ABSTRACT
– We call this world beneath Bareloi, which means underneath. All the way around Bareloi there is a very long snake – down in the earth around the entire world. This snake binds the world together. If the snake was not there, the world would fall apart. … To carry this world, to hold it above the world underneath, there is a gigantic bull named Melbara. The bull carries a pillar on his head and this supports this world so that it doesn’t fall down. Several hundreds of people tend to this bull feeding him all the time because he must not move. If they don’t feed him for just one minute, he moves. That is earthquake, bonjao (Khrosh Nawaz 1983).
