Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/194

 1 68 '■'' Hook-Sivinzincr'" in India.

is taken to the temple by his parents, who pay to the temple author- ities thirty-four chakrams [a chakram is a coin worth seven pies] in Travancore and sixty-four /z^Mo-'/i- [diputhati is a coin worth ten pies] in Cochin. The child is then handed over to the swinger who carries the child as he swings. These performances are sometimes made at the expense of the temple, but more generally of persons who make the outlay in fulfilment of a vow. In the latter case, it costs as much as one hundred and fifty rupees for the kite-swinger, but only thirty rupees for the boat-swinger. During the festival they are fed in the temple, owing to their being in a state of vow.

It is the Nairs, Kammalans (carpenters, blacksmiths, etc.), Kuruppans, and Izhuvans who perform the swinging in fulfilment of a vow. In the fight between the goddess Kali and the demon Darika, the latter was completely defeated, and the former, biting him on the back, drank his blood to gratify her feeling of animosity. Hook-swinging symbolises this incident, and the blood-shed caused by the insertion of the hook through the flesh is intended as an offering to the goddess." ^^

In the Wide World Jlfagasine for September, 1899, the Rev. R. T. Knowles described an elaborate performance of the hook-swinging ceremony in honour of the goddess Bhadra Kali at the Kollangudu temple in Travancore. A car was used as already described by Mr. Iyer, and the devotees would appear to have been suspended by means of ropes passing under their arms and round their chests. To some of these ropes were fastened hooks which were inserted into the backs of the victims, but from Mr. Knowles' description it would appear that the weight was partly, if not wholly, taken by the ropes passing round the chest. The car, with the votary suspended thereon, was dragged round the temple, in some cases three or four times. One devotee was swung with an infant in his arms. In other cases he carries a sword and shield. At this

^^ L. K. Anantha Krishna Iyer, The Cochin Tribes and Castes, vol. i. , pp. 323-4-