''Trishtubh'' ( sa, त्रिष्टुभ्, ,

IAST The International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration (IAST) is a transliteration scheme that allows the lossless romanisation of Indic scripts as employed by Sanskrit and related Indic languages. It is based on a scheme that emerged during ...

: ) is a

Vedic metre Vedic metre refers to the metre (poetry), poetic metre in the Vedic literature. The study of Vedic metre, along with post-Vedic metre, is part of Chandas, one of the six Vedanga disciplines. Overview In addition to these seven, there are fourte ...

of 44 syllables (four padas of eleven syllables each), or any hymn composed in this metre. It is the most prevalent metre of the

Rigveda The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' ( ', from ' "praise" and ' "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (''śruti'') known as the Vedas. Only one Sh ...

, accounting for roughly 40% of its verses. The Trishtubh pada contains a "break" or caesura, after either four or five syllables, necessarily at a word-boundary and if possible at a syntactic break, followed by either three or two short syllables. The final four syllables form a

trochaic In English poetic metre and modern linguistics, a trochee () is a metrical foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one. But in Latin and Ancient Greek poetic metre, a trochee is a heavy syllable followed by a light one (al ...

cadence. For example RV 2.3.1: :' :' :' :' :"Agni is set upon the earth well kindled :he standeth in the presence of all beings. :Wise, ancient, God, the Priest and Purifier :let Agni serve the Gods for he is worthy." :(trans. Griffith; the translator attempts to imitate the meter in English) This is to be read metrically as follows, with marking the caesura and separating the cadence: : : : : The

Avesta The Avesta () is the primary collection of religious texts of Zoroastrianism, composed in the Avestan language. The Avesta texts fall into several different categories, arranged either by dialect, or by usage. The principal text in the litu ...

has a parallel stanza of 4x11 syllables with a caesura after the fourth syllable. Trishtubh verses are also used in later literature, its archaic associations used to press home a "Vedic" character of the poetry. The

Bhagavad Gita The Bhagavad Gita (; sa, श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता, lit=The Song by God, translit=śrīmadbhagavadgītā;), often referred to as the Gita (), is a 700- verse Hindu scripture that is part of the epic ''Mahabharata'' (c ...

, while mostly composed in

shloka Shloka or śloka ( sa, श्लोक , from the root , Macdonell, Arthur A., ''A Sanskrit Grammar for Students'', Appendix II, p. 232 (Oxford University Press, 3rd edition, 1927). in a broader sense, according to Monier-Williams's dictionary, is ...

(developed from the Vedic anushtubhMacdonell, Arthur A., ''A Sanskrit Grammar for Students'', Appendix II, p. 232(Oxford University Press, 3rd edition, 1927).) is interspersed with Trishtubhs. A particularly long section of Trishtubhs is chapter 11, verses 15-50.

Notes

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References

* E. V. Arnold, ''Vedic Metre in its Historical Development'', 1905 * E. W. Hopkins, ''The Great Epic of India'', 1901

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See also