The Inner Conflict of Tradition: Essays in Indian Ritual, Kingship, and Society c9.23

c9.23

ritual errors on the last day of the ten-day period, which immediately precedes the mahāvrata festival. Though there are set procedures for correcting ritual errors in general, "declaring" them seems to be a distinguishing feature of this day. This "declaration" is to be made by a "declarer" (*vivaktṛ*) in the form of an improvised anuṣṭubh verse, that is, either by reciting an anuṣṭubh verse and then reciting the passage where the error occurred, or more ingeniously, by fashioning the erroneous passage into an anuṣṭubh. Thus the "declaration" resembles nothing so much as a contest in verbal skill between two parties enacting the crucial life-death antithesis.²⁸