Snakes

Stella Sandahl ssandahl at EAGLE.CA
Wed Jul 14 21:19:07 UTC 2004


The late Professor Ronald Morton Smith wrote an article with the intriguing
title: "Rejected Dragons, Accepted Snakes". It was supposed to appear in
Lakshman Sarup Centenary Volume (Chandigarh). It was listed as "forthcoming"
in the bibliography of his works which appears in Professor Smith's
Festschrift (Corolla Torotonensis. Studies in honour of Ronald Morton Smith,
Toronto 1994 - coedited by me). Has anybody seen this article?
Stella Sandahl


on 14/7/04 13:30, Robert Zydenbos at zydenbos at LRZ.UNI-MUENCHEN.DE wrote:

> Am Montag, 12. Juli 2004 02:40 schrieb Stephen Hodge:
>
>> L.S. Cousins wrote:
>>> kukku.ta + ada 'eating chickens'.
>>> Could this be confused with aadi ?
>>
>> Possibly, but kukku.ta + ahi is attested and Skt definitions say
>> "kukku.ta-cara.na-tulye sarpa-bhede".  [...]
>
> For what it's worth (or perhaps: to confuse matters further): in Jaina
> iconography the kukka.ta-sarpa is the vaahana of Padmaavatii, the
> yak.sii or protective goddess of the Tirthankara Paar;svanaatha (about
> Padmavati and other Jaina goddesses I may advertise myself and refer to
> items 16, 16a, 19 and 29 in my
> http://ca.geocites.com/zydenbos2001/publikationsliste.html). I have
> seen this vaahana depicted as a hen with the neck and head of a cobra
> (usually) or as a snake with a hen's head (sometimes).
>
> So if the snake is question is not a wholly biological creature (or if
> its ontological status is doubtful), this iconographical angle may be
> worth considering.
>
> RZ





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