Now the tiger has his domicile in the swampy land about Benares, to which point is come the Atharvan Aryan, but not the Rig Vedic people.

Here too, in the Atharvan, the panther is first mentioned, and for the first time silver and iron are certainly referred to.

In the Rig Veda the metals are bronze and gold, silver and iron being unknown.[22] Not less significant are the trees.

The ficus religiosa, the tree later called the 'tree of the gods' (_deva-sadana, acvattha_), under which are fabled to sit the divinities in heaven, is scarcely known in the Rig Veda, but is well known in the Atharvan; while India's grandest tree, the _nyagrodha_, ficus indica, is known to the Atharvan and Brahmanic period, but is utterly foreign to the Rig Veda.

Zimmer deems it no less significant that fishes are spoken of in the Atharvan and are mentioned only once in the Rig Veda, but this may indicate a geographical difference less than one of custom.