Book
Review


Nityasumangali:
Devadasi
Tradition in
South India

by Saskia C Kersenboom - Story

Published by Motilal Banarsidas, Delhi, 1987.


Reviewed by
Amrit Srinivasan


The author approaches the controversial devadasi or dancing girl tradition of south India with a rare combination of sensitivity, humility and scholarly ability, which makes this book very interesting indeed. A quality enhanced by the 'perilous' task it sets itself, the symbolic recovery of the devadasi system freed from the unfair charge of 'sacred prostitution', which came to be levelled against it during the colonial period. Focusing on the indigenous concept of nityasumangali or 'ever-auspicious female', the author examines the inner logic of the devadasi's identity both in life and in art. A true understanding of the devadasi, she is convinced, must be sought in the Hindu cultural and ritual view of the world as a 'sacred play' of which the living, functioning temple 'drama' was an inextricable part. It was the disintegration of this cosmology under the changed political conditions of modern times which, according to her, led to the simultaneous disintegration of the devadasi system. The individual destiny of the devadasi became now
a mirror for the more general 'decay' of Hindu tradition which was unable to reformulate itself to the needs of a new socio cultural order.

The reform movements aimed at the abolition of the devadasi institution arose in the Victorian colonial context of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, in reaction against what was seen as an impermissible combination of domestic and monastic codes in the devadasi's personal lifestyle.Traditionally, following her dedication, to a life in service to god, the devadasi was nevertheless permitted to pursue economic, aesthetic, sexual and familial activities of the world, in a perfectly open and legitimate manner. She thus highlighted what for the reformists appeared as the degenerate aspects of Hinduism which had to be thrown out if India was to achieve both political and spiritual freedom from the West. In their eagerness, however, to do away with the institution of 'temple dedication and convert the devadasi into a 'respectable housewife', the reformists ignored the fact that it was these very unusual and apparently
contradictory moral codes of the devadasi which had contributed to the 'auspiciousness' excellence and professionalism of her art, the ancient temple dance of bhakti Hinduism, precursor of the modern Bharata Natyam.

Rejecting a more usual kind of historical analysis, Kersenboom-Story pursues both field and textual research in order to reconstruct the cultural meaning of the devadasi which preceded her specific appearance in the temples of Tamil Nadu. In this unique 'semiological' approach, the devadasi comes to serve as a 'sign', signifying the mythical, ritual and aesthetic element residing in the collective consciousness of Hinduism irrespective of time and space. Thus although the banishment of the devadasis from the sacred and secular spheres of Tamil society in the early twentieth century certainly provides the study with its raison de'etre, it does not constitute its primary intellectual focus which is essentially atemporal and universal. Dividing south Indian history into three broad periods, the classical and late classical
period of Tamil culture (100 BC - 600 AD, medieval Hinduism (6oo AD -1600 AD), and the culture of the Tanjore courts and subsequent developments (1600 AD - 1947 AD), the author examines literary, inscriptional, epigraphical and field evidence to arrive at certain fundamental conclusions:

,... we can distinguish at all times and at all levels of culture and of society, a 'ritual' person who deals effectively with the divine which is considered dangerously ambivalent. This female ritualist whom we would like to call nityasumangali renders her special power effective in three ways: i) through her female sexuality that is identified with that of the goddess; ii) through a number of implements of ritual value like the pot, the lamp coloured water, certain flowers, fruits and unguents; iii) through her art.

At different times and in different sociocultural foci of south Indian culture a different emphasis has been laid on either of the three. In all cases, however, she deals with the ambivalent divine,
warding off its evil forces and supporting its benign workings. This in itself is an extremely dangerous task and only specially qualified persons can be up to it. Her special qualification is her "auspiciousness" which earns her the epithet nityasumangali' (page 67).

Any examination of the diachronic modifications within the devadasi system, the author reiterates, must intersect with an examination of its synchronic occurrence wherein expressions of the 'concept' of devadasi are manifested differently in the various socio cultural foci. Thus the 'village' or oral tradition the agamic or temple tradition and the court/patron tradition are to be found inextricably bound with the nityasumangali all through her history but with important modifications in their interrelations with one another. In the 'bardic' universe of the earliest Tamil period, the devadasi's precursors had been responsible for maintaining a balance of sacred power which revolved around the king: one manifested in the public or military life, puram, and the other in his private or erotic life, akam.
In time this milieu of heroism and love gave way to a vibrant anthropomorphic religiosity in conscious reaction against the heterodoxies of Buddhism and Jainism which had made their impact in the Tamil region by the fifth centurv AD. The divine, formerly represented by a local chieftain or king, now found new shape in a variety of gods, each associated with the sacredness of a specific locality. The Tamil country soon became dotted with temples in which the deity ruled with his 'sacred court', of which the devadasi was an integral component.

The consolidation of the temple institution in the period following the ninth century AD went hand in hand with vigorous political and cultural revitalisation and the devadasi participated in the latter through an increasingly sophisticated aesthetic repertoire. Her aesthetic excellence secured for her secular and temple patronage and gave, her the self respect and livelihood she required, without which she sank to the level of a mere ritual specialist who could be exploited by the local gentry at will.
Focusing with fascinating detail on firsthand accounts of the temple rituals, both daily and during festivals, to which the devadasi had contributed till her removal from the shrine's sacred precincts, the author examines how she combined the bard, the courtesan and the, ritualist in her person to become the embodiment of bhakti or devotional heroism. Capturing the discipline both of her art and unusual lifestyle, the author also examines the rites of passage which transformed an 'ordinary' girl into a devadasi exhibiting the lakshana or 'diagnostic features' of' a nityasumanigail', 'married' both to god and her vocation.

Despite the study's board compass, Kersenboom-Story has charted a rigorious methodological course involving a deep immersion in Tamil society, its myths, mores an customs. The single most significant aspect of this learning process has been her training in the very art practised by the devadasi. As a serious practitioner of the Bharata Natyam, the author has received formal instruction from the devadasis and their gurus since
1975, the fateful year when, as she candidly confesses, she first came under the spell of the 'dramatic force' of Hinduism and its spiritual and aesthetic power at a Tiruvarur temple festival. And thus began a process of discovery which achieves sophisticated, scholarly representation in this book. Strongly recommended for anyone, layman and academic alike, interested in the cultural and textual context of the south Indian temple institution and the aesthetic contributions made by it under the innovative influence of bhakti devotionalism.
In: the India magazine of her people and culture. April 1989, Vol 9, No. 5