The Vedic hymns were probably collected and arranged between 1000 and 500 B.C.  At that period rites and ceremonies multiplied and absorbed man’s mind to a degree unparalleled in the history of the world and literature occupied itself with the description or discussion of this dreary ceremonial.  Buddhism was a protest against the necessity of sacrifices and, though Buddhism decayed in India, the sacrificial system never recovered from the attack and assumed comparatively modest proportions.  But in an earlier period, after the composition of the Vedic hymns and before the predominance of speculation, skill in ceremonial was regarded as the highest and indeed only science and the ancient prayers and poems of the race were arranged in three collections to suit the ritual.  These were the Rig Veda, containing metrical prayers:  the Yajur Veda (in an old and new recension known as the Black and the White) containing formulae mainly in prose to be muttered during the course of the sacrifice:  and the Sama Veda, a book of chants, consisting almost entirely of verses taken from the Rig Veda and arranged for singing.  The Rig Veda is clearly older than the others:  its elements are anterior to the Brahmanic liturgy and are arranged in less complete subservience to it than in the Yajur and Sama Vedas.

The restriction of the words Veda and Vedic to the collection of hymns, though convenient, is not in accordance with Indian usage, which applies the name to a much larger body of religious literature.  What we call the Rig Veda is strictly speaking the mantras of the Rig Veda or the Rig-Veda-Samhita:  besides this, there are the Brahmanas or ceremonial treatises, the Aranyakas and Upanishads containing philosophy and speculation, the Sutras or aphoristic rules, all comprised in the Veda or Sruti (hearing), that is the revelation heard directly by saints as opposed to Smriti (remembering) or tradition starting from human teachers.  Modern Hindus when not influenced by the language of European scholars apply the word Veda especially to the Upanishads.

For some time only three[145] Vedas were accepted.  But the Epics and the Puranas know of the fourfold Veda and place the Atharva Veda on a level with the other three.  It was the manual of two ancient priestly families, the Atharvans and Angirasas, whose speciality was charms and prophylactics rather than the performance of the regular sacrifices.  The hymns and magic songs which it contains were probably collected subsequently to the composition of the Brahmanas, but the separate poems are older and, so far as can be judged from their language, are intermediate between the Rig Veda and the Brahmanas.  But the substance of many of the spells must be older still, since the incantations prescribed show a remarkable similarity to old German, Russian and Lettish charms.  The Atharva also contains speculative poems and, if it has not the freshness of the Rig Veda, is most valuable for the history of Indian thought and civilization.