·CHAKANDHAWA

·PREMIOLO
THE
VERTICAL
MAN
A STUDY IN
PRIMITIVE INDIAN
SCULPTURE
14839
by
W. G. Archer
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·FIRST PUBLISHED IN GREAT
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FIRST PUBLISHED IN INDIA 1947
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·Let us honour if we can
The vertical man
W. H. Auden
Art is a mathematics of the heart
D. V. Fumet

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·Το EDWARD WELBOURNE

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·as the on the wealthy products lowly sculpture of types there is a gap- Ibrilliant preliminary analysis of certain styles of English in the isolation of the countryside, and they represent main cathedral styles—the styles which we summarize English sensibility quite distinct from those which produced the Winchester, Canterbury, Durham and York schools of sculpture. of certain areas, local peasant traditions produced their county" culture of Western Europea culture which expressed "a gentle melodic sensibility. They spread wherever wealth could finance The village styles, on the other hand, grew up in a cultural vacuum. They neither influenced the cathedrals nor were influenced by them for the medieval town was far from the village and there was no critical consciousness to disturb the village way of carving. The cathedral styles represent the English sensibility in its robust essentials. If we compare this position with the situation in India, we 1 Myfanwy Evans, ed., The Painter's Object (London, 1937), article by "There existed all through the Gothic period the hieratic art of the church, also existed a subterranean art which was the art of the common people, PREFACE medieval sculpture to which little attention has hitherto been paid. These styles are found mainly in English parish churches, levels of Just as these schools stamped their styles styles--phrasing and formulating the more the village churches. Between the two types as rigid as that between two social classes, the townsman and the countryman, the squire and the peasant, the bishop and the country parson. The cathedral styles came from the floating refinements of a semi-English sensibility. shall find a striking similarity. In India, two types of sculpture. The first which has hitherto defined Indian sculpture for the West is principally the sculpture of the larger temples. This sculpture moves between the religious John Piper, “'England's Early Sculptors," 117–125. 2. Compare Herbert Read, “English Gothic," The Listener, May, 1930: vigorous, unlearned, even barbaric,” The peasant styles as in England, there are ci ·IO THE VERTICAL MAN diagram and the literal portrait and although it expresses certain values of ideal and indicates certain religious poses, anatomy it is as little indicative of Indian sensibility as a whole as the cathedral styles are summaries of English sculpture. As against this temple carving, there is a series of regional peasant styles. These represent a type of sensibility which in essentials is the same as that displayed in early English churches. There is the same interest in abstract rhythm and vital geometry and the same achievement of dignity through formal distortions. A view which focussed on these "subterranean” styles would find Indian sculpture strangely and compulsively parallel to Negro and Celtic sculpture—a world of art in which a contemporary mind can exult and delight. In this book, I have taken two of these regional styles—styles which are confined to the western portion of the Indian province of Bihar and have treated the sculpture as art. That is to say, my first concern has been with the formal values of the styles, the impact of the images as works of art. But a study of sculpture, particularly of a sculpture which is still in active production, inevitably raises other issues, and I have used this contemporary material to deal with such wider questions as the relations of art and religion, the influence on art of economics--to attempt an explanation of why the styles are what they are. The basis of experience from which this book is written should perhaps be stated. I first saw images of Bir Kuar in 1931 when I went with the late Mr. N. F. Peck, C.B.E., I.C.S., on a tour for tiger in the Sasaram and Rohtas thanas of Shahabad. The images with their brutal dignity excited me far more than any tiger but it was not until 1935 that I was again able to go to the area. In the winter of that year I went with Mildred Archer and made a short tour of the Latehar subdivision of Palamau district. This area lies north-west of Gumla in Ranchi district and is the extreme western portion of the Uraon country. In this tour we were only able to survey the fringes of the cult and I had again to wait until 1938 before going to the heart of the region. From October 1938 to February 1939, I made three sustained tours, working slowly down the western and eastern sides of the Son River, and visiting Ahir villages throughout the Sasaram subdivision of Shahabad and portions of Gaya, Palamau, Ranchi and Hazaribagh districts. In these tours, I saw as many Ahirs as I LE ·PREFACE II could, examined and photographed the sculpture, attended ritual and collected poems and legends. Of the many who helped me at different stages during the last fifteen years, I am particularly indebted to Mr. E. T. Prideaux, O.B.E., 1.C.s., and to Mr. M. Azfar, M.B.E., I.C..., both of whom assisted me with their knowledge of the area, to Mr. M. I. Malik, Director, Veterinary Services, Bihar, for a note on buffaloes, and to Mr. L. R. Sabharwal, I.F.S., Conservator of Forests, Bihar, for statistics of tigers. My special thanks are due to Mildred Archer for constant stimulus and advice, to Rai Sahib N. L. Bhattacharjee for a map, and to Rai Bahadur Sadashiva Prasad for detailed and valuable criticism. I must also record my great indebtedness to Miss Beryl de Zoete for constructive suggestions, Above all, my thanks are due to Babu Sankta Prasad who not only shared with me of many journeys, but continuous help in enquiries. But for his enthusiasm much of the preparation of this book would have been impossible. the rigours gave me W. G. ARCHER ·O SENCOR BHABHUA INDIA DAUDNAGAR Chandanpura PATNAON obey Deurig CANCIS SASARAMO Tendva Dusodni OCHANARI ODEHRI, PUNPUN R D S'Chaknaha Shankarpur) A O OBRA Narari. BARUN Ramdihra Baradih B Shekhpura H Tilauthu Bhista Bhadsa Churesaro Ranjitiganj Saraiyo & Majhiyawan H AURANGABAD S • Urdana O ADHAURA Khajuri Tendua MAP OF WEST BIHAR MIRZAPUR ROHTAS O Baknaur 'Dangwar NABINAGAR KUTUMBA Basan Bigha Rohtas. Jaintipur Bishunpur Dadara Pokrahi Banya . SON R Tilokhar Daranaggi Tiara Kol HARIHARGANJ Amahua. HUSSAINABADO Sonbarsa e Rambandh :? Karma KOEL R DUMARIA Lawadag Kalapahar Barwaria . Pandaria NORTH O BHAUNATHPUA MIRZAPUR Dinadag Kauwal kusahar) Bara o CHHATARPUR Р A L A M A NAGAR UTARIO Ramna a BISRAMPUA ·CONTENTS PAGB Preface 9 Map of West Bihar I2 IZ 25 I. Two Styles of Sculpture in West Bihar II. The Ritual of the Cattle-god III. The Myth of Bir Kuar IV. Wood and Stone 49 82 87 91 99 V. The Region and the Styles VI. Why the Styles are what they are Appendixes The Identity of Bir Kuar The Role of the Godlings The Control of Tigers Bibliographical Notes Glossary List of Villages Index IOS IIO I13 IIS II7 I2I

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·ILLUSTRATIONS Images of Bir Kuar Chakandhawa Frontispiece FIGURE between pages 16-17 STONE I Khajuri 2 Ghuna Bigha 3 Chandanpura 4 Bhadsa S Dadara Pokrahi 6 Banua 7 Majhiyawan 8 Saraiya 9 Urdana 10 Tendua, Ratanpura tola II Daranagar 12 Bhisra 13 Tilokhar 14 Nishunpur I5 Baknaur 16 Dangwar 17 Tenua Dusadhi 18 Sheikhpura 19 Shankarpur 20 Baradih 21. Basant Bigha 22 Manhania 23 Amahua 24 Churesar between pages 32-33 between pages 48-49

·16
THE VERTICAL MAN
25 Tilauthu
26 Rohtas, Bholna tola
27 Ramdihra
28 Barka Tiara
29 Ramna
WOOD
30 Rambandh
31 Nimahat
32 Kusiara
between pages 64-65
33 Dinadag
34 Sonbarsa
35 Kusahar
36 Kalapahar
37 Rohtas, Bholna tola
38 Ramgarh
39 Ramgarh
40 Rohtas, Bhabhantalao tola
41 Ramgarh
42 Bara
43 Bara
44 Banwari
45 Pandaria
46 Jairagi
47 Jairagi
48 Karma, Bairia tola
between pages 80–81
between pages 96-97

·I. KHAJURI ·2. GHUNA BIGHA ·INDIEN 3. CHANDANPURA ·4. BHADSA ·5. DADARA POKRAHI ·* 6. BANUA ·7. MAJHIYAWAN ·8. SARAIYA ·Chapter One TWO STYLES OF SCULPTURE IN WEST BIHAR I TN the south-west corner of Bihar, the Grand Trunk road is both a highway and a frontier. To the north, beyond its metalled surface, lie enormous open fields, wide and bare, like the fens at Ely. To the south, the Son river swells to a great stream in the Rains—to expire in sandy flats as spring merges into summer. To the west, the tall cliffs of Rohtas loom, gaunt and grim, in the light of evening. The road is, as it were, the end of a civilization, for, as one travels south, the sense of safety ends. The flat lands merge in rough hills, the soil reddens, cultivation thins. One is in an area of tumbled and scraggy jungle, which ranges from dense and shaggy folds to stunted derelict uplands. In this jungle, the Ahirs graze their buffaloes, and through its wild and sombre stretches the tiger stalks. Within this region each village has a form of stone or wooden sculpture. In places, stone and wooden images stand side by side. In others, wood alone is found, while in some the sole medium is stone. The latter marks the Sasaram, Dehri and Rohtas thānās of Shahabad, the Barun and Nabinagar thânās of Gaya and the Hussainabad thānā of Palamau, while the wooden figures flourish in Palamau district and in southern Sasaram. Each figure is normally made only for the Hindu caste of Kishnaut Ahirs, whose primary occupation is the tending of cows and buffaloes and its subject is their cattle-god, Bir Kuar. The stone sculpture is made by Gonrs, a subcaste of stone-cutters, while the images in wood are carved by Barbis, the caste of carpenters. No two figures are ever quite the same, yet the sculpture as a whole exhibits two distinct styles. Not only is each wooden figure related to a standard pattern, but the idioms of each image, its detailed ways of representing forms, are drawn from a regional stock. In a similar way, the stone images vary in details, yet, in basic conception, they, too, reflect a common style. It is, as it were, only in incidentals that an image expresses a particular B ·18 THE VERTICAL MAN carver. Beyond the individual lies the community and the sculpture is, in fact, a clue to the needs and values of a region. II The basis of both styles is a will to what may be called vital geometry;' and before we examine them in detail, it is necessary to make clear exactly what we mean by this fundamental term. An art may be said to be geometric when it uses the abstract forms of geometry—the circle, the straight line, the square, and the angle; and a purely geometric art is one which is severely limited to these forms. Examples are paintings by Helion or the village paintings of Singhbhum Santals2 in which the square of the picture is analysed into a series of subtly poised rectangles; or even certain plaques by Ben Nicholson in which the basic forms are circles and rectangles. In these kinds of art the forms are abstract in the sense that they correspond to certain mathematical concepts and do not derive directly from any vital forms. But even the purest geometry is not completely abstract for the presence of geometric forms in nature evokes human responses and charges them with vital associations. It is not true as Worringer thought, that “the rigid line is essentially abstract and alien to life” or that “the abstract geometrical line embodies no organic expression, no possibilities of organic interpretation."; The horizontal line is associated with the levels of a plain, the absence of obstacles, the recumbent, the passive and the female. The vertical line is linked to the thrust of trees, to energy, opposition, division, to the erect and the male. Similarly, the square and the triangle with their resolution into sharp points are associated with what is hard and brutal, the angular rock, the rational and masculine—the reverse of the curve with its yielding weakness, and feminine shrinkage. 1 I have adapted this term from Herbert Read's phrase "vitalised geometry" in his translation of Wilhelm Worringer's Form in Gothic. 2 I have discussed this type of painting in an article with Mildred Archer. (W. G. and M. Archer, “'Santal Painting," Axis (London), Autumn 1936.) 3 Wilhelm Worringer, Form in Gothic (trans). Herbert Read) (London 1927), 7 and 41. .

·TWO STYLES OF SCULPTURE IN WEST BIHAR 19 The vital associations of these forms could, in fact, be elaborated indefinitely. Worringer himself states, “What determines the impression made by the column is its roundness. This roundness at once evokes the illusion of organic vitality, because it directly reminds us of the roundness of those natural limbs which exercise a similar function of support, and more especially of the tree-trunk, which supports the crown and of the flower-stalk which bears the flower. Besides which, roundness in itself satisfies our natural organic feeling without the need of evoking analagous ideas. We cannot look at anything round without inwardly realizing the process which created that roundness. We feel above all the calm which evolves from this perpetual self-contained movement. The column, like the circle, is the highest symbol of self-contained and perfected organic life."I Henry Moore has said, “It might seem from what I have said of shape and form that I regard them as ends in themselves. Far from it, I am very much aware that associational, psychological factors play a large part in sculpture. The meaning and significance of form itself probably depends on the countless associations of man's history. For example, rounded forms convey an idea of fruitfulness, maturity, probably because the earth, women's breasts, and most fruits are rounded, and these shapes are important because they have this background in our habits of perception."2 Even the most geometric art, therefore, is not entirely abstract and does, in fact, contain emotional over-tones. Such an art, however, accounts for only a small proportion of sculpture and a far more common type may be termed semigeometric and semi-vital. In this art there are two kinds and in both the starting-point is not with the abstract but with the vital. The artist takes the organic forms of the human or animal body and proceeds to distort them in the direction of geometry. But while in one class the geometry deadens, in the other it vitalizes. Where it deadens, the vital forms are distorted to make a geometric pattern which has no relation to their meaning. The pattern is, as it were, imposed upon them from outside I Worringer, op. cit., 91. Henry Moore, "Notes on Sculpture," The Painter's Object, 28-29. % he ·20 THE VERTICAL MAN as an automatic diagram--and the shapes lose their vitality in being absorbed by it.: In the other group the forms are given geometric distortions, but instead of a pattern being imposed upon them, as something alien and arbitrary, they are welded into a rhythm which is based on their vital functions. Equally, while the distortions simplify the forms in a geometric direction, they use the vital associations of geometry for intensifying their human power. The geometry also reduces the forms to a common denominator and so makes easier their fusion into a single compulsive whole. It is this latter type of art which we can properly designate as vital geometry. III How then does the stone sculpture of West Bihar conform to this definition: We have seen that the various images are distributed throughout the region and that, taken together, they express a regional style. When we subject this style to scrutiny, we find that a will to vital geometry is expressed in a number of distinct ways. Firstly, the idioms or ways of representing the various human parts are given a geometric distortion. This is sometimes completely geometric and results in the pure forms of the circle or the rectangle. The head, for example, is treated as a circle,2 the mouth, the eyebrows, the shoulders and the waist are straight horizontals,3 the club is a straight line, the eyes and ears are semi-circles, the nose, the torso, and the legs are rectangles. At other times, the distortion is partly geometric in the sense that the forms are almost but not entirely a circle or a square. In these cases, the geometric form is twisted in a vital direction and has both the severity of geometry and the appeal of the organic. The torso becomes a flat or tapering oval,7 the arms are bulging semi-circles,8 and the lines of the legs spring outwards in a rigid curve.9 Finally, there are images in which the forms are vital rather than mathematical, but which yet contrive to 1 Compare, for example, early Scandinavian fibulas and Southern Germanic clasps. 2 Plates 13 and 23. 4 Plates 4, 5 and 31. 5 Plates 15 and 23. ng Plates I and 3. 8 Plates 9, IO, II and 21. 9 Plates 3 Plate 14. 6 Plate 14. and 21. 7 ·TWO STYLES OF SCULPTURE IN WEST BIHAR 21 evoke a geometric tone. The arms and head are reduced to irregular curving forms, or the arms, shoulders and club become a single violently twisting line. In these images, the curves and angles are too vital to be regular but in their jagged simplicity they set up a geometric sympathy. This will to vital geometry is similarly expressed in the rhythms. These are based on four geometric patterns—a vertical structure resembling a figure of eight,3 a second somewhat similar pattern based on three ascending circles or ovals, a third type based on interposing circles and rectangless and, finally, an angular structure with a more horizontal movement based on two splaying diagonals.6 These structures bear the same relation to the actual rhythms as a sonnet form or a blank verse form bears to the poem which uses it. They are fundamental frameworks on to which the idioms are fitted. But just as the process of writing a poem gives the verse form an organic irregularity, the process of carving the idioms modifies the structure. The rhythm of each image is not so much a mechanical repetition of a geometric structure as a vital organization of forms above it. The result is a system of rhythms and idioms which are geometric in their basic plan and tone but are otherwise fluid and vital. IV A similar effect is created by the wood sculpture but here the idioms and rhythms are somewhat different and there is an important respect in which the style in wood differs markedly from that in stone. The style in stone is essentially linear. That is to say, the images are conceived as flat planes jutting from a flat background. The edges of these planes are sometimes angular and the images are then the exact equivalent of linear drawings. At other times the edges are rounded and the plane becomes less a flat expanse as a series of shallow globular masses. At no time, however, do the stone images become fully round. Their aim rather is to build I Plates 25-27 4 Plates 7 and 25. 2. Plates 12, 15 and 23. 5 Plates 4 and 14. 3 Plates 1-3. 6 Plates 21 and 22.

·22 THE VERTICAL MAN up a flat geometric rhythm based on interposing lines and to reinforce it by the effect of light on slightly moulded linear forms. In the style in wood, the sculpture is essentially round. The figure, instead of being posed against a flat plaque, becomes a separate tubular form. The head swells into a rotund globe, and while the arms and legs continue to be treated as almost entirely linear, the basis shifts from the flat to the round. The lines no longer fuse on a flat plane but develop their formal relations on the rounded surface of the tube. Within these limits, the will to vital geometry employs two kinds of idioms. In the first the form is purely geometric and its characteristic shape is the vertical cylinder which represents the greater part of the body. In the second type, on the other hand, the forms are no longer purely mathematical but retain a geometric simplicity. The arms, for example, are treated as curving lines which swing towards each other either in a smooth unbroken curve or in one which is slightly angular and bent.3 The fingers become slim and tiny rectangles which splay out from the wrists like a fan. The legs, when they occur, are slightly irregular verticals. The face is either a tapering oval, a rough circle, or a blunt rectangle and the features are never far from the austerity of the straight line or the rigid circular curve. Similarly, although the head is never a pure sphere or a pure cube, it has a suave and smooth simplicity, a rounded grace or an angular formality which links it to more purely geometric forms. The vital forms of the body are, as it were, injected with geometry and while they are never completely abstracted, their lines and masses are simplified into curving and angular forms with geometric tones. Owing to the narrower range of the idioms there are fewer types of rhythm. The structure of one is a small oval poised on a larger oval and the rhythm consists in the swing of the lines round and across the curving masses of the cylinder and the head.6 In a second the tubular form is divided into three dwindling sections, which are interlinked by the lines of the hair, eyes, mouth, hands and ribs.7 Finally, in a type which is isolated from the others, the basic structure consists of two rectangles joined by a 2 Plates 35 and 36. 4 Plates 36 and 42. 5 Plates 39 and 41. 6 Plates 35 and 48. 7 Plates 38 and 41. 1 Plate 32. 3 Plate 43 ·TWO STYLES OF SCULPTURE IN WEST BIHAR 23 diamond-shaped parallelogram, and the rhythm is a system of balancing angles and rigid interfusing lines. V But geometric rhythm is only one element in the two stylesthe geometric in a will to vital geometry—and the same idioms and rhythms which produce an effect of mathematics are instrumental in projecting certain vital types. The styles, while distorting vital forms in the direction of geometry, also distort their relative sizes and it is this which both contributes to a geometric rhythm and produces certain emotional effects. The enormous head on a stunted body, the huge torso dominating the small head and legs, the towering club, the squat taut neck,5 the massive thighs which dwarf the head and torsoall these contrive to convey the sense of abnormal power. The human frame is not merely organized into a geometric scheme but becomes an image of a super-normal mani. The first of these summary supermen is a form which may be called the muscular guardian.7 This type is presented through the following idioms. The use of heavy semi-circles and jagged angles for the arms and torso creates a sense of muscular brutality. The welding of the arms and torso into a single compact form gives them the effect of compressed energy. At the same time, the rigid line of the club concentrating the posture on a weapon, the strict circular lines of the head, the rigid horizontal line of the mouth and the downcast eyes show that a decision has been taken and that there can now be no weakening. The figure is, as it were, taut and braced for defence. In the second type, the element of super-strength remains but the idioms create a type which may be called the benign hero.8 The brutal angular idioms are discarded and circular distortions take their place. The curves have an element of gentle grace—an abstraction which is ki kindly rather than austere. The club is whittled down to a baton or is omitted altogether, and the i Plates 46 and 47. 2 Plates 3, 22 and 17. 3 Plate 28. 4 Plates 12, 15 and 16. 5 Plate 20. 7 Plates 13, 19 and 20. 8 Plates 25, 33 and 37. 6 Plate 7.

·24 THE VERTICAL MAN rotund head merges in the rubicund. It is as if the muscular hero is about to bless rather than to strike. The third form may be designated the "doomed tough.”: In these images, the sense of power is conveyed through the large over-loaded head or the swelling thighs while the sense of tragic impotence comes through the drooping inward swing of the arms. In the two preceding types, the arms are compressed into a single but energetic line. The form is horizontal rather than vertical and it is as if they were about to spring apart. In this last type, the tension is vertical and the inward swing of the arms makes them look as if they were pinioned, as if the figure with the erect frame and powerful head was helplessly weak. The absence of the weapon contributes to this attitude while the blank and staring eyes, the thin mouth, the flat impassive face and the slim vertical form evoke the calm resignation of the doomed. In this last type, the will to a vital geometry reaches its height. The geometric rhythms convey an abstract exaltation, the beauty of a formal posture. At the same time they evoke majestic super-human type. They convey the pathetic dignity of a sentenced hero, the tragedy of a vertical man. I Plates 3, 7, 43 and 46; the phrase from a poem by Louis MacNeice. a ·Chapter Two THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD I T number of problems. Why should the styles project these vital types ? Why should they express this zest for vital geometry: To answer these questions, it is obvious that we must go to all the circumstances which surround their making. But before we ask why the styles are what they are, we must first inquire why they should exist at all. For in a peasant society, sculpture is never commissioned lightly. Its object is hardly ever simple decoration, the mere adornment of a harsh land. On the contrary its creation is normally impelled by vital needs. The two styles of West Bihar sculpture are both linked to a religious cult and if we are to explain their existence we must first examine their part in ritual. II We have already seen that the images are concerned with a cattle-god, Bir Kuar. The worship of this god centres on his primary function of actively aiding the Ahirs and of preserving them from harm. In the majority of Ahir villages his main task is to cause she-buffaloes to come on heat, and for this purpose bargains are made and special offerings are given. But besides this fertilizing function, Bir Kuar is also believed to exercise a general influence on the herds. Consequently, although his active help is only sought in accelerating pregnancies, sickness in a herd or attack by tiger are often thought to be due to his displeasure. And even in years when no special promise is to be redeemed, a certain minimum annual worship is done-partly as a caste habit but also from a feeling that it will insure against the effects of anger. In 1938, the Ahirs of Rohtas Kila delayed for some reason in doing the worship and they then began to notice that tigers were coming up to their houses. They therefore hurried up the ·26 THE VERTICAL MAN worship and after this the tigers went away. No actual harm had resulted, but there was a general feeling that the worship had been done none too soon. The most general time at which the worship is performed is at the Sohrai Festival in October. Among the Kishnaut Ahirs this is pre-eminently the festival of Bir Kuar; but its observance is not confined to Kishnauts and throughout Bihar it is observed as a general cattle festival under the sponsorship of Krishna. I Who commanded the Dashara : Who decreed the five days ? Who commanded Sohrai And the dance of the cows Raja Dasrath commanded the Dashara Ram decreed the five days Krishna commanded Sohrai And the dance of the cows. 2 Sohrai comes but once a year And the girls worship Gaura and Ganesh Going into the courtyards they light the lamps And the flames go to the sky Who observes the Dashara ? Who observes the five days? Who worships at Sohrai? Who worships on the sixth Sunday? Dasrath observes Dashara The gentry worship on the five days Krishna observes Sohrai And the mothers worship on the sixth Sunday. It is with the worship of Krishna that it probably originated, 1 The five days are the five holy Sundays the first Sunday of the bright halves of the Hindi months of Aghan, Pus, Magh, Phagun and Chait. These days are particularly holy. The sixth Sunday is the Sunday in the sixth month, Baisakh. Gaura is the wife of Shiva and Ganesh is their elephant son. The Dashara celebrates the victorious expedition of Ram to Lanka when he overcame Ravan and rescued Sita, Dasrath's daughter.

·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 27 and the Kishnaut Ahirs have specialized the festival by merging Krishna in Bir Kuar. II ORDINARY WORSHIP The Festival lasts for sixteen days in Kartik (October) and culminates in the day following Diwali. Six days before the Sohrai and again for six days after the festival has started, dohas or songs in praise of Bir Kuar are sung. These are not unlike Christmas carols which are sung for a week or ten days before Christmas and then on up to New Year's Eve. They range over all aspects of his character investing him sometimes with a naïve innocence, sometimes with majestic grandeur, at once celebrating his name and on occasion imploring him to regard the herds with favour. 3 Baba Bir Kuar, I offer you milk and gur Protect me Very small was Baba Birnath, brother But he quickly killed a tiger. 4 O Bir Kuar baba, you are very bold You wield two swords One And with the other You protect the world. you keep under your arm 5 O Bir Kuar baba, blessed is your name When I call upon you my cow conceives And with her milk I feed you.

·28 THE VERTICAL MAN 6 From that dense jungle Where no sound issues And no light enters And where two tigers roar Through the grace of Bir Kuar baba The tigers go away And the cows Eat undisturbed. 7 The shrine of Baba Bir Kuar Is west of the village All the village worships him Wherever our cows graze and wander Protect them. 8 Brothers, my tawny cow is very good Cow, you may wander where you will Through the grace of Bir Kuar baba I shall not need a stick. 9 O Bir Kuar baba I remember your name always And call upon it Through your strength I wander in the world Protect me. IO In a basket Are rice and sandal wood In a basket Are flowers O Bir Kuar baba Come down The annual day Has come.

·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 29 II Baba, of this place are you But your name I do not know I offer you milk and sugar Protect me On a black horse is Birnath On a white horse is Bhagwan Birnath comes on a stool of gold To see his sons and grandsons. I2 Which is the birth place of Birnath, brother : And where was he reared ? Where should his posts be put And where is he honoured In Ayodhya was Birnath born In Palamau he was reared His posts are in the open fields And there the people honour him. 13 Whose head Has the red cloth: Whose hair Is matted with ashes ? Whose neck Is graced with a garland: Whose body Shines with the rent silk ? The head of Birnath Is decked in the red cloth Chulhai Kuar Is beautified with the matted hair Langra Kuar Is graced with a garland Mother Jasoda Shines with the rent silk.

·30 THE VERTICAL MAN 14 Little is the image of Baba Birnath, brother His thighs are a plantain post His chest is a potter's wheel His moustache is the head of a spear His biceps are knotted wood Under his armpit he holds a quiver With nine hundred heads And with a hook he kills his quarry. IS What is the dais made of And who has carved it: Who sits on it? Who cleans his mouth: Whose thirty-two teeth are gleaming? The dais is of wood The carpenter has carved it Baba Bir Kuar cleans his mouth His thirty-two teeth are shining. Hunting in th I6 Red is the face of Birnath And double are the barrels of his gun the jungle He kills a tiger But though he slays a tiger He also shoots some partridges. 1 Just as the fifteenth-century wall painters in the Church of St. Peter and Paul, Pickering, Yorkshire, found it natural to paint Salome in the costume of a fifteenth-century glamour girl, Ahirs also assume that the world of Bir Kuar is no different from the world of today. The following song from an early English morality play refers to Christ in very similar terms. Hail, darling dear, full of godhead pray thee be near when that I have need Hail: sweet is thy cheer; my heart would bleed To see thee sit here in such poor weed I ·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 31 17 In the silent jungle grows a bamboo clump Out of the bamboo is your shrine made, Birnath Above and below it the royal geese play. I8 From the east comes a Turkiniai And spins fine thread With the thread is sewn a jacket And Birnath wears it as he sits. 19 I spun and wove a cloth of gold And on it my Baba reclines Like an Emperor of Delhi. For the same period of the festival some ghi is put on the posts or the images, usually each morning but occasionally in the evening. In many villages, the women quietly put the ghi on at night and only in villages where the cult is at a low ebb do the posts or images ever lack their ghi. On the night of Diwali, that is, the night preceding Sohrai day, the Ahirs like other castes worship Lakshmi (or Bhagwati). Fortune marks consisting frequently of small black circles with white dots are painted on each side of their doors and rows of earthen lamps are placed on the verandahs. At the same time, a few earthen lamps are placed before the shrine of Bir Kuar and left to burn themselves out, through the night. The worship proper is done the following morning. The Ahirs With no pennies Hail: put forth thy dall I bring thee but a ball Have and play thee withal And go to the tennis. (A. W. Pollard, English Miracle Plays, Moralities and Interludes (Oxford, 1927), 42.) 1 A female Jolaha or member of a Muhammadan weaving caste. 2 See Plate 37.

·32 THE VERTICAL MAN assemble at the shrine, and a small fire is inade. Some cows are then milked and after the milk has been boiled and some gur added, a preparation known as khir results. Some of this is then put on a leaf in front of the shrine. At the same time, some straw is put on a tile and hum is made by adding a little ghi. The straw is ſit and the tile is placed so that the smoke from the hum goes up in front of the shrine. In addition to the khir, thekua, gur, puris, and laung ka chhak, are sometimes offered. At the time of offering, Ahirs who feel like doing so bow before the shrine and after folding their hands offer a simple prayer in the following form. “Bir Kuar Baba, through your goodness my buffaloes have come on heat. Continue to protect them.” IV THE MINOR FIGURES But besides the offerings to Bir Kuar, subsidiary offerings are almost always made to one, two and sometimes three extra figures. These figures may be grouped into 1. personified elements of the main myth of Bir Kuar, 2. local accretions to the myth based on actual incidents or local needs, and 3. cult figures of other castes who are locally associated with Bir Kuar. All three groups are influenced by the varying social atmospheres of the area and I give below a chart indicating the names under which the figures appear. MINOR FIGURES Relatives of Bir Kuar Children Village A son Maharajganj Brothers Langru Bir Tendua Chandargarh I See glossary.

·OP
PR
9. URDANA

·IO. TENDUA, tola Ratanpura ·II. DARANAGAR ·I2. BHISRA ·13. TILOKHAR ·14. NISHUNPUR ·IS. BAKNAUR ·16. DANGWAR ·33 THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD Relatives of Bir Kuar Village Bir Mirsarae A brother who was killed by a tiger Mirsarae Associates, friends and companions A Muhammadan A lame carpenter An unknown Rajput Bankheta Mathurapur Churesar Bishunpur Goradih Madhkupia Dinadag Rambandh Bahiar Khurd Bahiar Khurd Dinadag Muhammadganj Bankheta A Bhuiya A carpenter Pipardih Baskatia Chakla Makritola A man killed by a tiger (Baghaut) An anonymous Pathan An unknown stranger with Muhammadan affinities A strange Hindu whose caste is unknown A nameless friend of low caste An unknown companion Tipa Lakhea Mirsarae Nishunpur Purnadih Urdana Pandaria Langru Bir (a) An unknown associate Khaira Sheikhpura Amba Ararua Kalan Khatin Kharwardih ·34 THE VERTICAL MAN Associates, friends and companions Village Langru Bir-continued (a) An unknown associate Tenudih tola of Sarma continued Banwari Chachayia Khajuri Barahi (6) A Muhammadan Ghunabigha Samauta Majhiyawan Benibigha Simarbari Arjundih Rambandh (c) A lame carpenter Tipa (d) An Ahir Narari Gopi Mian, a Muhammadan Khajuri Madhkupia Daranagar Turki Tulsi Bir, a Bhuiya Rudwa Darahi Madho Dank, a Bhuiya Sitalpur Dumarchatti Vishva Karma, a carpenter Dhoba Servants A cowherd Chapra Tilauthu Maharajganj A second cowherd Maharajganj An unknown servant Selupara A Jolaha servant Nimahat A pahardār (or body-guard) Parha Tendua Rudwa A begar (or "fag") Indrapura Baradih Ananditchak Parcha Gop Gwal ·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 35 3 Associates, friends and companions Village A favourite servant Tumba A Gorait (or drummer) Nawadih Langru Bir (a) an unknown servant Chatra (b) An Ahir servant Khajuri (c) a carpenter who was also a servant Chatra Gopi Mian (a) A Muhammadan cowherd (6) A Jolaha servant Khajuri Tulsi Bir, a body-guard Mali Bir Jamuni Goraiya, a Dusadh body-guard Ramgarh Seri, a body-guard Basaura Outsiders A Pathan servant of a landlord Pipardih Tardih Uchaila Milki Babhantalao tola of Rohtas Kanker A Khan Sahib Daranagar A Muhammadan dealer in bangles Ramna Sheikh Babal, a Muhammadan servant of the carpenter Muhammadganj Gopi Mian, a Pathan servant of a landlord Jaintipur Langru Bir, a Pathan servant of a landlord Kanker Pets Madhurampur A dog present When offerings have been made to one or more of these extra figures, the remaining khir is distributed among the Ahirs and the group disperses. On such occasions of routine worship a medium is not usually called in and the worship becomes almost entirely a group act.

·36 THE VERTICAL MAN THE EXPANDED WORSHIP between three to eight times, and the i A particular Ahir acts as a leader but all the Ahirs see what is needed and while some prepare the khir and thekua, others make the hum. The worship is almost an exact instance of the operation of Rousseau's "general will." V This routine worship is greatly expanded in years when a goat is sacrificed and in many villages a medium is summoned in order to lead it. On these occasions, the roots of the ceremony usually go back to many months prior to the actual Sohrai day, and the rites are simply the culmination of a processwhich includes a bakauthi or bargain with Bir Kuar the answer to the prayer the purchase of a goat in redemption of the promise the summoning of a medium the boiling of the village milk the goat sacrifice the offerings the medium's ecstasy the pantomime of the tiger and finally, the drama of the lame man. The bakauthi.-The bargain which starts the process of expanded worship is usually made by a villager when there is abnormal delay in a she-buffalo coming on heat. The period of a buffalo's pregnancy is ten months and buffaloes are covered from the age of five years onwards. A she-buffalo usually calves between becoming pregnant and again coming into heat is three years. The months in which she-buffaloes usually come on heat are Asar and Sawan (June to August). If therefore a buffalo has not come into heat within two years of calving and the next Asar passes, the owner is filled with anxiety and if the delay goes on, he makes a solemn promise or bargain with Bir Kuar to sacrifice a goat or even to erect images in return for the weakness being remedied. This is almost invariably the only matter for which bargains ·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 37 are made with Bir Kuarthe bringing of buffaloes into heat; and this is by far his major function. But just as throughout the area there are villages where his powers seem slightly more general, one also finds occasional villages where bargains are made to cover illness in the family or failure of crops, and in one village, Koeridih, a bargain had even been made for obtaining a child. In 1932, a childless Ahir of this village agreed to put up two stone images if he got a child. A little later his wife conceived and when the child was born two images were installed. But desolation succeeded delight for some time afterwards the child died. This is the only instance I know in which Bir Kuar was moved for increasing human fertility. It is for fertilizing shebuffaloes that nineteen out of twenty bargains are made. The answer to the prayer.-Bir Kuar is first and foremost a “utility” god, and whether an Ahir fulfils a promise depends entirely on whether Bir Kuar has first fulfilled his part. The promise is usually made at the shrine at night and in private and the existence of the bargain may thus be either public knowledge or a private secret. But the Ahir who makes it, knows that whether the village hears of it or not, Bir Kuar has heard and once his object has been achieved, he knows that he cannot lightly postpone completing the bargain. I give four instances in which posts and images formed the basis of the bargain. As the expenditure was greater than that involved in a goat, there was a greater element of hesitation but otherwise they are typical of all these bargains. In Ramdihra, one of Deni Ahir's she-buffaloes had failed to come on heat. The delay became serious and he then promised Bir Kuar that if she again became fertile and gave him another she-buffalo, he would put up an image. The buffalo soon after came on heat and he got first one and then a second shebuffalo from her. He did not, however, keep the promise and, in fact, made no attempt to do so. Six of his she-buffaloes then suddenly died from cow-pox. Not long after, Bir Kuar appeared in a dream and told him that his herd would again increase only if he redeemed the promise. He then hurriedly commissioned the image and since then the herd has been recovering. In Uchaila, Ram Nandan Pathak, a Brahman, had difficulty with his she-buffaloes and promised a stone image if they came ·38 THE VERTICAL MAN on heat. They did so and in 1935 he redeemed the promise and brought an image from Ramdihra. In the Turki tola of Daranagar, Somaru Ahir put up two stone images in 1936. Here also there was some delay in implementing the promise and it was only after Bir Kuar had appeared in a dream and threatened to punish him, that he took steps to complete the bargain. Finally, in Mahesara, an Ahir made a bargain that if the herd increased from five to fifty he would put up two posts. He died some years ago but when the herd did in fact reach fifty, his son honoured the bargain and in 1933 the posts were installed. We may say then that the normal Ahir attitude is not to pay until the object has been accomplished but once it has been achieved, to make no bones about honouring the pledge. The purchase of a goat.--For the purpose of sacrifice, a goat must not have been picked by a crow, bitten by a dog, or have ever been stolen. It must also be three years old and of only one colour. If a goat of these qualifications is available, it is bought about a month before the ritual date and is then duly offered. But if one is not forthcoming an ordinary goat is bought and the ceremony has to be delayed for three years while it roams freely. I was told that such cases are not common, and in any case, many villages are not very strict. But the tlaeory exists and where the Ahirs are strongly religious, it is normally followed. The extent to which goats are sacrificed varies very greatly. In some villages, a single goat is always sacrificed whether there is a promise to be redeemed or not. In others, years may elapse before a bargain becomes necessary, while in villages where belief in bargains is strong, the number of goats sacrificed in a year may be as many as three. In the Turki tola of Daranagar, two goats were sacrificed in 1937 and three in 1938. The latter included one from a Brahman and one from a Nunia. The summoning of the medium.-When the goat has been arranged, the next step is to summon the chhatia or medium. There is usually a medium within a radius of five miles and on such occasions, information is sent to him and he comes over to preside at the rites. A medium is qualified for his part less by any rites or knowledge than by the declaration that Bir Kuar comes regularly on ·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 39 him. It is the power to khel—to go through a paroxysm and achieve a climax--that is his main qualification. He is, as it were, the sensitiser who picks up the god, the body which temporarily receives him. He goes through a form of hysterical exaltation during which the god absorbs him and he in turn absorbs the god. When it is over, he sinks back in an ecstasy of relief. The boiling of the milk.-The ritual day then comes. When the medium has arrived, the Ahirs move over to the shrine. Incense is prepared. The medium puts on a new dhoti. All the village milk is collected and a trench, five to ten feet long, is dug. In this, a fire of wood is lit. A big earthen pot full of the milk is then put on it, a little rice is added and the milk is boiled up until a skin forms. The medium then squats on the pot and tosses the skin over his shoulders, sprinkling it at random. In Deuria and Tenua Dusadhi, the milk is put into seven pots on the trench and when the milk is boiling the medium walks on the pots five or six times and as he walks he scoops up the skin and tosses it in the air. In most villages the walking on the pots coincides with the start of the ecstasy, but in Bahiar Khurd it occurs when the medium is well into the frenzy and is in fact used to test whether or not Bir Kuar is actually on him. In this village, the medium comes out of the jungle moving on all fours like a tiger and nosing hither and thither. The Ahirs call on him to dip his hand into the boiling milk and sprinkle the skin. If he does this without being scalded, it is plain that Bir Kuar has possessed him. The medium pays no immediate heed to the challenge and goes nosing round and round. Then when he feels the moment has come, he hunches himself up on the pot, darts his fingers into the milk and throws the skin over his shoulders with a slick and easy gesture. The goat sacrifice.-With the sprinkling of the skin the stage for sacrificing the goat is reached. But before this can take place, the goat must first be tested. This sometimes takes the form of putting flowers and vermilion on its head and if the head shakes, Bir Kuar is believed to have accepted it. Or instead of putting flowers on the head, the horns are rubbed with vermilion and a little rice is put on the ground before it. If the goat eats the rice, it is again considered ·THE VERTICAL MAN and distributed; and to prevent the crows pickina 40 that Bir Kuar has assented. If the goat's head does not shake or the rice is not eaten, the goat is released and re-offered in a year's time. If, after one year, it still does not make the proper response, it is released and re-offered once a year until it signifies assent. If the test is satisfactory, the head is then struck off and lifted up and placed on the shrine. The liver is extracted, cooked and put on the shrine and some liquor is poured over it. The carcase them, the bones are buried at the spot. In villages such as Bagen, the custom is to cook the meat away from the spot (though never outside the village) while in villages such as Ganguli, the flesh is cooked then and there. In the Babhantalao tola of Rohtas, the liver is made into a ball, cooked, split up into five parts and then offered. The actual ritual for severing the head varies widely from region to region. The normal method is to use either a sacrificial sword, a balua or a hansua. The sword resembles a heavy butcher's chopper and a single weighted stroke is sufficient for neatly severing the neck. The same applies to a balua which is a kind of halberd, with the head fitted to a stout stick. The balua is gripped in both the hands and a slick cut is made with it. The hansua is a large sickle with a keen cutting edge with which the neck is sawn off. It is usual for the Ahir offering the goat to execute it. In contrast to these forms each of which is strictly practical, there is a form with ritual significance. This is the beheading with a bansula or a carpenter's adze. When it is used the goat is held down with its neck on a block of wood and its head is then hacked off in four or five strokes. The first drops of blood are put on the bansula as an act of worship to the carpenter. The blood from the neck is then collected, mixed with milk and drunk by the medium. In Madhkupia this rite is accompanied by a separate offering to a larne carpenter and wherever possible, as in Rambandh, Muhammadganj and other villages of Hussainabad, a carpenter is brought in to do the execution. In Sonbarsa there is the added requirement that the carpenter who does the beheading must belong to the same family as that of the carpenter who made the posts. To the meaning of this rite I shall return later.

·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 41 When the killing is over, there is usually nothing to commemorate it. But a marked exception is in the Aurangabad area where the sacrifice is always accompanied by the insertion of two pegs in the ground. These pegs are made of bel wood and are put in only when a goat is sacrificed and only when the goat is offered by an Ahir. The pegs are provided each year, free of charge, by the local carpenter, but as they are small, they rarely remain in place for more than a few weeks. In Itkhori thana, there is a similar usage. In Nagwa and Dhankheri, a post is put up whenever a goat is sacrificed, and in this way each village has acquired thirty to forty posts. In the Bahera tola of Gondaria there are as many as forty-five posts. As the posts are much taller than the pegs used in Aurangabad, the posts have remained where they were installed. Elsewhere, a discoloured patch near the shrine is all that marks the killing. The medium's ecstasy.—After the goat has been sacrificed, the medium starts his frenzy. He puts on a new saffron-coloured dhoti, approaches the shrine and prepares incense. His body then starts to quiver, his arms shake and he is tossed from spot to spot. In the course of the frenzy, he catches hold of the images, mounts them, or leaning heavily, goes round and round. If there are clay horses, he puts his toes on them, “rides” them for a few moments and then climbs the posts. In various villages in Chatarpur thana, he carries a hair cord with which he strikes himself and the Ahirs. This ecstatic ambulation then merges into the two final episodes—the pantomimes of the tiger and the lame man. The pantomime of the tiger.—This performance occurs in villages where the cult of “the man killed by the tiger" (Baghaut) is strong and where additional offerings are made to him during the worship of Bir Kuar. It sometimes follows, but more usually precedes, the pantomime of the lame man, and the two dramas then blend in one. In a village such as Mananpur, the two are telescoped and the lame man turns into the tiger on his way to the shrine. The first pantomime goes as follows. In Lawadag, when the offerings are over, the goat's head is taken four yards to the front and the medium ties his hair cord round the horns or ears. * Probably as a purification from evil spirits.

·42 THE VERTICAL MAN into a He then simulates a tiger and slinks about on all fours, finally pouncing on the head, putting an ear between his teeth, worrying it and, at last, tossing it away with a jerk of the head. In the Tendua tola of Ratanpura the goat's head is hidden by one of the Ahirs and the medium then pretends to be a tiger and slinks about, looking for it. When he finds it, he sniffs it and returns. In Basantbigha also, the goat's head is hidden and the medium ramps and roars like a tiger, creeping round on all fours and glaring till he finds it. He then takes an ear in his teeth and shakes it. The pantomime of the lame man.--The medium now changes to a lame man. There is not, however, any standard pattern to which this drama must conform and it varies widely from village to village. Thus, in Lawadag, two of the Ahirs present are nominated as begars (men who are compelled to do cooliework without any pay). They are given a few puris but after eating them they ask for more. A mock negotiation follows. At last, the amount of their food is settled and some cloth is made up bundle. One of the begars takes up the bundle and puts a hand under the medium's armpit while the other begar supports him on the other side. The medium carries two sticks and assisted by the begars, he hobbles a distance of ten yards. The begars then suddenly push him down and run away. The medium picks himself up and this ends the paroxysm. In Sunri the pantomime is slightly different. As soon as the offerings are over, a begar is chosen, some puris are put in a bundle on his head, and he is told to go in front. The medium has two sticks-one a short one and one a long one. He limps after the begar with his foot resting half way up the long stick. He then throws the short stick at the begar who drops the bundle, breaks the long stick in two, and falls down. Finally, he picks and walks to the posts. The stick which he has thrown at the begar is now brought back to him, he anoints it with milk and gur and gives it back to the owner. In Ramgarh, on the other hand, wraps are put on the shoulders of two men and the medium puts his arms round their necks and supports himself. They then advance six to ten paces when the begars push the medium over and run away. The medium rolls himself back posts where he bows and pours water on the ground. In himself up to the ·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 43 Muhammadganj the medium pretends to be lame and hunches up a leg. A man then pretends to be a coolie and is given some roti, which he puts on his head. He then sets off as if carrying a load and as he passes the medium, the latter tells him to stop and tries to snatch the roti. The man does not pay any attention. The medium threatens him and finally he throws a stick after him. On this, the coolie takes to his heels, the medium limps after the stick, recovers it and returns to the shrine where he bows his head. In Barka Tiaria there is a curious deviation. At the end of the offerings the medium stoops down and moves about six yards from the shrine in a hunched-up manner holding a chhar, the rope used for tying the legs of buffaloes. He imitates the posture of a lame man but does not carry a stick and there is no interlude with a begar or a bundle. Similarly in Khajuri the element of the mock assault is lacking and there is instead a strange meeting between Bir Kuar and the lame brother, Langru Bir. At the close of the offerings, a man (not the medium) leans on a stick, pretends to be lame and acts the part of Langru Bir. The medium, who pretends to be Bir Kuar, climbs on his back and is carried a few steps until the lame man stumbles and collapses. Other men help the lame man to his feet-while the medium bows down where he fell. Finally, in Mananpur there is a curious fusion with the tiger pantomime. A man is selected and fed with puris and is then given a bundle. He supports the medium and they advance ten yards. He then pushes the medium down and throws away the bundle. The medium then picks up the bundle in his teeth and crawls back to the post-his return signifying that Bir Kuar has left him. The pantomime of the horse.--In Kurasin, I came across a casual recollection of a third pantomime. An old Ahir said that when he was a boy, he saw the pantomime of the horse. The medium selected a man, made him pretend to be a horse and sent him racing off for a distance of two hundred yards. There was no mimicry of galloping. He then called him back with a shout and the horse left the man as he reached the shrine. Termination.—With the ending of the pantomime the celebrations end and the Ahirs disperse.

·44 THE VERTICAL MAN VI THE CLAY HORSES to of gram. In many villages in Rohtas thana and the Sadr subdivision of Palamau, little clay horses are offereds—sometimes as supplements goats and sometimes as substitutes for them. They are usually fired and are a sunny red colour, but occasionally, the clay is left soft and they then remain a dirty yellow. Like the carpenters who supply the posts, the potters who model them do so as a duty and not for sale, receiving in return either a pice or a pawa When the horse is the main offering, it occupies the place in the worship which is otherwise taken by the goat. On other occasions when it is only subsidiary, it is offered along with khir, thekua, puris and sweets. Its object is to provide Bir Kuar with a steed, a form of celestial conveyance and so to win his favour. "Let not the reckless heavenly riders Treat him or me as rank outsiders.", VIT THE INSTALLATION OF POSTS AND IMAGES While the offer of a goat is the commonest form of bargain the installation of wooden posts or stone images is the extreme kind and it is here that we approach the function of the sculpture. The offer of images is made at times of major crisis. It is a form of bargain which will secure favour when nothing else will. In years when images are erected, goats are also sacrificed and the worship follows the normal expanded type with the addition of the installation ceremony. The installation of the images. These ceremonies are essentially fluid and vary with the means of the Ahir. In Bank, when an image is put up, the custom is for the carpenter to bring the figure to the site, and after ceremonially receiving a present, to place it in the hands of the Ahir who is I See Plates 23, 29, 33, 34, 37, 38 and 45. 2 W. H. Auden.

·THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 45 dedicating it. The Ahir then sprinkles it with water, washes it with turmeric, anoints it with achhat and sandal wood and then plants it in the ground. A dhoti or a wrap round the post. The Ahir then makes a circle of the cattle present and offers a is put prayer to Bir Kuar. In Kundari, two wooden figures were put up in 1935. The posts were brought by the carpenter, washed in water and rubbed with turmeric. Two holes were then dug and a pie and a betel nut placed in each. The posts were put in and a dhoti was wrapped round them. A Brahman recited installation verses. In Tilauthu, two stone images were crected in 1932. The mason was given a cow worth six rupees, a dhoti and one rupee in cash. The images were brought to the spot on the morning of Sohrai, washed with water and anointed with haldi and ghi. Then they were set up in position, incense was made and they were again smeared with ghi. Finally a goat was sacrificed and tapawan prepared. VIII THE DANCE OF THE COWS At the end of the sacrifice or installation, the Ahirs unite in a general celebration of the cattle, “a dance of the cows." This is the climax of the Sohrai, the gala with which the puja ends, the mass rite which clinches the worship and ushers the Ahirs into another year. The Bhojpuri term for this rite is gaidarh. Gai means cow or cows while darh is a term used only in connection with the rite. If one asks an Ahir what darh means, he always replies gai darh. The term is sometimes expanded into gai nachne ka darh—the darh of the dancing cows. The “dance of the cows" seems, therefore, the nearest English equivalent, for it retains the sound of the original and hints also at the solemn lumbering dance in which the spectacle consists. The ritual has possibly two meanings. Dr. J. H. Hutton states that "the doctrine of soul-substance as a fertiliser is not less applicable to animals than to human beings, and it is therefore not surprising to find the Malas of Southern India and Ahirs at ·46 THE VERTICAL MAN the Gaidaur festival causing their cattle—the young in particularto trample a pig to death, after which, according to ancient custom, the corpse of the pig is eaten.": Another view is that the pig is a scapegoat, an animal on to which the weaknesses and blemishes of the herd are transferred; and this possibly receives confirmation from the fact that in certain villages, a calfis used as proxy for the pig and the slaughter is replaced by a chase. The dance itself is performed as follows. The cows and buffaloes are rounded up and after they have been sanctified with ghi and vermilion, a pig is swung into their midst on a rope. The animals come towards it, butt it with their horns and then prance over it. As the dance goes on, the animals get wilder and the pig is tossed high in the air. Finally, an animal gores or tramples on it and with its death the dance ends. During my tour in 1938, I saw two dances--one at Ghunabigha and the other at Naykagaon in Rohtas thana. At Ghunabigha, it was already late in the afternoon and the sun was descending on the Rohtas hills. The preliminaries had been completed and the cattle were being driven in. A small sow had been placed in a hollow in a mango grove and thirty yards away the images of Bir Kuar looked grimly on. There was a grassy open space, all round the mango grove and cattle were arriving from three directions. The cows were herded separately from the buffaloes. Ahirs stood about with sticks and some had drums. When the cattle had come in, three Ahirs went round them giving each some coarse country salt from a little basket and smearing some ghi on their horns from a leaf packet. An old woman vermilion first on the drums then on the foreheads of the cows and finally on the horns of the buffaloes. After the vermilion had been put, a man went round the three herds and sprinkled a little liquor on the horns. The drum then began to beat and the sow was got ready. A man stooped down beside it and tied a piece of rope about five yards long to the right back leg. A lota of water was brought and the water sprinkled on the sow. After that, the old woman sprinkled some vermilion on its forehead. Some rice was dropped * J. H. Hutton, Census of India, 1931, India, 1, 405. then came and put ·appeared THE RITUAL OF THE CATTLE-GOD 47 on' its mouth, and the sow gobbled it up. The man with the bottle of liquor poured out a handful and sprinkled it on its mouth, and about the same time a cup full of liquor was poured on the ground in front of the Bir Kuar shrine. The dance then started. Three Ahirs advanced towards the Cows-one of them leading the sow, another singing and the third beating a drum. The sow was pitched into the herd, and after dilly-dallying a little a cow ran at it and butted it with its forehead. The Ahirs then drove the cows round and as each cow came up, it drove its head against the victim and then jumped over it. When the cows had finished the sow was led over to the buffaloes. In order to excite them, some of their calves were taken and dangled near it. This made the buffaloes frantic and they ran at the sow. Occasionally the rope got hitched to the horns of a buffalo and the sow was swung about. I watched the process for half an hour and there then little likelihood of the animal being killed. It had been bruised by the butting and it tried to lie as quietly as possible, but when the drummer struck it playfully four times, it came smartly to its feet and trotted off. I then went on to Naykagaon where a similar dance was pending. Here the pig was put into the cattle almost at once, and as the cows were more savage, several attacked it together, butting and trampling on it. In less than five minutes, its limp and lifeless body was being swung among the horns, and when it rested on a furrow, the cows came and smelt its blood. Elsewhere in the area dances follow the same type but here and there, a village develops its own variant. Thus in Hardaspur a mock pig is used. A bhatua, or vegetable like a marrow, is wrapped up in a torn blanket, made into a bundle and dragged about among the cattle. The cattle are made to gore it with their horns and leap over it. Similarly in Uchaili a pig is not dragged but a rope is tied to a calf which is pulled through the herd. Other villages have other local expressions. With the termination of the rite, the Ahirs go home and the day ends with the worship of their household dead and with stick-dancing and drinking.

·THE VERTICAL MAN IX CONCLUSION In this long and intricate ritual, the role of the sculpture is clear. It marks the shrine of Bir Kuar and focusses Ahir attention on the ritual. It advertises the potent function of the god. But above all it is an offering to Bir Kuar, a means of purchasing his favour, a way of honouring him. It is put up in return for shebuffaloes coming on heat and is promised because its installation is thought to please Bir Kuar and satisfy his needs. It is because Bir Kuar demands the images and in return for receiving them will make the buffaloes fertile that the styles of sculpture exist.

·17. TENUA DUSADHI ·18. SHEIKHPURA ·19. SHANKARPUR ·20. BARADIH ·21. BASANT BIGHA ·22. MANHANIA ·SA 23. AMAHUA ·24 CHURESAR ·Chapter Three THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR I INTRODUCTION If the immediate cause of the sculpture, the reason for its to the we have still to see why the Ahirs should credit Bir Kuar with a need for sculpture, and why in satisfaction of it the figures should assume their strange and powerful shapes. To resolve these questions we must go story of Bir Kuar itself and I will now describe the myth which dominates the ritual and gives the cult its vital power. The life and death of Bir Kuar is recounted in several full narratives and is sometimes celebrated in chanchars or long sagas which are sung by the Ahirs at night. Not all Ahirs, however, recall these songs and the myth is sometimes only a sentence briefly describing Bir Kuar's function. These meagre phrases are obviously of much less value than the longer versions yet we must not ignore their contents. Once a myth has decayed, the summary which passes for it may be due to two causes. Either it is a genuine fragment of the main myth--surviving while the rest has been eaten away or it is a local substitute developed to explain the worship or the shrine. In the latter case, a complex of local influences may cause it to sprout in unexpectedly distorting forms. Yet equally with the major narratives, these forms are clues to Ahir needs. They supplement the main accounts. They state what Ahirs believe and expect from Bir Kuar and it is through the sum of all these versions that the myth reveals the nature of the god. II SUMMARY OR SUBSTITUTE LEGENDS In the greater part of the area, the legend is merely the name and no attempt is made to go beyond this final blank. The name D ·so THE VERTICAL MAN 79 is connected with the shrine and the function, and after this, there is no knowledge either of the caste, the family or the death. In another rudimentary form, the legend is the casteman. In Bahera, for instance, an Ahir said "Bir Kuar was an Ahir and we do not know if he is dead." In Shankarpur another Ahir told me “Bir Kuar was an Ahir. He died but we do not know why.' In this simple form-merely linking the god to the caste-the legend continues in villages such as Turki, Tiara Kurd and Longraha. In the next stage, Bir Kuar becomes both his wife and himself; and the legend is simply that he died and after his death his wife committed sati. This form is found particularly in Dehri and Rohtas thanās where the cult of Sati Devi is strong and where almost all the villages contain little double-breasted stones to mark a woman who has died in this manner. In this region, the two posts or the twin stones are regarded as male and female and the shrine explains the legend." A slight advance is made when the legend focusses on the function. In Dehri and Rohtas thanas, for instance, a common formula for describing Bir Kuar is that he was an Ahir who offered his life in the defence of cows--gai ke gohar me jujh gaya, and continues to protect them if he is worshipped. This formula is slightly amplified in the next stage where the legend is not simply the function but also the method of death. In a curious form of which I found only one instance2 the method of death implies the service of the cows. "Bir Kuar was an Ahir who along with two cowherds was trampled in a gai darh. He had a wife and a son.” They were killed, that is, while assisting the cattle in their annual rite. More usually, however, the death occurs as part of a definite effort to protect the cattle and in such cases Bir Kuar dies by combat. “Bir Kuar and a cowherd were killed by a man while rescuing cattle which the man was taking away." (Chapra) 1 In the sculpture the female figures, barring the primary sexual characters, are exact counterparts of the male, 2 Maharajganj. St.

·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR SI "Bir Kuar fought with a cattle thief and was killed. He appeared in a dream and said he would protect the cattle. His wife committed sati." (Baradih) Three other examples spring from the same locality--an area where Mughal influence was strong and decaying mosques and graveyards still mark the land. They illustrate the kind of distortion to which a substitute legend is susceptible. “Bir Kuar was killed in a fight while resisting the seizure of cattle by a Muhammadan ruler." (Manharia) "Bir Kuar was killed in a fight with some Muhammadan butchers while attempting to rescue some cattle. His wife died on realizing he was dead." (Ranjitganj) “During the Muhammadan period, the Muhammadans were impounding cattle and taking ghi and milk from the Ahirs by force. Bir Kuar, a brother named Bir and a third friend made a stand against it and were all killed while resisting the seizure of cows." (Mirsarae) 93 Finally, a stage is reached where although the legend is rudimentary, it ceases to be a substitute. It is not simply a local invention to explain the shrine. It contains a hint of the main myth. The forms taken at this stage are two. In the first, a tiger is introduced as the death-agent. “Bir Kuar was an Ahir who was killed by a tiger while rescuing cattle.” (Katar) “Bir Kuar was killed by a tiger while grazing his buffaloes. He appeared in a dream and told his family to put up posts.” (Tilokhar) "Bir Kuar was an Ahir who was killed by a tiger while grazing his buffaloes. His buffalo, Paraiwa, took him to the tethering ground where he told his castemen to worship him.” (Gauhara) 14833 ·52 THE VERTICAL MAN 99 In the second, a witch is the death-agent. "Bir Kuar was an Ahir who was killed by a witch.” (Katar) "Bir Kuar met a witch in the jungle who fatally injured (Lakhea) With the appearance of the tiger and the witch the substitute legends finish and we are on the road to the heart of the myth. him." III THE MAIN MYTH The main myth can be analysed into three groups. In the first is the complete story, while in the second and third are what we may call branch legends. Each of these is separate from the other but in the main myth they coalesce. The three forms may be summarized as follows. According to the first branch, Bir Kuar was an Ahir who goes into the jungle to graze his buffaloes and comes on his sister practising witchcraft. With her are seven companions and all have taken off their clothes. He at first takes away the clothes but later he gives them back. Then the witches fearing scandal decide to get him killed. They send a tiger and Bir Kuar is fatally mauled. His pet buffalo carries him home and on his death bed he tells the Ahirs to worship him. In the second branch, Bir Kuar quarrels with his sister and in consequence she gives a curse that a tiger will kill him. Bir Kuar does not pay any heed and goes into the jungle. When he enters it, a tiger mauls him. His pet buffalo then brings him home and he tells the Ahirs to worship him. Thus, in the first form, it is the exposure of the witches which brings the tiger on Bir Kuar and causes his death; and in the second it is the curse of his sister which brings out the tiger and sends him to his doom. These two accounts are caught up in the main myth and reconciled in the following ways-firstly, through the insistence (already present in the first form) that Bir Kuar's sister is herself a witch and secondly, through the first branch becoming the ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR S3 In no means through which the second takes effect. Bir Kuar is cursed that if he goes into the jungle the tiger will get him. The tiger does get him, but only because through going into the jungle against the curse, he stumbles on the witches, and the witches set up the tiger. On the basis of this structure the myth builds itself up. two villages is it quite the same, and, in fact, its vitality is gauged by the way it sprouts into new and vivid details. Through its Alimsy and varying forms drift a number of fluid figures and their emphasis changes from village to village. These figures supplement the structure rather than conflict with it. Their effect is to charge the situation with added power and it is through their mysterious presence that the vital issues become clear. IV THE FIRST BRANCH LEGEND: THE WITCHES The four legends which emphasize the witch motif spring from Tardih, Bahiar Khurd, Harihargunj and Chacharia. Each is based on the same pattern, but each develops in a different way and stresses points which are of vital importance for the cult. THE TARDIH LEGEND According to this legend, “Bir Kuar was a Kishnaut Ahir. He had a sister, Kani Biramdeia who used to take seven girls into the jungle at night, and instruct them in witchcraft. For doing this, they used to strip themselves naked. One night Bir Kuar untied his buffaloes and was taking them through the jungle when he came on the spot where they were practising their art and saw them naked. He thought he would teach them a lesson, so he picked up their clothes and climbed a tree. When the witches came they found their clothes gone, and saw that some one was looking at them. They started to cry and Bir Kuar then returned their clothes. The girls dressed and started for the village. On the way they summoned a tiger which sprang on Bir Kuar and mauled his right leg. Bir Kuar cried out with pain and alarm and ·54 THE VERTICAL MAN his buffaloes, Parewa and Bhuwari, lifted him on their horns and began to move home. As they carried him, the blood from his leg trickled on their bells and clogged the sound. Bir Kuar's brother, Kuar, heard the muffled noise and wondering what had happened went to the western side of the village. There he met the two buffaloes bringing his brother. Bir Kuar told him he was dying and said that the Ahirs should put up a post to him to the west of the village and should worship him. Because of what she had done, his sister should not be given any dowry at her marriage. In this form the fundamental points are: Bir Kuar is killed because he acts as a moral man. He does not show any great strength and is quite easily killed. His visit to the jungle with his buffaloes is normal and natural. There is nothing out of the ordinary either in the time or in the act. Two of his buffaloes show extreme devotion and his passage home on their backs is described with great clarity. It is in his right leg that he is mauled and it is this which leads to his death. The death-bed declaration results in his worship. A brother-Kuar-appears, acts as the transmitter of his declaration and then disappears. Bir Kuar's sister is named (Kani Biramdeia) but the act which kills Bir Kuar is an act of the witches as a group and is not specifically his sister's. THE BAHTAR KHURD LEGEND In the next form, Bir Kuar remains as the moral man who is destroyed by the forces of darkness but the emphasis shifts from his buffaloes to his own power as a fighter. According to this legend, “Bir Kuar's sister was a witch. One night as he was going through the jungle he saw some lamps lit and his sister and six girls dancing naked around them. He went and took away their clothes. When they had finished dancing they went to put on their clothes but could not find them. They thought that only Bir Kuar could be wandering in the jungle at night and went after him. They reached him and asked him to give them back their clothes. He gave them back. The witches ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 55 then began to think that if Bir Kuar returned to the village he would tell what he had seen and that it would be safer to destroy him. Bir Kuar's sister said, 'He is my brother. How can I consent to have him killed.' The other witches said 'We will do it.' They began by sending a snake but Bir Kuar killed it. Then they sent Bir Kuar's sister in the form of a tigress and she pounced on Bir Kuar and mauled him. Bir Kuar's buffalo then picked him up and carried him home. When they got home, Bir Kuar's castemen came and Bir Kuar told them to put up posts to him and worship him and he would promote the welfare of their cattle. Then he died." Here the following points are stressed: Bir Kuar is killed only after the witches have tried once and failed. He exhibits strength but a tigress proves fatal. There is a hint that Bir Kuar is entirely fearless, as he grazes his buffaloes in the jungle at night and is the only Ahir who does so. His sister opposes his murder but not actively; and finally she becomes a passive instrument in the hands of her companions and turns into the tigress-agent which finally mauls him. There is no brother but his castemen gather and receive his instructions. > THE HARIHARGANJ LEGEND This magnification of Bir Kuar is continued and extended in the Hariharganj legend. According to this legend, "Birnath was grazing his buffaloes in the jungle one day when he came on seven witches. They had stripped themselves naked and had put on short skirts made of brooms. Birnath took their clothes over to where his buffaloes 1 The association of brooms with witches is general in Europe and also in parts of India. Dehon, in describing witchcraft in the Mahuadanr area of Palamau district, states that “when a would-be. Dain Bisahi (or witch) wishes to learn, she strips off her clothes and puts them near her akhāra or dancing place. She then puts on a peridzoma made with broken sticks of an old broom and goes to a cave which is a resort of Dains.” (The Religion and Customs of the Uraons, 144.) Verrier Elwin, in a private communication, considers that the broom may be a penis-substitute and notes that at Gond, Pardhan and Muria weddings in Mandla and Bastar a man sometimes fastens a broom to his crutch and waggles it like a large penis.

·56 THE VERTICAL MAN gone and were grazing. When the witches had finished they were surprised to find their clothes and by a process a process of magic divined that Birnath had taken them. They decided to go to him each pretending to be one of his relatives--one his sister, one his mother, one his grandmother, and so on. When Birnath saw them he relented and gave the clothes back. The witches dressed and then began to think that if Birnath went back to the village he would spread the news of his discovery. So they decided to get him killed. First they sent a tiger but Birnath caught it, put a string through its nose, and rode it through the jungle. Then the witches sent a tigress. When the tigress came, Birnath left the tiger. As he fought the tigress, the tiger attacked him. In this way Birnath kept fighting, first one and then the other. After a long struggle he grew exhausted and called to his buffalo, Parai, for help. Parai came and stood over him and fought them in turn with her horns. But she also grew exhausted and then the tiger and tigress sprang on Birnath and killed him. Parai put Birnath on her back and carried him to the tethering ground. Birnath then came on his brother, Chulhai Kuar, told him how he had died, and said that his castemen should worship him in return for his protecting their cattle." In this legend there is no question of Birnath's strength, for he demonstrates his power by not only conquering the tiger but humiliating it. But the tigress remains fatal. None of the witches is Birnath's sister but the sister motif is not entirely absent for it is in the guise of sister, mother and grandmother that the witches get their clothes back. Birnath's special relation with his buffalo, Parai, is beginning to assume importance. She is not simply the chosen buffalo who carries him home but she is also the buffalo who fights for and super-normal protects him. A new turn is given to the cult since it is neither in a dream nor on a death bed that Birnath makes his divine appeal. He comes I In the Central Provinces, “a person who has ridden on a tiger brings luck. Consequently the Gonds and Baigas, if they capture a young tiger and tame it, will take it round the country, and the cultivators pay them a little to give their children a ride on it." (R. V. Russell and Hiralal, The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India (London, 1916), IV, 85.)

·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 57 on his brother and the revelation is made while the brother is possessed. THE CHACHARIA LEGEND If these legends define the first “branch,” it is with the version from Chacharia that the myth begins to move into its second form. The witch motif is still fundamental but it is Bir Kuar's relation with Paraiya, his buffalo, which now swamps the story. It is this situation which forms a major element in the second branch. According to this version, "Bir Kuar had seven sisters all of whom were witches. On the night, at the hour before daybreak, when Bir Kuar had brought his wife for their gaunā or second marriage he went at the usual time for untieing his buffaloes and taking them into the jungle. In the jungle he came on the seven sisters stripped naked and engaged in magic. He picked up their clothes and took them away. When the sisters had finished, they began to look for their clothes, and when they heard the bell of Paraiya they concluded that only Birnath could have taken them. They then went to him and asked him to return their clothes. He refused. They then conferred and decided to send a snake to bite him. Paraiya sensed that some danger might come to Birnath and told him that he must not get separated from her but must sit on her back. Birnath climbed on her back and a little later snake came, tried to swarm up Paraiya and reach him, but as the snake rose, Paraiya butted it with her horns and brushed it back with her legs. And presently the snake went away. The sisters then sent a scorpion thinking that it could get up without being seen and bring Birnath down by stinging him. The snake would then bite him. But Paraiya detected the scorpion and drove it away. The sisters then sent a tiger. Birnath felt thirsty and wanted water. Paraiya said she would take him to a stream where she would lower her head and he could drink while still remaining on her back. She told him he must not get down as otherwise he would be in danger. Birnath said, “How can I drink from your neck;' Paraiya said, 'You must drink that way or not at all. They reached the stream and went into the water. But Birnath could not reach the water from her head and came down a ·58 THE VERTICAL MAN from her back. While he was drinking with his hands, the tiger came to the water and pounced upon him. After mauling him the the tiger went away. Paraiya then came, dipped her horns in Birnath's blood and galloped to his home, to show that something was wrong. Birnath's mother saw Paraiya coming before the usual time and when she saw the blood on her horns, she knew that Birnath was hurt. She and Birnath's wife and two or four neighbours then went with Paraiya to where Birnath was lying and there they found him on the point of death. Before he died, he told them to put up twin posts to him and worship him and he would safeguard their cattle. Here the salient points are: Birnath is in no sense a super-man. It is his buffalo who staves off the snake and the scorpion, and when he neglects her advice, the tiger has no difficulty in killing him. The sister motifis given great importance. All the seven witches are Birnath's sisters and it is because of their hostility that Birnath dies. Birnath does not show great devotion to his buffalo, but the buffalo exhibits the greatest love for Birnath." > For a parallel to Parai, compare Sigurd's charger, Grani, in the Norse poem, "The Old Lay of Gudrun. From the Thing came Grani-with thundering hoofs but lo! Sigurd himself came not. The saddle-steeds all—with sweat were steaming long had they sped-the slayers bearing. Weeping I went-with Grani to whisper With tear-wet cheek--the charger questioned; Grani his head-in grief drooped, he knew that his master--lived no more. (Bertha S. Phillpotts, Edda and Saga, 58) “Grimm in his Teutonic Mythology remarks: 'One principal mark to know heroes by is their possessing intelligent horses, and conversing with them. The touching conversation of Achilles with his Xanthos and Balios finds a complete parallel in the beautiful Karling legend of Bayard.'" (N. M. Penzer, The Ocean of Story (London 1924-28), II, 57.) Sir George Grierson has also drawn attention to a similar role of horses in the Rajput Lay of Alha. “Each of the heroes, he says, possesses a horse of fairy breed that saves him in many a difficult situation. For instance, Malkhan's mare, Kabutri, or 'the Pigeon,' is ridden by her master in a furious battle charge.

·59 THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR SUMMARY: THE FIRST BRANCH We may now summarize the stages reached in the first “branch.' Firstly, Bir Kuar is throughout treated as a moral man but not invariably as a strong man. The legend fluctuates between the view of him as a man easily killed by the tiger and the view that only after a long combat does the tigress kill him. In the Bahiar Khurd version there is a hint of his fearlessness, but the total view is that, on the whole, he is not super-normally strong. Secondly, there is devotion to him by his pet buffalo but not devotion to the pet buffalo by Birnath. He does not show a super-normal interest in the buffaloes. Finally, the situation which causes his death is his exposure of the seven witches. These witches are either led by his sister, pretend to be his sister, or are all his sisters. The decision to kill him is the decision of a group outside the family or the village, "As the lion the kine, as the wolf the sheep As the schoolboy drives the ball So trench by trench did Malkhan leap With his Rajputs following all. “ 'If I gave thee barley in winter, And oil in time of rain, If Parmal stinted thee not of milk In thy foalhood lightsome and vain, ‘Kabutri, my mare, my Pigeon, Mine honour save this day, And let not thy foot take a backward step Whilst foes uphold the fray!' "Kabutri arched her brown neck free, And they rushed on the Chauhan men; But, where her master dealt with three, The mare she smote down ten. "For with teeth she tore and her heels she flung That she made a passage wide, And each howda she passed, in air she sprang, That her lord might reach the side." "In India it is natural that elephants should play a role similar to that of horses. In folk-lore they betray, or serve, their masters like human beings, and even converse with them in human voice." (N. M. Penzer, op. cit., II, viii).

·THE VERTICAL MAN and going on 60 and with its own witch values. None the less, it involves a disguised form of brother-sister hostility and the personal element is not entirely lacking. This hostility is fundamental to the myth and the reasons for it will become clear when we consider the myth in its main form. V THE SECOND BRANCH LEGEND: THE QUARREL WITH THE SISTER With the second branch legend, the exposure of the witches goes and its place is taken by Bir Kuar's quarrel with his sister. This quarrel appears in four different forms. In versions from Mahauli and Muhammadganj and also in certain versions of the main myth, Bir Kuar is stopped by his sister at the door of his marriage room and is asked to surrender his pet buffalo as a wedding present. Although he refuses, his sister insists. When he finds she is not open to reason, he pushes her aside and after that, she curses him. Secondly, in a version from Dinadag his sister warns him not to take his buffaloes into the jungle at night because of the tigers in it. Bir Kuar does not do what she says and is cursed for disobeying her. Thirdly, in a chanchar of Simarbari, Bir Kuar goes with his sister to milk the buffaloes but instead of milking all of them he lets the calves go when only four have been done. His sister upbraids him and Bir Kuar slaps her. A curse is not actually stated but the later remarks of Bir Kuar's mother imply that one has been given. Finally, in a version of the main myth from Mananpur, Bir Kuar's sister finds him leaving his wife on their wedding night when he pays no attention, she curses him. These versions are supplemented by two subsidiary ones. In a chanchar from Kauwal, Bir Kuar's mother and sister plead with him not to go into the jungle as his enemy is waiting: 20 Birnath starts from his house and his mother Catches his waist ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 61 "Son, do not take the buffaloes into the jungle In the jungle your enemy waits” But he does not listen. He goes short way and his sister a Stops him "Brother, do not take the buffaloes into the jungle In the jungle your enemy waits” To their pleading he does not listen And goes into Brindaban. Alone in the jungle He came on a tiger He folded his hands but the tiger Sprang He killed it Then down on it, into it, he pressed his buttocks He killed the tiger and down on it Into it he pressed his buttocks. On the scene the tigress comes And is wild with grief Who has killed my mate in the jungle And is stamping him with his buttocks ? So strong is the tigress that She hurls Birnath from him Holds him and wrenches his head off In the jungle she leaves his body And where the cows are tied She tosses the head. Parai his buffalo Wanders in the jungle And with the body she comes home His mother and sister, seeing it, Begin to cry bitterly "He did not heed what we said He has met the tiger” Placing his corpse on the ground, his sister Put up an image I Havelock Ellis has recorded a number of examples drawn from the West and the East illustrating the use of the buttocks as a mark of contempt. (Studies in the Psychology of Sex, V, 100-101.)

·62 THE VERTICAL MAN "All in the world will see it And seeing, will remember him.' In the second version, from Babhantalao tola of Rohtas, Bir Kuar's wife pleads with him not to go into the jungle because it is night. In neither case are their pleadings of any avail, and although they do not curse him, he goes away, leaving them resenting his behaviour. THE DEMAND FOR THE WEDDING PRESENT The version which makes the refusal of a wedding present the cause of disaster is current in Muhammadganj. According to this legend, “On the day of Birnath's gaunā or the consummation of his marriage, his sister stopped him at the bridal chamber and demanded a buffalo named Barowa as her present. Barowa and Banda were Birnath's head and pet buffaloes. Birnath refused to give her Barowa. They quarrelled and Birnath pushed her aside and went into the room. His sister cursed him that a tiger would kill him. One afternoon Birnath was grazing his buffaloes in the jungle when at dusk a tiger came and killed him. Banda and Barowa reached the spot, lifted his body up and brought it home. A carpenter who was Birnath's friend heard of his death and hurried to Birnath's house. When he saw Birnath lying dead, he also died. The carpenter had a servant named Sheikh Babal who saw his master run out of the house and thought that he would lose his days' wages. So he also ran after him but tripped up on a stone and died from the fall. After his death, Birnath appeared in a dream to his castemen (the Kishnaut Ahirs) and told them to put up pairs of posts and worship him and the carpenter. Since then they have received joint worship. In the same dream, Sheikh Babal also appeared and asked for a share in the worship. For this reason a small offering is put aside for him. The posts are known as Bir Kuar- Bir is Birnath and Kuar is the carpenter.” In this version, although it is the sister's curse which causes his death, it is Bir Kuar's devotion to his pet buffalo which is the ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 63 overriding element in the situation. This element is elaborated in other versions to which we will come later but at this stage we may note that although Bir Kuar's reaction is violent, it is his sister's action which is aggressive, and Bir Kuar is not without reason in refusing her demand. In view of this refusal, his sister becomes a disappointed girl, but in view of the curse, Bir Kuar becomes a wronged man. His death therefore is not his fault, but is rather a necessary part of the whole situation. It means that however Bir Kuar might have acted, he is bound to be killed. The whole situation has become fatal for him and what actually kills him is not his sister's pettiness but his love for his buffaloes. To this I shall return later. THE COMMAND TO AVOID THE JUNGLE AT NIGHT I. The Dinadag Legend If in the preceding version, the sister's curse results from a conflict of claims, in the next version it is the spurning of her advice which leads to Birnath's death. In this version, “Birnath untied his buffaloes one night and took them to the jungle to graze. His mother told him not to take them as there were many tigers and tigresses. But he did not listen and took them to the jungle. When he had gone a little way, his sister came after him and told him not to take them. But again he did not listen. When his sister saw that he was not heeding her, she cursed him that a blind tigress would come and kill him. A blind tigress then came and mauled him. Birnath's buffalo, Paraiya, came and killed the tigress. She then put Birnath on her back and took him to the village. As they were nearing the village, Birnath told her to put him near the tethering ground and to call his friends and castemen. Paraiya did so. A carpenter, a Rajput and a Musalman who were his friends, came. When they saw that Birnath was dying, they also died. After his death, Birnath appeared in a dream to his family and told them to put up posts in the tethering place and worship him." Here, the emphasis begins to shift. Bir Kuar's sister and mother cease to be petty and are merely solicitous for his welfare. Bir ·THE VERTICAL MAN 2. Minor point. 2 64 Kuar ceases to be the wronged man and becomes the foolhardy one. At the same time, the sister's curse ceases to be what really kills him. The blind tigress is already waiting when Bir Kuar disregards the warning, and the curse simply describes the existing situation and does not add to it. It is again the devotion of Bir Kuar to his buffaloes which makes the situation fatal. It is not a tiger but a tigress, and not simply a tigress, but a blind tigress which kills him. The killing is automatic and there is no suggestion that Bir Kuar is abnormally strong. The emphasis is on the man with the obsession--not on the man with the strength. Three mysterious friends—the carpenter, the Rajput and the Musalman-again gather for his death and do not survive the shock. The Babhantalao legend This pre-existing fatality is continued in the Babhantalao legend. According to this version, "Birnath and Kuar were two brothers. Birnath went to fetch his wife from his father-in-law's. As he was coming back, a witch felt a grudge against him and arranged for a tiger to kill him when he would next take his buffaloes to graze. It is not known who the witch was or why she had the grudge. On getting back, Birnath went to the jungle to graze his buffaloes. His wife implored him not to go as it was night, but he did not listen and took his buffaloes out. A tiger then came and killed him. Birnath's ghost came on his brother Kuar asking him for his pet buffalo and crying ‘Parai, Parai.' Kuar in his frenzy ordered his parents to put up a post and worship Birnath. Later, Kuar also was killed by a tiger and Birnath appeared in a dream to the Ahirs and told them to put up another post to Kuar and worship him also. Since then two posts are being made. In this version, there are four points of major importance. While the curse by a witch is stated to be the prima facie cause of Birnath's death, the account actually brushes it aside and shows it as virtually only incidental. It is again the devotion to the buffaloes which makes Birnath insist on grazing them at night and is the real cause of his death.

·5
海事
25. TILAUTHU

·er
vir.
26. ROHTAS, Bholna tola

·een 27. RAMDIHRA ·28. BARKA TIARA ·29. RAMNA ·30. RAMBANDH ·a 31. NIMAHAT ·To 32. KUSIARA ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 65 This general devotion to the herd at the same time conceals a particular passion for Parai, and the latter emerges in Birnath's cry of agony when he comes on Kuar. It is not for his mother, sister, brother or castemen that he cries, but for Parai, the pet. There is again no emphasis on Birnath's strength. THE REPRIMAND FOR LETTING LOOSE THE CALVES If the passion for the pet buffalo dominates the Babhantalao legend, it is this which indirectly occasions the sister's curse in the Simarbari chanchar. This chanchar falls into five parts: A preliminary section praising Birnath and stating that he was born in Ayodhya and reared in Brindaban. An episode of great tenderness in which Birnath, after fetching his wife for their second marriage, falls asleep from tiredness, but later goes out to comfort Parewa, the pet buffalo, who is crying because of his neglect. A second episode into which the first blends and which contains the milking incident and the implication of the curse. A scene in which Birnath, angry from his mother's alarm, stalks out into Brindaban with his buffaloes, sees Parewa suddenly attacked by a tiger, goes to her rescue, beats back the attacks of seven tigers and is finally mauled by a blind tigress. Finally an exhortation to worship. 21 Where was the birthplace of Baba Birnath ? He was born in Ayodhya He was reared in Brindaban His posts are everywhere And from his castemen he levies worship When will my castemen come? The hour for worship is passing Oh a hero is Birnath And a grazer of buffaloes When I sing, the buffaloes return It was the day of Birnath's gauna He went for his wife E ·66 THE VERTICAL MAN With his wife, he was coming He was tired and slept. As she was tied, his Buffalo Parewa Began to cry loudly. At the breaking hour before sunrise Birnath awoke from sleep Birnath went out Where the buffaloes were lying Wiping her tears with his cloth He told her not to cry "Because I was tired I slept. His sister, Radha Rukmini Comes. She comes For milking the buffaloes Two or four buffaloes Birnath milked And let loose the calves of the herd Sister Radha Rukmini Speaks “You are milking only four buffaloes And letting the calves go? How can you hope for a living" Hearing this, Birnath Flared into anger. Sharply he slapped her And crying she went home His mother Kosila Is filled with alarm. The curse of a mother Can be washed by the Ganges But the curse of a sister Goes on." Hearing this, Birnath Flared into anger Keeping the ropes on the buffaloes He drove them to Brindaban And squats on a hillock, ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 67 Suddenly a tiger Leaps on Parewa Birnath Drives it away Driving it away a second comes Driving away the second a third comes Driving away the third, a fourth comes Driving away the fourth, a fifth comes Seven tigers he drives away And when they had blind tigress Rips his belly. gone a Baba Birnath calls to his castemen "Listen, my castemen, Settle some chamārs to the south of the village And on the middle night of Kartik And the last day of Kartik Worship me And free of fee, the chamārs will beat their drums There Birnath gives his castemen peace. 99 Here the following points arise: Birnath's marriage duties again weigh like a feather on him and the grand passion is again for Parewa. He begins to talk to her as if she were his mistress. In the milking incident, Birnath is interested less in the milk than in being kind to the calves. He acts, in fact, as if his function were not to earn his living by the buffaloes but to nurture them as petted animals. His view of them is entirely non-economic. His anger at having his view doubted is almost hysterical, because his view is now based on what amounts to a religious intuition-an intuition, that is, which is no longer based on normal values. Finally he is again the supernormally strong man for whom the female—the blind tigress--proves completely fatal.

·THE VERTICAL MAN 70 Unlike the first branch, Birnath tends to be treated as a strong man. In the quarrels with his sister, he is almost always in the wrong. There is devotion to him by his pet buffalo and this is more than reciprocated by him. Indeed his passion for her amounts to an obsession which sweeps away all other interests and duties. Birnath is now the man whose super-normal interest is his buffaloes. The situation which causes his death is the sister's quarrel and her curse. But just as in the first branch the witches incident transmits the brother-sister hostility, in the second branch the brother-sister quarrel transmits a more fundamental situation. This is the conflict between the claims of the family and the claims of the herds—the love of the buffaloes and the love of the wife. VI THE MAIN MYTH I now turn to the main myth. This is contained in three poems and one account. Of the poems two are alternative versions from Baknaur, the third is from Mananpur, while the account was collected in Ramna. THE BAKNAUR VERSIONS The first of these chanchars begins with a recital of some preliminary details. It states that Birnath was born at twilight in the month of Magh and that his chhat ceremony took place on the sixth day. In his tenth year, he was married in Tirhut garh and on completing his twelfth year, he burst into his youthful powers. When he was sixteen, his gaunā took place. The poem then proceeds. 22 March saw the gaunā of Birnath Coming in the gaunā, Birnath Waited at the door Dewaki, sister of Birnath ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 71 you like Stood in his way at the door "You are my only brother Give me the buffalo I choose." Birnath said: "Listen, Dewaki sister Three hundred and sixty are the buffaloes Take which But leave Parai.' Dewaki said: "Listen, until I get Parai I stay at your door.” Hearing this, Birnath grew sulky "Three hundred and sixty buffaloes, sister, you leave! Not a single one pleases you? shall not have Whether you go or stand.” Parai you Pushing her, Birnath Enters the bridal chamber And makes ready for sleep. For loosing the buffalo, Parai, the time came Parai is shaking her bell: Baba Birnath Suddenly wakes Loosing the ropes he sees Seven lamps. What are these Seven lamps ? Clever in witchcraft was Dewaki sister of Birnath With her seven girls she was Revelling Stripped of their clothes And dancing in girdles of brooms Into the jungle where the lights were He takes Parai his buffalo Into the jungle where the lights were The buffalo falters at going Birnath sees the lights And goes where the lights are ·72 THE VERTICAL MAN The seven lamps of the witches were burning Merrily the witches were dancing Birnath comes on their clothes Taking the clothes he goes Back to his buffalo. The dance of the witches Ends and they look for their clothes None of them finds them Then Dewaki says: "Listen, the bell which is sounding Is the bell of Birnath. He it is who has taken our clothes." Over to Birnath troop the seven witches And they stand before him Dewaki speaks to him: Listen my brother At stake is the honour of the village This once give us back our clothes." Birnath returns the clothes And the witches cover their bodies. Going a little way the witches Confer together "Listen. Dawn will bring Birnath home And the news will spread in the village.” The witches Confer together Each of them Summons a scorpion Each of the seven scorpions Birnath kills Dewaki knows this by magic "Listen. Birnath is living. Each of the witches Sends a snake Each of the seven snakes Birnath kills Dewaki knows it by magic, and the witches 9 ·73 And findino , Master *Listen, my mother." THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR Send seven tigers Six of the tigers Birnath kills But a blind tigress Lurked in a bush From killing the tigers, Birnath was coming When the blind tigress Sprang Bitten by the tigress Birnath fell Birnath was dying At the breaking hour before sunrise The buffaloes moved to the bathan All of the buffaloes passed None of them lifted up Birnath Last of them Parai his buffalo comes With her teeth she lifts him And she carries him home To the house of his mother At the door his mother Is beating her breasts Birnath speaks: Birnath speaks: "'Listen, my mother On the edge of the village Put up my posts Put on them my image Tell my castemen to Worship me." In the second chanchar there is a change of order. Instead of the witch incident being the immediate means through which the curse comes to its fatal conclusion, the sister's quarrel clinches the witch incident and is followed by the death in the jungle.

·74 THE VERTICAL MAN 23 Gone is the night the first quarter Gone is the last quarter At the hour when waking the birds sing At the breaking hour before sunrise Birnath his buffaloes loosened Birnath to Brindaban took them Morning found Birnath in Brindaban Seven witches were in the midst of their revels Birnath their dresses collected Birnath removed their clothes Finished their magic, the witches: "What man is he who has taken our clothes ?" Dewaki sister of Birnath Asks for the clothes "Baba, our clothes to go home, our clothes To save your honour. Birnath returned the clothes Taking her clothes, the sister of Birnath Planned to avenge. will of my Meanwhile his gaunā was fixed Birnath his bride was bringing Home to his house Blocking the bridal room, the sister of Birnath Stood in the way “Give me your buffalo, Parai, And then I will let you in." "Take which you buffaloes Take of the three hundred and sixty But Paria I will not give, Birnath grew angry from standing And pushing his sister he entered “Baba Birnath by the time Your yellow dhoti has faded, You will turn to ashes And be blown in the wind." Seven tigers sent Dewaki Seven tigers Birnath belaboured ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 75 And they fled to their dens Birnath six tigers slaughtered The seventh, the blind tigress, killed Birnath To the three hundred and sixty called Birnath "Give me a little milk, my buffaloes Now I am dying." Parai his buffalo gave him A jet of her milk Birnath lay down to die Three hundred and sixty his buffaloes Stayed as they were Birnath was lifted by Parai Taking him, taking him Parai Brought him, brought him to his mother's There Birnath's body, Birnath's body was burnt There Birnath said "All of you who are present Put up my posts Worship me.” THE MANANPUR VERSION In this chanchar, also, the legend starts with Birnath's second marriage but there is no demand for Parai. Instead, as soon as he reaches home, Birnath deserts his wife and runs to his buffaloes.2 I Baknaur P.S. Rohtas. 2 In the Chhattisgarh song, "The Ballad of Lorik and Chandaini," neglect of a wife for the cattle also characterizes the Ahir cult hero, Lorik. The brave Bir Bawan milked the two-and-fifty cows and drank the milk But his friend, the Rawat, came and told him of Chandaini. "Come, come, my brave warrior, for the day to fetch your bride has “But my head is splitting with pain, my brother, I cannot go for her. Take my horse Katar and go yourself to fetch my. bride." The Rawat takes the great horse Katar and brings the bride home; He stands outside the house and calls to Bir Bawan. Bir Bawan gulps down his dish of rice and belches loudly, The noise of his belch goes for twelve kos round. Patting his belly he comes out and prepares to milk the cows. His bride Chandaini watches him astonished. His bride has come and he takes no notice of her. (Verrier Elwin, op. cit., 342) come.

·76 THE VERTICAL MAN 24 Where was the birthplace of Baba Birnath, brother And where did he marry? Bhojpur was his birthplace In Siris, he was married His wedding and gaunā are over His wife is put in the litter And taking her with him He started for home. Reaching his home He pulled out his kusum stick Pulling his stick out he Runs to his buffaloes Seeing him running, his Parents entreat him "This night at least you must Spend in your house Wait until dawn To go to the buffaloes." He did not listen to his mother He rooted out the tongue of his father. Somewhere his sister is sitting She goes and catches his hands “Do as I say today, brother Tonight at least You must sleep at home He throws off her hands, And she falls down Hurt by the fall, she Curses him “Step into Brindaban, Baba Birnath And the hungry tiger will get you" After these curses, her brother Goes to the buffaloes Going, he gets to them And looses them 1 Siris, a village in Barun police station, Gaya district.

·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 77 Then with his kusum stick He drives them to Brindaban You may go In Brindaban seven witches Were in the midst of their revels And their lamps were lighted His eyes fell on them and Lifting the clothes of the witches, he Took them away Lifting the clothes of the witches, and Taking them with him, he Went with his buffaloes When the revels were over each witch Began to search for her clothes None of them finds them the witches Say to each other "The bell of Birnath is sounding in the jungle If you like, sisters naked before him And appeal to his pity Either he wants to undo us, sisters Or safely he will send us home” All the witches go over And fall at his feet "Our honour is also your honour, brother Give us back our clothes" To all the witches, Birnath Returns the clothes They wear them and whisper together “Listen, sisters If now you go home Birnath will have you killed There is no help but to Put the witch tiger on him” Called by the witches, the witch tiger Springs at Birnath Seven days and nights With the kusum stick Birnath beats it ·78 THE VERTICAL MAN But on the seventh the stick Split, Birnath Climbs a kusum tree As he climbs, the tiger Climbs after him The tiger climbs The tiger climbs into the tree Up in the tree the tiger kills him In a dream Baba Birnath said "Whoever is my casteman Should put up a post to me If you put up my posts I shall show kindness to the buffaloes If you put up my posts, I shall show kindness to the cows" All his castemen are putting up posts And to the cattle Baba Birnath is kind. THE RAMNA ACCOUNT According to this legend, “Birnath was bringing his wife home for their second marriage when his sister stopped him at the bridal chamber and demanded the buffalo Paraiya as her wedding present. Birnath said she might have any other buffalo but not that one. She insisted and would not be satisfied with any other. Birnath refused to give up Paraiya, and started to go with his wife into the room. His sister cursed him saying 'As you have disappointed me, so my sister-in-law will be disappointed of her wedding night.' As he crossed the threshold of the room he heard the bell of Paraiya and went back to attend to her saying that his didi, his auntie, was calling him. He then went and unloosed her and took her towards Brindaban. In the jungle he saw seven witches--a Kumhain, Rajputin, Telin, Kayasthin, Ahirin Bamhani and a Chamain-all practising witchcraft. He crept up and took away their clothes. When they had finished they found their clothes and hearing the bell of Birnath's buffalo they said that Birnath must have taken them. They went in the gone ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR it, in fact, as a commentary on the WOIC 79 direction of the bell and asked Birnath to give the clothes back. He agreed but said that they must teach him witchcraft. While the witches were teaching him they thought that if they taught him all their art, they would put themselves in his power, so they reserved one of their spells and taught him all their methods except one. When Birnath had gone, they thought that he would spread the scandal of their being witches in the village, so they decided to kill him. They therefore sent a snake, a tiger, a bear, a leopard, a hyena and two other animals. Birnath killed them all. The Kumhain, who was blind, then sent a tiger, and when the tiger came on Birnath, Birnath struck it with his stick. But the stick broke and the tiger pounced on him. Paraiya came and butted the tiger off, but not before Birnath had been mauled. She then took him on her back and as he reached home Birnath told his mother to put up posts with carved figures on them and to do him worship at Sohrai and instruct his castemen. VII CONCLUSION The versions given in the preceding section I have called the main myth because they take the two branches and fuse them into a single structure. But they do not finally resolve the fluctuating roles of Bir Kuar and his sister. At most it can be said that they incline to the view that Birnath was the truly strong Ahir obsessed with a passion for his buffaloes and dying because of it. We should not, however, be understanding the myth if we treated this as the final or the only view, for without the variations already noted it would lose much of its validity and force. The importance of the myth is seen when we regard it as the expression of certain Ahir needs and perceptions—if we regard This situation may be summarized as follows: The prosperity of the caste hinges on the welfare of their buffaloes. This can be ensured by the caste faithfully tending them but there will always be crises when, owing to fertility failures, the herds are not increasing. Against these crises, it is necessary to have a form of insurance, and the only possible form is a cattle-god, whose function is to stimulate fertility.

·80 THE VERTICAL MAN There are, however, two other and equally important elements. Even if the herds are duly increasing, the caste will not prosper unless the Ahirs work hard, are fearless in the jungle and are strong and active. A model of the truly strong man, the true Ahir, becomes essential.. Finally, although the need to tend the buffaloes long and patiently is fundamental, it is equally vital that the means of livelihood should never become the whole of living. The herds must never be allowed to replace the family, and there must be a lesson to ensure that the buffalo is never regarded as more important than the wife. The importance of the myth of Bir Kuar is that it takes these three diverse elements and through its varying forms projects a figure who resolves the three in himself. Bir Kuar is, at once, the fertilizer god, the model and the lesson. The fertilizer god.—The part of the myth which qualifies him for his fertility function is precisely the part which would otherwise seem abnormal and mysterious—the relation with the pet buffalo. This relation is never depicted as sexual but it has all the appearance of a sexual passion. When Birnath goes to Parai after he has overslept, he comforts her as if he has neglected a mistress. When Birnath brings his wife, he refuses to sleep with her and instead goes at once to Parai. Similarly, on Parai's side, there is a love which makes her jingle her bell to bring her lover running, which makes her fight for and protect Birnath and finally bear him home when he is dying. At the same time, Dewaki's role is always that of the jealous spectator, the person who wants to separate two lovers. It is to prevent them coming together that she demands Parai as her present, and also implores Birnath to stay at home on his wedding night. She exhibits all the hostility of a woman who finds a member of the opposite sex turning to other and abnormal channels. The importance of this will be obvious, for if the buffaloes are to be properly fertilized, there is no more obvious way than through a sexual relation with them. Birnath becomes the god of the buffaloes because he is obsessed with them. He acquires the power to bring the she-buffaloes on heat because he has loved one of them. But a passion for buffaloes is of no avail unless it is linked to ·1 33. DINADAG ·34. SONBARSA ·35. KUSAHAR ·36. KALAPAHAR

·IC
ITO
37. ROHTAS, Bholna tola

·38. RAMGARH ·be 39. RAMGARH ·40. ROHTAS, Bhabhantalao tola ·THE MYTH OF BIR KUAR 81 supernatural power. Bir Kuar has first to be a god before he can be a fertilizer. This has therefore to be demonstrated, and the myth does so in the following way. We have seen that although in many versions Birnath is shown as the super-normally strong man, this is not always the case and he is sometimes shown as being easily killed. We have also noticed that there is no uniformity in the methods by which he is shown as demanding worship. It is sometimes on his death bed, sometimes in a dream, or sometimes through the act of possessing a person. Finally, in certain versions the news of his death causes other persons immediately to die. All of these variations are important for they make it clear that Birnath was an avatar or incarnation. It is not his death through a tiger which makes him a god. Neither is it the dream sanction or the act of possession. He is already a god and whether he is strong or weak is irrelevant. It is through the variety of his possible deaths and qualities that the myth reveals his godhead. The model.—But although certain versions minimize Birnath's strength, the majority show him as the truly strong man—the man who fearlessly goes through the jungle at night, who is tireless in tending the buffaloes, and who meets and defeats tigers. As such, he represents the ideal Ahir—the one who will most nearly fulfil all that the caste occupation demands of him. The lesson.--Finally, the lesson; for if the buffalo obsession fits him for the task of fertilizer god, it is the same obsession which ruins him as a man. It is the necessity of this contradiction which the myth is designed to indicate, and it is because it is recognized as a form of diverting and sublimating sex, that the obsession is presented in the form of a brother-sister hostility. Bir Kuar's sister represents the claims of Ahir women—the demands of the home on the breadwinner—the wife's sexual claims on her husband. This is recognized as fundamental by the caste and although Bir Kuar flouts it, he cannot avoid the consequences. The tigress who kills him is both literally and symbolically his sister who summarizes in herself the resentment of the female members of the caste. She is blind because in flouting the family sentiment Bir Kuar is outraging what is fundamental for the caste way of life and from this there is no escape and no reprieve. F.

·Chapter Four WOOD AND STONE I GAINST the background of this myth, certain aspects of the analysis, we have still to explain why the caste hero should have required such sculpture at all. We have seen how in the myth, Bir Kuar tells his castemen, the Ahirs, to put up a pair of wooden posts and after that, to worship him. It is always posts that he prescribes and although one style of sculpture is in stone, this is not referred to in the myth and does not have its sanction. To return, then, to an earlier question, why should Bir Kuar demand these wooden posts and why should two styles—in wood and stone-result from this behest: II Within the region of the sculpture no other shrines follow this pattern but there are two parallels. One is found in the posts which are put up by Rajputs, Kayasths and Brahmans at the death ceremony of birkhod. At this ceremony, which occurs on the eleventh day of mourning, a young bull is dedicated and allowed to roam free—the idea being that the roaming bull will bear away the sins of the dead man. At the same time, a post with a simplified human head is put up, as a brief memorial of the dedication. These posts are not expressions of a caste style and as they are not intended to be permanent, they are usually made with little sensibility. But in their general appearance, they afford a rough approximation to the posts of Bir Kuar. The other parallel is found in the posts which are put beside a well or in a mango grove as witnesses to the marriage of the grove or well. These posts also are usually given human heads and approximate roughly to the Bir Kuar type. Neither of these 1 For descriptions of these marriages, see L. S. S. O'Malley, Bihar and Orissa District Gazetteers: Muzaffarpur, 36-37.

·WOOD AND STONE 83 parallels, however, does more than supply a visual analogy; for the posts of Bir Kuar neither commemorate the offering of a bull nor indicate a symbolic marriage. On the contrary, they are the simple expression of a religious command—the demand made by Bir Kuar at his death that posts should be put up. Side by side with this insistence on posts goes the part played by a carpenter in the legends and worship. The fullest expression in a legend is the Muhammadganj version in which a carpenter is Birnath's friend who hurries to the scene of his death and dies at finding him dead. Birnath then appears in a dream, tells his castemen to put up pairs of posts, and directs them to accord joint worship both to him and the carpenter. The posts in Muhammadganj have since been known as Bir Kuar-Bir indicating Birnath and Kuar the carpenter. This legend is the only version which expresses a sensitive relation involving equal parity, but in Dinadag the legend confirms that a carpenter, a Muhammadan, and a Rajput hurried to the scene and died on realizing that Birnath was dead, while the Dinadag worship stresses the peculiar relation between Birnath and the carpenter, by including the carpenter's offering in the offering to Birnath. Similarly in Dumarichati where Bir Kuar appears in the multiple form of a group of seven Kuars, one of the Kuars, Bishun Kuar, is identified with a carpenter, Bishwa Karma, and is worshipped as if he were an Ahir like the rest. Elsewhere a carpenter figures in summary legends as either a companion of Bir Kuar who was killed along with him and Muhammadan (Madhkupia and Bankheta) or as a friend who also receives an offering (Bahiar Khurd). In Dhoba the carpenter friend again bears the name of Bishwa Karma. This merging of the carpenter in Birnath is carried over to the worship and a sensitive relation is again established. In villages by the Rohtas hills, a carpenter's adze is used for executing the goat while in villages of Hussainabad thana, a carpenter is especially brought in for doing the execution. In Sonbarsa the carpenter who does the beheading must also be of the same family as the carpenter who made the posts. If we examine this strange connection against the legendary background of the caste we shall find that the person of Viswa Karma is the clue to the posts. A legend of Viswa Karma is that a ·THE VERTICAL MAN 84 he was a Brahman who married the daughter of an Ahir. By her he had nine sons who became the ancestors of various artisan castes such as Lohars, Sonars, Kaseras, and Barhis (carpenters). He is in fact a Brahman who unites the carpenters to the Ahirs by an Ahir marriage. If then we are to expose the reasons for the posts, we must see them as the expression of a sensitive caste relation. The carpenter friend is a symbol of the caste connection and the posts symbolize the interaction of the two castes. III on the If these circumstances explain the initial demand for posts, they throw no light, however, emergence of sculpted figures or the development of styles in stone and wood. We have seen, however, that in certain versions of the legend, Bir Kuar demands that the posts should bear his features. A carved figure has therefore the sanction of myth and the construction of a figure to represent Bir Kuar himself is thus an obvious offshoot from the first demand. Once the modified demand was publicized, we must assume that it spread within the region until it came to be regarded as the only form acceptable to Bir Kuar. The figure that represented the god in this way replaced the bleak, inhuman post that merely memorialized his death. IV If this explains the growth of sculpture, why then in certain areas should stone have ousted wood: The style in wood is obviously sustained by the original command of Bir Kuar to put up posts. To many Ahirs, wood is the traditional ancestral form and any departure is not only incorrect, but wrong. Moreover, to a few, wood is an augury of good while stone is inauspicious. In general Hindu belief there is no basis for this division but once a small community has come to feel that certain objects are auspicious and others inauspicious the distinction acquires an irrational force. Finally to some Ahirs, as for instance those of Rohtas Kila, the very impermanence of wood is a reason for its maintenance. When I was discussing this with them in 1938, they said that the decay of wooden images 1 R. V. Russell and Hira Lal, op. cit., IV, 121.

·WOOD AND STONE 85 forced them to renew them at least once every ten years, that this kept the cult alert and alive and nourished in them a lively sense of their duties. To replace the wooden forms with stone would be to dismiss the cult and deaden its urgency. In spite of these factors, however, a style in stone developed, and there are four factors which seem to have assisted its development. In the first place, although the impermanence of wood is sometimes felt to be an added merit, it is easy to see how in other places this can well have been a weakness. In the Turki tola of Daranagar where a stone image was put up in 1936 the Ahirs said that none of the harder woods were obtainable near the village and the sal wood posts which they had formerly put up were eaten every year by white ant. They had eventually grown weary of installing posts every year and at last abandoned wood in favour of stone. Even where harder woods are obtainable, the life of a wooden image is rarely more than fifty years. The constant daubing of its surface with ghi gives it a protective coating but its isolated situation, its exposure to the pelting rain and the blistering sun, coupled with the sporadic raids of white ant make decay inevitable; and many of the older images, in fact, owe their present squat appearance to the gradual eating away of their stumps. In these circumstances a gradual abandonment of wood and a gradual drift to stone are not unnatural. Secondly, although the view that wood is ancestral is completely compulsive for many Ahirs, the alternative form of stone is felt by some to have a greater force with the god. It is as if the wooden form is the ordinary standard offering and a stone image by being variation from the norm, and also a more stable form, is an enhancement of the gift. To put up a stone image, therefore, is not to be listless but, on the contrary, to be more devout. Moreover, as we have seen in many places, the myth exists in fragments. Where the local version contains no hint of Bir Kuar's demand for wood, stone may well have seemed an equally valid way of honouring him. If to this we add the presence of quarries in the area and the existence of small groups of stone-cutting families, it is easy to see how the possibility of supply may finally have led to a precise and vital demand. A style in stone developed because stone was available and its stability was greater than that of wood. a ·86 THE VERTICAL MAN V If these factors are responsible for the two styles, why then is the area of the stone images not larger ? Why did the style in stone stop where it did In determining the area for stone, the decisive factor is the distance from the quarries. The quarries are found on the eastern and northern flanks of the Rohtas hills, in the extreme north-west corner of the cult area. Beyond the northern flank the cult vanishes, while immediately east of the hills runs the broad and glittering expanse of the river Son. During the cold weather its sandy flats can be crossed by bullocks, but during the rains, the period when the annual worship is done, it becomes a dangerously wide and swirling river. It is this which confines the style mainly to a belt of country on the west bank and although stone images occur on the east bank they are limited to a small area close to the river and within sight of its wall of cliffs. In this eastern area, the reputation of the quarries is known, the transport difficulties are not impossibly great, while the shrinkage of the jungle makes the wooden form difficult to get. But to the south of this area the quarries are only a vague name, the distance to be travelled is more than a day's march, the difficulties of transport are greater, while the presence of the jungle makes wood plentiful. The balance of advantage is therefore no longer with stone but with wood and as it reaches a radius of roughly twenty miles from the quarries, the style in stone dwindles and comes abruptly to its end, ·Chapter Five THE REGION AND THE STYLES 1 9 -F circumstances led to a division of material, the production Lof images in wood and stone did not, however, result in sculptural anarchy. On the contrary, within a range of varying idioms the sculpture is obviously an expression of a region. In place of a welter of sharply contrasting images, the figures have all a discernible common denominator. The style is of the region rather than the sculptor. What, then, is the explanation of this unified diversity A first reason is the fact that all the sculpture supplies a demand. When an Ahir wants to install an image, he asks a Barhi or Gonr to make a Bir Kuar image for him. And by a Bir Kuar image he means an image which looks approximately like other Bir Kuar images and will be recognized as such by other Abirs. The styles, as it were, define the god, and were the styles to fluctuate unduly they would fail to satisfy the Ahir need. Once the earliest forms had been invented, therefore, the Ahir need to visualize the god in a stable way must have quickly precipitated a common style, and once the style was formed the same kind of need imposed it on the region. But besides this subconscious pressure from the Ahirs, there are other stabilizing factors. A style would only not be regional if from a common starting-point there were a general will to break away and devise a variety of styles. But among the Gonrs and Barhis, no such will exists. It is rather what is ancestral traditional, and existent that commands their interest and allegiance. Once the original forins had been invented, therefore, a respect for the ancestors precluded any conscious divergences and although the process of carving inevitably introduced slight distortions and each family came to stress different sets of idioms, ·THE VERTICAL MAN chipping 88 the controlling factor must throughout have been their sense of the ancestral. III At the present day this sense of what is traditional determines both the wood and the stone carving. Stone images are supplied from two centres--one at Ramdihra and the other at Ranjitganj. At Ramdihra Aklu Genr and his son, Mahangu Gonr, work together, while at Ranjitganj Ram Charitra Gonr works with his nephew, Ram Prasad. In both these centres, the will of the family is to go on repeating the formulas it learnt from its ancestors. Ram Charitra Gonr, for example, learnt his idioms from his father, and when he carves a new image it is these idioms which determine how he works. The preparation of a pair of images falls into two partsfirstly, the choice and extraction of two stones in the hills, the transport home, the smoothing of the surface, and secondly, the actual carving. The first stage takes two to three days and usually involves two men since no Gonr thinks it prudent to work alone in the hills. The second stage lasts about a week. For smoothing the surface, a tool known as a tanki or chirna is first used. This is an iron wedge about nine inches long, tapering to a bluntish point. It is used in conjunction with a hammer for wedge or thapi is used. When the stone has been roughly shaped, a finer wedge is brought into play. This is known variously as a kurbandhi, paurhi or karara, and is six inches long, tapering to a half-inch edge. With this tool the smoothing of the surface is completed. When the slab is smooth the image is scratched on it in outline. A circle for the head is first traced with a pair of iron callipers, a rectangle for the torso is drawn in with the help of an iron T-square, and finally the eyes, mouth, ears, neck and legs are scratched freehand with the kurbandhi. When an image carries a stick or club, a line for the stick is ruled with a kurbandhi, the T-square being used as the ruler, The image is then carved round the outline.

·THE REGION AND THE STYLES 89 an In both these centres the construction of the outline and the process of carving round it are done according to an inherited formula. This formula must originally have been an expression of the sensibility of a particular Gonr, but as used in a Gonr centre nowadays, it is less an expression of an individual than individual's recapitulation of a family method. The family, as it were, standardizes an image as its "house style” and the carving of new images consists of repeating the standard formula. This formula is learnt rather than copied, and although it can be analysed as the use of a certain sized circle for the head and certain shaped rectangle for the torso, it operates more through an instinctive sense of how the family makes an image than as a conscious copying of a defined type. When Ram Charitra Gonr is making a new image, for instance, he knows if the image is coming right, not by any reference to existing images or to any notes, but by his sense of the family formula. It is this which controls the carving and which accounts for the slight but vital variations which the products of a family display. IV The production of wooden images is somewhat more casual as almost every village group has at least one family of Barhis or carpenters who perhaps once or twice in a lifetime make an image. But at Lateya-in the heart of the area—there is a colony of three Barhi households which is a Bir Kuar centre. One of the carpenters, Bishuni Barhi, made eight pairs of images in the last twenty-five years and supplied, among others, the villages at Lahanga, Hisag, Babhandi and Lawadag; while Baldeo Barhi made at least three pairs and supplied Kalapahar, Lawadag and Gotha. In this centre the process of carving is as follows: The Ahir who wants the image supplies Bishuni Barhi with the wood. Bishuni then shapes it to the required proportions and cuts and chisels out the form according to the family idiom. He does not work to any notes and does not make any pencil outlines. He learnt the style from his father and it is this ancestral style which determines the way he carves. This method of carving applies also to other Barhis, and even ·THE VERTICAL MAN 90 those who carve a Bir Kuar post for the first time do not make any pencil notes and do not carve from a copy. The most that they do is to look at an existing post and then cut the new one according to their memory and sense of form. When Thakuri Barhi of Kauwal was making the Dinadag posts, he first looked at some other posts in the area, and after he had seen what was wanted he proceeded to make them. He did not begin in vacuo but carved the images according to his sense of the regional style. Finally, there is a question of attitude, which is not without importance. Gonrs and Barhis regard themselves as artisans rather than as artists, and the production of the images as work rather than as art. Although their carving is, in fact, the expression of a private sensibility, they do not consciously or deliberately "explore their minds." Aklu Gonr, forexample, when he is carving a Bir Kuar image, does not feel that he is doing anything different from what he is doing when he shapes a grinding-stone. This unconsciousness of art makes it natural for the individual to sink himself in the region, to base his carving on a traditional form rather than invent his own-to satisfy a known demand rather than to risk a new experiment. It is this which in the last analysis explains why both the styles in wood and stone are regional.

·Chapter Six WHY THE STYLES ARE WHAT THEY ARE I STYLE in sculpture springs from the sensibility. This is an Axiom Laxiom to which any discussion of influences must constantly return. But just as the changing circumstances of his time has led Picasso to exploit different forms--to be obsessed, now with sentiment, now with abstract relations, now with surrealist images, so, in a peasant society, economics, religion, and the art consciousness stimulate or warp different types of sensibility. If then, in final analysis, we ask why the two styles are what they are, the answer must be that the needs of the cult, together with the working conditions of the sculptor, combined so to stimulate the sensibilities of the original workers that a will to vital geometry was released. II We have seen that, in essentials, the cult of Bir Kuar is a cult for fertilizing buffaloes, but that behind the cult and giving it its power and force is the myth of Bir Kuar. We have analysed this into two types. In the first, Bir Kuar is the abnormally strong Ahir, who grazes his buffaloes in the jungle at night and rids the jungle of its tigers. In the second, he is the doomed Ahir—the victim of a buffalo obsession which leads him to place his buffaloes above his own family and which, in the interests of the caste, makes his death a fateful necessity. It is as the strong man who dies for love of the buffaloes that he obtains his fertility power. Finally, we have seen that the original demand for posts was expanded into a demand for figures representative of Bir Kuar in all his actual power. These ideas constitute, as it were, the Ahir demands on the sculpture—the vital types it must project if their sense of the god is to be satisfied. The first is that the type must exude a supernormal power, and after this it may stress either of Bir ·92 THE VERTICAL MAN Kuar's attributes--his vigilant defence of the herds, his kindly strength or, finally, his tragic doom. The demand is, in other words, for a style which conveys the ideas of power with vigilance, power with kindness and, finally, power with doom. If we consider what type of style can best fulfill these needs, it is obvious that a style of vital geometry is much the most potent. The style has to show Bir Kuar as simplified into certain attributes, and without a radical simplification of forms these basic aspects would not emerge. Similarly his appearance has to be distorted to emphasize his power. For conveying this sense of power, geometric distortions are obviously suitable since it is with certain geometric forms that power is normally associated. But besides portraying power, the style must show the power as supernormal. For this a literal style would be of little relevance since it would at most display the god as human. A geometric style through the very fact that it is anti-imitational conveys the feeling of supernatural power. If we assume, then, an initial will to vital geometry, the needs of the cult greatly favoured its release. The vital types which the styles project fulfil exactly the needs of the myth. III Equally from the side of economics, all the factors favour a similar release. The economic position of the Gonrs is that of stone-cutting labourers living at a peasant level. Their main occupation is stonecutting—the extraction of sandstone blocks from the hills and the shaping of them into paving-stones and grinding-stones. In 1938 two pairs of grinding-stones were fetching a rupee, while the price of a paving-stone ranged from one to four annas. In addition to this, Aklu Gonr of Ramdihra grew a little rice on five bighas of land which he cultivated in return for paying half the produce. He also owned two bullocks which he used for ploughing and helping in the transport of stones. The total income I Compare the Frankish-Alemannic ivory, Christ on the Cross (8th-9th century A.D.) Worringer, op. cit., Plate p. 22, where the divinity of Christ is expressed through geometry.

·WHY THE STYLES ARE WHAT THEY ARE 93 from all these sources did not, however, yield him more than ten rupees in a good month, and in many months it was nearer five a scale of income just sufficient to feed and clothe a family, but little more. Similarly, the economic position of Barhis is only that of journeymen carpenters living at a peasant level. Their main occupation is the making of posts and planks for doors, legs for string beds, ploughs, carts, chairs and the handles of hammers and mattocks. For these there is an annual rather than a monthly demand, and in any one month their incomes may be only five rupees and rise to only a little more than ten. On to this peasant routine of life the making of the images is grafted in the case of Barhis, as a casual isolated act occurring only once or twice in a lifetime, and in the case of Gonrs, on an average rather more than once in two years. The making of the images, therefore, was at most only a casual variation in a pinched and arduous routine. At the same time, the rewards are indefinite and meagre. The prices are religious rather than economic, and a Gonr does not think so much of selling the image as of making it as a small gesture for which he will be rewarded. Accordingly, when an Ahir wants a Gonr to make an image, he asks him to do so and gives him a small present or bira. A bira is a kind of complimentary gift for getting a piece of work started. In Ranjitganj it is usually a rupee, and in Ramdihra it is a pice and a betel-nut. The Ahir asks him how much he will take in return for making the image. The Gonr replies that it is a religious matter and he will accept up to a cow, a dhoti, and some cash. The Ahir then tells him the amount he will give, and the transaction is concluded on the understanding that this amount will be given when the image is delivered. In the case of Ahirs already known to the Gonr this "price” discussion is omitted as the Gonr knows he will be given a sufficient present. The talk then simply consists of the time within which the image is wanted. Similarly, in the case of » Between 1928 and 1938, for example, the Ramdihra centre supplied images to Rampur, Jamuan, Rohtas Kila, Ramdihra, Kaldag, Lohardaga, and Jagarnathpur--a total of seven sets in ten years; while the Ranjitganj centre supplied Belanja, Lahiarpur, Sahaspur, Basant Bigha, and Kamalkerwa-a total of only five.

·THE VERTICAL MAN a 94 villages which are not too distant, there is no anxiety for the payment, and it is after accompanying the images to the site and assisting in their erection that the Gonr receives his reward. It is only in the case of distant villages and when the Ahir is a stranger that the transaction approaches a sale. On these occasions, the Ramdihra centre exacts eight rupees at the time of making over a pair of images. But even this is taken as a present and neither the Ahir nor the Gonr would refer to it as a price. Similarly with the Barhis, the carving is regarded as religious rather than commercial. The Ahirs recognize that the Barhi must be indemnified for his time and labour, and there are certain village rates below which it is improper to pay. But the payment is made less as a payment than as a thankoffering. Equally the Barhi does not make the posts for the payment. He makes them as a duty, and even if he were paid nothing he would still have the obligation to make them if they were needed. Within this system of ideas the actual presents given vary considerably, but none are so large as to make a Gonr or Barhi alter his routine and all represent a minimum rather than maximum level of payment. The Gonrs, for example, received a cow, a dhoti, a sāri, and two rupees for the Sahaspur image, and a calf, a dhoti and a rupee for the Belanja image. In Dinadag, when two posts were put up in 1938, the Barhi was given a dhoti and a bull calf. In Mathurapur two posts were made by Janaki Barhi of Bank in 1938, and he received a dhoti and four annas. These posts were more rudimentary than the Dinadag ones. In Chapra the more usual custom is to give only two annas for two simple posts. On the other hand, in Paharia, when two posts were put up twenty-five years ago, five rupees and a dhoti were presented to the carpenter, while Ramnand Barhi of Bajania received a cow, a rupee and a dhoti when he made two posts in 1925 for an Ahir of Muhammadganj. When it is remembered that the yield of milk from a cow is very small and that its main utility is as a source of dung for fuel and progeny for plough oxen, it will be seen that these presents affected very little the general level of living. If we now ask what relation these economic conditions have to the style, we may distinguish two causes and effects. Firstly, the arduous peasant level of living is obviously inimical to all ·WHY THE STYLES ARE WHAT THEY ARE 95 that is delicate or intricate. For a minute and loving naturalism, a degree of sheltered comfort is necessary, and that is completely lacking both to Gonrs and Barhis. A coarse way of life favours on the contrary a robust form of art, and unless the imitative standards of representational art have been foisted on an area we may expect a predilection for a simple energetic style. Secondly, the lack of leisure and the general lowness of the rewards put a premium on simplification. The more representational a style the more complicated is its execution; and even if the Barhis and Gonrs wished to be representational, it is doubtful if they would have the time. What is needed rather is a way of carving which lends itself to certain easily executed idioms and also keeps close to the natural shapes of the material. For this reason, a style of vital geometry is obviously preferable to a style of intricate representation. The one can be produced as an act of intuitive knowledge; the other requires prolonged study of a model. Similarly, a style that can use the tube of a tree as the natural basis for a geometric vertical form is much more suitable than a style which needs a naturalistic preliminary. In such conditions, vital geometry is a natural definition of art. IV Finally, we should stress the absence of an audience educated in the canons of naturalism. The area is still remote from all art schools. The Ahirs are still very largely illiterate. They have no preconceived views on what is accurate in drawing or what is correct in perspective. Their reactions, in fact, are as spontaneous and vital as those of children in urban society or peoples living in a cultural vacuum. They are free, in fact, to accept what they like and to like what they accept. Similarly the Gones and Barhis are devoid of alien standards. Occasionally a Gonr may carve a naturalistic model of a Ganesh. He regards that equally as work and the difference of market and patron effectually prevents him from treating it as relevant to his images of Bir Kuar. Moreover, the series of images mounting lonely guard on the area fortifies him in his sense of style. The fact that generations of Ahirs, Gonrs, and Barhis have regarded them with approval leads him ·96 THE VERTICAL MAN to define art not as the duplication of nature but in terms of the actual palpable styles which he knows. These styles grew up undisturbed by "consciousness.” The Gonrs and Barhis today are only conscious that what was approved by their ancestors is valid for themselves. If a will to vital geometry was first expressed in a sculptural vacuum, it is the persistence of that vacuum which still maintains it as a style. To a combination of all these factors we may ascribe the fact that the two styles are what they are.

·41. RAMGARH

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·44. BANWARI ·45. PANDARIA ·46. JAIRAGI ·47. JAIRAGI ·48. KARMA, Bairia tola ·APPENDIXES

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·THE IDENTITY OF BIR KUAR powman In the preceding chapters we have analysed the qualities of Bir Kuar which influenced the styles of sculpture. It is possible for us to do this because the myth shows Bir Kuar as a separate and distinct person, while at the same time the ritual celebrates his personal power as a caste god. We have seen, however, that while within the Bir Kuar country the Sohrai festival is a feast of Bir Kuar, outside that region it is pre-eminently a festival of Krishna. There is a similar blending of the two deities in Ahir songs. I propose, therefore, to complete the picture of Bir Kuar by analysing certain Ahir poetry and to suggest a tentative conclusion. When the myth of Bir Kuar is examined in the light of Ahir songs, two strands of material immediately become apparent-a local kind and a type deriving from the Krishna legend. The first shows Bir Kuar as an Ahir hero, whose life moves between his buffaloes and the tiger. The second merges him in Krishna. The two kinds fuse in the witch incident, where Bir Kuar in removing the clothes of the witches re-enacts Krishna taking away the clothes of the milk-maids. Bir Klar is thus either an Ahir hero, who in course of time has fused with Krishna, or he is a fragment or extension of Krishna, who takes the form of a local Ahir. The ways in which Bir Kuar's identity merges in Krishna's are through the geography of the myth, the names of his sister and certain ways of Ahir thought. If we consider the geography we find that Bir Kuar's birth-place varies between Ayodhya and Bhojpur. He is reared in Brindaban, Palamau and Bhojpur. He is married either at Tirhutgarh or in Siris. He hunts in Brindaban and drinks in Ayodhya. His discovery of the witches is in Brindaban, and it is always in Brindaban that he dies. With the exception, therefore, of a few flights into Ayodhya and Bihar, the country of Bir Kuar is the country of Krishna. Similarly, if we look at the names of Bir Kuar's sister, we find that although on one occasion she is referred to as Kani Biramdeia, on all other occasions she either bears the name of Krishna's mother, Dewaki, or the name of his wife, Radha Rukmini. Through his sister, Bir Kuar is at once Krishna's uncle and his brother-in-law. This confusing and conflicting relationship is given a further form in the following poem:

·IOO THE VERTICAL MAN 25 Whence came Baba Birnath, brother : And where was he reared Whose breast did he suck: What milk nurtured him? He came from the womb of Jasoda his mother He grew up in the lap of Dewaki his aunt. He is thus a cousin or a foster-brother of Krishna. Finally, in certain poems Bir Kuar and Krishna are identical. 26 Where was the birth-place of Krishna : For whom was he an enemy? To whom was he a joy: Where did he cut the bamboo Where did he trim the flute: Where does he play that the sound comes to Gokula And wakes the sleeping bodies of his thousand girls ? Dewaki gave birth to Krishna Jasoda's breast he sucked in Mathura There he reached his youth Born, he gives Raja Kans a foe And frees his parents from their bonds In Brindaban he tends the cow's And from a slim bamboo he trims a flure High on Daulagir he plays And the sound comes to Gokula And thrills the sleeping bodies of his thousand girls. The girls ask “Who is this trader who is born in Mathura : Whose is the voice that thrills our limbs? Run, sisters And let us scan his manner as we buy our things And view his nature What is this trader's form And the style of his flute: What is this flute Which plays on our bodies :" Their curds are ready, they start By the Jamuna, Krishna ·THE IDENTITY OF BIR KUAR IOI Is standing in a boat The Jamuna's water is in flood And all the girls will be drowned Krishna is sitting like a boy And the girls call him To bring the boat to land Krishna says “What will you pay me if I bring the boat in?" The girls reply "A piece of bread if you're quick, Krishna says "Listen. In each of your bosoms are two oranges. Let me have them.' "My husband paid sixty rupees And has not yet enjoyed me. Not a girl agrees. Krishna becomes an old man And shifts to another ferry The girls troop over saying **That was a slip of a boy and we women got the better of him." Krishna is sitting like an old sailor When the girls call the boat. He takes them all on board. He pushes off Out in the stream He catches their skirts and holds their wrists He puts his fingers in their bosoms And bruises their breasts With all the girls he frolics And lands them over the river. Up to Jasoda they go Some of them show their skirts And some the slips that supported their breasts "Your son has tampered with our honour Why do you let him run so wild." Jasoda replies "You were always a bad lot And son is no better." my ·102 THE VERTICAL MAN 27 Where was the birth-place of Birnath : Where did he graze the dhenua' cow? Where did he play the flute ? Where was Radhika sleeping And the seven hundred girls Whose bodies were thrilled : In Brindaban he grazed the dhenua cow And puts the flute to his mouth In Gokula siceps Radhika And there her body is thrilled Who made the flute And placed it in his mouth: Ram made the flute And Birnath the bold Has put it to his mouth And plays and thrills the girls. At the hero's birth All the girls were unmarried They take the infant in their arms And feel the contact of a lover In their arms they dandle him And let him smash their pots And eat their curds They tell Jasoda how wild the boy is And how he tampers with them Jasoda says he is only a baby six months old And is sound asleep on the quilt What wicked lies they are telling Mother Jasoda hides And herself sees hinı Throwing their pots down and rumpling their skirts. "Three hundred and sixty girls Have yet to be married in Gokula And I will daub them all with the scarlet" The girls upbraid Jasoda "He has stained us all with scarlet On all the three hundred and sixty of us He has put the mark of the married.” See glossary ·THE IDENTITY OF BIR KUAR 103 All the girls go up the mountain All the girls go up to worship the gods All the girls hunt for the boy god And to worship him they climb the mountain On the mountain they go and they say "The boy is alone. Where are his parents ?" They say “How calm must his parents be" On the way up the mountain The boy frolics He climbs the mountain and the girls Climb after to get to him "If your father came He would lift the mountain on his hand." 59 When we scrutinize these poems we are confronted with a remarkable identity, for just as Krishna in Poem 26 plays the flute and thrills the sleeping girls, Birnath also plays the flute and thrills the girls. Equally, just as Krishna in Poem 26 romps with the milk-maids, Birnath in Poem 27 rumples their skirts. In the two poems the characters are identical and it is only the names which differ. There is a similar confusion in the following poem. 28 I come for Birnath How should I describe him? On one side a cobra hisses And on the other hisses Nag On his throne Birnath hisses And vanquishes the foe Sweetly sings the suiya Shrilly calls the partridge Birnath asks in anger Who has started the dance of the cows? Many as the stars are the cows of Krishna Your cowherd, Krishna, sets the cows to dance. In this poem the question is asked by Birnath, but the reply is addressed to him as Krishna. In these poems, Birnath and Krishna fuse. Birnath is no longer the uncle or the brother-in-law, the cousin or the foster-brother. He is Krishna himself. It does not seem possible to say which of these two elements is prior--whether Bir Kuar was actually a caste ancestor who was later ·THE VERTICAL MAN 104 expanded into Krishna or whether he originated as a form of Krishna who was peculiarly relevant to Ahir needs. Either is equally possible. One of Krishna's characteristics in The Ocean of Love is his flexibilityhis power to appear in different forms, and there is, therefore, nothing improbable in the Kishnaut Ahirs stabilizing one of his forms as their caste deity. Equally there is nothing impossible in the deified hero evolving into a form of Krishna, in the Ahirs believing that one of their apparent ancestors was, in fact, a form of Krishna. All that is clear is that in present Ahir thought Bir Kuar is 110 longer simply a deified hero, neither is he merely a caste ancestor. His functions as fertilizer-god, as model and lesson remain distinct, but some, at least, of his aura of romantic power derives from his identification with the major deity.

·THE ROLE OF THE GODLINGS ground THE LAME MAN We have seen that in the course of worshipping Bir Kuar, the Ahirs make offerings to a number of mysterious figures. I These acts of supplementary worship do not obviously influence the sculpture, yet they are not without significance for the cult. If, therefore, we are to understand the ritual in all its intricate variety, we must attempt to remove the mystery which surrounds these odd associates. Among these minor figures, the name which bulks largest in the worship is that of the lame man, Langru Bir. It is in his naine that the pantomime of lameness is performed, and it is he who almost always receives an extra offering. But the name is charged with ambiguity. There is no version of the main myth which refers to it, and in the substitute legends his identity wavers from village to village. Sometimes Langru Bir is Bir Kuar's brother, sometimes an unknown associate, sometimes a servant. In isolated villages he is a begar or fag, and he even fuses with the Pathan servant of the landlord and with the carpenter. He is sometimes a Muhammadan, sometimes a carpenter and sometimes an Ahir, and the form he takes changes with every village. Only in the character of lameness is he constant. This obscure multiplicity of roles suggests that he is not a separate person but an aspect of Bir Kuar himself, and there are two circumstances which support this interpretation. In the first place, although almost all the main legends refer to a fight between Birnath and a tigress, there is no common formula for the way in which he died. He is either killed outright or he suffers a delayed death. In the latter case, he is mauled but not killed and it is his buffaloes that carry him home. The nature of this mauling is glossed over in most of the legends, but in one, the Tardih version, it is made clear that Bir Kuar was mauled in the leg. It is this laming which in the worship takes the form of the lame man, dramatizing a version of Bir Kuar's death and emphasizing his collapse into godhead. Just as Eve is the rib of Adam, the lame man is the leg. Secondly, although the phase of the medium's ecstasy during which he hobbles like a lame man is usually referred to as the phase of Langru Bir, it almost always plays the role of dispelling Bir Kuar. Thus in Lawadag, when the medium is pushed down, the pushing down 1 See pp. 32-35.

·106 THE VERTICAL MAN signifies not that Langru Bir has left him but that Bir Kuar has left, and this closes the worship. Similarly, in villages where the medium throws a stick, it is Bir Kuar and not Langru Bir who is dislodged. Summing up the process, we might say that during the ecstasy it is Bir Kuar who is throughout present and who works on the medium, and that the concluding stage re-enacts his fatal lameness. The different person is merely the label for the different stage. Finally, as we have seen in the Khajuri version, the medium representing Bir Kuar mounts on an Ahir who represents Langru Bir. The lame man hobbles with him and then collapses, and with this collapse the puja ends and Bir Kuar leaves the medium. This is a vivid diagram of Bir Kuar's death. The medium merging with the lame man is Bir Kuar sinking into lameness. The collapse is the death of the lame Bir Kuar and the end of the ecstasy is his elevation into a god. II THE STRANGE MUHAMMADAN A second figure who, like Langru Bir, plays no part in the main niyth but who constantly recurs in the worship is a Muhammadan. He is sometimes a friend of Birnath, sometimes a Muhammadan cowherd, and sometimes the Pathan servant of a landlord. In isolated villages he takes the form of a Khan Sahib, a Muhammadan dealer in bangles, the Muhammadan servant of the carpenter, a Jolaha servant, and a nameless Pathan. Finally, in various villages, he assumes the name of Gopi Mian and in others he fuses with Langru Bir. Of these forms the only one with a precise and widely diffused legend is the Pathan servant of the landlord. According to this legend the Ahirs had collected all the village milk for doing Birnath's worship when the Pathan servant of a Muhammadan landlord came and demanded milk. The Ahirs then placed all the milk before him and told him he might take it away if he could. The Pathan was taking it when a tiger came and killed him. As he died, he said that the Ahirs must worship him. A Tardih variant brings the legend nearer to Birnath's lifetime. According to this the milk was demanded from Birnath's brother, Kuar, who declined to give it on the ground that it was needed for Birnath's pujā. The Muhammadan insisted and then there was a quarrel, in the course of which Kuar struck him with a lathi on a fatal spot. As the Pathan was dying he told Kuar that he must receive a little worship, and that he would take it by the side of Bir Kuar. I Recorded in Milki and Uchaila.

·THE ROLE OF THE GODLINGS 107 In the Babhantalao version this variant is carried over, but Kuar becomes the Ahirs generally and the Pathan obtains his worship by threatening to give constant trouble unless he is worshipped. Finally, in a Jaintipur version, the Pathan becomes Gopi Mian, demands the milk when the chhatia is squatting on the pitchers and is struck dead by the chhatia. The other forms in which the Muhammadan appears have either severely local myths or diffused but very summary ones, or they are simply names without legends. Thus the Muhammadan servant of the carpenter is said to have died through falling into a ditch while pursuing his master who was running to the scene of Birnath's death.: The Muhammadan friend and the Muhammadan cowherd die with Birnath in the jungle while protecting cattle. Finally, the Khan Sahib, the dealer in bangles, the Jolaha and the anonymous Pathan are names and nothing else. Over them all move Gopi Mian3 and Langru Bir, fastening their names first to one and then to another, but adding nothing to the actual origin of the Muhammadan stranger. When we consider the various versions it is clear that the story of the landlord's servant is the more probable-it provides a credible starting-point for the worship—while the other variants are almost certainly substitute versions, developed when the memory of the incident was lost. But the incident seems scarcely the whole explanation, and if we are to understand why the Muhammadan is added we must look as well to the need which his presence serves. This need arises from the heavily Muhammadan tone of the area with its Moghul traditions, its memories of Muhammadan power and continued presence of Muhammadans in the villages. Its total impact involves an effort of adjustment by the Ahirs which we may describe in terms of three needs a need to assert Ahir superiority, a need to declare Ahir friendship and a need to appease Muhammadan violence. The strange Muhammadan who attends at Birnath's puja and is given a minor offering is the means through which all these needs are satisfied. The substitute legends make him a Muhammadan friend and at the same time a Muhammadan servant--thus declaring Ahir friendship and Ahir superiority—while the offering to him as an individual acts also as a general appeasement. I Muhammadganj. 2 Khajuri. 3 The name, Gopi Mian—meaning the Muhammadan with the Ahir functions-merely summarizes the situation.

·108 THE VERTICAL MAN The Muhammadan is present because in the circumstances of the area a modus vivendi with Muhammadans is necessary for the Ahir way of life. III THE BHUIYA A similar effort of adjustment is represented in the offering to the Bhuiya. This occurs in villages in Fatehpur and Untari thānās and is represented by three different legends. In the first the offering is to Tulsi Bir, the main caste deity of the Bhuiyas, who is said to have been a friend of Birnath. In the second it is made to a Bhuiya, who is said to have killed Bimath for damaging his silk cocoons. Finally, it is made to a Bhuiya named Madho Dank. According to this latter legend, Madho Dank was a friend of Basan Kuar (a substitute or pseudonym for Bir Kuar). After Bir Kuar's death, Basan Kuar decreed the death of Madho Dank, thinking that as they were not separated in life they should not be separated in death. He therefore caused Madho Dank to die and sent him in the form of a tiger to kill the Ahir's cattle. The ghost tiger killed some cattle. The Ahirs then began to worship both Basan Kuar and Madho Dank, and after this the ravages ceased. We need not regard these legends as statements of historical truth, for their function is obvious. They act as an index to the local relations of Ahirs and Bhuiyas—in one case marred by friction and in the others marked by an equable ease. The extra offering is a symbol of all that Ahir-Bhuiya relations should be. IV THE SON, THE SERVANT AND THE PET Finally, two other groups flit sporadically through the worship. They are firstly a nameless Rajput, and secondly a miscellaneous group covering a son, a servant and a pet. In the rare villages where the Rajput receives a supplementary offering, the legends show him as a friend of Bir Kuar who was associated with his death. And just as the offerings to the Muhammadan and the Bhuiya express an inter-caste relation, we may see in these offerings also the expression of local Ahir-Rajput relations.

·a special roles. THE ROLE OF THE GODLINGS 109 In the case of the son, the servant and the pet, on the other hand, caste relation is wanting and the offerings spring instead from inferences and assumptions. In the two villages where offerings are made to a son and a dog, the Ahirs do not say that Bir Kuar actually had a son and a dog. They say instead that as he was a truly bold Ahir he must have had them, and they interpret the deduction as a fact. The son and the pet, therefore, receive offerings because they are important appendixes of Bir Kuar rather than because they have any A similar deduction explains the offering to the servant. In a few legends, the servant is a cowherd who is killed with Bir Kuar, and in these cases the joint death explains the joint offerings. But in many villages there is no legend and the servant ranges from a cowherd, a Jolaha, a Gorait, to a begar (or fag) and a body-guard. Here the Ahir’s sense of Bir Kuar's greatness makes them attribute a servant to him, and the offerings are made to the servant partly as to a follower tinged with Bir Kuar's divinity but partly with the idea of having their main offerings recommended. Just as Roman Catholics regard saints as go-betweens between themselves and God, the Ahirs reinforce their offerings to Bir Kuar by placating his servant. The servants, in fact, owe their mysterious presence in the worship to the Ahir sense of Bir Kuar's might.

·THE CONTROL OF TIGERS of tigers. In the legends which I have given in the text, Bir Kuar is often assailed by tigers, and it is through a tigress that he ultimately meets his death. It is this method of death, the fact that the tigress is the death agent, which partially accounts for one of his minor functions--the protection of the herds from the ravages Throughout the Bir Kuar country, a man who is killed by a tiger is worshipped as a baghaut, baghaut, "one who has taken the tiger on him and has thus become an oblation for his fellows. The experience of this kind of death enables him, as it were, to control the death agent, and it is through the baghaut that Ahirs and others win temporary immunity in tiger-infested country. Bir Kuar, being also a baghaut, has also this power of controlling tigers, and it will illustrate this minor role if I record another chanchar from the same region. In this ballad Madhumalati is only nominally the heroine, for the object of the ballad, as the final lines make clear, is to glorify yet again the power of Bir Kuar to subjugate tigers, and to demonstrate his dominion. goes 29 Daughter of a raja was Madhumalati And she for pilgrimage to Kashi Parevag To Kashi Pareyag she goes for pilgrimage The Moghul soldiers have pitched their tents Madhumalati sees the camp And bitterly Madhumalati weeps There is none of my village neither friend nor enemy How shall I send a message home: Weeping, weeping lier eyes Swell to a red Hover And her sari is wet with wiping the tears Up in the sky circles a female vulture "Vulture, any aunt are you At home I have left the mother of my sins Oh! be to me a mother of goodness Why did I start for Kashi Pareyag on pilgrimage? The Moghuls are in camp There is none of my village neither friend nor enemy How can I send a message home : The mother of my sins Why did I leave at home:

·III broth THE CONTROL OF TIGERS my aunt Be to me a mother of goodness Carry a message to my father And Tulsi will tell my husband And my husband will save me from the Moghuls." Answers the vulture “Listen, my daughter. I am only a vulture How should a vulture carry news ?” Madhumalati tears her sāri And the pencilled black of her eyes she uses as ink And she trims her nail to a quill And she traces her story in a letter I Giving details of her state And the agony of her heart Finished Madhumalati sends the letter And the vulture takes it in her talons Speeding to her father's house And her father's court And drops the letter from the sky Madhumalati's father gets the letter And dismayed he learns its message Then he tells her brother Tulsi Tulsi gets ready at once And the three start with the army Her father moves on the royal elephant Her brother rides his charger Her husband goes on a fighting tiger And they join battle with the Moghuls But the Moghuls batter and rout them Then Madhumalati speaks "Listen, O Moghul Pathan The chief elephant, give back to my father 1 There is a parallel situation in the Chhattisgarh song, "The Story of Dhola." "Princess, I am here to serve you. Tell me what I can do for you. Of what can I make paper and what shall I use for ink: What pen can I use to write a word or two of love?" paper tear your säri, take the lamp black from your eyes For a pen use your little finger to write a word or two of love." Maru tears her precious sāri, she takes the lamp black from her eyes. With her little finger she writes a word or two of love. (Verrier Elwin, op. cit., 378-379) "For ·II2 THE VERTICAL MAN The dappled charger, give back to my brother And some marriage trinkets give to my husband To marry again a girl of his caste. The Moghul Gives to her father the elephant Gives to her brother the dappled charger Gives to her husband the marriage trinkets To marry a girl of his caste Again Madhumalati speaks "Listen, O Moghul Pathan Bring a litter with a million diamonds And a southern sari And thirty-two bearers And I start for your home.” The Moghul brings litter with a million diamonds And a southern sari And thirty-two bearers And they start for his home. Scarcely are they gone than Baba Birnath appears He sends a tiger Quickly it widows Madhumalati While Birnath gathers the travelling litter And brings it to his fort. On the roof is Madhumalati's mother "O Madhumalati You have saved the honour of the house The honour of two families is saved."

·BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES (1) FRANCIS BUCHANAN. Shahabad Journal, 1812-13, edited by C.E.A.W. Oldham (Patna, Bihar, 1926). Contains vivid notes on the Sasaram landscape, the habits of Ahirs, and on the stonecutting trade carried on by Gonrs. In a list of villagegods, a solitary reference is made to Bir Kuar under the spelling “Vir Kungar. There are unfortunately no notes either on the images or the cult. (2) H. H. Risley. The Tribes and Castes of Bengal (Calcutta, 1891). The article on Goala gives a survey of the Ahir caste in Bengal and Bihar, but the list of sub-castes is inaccurate and incomplete. There is a reference to the dance of the cows but not to Bir Kuar. (3) W. CROOKE. The Tribes and Castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh (Calcutta, 1896) Gives a note on Birnath and refers to the dance of the cows. It is doubtful whether many of the statements are strictly accurate, and there is no evidence which in any way connects Birnath with the Bangarama quintette (page 64). (4) L. S. S. OʻMALLEY. Bengal District Gazetteers; Palamau (Calcutta, 1907). Gives a largely inaccurate account of the Bir Kuar cult and confuses it with the Bir Puja of Bhuiyas. (s) L. S. S. O'MALLEY. Bihar and Orissa District Gazetteers; Paina. Revised edition by J. F. W. James (Patna, 1924). Pages 51-52 give a summary account of the gai dārh. (6) W. CROOKE. Religion and Folklore of Northern India (Oxford, 1926). Contains two references to Bir Kuar. Page 132 states that “in the United Provinces Ahirs worship Birnath, 'hero lord,' who is said to be a man of the caste who was killed by a tiger and now protects their cattle in the jungle,” while page 325 notes that “Birnath, the Ahir cattle godling, is represented by a post.” A poor copy of such a post, obviously artificially commissioned, was presented by Crooke to the Pitt-Rivers Museum, Oxford, where it is labelled “an Ahir fetish.” (7) SARAT CHANDRA MITRA. “On the cult of the godling Bir Kuar in the Palamau District in Chota Nagpur,” Journal of the Bihar and Orissa Research Society, March-June 1938. Analyses the accounts of Bir Kuar given in 4 and offers an interesting cominentary. As, however, almost all the facts in 4 are wrong, little of the commentary is valid. H ·114 THE VERTICAL MAN (8) RAM NARESH TRIPATHI. Kabita Kaumudi. Part V Gram Git (Hindi Mandir, Allahabad, 1929). The first big collection of Hindi folk-songs (including Ahir) to be published in India and as a pioneer effort deserving of the highest praise. The songs number 275 and are selected from a much larger collection made in the eastern districts of the United Provinces and the western districts of Bihar. The songs are grouped according to the occasions on which they are sung, but there is no note of the castes or areas from which they were collected.

·GLOSSARY Achhat: Rice from paddy which lias not been boiled (arwa chāwal); as distinct from rice from paddy which has been half-boiled before being threshed (usina chāwal). Akhāra: A dancing floor. Babur: A thorny tree, Acacia arabica. Baghaut: A man killed by a tiger. Bakauthi: A religious bargain by which supernatural help is given 112 return for worship or sacrifice. Balua: An axe shaped like a halberd. Bansula: A carpenter's adze. Barua: A divine steed on which a god or goddess rides. Bathan: The place where buffaloes are tethered. Begar: A person forced to do unpaid labour. Bel: A tree, Aegle marmelos. Bhang: A narcotic preparation made from the leaves of a sister plant to gănjā, Canabis sativa. The sprigs of dried leaves are powdered and made 11р into a drink by mixing them with almonds, sugar, inilk and water. It is said to give a feeling of hilarity and elation. "You feel as if you are flying through the air." Bhatua: A vegetable like a marrow. Birahā: A verse form. Chabutra: A mud platform. Chamār: A skinner or tanner. Chanchar: A verse form. Chauka: A square marked out with powdered rice. Chaurā: A chabutra or mud platform. Chhān: The rope for tethering for tethering or hobbling buffaloes. Chhatia: A medium. Chilam: An earthenware pipe which swells out into a small saucer, used for smoking Dhenua: A mythical cow that gives milk all the year round. Dlioti: A length of cloth used for draping a man's waist. Dihwar: The watchman god. Dohā: A verse forn Gai dārh: The dance of the cows. Ganja: A narcotic preparation made from the dried flowers of a tall bushy plant, Canabis indica, with flowers like a French marigold. The dried flowers are crushed and mixed with tobacco in equal parts. The mixed pellet of gānjā and tobacco is then put in a chilam. A lighted coal is added and the smoke inhaled. It is said to induce, at first, a feeling of energy, but later a kind of mad blankness. Gaunā: The ceremony of the second marriage, or installation of the bride in the husband's house. Ghi: Clarified butter, like white tallow.

·116 THE VERTICAL MAN Gur: Country sugar. Guru: A spiritual teacher. Haldi: Turmeric. Hansua: A large sicklc. Hum: Incense made from setting fire to ghi poured on straw. Khel: Literally "play" but here with the special meaning of "possession." Khir: A kind of milk pudding made with rice, milk, sugar and gii. Lathi: A long wooden stave. Laung kā chhak: Cardamon water offered to a god. Lorikāin: The ballad of Lorik. Lotā: A brass water pot. Malua: Bassia latifolia. Mantrā: A religious incantation. Otā: A mud platform. Pahardār: A body-guard. Pakka: Well-made. A macadamized road is a pakha road. Palki: A palanquin. Pān: A mixture of lime and areca nut, folded inside a betel leaf and chewed like tobacco. Pāwā: A quarter of a seer. Pie: A small copper coin, value about a farthing. Pujā: A religious ceremony or worship. Puri: A mixture of four, water and chi, fried in ghi. Roti: Indian bread made from water and flour and baked dry. Sadhu: A religious mendicant. Sadr Subdivision: The headquarters subdivision ot a district. Sakhi: A girl friend. Sambar: A form of deer, Cervus unicoler. Sāri: A length of cloth draped to form a woman's dress. Sati: A woman who cominits sati, i.e. who of her own free will burns on her husband's funeral pyre. Tapāwan: Liquor offered to a god Thāna: A police station or unit of police administration. Thekua: A thick slab of wheat powder mixed with gur and fried in ghi. Tola: A hamlet. S ·LIST OF VILLAGES Police Station District Village Amahua Amba Ananditchak Ararua Kalan Arjundih Rohtas Hariharganj Rohtas Hariharganj Chhatarpur Shahabad Palamau Shababad Palamau Palamnau Babhandi Bagen Bahera Bahiar Khurd Bajnia Baknaur Bank Bankheta Banua Banwari Bara Baradih Barahi Baraiya Barka Tiara Basant Biglia Basaura Baskatia Belanja Benibigha Bhadsa Bhisra Bishunpur Chhatarpur Dehri Sasaram Untari Barun Rohtas Dehri Bhaunathpur Rohtas Bhaunathpur Chhatarpur Sasaram Hussainabad Chhatarpur Rohtas Nabinagar Nabinagar Rohtas Barun Nabinagar Rohtas Rohtas Rohtas Palamau Shahabad Shahabad Palamau Gaya Shahabad Shahabad Palamau Shahabad Palamau Palarnau Shahabad Gaya Palamau Shahabad Gaya Gaya Shahabad Gaya Gaya Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Chacharia Chachayia Chakandhawa Chakla Makritola Chandanpura Chandargarh Chapra Chatra Churesar Bhaunathpur Bhaunathpur Dehri Bhaunathpur Sasaram Nabinagar Dehri Aurangabad Rohtas Palamau Palamau Shahabad Palamau Shahabad Gaya Shahabad Gaya Shahabad Dadara Pokrahi Dangwar Hussainabad Hussainabad Palamau Palamau ·118 THE VERTICAL MAN Darahi Daranagar (Turki tola) Deuria Dhoba Dinadag Hussainabad Rohtas Dehri Fatehpur Chhatarpur Palamau Shahabad Shahabad Gava Palamau Gauhara Ghuna Bigha Gondaria (Bahera tola) Goradih Gotha Hariharganj Rohtas Chatra Leslieganj Chhatarpur Palamalı Shahabad Hazaribagh Palaman Palamau Hardaspur Hariharganj Hisag Sherghati Hariharganj Chhatarpur Gaya Palamau Palamau Indrapura Sasaram Shahabad Jaintipur Jairagi Jamuni Rohtas Chainpur Daltonganj Shahabad Ranchi Palamau Kalapahar Kanker Karma Bairia tola Katar Kauwal Khaira Khajuri Kharwardih Khatin Koeridih Kundari Kurasin Kurd Kusahar Kusiara Chhatarpur Nabinagar Chhatarpur Dehri Chhatarpur Nabinagar Rohtas Chhatarpur Chhatarpur Nabinagar Leslieganj Sherghati Rohtas Chhatarpur Hussainabad Palamau Gava Palamnau Shahabad Palamau Gava Shahabad Palamau Palamu Gaya Palamat Gava Shahabad Palaman Palamau Lahanga Lakhea Lateya Lawadag Longraha Chhatarpur Garhwa Chhatarpur Chhatarpur Hariharyanj Palamau Palamat Palaman Palaman Palaman Madhkupia Madhurampur Rohtas Dehri Shahabad Shahabad ·LIST OF VILLAGES II9 Maharajganj Mahauli Mahesara Majhiyawan Mali Mananpur Manhania Mathurapur Milki Mirsarae Muhammadganj Sasaram Dudhi Chhatarpur Nabinagar Nabinagar Chhatarpur Sasaram Dehri Rohtas Sasaram Hussainabad Shahabad Mirzapur Palamau Gaya Gaya Palamau Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Palamau Narari Nawadih Nayagaon Naykagaon Nirahat Nishunpur Barun Rohtas Rohtas Rohtas Rohtas Rohtas Gaya Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Paharia Pandaria Panha Parcha Parha Pipardih Purnadih Rohtas Bhaunathpur Hazaribagh Rohtas Kutumba Aurangabad Rohtas Shahabad Palamau Hazaribagh Shahabad Gaya Gaya Shahabad Ramnbandh Ramdihra Ramgarh Ramna Ranjitganj Roliras (Bhabhantalan) Rohtas (Bholna tola) Rohtas Kila Rudwa Hussainabad Rohtas Chhatarpur Untari Rohtas Rohtas Rohtas Rohtas Chhatarpur Palainau Shahabad Palamau Palamau Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Palamau Sahaspur Samauta Saraiya Sarma (Tenudih tola) Selupara Shankarpur Sheikhpura Simarbari Siris Sitalpur Barun Rohtas Rohtas Chhatarpur Madanpur Dchri Barun Hariharganj Barun Fatehpur Gaya Shahabad Shahabad Palarnau Palaniau Shahabad Gaya Palamau Gaya Gaya ·I20 THE VERTICAL MAN Sonbarsa Sunri Hussainabad Panki Palamau Palamau Tardih Rohtas Tendua (Ratanpura tola) Nabinagar Tenua Dusadhi Debri Tiara Rohtas Tilauchu Sasaran. Tilokhar Rohtas Tipa Rohtas Tumba Rohtas Turki Rohtas Shahabad Gaya Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Shahabad Uchaila Uchaili Urdana Rohtas Madanpur Nabinagar Shahabad Palamau Gaya ·INDEX Ahirs, 17, 25-7, 31-2, 35-8, 48-), 62, 79-80, 82, 84-5, 87, 91, 93-5, IOS- Archer, Mildred, I5, 18 Auden, W. H., S, 44 Azfar, M., IS Bir Kuar, ritual-continued summoning of the inediuin, 38 boiling of the milk, 39 goat sacrifice, 39-41 inediuin's ecstacy, 41 pantoinime of the tiger, 41 pantomime of the lame mani, 41-2 pantomime of the horse, 43 terinination of extended worship, 43 clay horses, 44 installation of images, 44-5 dance of the cows, 45-7 Broom, in magic, 55 Buchanan, Francis, 113 Buffalocs, 25, 36-7, 48, 77-80, 91 buffalo obsession, 81 see also Bir Kuar myth Carpenter, sce Bir Kuar myth Celtic sculpture, 14 Chanchars, 49, 60, 65, 68, 70, 73, 75 Clay horses, 44 Crooke, W., 113 Barhi, Bishuni, Baldeo and Thakuri, wood carvers, 89 Barhis, 13, 87, 89-90, 92-6 Bhattacharjee, N. L., 15 Bhuiya, 33, 34, 108 Birkhod, Rajput, Kayasth and Brahman death ceremony, 82 Birnath, see Bir Kuar Bir Kuar: cattle god, 17, 25-6, 48, 81-2, 91-2 songs of praise, 27-31 wife, 50-I, 58, 62, 65, 68, 70, 95-6, 78, 80, 99 sister, 52-3, 54-6, 60-72, 74, 76, 78, 80,99 and the carpenter, 62, 83-4 other relatives, 56-8, 60, 99-100 relationship with Krishna, 99-104 identification with the lame man, I05-6 son, I08-9 and Madhumalati, 110-12 Bir Kuar, the myth: rudimentary forlis, 49-52 substitute legends, SI main myth, $3, 70-81 witch motif, 53-61, 71, 74, 77-9 Parai thc buffalo, 56-60, 63-5, 67, 71, 73-5, 78-9, 80 brother-sister motif, 60–70, So Banda and Barowa, buffaloes, 62 the fertilizer god, So the model, 80 the lesson, 81 Bir Kuar, ritual: Sohrai festival, 26-7, 31--2, 36-41,99 Diwali night, 31 minor figures worshipped, 32-5 bakanthi (or bargain), 36 answer to the prayer, 37-8 purchase of goat, 38 Dance of the cows, 45-7 De Zoete, Beryl, IS Dehon, P., 55 Diwali night, 31 Dog, the, 108-9 Early English sculpture, 13 Ellis, Havelock, 61 Elwin, Verrier, 55, 69, 75, III Fertilizer god, see Bir Kuar myth Folk-songs of Chhattisgarh, 69, 75, III Frankish-Alemannic ivory, 92 Fumet, D. V., S Geometric art, 18-19 Gonr: Aklu and Mahangu Gonr, stone carvers, 88, 92 Ram Charitra and Ram Prasad Gonr, stone carvers, 88 Gonrs, 13, 87-9, 92-6 Gopi, Mian, 34, 35, 106-7 Grierson, Sir George, 58 ·122 THE VERIICAL MAN Grimm's Teutonic Mythology, 58 Grove, marriage of, 82 Read, Herbert, 13, 18 Risley, H. H., 113 Rousseau, 36 Russell, R. V., and Hiralal, só, 84 Helion, paintings by, 18 Hutton, J. H., 45-6 Installation of images, 44-5 Sabharwal, L. R., IS Salome. 30 Santal painting, is Sculpture: stone and wooden inges, 17, 2004, Kani Biramdeia, $3 Krishna, 26-7, 99-104 Lakshmi, 31 Langru Bir, the lame man, 32, 33, 105- 6 sec also Bir Kuar in vth MacNeice, Louise, 24 Madho Dank, 108 Madhumalati ballad, 110-12 Malik, M. I, 15 Mediums, 38-9, 41-2, 104-6 Mitra, Sarat Chandra, 113 Moore, Henry, 19 Muhammadan, the strange, 106-8 see also Bir Kuar myth muscular guardian type, 23 benign hero type. 23 doomed tough type. 24 installation of, 44- parallels, 82-4 origin of features, & causes of wooden sculpture, 4-5 development of stone sculpture, $s restriction of stone sculpture, 86 regional styles, 87-90 process of stone carving, 89-90 process of wood carving, S9-90 economics of carving, 93-4 Sheikh Babal, 35, 63 Sohrai, see Bir Kuar ritual Son river, 17, 86 Stone images, see Sculpture Stone quarries, 85-6 Negro sculpture, 14 Nicholson, Ben, 18 Ocean of Love, The, 104 Ocean of Story, The, 58-9 Old Lay of Gudrun, The, 58 O'Malley, L. S. S., 82, 113 Tennis, 31 Tigers, 17, 110-12, see also Bir Kuar niyth Tools, 88 Tripathi, Ram Naresh, 114 Parai, the pet buffalo, sce Bir Kuar myth Peck, N. F., 14 Penzer, N. M., 58-9 Phillpotts, Bertha S., 58 Picasso, 91 Piper, John, 13 Pollard, A. W., 30-1 Prasad, Sadashwa, 15 Prasad, Sankta, IS Prideaux, C. T., 15 Vertical man, S Viswa Karına, 34 legend, $3-4 Vital geometry, 18-24, 92, 95-6 Well, marriage of, 82 Witchcraft, 52-), ser also Bir Kuar myth Wooden images, sc* Sculpture Worringer, Wilhelm, 18-19, 92 Rajput, the nameless, 33, 108.9 ·W. G. ARCHER THE BLUE GROVE With a Foreword by Arthur Waler This book is a study of folk song in its cultural setting among the Uraons, an aboriginal tribe of Eastern India. The poems, which are beautifully rendered, are preceded by an analysis of Uraon marriages and dancing, without which Uraon poetry cannot be fully understood. The Blue Grove is a work on an unknown culture that combines scholarship with delicate artistry in the translation of verse. "Of exceptional interest and importance. Mr. Archer has not only made a thorough and scientific study of this aspect of tribal life, but he has done so with a sensitivity and understanding that is almost unique. He not only renders the poems exquisitely, thus showing his own poetic inistinct; but as a poet himself, he is familiar with the technical structure of the poem and can discuss the relevant aesthetic problems from a poetic as well as an ethnological point of view.” HERBERT READ in The Listener. "Of great importance by reason of its subject and the originality with which it is treated."-BERYL DE ZOETE in The New Statesman. “The Blue Grove is important and charming--important because few such careful systematic collections have ever been made, and charminy because the songs are many of them beautiful and are translated into simple effective English."--Geoffrey Grigson in John London's Weekly LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & UNWIN LTD