What does the rite need, and who brings it?
Samagri is the word for the materials a rite needs, taken together. For the ancestral rites the list is short, and each thing on it has a job. This page says what each is for, in one place, and who brings it.
सामग्रीsamagri
the materials a rite needs, taken together
Table of contents
Section I
What is samagri?
The materials a rite needs, taken together. सामग्री samagri is the word for them, and it covers everything the priest lays out before he begins. Every rite has its samagri, and for the ancestral rites the list is short. Water, sesame, grass and rice, in the main, with ghee for the rice offering.
The word covers the things, not the amounts. How much of each is used is the priest’s business, and it differs from one place to the next.
Section II
What is each thing for?
Water for the offering itself, til to mark it as the ancestors’, darbha to set it on, rice for the pinda, and akshat given from the hand.
Water has more than one job. It is offered for the hands of the ancestors who are invoked, it is given in welcome, and it is poured from the hands. अर्घ्य arghya is the offering of water made in welcome. तर्पण tarpan is the offering of water to the ancestors, poured from the hands, and the tarpan page says how it is poured.
तिल til is sesame seed, and in the rite the black seed. It goes into the water poured in tarpan and into the pinda. In the offering to the ancestors til is used in place of barley. Water with til in it has its own word, तिलोदक tilodak.
दर्भ darbha is a stiff grass, also called kusha, and it is used all through the rite. The priest wears a ring of it on his finger, the offerings are set down on it, and it is held in the hand while the water is poured.
Rice is cooked and pressed by hand into the पिण्ड pinda. A pinda is the ball offered to one named ancestor, with til and ghee in it. The Garuda Purana has boiled rice soaked with ghee offered to the ancestors. The pind daan page carries the offering.
अक्षत akshat is rice too, but whole and unbroken, and it is not cooked. It is set out with the offerings and given from the hand at points through the rite.
Section III
Who brings the samagri?
The priest. By custom the priest arranges the samagri and lays it out where he performs, before the rite begins. A family that is present brings what he asks for, and what he asks for differs between tirthas and between priests. A family that is not present sends nothing and buys nothing, because the priest lays out the materials where he performs. At Ramkund the rites are performed through the year.
What the family gives the priest is not material at all. गोत्र gotra is the family line passed down from father to son. The family gives him that, the names of the departed the rite is for, and how each of them was related to the person in whose name the offering is made. If the family knows the तिथि tithi of the death, it gives him that too. A tithi is a day of the lunar calendar. The page on shraddh from abroad says how a family that cannot be present gives him those.
Section IV
Explore more guides
What is pind daan?
The offering the rice, the til and the darbha are laid out for, what a pinda is made of, and where it is offered.
What is tarpan?
The offering the water and the til are for, how the water is poured, and over which part of the hand.
What is shraddh?
The whole rite these materials serve, who it is for, when it falls, and its order as the Garuda Purana gives it.
Glossary of the ancestral rites
Til, darbha, akshat, tilodak, pinda and the other words on this page, each in Devanagari with a plain meaning.
Section V