ABSTRACT
In the Indian subcontinent childbirth is rarely associated with religion, spirituality or for that matter medical knowledge or aesthetics. This is despite the fact that explicit sculptural renderings of the birth process have found their way to the śikharas of south Indian temples, and from the earliest Upaniṣads, sacred texts are often replete with, to use Eliade’s phrase, ‘sexual and gynaecological’ symbolism. 1 This chapter focuses on the body mappings, representational and ritual imagery and birth knowledge of dais, the traditional handlers of birth – who operate both as ethno-medical and ritual practitioners.
