Makaranda Madhukar Anand Mahendale Festshrift

Author(s): M A Dhaky, Jitendra B Shah
Publisher: Shardaben Chimanbhai Educational Research Centre

Page 29

Hanns-Peter Schmidt
Makaranda
anustariņi cow or goat is killed by striking it behind the ears, which is the custom with the Madhyandinas. In the Baudhāyana Pitrmedhasūtra 1.4 the statement tām anyatraiva sastrād ghnanti “they slay her otherwise than with a sword”? does not allow any conclusion as to the manner of killing Baudhāyana followed, but indicates that killing by sword, namely decapitation, was practised by some people.
mánuşam probably refers to the profane killing for human consumption, but, given sacred character of the Vedic texts, we know little of how animals were killed outside the sacrifice.
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Eggeling's rendering of devatrá also is misleading because not the manner in which the gods sacrifice is meant, but rather how men sacrifice for the gods.
Decapitation probably was the ancient way of immolation. In the Aśvamedha-sūkta Rgveda 1.162.9, it is said : "what of the horse's flesh the fly has eaten, or what sticks to the post, to the axe, what to the hands of the slaughterer, what to the nails -- all that of you shall be with the gods." This passage speaks for itself and does not require any comment. J. C. Heesterman quotes this passage and adds: “Possibly the peculiar way in which the animal is bound to the stake points in the same direction: the cord is fastened to the right foot, goes round the left side of the neck and is then wound round the right horn and finally fastened to the stake. Thus room is left for the slaughterer's knife.” For ‘knife' we should substitute 'axe' because a knife is hardly the proper tool for decapitation. Heesterman also refers to the Taittirīya-Samhitā 6.3.6.3 where an opposition between sacred and profane slaughter seems to be alluded to : "He winds (the rope) transversely, for they fasten a (beast) for killing in front; (verily it serves) for distinction,” (aksnayá pári harati, vádhyam hi prátyañcam pratimuñcánti, vyávrttyai) According to Sāyaṇa, standing in front of the animal is the profane way of binding it to the pole, 'transversely' is the sacred way of doing it. If this interpretation is correct and reflects traditional knowledge, it would follow that also profane slaughter was originally done by decapitation, although Sāyana was hardly aware of this since he only knew suffocation as the method of killing in Vedic sacrifice.