Gunhi Punhi [47], Beginning of the Densest Festival Season

The four lunar fortnights starting with the last day of Gu(n)lathwa in August and ending with the last day of the elaborate autumn harvest festival, Mohani, on the tenth day of Kachalathwa (September/ October) contain thirty-one of the year's seventy-nine annual calendrical events, and thus constitute the year's densest season of such events. This is the quiet segment of the agricultural rice cycle. The rice planting has been completed at its beginning, and major harvesting will begin only at its end. The great farming segment of Bhaktapur's community has only routine maintenance work to do during this season, and is not fully engaged in the fields.

The full-moon day of Gu(n)lathwa, Gunhi (or, sometimes Guni)^[34] Punhi [47], is the time for a group of events m Bhaktapur. Two among them are of special interest. One of these is a variation of a pan-Hindu set of procedures customary on the day (Kane 1968-1977, vol. V, p. 127) that in Bhaktapur emphasizes the purification and rededication of Rajopadhyaya Brahmans. The other is the introduction of an annual carnival and festival of the dead, a festival that is specially elaborated in Bhaktapur. On the day before the full-moon day, that is, on the fourteenth day of the fortnight, Brahmans and some "orthodox" Chathariya shave their heads (as always, with the exception of the queue),^[35] and supervise the purification of their houses with cow dung. On the morning of the full-moon day the Chathariyas go to the river at Kware to

bathe and change their jona s, or sacred threads. Then, at a later time, all the Rajopadhyaya Brahman males who had their initiations as Brahmans go to the river at the same spot for a ritual bath. No one else is supposed to enter or cross the river when the Brahmans are in it. After bathing the Brahmans replace their jona s, while passages from the Vedas are being recited. They mark their foreheads with vertical and then horizontal triple parallel lines, and put small pieces of cow dung above their eyes, all of which is said to represent the Trisul and other symbols of Siva, and marks their vocation as Shaivite priests. The seven eldest Brahmans present represent the seven Rsis^[*] , and the other Brahmans pray to them and to their pitr^[*] s, their patrilineal ancestors, and make offerings. These proceedings are considered by the Brahmans as a reestablishment of their sacred authority through purification and rededication to the seven Rsis^[*] from one or another of whom all Brahmans claim descent.

There are also symbolic actions of exchange and solidarity at this time. Each Brahman brings with him many yellow threads and small cloth bags containing a mixture of dried white flowers and two kinds of seeds. These represent the household from which the Brahman, or most often a group of Brahmans, come. The threads and bags are put in the purified area in which the Rsi^[*]puja is to take place. Then, at the end of the puja , one of the Brahman leaders, fastens bags from all households on each of the Brahmans, tying them to their left wrists by means of the yellow threads. Then each Brahman takes threads and bags from his household, and ties one in turn onto the wrists of each of the other Brahmans.^[36]

There are a miscellany of other customary activities during the day of Gunhi Punhi. Many people from Bhaktapur, including Hindus, go to the important valley Buddhist religious center, the great stupa Svayambhunatha, on this day. There are special ceremonies among farmers in Bhaktapur, including the worship of frogs (whom farmers inadvertently kill while working in the fields), who help protect those fields from malevolent spirits. On this day people traditionally eat a kind of soup prepared from nine varieties of beans, which is said to protect them from intestinal ailments.

On the late afternoon of the day there is an event that acts as a preamble to the focal festival, which will begin the following day. On the night of Gunhi Punhi there is a minor procession that is supported by funds from the Guthi Samsthan, the Central Government Committee which now provides the centralized and bureaucratically controlled

support of many cultural events. The participants, who receive funds from the committee for their costume and incidental expenses, are members of one of the Jyapu thar s, from a group of families living near Laeku Square. Some six or eight men from these families, wearing traditional Jyapu costumes and taking the roles of both men and women, perform traditional farmers' dances accompanied by thar musicians. This small group dances around the pradaksinapatha^[*] in the late afternoon. Masses of people go to watch them. The procession is a preamble to the events of the next day, when similar but greatly more elaborate dances are elements in that day's festival. (Moderate.)