Similarly the custom of pouring water on the
buried flesh of the Meriah was no doubt a rain-charm. Again, magical
power as an attribute of the Meriah appears in the sovereign virtue
believed to reside in anything that came from his person, as his
hair or spittle. The ascription of such power to the Meriah
indicates that he was much more than a mere man sacrificed to
propitiate a deity. Once more, the extreme reverence paid him points
to the same conclusion. Major Campbell speaks of the Meriah as
"being regarded as something more than mortal," and Major Macpherson
says, "A species of reverence, which it is not easy to distinguish
from adoration, is paid to him." In short, the Meriah seems to have
been regarded as divine. As such, he may originally have represented
the Earth Goddess or, perhaps, a deity of vegetation; though in
later times he came to be regarded rather as a victim offered to a
deity than as himself an incarnate god. This later view of the
Meriah as a victim rather than a divinity may perhaps have received
undue emphasis from the European writers who have described the
Khond religion.
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