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Poison-detecting Birds.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 December 2009
Extract
The Arthaśāstra of Kautilya1 in the chapter of the first book dealing with the measures for safety within the royal harem has the following passage (ed. Jolly and Schmidt, vol. i, p. 25, 13 seq.):–
śukaḥ śārikā bhrngarājo vā sarpaviṣaśankāyāṃ krośati krauñco viṣābhyāśe mādyati glāyati jivajivakaḥ mriyate mattakokilaḥ cakorasyākṣiṇī virajyete ‖
“ The parrot, the maina, and the Malabar bird shriek when suspicious of snake poison; the curlew becomes quite tipsy2 in the neighbourhood of poison; the pheasant swoons; the amorous cuckoo dies; the eyes of the cakora partridge change their natural colour (i.e. become red).” 3
Kāmandaki has, of course, copied this as most other passages of the Kauṭilīya, cf. Nītisāra, vii, ll–13a–b:—
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- Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 5 , Issue 2 , June 1929 , pp. 233 - 242
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- Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1929
References
page 233 note 1 In spite of the arguments proffered by the late MM. Gapapati Shastri it seems clear to me that the form Kautalya is of no value (cf.Jolly, , Zschr. f. Indologie, 5, 216, seq.Google Scholar; Keith, , History of Sanskrit Literature, p. 17).Google ScholarMeyer, J. J. Dr, Das altind. Buch vom Welt- und Staatsleben, p. 23Google Scholar, has made no plausible contribution towards the solution of this problem.
page 233 note 2 Dr. Meyer's translation, “ wird toll,” is not quite to the point; cf. the commentary on Kāmandaki (cf. infra): mādyati vihvalibhavati.
page 233 note 3 Cf. also Ocean of Story, 1, 110Google Scholar; Jolly, , Journal of Indian History, 1925, p. 113.Google Scholar
page 233 note 4 Comm.: virajyete svabhāvavarṇatyāgāt.
page 234 note 1 Vol. 2, p. 246, 2 seq., in the edition of Gupta, Sri Madhusudana (Calcutta, 1836)Google Scholar, the only one available to me here. The text is partly in a shocking condition.
page 234 note 2 The lines immediately preceding deal with the signs exhibited by a fire tainted with poisoned food.
page 234 note 3 Text: ko kalaḥ.
page 234 note 4 Text: kṣeḍati.
page 234 note 5 Thus the translation of Jhā, Gangānāth, Manusmͬti, 3 (1924), 419Google Scholar, which I have had to use as the text of Medhātithi is not available to me here. The words “ becomes withered” are probably a not very good rendering of glāyati; “ become destroyed ” is, of course, entirely wrong.
page 234 note 6 cf.Winternitz, , Gesch. d. ind. Lit., 3, 545, seq.Google Scholar; Keith, , History of Sanskrit Literature, p. 507.Google Scholar
page 234 note 7 cf.Winternitz, , loc. cit., 3, 494.Google Scholar
page 235 note 1 Ulysses Aldrovandi (1522-1605), professor at Bologna and a famous naturalist, the author of a series of bulky folios on natural history.
page 235 note 2 Cf. Sāhitydarpaṇa, 233; Lüders, , Sitz. ber. preuss. Akad. d. Wiss., 1916, p. 728.Google Scholar
page 235 note 3 With this verse cf. Yajñavalkya, 1, 326Google Scholar; Viṣṇu, 3, 85; 87–8.Google Scholar
page 235 note 4 Sanatkumāracaritam, ein Abschnitt aus Haribhadras Nemināthacaritam … herausgegeben, Jacobi, von H. (Abh. d. Bayer. Akad. d. Wiss., phil.-hist. kl., 31, 2, 1921).Google Scholar
page 236 note 1 Jacobi, loc. cit., p. 98 n. 1, correctly suggests khajjanthī; phalangi (a loc. sing.) is unhappily of unknown meaning.
page 236 note 2 As regards the “ Bhasā ” problem, I am nowadays wholly on the side of Dr. Barnett. Neither the arguments of Professor Thomas, , JRAS., 1928, p. 877, seq.Google Scholar, nor even less those of Professor Keith, , History of Sanskrit Literature, p. 12, seq.Google Scholar, seem to me to carry any conviction.
page 237 note 1 Ornithologia (quoted by Gubernatis, A. de, Zoological Mythology, 2, 228)Google Scholar.
page 237 note 2 The person in question must, as far as I can understand, be Sultan Mahmūd of Ghaznī.
page 237 note 3 On him cf.Windisch, , Grundriss der indo-ar. Phil., 1, 1 B, p. 20, seq.Google Scholar, where, however, the dates of his birth and death are missing. These dates are 1748 and 1806.
page 237 note 4 In the French edition Voyage aux Indes Orientales, 1 (1808), 475, seq.Google Scholar
page 237 note 5 Nalla pāmbu, the Tamil name of the cobra.
page 237 note 6 This is apparently the hornbill, cf. the quotation from Paulinus, in the Rocznik Orjentalistycny, 2, 61.Google Scholar
page 237 note 7 This name—only known from the passage quoted above—is left without an explanation by Dalgado, , Glossario Luso-Asiático, 2, 167.Google Scholar For it is scarcely an explanation when Dalgado suggests that the name was given “ por papar cobras, se é verdade ”. The name may well be a native one.
page 237 note 8 Thurston, , Castes and Tribes of Southern India, 7, 352, seq.Google Scholar
page 237 note 9 Identically the same passage is found in Iyer, Anantha Krishna, Cochin Castes and Tribes, 1, 166Google Scholar.
page 237 note 10 Ethnographical Notes in S.India, p. 280.Google Scholar
page 238 note 1 cf.Jerdon, , Birds of India, 2, 566.Google Scholar
page 238 note 2 Cf also Tawney, , Kathāsarit-Sāgara, 2, 243.Google Scholar
page 238 note 3 Other traditions concerning the partridge in India have got nothing to do with the topic dealt with here. On omens in general from the cakora, cf.Hultzsch, , Vasantarāja's Śākuna, p. 59 seq.Google Scholar It is generally believed that when a partridge appears on one's right side that portends evil, cf. Ocean of Story, ed. Penzer, , 9, 76Google Scholar (this idea would underlie the old story of India and Gͬtsamada if the Bṛhaddevatā, 4, 18, were right Kuhn, A. cf, Ind. Stud., 1, 118))Google Scholar; Temple, , Legends of the Panjab, 2, 395Google Scholar; when it calls in the night it is a good omen, cf. Temple, loc. cit., 1, 161; again, when it cries at the start of a journey this is an entirely bad omen, cf. Temple, loc. cit., 1, 269, 271. As for the etymology of the word cakora, nothing definite seems to have been ascertained; the word seems to be widespread outside India; cf.Yule-Burnell, , Hobson-Jobson, 2 p. 194 seq.Google Scholar Yule suggested that it should be found in one passage of Marco Polo, cf. his Marco Polo, 2 1, 287.Google Scholar
page 238 note 4 cf.Yule-Burnell, , loc. cit., p. 194.Google Scholar
page 239 note 1 cf.Yule-Burnell, , loc. cit., p. 112.Google Scholar
page 239 note 2 Cf. Die Suparnasage, p. 345 seq.Google Scholar
page 239 note 3 Ethnographic Notes in 8. India, p. 282.Google Scholar
page 239 note 4 Manucci, , Storia do Mogor, transl. by Irvine, , 3, 196.Google Scholar
page 239 note 5 cf.Aldrovandi, , Historia Serpentum et Draconum (1640), p. 43.Google Scholar
page 239 note 6 On this idea cf. especially the admirable work by Hertz, W., “ Die Sage vom Giftmădchen” (Abh. d. Bayerischen Akad. d. Wiss., phil. hist. Kl. 20, 2, 1897)Google Scholar, as well as Penzer, , Ocean of Story, 2, 275–313Google Scholar, and Modi, J. J., Folk-Lore, 38, 324 seqCrossRefGoogle Scholar. Mr. Penzer has chiefly simplified the materials of Hertz and made little additions of his own.
page 239 note 7 Cf. Hertz, loc. cit., p. 146 seq.
page 239 note 8 Cf. p. 237.
page 240 note 1 Nat. Hist., 10, 33, 69; 92, 197.Google Scholar
page 240 note 2 Opera, ed. Kūhn, , 11, 601; 14, 227.Google Scholar
page 240 note 3 cf.Hertz, , Die Sage vorn Giftmädchen, p. 156 seq.Google Scholar, with literature; Ross, Sir Denison, C.H.I., 3, 315.Google Scholar
page 240 note 4 cf.Hertz, , loc. cit., p. 134Google Scholar, with n. 3.
page 240 note 5 Meyer, J. J. Dr, Das altind. Buch vom Welt- und Staatsleben, p. 684Google Scholar, has apparently totally misunderstood my remark on this passage in the Kuhn, Festschrift E., p. 283Google Scholar, as a perusal of my words there can leave no doubt whatsoever what I mean by saying that the text is “ unfortunately corrupted ”.
page 240 note 6 Cf. DieSuparnasage, p. 379 seq.Google Scholar; Festschrift E.Kuhn, p. 283 seq.Google Scholar
page 240 note 7 Ocean of Story, 1, 110 n.Google Scholar
page 240 note 8 It almost seems as if the above-mentioned statement of Mr. Penzer originated in a passage like this one.
page 241 note 1 The very same words are given, with a few insignificant additions, in the Historia Serpentum et Draconum, p. 25 seq.
page 241 note 2 The mustela, of course, is the mungoose, the nakula. Its enmity with the serpent is mentioned already in the A V., vi, 139, 5; in viii, 7, 23, the tradition is mentioned that the mungoose fortifies himself by the use of a certain drug, cf. Mil. Panha, p. 334: nakulo uragam upagacchanto bhesajjena kāyam, paribhāvetvā uragam upagacchati.
page 241 note 3 Nat. Hist., 10, 48.Google Scholar
page 241 note 4 cf.Gubernatis, deZoological Mythology, 2, 324, n. 2.Google Scholar
page 241 note 5 cf.Crooke, , Popular Mel. of N. India, 2, 250Google Scholar; Enthoven, , Bombay Folk-lore, p. 136.Google Scholar
page 241 note 6 cf.Smith, V., Akbar the Great Mogul, p. 314.Google Scholar
page 241 note 7 In a note on the same page I also suggested that the meat of peacocks and antelopes was really considered an antidote, and that this was perhaps the reason why Aśoka last of all gave up eating it. The plausibility of such a suggestion is somewhat enhanced by the fact that the meat of certain birds—and, according to Dioscorides—the marrow of deer, is really thought to annihilate poison.
page 241 note 8 Loc. cit., p. 684.
page 242 note 1 Classical testimonies are collected by Aldrovandi, , De Quadrupedibus bisulcis, p. 800 seq.Google Scholar, and Historia Serpentum et Draconum, p. 25 seq. The oldest classical authors to mention such a belief seem to be Theophrastus, and Lucretius, , De rerum natura, 6, 765 seq.Google Scholar Other authors are Plutarchus, , Pliny, , and Aelianus, , as well as Lucanus, Pharsalia, 6, 673.Google Scholar Cf. further Lauchert, , Geschichte des Physiologus, p. 27.Google Scholar and Thorndike, , A History of Magic and Experimental Science, 1, 84.Google Scholar