Saturday, February 19, 2011

Indian Traditional Jewellery-2


Edu Varala Nagalu-II

How the Days of the Week were Named:

Indian Calendar known as Panchang is based on scientific reasoning. 
  • Each week consists of 7 days
  • Each day is counted from sunrise of that day to the sunrise of next day 
  • A day means day time and night time put together
  • Each day is  divided into 24 Horas or hours. 
  • Each Hora is governed or affected by the  planet from the nearest lower orbit. 
  • That planet is known as Lord of that Hora. 
  • The day is named after the planet that rules the first Hora of that Day-like Sunday-Sun, Monday-Moon etc.
But why does Monday come after Sunday and Tuesday after  it ? There is a reason for it too. Read on....

Saturn is the farthest or highest. The order from lowest to highest is
  1. Moon
  2. Mercury
  3. Venus
  4. Sun
  5. Mars
  6. Jupiter
  7. Saturn
Sun is the King of all planets-as he is the Star burning bright and center of our Solar system and he was created or was visible first in the universe. He is known as Graha Raju-King of planets. So in his honour, he was considered as the Lord of the first hour of the first day, .

The Lords of the 2nd hora is Venus or Shukra whose orbit is below to the Sun. So the Lords 
of Horas are as follows:



Hora
Lord (English)
Lord (Sanskrit)
1st
Sun
Ravi
2nd
Venus
Shukra
3rd
Mercury
Budha
4th
Moon
Chandra
5th
Saturn
Shani
6th
Jupiter
Guru
7th
Mars
Kuja



After Mars Hora, it again starts with Sun hora and repeats on. So the 24th Hora from Sun Hora is  Moon Hora. Hence it is called as Monday. And so on....


Since the planets influence us a lot, it is believed that by wearing the gem stones, eating food, wearing the clothes of colours relating to these Planets will help us. 


Who wore such jewels:


The rich and royal wore these type of ornaments. Even in those days, only rich could afford one type of ornaments each day.


One of the famous or well known woman who had these Edu Varaala Nagalu was Sathyabhama.  She was the most loved daughter of rich king Satrajeet.


She is believed to be an Avatar (manifestation of Gods/Goddess on Earth as humans) of Bhudevi (Mother Earth).  


She was the daughter of King Satrajeet. He was one of the powerful kings and a very great devotee of Sun God. He did a great penance  and Sun God was pleased and gifted the king with Samantaka Mani or the jewel known as Samantaka. This jewel gave lot of prosperity especially lot of gold every day. So the King was considered as very rich and powerful.


Sathyabhama was his daughter. She was very beautiful and an apple of eye of the king. This made her to be very stubborn, egoistic and haughty. She was known for all these and for throwing tantrums. She was well trained in the martial arts and was no less than a man.


Sathybhama  was the 3rd wife of Lord Krishna. Lord Krishna is the Avatar of Lord Vishnu or one of the Trinity. 


She came to know of Lord Krishna as the most handsome and powerful King of Dwarka.  She heard of His many deeds and fell in love with Him. 


How she became Lord Krishna's wife and why her 7vaarala Nagalu became so famous...read in my next posts...till then keep an eye on my blog.......


Friday, February 18, 2011

Friday-Free Patterns


It is Friday again. Time for a Free Pattern. Here it is.
          Free Pattern-Indian FOLK Motif

This is again from Folk Art of Bengal. Looks like a Camel to me. But I am not sure. Anyway this is suitable for painting as well as embroidery. So try it out.

Keep watching for more patterns....

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Trendy Footwear


Indian footwear

I have been wanting to do some posts on foot wear of India for quite sometime now. Footwear is one of the important accessories that completes and compliments our dressing, style and fashion-be it a man or woman. No matter how elegantly you are dressed with out proper foot wear we don't get the complete look. Isn't it what they say "Put your best feet forward"? 

For us women footwear along with other accessories is  much more important.

One has to be very careful in choosing proper foot wear to suit the dress, occasion at the same time be more comfortable. i don't believe in getting dressed up in some silly clothing or footwear which, we cannot carry or feel uncomfortable.  Comfortable, sensible at elegant dress as well as footwear to suit the occasion as well as our personality give us confidence which makes us look more beautiful.

For us Indian women choosing footwear is a big challenge. First we din't have much to choose from till a few years ago. Getting something within our budget was also so difficult.  Added to that, we had to be careful in choosing foot wear to match our traditional attire of Saris, or Salwar suits. Even then when we are decked up for some occasion like marriages etc, we had no matching footwear or something which would go well with our silks, brocades or heavily embellished attires. 


But now we have a wide range to choose from. I don't much go in for glitters and loud coloured ones. However I  don't mind a very subtle elegant collection. I will try to post some of my limited collections.


Here is one, which is simple but elegant. The colour is black. Straps are orange mixed with gold and gold dots. They have been edged with little gold beads. They can be worn with silks and other traditional attire.




The only thing I don't like about them is that they are absolutely flat. I prefer a little heel. Any way I think they were a good pick for the money.