however, appear to have thought it unsafe to wait for even the slightest
symptom of decay and have preferred to kill the king while he was still in
the full vigour of life. Accordingly, they have fixed a term beyond which
he might not reign, and at the close of which he must die, the term fixed
upon being short enough to exclude the probability of his degenerating
physically in the interval. In some parts of southern India the period
fixed was twelve years. Thus, according to an old traveller, in the
province of Quilacare, about twenty leagues to the north-east of Cape
Comorin, "there is a Gentile house of prayer, in which there is an idol
which they hold in great account, and every twelve years they celebrate a
great feast to it, whither all the Gentiles go as to a jubilee. This
temple possesses many lands and much revenue: it is a very great affair.
This province has a king over it, who has not more than twelve years to
reign from jubilee to jubilee. His manner of living is in this wise, that
is to say: when the twelve years are completed, on the day of this feast
there assemble together innumerable people, and much money is spent in
giving food to Bramans. The king has a wooden scaffolding made, spread
over with silken hangings: and on that day he goes to bathe at a tank with
great ceremonies and sound of music, after that he comes to the idol and
prays to it, and mounts on to the scaffolding, and there before all the
people he takes some very sharp knives, and begins to cut off his nose,
and then his ears, and his lips, and all his members, and as much flesh
off himself as he can; and he throws it away very hurriedly until so much
of his blood is spilled that he begins to faint, and then he cuts his
throat himself. And he performs this sacrifice to the idol, and whoever
desires to reign other twelve years and undertake this martyrdom for love
of the idol, has to be present looking on at this: and from that place
they raise him up as king."(94)

(M33) The king of Calicut, on the Malabar coast, bears the title 