History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v3.c43.147

v3.c43.147

The Matsyapurāṇa (chap. 83. 92) speaks of ten kinds of *dānas* called *parvatadānas* or *merudānas*, viz. of *dhānya* (corn), *lavaṇa* (salt), *guḍa* (jaggery), *hema* (gold), *tila* (sesame), *kārpāsa* (cotton), *ghṛta* (ghee), *ratna* (precious stones), *rajata* (silver), *śarkarā* (sugar). The Agnipurāṇa (210. 6–10) enumerates these ten. Aparārka (pp. 344–354) quotes all the chapters of the Matsya. Hemādri (Dāna, pp. 346–396) not only dilates upon these ten dānas, but speaks of 12 of such dānas from Śaiva works like the Kālottara. These *dānas* were called *parvata*, *śaila* or *acala* because the substances were heaped up like hills. The procedure in all of them is the same. A square platform inclined towards the north-east or east was to be prepared, smeared with cowdung and strewn with kuśa grass. In the midst of it a heap was to be made to represent a mountain with smaller heaps to represent hills at the foot of the mountain. In the case of the mountain of dhānya, it is to be made with 1000 or 500 or 300 *droṇa* measures of corn. Three trees of gold are to be planted on the middle of it and in the four directions lotus-like plants of pearls, *gomeda* and *puṣparāga*, emeralds and sapphires, lapis lazuli respectively. Many more picturesque features such as gold and silver images of 81 gods are described in the Matsya. A guru and four priests are to be chosen for *homa* and 13 *āhutis* are to be offered to each of the gods. In the gift of salt, from 1 to 16 droṇas thereof are to be employed, in the gift of jaggery from 3 to 10 bhāras, in that of gold from 1 to 1000 *palas*, in that of sesame from 3 to 10 droṇas, of *kārpāsa* from 5 to 20 bhāras, of ghee from two *kumbhas* to 20, of *ratnas* from 200 pearls to 1000, with attendant hills of precious stones ¼ of the pearls, of cotton from 20 *palas* to 10 thousand, of sugar from half a bhāra to 8 bhāras.