Tiger King
Bodo · deity · mythic / agricultural cycle · Recorded classification
Bura Bagh Raja, the 'old tiger king', is counted by Endle and later ethnographers among the prominent household deities of the Bodos, alongside Bathoubwrai, Mainao and Song Raja. As monarch of the woods he presides over tigers and the wild fauna of the jungle bordering Bodo villages, and is propitiated so that the tiger may spare people and cattle. His cult belongs to a broad family of tiger-god veneration across the peoples of the Brahmaputra valley and central India, but among the Bodos he is an individuated, regularly named recipient of household worship.
Domains
- forest
- tigers
Powers
- to command the tigers and wild beasts of the forest
Epithets
- Bura Bagh RajaKameswar Brahma, A Study of Socio-Religious Beliefs, Practices and Ceremonies of the Bodos, Calcutta: Punthi Pustak, 1992. (secondary)
Relations
- subordinate to: Bathou BwraiBura Bagh Raja is worshipped as one of the household divinities ranged beneath the supreme god Bathoubwrai in the Bathou pantheon.Sekhar Brahma, Religion of the Boros and Their Socio-Cultural Transition: A Phenomenological Approach, Guwahati: DVS Publishers, 2006. (secondary)
Sources
- Bura Bagh Raja, the 'old tiger king' and monarch of the woods, is a prominent Bodo household deity propitiated for protection from tigers and the dangers of the jungle.: Sidney Endle, The Kacharis, London: Macmillan, 1911. (secondary); Kameswar Brahma, A Study of Socio-Religious Beliefs, Practices and Ceremonies of the Bodos, Calcutta: Punthi Pustak, 1992. (secondary)