The principal deities of the Dhanwars are Thakur Deo, the god of
agriculture, and Dulha Deo, the deity of the family and hearth. Twice
a year the village Baiga or medicine-man, who is usually a Gond,
offers a cocoanut to Thakur Deo. He first consecrates it to the
god by placing it in contact with water and the small heap of rice
which lies in front of his shrine, and then splits it asunder on a
stone, saying, '_Jai Thakur Deo_,' or 'Victory to Thakur Deo.' When
any serious calamity befalls the tribe a goat is offered to the
deity. It must also be first consecrated to him by eating his rice;
its body is then washed in water and some of the sacred _dub_ [534]
grass is placed on it, and the Baiga severs the head from the body
with an axe. Dulha Deo is the god of the family and the marriage-bed,
and when a Dhanwar is married or his first son is born, a goat is
offered to the deity. Another interesting deity is Maiya Andhiyari,
or the goddess of the dark fortnight of the month. She is worshipped
in the house conjointly by husband and wife on any Tuesday in the
dark fortnight of Magh (January-February), all the relatives of the
family being invited. On the day of worship the husband and wife
observe a fast, and all the water which is required for use in the
house during the day and night must be brought into it in the early
morning. A circular pit is dug inside the house, about three feet deep
and as many wide. A she-goat which has borne no young is sacrificed
to the goddess in the house in the same manner as in the sacrifice to
Thakur Deo. The goat is skinned and cut up, the skin, bones and other
refuse being thrown into the hole. The flesh is cooked and eaten
with rice and pulse in the evening, all the family and relatives,
men and women, eating together at the same time. After the meal,
all the remaining food and the water including that used for cooking,
and the new earthen pots used to carry water on that day are thrown
into the pit. The mouth of the pit is then covered with wooden boards
and plastered over with mud with great care to prevent a child falling
into it; as it is held that nothing which has once gone into the pit
may be taken out, even if it were a human being. It is said that
once in the old days a man who happened to fall into the pit was
buried alive, its mouth being covered over with planks of wood; and
he was found alive when the pit was reopened next year. This is an
instance of the sacrificial meal, common to many primitive peoples,
at which the sacred animal was consumed by the worshippers, skin,
bones and all. But now that such a course has become repugnant to
their more civilised digestions, the refuse is considered sacred
and disposed of in some such manner as that described. The goddess
is also known as Rat Devi or the goddess of the night; or Rat Mai,
the night mother. The goddess Maswasi was the mythical ancestress of
the Dhanwars, the wife of Karankot, and also the daughter of Maiya
Andhiyari or Rat Mai. She too is worshipped every third year in the
dark fortnight of the month of Magh on any Tuesday. Her sacrifice is
offered in the morning hours in the forest by men only, and consists
also of a black she-goat. A site is chosen under a tree and cleaned
with cowdung, the bones of animals being placed upon it in a heap
to represent the goddess. The village Baiga kills the goat with an
axe and the body is eaten by the worshippers. Maswasi is invoked by
the Dhanwars before they go hunting, and whenever they kill a wild
boar or a deer they offer it to her. She is thus clearly the goddess
of hunting. The tribe also worship the spirits of hills and woods
and the ghosts of the illustrious dead. The ghosts of dead Baigas
or medicine-men are believed to become spirits attending on Thakur
Deo, and when he is displeased with the Dhanwars they intervene
to allay his anger. The brothers of Maswasi, the twelve Gaolis,
are believed to be divine hunters and to haunt the forests, where
they kill beasts and occasionally men. Six of them take post and the
other six drive the beasts or men towards these through the forest,
when they are pierced as with an arrow. The victim dies after a few
days, but if human he may go to a sorcerer, who can extract the arrow,
smaller than a grain of rice, from his body. In the month of Aghan
(November), when the grass of the forests is to be cut, the members
of the village collectively offer a goat to the grass deity, in order
that none of the grass-cutters may be killed by a tiger or bitten by
a snake or other wild animal.