en
the Panwar Rajputs of the Waringanga Valley join in the sacrifice
and will allow the impure caste of Mahars to enter their houses and
eat of this sacrifice with them, though at other times the entry of
a Mahar would defile a Panwar's house. [217] The pig is sacrificed
either as the animal which now mainly injures the crops or because
it was the principal sacrificial animal of the non-Aryan tribes,
or from a combination of both reasons. Probably it may be regarded
as the corn-spirit because pigs are sacrificed to Bhanisasur or the
buffalo demon for the protection of the crops.

87. The king.

When the community reached the national or agricultural stage some
central executive authority became necessary for its preservation. This
authority usually fell into the hands of the priest who performed
the sacrifice, and he became a king. Since the priest killed the
sacrificial animal in which the common life of the community was
held to be centred, it was thought that the life passed to him and
centred in his person. For the idea of the extinction of life was not
properly understood, and the life of a human being or animal might
pass by contact, according to primitive ideas, to the person or even
the weapon which killed it, just as it could pass by assimilation
to those who ate the flesh. In most of the city-states of Greece
and Italy the primary function of the kings was the performance of
the communal or national sacrifices. Through this act they obtained
political power as representing the common life of the people, and
its performance was sometimes left to them after their political
power had been taken away. [218] After the expulsion of the kings
from Rome the duty of performing the city sacrifices devolved on
the consuls. In India also the kings performed sacrifices. When a
king desired to be paramount over his neighbours he sent a horse to
march through their territories. If it passed through them without
being captured they became subordinate to the king who owned the
horse. Finally the horse was sacrificed at the Ashva-medha, the
king paramount making the sacrifice, while the other kings performed
subordinate parts at it. [219] Similarly the Raja of Nagpur killed
the sacrificial buffalo at the Dasahra festival. But the common life
of the people was sometimes conveyed from the domestic animal to the
king by other methods than the performance of a sacrifice. The king
of Unyoro in Africa might never eat vegetab