Documenta Nepalica

Published by Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities: Documents on the History of Religion and Law of Pre-modern Nepal, Heidelberg, Germany, . Published by the courtesy of the National Archives, Kathmandu. The copyright of the facsimile remains with the Nepal Rashtriya Abhilekhalaya (National Archives, Government of Nepal). All use of the digital facsimiles requires prior written permission by the copyright holder. See Terms of Use.
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Commentary

In the original, use is made of lines of differing length to fill the space between the particulars of single entries in order to furnish proper columns. This typical format feature has been reproduced here by using a table.

The list refers to the buffalo sacrifices performed at the Mūlacoka (lit. "main courtyard") of the royal palace on occasion of the 14th lunar day of the bright fortnight of Aśvīna, on which the rituals of the autumnal Dasaĩ festival conclude. That the list refers to sacrifices at the Hanumānḍhokā palace can be inferred from the fact that many of the documents microfilmed on the same and neighboring reels concern affairs relating to the old royal palace of Kathmandu. Lists similar to the present one are extant from the years VS 1886 (E_2776_0001), 1888 (E_2767_0049), 1900 (E_2775_0040), and 1908 (E_2779_0005). As other documents (e.g. DNA_0002_0061) attest, records of buffalo sacrifices had to be dispatched from major state temples and army units throughout the country.

The list records the buffalos sacrificed with a running number, the name of the sacrificer, the number of hands and type of blade used. Moreover it is recorded whether the animal is decapitated with a single stroke or not. The terms in the second column refer to types of buffaloes. To judge by the present document, they were classified by size but could be listed according to age, from oldest to youngest. Under the assumption that the list given in E_2779_0005 presents the bulls in the order of their size, the kaṭuvā is the smallest type, followed by kanjokhā and malauṭo. The biggest buffalo of all is called "the big fat one" (satāra). According to Unbescheid (1996: 120–125, passim) and Tingey (1997: 99), who both refer to the recent practice at Gorkha Palace, it stands for Mahiṣāsura, the demon enemy of the goddess Durgā. In contradistinction to all other buffaloes, which should ideally be decapitated with a single stroke, this one needs to be killed with three strokes.

The document seems to be a clean copy of the list microfilmed as E_2764_0036. During the copying some changes were introduced by the scribe. They concern the adding of the attributes "senior" (jeṭho) and "junior" (kāṃcho) to the first and last bull respectively (cf. Unbescheid 1996: 121, passim); the addition of the agentive suffix (-le) to the names of the sacrificers; the altered spellings of names (e.g. Khatṛ instead of Katrī, Gorakṣa instead of Gorache) and titles (kummedāna instead of kumedāna); and the rearrangement of the summary. Though it may be by pure accident of transmission that no such clean copies exist for the similar lists from the years VS 1886, 1888, and 1900, one may speculate why in this particular case a copy was made. This may have to do with the persons named as sacrificers. Among them were not only members of the Kũvara family and later founding fathers of the dynasty of Rāṇā prime ministers (no. 22 General Jaṅga Bahādūra Kũvara; nos. 15, 30, 34 Captain Dhīra Samsera Jaṅga Kũvara and other Kũvaras), but also two princes (nos. 20, 21). These two princes, i.e. Raṇendra Bīra Bikrama Sāha and Bīrendra Bīra Bikrama Sāha were the only sons of King Rājendra's youngest queen (kānchā mahārānī) Rājyalakṣmī Devī. The latter had been officially appointed regent on 7 January 1843 (Stiller 1981: 124, 175-176), roughly two and a half years before the present document. In Major Thoresby's account of the Koṭ massacre in September 1846, the queen is reported to have been "continually urging General Jung Bahadur to put these two princes [i.e. the crown prince and later king Surendra and his full brother Upendra; A.Z.] to death and place the eldest of her two sons upon the throne" (cited after Stiller 1981: 315). Having the princes personally participate in the Dasaĩ sacrifices may have been part of a princely education and in line with their mother's scheme to present them as suitable heirs to the throne. The two princes of 9 and 11 years were given the smallest type of buffalo and, according to the record, both mastered the task.

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