CHAPTER 21
The Importance of Mythology.
The Aboriginal Tribes.
Comparative Study of Festivals.
Analogies to Rājput Customs in Northern Europe.
It would be less difficult to find Sanskrit derivations for many of the proper names in the Edda, than to give a Sanskrit analysis of many common amongst the Rajputs, which we must trace to an Indo-Scythic root:[[12]] such as Eyvorsél, Udila, Attitai, Pujun, Hamira,[[13]] and numerous other proper names of warriors. Of tribes: the Kathi, Rajpali, Mohila, Sariaspah, Aswaria (qu. Assyrian?), Banaphar, Kamari, Silara, Dahima, etc. Of mountains: Drinodhar, Arbuda, Aravalli, Aravindha (the root ara, or mountain, being Scythic, and the expletive adjunct Sanskrit), ‘the hill of Budha,’ ‘of strength,’ ‘of limit.’ To all such as cannot be [561] resolved into the cognate language of India, what origin can we assign but Scythic?[[14]]
Festivals in Mewār. Naurātri Festival.
The Repose of Vishnu.
According to another authority, the festivals commenced on Amavas, or the Ides of Chait, near which the vernal equinox falls, the opening of the modern solar year; when, in like manner as at the commencement of the lunar year in Asoj, they [562] dedicate the first nine days of Chait (also called Nauratri) to Iswara and his consort Isani.
Having thus specified both modes of reckoning for the opening of the solar and lunar years, I shall not commence the abstract of the festivals of Mewar with either, but follow the more ancient division of time, when the year closed with the winter solstice in the month of Pus, consequently opening the new year with Magh. By this arrangement, we shall commence with the spring festivals, and let the days dedicated to mirth and gaiety follow each other; preferring the natural to the astrological year, which will enable us to preserve the analogy with the northern nations of Europe, who also reckoned from the winter solstice. The Hindu divides the year into six seasons, each of two months; namely, Vasanta, Grishma, Varsha, Sarad, Sisira, Sita; or spring, summer, rainy, sultry, dewy, and cold.
It is not, however, my intention to detail all the fasts and festivals which the Rajput of Mewar holds in common with the Hindu nation, but chiefly those restricted to that State, or such as are celebrated with local peculiarity, or striking analogies to those of Egypt, Greece, or Scandinavia. The goddess who presides over mirth and idleness preferred holding her court amidst the ruins of Udaipur to searching elsewhere for a dwelling. This determination to be happy amidst calamity, individual and national, has made the court proverbial in Rajwara, in the adage, ‘sat bara, aur nau teohara,’ i.e. nine holidays out of seven days. Although many of these festivals are common to India, and their maintenance is enjoined by religion, yet not only the prolongation and repetition of some, but the entire institution of others, as well as the peculiar splendour of their solemnization, originate with the prince; proving how much individual example may influence[influence] the manners of a nation.
Spring Festival, Vasant Panchami.
The opening of the spring being on the 5th of the month Magha, is thence called the Vasant panchami, which in 1819 fell on the 30th of January; consequently the first of Pus (the antecedent month), the beginning of the old Hindu [563] year, or ‘the morning of the gods,’ fell on the 25th of December. The Vasant continues forty days after the panchami, or initiative fifth, during which the utmost license prevails in action and in speech; the lower classes regale even to intoxication on every kind of stimulating confection and spirituous beverage, and the most respectable individuals, who would at other times be shocked to utter an indelicate allusion, roam about with the groups of bacchanals, reciting stanzas of the warmest description in praise of the powers of nature, as did the conscript fathers of Rome during the Saturnalia. In this season, when the barriers of rank are thrown down, and the spirit of democracy is let loose, though never abused, even the wild Bhil, or savage Mer, will leave his forest or mountain shade to mingle in the revelries of the capital; and decorating his ebon hair or tattered turban with a garland of jessamine, will join the clamorous parties which perambulate the streets of the capital. These orgies are, however, reserved for the conclusion of the forty days sacred to the goddess of nature.
Bhān Saptami Festival.
Sun Worship.
The more we attend to the warlike mythology of the north, the more apparent is its analogy with that of the Rajputs, and the stronger ground is there for assuming that both races inherited their creed from the common land of the Yuti of the Jaxartes. What is a more proper etymon for Scandinavian, the abode of the warriors who destroyed the Roman power, than Skanda, the Mars or Kumara of the Rajputs? perhaps the origin of the Cimbri, derived by Mallet from koempfer, ‘to fight.’
Thor, in the eleventh fable of the Edda, is denominated Asa-Thor,[[19]] the ‘lord Thor,’ called the Celtic Mars by the Romans. The chariot of Thor is ignobly yoked compared with the car of Surya; but in the substitution of the he-goats for the seven-headed horse Saptasva we have but the change of an adjunct depending on clime, when the Yuti migrated from the plains of Scythia, of which the horse is a native, to Yutland, of whose mountains the goat was an inhabitant prior to any of the race of Asi. The northern warrior makes the palace of the sun-god Thor the most splendid of the celestial abodes, “in which are five hundred and forty halls”: vying with the Suryamandala, the supreme heaven of the Rajput. Whence such notions of the Aswa races of the Ganges, and the Asi of Scandinavia, but from the Scythic Saka, who adored the solar divinity under the name of ‘Gaeto-Syrus,’[[20]] the Surya of the Sachha Rajput; and as, according to the commentator on the Edda, “the ancient people of the north pronounced the th as the English now do ss,” the sun-god Thor becomes Sor, and is identified still more with Surya whose worship no doubt gave the name to that extensive portion of Asia called Συρία, as it did to the small peninsula of the Sauras, still peopled by tribes of Scythic origin. The Sol of the Romans has probably the same Celto-Etrurian origin; with those tribes the sun was the great object of adoration, and their grand festival, the winter solstice, was called Yule, Hiul, Houl, “which even at this day signifies the Sun, in the language of Bas-Bretagne and Cornwall.”[[21]] On the conversion of the descendants of these Scythic Yeuts, who, according to [565] Herodotus, sacrificed the horse (Hi) to the sun (El), the name of the Pagan jubilee of the solstice was transferred to the day of Christ’s nativity, which is thus still held in remembrance by their descendants of the north.[[22]]
Sun Worship at Udaipur.
The Spring Hunt.
The royal kitchen moves out on this occasion, and in some chosen spot the repast is prepared, of which all partake, for the hog is the favourite food of the Rajput, as it was of the heroes of Scandinavia. Nor is the munawwar piyala, or invitation cup, forgotten; and having feasted, and thrice slain their bristly antagonist, they return to the capital, where fame had already spread their exploits—the deeds done by the barchhi (lance) of Padma,[[26]] or the khanda (sword) blow of Hamira,[[27]] which lopped the head of the foe of Gauri. Even this martial amusement, the Aheria, has a religious origin. The boar is the enemy of Gauri of the Rajputs; it was so held of Isis by the Egyptians, of Ceres by the Greeks, of Freya by the north-man, whose favourite food was the hog: and of such importance was it deemed by the Franks, that the second chapter of the Salic law is entirely penal with regard to the stealers of swine. The heroes of the Edda, even in Valhalla, feed on the fat of the wild boar Saehrimner, while “the illustrious father of armies fattens his wolves Geri and Freki, and takes no other nourishment himself than the interrupted quaffing of wine”: quite the picture of Har, the Rajput god of war, and his sons the Bhairavas, Krodha, and Kala, metaphorically called the ‘sons of slaughter.’ We need hardly repeat that the cup of the Scandinavian god of war, like that of the Rajputs, is the human skull (khopra) [567].[[28]]
The Phāg or Holi Festival.
On the last day, the Rana feasts his chiefs, and the camp breaks up with the distribution of khanda nariyal, or swords and coco-nuts, to the chiefs and all “whom the king delighteth to honour.” These khandas are but ‘of lath,’ in shape like the Andrea Ferrara, or long cut-and-thrust, the favourite weapon of the Rajput. They are painted in various ways, like Harlequin’s sword, and meant as a burlesque, in unison with the character of the day, when war is banished, and the multiplication,[[31]] not the destruction, of man is the behest of the goddess who rules the spring. At nightfall, the forty days conclude with ‘the burning of the Holi,’ when they light large fires, into which various substances, as well as the crimson abira, are thrown, and around which groups of children are dancing and screaming in the streets like so many infernals. Until three hours after sunrise of the new month of Chait, these orgies are continued with increased vigour, when the natives bathe, change their garments, worship, and return to the rank of sober citizens; and princes and chiefs receive gifts from their domestics.[[32]]
Chait.
On the 3rd, the whole of the royal insignia proceeds to Bedla, the residence of the Chauhan chief (one of the Sixteen), within the valley of the capital, in order to convey the Rao to court. The Rana advances to the Ganesa Deori[[33]] to receive him; when, after salutation, the sovereign and his chief return to the great hall of assembly, hand in hand, but that of the Chauhan above or upon his sovereign’s. In this ceremony we have another singular memorial of the glorious days of Mewar, when almost every chieftain established by deeds of devotion a right to the eternal gratitude of their princes; the decay of whose [569] power but serves to hallow such reminiscences. It is in these little acts of courteous condescension, deviations from the formal routine of reception, that we recognize the traces of Rajput history; for inquiry into these customs will reveal the incident which gave birth to each, and curiosity will be amply repaid, in a lesson at once of political and moral import. For my own part, I never heard the kettledrum of my friend Raj Kalyan strike at the sacred barrier, the Tripolia, without recalling the glorious memory of[memory of] his ancestor at the Thermopylae of Mewar;[[34]] nor looked on the autograph lance, the symbol of the Chondawats, without recognizing the fidelity of the founder of the clan;[[35]] nor observed the honours paid to the Chauhans of Bedla and Kotharia, without the silent tribute of applause to the manes of their sires.
Sītala’s Festival.
Birthday of the Rana.
New Year’s Day. The Festival of Flowers.
The Festival of Flowers.
Ganggor Festival.
Gauri is one of the names of Isa or Parvati, wife of the greatest of the gods, Mahadeva or Iswara, who is conjoined with her in these rites, which almost exclusively appertain to the women. The meaning of Gauri is ‘yellow,’ emblematic of the ripened harvest, when the votaries of the goddess adore her effigies, which are those of a matron painted the colour of ripe corn; and though her image is represented with only two hands, in one of which she holds the lotos, which the Egyptians regarded as emblematic of reproduction, yet not unfrequently they equip her with the warlike conch, the discus, and the club, to denote that the goddess, whose gifts sustain life, is likewise accessary to the loss of it: uniting, as Gauri and Kali, the characters of life and death, like the Isis and Cybele of the Egyptians. But here she is only seen as Annapurna, the benefactress of mankind. The rites commence when the sun enters Aries (the opening of the Hindu year), by a deputation to a spot beyond the city, “to bring earth for the image of Gauri.”[[40]] When this is formed, a smaller one of Iswara is made, and they are placed together; a small trench is then excavated, in which barley is sown; the ground is irrigated and artificial heat supplied till the grain germinates, when the females join hands and dance round it, invoking the blessings of Gauri on their husbands.[[41]] The young corn is then taken up, distributed, and presented by the females to the men, who wear it in their turbans. Every wealthy family has its image, or at least every purwa or subdivision of the city. These and other [571] rites known only to the initiated having been performed for several days within doors, they decorate the images, and prepare to carry them in procession to the lake. During these days of preparation, nothing is talked of but Gauri’s departure from the palace; whether she will be as sumptuously apparelled as in the year gone by; whether an additional boat will be launched on the occasion; though not a few forget the goddess altogether in the recollection of the gazelle eyes (mrig-nayani) and serpentine locks (nagini-zulf)[[42]] of the beauteous handmaids who are selected to attend her. At length the hour arrives, the martial nakkaras give the signal “to the cannonier without,” and speculation is at rest when the guns on the summit of the castle of Eklinggarh announce that Gauri has commenced her excursion to the lake.
The Bathing of the Goddess.
Considerable resemblance is to be discerned between this festival of Gauri and that in honour of the Egyptian Diana[[44]] at Bubastis, and Isis at Busiris, within the [573] Delta of the Nile, of which Herodotus says: “They who celebrate those of Diana embark in vessels; the women strike their tabors, the men their flutes; the rest of both sexes clap their hands, and join in chorus. Whatever city they approach, the vessels are brought on shore; the women use ungracious language, dance, and indelicately throw about their garments.”[[45]] Wherever the rites of Isis prevailed, we find the boat introduced as an essential emblem in her worship, whether in the heart of Rajasthan, on the banks of the Nile, or in the woods of Germany. Bryant[[46]] furnishes an interesting account from Diodorus and Curtius, illustrated by drawings from Pocock, from the temple of Luxor, near Carnac, in the Thebaid, of ‘the ship of Isis,’ carrying an ark; and from a male figure therein, this learned person thinks it bears a mysterious allusion to the deluge. I am inclined to deem the personage in the ark Osiris, husband of Isis, the type of the sun arrived in the sign of Aries (of which the ram’s heads ornamenting both the prow and stem of the vessel are typical), the harbinger of the annual fertilizing inundation of the Nile: evincing identity of origin as an equinoctial festival with that of Gauri (Isis) of the Indu-Scythic races of Rajasthan.
The German Suevi adored Isis, and also introduced a ship in her worship, for which Tacitus[[47]] is at a loss to account, and with his usual candour says he has no materials whence to investigate the origin of a worship denoting the foreign origin of the tribe. This Isis of the Suevi was evidently a form of Ertha, the chief divinity of all the Saxon races, who, with her consort Teutates or Hesus[[48]] (Mercury), were the chief deities of both the Celtic and early Gothic races: the [574] Budha and Ila of the Rajputs; in short, the earth,[[49]] the prolific mother, the Isis of Egypt, the Ceres of Greece, the Annapurna (giver of food) of the Rajputs. On some ancient temples dedicated to this Hindu Ceres we have sculptured on the frieze and pedestal of the columns the emblem of abundance, termed the kamakumbha, or vessel of desire, a vase of elegant form, from which branches of the palm are gracefully pendent. Herodotus says that similar water-vessels, filled with wheat and barley, were carried in the festival of Isis; and all who have attended to Egyptian antiquities are aware that the god Canopus is depicted under the form of a water-jar, or Nilometer, whose covering bears the head of Osiris.
The Agastya Festival.
The Egyptians, according to Plutarch, considered the Nile as flowing from Osiris, in like manner as the Hindu poet describes the fair Ganga flowing from the head of Iswara, which Sir W. Jones thus classically paints in his hymn to Ganga:
Above the reach of mortal ken,
On blest Coilasa’s top, where every stem
Glowed with a vegetable gem,
Mahesa stood, the dread and joy of men;
While Parvati, to gain a boon,
Fixed on his locks a beamy moon,
And hid his frontal eye in jocund play,
With reluctant sweet delay;
All nature straight was locked in dim eclipse,
Till Brahmins pure, with hallowed lips
And warbled prayers, restored the day,
When Ganga from his brow, with heavenly fingers prest,
Sprang radiant, and descending, graced the caverns of the west [575].
COLUMNS OF TEMPLES AT CHANDRĀVATI.
To face page 670.
The Goddess Ganga.
The Aghori Ascetics.
The ὠμοφαγία, or eating raw flesh with the blood, was a part of the secret mysteries of Osiris, in commemoration of the happy change in the condition of mankind from savage to civilized life, and intended to deter by disgust the return thereto.[[54]]
The Buddhists pursued this idea to excess; and in honour of Adiswara, the First, who from his abode of Meru taught them the arts of agriculture, they altogether abandoned that type of savage life, the eating of the flesh of animals,[[55]] and confined themselves to the fruits of the earth. With these sectarian anti-idolaters, who are almost all of Rajput descent, the beneficent Lakshmi, Sri, or Gauri, is an object of sincere devotion.
Affinities of Hindu to other Mythologies.
Whoever desires to witness one of the most imposing and pleasing of Hindu festivals, let him repair to Udaipur, and behold the rites of the lotus-queen Padma, the Gauri of Rajasthan.
Chait (Sudi) 8th, which, being after the Ides, is the 23rd of the month, is sacred to Devi, the goddess of every tribe; she is called Asokashtami, and being the ninth night (nauratri) from the opening of their Floralia, they perform the homa, or sacrifice of fire. On this day a grand procession takes place to the Chaugan, and every Rajput worships his tutelary divinity.
The Birth of Rāma.
The Festival of Kamadeva.
“Hail, god of the flowery bow:[[59]] hail, warrior with a fish on thy banner! hail, powerful divinity, who causeth the firmness of the sage to forsake him!”
“Glory to Madana, to Kama,[[60]] the god of gods; to Him by whom Brahma [578], Vishnu, Siva, and Indra are filled with emotions of rapture!”—Bhavishya Purana.[[61]]
Festivals in the month Baisākh: April-May.
Although the court calendar of Udaipur notices only those festivals on which State processions occur, yet there are many minor fêtes, which are neither unimportant nor uninteresting. We shall enumerate a few, alike in Baisakh, Jeth, and Asarh, which are blank as to the Nakkara Aswari.
Savitrivrata Festival.
Festivals in the month Jeth: May-June.
The Aranya-Shashthi Festival.
Festivals in the month Āsārh: June-July.
Festivals in the month Sāwan: July-August.
The Tij.
Red garments are worn by all classes on this day, and at Jaipur clothes of this colour are presented by the Raja to all the chiefs. At that court the Tij is kept with more honour than at Udaipur. An image of Parvati on the Tij, richly attired, is borne on a throne by women chanting hymns, attended by the prince and his nobles. On this day, fathers present red garments and stuffs to their daughters.
The Nāgpanchami Festival: Serpent Worship.
Ambrosial fruit of vegetable gold;
which was termed amrita, and rendered them immortal. A drawing, brought by [581] Colonel Coombs, from a sculptured column in a cave temple in the south of India, represents the first pair at the foot of this ambrosial tree, and a serpent entwined among the heavily laden boughs, presenting to them some of the fruit from his mouth. The tempter appears to be at that part of his discourse, when
... his words, replete with guile,
Into her heart too easy entrance won:
Fixed on the fruit she gazed.
This is a curious subject to be engraved on an ancient pagan temple; if Jain or Buddhist, the interest would be considerably enhanced. On this festival, at Udaipur, as well as throughout India, they strew particular plants about the threshold, to prevent the entrance of reptiles.
The Rākhi Festival.
This day is hailed by the Brahmans as indemnifying them for their expenditure of silk and spangles, with which they decorate the wrists of all who are likely to make a proper return.
Festivals in the month Bhādon: August-September.
Ancestor Worship.
[1]. Travels in Scandinavia, vol. i. p. 33.
[2]. Bhumiputra.
[3]. Vanaputra.
[4]. Suryas and Induputras.
[5]. [For the Vedic cult of Sūrya see Macdonell, “Vedic Mythology,” Grundriss der Indo-Arischen Philologie und Altertumskunde, 1897, p. 30 ff.]
[6]. The Sauromatae or Sarmatians of early Europe, as well as the Syrians, were most probably colonies of the same Suryavansi who simultaneously peopled the shores of the Caspian and Mediterranean, and the banks of the Indus and Ganges. Many of the tribes described by Strabo as dwelling around the Caspian are enumerated amongst the thirty-six royal races of India. One of these, the Sakasenae, supposed to be the ancestors of our own Saxon race, settled themselves on the Araxes in Armenia, adjoining Albania. [There are no grounds for these comparisons.]
[7]. [There are no grounds for this classification.]
[8]. Long after the overthrow of the Greek kingdom of Bactria by the Yuti or Getes [Sakas] this region was popular and flourishing. In the year 120 before Christ, De Guignes says: “Dans ce pays on trouvait d’excellens grains, du vin de vigne, plus de cent villes, tant grandes que petites. Il est aussi fait mention du Tahia situé au midi du Gihon, et où il y a de grandes villes murées. Le général chinois y vit des toiles de l’Inde et autres marchandises, etc., etc.” (Hist. Gén. des Huns, vol. i. p. 51).
[9]. Yavan or Javan is a celebrated link of the Indu (lunar) genealogical chain; nor need we go to Ionia for it, though the Ionians may be a colony descended from Javan, the ninth from Yayati, who was the third son of Ayu, the ancestor of the Hindu as well as of the Tatar Induvansi. [Yavana is the general term for a foreigner, especially the non-Hindu tribes of the N.W. Frontier, and those beyond them.] The Asuras, who are so often described as invaders of India, and which word has ordinarily a mere irreligious acceptation, I firmly believe to mean the Assyrians. [This theory was adopted by J. Fergusson, Cave Temples of India, 34.]
[10]. [Such analogies of custom do not prove ethnical identity.]
[11]. [The theory breaks down, because the name of the sword of Argantýr was Tyrfing, or better Tyrfingr, the derivation of which word, as Mr. H. M. Chadwick kindly informs me, according to Vigfússon’s Icelandic Dictionary, is from tyrfi, a resinous fir-tree used for kindling a fire, because the sword flamed like resinous wood.]
[12]. See Turner’s History of Anglo-Saxons for Indo-Scythic words.
[13]. There were no less than four distinguished leaders of this name amongst the vassals of the last Rajput emperor of Delhi; and one of them, who turned traitor to his sovereign and joined Shihabu-d-din, was actually a Scythian, and of the Gakkhar race, which maintained their ancient habits of polyandry even in Babur’s time. The Haoli Rao Hamira was lord of Kangra and the Gakkhars of Pamir.
[14]. Turner, when discussing the history of the Sakai, or Sakaseni, of the Caspian, whom he justly supposes to be the Saxons of the Baltic, takes occasion to introduce some words of Scythic origin (preserved by ancient writers), to almost every one of which, without straining etymology, we may give a Sanskrit origin. [There is no ground for ascribing a Scythic origin to the proper names in the text.]
| Scythic. | Sanskrit or Bhakha. | |
| Exampaios | sacred ways | Agham is the sacred book; pai and pada, a foot; pantha, a path. |
| Arimu | one | Ad is the first; whence Adima, or man. |
| Spou | an eye. | |
| Oior | a man. | |
| Pata | to kill | Badh, to kill. |
| Tahiti | the chief deity is Vesta | Tap is heat or flame; the type of Vesta. |
| Papaios | ” ” | Jupiter Baba, or Bapa, the universal father. The Hindu Jiva-pitri, or Father of Life [?]. |
| Oitosuros | ” ” Apollo | Aitiswara, or Sun-God, applicable to Vishnu, who has every attribute of Apollo; from ait, contraction of aditya, the sun. |
| Artimpasa, or Aripasa | ” ” Venus | Apsaras because born from the froth or essence, ‘sara,’ of the waters, ‘ap’ [‘going in the water’]. |
| Thamimasadus | ” ” Neptune | Thoenatha; or God of the Waters. |
| Apia | wife of Papaios, or Earth | Amba, Ama, Uma, is the universal mother; wife of ‘Baba Adam,’ as they term the universal father. |
See Turner’s History of the Anglo-Saxons, vol. i. p. 35. [Many of the identifications are obsolete.]
[15]. Sir W. Jones, “On the Lunar Year of the Hindus,” Asiatic Researches, vol. iii. p. 257.
[16]. Bhaskara saptami, in honour of the sun, as a form of Vishnu (Varaha Purana) Makari, from the sun entering the constellation Makara (Pisces), the first of the solar Magha (see Asiatic Researches, vol. iii. p. 273).
[18]. This word appears to have the same import as Thor, the sun-god and war divinity of the Scandinavians. [? Thāwar, Saturday; Skt. sthāvara, ‘stationary.’]
[19]. Odin is also called As or ‘lord’; the Gauls also called him Oes or Es, and with a Latin termination Hesus, whom Lucan calls Esus; Edda, vol. ii. pp. 45-6. The celebrated translator of these invaluable remnants of ancient superstitions, by which alone light can be thrown on the origin of nations, observes that Es or Oes is the name for God with all the Celtic races. So it was with the Tuscans, doubtless from the Sanskrit, or rather from a more provincial tongue, the common contraction of Iswara, the Egyptian Osiris, the Persian Syr, the sun-god. [These words have, of course, no connexion. Syria perhaps derives its name from the Suri, a north-Euphratian tribe (Encyclopaedia Biblica, iv. 4845).]
[20]. Which Mallet, from Hesychius, interprets ‘good star.’ [The name Goetosyrus or Octosyrus (Herodotus iv. 59) is so uncertain in form that it is useless to propose etymologies for it (E. H. Minns, Scythians and Greeks, 86). Rawlinson (Herodotus, 3rd ed. ii. 93) compares Greek αἴθος, Skt. sūrya, in the sense ‘bright, burning Sun.’]
[21]. Mallet’s Northern Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 42.
[22]. [Much of this is from Sir W. Jones, Wilford and Paterson (Asiatic Researches, i. 253, iii. 141, viii. 48). Herodotus (i. 216) ascribes the custom of Sun sacrifice to the Massagetae.]
[23]. [The Mughal emperors followed the same practice (Manucci i. 98).]
[24]. In his delight for this diversion, the Rajput evinces his Scythic propensity. The grand hunts of the last Chauhan emperor often led him into warfare, for Prithiraj was a poacher of the first magnitude, and one of his battles with the Tatars was while engaged in field sports on the Ravi. The heir of Jenghiz Khan was chief huntsman, the highest office of the State amongst the Scythic Tatars; as Ajanbahu, alike celebrated in either field of war and sport, was chief huntsman to the Chauhan emperor of Delhi, whose bard enters minutely into the subject, describing all the variety of dogs of chase.
[25]. A hog in Hindi; in Persian khuk, nearly our hog [?].
[26]. Chief of Salumbar.
[27]. Chief of Hamirgarh.
[28]. [On the slaughter of the boar representing a corn-spirit see Sir J. Frazer, The Golden Bough, 3rd ed. Part v. vol. i. 298 ff.; Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 2nd ed. 290 f.]
[29]. He has been the father of more than one hundred children, legitimate and illegitimate, though very few are living.
[30]. That this can be done without any loss of dignity by the Sahib log (a name European gentlemen have assumed) is well known to those who may have partaken of the hospitalities of that honourable man, and brave and zealous officer, Colonel James Skinner, C.B., at Hansi. That his example is worthy of imitation in the mode of commanding, is best evinced by the implicit and cheerful obedience his men pay to his instructions when removed from his personal control. He has passed through the ordeal of nearly thirty years of unremitted service, and from the glorious days of Delhi and Laswari under Lake, to the last siege of Bharatpur, James Skinner has been second to none. In obtaining for this gallant and modest officer the order of the Bath, Lord Combermere must have been applauded by every person who knows the worth of him who bears it, which includes the whole army of Bengal. [James Skinner, 1778-1841. See Compton, Military Adventurers, 389 ff.; Buckland, Dict. Indian Biography, s.v.]
[31]. Evinced in the presentation of the sriphala, the fruit of Sri, which is the coco-nut, emblematic of fruitfulness.
[32]. Another point of resemblance to the Roman Saturnalia.
[33]. A hall so called in honour of Ganesa, or Janus, whose effigies adorn the entrance. [Janus probably = Dianus: Ganesa, ‘lord of the troops of inferior deities’ (gana).]
[36]. [See Hastings, Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, viii. 868 f.]
[37]. It fell on the 18th March 1819.
[38]. [For festivals in honour of Gauri see IA, xxxv. (1906) 61.]
[39]. Personification of spring.
[40]. Here we have Gauri as the type of the earth.
[41]. [The Gardens of Adonis, for which see Sir J. Frazer, Adonis, Attis, Osiris, 3rd ed. i. 236 ff.]
[42]. Here the Hindu mixes Persian with his Sanskrit, and produces the mongrel dialect Hindi.
[43]. Takht, Pat, Persian and Sanskrit, alike meaning board.
[44]. The Ephesian Diana is the twin sister of Gauri, and can have a Sanskrit derivation in Devianna, ‘the goddess of food,’ contracted Deanna, though commonly Anna-de or Anna-devi, and Annapurna, ‘filling with food,’ or the nourisher, the name applied by ‘the mother of mankind,’ when she places the repast before the messenger of heaven:
“Heavenly Stranger, please to taste
These bounties, which our Nourisher, from whom
All perfect good, unmeasured out, descends,
To us for food and for delight, hath caused
The earth to yield.”
Paradise Lost, Bk. v. 397-401.
[Diana is the feminine form of Dianus, Janus.]
[45]. ii. 59-64.
[46]. Analysis of Ancient Mythology, p. 312.
[47]. [Germania, ix.]
[48]. Hesus is probably derived from Iswara, or Isa, the god. Toth was the Egyptian, and Teutates the Scandinavian, Mercury. I have elsewhere attempted to trace the origin of the Suevi, Su, or Yeuts of Yeutland (Jutland), to Yute, Getae, or Jat, of Central Asia, who carried thence the religion of Buddha into India as well as to the Baltic. There is little doubt that the races called Jotner, Jaeter, Jotuns, Jacts, and Yeuts, who followed the Asi into Scandinavia, migrated from the Jaxartes, the land of the great Getae (Massagetae); the leader was supposed to be endued with supernatural powers, like the Buddhist, called Vidiavan, or magician, whose haunts adjoined Aria, the cradle of the Magi. They are designated Aripunta [?], under the sign of a serpent, the type of Budha; or Ahriman, ‘the foe of man.’ [Much of this crude speculation is taken from Wilford (Asiatic Researches, iii. 133).]
[49]. The German Ertha, to show her kindred to the Ila of the Rajputs, had her car drawn by a cow, under which form the Hindus typify the earth (prithivi).
[50]. Let it be borne in mind that Indu, Chandra, Soma, are all epithets for ‘the moon,’ or as he is classically styled (in an inscription of the famous Kumarpal, which I discovered in Chitor), Nisanath, the ruler of darkness (Nisa).
[51]. [Kedārnāth has, of course, no connexion with the cedar tree. The origin of the name ‘Lord of Kedār’ is unknown; probably Kedār was an old cult title of Siva.]
[52]. I have before remarked that a Sanskrit etymology might be given to this word in Ila and Isa, i.e. ‘the goddess of the earth’ [?] [p. 636, note].
[53]. I was informed at Naples that four thousand of these were dug out of one spot, and I obtained while at Paestum many fragments and heads of this goddess.
[54]. Prichard’s Researches into the Physical History of Man, p. 369. [For a full discussion of ὠμοφαγία see Miss J. E. Harrison, Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion, 483 ff.]
[55]. The Buddhists of Tartary make no scruple of eating flesh.
[56]. Durga, ‘a fort’; as Suvarnadurg, ‘the golden castle,’ etc., etc.
[57]. Literally Tripoli, ‘the three cities,’ pura, polis.
[58]. [The double jasmin (Michelia champaka).]
[59]. Cupid’s bow is formed of a garland of flowers.
[60]. Madana, he who intoxicates with desire (kama), both epithets of the god of love. The festivals on the 13th and 14th are called Madana trayodasi (the tenth) and Chaturdasi (fourteenth).
[61]. Asiatic Researches, vol. iii. p. 278.
[62]. [Savitri-vrata means ‘the vow to Savitri,’ and has no connexion with the vata or banyan-tree. But the tree is worshipped in connexion with it on 15th light or dark fortnight of the month Jeth (Census Report, Baroda, 1901, i. 127).]
[63]. Ap, ‘water,’ and sara, ‘froth or essence.’ [The word means ‘going in the waters, or between the waters of the clouds.’]
[64]. The Romans held the calends of June (generally Jeth) sacred to the goddess Carna, significant of the sun. Carneus was the sun-god of the Celts, and a name of Apollo at Sparta, and other Grecian cities. The Karneia was a festival in honour of Apollo.
[65]. The story of the vigils of Parvati, preparatory to her being reunited to her lord, consequent to her sacrifice as Sati, is the counterpart of the Grecian fable of Cybele, her passion for, and marriage with, the youth Atys or Papas, the Baba, or universal father, of the Hindus.
[66]. How did a word of Persian growth come to signify ‘the boundless brake’ of the new world?
[67]. Ari, ‘a foe’; manus, ‘man.’ [Angro Mainyush, ‘destructive spirit.’]
[68]. [There is no reason to believe that snake-worship was not independently practised in India.]
[69]. This is the snake-race of India, the foes of the Pandus.
[71]. I returned from three to five pieces of gold for the rakhis sent by my adopted sisters; from one of whom, the sister of the Rana, I annually received this pledge by one of her handmaids; three of them I have yet in my possession, though I never saw the donor, who is now no more. I had, likewise, some presented through the family priest, from the Bundi queen-mother, with whom I have conversed for hours, though she was invisible to me; and from the ladies of rank of the chieftains’ families, but one of whom I ever beheld, though they often called upon me for the performance of brotherly offices in consequence of such tie. There is a delicacy in this custom, with which the bond uniting the cavaliers of Europe to the service of the fair, in the days of chivalry, will not compare.
[72]. Sacred to Vishnu, with the title of Ananta, or infinite—Bhavishyottara. (See Asiatic Researches, vol. iii. p. 291.) Here Vishnu appears as ‘lord of the manes.’