Sandalwood and Carrion: Smell in Indian Religion and Culture

345 Pages·2012·1.81 MB·English

by  James McHugh

Sandalwood and Carrion
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Sandalwood
and Carrion
Smell in Indian Religion and Culture
JAMES M c HUGH

1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
McHugh, James.
Sandalwood and carrion : smell in Indian religion and culture / James McHugh.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ).
ISBN 978-0-19-991630-6 (hardcover : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-19-991632-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)—
ISBN 978-0-19-991631-3 (ebook) 1. India—Religion. 2. Rites and ceremonies—India.
3. Smell—Religious aspects. 4. Smell. 5. Odors—India. I. Title.
BL2015.R48M34 2013
152.1′660954—dc23 2012003121
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
To my parents
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CONTENTS
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xvii
PART ONE SMELLS IN THEORY
1. Introduction
3
2. Earth, Wind, Foul and Fragrant: Th e Th eory of Smelling
and Odors in Early South Asia
20
PART TWO SMELLS IN THE WORLD
3. Lotus, Fish, and Cows: Th e Smellscape of Traditional South Asia
61
4. Flowers and Fish in the M ahābhārata
91
PART THREE SMELLS IN PRACTICE
5. Moon Juice and Uproar: Perfumery Texts
105
6. Allies, Enemies, and Y aks.a Mud: Perfumes 135
PART FOUR AROMATIC MATERIALS
7. Th e Incense Trees of the Land of Emeralds: Exotic Aromatics
in Medieval South Asia
159
8. Sandalwood: Merchants, Expertise, and Profi t
180
viii Contents
PART FIVE SMELL AND RELIGION
9. Bois des Îles
203
10. Th e Toilette of the Gods
218
Epilogue
244
Appendix : Sanskrit and Prakrit Texts on Perfume Blending and Perfumery 249
Notes 253
Bibliography 2 95
Index 3 13
PREFACE
Th is book is about smells, perfumes, and stinks. Of course, smelling requires
people (or animals, or, indeed, gods) to do the smelling and also odorous objects
such as fl owers, corpses, or elephants to smell. Cambridge Massachusetts, where
I started work on this book as a dissertation, smells rather dull for the most part:
produce is sold chilled and wrapped; feces and urine are whisked away into sealed
sewers; the people of Cambridge (generally) deodorize their bodies and wear little
if any fragrance; and on Valentine’s Day, the roses have no scent.
In premodern South Asia, as in premodern Europe and North America, the
situation was quite diff erent. People, rich and poor, lived in a world that was more
varied and pungent in terms of smell: cows roamed the streets; incense burned in
homes and temples; gardens were planted with fragrant fl owers; bodies were
adorned with garlands and scented pastes, and corpses burned on smoky pyres.
Not only was the environment more odorous, but also educated people appear to
have been far more interested in and articulate about smells than we are. A quick
reading of almost any literary text in Sanskrit will reveal a large number of elabo-
rate references to perfumes, fl owers, and even stinks; it would appear that the
ideal love life involved the complex use of aromatics; many religious texts abound
in olfactory imagery, and the rituals devised for honoring both gods and people
frequently use diverse fragrant substances.
How might one go about studying smells and perfumes for a whole subconti-
nent over a period of many centuries if not millennia? As a scholar of texts, I have
chosen to work on the written sources that survive and, given the enormous va-
riety of sources that deal with smell in one way or another, I have taken an inter-
disciplinary approach. Hence, I have used a wide range of Sanskrit texts, and I also
draw on the work of scholars of religion, history, material culture, anthropology,
and art history. Th is study is also comparative: I compare the Hindu, Buddhist,
and Jain religious traditions in respect to matters of smell,1 and in places I com-
pare South Asian discourses on smell with notable features of Western discourses
about the senses.
ix