Vikram and Vaitaal
The king who had to speak
Vikram has given his word to an ascetic. To keep it, he must carry a body through a cremation ground. A spirit inside the body knows how to delay him. These three encounters come from a Lucknow printing of Baital Pachisi, the cycle of twenty-five tales.
Try the first riddle ↓A voice from the corpse
Vikram has promised an ascetic that he will fetch a corpse hanging from a tree. He takes it down, lifts it onto his shoulder and sets off. A vaitaal, the spirit inhabiting the body, begins to speak.
The spirit tells a tale and poses a question. If Vikram knows the answer and keeps silent, his head will split. If he speaks, the spirit escapes back to the tree. Each time he gives judgment, the king must retrace his steps to keep his promise.
Who should marry the woman who came back to life?
A father, mother and brother have each promised the same young woman to a different man. A snake bites her and she dies before she can marry. After the cremation, one suitor stays beside her ashes in a hut. Another keeps her bones. The third obtains the means to restore her to life.
All three can claim devotion. When she lives again, which man does Vikram say has the claim of a husband?
Read the printed verdict
The man who stayed with her ashes. Vikram distinguishes the three by the roles their acts resemble. The man who gave her life acted as a father. The man who tended her bones performed a son’s duty. He awards the husband’s place to the man who remained by the ashes. The verdict is Vikram’s. The tale gives the woman no say in the decision.
Who was most generous?
Somdatt threatens to kill himself unless Madan Sena visits him. She promises to come after her marriage. Her husband lets her go. On the road a thief stops her, then lets her pass on her word that she will return. When she reaches Somdatt, he fears the king and sends her away.
On her way home Madan Sena keeps her word and goes back to the thief. He lets her go with all her jewels. The vaitaal asks Vikram which of the three men showed the greatest generosity.
Read the printed verdict
The thief. Vikram considers what each man stood to gain or lose. The husband believed she loved another man. Somdatt feared punishment. The thief had her jewels within reach and let her keep them without expecting anything in return.
The question that keeps Vikram silent
Out hunting, a father and son come upon two sets of footprints. They agree to marry the women who made them, choosing by the size of the tracks. The travellers are a queen and her daughter. The tracks lead the son to marry the queen and the father to marry her daughter.
What relation are the children of these two marriages to one another? For once, Vikram cannot give an answer. He keeps walking in silence. This time the vaitaal stays long enough to tell him why the ascetic wanted the corpse.
Why the spirit told him stories
The ascetic intends to offer Vikram’s head. Forewarned by the vaitaal, Vikram asks him to demonstrate the prostration he requires. The ascetic bows, and Vikram strikes him down.
When Indra offers a boon, Vikram asks that these stories endure. Turn to the last opening of this copy. Across from the ending, the press advertises other reading, including Singhasan Battisi and a Nagari Indar Sabha. A reader who had followed Vikram through his last riddle could already see what to read next.
See the final page and facing book advertisement, printed p. 104 ↗
The book in Lucknow
The title names Pandit Ramratan Vajapeyi and calls this the third printing at Munshi Newal Kishore’s Lucknow press. The next opening carries a stock notice dated June 1877. The text tells readers that this telling is in Khari Boli, after an earlier version in Braj.
In another book on the same counter, a list bound into Arabian Nights offers Captain W. Hollings’s English Baital for eight annas. Look for his name at the foot of the page, underneath the legal books.
Explore Arabian Nights at Le Press ↗
Image credits and edition notes
The Baital pages come from the Internet Archive copy uploaded by “indic literature..”. The English advertisement is from eGangotri’s Arabian Nights scan. Both records carry a CC0 designation.
Enter Indar Sabha
Vikram’s wish has been granted. Turn to the other title beside his ending and meet a fairy who wants an audience with a king.
Continue to Indar Sabha →