The Sanskrit Epics, page 153
618
Mályavat: “The name of this mountain appears to me to be erroneous, and I think that instead of Mályavat should be read Malayavat, Malaya is a group of mountains situated exactly in that southern part of India where Ráma now was, while Mályavat is placed to the north east.” Gorresio.
619
Mantles of the skin of the black antelope were the prescribed dress of ascetics and religious students.
620
The sacred cord worn as the badge of religious initiation by men of the three twice-born castes.
621
The hum with which students conduct their tasks.
622
I omit here a long general description of the rainy season which is not found in the Bengal recension and appears to have been interpolated by a far inferior and much later hand than Valmiki’s. It is composed in a metre different from that of the rest of the Canto, and contains figures of poetical rhetoric and common-places which are the delight of more recent poets.
623
Praushthapada or Bhadra, the modern Bhadon, corresponds to half of August and half of September.
624
The Sáman or Sáma-veda, the third of the four Vedas, is really merely a reproduction of parts of the Rig-veda, transposed and scattered about piece-meal, only 78 verses in the whole being, it is said, untraceable to the present recension of the Rig-veda.
625
Áshádha is the month corresponding to parts of June and July.
626
Bharat, who was regent during Ráma’s absence.
627
Or with Gorresio, following the gloss of another commentary: “Has completed every holy rite and accumulated stores of merit.”
628
The river on which Ayodhyá was built.
629
I omit a śloka or four lines on gratitude and ingratitude repeated word for word from the last Canto.
630
The Indian crane; a magnificent bird easily domesticated.
631
The troops who guard the frontiers on the north, south, east and west.
632
The Chátaka, Cuculus, Melanoleucus, is supposed to drink nothing but the water for the clouds.
633
The time for warlike expeditions began when the rains had ceased.
634
The rainbow.
635
Indra’s associates in arms, and musicians of his heaven.
636
Maireya, a spirituous liquor from the blossoms of the Lythrum fruticosum, with sugar, &c.
637
Their names are as follows: Angad, Maínda, Dwida, Gavaya, Gaváksha, Gaja, Śarabha, Vidyunmáli, Sampáti, Súryáksa, Hanumán, Vírabáhu, Subáhu, Nala, Kúmuda, Susheṇa, Tára, Jámbuvatu, Dadhivakra, Níla, Supátala, and Sunetra.
638
The Kalpadruma or Wishing-tree is one of the trees of Svarga or Indra’s Paradise: it has the power of granting all desires.
639
The meaning is that if a man promises to give a horse and then breaks his word he commits a sin as great as if he had killed a hundred horses.
640
The story is told in Book I, Canto LXIII, but the charmer there is called Menaká.
641
Rohiṇí is the name of the ninth Nakshatra or lunar asterism personified as a daughter of Daksha, and the favourite wife of the Moon. Aldebaran is the principal star in the constellation.
642
Válmíki and succeeding poets make the second vowel in this name long or short at their pleasure.
643
Some of the mountains here mentioned are fabulous and others it is impossible to identify. Sugríva means to include all the mountains of India from Kailás the residence of the God Kuvera, regarded as one of the loftiest peaks of the Himálayas, to Mahendra in the extreme south, from the mountain in the east where the sun is said to rise to Astáchal or the western mountain where he sets. The commentators give little assistance: that Maháśaila, &c. are certain mountains is about all the information they give.
644
One of the celestial elephants of the Gods who protect the four quarters and intermediate points of the compass.
645
Váyu or the Wind was the father of Hanumán.
646
The path or station of Vishṇu is the space between the seven Rishis or Ursa Major, and Dhruva or the polar star.
647
One of the seven seas which surround the earth in concentric circles.
648
The title of Maheśvar or Mighty Lord is sometimes given to Indra, but more generally to Śiva whom it here denotes.
649
See Book I, Canto XVI.
650
The numbers are unmanageable in English verse. The poet speaks of hundreds of arbudas; and an arbuda is a hundred millions.
651
Anuhláda or Anuhráda is one of the four sons of the mighty Hiraṇyakaśipu, an Asur or a Daitya son of Kaśyapa and Diti and killed by Vishṇu in his incarnation of the Man-Lion Narasinha. According to the Bhágavata Puráṇa the Daitya or Asur Hiraṇyakaśipu and Hiraṇyáksha his brother, both killed by Vishṇu, were born again as Rávaṇ and Kumbhakarṇa his brother.
652
Puloma, a demon, was the father-in-law of Indra who destroyed him in order to avert an imprecation. Paulomí is a patronymic denoting Śachí the daughter of Puloma.
653
“Observe the variety of colours which the poem attributes to all these inhabitants of the different mountainous regions, some white, others yellow, &c. Such different colours were perhaps peculiar and distinctive characteristics of those various races.” Gorressio.
654
Susheṇ.
655
Tára.
656
Kesarí was the husband of Hanúmán’s mother, and is here called his father.
657
“I here unite under one heading two animals of very diverse nature and race, but which from some gross resemblances, probably helped by an equivoque in the language, are closely affiliated in the Hindoo myth … a reddish colour of the skin, want of symmetry and ungainliness of form, strength in hugging with the fore paws or arms, the faculty of climbing, shortness of tail(?), sensuality, capacity of instruction in dancing and in music, are all characteristics which more or less distinguish and meet in bears as well as in monkeys. In the Rámáyaṇam, the wise Jámnavant, the Odysseus of the expedition of Lanká, is called now king of the bears (rikshaparthivah), now great monkey (Mahákapih).” De Gubernatis: Zoological Mythology, Vol. II. p. 97.
658
Gandhamádana, Angad, Tára, Indrajánu, Rambha, Durmukha, Hanumán, Nala, Da mukha, Śarabha, Kumuda, Vahni.
659
Daityas and Dánavas are fiends and enemies of the Gods, like the Titans of Greek mythology.
660
I reduce the unwieldy numbers of the original to more modest figures.
661
Sarayú now Sarjú is the river on which Ayodhyá was built.
662
Kauśikí is a river which flows through Behar, commonly called Kosi.
663
Bhagírath’s daughter is Gangá or the Ganges. The legend is told at length in Book I Canto XLIV. The Descent of Gangá.
664
A mountain not identified.
665
The Jumna. The river is personified as the twin sister of Yáma, and hence regarded as the daughter of the Sun.
666
The Sarasvatí (corruptly called Sursooty, is supposed to join the Ganges and Jumna at Prayág or Allahabad. It rises in the mountains bounding the north-east part of the province of Delhi, and running in a south-westerly direction becomes lost in the sands of the great desert.
667
The Sindhu is the Indus, the Sanskrit s becoming h in Persian and being in this instance dropped by the Greeks.
668
The Sone which rises in the district of Nagpore and falls into the Ganges above Patna.
669
Mahí is a river rising in Malwa and falling into the gulf of Cambay after a westerly course of 280 miles.
670
There is nothing to show what parts of the country the poet intended to denote as silk-producing and silver-producing.
671
Yavadwipa means the island of Yava, wherever that may be.
672
Śiśir is said to be a mountain ridge projecting from the base of Meru on the south. Wilson’s Vishnu Puráṇa, ed. Hall, Vol. II. p. 117.
673
This appears to be some mythical stream and not the well-known Śone. The name means red-coloured.
674
A fabulous thorny rod of the cotton tree used for torturing the wicked in hell. The tree gives its name, Śálmalí, to one of the seven Dwípas, or great divisions of the known continent: and also to a hell where the wicked are tormented with the pickles of the tree.
675
The king of the feathered creation.
676
Viśvakarmá, the Mulciber of the Indian heaven.
677
“The terrific fiends named Mandehas attempt to devour the sun: for Brahmá denounced this curse upon them, that without the power to perish they should die every day (and revive by night) and therefore a fierce contest occurs (daily) between them and the sun.” Wilson’s Vishṇu Puráṇa. Vol. II. p. 250.
678
Said in the Vishṇu Puráṇa to be a ridge projecting from the base of Meru to the north.
679
Kinnars are centaurs reversed, beings with equine head and human bodies.
680
Yakshas are demi-gods attendant on Kuvera the God of wealth.
681
Aurva was one of the descendants of Bhrigu. From his wrath proceeded a flame that threatened to destroy the world, had not Aurva cast it into the ocean where it remained concealed, and having the face of a horse. The legend is told in the Mahábhárat. I. 6802.
682
The word Játarúpa means gold.
683
The celebrated mythological serpent king Sesha, called also Ananta or the infinite, represented as bearing the earth on one of his thousand heads.
684
Jambudwípa is in the centre of the seven great dwípas or continents into which the world is divided, and in the centre of Jambudwípa is the golden mountain Meru 84,000 yojans high, and crowned by the great city of Brahmá. See Wilson’s Vishṇu Puráṇa, Vol. II. p. 110.
685
Vaikhánases are a race of hermit saints said to have sprung from the nails of Prajápati.
686
“The wife of Kratu, Samnati, brought forth the sixty thousand Válakhilyas, pigmy sages, no bigger than a joint of the thumb, chaste, pious, resplendent as the rays of the Sun.” Wilson’s Vishṇu Puráṇa.
687
The continent in which Sudarśan or Meru stands, i.e. Jambudwíp.
688
The names of some historical peoples which occur in this Canto and in the Cantos describing the south and north will be found in the Additional Notes. They are bare lists, not susceptible of a metrical version.
689
Suhotra, Śarári, Śaragulma, Gayá, Gaváksha, Gavaya, Susheṇa, Gandhamádana, Ulkámukha, and Ananga.
690
The modern Nerbudda.
691
Krishṇaveṇí is mentioned in the Vishṇu Puráṇa as “the deep Krishṇaveṇí” but there appears to be no clue to its identification.
692
The modern Godavery.
693
The Mekhalas or Mekalas according to the Paráṇas live in the Vindhya hills, but here they appear among the peoples of the south.
694
Utkal is still the native name of Orissa.
695
The land of the people of the “ten forts.” Professor Hall in a note on Wilson’s Vishṇu Puráṇa, Vol. II. p. 160 says: “The oral traditions of the vicinity to this day assign the name of Daśárna to a region lying to the east of the District of Chundeyree.”
696
Avantí is one of the ancient names of the celebrated Ujjayin or Oujein in Central India.
697
Not identified.
698
Ayomukh means iron faced. The mountain is not identified.
699
The Káverí or modern Cauvery is well known and has always borne the same appellation, being the Chaberis of Ptolemy.
700
One of the seven principal mountain chains: the southern portion of the Western Gháts.
701
Agastya is the great sage who has already frequently appeared as Ráma’s friend and benefactor.
702
Támraparṇí is a river rising in Malaya.
703
The Páṇḍyas are a people of the Deccan.
704
Mahendra is the chain of hills that extends from Orissa and the northern Sircars to Gondwána, part of which near Ganjam is still called Mahendra Malay or hills of Mahendra.
705
Lanká, Sinhaladvípa, Sarandib, or Ceylon.
706
The Flowery Hill of course is mythical.
707
The whole of the geography south of Lanká is of course mythical. Súryaván means Sunny.
708
Vaidyut means connected with lightning.
709
Agastya is here placed far to the south of Lanká. Earlier in this Canto he was said to dwell on Malaya.
710
Bhogavatí has been frequently mentioned: it is the capital of the serpent Gods or demons, and usually represented as being in the regions under the earth.
711
Vásuki is according to some accounts the king of the Nágas or serpent Gods.
712
Śailúsha, Gramiṇi, Siksha, Suka, Babhru.
713
The distant south beyond the confines of the earth is the home of departed spirits and the city of Yáma the God of Death.
714
Suráshṭra, the “good country,” is the modern Sura
715
A country north-west of Afghanistan, Baíkh.
716
The Moon-mountain here is mythical.
717
Sindhu is the Indus.
718
Páriyátra, or as more usually written Páripátra, is the central or western portion of the Vindhya chain which skirts the province of Malwa.
719
Vajra means both diamond and thunderbolt, the two substances being supposed to be identical.
720
Chakraván means the discus-bearer.
721
The discus is the favourite weapon of Vishṇu.
722
The Indian Hephaistos or Vulcan.
723
Panchajan was a demon who lived in the sea in the form of a conch shell. Wilson’s Vishṇu Puráṇa, V. 21.
724
Hayagríva, Horse-necked, is the name of a Daitya who at the dissolution of the universe caused by Brahmá’s sleep, seized and carried off the Vedas. Vishṇu slew him and recovered the sacred treasures.
725
Meru stands in the centre of Jambudwípa and consequently of the earth. “The sun travels round the world, keeping Meru always on his right. To the spectator who fronts him, therefore, as he rises Meru must be always on the north; and as the sun’s rays do not penetrate beyond the centre of the mountain, the regions beyond, or to the north of it must be in darkness, whilst those on the south of it must be in light: north and south being relative, not absolute, terms, depending on the position of the spectator with regard to the Sun and Meru.” Wilson’s Vishṇu Puráṇa, Vol. II. p. 243. Note.
726
The Viśvadevas are a class of deities to whom sacrifices should be daily offered, as part of the ordinary worship of the householder. According to the Váyu Puráṇa, this is a privilege conferred on them by Brahmá and the Pitris as a reward for religious austerities practised by them upon Himálaya.
727
The eight Vasus were originally personifications like other Vedic deities, of natural phenomena, such as Fire, Wind, &c. Their appellations are variously given by different authorities.
728
The Maruts or Storm-Gods, frequently addressed and worshipped as the attendants and allies of Indra.
729
The mountain behind which the sun sets.
730
One of the oldest and mightiest of the Vedic deities; in later mythology regarded as the God of the sea.
731
The knotted noose with which he seizes and punishes transgressors.
732
Sávarṇi is a Manu, offspring of the Sun by Chháyá.
733
The poet has not said who the sons of Yáma are.
734
The Lodhra or Lodh (Symplocos Racemosa) and the Devadáru or Deodar are well known trees.
735
The hills mentioned are not identifiable. Soma means the Moon. Kála, black; Sudaraśan, fair to see; and Devasakhá friend of the Gods.
736
The God of Wealth.
737
The nymphs of Paradise.
738
Kuvera the son of Viśravas.
739
A class of demigods who, like the Yakshas, are the attendants of Kuvera, and the guardians of his treasures.
740
Situated in the eastern part of the Himálaya chain, on the north of Assam. The mountain was torn asunder and the pass formed by the War-God Kártikeya and Paraśuráma.
741
“The Uttara Kurus, it should be remarked, may have been a real people, as they are mentioned in the Aitareya Bráhmaṇa, VIII. 14.… Wherefore the several nations who dwell in this northern quarter, beyond the Himavat, the Uttara Kurus and the Uttara Madras are consecrated to glorious dominion, and people term them the glorious. In another passage of the same work, however, the Uttara Kurus are treated as belonging to the domain of mythology.” Muir’s Sanskrit Texts. Vol. I. p. 494. See Additional Notes.
742
The Moon-mountain.
743
The Rudras are the same as the storm winds, more usually called Maruts, and are often associated with Indra. In the later mythology the Rudras are regarded as inferior manifestations of Śiva, and most of their names are also names of Śiva.
744
Canto IX.
745
Udayagiri or the hill from which the sun rises.
746
Asta is the mountain behind which the sun sets.
