"The Rigveda or Rig Veda (Sanskrit: ऋग्वेद ṛgveda, from ṛc "praise" and veda "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (sūktas). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (śruti) known as the Vedas.
The Rigveda is the oldest known Vedic Sanskrit text. Its early layers are among the oldest extant texts in any Indo-European language. The sounds and texts of the Rigveda have been orally transmitted since the 2nd millennium BCE. The philological and linguistic evidence indicates that the bulk of the Rigveda Samhita was composed in the northwestern region (see Rigvedic rivers) of the Indian subcontinent, most likely between c. 1500 and 1000 BCE, although a wider approximation of c. 1900–1200 BCE has also been given.
The text is layered consisting of the Samhita, Brahmanas, Aranyakas and Upanishads. The Rigveda Samhita is the core text, and is a collection of 10 books (maṇḍalas) with 1,028 hymns (sūktas) in about 10,600 verses (called ṛc, eponymous of the name Rigveda). In the eight books – Books 2 through 9 – that were composed the earliest, the hymns predominantly discuss cosmology, rites, rituals and praise deities. The more recent books (Books 1 and 10) in part also deal with philosophical or speculative questions, virtues such as dāna (charity) in society, questions about the origin of the universe and the nature of the divine, and other metaphysical issues in their hymns.
Some of its verses continue to be recited during Hindu rites of passage celebrations (such as weddings) and prayers, making it probably the world's oldest religious text in continued use."
(from Wikipedia)
Information about the author of the book "A Vedic Reader for Students", available below, is provided here. This may help readers to better evaluate the contents of the book.
"Arthur Anthony Macdonell, FBA (11 May 1854 – 28 December 1930) was a noted Sanskrit scholar.
Macdonell was born at Muzaffarpur in the Tirhut region of the state of Bihar in British India, the son of Charles Alexander Macdonell, of the Indian Army. He was educated at Göttingen University, then matriculated in 1876 at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, gaining a classical exhibition and three scholarships (for German, Chinese, and the Boden Scholarship for Sanskrit). He graduated with classical honours in 1880 and was appointed Taylorian Teacher of German (language) at Oxford. In 1883 he obtained his PhD from the University of Leipzig, and then became Deputy Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford in 1888, and Boden Professor of Sanskrit in 1899 (a post that carried with it a fellowship of Balliol College, Oxford).
Macdonell edited various Sanskrit texts, wrote a grammar, compiled a dictionary, and published a Vedic grammar, a Vedic Reader, and a work on Vedic mythology; he also wrote a history of Sanskrit."