Footnotes

The MSS. vary very considerably in these stanzas of invocation: many
lines are generally prefixed in which not only the poet, but those
who play the chief parts in the poem are panegyrized. It is
self-apparent that they are not by the author of the Rámáyan
himself.
"Válmíki was the son of Varuna, the regent of the waters, one of
whose names is Prachetas. According to the Adhyátmá Rámáyana, the
sage, although a Bráhman by birth, associated with foresters and
robbers. Attacking on one occasion the seven Rishis, they
expostulated with him successfully, and taught him the mantra of
Ráma reversed, or Mará, Mará, in the inaudible repetition of which
he remained immovable for thousands of years, so that when the sages
returned to the same spot they found him still there, converted into
a valmík or ant-hill, by the nests of the termites, whence his
name of Válmíki."

WILSON. Specimens of the Hindu Theatre, Vol. I. p. 313.

"Válmíki is said to have lived a solitary life in the woods: he is
called both a muni and a rishi. The former word properly
signifies an anchorite or hermit; the latter has reference chiefly
to wisdom. The two words are frequently used promiscuously, and may
both be rendered by the Latin vates in its earliest meaning of
seer: Válmíki was both poet and seer, as he is said to have sung
the exploits of Ráma by the aid of divining insight rather than of
knowledge naturally acquired." SCHLEGEL.
Literally, Kokila, the Koïl, or Indian Cuckoo. Schlegel translates
"luscinium."
Comparison with the Ganges is implied, that river being called the
purifier of the world.
"This name may have been given to the father of Válmíki
allegorically. If we look at the derivation of the word (pra,
before, and chetas, mind) it is as if the poet were called the son
of Prometheus, the Forethinker." SCHLEGEL.
Called in Sanskrit also Bála-Kánda, and in Hindí Bál-Kánd,
i.e. the Book describing Ráma's childhood, bála meaning a boy up
to his sixteenth year.
A divine saint, son of Brahmá. He is the eloquent messenger of the
Gods, a musician of exquisite skill, and the inventor of the víná
or Indian lute. He bears a strong resemblance to Hermes or Mercury.
This mystic syllable, said to typify the supreme Deity, the Gods
collectively, the Vedas, the three spheres of the world, the three
holy fires, the three steps of Vishnu etc., prefaces the prayers and
most venerated writings of the Hindus.
This colloquy is supposed to have taken place about sixteen years
after Ráma's return from his wanderings and occupation of his
ancestral throne.
Called also Srí and Lakshmí, the consort of Vishnu, the Queen of
Beauty as well as the Dea Fortuna. Her birth "from the full-flushed
wave" is described in Canto XLV of this Book.
One of the most prominent objects of worship in the Rig-veda, Indra
was superseded in later times by the more popular deities Vishnu and
Siva. He is the God of the firmament, and answers in many respects
to the Jupiter Pluvius of the Romans. See Additional Notes.
The second God of the Trimúrti or Indian Trinity. Derived from the
root vis to penetrate, the meaning of the name appears to be he
who penetrates or pervades all things. An embodiment of the
preserving power of nature, he is worshipped as a Saviour who has
nine times been incarnate for the good of the world and will descend
on earth once more. See Additional Notes and Muir's Sanskrit Texts
passim.
In Sanskrit devarshi. Rishi is the general appellation of sages,
and another word is frequently prefixed to distinguish the degrees.
A Brahmarshi is a theologian or Bráhmanical sage; a Rájarshi is a
royal sage or sainted king; a Devarshi is a divine or deified sage
or saint.
Trikálajna. Literally knower of the three times. Both Schlegel
and Gorresio quote Homer's.

Ὅς ἤδη τ' ἐόντα, τά τ' ἐσσόμενα,
πρό τ' ἐόντα.

"That sacred seer, whose comprehensive view,
The past, the present, and the future knew."

The Bombay edition reads trilokajna, who knows the three worlds
(earth, air and heaven.) "It is by tapas (austere fervour) that
rishis of subdued souls, subsisting on roots, fruits and air, obtain
a vision of the three worlds with all things moving and stationary."
MANU, XI. 236.
Son of Manu, the first king of Kosala and founder of the solar
dynasty or family of the Children of the Sun, the God of that
luminary being the father of Manu.
The Indians paid great attention to the art of physiognomy and
believed that character and fortune could be foretold not from the
face only but from marks upon the neck and hands. Three lines under
the chin like those at the mouth of a conch (Sankha) were regarded
as a peculiarly auspicious sign indicating, as did also the mark of
Vishnu's discus on the hand, one born to be a chakravartin or
universal emperor. In the palmistry of Europe the line of fortune,
as well as the line of life, is in the hand. Cardan says that marks
on the nails and teeth also show what is to happen to us: "Sunt
etiam in nobis vestigia quædam futurorum eventuum in unguibus atque
etiam in dentibus." Though the palmy days of Indian chiromancy have
passed away, the art is still to some extent studied and believed
in.
Long arms were regarded as a sign of heroic strength.
"Veda means originally knowing or knowledge, and this name is given
by the Bráhmans not to one work, but to the whole body of their most
ancient sacred literature. Veda is the same word which appears in
the Greek οίδα, I know, and in the English wise, wisdom, to wit. The
name of Veda is commonly given to four collections of hymns, which
are respectively known by the names of Rig-veda, Yajur-veda,
Sáma-veda, and Atharva-veda."

"As the language of the Veda, the Sanskrit, is the most ancient type
of the English of the present day, (Sanskrit and English are but
varieties of one and the same language,) so its thoughts and
feelings contain in reality the first roots and germs of that
intellectual growth which by an unbroken chain connects our own
generation with the ancestors of the Aryan race,--with those very
people who at the rising and setting of the sun listened with
trembling hearts to the songs of the Veda, that told them of bright
powers above, and of a life to come after the sun of their own lives
had set in the clouds of the evening. These men were the true
ancestors of our race, and the Veda is the oldest book we have in
which to study the first beginnings of our language, and of all that
is embodied in language. We are by nature Aryan, Indo-European, not
Semitic: our spiritual kith and kin are to be found in India,
Persia, Greece, Italy, Germany: not in Mesopotamia, Egypt, or
Palestine."

Chips from a German Workshop, Vol. I. pp. 8. 4.
As with the ancient Persians and Scythians, Indian princes were
carefully instructed in archery which stands for military science in
general, of which, among Hindu heroes, it was the most important
branch.
Chief of the three queens of Dasaratha and mother of Ráma.
From hima snow, (Greek χειμ-ών, Latin hiems) and álaya abode,
the Mansion of snow.
The moon (Soma, Indu, Chandra etc.) is masculine with the
Indians as with the Germans.
Kuvera, the Indian Plutus, or God of Wealth.
The events here briefly mentioned will be related fully in the
course of the poem. The first four cantos are introductory, and are
evidently the work of a later hand than Valmiki's.
"Chandra, or the Moon, is fabled to have been married to the
twenty-seven daughters of the patriarch Daksha, or Asviní and the
rest, who are in fact personifications of the Lunar Asterisms. His
favourite amongst them was Rohiní to whom he so wholly devoted
himself as to neglect the rest. They complained to their father, and
Daksha repeatedly interposed, till, finding his remonstrances vain,
he denounced a curse upon his son-in-law, in consequence of which he
remained childless and became affected by consumption. The wives of
Chandra having interceded in his behalf with their father, Daksha
modified an imprecation which he could not recall, and pronounced
that the decay should be periodical only, not permanent, and that it
should alternate with periods of recovery. Hence the successive wane
and increase of the Moon. Padma, Purána, Swarga-Khanda, Sec.
II. Rohiní in Astronomy is the fourth lunar mansion, containing
five stars, the principal of which is Aldebaran." WILSON, Specimens
of the Hindu Theatre. Vol. I. p. 234.

The Bengal recension has a different reading:

"Shone with her husband like the light
Attendant on the Lord of Night."
The garb prescribed for ascetics by Manu.
"Mount Meru, situated like Kailása in the lofty regions to the north
of the Himálayas, is celebrated in the traditions and myths of
India. Meru and Kailása are the two Indian Olympi. Perhaps they were
held in such veneration because the Sanskrit-speaking Indians
remembered the ancient home where they dwelt with the other
primitive peoples of their family before they descended to occupy
the vast plains which extend between the Indus and the Ganges."
GORRESIO.
The third God of the Indian Triad, the God of destruction and
reproduction. See Additional Notes.
The epithet dwija, or twice-born, is usually appropriate to
Bráhmans, but is applicable to the three higher castes. Investiture
with the sacred thread and initiation of the neophyte into certain
religious mysteries are regarded as his regeneration or second
birth.
His shoes to be a memorial of the absent heir and to maintain his
right. Kálidása (Raghuvansa, XII. 17.) says that they were to be
adhidevate or guardian deities of the kingdom.
Jatáyu, a semi-divine bird, the friend of Ráma, who fought in
defence of Sítá.
Raghu was one of the most celebrated ancestors of Ráma whose
commonest appellation is, therefore, Rághava or descendant of Raghu.
Kálidása in the Raghuransa makes him the son of Dilípa and
great-grandfather of Ráma. See Idylls from the Sanskrit, "Aja" and
"Dilípa."
Dundhubi.
Literally ten yojanas. The yojana is a measure of uncertain length
variously reckoned as equal to nine miles, five, and a little less.
Ceylon.
The Jonesia Asoka is a most beautiful tree bearing a profusion of
red blossoms.
Brahmá, the Creator, is usually regarded as the first God of the
Indian Trinity, although, as Kálidása says:

"Of Brahmá, Vishnu, Siva, each may be
First, second, third, amid the blessed Three."

Brahmá had guaranteed Rávan's life against all enemies except man.
Ocean personified.
The rocks lying between Ceylon and the mainland are still called
Ráma's Bridge by the Hindus.
"The Bráhmans, with a system rather cosmogonical than chronological,
divide the present mundane period into four ages or yugas as they
call them: the Krita, the Tretá, the Dwápara, and the Kali. The
Krita, called also the Deva-yuga or that of the Gods, is the age of
truth, the perfect age, the Tretá is the age of the three sacred
fires, domestic and sacrificial; the Dwápara is the age of doubt;
the Kali, the present age, is the age of evil." GORRESIO.
The ancient kings of India enjoyed lives of more than patriarchal
length as will appear in the course of the poem.
Súdras, men of the fourth and lowest pure caste, were not allowed to
read the poem, but might hear it recited.
The three slokes or distichs which these twelve lines represent
are evidently a still later and very awkward addition to the
introduction.
There are several rivers in India of this name, now corrupted into
Tonse. The river here spoken of is that which falls into the
Ganges a little below Allahabad.
"In Book II, Canto LIV, we meet with a saint of this name presiding
over a convent of disciples in his hermitage at the confluence of
the Ganges and the Jumna. Thence the later author of these
introductory cantos has borrowed the name and person, inconsistently
indeed, but with the intention of enhancing the dignity of the poet
by ascribing to him so celebrated a disciple." SCHLEGEL.
The poet plays upon the similarity in sound of the two words:
soka, means grief, sloka, the heroic measure in which the poem
is composed. It need scarcely be said that the derivation is
fanciful.
Brahmá, the Creator, is usually regarded as the first person of the
divine triad of India. The four heads with which he is represented
are supposed to have allusion to the four corners of the earth which
he is sometimes considered to personify. As an object of adoration
Brahmá has been entirely superseded by Siva and Vishnu. In the whole
of India there is, I believe, but one temple dedicated to his
worship. In this point the first of the Indian triad curiously
resembles the last of the divine fraternity of Greece, Aïdes the
brother of Zeus and Poseidon. "In all Greece, says Pausanias, there
is no single temple of Aïdes, except at a single spot in Elis." See
Gladstone's Juventus Mundi, p. 253.
The argha or arghya was a libation or offering to a deity, a
Bráhman, or other venerable personage. According to one authority it
consisted of water, milk, the points of Kúsa-grass, curds, clarified
butter, rice, barley, and white mustard, according to another, of
saffron, bel, unbroken grain, flowers, curds, dúrbá-grass,
kúsa-grass, and sesamum.
Sítá, daughter of Janak king of Míthilá.
"I congratulate myself," says Schlegel in the preface to his, alas,
unfinished edition of the Rámáyan, "that, by the favour of the
Supreme Deity, I have been allowed to begin so great a work; I glory
and make my boast that I too after so many ages have helped to
confirm that ancient oracle declared to Válmíki by the Father of
Gods and men:

Dum stabunt montes, campis dum flumina current,
Usque tuum toto carmen celebrabitur orbe."
"The sipping of water is a requisite introduction of all rites:
without it, says the Sámha Purána, all acts of religion are vain."
COLEBROOKE.
The darhha or kusa (Pea cynosuroides), a kind of grass used in
sacrifice by the Hindus as cerbena was by the Romans.
The direction in which the grass should be placed upon the ground as
a seat for the Gods, on occasion of offerings made to them.
Parasuráma or Ráma with the Axe. See Canto LXXIV.
Sítá. Videha was the country of which Míthilá was the capital.
The twin sons of Ráma and Sítá, born after Ráma had repudiated Sítá,
and brought up in the hermitage of Válmíki. As they were the first
rhapsodists the combined name Kusílava signifies a reciter of poems,
or an improvisatore, even to the present day.
Perhaps the bass, tenor, and treble, or quick, slow and middle
times. we know but little of the ancient music of the Hindus.
Eight flavours or sentiments are usually enumerated, love, mirth,
tenderness, anger, heroism, terror, disgust, and surprise;
tranquility or content, or paternal tenderness, is sometimes
considered the ninth. WILSON. See the Sáhitya Darpana or Mirror
of Composition translated by Dr. Ballantyne and Bábú Pramadádása
Mittra in the Bibliotheca Indica.
Saccharum Munja is a plant from whose fibres is twisted the sacred
string which a Bráhman wears over one shoulder after he has been
initiated by a rite which in some respects answers to confirmation.
A description of an Asvamedha or Horse Sacrifice is given in Canto
XIII. of this Book.
This exploit is related in Canto XL.
The Sarjú or Ghaghra, anciently called Sarayú, rises in the
Himalayas, and after flowing through the province of Oudh, falls
into the Ganges.
The ruins of the ancient capital of Ráma and the Children of the Sun
may still be traced in the present Ajudhyá near Fyzabad. Ajudhyá is
the Jerusalem or Mecca of the Hindus.
A legislator and saint, the son of Brahmá or a personification of
Brahmá himself, the creator of the world, and progenitor of mankind.
Derived from the root man to think, the word means originally
man, the thinker, and is found in this sense in the Rig-veda.

Manu as a legislator is identified with the Cretan Minos, as
progenitor of mankind with the German Mannus: "Celebrant carminibus
antiquis, quod unum apud illos memoriæ et annalium genus est,
Tuisconem deum terra editum, et filium Mannum, originem gentis
conditoresque." TACITUS, Germania, Cap. II.
The Sál (Shorea Robusta) is a valuable timber tree of considerable
height.
The city of Indra is called Amarávatí or Home of the Immortals.
Schlegel thinks that this refers to the marble of different colours
with which the houses were adorned. It seems more natural to
understand it as implying the regularity of the streets and houses.
The Sataghní i.e. centicide, or slayer of a hundred, is
generally supposed to be a sort of fire-arms, or the ancient Indian
rocket; but it is also described as a stone set round with iron
spikes.
The Nágas (serpents) are demigods with a human face and serpent
body. They inhabit Pátála or the regions under the earth. Bhogavatí
is the name of their capital city. Serpents are still worshipped in
India. See Fergusson's Tree and Serpent Worship.
The fourth and lowest pure caste whose duty was to serve the three
first classes.
By forbidden marriages between persons of different castes.
Váhlí or Váhlíka is Bactriana; its name is preserved in the modern
Balkh.
The Sanskrit word Sindhu is in the singular the name of the river
Indus, in the plural of the people and territories on its banks. The
name appears as Hidku in the cuneiform inscription of Darius' son
of Hystaspes, in which the nations tributary to that king are
enumerated.

The Hebrew form is Hodda (Esther, I. 1.). In Zend it appears as
Hendu in a somewhat wider sense. With the Persians later the
signification of Hind seems to have co-extended with their
increasing acquaintance with the country. The weak Ionic dialect
omitted the Persian h, and we find in Hecatæus and Herodotus {Ἴνδος and ἡ Ἰνδική.
In this form the Romans received the names and
transmitted them to us. The Arabian geographers in their ignorance
that Hind and Sind are two forms of the same word have made of them
two brothers and traced their decent from Noah. See Lassen's
Indische Alterthumskunde Vol. I. pp. 2, 3.
The situation of Vanáyu is not exactly determined: it seems to have
lain to the north-west of India.
Kámboja was probably still further to the north-west. Lassen thinks
that the name is etymologically connected with Cambyses which in
the cuneiform inscription of Behistun is written Ka(m)bujia.
The elephants of Indra and other deities who preside over the four
points of the compass.
"There are four kinds of elephants. 1 Bhaddar. It is well
proportioned, has an erect head, a broad chest, large ears, a long
tail, and is bold and can bear fatigue. 2 Mand. It is black, has
yellow eyes, a uniformly sized body, and is wild and ungovernable. 3
Mirg. It has a whitish skin, with black spots. 4 Mir. It has a
small head, and obeys readily. It gets frightened when it thunders."
Aín-i-Akbarí.. Translated by H. Blochmann, Aín 41, The Imperial
Elephant Stables.
Ayodhyá means not to be fought against.
Attendants of Indra, eight Gods whose names signify fire, light and
its phenomena.
Kasyap was a grandson of the God Brahmá. He is supposed to have
given his name to Kashmír = Kasyapa-míra, Kasyap's Lake.
The people of Anga. "Anga is said in the lexicons to be Bengal; but
here certainly another region is intended situated at the confluence
of the Sarjú with the Ganges, and not far distant from Dasaratha's
dominions." GORRESIO. It comprised part of Behar and Bhagulpur.
The Koïl or kokila (Cuculus Indicus) as the harbinger of spring
and love is a universal favourite with Indian poets. His voice when
first heard in a glorious spring morning is not unpleasant, but
becomes in the hot season intolerably wearisome to European ears.
"Sons and Paradise are intimately connected in Indian belief. A man
desires above every thing to have a son to perpetuate his race, and
to assist with sacrifices and funeral rites to make him worthy to
obtain a lofty seat in heaven or to preserve that which he has
already obtained." GORRESIO.
One of the Pleiades and generally regarded as the model of wifely
excellence.
The Hindu year is divided into six seasons of two months each,
spring, summer, rains, autumn, winter, and dews.
It was essential that the horse should wander free for a year before
immolation, as a sign that his master's paramount sovereignty was
acknowledged by all neighbouring princes.
Called also Vidcha, later Tirabhukti, corrupted into the modern
Tirhut, a province bounded on the west and east by the Gaudakí and
Kausikí rivers, on the south by the Ganges, and on the north by the
skirts of the Himálayas.
The celebrated city of Benares. See Dr. Hall's learned and
exhaustive Monograph in the Sacred City of the Hindus, by the Rev.
M. A. Sherring.
Kekaya is supposed to have been in the Panjáb. The name of the king
was Asvapati (Lord of Horses), father of Dasaratha's wife Kaikeyí.
Surat.
Apparently in the west of India not far from the Indus.
"The Pravargya ceremony lasts for three days, and is always
performed twice a day, in the forenoon and afternoon. It precedes
the animal and Soma sacrifices. For without having undergone it, no
one is allowed to take part in the solemn Soma feast prepared for
the gods." Haug's Aitareya Bráhmanam. Vol. II. p. 41. note q.v.
Upasads. "The Gods said, Let us perform the burnt offerings called
Upasads (i.e. besieging). For by means of an Upasad, i.e.
besieging, they conquer a large (fortified) town."--Ibid. p. 32.
The Soma plant, or Asclepias Acida. Its fermented juice was drunk in
sacrifice by the priests and offered to the Gods who enjoyed the
intoxicating draught.
"Tum in cærimoniarum intervallis Brachmanæ facundi, sollertes,
crebros sermones de rerum causis instituebant, alter alterum
vincendi cupidi. This public disputation in the assembly of Bráhmans
on the nature of things, and the almost fraternal connexion between
theology and philosophy deserves some notice; whereas the priests of
some religions are generally but little inclined to show favour to
philosophers, nay, sometimes persecute them with the most rancorous
hatred, as we are taught both by history and experience.… This sloka
is found in the MSS. of different recensions of the Rámáyan, and we
have, therefore, the most trustworthy testimony to the antiquity of
philosophy among the Indians." SCHLEGEL.
The Angas or appendices of the Vedas, pronunciation, prosody,
grammar, ritual, astronomy, and explanation of obscurities.
In Sanskrit vilva, the Ægle Marmelos. "He who desires food and
wishes to grow fat, ought to make his Yúpa (sacrificial post) of
Bilva wood." Haug's Aítareya Bráhmanam. Vol. II. p. 73.
The Mimosa Catechu. "He who desires heaven ought to make his Yúpa
of Khádira wood."--Ibid.
The Butea Frondosa. "He who desires beauty and sacred knowledge
ought to make his Yúpa of Palása wood."--Ibid.
The Cardia Latifolia.
A kind of pine. The word means literally the tree of the Gods.
Compare the Hebrew {~HEBREW LETTER AYIN~}{~HEBREW LETTER TSADI~}{~HEBREW LETTER YOD~} {~HEBREW LETTER YOD~}{~HEBREW LETTER HE~}{~HEBREW LETTER VAV~}{~HEBREW LETTER HE~} "trees of the Lord."
The Hindus call the constellation of Ursa Major the Seven Rishis or
Saints.
A minute account of these ancient ceremonies would be out of place
here. "Ágnishtoma is the name of a sacrifice, or rather a series of
offerings to fire for five days. It is the first and principal part
of the Jyotishtoma, one of the great sacrifices in which especially
the juice of the Soma plant is offered for the purpose of obtaining
Swarga or heaven." GOLDSTÜCKER'S DICTIONARY. "The Ágnishtoma is
Agni. It is called so because they (the gods) praised him with this
Stoma. They called it so to hide the proper meaning of the word: for
the gods like to hide the proper meaning of words."

"On account of four classes of gods having praised Agni with four
Stomas, the whole was called Chatushtoma (containing four
Stomas)."

"It (the Ágnishtoma) is called Jyotishtoma, for they praised Agni
when he had risen up (to the sky) in the shape of a light
(jyotis)."

"This (Ágnishtoma) is a sacrificial performance which has no
beginning and no end." HAUG'S Aitareya Bráhmanam.

The Atirátra, literally lasting through the night, is a division
of the service of the Jyotishtoma.

The Abhijit, the everywhere victorious, is the name of a
sub-division of the great sacrifice of the Gavámanaya.

The Visvajit, or the all-conquering, is a similar sub-division.

Áyus is the name of a service forming a division of the Abhiplava
sacrifice.

The Aptoryám, is the seventh or last part of the Jyotishtoma, for
the performance of which it is not essentially necessary, but a
voluntary sacrifice instituted for the attainment of a specific
desire. The literal meaning of the word would be in conformity with
the Praudhamanoramá, "a sacrifice which procures the attainment of
the desired object." GOLDSTÜCKER'S DICTIONARY.

"The Ukthya is a slight modification of the Ágnishtoma sacrifice.
The noun to be supplied to it is kratu. It is a Soma sacrifice
also, and one of the seven Sansthas or component parts of the
Jyotishtoma. Its name indicates its nature. For Ukthya means 'what
refers to the Uktha,' which is an older name for Shástra, i.e.
recitation of one of the Hotri priests at the time of the Soma
libations. Thus this sacrifice is only a kind of supplement to the
Ágnishtoma." HAUG. Ai. B.
"Four classes of priests were required in India at the most solemn
sacrifices. 1. The officiating priests, manual labourers, and
acolytes, who had chiefly to prepare the sacrificial ground, to
dress the altar, slay the victims, and pour out the libations. 2.
The choristers, who chant the sacred hymns. 3. The reciters or
readers, who repeat certain hymns. 4. The overseers or bishops, who
watch and superintend the proceedings of the other priests, and
ought to be familiar with all the Vedas. The formulas and verses to
be muttered by the first class are contained in the
Yajur-veda-sanhitá. The hymns to be sung by the second class are in
the Sama-veda-sanhitá. The Atharva-veda is said to be intended for
the Brahman or overseer, who is to watch the proceedings of the
sacrifice, and to remedy any mistake that may occur. The hymns to be
recited by the third class are contained in the Rigveda," Chips
from a German Workshop.
The Maruts are the winds, deified in the religion of the Veda like
other mighty powers and phenomena of nature.
A Titan or fiend whose destruction has given Vishnu one of his
well-known titles, Mádhava.
The garden of Indra.
One of the most ancient and popular of the numerous names of Vishnu.
The word has been derived in several ways, and may mean he who
moved on the (primordial) waters, or he who pervades or influences
men or their thoughts.
The Horse-Sacrifice, just described.
To walk round an object keeping the right side towards it is a mark
of great respect. The Sanskrit word for the observance is
pradakshiná, from pra pro, and daksha right, Greek δεξίος, Latin
dexter, Gaelic deas-il. A similar ceremony is observed by the Gaels.

"In the meantime she traced around him, with wavering steps, the
propitiation, which some have thought has been derived from the
Druidical mythology. It consists, as is well known, in the person
who makes the deasil walking three times round the person who is
the object of the ceremony, taking care to move according to the
course of the sun."

SCOTT. The Two Drovers.
The Amrit, the nectar of the Indian Gods.
Gandharvas (Southey's Glendoveers) are celestial musicians
inhabiting Indra's heaven and forming the orchestra at all the
banquets of the principal deities.
Yakshas, demigods attendant especially on Kuvera, and employed by
him in the care of his garden and treasures.
Kimpurushas, demigods attached also to the service of Kuvera,
celestial musicians, represented like centaurs reversed with human
figures and horses' heads.
Siddhas, demigods or spirits of undefined attributes, occupying
with the Vidyádharas the middle air or region between the earth
and the sun.

Schlegel translates: "Divi, Sapientes, Fidicines, Præpetes,
illustres Genii, Præconesque procrearunt natos, masculos,
silvicolas; angues porro, Hippocephali Beati, Aligeri, Serpentesque
frequentes alacriter generavere prolem innumerabilem."
A mountain in the south of India.
The preceptor of the Gods and regent of the planet Jupiter.
The celestial architect, the Indian Hephæstus, Mulciber, or Vulcan.
The God of Fire.
Twin children of the Sun, the physicians of Swarga or Indra's
heaven.
The deity of the waters.
Parjanya, sometimes confounded with Indra.
The bird and vehicle of Vishnu. He is generally represented as a
being something between a man and a bird and considered as the
sovereign of the feathered race. He may be compared with the Simurgh
of the Persians, the 'Anká of the Arabs, the Griffin of chivalry,
the Phoenix of Egypt, and the bird that sits upon the ash Yggdrasil
of the Edda.
This Canto will appear ridiculous to the European reader. But it
should be remembered that the monkeys of an Indian forest, the
"bough-deer" as the poets call them, are very different animals from
the "turpissima bestia" that accompanies the itinerant organ-grinder
or grins in the Zoological Gardens of London. Milton has made his
hero, Satan, assume the forms of a cormorant, a toad, and a serpent,
and I cannot see that this creation of semi-divine Vánars, or
monkeys, is more ridiculous or undignified.
The consort of Indra, called also Sachí and Indrání.
The Michelia champaca. It bears a scented yellow blossom:
"The maid of India blest again to hold
In her full lap the Champac's leaves of gold."

Lallah Rookh.
Vibhándak, the father of Rishyasring
A hemisloka is wanting in Schlegel's text, which he thus fills up in
his Latin translation.
Rishyasring, a Bráhman, had married Sántá who was of the Kshatriya
or Warrior caste and an expiatory ceremony was necessary on account
of this violation of the law.
"The poet no doubt intended to indicate the vernal equinox as the
birthday of Ráma. For the month Chaitra is the first of the two
months assigned to the spring; it corresponds with the latter half
of March and the former half of April in our division of the year.
Aditi, the mother of the Gods, is lady of the seventh lunar
mansion which is called Punarvasu. The five planets and their
positions in the Zodiac are thus enumerated by both commentators:
the Sun in Aries, Mars in Capricorn, Saturn in Libra, Jupiter in
Cancer, Venus in Pisces.… I leave to astronomers to examine whether
the parts of the description agree with one another, and, if this be
the case, thence to deduce the date. The Indians place the nativity
of Ráma in the confines of the second age (tretá) and the third
(dwápara): but it seems that this should be taken in an allegorical
sense.… We may consider that the poet had an eye to the time in
which, immediately before his own age, the aspects of the heavenly
bodies were such as he has described." SCHLEGEL.
The regent of the planet Jupiter.
Indra = Jupiter Tonans.
"Pushya is the name of a month; but here it means the eighth
mansion. The ninth is called Asleshá, or the snake. It is evident
from this that Bharat, though his birth is mentioned before that of
the twins, was the youngest of the four brothers and Ráma's junior
by eleven months." SCHLEGEL.
A fish, the Zodiacal sign Pisces.
One of the constellations, containing stars in the wing of Pegasus.
Ráma means the Delight (of the World); Bharat, the Supporter;
Lakshman, the Auspicious; Satrughna, the Slayer of Foes.
Schlegel, in the Indische Bibliothek, remarks that the proficiency
of the Indians in this art early attracted the attention of
Alexander's successors, and natives of India were so long
exclusively employed in this service that the name Indian was
applied to any elephant-driver, to whatever country he might belong.
The story of this famous saint is given at sufficient length in
Cantos LI-LV.

This saint has given his name to the district and city to the east
of Benares. The original name, preserved in a land-grant on copper
now in the Museum of the Benares College, has been Moslemized into
Ghazeepore (the City of the Soldier-martyr).
The son of Kusik is Visvámitra.
At the recollection of their former enmity, to be described
hereafter.
The Indian nectar or drink of the Gods.
Great joy, according to the Hindu belief, has this effect, not
causing each particular hair to stand on end, but gently raising all
the down upon the body.
The Rákshasas, giants, or fiends who are represented as disturbing
the sacrifice, signify here, as often elsewhere, merely the savage
tribes which placed themselves in hostile opposition to Bráhmanical
institutions.
Consisting of horse, foot, chariots, and elephants.
"The Gandharvas, or heavenly bards, had originally a warlike
character but were afterwards reduced to the office of celestial
musicians cheering the banquets of the Gods. Dr. Kuhn has shown
their identity with the Centaurs in name, origin and attributes."
GORRESIO.
These mysterious animated weapons are enumerated in Cantos XXIX and
XXX. Daksha was the son of Brahmá and one of the Prajápatis,
Demiurgi, or secondary authors of creation.
Youths of the Kshatriya class used to leave unshorn the side locks
of their hair. These were called Káka-paksha, or raven's wings.
The Rákshas or giant Rávan, king of Lanká.
"The meaning of Asvins (from asva a horse, Persian asp, Greek
ἵππος , Latin equus, Welsh ech) is Horsemen. They were twin deities
of whom frequent mention is made in the Vedas and the Indian myths.
The Asvins have much in common with the Dioscuri of Greece, and
their mythical genealogy seems to indicate that their origin was
astronomical. They were, perhaps, at first the morning star and
evening star. They are said to be the children of the sun and the
nymph Asviní, who is one of the lunar asterisms personified. In the
popular mythology they are regarded as the physicians of the Gods."
GORRESIO.
The word Kumára (a young prince, a Childe) is also a proper name of
Skanda or Kártikeya God of War, the son of Siva and Umá. The babe
was matured in the fire.
"At the rising of the sun as well as at noon certain observances,
invocations, and prayers were prescribed which might under no
circumstances be omitted. One of these observances was the
recitation of the Sávitrí, a Vedic hymn to the Sun of wonderful
beauty." GORRESIO.
Tripathaga, Three-path-go, flowing in heaven, on earth, and
under the earth. See Canto XLV.
Tennyson's "Indian Cama," the God of Love, known also by many other
names.
Umá, or Parvatí, was daughter of Himálaya, Monarch of mountains,
and wife of Siva. See Kálidasa's Kumára Sambhava, or Birth of the
War-God.
Sthánu. The Unmoving one, a name of Siva.
"The practice of austerities, voluntary tortures, and mortifications
was anciently universal in India, and was held by the Indians to be
of immense efficacy. Hence they mortified themselves to expiate
sins, to acquire merits, and to obtain superhuman gifts and powers;
the Gods themselves sometimes exercised themselves in such
austerities, either to raise themselves to greater power and
grandeur, or to counteract the austerities of man which threatened
to prevail over them and to deprive them of heaven.… Such
austerities were called in India tapas (burning ardour, fervent
devotion) and he who practised them tapasvin." GORRESIO.
The Bodiless one.
"A celebrated lake regarded in India as sacred. It lies in the lofty
region between the northern highlands of the Himálayas and mount
Kailása, the region of the sacred lakes. The poem, following the
popular Indian belief, makes the river Sarayú (now Sarjú) flow from
the Mánasa lake; the sources of the river are a little to the south
about a day's journey from the lake. See Lassen, Indische
Alterthumshunde, page 34." GORRESIO. Manas means mind; mánasa,
mental, mind-born.
Sarovar means best of lakes. This is another of the poet's
fanciful etymologies.
The confluence of two or more rivers is often a venerated and holy
place. The most famous is Prayág or Allahabad, where the Sarasvatí
by an underground course is believed to join the Jumna and the
Ganges.
The botanical names of the trees mentioned in the text are Grislea
Tormentosa, Shorea Robusta, Echites Antidysenterica, Bignonia
Suaveolens, OEgle Marmelos, and Diospyrus Glutinosa. I have omitted
the Kutaja (Echites) and the Tinduka (Diospyrus).
Here we meet with a fresh myth to account for the name of these
regions. Malaja is probably a non-Aryan word signifying a hilly
country: taken as a Sanskrit compound it means sprung from
defilement. The word Karúsha appears to have a somewhat similar
meaning.
"This is one of those indefinable mythic personages who are found in
the ancient traditions of many nations, and in whom cosmogonical or
astronomical notions are generally figured. Thus it is related of
Agastya that the Vindhyan mountains prostrated themselves before
him; and yet the same Agastya is believed to be regent of the star
Canopus." GORRESIO.

He will appear as the friend and helper of Ráma farther on in the
poem.
The famous pleasure-garden of Kuvera the God of Wealth.
"The whole of this Canto together with the following one, regards
the belief, formerly prevalent in India, that by virtue of certain
spells, to be learnt and muttered, secret knowledge and superhuman
powers might be acquired. To this the poet has already alluded in
Canto xxiii. These incorporeal weapons are partly represented
according to the fashion of those ascribed to the Gods and the
different orders of demi-gods, partly are the mere creations of
fancy; and it would not be easy to say what idea the poet had of
them in his own mind, or what powers he meant to assign to each."
SCHLEGEL.
"In Sanskrit Sankára, a word which has various significations but
the primary meaning of which is the act of seizing. A magical
power seems to be implied of employing the weapons when and where
required. The remarks I have made on the preceding Canto apply with
still greater force to this. The MSS. greatly vary in the
enumeration of these Sankáras, and it is not surprising that
copyists have incorrectly written the names which they did not well
understand. The commentators throw no light upon the subject."
SCHLEGEL. I have taken the liberty of omitting four of these which
Schlegel translates "Scleromphalum, Euomphalum, Centiventrem, and
Chrysomphalum."
I omit, after this line, eight slokes which, as Schlegel allows,
are quite out of place.
This is the fifth of the avatárs, descents or incarnations of
Vishnu.
This is a solar allegory. Vishnu is the sun, the three steps being
his rising, culmination, and setting.
Certain ceremonies preliminary to a sacrifice.
A river which rises in Budelcund and falls into the Ganges near
Patna. It is called also Hiranyaráhu, Golden-armed, and
Hiranyaráha, Auriferous.
The modern Berar.
According to the Bengal recension the first (Kusámba) is called
Kusásva, and his city Kausásví. This name does not occur elsewhere.
The reading of the northern recension is confirmed by Foê Kouê Ki;
p. 385, where the city Kiaoshangmi is mentioned. It lay 500 lis
to the south-west of Prayága, on the south bank of the Jumna.
Mahodaya is another name of Kanyakubja: Dharmáranya, the wood to
which the God of Justice is said to have fled through fear of Soma
the Moon-God was in Magadh. Girivraja was in the same neighbourhood.
See Lasson's I, A. Vol. I. p. 604.
That is, the City of the Bent Virgins, the modern Kanauj or Canouge.
Literally, Given by Brahma or devout contemplation.
Now called Kosí (Cosy) corrupted from Kausikí, daughter of Kus]a.
"This is one of those personifications of rivers so frequent in the
Grecian mythology, but in the similar myths is seen the impress of
the genius of each people, austere and profoundly religious in
India, graceful and devoted to the worship of external beauty in
Greece." GORRESIO.
One of the names of the Ganges considered as the daughter of Jahnu.
See Canto XLIV.
The Indian Crane.
Or, rather, geese.
A name of the God Siva.
Garuda.
Ikshváku, the name of a king of Ayodhyá who is regarded as the
founder of the Solar race, means also a gourd. Hence, perhaps, the
myth.
"The region here spoken of is called in the Laws of Manu
Madhyadesa or the middle region. 'The region situated between the
Himálaya and the Vindhya Mountains … is called Madhyadesa, or the
middle region; the space comprised between these two mountains from
the eastern to the western sea is called by sages Áryávartta, the
seat of honourable men.' (MANU, II, 21, 22.) The Sanskrit Indians
called themselves Áryans, which means honourable, noble, to
distinguish themselves from the surrounding nations of different
origin." GORRESIO.
Said to be so called from the Jambu, or Rose Apple, abounding in it,
and signifying according to the Puránas the central division of the
world, the known world.
Here used as a name of Vishnu.
Kings are called the husbands of their kingdoms or of the earth;
"She and his kingdom were his only brides." Raghuvansa.

"Doubly divorced! Bad men, you violate
A double marriage, 'twixt my crown and me,
And then between me and my married wife."

King Richard II. Act V. Sc. I.
The thirty-three Gods are said in the Aitareya Bráhmana, Book I.
ch. II. 10. to be the eight Vasus, the eleven Rudras, the twelve
Ádityas, Prajápati, either Brahmá or Daksha, and Vashatkára or
deified oblation. This must have been the actual number at the
beginning of the Vedic religion gradually increased by successive
mythical and religious creations till the Indian Pantheon was
crowded with abstractions of every kind. Through the reverence with
which the words of the Veda were regarded, the immense host of
multiplied divinities, in later times, still bore the name of the
Thirty-three Gods.
"One of the elephants which, according to an ancient belief popular
in India, supported the earth with their enormous backs; when one of
these elephants shook his wearied head the earth trembled with its
woods and hills. An idea, or rather a mythical fancy, similar to
this, but reduced to proportions less grand, is found in Virgil when
he speaks of Enceladus buried under Ætna:"

"adi semiustum fulmine corpus
Urgeri mole hac, ingentemque insuper Ætnam
Impositam, ruptis flammam expirare caminis;
Et fessum quoties mutat latus, intre mere omnem
iam, et coelum subtexere fumo."

Æneid. Lib. III. GORRESIO.
"The Devas and Asuras (Gods and Titans) fought in the east, the
south, the west, and the north, and the Devas were defeated by the
Asuras in all these directions. They then fought in the
north-eastern direction; there the Devas did not sustain defeat.
This direction is aparájitá, i.e. unconquerable. Thence one
should do work in this direction, and have it done there; for such a
one (alone) is able to clear off his debts." HAUG'S Aitareya
Bráhmanam, Vol. II, p. 33.

The debts here spoken of are a man's religious obligations to the
Gods, the Pitaras or Manes, and men.
Vishnu.
"It appears to me that this mythical story has reference to the
volcanic phenomena of nature. Kapil may very possibly be that hidden
fiery force which suddenly unprisons itself and bursts forth in
volcanic effects. Kapil is, moreover, one of the names of Agni the
God of Fire." GORRESIO.
Garud was the son of Kasyap and Vinatá.
Garud.
A famous and venerated region near the Malabar coast.
That is four fires and the sun.
Heaven.
Wind-Gods.
Siva.
The lake Vindu does not exist. Of the seven rivers here mentioned
two only, the Ganges and the Sindhu or Indus, are known to
geographers. Hládiní means the Gladdener, Pávaní the Purifier,
Naliní the Lotus-Clad, and Suchakshu the Fair-eyed.
The First or Golden Age.
Diti and Aditi were wives of Kasyap, and mothers respectively of
Titans and Gods.
One of the seven seas surrounding as many worlds in concentric
rings.
Sankar and Rudra are names of Siva.
"Sárngin, literally carrying a bow of horn, is a constantly
recurring name of Vishnu. The Indians also, therefore, knew the art
of making bows out of the hons of antelopes or wild goats, which
Homer ascribes to the Trojans of the heroic age." SCHLEGEL.
Dhanvantari, the physician of the Gods.
The poet plays upon the word and fancifully derives it from apsu,
the locative case plural of ap, water, and rasa, taste.… The
word is probably derived from ap, water, and sri, to go, and
seems to signify inhabitants of the water, nymphs of the stream;
or, as Goldstücker thinks (Dict. s.v.) these divinities were
originally personifications of the vapours which are attracted by
the sun and form into mist or clouds.
"Surá, in the feminine comprehends all sorts of intoxicating
liquors, many kinds of which the Indians from the earliest times
distilled and prepared from rice, sugar-cane, the palm tree, and
various flowers and plants. Nothing is considered more disgraceful
among orthodox Hindus than drunkenness, and the use of wine is
forbidden not only to Bráhmans but the two other orders as well.… So
it clearly appears derogatory to the dignity of the Gods to have
received a nymph so pernicious, who ought rather to have been made
over to the Titans. However the etymological fancy has prevailed.
The word Sura, a God, is derived from the indeclinable Swar
heaven." SCHLEGEL.
Literally, high-eared, the horse of Indra. Compare the production of
the horse from the sea by Neptune.
"And Kaustubha the best
Of gems that burns with living light
Upon Lord Vishnu's breast."

Churning of the Ocean.
"That this story of the birth of Lakshmí is of considerable
antiquity is evident from one of her names Kshírábdhi-tanayá,
daughter of the Milky Sea, which is found in Amarasinha the most
ancient of Indian lexicographers. The similarity to the Greek myth
of Venus being born from the foam of the sea is remarkable."

"In this description of Lakshmí one thing only offends me, that she
is said to have four arms. Each of Vishnu's arms, single, as far as
the elbow, there branches into two; but Lakshmí in all the brass
seals that I possess or remember to have seen has two arms only. Nor
does this deformity of redundant limbs suit the pattern of perfect
beauty." SCHLEGEL. I have omitted the offensive epithet.
Purandhar, a common title of Indra.
A few verses are here left untranslated on account of the subject
and language being offensive to modern taste.
"In this myth of Indra destroying the unborn fruit of Diti with his
thunderbolt, from which afterwards came the Maruts or Gods of Wind
and Storm, geological phenomena are, it seems, represented under
mythical images. In the great Mother of the Gods is, perhaps,
figured the dry earth: Indra the God of thunder rends it open, and
there issue from its rent bosom the Maruts or exhalations of the
earth. But such ancient myths are difficult to interpret with
absolute certainty." GORRESIO.
Wind.
Indra, with mahá, great, prefixed.
The Heavenly Twins.
Not banished from heaven as the inferior Gods and demigods sometimes
were.
Kumárila says: "In the same manner, if it is said that Indra was the
seducer of Ahalyá this does not imply that the God Indra committed
such a crime, but Indra means the sun, and Ahalyá (from ahan and lí)
the night; and as the night is seduced and ruined by the sun of the
morning, therefore is Indra called the paramour of Ahalyá." MAX
MULLER, History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 530.
"The preceding sixteen lines have occurred before in Canto XLVIII.
This Homeric custom of repeating a passage of several lines is
strange to our poet. This is the only instance I remember. The
repetition of single lines is common enough." SCHLEGEL.
Divine personages of minute size produced from the hair of Brahmá,
and probably the origin of

"That small infantry
Warred on by cranes."
Sweet, salt, pungent, bitter, acid, and astringent.
"Of old hoards and minerals in the earth, the king is entitled to
half by reason of his general protection, and because he is the lord
paramount of the soil." MANU, Book VIII. 39.
Ghí or clarified butter, "holy oil," being one of the essentials of
sacrifice.
"A Bráhman had five principal duties to discharge every day: study
and teaching the Veda, oblations to the manes or spirits of the
departed, sacrifice to the Gods, hospitable offerings to men, and a
gift of food to all creatures. The last consisted of rice or other
grain which the Bráhman was to offer every day outside his house in
the open air. MANU, Book III. 70." GORRESIO.
These were certain sacred words of invocation such a sváhá,
vashat, etc., pronounced at the time of sacrifice.
"It is well known that the Persians were called Pahlavas by the
Indians. The Sakas are nomad tribes inhabiting Central Asia, the
Scythes of the Greeks, whom the Persians also, as Herodotus tells
us, called Sakæ just as the Indians did. Lib. VII 64 ὁι γὰρ Πέρσαι πάντας τοὺς Σύθας. καλέουσι Σάκας. The name Yavans seems to be used
rather indefinitely for nations situated beyond Persia to the west.…
After the time of Alexander the Great the Indians as well as the
Persians called the Greeks also Yavans." SCHLEGEL.

Lassen thinks that the Pahlavas were the same people as the Πάκτυες
of Herodotus, and that this non-Indian people dwelt on the
north-west confines of India.
See page 13, note 6.
Barbarians, non-Sanskrit-speaking tribes.
A comprehensive term for foreign or outcast races of different faith
and language from the Hindus.
The Kirátas and Hárítas are savage aborigines of India who occupy
hills and jungles and are altogether different in race and character
from the Hindus. Dr. Muir remarks in his Sanskrit Texts, Vol. I. p.
488 (second edition) that it does not appear that it is the object
of this legend to represent this miraculous creation as the origin
of these tribes, and that nothing more may have been intended than
that the cow called into existence large armies, of the same stock
with particular tribes previously existing.
The Great God, Siva.
Nandi, the snow-white bull, the attendant and favourite vehicle of
Siva.
"The names of many of these weapons which are mythical and partly
allegorical have occurred in Canto XXIX. The general signification
of the story is clear enough. It is a contest for supremacy between
the regal or military order and Bráhmanical or priestly authority,
like one of those struggles which our own Europe saw in the middle
ages when without employing warlike weapons the priesthood
frequently gained the victory." SCHLEGEL.

For a full account of the early contests between the Bráhmans and
the Kshattriyas, see Muir's Original Sanskrit Texts (Second edition)
Vol. I. Ch. IV.
"Trisanku, king of Ayodhyá, was seventh in descent from Ikshváku,
and Dasaratha holds the thirty-fourth place in the same genealogy.
See Canto LXX. We are thrown back, therefore, to very ancient times,
and it occasions some surprise to find Vasishtha and Visvámitra,
actors in these occurences, still alive in Rama's time."
"It does not appear how Trisanku, in asking the aid of Vasishtha's
sons after applying in vain to their father, could be charged with
resorting to another sákhá (School) in the ordinary sense of that
word; as it is not conceivable that the sons should have been of
another Sákhá from the father, whose cause they espouse with so much
warmth. The commentator in the Bombay edition explains the word
Sákhantaram as Yájanádiná rakshántaram, 'one who by sacrificing
for thee, etc., will be another protector.' Gorresio's Gauda text,
which may often be used as a commentary on the older one, has the
following paraphrase of the words in question, ch. 60, 3. Múlam
utsrijya kasmát tvam sákhásv ichhasi lambitum. 'Why, forsaking the
root, dost thou desire to hang upon the branches?' " MUIR, Sanskrit
Texts, Vol. I., p. 401.
A Chandála was a man born of the illegal and impure union of a Súdra
with a woman of one of the three higher castes.
"The Chandála was regarded as the vilest and most abject of the men
sprung from wedlock forbidden by the law (Mánavadharmasástra, Lib.
X. 12.); a kind of social malediction weighed upon his head and
rejected him from human society." GORRESIO.
This appellation, occuring nowhere else in the poem except as the
name of a city, appears twice in this Canto as a name of Vasishtha.
"The seven ancient rishis or saints, as has been said before, were
the seven stars of Ursa Major. The seven other new saints which are
here said to have been created by Visvámitra should be seven new
southern stars, a sort of new Ursa. Von Schlegel thinks that this
mythical fiction of new stars created by Visvámitra may signify that
these southern stars, unknown to the Indians as long as they
remained in the neighbourhood of the Ganges, became known to them at
a later date when they colonized the southern regions of India."
GORRESIO.
"This cannot refer to the events just related: for Visvámitra was
successful in the sacrifice performed for Trisanku. And yet no other
impediment is mentioned. Still his restless mind would not allow him
to remain longer in the same spot. So the character of Visvámitra is
ingeniously and skilfully shadowed forth: as he had been formerly a
most warlike king, loving battle and glory, bold, active, sometimes
unjust, and more frequently magnanimous, such also he always shows
himself in his character of anchorite and ascetic." SCHLEGEL.
Near the modern city of Ajmere. The place is sacred still, and the
name is preserved in the Hindí. Lassen, however, says that this
Pushkala or Pushkara, called by the Grecian writers Πευκελίτις, the
earliest place of pilgrimage mentioned by name, is not to be
confounded with the modern Pushkara in Ajmere.
"Ambarísha is the twenty-ninth in descent from Ikshváku, and is
therefore separated by an immense space of time from Trisanku in
whose story Visvámitra had played so important a part. Yet Richíka,
who is represented as having young sons while Ambarísha was yet
reigning being himself the son of Bhrigu and to be numbered with the
most ancient sages, is said to have married the younger sister of
Visvámitra. But I need not again remark that there is a perpetual
anachronism in Indian mythology." SCHLEGEL..

"In the mythical story related in this and the following Canto we
may discover, I think, some indication of the epoch at which the
immolation of lower animals was substituted for human sacrifice.… So
when Iphigenia was about to be sacrificed at Aulis, one legend tells
us that a hind was substituted for the virgin." GORRESIO.

So the ram caught in the thicket took the place of Isaac, or, as the
Musalmáns say, of Ishmael.
The Indian Cupid.
"The same as she whose praises Visvámitra has already sung in Canto
XXXV, and whom the poet brings yet alive upon the scene in Canto
LXI. Her proper name was Satyavatí (Truthful); the patronymic,
Kausikí was preserved by the river into which she is said to have
been changed, and is still recognized in the corrupted forms Kusa
and Kusí. The river flows from the heights of the Himálaya towards
the Ganges, bounding on the east the country of Videha (Behar). The
name is no doubt half hidden in the Cosoagus of Pliny and the
Kossounos of Arrian. But each author has fallen into the same
error in his enumeration of these rivers (Condochatem, Erannoboam,
Cosoagum, Sonum). The Erannoboas, (Hiranyaváha) and the Sone are not
different streams, but well-known names of the same river. Moreover
the order is disturbed, in which on the right and left they fall
into the Ganges. To be consistent with geography it should be
written: Erannoboam sive Sonum, Condochatem (Gandakí), Cosoagum."
SCHLEGEL.
"Daksha was one of the ancient Progenitors or Prajápatis created by
Brahmá. The sacrifice which is here spoken of and in which Sankar or
Siva (called also here Rudra and Bhava) smote the Gods because he
had not been invited to share the sacred oblations with them, seems
to refer to the origin of the worship of Siva, to its increase and
to the struggle it maintained with other older forms of worship."
GORRESIO.
Sítá means a furrow.
"Great Erectheus swayed,
That owed his nurture to the blue-eyed maid,
But from the teeming furrow took his birth,
The mighty offspring of the foodful earth."

Iliad, Book II.
"The whole story of Sítá, as will be seen in the course of the poem
has a great analogy with the ancient myth of Proserpine." GORRESIO.
A different lady from the Goddess of the Jumna who bears the same
name.
This is another fanciful derivation, Sa--with, and gara--poison.
Purushádak means a cannibal. First called Kalmáshapáda on
account of his spotted feet he is said to have been turned into a
cannibal for killing the son of Vasishtha.
"In the setting forth of these royal genealogies the Bengal
recension varies but slightly from the Northern. The first six names
of the genealogy of the Kings of Ayodhyá are partly theogonical and
partly cosmogonical; the other names are no doubt in accordance with
tradition and deserve the same amount of credence as the ancient
traditional genealogies of other nations." GORRESIO.
The tenth of the lunar asterisms, composed of five stars.
There are two lunar asterisms of this name, one following the other
immediately, forming the eleventh and twelfth of the lunar mansions.
This is another Ráma, son of Jamadagni, called Parasuráma, or Ráma
with the axe, from the weapon which he carried. He was while he
lived the terror of the Warrior caste, and his name recalls long and
fierce struggles between the sacerdotal and military order in which
the latter suffered severely at the hands of their implacable enemy.
"The author of the Raghuvansa places the mountain Mahendra in the
territory of the king of the Kalingans, whose palace commanded a
view of the ocean. It is well known that the country along the coast
to the south of the mouths of the Ganges was the seat of this
people. Hence it may be suspected that this Mahendra is what Pliny
calls 'promontorium Calingon.' The modern name, Cape Palmyras,
from the palmyras Borassus flabelliformis, which abound there agrees
remarkably with the description of the poet who speaks of the groves
of these trees. Raghuvansa, VI. 51." SCHLEGEL.
Siva.
Siva. God of the Azure Neck.
Satrughna means slayer of foes, and the word is repeated as an
intensive epithet.
Alluding to the images of Vishnu, which have four arms, the four
princes being portions of the substance of that God.
Chief of the insignia of imperial dignity.
Whisks, usually made of the long tails of the Yak.
Chitraratha, King of the Gandharvas.
The Chandrakánta or Moonstone, a sort of crystal supposed to be
composed of congealed moonbeams.
A customary mark of respect to a superior.
Ráhu, the ascending node, is in mythology a demon with the tail of a
dragon whose head was severed from his body by Vishnu, but being
immortal, the head and tail retained their separate existence and
being transferred to the stellar sphere became the authors of
eclipses; the first especially by endeavouring to swallow the sun
and moon.
In eclipse.
The seventh of the lunar asterisms.
Kausalyá and Sumitrá.
A king of the Lunar race, and father of Yayáti.
Literally the chamber of wrath, a "growlery," a small, dark,
unfurnished room to which it seems, the wives and ladies of the king
betook themselves when offended and sulky.
In these four lines I do not translate faithfully, and I do not
venture to follow Kaikeyí farther in her eulogy of the hump-back's
charms.
These verses are evidently an interpolation. They contain nothing
that has not been already related: the words only are altered. As
the whole poem could not be recited at once, the rhapsodists at the
beginning of a fresh recitation would naturally remind their hearers
of the events immediately preceding.
The sloka or distich which I have been forced to expand into these
nine lines is evidently spurious, but is found in all the commented
MSS. which Schlegel consulted.
Manmatha, Mind-disturber, a name of Káma or Love.
This story is told in the Mahábhárat. A free version of it may be
found in Scenes from the Rámáyan, etc.
Only the highest merit obtains a home in heaven for ever. Minor
degrees of merit procure only leases of heavenly mansions terminable
after periods proportioned to the fund which buys them. King Yayáti
went to heaven and when his term expired was unceremoniously
ejected, and thrown down to earth.
See Additional Notes, THE SUPPLIANT DOVE.
Indra, called also Purandara, Town-destroyer.
Indra's charioteer.
The elephant of Indra.
A star in the spike of Virgo: hence the name of the mouth Chaitra or
Chait.
The Rain-God.
In a former life.
One of the lunar asterisms, represented as the favourite wife of the
Moon. See p. 4, note.
The Sea.
The Moon.
The comparison may to a European reader seem a homely one. But
Spenser likens an infuriate woman to a cow "That is berobbed of her
youngling dere." Shakspeare also makes King Henry VI compare himself
to the calf's mother that "Runs lowing up and down, Looking the way
her harmless young one went." "Cows," says De Quincey, "are amongst
the gentlest of breathing creatures; none show more passionate
tenderness to their young, when deprived of them, and, in short, I
am not ashamed to profess a deep love for these gentle creatures."
The commentators say that, in a former creation, Ocean grieved his
mother and suffered in consequence the pains of hell.
As described in Book I Canto XL.
Parasúráma.
The Sanskrit word hasta signifies both hand, and the trunk of
"The beast that bears between his eyes a serpent for a head."
See P. 41.
The first progeny of Brahmá or Brahmá himself.
These are three names of the Sun.
See P. 1.
The saints who form the constellation of Ursa Major.
The regent of the planet Venus.
Kuvera.
Bali, or the presentation of food to all created beings, is one of
the five great sacraments of the Hindu religion: it consists in
throwing a small parcel of the offering, Ghee, or rice, or the
like, into the open air at the back of the house.
In mythology, a demon slain by Indra.
Called also Garud, the King of the birds, offspring of Vinatá. See
p. 53.
See P. 56.
See P. 43.
The story of Sávitrí, told in the Mahábhárat, has been admirably
translated by Rückert, and elegantly epitomized by Mrs. Manning in
India, Ancient and Mediæval. There is a free rendering of the
story in Idylls from the Sanskrit.
Fire for sacrificial purposes is produced by the attrition of two
pieces of wood.
Kaikeyí.
The chapel where the sacred fire used in worship is kept.
The students and teachers of the Taittiríya portion of the Yajur
Veda.
Two of the divine personages called Prajápatis and Brahmádikas
who were first created by Brahmá.
It was the custom of the kings of the solar dynasty to resign in
their extreme old age the kingdom to the heir, and spend the
remainder of their days in holy meditation in the forest:

"For such through ages in their life's decline
Is the good custom of Ikshváku's line."

Raghuransa.
See Book I, Canto XXXIX. An Indian prince in more modern times
appears to have diverted himself in a similar way.

It is still reported in Belgaum that Appay Deasy was wont to amuse
himself "by making several young and beautiful women stand side by
side on a narrow balcony, without a parapet, overhanging the deep
reservoir at the new palace in Nipani. He used then to pass along
the line of trembling creatures, and suddenly thrusting one of them
headlong into the water below, he used to watch her drowning, and
derive pleasure from her dying agonies."--History of the Belgaum
District. By H. J. Stokes, M. S. C.
Chitraratha, King of the celestial choristers.
It is said that the bamboo dies after flowering.
"Thirty centuries have passed since he began this memorable journey.
Every step of it is known and is annually traversed by thousands:
hero worship is not extinct. What can Faith do! How strong are the
ties of religion when entwined with the legends of a country! How
many a cart creeps creaking and weary along the road from Ayodhyá to
Chitrakút. It is this that gives the Rámáyan a strange interest, the
story still lives." Calcutta Review: Vol. XXIII.
See p. 72.
Four stars of the sixteenth lunar asterism.
In the marriage service.
The husks and chaff of the rice offered to the Gods.
An important sacrifice at which seventeen victims were immolated.
The great pilgrimage to the Himálayas, in order to die there.
Known to Europeans as the Goomtee.
A tree, commonly called Ingua.
Sacrificial posts to which the victims were tied.
Daughter of Jahnu, a name of the Ganges. See p. 55.
The Mainá or Gracula religiosa, a favourite cage-bird, easily
taught to talk.
The Jumna.
The Hindu name of Allahabad.
The Langúr is a large monkey.
A mountain said to lie to the east of Meru.
Another name of the Jumna, daughter of the Sun.
"We have often looked on that green hill: it is the holiest spot of
that sect of the Hindu faith who devote themselves to this
incarnation of Vishnu. The whole neighbourhood is Ráma's country.
Every headland has some legend, every cavern is connected with his
name; some of the wild fruits are still called Sítáphal, being the
reputed food of the exile. Thousands and thousands annually visit
the spot, and round the hill is a raised foot-path, on which the
devotee, with naked feet, treads full of pious awe." Calcutta
Review, Vol. XXIII.
Deities of a particular class in which five or ten are enumerated.
They are worshipped particularly at the funeral obsequies in honour
of deceased progenitors.
"So in Homer the horses of Achilles lamented with many bitter tears
the death of Patroclus slain by Hector:"

“Ἵπποι δ' Αἰακίδαο, μάχης ἀπάνευθεν ἐότες,
Κλᾶιον, ἐπειδὴ πρῶτα πυθέσθην ἡνιόχοιο
Ἐν κονίνσι πεσόντος ὑφ' Ἕκτορος ἀνδροφόνοιο”

ILIAD. XVII. 426.

"Ancient poesy frequently associated nature with the joys and
sorrows of man." GORRESIO.
The lines containing this heap of forced metaphors are marked as
spurious by Schlegel.
The southern region is the abode of Yama the Indian Pluto, and of
departed spirits.
The five elements of which the body consists, and to which it
returns.
So dying York cries over the body of Suffolk:
"Tarry, dear cousin Suffolk!
My soul shall thine keep company to heaven:
Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly abreast."

King Henry V, Act IV, 6.
Kausalyá, daughter of the king of another Kosal.
Rájagriha, or Girivraja was the capital of Asvapati, Bharat's
maternal grandfather.
The Kekayas or Kaikayas in the Punjab appear amongst the chief
nations in the war of the Mahábhárata; their king being a kinsman of
Krishna.
Hástinapura was the capital of the kingdom of Kuru, near the modern
Delhi.
The Panchálas occupied the upper part of the Doab.
"Kurujángala and its inhabitants are frequently mentioned in the
Mahábhárata, as in the Ádi-parv. 3789, 4337, et al." WILSON'S
Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. p. 176. DR. HALL'S Note.
"The Ὁξύματιςof Arrian. See As. Res. Vol. XV. p. 420, 421, also
Indische Alterthumskunde, Vol. I. p. 602, first footnote."
WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, Vol. I. p. 421. DR. HALL'S Edition. The
Ikshumatí was a river in Kurukshetra.
"The Báhíkas are described in the Mahábhárata, Karna Parvan, with
some detail, and comprehend the different nations of the Punjab from
the Sutlej to the Indus." WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, Vol. I. p. 167.
The Beas, Hyphasis, or Bibasis.
It would be lost labour to attempt to verify all the towns and
streams mentioned in Cantos LXVIII and LXXII. Professor Wilson
observes (Vishnu Purána, p. 139. Dr. Hall's Edition) "States, and
tribes, and cities have disappeared, even from recollection; and
some of the natural features of the country, especially the rivers,
have undergone a total alteration.… Notwithstanding these
impediments, however, we should be able to identify at least
mountains and rivers, to a much greater extent than is now
practicable, if our maps were not so miserably defective in their
nomenclature. None of our surveyors or geographers have been
oriental scholars. It may be doubted if any of them have been
conversant with the spoken language of the country. They have,
consequently, put down names at random, according to their own
inaccurate appreciation of sounds carelessly, vulgarly, and
corruptly uttered; and their maps of India are crowded with
appellations which bear no similitude whatever either to past or
present denominations. We need not wonder that we cannot discover
Sanskrit names in English maps, when, in the immediate vicinity of
Calcutta, Barnagore represents Baráhanagar, Dakshineswar is
metamorphosed into Duckinsore, Ulubaría into Willoughbury.… There is
scarcely a name in our Indian maps that does not afford proof of
extreme indifference to accuracy in nomenclature, and of an
incorrectness in estimating sounds, which is, in some degree,
perhaps, a national defect."

For further information regarding the road from Ayodhyá to
Rájagriha, see Additional Notes.
"The Satadrú, 'the hundred-channeled'--the Zaradrus of Ptolemy,
Hesydrus of Pliny--is the Sutlej." WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, Vol. II.
p. 130.
The Sarasvatí or Sursooty is a tributary of the Caggar or Guggur in
Sirhind.
Súryamcha pratimehatu, adversus solem mingat. An offence expressly
forbidden by the Laws of Manu.
Bharat does not intend these curses for any particular person: he
merely wishes to prove his own innocence by invoking them on his own
head if he had any share in banishing Ráma.
The Sáma-veda, the hymns of which are chanted aloud.
Walking from right to left.
Birth and death, pleasure and pain, loss and gain.
Erected upon a tree or high staff in honour of Indra.
I follow in this stanza the Bombay edition in preference to
Schlegel's which gives the tears of joy to the courtiers.
The commentator says "Satrughna accompanied by the other sons of the
king."
Not Bharat's uncle, but some councillor.
Satakratu, Lord of a hundred sacrifices, the performance of a
hundred Asvamedhas or sacrifices of a horse entitling the
sacrificer to this exalted dignity.
The modern Malabar.
Now Sungroor, in the Allahabad district.
Ráma, Lakshman, and Sumantra.
The svastika, a little cross with a transverse line at each
extremity.
When an army marched it was customary to burn the huts in which it
had spent the night.
Yáma, Varuna, and Kuvera.
"A happy land in the remote north where the inhabitants enjoy a
natural pefection attended with complete happiness obtained without
exertion. There is there no vicissitude, nor decrepitude, nor death,
nor fear: no distinction of virtue and vice, none of the
inequalities denoted by the words best, worst, and intermediate, nor
any change resulting from the succession of the four Yugas." See
MUIR'S Sanskrit Texts, Vol. I. p. 492.
The Moon.
The poet does not tell us what these lakes contained.
These ten lines are a substitution for, and not a translation of the
text which Carey and Marshman thus render: "This mountain adorned
with mango, jumboo, usuna, lodhra, piala, punusa, dhava, unkotha,
bhuvya, tinisha, vilwa, tindooka, bamboo, kashmaree, urista, uruna,
madhooka, tilaka, vuduree, amluka, nipa, vetra, dhunwuna, veejaka,
and other trees affording flowers, and fruits, and the most
delightful shade, how charming does it appear!"
Vidyadharis, Spirits of Air, sylphs.
A lake attached either to Amarávatí the residence of Indra, or Alaká
that of Kuvera.
The Ganges of heaven.
Naliní, as here, may be the name of any lake covered with lotuses.
This canto is allowed, by Indian commentators, to be an
interpolation. It cannot be the work of Válmíki.
A fine bird with a strong, sweet note, and great imitative powers.
Bauhinea variegata, a species of ebony.
The rainbow is called the bow of Indra.
Bhogavatí, the abode of the Nágas or Serpent race.
"The order of the procession on these occasions is that the children
precede according to age, then the women and after that the men
according to age, the youngest first and the eldest last: when they
descend into the water this is reversed and resumed when they come
out of it." CAREY AND MARSHMAN.
Vrihaspati, the preceptor of the Gods.
Garud, the king of birds.
To be won by virtue.
The four religious orders, referable to different times of life are,
that of the student, that of the householder, that of the anchorite,
and that of the mendicant.
To Gods, men, and Manes.
Gayá is a very holy city in Behar. Every good Hindu ought once in
his life to make funeral offerings in Gayá in honour of his
ancestors.
Put is the name of that region of hell to which men are doomed who
leave no son to perform the funeral rites which are necessary to
assure the happiness of the departed. Putra, the common word for a
son is said by the highest authority to be derived from Put and
tra deliverer.
It was the custom of Indian women when mourning for their absent
husbands to bind their hair in a long single braid.

Carey and Marshman translate, "the one-tailed city."
The verses in a different metre with which some cantos end are all
to be regarded with suspicion. Schlegel regrets that he did not
exclude them all from his edition. These lines are manifestly
spurious. See Additional Notes.
This genealogy is a repetition with slight variation of that given
in Book I, Canto LXX.
In Gorresio's recension identified with Vishnu. See Muir's Sanskrit
Texts, Vol. IV. pp 29, 30.
From sa with, and gara poison.
See Book I. Canto XL.
A practice which has frequently been described, under the name of
dherna, by European travellers in India.
Compare Milton's "beseeching or beseiging."
Ten-headed, ten-necked, ten faced, are common epithets of Rávan the
giant king of Lanká.
The spouse of Rohiní is the Moon: Ráhu is the demon who causes
eclipses.
"Once," says the Commentator Tírtha, "in the battle between the Gods
and demons the Gods were vanquished, and the sun was overthrown by
Ráhu. At the request of the Gods Atri undertook the management of
the sun for a week."
Now Nundgaon, in Oudh.
A part of the great Dandak forest.
When the saint Mándavya had doomed some saint's wife, who was
Anasúyá's friend, to become a widow on the morrow.
Heavenly nymphs.
The ball or present of food to all created beings.
The clarified butter &c. cast into the sacred fire.
The Moon-God: "he is," says the commentator, "the special deity of
Bráhmans."
"Because he was an incarnation of the deity," says the commentator,
"otherwise such honour paid by men of the sacerdotal caste to one of
the military would be improper."
The king of birds.
Kálántakayamopamam, resembling Yáma the destroyer.
Somewhat inconsistently with this part of the story Tumburu is
mentioned in Book II, Canto XII as one of the Gandharvas or heavenly
minstrels summoned to perform at Bharadvája's feast.
Rambhá appears in Book I Canto LXIV as the temptress of Visvámitra.
The conclusion of this Canto is all a vain repetition: it is
manifestly spurious and a very feeble imitation of Válmíki's style.
See Additional Notes.
"Even when he had alighted," says the commentator: The feet of Gods
do not touch the ground.
A name of Indra.
Sachí is the consort of Indra.
The spheres or mansions gained by those who have duly performed the
sacrifices required of them. Different situations are assigned to
these spheres, some placing them near the sun, others near the moon.
Hermits who live upon roots which they dig out of the earth:
literally diggers, derived from the prefix vi and khan to dig.
Generally, divine personages of the height of a man's thumb,
produced from Brahmá's hair: here, according to the commentator
followed by Gorresio, hermits who when they have obtained fresh food
throw away what they had laid up before.
Sprung from the washings of Vishnuu's feet.
Four fires burning round them, and the sun above.
The tax allowed to the king by the Laws of Manu.
Near the celebrated Rámagiri or Ráma's Hill, now Rám-tek, near
Nagpore--the scene of the Yaksha's exile in the Messenger Cloud.
A hundred Asvamedhas or sacrifices of a horse raise the sacrificer
to the dignity of Indra.
Indra.
Gorresio observes that Dasaratha was dead and that Sítá had been
informed of his death. In his translation he substitutes for the
words of the text "thy relations and mine." This is quite
superfluous. Dasaratha though in heaven still took a loving interest
in the fortunes of his son.
One of the hermits who had followed Ráma.
The lake of the five nymphs.
The holy fig-tree.
The bread-fruit tree, Artocarpus integrifolia.
A fine timber tree, Shorea robusta.
The God of fire.
Kuvera, the God of riches.
The Sun.
Brahmá, the creator.
Siva.
The Wind-God.
The God of the sea.
A class of demi-gods, eight in number.
The holiest text of the Vedas, deified.
Vásuki.
Garud.
The War-God.
One of the Pleiades generally regarded as the model of wifely
excellence.
The Madhúka, or, as it is now called, Mahuwá, is the Bassia
latifolia, a tree from whose blossoms a spirit is extracted.
"I should have doubted whether Manu could have been the right
reading here, but that it occurs again in verse 29, where it is in
like manner followed in verse 31 by Analá, so that it would
certainly seem that the name Manu is intended to stand for a female,
the daughter of Daksha. The Gauda recension, followed by Signor
Gorresio (III 20, 12), adopts an entirely different reading at the
end of the line, viz. Balám Atibalám api, 'Balá and Atibilá,'
instead of Manu and Analá. I see that Professor Roth s.v. adduces
the authority of the Amara Kosha and of the Commentator on Pánini
for stating that the word sometimes means 'the wife of Manu.' In the
following text of the Mahábhárata I. 2553. also, Manu appears to be
the name of a female: 'Anaradyam, Manum, Vañsám, Asurám,
Márganapriyám, Anúpám, Subhagám, Bhásím iti, Prádhá
vyajayata. Prádhá (daughter of Daksha) bore Anavadyá, Manu, Vansá,
Márganapriyá, Anúpá, Subhagá. and Bhásí.' " Muir's Sanskrit Text,
Vol. I. p. 116.
The elephant of Indra.
Golángúlas, described as a kind of monkey, of a black colour, and
having a tail like a cow.
Eight elephants attached to the four quarters and intermediate
points of the compass, to support and guard the earth.
Some scholars identify the centaurs with the Gandharvas.
The hooded serpents, says the commentator Tírtha, were the offspring
of Surasá: all others of Kadrú.
The text reads Kasyapa, "a descendant of Kasyapa," who according to
Rám. II. l0, 6, ought to be Vivasvat. But as it is stated in the
preceding part of this passage III. 14, 11 f. that Manu was one of
Kasyapa's eight wives, we must here read Kasyap. The Ganda recension
reads (III, 20, 30) Manur manushyáms cha tatha janayámása Rághana,
instead of the corresponding line in the Bombay edition. Muir's
Sanskrit Text, Vol I, p. 117.
The original verses merely name the trees. I have been obliged to
amplify slightly and to omit some quas versu dicere non est; e.g.
the tinisa (Dalbergia ougeiniensis), punnága (Rottleria
tinctoria), tilaka (not named), syandana (Dalbergia ougeiniensis
again), vandana (unknown), nípa (Nauclea Kadamba), lakucha
(Artoearpus lacucha), dhava (Grislea tomentosa), Asvakarna (another
name for the Sál), Samí (Acacia Suma), khadira (Mimosa catechu),
kinsuka (Butea frondosa), pátala (Bignonia suaveolens).
Acacia Suma.
The south is supposed to be the residence of the departed.
The sun.
The night is divided into three watches of four hours each.
The chief chamberlain and attendant of Siva or Rudra.
Umá or Párvati, the consort of Siva.
A star, one of the favourites of the Moon.
The God of love.
A demon slain by Indra.
Chitraratha, King of the Gandharvas.
Titanic.
The Sáriká is the Maina, a bird like a starling.
Mahákapála, Sthúláksha, Pramátha, Trisiras.
Vishnu, who bears a chakra or discus.
Siva.
See Additional Notes--DAKSHA'S SACRIFICE.
Himálaya.
One of the mysterious weapons given to Ráma.
A periphrasis for the body.
Trisirás.
The Three-headed.
The demon who causes eclipses.
"This Asura was a friend of Indra, and taking advantage of his
friend's confidence, he drank up Indra's strength along with a
draught of wine and Soma. Indra then told the Asvins and Sarasvatí
that Namuchi had drunk up his strength. The Asvins in consequence
gave Indra a thunderbolt in the form of a foam, with which he smote
off the head of Namuchi." GARRETT'S Classical Dictionary of India.
See also Book I. p. 39.
Indra.
Popularly supposed to cause death.
Garud, the King of Birds, carried off the Amrit or drink of Paradise
from Indra's custody.
A demon, son of Kasyap and Diti, slain by Rudra or Siva when he
attempted to carry off the tree of Paradise.
Namuchi and Vritra were two demons slain by Indra. Vritra
personifies drought, the enemy of Indra, who imprisons the rain in
the cloud.
Another demon slain by Indra.
The capital of the giant king Rávan.
Kuvera, the God of gold.
In the great deluge.
The giant Márícha, son of Tádaká. Tádaká was slain by Ráma. See p.
39.
Indra's elephant.
Bhogavatí, in Pátála in the regions under the earth, is the capital
of the serpent race whose king is Vásuki.
the grove of Indra.
Pulastya is considered as the ancestor of the Rakshases or giants,
as he is the father of Visravas, the father of Rávan and his
brethren.
Beings with the body of a man and the head of a horse.
Ájas, Maríchipas, Vaikhánasas, Máshas, and Bálakhilyas are classes
of supernatural beings who lead the lives of hermits.
"The younger brother of the giant Rávan; when he and his brother had
practiced austerities for a long series of years, Brahmá appeared to
offer them boons: Vibhishana asked that he might never meditate any
unrighteousness.… On the death of Rávan Vibhishana was installed as
Rája of Lanká." GARRETT'S Classical Dictionary of India.
Serpent-gods.
See p. 33.
The Sanskrit words for car and jewels begin with ra.
A race of beings of human shape but with the heads of horses, like
centaurs reversed.
The favourite wife of the Moon.
The planet Saturn.
Another favourite of the Moon; one of the lunar mansions.
The Rudras, agents in creation, are eight in number; they sprang
from the forehead of Brahmá.
Maruts, the attendants of Indra.
Radiant demi-gods.
The mountain which was used by the Gods as a churning stick at the
Churning of the Ocean.
The story will be found in GARRETT'S Classical Dictionary. See
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
Mercury: to be carefully distinguished from Buddha.
The spirits of the good dwell in heaven until their store of
accumulated merit is exhausted. Then they redescend to earth in the
form of falling stars.
See The Descent of Gangá, Book I Canto XLIV.
See Book I Canto XXV.
Asoka is compounded of a not and soka grief.
See Book I Canto XXXI.
An Asur or demon, king of Tripura, the modern Tipperah.
Siva.
See Book I, Canto LIX.
The preceptor of the Gods.
From the root vid, to find.
Rávan.
Or Curlews' Wood.
Iron-faced.
Kabandha means a trunk.
A class of mythological giants. In the Epic period they were
probably personifications of the aborigines of India.
Peace, war, marching, halting, sowing dissensions, and seeking
protection.
See Book I, Canto XVI.
Or as the commentator Tírtha says, Silápidháná, rock-covered, may be
the name of the cavern.
Pampá is said by the commentator to be the name both of a lake and a
brook which flows into it. The brook is said to rise in the hill
Rishyamúka.
Who was acting as Regent for Ráma and leading an ascetic life while
he mourned for his absent brother.
The Indian Cuckoo.
The Cassia Fistula or Amaltás is a splendid tree like a giant
laburnum covered with a profusion of chains and tassels of gold. Dr.
Roxburgh well describes it as "uncommonly beautiful when in flower,
few trees surpassing it in the elegance of its numerous long
pendulous racemes of large bright-yellow flowers intermixed with the
young lively green foliage." It is remarkable also for its curious
cylindrical black seed-pods about two feet long, which are called
monkeys' walking-sticks.
"The Jonesia Asoca is a tree of considerable size, native of
southern India. It blossoms in February and March with large erect
compact clusters of flowers, varying in colour from pale-orange to
scarlet, almost to be mistaken, on a hasty glance, for immense
trusses of bloom of an Ixora. Mr. Fortune considered this tree, when
in full bloom, superior in beauty even to the Amherstia.

The first time I saw the Asoc in flower was on the hill where the
famous rock-cut temple of Kárlí is situated, and a large concourse
of natives had assembled for the celebration of some Hindoo
festival. Before proceeding to the temple the Mahratta women
gathered from two trees, which were flowering somewhat below, each a
fine truss of blossom, and inserted it in the hair at the back of
her head.… As they moved about in groups it is impossible to imagine
a more delightful effect than the rich scarlet bunches of flowers
presented on their fine glossy jet-black hair." FIRMINGER,
Gardening for India.
No other word can express the movements of peafowl under the
influence of pleasing excitement, especially when after the long
drought they hear the welcome roar of the thunder and feel that the
rain is near.
The Dewy Season is one of the six ancient seasons of the Indian
year, lasting from the middle of January to the middle of March.
Ráma appears to mean that on a former occasion a crow flying high
overhead was an omen that indicated his approaching separation from
Sítá; and that now the same bird's perching on a tree near him may
be regarded as a happy augury that she will soon be restored to her
husband.
A tree with beautiful and fragrant blossoms.
A race of semi-divine musicians attached to the service of Kuvera,
represented as centaurs reversed with human figures and horses'
heads.
Butea Frondosa. A tree that bears a profusion of brilliant red
flowers which appear before the leaves.
I omit five slokas which contain nothing but a list of trees for
which, with one or two exceptions, there are no equivalent names in
English. The following is Gorresio's translation of the
corresponding passage in the Bengal recension:--

"Oh come risplendono in questa stagione di primavera i vitici, le
galedupe, le bassie, le dalbergie, i diospyri … le tile, le
michelie, le rottlerie, le pentaptere ed i pterospermi, i bombaci,
le grislee, gli abri, gli amaranti e le dalbergie; i sirii, le
galedupe, le barringtonie ed i palmizi, i xanthocymi, il pepebetel,
le verbosine e le ticaie, le nauclee le erythrine, gli asochi, e le
tapie fanno d'ogni intorno pompa de' lor fiori."
A sacred stream often mentioned in the course of the poem. See Book
II, Canto XCV.
A daughter of Daksha who became one of the wives of Kasyapa and
mother of the Daityas. She is termed the general mother of Titans
and malignant beings. See Book I Cantos XLV, XLVI.
Sugríva, the ex-king of the Vánars, foresters, or monkeys, an exile
from his home, wandering about the mountain Rishyamúka with his four
faithful ex-ministers.
The hermitage of the Saint Matanga which his curse prevented Báli,
the present king of the Vánars, from entering. The story is told at
length in Canto XI of this Book.
Hanumán, Sugríva's chief general, was the son of the God of Wind.
See Book I, Canto XVI.
A range of hills in Malabar; the Western Ghats in the Deccan.
Válmíki makes the second vowel in this name long or short to suit
the exigencies of the verse. Other Indian poets have followed his
example, and the same licence will be used in this translation.
I omit a recapitulatory and interpolated verse in a different metre,
which is as follows:--Reverencing with the words, So be it, the
speech of the greatly terrified and unequalled monkey king, the
magnanimous Hanumán then went where (stood) the very mighty Ráma
with Lakshman.
The semi divine Hanumán possesses, like the Gods and demons, the
power of wearing all shapes at will. He is one of the Kámarúpís.

Like Milton's good and bad angels "as they please
They limb themselves, and colour, shape, or size
Assume as likes them best, condense or rare."
Himálaya is of course par excellence the Monarch of mountains, but
the complimentary title is frequently given to other hills as here
to Malaya.
Twisted up in a matted coil as was the custom of ascetics.
The sun and moon.
The rainbow.
The Vedas are four in number, the Rich or Rig-veda, the Yajush or
Yajur-veda; the Sáman or Sáma-veda, and the Atharvan or
Atharva-veda. See p. 3. Note.
The chest, the throat, and the head.
"In our own metrical romances, or wherever a poem is meant not for
readers but for chanters and oral reciters, these formulæ, to meet
the same recurring case, exist by scores. Thus every woman in these
metrical romances who happens to be young, is described as 'so
bright of ble,' or complexion; always a man goes 'the mountenance of
a mile' before he overtakes or is overtaken. And so on through a
vast bead-roll of cases. In the same spirit Homer has his eternal
τον δ'αρ' ὑποδρα ιδων, or τον δ'απαμειβομενος προσφη, &c.

To a reader of sensibility, such recurrences wear an air of
child-like simplicity, beautifully recalling the features of Homer's
primitive age. But they would have appeared faults to all
commonplace critics in literary ages."

DE QUINCEY. Homer and the Homeridæ.
Bráhmans the sacerdotal caste. Kshatriyas the royal and military,
Vaisyas the mercantile, and Súdras the servile.
A protracted sacrifice extending over several days. See Book I, p. 24 Note.
Possessed of all the auspicious personal marks that indicate
capacity of universal sovereignty. See Book I. p. 2, and Note 3.
Kabandha. See Book III. Canto LXXIII.
Fire for sacred purposes is produced by the attrition of two pieces
of wood. In marriage and other solemn covenants fire is regarded as
the holy witness in whose presence the agreement is made. Spenser in
a description of a marriage, has borrowed from the Roman rite what
he calls the housling, or "matrimonial rite."

"His owne two hands the holy knots did knit
That none but death forever can divide.
His owne two hands, for such a turn most fit,
The housling fire did kindle and provide."

Faery Queen, Book I. XII. 37.
Indra.
Báli the king de facto.
With the Indians, as with the ancient Greeks, the throbbing of the
right eye in a man is an auspicious sign, the throbbing of the left
eye is the opposite. In a woman the significations of signs are
reversed.
The Vedas stolen by the demons Madhu and Kaitabha.
"The text has [Sanskrit text] which signifies literally 'the lost
vedic tradition.' It seems that allusion is here made to the Vedas
submerged in the depth of the sea, but promptly recovered by Vishnu
in one of his incarnations, as the brahmanic legend relates, with
which the orthodoxy of the Bráhmans intended perhaps to allude to
the prompt restoration and uninterrupted continuity of the ancient
vedic tradition."

GORRESIO.
Like the wife of a Nága or Serpent-God carried off by an eagle. The
enmity between the King of birds and the serpent is of very frequent
occurrence. It seems to be a modification of the strife between the
Vedic Indra and the Ahi, the serpent or drought-fiend; between
Apollôn and the Python, Adam and the Serpent.
He means that he has never ventured to raise his eyes to her arms
and face, though he has ever been her devoted servant.
The wood in which Skanda or Kártikeva was brought up:
"The Warrior-God
Whose infant steps amid the thickets strayed
Where the reeds wave over the holy sod."

See also Book I, Canto XXIX.
"Sugríva's story paints in vivid colours the manners, customs and
ideas of the wild mountain tribes which inhabited Kishkindhya or the
southern hills of the Deccan, of the people whom the poem calls
monkeys, tribes altogether different in origin and civilization from
the Indo-Sanskrit race." GORRESIO.
A fiend slain by Báli.
Báli's mountain city.
The canopy or royal umbrella, one of the usual Indian regalia.
Whisks made of the hair of the Yak or Bos grunniers, also regal
insignia.
Righteous because he never transgresses his bounds, and
"over his great tides
Fidelity presides."
Himálaya, the Lord of Snow, is the father of Umá the wife of Siva or
Sankar.
Indra's celestial elephant.
Báli was the son of Indra. See p. 28.
An Asur slain by Indra. See p. 261 Note. He is, like Vritra, a form
of the demon of drought destroyed by the beneficent God of the
firmament.
Another name of Indra or Mahendra.
The Bengal recension makes it return in the form of a swan.
Varuna is one of the oldest of the Vedic Gods, corresponding in name
and partly in character to the Οὐρανός of the Greeks and is often
regarded as the supreme deity. He upholds heaven and earth,
possesses extraordinary power and wisdom, sends his messengers
through both worlds, numbers the very winkings of men's eyes,
punishes transgressors whom he seizes with his deadly noose, and
pardons the sins of those who are penitent. In later mythology he
has become the God of the sea.
Budha, not to be confounded with the great reformer Buddha, is the
son of Soma or the Moon, and regent of the planet Mercury. Angára is
the regent of Mars who is called the red or the fiery planet. The
encounter between Michael and Satan is similarly said to have been
as if

"Two planets rushing from aspect malign
Of fiercest opposition in midsky
Should combat, and their jarring spheres compound."

Paradise Lost. Book VI.
The Asvins or Heavenly Twins, the Dioskuri or Castor and Pollux of
the Hindus, have frequently been mentioned. See p. 36, Note.
Called respectively Gárhapatya, Áhavaniya, and Dakshina, household,
sacrificial, and southern.
The store of merit accumulated by a holy or austere life secures
only a temporary seat in the mansion of bliss. When by the lapse of
time this store is exhausted, return to earth is unavoidable.
The conflagration which destroys the world at the end of a Yuga or
age.
Himálaya.
Tárá means "star." The poet plays upon the name by comparing her
beauty to that of the Lord of stars, the Moon.
Suparna, the Well-winged, is another name of Garuda the King of
Birds. See p. 28, Note.
The God of Death.
The flag-staff erected in honour of the God Indra is lowered when
the festival is over. Asvíní in astronomy is the head of Aries or
the first of the twenty-eight lunar mansions or asterisms.
Indra the father of Báli.
It is believed that every creature killed by Ráma obtained in
consequence immediate beatitude.

"And blessed the hand that gave so dear a death."
"Yayáti was invited to heaven by Indra, and conveyed on the way
thither by Mátali, Indra's charioteer. He afterwards returned to
earth where, by his virtuous administration he rendered all his
subjects exempt from passion and decay." GARRETT'S C. D. OF INDIA.
The ascetic's dress which he wore during his exile.
There is much inconsistency in the passages of the poem in which the
Vánars are spoken of, which seems to point to two widely different
legends. The Vánars are generally represented as semi-divine beings
with preternatural powers, living in houses and eating and drinking
like men sometimes as here, as monkeys pure and simple, living is
woods and eating fruit and roots.
For a younger brother to marry before the elder is a gross violation
of Indian law and duty. The same law applied to daughters with the
Hebrews: "It must not be so done in our country to give the younger
before the first-born." GENESIS xix. 26.
"The hedgehog and porcupine, the lizard, the rhinoceros, the
tortoise, and the rabbit or hare, wise legislators declare lawful
food among five-toed animals." MANU, v. 18.
"He can not buckle his distempered cause
Within the belt of rule."

MACBETH.
The Ankus or iron hook with which an elephant is driven and
guided.
Hayagríva, Horse-necked, is a form of Vishnu.
"Asvatara is the name of a chief of the Nágas or serpents which
inhabit the regions under the earth; it is also the name of a
Gandharva. Asvatarí ought to be the wife of one of the two, but I am
not sure that this conjecture is right. The commentator does not say
who this Asvatarí is, or what tradition or myth is alluded to.
Vimalabodha reads Asvatarí in the nominative case, and explains,
Asvatarí is the sun, and as the sun with his rays brings back the
moon which has been sunk in the ocean and the infernal regions, so
will I bring back Sítá." GORRESIO.
That is, "Consider what answer you can give to your accusers when
they charge you with injustice in killing me."
Manu, Book VIII. 318. "But men who have committed offences and have
received from kings the punishment due to them, go pure to heaven
and become as clear as those who have done well."
Mándhátá was one of the earlier descendants of Ikshváku. His name is
mentioned in Ráma's genealogy, p. 81.
I cannot understand how Válmíki could put such an excuse as this
into Ráma's mouth. Ráma with all solemn ceremony, has made a league
of alliance with Báli's younger brother whom he regards as a dear
friend and almost as an equal, and now he winds up his reasons for
killing Báli by coolly saying: "Besides you are only a monkey, you
know, after all, and as such I have every right to kill you how,
when, and where I like."
A name of Garuda the king of birds, the great enemy of the Serpents.
Sugríva's wife.
"Our deeds still follow with us from afar. And what we have been
makes us what we are."
Sugríva and Angad.
Angad himself, being too young to govern, would be Yuvarája or
heir-apparent.
Sushena was the son of Varuna the God of the sea.
A demon with the tail of a dragon, that causes eclipses by
endeavouring to swallow the sun and moon.
The Lord of Stars is the Moon.
Or the passage may be interpreted: "Be neither too obsequious or
affectionate, nor wanting in due respect or love."
Sacrifices and all religious rites begin and end with ablution, and
the wife of the officiating Bráhman takes an important part in the
performance of the holy ceremonies.
Visvarúpa, a son of Twashtri or Visvakarmá the heavenly architect,
was a three-headed monster slain by Indra.
The Vánar chief, not to be confounded with Tárá.
Srávan: July-August. But the rains begin a month earlier, and what
follows must not be taken literally. The text has púrvo' yam
várshiko másah Srávanah salilágamdh. The Bengal recension has the
same, and Gorresio translates: "Equesto ilmese Srâvana
(luglio-agosto) primo della stagione piovosa, in cui dilagano le
acque."
Kártik: October-November.
"Indras, as the nocturnal sun, hides himself, transformed, in the
starry heavens: the stars are his eyes. The hundred-eyed or
all-seeing (panoptês) Argos placed as a spy over the actions of the
cow beloved by Zeus, in the Hellenic equivalent of this form of
Indras." DE GUBERNATIS, Zoological Mythology, Vol. I, p. 418.
Baudháyana and others.
Sugríva appears to have been consecrated with all the ceremonies
that attended the Abhisheka or coronation of an Indian prince of
the Aryan race. Compare the preparations made for Ráma's
consecration, Book II, Canto III. Thus Homer frequently introduces
into Troy the rites of Hellenic worship.
Vitex Negundo.
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.
Mantles of the skin of the black antelope were the prescribed dress
of ascetics and religious students.
The sacred cord worn as the badge of religious initiation by men of
the three twice-born castes.
The hum with which students conduct their tasks.
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.
Praushthapada or Bhadra, the modern Bhadon, corresponds to half of
August and half of September.
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.
Áshádha is the month corresponding to parts of June and July.
Bharat, who was regent during Ráma's absence.
Or with Gorresio, following the gloss of another commentary: "Has
completed every holy rite and accumulated stores of merit."
The river on which Ayodhyá was built.
I omit a sloka or four lines on gratitude and ingratitude repeated
word for word from the last Canto.
The Indian crane; a magnificent bird easily domesticated.
The troops who guard the frontiers on the north, south, east and
west.
The Chátaka, Cuculus, Melanoleucus, is supposed to drink nothing but
the water for the clouds.
The time for warlike expeditions began when the rains had ceased.
The rainbow.
Indra's associates in arms, and musicians of his heaven.
Maireya, a spirituous liquor from the blossoms of the Lythrum
fruticosum, with sugar, &c.
Their names are as follows: Angad, Maínda, Dwida, Gavaya, Gaváksha,
Gaja, Sarabha, Vidyunmáli, Sampáti, Súryáksa, Hanumán, Vírabáhu,
Subáhu, Nala, Kúmuda, Sushena, Tára, Jámbuvatu, Dadhivakra, Níla,
Supátala, and Sunetra.
The Kalpadruma or Wishing-tree is one of the trees of Svarga or
Indra's Paradise: it has the power of granting all desires.
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.
The story is told in Book I, Canto LXIII, but the charmer there is
called Menaká.
Rohiní 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.
Válmíki and succeeding poets make the second vowel in this name long
or short at their pleasure.
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 Mahásaila, &c. are certain
mountains is about all the information they give.
One of the celestial elephants of the Gods who protect the four
quarters and intermediate points of the compass.
Váyu or the Wind was the father of Hanumán.
The path or station of Vishnu is the space between the seven Rishis
or Ursa Major, and Dhruva or the polar star.
One of the seven seas which surround the earth in concentric
circles.
The title of Mahesvar or Mighty Lord is sometimes given to Indra,
but more generally to Siva whom it here denotes.
See Book I, Canto XVI.
The numbers are unmanageable in English verse. The poet speaks of
hundreds of arbudas; and an arbuda is a hundred millions.
Anuhláda or Anuhráda is one of the four sons of the mighty
Hiranyakasipu, an Asur or a Daitya son of Kasyapa and Diti and
killed by Vishnu in his incarnation of the Man-Lion Narasinha.
According to the Bhágavata Purána the Daitya or Asur Hiranyakasipu
and Hiranyáksha his brother, both killed by Vishnu, were born again
as Rávan and Kumbhakarna his brother.
Puloma, a demon, was the father-in-law of Indra who destroyed him in
order to avert an imprecation. Paulomí is a patronymic denoting
Sachí the daughter of Puloma.
"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.
Sushen.
Tára.
Kesarí was the husband of Hanúmán's mother, and is here called his
father.
"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 Rámáyanam, 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.
Gandhamádana, Angad, Tára, Indrajánu, Rambha, Durmukha, Hanumán,
Nala, Da mukha, Sarabha, Kumuda, Vahni.
Daityas and Dánavas are fiends and enemies of the Gods, like the
Titans of Greek mythology.
I reduce the unwieldy numbers of the original to more modest
figures.
Sarayú now Sarjú is the river on which Ayodhyá was built.
Kausikí is a river which flows through Behar, commonly called Kosi.
Bhagírath's daughter is Gangá or the Ganges. The legend is told at
length in Book I Canto XLIV. The Descent of Gangá.
A mountain not identified.
The Jumna. The river is personified as the twin sister of Yáma, and
hence regarded as the daughter of the Sun.
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.
The Sindhu is the Indus, the Sanskrit s becoming h in Persian
and being in this instance dropped by the Greeks.
The Sone which rises in the district of Nagpore and falls into the
Ganges above Patna.
Mahí is a river rising in Malwa and falling into the gulf of Cambay
after a westerly course of 280 miles.
There is nothing to show what parts of the country the poet intended
to denote as silk-producing and silver-producing.
Yavadwipa means the island of Yava, wherever that may be.
Sisir is said to be a mountain ridge projecting from the base of
Meru on the south. Wilson's Vishnu Purána, ed. Hall, Vol. II. p.
117.
This appears to be some mythical stream and not the well-known Sone.
The name means red-coloured.
A fabulous thorny rod of the cotton tree used for torturing the
wicked in hell. The tree gives its name, Sálmalí, 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.
The king of the feathered creation.
Visvakarmá, the Mulciber of the Indian heaven.
"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
Vishnu Purána. Vol. II. p. 250.
Said in the Vishnu Purána to be a ridge projecting from the base
of Meru to the north.
Kinnars are centaurs reversed, beings with equine head and human
bodies.
Yakshas are demi-gods attendant on Kuvera the God of wealth.
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.
The word Játarúpa means gold.
The celebrated mythological serpent king Sesha, called also Ananta
or the infinite, represented as bearing the earth on one of his
thousand heads.
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 Vishnu Purána,
Vol. II. p. 110.
Vaikhánases are a race of hermit saints said to have sprung from the
nails of Prajápati.
"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 Vishnu
Purána.
The continent in which Sudarsan or Meru stands, i.e. Jambudwíp.
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.
Suhotra, Sarári, Saragulma, Gayá, Gaváksha, Gavaya, Sushena,
Gandhamádana, Ulkámukha, and Ananga.
The modern Nerbudda.
Krishnavení is mentioned in the Vishnu Purána as "the deep
Krishnavení" but there appears to be no clue to its identification.
The modern Godavery.
The Mekhalas or Mekalas according to the Paránas live in the Vindhya
hills, but here they appear among the peoples of the south.
Utkal is still the native name of Orissa.
The land of the people of the "ten forts." Professor Hall in a note
on WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. p. 160 says: "The oral
traditions of the vicinity to this day assign the name of Dasárna to
a region lying to the east of the District of Chundeyree."
Avantí is one of the ancient names of the celebrated Ujjayin or
Oujein in Central India.
Not identified.
Ayomukh means iron faced. The mountain is not identified.
The Káverí or modern Cauvery is well known and has always borne the
same appellation, being the Chaberis of Ptolemy.
One of the seven principal mountain chains: the southern portion of
the Western Gháts.
Agastya is the great sage who has already frequently appeared as
Ráma's friend and benefactor.
Támraparní is a river rising in Malaya.
The Pándyas are a people of the Deccan.
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.
Lanká, Sinhaladvípa, Sarandib, or Ceylon.
The Flowery Hill of course is mythical.
The whole of the geography south of Lanká is of course mythical.
Súryaván means Sunny.
Vaidyut means connected with lightning.
Agastya is here placed far to the south of Lanká. Earlier in this
Canto he was said to dwell on Malaya.
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.
Vásuki is according to some accounts the king of the Nágas or
serpent Gods.
Sailúsha, Gramini, Siksha, Suka, Babhru.
The distant south beyond the confines of the earth is the home of
departed spirits and the city of Yáma the God of Death.
Suráshtra, the "good country," is the modern Sura
A country north-west of Afghanistan, Baíkh.
The Moon-mountain here is mythical.
Sindhu is the Indus.
Páriyátra, or as more usually written Páripátra, is the central or
western portion of the Vindhya chain which skirts the province of
Malwa.
Vajra means both diamond and thunderbolt, the two substances being
supposed to be identical.
Chakraván means the discus-bearer.
The discus is the favourite weapon of Vishnu.
The Indian Hephaistos or Vulcan.
Panchajan was a demon who lived in the sea in the form of a conch
shell. WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, V. 21.
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. Vishnu slew him and recovered the sacred
treasures.
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 Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. p. 243. Note.
The Visvadevas 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 Purána, this is a privilege conferred on
them by Brahmá and the Pitris as a reward for religious austerities
practised by them upon Himálaya.
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.
The Maruts or Storm-Gods, frequently addressed and worshipped as the
attendants and allies of Indra.
The mountain behind which the sun sets.
One of the oldest and mightiest of the Vedic deities; in later
mythology regarded as the God of the sea.
The knotted noose with which he seizes and punishes transgressors.
Sávarni is a Manu, offspring of the Sun by Chháyá.
The poet has not said who the sons of Yáma are.
The Lodhra or Lodh (Symplocos Racemosa) and the Devadáru or Deodar
are well known trees.
The hills mentioned are not identifiable. Soma means the Moon. Kála,
black; Sudarasan, fair to see; and Devasakhá friend of the Gods.
The God of Wealth.
The nymphs of Paradise.
Kuvera the son of Visravas.
A class of demigods who, like the Yakshas, are the attendants of
Kuvera, and the guardians of his treasures.
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 Parasuráma.
"The Uttara Kurus, it should be remarked, may have been a real
people, as they are mentioned in the Aitareya Bráhmana, 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.
The Moon-mountain.
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 Siva, and most
of their names are also names of Siva.
Canto IX.
Udayagiri or the hill from which the sun rises.
Asta is the mountain behind which the sun sets.
Himálaya, the Hills of Snow.
Canto XI.
Hanumán was the leader of the army of the south which was under the
nominal command of Angad the heir apparent.
The Bengal recension--Gorresio's edition--calls this Asur or demon the
son of Márícha.
The skin of the black antelope was the ascetic's proper garb.
Usanas is the name of a sage mentioned in the Vedas. In the epic
poems he is identified with Sukra, the regent of the planet Venus,
and described as the preceptor of the Asuras or Daityas, and
possessor of vast knowledge.
Hemá is one of the nymphs of Paradise.
Merusávarni is a general name for the last four of the fourteen
Manus.
Svayamprabhá, the "self-luminous," is according to DE GUBERNATIS the
moon: "In the Svayamprabhá too, we meet with the moon as a good
fairy who, from the golden palace which she reserves for her friend
Hemá (the golden one:) is during a month the guide, in the vast
cavern of Hanumant and his companions, who have lost their way in
the search of the dawn Sítá." This is is not quite accurate: Hanumán
and his companions wander for a month in the cavern without a guide,
and then Svayamprabhá leads them out.
Purandara, the destroyer of cities; the cities being the clouds
which the God of the firmament bursts open with his thunderbolts, to
release the waters imprisoned in these fortresses of the demons of
drought.
Perceived that Angad had secured, through the love of the Vánars,
the reversion of Sugríva's kingdom; or, as another commentator
explains it, perceived that Angad had obtained a new kingdom in the
enchanted cave which the Vánars, through love of him, would consent
to occupy.
Vrihaspati, Lord of Speech, the Preceptor of the Gods.
Sukra is the regent of the planet Venus, and the preceptor of the
Daityas.
The name of various kinds of grass used at sacrificial ceremonies,
especially, of the Kusa grass, Poa cynosuroides, which was used to
strew the ground in preparing for a sacrifice, the officiating
Brahmans being purified by sitting on it.
Sampáti is the eldest son of the celebrated Garuda the king of
birds.
Vivasvat or the Sun is the father of Yáma the God of Death.
Book III, Canto LI.
Dasaratha's rash oath and fatal promise to his wife Kaikeyí.
Vritra, "the coverer, hider, obstructer (of rain)" is the name of
the Vedic personification of an imaginary malignant influence or
demon of darkness and drought supposed to take possession of the
clouds, causing them to obstruct the clearness of the sky and keep
back the waters. Indra is represented as battling with this evil
influence, and the pent-up clouds being practically represented as
mountains or castles are shattered by his thunderbolt and made to
open their receptacles.
Frequent mention has been made of the three steps of Vishnu
typifying the rising, culmination, and setting of the sun.
For the Churning of the Sea, see Book I, Canto XLV.
Kuvera, the God of Wealth.
The architect of the gods.
Garuda, son of Vinatá, the sovereign of the birds.
"The well winged one," Garuda.
The god of the sea.
Mahendra is chain of mountains generally identified with part of the
Gháts of the Peninsula.
Mátarisva is identified with Váyu, the wind.
Of course not equal to the whole earth, says the Commentator, but
equal to Janasthán.
This appears to be the Indian form of the stories of Phaethon and
Dædalus and Icarus.
According to the promise, given him by Brahmá. See Book I, Canto
XIV.
In the Bengal recension the fourth Book ends here, the remaining
Cantos being placed in the fifth.
Each chief comes forward and says how far he can leap. Gaja says he
can leap ten yojans. Gavaksha can leap twenty. Gavaya thirty, and so
on up to ninety.
Prahláda, the son of Hiranyakasipu, was a pious Datya remarkable for
his devotion to Vishnu, and was on this account persecuted by his
father.
The Bengal recension calls him Aríshtanemi's brother. "The
commentator says 'Aríshtanemi is Aruna.' Aruna the charioteer of the
sun is the son of Kasyapa and Vinatá and by consequence brother of
Garuda, called Vainateya from Vinatá, his mother." GORRESSIO.
A nymph of Paradise.
Hanu or Hanú means jaw. Hanumán or Hanúmán means properly one with a
large jaw.
Vishnu, the God of the Three Steps.
Náráyan, "He who moved upon the waters," is Vishnu. The allusion is
to the famous three steps of that God.
The Milky Way.
This Book is called Sundar or the Beatiful. To a European taste it
is the most intolerably tedious of the whole poem, abounding in
repetition, overloaded description, and long and useless speeches
which impede the action of the poem. Manifest interpolations of
whole Cantos also occur. I have omitted none of the action of the
Book, but have occasionally omitted long passages of common-place
description, lamentation, and long stories which have been again and
again repeated.
Brahmá the Self-Existent.
Maináka was the son of Himálaya and Mená or Menaká.
Thus Milton makes the hills of heaven self-moving at command:
"At his command the uprooted hills retired
Each to his place, they heard his voice and went
Obsequious"
The spirit of the mountain is separable from the mountain. Himalaya
has also been represented as standing in human form on one of his
own peaks.
Ságar or the Sea is said to have derived its name from Sagar. The
story is fully told in Book I, Cantos XLII, XLIII, and XLIV.
Kritu is the first of the four ages of the world, the golden age,
also called Satya.
Parvata means a mountain and in the Vedas a cloud. Hence in later
mythology the mountains have taken the place of the clouds as the
objects of the attacks of Indra the Sun-God. The feathered king is
Garuda.
"The children of Surasá were a thousand mighty many-headed serpents,
traversing the sky." WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. p. 73.
She means, says the Commentator, pursue thy journey if thou can.
If Milton's spirits are allowed the power of infinite self-extension
and compression the same must be conceded to Válmíki's supernatural
beings. Given the power as in Milton the result in Válmíki is
perfectly consistent.
"Daksha is the son of Brahmá and one of the Prajápatis or divine
progenitors. He had sixty daughters, twenty-seven of whom married to
Kasyapa produced, according to one of the Indian cosmogonies, all
mundane beings. Does the epithet, Descendant of Daksha, given to
Surasá, mean that she is one of those daughters? I think not. This
epithet is perhaps an appellation common to all created beings as
having sprung from Daksha." GORRESSIO.
Sinhiká is the mother of Ráhu the dragon's head or ascending node,
the chief agent in eclipses.
According to De Gubernatis, the author of the very learned,
ingenious, and interesting though too fanciful Zoological
Mythology. Hanumán here represents the sun entering into and
escaping from a cloud. The biblical Jonah, according to him,
typifies the same phenomenon. Sá'dí, speaking of sunset, says Yùnas
andar-i-dihán-imáhi shud: Jonas was within the fish's mouth. See
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
The Buchanania Latifolia.
The Bauhinia Variegata.
Through the power that Rávan's stern mortifications had won for him
his trees bore flowers and fruit simultaneously.
Visvakarmá is the architect of the Gods.
So in Paradise Lost Satan when he has stealthily entered the garden
of Eden assumes the form of a cormorant.
Priests who fought only with the weapons of religion, the sacred
grass used like the verbena of the Romans at sacred rites and the
consecrated fire to consume the offering of ghee.
One of the Rákshas lords.
The brother Rávan.
Indra's elephant.
Rávan's palace appears to have occupied the whole extent of ground,
and to have contained within its outer walls the mansions of all the
great Rákshas chiefs. Rávan's own dwelling seems to have been
situated within the enchanted chariot Pushpak: but the description
is involved and confused, and it is difficult to say whether the
chariot was inside the palace or the palace inside the chariot.
Pushpak from pushpa a flower. The car has been mentioned before in
Rávan's expedition to carry off Sítá, Book III, Canto XXXV.
Lakshmí is the wife of Vishnu and the Goddess of Beauty and
Felicity. She rose, like Aphrodite, from the foam of the sea. For an
account of her birth and beauty, see Book I, Canto XLV.
Visvakarmá is the architect of the Gods, the Hephaestos or Mulciber
of the Indian heaven.
Rávan in the resistless power which his long austerities had endowed
him with, had conquered his brother Kuvera the God of Gold and taken
from him his greatest treasure this enchanted car.
Like Milton's heavenly car, "Itself instinct with spirit."
Women, says Válmíki. But the Commentator says that automatic figures
only are meant. Women would have seen Hanumán and given the alarm.
Rávan had fought against Indra and the Gods, and his body was still
scarred by the wounds inflicted by the tusks of Indra's elephant and
by the fiery bolts of the Thunderer.
The Vasus are a class of eight deities, originally personifications
of natural phenomena.
The Maruts are the winds or Storm-Gods.
The Ádityas originally seven deities of the heavenly sphere of whom
Varuna is the chief. The name Áditya was afterwards given to any
God, specially to Súrya the Sun.
The Asvins are the Heavenly Twins, the Castor and Pollux of the
Hindus.
The poet forgets that Hanumán has reduced himself to the size of a
cat.
Sítá "not of woman born," was found by King Janak as he was turning
up the ground in preparation for a sacrifice. See Book II, Canto
CXVIII.
The six Angas or subordinate branches of the Vedas are 1.
Sikshá, the science of proper articulation and pronunciation: 2.
Chhandas, metre: 3. Vyákarana, linguistic analysis or grammar:
4. Nirukta, explanation of difficult Vedic words: 5. Jyotishtom,
Astronomy, or rather the Vedic Calendar: 6. Kalpa, ceremonial.
There appears to be some confusion of time here. It was already
morning when Hanumán entered the grove, and the torches would be
needless.
Rávan is one of those beings who can "climb them as they will," and
can of course assume the loveliest form to please human eyes as well
as the terrific shape that suits the king of the Rákshases.
White and lovely as the Arant or nectar recovered from the depths of
the Milky Sea when churned by the assembled Gods. See Book I, Canto
XLV.
Rávan in his magic car carrying off the most beautiful women reminds
us of the magician in Orlando Furioso, possesor of the flying
horse.

"Volando talor s'alza ne le stelle,
E poi quasi talor la terra rade;
E ne porta con lui tutte le belle
Donne che trova per quelle contrade."
Indian women twisted their long hair in a single braid as a sign of
mourning for their absent husbands.
Janak, king of Míthilá, was Sítá's father.
Hiranyakasipu was a king of the Daityas celebrated for his
blasphemous impieties. When his pious son Prahlada praised Vishnu
the Daitya tried to kill him, when the God appeared in the
incarnation of the man-lion and tore the tyrant to pieces.
Do unto others as thou wouldst they should do unto thee, is a
precept frequently occurring in the old Indian poems. This charity
is to embrace not human beings only, but bird and beast as well: "He
prayeth best who loveth best all things both great and small."
It was the custom of Indian warriors to mark their arrows with their
ciphers or names, and it seems to have been regarded as a point of
honour to give an enemy the satisfaction of knowing who had shot at
him. This passage however contains, if my memory serves me well, the
first mention in the poem of this practice, and as arrows have been
so frequently mentioned and described with almost every conceivable
epithet, its occurrence here seems suspicious. No mention of, or
allusion to writing has hitherto occurred in the poem.
This threat in the same words occurs in Book III, Canto LVI.
Rávan carried off and kept in his palace not only earthly princesses
but the daughters of Gods and Gandharvas.
The wife of Indra.
These four lines have occurred before. Book III, Canto LVI.
Prajápatis are the ten lords of created beings first created by
Brahmá; somewhat like the Demiurgi of the Gnostics.
"This is the number of the Vedic divinities mentioned in the
Rig-veda. In Ashtaka I. Súkta XXXIV, the Rishi Hiranyastúpa invoking
the Asvins says: Á Násatyá tribhirekádasairiha devebniryátam: 'O
Násatyas (Asvins) come hither with the thrice eleven Gods.' And in
Súkta XLV, the Rishi Praskanva addressing his hymn to Agni (ignis,
fire), thus invokes him: 'Lord of the red steeds, propitiated by our
prayers lead hither the thirty-three Gods.' This number must
certainly have been the actual number in the early days of the Vedic
religion: although it appears probable enough that the thirty-three
Vedic divinities could not then be found co-ordinated in so
systematic a way as they were arranged more recently by the authors
of the Upanishads. In the later ages of Bramanism the number went on
increasing without measure by successive mythical and religious
creations which peopled the Indian Olympus with abstract beings of
every kind. But through lasting veneration of the word of the Veda
the custom regained of giving the name of 'the thirty-three Gods' to
the immense phalanx of the multiplied deities." GORRESIO.
Serpent-Gods who dwell in the regions under the earth.
In the mythology of the epics the Gandharvas are the heavenly
singers or musicians who form the orchestra at the banquets of the
Gods, and they belong to the heaven of India in whose battles they
share.
The mother of Ráma.
The mother of Lakshman.
In the south is the region of Yáma the God of Death, the place of
departed spirits.
Kumbhakarna was one of Rávan's brothers.
The guards are still in the grove, but they are asleep; and Sítá has
crept to a tree at some distance from them.
"As the reason assigned in these passages for not addressing Sítá in
Sanskrit such as a Bráhman would use is not that she would not
understand it, but that it would alarm her and be unsuitable to the
speaker, we must take them as indicating that Sanskrit, if not
spoken by women of the upper classes at the time when the Rámáyana
was written (whenever that may have been), was at least understood
by them, and was commonly spoken by men of the priestly class, and
other educated persons. By the Sanskrit proper to an [ordinary] man,
alluded to in the second passage, may perhaps be understood not a
language in which words different from Sanskrit were used, but the
employment of formal and elaborate diction." MUIR'S Sanskrit
Texts, Part II. p. 166.
Svayambhu, the Self-existent, Brahmá.
Vrihaspati or Váchaspati, the Lord of Speech and preceptor of the
Gods.
The Asurs were the fierce enemies of the Gods.
The Rudras are manifestations of Siva.
The Maruts or Storm Gods.
Rohiní is an asterism personified as the daughter of Daksha and the
favourite wife of the Moon. The chief star in the constellation is
Aldebaran.
Arundhatí was the wife of the great sage Vasishtha, and regarded as
the pattern of conjugal excellence. She was raised to the heavens as
one of the Pleiades.
The Gods do not shed tears; nor do they touch the ground when they
walk or stand. Similarly Milton's angels marched above the ground
and "the passive air upbore their nimble tread." Virgil's "vera
incessu patuit dea" may refer to the same belief.
That a friend of Ráma would praise him as he should be praised, and
that if the stranger were Rávan in disguise he would avoid the
subject.
Kuvera the God of Gold.
Sítá of course knows nothing of what has happened to Ráma since the
time when she was carried away by Rávan. The poet therefore thinks
it necessary to repeat the whole story of the meeting between Ráma
and Sugríva, the defeat of Bálí, and subsequent events. I give the
briefest possible outline of the story.
DE GUBERNATIS thinks that this ring which the Sun Ráma sends to the
Dawn Sítá is a symbol of the sun's disc.
Sachí is the loved and lovely wife of Indra, and she is taken as the
type of a woman protected by a jealous and all-powerful husband.
The mountain near Kishkindhá.
Airávat is the mighty elephant on which Indra delights to ride.
Vibhishan is the wicked Rávan's good brother.
Her name is Kalá, or in the Bengal recension Nandá.
One of Rávan's chief councillors.
Hanumán when he entered the city had in order to escape observation
condensed himself to the size of a cat.
The brook Mandákiní, not far from Chitrakúta where Ráma sojourned
for a time.
The poet here changes from the second person to the third.
The whole long story is repeated with some slight variations and
additions from Book II, Canto XCVI. I give here only the outline.
The expedients to vanquish an enemy or to make him come to terms are
said to be four: conciliation, gifts, disunion, and force or
punishment. Hanumán considers it useless to employ the first three
and resolves to punish Rávan by destroying his pleasure-grounds.
Kinkar means the special servant of a sovereign, who receives his
orders immediately from his master. The Bengal recension gives these
Rákshases an epithet which the Commentator explains "as generated in
the mind of Brahmá."
Ráma de jure King of Kosal of which Ayodhyá was the capital.
Chaityaprásáda is explained by the Commentator as the place where
the Gods of the Rákshases were kept. Gorresio translates it by "un
grande edificio."
The bow of Indra is the rainbow.
We were told a few lines before that the chariot of Jambumáli was
drawn by asses. Here horses are spoken of. The Commentator notices
the discrepancy and says that by horses asses are meant.
Armed with the bow of Indra, the rainbow.
Rávan's son.
Conqueror of Indra, another of Rávan's sons.
The sloka which follows is probably an interpolation, as it is
inconsistent with the questioning in Canto L.:

He looked on Rávan in his pride,
And boldly to the monarch cried:
"I came an envoy to this place
From him who rules the Vánar race."
The ten heads of Rávan have provoked much ridicule from European
critics. It should be remembered that Spenser tells us of "two
brethren giants, the one of which had two heads, the other three;"
and Milton speaks of the "four-fold visaged Four," the four Cherubic
shapes each of whom had four faces.
Durdhar, or as the Bengal recension reads Mahodara, Prahasta,
Mahápársva, and Nikumbha.
The chief attendant of Siva.
Bali, not to be confounded with Báli the Vánar, was a celebrated
Daitya or demon who had usurped the empire of the three worlds, and
who was deprived of two thirds of his dominions by Vishnu in the
Dwarf-incarnation.
When Hanumán was bound with cords, Indrajít released his captive
from the spell laid upon him by the magic weapon.
"One who murders an ambassador (rája bhata) goes to Taptakumbha,
the hell of heated caldrons." WILSON'S Vishnu Purana, Vol. II. p.
217.
The fire which is supposed to burn beneath the sea.
Sítá is likened to the fire which is an emblem of purity.
I omit two stanzas which continue the metaphor of the sea or lake of
air. The moon is its lotus, the sun its wild-duck, the clouds are
its water-weeds, Mars is its shark and so on. Gorresio remarks:
"This comparison of a great lake to the sky and of celestial to
aquatic objects is one of those ideas which the view and qualities
of natural scenery awake in lively fancies. Imagine one of those
grand and splendid lakes of India covered with lotus blossoms,
furrowed by wild-ducks of the most vivid colours, mantled over here
and there with flowers and water weeds &c. and it will be understood
how the fancy of the poet could readily compare to the sky radiant
with celestial azure the blue expanse of the water, to the soft
light of the moon the inner hue of the lotus, to the splendour of
the sun the brilliant colours of the wild-fowl, to the stars the
flowers, to the cloud the weeds that float upon the water &c."
Sunábha is the mountain that rose from the sea when Hanumán passed
over to Lanká.
Three Cantos of repetition are omitted.
Madhuvan the "honey-wood."
Indra's pleasure-ground or elysium.
Janak was king of Videha or Mithilá in Behar.
The original contains two more Cantos which end the Book. Canto
LXVII begins thus: "Hanumán thus addressed by the great-souled son
of Raghu related to the son of Raghu all that Sítá had said." And
the two Cantos contain nothing but Hanumán's account of his
interview with Sítá, and the report of his own speeches as well as
of hers.
The Sixth Book is called in Sanskrit Yuddha-Kánda or The War,
and Lanká-Kánda. It is generally known at the present day by the
latter title.
Váyu is the God of Wind.
Garuda the King of Birds.
Serpent-Gods.
The God of the sea.
Indra's elephant.
Kuvera, God of wealth.
Kuvera's elephant.
The planet Venus, or its regent who is regarded as the son of Bhrigu
and preceptor of the Daityas.
The seven rishis or saints who form the constellation of the Great
Bear.
Trisanku was raised to the skies to form a constellation in the
southern hemisphere. The story in told in Book I, Canto LX.
The sage Visvámitra, who performed for Trisanku the great sacrifice
which raised him to the heavens.
One of the lunar asterisms containing four or originally two stars
under the regency of a dual divinity Indrágni, Indra and Agni.
The lunar asterism Múla, belonging to the Rákshases.
The Asurs or demons dwell imprisoned in the depths beneath the sea.
The God of Riches, brother and enemy of Rávan and first possessor of
Pushpak the flying car.
King of the Serpents. Sankha and Takshak are two of the eight
Serpent Chiefs.
The God of Death, the Pluto of the Hindus.
Literally Indra's conqueror, so called from his victory over that
God.
Their names are Nikumbha, Rabhasa, Súryasatru, Suptaghna, Yajnakopa,
Mahápársva, Mahodara, Agniketu, Rasmiketu, Durdharsha, Indrasatru,
Prahasta, Virúpáksha, Vajradanshtra, Dhúmráksha, Durmukha, Mahábala.
Similarly Antenor urges the restoration of Helen:
"Let Sparta's treasures be this hour restored,
And Argive Helen own her ancient lord.
As this advice ye practise or reject,
So hope success, or dread the dire effect,"

POPE'S Homer's Iliad, Book VII.
The Agnisálá or room where the sacrificial fire was kept.
The exudation of a fragrant fluid from the male elephant's temples,
especially at certain seasons, is frequently spoken of in Sanskrit
poetry. It is said to deceive and attract the bees, and is regarded
as a sign of health and masculine vigour.
Consisting of warriors on elephants, warriors in chariots,
charioteers, and infantry.
Indra, generally represented as surrounded by the Maruts or
Storm-Gods.
Janasthán, where Ráma lived as an ascetic.
Máyá, regarded as the paragon of female beauty, was the creation of
Maya the chief artificer of the Daityas or Dánavs.
One of the Nymphs of Indra's heaven.
The Lotus River, a branch of the heavenly Gangá.
Trilokanátha, Lord of the Three Worlds, is a title of Indra.
The celestial elephant that carries Indra.
As producers of the ghi, clarified butter or sacrificial oil, used
in fire-offerings.
This desertion to the enemy is somewhat abrupt, and is narrated with
brevity not usual with Válmíki. In the Bengal recension the
preceding speakers and speeches differ considerably from those given
in the text which I follow. Vibhishan is kicked from his seat by
Rávan, and then, after telling his mother what has happened, he
flies to Mount Kailása where he has an interview with Siva, and by
his advice seeks Ráma and the Vánar army.
Vrihaspati the preceptor of the Gods.
In Book II, Canto XXI, Kandu is mentioned by Ráma as an example of
filial obedience. At the command of his father he is said to have
killed a cow.
A King of the Yakshas, or Kuvera himself, the God of Gold.
The brace protects the left arm from injury from the bow-string, and
the guard protects the fingers of the right hand.
The story is told in Book I, Cantos XL, XLI, XLII.
Fiends and enemies of the Gods.
The Indus.
Cowherds, sprung from a Bráhman and a woman of the medical tribe,
the modern Ahírs.
Barbarians or outcasts.
Vrana means wound or rent.
Here in the Bengal recension (Gorresio's edition), begins Book VI.
The Goomtee.
The Anglicized Nerbudda.
According to a Pauranik legend Kesarí Hanumán's putative father had
killed an Asur or demon who appeared in the form of an elephant, and
hence arose the hostility between Vánars and elephants.
Here follows the enumeration of Sugríva's forces which I do not
attempt to follow. It soon reaches a hundred thousand billions.
I omit the rest of this canto, which is mere repetition. Rávan gives
in the same words his former answer that the Gods, Gandharvas and
fiends combined shall not force him to give up Sítá. He then orders
Sárdúla to tell him the names of the Vánar chieftains whom he has
seen in Ráma's army. These have already been mentioned by Suka and
Sáran.
Lakshmí is the Goddess both of beauty and fortune, and is
represented with a lotus in her hand.
The poet appears to have forgotten that Suka and Sáran were
dismissed with ignominy in Canto XXIX, and have not been reinstated.
The four who fled with him. Their names are Anala, Panasa, Sampáti,
and Pramati.
The numbers here are comparatively moderate: ten thousand elephants,
ten thousand chariots, twenty thousand horses and ten million
giants.
The Kinsuk, also called Palása, is Butea Frondosa, a tree that bears
beautiful red crescent shaped blossoms and is deservedly a favorite
with poets. The Seemal or Sálmalí is the silk cotton tree which also
bears red blossoms.
Varuna.
The duty of a king to save the lives of his people and avoid
bloodshed until milder methods have been tried in vain.
I have omitted several of these single combats, as there is little
variety in the details and each duel results in the victory of the
Vánar or his ally.
Yajnasatru, Mahápársva, Mahodar, Vajradanshtra, Suka, and Sáran.
Angad.
A mysterious weapon consisting of serpents transformed to arrows
which deprived the wounded object of all sense and power of motion.
On each foot, and at the root of each finger.
Varun.
The name of one of the mystical weapons the command over which was
given by Visvámitra to Ráma, as related in Book I.
One of Sítá's guard, and her comforter on a former occasion also.
The preceptor of the Gods.
Ráma's grandfather.
The Gandharvas are warriors and Minstrels of Indra's heaven.
"It is to be understood," says the commentator, "that this is not
the Akampan who has already been slain."
Rávan's son, whom Hanumán killed when he first visited Lanká.
Níla was the son of Agni the God of Fire, and possessed, like
Milton's demons, the power of dilating and condensing his form at
pleasure.
An ancient king of Ayodhyá said by some to have been Prithu's
father.
The daughter of King Kusadhwaja. She became an ascetic, and being
insulted by Rávan in the woods where she was performing penance,
destroyed herself by entering fire, but was born again as Sítá to be
in turn the destruction of him who had insulted her.
Nandísvara was Siva's chief attendant. Rávan had despised and
laughed at him for appearing in the form of a monkey and the
irritated Nandísvara cursed him and foretold his destruction by
monkeys.
Rávan once upheaved and shook Mount Kailása the favourite dwelling
place of Siva the consort of Umá, and was cursed in consequence by
the offended Goddess.
Rambhá, who has several times been mentioned in the course of the
poem, was one of the nymphs of heaven, and had been insulted by
Rávan.
Punjikasthalá was the daughter of Varun. Rávan himself has mentioned
in this book his insult to her, and the curse pronounced in
consequence by Brahmá.
Pulastya was the son of Brahmá and father of Visravas or Paulastya
the father of Rávan and Kumbhakarna.
I omit a tedious sermon on the danger of rashness and the advantages
of prudence, sufficient to irritate a less passionate hearer than
Rávan.
The Bengal recension assigns a very different speech to Kumbhakarna
and makes him say that Nárad the messenger of the Gods had formerly
told him that Vishnu himself incarnate as Dasaratha's son should
come to destroy Rávan.
Mahodar, Dwijihva, Sanhráda, and Vitardan.
A name of Vishnu.
There is so much commonplace repetition in these Sallies of the
Rákshas chieftains that omissions are frequently necessary. The
usual ill omens attend the sally of Kumbhakarna, and the Canto ends
with a description of the terrified Vánars' flight which is briefly
repeated in different words at the beginning of the next Canto.
Kártikeya the God of War, and the hero and incarnation Parasuráma
are said to have cut a passage through the mountain Krauncha, a part
of the Himálayan range, in the same way as the immense gorge that
splits the Pyrenees under the towers of Marboré was cloven at one
blow of Roland's sword Durandal.
Rishabh, Sarabh, Níla, Gaváksha, and Gandhamádan.
Angad. The text calls him the son of the son of him who holds the
thunderbolt, i.e. the grandson of Indra.
Literally, weighing a thousand bháras. The bhára is a weight
equal to 2000 palas, the pala is equal to four karsas, and the
karsa to 11375 French grammes or about 176 grains troy. The spear
seems very light for a warrior of Kumbhakarna's strength and stature
and the work performed with it.
The custom of throwing parched or roasted grain, with wreaths and
flowers, on the heads of kings and conquerors when they go forth to
battle and return is frequently mentioned by Indian poets.
Lakshman.
I have abridged this long Canto by omitting some vain repetitions,
commonplace epithets and similes and other unimportant matter. There
are many verses in this Canto which European scholars would rigidly
exclude as unmistakeably the work of later rhapsodists. Even the
reverent Commentator whom I follow ventures to remark once or twice:
Ayam sloka prak shipta iti bahavah, "This sloka or verse is in
the opinion of many interpolated."
Narak was a demon, son of Bhúmi or Earth, who haunted the city
Prágjyotisha.
Sambar was a demon of drought.
Indra.
Devántak (Slayer of Gods) Narántak (Slayer of Men) Atikáya (Huge of
Frame) and Trisirás (Three Headed) were all sons of Rávan.
The demon of eclipse who seizes the Sun and Moon.
Lakshman.
In such cases as this I am not careful to reproduce the numbers of
the poet, which in the text which I follow are 670000000; the Bengal
recension being content with thirty million less.
The discus or quoit, a sharp-edged circular missile is the favourite
weapon of Vishnu.
To destroy Tripura the triple city in the sky, air and earth, built
by Maya for a celebrated Asur or demon, or as another commentator
explains, to destroy Kandarpa or Love.
The Lokapálas are sometimes regarded as deities appointed by Brahmá
at the creation of the word to act as guardians of different orders
of beings, but more commonly they are identified with the deities
presiding over the four cardinal and four intermediate points of the
compass, which, according to Manu V. 96, are 1, Indra, guardian of
the East; 2, Agni, of the South-east; 3, Yáma, of the South; 4,
Súrya, of the South-west; 5, Varuna, of the West; 6, Pavana or Váyu,
of the North-west; 7, Kuvera, of the North; 8, Soma or Chandra, of
the North-east.
The chariots of Rávan's present army are said to have been one
hundred and fifty million in number with three hundred million
elephants, and twelve hundred million horses and asses. The footmen
are merely said to have been "unnumbered."
It is not very easy to see the advantage of having arrows headed in
the way mentioned. Fanciful names for war-engines and weapons
derived from their resemblance to various animals are not confined
to India. The "War-wolf" was used by Edward I. at the siege of
Brechin, the "Cat-house" and the "Sow" were used by Edward III. at
the siege of Dunbar.
Apparently a peak of the Himalaya chain.
This exploit of Hanumán is related with inordinate prolixity in the
Bengal recension (Gortesio's text). Among other adventures he
narrowly escapes being shot by Bharat as he passes over Nandigrama
near Ayodhyá. Hanumán stays Bharat in time, and gives him an account
of what has befallen Ráma and Sítá in the forest and in Lanká.
As Garud the king of birds is the mortal enemy of serpents the
weapon sacred to him is of course best calculated to destroy the
serpent arrows of Rávan.
The celebrated saint who has on former occasions assisted Ráma with
his gifts and counsel.
Indra.
Yáma.
Kártikeya.
Kubera.
Varun.
The Pitris, forefathers or spirits of the dead, are of two kinds,
either the spirits of the father, grandfathers and
great-grandfathers of an individual or the progenitors of mankind
generally, to both of whom obsequial worship is paid and oblations
of food are presented.
The Maruts or Storm-Gods.
The Heavenly Twins, the Castor and Pollux of the Hindus.
The Man par excellence, the representative man and father of the
human race regarded also as God.
The Vasus, a class of deities originally personifications of natural
phenomena.
A class of celestial beings who dwell between the earth and the sun.
The seven horses are supposed to symbolize the seven days of the
week.
One for each month in the year.
The garden of Kuvera, the God of Riches.
The consort of Indra.
The Swayamvara, Self-choice or election of a husband by a princess
or daughter of a Kshatriya at a public assembly of suitors held for
the purpose. For a description of the ceremony see Nala and
Damayantí an episode of the Mahábhárat translated by the late Dean
Milman, and Idylls from the Sanskrit.
The Pitris or Manes, the spirits of the dead.
Kuvera, the God of Wealth.
Varun, God of the sea.
Mahádeva or Siva whose ensign is a bull.
The Address to Ráma, both text and commentary, will be found
literally translated in the Additional Notes. A paraphrase of a
portion is all that I have attempted here.
Rávan's queen.
Or Maináka.
Here, in the North-west recension, Sítá expresses a wish that Tárá
and the wives of the Vánar chiefs should be invited to accompany her
to Ayodhyá. The car decends, and the Vánar matrons are added to the
party. The Bengal recension ignores this palpable interruption.
The arghya, a respectful offering to Gods and venerable men
consisting of rice, dúivá grass, flowers etc., with water.
I have abridged Hanumán's outline of Ráma's adventures, with the
details of which we are already sufficiently acquainted.
In these respectful salutations the person who salutes his superior
mentions his own name even when it is well known to the person whom
he salutes.
I have omitted the chieftains' names as they could not be introduced
without padding. They are Mainda, Dwivid, Níla, Rishabh, Sushen,
Nala, Gaváksha, Gandhamádan, Sarabh, and Panas.
The following addition is found in the Bengal recension: But
Vaisravan (Kuvera) when he beheld his chariot said unto it: "Go, and
carry Ráma, and come unto me when my thought shall call thee, And
the chariot returned unto Ráma;" and he honoured it when he had
heard what had passed.
Here follows in the original an enumeration of the chief blessings
which will attend the man or woman who reads or hears read this tale
of Ráma. These blessings are briefly mentioned at the end of the
first Canto of the first book, and it appears unnecessary to repeat
them here in their amplified form. The Bengal recension (Gorresio's
edition) gives them more concisely as follows: "This is the great
first poem blessed and glorious, which gives long life to men and
victory to kings, the poem which Válmíki made. He who listens to
this wondrous tale of Ráma unwearied in action shall be absolved
from all his sins. By listening to the deeds of Ráma he who wishes
for sons shall obtain his heart's desire, and to him who longs for
riches shall riches be given. The virgin who asks for a husband
shall obtain a husband suited to her mind, and shall meet again her
dear kinsfolk who are far away. They who hear this poem which
Válmíki made shall obtain all their desires and all their prayers
shall be fulfilled."
The Academy, Vol. III., No 43, contains an able and interesting
notice of this work from the pen of the Professor of Sanskrit in the
University of Cambridge: "The Uttarakánda," Mr. Cowell remarks,
"bears the same relation to the Rámáyana as the Cyclic poems to
the Iliad. Just as the Cypria of Stasinus, the Æthiopis of
Arctinus, and the little Iliad of Lesches completed the story of
the Iliad, and not only added the series of events which preceded
and followed it, but also founded episodes of their own on isolated
allusions in Homer, so the Uttarakánda is intended to complete the
Rámáyana, and at the same time to supplement it by intervening
episodes to explain casual allusions or isolated incidents which
occur in it. Thus the early history of the giant Rávana and his
family fills nearly forty Chapters, and we have a full account of
his wars with the gods and his conquest of Lanká, which all happened
long before the action of the poem commences, just as the Cypria
narrated the birth and early history of Helen, and the two
expeditions of the Greeks against Troy; and the latter chapters
continue the history of the hero Ráma after his triumphant return to
his paternal kingdom, and the poem closes with his death and that of
his brothers, and the founding by their descendants of various
kingdoms in different parts of India."
MUIR, Sanskrit Texts, Part IV., pp. 414 ff.
MUIR, Sanskrit Texts, Part IV., 391, 392.
See Academy, III., 43.
Academy, Vol. III., No. 43.
E. B. Cowell. Academy, No. 43. The story of Sítá's banishment will
be found roughly translated from the Raghuvansa, in the Additional
Notes.
E. B. Cowell. Academy, Vol, III, No. 43.
MUIR, Sanskrit Texts, Part IV., Appendix.
Ghí: clarified butter. Gur: molasses.
Haridwar (Anglicè Hurdwar) where the Ganges enters the plain
country.
Campbell in "Journ. As. Soc. Bengal," 1866, Part ii. p. 132; Latham,
"Descr. Eth." Vol. ii. p. 456; Tod, "Annals of Rajasthan," Vol. i.
p. 114.
Said by the commentator to be an eastern people between the
Himálayan and Vindhyan chains.
Videha was a district in the province of Behar, the ancient Mithilá
or the modern Tirhoot.
The people of Malwa.
"The Kásikosalas are a central nation in the Váyu Purána. The
Rámáyana places them in the east. The combination indicates the
country between Benares and Oude.… Kosala is a name variously
applied. Its earliest and most celebrated application is to the
country on the banks of the Sarayú, the kingdom of Ráma, of which
Ayodhyá was the capital.… In the Mahábhárata we have one Kosala in
the east and another in the south, besides the Prák-Kosalas and
Uttara Kosalas in the east and north. The Puránas place the Kosalas
amongst the people on the back of Vindhya; and it would appear from
the Váyu that Kusa the son of Ráma transferred his kingdom to a more
central position; he ruled over Kosala at his capital of Kúsasthali
of Kusavatí, built upon the Vindhyan precipices." WILSON'S Vishnnu
Púrana, Vol. II. pp. 157, 172.
The people of south Behar.
The Pundras are said to be the inhabitants of the western provinces
of Bengal. "In the Aitareyabráhmana, VII. 18, it is said that the
elder sons of Visvamitra were cursed to become progenitors of most
abject races, such as Andhras, Pundras, Sabaras, Pulindas, and
Mútibas." WILSON'S Vishnu Purána Vol. II. 170.
Anga is the country about Bhagulpore, of which Champá was the
capital.
A fabulous people, "men who use their ears as a covering." So Sir
John Maundevile says: "And in another Yle ben folk that han gret
Eres and long, that hangen down to here knees," and Pliny, lib. iv.
c. 13: "In quibus nuda alioquin corpora prægrandes ipsorum aures
tota contegunt." Isidore calls them Panotii.
"Those whose ears hang down to their lips."
"The Iron-faces."
"The One-footed."
"In that Contree," says Sir John Maundevile, "ben folk, that han but
o foot and thei gon so fast that it is marvaylle: and the foot is so
large that it schadeweth alle the Body azen the Sonne, when thei
wole lye and rest hem." So Pliny, Natural History, lib. vii. c. 2:
speaks of "Hominumn gens … singulis cruribus, miræ pernicitatis ad
saltum; eosdemque Sciopodas vocari, quod in majori æstu, humi
jacentes resupini, umbrâ se pedum protegant."

These epithets are, as Professor Wilson remarks, "exaggerations of
national ugliness, or allusions to peculiar customs, which were not
literally intended, although they may have furnished the Mandevilles
of ancient and modern times."

Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. p. 162.
The Kirrhadæ of Arrian: a general name for savage tribes living in
woods and mountains.
Said by the commentator to be half tigers half men.
The kingdom seems to have corresponded with the greater part of
Berar and Khandesh.
The Bengal recension has Kishikas, and places them both in the south
and the north.
The people of Mysore.
"There are two Matsyas, one of which, according to the Yantra
Samráj, is identifiable with Jeypoor. In the Digvijaya of Nakula he
subdues the Matsyas further to the west, or Gujerat." WILSON'S
Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. 158. Dr. Hall observes: "In the
Mahábhárata Sabhá-parwan, 1105 and 1108, notice is taken of the
king of Matsya and of the Aparamatsyas; and, at 1082, the Matsyas
figure as an eastern people. They are placed among the nations of
the south in the Rámáyana Kishkindhá-kánda, XLI., II, while the
Bengal recension, Kishkindhá-kánda, XLIV., 12, locates them in the
north."
The Kalingas were the people of the upper part of the Coromandel
Coast, well known, in the traditions of the Eastern Archipelago, as
Kling. Ptolemy has a city in that part, called Caliga; and Pliny
Calingæ proximi mari. WILSON'S Vishnu Purána, Vol. II. 156, Note.
The Kausikas do not appear to be identifiable.
The Andhras probably occupied the modern Telingana.
The Pundras have already been mentioned in Canto XL.
The inhabitants of the lower part of the Coromandel Coast; so
called, after them, Cholamandala.
A people in the Deccan.
The Keralas were the people of Malabar proper.
A generic term for persons speaking any language but Sanskrit and
not conforming to the usual Hindu institutions.
"Pulinda is applied to any wild or barbarous tribe. Those here named
are some of the people of the deserts along the Indus; but Pulindas
are met with in many other positions, especially in the mountains
and forests across Central India, the haunts of the Bheels and
Gonds. So Ptolemy places the Pulindas along the banks of the
Narmadá, to the frontiers of Larice, the Látá or Lár of the
Hindus,--Khandesh and part of Gujerat." WILSON'S Vishnu Purána,
Vol. II. 159, Note.

Dr. Hall observes that "in the Bengal recension of the Rámáyana
the Pulindas appear both in the south and in the north. The real
Rámáyana K.-k., XLIII., speaks of the northern Pulindas."
The Súrasenas were the inhabitants of Mathurá, the Suraseni of
Arrian.
These the Mardi of the Greeks and the two preceding tribes appear to
have dwelt in the north-west of Hindustan.
The Kámbojas are said to be the people of Arachosia. They are always
mentioned with the north-western tribes.
"The term Yavanas, although, in later times, applied to the
Mohammedans, designated formerly the Greeks.… The Greeks were known
throughout Western Asia by the term Yavan, or Ion. That the
Macedonian or Bactrian Greeks were most usually intended is not only
probable from their position and relations with India, but from
their being usually named in concurrence with the north-western
tribes, Kámbojas, Daradas, Páradas, Báhlíkas, Sakas &c., in the
Rámáyana. Mahábhárata, Puránas, Manu, and in various poems and
plays." WILSON'S Vishnu Purána Vol. II. p. 181, Note.
These people, the Sakai and Sacæ of classical writers, the
Indo-Scythians of Ptolemy, extended, about the commencement of our
era, along the west of India, from the Hindu Kosh to the mouths of
the Indus.
The corresponding passage in the Bengal recension has instead of
Varadas Daradas the Dards or inhabitants of the modern Dardistan
along the course of the Indus, above the Himálayas, just before it
descends to India.
From the word yonder it would appear that the prayer is to be
repeated at the rising of the Sun.
The creator of the world and the first of the Hindu triad.
He who pervades all beings; or the second of the Hindu triad who
preserves the world.
The bestower of blessings; the third of the Hindu triad and the
destroyer of the world.
A name of the War-God; also one who urges the senses to action.
The lord of creatures; or the God of sacrifices.
A name of the King of Gods; also all-powerful.
The giver of wealth. A name of the God of riches.
One who directly urges the mental faculties to action.
One who moderates the senses, also the God of the regions of the
dead.
One who produces nectar (amrita) or one who is always possessed of
light; or one together with Umá (Ardhanárísvara).
The names or spirits of departed ancestors.
Name of a class of eight Gods, also wealthy.
They who are to be served by Yogís; or a class of Gods named
Sádhyas.
The two physicians of the Gods: or they who pervade all beings.
They who are immortal; or a class of Gods forty-nine in number.
Omniscient; or the first king of the world.
He that moves; life; or the God of wind.
The God of fire.
Lord of creatures.
One who prolongs our lives.
The material cause of knowledge and of the seasons.
One who shines. The giver of light.
The hymn entitled the Ádityahridaya begins from this verse and the
words, thou art, are understood in the beginning of this verse.
One who enjoys all (pleasurable) objects; The son of Aditi, the lord
of the solar disk.
One who creates the world, i.e., endows beings with life or soul,
and by his rays causes rain and thereby produces corn.
One who urges the world to action or puts the world in motion, who
is omnipresent.
One who walks through the sky; or pervades the soul.
One who nourishes the world, i.e., is the supporter.
One having rays (Gabhasti) or he who is possessed of the
all-pervading goddess Lakshmí.
One resembling gold.
One who is resplendent or who gives light to other objects.
One whose seed (Retas) is gold; or quicksilver, the material cause
of gold.
One who is the cause of day.
One whose horses are of tawny colour; or one who pervades the whole
space or quarters.
One whose knowledge is boundless or who has a thousand rays.
One who urges the seven (Pránas) that is the two eyes, the two ears,
the nostrils and the organ of speech, or whose chariot, is drawn by
seven horses.
Vide Gabhastimán.
One who destroys darkness, or ignorance.
One from whom our blessings or the enjoyments of Paradise come.
The architect of the gods; or one who lessens the miseries of our
birth and death.
One who gives life to the lifeless world.
One who pervades the internal and external worlds; or one who is
resplendent.
He who is identified with the Hindu triad, i.e. the creator (Brahmá)
the supporter (Vishnu) and the destroyer (Siva).
Cold or good natured. He is so called because he allays the three
sorts of pain.
One who is the lord of all.
Vide Divákara.
One who teaches Brahmá and others the Vedas.
One from whom Rudra the destroyer or the third of the Hindu triad
springs.
One who is knowable through Aditi, i.e., the eternal Brahmavidyá.
Great happiness or the sky.
The destroyer of cold or stupidity.
The Lord of the sky.
Vide Timironmathana.
One who is known through the Upanishads.
He who is the cause of heavy rain.
He who is a friend to the good, or who is the cause of water.
One who moves in the solar orbit.
One who determines the creation of the world; or who is possessed of
heat.
One who has a mass of rays; or who has Kaustubha and other precious
stones as his ornaments.
He who urges all to action; or who is yellow in colour.
One who is the destroyer of all.
One who is omniscient; or a poet.
One who is identified with the whole world.
One who is of huge form.
One who pleases all by giving nourishment; or who is red in colour.
One who is the cause of the whole world.
One who protects the whole world.
The most glorious of all that are glorious.
One who is identical with the twelve months.
One who gives victory over all the worlds to those who are
faithfully devoted to him; or the porter of Brahmá, named Jaya.
One who is identical with the blessing which can be obtained by
conquering all the worlds; or with the porter of Brahmá named
Jayabhadra.
One who has Hanúmán as his conveyance.
One who controls the senses; or is furious with those who are not
his devotees.
He who is free in moving the senses; or urges all beings to action.
He who can be known through the Pranava (the mystical Om-kára.)
One who is the knowledge of Brahmá.
One who devours all things.
He who is the destroyer of all pains; and of love, and hate, the
causes of pain; and ignorance which is the cause of love and hate.
One who is bliss; or the mover.
One who destroys ignorance and its effects.
The doer of all actions.
One who beholds the universe; who is a witness of good and bad
actions.
Sacrifice of the five sensual fires.
According to Ápastamba (says the commentator) "it should have been
placed on the nose: this must therefore have been done in conformity
with some other Sútras."
A class of eight gods.
A class of eleven gods called Rudras.
Named Víryaván.
A class of divine devotees named Sádhyas.
One who resides in the water.
The third incarnation of Vishnu, that bore the earth on his tusk.
One whose armies are everywhere.
One who controls the senses.
He who resides in the heart, or who is full, or all-pervading.
Vámana, or the Dwarf incarnation of Vishnu.
The killer of Madhu, a demon.
He from whose navel, the lotus, from which Brahmá was born, springs.
He who has a thousand horns. The horns are here the Sákhás of the
Sáma-veda.
One who has a hundred heads. The heads are here meant to devote a
hundred commandments of the Vedas.
Siddhas are those who have already gained the summit of their
desires.
Sádhyas are those that are still trying to gain the summit.
A mystic syllable uttered in Mantras.
A mystic syllable made of the letters which respectively denote
Brahmá, Vishnu, and Siva.
A class of divine gods.
Sanskáras are those sacred writings through which the divine
commands and prohibitions are known.
Bali, a demon whom Vámana confined in Pátála.
Vishnu, the second of the Hindu triad.
Krishna, (black coloured) one of the ten incarnations of Vishnu.
A. Weber, Akademische Vorlesungen, p. 181.
Systema brahmanicum, liturgicum, mythologicum, civile, exmonumentis
Indicis, etc.
Not only have the races of India translated or epitomized it, but
foreign nations have appropriated it wholly or in part, Persia,
Java, and Japan itself.
In the third century B.C.

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