Note to Chapter XIV.
The practice of walking round an object of reverence with the right hand towards it, which is one of the ceremonies mentioned in our author’s account of Vásavadattá’s marriage, has been exhaustively discussed by Dr. Samuel Fergusson in his paper—“On the Ceremonial turn called Desiul,” published in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy for March 1877. (Vol. I. Ser. II. No. 12.) He shews it to have existed among the ancient Romans as well as the Celts. One of the most striking of his quotations is from the Curculio of Plautus (I. 1. 69.) Phædromus says—Quo me vortam nescio. Palinurus jestingly replies—Si deos salutas dextrovorsum censeo. Cp. also the following passage of Valerius Flaceus (Argon VIII. 243).
Inde ubi sacrificas cum conjuge venit ad aras
Æsonides, unaque adeunt pariterque precari
Incipiunt. Ignem Pollux undamque jugalem
Prætulit ut dextrum pariter vertantur in orbem.
The above passage forms a striking comment upon our text. Cp. also Plutarch in this life of Camillus Ταῦτα εἰπὼν, καθὰπερ ἐστὶ Ρωμαίοις ἔθος, ἐπευξαμένοις καὶ προσκυνὴσασιν, ἐπὶ δεξιὰ ἐξελίττειν, ἐσφάλη περιστρεφόμενος. It is possible that the following passage in Lucretius alludes to the same practice—
Nec pietas ulla est velatum sæpe videri
Vertier ad lapidem atque omnes accedere ad aras.
Dr. Fergusson is of opinion that this movement was a symbol of the cosmical rotation, an imitation of the apparent course of the sun in the heavens. Cp. Hyginus Fable CCV. Arge venatrix, cum cervum sequeretur, cervo dixisse fertur: Tu licet Solis cursum sequaris, tamen te consequar. Sol, iratus, in cervam eam convertit. He quotes, to prove that the practice existed among the ancient Celts, Athenæus IV, p. 142, who adduces from Posidonius the following statement “Τούς θεοὺς προσκυνοῦσιν ἐπὶ δεξιὰ στρεφόμενοι.” The above quotations are but a few scraps from the full feast of Dr. Fergusson’s paper. See also the remarks of the Rev. S. Beal in the Indian Antiquary for March 1880, p. 67.
See also Henderson’s Folk-lore of the Northern Counties, p. 45. “The vicar of Stranton was standing at the churchyard gate, awaiting the arrival of a funeral party, when to his astonishment the whole group, who had arrived within a few yards of him, suddenly wheeled and made the circuit of the churchyard wall, thus traversing its west, north, and east boundaries, and making the distance some five or six times greater than was necessary. The vicar, astonished at this proceeding, asked the sexton the reason of so extraordinary a movement. The reply was as follows: ‘Why, ye wad no hae them carry the dead again the sun; the dead maun aye go with the sun.’ This custom is no doubt an ancient British or Celtic custom, and corresponds to the Highland usage of making the deazil or walking three times round a person according to the course of the sun. Old Highlanders will still make the deazil around those to whom they wish well. To go round the person in the opposite direction, or “withershins,” is an evil incantation and brings ill-fortune. Hunt in his Romances and Drolls of the West of England, p. 418, says, “If an invalid goes out for the first time, and makes a circuit, the circuit must be with the sun, if against the sun, there will be a relapse. Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde, p. 322, quotes from the Statistical Account of Scotland, Vol. V. p. 88 the following statement of a Scottish minister, with reference to a marriage ceremony: “After leaving the church, the whole company walk round it, keeping the church walls always on the right hand.”
Thiselton Dyer, in his English Folk-lore, p. 171, mentions a similar custom as existing in the West of England. In Devonshire blackhead or pinsoles are cured by creeping on one’s hands and knees under or through a bramble three times with the sun; that is from east to west. See also Ralston’s Songs of the Russian people, p. 299.
See also the extract from Sinclair’s Statistical Account of Scotland in Brand’s Popular Antiquities, Vol. 1, p. 225; “When a Highlander goes to bathe or to drink water out of a consecrated fountain, he must always approach by going round the place from East to West on the South side, in imitation of the apparent diurnal motion of the sun. This is called in Gaelic going round the right, or the lucky way. The opposite course is the wrong, or the unlucky way. And if a person’s meat or drink were to affect the wind-pipe, or come against his breath, they would instantly cry out, “Desheal,” which is an ejaculation praying it may go by the right way.” Cp. the note in Munro’s Lucretius on V, 1199, and Burton’s Narratives from Criminal Trials in Scotland, Vol. I, p. 278.
[1] Alluding to Indra’s having cut the wings of the mountains.
[2] The peafowl are delighted at the approach of the rainy season, when “their sorrow” comes to an end.
[3] It is often the duty of these minstrels to wake the king with their songs.
[4] Weapons well known in Hindu mythology. See the 6th act of the Uttara Ráma Charita.
[5] Sútrapátam akarot she tested, so to speak. Cp. Taranga 21, śl. 93. The fact is, the smoke made her eyes as red as if she had been drinking.
[6] Or “like Kuvera.” There is a pun here.
[7] Young Deformed.
[8] Cp. the distribution of presents on the occasion of King Etzel’s marriage in the Nibelungen Lied.
[9] It must be remembered that a king among the Hindus was inaugurated with water, not oil.
[10] The word “adders” must here do duty for all venomous kinds of serpents.
[11] A similar story is found in the IVth book of the Panchatantra, Fable 5, where Benfey compares the story of Yayáti and his son Puru. Benfey Panchatantra I. 436. Bernhard Schmidt in his Griechische Märchen, page 37, mentions a very similar story, which he connects with that of Admetos and Alkestis. In a popular ballad of Trebisond, a young man named Jannis, the only son of his parents, is about to be married, when Charon comes to fetch him. He supplicates St. George, who obtains for him the concession, that his life may be spared, in case his father will give him half the period of life still remaining to him. His father refuses, and in the same way his mother. At last his betrothed gives him half her allotted period of life, and the marriage takes place. The story of Ruru is found in the Ádiparva of the Mahábhárata, see Lévêque, Mythes et Légendes de l’Inde, pp. 278, and 374.