Sacred Numbers
Certain numbers recur with great frequency in the dairy ceremonial, and may be regarded as having a special sanctity on this account. There seems to be a general preference for uneven numbers, and this preference comes out very strongly in the tesherst ceremony, in which an uneven number of men must take part on any one occasion. The number of men performing this ceremony together must be three, five, seven, nine, &c.
In the dairy ritual the numbers which occur chiefly are three, seven and nine, but other numbers have also been singled out in other branches of Toda lore. The numbers which occur in ceremonial may now be considered in detail.
Three.—A large proportion of the ritual acts of the dairy are performed three times, usually with the accompaniment of the sacred syllable Oñ uttered thrice, once with each performance of the act. This three-fold performance is especially marked in the ceremony of putting milk or curds on the sacred bells and in the ceremonial drinking of buttermilk. In the ordination ceremonies, the number occurs less frequently. The purificatory drinking is always done seven times or some multiple of seven, but after drinking, the candidate rubs himself three times with the shoots or bark, and, at the ordination of a palol, the candidate drinks three times seven on several occasions. Other acts during the ordination of the palol are also performed thrice, and the same number occurs in the ordination of the kaltmokh.
Acts are performed thrice with special frequency in the ceremonial of the ti, and, at the ordinary dairy, this number is especially connected with the ‘feeding’ of the sacred [[413]]bell, and there is no doubt that it is a number regarded as especially sacred. Whenever the sacred syllable Oñ is used, it is nearly always uttered thrice, and there seems to be a special association between the number three and this word.
In the erkumptthpimi ceremony three branches of tudr leaves are used, and they and the log with which the calf is killed are passed round the body of the animal thrice. Later in the ceremony three pieces of wood are thrown over the fire.
In the ceremonies connected with childbirth, the woman drinks thrice on various occasions, in the pursütpimi ceremony the name of the bow is asked and the answer given three times, and in the ceremony of name-giving three grains of barley are put into the mouth of the child and three into his hair.
At the funeral ceremonies, earth is thrown three times on the corpse and three times into the pen, the body is swung on the fire three times, and at the final scene of the azaramkedr the man who rings the bell goes round the burial place of the ashes thrice. Three oviônikârs are thrown by the man who crosses the pathway of the dead. The number three is not limited to the dairy ritual, but is of frequent occurrence in the whole of Toda ceremonial.
The number three also appears in connexion with magical or semi-magical practices. The various methods of treatment used by the utkòren are carried out three times and never more frequently than this, and the sufferer who drinks hot water to allay the effects of fright also does this thrice. A remedy is probably held to be more potent if repeated the same number of times as in the case of so many sacred acts.
Five.—This number does not occur in the dairy ceremonial except in certain ceremonies at the Nòdrs ti which are repeated five times because there are five groups of buffaloes belonging to this dairy. The number in this case has, however, no ceremonial significance, and is merely a consequence of the fact that one palol at this ti has three groups and the other two groups of buffaloes. The only other occurrence of the number is at the Kars ti, where the ancient lamp probably had five cavities, but even this is doubtful.
The number five comes in one place into Toda magic. The [[414]]sorcerer, who wishes to injure one who has not granted his request, hides five stones tied together with hair in the thatch of his enemy’s hut.
Six.—This number does not occur in the dairy ceremonial, but it seems to be regarded as an auspicious number in some ways. In Teitnir’s lament for his wife, reference is made to the hope that they might have had six children and six buffaloes, and in the prayer on the occasion of the ear-piercing ceremony, one clause runs “may he have six sons.”
Six sticks are used to make the artificial dairy of the hand-burning ceremony, but this is an obvious result of the fact that the dairy has to have two rooms.
Seven.—This number is especially prominent in the ordination ceremonies. The purificatory drinking out of leaf-cups is always done seven times or some multiple of seven, the palikartmokh drinking seven times only, the wursol seven times seven, and the palol three times seven, seven times seven and nine times seven at different periods of his prolonged ordination ceremonies. At the dairies of Taradr and Kanòdrs, the number occurs in a different form, seven different kinds of leaf being used in the purificatory ceremonies.
The number occurs again in connexion with the lamp. At the Nòdrs ti and at the Pan ti, and possibly at other dairies, there used to be lamps, each of which had seven cavities and seven wicks. Some of these lamps have been lost, but two remain at the dairies mentioned. I have already referred to the fact that some of the ancient lamps were said to have had five wicks, but it seems clear that in the only two examples which survive there are seven wicks, and it is possible that this was the number in all.
Another occurrence of the number seven is in the old dairies of the Nòdrs clan which had seven rooms. The funeral dairies, which are undoubtedly very ancient institutions, have three rooms, and the Nòdrs dairies, also undoubtedly ancient, had seven, but I heard of no case in which a dairy had four, five, or six rooms.
Outside the dairy ceremonial, the only occurrence of this number is in the lament of Teitnir for his wife, in which he speaks of their visiting seven courts and seven ships. [[415]]
It is perhaps significant that the number seven should be a sacred number to a people who have so highly developed the cult of different days of the week. It is possible that the purificatory drinkings of the ordination ceremonies were at one time performed seven times with the idea that the candidate was sanctifying himself for each day of the week, but at the present time it is clear that the act is performed seven times because this number is prescribed by custom. It would be interesting to ascertain whether the sanctity of the number seven occurs predominantly in the religious cults of peoples who have a seven-day week.
Nine.—This number only occurs in the dairy ceremonial during the ordination of the palol when the seven-fold purification with tudr is performed nine times.
Twelve.—I only met with this number once, in the prayer at the pilinörtiti ceremony, when the expression “12 years” is used as if it were equivalent to “for ever.”
Sixteen and Eighteen.—The chief interest of these numbers is that they are used in connexion with the gods. There are said to be 1600, 1800 gods, and these numbers are mentioned in the prayer of the Kanòdrs dairy and in the legends. The numbers are probably used in the way in which we should use the word ‘infinite,’ but there must be some reason why they should have been chosen.
The number 18 occurs in another connexion in the rule that the palol should perform a certain ceremony after eighteen years of continuous office.
I have one possible clue to the choice of the number eighteen. The Todas say that a species of Strobilanth growing on the Nilgiris as a shrub only flowers once in eighteen years. They call this shrub püvkat, and it was in flower during the year of my visit. Albert, my interpreter, had only seen it in flower once or twice, but had not paid special attention to the duration of the flowering period. The number of times that several Todas had seen the flowers agreed approximately with their probable ages. Thus, Kutadri saw the flowers in 1902 for the third time, having seen them for the first time when he was twelve years old. This would make his age forty-eight, which seemed from other sources of information to be [[416]]approximately correct. The Todas use the flower as a record of age, and some Todas are reputed to have seen the flowers seven times, which, taking five years as the age when they were first seen, would make them over 110 years.
There is another Strobilanth called tirparikat which is said to flower every twelve years, and another every six. I do not know of any confirmation of the flowering periods of these plants except the last, which probably refers to Strobilanthes sexennis.
Whether the Toda belief in the eighteen-year period of the plant they call püvkat is correct or not, it seems probable that it may have furnished the suggestion for the special position taken by the number eighteen in Toda lore. [[417]]
CHAPTER XVIII
SACRED PLACES AND OBJECTS
The Todas show undoubted signs of reverence to various material objects. Many of the objects so reverenced have been mentioned incidentally in the account of the dairy ritual and in other places, and in this chapter I propose to consider how far these objects are regarded as sacred, and to give an account of some sacred objects not hitherto noticed.
Of the various objects of reverence the following are the most important: hills and rivers; villages, dairies, their thresholds and contents; bells; the buffalo and its milk; trees and plants; the sun, fire and light; and stones.