WORSHIPPING A SACRED TOOTH.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3437, 17 March 1920, Page 5

WORSHIPPING A SACRED TOOTH.

At Kandy, in Ceylon, is kept the Buddhafs tooth, which is -the object of the unbounded reverence of more‘ than 400,000,000 people. When this holy molar was brought: to Ceylon in the sixteenth century {Kandy was only a mountain village. Now thousands of pilgrims go every year to the gorgeous temple where‘ the tooth reposes, bringing gifts of every kind, gold and silver ornaments, coins, jewels, and even fruit and flowers. The Kings of Burma and Siam send ‘annual contributions toWards the support of this temple that holds the sacred relic, which has a. rather strange history. It is said to hate been the left eye~ tooth of Buddha, and to have been taken from his ashes 2500 years ago. For centuries it was the marriage dower going with certain favoured. princes. _ . ,

In the fourth century after Christ it was taken from India, then the Malabars secured it. It. was afterwards captured by the Portuguese, who took it to Goa, where it was bufnedv in 1560 by the ‘Archbishop in the presence of the Viceroy of India. _

But a spurious tooth had to be provided to effect an international marriage, and the molar of a wild boat or ape was used. Its dimensions show that it could not be a man’s, for it is 2in. long and lin. in diameter. On important occasions it is displayed, but only at a distance. It is sometimes carried in processions on the back of an elephant‘, but while in the temple it reposes on a massive silver table, encrusted_With gems and‘ festooned with jewelled chains».