Kirats during the Pre-Historic Age.

The Epic Age

The earliest account of the Kirats has been found recorded in the Hindu Epics. Strange as it may sound, god Siva, one of the supreme gods of Hindu Trinity, is portrayed in the Hindu Epics as an ascetic and attired in the manner of a Kirat.

It is the pre-historic era when man was still a hunter-gatherer, Siva appears as one, draped in a single leopard pelt wrap-around, often armed with a trident or a bow and arrow. Surprisingly however, that is the one and only way Siva has been depicted in all Hindu cultural icons. The Kirats have thus been identified with that image of Siva and upon this basis the Kirats claim their noble ancestry.

However, long before the Hindus had arrived in their midst, the Kirats themselves had been claiming a direct lineage from Siva. Kirats have always associated their god Siva to the snow-clad Himalayas, whose residence is an abstract mountain abode known as Kailas. To the Kirats, their god was not a distant god, but one that lived among them sharing their daily pace of life. Somehow, the god of the Kirats appear to have been assimilated into pantheon of Hindu gods even before the Hinduism itself was properly codified.

The Epic Battle

During the Hindu epic battle of Mahabharat fought between the five brothers known as Pandaw against their one hundred cousins known as Kauraw, the Kirats had sided with the latter. Kauraws were annihilated in that battle and so were the Kirats. Students of this epic battle give credit to Krishna, the god incarnate, who had sided with the Pandaw to be the reason of Kauraw's defeat.

There ought perhaps to be some measure of truth attached to this episode, because we find the mention of Kirats completely disappears from all subsequent accounts following this epic battle.

However, just prior to this battle, Arjun the hero of the Pandaw brothers had fought a duel with Siva and the latter, impressed by the hero's prowess, it is mentioned in the same epic, had granted him a weapon endowed with divine power.

There is a curious detail apparently overlooked by the brahmin pundits about the Mahabharat personalities as interpreted by the Kirats. Kirats had not only sided with the Kauraws but according to a benediction* written in sanskrit, Duryodhan, the leader of the Kauraws, is invoked by the Kirats being the most honorable among all men whereas the names of Krishna and Arjun have not even been mentioned.

A Prelude to the Battle

The Pandaws and the Kauraws ruled over neighboring lands and they apparently lived in peace and harmony except that they too had their own share of human frailties, they were subject to a vicious passion of 'tripasha', a form of royal game of dice. During one of their tryst with destiny the Pandaws lost the wager, they lost not only their kingdom but their entire possession including their common wife. (The five brothers were wedded to a single woman).

Duryodhan spared their life but the Pandaws were banished from the land for the next thirteen years with a condition that they must spend the last year incognito and if their concealed identity is revealed they must pay with their lives.

The Epic records in vivid details their thirteen years sojourn in the forests of far eastern Himalayas, but they return nearer home to spend their fateful year of disguise. According to the Birat Parba of the Epic Mahabharat, the Pandaws successfully spent the thirteenth year disguised as domestic servants in the court of Kirati King Birat in Eastern Nepal. This provides one categoric evidence of their agnate relationship with the Kirats, that Pandaws and Kauraws were ethnic Kirats.

*The Benediction in sanskrit (A Father's Blessings).

"Aayurdronasute srayamcha Dasarathe, shatrukshayam Raghawe,
Aishwarya Nahuse gatishchapawane, manancha Duryodhane."

"May thou live the life of Drona's son,**
May thine reputation be as of Dasarath,
May thou vanquish thine enemies as did Raghaw;
May thine prosperity be as of Nahush,
May thou move as does the breeze,
May thou be as honorable as Duryodhan."

** Drona's son Ashwatthama was blessed to live an 'immortal' life.