History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c89.159.2

v7.c89.159.2

2-46) describes a Mahāśānti to be performed at a king's coronation, on his marching out on an invasion, when one has bad dreams or inauspicious omens (*nimittas*), when the planets are unfavourable or when there is lightning and the fall of meteors, when a Ketu appears, in a hurricane, earthquake, birth on a Mūla nakṣatra or Gandānta, on birth of twins, when parasols and banners fall on the ground, when a crow, owl or pigeon enters a house, when malefic planets are retrograde (especially in the nakṣatra or rāsi of birth), when Jupiter, Saturn, Mars and the Sun are in the 1st, 4th, 8th or 12th houses (in a person's horoscope), when there is *grahayuddha*; when garments, weapons, horses and cows, or jewels and hair are lost, or when rainbow is seen at night in front, when the beam on a house pillar is smashed, when a she-mule conceives, on eclipses of the Sun and the Moon—on these a Mahāśānti is commended. The procedure is briefly as follows. Five learned and well-conducted brāhmaṇas should officiate in a *maṇḍapa* ten or twelve cubits on each side, in the midst of which there should be a raised platform four cubits on each side and in the south-east corner of that platform there should be a *kuṇḍa* (receptacle for fire).