Indian Antiquary Vol 26

SR No.: 032518
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 360
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 15 MB

Page 255

SEPTEMBER, 1897.]
SPIRIT BASIS OF BELIEF AND CUSTOM.
249
(1) Satkuvaris. The Sâtkuvaris are the ghosts of seven sisters, or at least of seven maidens, who died unmarried. They are supposed to cause skin-diseases like mata or smallpox, góvar or measles, and kánjé or chicken pox, and they are always accompanied by a male companion called gooald or cowherd, probably the ghost of an unmarried cow-boy. These eight spirits live in the air, aud in the evening and at noon haunt caves, valleys, ponds, rivers and gardens. In the evening or at noon, when they make their rounds, a rattling or rumbling is heard in the air from the wheels of their chariot. At such a time if any woman comes in their way, or draws their attention by pointing a finger at them, or by staring at them in the air, they come down, take hold of her, outer her body, and make her their abode. They will then trouble her in various ways by causing melancholy or low spirits, paleness or discolouration of the body, and loss of appetite, until a bhagat or medium finds the secret and appeases them with an annual tribute of cocoanuts or fowls, or both. One of the most usual forms of injury done by the Seven Maidens is to make the offending woman barren. That the Seven Maidens are one of the causes of women's barrenness is a belief that is shared by many native physicians along with the Kunbis and Marathas of the Konkan. The head or queen of the Seven Sisters is Sitalâdêvi,67 the cold goddess, who is supposed both to cause and to cure small-pox. At Kêlvê, in the Thânâ district, a large image of Sftaladevi is famous for its power of curing small-pox, barrenness, and other spirit-diseases. Every year on the fall-moon of Vaisakh (April-May) a big festival is held in honour of Sitalâdevi at Kôlvê, when hundreds come to fulfil vows or to pay their respects to the goddess. The persons who make vows to Sitalâdêvi are generally women, and they often make very strange vows. In some cases the woman who has made the vow comes with sandals or shoes on her head and stands in front of the temple; in other cases a boy or girl suffering from small-pox is made to lie across the threshold of the temple and the people are allowed to pass over the body. Again, the mother causes her hands and feet to be fastened with iron chains, and then moves round the temple of Sitalâdêvi, or she makes the boy or girl, who has been cured, move round the temple.
(2) Vija or Lightnings is the spirit of the infant sister of the god Krishna, who was killed by Kansa, king of Mathurâ. The spirit of lightning is so much afraid of the leaves of the apta and shamieo trees, that when Konkan Kunbis and Kolis go out in the rainy season, they generally take apta leaves with them.61
(3) Epidemic Spirits include the spirit or goddess of cholera, locally called Jarimari, Mahamari, or Wakha. In the Kolába and Ratnagiri districts, and to some extent in Thânâ, cholera is annually worshipped. When cholera appears in a Konkân village, the people explain her arrival by some defect in their annual offerings to the goddess. To propitiate her the villagers assemble and call a bhagat or medium, in whose body the goddess of cholera appears. They ask the medium what steps should be taken to please Jarîmârî. The medium tells them to make the goddess offerings of fruit, rice and goats, and to escort her with music
57 At Nasik, at about twenty feet from the temple of Ganpati, is a small broken image of Sitalfidêvî. When a child has small-pox its mother pours water over this image for fourteen days, and on the fifteenth brings the child to the temple, weighs it against molasses or sweetmeats and distributes them among the people. The image was broken about ninety years ago by one Rambhat Ghirpurê. His only son was sick with small-pox, and though he did all in his power to please the goddess, his son died. Enraged with his loss Rambhat went to the goddess and broke off her hands and feet. Though maimed, the people still trust this Sitaladevi, and during small-pox epidemics so much water is poured over her that it flows in a stream down the stone steps to the river (Bombay Gazetteer, Vol. XVI.).
"The Romans believed lightning to be a spirit. They buried what was struck by lightning and surrounded the spot with a wall (Gibbon's Decline and Fall, Vol. I. p. 412).
to Bauhinia tomentosa
60 Mimosa suma.
61 The worship of the apta and shami trees has probably its origin in the belief in the electric influence of their leaves.
Compare the common belief in Europe in aerial devils who, if displeased, sent plagues, and if pleased did good (Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, pp. 120, 131).