In Uttar Pradesh Brahmins have common surnames as Chaturvedi alias Chaubey, Dwivedi alias Dubey and Trivedi. Are these surnames which have "Vedi" included in them have something to do with the Vedas. There is common folklore that the Brahmins who know all four Vedas are known as Chaturvedi and those who knew three were called Trivedi and Dwivedi were who knew two Vedas. Is this folklore true if not how did they get such titles?
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1yes what u have heard seems correct– user17294Commented Mar 25, 2019 at 5:08
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is there any written proof of this in any books– codeczarCommented Mar 25, 2019 at 5:36
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i am sorry that i dont know.– user17294Commented Mar 25, 2019 at 5:38
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The answers to this question cover the surnames: hinduism.stackexchange.com/questions/6802/…– user1952500Commented Mar 25, 2019 at 6:20
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2From this ch. of the book Hindu Dharma: "We had a Trivedi, who was governor of one of our states. Duve and Dave are derived from Dvivedi. One descended from a family well versed in the four Vedas is called a Caturvedin. In Bengal he is called a Catterji. Those who have mastered three Vedas are Trivedins. Today it is rare to see a man who has learned even one Veda, but the fact that members of some families still call themselves Trivedins or Caturvedins show that in the past there must have been individuals who knew more than one Veda."– Say No To CensorshipCommented Mar 25, 2019 at 17:34
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1 Answer
Before they became surnames Dwivedi, Trivedi and Chaturvedi were probably titles given to people who have studied more than one Veda. So says Swami Harshananda in A Concise Encyclopaedia of Hinduism (Vol. 1):
dvivedī ('one [who has studied] two Vedas')
Started perhaps as the academic title of a person who has studied two Vedas (dvi = two) it gradually became the family title of persons born as his descendants.
Similarly, the evolution of the two other titles trivedī and caturvedī — for those who are the scions of the persons who had mastered three or four Vedas.
Study of one Veda was the minimum expected of every dvija or the twice-born.
In Hindu Dharma: The Universal Way of Life, Swami Chandrasekarendra Saraswati says the same about the origin of these titles:
I said that there was no bar on anyone learning more than one śākhā. Even today we find North Indians with appellations like Caturvedī, Trivedī and Dvivedī.
We had a Trivedī, who was governor of one of our states, Duve and Dave are derived from Dvivedī. One descended from a family well versed in the four Vedas is called a Caturvedin. In Beṅgāl he is called Catterjī. Those who have mastered three Vedas are Trivedins. Today it is rare to see a man who has learned even one Veda, but the fact that members of some families still call themselves Trivedins or Caturvedins show that in the past here must have been individuals who knew more than one Veda.
answered Mar 27, 2019 at 1:47
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2chatterjee comes from chattopadhyay. chatta plus upadhyay is chattopadhyay.Chatta has nothing to do with the four vedas.Chattopadhyay, Bandyopadhyay, Mukhopadhyay and Gangopahyay were made Chatterjee Banerjee Mukherjee and Ganguli most probably by the foreign invaders.– user17294Commented Mar 27, 2019 at 4:50
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1Guess the swami is wrong about Catterjī then. So it's derived from a village named Chaṭṭa? @Pratimaputra Commented Mar 27, 2019 at 17:44
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not known, but highly probable– user17294Commented Mar 27, 2019 at 17:45
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1Bengal had only Sudras and so there was no one to ritually worship the deities. This situation occurred after the collapse of Buddhism around 1000 ce. So the Pal dynasty imported 5 Brahmin families from Kannauj around 1040 ce. Each one of these families were given 1 village to settle. So Gangopadhyays are derived from one of these families who settled on the bank of Ganga. Local kings also sometimes declared a Sudra family Brahmin in order that they had someone to ritually worship the deities. This is the story I have heard. Commented Feb 20, 2021 at 6:28