The Antiquities of Orissa v2.c17.s1.287

v2.c17.s1.287

[ 130 ] 4. *Dola Yātrā*, or Holi. Next to the Car and the Bathing Festivals this is the most important festival at Puri and draws from thirty to forty thousand pilgrims from all parts of India. According to the Vaiṣṇavite Purāṇas it was the anniversary of a great feat of heroism which Kṛṣṇa performed by destroying a she-demon variously named Śaṅkha-cūḍa, Hori, Holi, Holā, Holākā, Meḍhā and Dhūṇḍhā. The most probable supposition, however, is that it was designed to celebrate the return of spring,—'to typify the general influence of spring upon both the animate and inanimate creation and to express the feelings spread by the season and the delight which the revival of nature diffused'⁶⁶. It has been ever so among the Aryans. The *Festum stultorun*, the *Matronalia Festa*, the *Lupercalia Festa*, in which young men in perfect nudity, run about the streets on the ides of March, the feast of Bacchus, the pūjā of Anna Perennā, the Abbot of Unreason, the Carnival, the Passover and the day of All-Fools are all modifications of the same festivals of which Holi is the leading type in India.