A History of the Mahrattas v1.c5.s3.73

v1.c5.s3.73

No less aboriginal in character is the figure of Bhavānī, Sivājī’s family goddess. Like Khandoba, she is the patron deity of the Rāmosī tribe; for the Rāmosīs of Purandar always made vows to her shrine at Kōndanpur, near Singarh, whenever they were about to set forth plundering in the Konkan; and, like Khandoba, the goddess received a share of the Government treasure looted at Bhāmburda in 1824. She approximates in this matter to Kālī, who was the patron goddess of the Thugs. In the Deccan Bhavānī is one of the old *grāmadēvatas* or village-guardians; she can cause sickness and misfortune, but if pacified by the slaughter of a goat or cock will fend off troubles and give advice regarding the future.¹ Nor is her worship confined to the Marāthā Kunbīs and allied tribes; the upper-class Marāthās reverence her also. In the old palace of the Rājās of Sātāra the audience-hall, built by Rājā Shāhjī in 1844, is dedicated to Bhavānī, and in former days the Dasahra festivities always commenced with the slaughter of a buffalo at Bhavānī’s shrine.² Sivājī himself, as Grant Duff and others have recorded, claimed to be inspired on important occasions by the goddess; he built her a new shrine at Pratāpgarh; he named his trusty sword after her. Her famous shrine at Tuljāpur in the modern Hyderābād State is believed to be the scene of her victory over the buffalo-demon³; and the brass images of Bhavānī, still procurable in the Deccan, represent her in the form *Mahīshāsūra-mārdini*, i.e. ‘the slayer of the buffalo demon.’⁴ Bhavānī is without doubt one of the ancient *Mātas*, *Mātris* or mother-goddesses of the Dravidian or pre-Aryan population of India, who could only be placated by bloody sacrifices, in which in ancient times human beings, as well as buffaloes or goats, figured as the victims. She belongs to the same order of ideas and the same level of civilization as Kālī, Bhāiravi, and Chāndika, who were originally local earth and jungle goddesses, and were transformed by the contact of later Aryan ideas into manifestations of Mahādēvi, the Sakti or personified energy of the great god Siva.¹ Like other leading deities, Bhavāni of Tuljāpur has her own special vāhan or steed in the shape of the tiger. Crooke has suggested that these animal steeds may be relics of totemism, which was undoubtedly prevalent in India in past ages, or may be deities of the aboriginal tribes imported in later times into Brahmanic Hinduism.² Whatever be the origin of these ‘vehicles,’ Bhavāni herself is clearly one of the pre-Aryan mother-goddesses, whose energies are usually recruited in two ways, viz. by the rites of the sacred marriage and by the blood-sacrifice, often specially of male victims.³