XI. THE DAIRY RITUAL
In the preceding chapters I have given an account of an elaborate ritual wholly connected with the buffalo and with the dairy. This ritual is certainly of a religious character, and, though there is much in the nature of the dairy formulæ which is uncertain, there can be little doubt that they are intercessory and that they bring the dairy operations into definite relations with the Toda deities.
It seems most probable that the general idea underlying the dairy ritual is that the dairyman is dealing with a sacred substance, the milk of the buffaloes. This sacred substance is to be converted into other substances, butter and buttermilk, which are to be used by the profane. At the present time much of the butter goes to those who are not even Todas and are regarded by the Todas as inferior beings.
It seems most probable that the elaborate ritual has grown up as a means of counteracting the dangers likely to be incurred by this profanation of the sacred substance, or, in other words, as a means of removing a taboo which prohibits the general use of the substance.
Similarly the migration ceremonies have the general underlying idea of counteracting any possible evil influence which may accompany the passage of the buffaloes through the profane world from one sacred place to another. During the migration, objects may be seen by the multitude which under ordinary circumstances are strictly screened from the general gaze, and objects may be touched, or be in danger of being touched, by people who ordinarily may not even see them.
Again, the ceremonies connected with entrance upon any dairy office are intended to purify the candidate and make him fit to see and touch and use the sacred objects.
The purpose of some of the other ceremonies is less obvious. The irpalvusthi ceremony seems to be of the nature of a thanksgiving, one of its most important features being a feast, but in this feast people may partake of the milk of sacred buffaloes, which is not ordinarily used by them, and there is a suggestive resemblance to those religious ceremonies in which communion is held with the divine by eating or drinking the divine.
The salt-giving ceremonies seem to point to a time when salt was difficult to procure. According to the Todas the object of these ceremonies is to ensure a plentiful supply of milk. There is a belief that salt is beneficial to the buffaloes, and the occasions on which the salt is given have become religious ceremonies which at the ponup of the ti have reached a high degree of elaboration with very special relations to the chief gods of the dairy. The ceremonies of making new pep are especially mysterious, and I will reserve some speculations as to the general idea underlying them till later (see p. 242).
COMPARISON OF THE PROCEDURE OF DIFFERENT DAIRIES
One of the most striking features of the ritual in all its branches is its increasing elaboration and complexity from the lowest to the highest grade of dairy.
One of the details of the ritual which runs through the whole series of dairies is the separation between the vessels and objects which come into contact with the buffaloes or their milk, and those which come into contact with the outside world, or with the products of the churning which may go to the outside world.
In the proceedings with the milk of the ordinary buffaloes in the huts where the people live, there is, so far as I know, no distinction of this kind.
In the lowest grade of dairy we already meet with the separation. All the vessels are kept in the same room, but in different parts of the room, the patatmar and the ertatmar, and this distinction between the two sets of objects is kept up in the migration ceremonies where they are carried by different men.
There are no striking differences in this respect between the lower grades of dairy, whether tarvali, kudrpali, or wursuli; in all, the two sets of vessels are separated, but no strict measures are taken to prevent a vessel of the patatmar from coming into contact with a vessel of the ertatmar during the dairy operations. It is only on reaching the kugvali of Taradr that we find an intermediate vessel, the kuvun, used to transfer substances from a vessel of the more sacred to one of the less sacred kind, and to prevent possible contamination of the former by the latter.
It is in the ti dairy that these precautions reach their highest degree of development. Here the two sets of vessels are kept in different rooms, separated by a screen, and the dairy products are never transferred directly from a vessel of one kind to a vessel of the other, but always by means of an intermediate vessel. The butter and buttermilk produced by the churning operations in the inner room are transferred to the vessels of the outer room by means of the idrkwoi, which is kept on the dividing line between the two compartments. Similarly the vessels into which the butter and buttermilk are received are never allowed to come into direct contact with objects from the outside world, but their contents are transferred to vessels used outside the dairy by means of intermediate vessels, the uppun or the mòrpun.
In the migrations of the ti buffaloes this strict separation between the two kinds of vessel is still kept up. The things of the inner room are carried by the palol himself, while the things of the outer room are carried by others. The idrkwoi, though carried by the palol on the same staff as the things of the inner room, is kept apart from the rest, and is not allowed to touch them.
The fires of the ti dairy furnish another interesting example of the principle by which sacred objects are prevented from coming directly into relation with objects which may have been contaminated by contact with the outside world. The lamp is not lighted directly from the tòratthwaskal, which is probably sometimes touched by the kaltmokh, but fire is transferred from this fireplace to the pelkkatitthwaskal, from which the lamp is lighted. Here, again, the use of an intermediary object is limited to the ti dairy.
The principle of management by which the palol prevents the contamination of the sacred by the profane in the dairy is adopted by him in other ways. Whenever I paid any money to the palol at Mòdr, I placed it on a stone from which it was taken by the kaltmokh and handed to the palol. A similar procedure is generally adopted whenever anything is brought to, or taken from, a ti dairy. The kaltmokh in the above instance acts as the intermediate link between the palol and the unclean.
In the ordinary procedure of the village dairy, except at the kugvali of Taradr, no example occurs of this use of intermediate links, but there is such an example during the ordination of the wursol. When the palikartmokh gives the candidate milk from the ertatpun (p. 149), he does not pour it directly into the leaf-cup from which the candidate drinks, but first pours it into another leaf-cup and then from that into the cup used by the candidate.
Other features of the ritual in which there are differences in different grades of dairy are in the ceremonial touching of dairy vessels, in the avoidance of turning the back towards the contents of the dairy, in lamp-lighting, in the ritual connected with the bell, and in the frequency with which the prayer of the dairy is recited.
At the tarvali and kudrpali, the dairyman touches ceremonially the majpariv and the patat at the beginning of the afternoon churning, while at the wursuli this is done both morning and afternoon. At the ti, however, this ceremonial touching does not occur, or, at any rate, I failed to obtain any account of its performance.
The method of carrying out the dairy procedure kabkaditi, in which the back is never turned on the sacred vessels of the dairy, is not followed in the tarvali, except at the irpalvusthi ceremony. I have no record of it in the kudrpali, except on the same occasion, and it is only followed regularly in certain dairies of the wursuli grade, viz., Nòdrs, Nasmiòdr, Òdr, and Kozhtudi. The first has a conical dairy, and Nasmiòdr and Òdr are especially ancient and sacred places. At the kugvali and the ti dairy, on the other hand, the dairy ceremonial is always performed kabkaditi. At one ceremony, that of irpalvusthi, the work of the dairy is performed kabkaditi in every dairy of whatever grade.
The lamp-lighting is another feature which becomes more frequent and more ceremonial in the higher grades of dairy. In all the village dairies, including the kugvali of Taradr, [78] the lamp is only lighted ceremonially at the afternoon churning, the lighting being made the occasion of prayer. If the morning is dark, the lamp maybe lighted, but it is clear that this is not done ceremonially, and the lighting is not accompanied by prayer. At the ti we have already seen that the lamp is lighted in a more ceremonial manner and in the morning as well as in the afternoon.
Some of the details of the ritual are definitely associated with the mani, and since the presence of a mani implies a higher grade of dairy, this leads to an increase in the elaboration of the ritual. The mani is treated in much the same way in all the grades of dairy which possess this sacred object.
Another feature in which the increasing sanctity of the dairy is shown is the frequency with which prayer is offered. At all the village dairies the dairyman only prays at the afternoon ceremonial when lighting the lamp, and when shutting up the buffaloes in their pen for the night. As already mentioned, there is a definite association between prayer and the ceremonial lamp-lighting.
In the ti dairy, prayer is offered both morning and evening; at the morning ceremonial twice and in the afternoon three times. On both occasions the first prayer begins when the lamp is being lighted and is continued while the palol knocks on one of the persin with the persinkudriki. The second prayer in each case is offered at the conclusion of the milking, and the third prayer of the afternoon corresponds to the second prayer of the village dairy, being offered when shutting up the buffaloes for the night.
The increasing sanctity of the different grades of dairy is shown very clearly by the increasing stringency in the rules of conduct of the dairyman. The tarvalikartmokh may sleep in the living hut on any night in the week, and there are no restrictions on his intercourse with women. The kudrpalikartmokh may only sleep in the hut on Sundays, Wednesdays and Saturdays, and is prohibited from intercourse with Teivali women. The wursol is limited to two nights, Sunday and Wednesday, and, though himself a Teivali man, is prohibited from intercourse with Teivali women. The kugvalikartmokh has similar restrictions, but the pohkartpol of Kanòdrs must avoid women altogether, and this is almost certainly the case with the palol also.
The tarvalikartmokh takes his buttermilk and food without any ceremony. The kudrpalikartmokh must hold his food in his hands throughout his meal and must not put it on the ground.
In the case of the wursol we meet first with the ceremonial drinking of buttermilk, which must in this case be poured into the leaf-cup from the vessel called ertatpun. The kugvalikartmokh drinks buttermilk sitting on the seat outside his dairy and pours from the ertatpun, drinking three times only and saying “Oñ” each time.
The pohkartpol of Kanòdrs has to take his food with very special precautions. He sits on the wall of his dairy and his hand must not touch his mouth nor the leaf-cup his lips. At the ti the drinking of buttermilk has become a definite ceremony in which the kaltmokh pours out drink for the palol with prescribed formulæ, but, strangely enough, the palol does not suffer from the same restrictions against touching his mouth as the pohkartpol of Kanòdrs, though the latter holds an office which in most ways is distinctly less sacred than that of the palol.
The clothing of each grade is also regulated. Perhaps the most important feature here is the use of the garments called tuni. These are made of dark grey cloth of a quite different kind from that of the ordinary clothes worn by the Todas. The garments are procured from the Badagas, and cloth of the same kind, called än, is used to enwrap the corpse in the funeral ceremonies. It is mentioned as the ordinary clothing of a woman in the legend of Kwoten, and is almost certainly the ancient clothing of the Todas still persisting in ceremonial in connexion with the dead and in the dairy ritual.
The tuni is only worn by the higher grades of the dairyman-priesthood and by the palikartmokh of the Teivaliol. The palol wears tuni only, both his loin-cloth and his mantle being of this material. The kaltmokh has no need for a tuni, for when he is engaged in his work at the ti he has to be naked, and when away from the ti and in the sleeping hut he wears a small piece of tuni, the petuni, in his girdle, the piece of cloth marking the difference between the full kaltmokh and the perkursol.
The wursol, the kugvalikartmokh, and the Teivali palikartmokh only wear the tuni when actually engaged in the dairy work and leave it inside the dairy at other times. I am doubtful whether the pohkartpol of Kanòdrs resembles the palol or the lower grades in this respect.
Although the palikartmokh of the tarvali and the kudrpali never wear the tuni, a small piece of this cloth is put in the girdle during the ordination ceremonies, and this may be a relic of a time when every dairyman wore the tuni. [79] In the secret language (see Chap. XXV) the word petuni is used in one place as the equivalent of ‘uniform,’ and this seems to indicate that the petuni is regarded as the badge of a dairyman.
The use of the leaves and bark of the sacred tudr tree is another feature which distinguishes different dairies. In the tarvali it is, so far as I know, not used at all. In the kudrpali it is only used in the pepeirthti ceremony. The wursol uses tudr in his ordination ceremonies, but not in the ordinary ritual of his dairy, nor is it used in the daily ritual of the ti dairy, though largely used in the purification of the dairy and of the dairy vessels, and in the ordination ceremonies of the palol.
The use of tudr in the ordination ceremonies is only allowed to the members of the Teivali division and of the Melgars clan of the Tartharol.
Special kinds of dairy or special dairies may have features peculiar to themselves; thus the pepeirthti ceremony, in which the dairyman beats on the patat with a piece of tudr bark, is only performed at the kudrpali; the prescription of nakedness when milking is confined to the kudrpalikartmokh; the special method of wearing the putkuli open in front when going to the buffaloes is only practised by the wursol, and the method of taking food sitting on the wall of the dairy and throwing the food into the mouth is peculiar to the pohkartpol of Kanòdrs.
One feature of interest in the dairy organisation is the existence of different names at different dairies for the dairy products, and for the various objects used at the dairy or in connexion with the dairy ceremonies. The chief differences are found on comparing the village dairy with the ti, nearly every object having a different name in the two places, though occasionally a peculiarity of nomenclature may be confined to one dairy, as at Kanòdrs, where milk is called persin, the name of the churning vessel of the ti. As a general rule it seems that the name used in the village dairy is the same as that in ordinary use; thus, the dairy vessels used in the house for the milk of the ordinary buffaloes are known by the same names as those of the village dairy.
The use of special names in the more sacred dairies is probably connected with their high degree of sanctity. The names of the dairy vessels of the village are in common use, and it would doubtless seem sacrilegious that the names of the vessels of the ti should be thus in everyone’s mouth. Consequently nearly every object used in the ceremonial of the ti dairy has a special name, and in the ordinary life of the Todas these words are probably never uttered.
One striking feature of the dairy ritual is the use of the syllable Oñ. With one exception (p. 177) this word is always uttered thrice, and it seems to be especially connected with the act of putting curds or milk on the bells. It has a suggestive resemblance to the mystical syllable Om of the Hindus. It is also possible that it may be a form of the name of the god Ön, or, again, it may be a corruption of the word mani, of which the initial letter has been dropped, a process of which other examples have been given.
It is doubtful how much significance is attached to the right and left sides in the dairy ritual. There is no doubt that in the most sacred acts of the ritual, such as saluting the buffaloes and the sun, or feeding the bell, it is the right hand which is used. This preference of the right hand is emphasised by the action of the palol in washing out his mouth, when he takes the water into his mouth from the left hand, because it is his right hand which has most to do with the sacred objects. In the migration ceremonies the dairy vessels are carried on the left shoulder, but at the ti the choice of this shoulder by the palol is obviously due to the fact that either the mani or churning-stick is carried in the right hand, and in other cases it is probable that the choice of the left shoulder is due to the necessity of leaving the right hand free. When the candidate drinks in the ordination ceremonies he holds the cup in the right hand, and this hand certainly has the preference throughout the dairy ritual. On the other hand, the petuni is worn on the left side of the waist-string, both by the kaltmokh, as a sign of his full rank, and by the palikartmokh during his ordination ceremonies.
In the ordinary dairy the side which is on the right hand in entering seems to be the more sacred, and the platform on this side is the meitün or superior bed. In the ti dairy, on the other hand, there was some doubt as to the more sacred side. At Mòdr it seemed that the mani is on the left hand side of the palol as he is performing his duties, but it is doubtful whether this is so at other places, and it may be that my account of the Mòdr dairy is wrong in this respect.
THE SANCTITY OF MILK
The different degrees of sanctity attaching to the different dairies are associated with differences in the rules regulating the use of milk, and these rules seem to show clearly that the milk of buffaloes belonging to the more sacred dairies has a higher degree of sanctity than that churned in the lower grades.
The milk of ordinary buffaloes may be drunk by anyone, man, woman, or child. The Todas do not ordinarily sell milk, but if they do so, they may only use the milk of ordinary buffaloes for this purpose. I have a note that anyone may also drink the milk of buffaloes belonging to the tarvali, but I suspect that this only applies to men who must drink it at the dairy.
The milk of the kudrpali may only be drunk by the kudrpalikartmokh himself. It is believed that any other person or animal who should drink milk from this dairy would die.
At the wursuli milk may be given to men at the dairy, but it must be mixed with buttermilk. At the kugvali of Taradr the milk of the kugvalir themselves is not drunk by anyone, the dairyman having certain ordinary buffaloes for his own use, and this is also the case at the ti. I believe that not even the palol would drink the milk of the persinir, the sacred buffaloes of the ti.
There is one exception to the rule that ordinary people may not use the milk of the sacred buffaloes of the village dairies (except in the form of butter and buttermilk). At the irpalvusthi ceremony at all the village dairies, including the kugvali, food is prepared with the milk of one of the sacred animals and this food is given to the people of the clan to which the dairy belongs and also to members of other clans.
In the case of the wursuli, I was especially told that this is the only occasion on which the milk of wursulir is used by people in general. At the kugvali, people of other clans are only given this food on the second day of the proceedings, and the distribution of the food is preceded by a ceremony in which some of the food is thrown into the fire. The milk used on this occasion is the milk of the buffalo which has recently calved, the ceremony being in celebration of this event.
At the wursuli it is noteworthy that the food is cooked by the wursol himself, the ceremony of irpalvusthi being the only occasion on which a dairyman of this grade prepares food. Thus, when the milk of the wursulir is used ceremonially as a food by ordinary people, the food is prepared by the dairyman-priest. One feature of the irpalvusthi ceremony is that the work is performed kabkaditi in every dairy, and it is possible that this sign of increased respect is intended to counteract the desecration which is about to take place in the use of the milk by the profane. As I have already pointed out, the irpalvusthi ceremony has a strong resemblance to a sacrificial feast, in which people partake of the sacred animal, but in this case it is the milk of the animal and not the animal itself which is taken.
A further indication of the sanctity of milk is given in the prohibition against the drinking of milk by a widower or widow during a period which, as we shall see later, may extend to many months.
The restrictions on the use of the milk of the sacred animals have the general characters associated with taboos, and the whole daily ritual of the dairy would seem to be designed to remove the taboo. It is possible that at one time the milk of the sacred buffaloes was not used at all, and that these animals only suckled their calves. If then the Todas had begun to milk the sacred buffaloes, it is natural that the milking and churning should have been accompanied by ritual designed to counteract the evils to be expected from the profanation of the sacred substance and the breaking of the taboo. In certain circumstances even now the Todas do not milk their sacred buffaloes, but allow them to suckle their calves only. If a ti dairy, or even one of a lower grade, has no dairyman, the buffaloes are not milked, though they are still tended by some unsanctified person and are kept ready to take their part in the dairy ritual if a dairyman should again be appointed.
SPECIAL DAIRY CUSTOMS
The general method of treating the milk in the dairy procedure seems to be the same as that generally followed in India and other hot countries. The milk is allowed to coagulate and the curd is churned. The butter so obtained differs from that of European countries in containing the proteid as well as the fat constituents of milk. This butter is then clarified, but in this respect there is an important difference between the ordinary Hindu procedure and that of the Todas. The usual Hindu method is to heat slowly over a fire without the addition of any other substance. The Todas add grain or rice to the butter before clarification, and this sinks to the bottom of the vessel and forms a substance called by the Todas al, which is one of their chief foods. This deposit of grain or rice will carry down with it some, possibly all, of the proteid constituents, and the al will, therefore, be a nourishing food.
The only other detail in which the Toda procedure is peculiar [80] is in the addition of buttermilk from a previous churning to the newly-drawn milk, the buttermilk or pep being put into the vessel before milking. This addition probably hastens the process of coagulation, but its chief interest is derived from the fact that it has become the nucleus of some of the most interesting features of the dairy ceremonial.
This addition of buttermilk seems to be regarded as forming a thread of continuity in the dairy ritual, and the ceremony of pepkaricha, or making new pep, is held whenever this continuity is broken. The pep is connected with a dairy vessel of the kind called mu, which is buried in the buffalo pen, and if any evil befalls the mu, it is held to be a cause for making new pep—i.e., the usual course of the dairy procedure will be interrupted, in some cases for months.
The buried dairy vessel seems to be linked in some mysterious way with the fortunes of the dairy, and especially with the buttermilk which forms the element of continuity in the dairy procedure. The buried dairy vessel, or mu, is not one which is now generally used to hold buttermilk. There are two kinds of mu in the dairy, one which contains the butter added during the churning, while the other is used, partly as a receptacle for the milk which is about to be churned, and partly to fetch water from the stream. It is highly probable that there was at one time a third mu in the dairy, which was a receptacle for the buttermilk added before milking.
At the especially sacred dairy of Kanòdrs, where ancient procedure is likely to have lingered, the buried mu is still used as a receptacle for buttermilk. When this dairy is unoccupied, a certain amount of buttermilk is kept in the buried mu, and when the dairy is again occupied, this buttermilk is used to add to the milk. In this case the continuity of the dairy procedure is directly kept up by means of the buried vessel, and this procedure of the Kanòdrs dairy is strongly in favour of the view that the buried vessel was formerly a receptacle for the pep.
There are other indications that the mu is the most sacred of the dairy vessels. It is this vessel which is touched by the wursol the kugvalikartmokh of Taradr and the pohkartpol of Kanòdrs, as the final act which gives them their full status at the ordination ceremonies, and we shall see later that in the funeral ceremonies at Taradr a temporary building is made to represent a dairy by placing in its inner room a mu. In this last case, it would seem that the mu is regarded as the emblem of the dairy, and that placing a mu in the inner room of the temporary building makes it a dairy.
The representative of the mu at the ti dairy is the peptòrzum, but it does not seem that this vessel is specially distinguished from the rest, and it does not appear to have the sanctity and importance which attaches to this kind of vessel at the village dairy.
There seem to be two chief possibilities in explaining the existence of the buried mu. It may be that it was at one time the custom to bury the pep while the village was unoccupied, and that this custom now only persists at Kanòdrs, the mu at other places being no longer used for this purpose, though it has continued to be of ceremonial importance. The other possibility is that, as the pep acquired increased importance in the dairy ritual, the sanctity of the buttermilk was transferred to the vessel which contained it, and the sanctity of the vessel became so great that it was not thought right to leave it exposed to the dangers it might incur in the dairy, especially in the various migrations, and it was therefore buried in the buffalo pen of the chief village of the clan. It is probable that the custom arose in the way suggested by the procedure of the Kanòdrs dairy, but that the full development of the custom has been largely due to the belief in its special sanctity.
The obscure observance of having a ball of food larger than can be eaten at one sitting occurs twice in the various dairy ceremonials. It is a feature of the ceremonies which the kaltmokh has to undergo on the day after the migration of the Nòdrs ti to Anto, and the superabundant portion of food has also to be eaten by the candidate for the office of palol in the preliminary ceremony called tesherst. In each case the food is of the ceremonial kind called ashkkartpimi. I can offer no suggestions as to the meaning of the observance, nor do I know of any parallel for it.
PURITY AND IMPURITY
The idea of ceremonial purity is one running through the whole of the dairy rites. Many of the details of the ritual, the purification of new vessels and of dairies revisited after a period of disuse, the ordination ceremonies of the dairyman, the elaborate ceremonies accompanying the making of new pep, all show a very deeply engrained idea that men and things have in themselves some degree of impurity, and that in order to be made fit for the service of the gods, they must be purified and sanctified by appropriate ceremonies.
As regards man two grades of impurity are recognised: (i.) the impurity of the ordinary man which is perhaps an absence of ceremonial purity rather than actual impurity; and (ii.) the special impurity which is the result of certain events and especially of those accompanying birth and death.
The impurity of the ordinary man does not prevent him from visiting the dairies of the lower grade, but it prohibits him from taking any part whatever in the actual dairy operations. With certain exceptions, he is rigorously excluded from actual contact either with dairies or dairymen of the higher grades. He is perhaps regarded as unsanctified rather than impure. The definite impurity which is the condition of those who have attended funeral ceremonies or have been in relation with a woman in the period of seclusion after childbirth is something very different. Such a man is not merely unsanctified, he is unfit to hold any sacred office; even the prolonged ceremonies of ordination would not fit him to hold office in the dairy or to perform any part in the tendance of the sacred buffaloes, and he is not allowed even to approach the members of the higher grades of the dairyman-priesthood.
WOMEN AND THE DAIRY
Women take no part in the dairy ritual, nor in the milking and churning operations which are carried on in the hut. It is said that at one time the women took charge of the buffaloes at the time of calving, but this is not the case at the present time.
Women go to the dairy to fetch buttermilk, using an appointed path and standing at an appointed spot to receive it.
Females enter, dairies under two conditions only. They may enter the outermost rooms of those dairies which are used as funeral huts while the bodies of men are lying in them. Here they may sit only on one side of the room, and only when the dairy operations are not in progress. Women also enter the temporary funeral huts of men, which are called pali, or dairies.
The other condition under which a female enters a dairy is at the migration ceremony of the village, in which a girl, seven or eight years of age, is given food in the dairy of the village which the buffaloes are leaving, and sweeps the front of the dairy of the village to which they are going. This ceremony is one in which a girl seems to take a definite part in dairy ceremonial, but the girl chosen for this office must be below the age of puberty.
The relations of women with the different grades of dairymen have already been considered; a point which may again be mentioned is that the emblems of womanhood, the pounder, sieve, and broom, may be removed from the hut while the dairyman is present, though the women themselves remain.
During certain dairy ceremonials, women must leave the village altogether, and during the passage of the buffaloes of the Nòdrs ti near the village of Kiudr, the women leave the village, taking with them the pounder, sieve, and broom.
Although women are thus excluded from all participation in the dairy ceremonial, we shall see later (Chapter XIV) that an artificial dairy plays a part in some of the ceremonies connected with pregnancy and childbirth.
HISTORY OF THE DAIRY
The Todas can give very little information which throws any light on the development of this complex organisation of the dairy with its elaborate ritual. According to tradition, the most sacred dairies, and especially that of the Nòdrs ti, date back to the time when the gods were active on earth and were themselves dairymen.
Beyond the belief that buffaloes of different kinds were assigned to the different clans by Teikirzi, I could obtain no account of beliefs about the origin or growth of the other grades of dairy. One fact as to the past which seemed clear was that ti dairies were at one time more numerous than at present, and several places now possessing village dairies of the ordinary kind are said to have been at one time the seats of ti dairies. Thus it is believed that Kiudr was formerly a ti place, and the old weatherworn stones shown in Figs. 31 and 32, which are still called neurzülnkars, seem to provide evidence that tradition is here correct. The village of Teidr is said to have been at one time a ti, and here again two stones called neurzülnkars are to be seen about a quarter of a mile from the village.
There is another feature of the Kiudr dairy which suggests that it may at one time have been a ti dairy. It contains six bells called mani, which clearly differ in nature from the mani of the other village dairies, especially in the fact that they are not used at funerals. They are also distinguished as patatmani and ertatmani, a distinction not met with in any other village dairy. It seems probable that they are the representatives of the two kinds of bells of a ti, the mani proper and the kudrsmani. The ertatmani of Kiudr are ‘fed’ with buttermilk, a procedure not followed, so far as I know, in any other dairy, but it may be that this is a feature of the procedure of the ti dairy which escaped me. Certainly the most likely explanation of the existence of these bells at Kiudr is that they are survivals of its former position as a ti dairy.
The villages of Kiudr and Teidr both belong to the Teivaliol, and this raises the question whether this division of the Todas may not have possessed ti herds and ti dairies of their own at one time, and may not always have had to be content with providing dairymen for institutions belonging to the Tartharol. No information could be given on this point, but it seems unlikely that dairies and places belonging to a Tarthar clan should have been handed over to the Teivaliol when they were no longer used as ti dairies and ti places.
Certain Tarthar villages are also said to have had at one time ti dairies, especially the sacred places of Nòdrs and Òdr. This probably means that there is a tradition that the buffaloes of the Nòdrs ti were at one time kept at these places which, as we have seen, are still visited by the palol during his ordination ceremonies.
The process of extinction of ti institutions can be seen in progress at the present time. The Nidrsi ti is not now in working order; there has been no palol for some years and its dairies are unoccupied. It is said that a palol would have to be appointed temporarily if it was desired to perform the second funeral ceremonies of a Nidrsi man, but in the present condition of the Nidrsiol, it seems to me not at all unlikely, either that the rule will be disregarded, or that the second funeral ceremonies will not be performed, and that the Nidrsi ti will become absolutely extinct, possibly dragging down another institution into extinction with it.
The Kwòdrdoni ti is now only active for a short time once every year in order to satisfy a ceremonial requirement of the Kotas, and this institution may possibly soon become little more than a name. If it were not for the Kotas, it would undoubtedly be as near extinction as the ti of Nidrsi. One palol of the Pan ti has recently ceased to be appointed, and the same difficulty which has led to his disappearance will probably sooner or later vacate the other office, and Pan will follow in the footsteps of the other clans. Many of the dairies belonging even to the more prosperous ti institutions are now disused, and some have completely vanished. The legend of Kwoto preserves a tradition of ceremonial accompanying the migration of the buffaloes of the Kars ti which has now entirely disappeared, and nothing is known of the special features of ritual which were practised at many ti dairies which have become extinct.
Of dairies of other grades, the poh of Kanòdrs is now only occupied for a short time once a year, and its ceremonial may soon also become extinct. The conical poh of Kars and the seven-roomed kudrpali of Nòdrs are dairies which have ceased to exist, and with the extinction of the latter have gone completely all traces of the ritual which was practised in this kind of dairy, and nothing is known as to the meaning of the seven rooms.
Some of these changes are recent, and due to the altered conditions produced by the general invasion of the Nilgiris, but others date back to a time before Europeans came to the hills, and were due to intrinsic conditions, chiefly the hardships connected with the ritual practised in certain of the dairies. The altered surroundings of the Todas are undoubtedly hastening the process of decay, and institutions which would probably have lasted for centuries will now almost certainly disappear in a few decades.
XII. DIVINATION AND MAGIC
This chapter will furnish a very good example of specialisation of religious and magical functions among the Todas. We shall find that certain Todas have the power of divination, others are sorcerers, and others again have the power of curing disease by means of spells and rites, while all three functions are quite separate from those of the priest or dairyman. The Todas have advanced some way towards specialisation of function in this respect, and have as separate members of the community their prophets, their magicians and their medicine-men in addition to their priests.
DIVINATION
Certain men among the Todas are reputed to have special powers as diviners, and are known as teuòdipol, “god-gesticulating men,” or more commonly as teuol. Samuel, my interpreter, always spoke of their performances as devil-dancing and evidently regarded the teuol as like those whom he called the devil-dancers of his own people.
In several cases these men are said to have inherited their powers from some near relative, often a grandfather, but it seems that anyone who showed evidence of the necessary powers might become a teuol. All but one of the present diviners are Teivaliol, but the divining power is not limited to this division. There is no relation between the various offices of the dairy and the power of divination, and, in fact, a diviner necessarily gives up his divining if he becomes a palol. [81]
Each of the teuol is believed to be possessed by a special god when he falls into the divining frenzy, and when in this state it is said that the diviner does not, as a rule, speak in his own language, but in some other, most commonly in Malayalam, or one of its dialects. The following are those who are at present credited with the power of divination:—
Midjkudr (63) of Piedr, who is inspired by the gods Kulinkars and Petkon. He speaks in Malayalam, and he does not appear to have succeeded anyone else as teuol. He is the most successful of those who are at present practising the art, and played the chief part in all the divining which took place during my visit.
Tadrners (60) of Kuudr, inspired by Ethrol and Arivili, succeeded his mother’s father, Kasorivan (66) of Kusharf. He is said to speak the language of people whom the Todas call Mondardsetipol living in the Wainad, a language which appears to be a dialect of Malayalam.
Pangudr (66) of Kusharf, also succeeded Kasorivan, his grandfather, and is inspired by Petkon and Meilitars. There was some doubt as to the language used by him.
Ethgudr (52) of Kuudr is inspired by Arivili, and, like Tadrners, speaks the language of the Mondardsetipol.
Terkudr (63) of Piedr, inspired by Teipakh, the river god, succeeded his grandfather Keitolv. When inspired, his speech is like the babbling of a running river, “like the river’s voice,” and cannot be understood.
Kangudr (62) of Piedr, who lives at Kavidi in the Wainad, is inspired by Meilitars and speaks Malayalam. He succeeded Tarsvan (62), his father, and Tarsvan had succeeded his father Keithiolv.
Kobuv (61) of Kuudr, is inspired by Meilitars and Kuderol and speaks Malayalam.
Pöteners (54) of Kuudr, is inspired by Petkon and speaks the language of the Mondardsetipol.
Karkievan (63), the palol of the Nòdrs ti, was formerly a teuol, but gave up divining when he became palol.
All the above belong to the Teivaliol, and the only Tarthar diviner at the present time is Mongudrvan (13) of Kars. He is said to be inspired by the god of Miuni village, and to speak the Toda language. The village of Miuni belongs to the Teivaliol, so that the only Tarthar diviner is inspired by a god connected with the division to which the majority of the diviners belong.
Two other Tarthar men, Kerveidi (5) and Tevò (3), both of Nòdrs, are said to have been teuol at one time, but they have ceased to divine. They succeeded another man of their clan. Kangudr, who is inspired by Meilitars, has to ‘dance’ or divine before the Kurumbas, and when he does so he dances as a lame man. This custom is reputed to have come down from the time of Meilitars (see p. 210), who danced as a lame man before the Kurumbas, and promised that whenever he came in the future he would dance to the Kurumbas first and then to the Todas.
It will be noticed that many of the deities by whom the diviners are inspired are not true Toda gods. Petkon, who inspires Midjkudr, Pangudr, and Pöteners, is said to be a hunting god. According to some he was a son of Teikirzi, but is almost certainly not a true Toda deity.
Arivili inspires Tadrners and Ethgudr, who are both reputed to speak the language of the Mondardsetipol, and he is probably a god of these people, a tribe of the Wainad. Ethrol, who also inspires Tadrners, is probably another deity of the same people. I do not know anything about Kuderol, by whom Kobuv is believed to be inspired.
It is noteworthy that the only existing Tarthar teuol speaks the Toda language when divining, and is believed to be inspired by a local Toda god; while the diviners belonging to the Teivaliol seem to speak dialects of Malayalam, and many are believed to be inspired by gods who are almost certainly not true Toda deities.
The teuol are consulted whenever any misfortune befalls a Toda. The following are various instances in which I have records of resort to divination: sickness or death of a Toda or of any of his family; sickness or death of a buffalo; failure of milk in a buffalo and persistent kicking of its calf; failure to make a buffalo go to the spot at which it is to be killed during a funeral ceremony; failure of milk to coagulate; burning down of a dairy; disappearance of the bells of a dairy; loss of a tukitthkarsor lifting stone. In this last instance the stone at the village of Nidrsi was carried away some years ago by a party of English people who came to picnic near the village while the people were away. They carried the stone for some miles and then threw it down. The Nidrsi people could not find it, and consulted Midjkudr and Mongudrvan, who were able to reveal where the stone was to be found, and it was restored to the village, where it can now be seen.
The diviners usually work in pairs, though occasionally it would seem that one only may be consulted. If they are asked for an explanation of some misfortune which has befallen a man, the teuol usually find either that the sufferer has committed an offence against the dairy or that he is the subject of spells cast on him by a sorcerer. In the former case, they prescribe the ceremony which must be performed in order to expiate the offence. In the latter case, they name the sorcerer so that the sufferer may know with whom to make his peace.
I have already said that towards the close of my visit a number of misfortunes befell the Todas; one man fell ill, the wife of another died, and the dairy of a third was burnt down, and these events kept the diviners busy, but probably because I was implicated I was not allowed the chance of observing the diviners at work.
The only occasion on which I saw the process of divining was at a funeral. The buffalo which was to be killed had been caught at some distance from the place appointed for its slaughter. The animal was unusually refractory and at length lay down and all the natural efforts of the Todas failed to make it move. Midjkudr and Mongudrvan were then called upon to discover the cause of the obstinacy of the buffalo. Mongudrvan first began to dance slowly to and fro, away from and towards the buffalo. He had taken off his cloak and was only wearing the tadrp. As I already knew the man, I was able to observe that his general appearance was unaltered and that he did not appear to be in any abnormal mental condition. He was soon joined by Midjkudr, who danced up and down much more wildly (Fig. 36). His general appearance was very different to that usually presented by a Toda man. His hair seemed to stand out from his head, although it shook with each of his violent movements; his eyes were abnormally bright and his face gave every appearance of great mental excitement. I had not previously known the man, but when he came to see me a few days later I could hardly believe that the quiet, self-possessed man whom I saw before me was the same individual whom I had seen dancing at the funeral. It was obvious that he had been in a distinctly abnormal condition of frenzy during the divining process. After dancing for a time Midjkudr began to utter broken sentences in a loud and almost chanting voice, while Mongudrvan remained silent throughout. After Midjkudr had in these sentences given the reason for the obstinacy of the buffalo, and had prescribed what was to be done, he took a red cloth and dancing more violently than ever waved the cloth before the buffalo and pushed against the body of the animal. Then after the people had dragged the buffalo a little way, it rose and went quietly to the place where it was to be killed.
I had much difficulty in finding out exactly what Midjkudr had said. When he came to see me a few days later he stated that he did not know at the time what he was saying, and that his only knowledge was derived from those who had heard him, and I am inclined to believe that he was speaking the truth. His appearance during the divining was remarkably different from that of ordinary days, and strongly suggested a semi-hypnotic state, during which he might well have had no knowledge, or only a very vague knowledge, of anything he said. [82] In his ordinary condition he professed to be ignorant of Malayalam, the language which he was said to use in his frenzied condition.
My ignorance of Malayalam, and the obvious difficulties of the investigation, make me hesitate before expressing any decided opinion as to the real nature of Midjkudr’s condition when divining, but I have a very strong leaning towards the idea that the man was in a genuinely abnormal condition, allied to the hypnotic state, and I am disposed to accept the statement of the Todas that he was speaking in a language of which he had only a very vague knowledge when in a normal condition. It is, of course, quite possible that the abnormal appearance of Midjkudr was merely due to the exercise of dancing and to mental excitement, and that he knew perfectly well what he was doing and saying. I can but record my impression that there was something more, and I only commit myself to this extent in regard to the special occasion on which I saw Midjkudr divining; even if I saw a genuine hypnotic or semi-hypnotic phenomenon, it does not follow that all Midjkudr’s performances are wholly, or even partly, of this nature, and still less does it follow that the performances of all the teuol are of this kind. Nothing struck me more than the contrast between the frenzied condition of Midjkudr and the calm, ordinary demeanour of Mongudrvan, his fellow diviner.
In the case I have described the necessity for the intervention of the diviner arose out of the funeral proceedings, but it appears to be not uncommon for divination to be practised during funerals. Both Mr. Walhouse and Mr. Thurston have seen the process of divining going on at funerals. In Mr. Thurston’s case he notes that the diviners talked in Malayalam, and offered an explanation of a gigantic figure which had suddenly appeared and as suddenly disappeared some time previously.
SORCERY
I met with greater difficulties in discovering the methods of sorcery than in any other branch of my work. It was quite certain that there were men called piliutpol (sorcery praying people), or pilikòren, who had the reputation of possessing magical powers, comprised together under the title piliutvichi or piliutiti. I was able to obtain the names of these people from several sources, but when I approached any one of them on the subject he professed total ignorance and usually suggested that I should apply to some other man, who, he said, was a real piliutpol. Occasionally someone would give me a fragment of information, but would impress on me carefully that he had heard it from somebody else and did not know whether it was true or false.
One or two men, who were certainly not sorcerers, told me that they hoped that I should succeed in finding out the methods and would tell them, for they said that the Todas who had no magical powers were always trying to find out the methods of the sorcerers and were never successful.
I was told by two men that they believed that a sorcerer, by merely thinking of the effect he wished to produce, could produce the effect, and that it was not necessary for him to use any magical formula or practise any special rites.
It was not until my last week on the Nilgiris that I was told of some of the magical rites by Teitnir, who had previously denied all knowledge, though he was said by others to be a sorcerer, and he knew that I was aware of his reputation. He was not a trustworthy informant, but his account was consistent in itself and was in agreement with fragments which I had picked up elsewhere, and I believe it is correct, though I cannot guarantee its accuracy with the same degree of confidence which I feel in regard to most of my information.
The following men were said by various people to be pilikòren:—
Kaners, Kudrievan, and Teikudr (63), Ishkievan (60), Keinkursi (54), Puthion (64), and Teitnir (52), among the Teivaliol; Keitan (6), Mudrigeidi (1), Kiunervan and Usheidi (14), and Karseidi (8), among the Tartharol. Pushteidi, the elder brother of Keitan, was a noted sorcerer who paid for the belief in his magical powers with his life. It will be noted that magical powers appear to be fairly evenly distributed between the two divisions and do not greatly predominate in one as in the case of divination.
The power of sorcery was said to belong to certain families, and I was told that it was inherited. It seemed probable that a sorcerer only communicated his methods to his sons, and usually only to one of his sons, or if he communicated his knowledge to all, it was often one of them only who obtained the credit for magical powers.
We have already seen that when a man sustains a misfortune of any kind, he consults the diviners, and they find whether the misfortune is due to a fault committed by the sufferer or whether it is the result of sorcery. In the latter case, they say by whose magic the misfortune has been produced, and the sorcerer is then propitiated and removes the spell, the nature and details of the process varying according to the method of sorcery used and the offence which had led the sorcerer to exert his powers. Thus when Pirsners (9) fell ill, he consulted Midjkudr, who said that Kudrievan had bewitched him. Pirsners went to Kudrievan and gave him food, and asked him to remove the spell, and Pirsners became well soon after.
There are two chief reasons which induce a sorcerer to work his magic on another. One is when a request by the sorcerer for assistance has been met by deception. If the sorcerer asks a rich man for a buffalo, or for money, and the rich man refuses point-blank, it does not appear that the sorcerer proceeds farther; but if the rich man promises a gift and does not give it, or if he delays giving a positive answer and puts off a decision from day to day, it is a clear case for the application of occult measures. The other chief motive for sorcery is a quarrel with a sorcerer. The methods are different in the two cases. In the first case the sorcerer procures some human hair—it may be the hair of any one, even his own hair. It is not the hair of the man he wishes to injure because it would be impossible to get it. Five small stones are taken and tied together by means of the hair, and both hair and stones are tied up in a piece of cloth. Then, holding the stones and hair in his hand, the sorcerer utters the following incantation:—
Pithioteu Ön idith, Teikirzim Tirshtim idith; â teu sati those gods power
udâsnûdr; an nòdr nòdr udâsnûdr; an kar warkhi peu mâ; if there be; his country country if there be; his calf sleep go may;
an îr têrgi pûti pâr mâ; ath on nîr ud puk âthm his buffaloes wings grow fly may; he I water drink as he also
nîr un mâ; on nîkh as puk âthm nîkhai mâ; on eirt puk water drink may; I thirsty am as he also thirsty be may; I hungry as
âthm eirth mâ; en mokhm ödrth puk an mokhm ödr mâ; en he also hunger may; my children cry as his children cry may; my
tazmokh kûtm pût puk an tazmokhm kûtm pûv mâ. wife ragged cloth wear as his wife ragged cloth wear may.
This incantation was freely rendered by Teitnir as follows: For the sake of Pithioteu, Ön, Teikirzi, and Tirshti; by the power of the gods if there be power; by the gods’ country if there be a country; [83] may his calves perish; as birds fly away may his buffaloes go when the calves come to suck; as I drink water, may he have nothing but water to drink; as I am thirsty, may he also be thirsty; as I am hungry, may he also be hungry; as my children cry, so may his children cry; as my wife wears only a ragged cloth, so may his wife wear only a ragged cloth.
When he has uttered the incantation, the sorcerer takes the hair and stones in their cloth to the village of the man upon whom he wishes these misfortunes to fall, and hides them secretly in the thatch of the roof of the man’s hut.
It seemed that this method of sorcery is only justified when the sorcerer is a poor man, and the references in the incantation to the poverty of the sorcerer confirm this.
When a man who has prevaricated with the request of a sorcerer suffers any evil fortune, he consults the diviners, and they may tell him not only who has produced the misfortune, but why the sorcerer has brought the misfortune upon him and they may advise the sufferer to become reconciled with his enemy and to give him what he has asked. The man goes to the sorcerer, who is usually only too ready to take the credit of the affair, and it is arranged that he shall come to the village of the sufferer. Whenever he comes a third person must be present, who is called the nedrvol, or intermediate man. [84] The nedrvol brings about the reconciliation, and arranges the terms, and then the sufferer bows down before the sorcerer and performs the kalmelpudithti salutation. The sorcerer then utters the following formula while his foot is resting on the head of the man:—
â teu udâsnûdr, an nòdr udâsnûdr; taned peu mâ; term Those gods if there be, his country if there be; cold go may; mercy
ai peu mâ; in îr kark elm ultâmâ; en mans elm become, go may; this buffalo calf to all be well; my mind all
tülsvîshpini, tan mansm tüli mâ. cleared from guilt have I, his mind also clear may.
Teitnir rendered this freely as follows:—
By those gods if there be gods, and by their country if there be a country; as water is cold, so goes my anger; as mercy comes, may my anger go; may his buffaloes and calves be well; I have now nothing evil in my mind, you must also have no evil in your mind.
Food is then given to the sorcerer, who also obtains the object for which he had originally asked. Later the sorcerer goes secretly to the hut of the man and takes out the stones and hair which he had hidden in the thatch.
In removing the spell the sorcerer does not mention the names of the four gods, but speaks of them as “those gods.” The object of this is that the names of the four gods whom the sorcerer invokes shall not become generally known.
If any one quarrels with a sorcerer, the method adopted by the latter is different. He obtains a bone of a man, buffalo, or some other animal, or if unable to obtain a bone, he may use a lime. He sits, holding the bone or lime in his right hand, and utters the following incantation:—
Pithioteu Ön idith, Teikirzim Tirshtim idith; a teu sati udâsnûdr,
an nòdr udâsnûdr; ank pudra pîrsk pat mâ; ank ud to him will destroy disease come may; to him one
ultâkhâth pun pâ mâ; an kal muri ûmâ; an kai mûri ûmâ; incurable sore come may; his leg broken may be; his hand broken may be;
an kan pudri ûmâ; an ârs ulrsh an kûdûpel ûvòdink sakötam his eye destroyed may be; his house into his family to all trouble
pâ mâ; âth enk sakötam kasvai agi ankm sakötam come may; he to me troubles did who accordingly to him also troubles
ö mâ; an nòdr udi ed ariken â teu udi occur may; his country there is that we shall know those gods there is
ed kanken; i elv nels alaiu ai that we shall see; this bone into the ground what happens, that
òlkm alâ mâ. man to also happen may.
The only clause of this incantation of which the meaning is not clear is the penultimate, and the free rendering of this was said to be “as there are undoubtedly gods, we shall see all this happen”; it seems that ariken, which means literally “we shall know,” is often used in the sense “without doubt.” If he is using a lime, the sorcerer substitutes îrsimitch for elv in the last clause.
The bone or lime is then buried in a wood near the village of the man who is to suffer the misfortune.
When the misfortune comes, and the diviners have discovered its cause, the matter is arranged by a nedrvol as in the other kind of sorcery, and it is usually settled that the sufferer shall give a one- or a two-year-old calf to the sorcerer. When the matter is arranged, the sorcerer visits the village of the bewitched man, who does kalmelpudithti to the sorcerer, and the spell is removed with the following words:—
teu udâsnûdr, an nòdr udâsnûdr; taned peu mâ; term ai peu mâ [85]; mokh son
madrik an kûdûpel elmk; in mel en mans elm children to his family all to; this after my mind all
tülsvînem in uli agi mâ; nûv put, nudri cleared from guilt (as I) this well be may; disease leave, troubles
put peu mâ. leave go may.
The sorcerer is then given food and goes away with his calf, and later he goes secretly and takes the bone or lime out of the ground.
I have already mentioned that these methods of casting and removing spells were obtained with great difficulty and only from one man. This man, Teitnir, was one of the most intelligent of the Todas, but was not a very trustworthy guide. In this case, however, the account he gave was so consistent in itself and with the general character of Toda customs and beliefs that I have no doubt that his methods are those actually in use. It is more than probable, however, that other sorcerers may use other methods, and even that Teitnir’s account is not a wholly accurate description of the methods of any one sorcerer. The other Todas had told me that Teitnir was himself a sorcerer, but even after he had given me the above account, he denied that he had himself magical powers, but said that he had learnt the methods from Ishkievan. I had been told of one instance in which Teitnir had practised sorcery on Teikudr (63), but Teitnir gave a different account of this event. Teitnir and Teikudr had quarrelled and in consequence Teitnir had been angry with Teikudr, a condition which the Todas call murthvichi. Teitnir belonged to the chief family of the Kuudrol, which is known as the mani kudupel; “it is a bad thing for one of so important a family to have murthvichi” and any one who has been the cause of such a state of things is liable to suffer misfortunes. When therefore some of Teikudr’s buffaloes died and Teikudr consulted the teuol, these diviners gave as the reasons for the misfortunes the murthvichi, not the piliutvichi, of Teitnir. According to Teitnir, Teikudr was himself a sorcerer and there were reports that the recent death of Teitnir’s wife was due to the piliutvichi of Teikudr, and just before I left the hills, I was told that the teuol had arrived at the conclusion that Teikudr had had a hand in her death.
The Toda sorcerers are not only feared by their fellow Todas but also by the Badagas, and it is probably largely owing to fear of Toda sorcery that the Badagas continue to pay their tribute of grain.
The Badagas may also consult the Toda diviners. In one recent case a Badaga consulted Mongudrvan, who found that the misfortune from which the man was seeking relief was due to the sorcery of Kaners. Kaners was, no doubt, propitiated by the Badagas, and it is probable that the belief of the Badagas in the magical powers of the Todas is turned to good account by the latter.
In some cases Todas have been killed by the Badagas owing to this belief. About ten years ago Pushteidi of Nòdrs (6), the elder brother of Keitan, was a very notable sorcerer, much dreaded by both Todas and Badagas. He visited the Badaga village of Nanjanad on the occasion of a feast, and soon after a Badaga child died and its death was at once ascribed to the sorcery of Pushteidi. Not long after, Pushteidi’s dead body was found near his village, and there seemed to be no reason to doubt that the Badagas had killed him, but owing to the fact that the Todas held the funeral and burnt the body before they made a report to the police, the crime could not be thoroughly investigated nor the murderers brought to account.
One of the events which the Todas ascribe to sorcery is failure of the milk to coagulate. If there is much trouble in getting the milk to form adrpars, the teuol are consulted, and they sometimes find that it is due to sorcery and sometimes that some offence against the dairy has been committed. I have no information, however, as to the method which the sorcerer uses to prevent the coagulation of the milk of any one who has offended him.
The only other indication of Toda methods of sorcery came to me from a Badaga source. A Badaga maistri said that he had been given an account by a Toda. According to this account, the sorcerer takes three leaves of each of the plants which the Badagas call jakalmul, pemmul, and tupumul (evidently varieties of the muli of the Todas), puts the nine leaves in a new earthenware pot and buries the pot in a wood after saying certain formulæ in which he wishes evil to a given man whom he mentions by name. When the man falls ill and the diviners say by whom his illness has been produced, a reconciliation is effected and the sorcerer digs up the pot of leaves when the sufferer again becomes well. This information came from a Badaga source and I could not obtain confirmation of it from the Todas but it is possibly an approximation to the method employed in one form of Toda sorcery.
The Todas dread the sorcery of the Kurumbas more than that of their own pilikòren. The latter can be remedied, but the sorcery of the Kurumbas, called kurubudrchiti (Kurub = Kurumba), is much more dangerous and cannot be remedied. If it is found that a Kurumba has made a man ill, the only thing to be done is to kill the Kurumba (see p. 641).
When Kutadri became ill while he was with me in the Kundahs, the first suggestion was that the Kurumbas were responsible. Soon after this I went to Kotagiri, and Kòdrner, Kutadri’s brother, who was to accompany me, said that as the Kurumbas were very numerous in that part he did not like to go alone with me and made a stipulation that while I was on that side of the hills I was to provide him with a companion. Mr. Thurston [86] describes a similar experience in which his guide was afraid to walk from Ootacamund to Kotagiri lest he should come to grief at the hands of the Kurumbas. In this case it seemed that the man was using his fears as an excuse, and in my case the fear may have been used as a lever to provide occupation for a friend, but that there was a very real fear of Kurumba sorcery I have no doubt.
It is easy to see how this belief in the magical powers of the Kurumbas may have arisen, or, more probably, how its existence may have been maintained. The slopes of the hills on which the Kurumbas live are extremely malarious, and it must often have happened that a visit to a Kurumba village was followed by an attack of fever of a severe kind. We probably have here a good example of a vicious circle. Whenever two tribes of different degrees of culture live near one another, the members of the lower usually acquire the reputation of being sorcerers. For this and other reasons they are driven to a less healthy district, and the unhealthiness of the district helps to maintain and reinforce their reputation for magical powers.
THE EVIL EYE
Various misfortunes may befall a man if any one says that he is looking very well or is very well dressed. It is also unlucky that any one should look at a man when he is eating. Similarly it is unlucky for anyone to say that a buffalo is giving much milk; she will probably kick her calf or will suffer in some other way soon after.
This kind of misfortune is usually called kanarvaznudr, which was translated, “if looking anxiously.” It is also often known now by the Tamil name konduti or kontushti or evil eye. One of the commonest effects of kanarvaznudr is indigestion. When anyone is suffering from evil effects of this kind, he calls in one of certain people called utkòren, or “praying people,” or, probably more correctly, “saying incantations people.” Piutolvan (10), Keitazvan (15), and a woman, Sinpurs (7), are utkòren of repute. Any one of the male utkòren may be spoken of as an utpol, but I was doubtful whether this name would also be used for a woman.
The utpol rubs the belly of the sick person, holds one corner of his cloak in his left hand, and, putting some salt on the cloak, strokes the salt with a thorn of the plant called pathanmul. [87] The thorn and some of the salt are then put into the fire, and the utpol utters the following incantation:—
Pithioteu Ön idith, Teikirzim Tirshtim idith, tan âv kan pudrs kan his mother eye perish eye
pudri ûmâ; tan in kan pudrs kan pudri ûmâ; be destroyed may; father
and this formula is repeated, substituting for av or in the names of the following relatives:—an, akkan, nòdrved, mun, mimi, pian, piav. [88] Then follows the same formula repeated, in which the names of various tribes are substituted for those of the relatives, as “mav kan pudrs kan pudri uma”—“Badaga eye perish, may his eye be destroyed.” The people mentioned are mav (Badaga), pedr (Tamil), suti (? chetties), kurub (Kurumbas), erl (Irulas), panin (Panyas). [89] The last clause is möditi kan pudrs kan pudri uma, extending the imprecation to the women of all the people already mentioned. When the incantation is finished, the remainder of the salt is eaten by the sick man.
The Toda utkòren may practise ‘absent treatment.’ If a man wishes to treat a sufferer from the evil eye, and is unable to visit his patient, he puts the salt on the ground and strokes it with the thorn of pathanmul, repeating the above incantation as he strokes. He then sends the salt to the sick man, by whom it is eaten.
The treatment in any case is repeated till it has been done three times.
If it is a buffalo which is suffering from the evil effects of kanarvasnudr, the utkòren use the same method, and the salt is eaten by the buffalo.
In the special case in which the evil is produced by saying that a man is looking well or is well dressed, the utkòren have a different method. They take a piece of the root called kabudri, [90] and a plant called kwagal, and squeeze the juice of both into a vessel. An incantation is said, the same as, or similar to, that already given, while the utkòren strokes the sick man with the corner of his cloak. After the incantation the sufferer drinks the juice.
VARIOUS MAGICAL REMEDIES
The utkòren also practise various other methods of treatment.
Headache. This is called madersnûdr, “if head aches.” For this the utpol places his hand on the head of the sufferer, and says the following incantation in a low voice, so that the patient may not distinguish what is being said. [91] After the names of the four gods, as in previous formulæ, it runs:—
nâkherov mad tathi kan tath mâ; ker mad tathi cobra head broken into pieces not break may; a snake &c.
kan tath mâ;
and the same formula is repeated, substituting first the names of other kinds of snake and then of other animals. The following are the animals mentioned: kûrûpatz, a black poisonous snake; putpob, a variegated snake, which is called the foolish snake, because it will not get out of the way; taverûni, a green snake; pâlipob, another green snake; uitch, a kind of lizard reputed to suck blood; anîli, a squirrel; kapan, a frog; tugûli, a crayfish(?); kadrmad, a water animal of some kind; mîn, a fish; îgal, an earthworm; nelnpüf, an insect found under stones; âpipüf, an insect found in buffalo dung. After all these animals have been mentioned with the same formula, the names of Pithioteu and Ön are again uttered, followed by the words tathkhma. The utpol flicks the corner of his cloak first against the ground, and then against the forehead of the sufferer, and then, if the man is sitting, he says, “ateuk ir,” “sit there off!” and the man moves a little way from the place where he had been sitting. If the man is unable to sit, and is lying down, the words will be “ateuk padr,” “lie there off!” or “lie a little way off!”
I could not obtain a satisfactory account of the exact meaning of the incantation; it was said to mean “may the snake’s head be broken in pieces, and so may your head be broken”—i.e., so may the pain go; another rendering was “may the pain go to the snake’s head,” the latter being by far the more probable meaning. Three divisions of the incantation are recognised: in the first, snakes only are mentioned; in the second, things which live in the water; and in the third, things which live in the earth. The treatment is repeated on one or two days, if necessary, but it is never done more than three times, “because the ailment is always cured in that time.”
Another condition treated by the utkòren is stomach-ache, which is called püfkwatnûdr, “if worms bite.” The utpol places his hand on the belly of the sufferer, and after reciting the names of the four gods, he continues:—
kêrs pûv kâdkanm kâl mâ; kêrs tree flower fallen as fall down may;
and this formula is repeated, substituting the names of various trees and other plants for the name of the kêrs tree. The trees and plants mentioned pirzkh and kûrêrs, trees having edible fruit; pul, kîl, kwadriki, kid, trees from which bees get honey; kab, sugarcane; teg, coco-nut; patm, samai; ners, rice; eri, ragi; kîtj, potato; perigi, chillies; melkh, pepper; kwatimeli, Coriandum sativum; kadrkh, mustard; and kîri or kîrsi, red amaranth.
Thus the last clause would run: kîri pûv kâdkanm kâl mâ, and this would be followed by the names of Pithioteu and Ön. Then the utpol flicks his cloak three times, first against the ground and then against the belly of the sufferer, and says, “ateuk ir,” or “ateuk padr,” according as the man is sitting or lying down, and the sufferer moves a little from his place.
The names of flowers are used because the Todas believe that worms come from eating honey, and the honey has come from flowers. The flowers mentioned belong to four groups; [92] (i) those of trees which bear edible fruits; (ii) those from which bees get honey; (iii) those of trees or plants part of which are eaten; (iv) those of trees which give pungent substances like chillies and pepper.
There were various other complaints for which the utkòren are consulted, such as:—elptûksnûdr, depression in the chest of a child when it breathes (elp or elv = bone); tekhpkâdathvüdnûdr, pain in the side; kankpudithnûdr, if anything gets into the eye; erutûthtinûdr, if cut or wounded in any way; pobersnûdr, if snake bites.
Each of these has its appropriate treatment, but the only method of which I obtained an account was the last. Certain men have a special reputation for the treatment of snake-bite. A cord is made of woman’s hair and this is bound tightly round the bitten limb in three places. The doctor takes a piece of pathanmul and strikes the bitten limb while he utters the appropriate incantation. [93] The ligature is kept on the limb for two or three days and the incantation is repeated three times a day during that period. Anyone whom a snake has bitten must not cross a stream. If it is absolutely necessary that he should cross, he must be carried over it.
If wild animals attack the buffaloes, a procedure which closely resembles those already described is carried out by the utkòren. The procedure is called kâdrkatinamûdr—i.e., “wild beast tie mouth if.” It is also carried out if a buffalo is lost, and in this case the charm will keep the animal from injury by wild beasts. The utpol takes three stones secretly and goes at night to the front either of the dairy or hut and utters the following incantation:—
Pithioteu Ön idith, Teikirzim Tirshtim idith; pef pîrzi kût terz big tiger teeth fastened
nil mâ; kâkh kerman mûn terz nil mâ; padr kenai amûn stand may; black bear face crowd red dog other side
terz nil mâ; pob teuv terz nil mâ; pef per terz nil mâ; pef snake erect head big hill big
po pâ terz nil mâ; pef pòdi mul [94] terz nil mâ. river stream big porcupine quills
Then come the names of Pithioteu and Ön, followed by
âth ûvòdin kati vaiumâ. these all before tie keep may.
The utpol then takes a piece of ragged cloth in which he ties the three stones and hides them in the thatch of the hut. If a buffalo has been lost it will come back the next day, and even if it remains in the wood no tiger would touch it while the stones are in the thatch. When the buffalo returns the stones are taken out and thrown away.
All the remedies so far described resemble one another in that they are applied by one of the people called utkòren. The following remedy is applied by the sufferer himself. If a man is frightened in any way, as by a sudden noise when he is passing along a road, he will go home and put the hoe (kudali) and a stone called neilikal into the fire till the hoe is red hot. He puts the hoe and stones into a brass vessel called terg and pours on water. He then covers himself entirely with his cloak and remains covered till the water in the vessel ceases to bubble, when he opens his cloak, drinks water from the vessel three times, and throws the rest away.
There was some difference of opinion as to the use of the stone called neilikal at ordinary times. It was said first to have been used for making fire before matches were introduced, and there seems to be no doubt that fire was sometimes made in this way. Others said that the neilikal was used for sharpening iron tools. The only neilikal I saw was at Nidrsi and this was a large piece of quartz, and there seemed to be no doubt that this had at one time been used for making fire.
In one of the methods of sorcery which have been described it will be remembered that human hair is used. The Todas take the same kind of precautions about hair and nail-parings which are so widely spread throughout the world, but the reasons for the precautions differed from those usually given. I was told that the Todas do not ordinarily cut their hair, but the heads of children are shaved and adults also shave their heads on special occasions. The hair removed at these times is hidden in bushes or hollows in the rocks, and the reason given is that it may not be taken by crows.
Nail-parings are buried in the ground, and this is done in order that they may not be eaten by the buffaloes, for “nails are poisonous to buffaloes,” who will die or become ill if they find them when grazing.
There was some difference of opinion as to what was done with the hair cut off at the ceremony called tersamptpimi (see p. 333). It was clear, however, that care was taken that it should not be eaten by crows, for if crows obtained any of the hair first cut from a child’s head the child would suffer from shaking of some kind.
Both at the first head-shaving and at the tersamptpimi ceremony special bangles are put round the wrist of the child, and these are certainly of the nature of charms, for it is believed that the child would fall ill if they were not used.
The Todas believe in certain injurious influences which they class together under the name of pudrtvuti, [95] but I was able to obtain very little information about them, and I suspect that belief in these influences is largely of recent growth and due to contact with Hinduism.
One variety of pudrtvuti is the evil influence of Keirt (Keirtpudrtvuti) at the ceremonies after childbirth (see p. 326). Another variety is kòdipudrtvuti (kòdi, demon?). The Todas now adopt as a preventative of this evil influence a round mark made with ashes above the nose. If a Toda should suffer from the effects of kòdipudrtvuti, two remedies are adopted. One is called kavkal wart atpimi—i.e., “kavkal (a stone) grind, pour we.” I did not obtain an account of the remedy, but it is possibly the same as that already described which is used by a man when frightened. The other remedy is kwagal atpimi. Kwagal (Polygonum rude or P. Chinense) is the same plant which is used in one of the remedies for the evil eye (see p. 264) and it is possible again that this remedy is the same as that already described. Kwagal is also the plant used by the goddess Puzi to quench the fire of her son, Kurindo.
It will have been noticed that the formulæ recorded in this chapter have the same general form as the prayers of the dairy ritual. They consist of sentences ending in mâ, which seem to be of the nature of supplications that certain things may come to pass, preceded by the names of certain deities followed by the word idith, occasionally with other sentences allied in meaning to these. The two parts of the prayer are represented, but the first part, consisting of the kwarzam, does not appear to have acquired the same degree of importance as in the prayer. Thus the magical formulæ of the Todas have precisely the same general form as those used in their religious ritual. In the case of the prayer, I have pointed out that the actual words leave one in doubt as to whether there is anything of the nature of a direct appeal to the gods. In the magical formulæ, on the other hand, the case for an appeal to the gods is stronger. In all the formulæ, whether used by sorcerers to bring evils on their enemies or by medicine-men to remove sufferings of various kinds, the names of the same four deities are mentioned, and these four deities, Pithioteu, Ön, Teikirzi, and Tirshti, are undoubtedly four of the most ancient and sacred of the Toda gods. It is noteworthy that the sorcerer does not say the names of these gods when he is removing his spells, but simply refers to them as “those gods,” and it is clear that he does this because he does not wish his victim to learn the names of the gods by whose power his misfortunes have been brought about and are now to be removed. This procedure leaves little room for doubt that it is through the active intervention of the gods that the sorcerer is believed to work.
There still remains the question whether the words of the magical formula imply anything of the nature of supplication, or whether the sorcerer is not rather using forms of words which will compel the gods to exert their powers in the way the sorcerer wishes. I have no definite information as to the belief of the Toda sorcerer on the point, but the almost contemptuous tone of the two clauses which follow the names of the four gods might perhaps be held to point to the latter conclusion, and to indicate that the sorcerer can use the gods as his instruments of wrath much as seems to have been the case with the magicians of our mediæval times.
On the other hand, it is not unlikely that the words, “â teu sati udâsnûdr, an nòdr nòdr udâsnûdr,” may have originally had a meaning very different from that which the bare translation seems to give to them. A similar formula occurs in the story of Kwoten (p. 194) in the curse uttered by Kwoten’s mother, which has the proviso, “on sati udairnûdr,” which was translated, “if I have reverence to the village.” This makes it possible that the translation of the words of the magical incantation should rather be, “if I have proper reverence to the gods and to the gods’ country.” The interpretation on page 257 is that which was given to me by Teitnir, but it is not at all improbable that it is wrong, and that a translation on the lines of that given for the curse of Kwoten’s mother would be more correct.
The nature of the words used makes it clear that the remedies employed by the Toda utkòren, or medicine-men, are of a magical kind. The words are essentially the same as those used by the pilikòren, or sorcerers, to remove the evils they have brought about by their previous magical incantations. The same formulæ are used to remove ills supposed to be due to natural causes as are used to remove those due to the workings of magic. It seems clear that the Todas have advanced beyond the stage of human culture in which all misfortunes are produced by magic. They recognise that some ills are not due to human intervention, but yet they employ the same kind of means to remove these ills as are employed to remove those brought about by human agency. The advance of the Todas is shown most clearly by the differentiation of function between pilikòren and utkòren, between sorcerers and medicine-men, and we seem to have here a clear indication of the differentiation between magic and medicine. The two callings are followed by different men, who are entirely distinct from one another, but both use the same kind of formula to bring about the effect they desire to produce. It seems that the powers of the utkòren are less definitely passed on from father to son than in the case of the pilikòren. There is no doubt that these powers depend largely on a knowledge of the words to be used, and especially on a knowledge of the names of the four gods, but it is probable that this knowledge is transmitted from one old person to any other who may be likely to inspire confidence. It will be noted that a woman can practise the magical remedies of the utkòren, but I do not know whether this is a recent innovation. It seems clear that a woman could never become one of the pilikòren or sorcerers.
When discussing the formulæ of the dairy ritual, it was mentioned that one difficulty in the way of regarding these formulæ as prayers is that the names of deities are not uttered in the vocative form, and that this might be held to negative the idea that they involve supplication to higher powers. In the magical formulæ there seems to be a clearer case for the presence of a distinct address to deities, though it is doubtful whether this address is of a supplicative or compelling character. If there is a distinct address in the case of the magical formulæ, which every Toda would acknowledge to be used for an evil end, it is very probable that the words of the dairy formulæ also involve the idea of an address to deities. These formulæ are always directed to avert evils from and to call down blessings on the buffaloes, and it seems almost certain that for this good end the words imply not only an address to the powers of the gods, but also one of a supplicative rather than of a compelling character.
One distinction between the formulæ of the dairy and those of the sorcerer may be pointed out. In the latter the names of the gods are those used in ordinary conversation, i.e., Teikirzi, Tirshti, and are not the kwarzam, i.e., Ekirzam meidjam.
One of the most interesting features of this chapter has been the clear evidence given in the formulæ of the close relation existing between magic and religion among the Todas. The formulæ of magic and of the dairy ritual are of the same nature, though the differentiation between the sorcerer and the priest who use them is even clearer than that between the sorcerer and the medicine-man. It is probable that the names of the gods with the characteristic formulæ of the prayer are later additions to the magical incantation; that at some time the sorcerer has added the names of the most important of his deities to the spells and charms which at one time were thought to be sufficient for his purpose. It is also possible, however, that the similarity of prayer and spell points to a time when the functions of priest and sorcerer were combined in one person; that as the restrictions which hedge round the life of the dairyman-priest increased, it became impracticable for him to exert his magical functions, and that there has therefore come about a differentiation of function, though the means used continue to show a close resemblance.
It may perhaps be said that the clear evidence of the supposed influence of the gods takes the facts which have been described in this chapter out of the realm of magic and puts them in that of religion. The Toda’s methods of procuring ill to his neighbours are clearly in their essential nature of a magical kind, but their close blend with religious ideas is the reason why I have considered them in their present place.
OMENS
The Todas do not pay much attention to omens, but meeting certain animals is regarded as lucky or unlucky. The most definite instance of an omen-animal is a black bird called karpüls, which is said to be the Indian cuckoo. If a Toda is going on an errand and sees this bird on the left side, he takes it as a bad omen and turns back; if on the right side, it is a good omen. This bird appears twice in Toda legend. It warned Püv, the son of Ön, and in the last scene of the life of Kwoten, it appeared going from left to right. It is noteworthy that when Erten is interpreting the omen in this legend, he brings in Naraian (Narayan), who is certainly not a Toda deity, and this suggests that the whole incident of the omen-bird may be an accretion to the legends, and that the belief in omens has been borrowed from the Badagas or other Hindus.
XIII. SACRIFICE AND OFFERINGS
In this chapter various ceremonies will be described which may all be regarded as examples of propitiation of the higher powers by sacrifices or offerings. We shall see later that in the funeral ceremonies buffaloes are killed, but it is clear that there is no idea of propitiation or atonement connected with this slaughter, the animals being killed so that they may go to the next world for the service of the dead.
THE ERKUMPTTHPIMI CEREMONY
In this ceremony a young male calf is killed and eaten. The ordinary name is erkumptthpimi (“male buffalo we kill”) or erkumptthiti, but at the ti the ceremony is called ernudrtipimi. I met with great obstacles in obtaining a satisfactory account, the men who had told me all the details of the dairy ceremonial denying at first all knowledge of any ceremony among the Todas in which a calf was killed or eaten. As soon as they found that I knew positively of the existence of the ceremony, they acknowledged that they killed a calf, but said they could not tell me anything about it. I succeeded at last in obtaining a record of the ceremony from Teitnir, and when I was endeavouring to identify the various parts into which the sacrificial animal is divided, we met with such difficulties [96] that Teitnir agreed to allow me to see the ceremony on the condition that I would provide the cost of the calf.
Owing to the general reluctance to talk about this ceremony, I was not able to obtain such independent accounts from other people as I should have liked, but the details of the sacrifice as given me by Teitnir agreed with those of the ceremony I witnessed, and I have no doubt as to its essential accuracy. I had hoped to have obtained independent evidence on some doubtful features at the end of my visit, but these hopes were entirely frustrated by the death of Teitnir’s wife a few days after the ceremony which had been performed for my benefit, her death being generally ascribed to the anger of the gods because the secrets of erkumptthpimi had been revealed. After I had left the hills, however, Samuel succeeded in obtaining information on several doubtful points, and was given an independent account which entirely confirmed the accuracy of the proceedings which he had witnessed at the same time as myself.
The ceremony is performed both at the ordinary village and at the ti dairy. At the ti there is no doubt that it is performed three times a year, but there was much discrepancy in the accounts of its frequency at the village. According to some, the sacrifice only takes place once a year at each village in October, soon after the ceremony of teutütusthchi, to be described later in this chapter. According to others, the ceremony is performed whenever the people have a suitable male calf to sacrifice. During the ten years that my interpreter, Samuel, had been living among the Todas, he had come to the conclusion that the ceremony is performed fairly often, his opinion being based on chance remarks made by the children. I think there is very little doubt that a calf is now killed in each village more often than once a year, and the ceremony at which I was present was almost certainly one of the occasional performances, though the time of year at which it took place makes it possible that it was the chief annual occasion of that village.
There was also some doubt whether there is an annual ceremony in every village for the people living in that village, or whether the annual ceremony is only performed in the etudmad, or chief village of each clan, for all the people of the clan. The true state of affairs at the present time is probably that the ceremony is performed at the Nòdrs ti in October. Fifteen days later it is performed at the other ti mad and at the chief village of each clan. In addition to these annual celebrations the sacrifice is performed on two other occasions at the ti, while at a village it may be performed whenever the people of the village have a suitable animal.
The place at which the sacrifice is performed is called the ernkar, and at Karia, where I witnessed the ceremony, the ernkar is in a wood nearly half a mile from the village at a spot where it is very unlikely that the proceedings would be disturbed by chance visitors. It seems that there is not only a special ernkar for each ti and for each clan, but that each village has also its appointed place.
The ceremony is performed on appointed days, different for each ti and clan. In the case of the Kuudrol, these are Sunday, Wednesday, and Thursday, and the ceremony which I witnessed at Karia, a village of this clan, took place on a Sunday. The chief officiator at the sacrifice at an ordinary village is the palikartmokh of the village, who must, however, for this occasion be of the same clan as those who are celebrating the sacrifice.
On the day arranged for the ceremony at Karia the palikartmokh was ill, and as none of the other inhabitants of Karia was able to undertake the office, an elderly man, Punatvan (53), had to be fetched from another village. On his arrival he had first to go through the ordination ceremonies for the office of palikartmokh, a lucky chance which gave me the only opportunity I had during my visit of observing these proceedings.
At the ernkar wood for the fire is collected, and over small firewood the people place several logs about three feet in length, so that the fire is of an oblong form. The firewood must be of one or both of the kinds called main and kiül. While some of those present are making the fire, others will be fashioning sharply pointed stakes of wood on which the parts of the calf are to be impaled. These sticks are called ko, and must be made of one of the following four kinds of wood: avelashki, karkekoi, kwadiki, or pohvet. It was said that exactly fifty of these ko must be provided.
The first stage of the ceremonial is to make fire by friction, which should be done by the palikartmokh. The only occasion on which I saw fire made by friction during an actual ceremony was when I witnessed the sacrifice at Karia, and on this occasion both Punatvan and his chief assistant, Pichievan (69) of Keadr, twirled the fire-sticks alternately, but though they soon produced some smoke, they failed to light the rag used as tinder. My constant attendant, Kòdrner, was called in, and with his more powerful manipulations was almost immediately successful, and the lighted rag was carried by Punatvan to the heap of firewood, which was soon in a good blaze.
As soon as the fire is alight the calf is brought to the ernkar, and the palikartmokh goes to cut a log of tudr wood and three small branches of tudr leaves. The calf should be fifteen days old and must be without blemish. Its ears must not be split, its tail must not be cut, and its eyes must be clear.
The log of tudr wood is for the killing of the calf and is about four feet in length and about three inches in thickness. Such a log is usually called tudrkud, but on this occasion is named erkumptthkud. The three branches of tudr must consist of perfect leaves. Such branches are usually called tudrkwunak, but on the occasion of this ceremony they receive the name toashtitudr.
The palikartmokh then stands in front of the calf, holding the log and leaves in his right hand. He raises the log and leaves to his forehead as a salutation, and then recites the appointed prayer. This prayer is different for each clan and consists of clauses in each of which the kwarzam of one of the villages of the clan is followed by “——k per mâ.” Thus the first clause of the Kuudr prayer is atthkârk per mâ; atthkâr is the kwarzam of Kuudr, k is the suffix, meaning “to,” and per mâ is “may increase” or “may there be increase.” All the clauses of the prayer are of this form except the last two, which are karsêram parsêram; Nòtîrzk êr usht mâ; the first of which is a kwarzam of Kulinkars, êram probably meaning buffaloes, while the second means, “may the buffalo appear to Nòtirzi.” The calf is supposed to appear to Nòtirzi and then to go from the hill of this goddess to the hill of Kulinkars. The complete prayers of Kuudr and Kars are given on pp. 288, 289.
The palikartmokh touches the head of the calf with the erkumptthkud (Fig. 38) as he utters each kwarzam till he comes to the penultimate clause of the prayer, at which point he begins the following series of actions. He draws the three branches of tudr leaves along the back of the calf from head to tail and then drops one of the three toashtitudr on the ground behind the calf. The two remaining branches are drawn along the back of the calf from tail to head in the reverse direction to the first, and on reaching the head one of the two branches is dropped on the ground at the head of the animal. The remaining branch is drawn from head to tail and dropped on the ground by the side of the first (see Fig. 39).
The animal is then killed by striking it on the head with the erkumptthkud. The palikartmokh then takes up the three toashtitudr, and, taking them in his right hand with the log, passes them round the calf three times. In doing this, the body of the calf rests on its side, while the log and leaves are passed between the two fore-legs, then between the two hind-legs, round the hind-quarters, and forward over the back and head, so that they make a complete circuit of the animal, and this circuit is twice repeated, so that the log and leaves are passed completely round the calf three times.
The palikartmokh then proceeds to cut up the calf (Fig. 40), beginning with a complete incision round the neck. The knife used is of the ordinary kind called turi, but on this occasion it is called ab, or “arrow.” On the occasion on which I saw the ceremony, the calf seemed to have only been stunned by the blow on the head and began to kick as soon as this incision was made. The animal was, in consequence, vigorously belaboured over the testicles with the log of tudr wood, and this was repeated till the movements of the animal ceased.
The next incision is down the mid-ventral line; incisions are made through the skin above each hoof, and the palikartmokh then removes the skin of the whole animal except the head and feet, beginning at the right fore-limb.
When the skin (tars) is removed, it is laid on the ground with its outer surface downwards a few yards from the spot at which the animal is being cut up, and the palikartmokh proceeds to cut the animal into the following parts:—
Kwelthkh, hoof and attached skin and bones.
Mogâl, lower segment of fore-limb (metacarpus).
Kemal, or kemalth, upper segment of fore-limb corresponding to fore-arm.
Kanòdri, shoulder.
Mêdrkwelv, trachea and larynx.
Tòdrthars, lower segment of hind-limb (metatarsus).
Pevutth, upper segment of hind-limb (leg).
Ûrûf, liver.
Putth, gall-bladder.
Pushk, kidneys.
Kwur, small intestine.
Tütkwur, large intestine.
Mulikudri, urinary bladder.
Agelv, pelvis, including thigh bones.
Mudri, sternum and part of ribs attached.
Nüdz, heart.
Püth, lungs.
Kwotinerûf (kwotinûrûf?), spleen.
Pâlvîr, stomach full of milk, called pâlvetâr when emptied of milk.
Mutelf, lower part of backbone with parts of lower ribs attached.
Nòdi, upper half of backbone with parts of upper ribs attached.
Mad, head.
The parts of the calf are removed approximately in the order in which they are given above. The palikartmokh first cuts off the four feet of the animal, beginning with that of the right fore-limb and the four kwelthkh are placed under the skin, one at each corner.
The next part to be removed is the right mogâl, and then the three other corresponding parts. Up to this point, everything must be done by the palikartmokh himself, but after the mogâl have been removed any one may help, and on the occasion when I witnessed the ceremony, several operations were going on simultaneously after this point of the proceedings, and it became difficult to ascertain exactly what was being done and the exact order in which the parts were being removed. The cutting up of the calf was performed chiefly by Pichievan, while the palikartmokh, Punatvan, occupied himself with other operations.
After the removal of the mogâl, the remaining parts of the two fore-limbs are removed and placed on the skin. The larynx and windpipe are taken out together, and in doing this the large vessels of the neck are divided. The body of the animal is then taken up and held over the skin, so that the blood runs out over the parts placed on the skin, and these parts are then moved about, so that they become smeared with blood, and are then placed on the stakes (ko), and each ko with its part of the animal is stuck in the ground on one side of the skin. Some of the other parts when removed are rubbed in the blood on the skin.
When the different parts have been impaled in this manner, the palikartmokh cuts from each part a small piece of flesh called mîis and puts the pieces on a stake. From the ribs and sternum, he cuts a part called the tütmîis, much larger than the other fragments, and puts this on a stake. I could not ascertain exactly of what the tütmîis consisted, but it seemed to be the lower end of the sternum with some of the diaphragm attached to it. [98]
After cutting off the mîis, the palikartmokh begins to put the parts round the fire (Fig. 41), beginning with the mogâl, which are placed, one on each side, about the middle of the fire, but rather nearer that end at which the head is to be placed later. The mogâl must be put in this position by the palikartmokh himself, but the other parts may be arranged in any order. While the palikartmokh is manipulating the parts first cut off and placing them round the fire, his assistants will be continuing the division of the animal. When the liver is taken out, the gall-bladder is cut from it and thrown on one side. The intestines are removed and put on stakes by transfixing every few inches of their length.
The small intestine is placed on more than one ko, while, so far as I could see, the large intestine is put on one stake. The urinary bladder is thrown on one side. The ribs are cut through nearer the back than the front, and the sternum and anterior parts of the ribs form one part, the mudri. It was from this part that the tütmîis was taken. The spleen is put on one side in order that it may be given to a cat, and its name is derived from this fact. The stomach when taken out of the body is filled with milk and in this state is called pâlvîr. Its contents are poured out and it then receives the name pâlvetâr.
As soon as the cutting up is completed and all the other parts have been placed round the fire, the head is put on a ko, and this is stuck in the ground at one end of the fire and about half a yard from it, and the four kwelthkh are placed on the ground round the head. Some of the parts placed round the fire may by this time have charred, and they are turned round so as to expose the opposite side to the flames.
The next step is to take up the head on its ko and place it in the middle of the fire for about a minute, after which it is replaced. The object of this is to singe the ears, which the palikartmokh then pulls off. He also takes certain fragments (mîis) from some of the other parts and throws them, together with the ears, into the fire, standing at one end, the opposite end to that at which the head is placed. He then takes three charred pieces of wood from the fire, and throws them over the fire and over the head, so that they fall beyond the latter, saying as he throws each time, “Nòtîrzk per mâ, mañ!” the last exclamation being the sound which is ordinarily uttered when calling a calf.
When the flesh is sufficiently roasted the palikartmokh eats the tütmîis, while the others present may eat any portion. When enough has been eaten, the remainder of the cooked flesh is carried to the village. The mogâl, agelv, mad, and kwelthkh are carried to the dairy by the palikartmokh and kept there. The flesh of these parts is eaten by the dairyman or by other men, but may on no account be eaten by a woman. The other parts are taken to the hut and given into the keeping of the women, and the flesh of these parts can be eaten by any one—man, woman, or child. Butter is often put on the flesh before it is eaten.
THE SACRIFICE AT THE TI
The sacrifice at the ti is called ernudrtipimi, and is performed at every ti three times in the year. The first occasion is about fifteen days after the ceremony of teutütusthchi in October. The second occasion is about January, when the buffaloes of the ti migrate to the Kundahs or elsewhere for the dry season. The third occasion is after the ceremony of giving salt, which is known as kòrup (see p. 175). The ceremony may take place at any ti mad except Anto.
The appointed days are Sunday and Wednesday. On the day before the ceremony wood is taken by the palol and kaltmokh to the sacrificial spot, called ernkar as at the village. At Mòdr the wood in which the sacrifice takes place is called Turikipül.
The sacrifice may be performed either in the morning or evening, and takes place, in either case, before kaizhvatiti, the ceremonial pouring of buttermilk. This means that the sacrifice takes place during and not after the dairy ceremonial, and thus forms part of the dairy ritual. Each palol wears the pòdrshtuni, while the kaltmokh is naked throughout except for the kuvn. The kaltmokh arranges the firewood and the chief palol (at the Nòdrs ti, the ti palol) lights the wood with fire brought from his dairy. The calf is then killed and cut up with exactly the same ritual as in the village ceremony.
After the flesh has been placed round the fire both the palol return to their dairies, leaving the kaltmokh at the ernkar to look after the roasting flesh. Each palol prays as usual and takes buttermilk without the aid of the kaltmokh, and then returns to the ernkar, the chief palol taking butter with him. At the place of the sacrifice the palol eats the tütmîis only, first putting it, together with butter, on leaves of kakud, from which he eats. The kaltmokh eats part of the liver at the ernkar, and is not allowed to touch any other part of the animal unless given to him by the palol. The mogâl, agelv, mad, and kwelthkh are then carried by the palol to the dairy where they are kept. They are eaten only by the palol and kaltmokh. Some parts are carried by the kaltmokh to the sleeping-hut, and are eaten by the kaltmokh and mòrol; other parts are taken to the outskirts of the ti mad and given to any Todas who may visit the dairy.
In connexion with the erkumptthpimi ceremony, I was told of a device employed to induce the mother of the sacrificed calf to continue suckling after her offspring has been killed. Several days before the sacrifice the calf to be sacrificed and a female calf of about the same age are shut up together in the kush, or small structure in which young calves are kept. On the floor of the kush are spread some of the grass called nark [99] and some leaves of the kiars [100] tree. When these have been broken up and mixed with earth by the trampling of the calves, a handful of the mixture, together with milk, is rubbed on the backs of both calves, and this is repeated for three or four days. The object is that the mother shall not know which is her own calf, and shall suckle both, and continue to suckle the female calf when her own has been taken away. During the days on which the calves are shut up together the dairyman should keep pon, i.e., he should not sell or give away any of the produce of the dairy.
If this device is not employed or is unsuccessful the skin of the sacrificed calf is placed on the back of a female calf, and in this way the mother may be induced to suckle the latter. When Teitnir performed the erkumptthpimi ceremony for my benefit, he did not succeed in getting the mother to suckle another calf and demanded 60 rupees [101] as compensation for the loss of milk which he would suffer till the buffalo had another calf. When he found that I had no intention of paying this sum, he adopted the second device just described, and this expedient was successful.
The erkumptthpimi ceremony was first mentioned by Harkness (p. 139), who witnessed the sacrifice. The details of the ceremony which he gives agree in general with those observed by myself. He calls the sacrifice “yerr-gompts.” A still more complete account which agrees closely with my own was given by Muzzy in 1844. Breeks mentions the ceremony, as is usual with him, under its Badaga name of kona shastra, and his account contains several features which disagree with those of Harkness, Muzzy, and myself.
I could obtain no satisfactory account of the origin of the sacrifice. Teitnir gave me a circumstantial story of the way in which Kwoto or Meilitars induced the gods to eat the flesh of a male calf. Teitnir stated that when Kwoto was visiting the gods in the form of a kite, and before he had tied down the sun (see p. 206), he killed a male calf with exactly the same ceremonial as that practised since, and taking some of the flesh threw it into the midst of the gods, saying, “I have brought the flesh; it is sacred flesh; I have partaken of it, and if your counsel is to be right, you must partake of it.” At this the gods were very angry and blamed Kwoto, whereupon he said, “I am not blameworthy; if you blame a man who should not be blamed, why do you not eat flesh which should not be eaten?” Kwoto was then given the task of tying down the sun, and when he succeeded in doing this and had been acknowledged by the gods as their superior, the gods agreed to eat the flesh, and since that time the Todas have sacrificed a male calf, just as Kwoto did, and have eaten the flesh of the calf.
The truth of this account, given by Teitnir, was denied by every other Toda whom I questioned, and I have not therefore included it in the story of Kwoto given in Chap. IX, but I think it is possible that Teitnir was right, and that the denial of the other Todas was due to their reluctance that I should know the real belief about this ceremony. Even if not correct, Teitnir’s account is valuable as a record of an ingenious example of Toda reasoning.
At the ceremony I witnessed there was one feature of some interest. When it was found that the calf had not been killed by the blow with the log of tudr wood, the animal was belaboured over the testicles. This procedure had not been included in the account given to me before the ceremony, and I could not discover how far it is an established custom to kill the animal in this way if it is not killed by the blow. The interest arises from the fact that in the ancient Vedic sacrifices, the animal was killed by stopping its mouth and beating it severely ten or twelve times on the testicles till it was suffocated. [102] I have not been able to discover whether this method of killing an animal is still practised in India. If so, it has probably been borrowed by the Todas; but if not, this ancient Indian method may have been preserved by the Todas. I did not observe that the mouth of the calf was stopped at the sacrifice which I witnessed, but this was probably done.
THE ERKUMPTTHPIMI PRAYER OF KUUDR
This consists of clauses of the form Atthkark per ma in which the following kwarzam of villages are mentioned: Atthkâr and Òners (Kuudr), Kidnârs and Toarsòdri (Ars), Moskar and Manêthi (Òdr), Keikòdr and Karsülh (Melkòdr), Kwoteiners and Kwelpushol (Kiudr), Tashtakhkush (Pirsush), Kwotirkwirg (Kwirg), Toarskâria (Karia), Pârners and Tîindeuk (Miuni). These are followed by the final two clauses, karsêram parsêram, Nòtîrzk êr usht mâ.
The chief features of this prayer are that the chief villages of the Kuudrol have each two kwarzam and that two kwarzam of Òdr, a Nòdrs village, are included (see p. 647).
THE KARS PRAYER
This consists of the kwarzam of the villages of the Karsol followed by -k per mâ, as in Mutashkitik per mâ, but in this case only one kwarzam is mentioned for each village. The following are the kwarzam with the corresponding villages in brackets: Mutashkiti (Kars), Karadrners (Kuzhu), Kiugners (Keshker), Külnkars (Taradrkirsi), Nersmi (Nasmiòdr), Eḍstârs (Tashtars), Keiikârs (Kerkars), Kuzhârmûdri (Isharadr), Pòḍshners (Pòdzkwar), Peleiners (Peletkwur), Tarskidt, Tüli, Sing, Keitaz. In the last four cases the kwarzam and ordinary name of each village are the same. These kwarzam are followed by ekîrzam meidjam, Nòtîrzk êr usht mâ. The place of karsêram parsêram in the Kuudr prayer is taken by ekîrzam meidjam, the kwarzam of Teikirzi, but I do not know how far this is a special feature of the Kars prayer. It may be that the Tartharol have the latter formula. It is remarkable that the Karsol should omit karsêram parsêram, for it is the kwarzam of their nòdrodchi, Kulinkars.
Several of the kwarzam of this prayer are those of villages which no longer exist. The prayer thus preserves a record of Toda institutions which have entirely disappeared.
These prayers are also interesting as records of a number of village kwarzam. It will be noticed that in many cases there is a considerable degree of resemblance between the ordinary name and the kwarzam; in other cases the words are wholly different.
In villages on the west side of the Paikara River the palikartmokh says, “Teikhârsk êr usht mâ,” may the buffalo appear to Teikhars, instead of Nòtîrzk êr usht mâ as the last clause. Teikhars is merely another name for Kulinkars. The reason for the modification is probably connected with the fact that the calf would have to cross the sacred Paikara River in order to go to Nòtirzi (Snowdon) on its way to Kulinkars.
I was unable, as usual, to obtain any information from the Todas on the significance of the erkumptthpimi ceremony, but the prayer offered before the calf is killed seems to make it clear that the idea underlying the ceremony is that of promoting the general welfare of the buffaloes. The actual words of the prayer are directed to bring about an increase to the various villages of the clan, but there is, I think, no doubt that in this prayer, all have the buffaloes especially in mind and that the meaning of the prayer is, “may the buffaloes of ... increase!” The sacrifice of the calf would seem to be of that kind in which one is killed that the rest may prosper.
There is one feature of the sacrifice which might be held to be out of harmony with this suggestion—viz., that the sacrificed calf is a young male, and hence a comparatively worthless animal. The name of the ceremony means strictly “we kill a male buffalo,” [103] and it is possible that at one time an adult male was sacrificed, but even then the sacrifice would be of an animal comparatively little valued by the Todas. As we shall see, the animals killed at funerals are always female, but there is an obvious reason for this, as the buffaloes are to be of use to the dead person in the other world. Formerly large numbers of buffaloes were killed at funerals, and it is possible that it was found impracticable to use female buffaloes also for the erkumptthpimi sacrifice.
There is another possible reason for the use of male buffaloes. The flesh of the sacrificed animal is eaten, and it is possible that the Todas may have preferred to use for this purpose the less sacred male buffaloes, and not to risk any possible evil effects which might follow the consumption of the flesh of the females. It is probable that utilitarian motives have played the chief part in the choice of a male, but other more religious motives may have had some influence.
THE TEUTÜTUSTHCHI CEREMONY
This is an annual ceremony in which a fire is lighted at the foot of a hill by the palol and kaltmokh. The name teutütusthchi or teutütusthtiti means “god fire he lights.” It is performed in the month which the Todas call Tai, beginning with the new moon in October.
The two palol and the kaltmokh of the Nòdrs ti perform the ceremony on the first or second Sunday after the new moon, and make the fire in alternate years at the hills called Kòti and Puthi. The two palol of the Kars and Pan ti set fire together at the hill Kònto on the following Tuesday. This ceremony is not performed by the palol of either the Kwòdrdoni or the Nidrsi ti. In 1902 the Nòdrs palol went to the hill Kòti on the second Sunday after the new moon (October 12th).
The hills of Kòti, Puthi, and Kònto are said to be chosen because they are very high, and have the highest teu, who are spoken of as elder brothers.
The palol and kaltmokh set out when they have taken buttermilk after the morning work, abstaining from other food till the ceremony is over. They take with them the nirsi or fire-sticks, some leaves of kakud, a piece of tuni, and some dried grass from the thatch of the dairy. Each palol wears both the pòdrshtuni and the kubuntuni.
When they reach the foot of the hill they make a heap of firewood. They then spread the kakud leaves on a stone and powder the thatch of the dairy on the leaves, and each palol makes fire with the fire-sticks and lights the powdered thatch. Then the kaltmokh says, “Teutütusthtkina?”—“Shall I light the god (or sacred) fire?”—and both palol answer “Teutütustht!” Then the kaltmokh takes the lighted thatch and applies it to the heap of firewood. As soon as the fire burns well, each palol takes off his kubuntuni and, standing some little distance from the fire, the two dairymen pray, using the usual prayer of the ti with the following additions:
Kòr pûv mâ; tein pûv mâ; pom Young grass flower may; honey flourish may; fruit
purzh mâ. ripen may.
After the prayer the dairymen and their attendant return to their dairies so as to be in time for the afternoon work.
The object of the ceremony is to make the grass and honey plentiful, as the additions to the prayer indicate. The Todas told me that in ancient times they lived largely on wild fruits, nuts, and honey, and that then the ceremony was of great importance. At the present time the Todas in general seem to take but little interest in the occasion, but its former importance is still shown by the fact that the Sunday and Tuesday on which the ceremony is performed are among the chief Toda feast days, when the people of every village eat the special kind of food which they call ashkkartpimi.
OFFERINGS
The ceremonies which have been described are sacrifices or offerings which occur at regulated intervals. Teutütusthchi is certainly an annual ceremony, and it is probable that erkumptthpimi was also originally an annual ceremony, though now it may be performed several times in the year. Even now, however, there seems to be little doubt that on one occasion in the year this ceremony is regarded as of special importance.
The ceremonies which remain to be described are of a different nature. They are mostly occasions on which offerings are made to avert or remove misfortune. Some are distinctly of the nature of sin offerings, but are only made when an offence which has been committed has brought some misfortune on the offender. In these cases the object of the offering seems to be propitiatory and to bring about the removal of the misfortune.
In other cases the offering may be made with the object of removing a misfortune which is not due to any fault on the part of the sufferer.
The simplest kind of offering is usually spoken of as kwadr kwadrthpimi—i.e., we give kwadr. The word kwadr probably means gift, but seems now to be often used in the sense of ‘fine.’ The kwadr takes the form of a buffalo. When a man gives a buffalo in this way it means that he undertakes not to give or sell the buffalo to anyone and not to kill it at a funeral. The buffalo is to be allowed to die a natural death, but so long as it is alive the owner has the full use of the milk given by the animal. The idea of this offering is that the buffalo is given to the gods, according to some, or to the Amatol or people of Amnòdr, according to others. I also heard it spoken of as if the buffalo were given to the man’s father or grandfather (pia)—i.e., as if it was not given to the Amatol in general, but only to the spirit of the giver’s father or grandfather. It is possible that I have confused together two or more separate things, but so far as I could learn these cases resembled one another in that the owner was not allowed to kill or part with the buffalo.
When the man devotes a buffalo in this way he mentions the buffalo by name, saying that he gives it to the gods or to his fathers, and as a sign that he has done so he bows down before an elder and performs the salutation of kalmelpudithti.
This offering was made at the funeral of a child at which I was present, when the diviners found that a buffalo about to be killed was of the wrong kind, and said that Kuriolv, the father of the child, should give a buffalo. In this case the diviners said that a special buffalo called Perov was to be given. Kuriolv made a vow to give this buffalo and performed the kalmelpudithti salutation to Perner, the grandfather of the dead child. Another example of this offering will be mentioned at the end of this chapter.
IRNÖRTITI TO THE TI
Another kind of offering is to give a buffalo to one of the ti dairies. This is called irnörtiti, but must be distinguished from another kind of irnörtiti to be presently described. A man gives a buffalo to a ti when he has committed any offence against the ti. In one case in which I have a record of this kind of offering, the cause was the refusal of a man to become palol after he had promised to undertake the office. One of the results of my visit to the Todas was a wholesale sentence from the teuol that the people were to do ti irnörtiti (see p. 310).
The Tartharol may sometimes give buffaloes to the herds of a ti when they have not committed any offence against the dairy. This is done when the buffaloes of the ti have become very few in number, and this offering is also known as irnörtiti, and is given with the same ceremonial as when an offence has been committed.
The gift of a buffalo to the ti dairy must take place on a Thursday or Sunday. On the morning of the day the man making the offering, who is called the irnörtpol, abstains from food and goes to the ti mad with a female calf between one and two years of age. He may be accompanied by other men, usually those closely related to him. The men go to the outskirts of the dairy and wait there till the morning business of the dairy is concluded, each man carrying a green stick, either a kwadrikurs or avelashkikurs. When the palol has finished his work he goes towards the men on the outskirts of the dairy, also carrying a stick of the same kind, and as he approaches, the other men drive the calf towards him, and when it reaches the palol, he drives it so that it joins the buffaloes of his herd. The palol then gives food to the irnörtpol and his companions, who eat it on the spot, where they remain till after sunset, when they return home. If the calf given belongs to the putiir, it becomes one of the punir of the ti, but if it is of one of the sacred kinds, pasthir, wursulir, &c., it joins one of the sacred herds of the ti.
IRNÖRTITI, TUNINÖRTITI AND PILINÖRTITI
We now come to three kinds of offering, with their attendant ceremonial, which are of a much more complex nature. These are irnörtiti, tuninörtiti and pilinörtiti, in which the offerings are a buffalo calf, a piece of the cloth called tuni, and a silver ring respectively. The first two offerings are made only when one of a certain number of recognised offences has been committed, and in order to bring about the removal of some misfortune which has befallen the offender. Pilinörtiti, on the other hand, is usually performed to bring about the cessation of some ill-fortune which is not due to any fault on the part of the sufferer, but it may also be done in expiation of an offence.
One essential feature common to all three offerings is that the primary divisions of the clan called kudr (see p. 542) here become of importance.
Nearly every Toda clan is divided into two kudr, and the offerings in the three ceremonies always pass from one kudr to the other. The offering which is given by a man of one kudr becomes the property of the members of the other kudr. At the present time the kudr is of no importance except in connexion with these ceremonies, and, so far as I could learn, it never had any other significance. There are a few clans of recent origin which have no kudr, and members of these clans cannot make the offerings. In other clans, one kudr has become extinct, and so long as no occasion for these ceremonies should arise, nothing is done to supply the deficiency. As a general rule, it is only when some trouble arises which may require one or other of these ceremonies that a redistribution of the members of the clan is made, and it is decided that one or more of the pòlm or smaller sub-divisions of the clan shall be constituted a new kudr.
The following are the chief offences for which the irnörtiti or tuninörtiti ceremonies have to be performed:—
(i) Stealing milk, butter, buttermilk, or ghi from the dairy.
(ii) Going to the dairy after having had intercourse with a woman in the day-time.
(iii) Quarrelling between people of the same clan on a feast day.
(iv) Quarrelling in the dairy.
(v) Going to the dairy after visiting the seclusion-hut for women (see Chap. XIV).
(vi) Going to the dairy after taking food with a man who has been to the seclusion-hut.
(vii) Going to the dairy after throwing earth at a funeral (see Chap. XV).
(viii) Going to the dairy after chewing tobacco.
(ix) Buying or selling buffaloes on the madnol or sacred day of the village or on the palinol, the sacred day of the dairy (see Chap. XVII).
(x) Driving buffaloes from one place to another on these days.
Going to the buffaloes or touching the buffaloes is an offence of the same rank as going to the dairy.
The general name for all these offences is paliwörtvichi; they are all regarded as offences against the dairy.
For the first three of the offences it is customary that the irnörtiti ceremony shall be performed. For the last seven tuninörtiti is more usual. For the fourth offence the punishment varies according to the status of the offender. If he is a palikartmokh, he usually has to give the tuni only, but if an ordinary man he may be ordered to give a buffalo. It is a far smaller punishment to give a piece of cloth worth about one rupee four annas than to give a buffalo calf, and it would seem therefore that the first three offences are regarded as more serious than the last seven. It would seem also that if a dairyman quarrels in his dairy it is regarded as a less serious offence than in the case of an ordinary man.
The decision as to which ceremony shall be performed rests with the teuol or diviner, but although a diviner usually follows the rules I have given, it seems that he may order otherwise, and if he does so I was told that his decision would be followed. I have a very strong impression, however, that if a diviner ordered a man to do irnörtiti for one of the more trivial offences, the offender would take further advice and consult another teuol before obeying.
There were several other offences for which it was said by some that a man might have to perform irnörtiti or tuninörtiti; thus, if a dairyman gave up his office on any but one of the appropriate days of the week he might be ordered to do irnörtiti, and the same penalty might be incurred if a man assumed office on a wrong day. Similarly a dairyman might have to perform one of these ceremonies if he spoke to a woman in the day-time, and probably if he broke any other of the laws regulating his conduct or made any serious mistakes in carrying out the ritual of his office. One occasion for irnörtiti was said to arise if anyone crossed the Paikara or Avalanche rivers on a Tuesday, Friday, or Saturday, but this is certainly a dead letter at the present time (see p. 418).
There was some difference of opinion about the penalty for buying, selling, or driving buffaloes on the arpatznol, or day on which the father of a man had died. According to one account, the proper penalty for this is that the offender should give a buffalo to his ancestors—i.e., that he should name a buffalo which he would neither kill at a funeral nor sell to others.
In one definite case, however, it appeared that driving buffaloes from one village to another on the arpatznol had been one of the offences for which a man had been ordered to do irnörtiti. In this case, however, other faults had been committed, and it is possible that if driving buffaloes on the arpatznol had been the only offence a slighter penalty would have been inflicted.
The ceremony of irnörtiti was performed thirty years ago after the disappearance of the sacred bells of the Kars kudrpali. In this case the diviners were consulted, and they found that the bells had gone away and would not return. It was thought, however, that the palikartmokh, Kakarsiolv, might have committed some offence against the dairy, or have made some mistake in the performance of his duties, and it was thought best that he should perform the irnörtiti ceremony, though, so far as I could learn, it was not directly prescribed by the diviners.
As we shall see, the irnörtiti and pilinörtiti ceremonies may have to be performed as expiation for revealing the secret lore of Toda institutions, but this is an innovation in custom for which I am afraid I was indirectly responsible.
It does not seem that the penalties with their attendant ceremonies are inflicted merely because it is known that a man has committed any of the recognised offences. It is only when some misfortune befalls a man which obliges him to have recourse to the diviners that the ceremonies are performed.
The usual course of events is that a man, his wife, children, or his buffaloes fall ill, or the buffaloes will not give milk or kick their calves, or the milk in the dairy will not coagulate properly. Whenever any of these ills happen the man concludes that for some reason the gods are angry with him and he goes to the diviners to ascertain the cause of their displeasure.
The diviners may find that the man’s misfortunes are due to the action of a sorcerer, or that he has committed some offence against the dairy, possibly some offence which it is well known he is in the habit of committing. The diviners not only announce the cause or causes of the misfortune, but also give information as to the course to be pursued to remove it. If the diviners decide that an offence has been committed and that one of the ceremonies should be performed, the offender goes on the following Sunday to the dairy or dairies of his village and makes a vow that he will perform the ceremony which has been ordered. The following is probably a typical instance. Ten years ago Kòdrner fell ill and one of his buffaloes died. He and his brother consulted the teuol, who said that they had bought things (i.e., given money from the village) on Mondays and Thursdays, the madnol or sacred days of Kars and Kuzhu. They had also driven their buffaloes from Kars to Isharadr on their arpatznol; there had been sickness among the buffaloes and they had driven them to Isharadr without thinking that it was the arpatznol. The teuol said they must do irnörtiti, and on the following Sunday Kòdrner went first to the kudrpali of Kars (Tarziolv) and then to the wursuli (Karziolv) and made the following vow at each:—
Ir kar ultâmâ, pîrsk ultâkh en, Buffalo calf may it be well, illness from be well I,
irnörtkin buffalo will I give,
or “May the buffaloes and calves become well, may I recover from my illness, I will give a buffalo.” [104]
From this account it seems clear that the ceremony of irnörtiti is not a mere punishment for offences committed. If a man commits any of the recognised offences habitually and with the knowledge of the whole community, it does not appear that anything is done. Only when some severe misfortune befalls the offender does he appeal to the diviners to learn how he has offended and how he can atone for his fault. He gives the buffalo with the definite idea of recovering from the illness or removing any other ills which his offences have brought upon him. Giving the buffalo is clearly of the nature of a ‘sin offering,’ but the offering is only made when the sin has already had evil consequences and it is made in order to remove these consequences. Its object is atonement for an offence committed. It seemed that a man only had resort to the advice of the diviners in the case of exceptionally severe misfortunes. The act of giving the buffalo is attended by ceremonial which involves considerable expense to himself and great inconvenience to all the members of his clan. The expenses and inconvenience are so great that the ceremonies of irnörtiti and tuninörtiti are rarely performed, and in some clans it is many years since they have occurred.
There is one case in which the irnörtiti ceremony may be performed for a reason quite different from any of those given above. Owing to a quarrel which took place many generations ago, the people of Pedrkars (and probably also those of Kulhem) may not hold the office of palol. They may become eligible, however, if they perform the irnörtiti ceremony at Kuudr or Kiudr. It would seem as if they can only hold the office by expiating the offence committed in the remote past by their ancestors.
THE IRNÖRTITI CEREMONY
This ceremony takes place at certain prescribed villages, usually at the chief village of the clan, though when a clan has several important dairies the ceremony may be performed at any of them. Thus, members of the Kuudrol may give the buffalo at Kuudr, Kiudr or Miuni.
At nearly every village there is an appointed spot, usually marked by a stone or a group of stones, called irnörtkars, at which the ceremony is to be performed. At Kars there is a row of stones, shown in Fig. 42. At Nòdrs the appointed spot is a pool of water (Fig. 43) by the side of a gap in the long wall of that village.
On the day before the new moon following the vow to give the buffalo, all the women leave the village at which the ceremony is to take place, and all the men of the same kudr as the man who is giving the buffalo must also leave the village if they should be living there. Their place is taken by men of the kudr which is to receive the buffalo. If men of both kudr are living at the village, those of the giving kudr go and those of the receiving kudr remain; thus, when Kòdrner, who lives at Kars, made his offering, he and his brother left and went to live at another village of the clan, while Parkurs and his brothers, who belong to the other kudr, remained behind. If there is a wursuli at the village, the wursol remains at his post. If the palikartmokh is of the same kudr as the offender, he leaves and a new dairyman from the other kudr is appointed. All the men who remain at the village sleep in the outer room of the dairy—at Kars, in the outer room of the kudrpali. The palikartmokh does his dairy work in the inner room as usual and sleeps in the outer room with the rest.
The people live thus at the village for a month, no women, no men of the offending kudr and no people of other clans being allowed to visit them.
The actual ceremony takes place at the end of this month, on the Sunday following the new moon. On the Saturday the man, called the irnörtpol, who is to make the offering brings a female calf between one and two years of age to a wood near the village and makes a rough temporary calf enclosure (kadr), tying the calf to a tree. If the calf is troublesome, the man and his companions may sleep in the wood by the side of the calf, but generally they leave it in the wood and go to sleep in the village where they have been living. The calf must have no blemish, its eyes must be clear, and no part of its ears or tail may be cut. [105]
On the following morning a boy between ten and fifteen years of age is chosen, who is called ponkartvaimokh, the boy who observes the festival. It is his duty to drive the calf.
All those who are to be present take in their hands green sticks of the kind called kwadrikurs. All have their right arms outside their cloaks (kevenarut), and must have bathed in the morning and abstained from food.
When the time for the ceremony comes, the ponkartvaimokh, who is followed by the irnörtpol and other men of his division, drives the calf towards the village. The people in the village then call out “Irnört! it vos!”—“Give the buffalo! Come here!” and they go to the appointed place and stand on the dairy side of the irnörtkars, or other spot appointed for the ceremony, while the calf is driven up towards the stones or other mark from the side away from the dairy. The palikartmokh, naked except for the kuvn, and the wursol, with the tuni round his loins, stand with the people of the receiving kudr. When the ponkartvaimokh has driven the calf up to the place, he asks three times, “Irnörtkina?”—“Shall I give the buffalo?”—and the palikartmokh replies each time, “Irnört!” The boy then drives the calf across the stones or other mark to the place where the buffaloes of the receiving kudr are standing. According to one account, the calf is driven direct into the tu, but it seems almost certain that this is wrong, though it may be that it is the practice of some clans. The calf then becomes the property of the kudr whose representatives have been living at the village. At Nòdrs the calf is driven through the gap in the wall and across the pool of water in the direction of the conical dairy.
All those present, both the man who has given the calf and his companions and those who have received the calf, bow down to the ground, resting their foreheads on the ends of their cloaks (as in Fig. 44), and utter a formula different for each clan. At Kars it runs:—
Swâmi, Teikîrzi, Târziolv, Kârziolv, Kârzû ultâmâ; îr kark ultâmâ; îrnörtvuspimi, [106] ultâmâ.
Then all present go to the dairy or dairies and bow down at the threshold. At Kars they go to Tarziolv (the kudrpali), to Karziolv (the wursuli), and to Karzu (the buffalo pen) and bow down at the threshold of each, and then all partake of a feast. The food has been prepared by the dairyman, and includes the special kind called ashkkartpimi, which is eaten outside the dairy. Only the men of the clan who have taken part in the ceremony may be present at this feast.
After the feast all the men belonging to the kudr of the irnörtpol must again leave the village, but the only one of their number who is subject to any special restrictions is the boy who has acted as ponkartvaimokh, who must avoid women and must sleep in the dairy of some village until the end of the whole business. He is spoken of as being in the condition called pon and derives his name from this.
The wursol and the palikartmokh of the village at which the ceremony has taken place must stay there for another month, but the men of the kudr which has received the calf may stay there or not as they please. No women and no people other than men of the same kudr may visit the village during this time.
At the end of the month the people who have been occupying the village rub the dairy or dairies thoroughly with buffalo-dung (palikâratiti, dairy he purifies). All the people of the village then return and another feast takes place, in which the food is rice boiled in milk. Then the usual inhabitants of the village return to their houses, and if any men of the receiving kudr have come from another village, they return and life resumes its normal course.
The ceremony of irnörtiti may thus involve the removal of the usual inhabitants from a village for about two months, and the giving of two feasts, while the man who has offended also loses a calf. The Todas probably think little of the inconvenience of removal, though probably they are more troubled by it now than in former times, especially when they have to leave a village like Kars, which is, under normal circumstances, always inhabited at the present time. It seems that the inconvenience, together with the expense of the feasts, is sufficient to render the ceremony a very unusual incident in the lives of the Todas.
TUNINÖRTITI
The smaller importance of this ceremony as compared with irnörtiti is shown in several ways. The ceremony may be performed at any village at which there is a dairy, and it is not necessary for the people of the receiving kudr to stay at the village for a month before the ceremony is performed.
The prescribed day is Sunday, and on the previous day all the people of the same kudr as the giver of the tuni leave the village, and the men of the other division come and sleep in the dairy as before the irnörtiti ceremony. The man who gives the tuni is called the tuninörtpol, and he procures the garment from a Badaga, paying for it about 1 rupee 4 annas.
On the Sunday morning the tuninörtpol comes with some companions, all having abstained from food. The palikartmokh, who must be of the same kudr as the other men at the village, goes to the front of the dairy and one of the men calls out, “Tuninörtpol bon!”—“Cloth giving man, come!” The tuninörtpol, who is standing at an appointed spot not far off, goes to the dairy, lays the tuni at its threshold, and bows down, touching the cloth with his forehead. While he is doing this the palikartmokh prays in the inner room of the dairy and the men staying at the village pray in the outer room. Then the tuninörtpol enters the dairy and is given buttermilk and food by the palikartmokh, after which he stays in a wood near the dairy all day and returns to the village where he is living after night-fall. The people of the receiving kudr stay at the village for a month, at the end of which they have a feast and then all return to their own villages.
PILINÖRTITI
In this ceremony a man gives a silver ring. The offering is differentiated from those already described in that it may be given to bring about the removal of misfortunes which are not due to any offence committed by the man. In some cases, however, the ceremony may be undertaken as an atonement for an offence. Kòdrner, my guide, had to give a ring to the dairy at Kiudr in the general distribution of penalties which followed my visit.
The custom of pilinörtiti is limited to certain villages or clans. According to some accounts it is only followed at the villages of Kiudr and Kanòdrs, noted for the special sanctity of their dairies. According to others the ceremony is performed by the Karsol at the dairy of Kuzhu, and at Nidrsi I was shown a small stone, almost completely buried in the ground, which was called the pilinörtkars, and this indicates that the ceremony was also at one time performed at this village. The ceremony is certainly of especial importance at Kiudr, and the following description is of the procedure at this place.
If a man has no children, or if he becomes ill, or if his buffaloes give no milk, he may make a vow to do pilinörtiti. If he is a member of the Kuudrol, the people of the kudr to which he does not belong go to the dairy. The offerer of the ring sleeps the night before in the dairy of his village and goes in the morning with one companion to Kiudr, taking care that no one sees him by the way. Both must go without food.
On reaching Kiudr the two men go to the stream called Keikudr [107] which flows between the dairy and the dwelling-huts, and after washing hands and face in the stream they wait there. The people of the other kudr who are in the dairy light a lamp and place it between the two rooms, and then one goes to the door of the dairy and calls out three times “Pilinörtpol bon!” The men at the stream are not within sight, but they hear the summons and come to the front of the dairy. The men in the dairy lay the tuni of the dairyman at the threshold and the pilinörtpol places the ring on the cloth and bows down, touching the cloth with his forehead, and prays as follows:—
Tânenmâ, târmâmâ; atch kar tâ mâ, atch mokh tâ May it be well, may it be well; little calf give may, little son give
mâ; kar kulâth, kar kuleiti tâ mâ, kar nesâth, may; calf not refuse milk, calf take milk give may, calf not kick away,
neseiti tâ mâ; opath ûtm âthi punerd kwar arki madi; nû stand give may; once meal it is twelve years vow will; may there be
ârk mâ; nudri ârk mâ; kazun ârk mâ; per no disease; may there be no trouble; may there be no kazun; may there be
ârk mâ. no Tamil.
The free rendering of this prayer was said to be as follows:—
“May it be well; may my buffaloes have calves; may I have children; may my calves have milk, and may they not be kicked away by their mothers; as surely as I am shortly to take food, do I make my vow for ever and ever; may I and my buffaloes be free from disease; may no evil befall me; may there be no kazun (see p. 403) to kill me; may no Tamil or other outsiders come to disturb me.”
The last clause was said by Samuel to be interpreted: “Let me not get into trouble with the government,” but it is probably much older than this interpretation would indicate, and refers to the former dislike of the Todas to any intercourse with people other than the Badagas and Kotas. “Twelve years” is a common expression for an indefinitely long time, and may be translated “for ever.” The practice of combining positive and negative sentences as in this prayer is one which seems to be not uncommon in the Toda language. It will be noticed that several of the clauses are identical with those of the prayer ordinarily used in the dairy.
When the pilinörtpol has finished his prayer he rises, and the palikartmokh takes up the tuni and the ring and puts them in the dairy. Then the pilinörtpol and his companions go into the outer room of the dairy and take food prepared by the dairyman, after which they go to a wood near Kiudr and stay there till after nightfall, when they make their way home, taking care not to be seen by anyone.
If the ring is given by one of the Kuudrol it becomes the property of the men of the other kudr, but as its value is very small, only from four annas to two rupees, it is not divided, but is usually taken by the man of the kudr who takes the chief part in the ceremony.
The ceremony as described above resembles those of irnörtiti and tuninörtiti, in that the offering is given by a man of one division of the clan to the members of the other division.
Pilinörtiti may also be undertaken by a man as an atonement for wrong-doing, and in the only case of the kind of which I know, the wrong-doer, although he belonged to the Kars clan of the Tartharol, had to make the offering to Kiudr. In this case there was no question of the ring passing from one kudr to another, and it probably became the property of the man connected with Kiudr who took the chief part in conducting the ceremony.
Various unfortunate events which occurred during my visit to the Todas illustrate very well the working of the regulations which have been described in this chapter. One of these misfortunes befell Kutadri, who went with me to visit the Kundahs, the headquarters of the Pan clan. Mr. Mackenzie, with whom I was staying, had shot a sambhar, and Kutadri joined others in making a hearty meal on the flesh of the animal. The next day he felt far from well, and searching in his mind for the cause of his sufferings, his suspicions did not fall on the sambhar, but wavered between sorcery of the Kurumbas and the anger of the gods of the locality, because he had shown me certain sacred features of the land. He was unable to continue to act as my guide, rendering my visit to the Kundahs largely fruitless, and on his return home he frightened himself into serious illness.
Teitnir, who had told me many things, but, above all, had dared to show me the erkumptthpimi sacrifice, lost his wife a few days after this ceremony. She had given birth to a dead child, and in spite of obviously serious fever, she had gone through a trying ceremony connected with removal to the seclusion-hut, and had walked a long way to this hut. Two days later she died.
Kaners, who had been my chief informant on the procedure of the ti dairy, awoke one morning to find the dairy of his village burnt. No human agency seemed possible, and no doubt was entertained that it was another manifestation of the displeasure of the gods.
Numerous councils were held, and the diviners were consulted, on this occasion Midjkudr and Tadrners. They found that Kutadri’s misfortunes were due to his having revealed to me secrets about Pan, although, as a matter of fact, his illness had prevented his telling me anything of importance. It was decided that he was to give a buffalo to the Pan ti.
The death of Teitnir’s wife was found to have two causes. [108] The first was that Teitnir had shown me the erkumptthpimi ceremony; the second was that he had gone with his wife to Lake View, the house of the Zenana mission, and had stayed there for several months, Teitnir having done this in order to avoid losing his wife according to the terersthi custom (see Chap. XXII). For the first offence Teitnir was to do irnörtiti to his clan, the Kuudrol, and for the second offence he was to give a buffalo to the Amatol, his pia, or grandfather, being especially singled out among them. The latter penalty was paid before I left the hills. Teitnir devoted a sacred buffalo (pasthir) to his grandfather, and as a sign that he had done so, he did kalmelpudithti to Ivievan (52), one of the chief men of his family. The giving of the buffalo was followed by a feast.
The teuol were also consulted on account of the burning of the dairy belonging to the village of Kaners. They decided that the loss of the dairy was due to spontaneous combustion, “had burnt of itself,” because Kaners had revealed to me the secrets of the ti, and, as he had told me chiefly the procedure of the Nòdrs ti, he was sentenced to do irnörtiti to this institution.
Kòdrner, who had been my general assistant, was directed to perform pilinörtiti to Kiudr, and the teuol also said that all the Todas were to do irnörtiti to the ti dairies because the elders had not intervened and put an end to the revelations which the people had been making to me.
Unfortunately these decisions of the teuol were only given out very shortly before I left the hills. Indeed, the divination appeared to be still going on when I left, probably in order to obtain further light on the troubles. I had therefore no opportunity of witnessing the various ceremonies which were to result from my visit. I hoped that Samuel might have been able to see some of them, but the only proceedings of which he was able to give me any account took place on January 5th, nearly a month after my departure, when all the Todas assembled at the ti mad of Mòdr, where the buffaloes of the Nòdrs ti were standing, and prayed to the ti to pardon them for the sins they had committed in revealing its secrets. After praying, they took food in the pül of the dairy, and did not return home till the evening. I was not told of the existence of any such ceremony of atonement by prayer only, and I strongly suspect it was an innovation adopted in order to avoid the expense of the general irnörtiti to the ti which the diviners had prescribed.
Several of the offerings which were thus ordered by the teuol seem clearly to have been of the nature of punishment. Kòdrner was to do pilinörtiti because he had helped me, and the Todas in general were to give buffaloes to the ti dairies. When I was first told about these offerings, I was inclined to regard them in general as punishments and to treat them as if they were social regulations. With further knowledge it seemed clear that they were distinctly of a religious nature, and were really sin offerings designed to propitiate the gods and bring about the removal of misfortunes which had come upon the offenders. I have therefore described these offerings in the same chapter as the ceremony which is clearly a sacrifice.
The variety of the irnörtiti ceremony in which a buffalo is given to the ti dairy is that which approaches most nearly to a sacrifice; the offered animal is not killed, but in going to the sacred herd of the ti, it may clearly be regarded as devoted to the service of the gods. The ceremony of pilinörtiti to the sacred dairy of Kiudr is again an example of an offering to a higher power in those cases in which the ring is given by a man of another clan so that the mechanism of the kudr does not come into play.
These clear examples of offerings to gods or sacred places are, however, very closely related to the other cases in which offerings simply pass from one division of the clan to another. It seems that we have in these offerings a good example of something which is midway between a social regulation of the nature of punishment and a definitely religious rite of propitiation of higher powers.
There are two chief possibilities. The idea of offering to a higher power may be primary, and the ceremonies of irnörtiti, &c., in which the property merely passes from one division of the clan to the other may be secondary modifications to keep property within the clan. On the other hand, the mechanism of the kudr may be primary, and irnörtiti to the ti dairy and pilinörtiti to Kiudr may be religious developments of what was originally a social regulation.
I have no information which enables me to say that one of the two possibilities is more probable than the other. The solution probably depends on the much larger question, whether the Todas are people whose religious system has developed out of the state of many primitive people where social regulations exist without anything which can clearly be called a religious sanction, or whether they are a people whose religious system has degenerated from one higher than that they now possess.
If the former supposition is correct, it is probable that the religious sanction has been added to the system of social punishment, which seems to be all which clearly exists in the offerings when these are kept within the clan. If the latter supposition is correct, it seems more likely that the whole mechanism of the kudris a device by which offerings which should be made to a higher power may remain the property of the clan.
The fact that the giving of the buffalo or other offering is accompanied by prayer and the various restrictions of a more or less religious nature which accompany the ceremonial show that at the present time the ceremony has in all cases a very definitely religious character, but it is quite possible to regard these features in two ways, either as accretions to a system of social punishment or as vestiges of what was once a purely religious sacrifice in which the offerings were given to the gods.
XIV. BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD CEREMONIES
The ceremonies connected with childbirth begin before the birth of the child. These ceremonies are only performed for the first child or when the woman obtains a new husband, so that they may, from one point of view, be regarded as marriage ceremonies. Nevertheless, I prefer to consider them here, and to leave the ceremonies more strictly connected with marriage till a later chapter. These latter ceremonies are far less elaborate than those to be described in this chapter, and may be more fitly considered in connexion with the social regulation of marriage.
At or about the fifth month of pregnancy, a ceremony is performed which is called ûr patitth kaitütitthpimi, “village left, hand we burnt,” or more shortly, ürvatpimi, “village we leave,” or kaitütitthpimi. The ceremony is named from its two essential features; the woman leaves the village and lives secluded in a hut and her wrists are burnt.
When it is known that the ceremony is to take place, a special hut, called puzhars (Fig. 45), is built in a prescribed place at some little distance from the village, or if this building already exists, it is put into good order. The word puzhars means “mud-house” or “earth-house,” which would seem to point to a time when a temporary hut of mud was used, but at the present time it is built of wood, though it is of much simpler and rougher construction than the ordinary house.
The distance of the puzhars from the huts in which the people live depends on the degree of sacredness of the village. According to Breeks, the distance is greatest in those villages which have a dairy of the conical kind, but it seems that there is no real difference between these villages and any other etudmad. In some cases when the dairy has a high degree of sanctity, the puzhars may be at an adjacent village; thus, a pregnant woman of Kiudr goes into seclusion at Molkush, about a quarter of a mile away, and at this village the seclusion-hut (Fig. 45) is about a hundred yards from the house in which the people live.
I may mention here that the objection to the presence of a pregnant woman in one of the more sacred villages may extend to a time when she is not in the seclusion-hut. When I visited Kiudr for the purpose of testing the people of the village for colour-blindness, Sintagars, who was pregnant and was living at Molkush, was not allowed to come to the hut to be tested like the rest, but sat on the mound shown in the foreground of Fig. 7, about thirty yards away.
The features of the hand-burning ceremony as performed by the Tartharol differ considerably from those for a Teivali woman, and I will begin with a description of the former.
On the day of the new moon, the woman goes to the puzhars. The husband (or in his absence his brother or other near male relative) cuts six sticks of the kind called kwadrikurs and sets them up so as to represent a dairy with two rooms, which is called pülpali. He then cuts four bamboo-reeds called wadr, about eighteen inches long, which represent dairy vessels; two of them are called patatpun, and the other two ertatpun. He fills these with water taken neither from the pali nipa nor from the ars nipa, for if he touched the water of either of the streams, they would be defiled and their water could not be used. He therefore fetches the water from a stream at some distance from the village.
The husband brings the reeds half filled with water and places those called patatpun in the inner room of the pülpali. He takes the other two—the ertatpun—to a two-year-old female calf (pòl), and pours out the water from one reed on the left side of the middle of the back (ûv) of the calf, and catches the water in the other. He then gives two leaves (kakuders) to the woman, who makes a leaf vessel, into which he pours three times from the ertatpun the water which has flowed from the back of the calf. The woman raises the leaf vessel to her forehead and then drinks, and the man puts the two ertatpun into the outer room of the pülpali. [109] The woman then bows down with her forehead to the threshold of the pülpali, and the man takes up the sticks forming the imitation dairy and the four reeds and throws all away.
The woman has brought with her a new earthenware pot called mâtkûdrik, into which she puts food (rice or grain) and water, and places it on a small oven made on the spot with stones. When the food is cooked, the woman takes two leaves called pelkkodsthmuliers, i.e., leaves used in the ordination of the palikartmokh, and portions out the food on the leaves. She then brings two pieces of wood called parskuti (Eleagnus latifolia), puts them in the ground and covers them with a blanket. The two leaf-plates with the food are now placed on the two pieces of wood, one on each, and the woman asks Pîrn podia, Piri podia? (podia = have you come?) My informants could tell me nothing about Pirn or Piri, except that the former was supposed to be male and the latter female.
The woman throws the parskuti into the bushes, this procedure being called tapi kûrs vutpimi, “bushes stick throw we,” and then makes a little roll of threads which is called pashti, puts it in the fire and burns herself with the roll in four places, two on each hand, once on the prominence formed by the carpo-metacarpal joint of the thumb, and once on the prominence formed by the styloid process of the radius. The burning is sometimes done for her by the woman who is to stay in the puzhars with her [110] during her period of seclusion. When the ceremony is over, the woman goes into the hut with her companion and stays there for nearly a month, till three or four days before the next new moon. While in the seclusion-hut, the woman is visited by relatives and friends, who do not, however, come near the hut, but stand some way off and say kaitütudpatia? (“Have you had hand-burning?”) They leave a present of rice for the woman and go to the people of the village, by whom they are entertained.
When the woman comes out of the puzhars at the end of the month, there is a ceremony called marthk maj atpimi, “To the village buttermilk we pour.” Early in the morning of the appointed day a man of the Melgars clan comes to the village and milks one of the ordinary buffaloes (putiir) into the vessel called kabanachok. The buffalo must not have been milked by any one else since the time it last calved. The Melgars man places the milk in front of the hut where the woman usually lives, and then goes away, and the milk is taken by the people of the village. In the evening, after the day’s work is over and the buffaloes are shut up for the night, a woman is chosen who has had no contact with the secluded woman, and she takes the milk drawn by the Melgars man to the puzhars, together with the leaves of the kind called parsers. She pours out the milk three times into these leaves and gives to the pregnant woman to drink. The latter has previously bathed and put on a new mantle, and after drinking she returns to the ordinary hut and may resume her household work.
The milking is done by a Melgars man for all the Tarthar clans except that of Kwòdrdoni, where the buffalo is milked by a man of that clan. I do not know why this clan forms an exception to the general rule, but Kwòdrdoni is one of the most remote Toda villages, and it is possible [111] that the difficulty of getting a Melgars man to come to them has led the people to do this part of the ceremony themselves.
For fifteen days after leaving the seclusion-hut, the woman must drink buttermilk procured from a Melgars dairy, and must take food called peritòr, [112] viz., grain or rice which has been cooked in Melgars buttermilk. At the end of the fifteen days she gives up taking the peritòr, but continues to drink Melgars buttermilk for another fifteen days.
For a woman of the Teivaliol, the ceremony of urvatpimi is much more simple. No pülpali is made, and the husband fetches two pieces of reed only, which are called ertatpun. They are half filled with water, which is poured from one over the back of a calf into the other as in the Tarthar ceremony, and the woman drinks in the same way, but this is immediately followed by the hand-burning, and the rite with the two sticks and the invocation of Pirn and Piri is entirely omitted.
The Teivali ceremony on coming out of the puzhars takes place in the early morning. A man (not the husband) fetches water from the ars nipa in a brass vessel called achok. He takes the vessel to a pregnant buffalo and tries to milk the buffalo over the vessel of water. Although no milk comes, the attempt is supposed to convert the water in the vessel into milk. The woman then leaves the seclusion-hut and is given two leaves (parsers), of which she makes a leaf cup, and the man pours the water which is supposed to be milk into the cup three times, and the woman drinks each time after raising the cup to her forehead. The woman and her companion then go to another special hut, called aliars, and stay there for a week, or if there is in the village a house of the kind called merkalars (see p. 29), the woman may go to the hinder part of this house instead of to the aliars, but in this case all the household things have to be removed from the merkalars.
At the end of the week in the aliars or merkalars, there follows the ceremony called marthk maj atpimi. Early in the morning the palikartmokh brings penmaj (i.e., butter and buttermilk) in an earthenware pot and two firebrands (tütkuli) to the front of the hut, puts the brands on the ground, lays the pot on them for a time, and then puts the pot on the raised platform in front of the hut. He then goes away, and a woman brings a brass vessel (terg) and transfers the butter and buttermilk to the terg, and gives it to the woman, who drinks and goes to the ordinary hut.
While the woman is in the aliars or merkalars, she is not confined to the dwelling as when in the puzhars, but may go about. She must not, however, do any household work, nor go to any other village, nor to the ordinary huts of her own village. If in the hinder part of the merkalars, she must not go to the fore part of the house.
Thus the ritual of the Tartharol differs greatly from that of the Teivaliol in these ceremonies. The rite of making an artificial dairy is entirely omitted by the Teivaliol, and, as we shall see later, it is also omitted in a similar ceremony performed after childbirth, though the pieces of reed used to pour water over the calf are named after dairy vessels in both cases. I could obtain no explanation of the difference of procedure, nor of the omission of the invocation of Pirn and Piri by the Teivali division. It is possible that this latter ceremony has been borrowed, but if so, there is no obvious reason why it should have been borrowed by one division, and not by the other.
In the ceremonies accompanying the return to ordinary life, it is perhaps natural that the Melgars man should only take part in the proceedings of his own division. The other chief difference in the procedure of the two divisions is that the return takes place in two stages among the Teivaliol, while the Tarthar woman goes directly from the puzhars to the ordinary hut. I was told that the difference was connected with the fact that the Tarthar women drank milk, whilst the Teivali women did not, but I could not discover why this should lead to a difference of procedure.
THE PURSÜTPIMI CEREMONY
About the seventh month of pregnancy a ceremony is performed, which is called pursütpimi, “bow (and arrow) we touch.” This ceremony begins on the evening before the day of the new moon. The pregnant woman goes into a wood about a furlong from the village at which she is living. She is accompanied by her husband, or if she has several, by the husband who is to give the bow and arrow. The husband cuts a triangular niche in a tree, [113] of which the Toda name is kers. The niche is large enough to contain a lamp, and is made a few feet above the ground, so that it is about on a level with the eyes of the woman when she is sitting on the ground. Ghi is then put in an earthenware lamp, which is lighted and placed in the niche. Some sort of arrangement is made on the tree to provide a covering under which the woman is later to sit, but I could not satisfy myself exactly how this is done. Husband and wife then go to find the wood called puv, [114] and the grass called nark. [115] A bow (purs) is made from the wood by stripping off a piece of bark and stretching it across the bent stick so as to form the string of the bow. [116] The grass is put in the little artificial bow so as to resemble an arrow.
The husband and wife return to the tree with the bow and arrow, and the relatives of the pair come to the spot. The father of the woman promises a young female calf, the offspring of a given buffalo, which he names, saying after the name pòl todein, or “calf I have given”; thus, Kemars pòl todein would mean, “I have given a calf, the daughter of Kemars.” [117] Then husband and wife salute certain people by bowing before them and raising their feet to the forehead (kalmelpudithti). The wife salutes in this way all her male relatives and those of her husband older than herself—i.e., she salutes those whom she would salute in this way under normal circumstances (see Chap. XXI). The husband salutes all the male [118] relatives of his wife, irrespective of their being older or younger than himself.
The wife then sits down beneath the tree in front of the lamp, and the husband gives her the imitation bow and arrow. In doing so he says the kwarzam of his village followed by the words “Teikirzi Tirsk, pursvat!”—i.e., “To Teikirzi and Tirshti, hold the bow and arrow!” The wife replies, “purs iveru?”—“What is the name of the bow and arrow?”—and the husband then gives the name of the bow and arrow, which is different for each clan. The question and answer are each time repeated so that they are said three times. The formulæ repeated on this occasion differ for each clan in the kwarzam of the village and in the name of the bow. For the Kuudrol the latter was pursgârûv, so that a Kuudr man would first say, “Atthkar Teikirzi Tirsk pursvat,” and in answer to his wife’s question he would answer, “Pursgârûv”. The only clan which does not say the kwarzam of the village is that of Nòdrs, where only the names of the gods are mentioned.
I only obtained the special names of the bow from three clans—those of Kuudr, Kars and Taradr. That of Kuudr has already been given; the name of the Kars bow is pulkiûkhm and that of Taradr pursüdsk. When the husband gives the bow and arrow to his wife, she raises it to her forehead and then, holding it in her right hand, turns to gaze at lamp in the tree. She looks for an hour or until the lamp goes out, and then all present [119] go to the village for food, except the husband and wife. The man makes a fireplace, lights a fire and cooks jaggery and rice in a new pot, using only ghi, and not butter, to mix the rice, and while he is doing this his wife ties up certain kinds of food in a cloth and puts the bundle under the tree. This food includes rice, ragi, barley, wheat, the grain (?) called kirsi (see p. 266), some jaggery and salt. Some pieces of honeycomb are also placed on leaves, which are then thrown away. When the food cooked by the man is ready both husband and wife eat together.
Later the relatives return from the village and all pass the night in the wood, the relatives keeping at some distance from the married pair. At daybreak on the following day, the day of the new moon, all return to the village and feast, food being given to all visitors.
Several of those who have described this ceremony have included in the description an account of “tying the tali.” [120] So far as I could ascertain nothing of the kind is done. I inquired into the point many times and all agreed that it formed no part of the Toda ceremony and that its equivalent was the giving of the bow and arrow. More than one man spoke of the pursütpimi ceremony as “tying the tali,” but the latter expression is merely the equivalent of “marriage ceremony,” and the very man who used this expression denied vehemently that tying the tali or anything else round the neck of the woman formed any part of the Toda ceremony.
It seemed, however, that after pursütpimi the woman is allowed to resume her ornaments, which she has been prohibited from wearing up to this time, and it is possible that this resumption of her ornaments may have been mistaken for “tying the tali.” It seemed clear, however, that the ornaments were not put on by the husband, nor did the resumption of the ornaments partake in any way of a ceremonial character.
As I hoped to have a chance of witnessing this ceremony during my visit, I did not thresh out the details of pursütpimi as thoroughly as those of most other ceremonies and my account is not as complete as I could wish.
The ceremony of pursütpimi is of the greatest importance from the social point of view and, as we shall see later, the fatherhood of the child depends entirely upon it. The man who gives the bow and arrow is the father of the child for all social purposes, and is regarded as such even if he has had nothing to do with the woman before the ceremony.
The ceremony must always be performed during the first pregnancy of a woman and it takes place in any succeeding pregnancy only when it is desired for any reason to alter the fatherhood of the children. One of the most serious scandals in Toda society is the birth of a child when the mother has not been through this ceremony.
Both the pregnancy ceremonies are performed at the first funeral of an unmarried or barren woman. In the case of an unmarried girl the bow and arrow are given at the pursütpimi ceremony by a matchuni of the deceased—i.e., by a relative whom the deceased girl might herself have married. The hand-burning of the urvatpimi ceremony is usually performed by a woman of the same clan as the deceased.
Since the ceremonies are only performed at the first pregnancy, or when it is desired to change the fatherhood of a child, it seems clear that they closely resemble marriage ceremonies. They would seem to be either marriage ceremonies which have been postponed till shortly before the birth of the first child, [121] or, what is more probable, pregnancy ceremonies resembling those customary in India, which have acquired social significance and have come to resemble marriage ceremonies. But the numerous ceremonies which are performed during pregnancy by the Hindus take place during every pregnancy and are, therefore, sharply differentiated from the Toda rites.
CHILDBIRTH
When the woman returns from the seclusion-hut after the urvatpimi ceremony she lives in her usual home with the rest of the family and does her usual work, and she is delivered there. It seemed that any one might be present, and that there was no special ceremony connected with delivery.
During delivery, the woman kneels with her head resting on the breast of a man, usually her husband, who clasps his hands behind her neck. She is tended by a woman, usually by one noted for skill in these matters. If there is much delay, all men and women present lay their hands on the head of the woman and say:
“Swâmi maz vûrmâ; swâmi pûdikan termâ.”
If this is not efficacious a man brings water in a vessel and prays, stirring the water with a piece of grass of the kind called kakar. When the prayer is finished, the man sprinkles the water over the woman.
The cord (pekû) is cut with a knife, being held down with a stick while it is being cut.
The afterbirth is called naj or pekûkûdri. If there is delay in its delivery, a medicine called najmad is given which is procured from the Badagas. The afterbirth is buried on the day on which the woman goes to the seclusion-hut, a few days after delivery. If the child is still-born its body is buried at the same time.
A caul is named kwadri (umbrella), but no importance is attached to it, nor is it kept.
SECLUSION AFTER CHILDBIRTH
Two or three days after childbirth the mother and child go to the seclusion-hut, or puzhars, the same structure being used as after the hand-burning ceremony. Various rites are performed, both when going to and leaving the seclusion-hut, and these have many points in common with those which take place before and after the hand-burning. As in that case, the procedure for the Tartharol differs considerably from that of the Teivaliol.
The general name for the ceremony of going to the puzhars is pòlk pòtha nir utpimi—“to the calf back (or hind quarters) water we pour,” from one of the chief features of the proceedings. The ceremony takes place either in the early morning or in the evening.
The woman who is to be secluded, whether she be Tarthar or Teivali, rubs ashes on her head and face (pûthi adipimi, ashes we rub), and comes out of the ordinary hut in which she has been living since the delivery. She holds over her head a branch of the ‘Nilgiri holly,’ [122] which has spreading leaves so that it resembles an umbrella; this leafy umbrella is called tòrikwadr, and the act is called tòrikwadr patipimi, “we hold the umbrella.” The head is also covered with the putkuli. From the moment she leaves the hut the woman is very careful to keep her face turned away from the sun, not on account of its noxious influence, but in order to avoid the star or other body called Keirt, which is supposed to be near the sun. The child is carried in front of the mother by another woman, who also holds a tòrikwadr to shelter the infant from the evil influence of Keirt. Among the Tartharol a small artificial dairy is made, exactly as in the urvatpimi ceremony, and four reeds are cut to represent dairy vessels. As the woman walks towards the place where the pülpali has been erected, another woman lays on the ground before her a leaf of kakud on which she puts some threads taken from a madtuni—i.e., the garment worn by the wursol. These threads are called tunikar, [123] and they are taken up by the mother and put in the string round her waist on the right side. [124] Water is then poured by the husband from the imitation patatpun over the hind quarters (pòtha) of a calf, so that it falls into the ertatpun just as in the urvatpimi ceremony. Before the woman drinks this water, three drops of it are put into the mouth of the child and a four-anna piece (panm) into its hand. The mother then drinks three times and bows down at the threshold of the imitation dairy, after which she goes into the seclusion-hut. During the whole of the proceedings she is careful not to turn her face towards the sun.
Among the Teivaliol there is no imitation dairy and, as in the urvatpimi ceremony, only two reeds are used as ertatpun. A fire is made on an improvised fireplace of three stones, and lighted by means of thatch brought from the hut, [125] and food is put on a fragment of an earthenware vessel and placed over the fire.
After the woman has drunk of the water which has been poured over the back of the calf, she breaks the earthenware fragment over the fire, saying, Namavku, “to Namav,” this rite being called Namavtur kwudrtpimi, “to Namav we give.” The woman then goes to the seclusion-hut, being assisted by her husband, who now acquires the impurity which is called ichchil, and any one else who touches the woman after this ceremony also becomes ichchil.
I saw the ceremony of going to the puzhars on two occasions, the woman each time belonging to the Teivaliol. The most striking feature of each occasion was the obvious and intense dread of Keirt. In one case, soon after leaving the hut, the woman, Sintagars, called out for another umbrella as she feared that the tòrikwadr was not sufficient to shelter her from Keirt, and during the rest of the proceedings she held over herself both the leafy umbrella and one of the ordinary kind.
I was told that all the chief incidents of the ceremony—the rubbing on of ashes, the holding of the leaf umbrella, the pouring of water over the calf and the giving to Namav—were all designed to avert the evil influence of Keirt, which they call Keirtpudrivuti (see p. 269).
After the woman has gone to the seclusion-hut she is visited by relatives and friends, who stand at a distance, just as they did after the hand-burning ceremony. They bring rice with them as a present and call out
Marsvut sivn mikh mokh (or kugh) udpatia? Confined life remaining son (or daughter) had you?
“Have you had a son (or daughter) and are yet alive?” The visitors then go to the huts of the village and are entertained.
The woman and child stay in the seclusion-hut, accompanied by the husband and by a woman who is usually the assistant at the birth. If the child is not the first, the mother remains in seclusion till a few days before the next new moon, this kind of seclusion being called nâtersper. If the child is the first-born, the stay in the seclusion-hut is longer and is called kadrthersper. In this case the woman stays in the hut till a month has elapsed after the new moon following the birth. Thus Sintagars went into seclusion on Sunday, October 19th, and came out on Thursday, November 27th, 1902, exactly four weeks after the new moon of October 31st.
The proceedings on leaving the seclusion-hut are like those which take place after the seclusion following the urvatpimi ceremony, but with a few additional rites.
Among the Tartharol there is only one ceremony, called marthk maj atpimi, in which a buffalo is milked on the morning of the day by a Melgars man. Before the woman drinks the milk in the evening, another woman lays threads of tuni on leaves of kakud, and puts them on the ground before the mother, who puts them in the right side of her waist-string as when going to the seclusion-hut. After returning to the hut the woman drinks Melgars buttermilk and eats food cooked in Melgars buttermilk in exactly the same way as after the hand-burning ceremony.
Among the Teivaliol the return to ordinary life takes place in two stages, as after the hand-burning ceremony. The woman first goes to the aliars, or to the hinder part of the merkalars, after drinking water, which has been supposed to be turned into milk by pretended milking from a pregnant buffalo. I saw this ceremony on one occasion (Fig. 47) when the pretended milking was done by a small boy, Pongudr (52), and the supposed milk was poured into the leaves and given to the mother by a woman who had not been present in the seclusion-hut with her. The person who pretends to milk the pregnant buffalo becomes ichchil by doing so, and the reason why a young boy was chosen for this office was that the adult members of the family might escape the disabilities attendant on this condition. On this occasion especial care was taken that the mother should sit facing the sun during the ceremony. She at first sat down with her face turned away from the sun, and she was made to turn round, so that she directly faced it. This was the exact opposite of the procedure followed when going to the seclusion-hut.
After being in the aliars or merkalars for a week there follows the ceremony of marthk maj atpimi, which is the same as that after the urvatpimi ceremony, with the addition that a representation of a hut is made with five or six sticks of the kind called kwadrikurs. A boy goes within the imitation hut with a brass vessel (achok), and coming out gives this to the woman, who bows down (nersatiti) with her child at the threshold of the imitation hut. She then takes butter and buttermilk which have been placed by the palikartmokh on fire-brands (see p. 318). After taking the mixture the woman goes to the dwelling-hut and resumes her ordinary duties.
It is the custom for everyone present on this occasion to give the child a four-anna piece (panm), and near relatives may often give more. A small loincloth (tadrp) provided with a pocket called terigs is put round the child, and into this pocket the money is put, this action receiving the name of terigs katpimi, or “we tie the terigs.” I did not hear of this pocket in any other ceremonies, and, so far as I know, it is only made in the tadrp used on this occasion, or if a constant feature of the tadrp, it has no other ceremonial use. So far as I am aware, the representation of a house is only used by the Teivaliol, while the imitation dairy made on going to the seclusion-hut after hand-burning and childbirth is only made by the Tartharol.
It is tempting to suppose that the water poured in these ceremonies from an imitation dairy vessel over the back of a calf is regarded as milk, and if this is so, the drinking of milk, real or fictitious, would be the essential feature of all these ceremonies. Further, the conjecture is natural that the drinking is designed to promote the formation and flow of milk in the woman. It is perhaps in favour of this that in the ceremony after childbirth, when this motive would be especially important, the water is poured over the hind-quarters of the calf and not over the middle of its back, as in the earlier ceremony. But if the promotion of lactation is the leading motive of the ceremonies, it is difficult to see why a buffalo in full milk should not have been chosen instead of a two-year-old calf.
It is possible that there is some reason why an adult buffalo should not be used on such an occasion, and that a calf is used as a substitute, and, on the whole, the view that some features of the ceremonies had their origin in the motive suggested is the most probable one; but this can only be conjecture, for it is, I think, quite clear that the ceremonies have now become purely ritual, and are performed with no other reason than that they are prescribed by custom.
The use of an artificial dairy among the Tartharol, however, has almost certainly a deeper meaning. It is a striking fact that a pregnant woman and one soon after childbirth should have relations with a dairy, even if only artificial, when in ordinary life they have nothing to do with it or its ceremonial. Still more remarkable is the fact that a Tarthar woman after childbirth puts round her waist threads from the garment worn only by dairymen, a garment which has a distinctly sacred character. If this were done only in the case of a male child, it might be supposed that the idea is one of initiation into the life connected with the dairy, but the artificial dairy after the hand-burning ceremony is made when the sex of the child is unknown, and, so far as my information goes, the use of the dairy and the threads from the tuni occurs after the birth of either a boy or girl. It is possible that the ceremonial observances are relics of a time when women had more to do with the dairy and its ritual than they have at present; or it may be that contact with the sacred objects, real or fictitious, is held to neutralise in some way the dangerous nature of pregnant and parturient women.
There is some reason to believe that the material of which the tuni is made is the same as that of the ancient clothing of the Todas, the cloth called än. As we shall see later, the än is still used in the funeral ceremonies, and it is possible that the threads of tuni are used in these ceremonies as relics of the ancient clothing of the Todas, and that they are obtained from the madtuni because it is the most convenient way of obtaining the ancient material. If this had been the motive, however, I think the word än would almost certainly have been used, as it still is in the funeral ceremonies. Nevertheless, this remains as a possible alternative explanation of the use of a sacred dairy garment by a woman after childbirth.
A further mysterious feature of these ceremonies is that the two rites which seem to bring women into special relation with the dairy are limited to the Tartharol. If these rites be regarded as relics of a time when women had more to do with dairy operations than at present, the possibility follows that this former function of women was limited to one division of the Todas.
I could obtain no explanation of the meaning of the word pülpali, used for the imitation dairy made in the Tarthar ceremonies. Püli means tamarind, and in a ceremony of the Nairs of Malabar called pulikati, performed in the ninth month of pregnancy, the woman drinks tamarind juice. [126] It is possible that the two ceremonies have a common origin, the only indication of which in the Toda ceremony lingers in the name of ‘tamarind dairy.’ It is, however, possible that the dairy is so called because it is made on the outskirts of the village, though I do not know definitely that the word pül would be used for outskirts in this special sense.
UNCOVERING THE CHILD’S FACE
While in the seclusion-hut with its mother and for some time after, the child has its face covered, and no one except the mother is allowed to see it. At the end of the third month [127] the face of the child is uncovered, and this ceremony is called mokh mûtâr terithti, “child outside he opens,” or, more shortly, mûtâr terthpimi. If the child is a boy, he is taken by his father early in the morning to the front of the dairy, and both father and child bow down at the threshold of the dairy (pavnersatiti), the child being put down by his father so that his forehead touches the threshold. The child is then taken to the place where the buffaloes are standing, and there the face is uncovered, the child being held so that he looks towards the sun when the covering is removed.
If the child is a girl, she is taken by her mother to the majvatvaiidrn, the place where the women go to receive buttermilk from the dairyman, and there the mother uncovers the child’s face.
I was not told that the covering of the face is designed to protect the child from the influence of the evil eye, but this is the probable motive. The object of the ceremony is probably to minimise the danger incurred when the covering is removed by putting the child, if a boy, into relation with the three sacred objects, the dairy, the herd of buffaloes, and the sun. If a girl, the child is taken to the spot nearest to the dairy where women are allowed to go.
NAMING THE CHILD
The child is named after its face has been uncovered. The ceremony is called per vasthpimi, “name we give,” and it may take place immediately after the ceremony of uncovering the face, or a few days later. In the former case, the child, if a boy, is taken by his father from the place where the buffaloes are standing to the front of the house, and there the father shaves the middle part of the head of the child. Then the boy’s maternal uncle (mun) gives the name, and promises a calf, saying, pòl ud todein, “calf one I have given,” followed by the name of the child, [128] and raises each foot to the head of the boy and touches his forehead, the salutation on this occasion being called kalkartiti. Three grains of barley are put into the mouth of the boy and three into his back-hair, and then the grains are thrown away.
There was some doubt as to the relative by whom a girl is named. It seemed clear that the name is given by a woman, and I was told definitely by some that it is given by the father’s sister (mumi) of the child. The wife of the mun would also be the mumi of the child, and it is possible that this relative may give the name. No calf is given to a girl, this being only done when boys are named.
After the naming, the parents of the child may give a feast if they are rich, but this seems to be now exceptional. After receiving its name, the child is given food for the first time, having been suckled up to this day, but my notes do not make it clear whether the child is weaned at this time or continues to be suckled.
When the child is shaved, a bone of a bird called mâtpül and a stone procured from the bazaar called kansutimani are put round its wrist. The bone is cut into small pieces and strung alternately with pieces of the stone so as to form a kind of bangle. It was said that the child would become ill if this charm were not used, and the name of the stone (kan = eye) shows that it is intended to avert the evil eye.
THE TERSAMPTPIMI CEREMONY
This is a ceremony closely connected with the naming of a child, but only performed after the second funeral (marvainolkedr) of a Tarthar man. It seemed probable that at one time the name was actually given during the tersamptpimi ceremony, but as the marvainolkedr of Tartharol now occur only at considerable intervals, it has become the custom to bestow the name in connexion with the ceremony of uncovering the face.
The ceremony of tersamptpimi is performed on the day after the funeral, this day being called karvnol, and as in the ceremony of naming, the chief part is taken by the child’s maternal uncle. The uncle comes to the village where the child is living, bringing a stake of wood of the wild rose [129] called kadakmän. He splits the piece of wood into two pieces, each of which is called ketkark, and putting the hair of the child between the two ketkark, he cuts off a lock. If the child is of the Tarthar division, the hair is cut with a piece of sharpened iron called kanab, [130] while the hair of a Teivali child is cut with an ordinary knife (turi), but both kanab and turi on this occasion receive the special name of tersampki. After cutting the lock of hair, the uncle puts it on one side together with the ketkark and the tersampki, and if the boy has not already been named, the name is now given by the uncle and a calf promised.
Before this ceremony, the bangle of bone and stone, put round the wrist of the child when it was shaved, is taken off and replaced by a piece of creeper called peival. [131] After the ceremony the peival is removed.
There was some doubt as to what was done with the lock of hair. Mr. Natesa Sastri states [132] that the hair is carefully preserved, but my informants did not confirm this, and it seemed as if they did not even adopt the precaution of hiding the hair, which is generally practised (see p. 268).
THE EAR-PIERCING CEREMONY
The ceremony of piercing the ears is called kevi kûtiti, and may be done at any time from infancy up to even twenty years of age. The ceremony is often delayed until it can be performed for several members of a family at the same time in order to avoid the considerable expense connected with it. The ceremony must be done on a Sunday or Wednesday, and there must be no kedr in the clan, i.e., it must not be performed if the funeral ceremonies of a member of the clan are still unfinished.
On the day appointed for the ceremony many guests assemble at the village, and the boys whose ears are to be pierced are dressed in their best clothing. The piercing is performed by two men, one for each ear. One is the mother’s brother (mun) of the boy, while the other is a man of the division to which the boy does not belong—a Teivali man if the boy is one of the Tartharol and vice versa.
The piercing is done with a piece of a small ring, so fine that it is like a needle. The ring used in this way may be of silver or gold, the latter only being used by the richer members of the community.
Each boy then salutes (kalmelpudithti) all those present older than himself, both male and female. Each man as he raises his foot to the head of the boy says:—
Tânenmâ, târmâmâ, pathk mâ, peda mâ, May it be well, may it be well, may he prosper, may he prosper,
îr anûr òl mâ, âr mokh pai mâ. buffaloes 100 may he rule, six sons may he have.
Each man also gives four annas to the boy and each chief Toda may give one rupee.
The salutation of their elders seems to be conditional on this gift of money. One of the most recent cases in which the ceremony has been performed was when the ears of six of the sons of Tikievan of Kuudr and his brothers (56) were pierced. On this occasion Tikievan refused to take any money from those present, and the boys only saluted those men who had celebrated the occasion by giving buffaloes to their father.
As the kalmelpudithti salutation was omitted, the words given above as usually said by each person were on this occasion said collectively by all present while the six boys bowed down their heads to the ground. The ears of these boys were pierced by Teikudr (63), the first cousin of Sulnir, the mother of the boys, but regarded according to the Toda system as elder brother of the mother.
The representative of the Tartharol who pierced the other ear was Pidrvan (9), probably chosen because he was one of the oldest and most influential of the Todas who lived at Pakhalkudr, not far from Peivòrs, the home of the boys.
After the ceremony all those present receive two balls of the food called ashkkartpimi, even a young child receiving his two balls of food. Each person then makes a hole in his food, into which ghi is poured, and all eat, washing their hands afterwards in water brought from the ars nipa.
Only the ears of boys are pierced, and a boy may not enter upon the more sacred offices of the dairy till this ceremony has been performed. Among the Teivaliol, he cannot become palol, wursol, or kaltmokh, but he may be palikartmokh. Among the Tartharol, a boy cannot become palikartmokh at any kind of dairy till the ear-piercing ceremony has taken place.
In the case of the ceremony for the sons of Tikievan I inquired into the actual expenses of the day. These were as follows:—
grain 17 rupees jaggery 10 ,, rice 7 ,, 10½ kudi of ghi 21 ,, tobacco and salt 2 ,,
amounting to 57 rupees.
On the other hand, six buffaloes were given to Tikievan; two by the Badaga Monegar of Tuneri; one each from Perner and Tebner (68), whose daughter Sinmokh had married Piliagar, one of the boys. The other two buffaloes were given by Teikudr, the uncle of the boys who had taken part in the ear-piercing.
Several of these buffaloes were either given in return for buffaloes which Tikievan had previously given, or Tikievan would be expected to give buffaloes in return when any suitable occasion arose in the families of the donors.