance of thundering chariots must have stricken the local population with terror similar to that experienced by the Aztecs and the Incas upon the arrival of the iron-clad, horse riding Spaniards.
  • Witzel M. Early Indian history: Linguistic and textual parametres in : The Indo-Aryans of Ancient South Asia: Language, Material Culture and Ethnicity edited by George Erdosy (Papers by Michael Witzel and P. Oktor Skjærvø), Walter de Gruyter, Berlin-New York, 1995. Quoted in Talageri, S. (2000). The Rigveda: A historical analysis. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

• Not only the language, but also the culture of the newly arrived elite was appropriated, including the 'Vedic Tank' the horse drawn chariot.
  • Michael Witzel, IndicTraditions ([1]) on 11 December 2000, message # 2735. quoted e.g. in Vigil (2006), 'Thus Spake Professor Michael Witzel A Harvard University Case Study in Prejudice?' (Chennai 2006)

From Hindu texts

• The twelve-spoke wheel of truth revolves about the heaven unwearied. Seven hundred and twenty sons in pairs stand on it, O Agni. They call the full one in the upper half of heaven the “Father with five feet and twelve forms”. These others call him “the far-seeing one mounted below on seven wheels and six spokes”. On this ever-revolving five-spoked wheel, all creatures take their stand. Its axle, though bearing a heavy load, does not get hot, nor has its nave ever broken apart for ages.
  • Rigveda,1, 164; quoted in M. Danino, "A Demilitarizing the Rigveda: A Scrutiny of Vedic Horses, Chariots and Warfare", Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences, vol. 26, no. 1 (Summer 2019)

• Soma flows on for u's as winner of the kine, winner of thousands, cars, water, and light, and gold; He whom the Gods have made a gladdening draught to drink, the drop most sweet to taste, weal-bringing, red of hue.
  • Rigveda, IX, 78, 4, as translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith (1889)
  • We saw Indra and Soma “winning cows and horses” from their enemies, but Soma occasionally wins chariots too (9.78.4) (besides the Sun and waters ...). Here too, a literalist reading would force us to conclude that the Dasyus and Dåsas, besides horses, possess “chariots”, defeating the dogma that chariots were brought (physically or mentally) by the Aryans.
  • quoted in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

• By the time of the Katha Upanishad, the metaphor of the horse (and the chariot, to which we will turn shortly), though slightly altered from the `Rgvedic imagery, had become perfectly explicit: “Know the self (åtman) to be the chariot’s master, and the body, the chariot itself; know the intellect (buddhi) to be the charioteer, and the mind (manas), the reins” (1.3.3); the horses, the Upanishad continues, are the five senses (indriya-s) which must be reined in by our intellect and (higher) mind, and ultimately the self. The chariot, here, stands for the body or our external being.
  • Katha Upanishad in Danino, M. (2019). Demilitarizing the Rigveda: a scrutiny of Vedic horses, chariots and warfare., STUDIES IN HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES Journal of the Inter-University Centre for Humanities and Social Sciences VOL. XXVI, NUMBER 1, SUMMER 2019

• Forty bay horses of the ten cars’ master before a thousand lead the long procession. Reeling in joy Kakßivån’s sons and Pajrå’s have grounded the coursers decked with pearly trappings.
  • Rigveda RV 1.126.4 (in Lal, B. B. (2005). Can the Vedic people be identified archaeologically?–An approach. IT, 31, 173-194.)

• Joyfully the youthful daughter of the sun Ascends your rátha, heroes, here; Around are marvellous áßvás flying, May the flame-coloured birds bring you to us.
  • RV 1.118.5 quoted in Thomson, K. (2009). A still undeciphered text: How the scientific approach to the Rigveda would open up Indo-European studies. Journal of Indo-European Studies, 37(1-2), 1-72.