"Let purifying Saraswati plentiful with florescence of being dwell in Yajna ( either the Lord, or action), rich with the understanding. Inspirer of true intuitions, awakener of right thoughts, Saraswati supporteth the Yajna.

Saraswati awakeneth to consciousness by force of will (or by thought, ketu, keta will, intuition, intellect) Mahas the ocean and shineth out this way and that in all the movements of the understanding." Back to text

13 David Kinsley: Hindu Goddesses: Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu religious tradition, University of California Press, California, 1986, pp 12 - 13. I am indebted to David Kinsley for his insights concerning Sarasvati and Vac in this book . Back to text

14 O' Flaherty, Wendy Doniger: The Rig Veda, Penguin Books, London, 1981, pp 62-63 Back to text

15 ibid, p 61. I am reminded here of the 8th century Irish text which states that the source of poetic art and knowledge is present in everyone but that it does not appear in 'every second person; in the other it does.' Breatnach, Liam: The Caldron of Poesy, Ériu 32, p 65 Back to text

16 David Kinsley: Hindu Goddesses: Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu religious tradition,  University of California Press, California, 1986, p59 Back to text

17  ibid pp 63 Back to text

18  ibid; pp 95-97 Back to text

19 Kinsella, Thomas trans.: The Táin, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1969, p 206 Back to text

20 Davies, Oliver: Celtic Christianity in Early Medieval Wales, University of Wales Press, Cardiff, 1996, pp 77-78 Back to text

21  Stokes, W: Three Irish Glossaries, CHECK pp LVII - LVIII Back to text

22 Brigit the Saint  Back to text

23 Bloomfield, Maurice (trans): Hymns of the Atharva-Veda, Greenwood Publishers, New York, 1969, pp 111-113 Back to text

24  Gray, E.A: Cath Maige Tuired, Irish Texts Society, Naas, Co. Kildare,  1982, p 119 Back to text

25  The Hero in Irish Folk History, Gill and Macmillan, Dublin, 1985, p 259 - 260 Back to text

26 This story and its poetic association with Brigit reminds me of a verse in the Rig Veda, 10, 73 6. “The milch-cows of the Truth, enjoyed in heaven, [or, shared by heaven,] full uddered, desiring us, have fed us with their milk...” (translated by Sri Aurobindo.) Back to text

27 Breatnach, L: The Caldron of Poesy, in Ériu 32, 1981, p.68-69 Back to text

28 Renou, Louis: Vedic India, Indological Book House, Varanasi, 1971, p 82 Back to text

29  Haycock, Marged: The Significance of the ‘Cad Goddau’ Tree-List in the Book of Taliesin in Current Issues In Linguistic Theory 68, Celtic Linguistics, p.300 Back to text

30 Breatnach, L: The Caldron of Poesy , p.49 Back to text

31  Henry, P.L: The Caldron of Poesy, in Studia Celtica 14/15, 1979/80, p. 117 Back to text

32  Stokes, W: ‘The Colloquy of the two Sages’  in Revue Celtique 26, 1905 Back to text

33 ibid: pp 18-21 Back to text

34  O’ Flaherty, Wendy Doniger: The Rig Veda, Penguin Books, London, 1981, p 36 Back to text

35 Although the names Oghma and Ogmios, the Gaulish god of eloquence, appear to be related, this link is disputed by scholars. Back to text

36 Stokes, W: ‘The Colloquy of the two Sages’  in Revue Celtique 26, 1905 p 9 Back to text

37 Wagner, H: Studies in the Origins of Early Celtic Tradition, in Ériu 16, p 1 Back to text

38  Sri Aurobindo, Hymns to the Mystic Fire, Mandal 10, 45, 3, 10 Commentary on the Rig Veda - The Planet's most Ancient Text , Web Publication by Mountain Man Graphics, Australia Back to text

39 Bloomfield, Maurice: The Religion of the Veda, G.P.Putnam’s Sons, New York and London, 1908, p 260 Back to text

40 This view is that of Calvert Watkins in ‘Indo-European Metrics and Archaic Irish Verse’. Heinrich   Wagner does not support this view, see ZCP 31, pp 48 - 53. Instead he posits an etymology concerned with weaving. Back to text

41 ibid, p. 243 Back to text

42 ‘A History of the Voice’ 1, BBC Radio 4,  broadcast 25.4.2000 Back to text

43 Quoted in Ó hÓgáin, D: The Hero in Irish Folk History, Gill and Macmillan, Dublin, 1985, p 63 Back to text

44 According to Renou, the word rita has an original meaning of ‘movement’ or ‘adaptation’, perhaps related to the word ‘furrow’ and the corresponding word in Iranian Avesta is asha which means something like ‘health’. Heinrich Wagner, however, sees them both as coming from a root meaning ‘to join’. Back to text