[INDOLOGY] Female authors of vedic hymns.

[Harry Spier]

I have been provided information off-list that suggests the answer is no.

1)
Stephanie Jamison holds that there is no real reason to believe that this
attribution, found in the *anukramaṇīs*, is accurate.
"The Anukramai)T attributes a few hymns to females, for example XIII.91 to
Aplila
Atreyi and X.39-40 to Gho~a Kak~Ivati, but these ascriptions are derived
from the
personnel depicted in the hymn itself. There is no reason to assume that
the poet
was female in these cases. A particularly egregious example is the
attribution of the
very interesting X.l09 to Juhii Brahmajaya, or "Sacrificial Ladle, Wife of
Brahma [/
the brahmin]," based on the appearance of both those terms in the text."
p 59, Jamison, S. W., & Brereton, J. P. (2014). *The Rigveda: the earliest
religious poetry of India.* New York: Oxford University Press.

2) Michael Witzel's article : Female Rishi's and Philoso[hers in the Vedas
I'm attaching the article (Note: I also found the Harvard DASH link to this
article but I get a PDF error when I click on the Harvard link)

Harry Spier

On Sat, Jun 6, 2020 at 7:25 PM Dean Michael Anderson via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info> wrote:

>
> There is Vagambhrini from RV 10.125.
>
> I'm not sure if Apala(8.91)is considered a rishi or not although in the
> hymn she has the kind of visionary experience attributed to Rishis.
>
> There are others who are mentioned or who speak and thus could be
> considered rishis but I don't have the Anukramini close to hand and I'm not
> sure what the tradition is regarding them.
>
> They include Romasha, Lopamudra, Kadru, Visvavara, Ghosha, Juhu, Paulomi,
> Yami, Indrani, Savitri, and Devayani according to Wikipedia.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rishi
>
> Hopefully, others are better informed about this. It's an interesting
> question.
>
> Best,
>
> Dean
>
> On Sunday, June 7, 2020, 3:31:40 AM GMT+5:30, Harry Spier via INDOLOGY <
> indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
>
>
> Dear list members,
> Are any vedic hymns attributed to female authors?
> If so names and hymn references would be appreciated.
> Thanks,
> Harry Spier
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