वेदों की प्राचीनता एवं काल-निर्णय / ओरायन (लोकमान्य बाल गंगाधर तिलक - खगोलीय वैदिक शोध)

THE COWS' WALK. 211
(vimshatim râtrîh, VII. 3, 9, 1; dvâtrimshatam râtrîh, VII, 4, 4, 1).
According to the principle of division noted above all night-
sacrifices of less than thirteen nights' duration will be called
Ahîna, while those extending over longer time upto one hundred
nights will come under Sattras; but this is, as remarked above,
evidently an artificial division, and one, who reads carefully
the description of these sacrifices, cannot fail to be struck by
the fact that we have here a series of night-sacrifices from two to
a hundred nights, or if we include the Ati-râtra in this series, we
have practically a set of hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, though,
according to the principle of division adopted, some may fall
under the head of Ahîna and some under that of Sattras.
Now an important question in connection with these
Sattras is why they alone should be designated 'night-sacri-
fices,' (râtri-kratus), or 'night-sessions' (râtri-sattras)? and
why their number should be one hundred? or, in other words,
why there are no night-sattras of longer duration than one
hundred nights? The Mîmâmsakas answer the first part of
the question by asking us to believe that the word 'night'
(râtrih) is really used to denote 'a day' in the denomination of
these sacrifices (Shabara on Jaimini VIII, 1, 17). The word
Dvi-râtra, according to this theory, means two days' sacrifice,
and Shata-râtra, a hundred days' sacrifice. This explanation
appears very good at the first sight, and as a matter of fact it
has been accepted by all writers on the sacrificial ceremonies.
In support of it, we may also cite the fact that as the moon was
the measurer of time in ancient days, the night was then natu-
rally more marked than the day, and instead of saying
'so many days' men often spoke of 'so many nights,' much
in the same way as we now use the word 'fort-night.' This
is no doubt good so far as it goes; but the question is
why should there be no Soma sacrifices of a longer duration
than one hundred nights? and why a gap, a serious gap, is left