The custom of burning the hut at a woman’s funeral is probably a survival of the common custom of burning the house of a dead person, but it is possible that in the case of the Todas this may have been associated with the belief that the hut would be useful in the next world. The funeral hut of a man is not burnt, and this is almost certainly because it is, or represents, a dairy. The motive for the burning of the house of a dead person is probably to remove a place which the ghost may haunt, and the sanctity of the dairy was probably such as to render this precaution unnecessary after the death of a man.
The Toda custom of cremating their dead is accompanied by a belief that the dead go to a distant spirit-world. It seems quite certain that the Todas believe that the dead do not set out on their journey to the next world till after the second funeral ceremonies, but I am not at all clear what is supposed to become of the spirits of the dead in the interval between the two ceremonies. The spirit of a Melgars man during the interval is said to be a kazun or malignant spirit, but I was unable to obtain a full account of the Toda belief about the kazun, nor was I able to find out whether there is any belief in the malignity of the spirits of the dead of other clans.[23] That such spirits are impure is, I think, shown conclusively by the impurity of the relics of the dead and of all those who have been in contact with them. The intense objection to the sacred ti buffaloes or their guardians coming into relation, however indirectly, with the relics is evidence of the belief in the impurity, if not in the malignity, of the spirits of the dead between the two funeral ceremonies.
There is one rite which seems to point to the influence of the spirits of the dead on the living, and this is the obscure ceremony of tersamptpimi, which is performed on the day after the marvainolkedr of a Tarthar man (see p. 333). The ceremony consists in cutting a lock of hair from a young child. One obvious explanation would be [[404]]furnished if we supposed that the spirits of the dead are malignant and that the ceremony was postponed till after the spirit had set out on his journey to Amnòdr, but there are two objections to this explanation. If the Todas had had this in their minds, they would have said that the ceremony might not be performed while there was kedr among the Tartharol, i.e., while the funeral ceremonies of a Tarthar man were still incomplete. For the tersamptpimi ceremony, however, it seems that a child has to wait till after a marvainolkedr even if there has been no recent death among the Tartharol. Further, if the proposed explanation had been correct, there is no reason why the karvnol, or day immediately after the funeral, should have been appointed for the ceremony. The fact that this day is prescribed points rather to some beneficial influence which it is hoped may emanate from the dead. [[405]]
[1] Kûdri is the generic word for creeper. [↑]
[2] See Thurston, Bull., ii. p. 4. [↑]
[3] See [Chap. XXV]. [↑]
[4] Probably Olea robusta. [↑]
[6] As I have already pointed out, this would only happen if the people were of the same clan and sex. [↑]