Note 1 — TABLE OF CONTENTS.

Besides the higher-grade deities, whose worship is enjoined and treated of in the Shāstras and Purānas, numerous other minor deities, none of whom however find a place in the Scriptures, are worshipped by the lower classes. The principle underlying the whole fabric of the worship of these minor deities, who for the most part are the spirits of dead ancestors or heroes, has more in it of fear for their power of harming than of love for their divine nature. All untoward occurrences in domestic affairs, all bodily ailments and unusual natural phenomena, inexplicable to the simple mind of the villager, are attributed to the malignant action of these nameless and numerous spirits, hovering over and haunting the habitations of men.1 The latent dread of receiving injuries from these evil spirits results in the worship by the low-class people of a number of devas and mātās, as they are called. The poor villager, surrounded on all sides by hosts of hovering spirits, ready to take offence, or even to possess him, on the smallest pretext, requires some tangible protector to save him from such malign influences.1 He sets up and enshrines the spirit that he believes to have been beneficent to him, and so deserving of worship, and makes vows in its honour, often becoming himself the officiating priest. Each such deity has its own particular thānak (sthāna) or locality. Thus there is hardly a village which has not a particular deity of its own. But in addition to this deity, others in far off villages are generally held in high esteem.1