यम m. m. a rein, curb, bridle,
[RV. v, 61, 2] a driver, charioteer,
ib. viii, 103, 10वाचाम् the act of checking or curbing, suppression, restraint (with , restraint of words, silence),
[BhP.] नियम self-control forbearance, any great moral rule or duty (as
opp. to , a minor observance; in
[Yājñ. iii, 313] ten
यमs are mentioned, sometimes only five),
[Mn.] ;
[MBh.] &c.
(in
योग) self-restraint (as the first of the eight
अङ्गs or means of attaining mental concentration),
[IW. 93] any rule or observance,
[PārGṛ.] यम mfn. mf(आ॑ or ई॑)n. twin-born, twin, forming a pair,
[RV.] &c. &c.
यम m. m. a twin, one of a pair or couple, a fellow (
du. ‘the twins’
N. of the
अश्विन्s and of their twin children by
माद्री, called
नकुल and
सह-देव;
यमौ मिथुनौ, twins of different sex),
ib.a symbolical
N. for the number ‘two’
[Hcat.] संगमनो जनानाम् N. of the god who presides over the
पितृs (
q.v. ) and rules the spirits of the dead,
[RV.] &c. &c.,
[IW. 18; 197, 198 &c.] ;
[RTL. 10; 16; 289 &c.] (he is regarded as the first of men and born from
विवस्वत्, ‘the Sun’, and his wife
सरण्यू; while his brother, the seventh
मनु, another form of the first man, is the son of
विवस्वत् and
संज्ञा, the image of
सरण्यू; his twin-sister is
यमी, with whom he resists sexual alliance, but by whom he is mourned after his death, so that the gods, to make her forget her sorrow, create night; in the
वेद he is called a king or , ‘the gatherer of men’, and rules over the departed fathers in heaven, the road to which is guarded by two broad-nosed, four-eyed, spotted dogs, the children of
शरमाq.v. ; in Post-vedic mythology he is the appointed Judge and ‘Restrainer’ or ‘Punisher’ of the dead, in which capacity he is also called
धर्मराज or
धर्म and corresponds to the Greek Pluto and to Minos; his abode is in some region of the lower world called
यम-पुर; thither a soul when it leaves the body, is said to repair, and there, after the recorder,
चित्र-गुप्त, has read an account of its actions kept in a book called
अग्र-संधाना, it receives a just sentence; in
[MBh.] यम is described as dressed in blood-red garments, with a glittering form, a crown on his head, glowing eyes and like
वरुण, holding a noose, with which he binds the spirit after drawing it from the body, in size about the measure of a man's thumb; he is otherwise represented as grim in aspect, green in colour, clothed in red, riding on a buffalo, and holding a club in one hand and noose in the other; in the later mythology he is always represented as a terrible deity inflicting tortures, called
यातना, on departed spirits
; he is also one of the 8 guardians of the world as regent of the South quarter; he is the regent of the
नक्षत्रअप-भरणी or
भरणी, the supposed author of
[RV. x, 10; 14] , of a hymn to
विष्णु and of a law-book;
यमस्या-र्कःN. of a
सामन्,
[ĀrṣBr.] )
N. of the planet Saturn (regarded as the son of
विवस्वत् and
छाया),
[Hariv.] ;
[BhP.] of one of
स्कन्द's attendants (mentioned together with
अति-यम),
[MBh.] -दूतक a crow,
[L.] (
cf. )
a bad horse (whose limbs are either too small or too large),
[L.] यम n. n. a pair, brace, couple,
[L.] (in gram.) a twin-letter (the consonant interposed and generally understood, but not written in practice, between a nasal immediately preceded by one of the four other consonants in each class),
[Prāt.] ;
[Pat.] on
[Pāṇ. 1-1, 8] pitch of the voice, tone of utterance, key,
[Prāt.]