Georges Dumézil, Mitra-Varuna: An Essay on Two Indo-European Representations of Sovereignty, translated by Derek Coltman, edited by Stuart Elden, afterword by Veena Das – HAU books, December 2024

The book is now available for sale, in print or e-book via University of Chicago Press. HAU will make an open-access e-book available when they sell 200 copies. This is to recoup the costs of buying the rights to the translation (not to pay me as editor). If you’re in a position to buy the book or recommend to a library please do. The Introduction and Afterword are open access now.

The edition uses the existing translation by Derek Coltman, long out of print, and has a new critical apparatus and Introduction by me. There is a discussion of the editing work here. This is part of the work of my Mapping Indo-European thought in twentieth-century France research project, funded by the Leverhulme Trust.

A classic text that develops one prong of Dumézil’s tripartite hypothesis of Indo-European tribes: the sacred sovereign.
 
Georges Dumézil’s fascination with the myths and histories of India, Rome, Scandinavia, and the Celts yielded an idea that became his most influential scholarly legacy: the tripartite hypothesis, which divides Indo-European societal functions into three classes: the sacred sovereign, the warrior, and the producer. Mitra-Varuna, originally published in 1940, concentrates on the first function, that of sovereignty. Dumézil identifies two types of rulers, the first judicial and worldly, the second divine and supernatural. These figures, both priestly, are oppositional but complementary. The title nods to these roles, referring to the gods Mitra, a rational mediator, and Varuna, an awesome religious figure. 
 
Stuart Elden’s critical edition, based on the 1988 English translation by Derek Coltman, identifies variations between the first and second French editions and completes—and in places corrects—Dumézil’s references. The editor’s detailed introduction situates Mitra-Varuna within Dumézil’s career, outlines how his treatment of its themes developed over time, and relates the book to the political controversy around his ideas. Two new appendices contain passages that did not appear in the second French edition.