she dwells in the forest alone, but in dual form. In this form she has been worshipped by Tamils for many centuries as Māriamman of smallpox.
Not only the smallpox deity but other deities as well receive massive support in Madras. One of these is the Catholic Veḷḷāṅkanni (“the White Virgin” or “Virgin of the Tide”), who is famed for her healing and other boon-granting powers. Near the Veḷḷāṅkanni temple, a Vaishnava temple has been built to Lakshmi. Visitors to one temple may also stop at the other; there is evidently no rivalry between them.
Each of these large temples seems geared to urban, middle-class tastes. Māriamman is portrayed in posters sold at the Tiruvērkāḍu temple as a smiling, doll-faced, pink-skinned lady, despite the lion she rides on and the adjective karu, “black,” prefixed to her name. In the smaller temples and in the villages, however, the angry demeanor of Māriamman remains unhidden.
The blackness of Māriamman represents not only her anger but also her fertility. Often in pictures she is colored green. Her greenness is complementary to the redness of her male partner, the great deity Siva, whose name in Tamil means red, beautiful, and auspicious. Among Tamils, who are mostly dark brown, a light-skinned person is described as red. By the same token, the greenness of Māriamman represents her darkness. Green and black, the colors of vegetation, are the colors of Māriamman. Red and white, the colors of animal life, are the colors of Siva. Paradoxically, animal sacrifices are offered only to Māriamman, never to Siva. Siva’s whiteness also symbolizes his purity, the purity of fire; Māriamman’s darkness symbolizes the fruitfulness of water.
One of the most important attributes of Māriamman in India is her possession of many forms and many names. Thus the temple at Tiruvērkāḍu is decked with dozens of large paintings portraying the multiple forms of Māriamman, and the newly built Vaishnava temple is called the Ashtalakshmi temple, the temple of eight Lakshmis, each of which is given an equal place in the temple, like the many paintings of Māriamman in the Tiruvērkāḍu temple, and unlike the hierarchical arrangement of deities associated with the temples to the male gods. The multiplicity of Māriamman suggests not only that she embodies the changing nature of all life but also that she is found in all women, and that all women are equal.
Interview I: How She Became a Priestess
I was born in Mylapore.7 My age is thirty-eight. At sixteen I was married. I have two younger brothers, one younger sister, and I am one. I am the oldest.8 The oldest in the family is me. My name is Sarasvati.9
My father had a big business, a store. You know toddy? Liquor. That trade.10 That is gone. Afterward, the Hindu [newspaper] office, he worked in the Hindu office. He is retired.11 He retired in sixty-seven.12 Now he is just in the house. Two years have passed since Mother died. Two years have passed. Now there is only father.
From a small age, from the age of eight, I had devotion to the gods. Often I would eat only once a day. In the person of the mother I had much desire. In the person of the mother only. Murugan and the mother I liked very much.13 Often in the house I would fast. Friday and Tuesday I would go to the temple without fail. In Mylapore, the Kaṯpakambāḷ temple, the Muṇḍakkanniyamman temple, the Kaṯpakavalli temple, I would go there. After marriage, in Maṇḍaveḷi the Piḷḷaiyār temple. Every Friday I would put oil there, circle the temple and return. I did nothing else. In my sixteenth year. From the tenth year, some difficulty came to us. Then Kumāri Kamalā, the cinema actress—have you seen Kumāri Kamalā? She dances Bharat Natyam. In her house, our husband worked for her, as a driver.14 He was working as a driver, and my father had no work; it was very difficult. After that, the two of us, we followed our desire and got married. In my sixteenth year, as soon as I came of age, in my sixteenth year, the marriage took place.15 That happened, and in fifty-three Rukmaṇi was born. In fifty-three, May twenty-sixth. After she was born, the next one in fifty-six, this one, Vasanti, was born.
I had much devotion, I had very much devotion to the gods. Nevertheless, I thought that the mother was only in the temple. If she came into someone’s person (possessed someone) I had no belief in that. If some shaman beat a drum and danced and all that, I did not like that, I had no belief in that at all. I would come up to them and tell them. If someone becomes possessed by a god, they are pretending, it is not a real god.16 If I heard the sound of a drum and saw them dancing like this, I would wave my head and make fun of them.
In sixty-four, nine years ago, eleven years ago, we went to my father-in-law’s house to shave the heads of all the children.17 Thinking that we should go to that place and worship Māriamman, make an offering to Māriamman and worship Māriamman, he took us to that town. When we went, then too I was fasting. But I did not think that the god would come into my person. Then the priest of that town decorated the image of the mother and called her, trying to make her come into someone’s person.18 She did not come. She did not come upon anyone’s person. I thought, “O Mother, who are you? Are you a god? If you are a real god, you have to come into anybody’s, somebody’s person.” So saying, we prayed. When we prayed, in my family she came upon my person only. When she came, no one believed. Everyone said it was a demon that was in my person. Not a god. Everyone said there was a demon in my person, there was no god in my person, they said.19 Then the mother said, “If you want to know whether I am a demon or a god, put fire in my hand and see. If I am a god, I will carry that fire.”
Thus speaking, I held that fire, and put it on my head.20 Then they said it was a god. Everyone believed. From then on, for this many years, if anyone had a demon, or if there was a sickness in the body, or if they were without children, for everybody she would cure it.
After that, ten children were born to me. Six girls, four boys were born. After Māriamman came, five children were born. When Māriamman came into my person, she said, “For five more years only you will have a married life. You may be with your husband. For this long, children will be born. If you have more than five [more] children, I will have no more connection with you. In the family, without a single desire or attachment to your husband or children, I myself will come to your house, I myself will suddenly come. To you I will give in this way my tangled hair and my appearance and all.”
That is what that mother said. I must not cook in the family. I must not serve meals to a group of people. I must not go to a wedding. If anyone dies, I must not go to that. My whole body will catch fire and burn. After that, however we want to be, that way we will be. I do not put on wet [ritually pure] clothes, I have no Sanskrit Veda, I have no learning.21 I do not know what that mother’s history is. I do not know. But she, for everybody, whatever history they want her to tell, whatever cure or atonement they want her to give, whoever has whatever disease of the body, for all of that she will make a way.
[Interviewer asks if she remembers afterward what occurs during the state of possession.]
There is no recollection. If that mother comes, and after an hour says, “Will you ask anything?”—that I know. But when words are said, they come to me only in the form of feeling. I know that we say these words, but afterward, how we say them, how it happens, that I do not know. The feeling of it comes.22 The feeling comes, when she ways, “I will protect you,” that feeling comes to me.23 Then the thought comes to me, “We spoke this way—will it be true?” But it will be true.
In dreams she will come directly. She has come countless times. Just the day before yesterday she came. That temple must be built. It is this kind of very small place. Everyone brought stones and cement. I was thinking, “By means of whom will this be carried out for me?” The place you are in now, can it be like this, without convenience for the people who come and go? Then she came, wearing a white sari, making a lap like this she was seated, holding a pot.
She said, “This
