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This film records a 12 day ritual performed by Mambudiri Brahmins in Kerala, southwest India, in April 1975. This event was possibly the last performance of the Agnicayana, a Vedic ritual of sacrifice dating back 3,000 years and probably the oldest surviving human ritual. This film records a 12 day ritual performed by Mambudiri Brahmins in Kerala, southwest India, in April 1975. This event was possibly the last performance of the Agnicayana, a Ve... This film records a 12 day ritual performed by Mambudiri Brahmins in Kerala, southwest India, in April 1975. This event was possibly the last performance of the Agnicayana, a Vedic ritual of sacrifice dating back 3,000 years and probably the oldest surviving human ritual. This film records a 12 day ritual performed by Mambudiri Brahmins in Kerala, southwest India, in April 1975. This event was possibly the last performance of the Agnicayana, a Vedic ritual of sacrifice dating back 3,000 years and probably the oldest surviving human ritual. Long considered extinct and never witnessed by outsiders, the ceremonies require the participation of seventeen priests, involve libations of Soma juice and oblations of other substances, all preceded by several months of preparation and rehearsals. They include the construction, from a thousand bricks, of a fire altar in the shape of a bird. Around 1500 B.C., nomads who spoke an Indo-European language entered India and evolved a complex ritual involving the cults of fire and Soma, a hallucinogenic plant that grew in the Western Himalayas. Their Vedic language developed into Sanskrit, the classical language of Indian civilization. Among the later religions of India, Hinduism accepted and Buddhism rejected the Vedic culture. But both retained many of its ritual forms and recitations. Some of these have traveled all over Asia. Agni, the fire, is still worshipped with the help of Vedic mantras in Japanese Buddhist temples. In India itself, the preservation of the Agnicayana, though partly explained by the extraordinary conservatism of the Vedic Brahmins and their dedication to the culture of their spiritual ancestors, remains one of the miracles of history. Show more Show less

A page contains a single, typed passage with page number reference, possibly from an unspecified book by Alan Gardiner, taken down in support of a criticism of his work by Malinowski. It is written on the back of reused stationery, a partial class schedule for the Lent Term of 1933-34, probably from the London School of Economics and Political Science and listing Malinowski as teaching a seminar in modern anthropology.

Handwritten Biwat language (Mundugumor) field notes written and collected by Don Laycock. Field notes focus on morphophonemics, plurals, pronouns, adjectives, clothing, numbers, verbs, a limited vocabulary with translations, and useful phrases with translations.

An undated, hand-written page headed ''Copula'' contains brief notes discussing connecting words, with specific examples in the Trobriand language, in support of a book on semantics and ethnolinguistics. It is written on the back of reused stationery, a partial, typed manuscript discussing the communal work of an indigenous people.