On the Growth and Composition

of the Sanskrit Epics and Purāṇas

Relationship to Kāvya. Social and Economic Context
Proceedings of the Fifth Dubrovnik International Conference
on the Sanskrit Epics and Purāṇas
August 2008

Edited by
Ivan Andrijanić
Sven Sellmer

General Editor
Mislav Ježić
Fellow of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (Zagreb)
Published in November 2016 by
Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts
and Ibis grafika, Zagreb

ISBN 978-953-347-105-1 (HAZU)

ISBN 978-953-7997-28-1 (Ibis grafika)
sven sellmer

Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata

1 Introduction
The following study of the word manas in the Mahābhārata is part of a larger pro-
gramme: the reconstruction of what I call epic psychology. The first step in this
direction consists in a systematic investigation into the semantics of the words used
in the epic idiom to describe mental and emotional acts and events.1 The whole proj-
ect is based on the working hypothesis that there does exist an implicit psychology
of the epic language that is at least partly independent of “scientific” psychological
theories, which belong to other discourses, especially (to use Western terms) phi-
losophy (including psychology), mysticism and medicine. To be sure, there is also
much of this kind of material in the Mahābhārata, especially in the Śāntiparvan,
but it is largely confined to passages of a specific type, commonly called “didactic”.
Therefore it seemed advisable to leave these didactic portions out of the picture and
to confine myself to purely narrative passages (which does not exclude the use of
non-narrative material on a later stage, of course). In an earlier study I have analysed
hṛd and hṛdaya, the main words for “heart”, in the Mahābhārata,2 now I turn to the
word that is often translated as “mind”: manas.3 But studies of single words can only
be a beginning; at a later stage, it is hoped, conceptual structures will emerge that
allow for a comprehensive study of the whole semantic field.
A project of this kind raises several fundamental questions of a methodological
kind that can, however, only be briefly addressed here. The first may have occurred
to some readers at the very beginning of this paper when I used the expression:
“mental and emotional acts and events”. Must such a formulation not be regarded as
an unwarranted application of modern terminology? The short answer to this objec-

1 A first outline of this programme can be found in Sellmer 2009. The restriction to the Mahā­
bhārata is simply due to practical reasons. The psychological language of the Rāmāyaṇa
should be investigated in the same way, especially because it would be quite interesting to see
if any major differences between the epics come to light.
2 See Sellmer 2012.
3 In this paper I will leave manas untranslated in most of the cases, treating it as a quasi-loan-
word and, therefore, not italicising it. Written in italics, manas refers to the Sanskrit word.
450 sven sellmer

tion is that there is no way to avoid modern, in this case English, terminology alto-
gether because we have to do with a kind of necessary hermeneutical circle. Starting
from inside the circle one can only proceed by assuming that certain expressions—of
both the language of the researcher and of the texts—in the semantic field at ques-
tion are to a certain extent equivalent, because they refer to the same (possibly even
universally occurring) experiences and situations, so that the researcher, taking into
account the context, the reactions of the persons involved and his general knowl-
edge about the language and the culture concerned, more or less knows what (e.g.)
ancient Indian texts mean when they are talking about specific mental and emotional
events. It is furthermore possible that these experiences might be describable in a
more neutral, phenomenological way, so that it would be possible to speak of true
mental and emotional universals. But if this is a realistic scenario it remains a matter
of discussion, just like the existence of linguistic universals in general.
Coming back to the language of the Sanskrit epics, we are confronted with a
number of specific problems. First of all it is obvious that we are dealing not with a
natural language but with an artificial idiom. Still it must be assumed that at least at
the time when a turn (term?) or formula was coined it sounded familiar enough to the
audience to be understandable; so it cannot have been utterly detached from every-
day usage.1 But the most important and most problematic feature of the epic texts
in the present context is that they are composed in the style of oral poetry (perhaps
even partly as oral poetry).2 This means that semantic investigations cannot be done
without taking into account the techniques of versification employed by the authors
of these texts, especially when one is dealing with frequent words that tend to form
part of fixed formulaic expressions, like manas.
Studies on versification in the Sanskrit epics are not altogether lacking,3 but over-
all it has to be admitted that in this respect classical philology is more advanced, so
it is worthwhile to have a look at recent developments in Homeric studies. Firstly,
Thomas Jahn’s important book “Zum Wortfeld ‘Seele­Geist’ in der Sprache Hom-
ers” of 1987 must be mentioned, in which the author shows that formulae like “in
the breast”, “in the heart”, “with the mind” etc., which occur in Homer with re-
markable frequency, have become semantically almost indistinguishable.4 What is
more, they form a coherent system of expressions of different length and metrical
1 “Everyday usage” primarily means Prakrit usage. A systematic comparison of Epic Sanskrit
and Prakrit psychological language would be a highly interesting topic. For some general
remarks on the relationship of Epic Sanskrit to Middle Indo-Aryan see Oberlies 2003: ch.
IV–VI and the pertinent papers by Salomon (1986; 1989; 1995).
2 For a discussion of the relationship of oral poetry and oral style poetry see Sellmer 2015:
21–24.
3 Cf. the studies by Brockington (1970; 1998a: 103–116; 1998b; 1999), Grincer (1974: part I,
ch. 2–4), Vasil’kov (1971; 1973) and myself (Sellmer 2015, where also further bibliographi-
cal references are given).
4 A short summary of Jahn’s argument can be found in Sellmer 2009: 183.
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 451

structure, which in most cases have only one function: to help the poet in coping
with the exigencies of the hexameter. It remains to be seen if a comparable sys-
tem is functioning in the Indian epics, too. While Jahn’s work is methodologically
very strongly connected to Milman Parry’s analysis of Homeric epithets there is a
number of studies that try to give this kind of approach to Homeric versification a
more flexible shape: Instead of seeing formulae as ready-made building blocks, as
it were, attention is paid to the process in which different elements gradually make
up a formula, and then a whole verse. A good example of this kind of research is
Visser’s (1987) analysis of Homeric ways to express the idea “A slayed B” in battle
scenes. He manages to demonstrate that these verses are built up in three stages: (1)
Central, more or less fixed components (e.g. the names of the slaying and the slain
hero) are (2) accompanied by a variable element (different verbs of killing) and, if
necessary, (3) the verse is further filled up with one or more “free elements” of little
significance (a particle or the like).5 Bakker has undertaken similar investigations,
especially concerning the usage of expressions with spears and suchlike weapons in
the dativus instrumenti in killing scenes.6
I applied a similar approach to the study of descriptions of arrow fighting in
the MBh (Sellmer 2015); here, an attempt will be made to use the concept that
Bakker calls “nuclear and peripheral semantics”, in a modified manner, to the study
of word meanings. In order to be able to deal with different levels of centrality in
relation to the main idea of a sentence I propose to introduce the notion of “semantic
weight”: The central elements of a proposition (or part of a proposition) expressed
in a verse (or pāda) have maximal semantic weight, a mere empty filler has none
(which does not imply, of course, that a filler has no meaning at all, it certainly has;
but this meaning is of minimal importance in the given context, making one “light”
word easily replaceable by another, metrically more convenient one); and there is a
“weight class” in between the extreme points, like the different Homeric verbs with
the meaning “to kill”: the notion of killing is basic, but the importance of the seman-
tic differences between the verbs realizing this notion are rather small. Already in
1973, Vasil’kov introduced a somewhat similar distinction between basic and addi-
tional, semantically “neutral” formulaic elements at the end of a pāda.7

5 See the summary in Visser 1987: 331–336.

6 Bakker 1991; 2005: ch. 8. For a cognate, but linguistically more sophisticated new approach
see Bozzone 2014.
7 Vasil’kov 1973: 5; for a critical discussion see Sellmer 2015: section 3.2.
452 sven sellmer

2 The evidence
After these rather lengthy introductory remarks it is time to come to the evidence.
The percentage figures given below refer to the total number of the 1,524 occur-
rences of manas outside of compounds in the MBh8. Of these about 60% appear in
narrative passages, but this percentage varies considerably in the different groups
analysed below; furthermore, the dividing line between narrative and didactic pas-
sages is sometimes blurry. Consequently, the percentages and figures given in what
follows contain a certain margin of vagueness, but I am quite confident that this does
not affect the general picture.
In the following analysis the occurrences are arranged in groups according to
grammatical cases and syntactic roles. This is more than a convenient way of bring-
ing them in order because in many instances the single meanings (or aspects of
meanings) are remarkably closely connected with certain cases and roles. Next, the
use of manas in compounds will be recorded.
An attempt has been made to assess the typical semantic weight of the usages
in the singular subgroups, but this should be treated rather like an experiment. Most
importantly, it must be underscored that a given word or combination of words, even
when occurring in the same grammatical case, does not carry one fixed semantic
weight, but this weight depends on its role in the frame of the whole sentence. Nev-
ertheless, it is more often than not possible and justified to ascribe a typical semantic
weight to a particular usage of manas. This is because the large majority of occur-
rences in a given group appear in very similar roles and contexts.

2.1 Instrumental
The occurrences of manas in the instrumental case make up by far the largest group
in the MBh (38,4%, of which about 40% are found in non-narrative passages), there-
fore I start with them, distinguishing five subgroups:

2.1.1 Mind, body, speech

As a member of a well-attested and old group—speech, body, mind—9 the manas
is one of the three instruments of action: namely of the kind of action that is neither
speech nor outward behaviour. E.g., in one passage Mārkaṇḍeya teaches Yudhiṣṭhira
about the latter’s duties and finishes with the admonition:

8 Use has been made of the electronic BORI version, prepared by Muneo Tokunaga and revised
by John Smith. For specially designed, freely downloadable analytic tools and databases see
Sellmer 2015: section 1.2.3.
9 Cf. Schlerath 1974. The words used in the Mahābhārata are mostly vāc, karman and manas,
but vāc is in 10 instances replaced by gir, karman once by śarīra (1,56.23ab), in compounds
also by kāya.
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 453

Q1 karmaṇā manasā vācā sarvam etat samācara (3,189.27cd).

This usage is typical in the sense that the triad of action mostly occurs not in plain
narrative passages but in textual environments of a more or less didactic flavour
where the moral and religious aspects of certain actions, or of acting in general, are
discussed.
The question of semantic weight must be addressed on two levels: As an essential
member of the triad of organs of action, manas carries maximal semantic weight, but
only in this small context. The whole group of three, on the other hand, mostly has
a vague generalising meaning, just underscoring that all kinds of actions are meant.

2.1.2 “only/not even in the mind”

Apart from the combination with deeds of the two other kinds those done by the
manas also occur in two more specific contexts.
In the first one, what is going on in the manas is contrasted with (really or poten-
tially) spoken words, as in:
Q2 na sma kiṃ cid abhāṣanta manasā samapūjayan (7,118.49cd).

This usage is important as it shows the role of the concept of manas in distinguish-
ing between observable or audible, i.e., public, behaviour and things that go on only
privately.
Another trait of “manasic” actions emerges in several passages, where it is com-
bined with the particles na and api (“not even”). Typically, an action performed
manasā is (often only implicitly) contrasted with another action of the concrete,
physical kind, as in the following case, where Damayantī declares she has done no
wrong whatsoever to Nala, “not even with her manas”:
Q3 yathā nāsatkṛtaṃ kiṃ cin manasāpi carāmy aham (3,75.6cd).

This instance shows that action by manas here is seen as a kind of minimal action—
like in English expressions of the type “Don’t even dare to think of doing it!”—and
contrasted with another kind of action that is therefore in this context to be regarded
as action in the full sense: physical action happening in the world of physical things.
This comes close to the modern opposition of “just imagined” vs. “real” action
(leaving aside all philosophical implications of these words, of course).
As the fact of their being (or not being) done by manas constitutes the crucial
feature of the actions in question, manasā carries maximum semantic weight in pas-
sages like Q2 or Q3.
454 sven sellmer

2.1.3 “to go with the mind”

A special kind of action is expressed by the popular turn manasā + gam. The aim of
this going often is a human or divine person,10 as in the case of Mādrī and the Aśvins.
Kuntī tells her co-wife she should “think of a god” (cintaya daivatam—1,155.15) to
obtain offspring. So Mādrī “goes with her manas” to the twin gods, who then visit
her and beget two sons:
Q4 tato mādrī vicāryaiva jagāma manasāśvinau |
tāv āgamya sutau tasyāṃ janayām āsatur yamau || (1,115.16)

This example shows two things. Firstly, some kind of contact between the queen
and the gods is established by means of the manas because the divine twins react to
Mādrī’s request. Secondly, this contact is not of the bodily kind because afterwards
the Aśvins have to come in person (āgamya, without manasā) to fulfil the queen’s
wish.
If manasā would have to be regarded as making the difference between two
forms of going, one would have to assign maximum semantic weight to manas.
But it seems more appropriate to take manasā + gam as a fixed collocation though
probably not as an idiomatic turn in which manas would have entirely lost its proper
meaning. Are we losing much if we translate “she thought of”, according to Kuntī’s
formulation? Perhaps not, but the existence of the nominative transformation manas
+ gam seems to suggest that the manas retains a certain independence in the com-
binations with gam.
Regardless of its classification as collocation or idiom proper the combination
manasā + gam semantically belongs to the middle weight category.

2.1.4 Inner instrumental

The three usages just enumerated have to be clearly distinguished from a large num-
ber of incidents where manas in the instrumental is added to several verbs designat-
ing mental action in quite a broad sense: deliberating (cint with different prefixes),
contemplating (dhyai), deciding (niś­ci), wishing, wanting (iṣ, īps), remembering
(smṛ) etc., to name just the most frequent roots. The point here is never that the ac-
tion in question is done “by the manas” and not by some other instrument or faculty
(as in groups 2,1.1–2,1.3), manasā rather acts as a mere enlargement of the verb, as
a kind of “inner instrumental”, so to speak.11 Consider the following two examples
10 In addition to persons sometimes a place appears as the goal, seldom also a mental object, as
a wish, a sorrow etc. E.g., when Saṃvaraṇa meets Tapatī in the forest his longing is mixed
with worries which is expressed in the following way:
tāṃ ca dṛṣṭvaiva kalyāṇīṃ kalyāṇābhijano nṛpaḥ |
jagāma manasā cintāṃ kāmamārgaṇapīḍitaḥ || (1,160.32).
11 This expression may be new, but the parallels to the so-called “inner accusative”, as in va-
canaṃ brū etc., are quite striking, it seems to me.
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 455

where in both cases an act of deliberation takes place, once with added manasā, once
without:
Q5 vaidarbhīṃ tu tathāyuktāṃ yuvatīṃ prekṣya vai pitā |
manasā cintayām āsa kasmai dadyāṃ sutām iti || (3,94.27);
Q6 tasya tad vacanaṃ śrutvā kṛpāśīlasya sā sarit |
cintayām āsa kauravya kiṃ kṛtaṃ sukṛtaṃ bhavet || (9,41.24).

In Q5, as in the majority of comparable instances, it is very difficult to detect if

manasā adds any special sense. Sometimes a nuance of intensity or privacy is con-
veyed in this manner,12 but, notwithstanding the difficulty of grasping the exact force
of manasā in each single case, it seems safe to say that its meaning generally is un-
specific and its semantic weight rather small.

2.1.5 adjective + manasā

In yet another, quite frequent usage manasā is combined with an adjective that de-
scribes the state of mind, i.e. most often the mood, but sometimes also the intention13
of the acting person at the time of her action. For a typical example of the first type
see Q7 where the combination of adjective + manasā can most easily be translated
by one single English word, “gladly”:
Q7 tāṃ prahṛṣṭena manasā rājamātedam abravīt (3,62.41ab).

If we compare it with verses like:

Q8 tataḥ praṇeduḥ pāñcālāḥ prahṛṣṭāḥ sādhu sādhv iti (App. I, 79.111 to 1,128.18),
we see that a pure adjective qualifying the subject gives just (or nearly) the same
sense. This shows that in such cases manasā is on the way to losing its meaning and
becoming a mere part of adverbial expressions so that the present usage definitely
belongs to the light weight category.
In an interesting case of parallel development a very similar adverbial construc-
tion gains popularity in late Latin; there, it is based on the ablativus modi of the noun
mens (the exact etymological equivalent of manas), i.e., mente, preceded by an ad-
jective. But this process has gone much further than in Sanskrit, leading to ­ment(e)
as general adverbial suffix in most Romanic languages, that is to say the resulting
adverb is no longer limited to describing the state of mind, the intention etc. of the
subject accompanying a certain action.14 The fact that, at least in the Mahābhārata,

12 These usages in the Mahābhārata seem to correspond quite closely to what Jahn (1987) calls
“prägnanter Gebrauch”.
13 As in cases like duṣṭena or pāpena manasā.
14 For an overview of the development and a short discussion of the relevant secondary litera-
ture cf. Hummel 2000: 461–470. More details can be found in Karlsson 1981.
456 sven sellmer

the adverbial turns with manasā are confined to the latter role implies that even in
them manas retains a certain force as a noun.

2.2 Manas as agent

The present group, making up almost 25% of all occurrences of manas, is formed
not of all instances where the word appears in the nominative case but only of those
where it plays the syntactic role of the agent, so passive constructions with manas
as grammatical subject are excluded here. In this semantic role the manas is not
concerned with the same activities that are connected with it in the instrumental:
deliberating, deciding, willing and the like. As a matter of fact, it is never used as the
subject of any transitive verb.

2.2.1 Manas as subject of mental events

In the majority of agent occurrences the manas appears as the subject of certain
emotional experiences (in a large sense). Here we have verbs like ram, sad (with pre-
fixes), śam, (sam­)muh, ud­vij, kamp, cal or vyath, that cover a large scale of positive
and negative emotional reactions. Sudeva, e.g., describes his feelings on seeing the
deserted Damayantī in her undeservedly unhappy state in the following way:
Q9 sukhārhāṃ duḥkhitāṃ dṛṣṭvā mamāpi vyathate manaḥ (3,65.20cd).

Most of these verbs occur also with a person as subject. In the following verse Vi-
dura gives Yudhiṣṭhira the advice not to care about defeats that are the result of
“undharmic” actions of the enemy:
10 nādharmeṇa jitaḥ kaś cid vyathate vai parājayāt (2,69.7cd).

Examples like this one suggest that the manas acts as a kind of pars pro toto place-
holder for the whole person.15 A closer look at the evidence shows that this con-
struction is often to be found in a specific communicative situation, namely when
someone is talking about his own feelings.16 With some verbs (like sad) this is the
rule, with others (e.g. ram) it is not.
In both groups the semantic weight of manas, which is middle, cannot be estab-
lished independently of the whole collocation.

15 A special case is the verb dṝ: a manas that “is bursting” (dīryate) can hardly stand for the
whole person. Most likely this expression is an analogical formation on the basis of the more
popular collocation hṛdayam + dīryate.
16 The narrative functions of the different “psychic organs” will have to be analysed in a more
comprehensive and detailed study. A model how to address such questions is Hayden Pellic-
cia’s brilliant study on this feature in the Homeric epics (Pelliccia 1995).
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 457

2.2.2 The mind goes out

Manas as agent is never connected with a transitive verb. Closest to a transitive con-
struction comes the nominative transformation of the idiom manasā gam (see 2.1.3):
in some cases the manas itself is said to “go” to an object, place or person.17 Playing
with the different ways of going, Bhīma tells Jaṭāsura the latter will not reach the
place his manas has already gone to, instead he will follow the same path as Baka
and Hiḍimba, i.e., he will die:
11 yaṃ cāsi prasthito deśaṃ manaḥ pūrvaṃ gataṃ ca te |
na taṃ gantāsi gantāsi mārgaṃ bakahiḍimbayoḥ || (3,154.36).

The very fact that the manas is able to “go” to persons and other material objects
implies that—at least at the time this expression was coined—it was not conceived
of as (in some sense) moving in a sphere of its own, in a kind of “inner space”, but
that it was thought to establish some kind of effective contact with the aims of its
movement, as we have already seen above in 2.1.3. On the other hand, the very point
of the quoted verse is based on the fact that the movements of the mind are quite
clearly distinguished from those of the person himself.
Concerning the extent to which it is idiomatic and the semantic weight of this
construction, the remarks made in 2.1.3 apply here, too.

2.2.3 State of mind

Another group of occurrences features instances where manas signifies, more gen-
erally, the mood or state of mind somebody is in. Several times this usage is to be
found in questions with kim and katham, as in the following verse where Janamejaya
wants to know how the Kauravas feel when the Pāṇḍavas are about to leave after the
first part of the dicing game:
12 anujñātāṃs tān viditvā saratnadhanasaṃcayān |
pāṇḍavān dhārtarāṣṭrāṇāṃ katham āsīn manas tadā || (2,66.1).

This collocation falls into the middleweight category.

2.3 Manas as patient

The occurrences of manas as patient are slightly less frequent than the ones as agent:
about 24,2%. Here, too, a functional approach is applied, so that both accusatives
and nominatives in passive constructions are included in this group.18

17 This movement is extremely quick, the mind manages to be “with” its objects almost imme-
diately, therefore the manas (sometimes together with the wind) serves in comparisons as the
prime example of utmost swiftness (cf. the popular compound mano­java).
18 In the latter case there is a certain margin of uncertainty because sometimes it is not clear if a
given form should be considered passive or medium (e.g. tapyate).
458 sven sellmer

2.3.1 The affected manas

In 2.2.1 the manas appeared as the centre of emotions which are ascribed to manas
as subject. In the present group this centre is passively affected by persons, shocking
or joyous events etc. Sometimes exactly the same roots (especially kamp and vyath)
are used in both kinds of constructions, in the first case as simple verbs, in the latter
as causatives. Compare for instance Q10 with the following example where Duryo-
dhana talks about the effect it has on him when Draupadī and the other women laugh
at his embarrassing behaviour in the Pāṇḍavas’ new hall:
Q13 draupadī ca saha strībhir vyathayantī mano mama (2,46.30cd).

The remarks made in 2.2.1 concerning the semantic weight of manas generally apply
here too.

2.3.2 The manas employed

But the manas is not only affected by outward forces. The subject itself also may
control, or employ, its manas in a certain way. This act of controlling is expressed
by the very popular idioms dhā and kṛ + manas which together form the bulk of
occurrences of manas as direct object. In combination with prati + accusative, with
dative, locative or infinitive they are mostly used to express the fixing of attention,
the forming of an intention or the undertaking of a decision. To quote just two ex-
amples out of many, Vyāsa’s decision to practice asceticism and Savitṛ’s decision to
marry Tapatī to Saṃvaraṇa are expressed in the following verses:
Q14 sa mātaram upasthāya tapasy eva mano dadhe (1,57.70ab),
Q15 tasmai dātuṃ manaś cakre tapatīṃ tapanaḥ svayam (1,160.20cd).

But the “managing” of the manas can also extend to the emotional sphere, as in the
formula:
Q16 mā … śoke manaḥ kṛthāḥ

In view of the idiomatic character of the combinations in question it would be point-

less to try to assess the semantic weight of manas in it. But the idiom as a whole
belongs quite clearly to the middle weight category. E.g., the adhortation “Don’t be
sad!” (as in Q16) is, without discernible difference in meaning, also expressed with
the help of the simple verb śuc, as in mā śocīḥ/śocaḥ/śoca.

2.4 Locative
The locative of manas can be found exactly a hundred times, which equals 6,6%
of all occurrences of the word. About 60% of the locatives belong to didactic envi-
ronments, but, as pointed out in the introduction, only the narrative passages are of
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 459

interest here. In these, the manas serves as a kind of “inner space” of consciousness,
wherein certain thought contents, wishes, decisions and the like are located (often
using the verbs sthā or vṛt). This location sometimes carries the implication of in-
tense interest, as in the combination with kṛ, which comes close to the English idiom
“take to heart”. Thus Lomaśa pleads Muṣaka to forgive any former wrongdoings of
his in this manner:
Q17 yac ca kiṃ cin mayājñānāt purastād vipriyaṃ kṛtam |
na tan manasi kartavyaṃ kṣamaye tvāṃ prasīda me || (12,136.99).

In some instances the fact that the content is said to be in the manas implies its inac-
cessibility to other persons. In these cases we often find a verbum dicendi in the near
context by which the act of revealing this “hidden’ content is expressed. Consider
e.g. the following verse where Vyāsa urges Dhṛtarāṣṭra to speak out what he “has in
mind” in order to remove his doubts:
Q18 vaicitravīrya nṛpate yat te manasi vartate |
abhidhatsva yathākāmaṃ chettāsmi tava saṃśayam || (6,4.14).

When some content is located in the manas for a longer period of time it may be
said to be “stored”. And with the manas as a “storage place” we come close to the
meaning of “memory”, as in the following verse where Bhīṣma is said to know
Itihāsas and Purāṇas and to have the whole of the Dharmaśāstra permanently “in
the manas”:
19 itihāsapurāṇaṃ ca kārtsnyena viditaṃ tava |
dharmaśāstraṃ ca sakalaṃ nityaṃ manasi te sthitam || (12,50.34)

All of these collations containing manas in the locative are of middle semantic
weight.

2.5 Genitive
The genitive is even rarer than the locative (5,6%, of which about 57% belong to
non-narrative passages). For the meanings of the word manas, these occurrences
do not provide any new information because the large majority of them consist in
combinations of manas with nouns based on the same roots that are found with the
nominative, accusative and instrumental case. To quote just one example each:
460 sven sellmer

genitive other cases

instr.:
manasaḥ … īpsitam manasepsitam
acc.:
manasaḥ … priyam22 vikramādhigatā hy arthāḥ kṣatra­
dharmeṇa jīvataḥ | mano manuṣyasya
sadā prīṇanti puruṣottama || (5,88.78)
nom.:
yataḥ prāptaḥ saṃjayaḥ pāṇḍavebhyo eṣā me paramā śāntir yayā śāmyati me
na me yathāvan manasaḥ praśāntiḥ manaḥ (5,52.15ab)
(5,33.12ab)

In most genitive occurrences manas is of little semantic weight.19

2.6 Compounds
Apart from being used independently, manas also appears in quite a large number
of compounds. From a formal point of view these can be divided into two groups
of more than 60 members each, depending on the position of manas: initial or final.

2.6.1 Manas as first member

The first group could of course be further analysed, but for our purpose the main
point is that for most of the occurrences parallels may be found among the indepen-
dent usages, so that nothing new can be learned from them concerning the semantics
of manas. In the following small table examples of compounds are paired with the
corresponding independent usages:
compounds manas in different cases
mano­vāk­kāya­ceṣṭita instr.: karmaṇā manasā vācā sarvam etat samācara
(= Q1)
manas­tuṣṭi nom.: ātureṣv api kāryeṣu tena tuṣyati me manaḥ
(13,124.18cd)
mano­hara acc.: darśanād eva hi śubhe tvayā me ’pahṛtaṃ manaḥ
(1,65.13ab)

19 It is a notable fact that in about one third of the genitive instances there is to be found a
connection with joy and things dear or desired (in many cases expressed with the help of the
root prī). To a certain extent this is due to the recurring formulaic elements manasaḥ prītivar­
dhanān/āh/īm and te manasa īpsitam.
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 461

manasi­stha loc.: bravīṣi yad idaṃ karṇa sarvaṃ me manasi sthitam

(3,227.2ab)
manaḥ­priya gen.: hitvā sukhaṃ manasaś ca priyāṇi (5,29.12a)

2.6.2 Manas as final member

In the second group of compounds, with manas as the final member, we almost
exclusively find adjectival karmadhārayas with an adjective or past participle in
the initial position20 (i.e., apart from the very common prefix compounds su­manas,
dur­manas and vi­manas, which are already lexicalized and are therefore of lesser
interest for the understanding of the word manas in the Mahābhārata.) From a se-
mantic angle we can further distinguish two subgroups:

2.6.2.1 Adjective qualifies manas

In the smaller one, the first member refers unequivocally to manas, as in compounds
like mahā­manas or bṛhan­manas.21 This implies a distinction between the person
and the manas (of a certain kind or quality) he or she “has”. Accordingly, manas is an
indispensable part of the conveyed information and in this sense carries maximum
semantic weight—but only as a member of the compound, while the compound it-
self is often added without any special weight, as a freely used epithet.

2.6.2.2 Adjective qualifies person-cum-manas

This is differently in the second group, where the adjective used may as well refer di-
rectly to the person characterized by the compound. Here, manas has a similar posi-
tion as in the adverbial usage adjective + manasā (2.1.5). This is clearly visible when
we compare a sentence of the present type with two verses cited above; here, no
difference in meaning between the various expressions for “glad(ly)” can be found:
Q20 sarve prahṛṣṭamanasaḥ sādhu sādhv ity apūjayan (1,35.1cd)
Q8 tataḥ praṇeduḥ pāñcālāḥ prahṛṣṭāḥ sādhu sādhv iti
Q7 tāṃ prahṛṣṭena manasā rājamātedam abravīt

20 In addition there is to be found a handful of compounds of the type infinitive + manas. Their
scarcity is rather remarkable in view of their great popularity in later literature.
21 This is also true for the curious compound ati­manas in 5,178.9ab: tatas taṃ nātimanasaṃ
samudīkṣyāham abruvam, where van Buitenen translates “Perceiving him to be not too irate
I said …” If the chosen reading of the CE and the translation is correct, manas would, in this
one compound, come closer in meaning to its Homeric counterpart μένος (“spirit, passion”).
But the case is doubtful because the word is absent in the dictionaries.
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3 Conclusion
As has been mentioned before, the full picture about manas will only emerge against
the backdrop of the whole semantic field. Nevertheless, it is time to summarize the
results reached in this paper, draw some preliminary conclusions, and venture a few
hypotheses.
As to the range of meaning of manas, I have, expectedly, nothing to add to the
major dictionaries, but would propose an arrangement that is perhaps a little more
transparent than the ones offered in those works.22 According to the foregoing inves-
tigations the meanings of manas can be organized around four central notions:
1. instrument in connection with acts of deliberating, willing, deciding and the
like;
2. instrument in connection with imagination and thought when these are mov-
ing towards their objects;
3. centre and/or subject of emotional events (sometimes as pars pro toto expres-
sion for the whole person);
4. “inner” space of consciousness.
It is notable that most of these groups are rigidly associated with specific grammat-
ical cases. The first is restricted to the instrumental; the second to the instrumental
and nominative; the third and the fourth to the nominative and accusative; the fifth to
the locative. As to the remaining cases, the genitive replaces nominative, accusative
and instrumental in several nominal expressions; the ablative occurs only a handful
22 The picture is of course richer in the dictionaries because they are not restricted to the usage
in the Mahābhārata. The PW s.v. gives as the main meaning “Sinn, als weite Bezeichnung
für geistiges Vermögen, sowohl das Empfinden und Vorstellen als das Wollen einschliessend”
[mind, broadly understood as the mental faculty, including sensitivity and imagination, and
also volition], distinguishing five further “Modificationen der Bedeutung” [modifications of
meaning]: a) “das Denken, Vorstellen; Verstand, Geist” [thinking, imagining; reason, mind];
b) “das Erdenken, Ersinnen, Nachdenken” [thinking up, thinking about]; c) “Wunsch, Wille,
Geneigtheit” [wish, will, inclination]; d) “Lust, Verlangen, Streben, Trieb” [desire, longing,
striving, drive]; e) “Gesinnung, Stimmung” [attitude, mood].—Monier-Williams (1899: s.v.)
distinguishes three meanings: 1. “mind (in its widest sense as applied to all the mental pow-
ers), intellect, intelligence, understanding, perception, sense, conscience, will”; 2. “the spirit
or spiritual principle, the breath or living soul which escapes from the body at death”; 3.
“thought, imagination, excogitation, invention, reflection, opinion, intention, inclination, af-
fection, desire, mood, temper, spirit” (to the last group is added a useful list of collocations
and idioms, arranged according to the cases in which manas appears).—Apte (1924: s.v.)
gives a list of twelve meanings: “1. The mind, heart, understanding, perception, intelligence
[…] 2. (In phil.) The mind or internal organ of perception and cognition, the instrument by
which objects of sense affect the soul […] 3. Conscience, the faculty of discrimination or
judgement. 4. Thought, idea, fancy, imagination, conception […] 5. Design, purpose inten-
tion. 6. Will, wish, desire, inclination […] 7. Reflection. 8. Disposition, temper, mood. 9.
Spirit, energy, mettle. […] 11. Breath or living soul. […] 12. Desire, longing after.”
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 463

of times, exclusively in non-narrative passages;23 the dative and vocative are not
attested at all.
It seems possible to detect a certain logic behind some of these links. Intentional
mental activity, like deliberating, is more strictly controlled by the subject than emo-
tional events. So it is appropriate that the manas serves as a mere instrument in in-
stances of type 1, but, in accordance with its role as grammatical subject, somewhat
independently in type 3. The least characteristic usage of manas is in the locative; it
may have appeared due to the influence of the words hṛd, hṛdaya and ātman which
are, in similar contexts, very often used in this grammatical case. But this and other
questions of the relation of manas to the other words of the semantic field of the
mental must be left to future investigations.
Nevertheless, even now it can be said that manas probably does not form part of
a closed system of “mental” formulae comparable to what we find in the Homeric
epics. As far as I can see, such a system has just not developed in the Sanskrit epics;
this is perhaps due to the less rigid metrical requirements and to the greater richness
in synonyms of epic Sanskrit in comparison to Homeric Greek. But what can be
observed is the tendency of manas in several collocations and in certain usages—es-
pecially in the quasi-adverbial ones—to lose its semantic weight, which is illustrated
in the table below. This weight loss increases its usefulness for the oral poet as a part
of alternative expressions (second column) or even as a more or less freely usable
filler in certain contexts (third column). But formulaic and stereotyped usages are
only part of the picture; the word appears frequently in five (though not in all) gram-
matical cases in various metrical positions and in connection with an astonishing
number of verbs (over 200, including the prefixed ones). All this points to the fact
that manas—together with hṛd, hṛdaya, buddhi, citta and other words—belongs to a
versatile repertoire of expressions the bards used to depict the mental and emotional
life of their heroes.

23 Here also (like in the case mentioned in note 16), these stray occurrences probably are due to
the influence of more numerous expressions containing hṛdaya.
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“SEMANTIC WEIGHT” OF USAGES OF MANAS IN DIFFERENT

GRAMMATICAL CASES AND SYNTACTIC ROLES
Semantic Weight
High Middle Low
instr. member of triad deed- [adj. + manasā] [triad deed-speech-
speech-mind mind]
[manasā gam]
Q2 Q5 (inner instrumen-
tal)
Q3
subj. pars pro toto
[manas + gam]
[katham/kim + manas]
[manas … sīdati]
dir. obj. [manas + kṛ/dhā]
pars pro toto (Q13)
loc. [manasi + sthā/vṛt
etc.]

gen. īpsitaṃ te manasaḥ

manasaḥ prītivardhan
comp. element of bṛhan­ element of prahṛṣṭa­
manas manas

Remarks:
On the horizontal axis usages of manas and collocations/idioms containing that word
are experimentally arranged according to semantic weight. Of the different groups
to be found in the table more or less representative examples have been chosen, and
the scale on top refers only to occurrences of a given type, not to all occurrences of
manas in, say, the instrumental case (see above section 2). Collocations and idioms
containing manas are put into square brackets.
 Aspects of Manas in the Mahābhārata 465

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