The Branches of the Samaveda

The lineage of the teachers who promoted the branches of the Samaveda Samaveda The Veda of Melodies and Chants. is provided in the Vishnu Purana One of the eighteen major Puranas, a sacred Hindu text focusing on the deity Vishnu and containing genealogical and cosmological records. (Book 3, Chapter 6) as follows: Jaimini, Sumantu, and Sukarma successively studied and taught the Samaveda Samhita. Sukarma, the grandson of Jaimini, had two disciples named Hiranyanabha and Paushpinji. Among them, the fifteen disciples of Hiranyanabha, a resident of the Kosala region, became famous as the "Eastern Chanters of the Sama" original: "प्राच्यसामग" (prācyasāmaga). Through the twenty-four disciples of the sage Kriti (who was among them), many branches of the Samaveda were established. Paushpinji, the other disciple of Sukarma, had four principal disciples named Lokakshi, Kuthumi, Kusidi, and Languli. According to the opinion of the Vishnu Purana, the Samaveda had 1,000 branches shakhas Literally "branches"; these represent different recensions or schools of Vedic tradition.. According to Durgacharya, the commentator on the Nirukta An ancient treatise on etymology and lexicography by Yaska., the Samaveda was also divided into a thousand branches.

Thus, according to the records in texts like the Charanavyuha A text detailing the various schools and branches of the four Vedas., there are 1,131 or 1,137 branches of the four Vedas. The Charanavyuha mentions these seven principal branches of the Samaveda: Ranayaniya, Shathya, Mugdha, Kalaya, Mahakalaya, Shardula, Langulyayana, and Kauthuma. The Asurayana, Vatayana, Pranjali, Dvaitabhrita, Prachinyogya, and Naigeya are merely sub-branches included within the Kauthuma branch. The Kauthuma branch is prevalent in Gujarat, the Jaiminiya branch in Karnataka, and the Ranayaniya branch in the Maharashtra region. In the Bengal region, Brahmins of Samavedic branches other than the Kauthuma are not found.

“The branch of the Samaveda tree was Jaimini, the disciple of Vyasa. Hear from me, O Maitreya, the sequence in which he divided it. (1)
His son was Sumantu, and Sukarma was his son. These two great sages each studied one collection. (2)
Then his son Sukarma made a thousand divisions of that collection. His two highly intelligent disciples then received them: (3)
Hiranyanabha of Kosala and Paushpinji, the best of the twice-born. The fifteen disciples from them are remembered as the Northern Chanters. (4)
Lokakshi, Kuthumi, and also Kusidi and Languli.”
original Sanskrit verse: "सामवेदतरो: शाखा व्यासशिष्य: स जैमिनि:..."

* According to the statement of the Great Sage Patanjali, there are 101 branches of the Yajurveda, 1,000 of the Samaveda, 21 of the Rigveda, and 9 branches of the Atharvaveda. ** "One hundred and one branches for the practitioners of the Yajurveda; the Samaveda has a thousand paths. Twenty-one for the Rigveda, and the Atharva Veda is nine-fold." — From the Mahabhashya original: "एक शतमध्वर्यु शाखा सहस्र वर्त्मा सामवेद ।... महाभाष्ये"