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RELIGION—ANIMISNI
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on other beasts and birds, astrology, the power of prophecy, incantations, oracles, consulting gods through a girl possessed or by means of mirrors, worshipping the Great One, invoking Sirī (the goddess of Luck), vowing vow's to gods, muttering charms to cause virility or impotence, consecrating sites, and more of the same kind. It is a queer list; and very suggestive both of the wide range of animistic superstitions, and of the proportionate importance, then and to the people at large, of those particular ones included in the l'eda.
It may be noticed in passing that we have representations, of a very early date, of this Sirī, the goddess of Luck, of plenty and success, who is not mentioned in the Veda. One of these is marked in plain letters Sirima Devatā; and like Diana of the Ephesians, she bears on her breast the signs of her productivity. The other shows the goddess seated, with two elephants pouring water over her. It is the oldest instance of the most common representasentation of this popular goddess; and figures of her, exactly in this form, can be bought to-day in the bazaars of Northern India. (Figs. 36, 37, 46.)
I am allowed, by the kindness of Mrs. Craven, to add a reproduction of a photograph of an image of this popular deity which was recently found in the south of India. It is probably of about the eleventh century, and is decisive evidence that the worship of this non-Vedic goddess prevailed also in the interval between the date of the oldest sculptures and our own time. (Fig. 38.)
That Sirī was already a popular deity in the
Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com
