Pa'ta'ne Prabhus are returned as numbering 200 and as found only in the city of Poona. Only a few have been long settled in Poona. These, they say, came from Bombay about sixty years ago as clerks in Government offices, and after retiring from service settled in Poona with their families. The rest appear to have come also from Bombay as clerks within the last eighteen years and are not permanently settled in Poona. Poona Patane Prabhus have no subdivisions and deny that the Dhruv Prabhus belong to their caste. They say that they formerly had no surnames and that the fashion of using surnames has been introduced with the last twenty-five years. Their chief gotras
of family-stocks are Bharadvaj, Brahma-Janardan, Gargya, Gautam, Jamadagni, Mudgal, and Vashishth. The names in common use among men are Dhvarkanath, Moreshvar, Moroba, Sadanand, and Vishvanath; and among women, Hirabai, Nanibai, Sokarabai, and Sundarabai. The men are generally stoutly made and in height above the middle size with regular features; and the women are about the same size as the men, fair, and goodlooking. They speak purer Marathi than the Bombay Prabhus owing to their intercourse with Deccan Brahmans. The older residents own houses two storeys high with brick walls and tiled roofs, clean and well kept. They have servants, carriages, and horses as well as cows, parrots, or pigeons. Besides the ordinary Hindu cushions, carpets, and pillows, they keep in European style tables, benches, couches, chairs, chests of drawers, brass or wooden bedsteads, wardrobes, cabinets with ornamental knick-knacks, wall pictures, lamps, and chandeliers. Their cooking pots and eating and drinking vessels are generally metal. Their usual food is rice, wheat cakes, pulse, vegetables, fish, and mutton. Besides mutton the only animals they have no scruple
in eating are the wild hog, deer, and hare, and of birds the wood-pigeon, partridge, quail, and water-fowl. Their caste rules are against the use of any other animals. Their drink is milk, coffee, and the, liquor being forbidden them. They have two principal daily meals, one between nine and twelve in the morning, the other between seven and ten in the evening. A family of five living in comfort spend £5 to £10 (Rs. 50 -100) a month; the poorer families live on £2 to £3 (Rs. 20 - 30). The men dress in a waistcloth, waistcoat or coat, and the Maratha Brahman turban, and English or Marathi shoes. The women dress in a full Maratha robe with the skirt drawn back between the feet
and a tight-fitting bodice with a back and short sleeves. Out of doors and on ceremonial occasions they draw a shawl over the shoulders or head.
Most Poona Patane Prabhus are clerks in Government offices.
One is a teacher of drawing and plan-making in the Poona College
of Science, and another is a High Court pleader qualified to practise
as a solicitor in Bombay; a third is a retired broker. Their boys
attend the Government schools and colleges; some of them are
matriculated and one has taken the degree of Bachelor of Arts and
Bachelor of Laws. Some of them own houses and land, but most live
in hired houses paying monthly rents varying from 10s. to £2 10s.
(Rs. 5-25). Their house furniture is worth £50 to £100 (Rs.500-1000). Besides their every-day clothes they keep a store of rich
garments and of jwels worth £100 to £500 (Rs. 1000-5000). A
birth costs £10 to £40 (Rs. 100-400); a thread-girding £20 to £50
(Rs.200-500); the marriage of a son £150 to £400 (Rs.1500-4000),
the marriage of a daughter £100 to £500 (Rs. 1000-5000); a girl's
coming of age £10 to £20 (Rs. 100 - 200); a pregnancy £10 to £15
(Rs. 100-150); the death of an adult £10 to £30 (Rs. 100-800), and
the death of a child 10s. to £1 (Rs. 5-10).
Prabhu customs come under the six heads of marriage, pregnancy
birth, infancy, thread-girding, and death.
Marriage.
[Marriage, in Sanskrit, is technically called panigrahan or hand-holding, the popular Sanskrit word for marriage is vivaha or mutual taking, and the common Marathi word is lagin that is union. Among Prabhus the wedding months are Magh or January-February, Falgun or February-March, Vaishakh or April-May,
Jeshtha or May -June, and Margashirsha or November-December. If either the boy's or the girl's birthday falls in Jeshtha or May- June marriage in that month is risky and if it is the birth-month of both the marriage cannot take place. Marriage cannot be held when the planets Jupiter and Venus are hid, on any amavasya or no-moon, at the sankrants when the Dim passes from one zodiacal sign to another, or during the shinhast once in twelve years, when the planet Jupiter is in the constellation Leo.]
A child's marriage occupies its parents' thoughts from its earliest
days. The choice is limited to families of the same caste and among castefellows to families of a different stock or gotra. Boys generally marry between ten and sixteen; girls between four and eight. The only form of marriage now in use is Brahma-vivaha or the Braham wedding according to which, besides giving a dower, the bridegroom receives presents with his wife. The ceremonies connected with marriage last over many months, and involve the spending of the savings of years. They may be brought under three groups, those before, those on, and those after the wedding day. The first group includes eleven heads, offer of marriage, comparison of horoscopes,
goat-offering, day-naming, guest-asking, gift-making, booth and altar-building,
pot-buying, god-pleasing, and gift-making.
offer.
In families, who have a young daughter, the women of the house
fix on some boy as a good match. The family priest is sent for and
the girl's father, handing him her horoscope and naming the boy's
father, asks the priest to got to his house and offer the girl in
marriage. If he approves of the offer the boy's father gives the
priest one to two shillings, a cocoanut, and sugar, telling him to say that he has kept the horoscope without waiting to see if it agrees with his boy's. If not rich enough to meet the cost of his son's marriage, the father says the times are unsuitable. The priest asks if he would wish the girl's family to help. The father says help would be welcome, and between them they agree on the sum the father wishes to have. These are unusual cases. The common
practice is for the boy's father, without opening it, to place the horoscope either before the family gods, or in some other safe place.
Horoscopes.
After a day or two the father hands his boy's and the girl's horoscopes to his family priest to take to an astrologer. The astrologer compares their details and tells the priest whether or not they agree. The priest returns and tells the boy's father. A few days more and the girl's family priest comes to learn the boy's father's answer. If the horoscopes do not
agree the girl's is sent back, and the priest is told to say that the horoscopes do not agree. If the horoscopes agree, the priest leaves with a cocoanut and a handful of sugar.
Betrothal.
There is no betrothal. In most cases, after the boy's father has accepted the proposal and the horoscopes are found to agree, the first ceremony is the goat-offering.
Goat-offering.
A day or so before the astrologer has fixed the wedding day a child, escorted by a servant, is sent to ask a few married women relations to a feast in honour of the family goddess, and on the evening of the same day a young he-goat is bought. Early in the morning of the feast day a room on the ground-floor is smeared with cowdung, and on a high wooden stool, in a square marked off by lines of white quartz powder, the image of the family goddess is set and worshipped by the oldest man in the family. The goat is brought into the room and made to stand in front of the goddess. One of the married women of the family comes forward, washes the goat's feet and sprinkles redpowder on his head, and, after waving a lighted lamp round his face, retires. The eldest man in the family lays a bamboo winnowing fan with a handful or two of rice in it before the goat, and taking a sword stands on one side, and, while the goat is
eating the rice, with one stroke cuts off its head, and holding it up lets a few drops of blood trickle over the goddess, and then places the head in a metal plate under the goddess's stool. Except the head, which is left till the next day, the flesh of the goat is cooked and eaten. [In some families the goat-offering ceremony takes place at midnight on the day before the marriage and the goat's head is laid on the top of the marriage hall. In other families it is offered at the time of the planet-propitiation, when the blood is allowed to trickle on the cooked rice before it is left in the corner of the street. In some families the flesh is eaten on the first, and the head and feet on the second day. Again in some families, instead of a goat, a cock is offered, its neck cut, and the blood dropped on the goddess. As Prabhus do not eat domestic fowls the cock is given to a married woman of the Maratha Kunbi caste, who dresses it at her house, and eats some of it at the host's house with liquor. In other families no animal is sacrificed. The guests being feasted on sweet dishes either at the host's house or at a temple.]
Some day, about the same time as the goat-offering, the girl's parents send to the boy's house a present of fruit, sugar cakes, and other eatables. Like gifts are in return sent to the girl. [The details are: Twenty-five to fifty cocoanuts, twenty-five to fifty sugar-cakes eight or nine inches across, two or more legs of mutton, and ten or fifteen fish sprinkled with redpowder and turmeric.]
Day-naming.
The day-naming ceremony has two parts, a general fixing of the
day and a special religious rite. Two or three days after the exchange of presents the boy's parents send for their family priest
and ask him to find out lucky days and months. This he learns
from astrologers or other Brahmans, and partly on the priest's
advice partly on family grounds, the boy's father and mother, after
consulting the girl's family, fix one of two days.
One of these days, if the father of the girl approves, is chosen by
the boy's father for the day-fixing or tithi-nishchchaya. The day
before, the boy's family priest calls on the astrologer, and, on the
morning of the day, boys from both families are sent to ask near
relations. At the boy's home, about eight or nine in the evening
when the guests have come, the boy's father takes a basket or two
full of cocoanuts and sugar-cakes, and, with his guests the astrologer
the family priest and other Brahmans, goes to the girl's house.
Here they are met by the girl's father or some other elder and led
into the hall. The astrologer is seated in the midst of the company
with a lighted brass lamp, a slate and pencil, two blank sheets of
paper, pens, an inkstand, a ruler, a few grains of rice, and some
redpowder. He reads over both the horoscopes, sees under what
constellations the boy and girl were born, and by calculations on the
slate finds out the lucky days and hours. He then tells the elders
of both families the result, and with their consent fixes the marriage
day or tithi. When the day is fixed the astrologer draws up a
marriage paper, writing, after an invocation to Ganesh, the names of
the boy's grandfather father and mother, then in like order the
names of the girl and her relations, their family, the date of the boy's
and girl's birth, and the day fixed for the marriage, finishing the
paper with tables taken from their horoscopes. The whole is read
aloud, spotted with redpowder, and a copy is given to the elders
of each house with a blessing and marking of redpowder. Each
family gives the astrologer 1s. to 2s. (8 as.-Re.1), cocoanuts and of
sugar-cakes are handed, and, according to their rank, silver or copper
coins are given to the other Brahmans. This ceremony costs each of
the families £1 to £3 (Es.10-30). [The details are: Cocoanuts
Rs. 5 to Rs. 15, sugar-cakes
Rs. 1½ to Rs. 5, gifts to
Brahmans Rs. 5 to Rs. 10, total £ 3s. to £3.]
Guest-asking.
Three classes of guests are asked each in a different way. Friends
and caste fellows are asked by children, women relations by the women of the house, and men relations by letter. A fortnight or so before the wedding day, about noon, both families send four or five boys and girls, with one or two servants and drummers, to bid friends and caste people to the wedding. When they reach a house the girls hurry in and give their invitation to the women of the family
in four words, Somvari navagraha Mangalvari lagna, that is, Monday
the nine planets' worship Tuesday the wedding. [Monday and Tuesday are used vaguely; the actual days are generally found out
from the family priest.] Then, without
an answer, they leave, delighting in hurrying from house to house
and if asked for particulars shouting back answers from the street.
When the girls go inside, the boys stand in the doorway and call
out, 'Is any man at home.' If no one comes they either shout that
so and so has asked them to a marriage or chalk a message on the
front door. If one of the men of the house comes out, the boys
stand before him with folded hands and repeat a very courteous and
elaborate invitation, including the whole family and any guests that
may be with them. Of late the practice has been introduced of
asking male friends and caste fellows one or two days before the
wedding by cards distributed by a Brahman or a house servant in
the name of an elder of each family.
A few days later, about a week before the marriage, the girl's
mother, with two or three other women and one or two children and
servants, goes in the afternoon to the house of the boy's parents.
From the boy's house she takes his mother and two or three other
women, one or two children, and servants with empty bags to hold
cocoanuts, and they start in horse carriages to ask their kinswomen.
When they come to a house they alight, go in, and give the invitation.
Low wooden stools are set and they are asked to sit down, and, if
they are near relations, they are offered sweetmeats on English
plates. After eating a little and washing their hands, betel is
handed, and at parting the boy's and the girl's mothers are each
given a cocoanut. If the people called on are not near relations,
they offer the mothers nothing but a cocoanut each. The women of
some families are asked only for the marriage day. Others are
asked to stay for five days while the ceremonies are going on, and
the mother of one of the sons-in-law is asked to send her boy to
take part in the gourd-cutting ceremony. The work of asking the
female relations of both families takes four or five hours a day for
three or four days.
Gifts.
Four days before the marriage the boy's mother sends a servant
to the girl's house to ask her to come the next day for the flower- giving. Next day, in the afternoon, a child dressed and seated in a Palanquin or carriage is sent with music to fetch the girl to the boy's house. The girl, who is dressed in velvet and decked with ornaments, goes with the child. When she reaches the boy's house she is met by the women of the family and seated on a wooden stool. After dining, she is dressed in a rich petticoat or parkar, or in a gold-embroidered
robe and bodice, and decked with jewels and flowers. She is shown to the older men of the family and given five to ten dishes of fruit and sweetmeats. [This practice is becoming uncommon; instead of sweetmeats and fruit the girl gets a money present of £1 to £2.] Then she is sent to the nearest relations of both families, the women asking her what her mother-in-law has given her. This round of visits generally lasts all about nine in the evening when the girl goes home.
Next day, like the girl, the boy goes to the house of the girl's
parents in a carriage, where, if of age, he is met by the men, and if
under twelve by the women, and seated on a chair in the hall. After
an hour or so he dines, and is given a new suit of clothes, a turban,
a waistcoat and coat, a handkerchief, and a waistcloth, and in some
families a pair of patent leather English shoes and silk stockings
and garters. Long flower garlands are hung round his neck, a garland is tied to each wrist, and a nosegay is placed in his hand, and
like the girl he gets a money present of £1 10s. to £3 (Rs. 15-30).
Booth-building.
During this interchange of gifts, at both houses stores of ornaments,
and dress, supplies of rice, pulse, oil, butter, sugar, fruit, spices,
betel, bamboo winnowing fans, and earthen pots are laid in, and a
wedding booth or hall is built.
Altar-raising.
In the bride's house, after the booth has been some days ready,
a bricklayer is called, given earth and bricks, and told to make an altar or bahule near the house-steps. Measured by the bride's arm this altar is three cubits long, three broad, and one high. In front is a step about a span square, and behind the back rises about eighteen inches above the altar in three six-inch tiers each narrower than the tier below it. When finished the whole is whitewashed, For this, besides a rupee; the bricklayer is given a handkerchief, some rice and betel, and a cocoanut.
Pot -buying
The day before the wedding a set of forty-six earthen pots white
washed and marked with red, green, and yellow lines, are piled four or five high at each side of the marriage god, of the house, and of the altar.
Turmeric-rubbing.
The next ceremony is the turmeric-rubbing. One or two day before the wedding day, at the houses of both families a large wooden mortar and five long wooden pestles are washed and placed in the women's hall. Early next morning a girl is sent to ask the nearest kinswomen and a second message is sent them about nine. About ten or eleven, the guests meet in the women's hall and sit chatting on the ground-floor till noon or later. Then in the Women's hall the women of the house or the guests trace two squares opposite each other with white powdered quartz or rangoli. In one square is set a low wooden stool and in the other square a two-feet high
wooden mortar or ukhli, hung with garlands of bachelor's-button flowers or roje. The boy is called in dressed in his waist cloth, and set on the low wooden stool in front of
the mortar. A few pieces of turmeric are put in the mortar, and five married girls, each with a pestle, pound the turmeric and sing. After a few strokes four of the girls leave, and one, a sister or other near relation
of the boy, goes on pounding till the turmeric is powdered. She takes out the powder, puts it in a metal cup or vati, and mixing it with water rubs it over the boy's body. Then the four other girls come back, and each of the five
rubs some turmeric powder on her
own hands and eats some grains of coriander or dhane and molasses. Next, at one end of the marriage hall, one of the girls traces afresh white powder square, setting in it a low wooden stool. The others bring four metal water-pots or tambes filled with cold water and set them one at each corner of the square with a mango leaf floating in
each and a cotton thread passed, once round them, and a servant
brings a bathing pot filled with warm water and sets it near the low
wooden stool, When this is ready the girls go into the house, bring
the boy, and seat him on the stool. Then each girl lifts a water-pot,
and, while the drummers beat their drums, the girls sing and let
water trickle from the point of the mango leaf on the boy's head.
When the singing is over four of the girls leave, and the girl who
rubbed the boy with the turmeric powder bathes him in warm water.
When he is bathed the boy is dressed in a fresh waistcloth and
decked with a chaplet of bachelor's-button flowers. Red lines or nand are drawn on the upper part of his feet, a lighted lamp is
waved round his face, and he is led into the house. At the girl's
house, with the same ceremonies, the girl is rubbed with turmeric
powder and bathed. The boy and girl are now sacred. They are
called bridal gods or navardevs, and may not leave the house till the
four wedding days are over.
God-calling.
A number of rites, calling Ganesh, the marriage-booth spirit, the water goddess, ancestors, and the planets, and the sacrifice of a gourd, and a fig branch, are performed with the same detail at both the bride's and the bridegroom's. In the afternoon, when the turmeric rubbing is over, to call the god Ganesh, the women guests, with lines of white powdered quartz, trace a square in the inner part of the marriage hall in front of the house steps. In the square four stools are set, three in a line and the fourth close by at right angles to the three, and in front of the three stools matting is spread. The family priest and other Brahmans seat themselves, the family priest on the fourth stool, and the other Brahmans on the mats. The family priest's assistant goes into the house and brings a silver plate, a cup, a ladle, a pot, a bamboo basket, a gourd, and a tray filled with flowers, fruit, and scented powders. [The details are Cocoanuts, betel, flowers, basil or tulsi leaves, plantains, rice, cotton wicks, camphor, frankincense, sandal-powder, clarified butter, milk, curds, honey, sugar
turmeric powder, redlead, yellow, red, and scented powders.] When all is ready the family priest goes into the house and calls the parents. They come, the father wearing a silk turban and a waistcloth and a shawl thrown either round his shoulders or tacked under his arm; the mother in a silk bodice robe and shawl; and the child in a cotton Waistcloth and a handkerchief tied to the neck and hanging down the back. Laying a cocoanut before the house gods and bowing to the older men and women, they seat themselves on the three stools, the father next the priest, the mother on his right, and the boy or girl beyond her. The priest touches with redpowder the child's and the parents' brows, and repeats texts, and the father thrice sips water and sits bowing till the priest has repeated the names of the twenty-four gods. The father takes a round bamboo basket, and, spreading a yellow cloth over it, sets on the cloth a handful of wheat, and on the wheat sixteen betelnuts and six mango leaves rolled into cigar form, with a knife stuck into one of them, and tied with thread. Next, on a metal plate, the father lays half a pound of rice, and on the rice sets four betelnuts, three in a line and the fourth in front,
representing the god Ganesh, his two wives Siddhi and Buddhi and the family goddess. Then, raising his joined hands, he calls on the god and the goddesses to come and stay in the nuts till the marriage is over. He then sets the nuts in another metal
plate, pours on the top of each a drop or two of milk, some curds, clarified butter, honey, sugar, and water, mixed with sandal powder, and holding over them a metal water-pot with a hole in it lets water drop on them. He wipes them dry, sets them on the rice as before, marks them with sandal powder, and throws over them a few grains of rice, some dark red and yellow powder and flowers waves burning frankincense and lighted butter lamps round them and lays before them a little sugar, a cocoanut, a plantain, two betel leaves and one nut, and a small copper and silver coin. Again he waves lighted camphor, and, taking a flower in both his hand after the priest has recited texts over it throws it on the god's head. The whole ends with a prayer that the gods may continue kind till the marriage rites are over. All this time the mother sits still now and then touching her husband's right elbow with the tip of the first finger of her right hand. The child has nothing to do.
Booth Spirit.
After the worship of Ganesh comes the calling of the booth-spirit.
While the child and its parents are seated on their stools, a
married woman draws red lines and lays a wreath of flowers on a
gourd, and close by the priest places a forked mango post and a pair
of cocoanuts tied together by their fibre. A servant brings a long
pole, and laying it down ties to its top an open umbrella, a pair of
cocoanuts fastened by the fibre, and a bunch of mango leaves. Four
married girls, singing songs, wave rice over the gourd, the forked
mango post, and the pole. As they sing they hold a mango leaf
cup filled with oil over the gourd, the mango post, the pole,
and lastly over the head of the boy. Then leaving their seats the
father, mother, boy, and priest go to a corner in the marriage hall
where a hole has been dug, and standing in the order in which
they sat, worship the hole, dropping into it a few grains of wheat
a copper coin, and a little water. A servant now sets the pole in
the hole, fixing it in its place by filling in earth and stones, and
plasters the ground round it with cowdung. A married woman
draws lines with quartz powder, and the father, passing a cotton
thread three or four times round the pole, worships it. When this
is done all go back and sit on their stools as before.
Water Gods.
Then Ganesh is called and two brass water-pots filled with cold water
are placed on a few grains of rice in front of the father. In the water is put a little turmeric and sandal powder, a few grains of rice, small silver and copper coins, bunches of mango leaves, a
few blades of bent grass or durva, and cocoanuts on the top. A cotton thread is thrice passed round the whole, and with the middle finger of the right hand the father draws four lines of sandal powder on the outside of the pots, and with open hands prays Varun the water-god to be kindly. As the father sits with his legs doubled under him resting on his toes, he takes one of the two pots in his open
hands and with the pot thrice touches his brow and right shoulder and the brows of his wife and child. He next pours water from the
hands on the palms of the Brahman assistants, throwing on the water sandal
powder, a few grains of rice and some flowers and betel, and finishes with a
copper pice (¼ anna), which he dips in water before laying it on
the Brahman's hand, [Money or dakshana given to a Brahman is dipped in water that it may not be consumed by the fire that burns in a Brahman's hand.] Lifting the water-pots one in each hand and
crossing hands he pours water from both together in one unbroken
stream into the metal plate. The parents change places, the father
taking the mother's seat and the mother the father's, and the
priest standing up with three other Brahmans and dipping a blade
of bent grass into the metal plate sprinkles water over the parents'
heads. Then the parents sit as at first on their low stools and the
Brahmans also take their seats. The priest next lays the metal
plate before the parents, who dip in their forefingers and touch their
eyelids with the water. A married woman coming from the house
waves a lighted lamp first before the god Ganesh, then before the
family goddess, then before the two water-pots, the priest, the father,
the mother, and the child. The priest lays in the mother's lap a
cocoanut, two leaves and a betelnut, and with a prayer that she may
have eight sons this part of the ceremony closes. [Either in the ease of the bride or of the bridegroom, if the father and mother are dead their place is taken by some near relations, a brother and his wife or an uncle and aunt. Where there are no near relation any member of the same stock or gotra may
sit. The only exception to this rule is that when the father is a widower he
sits alone with a betelnut tucked to his waist in place of his wife.]
Ancestore.
Next to keep the house free from uncleanness and to call the spirits of forefathers, the father, taking four blades of bent grass between the fingers of his right hand, with the left hand pours water on his right palm, and prays the gods goddesses and ancestors to be present during the marriage and the next four days. Then striking a copper coin against the metal plate he opens the fingers of his right hand and lets the blades of grass fall.
Ganesh Worship.
The father then takes an earthen jar called the avighna-kalash or hinderance-removing-jar and fills it with rice. On the rice he sets a betelnut, a piece of turmeric, and a silver coin. He spreads mango leaves over the top, and on the leaves lays a cocoanut and winds cotton thread round the whole. On the outside of the jar he draws five lines of sandal powder, worships the jar, bows to it with joined hands, and pulls the round bamboo basket before him. The boy's mother puts the six rolled mango leaves into a metal plate, waves a few grains of rice thrice round the leaves, and taking in her hand the sixth leaf in which is the penknife, crushes a few grains of rice on the floor, and replaces the leaves in the basket. The father places a cotton bodice, a cocoanut, betelnut and leaves, a plantain, and a silver coin in the basket, and prays the water-goddesses or jalamatrikas to stay in his house till the ceremony is over.
Gourd-offering.
A gourd is brought in and laid on a wooden stool close to the altar. A son-in-law of the family, holding a shawl under his arm, and behind him his wife also covered with a shawl and with a metal pot of turmeric powder in her hands, come into the marriage hall. One of the married women of the family ties together the skirts of the two shawls, and with a sword given him by the priest the son-in-law
cuts the gourd in two, The wife rubs the two pieces with turmeric and steps
back. Then with two more strokes the son-in-law quarters the gourd. The wife as
before rubs turmeric powder, and Wave a lighted lamp in front of her husband,
who receives from his father-in-law either a shawl, a turban, or a waistcloth,
and withdraws.
Gods-installing.
When the presence and the goodwill of the gods are secured, the
next step is to set them in some part of the house where they will be comfortable and safe. While the parents, the child, and the priest are seated as before, a married woman comes holding an earthen water jar, and after standing before the worshippers moves towards the house scattering drops of water as she goes. After her the mother walks with the earthen water-pot in her hands; the father with the round bamboo basket, and the six rolled mango leaf goddesses or matrikas; the son-in-law with the drawn sword, the forked mango post, and the pair of cocoanuts; the priest with a pot containing a few grains of rice and sandal powder; and last of all the child
and a few under-priests. They enter the house and in this order go to one of the ground-floor rooms, where, some days before, a
high wooden stool has been placed with two heaps of rice piled on it and the walls adorned with pictures of gods and in the centre with the picture of a fruit-laden mango tree. On the stool on one of the heaps of rice, the mother sets the earthen pot, and on the other the father sets the bamboo basket. In a hole dug on one side of the stool, after throwing in a few grains of wheat, a nut
a copper and a little water, the mango post is planted, the cocoanuts are hung over the post, and the ground is smoothed. Then the father mother and child sit on stools, and the father worships the pot and
the basket. Next, out of respect to the ancestors and as there
are no images of them to instal, the father repeats the names of his
own and of the priest's forefathers. When this is finished, the
father gives the priest and eight other Brahmans a copper coin
and a betel nut each.
Planet Worship.
After the marriage-gods are installed the goodwill of the planets
has to be secured. The priest goes into the marriage booth, takes a copper plate, puts nine pounds of rice in it, and on the rice sets about seventy betelnuts. A servant brings a basket full of earth and the priest makes a flat raised square altar. The mother fetches fire from the house in a tile, and the priest, rubbing a few grains of rice on her forehead and throwing some rice on the fire, spreads the hot cinders over the altar, purifies the firewood by sprinkling water over it, and then arranges it upon the fire. The priest worships the planets sitting on the low stool on which
the mother sat. He goes into the house and bringing a pound of cooked rice, a leaf-cup with half a pound of butter, and 108 nine-inch sticks, twelve of each of the nine pure plants and trees, sits with eight other Brahmans round the altar. [The nine pure trees and plants of which the sticks or
samidhas are made, are: Umbar Ficus glomerata, aghada Achyranthes aspera, rui swallow-wort, durva bent grass, darbha sacred grass,
khair Mimosa catechu, palas Butea frondosa, pimpal Ficus religiosa, and shami Mimosa suma.] One of the
Brahmans holds in his hands the leaf-cup with butter in it,
another the grains of rice, the priest the sticks, and two more repeat passages from the Veds. After the priest has kindled the fire more texts are repeated, and butter, grains of rice, and sticks are thrown on the fire. While the eight Brahmans are busy repeating texts and feeding the flame, the priest goes into the house, and, bringing seventeen rice-flour lamps, places them in pairs round the sacred fire and lights them. A married woman comes from the house, draws with white powder two squares in the marriage hall, and places in one square four low stools, three in a line and the fourth close by at right angles, and goes back into the house. The priest fetches from the house a round bamboo basket filled with cooked rice, and placing it in the other square,
sprinkles it with curds and redpowder or goat's blood, and sets a lighted flour lamp and a lighted torch in the basket.
Evil Spirits.
The father mother and child again take their seats on the three Stools and the
priest on the fourth. While the priest repeats texts the father lays in the
basket two leaves and a nut and four copper coins. Then a servant, lifting the
basket in both hands, waves it three times round the child's face, and taking it
away without looking behind, is followed as far as the marriage hall door by the child
and the parents; the father, as they walk, sprinkling water on the ground. On reaching the door the parents and the child wash their feet and again take their seats
in front of the sacred fire. The servant, without looking behind, leaves the basket in a corner of the street, and taking the four copper coins returns and bathes. The child and the parents now stand, the father taking in his hand a leaf-cup with butter in it, a copper coin, two betel leaves and a nut, and walking once round the fire pours on it the contents on the sacred fire. Then the father holding out his open hands, the mother holding hers below his, and the child holding its under the mother's, the priest pours three spoonfuls of water into each of their hands, and putting four nuts and a little more water into each, they all sip a little from their hands. [Of the four nuts, three are eaten by the parents of the boy and the fourth by the boy when he starts for the bride's house on the wedding day.] The father takes his seat, touches the brows of the eight Brahmans with sandal powder, and presents each with a silver coin. The priest touches the brows of the child and of the parents with redpowder and a few grains if rice, and taking a cocoanut plantain and two betel leaves and one betelnut presents them with a blessing to the father, who receives them
in his shawl and passes them to his wife. A married woman waves a lighted lamp round the face of the child and the parents, and the father throws a few grains of rice over the sacred fires and with the mother and child goes into the house. Lastly the priest follows with the articles of worship and the day's religions rites are over. In the evening a dinner is given to the men friends of the house.
Gifts.
About eight in the evening of the same day the kinswomen of
the boy's family start for the girl's house [The details are: Sugar figures of men, animals, houses, temples, ships, fruit, flowers, and trees; twenty-one balls of pulse flour mixed with butter and sugar; about fifty cocoanuts; a
miniature silver dinner and cooking set and another set of brass; English China and Indian glass ivory and wood toys; a set of miniature wooden articles of furniture; a chair and a pair of glass candle-shades; a looking glass; tumblers with oil and wicks ready to light; three robes and bodices; and wreaths of flowers; silver trays with a rosewater stand: a lighted lamp; a few grains of rice; sugar; and redpowder.] with music and about
twenty metal trays filled with sweetmeats, toys, nick-nacks, clothes,
house furniture, and cooking pots carried on the heads of servants.
When they reach the girl's they stand on the threshold, and the
girl's sister comes forward, and pouring water from an earthen
jar or kara, and waving a lighted lamp before the face of the boy's
sister, leads the way, and seats them on carpets in the women's hall,
where the girl and the women of her family are assembled. The
trays are laid down, and, after sprinkling a little water on the
ground, a square is traced with white powdered quartz, and a chair
set in the square facing the east. A few of the toys are spread
before the chair, the candles and oil lamps are lighted, and the clothes
are unfolded and laid ready for wearing. The boy's sister, followed
by the girl and sprinkling water as she walks seats the girl on
the chair. One of the women of the boy's family combs and braids
the girl's hair and puts garlands of flowers on her head. She is
dressed in a robe and bodice and a lighted lamp is waved round
her face. After eating a little sugar she goes with a toy in her
hand to show herself to her mother and other women. This is twice
repeated and the third time she stays with her mother. Then
cocoanuts are handed round, and the boy's sister is given about a,
pound of sugar on a leaf-plate. The party make over the gifts to
the girl's mother or some other elderly woman, and return to the
boy's. The same evening or the evening after the girl's family sends
a return present to the boy. Except that a book, a desk, a chair,
glass candle-shades, chess, marbles, slippers, an umbrella, a silver
tea set, and writing things are sent instead of cooking pots, and that
the boy does not go to show himself to the people of the house, the
practice is the same as in making presents to the girl.
Wedding Day.
The wedding day ceremonies come under eleven heads; gift-making, oil-pouring, shaving, bathing, feet-washing, fig-worship
boy's procession, marriage, guest-worship, leave-taking, and return
to the bridegroom's house.
Gift-making.
Early on the morning of the marriage day one of the women of
the boy's family is sent to call near kinswomen. The women guests begin to arrive about ten, and sit chatting on a carpet spread
in the women's hall. The women of the house fill three silver salvers with silver and brass cups, clothes, ornaments, and fruit. [The details are: In the first salver a silver rosewater holder, silver cups with wet turmeric powder, wet sandal powder, redpowder, and powdered quartz,
a silver lamp with five partitions; a lamp with five partitions containing redlead and red dark and yellow powder; twenty-five to thirty betelnuts and leaves and about a hundred cocoanuts. In the second salver, a high metal or wooden stool, a looking glass in a silver frame, an ivory comb, a silver cup for holding red and one for holding turmeric powder, a silver five-inch stick, a bag worked in gold or silver holding five silver shells, a rupee, a gold necklace, a gold ring, a necklace of black beads, six glass bangles, a silk robe, a green cotton robe, a gold-bordered silk waistcloth, and a fine cotton robe. In the third salver, a bunch of five plantains, a cocoanut, two betelnuts and leaves, five almonds, five apricots, five dried dates, and a handful of wheat.]
About one o'clock musicians, the women guests, the family priest, and the boy's married brother, with servants carrying the metal plates on their heads or shoulders start in procession for the girl's house. At the girl's house, except the boy's sister, all the women go in. The boy's sister stands in the doorway, and one of the women of the girl's family comes out with a lighted lamp, and waving it round her face, loads her into the house. Except the family priest and the boy's married brother who wait on the veranda, the guests are all seated on carpets spread in the women's hall. Then in the marriage hall in front of the house steps, one of the women of the bride's family draws a square with white quartz powder, and sets four stools, two facing the east in one line, a third in front of the two, and a fourth beside the third for the priest. Between the stools are set a water-pot, a lighted lamp, and a metal plate with rice, and on the rice a betelnut. The boy's sister takes an earthen jar full of water, and, followed by the bride, walks from the house to the stools, sprinkling water as she walks. On the two stools, facing the east, sit the girl and her father, on the stool in front sits the boy's brother, and on the stool on the other sits side the boy's family priest. Helped by the priest the boy's brother worships Ganpati in the betelnut placed on the rice, and the water god Varun in the water-pot. He offers the second tray filled with clothes and ornaments to the bride. She touches the tray and the priest makes it over to some elderly woman, who, taking the bride into the inner part of the house, dresses her in the new clothes and bringing her back seats her, as before, next her father. Then the girl's father and the boy's brother tie five pieces of tamarind and betelnuts in the corner of their handkerchiefs and leave their seats. Another square is traced with lines of white powder and a low stool is set in it. The girl is seated on the stool; her hair is for the first time divided with a silver stick or bhangsal, combed, braided and decked with flowers; a green robe is folded round her waist; a gold chain is hung round her neck; a gold ring is put on one of her right fingers; silver rings are put on her toes; and she is led into the marriage hall, and her lap filled with fruit and spices taken from the third salver. A married woman of the family brings a lighted lamp, waves it round the faces of all present, gives the girl's brother a silk waistcloth, and withdraws. While this is going on in the marriage hall, two or three women of the boy's family go through the house with the first salver, and, wherever they find a married woman belonging to the girl's family, they sprinkle rosewater over her, rub wet turmeric powder on her hands, mark her brow with redpowder, and her throat with wet sandal powder, and giving her two betel leaves, a betelnut, and a cocoanut, again sprinkle water over her. After they have done this to almost all the women of the girl's family, cocoanuts are handed to all the women present, and the party form in procession and go home. About two or three in the afternoon, when the boy's people have left, the musicians meet at the girl's house, and her mother, dressed in a gold-embroidered robe and bodice and muffling herself in a long shawl, with a crowd of female relations friends and servants carrying five large copper and brass pots full of pulse
and flour, goes to the boy's house. [The details are: Five large pots with rice, split peas, split gram, wheat, and wheat and udid flour; their turned-up lids are full of balls of sesamum seed, grain, mug, and wheat flour. Besides these five pots are a cask of oil, a box of sugar, bamboo baskets full of fruit and vegetables, and a salver with the following silver articles, a raised stool, two dining leaves, five silver cups, five baskets, a plate with two small boxes, a betelnut-cutter, a lime-holder, a tree with packets of betel leaves hanging from its branches, a looking glass with richly carved frame, a comb, two cups one for turmeric the other for redpowder, a robe and a bodice. Another salver contains two silk waistcloths, a rich gold-worked robe and bodice, eight or ten other robes and bodices, and sweetmeats.]
At the house, a lighted lamp is waved round the daughter's face, and they all go in and seat themselves on carpets in the women's hall. At one end of the hall, one of the women of the bridegroom's family traces a square with lines of white quartz powder and within the square sets two low wooden stools. In front of the wooden stools is set a high silver stool, and on the stool five silver cups with five kinds of sweetmeats. Next to the silver stool two silver plantain leaf-plates are laid and sweetmeats served on them. When this is done the girl's sister, taking an earthen jar in her hand, seeks the boy, and, when she finds him, leads him to the women's hall, dropping water from the jar as she walks. He takes his seat on one of the two low stools, and soon after his mother, accompanied by some elderly married women, takes her seat on the second low stool, next her son, the elderly married women standing behind her. The girl's sister then comes to the boy and rubs turmeric powder on both his hands, and four married girls, two from each family, wave rice over him, and the girl's sister presents him with a silk gold-bordered waistcloth. The girl's mother comes forward, washes the feet of both the boy and his mother and dries them. She then presents the boy and his mother with costly clothes. They take the clothes into the house and put them on, and coining back seat themselves as before. The elderly women are then given robes and bodices, and a lighted lamp is waved round their faces. While this is going on the boy's sister or some other woman of his family, as she moves about, slips into the boy's hand a ball of wet turmeric powder. The boy and his mother are then asked to eat some of the sweets. As they are eating the girl's mother offers the boy a cup of milk, and he, on pretence of reaching his hand to the cup, thrusts the turmeric ball into her mouth, or rubs it over her face. She tries to avoid the rubbing, and the trick causes much amusement. When this is over the women are presented with cocoanuts, one from each house, and the procession returns.
Oil-offering.
At about three in the afternoon eight married girls, four from
each house, taking a metal plate with two betel leaves, one betelnut,
a sweetmeat ball, redpowder, a little rice, a copper coin, a lighted
lamp, and about a quarter of pound of cocoanut oil, go to Kalika's
temple. Each waves rice and redpowder three times over the
goddess, and the last girl lays the betel leaves and nut and the
sweetmeat ball before her, waves the lighted lamp, pours oil into the
lamp which is kept burning before the goddess, and withdraws.
Shaving.
When the women of the boy's family come back from making
presents at the girl's house, a barber is called, a square is traced
with lines of white powder, and a low stool is set in the square. On this stool the boy seats himself, and the barber shaves his
head except the too-knot, and is paid eight pounds of rice, a rupee, a cocoanut, and betel. Then the boy is taken to a square traced in the marriage hall, where he is bathed and dried, and is led into the house with a lighted lamp waved in front of him.
Second Bath.
Shortly after returning from Kalikadevi's temple four married girls, each with an earthen pot, a metal plate with a lighted lamp in it, a box of redpowder, and a sugar ball carried before them, start for the house well. They worship the well, offer it sweetmeats, and draw water only partly filling their pots. On coming back to the marriage hall they again trace a square, set the four water-pots one at each corner, pass a thread round them, and placing two
low stools together go into the house. In the women's hall another square is traced, two stools are set, and the boy and his mother are seated on the stool. Turmeric powder is rubbed over them, and they are brought into the marriage hall and seated on the stools in the square. A rupee is tied in the skirt of the boy's waistcloth, and while the musicians play the four girls sing and let water drop from mango leaves on the boy and his mother. When the bathing is over, the mother stands in her wet clothes and pours a little water on the feet of her nearest kinswomen, each of them in return dropping a silver coin into the water-pot. Then the girl's mother, waving a lighted lamp round her face, gives her a gold-embroidered robe, which she takes and walking into the house puts on. When the boy is done bathing he is given a fresh waistcloth, a lighted lamp is waved round his face, and red lines are drawn on his feet As he is putting on his new waistcloth his brother runs away with the old one, and puts it on keeping the rupee that was tied in its skirt. Next his maternal uncle throws a cotton sheet over the boy and lifting him sits with him on the threshold. Four elderly married women come with a shawl in their hands and a little rice, cumin seed, a rupee, a betelnut, and a winnowing fan, and stand holding the shawl over the boy and his uncle. They lay the rice and nuts on the fan, drop them into the shawl and then again taking them up put them back on the fan. This is done thrice by each of the women, and the rice, cumin seed, rupee, and betelnut are tied to the hems of the boy's and girl's clothes. After this is over his uncle takes the boy into the room where the marriage gods are worshipped, and dresses and adorns him. Except the shaving the ceremonies at the girl's house, after her mother has returned from taking gifts to the boy's house, are the same as at the boy's. Then the bride is taken to the room where the marriage gods are worshipped to be dressed and decked for the wedding.
Feet-washing.
About half-past four in the afternoon the girl's kinsmen, with music and flowers milk and jewels, go to the boy's house to wash his feet before he starts for the girl's. On reaching the boy's house they are received by the boy's father and his relations, and seated some in the marriage hall and others in the house. The father of the girl goes into the house, and, seating the boy on a high
carpet-covered stool set in a white powder square worships him with the help of his family priest. He washes his feet with milk and wipes them with his handkerchief; he marks his brow with sandal powder, puts a gold ring on one of the fingers of his right hand, offers him sugar-cake to eat, sprinkles rosewater over him, and placing a nosegay in his hands, withdraws bowing. When this is over, the girl's father and the other guests are each given a cocoanut and a nosegay, sandal powder is rubbed on their brows, and rosewater is sprinkled over them. They are asked to stay and join the procession to the girl's house. Some of them stay, but the girl's father and others have to go back at once to their own house. Meanwhile at their home the girl and her mother are bathed and rubbed with perfumes, and the girl is decked in her yellow silk wedding dress and jewelry.
Fig Worship.
When the feet-washing is over, at both houses the family priest
brings a branch of umbar Ficus glomerata, and places it on one side of the marriage hall. A boy who has married into the family is asked to cut the branch. The boy walks into the marriage hall with a shawl under his left arm and a sword in his right hand followed by his wife with a lighted lamp and by another woman. The woman ties together the skirts of the boy's and his wife's shawls. When this is done three more married women come into the marriage hall, and the one who tied the knot joining the other women three of them wave rice, and the fourth waves a lighted lamp over the branch. Then the four married women withdraw, and the son-in-law, with one stroke of his sword, cuts the branch in two. After his wife has waved a lighted lamp round his face he takes one of the two pieces of the branch, and walking into the house, followed by his wife, lays the branch and the sword near the marriage gods.
Procession.
After the girl's father has gone, the boy is rubbed with sandal
and other fragrant spices and decked with jewels. His waistcloth is of silk, talc is sprinkled on his red turban, and three ornaments are tied to his brow, the wedding coronet or bashing, a plume or crest on the right side, and an aigrette of jewels in front. Next, he is clad in a long white robe hanging to his feet; his loins are girt with a sash, and another richly wrought sash is thrown across his shoulders; long wreaths of pearls or flowers fall over his chest and back down to his knees; on his feet are a pair of red gold-embroidered shoes with silk tassels, and a packet of betel leaves is given him to chew. His eyelids are blacked with antimony and a tinned cocoanut is put in his hand, and he thrice swallows a little curds placed on the palm of his right hand. With the family priest he goes to the household and marriage gods, and, bowing before them, offers them a cocoanut, and asks their blessing. Then, after bowing to the elders of the house, he is mounted on a richly dressed horse, and, besides the tinned cocoanut, holds a penknife [Among Prabhus the penknife has taken the place of the sword.] in his right hand. The order of the procession is: A bullock cart with a band of pipers and drummers; a row of carriages full of richly dressed children; buglers walking; a band of Muhammadan drummers; behind the
drummers boys and men on foot; then dancing-girls walking in a line, and immediately behind them the boy-bridegroom on a horse with gold and silver trappings. On either side of the boy a couple of men wave fly-whisks or chavris, another couple fan him with silver fans, and a barber holds over him a long-handled big red silk umbrella. After the boy walks his mother and all the other women guests except widows. On either side of and behind the boy and the women are carried wooden frames called vadis or gardens with pots of artificial trees fruits and flowers. [Each frame-work which is about six feet long and one broad is borne on the heads of two carriers. Two of them are carried on each side of the boy and one behind, the space in front being left open.] Then comes a bullock cart with about a thousand cocoanuts, four bundles each of fifty sugarcanes, and one hundred round bamboo baskets strung on a rope. [Besides the cocoanuts sugarcane and baskets, the cart contains four bunches of plantains, 100 copper or brass round baskets, forty pounds of almonds, dry dates, turmeric, betelnut, sugar, twenty pounds of cumin and coriander seed, forty pounds of fine rice, and about eighty pounds of dry cocoa-kernel.] This closes the procession. Any women of the family who are too weak to walk follow the bullock cart in horse carriages. On the way, should two processions meet, the barbers lower the umbrellas and that they may not see each other's marriage coronet or bashing literally brow-horn, hold them in front of the bridegrooms' faces. At each turn in the street, to please evil spirits, cocoanuts are dashed on the ground and thrown away.
Wedding.
At the girl's house the party stops at the door of the marriage
hall, where two female servants stand with an earthen water jug in their hands. The bridegroom stays on his horse and some of the men of the party enter the marriage hall and take the seats prepared for them, and the rest stand outside with the bridegroom. On the veranda the astrologer sets close together two silver water-pots filled with cold water, and in each floats a copper cup with a small hole in its bottom. In front of the water-pots surrounded by lighted brass lamps he places the marriage papers. The bride's maternal aunt, with a rice-flour lamp in her hand and a shawl held over her head at the four corners, going to the boy, who is still on horseback, waves the lamp round his face and gives him a little sugar to eat, and receiving a present of clothes from the boy's parents is led into the house under the shawl; then a young brother of the bride's or the son of some near relation is carried in like manner under a shawl to the bridegroom, and squeezing his right ear, receives a present of clothes, and is led back into the house. Next, the girl's father, dressed in a silk waistcloth, a shawl on his body, and a silk turban on his head, with a shawl held by the four corners over his head, lays a cocoanut near the forefeet of the bridegroom's horse, and walking round it offers the boy sugar, and
lifting him from the saddle carries him to the altar in the centre of the hall. By this time the astrologer's copper cup fills with water and sinks and the astrologer and the bride and bridegroom's family priests begin to chant hymns. The bride's mother, with a few of her nearest relations, bringing some presents, comes to receive The women of the bridegroom's family. When she comes to the
bridegroom's mother she touches her feet, bows to her, and, holding
her by the right hand, respectfully leads her into the house the
others follow, and are seated on carpets in the women's hall. The
remaining male guests either take a seat in the marriage hall or in
the house, or stand till the bridegroom and the bride are married.
The barber also remains standing in the marriage hall with the
umbrella open. The girl's father and mother take their seats on
low stools in front of the altar. The bridegroom standing on the
altar takes off his long robe and turban and sits down with nothing
on except his silk waistcloth.
Honey sipping.
Then the marriage service begins with its ten rites of honey-sipping
feet-washing, rice-throwing, moment-naming, present-making
clothes-worship, bride-giving, oath-taking, seven-steps, and feedings.
When all are in their places, some honey and curds are laid in
the bridegroom's right palm, and the priest repeats in Sanskrit, the
bridegroom saying the words after him: ' I see and take thee my
bride with the eyes and strength of the sun; I mix thee with honey and take away all that is hurtful in feeding
on thee; I eat that
sweet nourishing form of honey, and may I thus be of choice sweet
well-nourished temper.' Touching the several parts of his body he
says: ' May there be speech in my mouth, breath in my nostrils
sight in my eyeballs, hearing in my ears, strength in my thighs and
may my whole body and soul keep sound.'
Feet washing.
Then the bride's father washes the feet of his sons-in-law and their
wives, and of the boy's married sisters, and a lighted lamp is waved
round their faces. A little sugar is given them to eat and with the
present of a silk waistcloth and robe they go back into the house.
After this the bridegroom's feet are washed with milk and water
and dried, and he is presented with a rick silk waistcloth with broad
gold borders and jewelry.
Rice-throwing.
Then the bridegroom, putting on the new silk waistcloth and a
silk turban, is led by the bride's father into the house at one side of the women's hall. Here, with his face to the west, he is
made to stand on a large heap of rice. The bride, clad in her richest robes and covered with jewels, is carried in by her maternal uncle and with her face to the east, is made to stand on a second rice heap facing the bridegroom. Between the bride and bridegroom, so that they cannot see one another, four men, if possible sons-in-law of the families, one of them with a drawn sword, hold a sheet of unbleached cloth with red lines drawn on it. Standing by the bride and bridegroom the family priests and the astrologer chant verses, at the end of each verse calling on the boy and girl to think how great a step they are taking. The girl's sister stands by with a lighted rice-flour lamp in a metal plate, and relations and others, clustering round the bride and bridegroom, at the end of each verse keep silently. throwing a few grains of rice over them. Now and then the father of the bridegroom, standing behind him with a long string of black glass beads with a gold button, [The gold button should be one tola in weight, but at the time of taking it from the goldsmith it is not weighed; he is paid at the bazar rate at so much per tola of pure gold.] asks him to
look at the mystic figures on the sheet held between him and the bride and say over the names of the family gods. All this time the guests keep quiet and with the musicians wait for the lucky moment.
Moment-naming.
When the lucky time is come the priests cease chanting and the cloth is drawn to the north. A bugle sounds, and at the signal the musicians raise a blast of music, the guests clap their hands, the bridegroom's father puts the black bead necklace round the bride's neck, and the bride throws a garland of flowers round the bride-groom's neck. The astrologer touches the bride and bridegroom's eyelids with water, women wave lighted lamps round their faces, and they are seated on chairs face to face. The old women start their marriage songs, the dancing-girls dance, the barber shuts the umbrella, the parents and guests embrace or exchange greetings, and cocoanuts are handed to all present.
Present-making.
Then the bride and bridegroom receive money and jewelry from their friends and relations. Each present, as it is given, is noted down by the boy's and girl's brothers, who stand by with paper and pencil.
Clothes-worship.
Immediately after, near to where the astrologer set the water-pots, are placed the
jewelry box and other articles intended as presents for the bride. [Bunches of plantains, metal baskets, almonds, dried dates, turmeric, betelnut, sugar, cumin, coriander seed, and
rice.] As soon as all friends and relations have given their presents the astrologer leads the bride from the house and seats her on a low wooden stool between her own and the bridegroom's brother. After a little worship the bridegroom's brother gives her two robes, two bodices, a sash, and a jewelry box. After touching these and handing them to her mother, the bride takes her seat on the chair opposite her husband, and the ceremony closes by the two brothers embracing.
Bridge-giving.
An hour or so after the lucky moment, close to the bride and bridegroom's chairs, two low stools are set for the bride's father and mother, and in front a third for the priest. Between the stools are laid a cup, a ladle, and a plate, and close by another plate with fifty-one rupees. After the girl's parents and the priest have taken their seats, the girl's father sips water thrice and repeats the names of his twenty-four gods. Then he, his wife, and the priest leave their seats and go towards the bride and bridegroom's chairs. At the priest's request the bride and bridegroom stand facing each other. The boy holds out his open hands, the girl lays her's half open in his, he clasping her thumbs with his. Over their hands the girl's father holds his, open and slanting, and the mother pours cold water from a silver jug which running off her husband's hands passes through the hands of the bride and bridegroom, and, as it falls, is caught by the priest in a silver plate. While the mother pours, the priest says in Sanskrit: ' This is my daughter whom to this time I have nourished as a son, I now give her to your most sacred keeping, and solemnly pray you to centre in her your love
as a husband and to treat her with kindness.' The priest then
repeats the names of the bride and bridegroom, their fathers,
grandfathers, great-grandfathers, and families. The girl's
father dips fifty-one rupees in cold water and lays them in the
bridegroom's open hands, and the ceremony closes by the priest
giving to each old woman of the family three ladlefuls of the water
that was poured over the bride and bridegroom's hands.
Oath-taking.
Next at one end of the marriage hall the family priest kindles a
sacrificial fire and sets the cocoa-kernel grindstone or pata before
the fire with seven betelnuts on it, each betelnut lying on a little
rice heap. Calling Indra, Varun, and Umamahesh to be present,
the bride, the bridegroom, and the bride's father sit down, the bride's
father saying:' You should treat her as duty bids you and not
cheat her in religion, wealth, or pleasure.' The bridegroom thrice,
repeats:' I will not deceive.'
Seven steps.
Then the bride and bridegroom leaving their seats walk thrice round the fire,
and, on coming towards the grindstone, the bride
groom sitting down and repeating a Sanskrit text. [The substance of the text is: May Vishnu make thee take one step for food
one step for strength, one step for cattle, one step for happiness, one step for priests
to perform sacrifices, one step for wealth, and one step for religion.] lifts the great
toe of his wife's left foot and draws it over the seven rice heaps.
This, which is called the seven steps or saptapadi or the crossing
of seven hills, is the chief of all marriage rites. No marriage is
complete until the bride has taken the seventh step. Till the
seventh step is taken the father of the girl may break off the match
and marry his daughter to some one else. The rite ends by a
married woman striking the bride's and bridegroom's brows
together.
Feeding.
After the marriage oath the bride and bridegroom feed one another,
eating sweetmeats, vegetables, and rice from the same plate.
Guest-worship.
They are then dressed and seated near each other in the hall and
again rise and go round among the guests marking their brows with
redpowder.
Leave-taking.
At the same time the guests' brows are marked with sandal
powder and each is given two cocoanuts. From the hall the bride and bridegroom are taken to the women's room and other places where the elder women are. Here each one, lifting the bride in her arms, kisses her, and with tears in her eyes
speaks kindly to her and last of all the girl bids farewell to her parents. Meanwhile the party are getting ready to start for the bridegroom's house.
The bride and bridegroom are seated either on the same horse on which
the bridegroom rode in the evening, or in an open carriage; they are
followed by a company of friends and kinspeople in the same order
as they went to the bride's house. [The order is the same as in the evening, except that a servant walks in front of
the bride and bridegroom's horse, sprinkling cooked rice to satisfy evil spirit, and
that link-boys surround the party, each carrying at the end of a stick a grated open
iron bowl with lighted pieces of dried cocoa-kernel.] As they go fireworks are let off.
The girl's father and some of his nearest relations follow for a
few steps and then return home.
Home-coming.
In some families when the procession reaches the door of the bride-groom's house two servants, the one taking the bride and the other the bridegroom on his shoulders, dance to the sound of music for about a quarter of an hour. Lines of white stone powder are drawn on the ground leading to the room where the marriage gods are worshipped and on both sides of the lines rows of lighted rice flour lamps are set. Between these the bride walks, her hands full of rice; the bridegroom follows bending over her, holding both her hands from behind, and with his thumbs from time to time forcing grains of rice out of them. As soon as the bridegroom comes near the house door his sister stops the way and does not let him pass till he promises her to give his daughter in marriage to her son. He then goes to the room where the marriage gods are worshipped, throwing the rice as before, and he and his wife are seated on low stools before the marriage gods.
Naming.
After performing some short rites the bridegroom's sister and parents tell him
the bride's new name and this he whispers in her right ear. Meanwhile in the
reception hall guests are seated and served with sugared milk and a handful of
sugar folded in paper. This closes the wedding day ceremonies. The bride
retires and sleeps with the other girls in the women's hall, and the bridegroom
with the men.
Each of the four days after the wedding is marked by some special rites.
After the Wedding.
About nine or ten on the morning of the first day the bride is asked to serve food to the men of her husband's house. The five pots sent by the girl's parents are piled in the dining hall. In the highest is a gold necklace and in the four others are sweatmeats. Low stools and leaf-plates are laid out, and when the men are seated, the bride without letting the pots strike together uncovers them one after the other. She opens the first, and seeing a gold necklace, puts it round her neck; she opens the second and finding sweetmeats serves them to the guests uncovering each pot with great care and handing round its contents. She then takes a metal plate with a lighted lamp in it, and going to each guest waves the lamp round his face, each according to his means putting some silver in the plate. She then leaves the room and after the guests have eaten the sweet-meats they also leave.
Feeding.
In the afternoon the bride and bridegroom
eat from the same leaf-plate, feeding one another in the presence of
the women and children of the house. When the meal is over
small round betel-leaf parcels are given to the boy and girl. The
bride holds one end of the rolled leaf in her teeth and the bride-groom bites off the other end. After this about fifty betelnuts are
equally divided between the bride and bridegroom. A few girls
side with the bride and some boys with the bridegroom, and for an
hour or two play games of odds and evens called eki-beki. About
four in the afternoon the bride and bridegroom are asked to spend
the night at the bride's house.
Visiting.
Before the bride leaves the women . of the bridegroom's family make her presents of jewelry. Then the bride and bridegroom go to the nearest relations of both houses, the women asking the bride what presents have been given her, and elderly widows who have not been at the wedding give her
2s. to £5 (Rs. 1-50) in cash, or they give a cocoanut both to her and her husband. This round of visits generally lasts till about seven in the evening when the bride and bridegroom go to the bride's house. Here
they play a game of odds and evens, and about nine they feed one another sitting down to dine with the men.
Second Day After.
During the night the bridegroom steals his mother-in-law's bracelet, and early in the morning makes off to his father's house.
When the bracelet is missed, the bride, her parents and friends, and the family priest go in procession to search the bridegroom's house. On hearing they are come the bridegroom hides, and the bride and one of her party start over the house searching for him, shouting that he has stolen a water-jug and an old pair of shoes. At last his hiding place is found and he is led by his wife into the hall and seated on a raised carpeted stool in the midst of the guests. Before him on the carpet sits the bride and her father. The father, placing before him a silver water-pot, a silver plate, and a silver cup and ladle worships the bridegroom, and with joined hands asks him to give his feet to be washed. He refuses unless they promise to give him whatever he asks. They agree, and he asks something whimsical, a cart with a pair of goats, his father-in-law's garden, or his house, or asks his father-in-law to give up smoking or snuffing. When all he asks is promised he lets his feet be washed with milk and water. He is then given a suit of clothes and taken to the bride's house.
Third Day After.
On the third day, about ten at night, the bridegroom, the bride,
and her parents and relations go with music to bring the bridegroom's
parents and nearest relations to their house. On the way back they
walk on cloths which are taken up as they pass and again laid in
front. On entering the bride's house the guests are seated either
in the receiving room or in the marriage hall. Before the altar
lines are drawn and three low stools are set. The bride and bride-groom are seated on the altar, and the bride's parents and the
priest on the low stools. The priest repeats texts and the bride's
parents touch their eyelids with water. The bridegroom's married
relations and their wives come in pairs. The husbands sit beside
the bridegroom and the wives stand close by their husbands. Then
the bride's mother pours water over the men's feet and the bride's
father wipes them dry; and again the bride's father pours water
over the women's feet and the mother wipes them dry. A married
woman waves a lighted lamp round the faces of each pair, and then
go back to their seats with a present of a silk waistcloth for that
man and a robe and bodice for the woman. The feet of all the
sons-in-law and their wives, and, last of all, the bride and bride-groom's feet are washed with the same ceremony.
When the feet-washing is over, in the marriage hall in front of the house steps a white powder square is traced, and, on one side facing the east, three low stools are set in a line and a fourth at right angles for the priest. In front of the three stools is placed a bamboo basket with five lighted rice-flour lamps, a sweetmeat ball, cooked rice, split peas, butter, vegetables, and cakes, a leaf-plate served with cooked rice, vegetables, split peas, and butter, and a few
sweet cakes. On the other side the bridegroom and his relations sit on carpets. The bride and her parents dressed in silk seat themselves on the three stools and the priest on the fourth. The bride's father gives light Brahmans round bamboo baskets, with, in each basket, a silver two-anna piece, a cocoanut, a betelnut, and two almonds. Then the bride's father, taking the girl in his arms, seats her on the lap
of each of the bridegroom's kinsmen, who in return put a little sugar into her mouth. The mother takes the bride in her arms, and seats her on the lap of each of the bride-groom's kinswomen who, like the men, put a little sugar into her mouth, and last of all she is seated by her father beside her husband. Then the girl's mother making a twisted cloth ring puts it on the head of each of the bridegroom's kinsmen, and the father taking the square bamboo basket in both his hands touches with its
bottom the twisted cloth ring. The bride's father then taking the ring in his hands places it on the head of all the women guests and the mother touches it with the bamboo basket. The fathers embrace, and the bride's father addressing the father of the bridegroom asks him to take care of their daughter whom they have nourished as their only fond child, whom they have always petted, and never allowed to leave her mother's side. Then the bridegroom's party taking the bride with them go back to his house.
Fourth Day. After.
About eleven on the morning of the fourth day, at the boy's house
three squares are drawn, one in the women's room and two in the
marriage hall one in the middle near the house steps and the other on one side. In the square drawn in the women's hall two low wooden stools are set in a line, and on them the bride and bridegroom are seated. The sister, or some other of the boy's kinswomen tightly ties his hair in a knot, and asks the bride to untie it with her left hand. The bride unties the knot, puts cocoanut milk on the bridegroom's hair, and rubs a mixture of turmeric and rice on his body. Then the bridegroom has to untie his wife's hair, to put on cocoanut milk, and rub her with a mixture of turmeric powder and rice flour. A married woman now goes to the marriage hall, sets a low stool in the corner square, and opposite to it the grinding stone. Between these she sets a metal plate with a mixture of lime and turmeric hiding in the mixture a gold finger ring, for which the boy and girl search and whoever finds keeps it; she also, at each corner of the square, sets a jar of cold water with a mango leaf floating in it and winds a thread round the jar. The bride and bridegroom are then led to the corner square in the marriage hall and seated face to face, the bridegroom on the low stool and the bride on the grindstone. Each is given a packet of betel leaves to chew; and while they chew four married women sprinkle water on their heads and sing songs. The drums beat and the bride and bridegroom squirt betelnut and leaf juice on each other and from the metal plate throw red paint over each other. After this they are bathed, dried, and dressed, the bridegroom in his turban, long robe, silk waistcloth, and shoes, and the bride in a silk robe and bodice. The marriage ornaments are exchanged, the bridegroom's being tied on the head of the bride, and the bride's on the head of the bridegroom. A lighted lamp is waved round them, red lines
are drawn on their feet, the silvered cocoanuts are exchanged, and the bridegroom raising his bride by the left hand follows his sister who walks before him sprinkling water from an earthen jar to where the third square is drawn in the middle of the marriage hall. Here, while the bridegroom and the bride are bathing, a bedstead with a large sugar-cake at each corner is brought in and the whole is covered with a sheet. In the middle of the bedstead is a grindstone muffled in cloth spotted with wet turmeric powder and at each corner an earthen jar. The bridegroom and bride are seated on the bed near the grindstone and each of four married women waves rice three times round their heads and touches their brows with the hems of the bride and bridegroom's clothes. Again, taking both the girl's hands in their own, each of the married women thrice waves a rupee, a piece of turmeric, and a few grains of cumin seed before the boy's face. Then taking the cumin seed, the turmeric, and the rupee from the hem of the bridegroom's robe they are waved before the bride. The bridegroom sits down and the bride rising takes the grindstone in her hands, and passes it to him saying: ' Take the baby, I am going to cook,' and again sits down. Then the bride-groom rising hands back the grindstone, saying: ' Take the baby I am going to office.' After this she leaves the child on the bedstead, and the bridegroom lifting his wife by the left hand leads her into the room where the marriage gods have been worshipped. Here he sits on a low stool before the gods, takes his wife on his lap, and, with a mango leaf, sprinkles the molasses and lime-water on the figure of the mango tree on the wall. Then, going into the women's hall where some married women are met, the bride and bridegroom feed one another. In the afternoon they are asked to go to the girl's house and start accompanied by the bridegroom's sister and music. Here in welcoming them a lighted lamp is waved round the faces of the three, and, except that the bedstead hangs from the roof and that before it is let down the bridegroom has to give the children of the bride's family 10s. to £1 10s, (Rs. 5- 15) the details are the same as at the bridegroom's house. When the baby-ceremony and the mango-tree worship are over, the boy is made to stand behind the girl, and each married woman, dipping the girl's hands in a mixture of molasses and lime, rubs them on the boy's long robe. The mother of the girl draws red lines on a wall close by the marriage gods, and places a grindstone below the lines. In the middle of this she sets a brass hanging lighted lamp surrounded by sweetmeats and sweet
cakes, and beyond them a row of lighted rice-flour lamps. The boy places five to fifteen rupees on the stone, and in presence of the women the bride and bridegroom feed one another.
In the evening the father and mother, and the bride and bride-groom, first at the bridegroom's and then at the bride's, sit in a line before the marriage gods, and worshipping them, throw a few grains of rice over them and over the floor of the marriage hall, and say: ' Depart ye gods and goddesses until such time as I may ask you to come again.' Last of all the priest, untying the six cigar-rolled mango leaves, sprinkles water over the heads of the four worshippers.
In the afternoon of the fourth day, comes the last of the marriage ceremonies, the rubbing of the bride and bridegroom with rice-flour
at their own houses. The bridegroom is seated on a stool in the women's hall in a square of white powder, and some woman of the family rubs him with rice flour and takes him into the marriage hall, where he is seated on a low stool in a square of white powder, bathed with warm water, and has a lighted lamp waved round his face. He then goes into the house and is now free to go about as usual. After a few days the girl is presented with copper or brass miniature cooking and other house vessels filled with rice, pulse, flour, butter, and oil.
Parting Dinner.
Next day, or a day or two after when the host wishes the guests to go, a sweet dish of pulse is cooked and served at dinner time. After eating the pulse the marriage guests leave.
After the marriage ceremonies are over the boy and girl, on feast and high days, are asked to one another's houses, and at least during the first year at each visit receive clothes and other gifts. Before one of these visits the sight of a servant from the father-in-law's house often sets the bride crying. Coaxing threatening and whipping are all sometimes in vain, and the little wife from the time she leaves her father's house till she comes back keeps on sobbing. She is now a part of her husband's family. Her duty is entirely to her husband and his parents, who must support her through the wedded and if need be through the widowed state. To her husband's relations the young wife shows much respect. She stands up when they pass near her, and in talking to them uses not their names but some term of respect. She does not call her husband by any name, and whether in public or private should never be seen talking to him. The husband is generally kind to his wife, he thinks her his friend and his equal, and leaves her the full use of his goods.
In the case of the girl, between marriage and pregnancy, come three minor rites, lucky-dress wearing, skirt-weaving, and puberty.
Lucky Dress.
Muhurt sada or lucky-dress wearing may take place at any time after a girl's marriage and before she is twelve years old. The boy's father consults an astrologer, who examines the boy's and girl's horoscopes, and names a lucky day and hour. A day or two before a servant is sent to tell the girl's mother when the robe is to be given. On the day fixed, two boys and the family priest, with fifty to a hundred cocoanuts, sugar cakes, and fruit, a robe, a bodice, and music are sent to the girl's house. On the floor of the women's hall a square is drawn with white powder, and two low stools are placed opposite each other, one for the elder of the boys and the other for the girl. The family priest sits beside them on a third stool. Then the elder boy worships Ganpati and performs the holy-day blessing, and touching the hem of the robe with red-powder, presents it along with the bodice to the girl. The girl rises, and going into an inner room winds the robe round her waist, and coming back seats herself as before facing the boy, who lays in her lap five plantains, an orange, a lemon, a guava, betelnut and leaves, a
few grains of wheat, and a silver coin. A married woman waves a lighted lamp round the faces of the priest, the girl, and the elder boy, and the priest blesses the girl, drops a few grains of rice over the Ganpati, and taking a rupee from the boy retires. The elder boy
goes home, and the younger, taking the girl with him in a carriage starts, with music, for the husband's
house. At her mother-in-law's the girl stays for two days and then goes home.
Breast robe.
A few weeks after the lucky-dress wearing comes the padar-sada
or breast-robs. The girl is taken to her father-in-law's house and for the first time wears her robe like a woman, drawing one end
over her shoulders and letting it hang on the right side. In the afternoon of the second day, before leaving for her parents' home, the girl, seated on a low stool, has little children set opposite her, and her lap is filled with fruit as on, the first day.
She throws the fruit to the children, and after a scramble, some elderly woman of the house divides them between the children and the girl. The customs are the same as at the lucky-robe wearing except that the girl sits by the side of her husband instead of by the side of a boy of his family.
Coming of Age.
When a girl comes of age an elderly married woman fills her lap with rice, betelnut and leaves, and a cocoanut, and waving a lighted lamp round her face gives her sugar to eat. She is sent to her husband's house in a carriage, and her mother-in-law takes her and leaves her in a room by herself. Little girls are sent to ask kinswomen and friends. An elderly woman goes to invite the girl's mother, and when she comes, about three in the afternoon,
she changes her dress, and going to her daughter, combs and braids her hair, dresses her in a rich robe and bodice, and decking her with ornaments, seats her in a wooden frame leaning forward, her hands resting on her knees. On each side of the frame two large brass lamps and a pair of glass candle-shades are placed, and on the floor in front, a silver plate with boxes for betelnut and leaves, and spices, and close by a silver tree, its branches hung with packets of betel leaves. The music plays, and the guests, all of whom are women keep dropping in from five to eight, each as she comes having sweet cakes given her. When the guests are gone her mother leads the girl to the inner room, and taking off her ornaments makes them over to the mother-in-law, and after bathing and taking sugar cakes
goes home. This is done every day for four days. About four on the morning of the fifth day, the mother of the girl, going to her daughter's house, bathes her, and then herself bathing, both the daughter and the mother are presented with robes and bodices. The mother then goes home. In the afternoon, on one side of the dining hall, a square of white quartz powder is drawn and in the square
low stools are set. On these stools the girl and her husband are seated and their bodies are rubbed with rice-flour. Then in a square tracing, in the back part of the house, they are seated close to each other on low stools, and the boy loosens the knot of the girl's hair
and the girl loosens his top-knot and they are bathed. Then, on a square traced on one
side of the women's hall, three low stools are placed, two in a line, and the third at right angles. The boy and the girl seated on the two stools and
the priest on the third, worship Ganpati, perform the holy-day blessing, worship
the Matriks that is the seven goddesses Gauri, Padma, Shachi, Medha, Savitri, Vijaya, and Jaya, and perform the joyful-event spirit-worship. The boy and girl leave their seats, and the priest,
helped by ten other Brahmans, kindles the sacred fire in honour of the nine planets and of Bhuvaneshvar, the god of the universe. When this is over the boy and girl sit as before, cooked rice is waved round them, and is laid by the roadside to please evil spirits. After washing their feet, they are given new clothes and have their bodies rubbed with sweet-scented powder, and seating them close to each other in a square tracing in the back part of the house, the priest pours over their heads water from a rice-washing metal-pot or viroli, and after bathing and dressing in new clothes they take their seats as before in the women's hall. An earthen altar is made, Ganpati is worshipped, and the sacred fire is lit. The boy touches the hem of a new robe which he gives to the girl and fills her lap with presents. A married woman hands the boy a small quantity of bent or durva grass, pounded wetted and tied in a piece of white cotton, and standing behind the girl and laying her head between his knees, he lifts her chin with his left hand and with his right squeezes into her right nostril a few drops of the juice of the bent grass. A lighted lamp is waved round their faces and the ceremony is at an end. In the evening the girl is seated in the frame richly dressed and decked with jewels. The mother and other kinswomen, and friends with music and trays of clothes and jewelry, go to the boy's house and take their seats on carpets spread in the women's hall. A square is traced near the frame, and on one of two low stools placed near each other, the boy sits, and the girl coming out of the frame sits on his right. The girl's mother goes to them, and waving a lighted lamp round their faces puts a shawl over the boy's shoulders and a rich suit of clothes and jewelry in the girl's hands. The other women follow giving presents according to their husband's means; sugar cakes and cocoanuts are handed, and, except the mother and her sister, the guests leave. [In handing sugar cakes and cocoanuts a married woman with a tray full of sugar cakes goes to each woman guest and, sitting in front of her, asks from whose house she has come. The guest says from her parents
or mother-in-law's as the case may be. The hostess takes in her hand two sugar cakes and goes on giving them two at a time till the guest stops her and will have no more. Some women take ten or twenty or even as many as fifty or 100 pairs of sugar cakes and afterwards sell them and buy ornaments with the money.
in some houses women who are known to do this are watched and given just as many cakes as there are people
in their
houses. Lately, except among the rich, cakes are less freely given, each guest getting only two.] About nine at night the boy is seated in the frame and the girl rubs him with sweet-scented powder, and gives, him a cup of milk to drink. He drops a silver coin into the cup and drinks the milk, and kissing his wife lifts her in his arms, and carries her in to the nuptial room which is adorned with garlands of sweet-scented flowers. All this time the mothers and other relations, both male and female, surround the pair. The boy's mother sobs, ' We have brought you so far and now make you over to the toils of married life.'
Pregnancy.
In the fifth month of a woman's pregnancy a few families perform a ceremony called the panchangne or fifth month. [Very few families perform this ceremony.] Ganpati is worshipped, sugar cakes distributed, and in the evening both the boy and the girl are presented with clothes. In the seventh or
eighth month of a woman's pregnancy the priest is called to fix a day for the pregnancy ceremony. On the morning of the day little girls go to ask kinswomen and friends, and an elderly woman goes to invite the girl's mother. In the afternoon the husband and wife are seated on two low stools, and the priest on a third. After a
sacred fire is kindled, Ganpati is worshipped, holyday-blessings performed and the planets worshipped, the boy squeezes a few drops of bent grass juice into the girl's right nostril, throws a garland of fig-tree leaves round her neck, and sticks a porcupine quill into her hair. He next gives her a ladleful of curds mixed with two grains of pulse and one of barley, and asks her thrice what she is sipping. She each time says in reply, ' That by which women are blessed with children.' When this is over some elderly married woman waves a lighted lamp round their faces. In the evening the girl's mother and other women go to the girl's house, and, seating the boy and the girl in a square traced on the floor, give them shawls, clothes, and jewelry, and taking some sugar cakes, go home. A dinner is given by the boy's household to both men and women relations. Other dinners at relations and friends' houses follow, the young wife receives presents, and in every way meets with the greatest care and kindness. In the eighth or ninth month of her first pregnancy the young wife, who is often not more than fourteen, is seated in a palanquin and sent with music to her father's house. As she goes, at every corner of the street, to please evil spirits, cocoanuts are dashed on the ground and thrown away.
Birth.
From the time the girl goes to her father's house she is fed
daintily and decked with flowers. A midwife, generally one known, to the mother's family, attends the girl, and when the girl's time
comes is called in. The young wife is taken to a warm room and one or two of the older women of the family gather round her. Outside of the room the girl's father or some other of the older men of the house stands with a watch in one hand and with the other tells his beads, promising much to the gods and goddesses if they will grant the girl a safe delivery. Care is taken that the birth may happen at a lucky moment, and should the mother suffer severely, Brahmans are hired to read sacred books or to tell beads both in their houses and temples. As soon as the child is born the girl's father or some one of the older men of the house notes the time, and a metal dinner plate is beaten as a sign of joy, the women rejoicing over the mother as one brought back from death. Till the mother is washed and laid on a cot, the babe is put in a bamboo winnowing fan. It is then washed in warm water, its navel-cord cut, its head squeezed to give it a proper shape, its nose pulled to make it straight, and the cartilage of its ears bent. It is bound in swaddling clothes and laid beside it's mother on the bed, and a bit of karvi Strobilanthus grahamianus, and a penknife are laid under the pillow to ward off evil spirits. Word is sent to the husband's family, sugar is handed, and the midwife is given four to ten shillings, rice, betel, a cocoanut, and a robe. The room-door is covered with a blanket, and an iron bar is thrust across it. A dim-shining brass lamp burns near the child's face. The mother is given a packet of betel leaves, myrrh or bol, a mixture of honey and butter, sagargota, that is the fruit of the Guilandina
bonducella and butter, myrrh mixed with molasses, and myrobalan
powder mixed with molasses. For forty days she drinks nothing at water in which a red-hot iron has been cooled, boiled with cloves. For three days she eats a coarse wheat-flour paste mixed with molasses and butter. On the eleventh day she has wheat cakes boiled in butter, and, from the
twelfth to the fortieth, rice mixed with black pepper and butter. After the fortieth day she takes her usual food, rice, vegetables, or fish, as suits her best. For forty days she does not leave her bedroom without a hood, a thick blanket thrown over her body, and slippers. Every evening the babe is rubbed with parched gram powder and the white of an egg, and bathed in hot water. Before drying the child, the midwife takes water in a metal pot, and waving it thrice round, that the child's misfortunes may be on her and no evil eye may look at it, stands up,
pours water over her feet, and touches the child's brow with dust, Then she marks the child's brow and cheeks with soot, and taking a few grains of mustard seed waves them round the child and throws them into the fire. For the first three days, the child is fed by sucking a cloth soaked in coriander juice. For ten days after the birth both the wife's and husband's houses are unclean, and there is no worship and no prayers. That evil spirits may not choose this time to enter the house, a Brahman, every evening, holding in his hand a pinch of ashes, repeats charms and spells, and gives the ashes to some one in the house to rab on the child's brow and lay
under its
pillow. With the same object the midwife draws ash-lines at the house-door and at the door of the mother's room. Any one coming into the house must, as he enters, look round and drive off any spirit that may be following him, and wash his feet and hands. If he is not a member of the family he must bring some sugar cakes or clothes. It is unmannerly to go to a new-born babe empty-handed.
First Day.
On the evening of the day of birth, or on the next day, the father of the child, the astrologer, the family priest, and kinspeople and friends go with music to the mother's house. They are met by the mother's parents and seated, the men guests in the hall and the women guests in the women's room. The astrologer is handed a slate and pencil and paper pen and ink. He takes from the wife's father a note of the time of birth and sits in the midst of the company calculating. When the horoscope
is ready he reads it aloud, almost always foretelling for the child talent, comfort, success, and long life. Then touching the brow of the oldest man in the father's family, he makes over the horoscope to him with a blessing. While this is going on, in the inner part of the house, the father of the child, sitting on a low stool in a square traced on the ground, worships Ganpati and performs the holy-day blessing. He rubs a little gold and honey on a stone, takes it in a silver cup, and going into the lying-in room, dips a gold finger ring into the cup, and in presence of some kinspeople lets a drop fall into the child's mouth. If the birth hour be unlucky the father has to undergo penances; and he does not see the child's face for fear he should loose his own or the child's life. When the lucky hour comes, he worships Ganpati and performs the holy-day blessing, kindles a sacred fire, and placing the child on a piece of red cloth in a winnowing fan, lays him before
the face of a cow, and lets honey drop into his month. In honour of the birth a feast is given by the mother's father. Dancing-girls amuse the guests, milk, cocoanuts, and sweet cakes are handed round, the astrologer the priest and other Brahmans are paid, and the guests leave.
The third day After the birth the child and the mother are bathed, and the mother first suckles the child. [The practice of not suckling a child till the third day is dying out.] In the mother's room two. long lines of white powder are drawn and divided, if the child is a boy into eleven and if a girl into ten spaces. In each space is placed a betel leaf touched on the top with soot redpowder and turmeric, boiled gram, cooked horse-radish leaves, and cocoanut scrapings mixed with molasses. Close by a square is traced on the ground and a low stool is set in the square. In front of the stool are laid a metal plate with a lighted
lamp, redpowder, a few grains of rice, a sugar cake, a cocoanut, and close by a full water-pot and ladle The mother is seated on the low stool, her hair is combed, and the child is laid in her arms. Then the brows of both the child and the mother are touched with redpowder and a few grains of rice
Bits of sugar cake are put into their mouths, a cocoanut is laid in
the mother's hand, and a lighted lamp is waved round their faces.
Then placing the cocoanut on the ground, the mother silently raises
the ladle from the water-pot, and taking a little water sprinkles
it on the child's body, and throws a few grains of rice on the leaves.
The guests, who are little boys and girls, are sent home after eating
boiled gram and cocoanut scrapings.
Fifth Night.
The fifth night is a time of much danger to the child. Sathi, the
goddess of that night, is worshipped by some elderly married
woman of the family with presents of fruit and is besought to take
care of the babe. [In some families, along with the fruit, fried pulse, grain, a cock, and a tumbler of liquor are offered. All these are given to the midwife.] A blank sheet of paper with pen and ink is laid
near the goddess that she may write the child's fate, and a drawn
sword is left leaning against the wall. The father of the child,
with some relations and friends, goes to his wife's house with
presents. He worships Ganpati, gives the midwife two to ten
shillings in cash, and receiving sugar cakes returns home. [The present consists of butter, sugar, betelnut and leaves, rice, cocoanuts, five
suits of embroidered and plain clothes, an umbrella, a pair of English shoes, stockings, gold silver and pearl ornaments, wood and metal boxes for holding cloves,
cinnamon, nutmeg, mace, and other articles.] That no
evil spirit may steal in watchmen are set to guard the house and
outside, till daybreak, servants sing by turns, and, according to the
father's means, are paid two to ten shillings. The midwife is seated
near the child, and that she may not sleep is closely watched by the
elder women of the house.
Tenth Day.
On the tenth day the mother and child are bathed, and their clothes washed, the whole house is cleaned, the floors are smeared with a mixture of cowdung and water, and cow's urine is sprinked all over the house. After bathing and dressing in fresh clothes, to free them from impurity, each member of the household thrice drinks about
a teaspoonful of the five cow gifts. [The five cow-gifts are clarified butter, curds, milk, cowdung and cow's urine.] Then the men of the father's family change their sacred threads and drink the five cow-gifts.
Infancy.
Under the head Infancy come eight rites, naming, thirtieth day,
fortieth day, ear-boring, vaccination, teething, hair-cutting, and
birth-day.
Naming.
On the tenth, eleventh, or twelfth day, but sometimes not till the
hundred and first day after birth, the child is named. About four in the evening the women of the father's house go to the child with presents of clothes, and putting a large sugar-cake on each of the
four corners of the cradle, lay the child in the cradle, and swing it, calling the child by a name chosen in its father's house. The mother's relations give the child another name; but a child is generally known by the name chosen for it by the father's family.
Thirtieth Day.
'On any day between the twelfth and the thirtieth a servant brings into the house a copper pot full of cold water, and placing it in a square traced on the floor of the women's hall, the mother, who is
seated on a low stool in another square, worships the water-pot. When the worship is over, she takes in her hand a piece of white cloth, and putting a little turmeric powder in it, is asked by an elderly married woman, who, at the same time waves a lighted lamp before her face, where she is going with the cloth. The mother answers:' To the well to wash my child's clothes.'
Fortieth Day.
On the fortieth day the mother is bathed, a necklace of new beads
is tied round her neck, and new glass bracelets are put on her wrists.
The bracelet-seller is given two shillings, eight pounds of rice, a
cocoanut, and betelnut and leaves, and bowing low retires, praying that the woman may never be a widow and may be blessed with
eight sons. The young mother is again pure, and her relations and
friends come bringing presents of clothes and sugar cakes. With
this ceremony the days of confinement end.
Two to five months after, on a lucky day, a boy, seated in a palanquin, is sent with music, from the husband to the mother with clothes, small silver pots, and gold and silver ornaments, toys, and about a hundred cocoanuts and sugar cakes. At the house the boy is seated on a stool, and the mother and babe are dressed in new clothes and
go to the father's house. On the way, to please evil spirits, at each turn of the street a cocoanut is broken, and on reaching the father's house the child's aunt or other kinswoman, lifting the child in her arms, stands with it on the veranda, and another woman waves a pot full of cold water round the child's head, throws the water away, and takes the child into the house, followed by the mother.
Ear-boring.
When the child is between six and twelve months old comes the
ear-boring or kanvindane. A girl's ear is bored in three places,
in one part of the lobe and in two places in the upper cartilage.
About a year after the ears are healed her nose is bored. The hole is generally made in the right nostril. But if the child is the
subject of a vow, the left instead of the right nostril is bored, the
nose-ring is worn in the left nostril, and the child is called by such names as, stone or Dhondibai, beggar or Bhikubai, sweepings or Govarabai. In such cases after marriage the mother-in-law bores the left nostril, and at the husband's expense puts in a rich new nose-ring. In a boy the lobe of both ears and sometimes the upper cartilage of the right ear are bored. If a woman, who has
lost one or more sons, has another, that he may be thought to be a girl, she bores his right nostril, and puts a nose-ring into it sometimes giving him a silver anklet to wear, and calls him stone or Dhondu, or beggar Bhiku or Fakir. [These nose-rings and anklets are worn till the thread-girding time. They are then taken off and given in charity.] In boring the ears and nose the hole is made with a needle and black cotton thread tied like a little ring. The wound is fomented with boiled cocoanut oil and the child is dieted to guard against inflammation. When the wound is healed a gold ring is passed through each of the holes and afterwards a heavier ring is worn circled with pearls and precious stones. As a rule two holes are first made, and when the
place is healed a third hole is bored. The borer, who is generally
a goldsmith, is paid 3d. to 6d. (2-4 as.) a. hole. For the first,
boring he is given a rupee, about eight pounds of rice, a cocoanut,
and betelnut and leaves.
Vaccination.
When the child is five or six months old, some vaccinator who
known to the family is sent for, and operates in three places on the right arm and in two on the left. [Brahman vaccinators are most popular. They are paid 2s. to
4s. In some families children are not vaccinated, the parents waiting till they are attacked by the small-pox. Then ceremonies like the above are performed, and in addition, Hindu male or female devil-dancers are called in.] On the third day he again calls and examines the wounds. If the lymph has taken, the goddess Shitaladevi is supposed to have entered the child, who is sacred treated with respect and spoken to as devi, that is the goddess. A silver pot filled with cold water is set in some clean spot, English Chinese and Indian toys are laid round it, and at night the place is lighted. The mother dresses in white and does not wear the usual mark on her brow. Morning and evening she waves buring frankincense and a lighted lamp round the child's face, the swinging cot, and the water-pot, and bows before them. She touches nothing impure. Neither the men nor the women of the family eat fish or flesh, and go to no marriages, funerals, dinner parties, or processions. The husband sleeps apart from his wife, and none of the woman of the family, who may be ceremonially impure, walk about the house,
or talk loud. Morning, noon, and dusk, the women seated on swinging cots, sing songs in praise of the small-pox goddess, and the whole care of the household is centered in the child. If a stranger comes into the house, he has to sprinkle cow's urine on his feet with a lime-tree twig, and speak to the child kindly and reverently as though addressing the goddess. On the mourning of the seventh day after the lymph took, a girl is sent round to ask female relations and friends, and a written invitation is sent to men
to be present at the ash-rubbing or vibhut. About ten in the morning, in front of the water-pot, a square is traced with powdered quartz, and in it figures of men, animals, houses, and fruit-laden trees are drawn. In the square a low stool is placed and in front of the stool two silver plates are laid, one with scented powder or abir, the other with cowdung-ashes or vibhut. Lighted metal and glass lamps and burning frankincense-sticks are mounted on brass and silver stands. From four in the afternoon women begin to come, bringing trays of sweetmeats, flowers, and fruit. The mother, dressed in a rich suit of white, comes with her child in her arms, and seating it on the low stool, humbly, as if addressing the goddess, asks it to accept the offerings. Then rubbing the ashes and the scented powder on the sores, she again begs the child to accept the sweetmeats, fruit, and other offerings. Then the salvers are emptied, a little of each article being left in each salver, sugar-cakes are handed, and the women go home. About eight in the evening men begin to drop in, and after fruit and a cup or two of spiced milk served in English dishes and on tables, sugar-cakes are handed and they leave. A fortnight after the vaccination day, the nearest relations are called, and at noon, with music playing, the child and its parents relations and friends go to the temple of the goddess Shitaladevi. Hero the mother pouring pot after pot of cold water upon the image's head, sits with her husband and child before the image, the priest murmurs verses, and the mother throws rice, flowers, and redpowder on the goddess and bows low. They then fill the laps of married women and giving them pieces of watermelons go back to the child's house. Here they are served with a rich dinner, with a dish of spiced milk, and leave after throwing water from the water-pot into a well. In the evening a rich dinner is given to the men. After this, lest other children should be attacked with small-pox, no songs are sung in praise of the goddess.
Teething.
When a child begins to cut its first tooth, it is dressed in trousers
cap and shoes, and loaded with ornaments, and, accompanied by servants, is sent to the houses of relations, with either silver or brass cups and sweetmeats. At each house the servant puts a little sugared gram into a cup, goes in, and lays it before a married woman. Then the women gather round the child, smiling, and touching its cheeks. In this way the child goes from house to house till about seven or eight at night it is taken home. Only the well-to-do keep this custom.
Hair-cutting.
For the hair-cutting the boy is made to sit either on his father's lap or on a low wooden stool, a new handkerchief is spread over his knees, and sometimes a silver water-cup is set beside him. The barber shaves the boy's head, leaving two tufts of hair, a top-knot and a forelock. When the shaving is over, the women of the family, as the barber's perquisite, let sugar-balls roll down the boy's head into the handkerchief, and the barber is given one rupee, eight pounds of rice, a cocoanut, betelnut and leaves, the handkerchief, and the silver cup. The forelock is from time to time cut and kept short and the top-knot is allowed to grow into a long lock or shendi.
In well-to-do families on their birthdays, boys are generally given a new suit of clothes and ornaments relations and friends are treated to a cup of spiced milk, and singing and dancing go on the whole night. The birthday is kept sometimes till the child is girt with the sacred thread, sometimes till he is married, and sometimes till he is a father.
Thread-girding.
A boy's munj or thread-girding may take place at any time between
four and ten. The parents ask the astrologer who sees the boy's
horoscope, calculates, and fixes the day. On some lucky day about
a week before the ceremony, a quarter of a pound of turmeric, of
redpowder, of coriander seed, of molasses, and of thread are brought from the
market and laid before the family gods. Two or three
days after, from the house of the boy's father, a party of boys and
girls with music go to ask the people of their caste to the ceremony.
A booth or porch is built in front of the house, and the chief women of
the family go to ask their kinswomen both for the thread-girding
and for the dinner, begging the mother of one of the sons-in-law to
send her son for the gourd-cutting. On the same day the head of
the family asks men relations and friends by letter. Next day the
boy is rubbed with turmeric and the same rites are gone through
as before a marriage. About three in the afternoon, such of the
guests as are married women are served with a rich dinner. A
the head of the row of guests sit the boy and his mother in a square
space traced with white powder on the threshold of the room.
Before they begin to eat, a morsel from the plate of each guest is
set before the boy and his mother and tasted. The mother is then
served on a separate plate close by the boy. In the back yard of
the house an altar is built, the same as the marriage altar except
that it is measured by the boy's and not by the girl's arm. The
same night male guests are entertained at dinner, musicians come,
and a store of earthen pots is laid in. Early in the morning of the
thread-girding day lines are drawn in the booth and two low stools
are set within the lines. The boy and his mother sit on the stools and
with songs and music are bathed by a band of young married girls
After they are bathed lighted lamps are waved round them and they go
into the house. On one side of the entrance hall lines are drawn and
the boy is seated on a low stool. The boy's mother's brother and
his father's sister come to him. The mother's brother puts a gold
ring on the boy's right little finger and with a pair of silver scissors
cuts some hair off his forelock, and the aunt catches the hair in a silver
cup filled with milk. The barber sits in front of the boy and shaves
his head except his top-knot. When the shaving is over, the
women of the family roll sugar-balls and silver coins down the boy's
head into a handkerchief spread over his knees. These are given to
the barber, and also a new turban or a handkerchief, rice, betel and
a cocoanut. The boy is a second time bathed in the booth, rubbed
dry, and a lighted lamp is waved round his face. Then his maternal
uncle, covering him with a white sheet, carries him in his arms to
the veranda. Here again a lighted lamp is waved round his face
and he is carried into the room where the goddesses have been
worshipped. After a short time the boy eats from the same plate
as his mother along with eight boys who wear the sacred thread but are not married. When the meal is over, presents are made to the eight companions, and the boy is washed and taken to the room where the goddesses have been worshipped, decked with ornaments, and led to the altar on one side of which his father sits with his face to the east. The guests begin to come and either sit in the hall or stand near the altar. The boy stands opposite his father on a heap of about eight pounds of rice facing him. An unbleached cloth marked with red lines is held between them, and, till the lucky moment comes, the astrologer, the family priest, and other Brahmans repeat texts. The boy's sister stands by with a lighted rice-flour lamp in a metal plate, and relations and others gather round the boy, and at the end of each verse keep silently throwing a few grains of rice over him. At the lucky moment the priest stops chanting and the cloth is pulled to the north, a bugle
sounds, and at the signal musicians raise a blast of music and the guests clap their hands. A piece of silk cloth fastened to his waist-band is passed between the boy's thighs and tucked into the waist-band behind, the sacred thread is put over his left shoulder so as to fall on the right side, and a string of munj grass Saccharum munja, together with a piece of deer hide is bound round his middle. The boy is now ready to hear the Gayatri mantra or holy text. He bows to his father, is seated on his father's right knee, and, in an undertone, the words of the hymn are whispered in his right ear. Lest the words should be overheard by a woman or by a man of low caste, a shawl is thrown over the father's head and the guests talk together loudly or repeat a hymn in praise of the gods. After this kinspeople and friends present the boy with gold, pearl, or diamond rings, or money. The family priest takes away the rice heap and kindles the sacred fire in the middle of the altar. The observance ought to last five days, the sacred fire being kept alight and the boy touching no one. But as few families can afford to spend five idle days, the fire is usually put out on the evening of the first day. In the afternoon the mother of the boy, with a number of kinswomen and friends, goes with music to her parents' house. She receives clothes and other presents, and leaves after sugar-cakes and cocoanuts have been handed round. [The presents are: Silver or brass plates, ladles, cups, looking glasses, silver brow-marks, cups for sandal powder, a gold or cotton sacred thread, a low wooden stool, a silk waistcloth, and a rupee in cash, the whole worth 8s. to £5.]
On the mother's return comes the begging ceremony. The boy stands near the altar with a beggar's wallet round his shoulder and a staff in his hand, and begs, and each man and woman gives him a sugar-ball and a silver or copper coin. After this the kinsmen and kinswomen are served separately with a rich dinner. About eight or nine at night the boy starts on a pilgrimage nominally to Benares, but in practice to his mother's father's house. When he is gone the guests sit in the receiving hall, and about ten form a procession and with music follow the boy to his grandfather's.
On their arrival the boy is seated on a high carpeted stool, and his maternal uncle dresses him in a rich suit of clothes. Sugar-cakes
and cocoanuts are served and the party returns with the boy to his
father's. Then the guests take their leave after a parting cup or two
of spiced milk and some betelnut and sugar. At night the guardian
deities of the thread-girding are bowed out, and the next day the
boy is rubbed with rice flour and goes back to his every-day duties.
A day or two after the guests have gone special sweet dishes are
cooked and five to a hundred Brahmans are fed. While taking
their dinner the Brahmans by turn repeat hymns, joining in a
chorus at the end of each hymn. When dinner is over, betelnut
and leaves are served, and, except the family priest and one or two
learned Brahmans who are paid one to two shillings, each is given
1½ d. to 3d. (1-2 as.) After distributing these gifts the host
stands
with his turban on his head and his shawl in his open hands before
the seated Brahmans, who repeat the usual blessing for the gain of
money, corn, cattle, children, and long life, and at the end throw
grains of rice over the host's head and into the shawl held in his
hands.
Death.
A few hours before death the family priest brings in a cow with her
calf, marks the cow's forehead with red and salutes it by bowing
and raising his joined hands. The eldest son or other near kinsman
of the dying man pours into the dying mouth a ladleful of water
in which the end of the cow's tail is dipped. The priest is given 10s.
to £1 10s. (Rs. 5-15) as the price of the cow, and a learned Brahman
is called to read the sacred books or Gita. [No cow is given in the case of children.] In the name of the
dying man rice pulse and money are given to Brahmans and other
beggars, and a Spot in the women's hall is strewn with sacred grass
and sweet basil leaves. On the grass and leaves the dying is laid the
feet towards the outer door, and a few drops of Ganges water, a leaf
of sweet basil, and a particle of gold are put in the mouth. The name
of the god Ram is called aloud in the dying man's right ear and he is
asked to repeat it. The eldest son sits on the ground and taking
the dying man's head on his knee, comforts him till he draws his last
breath, promising to care for the widow and children. The body is
covered with a sheet, and the women sit round weeping and wailing.
The men go out and sit bareheaded on the veranda, and servants
start to tell relations of the death. About £2 is handed to friends,
who go to the market and bring what is wanted for the funeral. [Things wanted for a funeral are always brought from the market; they are never
taken from the house. The details are: For a woman's funeral, two bamboo poles,
two split bamboos, 20 yards of fine cotton cloth, coir rope, date matting, basil leaves,
a flower wreath, 1 large and 5 small earthen pots, sandalwood, 1200 cowdung
cakes, clarified butter, six large wooden posts, 1 to 1½ khandis of wood, dry palm
leaves, tobacco and country cigars, parched grain, a cocoanut, matches, two copper
coins, one winnowing fan, a dish and a copper pot, wheat flour, pounded turmeric,
red and scented powder, camphor, plantain leaf, white clay, dried clay, myrabolans,
sesamum, rice, betelnut and tobacco, lime, five plantains, one cocoanut, a small
looking glass, a comb, a small wooden box, bangles, wheat, and betel.
For a man the details are the same as for a woman, except that plantains and other fruits are not wanted, and that about ten yards less of cloth is used in the shroud If a child's body is burned, its funeral costs about Rs. 3-5-0. Of this 4 annas
go in cloth, ¼ anna in cowdung cakes, 1 anna for a clay pot, and about
Rs. 3 in firewood. To bury a child coats about Rs. 1½, Rs. 1¼ for digging the grave and 4 annas for salt.]
When they come back, they busy themselves in making the body
ready. Outside of the house the chief mourner and his brother, if he has brothers, are bathed one after the other, and their mustaches and except the top-knots their heads are shaved and their nails pared. The chief mourner is dressed in a new waistcloth, and a shouldercloth is twined with his sacred thread. Near the feet of the body rice is cooked, made into balls, and laid at its feet, and then taken and placed on the bier near the head. [The bier is made of two solid bamboos in the shape of a ladder, strongly bound with a coir string. On the ladder is laid a piece of date matting covered with a white sheet.] The nearest male relations followed by the women carry the body through the main door and lay it on the house steps on a small plank, the head resting on the steps. Round the head the women sit weeping, the men standing at some distance. A second rice ball is laid near the feet and the third is placed on the bier. A pot of cold water is brought from the well and poured over the body, which is hidden while it is being dressed. Elderly women dress a woman's body in a full suit of new every-day clothes. [A widow's
body is dressed in a white robe, her brow is rubbed with white powder, and the body
is laid on the bier covered with the winding sheet. A married woman's body is not covered with a winding sheet. A man's body is covered, except the face.]
If the dead woman leaves a husband, her lap is filled with fruit and flowers, and a lighted hanging brass lamp is waved round her face, and without putting it out is thrown on one side upside down. Each married woman present takes a little redpowder from the dead brow and rubs it on her own brow, praying that like her she may die before her husband dies. A man's body, except the waistband, is left bare, yellow powder is rubbed on the brow, garlands of sweet basil leaves are thrown round the neck, and he is laid on the bier and covered with a sheet. If he leaves a widow of more than fifteen, old widows lead her into a room, her bodice is stripped, her glass bangles are broken on her wrists, her lucky necklace of black beads is torn from her neck, and her head is shaved. The hair, the broken bangles, and the lucky string of black beads are rolled in her bodice and laid near the head of the dead.
The bier is raised on the shoulders of four of the nearest male relations, and is carried out feet first close after the chief mourner who walks with an earthen pot of burning cowdung cakes hanging from his hand in a three-cornered bamboo sling. With the chief mourner walk two other men, one holding a metal pot with the rice which was cooked near the feet of the body, and the other a bamboo winnowing fan with parched pulse and small bits of cocoa-kernel, which, as he walks, he throws before him to please the evil spirits. Of the men who have come to the house some follow bareheaded, saying Ram Ram in a low tone; the rest go to their homes. The body is carried at a slow pace, the chief mourner keeping close in front that no one may pass between the fire and the body. No woman goes to the burning ground. The friends take the women and the children and bathe them, get the floor where the body was laid, the veranda, and, which is never done at any other time, the house steps washed with water and
cowdung, arrange for the mourner's dinner, and go home. On nearing the burning ground a small stone called ashma or the soul is picked up. To this stone as a type of the dead funeral cakes and offerings are made. Further on, the litter is lowered, a ball of rice and a copper coin are laid on the ground, and, without looking back, the bearers change places, and for the rest of the way carry the bier in their hands.
At the burning ground, where the pile is to be raised, a small hole is made, and filled with water and in the hole blades of sacred grass and sesamum seed are laid. From the earthen pot fire is dropped on the ground, and, while the priest says texts, the chief mourner kindles the holy fire. When the pile is ready, the chief mourner draws three lines on the ground with a piece of firewood, and from the hole sprinkles water on the pile. The bearers pour water on the body, lift the litter three times, touch the pile, and lay the body on it with the head to the south. From a small stick butter is dropped into the mouth, nostrils, eyes, and ears. Five small unbaked wheaten balls are laid, on the mouth, on each shoulder, on the brow, on the navel, and on the breast, and, if a person has died on an unlucky day, rice-flour figures of men are laid beside it. When this is done, each man lays on the breast a small piece of sandalwood. The chief mourner, taking a little water and few blades of sacred grass, walks round the pile. Layers of cakes are heaped over the body, and it is made ready for burning. The bier is turned upside down, thrown
on one side, and taken to pieces. The winding sheet is carried off by some Mhar, the date mat is destroyed, and the bamboo poles are kept for stirring the fire. The chief mourner is called, a brand is put in his hand, and, going thrice round the pile with his right hand towards it, shifts his sacred thread to his right shoulder, and, looking towards the north, applies the brand near the feet. He fans the fire with the hem of the shoulder cloth which is twined, with his sacred thread. Except a few who know how to burn the pile, the rest with the chief mourner sit some way off. When the fire bursts into flames, and the body begins to burn, the party withdraw still further, and, till the burning is over, talk, laugh, joke, smoke, a few even chewing betel. [During the last two or three years the chewing of betelnut and leaves at the burning ground has come into fashion, A few young
Prabhus even go so far as to drink sodawater and lemonade.]
When the skull bursts, which is known as kapal moksh or the skull-freeing the chief mourner goes near the pyre, and throws cocoa-milk over it to cool the body. When all is burnt and it is time to put out the fire, the chief mourner, carrying on his right shoulder an earthen pot filled with water, and starting from the west side with his left shoulder towards the pyre, begins to walk round it. When he comes to the south near where the head lay, one of the relations makes a small hole in the earthen pot with the life-stone or ashma, and as the chief mourner goes round the water trickles through the hole. At the end of the first round, on coming back to the south, a second hole is made with the stone
and a second stream runs out. At the end of the second round a third hole is made, and after making a third turn, at the south end he turns his back to the pyre and drops the jar from his shoulder so that the jar dashes on the ground and the water spills over the ashes. The chief mourner strikes his mouth with the back of his right hand and cries aloud. After this, the rest of the party pour on the fire pot upon pot of water, and the ashes are carried away and thrown into the sea. [At
some rich funerals the body is covered with a Kashmir shawl, sandalwood is mixed with other firewood, and the fire
is quenched with milk instead of with water.]
A three-cornered earthen mound is raised in the centre of the spot where the body was burnt. On the mound cowdung and water are sprinkled, sacred grass is strewn, and on the grass are set five earthen pots full of water, a few bits of sacred grass, sesamum seed, rice rolled into balls and mixed with sesamum seed and barley, wheat cakes and butter, a thread from the chief mourner's waistcloth, a few flowers, sprigs of sweet basil, and small yellow flags. The chief mourner lights camphor and burns frankincense before the balls, and asks the dead to accept the offering. Then, one after the other, the mourners shift the sacred thread to the right shoulder, and thrice offer water to the soul-stone saying: ' Since by burning you are heated and that the heat may cool we offer thee, naming the deceased and his family, water. May this offering reach you.'
Then the party start for the house of mourning, the chief mourner going first, carrying in his hand the soul-stone in a metal vessel wrapped in fragments of the shroud. When the mourners return the women in the house again burst into weeping. The chief mourner is bathed on the front steps of the house, and the others wash their hands feet and mouths and go inside. Then the relations quiet and comfort the women, and make the mourners take food. After the mourners have begun to eat, the friends bow to the lamp which is kept burning on the spot where life left the dead, and return to their homes.
After Death.
For ten days the spirit remains seated on the eaves of the house where it left the body. At sunset, that the spirit may bathe and drink, two plantain-leaf cups are placed on the eaves, one full of milk the other full of water. During the ten days when the spirit of the dead still rests on the house-top the mourners are bound by strict rules. Except to worship at the burning ground the chief mourner does not leave the house for thirteen days after the funeral. The members of the family eat no animal food, nor any food or drink in which sugar is mixed. Leaves are used instead of metal plates. They neither buy. nor cook, eating only fish, herbs, and things sent them by their relations and friends, and cooked by some one who stays with them to comfort them. They neither worship their family gods, nor say their prayers; and husbands sleep away from their wives, on blankets or mats, or on the bare ground. On the second day after the death, at the burning ground the chief
mourner cooks or hires a Brahman to cook rice-balls and wheat cakes, offering them as he offered them on the first day that the dead may gain a new body. On the first day the dead gains his head, on the second day his ears eyes and nose, on the third his hands breast and neck, on the fourth his middle parts, on the fifth his legs and feet, on the sixth his vitals, on the seventh his bones
marrow veins and arteries, on the eighth his nails hair and teeth, on, the ninth all remaining limbs and organs and his manly strength, and on the tenth he begins to hunger and thirst for the renewed body. On this day the lamp, which has been kept lighted in the house since the mourners came back from the burning ground, is upset, the lighted wick is pulled in from below, and the wick is taken to the burning ground for the tenth day's ceremony. As the light goes out the soul of the dead leaves the house and the women raise a cry of sorrow. On reaching the; burning ground, the chief mourner makes a three-cornered mound of earth, and sprinkles cowdung and water on it. He strews turmeric powder, sets five earthen pots on five blades of sacred grass, three in one line and two at right angles. He fills these five pots with water, throws in a few grains of sesamum, and over their mouths lays a wheaten cake and a rice-ball. He plants small yellow flags in the ground, and, setting up the soul-stone, strews flowers before it, and waving burning frankincense and lighted lamps prays the dead to accept the offering. If a crow comes and takes the right-side ball the dead died happy. If no crow comes the dead had some trouble on his mind. With much bowing he is told not to fret, his family and goods will be cared for, or if the ceremony was not rightly done the fault will be mended. In spite of these appeals, if for a couple of hours the crow will not take the rice, the chief mourner touches the ball with a blade of sacred grass. He then takes the soul-stone and rubbing it with sesamum oil to quench the hunger and thirst of the dead, he offers it a rice ball and water, and standing with it near water, facing the east, throws it over his shoulder into the water. This ends the tenth day ceremony. During these ten days friends and relations grieve with the mourners staying with them daily till dusk. On the eleventh day the chief mourner goes to some charity-house or dharmshala to perform the shraddh or memorial service. in performing the shraddh the chief mourner [The chief mourner is the eldest or the only son. If there is no son there is no yearly shraddh.] smears a plot of ground with cowdung and water, and placing a few blades of the sacred darbha grass on one side, sits on them, and draws rings of sacred grass on the ring-fingers of both his hands. He sots before him a lighted metal lamp, a water-pot, a cap, a ladle, and a platter filled with flowers, grain, spices, and other articles. [The details are: Flowers, sweet basil leaves, sacred grass, barley, sesamum, rice, butter, curds, milk, sugar, scented powder, frankincense, cotton wicks dipped in butter, betel, plantains, and copper and silver coins.] He dips a sweet basil leaf in the water-cup, and sprinkles water from it over himself and the articles of worship. For the gods he sets two blades of
sacred grass on two spots in front of him and a little to the right; he then shifts [During the shraddh the mourner
has to shift his sacred thread to his right Shoulder when offering to the spirit of the dead, and to his left when offering to the gods. When offering to the spirit of an ascetic or sadhu the thread is hung round the neck like a chain.] his sacred thread to his right shoulder and lays on his left six blades, three for paternal and three for maternal ancestors, praying both the gods and the ancestors to come and sit on the grass. He spreads sacred grass in front of the spots where the gods and the forefathers are seated, and sets leaf-cups on them. From another leaf-cup he sprinkles water on the cups from the point of a sacred grass leaf. He lays sacred grass on the rims of the cups, partly fills them with water, putting barley in the gods' cups and sesamum in the forefather's cups, and lays betel, plantains, and copper coins before them. One after another the cups are taken up, smelt, and laid down. The sacred grass that lay on the rim of the cups is laid on the priest's right palm, and the sacred grass that was under the cups is held by the mourner in his own hand, and from it he pours water from the cups on the priest's hand. He piles the cups in three sets. Then his cook or some other elderly woman hands him a pound of freshly cooked rice. In the rice he mixes a little butter and barley and a few sweet basil leaves, rolls them into balls, and lays them on a bed of sacred grass. Over the balls he sprinkles water, flowers, sweet basil leaves, and scented powder, and lays on the top a thread from his waistcloth, and offers the balls cooked rice, vegetables, cakes, sweet milk, betel, a cocoanut, and copper and silver coins, waves lighted cotton wicks and camphor, and makes a low bow. He takes the middle ball and smells it in the hope that it may lead to the blessing of a son. He pays the priest
1s. to 4s. (8 as.-Rs.2) and the priest retires. The chief mourner gathers the offerings, gives them to a cow, and closes the ceremony setting on the housetop a leaf-plate filled with several dishes. On the evening of the twelfth day the chief mourner is brought home by relations and friends. When he reaches home he washes his hands and feet, and, standing on the edge of the veranda, with joined hands, dismisses the company with low repeated bows. On the morning of the thirteenth day, to purify the spot on which the deceased died, it is made clean, a mound is raised over it, and a sacred fire is kindled. To raise the spirit of the dead from this world where it would roam with demons and evil spirits to a place among the shades of the guardian dead, the shraddh ceremony is again performed. When the second shraddh is over part of the deceased's property is given to Brahmans. [During the shraddh the mourner
has to shift his sacred thread to his right Shoulder when offering to the spirit of the dead, and to his left when offering to the gods. When offering to the spirit of an ascetic or sadhu the thread is hung round the neck like a chain.] If the dead was a man, his clothes, bedding and cot, snuff-box, walking stick, and sacred books are given; if the dead was a married woman her wearing apparel, ornaments, combs, lucky necklaces, and redpowder boxes are given to married Brahman women whose feet are washed with cocoanut Water. A certain uncleanness or dishonour attaches to the Brahmans who take these presents. In return the priest gives the mourner a little sugar to eat. Then, laying a little of each dish on the eaves
to feed the crows, the guests and the chief mourner dine together, the guests now and then asking the chief mourner to taste the dishes prepared with sugar. The chief dish is milk boiled with sugar and spices. In the evening relations and friends come and present the mourner with snuff-coloured turbans, one of them being folded and placed on his head. Then the mourner, dressed in his usual clothes, leads the company to the nearest temple. At the temple he offers oil cocoanuts and money, and the others stand outside or come in and bow to the gods. When his offerings are over, the chief mourner leads the company back to his house, and dismisses them, and is free to follow his daily duties. This evening all the married women go to the houses of their parents, and the little married girls to the houses of their husbands, and not a particle of cooked food is left in the house. On the sixteenth day the mourner performs a ceremony for the dead that he may not suffer from hunger or thirst. Every month for a year this ceremony. is repeated, and after that on the death day and also on the corresponding day of the month in Bhadrapad
or August-September, when the dead hover round their kinsmen's houses looking
for food.
Corpse-less Funeral.
Besides the regular funeral ceremonies when death takes place at home, special rites are sometimes performed when there is no body to burn. There may be no body to burn either because the deceased died in a distant land or was drowned at sea, or the burning may be symbolic, done while the person is alive, to show that he is dead to his family and caste. Sometimes when a wife has forsaken her husband and will not return, he performs her funeral and from that day will never see her face again. Or if a Prabhu gives up his father's faith and turns Christian or Musalman, either at or after his change his parents perform his funeral rites. In these cases, the chief mourner with the family priest and one or two near relations go to the burning ground and spread the skin of a black antelope in a corner. On the antelope skin the chief mourner lays three hundred and sixty palas
leaves, forty leaves for the head, ten for the neck, one hundred for both
arms, ten for the ten fingers, twenty for the chest, forty for the belly,
one hundred and thirty for the legs, and ten for the ten toes. Tying them by
their stems with sacred grass in separate bunches and laying them on their
former places, he spreads more grass on the leaves, and rolls the whole into
a bundle a foot or eighteen inches long. He holds the bundle in front of
him, mixes about a pound of wheat-flour honey and butter, and rubbing the
mixture on the bundle draws a white cloth over it. At its top, for the head he places a cocoanut, for the brow a plantain leaf, for the teeth thirty-two pomegranate seeds, for the ears two pieces of shell, for the eyes two kavdi shells their corners marked with redlead, for the nose sesamum flower or seeds, for the navel a lotus flower, for the arm bones two carrots, for the thigh bones two brinjals, lemons and Abrus or gunja berries for the breasts, and sea shells or a carrot for the other parts. For the breath he puts arsenic, for the bile yellow pigment, for the phlegm sea foam, for the blood honey, for the urine and excrement cow's urine and dung, for the seminal fluids quicksilver, for the hair of the head the hair of a wild hog, for
the hair of the body wool, and for the flesh he sprinkles on the figure wet barley-flour honey and butter. He sprinkes milk, curds, honey, butter, sugar, and water on the figure, and covers the lower part
of it with a woollen cloth. He puts on its chest a sacred thread, round its neck a flower necklace, touches the forehead with sandal, and places on its stomach a lighted flour-lamp. The body is laid with its head to the south and is sprinkled with rice and the life of the dead is brought into it. When the lamp flickers and dies the mourner offers the gifts and performs the ceremonies which are usually performed to a dying man. When the lamp is out he raises a pile of wood, and burns the figure with full rites, mourning ten days and going through all the after-death or shraddh
ceremonies. [The special expenses of such a funeral are:
Corpse-less Funeral.
|
ARTICLE. |
Cost. |
ARTICLE. |
Cost. |
| | Rs. |
a. |
p. |
|
Rs. |
a. |
P. |
|
Deer Skin |
1 |
0 |
0 |
Cowdung |
0 |
0 |
1 |
|
360 Butea Leaves |
-- |
-- |
-- |
Limes, two |
0 |
0 |
2 |
|
Two Cocoanuts |
0 |
1 |
6 |
Brinjals, two |
0 |
0 |
6 |
|
Plantains |
0 |
2 |
0 |
Carrot, one |
0 |
0 |
1 |
|
Plantain Leaf |
0 |
0 |
3 |
Hog-hair |
0 |
2 |
0 |
|
Pomegranate |
0 |
1 |
0 |
Woollen Waistcloth |
2 |
0 |
0 |
|
Bangles, two |
0 |
0 |
2 |
Wheat Flour |
0 |
1 |
0 |
|
Cowri Shells |
0 |
0 |
1 |
Five Cow-Gifts |
0 |
0 |
3 |
|
Sesamum Flower |
0 |
0 |
3 |
Rice | 0 |
0 |
2 |
|
Talc | 0 |
0 |
2 |
Lotus Flower |
0 |
0 |
1 |
|
Yellow Orpiment |
0 |
0 |
3 |
Abrus Berries |
0 |
0 |
2 |
|
Cuttle Fish Scale |
0. |
0 |
3 |
Wool | 0 |
0 |
3 |
|
Gorochan |
0 |
0 |
3 |
Barley Flour |
0 |
1 |
0 |
|
Quicksilver |
0 |
1 | 0 |
Sacred Thread |
0 |
0 |
6 |
|
Red Sulphuret of Arsenic |
0 |
0 |
3 |
Garland |
0 |
1 |
0 |
|
Honey |
0 |
0 |
3 |
Total |
3 |
15 |
0 |
|
Cow's Urine |
0 |
0 |
1 |
]
Religion.
A few Prabhus are of the Shaiv sect of Brahmanic Hindus, but most are followers of Shankaracharya (700-800) whose representative, the head of the Shringeri monastery in West Maisur, is the pontiff of all members of the Smart sect. The Smarts hold the ekdvait or single belief that the soul and the universe are one. Few Prabhus become ascetics or religious beggars. In childhood all are taught Sanskrit prayers and know the details of the ordinary worship. But, except the women and some of the older men, beyond marking feast days by specially good living, few attend to the worship of the gods or to the rules of their faith. Each day on waking the first thing a Prabhu looks at is a gold or diamond ring, a piece of sandalwood, a looking glass, or a drum. He rubs the palms of his hands together and looks at them for in them dwell the god Govind and the goddesses Lakshmi and Sarasvati. Then he looks at the floor to which, as the house of the god Narayan and of his wife Lakshmi, he bows, setting on it first his right foot and then his left. Next with closed eyes, opening them only when before the object of his worship, he visits and bows to his house gods, his parents, his religious teacher, the sun, the basil plant, and the cow. About nine, after his bath, he goes to the god-room to worship the house gods. On entering the room he walks with
measured steps so that his right foot may be the first to be set on the low stool in front of the gods. His house gods are small images of gold, silver, brass, and stone, generally a Ganpati, a Mahadev in the form of the ban or arrow-head stone ling, [The ban or arrow-headed brown stone is found in the Narbada,] a Vishnu in the form of the pierced shaligram [The shaligram. is a round black stone found in the Gandaki river in Nepal. It sometimes has holes in the shape of a cows foot or of a flower garland, and
is believed to be bored by Vishnu in the form of a worm, and in specially sacred as the abode of Vishnu under the name of Lakshmi-Narayan.] the conch or shankh, and the chakrankit or discus marked stone, a sun or surya and other family gods and goddesses. These images are kept either in a dome-shaped wooden shrine called devghara or the gods' house or on a high wooden stool covered with a glass globe to save the gods and their offerings from rats. [Rats are troublesome in Hindu houses and are either poisoned or caught in traps, except on Ganesh's Birthday in August when balls of rice flour, cocoanut scrapings, and sugar are thrown to them.] In worshipping his house gods, the Prabhu seats himself before them on a low wooden stool, and, saying verses, lays ashes on the palm of his left hand, and, covering the ashes with life right hand, pours one or two ladlefuls of water on the ashes, rubs them between the palms of both hands, and, with the right thumb, draws a line from the tip of the nose to the middle of the brow, thence to the corner of the right temple, and then back to the corner of the left brow. He closes his hands so that the three middle fingers rub on each palm, opens them again, and draws lines on his brow, those from left to right with the right hand fingers, and those from right to left with the left hand fingers. He rubs ashes on his throat, navel, left arm, breast, right arm, shoulders, elbows, back, ears, eyes, and head, and washes his hands. He ties his top-knot, pours a ladleful of water on the palm of his right hand, and turns his hand round his head. He says his prayers or sandhyas [Sandhya, literally joining that is twilight, includes religious meditation and repeating of verses. It should be repeated thrice a day, at sunrise, noon, and sunset. Most Prabhus say prayers in the morning, none at noon, and a few at night.] sips water, repeats the names of twenty-four gods, and, holding his left nostril with the first two fingers of his right hand, draws breath through his right nostril and closing that nostril with his thumb, holds his breath while he thinks the Gayatri verse. [This very holy and secret verse should every day be thought on. It runs; Om! Earth ! Sky ! Heaven ! let us think the adorable light, the sun; may it lighten our minds. Compare Descartes (1641) (Meditation III. The Existence of God); 'I will
now close my eyes, stop my ears, call away my senses and linger over the
thought of God, ponder his attributes, and gaze on the beauty of this marvellous light.' Rene Descartes by
Richard Lowndes, 151 and 168.] He raises his fingers, breathes through his left nostril, and, with his sacred thread between his right thumb and first finger, holding his hand in a bag called gomuki that is cow's-mouth or in the folds of his waistcloth, he ten times says the sacred verse under his breath. He then sips water and filling a ladle mixes the water with sandal powder and a few grains of rice, and bowing to it spills it on the ground. He takes a water jar, sets it on his left side, pours a ladleful of water into it, covers its mouth with his right palm, rubs sandal powder and rice grains on the outside, and drops flowers on it. He worships a little brass bell, ringing it and putting sandal powder, rice, and
flowers on it. He worships the conch shell and a small metal water-pot which he fills with water for the gods to drink. He takes the last day's flowers, smells them, and puts them in a basket so that they may be laid in a corner of his garden and not trampled under foot. He sets the gods in a copper plate, and bathes them with milk, curds, butter, honey, and sugar, and, touching them with sandal powder and rice, washes them in cold water, [During the Divali holidays the gods are rubbed with scented powder and bathed in warm water.] and dries them with a towel, and putting them back in their places, with the tip of the right ring-finger marks the ling with white sandal powder and Ganpati and Surya with red. He sprinkles the gods with turmeric, red and scented powder, and grains of rice. He sprinkles the ling with white flowers and Ganpati with red, the ling and shaligram with bel and sweet basil leaves, and Ganpati with bent grass or durva. He lays sugar or cooked food before them and rings a bell which he keeps on ringing at intervals during the whole service. He offers them sugar, covering it with a basil leaf and sprinkling water over the leaf, and drawing a towel over his face, waves his fingers before the gods, and prays them to accept the offering. Waving burning frankincense a lighted butter lamp and camphor, and taking a few flowers in his open hands, he stands behind the low stool on which he had been sitting and repeating verses lays the flowers on the gods' heads, passes his open palms above the flames, rubs them over his face, and going round the dome where the gods' images are kept, or if there is no room turning himself round, bows to the ground and withdraws.
He goes to the stable, sits on a low wooden stool before the cow, throws a few grains of rice at her, pours water over her feet, touches her head with sandal and other powders, rice, and flowers, offers her sugar, waves a lighted lamp, and goes round her once, thrice, five, eleven, or one hundred and eight times, and, filling a ladle with water, dips the end of her tail in it and drinks. With the same details he worships the basil plant, [To Prabhus, 'Tulsi, Krishna's wife, is the holiest of plants. No Prabhu backyard is without
its tulsi pot in an eight-cornered altar. Of its stalks and roots rosaries and necklaces are made. Mothers worship it praying for a blessing on their husbands and children.] and last of all the sun, before whom he stands on one foot resting the other foot against his heel, and looking toward the sun and holding out his hollowed hands begs the god to be kindly. Then taking an offering or arghya, of sesamum barley red sandal and water in a copper boat-shaped vessel, he holds it on his head and presents it to the deity. These rites are generally performed in the morning, either by the master of the house if he has the mind and the time, or by a Brahman, who is a different man from the family priest and is paid one or two shillings a month. [A hired Brahman in worshipping the family gods uses water not milk, and in
some cases the master of the house bathes the gods in water. On great worships or mahapujas, the gods are bathed first in milk and
then in water. In the evenings a Hindu doss not bathe his gods but puts fresh
flowers on them, offers them sugar to eat, and waves a lighted lamp before
them.]
Fasts and Feasts.
Before taking their morning meal the elder
women of the house, especially widows, tell their beads [These rosaries or malas have one hundred and eight beads made either of rough brown berries called rudraksha or of light brown tulsi wood. While saying his prayers the devotee at each prayer drops a bead, and those whose devotions are silent hide their hand with the rosary in a bag of peculiar shape called the cow's mouth or gomukhi.] sitting on the low stools in the god-room with rosaries in their hands. The other women worship the gods and the basil plant when their husbands have gone to office. At any time in the morning or evening, before taking their meals, the boys come into the god-room and say Sanskrit prayers.
Month Days.
The Hindu month has two parts, the bright fortnight called the shuddh or shukla paksha that is the clean half, and the dark fortnight
called the vadya or krishna paksha that is the dark half. Each
fortnight has fifteen lunar days called tithis; the first pratipada, the second dvitiya, the third tritiya, the fourth chaturthi, the fifth
panchami, the sixth shashthi, the seventh saptami, the eighth ashtami,
the ninth navami, the tenth dashami, the eleventh ekadashi, the
twelfth dvadashi, the thirteenth trayodashi, the fourteenth chaturdashi, the fifteenth in the bright half is purnima or full-moon, and
in the dark half amavasya, literally with-living, that is when there
is no moon because the sun and moon live together. Of these the
first lunar day which is called padva both in the bright and dark
fortnights is thought lucky for any, small ceremony. There are
three leading first days Gudi-padva the banner-first in bright Chaitra or March-April, Bali-pratipada Bali's first in bright Kartik or October-November, and Aje-padva the grandfather's first in Ashvin or September-October. [Ajepadva is celebrated for the performance of shraddhs in the name of the grand-father by the daughter's son while his parents are alive.] Two second days are specially
sacred, Yamdvitiya Yam's second in bright Kartik or October-November
also called Bhaubij or the brother's second and Mahabij or the
second. Two third days are important Akskayatritiya or the undying
third in bright Vaishakh or April-May, and Haritalika or the
bent-grass third in bright Bhadrapad October-November. Fourth
day are of two kinds, Vinayaki or Ganpati's in the light half, and Sankashti or troublesome fourths in the dark halfs. The sankashti are by some kept as evil-averting fasts. On all bright fourth
and specially on the fourth of Bhadrapad or August - September
Ganpati is worshipped, and at nine at night, after 'bowing to the
moon, rice balls are eaten. Of fifth days, Nagpanchami or the
cobra's fifth in bright Shravan or July-August, Rishipanchami or the seers' fifth in Bhadrapad or August-September, Lalitapanchami or Lalita's fifth in bright Ashvin or October-November, Vasant panchami the spring, and Rangpanchami the colour fifth in bright Phalgun or March - April. Two-sixths are important Varnashasthi or the Pulse sixth in bright Shravan or July-August, and the Champashashthi or the Champa sixth in bright Margashirh or
December-January. [On the Champashasthi day the worshippers of Khandoba hold a feast. Brinjals after a break of nearly five months, since Ashadh or June-July, again begin to be eaten.] Of the sevenths two are important Shital or the cold seventh in bright Shravan or July-August, and Rath or the car seventh in bright Magh or January-February. Of the eighths one is important Janma
or the birth eighth, that is Krishna's birthday also called Gokul from Krishna's birthplace. Of the ninths one is important Ram or Ram's birthday in bright Chaitra or April-May. Of the tenths, all of which are holy and kept as fasts by the strict, the chief is Vijaya or Victory tenth the same as Dasara in bright Ashvin or September-October. Of the elevenths, all of which are holy and kept as fasts by the strict, two are important the Ashadh eleventh in bright Ashadh or June-July, and the Kartik eleventh in bright Kartik or October-November. Of the twelfths, all of which are holy and kept as fasts by the strict, two are important Vaman or the Dwarf Vishnu's Twelfth in bright Bhadrapad or August-September, and Vagh or the Tiger's Twelfth in dark Ashvin or October -November. Of the thirteenths called Pradosh or evening, because on that day food cannot be eaten before looking at the stars, all are sacred to Shiva, and one is specially sacred if the day falls on a Saturday. Of these the chief is Dhan or the Wealth Thirteenth in dark Ashvin or October-November. Of the light fourteenths two are held in honour Anant or Vishnu's Fourteenth in Bhadrapad or September-October, and Vaikunt or Vishnu's Heaven's Fourteenth in Kartik or November - December. All the dark fourteenths are nailed Shivratris or Shiv's nights. The chief are Nark or the demon Nark's Fourteenth in Ashvin or October-November and Mahashivaratri or the Great Shiv's night in Magh or February-March. Of the fifteenths the bright fifteenth as Purnimas or Full Moons are sacred. There are five chief full moons Vata or the Banyan Full Moon in Jeshth or May-June, Narali or the Cocoanut Full Moon in Shravan or July-August, Kojagari or the Waking Full Moon in Ashvin or October-November, the Vyas or Puran expounder also called the Tripuri or Three Demons' Full Moon in Kartik or November-December, and Hutashani or the Fire Full Moon also called Holi or Shimga in Phalgun or March-April. On the dark fifteenths called Amavashyas or together-dwellings cakes are offered to the spirits of the dead. Three together-dwellings or no-moon nights are specially holy, Divali or Lamp No-Moon, also called Pithori or Spirits No-Moon in Shravan or August-September, Sarvapitri or All Spirits' No-Moon in Bhadrapad or September-October, and a second or greater Divali or Lamp No-Moon in Ashvin or October-November. If no-moon day falls on a Monday it is called Somvati or the Monday No-Moon. This is a specially holy day on which Prabhu men and women bathe early and give Brahmans money.
Sunday.
Of the days of the week Sunday or Aditvar is sacred to the sun. The
sun is a red man seated in a car, with a quoit, and sometimes a lotus in his hand, driving a team of seven horses. The sun is the father of some of the heavenly beings, and among men of the Kshatriya or warrior race. He is the eye of God, or God himself; Brahma in the morning, Vishnu at noon, and Mahadev at night. Sunday is a good day for sowing seed, for beginning to build, for holding a fire; sacrifice, for planting a garden, for beginning to reign, for singing and playing, for starting on a journey, for serving a king, for
buying or giving away a cow or an ox, for learning and teaching hymns, for taking and giving medicine, for buying weapons gold and copper articles and dress. It is unlucky for a girl to come of age on Sunday; she will die a widow. It is unlucky to travel west, and a lizard falling on one's body means loss of wealth. On Sunday nights a green robe should be worn.
Monday.
Monday or Somvar is sacred to the moon. The moon is a male
deity, large gentle and kindly, young and sweet-faced, a warrior with four arms, a mace in one and a lotus in another, seated on a white antelope. Monday is good for beginning a war, mounting a new horse elephant or chariot; for buying flowers, clothes, hay, plants, trees, water, ornaments, conch-shells, pearls, silver, sugarcane, cows, and she-buffaloes. It is unlucky for a girl to come of age on a Monday; her children will die. A blow from a falling "lizard brings wealth. At night a parti-coloured robe should be worn.
Tuesday.
Tuesday called Mangalvar or the day of the planet Mars. The
planet Mars, who is sprung from the sweat of Mahadev's brow and the earth, is four-armed, short, and fire-coloured. He is a warrior, quick-tempered, overbearing, and fond of excitement. Tuesday is good to fight and to forge or work with fire, to steal, poison, burn, kill, tell lies, hire soldiers, dig a mine, and buy coral. If a girl comes of age on Tuesday she commits suicide. A blow from a falling lizard takes away wealth. On Tuesday nights a red robe should be worn.
Wednesday.
Wednesday is called Budhvar the planet Mercury's day. The
planet Mercury is the son of the moon and a star. He is middle-sized, young, clever, pliable, and eloquent, in a warrior's dress, and seated in a lion-drawn car. Wednesday is good for becoming a craftsman, for study, for service, for writing, for painting, for selling metals, for making friends, and for arguing. It is unlucky for going north. If a girl comes of age on a Wednesday she bears daughters. A blow from a falling lizard brings wealth. On Wednesday night yellow should be worn.
Thursday.
Thursday, Brihaspatvar, the planet Jupiter's day, is sacred to
Brihaspati the teacher of the gods. He is a wise old Brahman, large, yellow-skinned and four-armed, seated on a horse Thursday is a good day to open a shop, to wear ornaments, to give charity, to worship the planets, to learn reading and writing. For a married woman it is good for such pious acts as will prolong her married life, for buying clothes, for house work, for going on pilgrimage, for sitting in a chariot or on a horse, for making new ornaments, and for taking medicine It is a bad day for going south. Thursday is a good day for a girl to come of age she will bear sons. A blow from a falling lizard brings wealth. On Thursday nights white should be worn.
Friday.
Friday or Shukravar, the planet Venus' day, is sacred to
Shukra the Brahman teacher of the giants, gentle, ease-loving, middle-aged, with four arms. He is seated on a horse. Friday is the proper day for worshipping Balaji. It is a great day for eating parched gram. Clerks club together to lay in a store at their offices, and women, to free their husbands from debt, send presents of
parched gram to Maratha schools. Friday is a good day for buying precious stones, sandalwood, clothes, a cow, treasure, for sowing seed, for making ornaments, and for a woman to sing or hear singing. It is a bad day to go west. A girl who comes of age on a Friday bears daughters. A blow from a falling lizard brings wealth. On Friday nights a white robe should be worn.
Saturday.
Saturday, called Shanvar or the slow mover, is the planet Saturn's day. Shanvar, a Shudra some say a Chandal by caste, is four-armed, tall, thin, old, ugly, and lame, with long hair nails and teeth, riding on a black vulture. He is sour-tempered and bad,
the patron of evil-doers, who on Saturdays make offerings at his shrine. Saturday is good to buy metal, swords, and slaves, to sin, to steal, to make poison, to enter a new house, to tie an elephant at one's door, and to preach. It is a bad day to travel east and to start on a journey. Children who eat gram on Saturdays bring poverty and become horses. A girl who comes of age on Saturday becomes a bad character. A blow from a falling lizard takes away wealth. On Saturday nights a black robe is worn.
Months.
The twelve Hindu months are, Chaitra or March-April, Vaishakh or April-May, Jeshta or May-June, Ashadh or June-July, Shravan or July-August, Bhadrapad or August - September, Ashvin or September - October, Kartik or October - November, Margashirsh or November-December, Paush or December-January, Magh or January-February, and Falgun or February - March. Of these months Shravan or July-August is the holiest. Almost every day in Shravan is either a fast or a feast. Its Mondays are holy to Shiv, its Tuesdays to Shiv's spouse Mangalagauri, its Fridays to Vishnu, and its Saturdays to Hanumant. Besides the regular months, extra or adhik months are occasionally added, and, sometimes, though more rarely, a month is dropped and called the kshay mas or dropped month. [Professor Keru Lakshman Chhatre has kindly given the following explanation of extra and suppressed months., As the Hindu year is a lunar year fitted to solar periods it falls short of the solar year by eleven days, or in three years by a month and three days. To each of the twelve lunar months one of the twelve Zodiacal divisions or sankrants is allotted, and as the sankrants vary in length from twenty-nine to thirty-two and a half days, while the lunar months are all about twenty-nine and a half days, it sometimes happens that a lunar month passes without any sankrant and sometimes that two sankrants fall in the same lunar month. If no sankrant falls a month is put in and if two sankrants fall a month is suppressed. Extra months do not come at regular intervals, but in nineteen years seven of them occur. Suppressed months are rarer; the last was in 1823 (Shak
1744), the next will fall in 1964 (Shak 1885).]
Holidays.
Of special fast and feast days there are altogether twenty-six. , Of these three come in Chaitra or March-April, Gudipadva or the Banner-first the Shalivahan new year on the bright first,
Ram's Birthday on the. bright ninth, and Hanuman's Birthday on the bright fifteenth or full-moon; one in Vaishakh or April - May, Akshay or the Immortal Third of the bright half; one in Jeshta or May-June, the Banyan Full-Moon; one in Ashadh or June-July, the bright eleventh; four in Shravan or July-August, Cobra Day on the bright fifth, Cocoanut Day on the full-moon, Krishna's Birthday on the dark eighth, and Durga's Attendants Day on the
no-moon; seven in Bhadrapad or August-September, Haritalika's Day on the bright third, Ganpati's Birthday on the bright fourth, the Seers' Day on the bright fifth, Gauri's Day on the bright
eighth or ninth, Vaman's Day on the bright twelfth, Anant's Day on the bright fourteenth, and All Souls Day on the dark fourteenth; three in Ashvi or September-October, Dasara the bright tenth, Kojagari the full-moon and the first two Divali days the dark fourteenth and fifteenth; three in Kartik or October-November, the last two Divali days the first and second of the bright half, the last of which is also known as Yam's Second, the Basil Wedding-day on the bright eleventh, and the Lamp Full-Moon; one in Paush or December-January, a variable lunar day Makar Sankrati or the Sun's entry into Capricorn; one in Magh or January-February Shiv's Night on the dark fourteenth; and one in Falgun or February-March the Holi Full-Moon.
Gudipadva.
Gudipadva, the Banner First, is the first day of Chaitra or March-April and the first day of the Shalivahan year. The day is sacred
to the Deccan king Shalivahan whose nominal date is A.D. 78. The
story is that in Pratishthan or Paithan on the Godavari, about forty
miles north-east of Ahmadnagar, the daughter of a Brahman became
with child by Shesh the serpent king, and was turned out of the city.
She went to live among the potters and bore a son named Shalivahan. As a child Shalivahan martialled armies of clay figures,
drilled his playfellows, and settled their quarrels showing surprising
talent and wisdom. News of his talent came to Somkrant the king
He sent for the boy, but the boy would not come. The king brought
troops to take him by force, and Shalivahan breathed life into his
clay figures, defeated the king, and took his throne. On this day
Prabhus bathe early in the morning, rub themselves with scented
oil, and to secure sweets for the rest of the year eat a leaf of the
bitter nim, Azadirachta indica. From one of the front windows
of every Prabhu's house a bamboo pole is stretched, capped with
a silver or brass water-cup, a silk waistcloth hanging to it as a flag,
with a long garland of bachelor's button-flowers and mango leaves. Below the flag, in a square drawn by lines of quartz powder, is a
high metal or wooden stool, and on the stool, in honour of the
water-god, is a silver or brass pot full of fresh water on whose
mouth are set some mango leaves and a cocoanut. After an hour
or two the water-pot and stool are taken into the house, but the
flag is left flying till evening. During the day a Brahman reads out Maratha almanacs, telling whether the season will be hot or
wet, healthy or sickly, and for each person whether the year will
go well or ill with him. In the evening every family has a specially
rich dinner. New year's day is good for beginning a house, putting
a boy to school, or starting a business.
Ram's Ninth.
Eight days later on the ninth of Chaitra, or about the beginning
of April, comes Ramnavami or Ram's Ninth, the birthday of the seventh incarnation of Vishnu, Ram, the hero of the Ramayan who became man to fight Ravan the giant-ruler of Ceylon. For eight days preparations have been made,
Ram's temples are white washed, adorned with paintings and brightly lighted at night. Men
and women throng them to hear Brahmans read the Ramayan, and Haridases or Ram's slaves preach his praises. On the ninth or birthday before noon, Prabhus, especially men and children, flock in holiday dress to Ram's temple, and listen to a preacher telling how Ram was born, and to dancing-girls singing and dancing. At noon, the hour of birth, the preacher retires, and comes again bringing a cocoanut rolled in a shawl like a newborn babe, and showing it to the people lays it in a cradle. He tells the people that this is the god who became man to kill the wicked Ravan. The people rise, bow to the god, and full of joy toss red-powder, fire guns, and pass to each other sunthvada or presents of powdered dry ginger and sugar. Then all but the devout go home, and dine freely on wheat cakes, butter, sugar, milk, and fruit, rice fish and flesh being forbidden. In the evening they flock to the temples once more to hear Ram's praises.
Hanuman's Birth.
Six days after Ram's birthday, on the bright fifteenth or full- moon of Chaitra, generally early in April, comes the birthday of Ram's general Hanuman the monkey-god. In Hanuman's temples Brahman preachers tell Hanuman's exploits. Some old Prabhu women keep the day as a fast eating nothing but fruits and roots.
Akshayatritiya.
About eighteen days later on the third of Vaishakh, generally about the beginning of May, comes the Undying Third or Akshayatritiya. It gets its name because being the first day of the Satya Yug or the first cycle it is believed to secure the merit of permanency to any act performed on the day. For this reason gifts of earthen jars, fans, umbrellas, shoes, and money made to Brahmans have a lasting value both to the giver and to his dead friends. The day is not specially kept either as a feast or as a fast.
Banyan Full-moon
The Vad Pornima or Banyan Full-Moon falls about five weeks later on the Jeshta full-moon, generally early in June. On this day, to prolong their husbands' lives, Prabhu women hold a festival in honour of Savitri from which the day is also called Vadsavitri or Savitri's Banyan. This lady, who was the daughter of king Ashvapati, chose as her husband Satyavan the son of king Dumatsen. Soon after Savitri made her choice the seer Narad came to Ashvapati and told him that Dumatsen had become blind and lost his kingdom, and was wandering in the forests with his wife and son. Ashvapati wished his daughter to change her choice, but she would not, and, though the seer told her that within a year of their marriage her husband would die, she refused to give him up. Seeing that she was not to be shaken, Ashvapati marched into the forest, and, giving his daughter a large dowry, married her to Satyavan. For a year she served her husband and his father and mother. Two days before the close of the year, when according to the seer's prophecy her husband must die, Savitri began to fast. On the second day, though she asked him to stay at home, Satyavan took his axe and went into the forest. Savitri followed and in spite of her prayers Satyavan went on and fell dead as he was hacking a fig tree. As Savitri sat by him weeping, Yama, the god of death, came and took Satyavan's soul. Savitri followed him and prayed him to give her back her husband's soul. Yam refused, but Savitri persisted, until
he promised to give her anything short of her husband's life. She
asked that her father-in-law might regain his sight and Yam
granted this boon; Savitri still followed Yam and, refusing to let
him go, gained from him her father-in-law's kingdom, a hundred
sons for her father, and sons for herself. Then she once more
pleaded, ' How can I have children if you take my husband,' and
the god, pleased with her faith, granted, her prayer. She went back
to the tree and touched her dead husband, and he rose, and they
returned together to their home. She touched her father-in-law's
eyes and brought back their sight, and with his sight he received
his kingdom. On the morning of this day, after bathing and
dressing in rich silk clothes, married Prabhu women worship the
Indian fig tree or vad. In front of a wall where pictures of a vad
and a pipal tree have been painted, the woman sets a high wooden
stool with a vad twig on it, and sits on a low wooden stool and
worships the twig. When the worship is over she gives the priest
a present called vahan, and touching it with the end of her robe
repeats verses. [The present includes a round bamboo basket with a bodicecloth, a looking
glass, five glass bangles, a necklace of black glass beads with a gold button, a comb,
small round redpowder boxes, lamp-black and turmeric, five mangoes, a cocoanut
betel, sprouting pulse, a glass spangle, and a copper coin. The whole is covered with
another bamboo basket rolled round with thread] She gives the priest one to two shillings, and the
priest touching her brow with redpowder and throwing a few grains of rice over
her, blesses her saying, ' May you remain married till your life's end and may god bless you with eight sons.'
The chief dish on this occasion is mango-juice and fine soft rice
flour cakes called pithpolis. Some women in performing this ceremony live for three days on fruit, roots, and milk.
Ashadhi Ekadashi.
About twenty-six days after the Banyan Full-Moon, generally
about the beginning of July, the eleventh of Ashad or June-July
is kept in honour of the Summer Solstice, that is the twenty-first of
June. This is the beginning of the gods' night, when, leaning on
Shesh the serpent king, the gods sleep for four months.
Cobra Day.
About three weeks later on the bright fifth of Shravan, generally
about the end of July, Prabhu women worship the nag or cobra. On a wooden stool nine snakes are drawn with sandalwood powder or redlead. Of the nine two are full grown and seven are young; one of the young snakes is crop-tailed. At the foot is drawn a tenth snake with seven small ones, a woman holding a lighted lamp a stone slab, and a well with a snake's hole close to it. All married women sit in front of the drawing and each throws over it parched grain, pulse, round pieces of plantains, cucumber, and cocoa kernel. Leaf-cups tilled with milk and pulse are placed close by redlead is sprinkled, and flowers are laid on the redlead. They pray the snakes to guard them and their families and withdraw. The eldest among them gathers the children of the house and tells them this story of the Nine Snakes and the Woman with the Lamp. A village headman had seven daughters-in-law. Six of them he liked and the seventh he hated, and, because she was an orphan, he made her do all the housework and live on scraps left in the cooking
pots. One day, while the seven girls were at the house well, the six
were boasting that their relations had come to take them home for feast; the seventh was silent, she had no home to go to. From
their hole close by a male and female snake overheard the talk, and
the male snake told his wife, who was then with young, that he
would ask the seventh daughter-in-law to their feast and keep her
till his wife's confinement was ever. In the afternoon, when the
orphan went to graze the cattle, the male snake, in the form of a
handsome youth, came to her and said; ' Sister, I am one day coming
to take you home, so when I come be ready.' One day when the
house people had dined, the orphan took the cooking pots to clean
by the well side. She gathered the scraps in one pot and went to
bathe on the other side of the well. While she was bathing the
female snake came out of her hole and ate the scraps. The orphan
came back to eat her dinner, and finding it gone, instead of cursing
the thief, she blessed him, saying, ' May the stomach of the eater
be cooled,' Hearing these words the female snake was overjoyed,
and told her husband to lose no time in bringing the orphan home.
The male snake, taking human form, went to the headman's house
and told the orphan he was come to take her home. She asked no
questions and went. As they went the snake told her who he was,
and that on entering his hole he would turn into a snake. She was
to hold him fast by the tail and follow. Trusting and obedient the
girl followed the snake, and, at the bottom of the hole, found a
beautiful gold house inlaid with gems, and in the middle, on a
hanging swing of precious stones, a female snake big with young.
While the orphan held a lighted lamp the snake gave birth to seven
young ones. One of them climbed on to the girl and she in her
fright let fall the lamp and it cut off part of the snake's tail. When
the brood of snakes grew up they laughed at the crop-tailed snake,
and he in auger, finding how he had been maimed, vowed to kill
the headman's daughter. He made his way into the house on a day
which chanced to be Nagpanchami Day. He found the girl worshipping snakes and laying out food for them. Pleased with her
kindness the crop-tailed snake kept quiet till the girl left the room,
ate the offering, and went back and told his parents of the girl's
devotion. The old snakes rewarded her freely, making her rich and
the mother of many children. When the story is over the children
and the rest of the family have a good meal, chiefly of rice-flour
balls. Bands of snake-charmers go about calling on people to
worship their snakes, and the people worship them, offering parched
pulse, grain, milk, and a copper coin. On the same day a fair is
held in honour of snakes. Prabhu women fill leaf-cups with milk
and pulse and place them in corners of the garden for snakes to feed
on. As they are hurtful to snakes, no grinding baking or boiling
are allowed in Prabhu houses on the Cobra's Fifth.
Cocoanut Day.
About ten days later, generally early in August, on the full-moon of Shravan, comes Cocoanut Day or Narli-pornima.
In the evening, after a hearty afternoon meal, Prabhu men and children go
to the river side, and to win the favour of the water throw in
cocoanuts. On going home the men and children are seated on low
wooden stools, and the women of the house wave a lighted lamp
round their faces, the men according to their means presenting
them with 1s. to 12s. (8 as.- Rs. 6).
Janma and Gokul Ashtami.
Eight days after, about the middle of August, comes a festival in
honour of Krishna, either his birthday or the day after when he was
taken to Gokul. The story is that Kansa, Krishna's uncle, hearing
that Krishna would cause his death, tried to destroy him as a child but failed. This is the cowherds' great day. Covering themselves
with dust and holding hands they dance in a circle, calling out Govinda, Gopala, Narayana, Hari. Curds, milk, and cold water are thrown over them, and they get presents of cocoanuts, plantains, and money. Those who keep the birthday observe it as a fast; those who keep the second or Gokul day observe it as a feast.
Pithorya's No-Moon.
About a week after, at the Shravan new-moon, generally towards
the end of August, comes the worship of the Pithorya's or attends
of the goddess Durga. Married women with children alive bathe
in the early morning and fast. On a high stool or wall redlead
pictures of Durga's sixty-four attendants are drawn and worshipped. Then the oldest woman of the family offers the goddess
the leaves of sixteen kinds of trees and flowers and a bunch of five
to twenty-one cocoanuts, and prays her to bless the children of
house. Then, arranging dishes of prepared food round her,
worshipper calls the children one by one, asking them in turn
is worthy to eat the offerings. The child answers, I am worthy.
This is thrice repeated and the worshipper touches the child's
brow with redlead, and, throwing grains of rice over it, bless it
and gives it the plate. The children and grown people sit down
together and eat the food.
Alika's day.
Three weeks later in Bhadrapad or August-September come
fast in honour of the maid Alika. A king's daughter had vowed to
wed none but Shiv. Her father, not knowing of her vow, offered
her in marriage to Vishnu. Hearing this the king's daughter, with the
help of her maid retired to a deep forest, refusing to move unless she
was allowed to marry Shiv. In her honour, getting up early in the
morning Prabhu women bathe, wash their hair and putting on a silk
robe and bodice draw a quartz square and in it set a high wooden
stool. Sitting before it on a low stool they lay a handful of sand in the
middle of the high stool and with the sand make figures of Parvati
and Sakhi, Shiv's wife and maid, and in front of them a ling. These three they worship with flowers and the leaves of sixteen kinds of
trees, and as in the Vadsavatri fast present the Brahman priest with
two round bamboo baskets and 1s. to 2s. (8 as.-Re. 1) in money
On this day women drink no water and eat nothing but plantains
and melon or chibud. Next morning they again worship the sand
images, offering them cooked rice and curds and-cast them into the
river, or into some out-of-the-way place.
Ganpati's Birthday.
Next, on the fourth of Bhadrapad, generally late in August, comes the birthday of 'Ganesh or Ganpati, the god of wisdom and of beginnings, in figure a fat man, seated, with four hands, and an elephant's head. Of the stories of Ganpati's birth the commonest is that Parvati, Shiv's wife, from oil and turmeric rubbed off her own body, made a man and set him to guard her door. Shiv coming
in, annoyed at being stopped by the watchman, cut off his head. Hearing this Parvati demanded that her son's life should be restored, and Shiv going into the forest cut off a one-tusked she-elephant's head and setting it on Ganpati's shoulders brought back his life, making him for his trustiness god of wisdom.
Some time before Ganpati's birthday the reception hall is whitewashed and painted, a wooden framework or other seat is made ready, and the room is filled with rich furniture and at night is brightly lit. On the morning of the feast day the head of the house and some children and servants, with music and a palanquin, go to the market and buying an image of the god, [Ganpati's image is of gilt or painted clay, with four hands, a big belly, and an
elephant's head. It is either made in the house or bought from men, chiefly of the
Deccan Brahman caste, whose sole calling is the making of Ganpatis. The cost
varies from a few pence to £15 or £20. Some do not buy clay Ganpatis but with
rice grains on a plate trace an image of the god known as the pearl Ganpati.] seat it in the palanquin, and bring it home. At the house the mother of the family waves a lighted lamp before the god and it is laid down till the head of the house is ready to worship it. It is then set in the shrine and with the help of the family priest verses are recited that fill the image with the presence of the god. The image of a mouse, Ganpati's pet charger, is placed close to it. After the worship, the head of the house, with a lighted lamp in his hand and with his sons and relations round him, standing in front of the image, plays and sings hymns in praise of the god. This is done shortly in the morning and in the evening at greater length. At the end of the service sweetmeats are handed round among the guests and family. In the morning of the first day, at the end of the worship, the family feast on sweet-spiced rice-flour balls, and in the evening the mice are allowed to share in the feast. Ganpati, they say, one evening fell off his mouse. The moon laughed at the god's mishap, and to punish him Ganpati vowed that no one should ever look at the moon again. The moon prayed to be forgiven and the god agreed that the moon should be disgraced only one night in the year, Ganpati's birth-night. For this reason no one on that night will look at the moon.
According to the will and means of the family the image is kept in the house from one and a half to twenty-one days, in most cases about a week. So long as it is in the house the god is worshipped night and morning. When the time comes for the god to go, in the evening players and a palanquin are hired, and a priest is called in. After praying Ganpati to bless the family, to keep sorrow from its doors, and to give wisdom to its children, verses like those that brought the presence of the god into the image are said and its divinity is withdrawn. Then waving a lamp round its face, laying a little curds in one of its hands, and seating it in a flower-decked palanquin, calling out the god's name as they go, they carry him to the side of a lake or river. At the water's edge they take the image out of the palanquin and seat it on the ground, and waving a lighted lamp round its face carry it into the water sorrowing that for another year they will not see the god again.
Bhadrapad bright-fifth, the day after Ganesh's birthday, is kept in honour of the Rishis or Seers who sit in heaven as the seven stars in the Great Bear. The day is kept only by women. Their chief rule is to eat nothing that is not hand-grown. Anything in which the labour of cattle or other animals has been used in rearing or bringing to market is forbidden. So hand-grown fruit and vegetables are on that day sold at four times their usual price.
Gauri.
On Bhadrapad bright-eighth or ninth, the third or fourth day after
Ganesh's birthday, women hold a feast in honour of his mother Parvati or Gauri. In the morning ten or twelve balsam or terda plants are bought for an anna or so and hung on the eaves. About two in the afternoon, over the whole of the house, women draw quartz powder lines six inches apart and between them trace with sandal powder footsteps two in a line and four or five inches apart. An elderly married woman, taking one or two of the balsam plants, washes their roots and folds them in a silk waistcloth. [Prabhu women call the balsam roots Gauri's feet.]
This representing the goddess Gauri is laid in a girl's arms, who carrying a
metal plate with a lighted lamp, a few rice grains, a redpowder box, and some round pieces of plantains, and taking with her
a boy with a bell, starts through the house, the boy ringing the bell
as they go. In each room the woman seats the girl who carries the
goddess on a raised stool, waves a lighted lamp round the faces
of the girl and of the goddess, and, giving the girl and the boy a bit
of plantain, calls 'Lakshmi, Lakshmi, have you come?' The girl
says, ' I have come.' The woman asks, 'What have you brought;'
the girl says, ' Horses, elephants, armies, and heaps of treasure
enough to fill your house and the city.' Thus they go from one room to
another, filling the house with treasure and bringing good luck. When
they have been through the whole house, the goddess is seated on a
high stool in the women's hall leaning against a wall, on which have
been painted a Prabhu's house and all it holds. At lamplight the
goddess is offered plantains, cakes, and milk, and at night she is richly
dressed, decked with jewels, and with lamps lighted before her is
offered milk and sugar. The next day is a time of great rejoicing,
when many dishes of sweetmeats, fish, and mutton are cooked,
offered to the goddess and eaten. [The dish offered to the goddess varies in different families. Some offer
vegetables, some pickles, some fish, some goat's flesh, and some a cock and liquor.] During the day Kunbi and Koli
women and the house servants dance before the goddess and are
well paid. On the third day the goddess is offered cooked food, and
about three o'clock she is laid in a winnowing fan, stripped of
her ornaments, except her nosering glass bangles and necklace of
black glass beads, and with some cooked food tied to her apron and
four copper coins is placed in a servant's arms. Without looking
behind him, while an elderly woman sprinkles water on his footsteps,
the servant walks straight out of the house to the river or lake
side, and, leaving the goddess in the water, brings back the silk
waistcloth, the winnowing fan, a little water, and five pebbles.
Vaman Dvadashi.
Vaman Dvadashi or Vaman's Twelfth falling on the twelfth of Bhadrapad generally in September, is sacred to Vaman, the black
Brahman dwarf, the fifth incarnation of Vishnu. Vaman's story is that to keep the religious merit of the great king Bali from winning him the rule over the three worlds, Vishnu appeared at his court as a Brahman dwarf. He beat all other Brahmans in explaining the holy books and the king asked him what gift he would wish. Vaman said, 'As much space as I can-cover in three strides.' The king agreed, and the god, falling the earth with his first step and the air with his second, took his third step on the king's head and drove him into the bottomless pit. On Vaman's Day old Prabhu women fast and give Brahmans money presents.
Some Prabhus keep the day before All Hallows Day, that is the bright-fourteenth of Bhadrapad or August-September in honour of Anant or Vishnu. If a Prabhu by chance finds a silk string with
fourteen knots he takes it home and lays it by. [The string worshipped by Prabhu women has one line with fourteen knots; those worshipped by men have two or three lines with the same number of knots as the women's.] On the fourteenth of Bhadrapad with his whole family he fasts, and in the evening places on a raised stool two metal pots filled with cold water, representing the holy rivers Ganga and Jamna, and covering the water-pots with a metal plate, he lays in the plate a snake made of the sacred darba grass, and close by a string called anant-dora with fourteen bead-like round moveable knots, the whole generally worked with gold and silver lace. Then with the help of the priest he worships the gods Anant and Shesh, and the goddesses Ganga and Jamna, offering them fourteen kinds of flowers, leaves, fruits, and sweetmeats, and ending with a feast in honour of Vishnu. The thread is either worn or laid by for a year. At the end of the year a new thread is bought and worshipped and the old one is made over to the priest. The worship of this thread should be kept up for over fourteen years and should then cease. The practice is observed both by men and women, and begins only when a chance thread is found.
Pitripaksha.
A day after Anant's Day, the second of the dark half of the month of Bhadrapad or August-September called Pitripaksha or the Spirits' Fortnight is sacred to the spirits of ancestors. In the name of each ancestor, both men and women, funeral rites or shraddh are 'performed on the day corresponding to the day of death. The ninth day known as avidhva-navmi, is kept for rites in honour of unwidowed mothers. And on the fourteenth day there is an All Hallows No-moon or sarvapitriamavasya, for any ancestors whose worship may have been left out. The shraddh is generally performed by the head of each family at midday on the ground-floor of the house. The object of the rite is to improve the ancestors' state in the spirit world. When the rite is over dishes of rice, milk, and sweetmeats are left on the tiles for the crows to feed on, and a rich dinner with spiced milk is given to relations and friends.
Navratra.
A day or two after All Hallows are sacred to Durga the wife of Shiv. The first nine are known as the Navratra or nine nights, and the last as the Dasara or tenth. Some Prabhus fast during
the nine days, living on fruits and roots. On the ninth the goddess
Durga is worshipped, a sacred fire is lit, and fed with firewood and
butter. During these days married women of the Konkan Vadval or
oartkeeper caste with a hollow dried gourd wrapped in cloth hanging
from their right arm, beg in Bhavani's name from house to house.
Each day they are given a handful of rice and on one of the nine days
an elderly married woman of each household worships the hollow
gourd. A Vadval woman and her husband are called; a quarts
square is drawn, and the hollow gourd placed in it on a low stool.
The worshipper rubs the outside of the gourd with turmeric and
redpowder and a few grains of rice, fastens a spangle on it, and
filling it with rice waves a lighted lamp before it. The Vadval's
wife rubs her own hands with turmeric powder and fastens on
her brow redpowder and a spangle, and before her and her gourd
the worshipper waves a lighted lamp. The Vadval man is given
some rice and oil, and blessing the worshipper, he blows the conch
shell. [Only on this day does a Prabhu allow a conch-shell to be blown in his house.
At any other time the sound of the conch is supposed to blow everything out of a
Prabhu's house.] Married and unmarried girls and women go to one another's
houses during these nine days. Seated on mats spread in the
women's hall, their arms are rubbed with turmeric powder; their
brows adorned with redpowder and glass spangles; their heads
crowned with flowers, and their laps filled with parched rice,
betelnut and leaves, and a few copper coins. [Some of these girls collect during these nine days one to two rupees at the
rate of two or three pies (¼d.- ⅜ d.) from each house. The Poona Prabhus have given
up this ceremony. It is still observed in Bombay.]
Durga's Tenth Dasara.
Early in the morning of the tenth or Dasara, the day on which Durga slew the monster Mahishasur, Prabhus bathe and worship their
house gods. In front of the house the women trace a quarts square [From this day, in different coloured powders, Prabhu women begin to trace
pictures of trees and houses on the ground in front of their doors. They go on
making these drawings for about six weeks.]
and in honour of the five Pandavs set five cowdung balls on a leaf
in the middle of the square and sprinkle flowers and redpowder
or gulal over the balls. Those who own a horse have him brought
in front of the house. Garlands of bachelor's button-flowers are
thrown round his neck and tied round his feet, a shawl is laid on
his back, and a married woman, coming out of the house holding a
plate with a lighted lamp, a cocoanut, sugar-cake, redpowder, a
few grains of rice, betelnut and leaves, and a silver coin, rubs his
forehead with redpowder and rice, gives him sugar to eat, and
laying the betelnut, leaves, cocoanut and silver coin at his forefeet
waves a lighted lamp before his face. [It is said that the horse-loving Arjun washed his horses' feet, threw garlands of
flowers round their necks, and patted them.]
Dasara.
Besides the coin offered to his horse, the groom gets a few shillings and a turban or a suit of clothes. In the evening, after a hearty meal of mutton and sweetmeats, Prabhus take their children and carrying branches of the
apta tree Bauhinia racemosa, go to Devi's temple and offer her apta or shami Mimosa suma leaves and
a copper coin. [On this day apta leaves are called gold apparently because on this day their power to scare spirits is as great as the spirit-scaring power of gold.] They then go visiting their friends and relations, greet each other, and offer an
apta leaf and embrace. [On this day if a Brahman and a Prabhu meet they exchange leaves and the Prabhu bows to the Brahman and gives him ¾d. to 1s. (½-8 as.)] On his return home, his wife, standing in the doorway or seating her husband in the house on a low stool, touches his brow with red-powder and rice, and giving him sugar to eat and laying a cocoanut in his hands waves a lighted lamp before his face. The husband drops 4s. to £1 (Rs. 2-10) in the plate, and washing his hands and feet sets a stool close to the house gods, and on the stool lays a sword, a gun, [Prabhus worship the sword and gun as they claim Khsatriya descent.] a sheet of paper with carefully written sentences in English Marathi and as many other languages as he knows, a pen, a ruler, a penknife, and inkpot and sacred books. He touches these with sandal and redpowder, lays on each an
apta and a shami leaf, and asks them to keep his house safe during the year.
Kojagari Pornima.
Abut five days after Dasara generally in Ashvin or September October comes the Kojagari Pornima feast. About eight in the evening Parvati Shiv's wife is worshipped. A supper is eaten of rice cooked in milk and sugar, and gram-flour cakes mixed with plantains, onions, brinjals, and potatoes and boiled either in butter or oil, and after supper men and women play chess till midnight. [People play chess on this night in the hope that Parvati will bring them cartloads of treasure.] A. week later comes the Athvinda or eighth day feast, when a servant draws a line of ashes, and lays castor-oil leaves on the veranda and other parts of the house.
Divali.
This and the Khojagari festival in the week before lead to the great feast of Divali. This, the lamp or diva feast, in honour of the goddess Lakshmi and of Vishnu's victory over the demon Sariki, lasts four days, the two last days of Ashvin or September-October and the two first days of Kartik or October-November. The day before the feast large metal water-pots are filled and placed in the house. An elderly woman, taking an aghada Achyranthes aspera plant, cuts from it six one-inch pieces, and as many more as there are persons in the house including servants. These pieces she lays in a round bamboo basket, and near them the cut fruit of the chirhati creeper. She takes a castor-oil leaf, lays in it the bark of a plant called takla, used both for food and as a drug, and a few blades of fine grass, and folding the leaf lays it in the bamboo basket. In this way she prepares a packet for each of the household. Then taking a metal plate she makes as many rice-flour lamps as she has made packets, and putting two wicks and oil in each, dusts its rim in three places with redpowder and places the plate close to the bamboo basket. She then makes an extra rice-flour lamp and placing it by the house wall lights it in honour of the god Yam. She washes her hands and in another dish makes ready another five-wick lamp, and, with a cocoanut, a few rice grains, and a box of redpowder, lays it in the plate. Lastly she fills cups with sweet smelling spices, oil, and cocoa-milk. Then, as
Vishnu promised him, in Narkasur's honour every nook and corner
of the house is lighted. Till eight or nine at night children let off
firework and then all feast on sweetmeats and other dainties. Next
morning a married woman rises about three and drawing a square
in the entrance room, places a low stool in the square and close to
the stool sets the cups of spices and scented oil, and, on each side of
the stool, sets a lighted brass lamp. The head of the house sits on the stool
and the barber or some house servant rubs him with rice
flour, spices, and oil, and his top-knot with cocoanut milk. He next
sits facing the east on a high wooden stool in a square-traced in the
yard in front of the house-door and bathes, and putting on a waist
cloth and turban stands in front of the house door. As he stands
his wife or some other married woman of the family takes the
five-wick lamp and a flour-lamp, places the flour-lamp at one side
of the doorway, and marking his brow with redpowder and a few
grains of rice, hands him a cocoanut, and waves the lighted lamp
before his face. He gives back the cocoanut, touches the flour,
lamp with the toe of his left foot, and enters the house. [This is done in memory of Vishnu's fight with the giant Narkasur.
After killing the giant, Vishnu entered the city early in the morning. The people lighting up the city, received him with great joy, the women going out to meet him and waving lighted lamps before his face.] After
the head of the house, the other men of the family bathe in turn, and
when all are bathed feast on sweetmeats. Then they worship the
house gods, dress in rich clothes, and either go visiting or sit on
the veranda talking. The married women dine at noon, and sit
tracing drawings before the house door, while an old woman makes
ready sixteen lights and sets them on a high stool. At dusk an
elderly married woman sets the stool with its sixteen lights in the
middle of the square drawn in front of the house. [To make these sixteen lights, two one-inch pieces of nilgut are taken and
about half an inch on the top is hollowed and tilled with oil and wicks.] Then placing
near the stool a cocoanut, betelnut and leaves, a plantain, a sugar
ball, and a copper coin, she bows to the lights and walks into the
house. As the people of the house gather round the lamps, letting
off fireworks and making merry, one of the servants takes a light
from the stool and carrying it hid in his hands, goes to a neigh
hour's house and tries without being seen to place his master's
light among their lights, saying, as he lays it down, ' Take this son
in-law, javai ghya.' Other servants are on the look-out for him and
as he steals in, try without putting out his light to duck him with
water. In this merrymaking and in letting off fireworks two hours
are spent. Then the high stool is taken into the house with as many
of the lights as are left on it. On the second day nothing special is
done except bathing in the morning in front of the house. In the
evening the head of the family worships Lakshmi the goddess of
wealth. On the third day, a servant rises a one in the morning
sweeps the house, and, gathering the sweepings into a bamboo
basket, lays on the basket an old broom, a light, some betel, an
four copper coins, and waving the basket in front of each room, says Idapida
javo Baliche raj yevo, 'May evils go and Bali's kingdom
come.' While the servant says this, a woman walks behind him as far
as the house door, beating a winnowing fan with a stick and urging the servant to keep saying the verse without stopping. She drives him to the house door telling him not to look back, and he goes out, lays the sweepings by the roadside, and brings back the coin. He then rubs himself with oil, and without touching any one bathes in warm water. When the servant's bath is over the house, people bathe one after another. Then, as Vishnu promised, the head of the house takes a metal image of king Bali on horseback, dresses it and sets it on a high stool with twenty-one brass lamps round it. [When Vishnu in the form of the dwarf Vaman stamped king Bali into hell, he promised that once a year his followers would worship the king. The story of
Vaman and Bali is given at p. 249.] At dawn he sets the god in front of the house, and the household let off fireworks, play games of chance, and give money to Brahmans and other beggars who swarm in front of their houses. The last of the Divali days is Yamadvitiya or Yam's Second or Bhaubij also called the Brother's Second. On this day Yam, the lord of death, came to see his sister the river Jamna, and she won from him the promise that no man who on this day goes to his sister's house and gives and gets presents will
he cast into hell. So on this day Prabhus go to their sisters' houses. The sister draws a square of quartz-powder lines, seats her brother in the square on a low stool, and waves a lighted lamp before his face. He gives her 2s. to £ 1 (Rs.1-10) and she gives him a waistcloth and a rich dinner of milk and sweetmeats.
Basil Wedding.
Nine days after Yam's Second, on the bright eleventh of Kartik generally in October, a day is kept in honour of the marriage of the holy basil or tulsi with the god Vishnu. The head of the house fasts in the early part of the day. At noon the basil-pot is coloured red and yellow and a square of quartz powder is drawn round it. After breaking his fast the head of the house, with the help of the family priest, worships the basil and an image of Vishnu. Then, with Vishnu's image in his hands, he stands in front of the plant, a shawl is drawn between the image and the plant and held by two married men, the priest repeating verses, and the house people, both men and women, at the end of each verse throwing grains of rice over the plant and the image. When the verses are done, the curtain is dropped, the guests clap their hands, the image is set in the flowerpot in front of the plant, fireworks are let off, sugarcane is handed round, and 1s. to 2s. (8
as.-Re. 1) are presented to the priest.
Lamp Full-Moon.
Four days after the Basil-wedding on the bright fifteenth of Kartik
or October-November comes Dip-purnima or the Lamp Full-Moon.
On this day, in honour of Shiv's victory over the giant Tripurasur,
Prabhu women present Brahmans with fruit, money, and lighted
lamps, either silver lamps with gold wicks, brass lamps with
silver wicks, or clay lamps with cotton wicks. [This demon, the lord of a golden a silver and an iron city, is said to have grown so mighty that beating almost all the gods he drove them out of their palaces. The gods crowded round Shiv and
he, pitying their case, made the earth his car, the sun and moon its wheels, the Himalaya mountains his bow, Vasuki
the serpent king his bowstring, and Vishnu his quiver. Thus armed, after a
furious struggle, Shiv destroyed the mighty giant.] In the evening they
fill the holes in the lamp-pillars or dipmals with lights, and soaking
wicks in butter lay them in earthen pots, pierced with holes, light them and
send them floating over the temple pond.
Makarsankrant.
On the twelfth of January, a solar festival and therefore on an uncertain day
in Paush comes the Makarsankrant that is the passage of
the Sun into the sign of the Crocodile or Capricorn, the day when the sun's
course turns northward. In honour of the sun's return devout Hindus make great
rejoicings. From this day begin the six lucky northing or uttarayani
mouths when light is large and heaven's gates are open, and when marriages
should be held, and youths girt with the sacred thread. These are followed by
the six spirit-haunted southing or dakshanayani months, when the days
creep in and heaven's gates are shut, and the spirits of the dead have to wait
without till Makarsankrant comes again. The Prabhus both men and women
rise early, rub themselves with sesamum oil, bathe in warm water, worship the
family gods, and present Brahmans with sesamum seed, money, clothes, pots,
umbrellas, and even lands and houses. In the afternoon they feast on
sweetmeats and in the evening dress in new clothes and taking packets of
sesamum seed mixed with different coloured sugar, give them to their friends
and relations, saying : 'Take the sesamum seed and speak sweetly'. [The Marathi runs ; Tilsa ghya, godsa bola.] Next day is an
unlucky or kar day. On it married women bathe, and, dressing in rich
clothes, deck their heads with flowers, and make merry going to their parents'
houses and speaking no unkind word. As they do this day, so will they do all
the year. She who beats her children will go on ill-using them, she who weeps
is entering on a year of sorrow.
Shiv's Night.
About two weeks after the Makrasankrant on the bright fourteenth of Magh or January-February conies Shiv's great fourteenth or
the Mahashivaratri. A wicked archer hunting in the forest followed a
deer till night fell. To save himself from wild beasts he climbed a bel tree Ęgle marmelos, and to keep himself awake kept plucking its leaves. By
chance at the tree-foot was a shrine of Mahadev and the leaves falling on his
shrine so pleased the god that he carried the hunter to heaven. Prabhus keep
this day as a fast. In the evening they worship Shiv and in the hope of
gaining the hunter's reward lay a thousand bel leaves on the ling. After worship they eat fruit and roots and drink milk, and, that they may
not sleep, either read sacred books or play chess, a favourite game with both
Shiv and his wife. Shiv's temples are lighted and alms are given to begging
Brahmans and others.
Holi.
About three days after the Mahashivaratra and fifteen before
the full-moon of Falgun or February-March begins Holi or Shimga,
apparently the opening feast of the husbandman's new year of work.
On the first day little boys dig a pit in the middle of the street or yard
and, beating drums and shouting the names of the organs of generation, go from
house to house begging firewood. At night they burn the wood in the pit crying
out and beating their mouths.
This goes on for fifteen nights, and each night for three or four hours. On the
eleventh night, dressed in white clothes, they go to the house of their high
priest or to one of Vishnu's temples where red-coloured water is thrown over
them. From this time till the full-moon the festival is at its height Young and
old men shouting the names of the organs of generation, rub redpowder on each
other's clothes and faces. On the last or full-moon day, in the afternoon, after
feasting on mutton and sweetmeats, a plantain tree is set in the pit and heavy
logs of wood are piled round it. About eight at night each householder who lives
in the street with his family priest worships the pit, and gives sweetmeats.
When this is over one of them takes a brand and, lighting the pile, which is
called holi, shouts' the names of the male and female organs of
generation and beats his mouth. Next day is the dust or dhul day, when
people go about in bands throwing dust and filth. At night men go to each
other's houses and the head of the house marks the guests' brows with
sweet-scented powder or abir, and gives them milk, coffee, fruit, and
sweatmeats. Women have parties of their own, where dressed in white robes and
green bodices, their heads decked with flowers and their brows marked with
sweet-scented powder, they treat one another to fruit, coffee, and milk.
Eclipses.
Eclipses or grahans caused by the giant Rahu swallowing the sun, or the
giant Ketu swallowing the moon, are thought to foretell evil. Of the beginning
of eclipses the story is that when Dhanvantra brought nectar from the churned
ocean, the giants hoped to keep it to themselves. Seeing this, Vishnu, taking
the form of Mohani, a handsome woman, ranged the gods on one side and the giants
on the other. Struck with the woman's beauty, the giants sat at a distance from
the gods waiting for the drink. When the woman began to give the nectar to the
gods, Rahu slipt between the sun and the moon, and gaining a share drank it off.
Mohani with her discus cut Rahu in two, the body being called Rahu and the head
Ketu. The rest of the giants attacked the gods, but after a hard fight were
beaten. In a solar eclipse twelve hours and in a lunar eclipse nine hours before
any change is visible the influence or vedh of the eclipse begins. From
this time Prabhus may neither eat nor drink; the water-pots have to be emptied
and cooked food thrown away. The place swarms with evil spirits. An eclipse is
the best time for using a charm or a spell, and mediums, sorcerers, and jugglers
are busy repeating spells on river-banks and in waste places. To keep the giants
from entering the house, blades of holy or darbha grass are laid on
pickle-jars and wafer-biscuits and tied in the skirts of clothes. When the
eclipse begins, Prabhus give rice, parched grain, old clothes, and money to
Mhars and Mangs who go about carrying large bamboo baskets and shout, De dan
sute giran, that is ' Give gifts and free the planet'. When the
eclipse is over every Prabhu bathes, the cook-room is fresh cowdunged, cooking
pots and pans are washed, jars are filled with fresh water, and fresh food is
cooked and eaten.
Patane Prabhus have no headmen and no caste council. They are a
prosperous and well-to-do class. Their monopoly of English clerkship has broken
down, but they are pushing and successful as doctors, lawyers, engineers, and in
the higher branches of Governments service.
