FOLK DANCES Folk dances (des'i, i.e., "countrified") still are and no doubt have always been found all over India; among agriculturists and in primitive tribes everything is celebrated and solemnized with the dance. It should be observed that, as Col. Hodson has re marked, primitive culture is the matrix of the higher ; thus the folk dances have not only an interest of their own, but also they provide the material from which the dances of the aristocracy and of the higher ritual are derived. Indeed, there are many folk dances which make their appearance in the most artistically sophisticated spheres as dances de divertissement. Before refer ring to these, however, we shall discuss the dances of the people in their original environment.
There are, for example, courtship dances among the Santals. On full moon nights the drum is sounded and the girls assemble under a big banyan tree, their dresses decorated with flowers in spring, with feathers in winter. Meanwhile the young men with a banner and musical instruments gather in the rice-fields beyond. The girls do not seem to see them, but are chattering together and completing their toilet. Then the banner and drum come forward; the young men approach the girls, who stand in a row, linked in pairs, arm in arm. The girls sway to and fro with the music, bending and rising; they advance and retire, but never actually mix with the young men. It is only after the dancing that young men and women have any opportunity to meet and court. The Santals have also their decorative dances de diver tissement; for example, "the gathering of indigo," and "the quar relling of co-wives." In Bengal there is a women's ritual dance, never seen by men, the drummer remaining behind a curtain. This takes place during the Indra-piija festival on full moon nights. The women dance and sing erotic songs and in the morning they go down to the river and bathe.
A kind of dancing especially characteristic of southern India and Ceylon is the so-called devil dance (Yakkun netuma). This is a violent male dance, thus of tandava character. Used pri marily as a means of exorcism, it is performed in cases of sick ness. The possessing yakkas, regarded as demons causing disease, are first invited by beat of drum to attend the performance; afterwards, having been thus entertained, they are asked to take their departure.
The Nongkrem dance, one of the greatest festivals in the Khasi hills, is an essential part of the goat sacrifice performed by the Siem of Nongkrem : "the sacrifice is followed by twenty-two men armed with swords and cowries (fly-flaps). Having danced be fore the altar, the party returns to the house of the Siem priestess and executes another dance in the great courtyard. . . . Then follows a great dance of girls and men in front of her house . . . then there is the dance of the men. . . . After gyrating for some time two men at a time rapidly approach one another and clash their swords together in mock combat. . . . Dancing forms part of the ceremony of placing the ashes in the sepulchre of the clan." With the last feature may be compared the honouring of the body of the Buddha before the cremation, with song, dance and music, as mentioned in the Mahaparinibbiii.ia Sutta.
Primitive dances are often symbolical enactments of events which the people desire to be successfully accomplished. "The Bhils danced at their festivals and before battles. . . . The object was to obtain success in battle by going through an imitation of a successful battle beforehand. . . . The Sola dance of Gonds and Baigas in which they perform the figure of the grand chain of the lancers, only that they strike their sticks together instead of clasping hands as they pass, was probably once an imitation of a combat. It is still sometimes danced before their communal and hunting parties." Among the Angami Nagas, "Dancing, singing . . . go hand in hand with ceremonial dress . . . the songs sung include both particular songs traditionally associated with the occasion, and sometimes in archaic language not fully understood except by those skilled in them" or a highly developed sign language (Col. Hodson, Primitive Culture of India).
It is by no means unusual to meet with the folk dances in the environment of the higher culture. The Sangitp Ratnakara, an authoritative work on music and dramatics, enumerates o vari eties. The Tamil Silappadigaram enumerates 14 dances of which the majority are for use at the Indra Puja festival, and of these several, such as Kottavai's dance with a rice measure, are of folk character. We also meet with these folk dances on the classical stage; as in the Karpfiramaiijari of Rajaiekhara we have a circular dance performed by girls, another in which the dancers face each other in two rows, and also the stave dance (danda rasa) referred to above. This danda rasa, in which the dancers hold short staves in each hand, striking them against those of the neighbouring dancer alternately to right and left, is also fre quently depicted in decorative temple sculpture (fig. 6). The rasa-mandala and other dances of Krsria with the milkmaids of Brndaban are of folk character, being constantly represented in paintings of the Rajput school, and are typically circular dances in which the figure of Krgia is multiplied. Not infrequently Krspa and Radha, occupy the centre of the field, whirling round with feet together and leaning apart with hands clasped at full arm's length.
Folk dances: T. Callaway Yakkun Nattanawa and Kolan Nat tanawa 0829) ; H. Parker, Ancient Ceylon (19o9) ; A. H. Fox Strangways, Music of Hindustan (1914) ; W. Ridgway, Dramas and Dramatic Dances of Non-European Races (1915); H. Whitehead, Village Deities of Southern India (1916) ; T. C. Hodson, Primitive Culture of India (1922) ; K. N. Sitaram, Dancing among the Tamils, Hindustan Review (1925).
Indian Sources: S. K. Sastri, Cat. Sanskrit Mss. Govt. Oriental Manuscripts Library, Madras, vol. xxii. (1918) ; Balabharatam (see A. S. R. Ayyar, in Shama'a [July, 1924] ; Bharatiya Neitya-s'astra ("Baroda Sanskrit" series) Samgitaratnakara ("Anandasrama" se ries) ,• NandikeSyara, Abhinaya-darpanam (translation above—Mir ror of Gesture); Silapadigaram, ed. Swaminatha Ayar. (A. K. C.)