Jatayu
A virtuous vulture in the Ramayana, the
earlier of the two great Indian epics.
When Rama’swife Sitais kidnapped by
the demon-king Ravanaand is being
spirited away in Ravana’s aerial chariot,
Jatayu makes a valiant effort to rescue
her. In his battle with Ravana, Jatayu’s
wings are cut off; the force of his subse-
quent fall left him near death. With his
dying breaths he informs Rama and
Rama’s brother Lakshmanaof what has
happened, and identifies Ravana as
Sita’s kidnapper. Although Jatayu fails to
rescue Sita, he is critical to the plot of the
epic because he gives Rama the crucial
information he needs to begin to
searching for her.
Jati
(“birth”) A traditional social subgroup in
Indian society. There were hundreds of
these groups, considered exogamous
because strict taboos existed against
marrying outside one’s jati—people
belonging to different jatis were looked
upon as different “species” of people.
Jatis were usually defined by the sub-
group’s traditional occupation, which
they and they alone had the right to
practice. The jatis were hierarchically
arranged in society, based on the per-
ceived purityor impurity (ashaucha) of
their occupations, and this hierarchy
formed the basis for the traditional
Hindu social structure known as the
castesystem.Jatra
Vernacular form of the Sanskritword
yatra (“journey”). The word yatra is
most often used to describe journeys to
far-away places, whereas jatra is used to
denote visits to spots within the imme-
diate region.JatraAn ascetic in Haridwar with his hair in matted locks (jata).
This hairstyle marks the wearer as a person who is detached from worldly concerns.