Ritual of the topknot

South East Asia Traveller Vol. 5, No. 4

One morning, Lord Shiva, rising from his couch on the summit of Mount Kailaca, bathed and dressed his streaming hair and announced: ‘Now it shall be our pleasure to institute a propitiatory rite that will in future be adopted by all and drift into permanent custom.’ This Brahmin custom, which subsequently became widespread among the peoples of Asia, is the tying up of the hair into a topknot.

In Thailand, a culture much influenced by Hindu beliefs and ritual, the custom has long fallen into disuse. Among a number of old-fashioned families, however, the traditional topknot is sometimes seen and the ritual surrounding its cutting is still observed. One also sees the custom maintained, though increasingly rarely, among the children of the Mon ethnic minority living along the banks of the Chao Phraya River, the famous River of Kings, running through Bangkok.

In many cultures, the puberal tonsure, when the topknot of the child is ceremonially cut, marks the transition from infancy to adolescence.

In Thailand, it is generally agreed among savants that the topknot custom derives from Shiva, who wore it long and knotted at the top. According to the legend, Shiva instituted the topknot-cutting ceremony for his two sons, Ganesh, the elephant-headed god of wisdom, and Skanda, the god of war.

The Thai word for the topknot is chuk. In the case of young members of the Royal Family, however, it is designated in court language as chula or moli.

From infancy, the hair is usually allowed to grow over the fontanel, at the top of the cranium, through which, the ancient Hindu Aryans believed, the spirit of life enters the child and from which it departs again at death. For this reason, in Thailand, the head is the sacred portal of the spirit and therefore not to be treated lightly.

From the crown of the head, the same sacred character is extended to the hair growing upon it. The topknot is frequently decorated with a golden pin or a garland of flowers and the ensemble looks, indeed, extremely pleasing and graceful.

The rite of tonsure is traditionally performed during an uneven year of the child’s age (the ninth, 11th or 13th year) and before he or she has reached puberty. This is so because odd numbers are regarded as propitious. To avoid a certain amount of childish abuse from his or her playmates when the child goes to school, the ceremony nowadays is often performed during the child’s seventh year.

As with most Thai ceremonies, superstition and an elaborate ritual surround it, usually derived from a hodgepodge of beliefs and customs of varying origin.

In Bangkok, it can take place either at home, if the family is reasonably wealthy and can afford the considerable expense of the ceremony, or at the Brahmin Temple near the Giant Swing.

Both Buddhist monks and Brahmin priests officiate at the tonsure. The latter are descendants of Brahmin priests who were brought to Thailand from India in order to assist at Court ritual. Their home is the Brahmin Temple and normally their number does not exceed 11.

The date of the ceremony is carefully chosen. It must be free of any malign influence, the alignment of the stars must be just right.

An Englishman, Ernest Young, educational advisor to King Chulalongkorn, had this to say about the choice of the perfect day. ‘The day must not be one on which sickness is liable to appear; in the heavens above, no constellation bearing a female name must be visible; it must not be a name marked in the calendar as being likely to be visited by thunderbolts, conflagrations, wrecks or loss of life by drowning.’

The day designated for this year’s puberal tonsure in the Brahmin Temple was indeed clear and the hall had already begun to fill up with children beautifully adorned, accompanied by their parents. It was a royally sponsored ceremony and the press and television were there t record the ritual passage into adolescence of 40 or so children.

A fine white thread of unspun cotton called sai sin encircled the temple. By means of this thread, the holy influence of the Buddhist texts recited by the officiating monks, and of the Buddha image – to which one end is attached – is supposed to be transmitted.

It was not yet light and the monks were arriving and settling themselves on the dias. Betel nut, spittoon, cigarettes and tea were placed within arm’s reach. The Brahmin priests were busy making sure everything was in order. At the rear of the temple, food was being prepared for the monks by a group of older women.

Appropriate offerings were made to the various images. Lustral water, a conch shell, and a large pair of golden scissors were placed before a small throne. At a designated moment, the presiding monks began their prayers and both children and parents joined in with the responses. Incense wafted through the air, already hot with the lights from the television cameras.

A small orchestra of unusual composition entered. There was a conch trumpet from which strange, haunting notes were blown. Cymbals, a tabor drum – used, according to the Brahmin priests, to awaken Shiva in the morning – added an eerie rhythm. A gong, one of the most ancient of musical instruments, now and then added mystique to the chanting.

The actual cutting of the topknot was swift. A Brahmin priest went among the children, carefully wet the topknot with the lustral water carried in a silver bowl, and snipped away the sacred hair.

The music combined with the chanting monks created a strangely intense atmosphere, but once outside the temple, the children seemed relieved to be counted among the initiated and to have passed unscathed.

In December 1892, the Royal tonsure or Sokan of prince Vajiravudh extended over three days and was attended by great ceremony and elaborate entertainment. Acrobats, tumblers, sword tossing, Chinese dragon-plays and dancing girls all contributed to the spectacle.

An Italian teacher, G E Gerini, who witnessed the ceremony, provides a wonderfully exact description of the moment of tonsure. ‘As the favourable time approached, the King, having placed on his right hand the ancient auspicial ring set with nine kinds of gems forming as many cuspidal points, poured by means of the major sankha shell a few drops of lustral water upon the head of the candidate; and then, as the propitious moment was proclaimed by the triumphal gongs, conch trumpets and other musical instruments in attendance, he severed three of the five tufts with the golden scissors and passed over the head of the boy, in succession, the three symbolic shaving knives. These together with the shears he handed to the two eldest princes in attendance, charging them with the task of cutting off the two remaining locks. The chief of the Royal wardrobes was then called upon to complete the shaving of the prince’s head ...’

Following the tonsure ceremony, the shorter hair was normally placed on a banana leaf and allowed to drift away on the river. The symbolic gesture represents the purification of the child of all his bad habits. The longer tufts of hair were taken to Phra Phutthabat, the sacred Buddha’s footprint in Saraburi Province, and supposedly used by the monks there to make brushes used in sweeping the footprint clean.

Much of the elaboration has gone out of the present-day topknot-cutting ceremony. Among well-to-do traditional families, it is fast becoming an event to be recorded by the video camera and national television, rather like religious ceremonies in the West. But it is still a moving and very beautiful rite of passage, marking an important turning point in every child’s life.