Note 53 — K

When a child is born in a family, the entire family observes pollution for thirty days, during which entrance into a temple is forbidden. Among the Nāttar Kallans, children are said to be named at any time after they are a month old. But, among the Puramalai Kallans, a first-born female child is named on the seventh day, after the ear-boring ceremony has been performed. “All Kallans,” Mr. Francis writes,52 “put on sacred ashes, the usual mark of a Saivite, on festive occasions, but they are nevertheless generally Vaishnavites. The dead are usually buried, and it is said that, at funerals, cheroots are handed round, which those present smoke while the ceremony proceeds.” Some Kallans are said,53 when a death occurs in a family, to put a pot filled with dung or water, a broomstick, and a fire-brand at some place where three roads meet, or in front of the house, in order to prevent the ghost from returning.