"I came across a funny thing in an embankment in a rice-field. The
tender part of a young cocoanut branch had been cut into three
strips, and the strips fastened one into the other in the form
of a triangle. At the apex a reed was stuck, and along the
base and sides small flowers, so that the thing looked like a
ship in full sail. My inspector informed me, with many blushes,
that it contained a devil, which the sorcerer of a neighbouring
village had cut out of a young girl. Mrs Bishop, in her book
on Korea, mentions that the Koreans do exactly the same thing,
but, in Korea, the devil's prison is laid by the wayside, and is
carefully stepped over by every passer-by, whereas the one I saw
was carefully avoided by my peons (orderlies) and others."
In the Godavari district, Mr H. Tyler came across the burning funeral
pyre of a Koyi girl, who had died of syphilis. Across a neighbouring
path leading to the Koyi village was a basket fish-trap containing
grass, and on each side thorny twigs, which were intended to catch
the malign spirit of the dead girl, and prevent it from entering the
village. The twigs and trap containing the spirit were to be burnt
on the following day. By the Dombs of Vizagapatam, the souls of the
dead are believed to roam about, so as to cause all possible harm to
mankind, and also to protect them against the attacks of witches. A
place is prepared for the Duma in the door-hinge, or a fishing-net,
wherein he lives, is placed over the door. The witches must count
all the knots of the net, before they can enter the house. [299]
At cross-roads in the Bellary district, geometric patterns are
sometimes made at night by people suffering from disease, in the
belief that the affliction will pass to the person who first treads
on the charm. [300]
"At cross-roads in the South Arcot district may be sometimes seen
pieces of broken pot, saffron (turmeric), etc. These are traces
of the following method of getting rid of an obstinate disease. A
new pot is washed clean, and filled with a number of objects (the
prescription differs in different localities), such as turmeric,
coloured grains of rice, chillies, cotton-seed, and so forth,
and sometimes a light made of a few threads dipped in a little
dish of oil, and taken at dead of night to the cross-roads, and
broken there. The disease will then disappear. In some places
it is believed that it passes to the first person who sees the
debris of the ceremony the next morning, and the performer has
to be careful to carry it out unknown to his neighbours, or the
consequences are unpleasant for him." [301]
Some Valaiyans, Paraiyans, and Kallans, on the occasion of a death
in the family, place a pot filled with dung or water, a broomstick,
and a firebrand, at some place where three roads meet, or in front of
the house, to prevent the ghost from returning. [302] When a Paraiyan
man dies, camphor is burnt, not at the house, but at the junction of
three lanes.
In the Godavari district, a sorcerer known as the Ejjugadu (male
physician) is believed, out of spite or in return for payment,
to kill another by invoking the gods. He goes to a green tree, and
there spreads muggu or chunam (lime) powder, and places an effigy of
the intended victim thereon. He also places a bow and arrow there,
recites certain spells, and calls on the gods. The victim is said
to die in a couple of days. But, if he understands that the Ejjugadu
has thus invoked the gods, he may inform another Ejjugadu, who will
carry out similar operations under another tree. His bow and arrow
will go to those of the first Ejjugadu, and the two bows and arrows
will fight as long as the spell remains. The man will then be safe.
Writing concerning the nomad Yerukalas, Mr F. Fawcett says [303] that
"the warlock takes the possessed one by night to the outskirts of the
village, and makes a figure on the ground with powdered rice, powders
of various colours, and powdered charcoal. Balls of the powders, half
cocoanut shells, betel, four-anna pieces, and oil lamps, are placed on
the hands, legs, and abdomen. A little heap of boiled rice is placed
near the feet, and curds and vegetables are set on the top of it,
with limes placed here and there. The subject of the incantation
sits near the head, while the magician mutters mantrams. A he-goat
is then sacrificed. Its head is placed near the foot of the figure,
and benzoin and camphor are waved. A little grain is scattered about
the figure to appease the evil spirits. Some arrack is poured into a
cup, which is placed on the body of the figure, and the bottle which
contained it is left on the head. The limes are cut in two, and two
cocoanuts are broken. The patient then walks by the left side of the
figure to its legs, takes one step to the right towards the head,
and one step to the left towards the feet, and walks straight home
without looking back."
In Malabar, Mr Govinda Nambiar writes, [304] "when a village doctor
attending a sick person finds that the malady is unknown to him,
or will not yield to his remedies, he calls in the astrologer, and
subsequently the exorcist, to expel the demon or demons which have
possessed the sick man. If the devils will not yield to ordinary
remedies administered by his disciples, the mantravadi himself comes,
and a devil dance is appointed to be held on a certain day. Thereat
various figures of mystic device are traced on the ground, and in their
midst a huge and frightful form representing the demon. Sometimes an
effigy is constructed out of cooked and coloured rice. The patient
is seated near the head of the figure, and opposite sits the magician
adorned with bundles of sticks tied over the joints of his body, tails,
and skins of animals, etc. Verses are chanted, and sometimes cocks are
sacrificed, and the blood is sprinkled on the demon's effigy. Amidst
the beating of drums and blowing of pipes, the magician enters upon
his diabolical dance, and, in the midst of his paroxysm, may even
bite live cocks, and suck with ferocity the hot blood."
When a Malayan exorcist is engaged in propitiating a demon, a fowl is
sometimes waved before him, and decapitated. He puts the neck in his
mouth, and sucks the blood. By the Tiyans of Malabar a number of evil
spirits are supposed to devote their attention to a pregnant woman,
and to suck the blood of the child in utero, and of the mother. In the
process of expelling them, the woman lies on the ground and kicks. A
cock is thrust into her hand, and she bites it, and drinks its blood.
It is noted by Mr L. K. Anantha Krishna Iyer that by the Thanda
Pulayans of the west coast "a ceremony called urasikotukkuka is
performed with the object of getting rid of a devil, with which a
person is possessed. At a place far distant from the hut, a leaf,
on which the blood of a fowl has been made to fall, is spread on the
ground. On a smaller leaf, chunam and turmeric are placed. The person
who first sets eyes on these becomes possessed by the devil, and
sets free the individual who was previously under its influence. The
Thanda Pulayans also practise maranakriyas, or sacrifices to demons,
to bring about the death of an enemy. Sometimes affliction is supposed
to be brought about by the enmity of those who have got incantations
written on a palm leaf, and buried in the ground near a house by the
side of a well. A sorcerer is called in to counteract the evil charm,
which he digs up and destroys."
In a note on the Paraiyas of Travancore, [305] the Rev. S. Mateer
writes that Sudras and Shanars [306] frequently employ the Paraiya
devil-dancers and sorcerers to search for and dig out magical charms
buried in the earth by enemies, and counteract their enchantments.
A form of sorcery in Malabar called marana (destruction) is said by
Mr Fawcett [307] to be carried out in the following manner:--
"A figure representing the enemy to be destroyed is drawn on a
small plate of metal (gold by preference), and to it some mystic
diagrams are added. It is then addressed with a statement that
bodily injury, or the death of the person, shall take place at a
certain time. This little sheet is wrapped up in another metal
sheet or leaf (of gold if possible), and buried in some place
which the person to be injured or destroyed is in the habit of
passing. Should he pass over the place, it is supposed that the
charm will take effect at the time named."
One favourite tantra of the South Indian sorcerer is said [308]
to consist of "what is popularly known in Tamil as pavai, that
is to say, a doll made of some plastic substance, such as clay
or wheat-flour. A crude representation of the intended victim is
obtained by moulding a quantity of the material, and a nail or pin
is driven into it at a spot corresponding to the limb or organ that
is intended to be affected. [309] For instance, if there is to be
paralysis of the right arm, the pin is stuck into the right arm
of the image; if madness is to result, it is driven into the head,
and so on, appropriate mantras being chanted over the image, which
is buried at midnight in a neighbouring cremation ground. So long
as the pavai is underground, the victim will grow from bad to worse,
and may finally succumb, if steps are not taken in time. Sometimes,
instead of a doll being used, the corpse of a child recently buried
is dug out of the ground, and re-interred after being similarly
treated. The only remedy consists in another sorcerer being called
in for the purpose of digging out the pavai. Various are the methods
he adopts for discovering the place where the doll is buried, one of
them being very similar to what is known as crystal-gazing. A small
quantity of a specially prepared thick black fluid is placed on the
palm of a third person, and the magician professes to find out every
circumstance connected with the case of his client's mental or physical
condition by attentively looking at it. The place of the doll's burial
is spotted with remarkable precision, the nail or pin extracted,
and the patient is restored to his normal condition as by a miracle."
The following form of sorcery resorted to in Malabar in compassing
the discomfiture of an enemy is recorded by Mr Walhouse. [310]
"Make an image of wax in the form of your enemy; take it in
your right hand at night, and hold your chain of beads in your
left hand. Then burn the image with due rites, and it shall
slay your enemy in a fortnight. Or a figure representing an
enemy, with his name and date of his birth inscribed on it, is
carved out of Strychnos Nux-vomica wood. A mantram is recited,
a fowl offered up, and the figure buried in glowing rice-husk
embers. Or, again, some earth from a spot where an enemy has
urinated, saliva expectorated by him, and a small tuft of hair,
are placed inside a tender cocoanut, and enclosed in a piece of
Strychnos Nux-vomica. The cocoanut is pierced with twenty-one
nails and buried, and a fowl sacrificed."
A police inspector, when visiting a village a few years ago, was told
by one of the villagers that a man was going to bury two wax dolls,
in order to cause his death. The inspector accordingly went to the
house of the suspected enemy, where he found the two dolls, and some
books on witchcraft.
The Native servant of a friend in Madras found buried in a corner
of his master's garden the image of a human figure, which had been
deposited there by an enemy who wished to injure him. The figure was
made of flour, mixed with "walking foot earth," i.e., earth from the
ground, which the servant had walked over. Nails, fourteen in number,
had been driven into the head, neck, and each shoulder, elbow, wrist,
hip, knee, and ankle. Buried with the figure were fourteen eggs,
limes, and balls of camphor, and a scrap of paper bearing the age
of the servant, and the names of his father and mother. A Muhammadan
fortune-teller advised the servant to burn the image, so at midnight
he made an offering of a sheep, camphor, betel nuts, and cocoanuts,
and performed the cremation ceremony.
In 1903, a life-size nude female human figure with feet everted and
directed backwards, carved out of the soft wood of Alstonia scholaris,
was washed ashore at Calicut in Malabar. Long nails had been driven
in all over the head, body, and limbs, and a large square hole cut
out above the navel. Inscriptions in Arabic characters were scrawled
over it. By a coincidence, the corpse of a man was washed ashore
close to the figure. Possibly it represented the figure of a woman
who was possessed by an evil spirit, which was attached to it by a
nail between the legs before it was cast into the sea, and was made
on the Laccadive islands, [311] some of the residents on which are
notorious necromancers. It has been suggested [312] that the figure
may represent some notorious witch; that the nails were driven into
it, and the mutilation made in order to injure her, and the spells
added to destroy her magical powers; finally, that the image was cast
into the sea as a means of getting rid of the sorceress. There is a
tradition that the goddess Bhagavati, who is worshipped at Kodungallur
in Malabar, was rescued by a fisherman when she was shut up in a jar,
and thrown into the sea by a great magician. The Lingadars of the
Kistna district are said [313] to have made a specialty of bottling
evil spirits, and casting the bottles away in some place where no
one is likely to come across them, and liberate them.
A few years ago, another wooden representation of a human being was
washed ashore at Calicut. The figure is 11 inches in height. The arms
are bent on the chest, and the palms of the hands are placed together
as in the act of saluting. A square cavity, closed by a wooden lid,
has been cut out of the abdomen, and contains apparently tobacco,
ganja (Indian hemp), and hair. An iron bar has been driven from the
back of the head through the body, and terminates in the abdominal
cavity. A sharp cutting instrument has been driven into the chest
and back in twelve places.
A life-size female figure, rudely scratched on a plank of wood, with
Arabic inscriptions scrawled on it, and riddled with nails, was washed
ashore on the beach at Tellicherry in Malabar. In the same district,
a friend once picked up on the shore at Cannanore a wooden figure about
6 inches high, riddled with nails. His wife's ayah implored him to get
rid of it, as it would bring nothing but misfortune. He accordingly
made a present of it to a recently married friend, whose subsequent
career was characterised by a long series of strokes of bad luck, which
his wife attributed entirely to the possession of the dreadful image.
Sometimes, in Malabar, "a mantram is written on the stem of the kaitha
plant, on which is also drawn a figure representing the person to
be injured. A hole is bored to represent the navel. The mantram
is repeated, and at each repetition a certain thorn (karamullu)
is stuck into the limbs of the figure. The name of the person,
and of the star under which he was born, are written on a piece
of cadjan, which is stuck into the navel. The thorns are removed,
and replaced twenty-one times. Two magic circles are drawn below the
nipples of the figure. The stem is then hung up in the smoke of the
kitchen. A pot of toddy, and some other accessories, are procured,
and with them the warlock performs certain rites. He then moves three
steps backwards, and shouts aloud thrice, fixing in the thorns again,
and thinking all the while of the particular mischief with which he
will afflict the person to be injured. When all this has been done,
the person whose figure has been drawn on the stem, and pricked with
thorns, feels pain." [314]