PuNDarIka sacrifice

[Jan E.M. Houben]

Dear Joerg,
The 11 days of the Braahma.na and ;Srauta-suutra sources (and the 1996
performance in Delhi) which I indicated refer to the sutyaa-days
(Soma-pressing days) of the Pau.n.dariika and does not count the
preparatory days (those on which the Diik.saa, Pravargya-Upasad etc. take
place).
Best, Jan


On 2 April 2012 14:32, Jörg Gengnagel <joerg.gengnagel at urz.uni-heidelberg.de
> wrote:

>  Dear François,
>
> just a short addition: The Rājguru of Savāī Jaisingh, Ratnākara Dīkṣita
> Mahāśabde, was given the title Samrāṭ and Puṇḍārīka (or Pauṇḍarīka). The
> titles are linked to the Vājapeya- and Puṇḍarīka-sacrifices performed in
> 1709 and 1713.
> See: Horstmann, Monika. 2009. Der Zusammenhalt der Welt. Religiöse
> Herrschaftslegitiation und Religionspolitik Mahārājā Savāī Jaisinghs
> (1700-1743). Harrassowitz. On Ratnākara pp. 24-39.
> P. 25, fn. 41 "Bei dem Puṇḍarīka-Opfer handelt es sich um ein
> einundzwanzigtägiges Soma-Opfer". So now we have to check whether 11 or 21
> days is correct.
> Best
>
> Joerg
>
>
> Am 02.04.2012 14:08, schrieb Jan E.M. Houben:
>
> Dear François,
> It must be the same as pauNDarIka: e.g. .Sa.dvB 4.3.4, K;S 23.5.37;
> Hillebrandt does not refer to it particularly but generically under ahIna.
> Modern performance: the Pravargya I filmed in Delhi in 1996 (
> http://www.jyotistoma.nl/EN/pravargya/Pravargya100Introduction.asx) was
> part of a pauNDarIka (11 pressing day) Soma yAga.
> Jan
>
> On 2 April 2012 12:09, Francois Voegeli <francois.voegeli at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> Dear Members of the Indology List,
>>
>> I recently stumbled on a sacrifice called "puNDarIka-" in a Gupta
>> inscription edited by Fleet (Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum vol. III, No.
>> 59, pp. 252–254, "Bijayagadh Stone Pillar Inscription of Vishnuvardhana").
>> In this inscription it is said that having performed the "puNDarIka",
>> king ViSNuvardhana erected a yUpa: "kRtau puNDarIke yUpo yam pratiSThApitas
>> [...] zrI ViSNuvarddhanena" (Fleet op. cit. p. 253, l. 3). This post seems
>> to be the stone pillar where this inscription is found and which is shaped
>> like a vedic yUpa, set up on a platform near the south wall of a fort now
>> located at Bayana in the Bharatpur District of Rajasthan.
>>
>> I cannot see exactly what kind of sacrifice this "puNDarIka" is. It is
>> nowhere to be found in the lexicons devoted to Vedic ritual (Renou 1954,
>> Sen 1978, Mylius 1995), or in fundamental textbooks on ritual like that of
>> Hillebrandt (1897, repr. 1981), or in the section of Kane's Hist. of Dh.
>> devoted to sacrifices and rituals (Vol. II pp. 976–1255).
>>
>> The dictionaries (MW, PW) give, among the possible meanings of puNDarIka,
>> "a kind of sacrifice/ein best. Opfer" with references to the MahAbhArata,
>> among which the most significant I could find seems to be:
>>
>> MBh 3.13.16 azvamedho rAjasUyaH puNDarIko 'tha gosavaH / etair api
>> mahAyajJair iSTaM te bhUridakSiNaiH.
>>
>> There it is said to be a "great sacrifice". In this context this
>> qualification seems to imply that it is a zrauta ritual, as it is mentioned
>> together with other well known zrauta sacrifices described by the
>> ZrautasUtras, most of them regalians, but the ZrautasUtras do not, to my
>> knowledge, describe any kind of puNDarIka rite.
>>
>> A puNDarIka sacrifice is otherwise mentioned a number of times as
>> bringing some unspecified but usually great reward in the "tIrtha" section
>> of the MBh (3.81–82; e.g. ), where we also learn that there was a
>> "puNDarIka" place of pilgrimage, and that going there rewards the pilgrim
>> with the fruits of a... puNDarIka sacrice (MBh 3.18.69 zuklapakSe dazamyAM
>> tu puNDarIkaM samAvizet, tatra snAtvA naro rAjan puNDarIkaphalaM labhet).
>> In this section of the MBh the puNDarIka sacrifice sometimes appears
>> close to, or is contrasted with, the azvamedha, e.g. in MBh 3.82.24ff., or
>> the vAjapeya in a surprising passage where a yUpa appears, but we do not
>> know if it was erected for/as a result of a sacrifice and which kind it
>> could have been:
>>
>> MBh 3.82.74–75 tato brahmasaro gacched dharmAraNyopazobhitam /
>> pauNDarIkam avApnoti prabhAtAm eva zarvarIm [74] tasmin sarasi rAjendra
>> brahmaNo yUpa ucchritaH / yUpaM pradakSiNaṃM kRtvA vAjapeyaphalaM labhet
>>
>> Another passage of the MBh where puNDarIka and vAjapeya appear side by
>> side is 2.5.89 kratUn ekacitto vAjapeyAMz ca sarvazaH / puNDarIkAMz ca
>> kArtsnyena yatase kartum AtmavAn.
>>
>> Both MBh 2.5.89 and 3.28.74–75 seem to rule out the possibility that
>> "puNDarIka" may sometimes have been a synonym of "vAjapeya" in the MBh, as
>> I first thought could have been the case.
>> The data I have collected so far nevertheless suggest that this
>> "puNDarIka" sacrifce was a zrauta ceremony of some kind, that involved the
>> erection of a yUpa, and thus an animal sacrifice following the Vedic norms.
>>
>> Could anyone on the list tell me more about this sacrifice? All help
>> would be greatly appreciated.
>>
>> Thanks in advance,
>>
>> Dr François Voegeli
>>
>> Senior FNS Researcher
>> Institut d'Archéologie et des Sciences de l'Antiquité
>> Anthropole, bureau 4018
>> Faculté des Lettres
>> Université de Lausanne
>> CH-1015 Lausanne
>
>
>
>
>  --
> Prof. Dr. Jan E.M. Houben,
> Directeur d Etudes « Sources et Histoire de la Tradition Sanskrite »
> Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, SHP,
> A la Sorbonne,45-47, rue des Ecoles,
> 75005 Paris -- France.
> JEMHouben at gmail.com
> www.jyotistoma.nl
>
>
> --
> Priv.-Doz. Dr. Jörg Gengnagel
> Heidelberg University
> Interim Professor (Professurvertretung)
> Department of Cultural and Religious History of South Asia (Classical Indology)
> Collaborative Research Center 619 "Dynamics of Ritual"
> Head of Subproject B5 "Court Ritual in the Jaipur State"
> Modern South Asian Languages and Literatureswww.ritualdynamik.uni-hd.dewww.benares.uni-hd.de
>
> South Asia Institute
> Department of Cultural and Religious History of South Asia (Classical Indology)
> Im Neuenheimer Feld 330
> D-69120 Heidelberg
> phone: +49(0)6221/54-8906
> fax:   +49(0)6221/54-8841
>
>


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