Vedic Brahmin practices in ancient South India

[N. Ganesan]

In his theory of Caste origins in Tamil culture using sangam
literature, George Hart has a paper, "Early evidence for Caste in
South India", Dimesions of Social Life: Essays in honor of David B.
Mandelbaum, 1987. Hart writes,

"Brahmins are found in the poems presiding at the
war sacrifice, in which the blood and intestines of dead
enemies were symbolically cooked up (PuRam 26), and
at a rite in which a king who died in bed was cut
with a sword to make it appear that he had been
killed in battle so that he could go to the Tamil
Valhalla (puRam 93)."

Cooking the blood and intestines of enemy king killed in battle
using a hearth made of chopped heads is found in Sangam texts,
Hart-Heifetz translation (puRam 93):
"... and you quickened the battle
  so that kings fell, and you captured
their royal drums and spread your fame!
and then, with food you had created, you
    sacrificed on the killing field,
using an oven of crowned heads after pouring
    out a torrent of blood
into the cooking pot and stirring it with the
    ladle of an arm still braceleted!
Ce_liya_n, murderous in battle! As Brahmins
   of the Four Vedas,
calm through the breadth of their knowledge,
devoted to restraint, surrounded you
and kings carried out your orders,
you completed the sacrifice established
by tradition! ..."

In medieval times, it is found in Karnataka,
and well explained in kalingattup paraNi in Tamil:
"Human beings were sacrificed on the stone by cutting through their
necks and separating the head from the body. The bodies
were kept together at one place, but the three heads were
picked up and arranged in the form of a hearth.
Food was cooked on this hearth."
(S. Silva 1955. Traces of human sacrifices in Kanara.
Anthropos 50:577-92)

In another poem, brahmin experts of the four vedas cut and split the
dead body so that the dead men can reach heaven. It was an ancient
Tamil custom, even if a very young male child dies, his body was cut
in two, and then buried or cremated (puRam 74). In fact, the tamil
name, "veTTiyAn2" (=cutter/splitter) refering to ex-outcaste persons
performing cremation rites refers to this ancient custom. Online Tamil
Lexicon entry: veTTiyAn2 1. a village menial servant;  2. one who
cremates corpses; 3. an insect that cuts off the leaves of crops

> From S. Palaniappan,
Bards, Priests, Washerwomen, and the Ancient Tamil Society in INDOLOGY
[Quote]
In fact, a very powerful evidence can be
presented regarding the status of funerary priests.
Consider an excerpt from puR.93 and its translation
by Hart and Heifetz given below.

            pITu il man2n2ar
            nOy pAl viLinta yAkkai tazIi
            kAtal maRantu avar tItu maruGku aRumAr
            aRam puri koLkai nAn2maRai mutalvar
            tiRam puri pacu pul parappin2ar kiTappi
            maRam kantu Aka nal amar vIznta
            nIL kazal maRavar celvuzi celka en2a
            vAL pOzntu aTakkal um uyntan2ar mAtO
            (puR.93.4-11)


    Kings without majesty, they evaded what would have been done
  had their deaths come naturally, of sickness, and their bodies taken
  to be laid out on ever green grass of the finest kind by Brahmins
  schooled in the Four Vedas and the principles of Righteousness,
  who would have then chanted, "Go to where the great warriors go!
  those who wear their splendid war anklets, those who have died
  in a good battle and kept faith in their manhood!" and forgetting
  any love they may have had for them, they would have then wounded
  the bodies with the sword so as to free them of sin and buried them.

This song by auvaiyAr is interesting for the following
reasons. Brahmins act as funerary priests in a burial. Moreover,
the brahmins cut the body with the sword before burial. (According
to Prof. Michael Witzel, this was not a Vedic custom.) Although Hart
and Heifetz translate the word "pOzntu" as "would have wounded", the
real meaning is ‘would have split/cloven open’. This clearly disproves
Hart’s theory of anaGku/pulai being the cause of  low caste status.
[END QUOTE]

In Varanasi, the cremation priests are called mahAbrAhmaNas,
and are considered highly inauspicious because of their dealings with
death. This is a phenomenon found in all of India about the
persons performing cremation or burial rites. Birth=Auspicious/Impure,
Wedding = Auspicious/Pure and Death=Inauspicious/Impure(polluting).
The polarities of Caste society (Louis Dumont calles Indians
Homo Hierarchicus) Pure vs. Polluted is KannaDa maDi/pole,
Tamil maTi/pulai, Telugu madugu/pola, acc. to Indianists.

The question to Indologists is whether in the North,
the brAhmaNas, experts in the Four vedas,
("nAn2maRai mutalvar" acc. to sangam lit.)
participated in sacrifices involving human blood and
intestines in ancient times? Also, did they cut the bodies
of men in half before disposal? In Vedic, Epics??

Regards,
N. Ganesan



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