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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
[JULY, 1927
or the different idols in the Siva temples (p. 380 sq.) there always recurs the daubing or painting with red sandal, etc. The foreheads of the idols are generally daubed in a way which reminds us of the putting on of the tilakas amongst their worshippers. The image of Vishnu is daubed with gopicandana (p. 406), the sacred Salagrâma is washed in pañcamrita (p. 270). We need not doubt for a moment that what we see here is in reality the constitutive element of the půjd.
Very extensive materials from the Bombay Presidency (with the exception of Sindh) have been collected by Mr. Enthoven in his book The Folklore of Bombay (1924).69 We read there how the low-costos in Konkan (Mahârs, etc.) daub stones with oil and red ochre and give them the names of mostly evil godlings such as Vetal, Khandoba, etc., (p. 112). A certain species of tree in Kâthiâwâr have fruits like a human face and are consequentıy worshipped with red ochre and oil (p. 125). Ahirs and other cattle-breeding castes in Gûjarát erect stones called palios at the village frontiers in remembrance of dead caste-fellows; and these on certain days are daubed with red ochre (p. 143). In the Ratnagiri District holy men are worshipped with sandal paste, etc., (p. 146). The gramadevatás are represented by stones on which are painted trišalas with oil and red ochre. 61 or by wooden tridents the tops of which are painted red (p. 170). On the eighth day of the Navaratra the "Mothers" are daubed with oil and red ochre (p. 171), and on the last day of Aradha the members of the low castes wash their idols with water and milk and smear them with oil and red ochre (p. 172). On other occasions the house godlings are washed in pañcá mrita (p. 180).
The goddesses described as the "Mothers" 69 are sometimes represented simply by red spots on the wall which are daubed with ghi, etc., (p. 185 89.). The image of Ganapati, here as in other parts of India, is smeared with oil and red ochre, the remnants of which are then put on doors and windows (p. 187 sq.); 68 and it goes without saying that Hanuman is regularly painted with those same substances (pp. 175, 188, 191 89.)64 On the first day of Margasira in the Deccan the domestic animals are worshipped like deities, their horns are washed and painted red, lamps are swung in front of them, etc., (p. 221). Sitalâ, the goddess of small-pox, is mostly represented by a rough stone daubed with red ochro (p. 265). Cheda, a gramadevata of the Thana District, is represented by a stone or a stake erected at the village border and painted with red ochre (p. 303), and Mhasôbå, another godling, is worshipped with red ochre at the time of ploughing and sowing (p. 304). In other places the sacred stones are daubed with red ochre at the re-planting of the rice (p. 308). On the twelfth day of the dark half of Karttika the inhabitants of certain villages of the Thana District worship Waghôbâ, the tiger godling, by daubing his stone in the jungle with red ochre and bringing him food (p. 310).
Proceeding southwards we find that already Pietro della Valle, who journeyed from Surat lo Calicut in 1623-1624, remarked how the Hindus painted the faces of their idols red. 6 About a century later Alexander Hamilton speaks about the red-painted stones representing godlings. 66 Also the good old Abbé Dubois had noticed how the idols were painted with various colours.87 In our own day we learn that bulls and cows are daubed with red and yellow powder, 8 that pots which often seem to represent gods among the
B OL JRAS., 1925, p. 796 81
60 Cf. also p. 190 n.
Cf. Stevenson, 1.c., p. 374. 63 On their worship, cf. Crooke, Folklore, vol. XXX, p. 302 sq.
3 CJ. also p. 327. * Cl. also the description of a curious ceremony (p. 269) where Bhangis (scavengers) sprinkle the image of Hanuman with the blood of a cow.
65 C. Professor Zacharia's extremely valuable Kleine Schriften, p. 247 89. 88 Cf. Powell, Foll-lore, vol. XXV, p. 167.
87 Hindu Manners, p. 581. 68 Thurston, Omens and Superstitions in S. India, p. 166.
