During creation, the veda emerged from the creator’s mouth and had four padas including Rik and consisted of a lakh of granthas. One granth equals 32 characters. From vedas were created yajnas. Later Vyasa divided the veda into 4. Brahma asked Vyasa to do so. Vyasa chose 4 disciples who could see the other side of the vedas. He chose Paila to study the Rigveda, Vaishambaya for Yajurveda, Jaimini for Samaveda and Sumantu for the Adharvaveda. He also made the suta Romaharshana his disciple for the puranas. Vyasa further split the Yajurveda into 4, according to 4 kriyas – Chaturhotra. He decided upon the kriyas for Adharyu using Yajus, Hota with Rik, Udgata with Sama and Brahma with Adharva. With Riks he made Rigveda, with Yajus he made the Yajurveda, Samas Samaveda. With Adharvaveda he narrated the deeds of kings and Brahma’s kriyas.

Paila split the Rigveda into samhitas and gave one each to Indrapramati and Bashkala. Bashkala split his samhita into 4 and taught Bodhi, Adimaddhaka, Yajnavalkya, Parashara. Indrapramati taught his entire samhita to his son Mandukeya. In this dynasty was born Vedamitra in the Shakalyagotra. He split the samhita into 5 and taught Mulgala, Gomukha, Vatsya, Shaliya, Sharira. Shakapurna, who studied with Vedamitra split the samhita into 3 and added a fourth part. This was taught to Krauncha, Vaitalika, and Balaka. Bashkala split his samhita further into 3 and taught them to Kalayani, Gargya, Kathajava. All of the above were the Rigvedis.

Vyasa’s disciple Vaishambayana split the Yajurveda into 27 partsand taught his disciples including Yajnavalkya, son of Brahmarata. From him originated the Thaithiriya shakha. Once all the sages took a decision regarding the vedas. The sage who did not appear in the Brahmasamajas on Meru would get a brahmahatya curse. Once Vaishambayana was not able to attend it and had a curse on him. He called his disciples and asked them to take a vrat to get rid of it. Yajnavalkya volunteered to do the entire task himself. When he was asked for the reason, he said that the others did not have the spiritual energy required. Vaishambayana did not like this and asked Yajnavalkya to return everything that he had been taught. Yajnavalkya vomited his yajas in front of his guru and left. The remaining sages consumed the yajas by taking the form of Thithiri birds, and thus this branch of the vedas came to be known as Thaithariya and the sages, Thaithariyas. Later, even without Vaishambayana realising it, Yajnavalkya created the yajas named Ayatayama. After leaving his guru, Yaknavalkya began praying to Surya, who appeared as a horse. (vaji) Yajnavalkya asked for yajas that even his guru did not have, and thus Surya taught him the Ayatayamas. The sages who learned this later came to be known as Vajis. The Vaji branches amount to 15, all of which can trace their origins to Yajnavalkya.

Vyasa taught the Samaveda to Jaimini, whose son was Sumantu, and who in turn had a son named Sutva. They were both brilliant and practised a veda branch each. Sutva’s son Sukarma divided the Samaveda into a thousand branches. He had two disciples – Hiranyanabha (Kausalya) and Paushpinji. They both practised the entire set of branches. Hiranyanabha’s 500 disciples were from the north and were called Udichya (northern) Samaganmas. Another 500 disciples came from the east, learned 500 branches and were called  Prachya (eastern) Samaganmas. Paushpinji’s disciples were Lokakshi, Naudhami, Langali, Kakshivan. They, and their disciples split the branches even further. Kriti, a sage in Hiranyanabha’s set of disciples taught 24 samhitas to his own disciples.

Vyasa taught the Adharvaveda to Sumantu, who first taught it to his disciple Kabandha. Kabandha split it into 2 and taught it to his disciples Devadarsha, Padhya. Devadarsha’s disciples were Medha, Brahmabala, Shaulkayani, Pippilada. Padhya had 3 disciples Jabali, Kumudadi, Shaunaka, and each made his own samhita. Shaunaka split his samhita into two and gave it to Babhru and Saindhava. Munjikesha received it from Saindhava and split it first into two, and then three parts. His works Nakshatrakalpa, Vedakalpa, Samhitakalpa, Aangirasakalpa and Shantikalpa are part of the Adharva veda. The Nakshatrakalpa has the kriyas of Brahma, the Samhitakalpa contains mantras, the Aangirasakalpa has rituals and the Shantikalpa has Ashvagajadi shantis.

Vyasa made the purana samhita from Akhyana, Upakhyana, Gadha, Kalpanirnaya and taught them to the suta Romaharsha. Romaharsha had six disciples – Sumati, Agnivarchas, Mitrayus, Shamsapayana, Akritavarna, Savarni. The last three were born in kashyapa’s dynasty and had built puranasamhitas. A mulasamhita made by Romaharsha was the base for all of these. From these four was created the Vishnupurana. There are eighteen puranas – Brahma, Padma, Vaishnava, Shaiva, Bhagavata, Naradiya, Markandeya, Agneya, Bhavishya, Brahmavaivarta, Lainga, Varaha, Skanda, Vamana, Kaurma, Matsya, Garuda, Brahmanda. There are eighteen upapuranas too and they describe creation, pralaya, the dynasty of the devas, Manvantaras, royal dynasties, as per Vishnupurana Ansh 3 and Bhagavata Dwadashaskanda.