Dakṣiṇa Kaparda-The Identity of Vasiṣṭhas
By: Rupa Bhaty
Tags: Hairstyle, Culture, Tradition, Modernhumanbehavior, Rigveda

A short note on how ancient people identified each other.

Recently, I was deep into anthropological studies to understand the behavior of Modern Man in Indian Subcontinent. We see that different tribes of the world have different cultures of their looks too apart from their other behavior. One of the behavior of modern humans is to look different from the other flock people. When did this thought arrive to look different? Why there was a need to look different? And how a very similar type of tuft hairdo behavior became common in Asian subclades who moved to Europe (Germany-Suebian knot, Russia-Khokhol), Africa (Fulani, Himba etc), South-East Asia, some part of China (Manchuria-A queue or cue hairstyle) and Japan (Chonmage) etc. Interestingly, southern Chinese used to call Manchurians suotou “braided”. Braiding indeed gave typical identity very similar to Nair men and women in the past in India or the Brahmins with the tuft. This appears to be a worldwide phenomena, but how old we don’t know. Indeed, its a modern human behavior.

Here ‘Modern Human Behavior’ is not just a statement. Modern behavior (internationaly) includes and emerge from Middle to Upper Paleolithic period. They include…

Burial

Fishing

Figurative art (Cave paintings, petroglyphs, dendroglyphs, figurine)

Systematic use of pigment (such as ochre) and jewelry for decoration or self ornamentations

Using bone material for tools

Transport of resources over long distances

Blade technology

Diversity, standardization, and regionally distinct artifacts

Hearths

Composite tools

What about the cultures, architecture attesting these Modern behavior? One who wants to understand the modern behavior in detail can read a brief here. In Indian perspective the most modern behavior, advanced w.r.t any other culture of the world, happened at least during 45,000 yBP. One can read about Riwat at Sohan River Valley. This site, called Riwat Site 55, shows a later occupation dated to around 45,000 years ago, during Upper Paleolithic periodic Site. This shows the footing of the wall very clearly. It also shows that people were communicating and had language since to advance into such an art one needs to communicate. Homo sapiens during Middle to Upper Paleolithic period were communicating since they were advancing in the art and architecture and were trading in stone tools.

Riwat at Soan Valley, now Pakistan, Rendell et al.

The interesting feature of this site is due to the architectural wall evidence. The modern human behaviors can be seen very distinctly on this site which has its own Soanian Culture (500,000 yBP — 125,000 yBP), Indian contemporary to Acheulean, predecessor to Upper and Middle Paleolithic. Deem it as a prologue to the database on healthy and huge arguments to be followed in the future.

Finally back to the title of the article. Dakṣiṇa Kaparda-The Identity of Vasiṣṭhas

Kaparda means, ‘braid,’ Kapardin, ‘wearing braids.’ These words refer to the Vedic custom of wearing the hair in braids or plaits. Fimales used to have four plated hair known as catuṣ-kapardā and is described in Rv. x. 114, 3.

चतु॑ष्कपर्दा युव॒तिः सु॒पेशा॑ घृ॒तप्र॑तीका व॒युना॑नि वस्ते । तस्यां॑ सुप॒र्णा वृष॑णा॒ नि षे॑दतु॒र्यत्र॑ दे॒वा द॑धि॒रे भा॑ग॒धेय॑म् ॥

catu॑ṣkapardā yuva॒tiḥ su॒peśā॑ ghṛ॒tapra॑tīkā va॒yunā॑ni vaste । tasyāṃ॑ supa॒rṇā vṛṣa॑ṇā॒ ni ṣe॑datu॒ryatra॑ de॒vā da॑dhi॒re bhā॑ga॒dheya॑m ॥

Rudra and Pūṣan have also been described as wearing distinct hairstyle.

Vasiṣṭhas were distinguished by wearing their hair in a plait on the right (dakṣiṇatas-kaparda). The opposite was to wear one’s hair ‘plain’ known as pulasti probably like the contemporary tuft being kept by the Brahmins. Below is the picture of Himba from the collection of Anneliese Scherz, 1940. I am showing a close resemblance to what Kaparda of Vasiṣṭhas would look like.

Himba boy

Such braiding is also found on Khonsu’s head, the Lunar God who was Tutankhamun’s brother.

Khonsu, the Lunar God

I deliberately started the article with the Upper Paleolithic Culture and with the description of 45,000~65,000 year old footing of a wall in Riwat which was on one of the tributaries of Rg vedic river on Saraswati — Sindhu site, out of twenty-one river system mentioned in Rg veda, known as Sushoma. Today we call the river as Soan- Sohan. Since I have a conjecture that the Rg veda is much older than previously thought (one can read my blogs here), much of the movement was happening to and fro from the Soan sites towards east and west, and also towards south. The similitude and the influence of vedic kind of braiding is quite visible, both in the west towards Africa, in the east till Japan and in Eurasia as well.

Our Vasiṣṭha Gotra brāhmins didn’t wear such braid even in the recent past during the 18th century, and we don’t have any pictorial or sketch information, neither we have such memory documented. This information embedded in the Rg veda appears to be an ancient one. But we do see slightly similar hairdo by the Vellalas-Pillai, Nair men and women both, yet not in braids and plaits.