[Advaita-l] ’atiraatram' - a Vedic ritual coming up in Kerala

[V Subrahmanian]

On Mon, Apr 18, 2011 at 10:00 PM, Venkata sriram P
<venkatasriramp at yahoo.in>wrote:

> Dear Ramakrishna,
>
> Namaste.  Nice to see those photos of Atiratram.  It was really wonderful
> to see one of the major kratus.
>
> But i see that none of the ritwiks are having Shikha and Krishnajinam.
>
>   none of the ritwiks including yajamAna is seen with shikha,
> krishnajina & siromunDana.
>
> This is just my observation.  No offence meant.
>
> regs,
> Sriram
>
>
Namaste.


This is just my guess:  The people involved in the ritual in this case are
namboothiri brahmins.  For them the shikhA is not in the usual place where
others have but in the right side of the head.  Maybe this is there in their
case and not visible in the photographs.

Last year I happened to interact with a very young Vedanta Vidwan Dr.
Maheswaran Namboothiri who had come for the vAkyArtha sadas at Sringeri.
Only at close quarters did I notice that he had a thin shikhA at the right
side and I even questioned him on this.  The shikhA merges with the usual
cropped hair.

Also, in the Kerala yajna photographs that we have just seen, the ritviks
are all clad in white.  In Bangalore and Sringeri I have seen these clad in
yellow.  Maybe this, along with the shikhA, mundanam, etc. is a deshAchAra.
I have known that generally Namboothiri women do not put any thilakam on the
forehead even if they are sumangali-s, although there may be exceptions.
This is considered amangalam in other parts of the south.

Regards,
subrahmanian.v