190 The “ Kols”’ of Chota-Nagpore. 
Nagpore, and amongst the Sonthals ‘passim.’ Marang Booroo and 
Pongla his wife; Desaoolli, Jaer Boori, Hekin Bonga, Boora Bonga, 
Charee Desoolli and Dara are invoked in Chota-Nagpore. 
The Sonthals have Marang Booroo, also Maniko his brother and 
Jaer his sister. ickell’s paper in Vol. IX, part 2nd of this Journal 
gives the Singbhoom gods and their attributes. They too have 
Marang Booroo and Pongala, Desaoolli and Jaer Boori or Jaer Hra 
and others. In cases of sickness the Ho, after ascertaining by augury 
which of the gods should be propitiated, will go on offering sacrifices 
till the patient recovers or his live stock is entirely exhausted. 
Next to Singbonga I am inclined to place the deity that is adored 
s “‘ Marang Booroo.” Booroo means mountain, but every mountain 
has its spirit, and the word is therefore used to mean god or spirit* 
also. Marang Booroo is the great spirit or great mountain. Not far 
from the village of Lodmah in Chota-Nagpore one of the most 
conspicuous hills on the plateau is called Marang Booroo, and here 
the great spirit is supposed to dwell. It is worshipped by the 
Sonthals, the Bhoomij, the Hos, the Moondahs and the Oraons. The 
two latter make pilgrimages to it. The Hos have some vague notion 
of its situation; the more distant members of the family canonize 
some hill more conveniently situated. 
The Marang Booroo is especially venerated as the lord of rain. 
Before the rains the women go to the top of the hill, under the 
Jeadership of the wives of the Pahans, with drums, which are on this 
occasion only played on by young ladies, and with offerings of milk 
and leaves of the Bel tree. On the top of the hill there is a flat mass 
of rock on which they deposit their offerings. 
The wives of the Pahans now kneel down, and with hair noxentel 
invoke the deity, beseeching him to give their crops seasonable rain. 
They shake their heads violently as they reiterate this prayer, till they 
work themselves into a phrensy, and the movement becomes involuntary. 
They go on thus wildly gesticulating, till a “little cloud like a man’s 
hand” is seen. Then they arise, take up the drums, and dance the 
Kurrun on the rock, till Marang Booroo’s response to their prayer is 
heard in the distant rumbling of thunder, and they go home rejoicing. 
. * Thus they have for their altars groves and high places like the idolatrous 
EWS. 
