Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c30.s14: § 14. The Royal Consecration

The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c30.s14

Language
English

Contents

§ 14. The Royal Consecration

v2.c30.s14.1.1

The royal consecration⁶ is a Soma sacrifice having the usual Dīkṣā and Upasad days and preceded by a long series of preparatory rites. It is mythically connected with the consecration of Varuṇa or with Indra, and it displays many popular elements in its character, as was inevitable from its nature. The great nobles and office bearers of the court play an important part, the Purohita performs many of the priestly functions, the people are at least present to hear the announcement of the consecration of the sovereign. It connects itself with Vedic history: the tribes who are mentioned are the Bharatas or their successors in blood and tradition, the Kuru-Pañcālas. The preliminary ceremonies begin with the first day of Dīkṣā on the 1st Phālguna, followed by offerings to Anumati and to Nirṛti, who receives the fallen portions of the grain on a salt piece of ground in the south. With the 15th of the month commence the observances for a year of the four-month offerings, the periods between the new- and full-moon days being filled up either by the new- and full-moon offerings or offerings to the sun and the moon.

v2.c30.s14.1.2

These offerings cease with the Çunāsīrīya offering on the 1st Phālguna of the following year, and on that and the next two days offerings are made to the deities of the quarters, and others, and then on the 4th to the 15th offerings called the Ratnināṁ Havīṅṣi, which are offered in the houses of the ‘jewels’ of the king,¹ his wives and high officers, the deities chosen being the appropriate gods for the persons in whose houses the offerings are made, as for Aditi in that of the chief queen, for Nirṛti in that of the discarded lady. After these follow various libations, and on the 1st of Caitra comes the day of anointing, which is performed as an Ukthya rite. There are offered on it eight offerings to the divine instigators, who are to pay heed to the crowning of the prince in the rite. The actual anointing takes place after the Marutvatīya cups: seventeen kinds of waters, brought from the Sarasvatī, drawn against the current of the stream, or with it, &c., are used: they are sieved after mixing and poured into four vessels, of Palāça, Udumbara, Nyagrodha, and Açvattha. The sacrificer clad in splendid raiment takes from the Adhvaryu a bow with three arrows, and is proclaimed with the Āvid formulae which he repeats announcing his anointment. The evil spirits are appeased by the gift of copper placed in the mouth of a long-haired man.

v2.c30.s14.1.3

The sacrificer then strides to the various quarters, and steps on a tiger-skin, beneath which is a piece of lead, on which he tramps as on the head of Namuci. With gold under his feet and a gold fillet over his head, he is anointed by the Adhvaryu in front, and also by a kinsman, a Rājanya, and a Vaiçya, representing the whole people. After this are performed six Pārtha libations which are offered to correspond with six before the anointing;² the king steps on the skin the steps of Viṣṇu and puts in the Palāça dish the remains of the mixture, which he hands to his eldest son, that he may continue his work and strength. An offering is also made in which the names of the father and son are first confused, then rightly said. A mimic expedition for booty is performed: the king in his chariot goes out against cattle of his kinsfolk: at the time of the fees he plunders them and they surrender their belongings: a third of their goods goes to the priest, a third to the drinkers of the Daçapeya, and the owners are allowed to have a third back. But they also receive villages, and are called Rājanyas, but unworthy of anointing.¹ In another account,² which does not in this interesting way bring out the conception of the pretenders to the royal throne and their defeat, the king mounts his horse and advances to the quarters, a parallel to which is quoted from the ceremony of coronation of the King of Hungary.

v2.c30.s14.1.4

Before descending from the chariot which he mounts for the fray, the king puts on sandals of boar's hide, and prays neither to injure the earth, nor be injured by it, a clear allusion to his high sanctity. After the later Keçavapanīya rite he never stands with bare feet on the ground. He then sits on a throne placed over the tiger-hide, and takes five dice from the Adhvaryu: the priest gently beats him from behind with sticks of pure trees, doubtless to expel any taint of ill.³ Before the dicing begins the Purohita hands the king a wooden sword, which he passes on to his brother, and through him it is taken by a man who marks out the place for dicing, where a hut is erected. After the dicing, which is merely formal and which deliberately was so carried out as to make the king a victor, the sacrifice progresses to the normal end, but the bath is followed by an offering to Indra and Viṣṇu of a special nature. Then comes the preparation for the Daçapeya offering, for which the Dīkṣā consists in ten Saṁsṛpāṁ Havīṅṣi. The offering itself seems to have been in origin an independent offering: it is performed on the 7th of Caitra: the performers must have ten generations of Soma drinkers: from ten cups ten drink together at each: it is uncertain if the relatives of the king may drink or not, but he certainly has a goblet. After this, according to some authorities, the king, the people save the Brahmans, and the steeds may not have their hair cut for a year.

v2.c30.s14.1.5

There are also a number of minor offerings to propitiate the quarters, to win the seasons, for Aditi or the Ādityas, and the Maruts or the All-gods. In Jyaisṭha follows in the next year the ceremony of the cutting of the hair, the Keçavapanīya, which may be followed by two Vyuṣṭi offerings a fortnight later, and the Kṣatradhṛti, a month later, a rite interesting as it is connected with the ruin of the Kurus.¹ The fees are exaggerated beyond measure, even 240,000 cows being given.

v2.c30.s14.2

⁶ ĀpÇS. xviii; BÇS. xii; KÇS. xv; ĀÇS. ix. 3, 4; ÇÇS. xv. 12–27; xvi. 18; LÇS. ix. 1–3; Vait. xxxvi; Weber, *Über die Königsweihe* (APAW. 1893), who is exhaustive, but had not then available ApÇS. and BÇS.; Eggeling, SBE. xli. pp. xxiv ff.; xliv. pp. xv ff. The term of the ÇB. and the Black Yajurveda is Rājasūya, the Abhiṣecanīya denoting the actual aspersion of the king in the course of the whole rite. Cf. TS. i. 8; TB. i. 6–8; PB. xviii. 8–11; AB. vii. 13; viii; ÇB. v. 2. 3–5. 5; N. N. Law, *Ancient Indian Polity*, pp. 161 ff.; Keith, *Taittirīya Saṁhitā*, i. pp. cxi ff.; *Rig-Veda Brāhmaṇas*, pp. 61 ff.

v2.c30.s14.3

¹ See Macdonell and Keith, *Vedic Index*, ii. 200.

v2.c30.s14.4

² At this point or later is recited by the Hotṛ the legend of Çunaḥçepa, in which has been seen a trace of an old human sacrifice; above, Part III, Chap. 18, § 2. See also Keith, *Taittirīya Saṁhitā*, i. pp. cxi–cxiii. Wellhausen (*Archiv f. Religionswissenschaft*, vii. 33–9) argues that the touching is the essential and primitive feature of the Hebrew royal anointment.

v2.c30.s14.5

¹ LÇS. ix. 1. 14 ff.

v2.c30.s14.6

² Hillebrandt, *Rituallitteratur*, p. 146. The Buddhist legend preserves this feature in the account of the movements of the Buddha on birth; see Windisch, *Buddha's Geburt*, pp. 130 ff.

v2.c30.s14.7

³ KÇS. xv. 7. 4. There is no Mantra for this in any Saṁhitā. Weber (p. 63) compares the occasional beating of the bridegroom in the marriage ceremony (*Ind. Stud.* v. 300), but erroneously thinks that the rite is a symbol of priestly power. Reinach (*Cultes, Mythes et Religions*, i. 173 ff.) finds totemism in ritual flogging; Mannhardt (*Myth. Forsch.*, p. 72), much more plausibly, mere fertilization, as obviously in the Lupercalia (Warde Fowler, *Religious Experience of the Roman People*, pp. 54, 479). Cf. *JRS.* iii. 162 ff.

v2.c30.s14.8

¹ According to ÇÇS. xv. 16. 11.

v2.c30.s14.9

The rite is full of magic and symbolism: its nature is obvious and has innumerable parallels: it is worth noting that the king is expected to rub in the substance of the anointing mixture with the horn of a black antelope: it is thus clear that the holy strength is actually in the mixture, and must be made to impregnate the system; the keeping of the long hair, like the Frankish kings, is to preserve for a time this holiness. The position and prominence of the game of dice² are interesting: it is possible to see in it a connexion with the foretelling of prosperity, but it must have been made the more natural in that the king was interested, we may believe even at this period, in the revenue to be derived from dicing, which was carried on in the Sabhā, ‘house of assembly’, and which in later times was assuredly a valuable monopoly, and probably so in earlier days.

v2.c30.s14.10

² Lüders, *Das Würfelspiel im alten Indien* (1907); cf. Keith, *JRAS.* 1908, pp. 823 ff.; *Vedic Index*, i. 2 ff.

v2.c30.s14.11

Different forms of consecration are referred to: the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa³ distinguishes the great consecration, Abhiṣeka, of Indra from the renewed consecration of a consecrated king, and its account of the consecration, which deals only with the anointing, differs very greatly from that of the Yajurveda, which it possibly presupposes. Great stress is laid on the fact that the king is only given a curious mixture to drink, being absolutely denied the use of Soma, a fact explained by a long mythological story.

v2.c30.s14.12

³ viii. 5, 12. Kauç. xvii has the consecrating of a subordinate prince and a sovereign ruler respectively: the dicing plays an important part in either case; in the latter the king goes to his queens, a symbol of his royal status; a tiger-skin is used in the latter, a bull-hide in the former case; cf. Henry, *La magie dans l'Inde antique*, pp. 146-8.

Linked texts (11)