Pope has suggested that tudr is connected with tulasi, Ocymum sanctum or holy basil. This is a small flowering plant, and it is improbable that there is any connexion between the two plants except a resemblance in name.
Another tree which appears to be especially sacred is the kiaz tree (Litsœa Wightiana). Whenever a tree is used to mark the spot where the mani is laid during purificatory and other ceremonies, the tree must be of this kind. The wood of this tree is used when making fire for most sacred purposes.
The leaves of trees and shrubs are used in various branches of the dairy ritual. Those in most frequent use are various kinds called generically by the Todas muli, three of which belong to the genus Rubus. The young shoots of the same plants are used in the ordination ceremonies.
Grasses are also used in Toda ceremonial, and one of these, a slender grass called kakar (Eragrostica nigra) is used on several occasions, those of especial importance being the ordination of the Teivali palikartmokh and the sweeping of the threshold of the dairy by a girl at the migration ceremony. The same grass is also used in one of the methods adopted to promote speedy delivery in childbirth.
Of the various kinds of grain used by the Todas, that called patm or samai (Panicum miliare) seems to be in most frequent use in connexion with ceremonial, but it cannot be said to be sacred in any way. Barley (kodj) seems to have a peculiar place in Toda belief. The tòratthadi or cooking-vessel of the dairy may not be used for this grain, although any other kind may be boiled in it. On the other hand, three grains of barley are put into the mouth and three into the hair of a boy at the naming ceremony. In explanation I can only offer the surmise that barley is not cooked in the dairy vessel because its use by the Todas is an innovation, and that similarly the use of barley in the naming ceremony is also an innovation borrowed from the Badagas or some other tribe. [[436]]
The Sun, Light, and Fire
There is no doubt that the sun is an object of reverence to the Todas. It is the duty of every man when first he leaves his hut in the morning to salute the sun by raising his hand to his face in the kaimukhti salutation. The sun is also saluted by the palol as he comes out of his dairy to milk the buffaloes. All my informants were unanimous in saying that the salutation of the palol was both to the buffaloes and to the sun. The doors of the great majority of the dairies faced more or less in an easterly direction, so that the dairyman, on coming out of his dairy in the morning, would see the sun, and when the dairy had a different orientation, as at Mòdr, the palol had to turn so that he would perform the salutation looking eastward. At the afternoon ceremonial the salutation was performed in the same direction as in the morning, so that, so far as the salutation is performed to the sun, it would appear that it is to the place of the sun-rise rather than to the sun itself.
The sun plays a part in the ceremony which takes place when a woman goes to the seclusion-hut after childbirth, but there was some reason to think that this was due to the belief in the noxious influence of the mysterious body, Keirt, which is near the sun, and not to the influence of the sun itself. When performing the ceremony on leaving the seclusion-hut the woman faces the sun, and this may be an act of reverence, since now Keirt is no longer feared. It seemed quite clear that the moon is not saluted in the same way as the sun with the kaimukhti salutation. No salutation is paid at all to the new moon when it is first seen, but after a day or two, usually on the third day, it is the custom to bow down the head, so that the forehead rests on the corner of the putkuli lying on the ground. The salutation is that called nersatiti shown in [Fig. 44]. I only heard of one custom indicating reverence to the full moon. When the Todas throw away water on the day of the full moon, they do not throw it towards the moon, but away from it. Thus, if the moon is opposite the door of the hut, the people will go round to the back in order to throw the [[437]]water there. Light is undoubtedly an object of reverence to the Todas. Captain Harkness states that when the household lamp is lighted in the evening, obeisance is paid to it by bringing the right hand to the face, and this sign of reverence is still shown. In the dairy ceremonial the lamp and the light it gives are also undoubtedly reverenced, and lighting the lamp is, as we have seen, an act of a ceremonial character.
In some cases the lamps used in the dairies are certainly very ancient and are believed to have come from Amnòdr, but it is clear that they are not reverenced merely on this account, for a lamp of modern origin would, when once consecrated, be treated with as much reverence as those which had come down from antiquity.