Monthly Archives: September 2006

Flights of fancy

The black basaltic rock had assumed the delightful shape of a large throne, fit for a mighty rakSha like atikAya, who was slain by the saumitra. It was a cool refugium in the hot plains baked by the eye of … Continue reading

Posted in Life | Leave a comment

Wanderings in oDDiyAna

Long ago the great old vaiShNava wandered in the hallowed oDDiyAna pITha, when he reached an old desolate prAsada towards the evening hour. There he seated himself and concentrated ThaM bIja. Then the divine boar-faced mistress of the 5th lunar … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

The gotra-specific elements of the installation of the gArhapatya fire

-The udgAtA starts singing the rathanthara and ya~jna-yaj~nIya sAman-s [The jaiminIyas recite their samans in a low inaudible voice on the occassion of this rite].-The adhvaryu starts installing the gArhapatya from the fire he has just kindled with the araNi-s … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

On some dAnas and utsargas of the mediaeval Hindus

The dharma texts interminably dilate on the performance of a variety of dAna-s and utsarga-s to deserving people or for public benefit which ranged from elephants, cattle, horses, clothing, umbrellas, footware, toothbrushes, gold, gems, grains, sugar etc. These have all … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

memories arising from the padmAvatI stones

As mentioned earlier in my explorations of the maharaTTa country with shUdra-shreShTha, S and Mis-creant I came across several aniconic padmAvatI stones painted orange with a lead paint. However, in the exploration of Satmala we did see a couple of … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

The new australopithecine skeleton

R and I discussed the new find of Australopithecus afarensis by Alemseged et al with some excitement. It is not so common that we get relatively complete remains of the australopithecines. This particular one from the Hadar formation is the … Continue reading

Posted in Scientific ramblings | Leave a comment

The worship of the pa~nchAkSharI vidyA of shiva

Late in the evening the my clansmen and me left by an uncomfortable bus journey through the drAviDa country to the outpost of aunts N and H. Their clansmen had been killed by fiery abhichAras of their shatrus, but they … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

yantra gaNita

All polygons with n>4 are vector polygons because they occur as families of polygons i.e the polygon and its stars (or n-grams) The considerations described here apply to regular polygons that are chiefly used in yantra construction. All regular polygons … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

The Satmala adventures

1) Chandvad (Chandradityapura) 2) Chandvad fort 3) chandreshvarI cave temple 4) reNukA temple 5) indrANI temple 6) indragiri durga (Indrai fort) 7) Koldher fort 8)Rajdher fort After a long bus journey the shUdra, the feral brahmin, Mis-creant and myself entrenched … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought, Life | Leave a comment

The battle of Haldighat

One of the tragic battles that represents the epitome of the valiant struggle of Hindu rulers against the numerically superior Moslem armies buttressed by the quintessential Hindu traitors was the battle of Haldighat. It stands for that great freedom struggle closer … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

At the rim of the kandukaprastha

We stood accompanied by three others at the rim of the kandukaprastha. They were: the fallen brahmin, whose eyes were fixed on the exceedingly rare tIkShNa-tripatha strI ratna-s, much like those of the bauddha bikShu, which were set on the … Continue reading

Posted in Life | Leave a comment

The monkey-eating eagles

From when I was a kid one part of the rAmAyaNa that thrilled me was the battle between the eagle-king jaTAyu and rAvaNa in the daNDaka forest tat cha agni sadR^isham dIptam rAvaNasya sharAvaram | pakShAbhyAm cha mahAtejA vyadhunot patageshvaraH … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought, Scientific ramblings | Leave a comment

The split forces and the pralApa

The muni and me were in a sense like branches of the same tree. We wondered what might have happened if only the muni and me could have joined our forces on the battle field. Our coordination on the field … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

The mahAkaumara mantras in AstIka and nAstIka parlance

|| OM namaH kumArAya || namo.astu te raktavarNAya shaktidharAya nilakaNThavAhanAya mahAsvamine We bow to the great red-hued wielder of the shakti, who is seated atop a fierce peacock. Sadly, many of the great tantras pertaining to the god kumAra appear … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

Iconography of varAhamihira

varAhamihira was a Hindu encyclopedist who lived in the 500s of the CE era. He may have descended from a family of shAkadvIpI brAhmaNas, as suggested by the mihira epithet in his name combined with varAha. This is also suggested … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

rohiNI shakaTa bheda

The rohiNI shakaTa bheda is a peculiar conjunction mentioned repeatedly in Hindu astronomy. It is technically defined in the sUrya-siddhAnta (8.13) thus: vR^iShe saptadashe bhAge yasya yAmyo .aMshakadvayAt | vikShepo .abhyadhiko bhindyAd rohiNyAH shakaTaM tu saH || In the constellation … Continue reading

Posted in Heathen thought | Leave a comment

Tilak

The brahmins of the coastal strip of the maharaTTa country shot to prominence under their first hero Balaji Vishvanath who turned the tide on the Islamic deluge in India. His son Bajirao, and successor was the greatest luminary of this … Continue reading

Posted in Politics | Leave a comment