'The two Unfasteners.' The single most important find in this cluster: unlike the nakshatra lists, which name asterisms, the Atharvaveda here calls Vicṛtau explicitly तारके — 'the two stars' — the earliest Indian passage to name individual stars as stars. It occurs in four separate AV hymns (2.8.1, 3.7.4, 6.110.2, 6.121.3); in AV 3.7 and 6.121 the Wikisource sūkta headers give the deity of the verse as तारके. Macdonell & Keith, Vedic Index (1912) ii.295: 'Vicṛtau, "the two releasers"; Mula, "root"; or Mulabarhani, "uprooting," denote primarily λ and υ at the extremity of the tail of the Scorpion.' Sāyaṇa's bhāṣya on this verse glosses एतन्नाम्न्यौ तारके मूलनक्षत्रम्. Note that Vicṛtau also stands in the Mūla slot of the Taittirīya Saṃhitā 4.4.10 list itself.
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विचृतौ Vicṛtau
Shaula and Lesath (the Scorpion's sting) · λ & υ Scorpii · Scorpius
vedic asterismidentification certainattestations 3stars 2
Attestations
Ṛgveda & Vedāṅga Jyotiṣa · c. 1200–1000 BCE
उदगातां भगवती विचृतौ नाम तारके ।
वि क्षेत्रियस्य मुञ्चतामधमं पाशमुत्तमम् ॥१॥
Arisen are the (two) blessed stars called the Unfasteners (vicṛ́t); let them unfasten (vi-muc) of the kṣetriyá the lowest, the highest fetter. — W.D. Whitney, rev. C.R. Lanman (1905)
Atharvaveda (Śaunaka) 2.8.1 · text · translation
Ṛgveda & Vedāṅga Jyotiṣa · c. 1200–1000 BCE
अमू ये दिवि सुभगे विचृतौ नाम तारके ।
वि क्षेत्रियस्य मुञ्चतामधमं पाशमुत्तमम् ॥४॥
The two blessed stars named Unfasteners (vicṛ́t), that are yonder in the sky—let them unfasten of the kṣetriyá the lowest, the highest fetter. — W.D. Whitney, rev. C.R. Lanman (1905)
The Sanskrit Wikisource sūkta header for AV 3.7 assigns the deity of verse 4 literally as तारके ('the two stars') — 'दे. १-३ हरिणः, ४ तारके, ५ आपः'. Whitney's note on the passage discusses the identification with the Scorpion's sting.
Atharvaveda (Śaunaka) 3.7.4 · text · translation
Ṛgveda & Vedāṅga Jyotiṣa · c. 800–600 BCE
अमी ये सुभगे दिवि विचृतौ नाम तारके । प्रेहामृतस्य यच्छतामेतद्बद्धकमोचनम, इति ।
Those two blessed stars in the sky named the Unfasteners — may they come forth and grant immortality; this is the loosing of the bound one. — No public-domain English translation of the Taittirīya Āraṇyaka located; literal rendering supplied by the compiler (cf. Whitney's rendering of the near-identical AV 6.121.3)
The āraṇyaka attestation, in the Yajurvedic tradition rather than the Atharvavedic. Sāyaṇa quotes this exact verse (as तैआ २,६,१) in his commentary on AV 2.8.1 to prove that vicṛt is a synonym of the Mūla nakshatra. The same verse also stands at AV 6.121.3, and in the Paippalāda Saṃhitā kāṇḍas 1, 3 and 16.
Taittirīya Āraṇyaka 2.6 · text · translation