ELECTRONIC JOURNAL OF VEDIC STUDIES (EJVS)
Vol. 10 (2003) Issue 1a (Sept.21) (©) ISSN 1084-7561
T. P. Mahadevan & Frits Staal
THE TURNING-POINT IN A LIVING TRADITION
somayAgam 2003
Fig. 1. Pota sprinkling the Soma with mantras at Apyayanam
1. Introduction
2. Background: The Oral Tradition of zrauta
3. Breathing New Life into a Tradition
4. Three potAs, Four adhvaryus and Seven hotAs
5. Preparation and Training
6. The yajamAna and his Priests
7. The Performance
8. Twelve Pillars of zrauta
9. Literature
10. Conclusion
Bibliography
1. Introduction
During April 7-12, 2003, a "somayAgam," i.e., agniSToma-somayAga, was
performed by Nambudiri Brahmans in Trichur in central Kerala, formerly the
punarAdheya, on April 6. The location of the ceremonies was the "Vadakke
Madham Brahmaswam," the Northern (vadakkE) of two Vedic institutions within
Trichur town where the Rgveda has been taught to young pupils for four
centuries or more. (The
at present one.)
The last performance of somayAgam was in 1984. It is one of two large
Vedic rituals that are preserved in the Nambudiri community, the other
being the 12-day atirAtra-agnicayana. One of the many characteristic
differences between the two rituals is that there are twelve
"Soma-sequences" in the somayAgam and twenty-nine in the agnicayana. A soma
sequence consists of a sAmaveda chant (stotra or stuti, as the Nambudiris
call it), Rgveda recitation (zastra), soma offerings to the deities and
soma drinking by the yajamAna and his priests. The first twelve soma
sequences of the agnicayana are similar to the twelve sequences of the
somayAgam, but all of them are not the same. And only a ritualist who has
performed the somayAga, and thus become a somayAjI, is eligible for an
agnicayana and to become thus an akkitiri.
The authors of the present article were both able to attend the 2003
ceremonies at Trichur but Mahadevan (TP) could spend more time than Staal
(FS) in Kerala both prior to and after the performance. We decided to work
together because it seemed to us that our experiences and qualifications
could usefully complement each other. TP was born in a community of Tamil
Brahmans in the Palghat valley, a gap in the
Tamilnad and Kerala from each other. These Brahmans wear the top-knot on
the front of the head (pUrvazikhA), like the Nambudiris. TP has shown that
the two communities are closely related (Mahadevan et al. forthcoming and
see below). Though their mother tongue is Tamil, their first language and
the language of their education is Malayalam. TP had never witnessed a
large zrauta ritual. FS does not know Tamil or Malayalam but has
witnessed two such rituals, both atirAtra-agnicayana, the first one in 1975
(see Staal et al.1983) and the second in 1990 (see Staal 1992). FS did not
witness the 1984 agniSToma-somayAga. The two authors are jointly
responsible for the following observations, speculations and questions and
use, if necessary, the abbreviations TP or FS.
Fig. 2 Erkkara Raman Nambudiri with pUrvaziKhA
performing apyAyanam in 1975.
2. Background: The Oral Tradition of zrauta
Like its three immediate predecessors--the 1975 agnicayana of Panjal, the
1984 agniSToma of
agniSToma of Trichur was a manifestly living tradition and entirely oral.
That is, the recitations from the Rgveda, the chants from the sAmaveda and
the mutterings from the yajurveda, are transmitted outside literacy, as are
the ritual manuals that prescribe at which point in the ritual performance
they have to be inserted. It is not that the priests were illiterate in the
ordinary sense of the word; they were literate, living as they do in the
most literate state of the Indian Union. Most of the adult priests earn
their normal livelihoods through regular jobs of the world at
large--teaching, engineering, one in IT profession--and several younger
ones were still high school and junior college students. But as the
different recitatory episodes unfolded during the course of the ritual, not
the least sign of literacy, a piece of paper or a notebook with written
prompts and directions, was in evidence. It is known that during the
six-month period of the training, preparation and rehearsals leading up to
the actual event, use is made of notebooks, prepared by the senior AcAryas
who have already taken part in previous rituals, containing paddhatis
written out in Malayalam on the different episodes of the ritual, the
AdhAna or the pravargya. The paddhati notebooks of Erkkara Raman
Nambudiri, the doyen of Nambudiri zrautism of yesteryears, are legendary.
But in the actual event in Trichur, all these aids, that presumably began
to come into use millennia ago with the rise and spread of literacy, were
held as strict taboos, as must have been the case for the traditional
Nambudiri zrauta performance. FS recalls this to be the case for both the
1975 and 1990 performances. The situation resembles the taboo regarding
the source of fire in the ritual. That is, fire is ubiquitous in and
outside the yAgazAlA before the actual start of the ritual: the great brass
lamps of Kerala ablaze with burning wicks, men smoking cigarettes and
beedies are a common sight. But fire for the ritual proper comes only from
the stone age technology of making fire, the laborious ceremony of rubbing
two pieces of wood together. Thus, the ritual marks a warp in time and
space that transports the participants to a Vedic realm of pure orality and
virtual absence of modern technology.
It does not follow from the above that the individual priests, one as young
as all of ten years, do not need help in discharging their individual oral
performances. The ritualists are less perfect than the tape recorders to
which they have been likened. They use a system of hand signs, say an
outstretched thumb and forefinger, that the reciter can only understand if
he already knows the mantras. Besides, the older priests were in constant
huddle over the performing ritualists, and when the latter made mistakes,
not an uncommon occurrence, the AcAryas took care that a completely
error-free version of the relevant text or mantra found utterance, for the
gods should hear only the complete and correct mantras.
A few feet from the reciting Nambudiris the situation was different. Three
zrauta ritualists, visiting from
recitations from a printed page. They might as well be in a different time
and place, more modern and innovative. The two together presented a
synchronic picture of the zrauta traditions in
oral, even atavistic but living tradition of Nambudiri Vedism and the
innovative and literate traditions represented by the zrautins from
Such a synchronic juxtaposition of zrauta traditions at two different
phases is visible within
progress (Mahadevan, forthcoming), we know now that there were in the main
two different waves of Vedism arriving in
periods of history: the first is represented by the pUrvazikhA Brahmans
with their fronted top-knots and the second by the aparazikhA Brahmans,
their top-knots toward the back of their heads, making a pony tail. The
pUrvazikhA Brahmans who include the Nambudiris are seen to be well
established in the Tamil country by the Sangam period, thus plausibly
departing from the core areas of Vedic culture by ca. 100 BCE. They
brought with them a phase of Vedism centering around an earlier canon, when
literacy was still nascent and the early taboo of its use for the Vedas
still very much in effect. The arrival of the second group of Brahmans,
the aparazikhAs, is a later event dating from the Pallava age of Tamil
history, from the 5th century CE, and this migration is historically well
attested in the Pallava land grant deeds, by now well into literate times.
The role of literacy is well attested in the zrauta ritual of the
aparazikhA Brahmans, living along the
Kaveri in the Kumbakonam-Tanjavoor area.
3. Breathing New Life into a Tradition
But for the 1975 performance of agnicayana, there would not have been an
agniSToma in 1984; but for 1984, there would not have been the 1990 agni;
but for 1990, there would not have been 2003. That is how an oral tradition
is being transmitted and kept alive. It means, for example, that the 1975
hotA and pratiprasthAtaA officiants were AcAryas for Rgveda and yajurveda
in 2003. Similarly, the father of the 2003 yajamAna, who was yajamAna in
1990, was AcArya in 2003. But why should one start at 1975 and not before?
Because the 1975 performance was the first that was widely publicized,
attracted media and foreign attention, and touched the minds and hearts of
many Nambudiri youngsters. The 2003 performance shows these youngsters,
now in middle age, often with jobs in towns and cities, taking the helm and
stepping forward with a strong desire to train a new generation of young
vaidikas or seeing to it that they were being trained. The third generation
had now arrived and many of its members were eager to receive instruction,
unlike a few decades before. They accepted the value of the old tradition,
realized that it was getting weaker, the expertise being thinner and
distributed among fewer people, but also saw a chance of earning a
livelihood from zrauta.
In the past, almost all Nambudiri houses were in the countryside as
distinct, for example, from the Tamil Brahman agrahArams which are situated
at the center of villages. Ritual performances took place there, as in
Panjal and Kundoor. The 1984 performance of the somayAga was the first to
take place in a large city,
suit in that it was also an urban event. It was decided to organize it at
the only Vedic school that is situated in a town, viz., the Vadakke Madham
Brahmaswam at Trichur. A township of 50,000 people, Trichur, with its
celebrated Nambudiri-run VatakkunnAtha temple and its popular "round"
around the temple grounds, once a chic promenade, now hazardous with its
traffic pollutants and pot holes, is the traditional Nambudiri town, as
much a concession to an urban setting as the fiercely rural community has
allowed itself. It was also decided to give wide publicity to the
proceedings, preparations as well as performance, make it a media event and
try to raise money by appealing to the public at large. An important role
was played by the Nambudiri website nambudiri.com run by P. Vinod
Bhattatiripad, which started to spread information about the ritual all
over the world.
This development was not without its critics. There were those who did not
like what they regarded as commercialization. These included inside critics
like the Taikkat Vaidikan himself; and outside critics such as Dr. T.I.
Radhakrishnan who played a crucial role in 1990. The organizers felt, on
the other hand, that without publicity the tradition would be further
endangered. In the past, many performances had depended on a few great
Nambudiri families. What today's Nambudiri elite wanted presently was for
the performance to be easily accessible to a large number of people who
would also contribute money at the site of the yAga. The Brahmaswam Madham
obviously met those requirements. And the hoped-for remuneration did not
fail to materialize: vecchu namaskAram, "deposit and prostrate," (for the
yajamAna) came to approximately Indian Rupees 165,000 = $1500; sales of
gold lockets with the agnicayana emblem: Rs. 1.5 million = $30,000; gate
collections and other donations: Rs.2.6 million = $ 50,000. The collections
and donations include offerings at a dakSiNAmUrti shrine, an important
feature of the Trichur yAga to which we shall return.
The geographical position of Trichur itself is of ritual interest. A
Nambudiri Vedic ritual is organized by two groups of Brahmans: the small
group of sAmavedins who are concerned with everything that pertains to
their Veda; and the larger group of Vaidikans who are in charge of both
Rgveda recitations and yajurveda mantras and kriyAs, whatever their Veda of
birth. All recent performances have been organized by Vaidikans who
belonged to the kauSItaki school of the Rgveda. Major yajurveda officiants
such as the adhvaryu were also kauSItakins though a few baudhAyana
yajurvedins officiated in minor priestly roles. The particular virtue of
Trichur is that it is located at the southern limit of the geographical
distribution of the kauSItaki school of Rgveda, and, at the same time, at
the northern limit of the Baudhayana Yajurvedins whose center is
Irinjalakuda, some thirty miles to the south. A significant feature of the
2003 Trichur yAga was that the adherents by birth of baudhAyana yajurveda
played a more important role than before. We consider this new cooperation
betwen baudhAyana and kauSItaki in some detail in the next section.
The rarity of qualified performers and the feeling that the tradition was
in danger engendered a new spirit of cooperation between the sAmavedins and
kauSItakins as well. The sAmavedins who, despite or because of their
small numbers had split into two factions, started to seek closer contact
with priests of the other Vedas. Vaidikans and sAmavedins began to work
more closely together than perhaps ever before. One kauSItaki Vaidikan
offered his son to be trained for the office of the subrahmaNya -- the one
sAmaveda priest whose task is limited to merely reciting the
subrahmaNyAhvAnam. There was at the same time an increasing demand for tape
recordings made in the past and especially at the time of the 1975
performance. Taikkat Vaidikan approached FS about ways and means of
obtaining copies of all recordings he had made since 1957 . The
most important manifestation of the new spirit is that youngsters realized
that Vedic ritual has a place in modern Kerala society and that a Vedic
ritualist, with his extensive and specialized knowledge, may have a future.
4. Three potAs, Four adhvaryus and Seven hotAs
Nothing illustrates the keen awareness of the weakening of tradition more
clearly than the exceptional care that was taken to prevent mistakes in
chants and recitations. The case of the sAmaveda is special because the
transmission of the chants is entirely in the hands of the few qualified
sAmavedins. The always larger tradition of Rgveda saMhitA recitation
continues to be strong, but the ritual does not follow the saMhita order of
Rks within a given hymn and requires extraordinary transformations to which
the Rks themselves are subjected. In the yajurveda, the ritual sequence is
often the same as in the taittirIya saMhitA, but the sequences that have to
be recited may be long and the vaidikans are not yajurvedins but Rgvedins
by birth. In 2003, all the required recitations and their modifications
were known only to a handful of people--basically the AcAryas and a few
others. Moreover, the concern for fidelity took on an extra dimension in
view of the tender age of some of the priests. The ten year old potA, a
minor officiant, was one of the priests whose task it is to recite the
ApyAyana mantras that make the Soma swell. Barely tall enough to touch the
bundle of Soma stalks on its high stool immediately to his south, he looked
across at his two preceptors who were standing on the other side, fixing
their gaze on him and indicating the mantras with their gestures. And so,
it looked on this occasion as if three priests were jointly executing the
office of the potA.
One technique that may assist in safeguarding the tradition is prompting
(see, e.g., Staal et al. I:287). It is a variation on an ancient custom.
The yajamAna, who may be a king or any person of importance and/or wealth,
not necessarily a Brahman, need not be familiar with Vedic or Sanskrit. He
repeated the required mantras after the purohita has recited them first. In
a modern "Vedic" marriage the bridegroom does the same. Haltingly in
Nambudiri gRhya and more fully in zrauta, prompting works as follows. If
the designated priest, who had been elected at RtvigvaraNam, has to recite
a set of mantras, the recitation is prompted by a student who stands next
to him and recites each verse before him, after which he repeats it
"officially." During the 2003 performance, the adhvaryu was often assisted
by such a student-prompter, standing himself in front of his teacher or
teachers, one of them a baudhAyana yajurvedin. Here there are four
adhvaryus: two assisters of the prompter, the prompter himself and finally
the officially elected adhvaryu.
The use of prompting is not allowed in the case of the zastras, which
consist of Rks culled from different hymns of the Rgveda. They are often
long and the sequence of the Rks that make up a given sastra have undergone
unusual transformations. The recitations are not only an intellectual
challenge but also place extraordinary demands on the lungs of the reciter,
since a prescribed sequence of Rks should be recited within a single
breath. In the agniSToma, the hotA has to recite six zastras; and
maitrAvaruNa, BrAhmaNAcchaMsin and acchAvAka two each. There was a general
feeling that the maitrAvaruna had problems with control of breath, but the
hotA's sastra recitations were exemplary. However, the latter also has to
recite the prAtaranuvAka litany in the early morning of the Pressing Day.
It consists of 360 Rgvedic verses, picked, as in a zastra, from different
hymns of different books, and arranged in an order different from that in
the Rgveda. The hotA's delivery of the prAtaranuvAka did not match the
excellence of his zastra performances. Seated facing east along the pRSThyA
line, he began the Morning Litany a little after 2 AM, on the fifth day,
assisted by two helpers: one, eighteen years old, the most promising
current Rgveda student at the Brahmasvam Madham, squatting in front of the
hotA to his right, and the other, one of the current core members of the
Nambudiri zrauta community, squatting likewise in front of the hotA but to
his left. There was a constant mime of hand signals from these two to the
hotA as he began his recitation: thus, we have three hotas, forming a
triangle.
But the story of the multiplying hotas does not end there. The small
triangle was at one angle of a larger triangle. At another angle of the
larger triangle, a group of at least three senior Vaidikans sat behind the
performing hotA, a few feet to his left, edging forward inch by inch,
constantly and in some alarm, as the hotA began to falter. At the third
angle of this larger triangle, the two Madham Rgveda teachers sat in front
of the hotA but a few feet to his left, in constant communication by hand
signals with the young helper who was their student. Thus our total of
seven hotAs.
Some of the hotA's trouble spots in the prAtaranuvAka may be mentioned
here. The first is RV 1.34.6 which begins: trir no azvinA... and this
beginning is the same as that of 1.34.7, two verses ahead. The hotA jumped
over one verse, a simple mistake in the order of Rks in the SaMhitA which
has nothing to do with the difficulties of the prAtaranuvAka. All it shows
is that he was nervous.
The second example is RV 5.79.1 which begins: mahe no adya bodhaya as it
occurs in the prAtaranuvAka. The next verse begins with the same three
words: RV 7.75.2: mahe no adya but then continues: suvitAya bodhi. It is
very confusing not only because bodh- occurs in both verses, but also
because RV 7.75 does not occur in the prAtaranuvAka at all, though each of
the hymns 7.73, 74, 77, 78, 79, 80 and 81 are recited there almost as if a
trap was planned. The hotA fell into it, but the young helper did not.
5. Preparation and Training
The undoubted stable of Rgveda recitation of the Nambudiri community is the
Vadakke Madham Brahmasvam. It probably owes its origin to the former custom
of some Nambudiri youngsters after samAvartanam to spend a year at the
Vatakkunnatha temple in Trichur where they would partake in the naivEdya
offerings and receive some training in Rgveda recitation. Subsequently they
were accommodated in a separate building, the Vadakke Madham Brahmasvam or
Brahmasvam Madham, where they received a more advanced education in Rk
saMhitA with padapATha and vikRti recitations such as krama, jaTA, etc. No
doubt, most children had begun their saMhitA mastery at home where they
were taught by their father, another relative or teacher. That practice
continues. At present, 430 Nambudiri families are affiliated to the Madham
and the bulk of its students come from these families, although other poor
Nambudiri children are also accepted. The Madham has now 25 students and
provides them with full room and board. The children also receive a modern
education, as mandated by state laws, and must appear for public
examinations of the State Board of Education.
All recitational studies available at the Madham are prerequisites for a
Rtvik taking part in a zrauta ritual, but no special training for zrauta
rituals is available at the Madham now. Specially selected students receive
it in the vaidikapITham in Perungottu, a town not far from Trichur, under
the leadership of Cerumukku Vaidikan Vallabhan Nambudiri. At the time of
the Trichur ritual there were four students in this institution and
Cerumukku Vallabhan's wish is to amalgamate it with the Madham facility,
leading to a central institute of zrautasamskAra. The sAmaveda tradition
remains largely within families. Out of the 21 Samaveda families in the
Nambudiri community, nine are entitled to perform zrauta rituals. Although
the situation with respect to trained sAmavedis seemed dire a while ago,
the Trichur yAga revealed the availability of a fully trained sAmavedi
corps. Throughout the training period, Tottam Krishnan Nambudiri, the
udgAta, worked closely together with Cerumukku Vallabhan.
The training for the yAga itself lasted five months, posing a measure of
hardship on the priests some of whom possessed secular employment. The
Trichur hotA was a school teacher, luckily not far from Trichur, but there
were priests from as far away as Bombay. In the weeks leading upto the
Trichur yagam, there were three full rehearsals. The training began under
the auspices of the senior Vaidikans, men we have identified as AcAryas. A
hotA of a previous ritual trains the hotA for the coming ritual. For
instance, the 1975 hotA, Naras Mangalath Narayanan Nambudiri, trained the
2003 hotA, Bhavatratan Nambudiri, who had been the 1990 maitrAvaruNa, the
priest with the second greatest Rgveda load. A spare hotA was also in
training in case the designated hotA would be disabled by poor health or
death/birth pollution. Such substitute trainees existed for all the major
priests, and they became the second and third priests in the yAga itself as
illustrated in section #4. A conspicuous feature in the training and
preparation of the 2003 yAga was the active role played by the Pantal
Vaidikan, a baudhAyana yajurvedin.
Soma arrived at Trichur on Friday April 4, having been brought on foot
from its traditional habitat, the Kollengode mountains in the Palghat
Ghats. Its local journey through the Trichur downtown streets to the site
of the ritual started on elephant back from the main entrance of the
Vatakkunnatha temple. Traditional pajJavAdhyam music accompanied the
procession with much pomp and circumstance. Soma was transferred to the
Madham and later lay stored under wet rags in one of its backrooms.
6. The Yajamana and his Priests
yajamAna: bhaTTi putillat rAmAnujan naMbUtiri
Gotra: vaizvAmitra. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 48.
yajamAnapatnI: Dhanya pattinAdi antharjanaM. Age: 39.
adhvaryu: kAvapra mARath zankaranArAyaNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: AGgirasa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 34.
pratipaSTAta: puthillaM jayarAman naMbUdiri
Gotra: kAzyapa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 49.
nESTAR: nARAs vAsudEvan naMbUtiri
Gotra: kAzyapa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 20.
unnEtAr: kApra nArAyaNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: AGgirasa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 50.
hOtAr neDTum bhavadrAtan naMbUtiri
Gotra: kAzyapa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 52.
maitrAvaruNa: ERkkara nArAyaNan naMbUtiri.
Gotra: vaizvAmitra. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 34.
acchAvAka: kApRa nArAyaNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: AGggirasa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 50.
grAvastut: kIZmudayUr paramEzvaran naMbUtiri
Gotra: kAzyapa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 57.
udgAtA: tOTTaM krSNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: vAsiSTha. Sutra: jaiminIya. Age: 45.
prastOtA: tOTTam zivakaran naMbUtiri
Gotra: vAsiSTha. Sutra: jaiminIya. Age: 38.
pratihartA: maGgalathEri nArAyaNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: vAsiSTha. Sutra: jaiminIya. Age: 58.
subrahmaNya: magGalathEri nArAyaNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: vAsiSTha. Sutra: jaiminIya. Age: 58.
brahMan KariyaNNUr divAkaran naMbUtiri
Gotra: AGgirasa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 42
brAhMaNAcchaMsin: kuZiyAMkunnaM nArAyaNan naMbUtiri
Gotra: vaizvAmita. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 27.
agnidhra: nARAs agnizarman naMbUtiri
Gotra: kAzyapa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 53.
pOtA: pANTaM subrahmanyan naMbUtiri
Gotra: kAzyapa. Sutra: kauSItaki. Age: 10.
sadasya: pantal dAmOdaran naMbUtiri
Gotra: bhARgava. Sutra: baudhAyana. Age: 35.
kautsan C. P. Ramaswamy
(sOma merchant) Gotra: vaizvAmitra. Sutra: ApastaMba. Age: 63.
7. The Performance
Since the Yajamana had not kept his fires burning, the ritual performance
had to start with punarAdheya/agnyAdhAna or AdhAnam. It took place on April
6 outside the prAcInavaMza in the area where the sadas was to be
constructed later. The three altars were temporarily constructed there and
the fourth, the aupAsanAgni altar, was located to the north of the
AhavanIya. FS asked the baudhAyana sadasya, who is also a zulbazAstrin,
what its exact location was and his prompt answer was: anywhere. The
making of the main fire began in the evening with many Nambudiris taking
part in the churning of the wooden upper araNi stick, drilling it into a
hole in the lower araNi. Although smoke was sighted soon, around 8.10 PM, a
self-sustaining fire itself did not catch till midnight. The Maharashtrian
ritualists declared that they possessed a more efficient and predictable
method.
To do justice to the agniSToma somayAga performance would require a tome of
at least a third the size of the first volume of the 1983 AGNI (Staal et
al.). We can do no more than mention a few haphazard episodes here, many of
them of a non-ritual nature, and beginning with the always spectacular
pravargya ceremonies on the 2nd through 4th day, when each time the flame
shot up about 3 feet high. It did not satisfy the Maharasthrians who are
used to a 6 feet flame. The explanation lies in the traditional shape of
the Nambudiri mahAvIra vessel which has a wider neck than the one that is
used in Maharasthra.
Sparse at first, crowds increased with the second and third day. Under a
roof of coconut thatch that surrounded the entire area of the yAgazAlA,
chairs and benches had been placed for visitors to a depth of four. The
numbers increased exponentially as the ritual unfolded, roughly equal for
men and women, mostly middle-aged and almost all Hindu although several
Christians could be counted. TVs had been placed in the periphery for
visitors to watch the live proceedings on the familiar screen. There was a
steady stream of people worshiping dakSiNAmUrti, installed within a shrine
erected to the south of the yAgazAlA. It is of special interest,
illustrating as it does not only a most generous flow of donations but
also, and related to it, the interface between Vedic ritual and the Hindu
religion. The number of dakSiNAmUrti devotees increased throughout the
performance, and we shall revert to it at the end of the present section.
There was a storm with thunder and lightning on the third day accompanied
by widespread whisperings among spectators that Indra had arrived. More
heavy downpours followed on subsequent days, a relief not to humidity but
to temperatures that had soared into the nineties. The climax of the
entire yAga began in the early hours of the 5th day, with the prAtaranuvAka
at 2.40 AM and the saptahotR, discussed in Section #4. With the
bahiSpavamAna in the early morning hours came another surprise: only the
first of the nine stotriyAs was chanted. The puzzlement of FS, expressed
sotto voce to TP, was immediately sensed by the sAmavedins who came to the
periphery of the enclosure as soon as the chant and the important rites
that follow it were over in order to explain, that it is only in the
agnicayana that all nine couplets are sung. Since the mystery of these
melodies and their dangerous powers (with undercurrents of witchcraft) have
always been keenly felt, was their number at an agniSToma performance in a
distant past perhaps reduced to one? Is it another testimony to the
freedom of a living tradition? The jaiminIya brAhmaNa refers to nine
stotriyAs, the zrauta sUtra is silent about their number, and so we hope
that jaiminIya specialists will throw light on the matter.
Fig.3. On the left, the akkitiri from 1990 holding hands with another
priest in the embrace of the sarpana cortege which consists, from left to
right, of adhvaryu, the two bearded sAmavedins looking to their right, the
yajamAna smiling and his brahman. A helper with a basket looks on, baffled.
The bahiSpavamAna was followed by another unexpected scene. The priests
did not only resume their sarpaNa movement, "as hunters approach their
prey," but others surrounded them in a circle of tight embrace that
introduced a merry moment into the solemn ritual. Is it to celebrate the
inclusion of the chanters in the yajamAna's cortège that already includes
his brahman, adhvaryu (in front) and pratiprasthAtA (at the end), thereby
paving the way for the union of chanters and reciters in the sadas once the
bahiSpavamAna is over? Whatever it is, it unleashed the unceasing whirl
of activities that characterizes the Soma pressing day and includes the
remaining eleven sAma stutis and twelve Rk zastras that continued on well
into the next morning and early noon. The avabhRTha bath occurred only late
after