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Types Of Shaligrams
Works of Hindu literature such as the '' Viramitrodaya'', '' Chaturvarga-chintamani'', ''Matsyasukta'', ''Vaishvanara Samhita'', ''Puranasamgraha'', and the ''Pranatoshani Tantra'' cites the following varieties of shaligrams on the basis of shape, colour, features of the ''chakra'' (imprint of the ammonite shell present on the outer surface or inside the stone, resembling Sudarshana Chakra, the discus of Vishnu) and ''mukha/vadana/dvara'' (a large aperture resembling an open mouth through which the ''chakra'' present within the stone can be seen from outside) and distinct markings like the ''vanamala'' (a linear white line running throughout the body of the stone, resembling a garland) A more detailed classification is provided in the ''Meru Tantra'' and in the book ''Shalagrama Kosha'' compiled by S. K. Ramachandra Rao from a manuscript named ''Shalagrama Pariksha'' written by a Telugu Brahmin named Anupasimha, and unpublished sections of the ''Sritattvanidhi The ''Sritatt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shaligram (1)
A shaligram, or shaligrama shila ( deva, शालिग्राम शिला; IAST: ''Śāligrāma-śilā''), is a fossilized stone or ammonite collected from the riverbed or banks of the Kali Gandaki, a tributary of the Gandaki River in Nepal. It is also considered a form of Vishnu within Hinduism. The Kali Gandaki river flows through sacred places such as Muktinath and Damodar Kunda, enhancing the spiritual significance of these shaligrams. There are numerous different types of shaligrams. Legends According to the Devi Bhagavata Purana, Brahmavaivarta Purana, and Shiva Purana, shilagrama shilas originated due to the following chain of events. A king named Vrishadhvaja had been cursed by Surya to endure poverty, due to his reluctance to worship any deity other than Shiva. To regain their lost prosperity, his grandsons Dharmadhvaja and Kushadhvaja performed austerities to appease Lakshmi, the goddess of prosperity. Pleased with the austerities, she granted them prosper ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kadamba Tree
''Neolamarckia cadamba'', with English common names burflower-tree, laran, and Leichhardt pine, and called kadamba or kadam or cadamba locally, is an evergreen, tropical tree native to South and Southeast Asia. The genus name honours French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. It has scented orange flowers in dense globe-shaped clusters. The flowers are used in perfumes. The tree is grown as an ornamental plant and for timber and paper-making. Kadamba features in Indian religions. Description A fully mature tree can reach up to in height. It is a large tree with a broad crown and straight cylindrical bole. It is quick growing, with broad spreading branches and grows rapidly in the first 6–8 years. The trunk has a diameter of 100–160 cm, but typically less than that. Leaves are long. Flowering usually begins when the tree is 4–5 years old. Its flowers are sweetly fragrant, red to orange in colour, occurring in dense, globular heads of approximately diameter. The fruit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lac (resin)
Lac is the resinous secretion of a number of species of Kerriidae, lac insects, of which the most commonly cultivated is ''Kerria lacca''. Cultivation begins when a farmer gets a stick that contains eggs ready to hatch and ties it to the tree to be infested. Thousands of lac insects colonize the branches of the host trees and secrete the resinous pigment. The coated branches of the host trees are cut and harvested as sticklac. The harvested sticklac is crushed and sieved to remove impurities. The sieved material is then repeatedly washed to remove insect parts and other material. The resulting product is known as seedlac. The prefix ''seed'' refers to its pellet shape. Seedlac, which still contains 3–5% impurity, is processed into shellac by heat treatment or solvent extraction. The leading producer of lac is Jharkhand, followed by the Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, and Maharashtra states of India. Lac production is also found in Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, parts ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jaggery
Jaggery is a List of unrefined sweeteners, traditional non-centrifugal cane sugar consumed in the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, North America, Central America, Brazil and Africa. It is a concentrated product of Sugarcane juice, cane juice and often Date (fruit), date or Arecaceae, palm plant sap, sap without separation of the molasses and crystals, and can vary from golden brown to dark brown in colour. It contains up to 50% sucrose, up to 20% invert sugars, and up to 20% moisture, with the remainder made up of other insoluble matter, such as wood ash, proteins, and bagasse fibres. Jaggery is very similar to muscovado, an important sweetener in Portuguese cuisine, Portuguese, British cuisine, British and French cuisine. Etymology Jaggery comes from Portuguese terms , , borrowed from Malayalam (), which is borrowed from Sanskrit (). It is a wikt:Appendix:Glossary#doublet, doublet of wikt:sugar#English, sugar. Origins and production Jaggery is made of the products o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kali Yuga
''Kali Yuga'' (Devanagari: कलियुग), in Hinduism, is the fourth, shortest, and worst of the four '' yugas'' (world ages) in a '' Yuga cycle'', preceded by '' Dvapara Yuga'' and followed by the next cycle's '' Krita (Satya) Yuga''. It is believed to be the present age, which is full of conflict and sin. According to Puranic sources, Krishna's death marked the end of '' Dvapara Yuga'' and the start of ''Kali Yuga'', which is dated to 17/18 February 3102 BCE. Lasting for 432,000 years (1,200 divine years), ''Kali Yuga'' began years ago and has years left as of CE. ''Kali Yuga'' will end in the year 428,899 CE. Near the end of ''Kali Yuga'', when virtues are at their worst, a cataclysm and a re-establishment of ''dharma'' occur to usher in the next cycle's ''Krita (Satya) Yuga'', prophesied to occur by Kalki. Etymology '' Yuga'' (), in this context, means "an age of the world", where its archaic spelling is ''yug'', with other forms of ''yugam'', , a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jujube
Jujube (UK ; US or ), sometimes jujuba, scientific name ''Ziziphus jujuba'', and also called red date, Chinese date, and Chinese jujube, is a species in the genus '' Ziziphus'' in the buckthorn family Rhamnaceae. It is often confused with the closely related Indian jujube, '' Z.mauritiana''. The Chinese jujube enjoys a diverse range of climates from temperate to tropical, whereas the Indian jujube is restricted to warmer subtropical and tropical climates. Description It is a small deciduous tree or shrub reaching a height of , usually with thorny branches. The leaves are shiny-green, ovate-acute, long and wide, with three conspicuous veins at the base, and a finely toothed margin. The flowers are small, wide, with five inconspicuous yellowish-green petals. The fruit is an edible oval drupe deep; when immature it is smooth-green, with the consistency and taste of an apple with lower acidity, maturing brown to purplish-black, and eventually wrinkled, looking like a sma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aegle Marmelos
''Aegle marmelos'', commonly known as bael (or ''bili'' or ''bhel''), also Bengal quince, golden apple, Japanese bitter orange, stone apple or wood apple, is a species of tree native to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. It is present in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal as a naturalized species. The tree is considered to be sacred by Hindus and Buddhists. Name The plant is known all over India and in Southeast Asia. Across the languages of India, the fruit is called ''sriphal'' and ''bilva'' in Sanskrit, ''bel'' in Urdu, Bengali, Punjabi and Marathi; ''baelputri'', ''bela'' or ''sriphal'' in Hindi; ''bela'' in Kannada; ''beeli'' or ''billi'' in Gujarati, ''koovalam'' in Malayalam, ''bilvam'' or ''vilvam'' in Tamil and ''bilavamu'' in Telugu. In Southeast Asia, it is called ''opesheet'' or ''ohshit'' in Burmese, ''maja batuh'' in Indonesian, ''matum'' in Thai, and ''tar imam'' in Vietnamese. In English, the fruit is alternatively known as bael fruit, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brahminy Kite
The brahminy kite (''Haliastur indus''), also known as the red-backed sea-eagle in Australia, is a medium-sized bird of prey in the family Accipitridae, which also includes many other diurnal Bird of prey, raptors, such as eagles, buzzards, and harrier (bird), harriers, all found in the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and Australia. The brahminy kite is found mainly on the coast and in inland wetlands, where it feeds on dead fish and other prey. Adults have a reddish-brown body plumage contrasting with their white head and breast which make them easy to distinguish from other birds of prey. Taxonomy In 1760, French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson described and illustrated the Brahminy kite in the first volume of his ''Oiseaux'' based on a specimen collected in Pondicherry, India. He used the French name ''L'aigle de Pondichery''. The brahminy kite was included by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in his ''Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux''. It was a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Euphorbia Antiquorum
''Euphorbia antiquorum'', known as antique spurge and "Euphorbia of the Ancients", is a species of succulent plant in the family Euphorbiaceae. It is widespread throughout peninsular India, but its wild origin is obscure. Escaped or naturalized and widely cultivated in neighbouring regions, such as Burma, China, Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Thailand, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam, and in many tropical zones worldwide. The juice of this plant is a potent ingredient for a mixture of wall plaster, according to the Samarāṅgaṇa Sūtradhāra, which is a Sanskrit treatise dealing with Śilpaśāstra (Hindu science of art and construction). This species is the type species of the genus ''Euphorbia''. As most other succulent members of the genus ''Euphorbia'', its trade is regulated under Appendix II of CITES. See also * ''Euphorbia ''Euphorbia'' is a large and diverse genus of flowering plants, commonly called spurge, in the f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kaustubha
Kaustubha () is a divine ruby or ''ratnam'' (gem) in Hindu mythology. This gem is in the possession of Vishnu, granting him the epithet of ''Kaustubhadhari''. It is believed in Hindu scriptures to be the most magnificent ''ratnam'' in all of creation, at the time of the churning of the ocean, and acts as a symbol of divine authority. Legend In Hindu mythology, the devas and the asuras performed the churning of the ocean of milk (Samudra Manthana) in order to obtain amrita, the elixir of immortality. During this process, fourteen jewels ( ratnas) emerged from the ocean. Among the first few treasures that emerged was the kaustubha, described to be an "excellent gem, the lotus-hued ruby". The Skanda Purana describes the nature of this gem: Krishna is described to be wearing the ruby in the Mahabharata: See also * Chintamani Gem *Navaratna ''Navaratna'' () is a Sanskrit compound word meaning "nine gems" or "ratnas". Jewellery created in this style has important cultur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brahmahatya
Brahmahatya (), also rendered Brahmanahatya () is the Sanskrit term for "the killing of a Brahmin". It is translated as Brahminicide in English. The Manusmriti regards the murder of a Brahmin to be the greatest of sins, and the highest of the ''mahapatakas'' (mortal sins). Brahmahatya is also personified as a hideous woman in Hindu texts such as the Puranas. Described to possess red hair and wear blue robes, she is stated to laugh boisterously, chasing the murderers of Brahmins. Literature The Ramayana describes the conflict between Indra and Vritra. After Indra slays Vritra, he incurs the sin of brahmahatya and is immediately paralysed, falling unconscious. The deities arrange for the purification of Indra's sin with the performance of the ashvamedha sacrifice. In the same epic, to expiate Rama's sin of brahmahatya for the killing of Ravana, Sita Sita (; ), also known as Siya, Jānaki and Maithili, is a Hindu goddess and the female protagonist of the Hindu epic ''Ramay ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shivalinga
A lingam ( , lit. "sign, symbol or mark"), sometimes referred to as linga or Shiva linga, is an abstract or aniconic representation of the Hindu god Shiva in Shaivism. The word ''lingam'' is found in the Upanishads and epic literature, where it means a "mark, sign, emblem, characteristic", the "evidence, proof, symptom" of Shiva and Shiva's power. The lingam of the Shaivism tradition is a short cylindrical pillar-like symbol of Shiva, made of stone, metal, gem, wood, clay or precious stones. It is often represented within a disc-shaped platform, the ''yoni'' – its feminine counterpart, consisting of a flat element, horizontal compared to the vertical lingam, and designed to allow liquid offerings to drain away for collection. The ''lingam'' is an emblem of generative and destructive power. While rooted in representations of the male sexual organ, the ''lingam'' is regarded as the "outward symbol" of the "formless reality", the symbolization of merging of the 'primordial m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
