Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 29, 1918.djvu/143

 of Sociology and Folklore.

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and the figure represents the earth-spirit supposed to be dwelling in the ground : if this rite is omitted, it is believed that there will be no luck about the house. ^ In the Central Provinces an astrologer calculates the direction in which Shesh Nag, the world serpent, is lying, and plants the first brick or stone to the left of that direction. The explanation of this is that snakes and elephants are believed to turn, not to the left, but always to the right. If this is done, the house will be more secure and less likely to be shaken down by the movements of Shesh Nag, which cause the phenomenon known to us as an earthquake.^ When a Buddhist king laid the foundation of a stupa, he entered the holy site, bowed to the Bhikshus or mendicants, marked out a circle with a pair of silver compasses, placed in the centre eight gold or silver coins surrounded by eight gold or silver bricks, and then laid the eastern brick in a fragrant cement made of jessamine flowers.^

Various precautionary rites are done while the house is being built. The door posts are specially important. The Nagas call the two front posts of the Morang male and female, and attribute sanctity to them."* The Lingayats, when setting up the main door, do the " door consecration " rite, and drive an iron nail into the frame to keep out evil spirits.^ When the Meitheis fix the first post they bind round the top cloth leaves and flowers, and on its base they pour butter, milk and sugarcane juice, being careful to drop a little gold and silver into the hole in which it is placed.^ The Kammalans of Madras, when the carpenters

^ E. Thurston, Ethtiographic Notes in South India, 327 et seq.

" R. \'^. Russell, Tribes and Castes, Central Provinces, iv. 88.

■*Sir A. Cunningham, The Bhilsa Topes, I'jo et sajq.

Jachin and Boaz, erected in the porch of Solomon's temple — -i Kings, vii. 2i> 2 Chronicles, iii. 17, Jeremiah, lii. 21, 22 ; J. Hastings, Dictionary of the Bible, i. 308 et seq. ; Encyclopcedia Biblica, ii. 2304 et seq.
 * Journal Anthropological histitute, xxxii. 452. Compare the two posts,

'^ Thurston, op. cit. iv. 2 et seqq. ; Crooke, op. cit. ii. 1 1 et seq.

"T. C. Ilodson, The Meitheis, 122.