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SARASVATI: SOMA YAJÑA AND THE

VEDA
The argument: Rigveda is a metallurgical allegory; soma is electrum ore

According to Louis Renou, the immense Rigvedic collection

is present in nuce in the themes related to Soma.Soma About
120 hymns out of a total of 1028 hymns or a thousand
verses and almost the entire ninth book deal with Soma. Soma
Soma is a material and also the only process elaborated in
the Rigveda. The rest of the hymns related to Agni, Indra
or other facets of vedic life will have to be concordant
with this process which seems to constitute the very essence
of vedic life, a process integral to the day-to-day living of
the vedic seeker. The amšu were pressed and processed
almost like a religious act.

Soma yajña in Rigvedic days, in particular, connotes the

process of parting/extracting gold and silver from Soma,
Soma
electrum ore (gold-silver pyrite ore). This may be called
auri-faction in alchemical terms; the ri±is or sages who
composed riks abounding in philological brilliance, perhaps
believed that they were in fact producing gold.

The interpretation of the Rigveda as a metallurgical allegory,

in respect of the processing of Soma,
Soma declares a change of
paradigm in vedic studies.

The oral tradition of transmitting the knowledge of gold-

smelting operations was continued over millennia to maintain
secrecy. The tradition of secrecy becomes allegorical as the
bràhma¯as and Šrautasùtras bureaucratize the process with
allegorically-coded manuals for smelting operations. A nexus
develops between the brahmans and the ruling classes and
the former are generally in the employ of kings, led by a
r.twij and a purohita; and live in the same quarters of the
royal palace, where goldsmiths live. The processes indicate
that the alchemical tradition sustained by the ruling-priestly
class-consortium was auri-fiction; that is, the priests knew
that they were not, in fact, producing gold. The state-
power was used to monopolize this operation of accumulating
gold and silver metals into the state treasuries.

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The analysis is advanced with reference to three historical

milestones, and three related facets of alchemy as an
enterprise:

(1) Rigveda and aurifaction;

(2) Šatapatha Bràhma¯a and aurifiction; and

(3) Arthašàstra and alchemy as a state enterprise.

Soma,
Soma as a metaphorical elixir of immortality

We have drunk the Soma and become immortal;

We have attained the light the gods discovered.
What can hostility now do against us?
And what, immortal God, the spite of mortals?
(R.V. VIII.48.3)

This hymn from the world's oldest recorded oral literature

seems to deal with the preparation and use of an 'elixir'.
This hymn sets the framework for tracing the Indian
alchemical tradition and its science potentials. The trace will
perhaps lead us to the earliest alchemical tradition of the
ancient world. It is significant that in a contemporary
civilization, Gilgamesh of Babylonian myths too sets out to
discover eternal life and finds a miraculous plant of
immortality growing at the bottom of the sea. He plucks it,
leaves it unguarded. It is stolen by a water snake.
Water, plant and snake symbolisms are indeed central to all
alchemical traditions.

Soma is not a drink

Chàndogya Upani±ad (V.10.4) is emphatic:

es.a somo ràjà. tad devànàam annam. tam devà

bhak±yanti.
Soma is king. Soma is food for the gods. Gods eat
Soma.
Soma

Two vedic hymns reiterate that Soma is not a drink of

mortals:

'One thinks to have drunk Soma,

Soma when they crush the
plant. Of him (Soma
Soma), which the bràhma¯as know, no

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one ever tastes.' (RV X.85.3; the same hymn in AV

XIV.1.3).

'O Soma,
Soma guarded by that which is meant to cover
you, guarded by him who lives in the high (heaven?),
you stand listening to the pressing stones. No earthly
one eats you.' (RV X.85.4).

Atharva veda refers to the deficiency in name; this stanza is

used, as a primary authority by some scholars, to justify the
identification of Soma as the moon, since dars'a is
interpreted as the slender crescent of the moon:

'O stem of Soma (somasyamšo), lord of the combatant

(yudhàm), you are indeed not-deficient by name (nùno
nama); make me, O first sight (darša) not-deficient
(anùnam), both by progeny and wealth.' (AV. VII.86.3).

Soma,
Soma has the radical su, to press; pressing is the key
process. Soma is that which is pressed. In the developing
allegory, Soma is seen to be released from the cover, Vritra
or the 'aryan dragon motif or Vritra, who possesses the
waters, using the vajra thunderbolt. Buschardt also observes
that the mountains which are Vritra's body are also the
same on which the Soma plants grow; Vritra-killing and
Soma-pressing
Soma are one and the same act; Soma-pressing
Soma is
Soma-killing;
Soma killing signifies making him 'whole' and this is
creation. Vajra is a concept related to the reducing agents:
Lahiri summarizes Buschardt's perceptions succinctly.
"Buschardt traced the origin of the vajra, the weapon with
which Indra kills Vritra, to the cultic implements the
pressing stone used to crush the Soma-stalks,
Soma or pestle.

The cultic implements on icons are remarkable records of

alchemical legacy. Since the artist wanted to symbolize the
representation with great fidelity, he used enormous degrees
of freedom in adding to the icons four, six or eight hands;
so that on each hand, he could represent the symbolism
related to a cult implement such as a kaman.d.alu, an aks.a
ma_la, a ladle, a vajra,
vajra etc. Many of these implements are
alchemist's tools and relate to his apparatus. If this
iconographic tradition can be extrapolated to the proto-indus
seals, the so-called 'cult object' in front of the unicorn
comes alive as a smelter-filter of the lapidary, the centre-
piece of his very craft and life-mission.

Sometimes, even àjya (melted butter), sphya (spade of

khadira wood), abhri (spade), yùpa (posts in the sacrificial
site where the victim used to be bound), the waters etc.

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are styled vajra... the cult instrument which happens to be

decisive at that particular moment is referred to as vajra...

Linking vajra with the waters finds significant support from

dravidian etyma: DEDR 761: Kannada.vajjara, ojjara a spring,
fountain; orale oozing, oravu spring; Tamil. ùru to spring,
flow (as water in a well); ùral small spring, spring-water,
oozing, percolation; Kui. urpa to ooze, spring up; Maltese.
orbe to fall in showers. The imagery sought to be evoked
by the vedic poet-artisan is relatable to the intense desire to
use a weapon that will enforce the flow of the metallic
essence, rasa. vajra, therefore, connotes the resin that flows
from the male trees!

“Vajra is the cult's demon killing power as such, and

Buschardt thought that the origin of vajra must be traced to
the pressing stones which play a dominant role in the
central moment of the cult, the pressing of the Soma...
Soma At
the Soma pressing water is poured over the Soma stalks
and hence they actually take part in the Soma pressing, that
is, Vritra-killing...The separation of Soma and Vritra becomes
complete with the purified Soma on the one side, and the
crushed lifeless demon on the other. This Soma 'clear
flowing' fills up the gathering vessel...Thus the conflict is
over." (Buschardt,L., Vrtra: Det Rituelle Daemondrab iden
Vediske Soma-kult, Kobenhavn 1945, p.48; loc.cit. Lahiri,
A.K., Vedic Vrtra, Delhi, Munshiram Manoharlal, 1984, p.21.)
Crysocole, or copper carbonate, was used by goldworkers as
a solder. Two oxides of copper, red and black, were
known. Mary, the Jewess-alchemist, often refers to the 'little
leaf of copper', the copper foil hung on the kerotakis to be
subjected to the attack of mercury vapours or of sulphur
vapours which was sublimed in the aludel fitted with
kerotakis. cf. Hopkins, A.J., Alchemy, 1967, p.108. The 'leaf'
motif has a remarkable parallel in Indus script signs and in
an exquisitely executed pictorial motif which depicts two
'unicorn' heads surrounding a stylized 'sublimation device',
may be kampat.t.am, topped by nine leaves. In the jeweler's
art, a process called 'royal cement' is used, which may
perhaps be traced to Tvashtr's gilding techniques. "To a
large quantity of fused base metal a little gold was added
and the whole cooled to form one 'metal', and this solid
solution was then shaped into some form such as a ring.
This was then etched on the surface by alum or other
mordant salt. The surface of the base metal, such as lead,
by this process would be dissolved away, leaving granules
of pure gold in relief, thus making the ring appear to be
made wholly of gold. This process had been known from

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very early times." Hopkins, A.J., Alchemy, 1967, p.49.

Some etyma: RV iv.20.6 vajra mark; in RV. x.108.7
vajrabhir-nryu±²ah qualifying nidhi;
nidhi in vi.22.5 vajra-hastam
holding vajra in hand. Pali.vajira
vajira Indra or Sakka's
thunderbolt; diamond. Tamil (lex.) vaccira-kantam yellow
orpiment; vaccirakam pericarp of the lotus; vaccirappacai a
kind of glue; vacciram a treatise on architecture; vaccira-
ya_ppu glue-ing, in woodwork; vaccira-rasam purified mercury.
DEDR 5214 Tamil. vaci rain, water; Kannada. basi, bose to
drip, drop, trickle.

Atharva veda (AV.IX.6) can be interpreted as providing the

clearest statement on the smelting process of the Soma yaja
which is echoed in later-day alchemical texts:

"...the shed for housing the Soma cars...green sticks that

surround the sacrificial altars (as a fence to restrict the
range of fire)...The grains of rice and barley that are
selected are just filaments of the Soma plant. The pestle
and mortar are really the stones of the Soma press. The
winnowing-basket is the filter, the chaff the Soma dregs, the
water the pressing-gear. Spoon, ladle, fork, stirring prong
are the wooden Soma tubs; the earthen cooking pots are the
mortar-shaped Soma vessels; this earth is just the black-
antelope's skin...The man who supplies food hath always
pressing stones adjusted, a wet Soma filter, well-prepared
religious rites...he who hath this knowledge wins the
luminous spheres."

Metals were not fully distinguished from their alloys; all

carried names such as aes, electrum etc. Ayas meant metal.
Asem denoted the natural alloy of silver and gold; it also
meant any bright metal made with copper, tin, lead, zinc,
arsenic and mercury. Twelve or thirteen different alloys were
called asem (Needham, Joseph, Science and Civilization in
China, vol. 5, pt. II, p.45) "At Gungeria, in district
Balaghat, 102 pieces of silver plates were discovered along
with 424 copper implements. The silver was found to be
admixed with 3.7% gold (...1100 B.C. - 800 B.C.). The
presence of 3.7% gold in these silver pieces indicates the
extraction of silver from electrum..." (Smith, V., 1905, Indian
Antiquary, pp. 233 ff.; loc.cit. Bharadwaj, H.C., Aspects of
Ancient Indian Technology, Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass, 1979,
p. 138).

Asem was Soma;

Soma this hypothesis will be the running-thread
of this review of the alchemical tradition of ancient India,

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dating back to R.gveda. Hopkins states: "The existence of

this alloy (asse*m) may have been the original cause for
the suggestion of transmutation since by adding silver to it,
one would get a metal nearly identical with the crude silver
from the mine; and by adding gold, something
indistinguishable from gold. [The paucity of the Egyptian
language may perhaps have been responsible for a confusion.
Gold was the 'yellow metal', and the alloy produced was
also a 'yellow metal'.]" (Hopkins, A.J., Alchemy, 1967, pp.
103-104).

The parallels with the Indian alchemical tradition are

apparent: taµkam gold in dravidian-Chinese becomes t.an.kan.a
borax (a reagent!) in indo-aryan, ²aµka gold coin; the terms
hiran.yam, hema-bìjam, connote the yellow metal.

"The use of borax (pheng sha) as a preparatory agent for

soldering and brazing (in the molten state it cleans metal
surfaces by dissolving metallic oxides) goes back in China
to the +11th century, for it is mentioned by Su Sung (kho
han chin yin)... Li shi-Chen says that borax 'kills' the five
metals, as saltpetre does; presumably this refers to the
preparation of metallic salts. The mild and non-irritant
antiseptic quality which has given it such wide use in
Western and even modern, medicine, was appreciated by the
Chinese pharmacists, who prescribed it for all kinds of
external, including phthalic, affections.” (Needham, J., SCC,
vol. III, 1959, p. 663).

In the Babylonian Talmud (+2nd century), asemon is a

commonly used word referring to bullion (gold, silver or
mixed.) Leiden X papyrus (c. +3rd century) says: "no.8. It
will be asem, (i.e. electrum, an alloy of gold and silver)
which will deceive even the artisans (a tin-copper-gold-silver
alloy); no.12. Falsification of gold (a zinc-copper-lead-gold
alloy)...” (cited in Needham, Joseph, SCC, vol. 5, Pt. II, pp.
18-21). Soma yajña as a ritual, can be interpreted as an
elaborate justification for the memories of processing asemon,
asem, electrum.

A Tamil lexicon of Winslow (1862) provides a philological

trace: Soma ma¯al, is interpreted as meaning ve³³i ma¯al,
sand containing silver ore!

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Soma,
Soma Soma ma¯al, asemon, asem, electrum may perhaps
denote the same substance that dazzled and drew travellers
of antiquity in search of indus gold. It may perhaps be the
same substance [which required the purificatory 'mineral
waters'] contained in the kaman.d.alu symbols in the icons
of the yaks.a legacy. It may perhaps be the same
substance said to be am°tam which was considered to be
the elixir of life, of immortality. It may perhaps be the
same substance referred to, in sheer poetry, as amritam àyur
hira¯yam. Gold is immortality.

Soma!
Soma The very justification for the vedic hymns; the
quintessence of the only technological process elaborated in
magnificent poetry and philological excursus in the grand
allegory, the Rigveda.

These findings are further elaborated in the work: Indian

Alchemy: Soma in the Veda, by Dr. S. Kalyanaraman (in
press; forthcoming (1998) publication of Munshiram
Manoharlal, Delhi).

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