Vol. X, No. 5.] The Worship of Mud-Turtles. 135 



[N.S.] 



are only lower halves. The tortoise represented is certainly a 



mud-turtle and not a land-tortoise. 



(c) In chapter LXIV of Vrhat Samhita of Varaha Mihir 

 (a Sanskrit encyclopaedia of the 6th century a.d.) kings are 

 enjoined to rear up tortoises and turtles with the following 

 auspicious signs :— The colour should be either like that of a 

 crystal or silver variegated with lines of blue. The shape 

 should be like that of a water jar, with a beautiful bridge at 

 its back ; or it may be of the rosy colour like that of the morn- 

 ing sun with spots (most likely black) like mustard. 



If such a tortoise is kept in the house it increases the great- 

 ness of the king. The tortoise which has a body black like 

 eye-paint or like the bee, variegated with spots, which has no 

 defective limbs, and whose head is like that of a serpent and the 

 throat thick, increases the prosperity of the empire. 



The tortoise which shines like lapis-lazuli, whose neck is 

 thick, which has covered holes at three points and which has 

 a good bridge at its back, is worthy of praise. [The variegated 

 colours mentioned, though the precise meaning is obscure, cer- 

 tainly point to Trionychidae being the tortoises intended. The 

 species which has ' ' covered holes at three points ' ' is probably an 

 Emyda, the three points being the apertures through which 

 emerge the two hind limbs (separately) and the head and fore 

 limbs together.— N. A.] 



{d) In the survival of Buddhism in Bengal which I identi- 

 fied in 1893 with the Dharmapuja in Western Bengal, the tor- 

 toise plays an important part. In some of the Dharma temples 

 the figure of the deity is exactly like that of a tortoise and he is 

 often represented in Bengali Mantras, with which he is wor- 

 shipped, as Kurmarupl or Kacchapakara. I may suggest the 

 following explanation for this iconography of Dharma. Dharma 

 is the second member of the Buddhist Triad, but Dharma is 

 always represented as a stupa or mound. The earliest stupas 

 were of a semi-circular shape, but in the course of time the 

 mound became higher and higher, with a top forming any seg- 

 ment of a circle. In the beginning they had no niches. In the 

 Kushan period they had one niche to the East ; but with tin 

 expansion of the Mahayana School the number increased till it 

 became four at the four cardinal points of the stupa, giving 

 resting places to the four Dhyani BuddhaS— Aksobhya, Ratha- 

 sambhava, Amitabha and Amoghasiddhi. The fifth, but the 

 first in order of merit, being supposed to reside at the very 

 centre of the stupa in the flagstaff which at the top held the 

 umbrellas ; but in one of the great stupas in India, the first 

 Dhyani Buddha has his niche located at the South-East. This 

 is at Svayambhu Stupa in Nepal. A stupa with five niches 

 would look like a tortoise with four legs and the head. There 

 is a small stupa of the kind in the Indian Museum. The wor 

 shippers of Dharma I believe associated the five-niched stupa 



