Note 565 — Chapter V

Vinatâ is also the name of a disease of women; and, as far as we can judge from the passage of the Mahâbhâratam (iii. 14,480), which refers to it, it is the malignant genius who destroys the fœtus in the womb of the pregnant mother. He is defined as çakunigrâhî, properly the seizer of the bird. Kaçyapas, the universal phallos, the Praǵâpatis, certainly unites himself to Vinatâ in the form of a phallos-bird, as to Kadrû in that of a phallos-serpent.