Matangalila and Hastyayurveda (study)

by Chandrima Das | 2021 | 98,676 words

This page relates ‘Avapata: The fifth technique’ of the study on the Matangalina and Hastyayurveda in the light of available epigraphic data on elephants in ancient India. Both the Matanga-Lila (by Nilakantha) and and the Hasti-Ayurveda (by Palakapya) represent technical Sanskrit works deal with the treatment of elephants. This thesis deals with their natural abode, capturing techniques, myths and metaphors, and other text related to elephants reflected from a historical and chronological cultural framework.

Avapāta: The fifth technique

The fifth or the last method of catching elephants is known as the ‘pit’ or Avapāta method. Mātaṅgalīlā describes of digging of a hole four hastas (six feet) deep, two hastas broad, and five hastas long, concealed with bamboo shoots and grass mats, covering it over with earth, and bestrewing it with food, the attendants shall cause the young elephants to fall into it and then bind them firmly (v. 14).[1]

Mānasollāsa (v. 217-220) and Gajaśāstra also mention this technique. Gajaśāstra (v. 34) briefly mentions that the Avapāta is the same where the elephant falls a long way. It can be certainly presumed that there might be some expert people who dig out these holes with correct measurement.

Mānasollāsa mentions about the harmfulness of avapātabandha especially referring to the fact that it caused the risk of death, breaking of legs, injuring of chests and tusks of the elephants when this technique is employed for capturing elephants. The treatise prohibits the hunters to adopt this catching method.[2] The text explicitly mentions that in this technique a pit measuring four forearms in depth, two in width and five in length (a forearm is approx. equal to 18 inch or 45cm) should be prepared by a wise person. It should then be carefully covered with sticks, grass, leaves, etc. When an elephant falls into it, the risk of injury or death is present here too. He may break his legs, get his chest torn, lose his tusks or may in extreme cases die. This device called Avapāta is also therefore condemned. In this operation elephants perish and hence wise persons must not practice it.

Of all the five techniques discussed above all the treatises condemn the last two methods i.e., āpāta and avapāta because these were dangerous to the elephants, sometimes elephants die in these process, so they must be avoided[3]. Thus the early Indian consciousness, moral conduct and empathy are reflected in this approach.

Besides these practical techniques there are references to the magical and superstitions involved in the process. Gajaśāstra mentions about a strange practice of casting a spell for tying an elephant to the post (v. 35-36).

An elephant full of good deeds, valour and power, should be tied the post in its own stall with this spell:

Aniruddha, enter here and be established on this post for a hundred years, endowed with good health and strength, and make the king victorious again and again”[4].

This on one hand reflects the use of magical spells and supernatural intervention in the capturing of this vital beast and the birth of rituals related to the capturing of elephants and involvement of the priestly class in the procedure. Aniruddha mentioned here is a hitherto unknown deity responsible for taking care of capturing and tying up of elephants.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

garte hastacatuṣkanikarayugmavyāsadoḥpañcakāyāmaṃ veṇudalaiḥ kaṭaiśca pihitaṃ kṛtvā mṛdācchādya tam /
tasmin bhakṣyaparistṛte tu kalabhānā pātayitvā bhaṭā badhnīyuḥ suiḍhaṃ gajagraha iti proktoâvapātāhvayaḥ //
     —
T. Ganapati Śāstri. ed. The Mātaṅgalīlā of Nīlakaṇṭha, p. 28. Franklin Edgerton. tr. The Elephant-Lore of the Hindus, p. 91.

[2]:

Gajanan K. Shrigondekar. ed. Mānasollāsa, Vol. I, v. 219-220, p. 49.

[3]:

ShriMantramurti K.S. Subrahmanyaśāstri. ed. &tr. (in Tamil), Gajaśāstra [Gaja-śāstram] of Pālakāpya muni with extracts from other works and Coloured Illustrations, p.62.

[4]:

Ibid., p.63.

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