Atharva Veda info request

[Madhav Deshpande]

        For Shaunakiiya Atharvaveda, a few years ago (1980) there were two
reciters in Varanasi, Narayan Shastri Ratate and one more whose name
escapes me.  I visited Pt. Ratate and got hold of a manuscript of the
Shaunakiiya Caturaddhyayikaa.  Mr. Ratate is now gone, but I hear that his
son is continuing the tradition.
        I am currently editing three manuscripts, two of the Jatapatha and
one of Kramapatha for the Shaunakiiya AV, and as far as I know there is no
one alive who can recite these VikRtipathas.
        All the best,
                                Madhav Deshpande

On Thu, 30 Oct 1997, Frederick M. Smith wrote:

> To the best of my knowledge, there is nobody in Gokarna who knows the
> Saunakiya AV, or any other AV "saakhaa. And I would venture to guess the
> same is the case in Varanasi. A few vaidikas may know a few mantras, but
> the last of the "Saunakiiyas, in Gujarat, may be gone by now (to fiveness).
> A taperecording of this text was made several years ago (in Gujarat) by the
> Tirupati Devasthanam and is on file there, though it is virtually
> impossible to get (I have tried). The IGNCA also has a copy of this
> recording, but the procedural problems there are nearly as forbidding. I am
> currently working on a proposal which would enable copying the material in
> Tirupati. (Ask me in a year what has come of it).
>
> Fred Smith
>
> Frederick M. Smith
> Assoc. Prof. of Sanskrit and Classical Indian Religion
> School of Religion - 314 Gilmore Hall
> Department of Asian Languages and Literature - 653 Phillips Hall
> University of Iowa
> Iowa City, IA  52242  U.S.A.
> + 319-335-2178 (O)
> + 319-338-7193 (H)
> fsmith at blue.weeg.uiowa.edu
>