Beware the Yakshi

A monster masquerading as a beautiful woman, yakshis are a common subject of folk literature in Kerala, infamous for enchanting men and leading them to their peril. In today's story, we explore one of these legends in detail!

Beware the Yakshi. Illustrated by Gowri Suresh, Visual Storyteller at ThisDay

Stories about monstrous encounters during travel are ubiquitous in every culture. Scholars see them as figurative representations of the cultural anxiety related to traversing the unknown and the encounter with the “other”. For instance, the early Greek ‘monster-on-the-road’ tales are often read in the context of the expansion of trade among Greek city-states and the Greek colonisation of far-flung territories, which necessitated going beyond the safety of familiar town boundaries. The Indian epics and folktales also abound with encounters of travellers with supernatural or monstrous beings. Whether it is episodes such as “Yaksha Prasna” in the Mahabharata, or the Bodhisatta’s encounter with the naga and the yaksha in Buddhist legends, or his encounter with Yakkhinis in the Jataka tales, travel often involved encountering the dangerous “other” who had to be defeated, satiated, or converted. All these “forgotten” traditions of travel come together in the Yakshi tales of medieval Kerala where the Yakshi, a shape-shifting tree spirit haunting lonely pathways, evokes memories of the ancient traveller’s encounter with the wilderness and its corresponding deities.

The film Yakshi (1968) was based on a novel of the same name by Malayattoor Ramakrishnan published a year earlier. But even before the movie’s release, the stories of yakshis were very much in the popular imagination of Malayalis. Famed writer Kottaratthil Sankunni, in his collection of legends of Kerala titled Aithihyamala published in early 20th century, brings in the story of a few yakshis along with their tormentors like Surya Kaladi Bhattathiri and Kadamattathu Kathanar. In these stories, yakshis would entice their victims with their bewitching beauty, usually travellers passing through scantily populated regions. Due to their magic spell, the saptaparni (Indian devil tree) would bloom with its intoxicating fragrance and the travellers would see a palatial mansion—which in reality was the palmyra tree, the abode of these yakshis. After reaching the top of the trees, these dazzling damsels would transform into ferocious ogresses and devour their victims. In some of the cases, the victims would escape these torments due to the protection they receive through some miracle or holy book. In one of the stories, Chamravattatthu Yakshi falls in love with her victim and spares his life and even enters into a secret relationship with him.

It seems Neeli was the most ferocious one and had a long list of victims. She is said to have surrendered to Kadamattathu Kathanar, a well-known exorcist in Kerala, who encaptivated her in Panayannarkavu temple in Pathanamthitta district. Whatever name she may have gained in many stories we have heard of her, we find references to the different versions and avatars of yakshis in different ballads from Kerala.

The typical yakshi tale of medieval Kerala begins with a traveller, usually a Namboothiri or a Brahmin man, on his way to a late-night Kathakali performance in a faraway temple or a relative’s place, meeting a beautiful woman on the deserted pathway at night. The woman wants to have a paan and wants to know if the Namboothiri might have some lime with him to spread on the betel leaves.

The Namboothiri, usually presented in these stories as a lascivious man ready for all kinds of sexual adventures, wastes no time in offering the lime. The woman who acts coy and bashful is impressed by the Namboothiri and wonders if he would like to visit her home, which is quite nearby. The Namboothiri is overjoyed.

This is where the tale changes its tenor as the young woman and her home both undergo a transformation. The woman changes into a yakshi and sinks her fangs deep into the Namboothiri’s neck. The woman’s home changes into a palm tree, the yakshi’s haunt. The Yakshi doesn’t just drink the Namboothiri’s blood; she eats him alive and leaves his hair and teeth under her palm tree for the next sojourner to learn a lesson about the dangers of night travel.

This medieval yakshi tale of Kerala has a number of cultural specificities that explicitly and implicitly mark the caste and gender codes of the day. However, as a warning tale about travel, it is no different from the innumerable stories about monstrous encounters during travel ubiquitous in every culture.

One of the favourite yakshis of Kerala is a folkloric deity known as Kanjirottu Yakshi, also known as Chiruthevi or Sreedevi. She was born into a rich Nair tharavad by the name Mangalathu Sreedevi in Southern Travancore. She was a well-known courtesan who had fun with the lives of her many wooers due to her beauty. She enjoyed toying with the lives of her many admirers and driving them to financial ruin.

She had a servant by the name Kunjiraman (palanquin-bearer), who was said to be a tall, well-built, youthful man. Kunjiraman’s job was to carry Sreedevi and her brother Govindan on his back. Very soon, Sreedevi fell in love with Kunjiraman but

Kunjiraman got married on the other side. Govindan and Kunjiraman were close friends, with some versions of the tale claiming that the two were lovers. To get Kunjiraman, Sreedevi planned to kill his wife, but Govindan came to know of her plans. He told Kunjuraman, who agreed to sleep with Sreedevi. While they were in bed, Kunjuraman strangled Sreedevi in order to avenge the murder of his wife.

Following her murder, Chiruthevi was reborn as a yakshi to a couple in Kanjirottu. She magically transformed into a bewitchingly beautiful woman moments after her birth. As a yakshi, she proceeded to seduce and terrorise men and drink their blood, never forgetting to harass the still-living Kunjuraman, whom she still desired. To help Kunjiraman, Govindan, who was also a great upasaka of Lord Balarama, made a deal with the yakshi, whereby she could cohabit with Kunjiraman for a year, after which she was to become a devotee of Narasimha. The other conditions of this deal were that she must agree to be installed at a temple after the year was up, and that she must pray for Govindan and his relationship with Kunjiraman in this birth and all subsequent ones. The yakshi swore in agreement, and after the year was up, she

was installed at the Kanjiracottu Valiaveedu Temple, which was destroyed many years later.

After becoming a devotee of Narasimha, the Yakshi is now believed to reside in Vault (or 'Kallara' in Malayalam) B of the ancient Sri Padmanabhaswamy

Temple in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. References to the temple have appeared in literature dating back to the Sangam era, though nobody is certain of when it was constructed. It is currently managed by the royal family of Travancore. Vault B is one of six vaults of the temple, five of which were opened in 2011 following an order by the Supreme Court of India. Sundarajan, a retired IPS officer, filed a petition in the Supreme Court for taking stock of the temple’s unknown treasury. The SC appointed a seven-member association to look into the unaccounted wealth of the temple and make an official record of it. When the committee began its work, six huge vaults were discovered in the temple. It took utmost toil and hard work to open the heavy iron doors to the secret vaults, and what they revealed was beyond human imagination―bags full of ancient gold coins, diamonds, gemstones, heavy gold and diamond necklaces, a treasure estimated to be worth over USD 20 billion. The ruling family, the temple priests, and Vedic scholars believed and warned that any effort to unlock the vaults will bring misfortune. The said belief strengthened with the untimely death of Sundarajan, the petitioner, a month after the doors were opened.

The portals of Vault B remained locked despite all efforts made by the committee to open it. It is now popular belief that in Vault B, there is an even greater treasure than what was found in the other five. But till Sreedevi resides there, it will be protected and her prayers to Lord Narasimha go on. The legend suggests that any attempt to open it would stir up the Kanjirottu Yakshi, interrupting her prayers to Lord Narasimha and unleashing her evil upon the world.

As Princess Aswathi Thirunal Gowri Lakshmi Bayi, the niece of the last King of Travancore observes, "Disturbing her peace would be a disaster especially if her current quiet temperament reverts to the menacing nature that was once hers." The enchanting and ferocious forms of this yakshi are painted on the southwest section of Sri Padmanabha's shrine. The July 2020 ruling was a relief for those who believe that the decision to open Vault B or leave it undisturbed stands with the advisory and administrative committees appointed to help manage the temple.

Interestingly, north Indian yakshis, be it the Mauryan-period yakshis of Didarganj, Patna, or Vidisha with their voluptuous physiques, the Kushana-period yakshis of Bhuteshwar and their nonchalant nakedness, and or the Gyaraspur yakshis, they all smile at us enchantingly from the volumes on Indian art. The difference was that they were not the poltergeists from horror movies, but embodiments of beauty and the representation of abundance.

The yakshis also appear to be part of the Tantric tradition, where they are classified into 36 types. The characters of yakshis in Kerala seem to have close affinity to those of the Tantric tradition. This is because the state was one of the last bastions of Tantric Buddhism and is now a centre of Brahmanical Tantric tradition. In the Jataka, these ogresses are never designated as yakshis because of the fact that in the Buddhist and Jain traditions, the yakshis and their male counterparts, yakshas, are protectors of the village and reside on the peepal or banyan trees. They are usually handsome and beautiful, representing the fertility cult. Many of them are represented with children, as in the case of Ambika, the yakshi associated with Neminatha, the 22nd Jain Tirthankara. Buddhism has Hariti, an ogress converted by Buddha as the protector of children. The ferocious mother goddesses as the protectors of children and villages are also popular in Tamil culture.

Most of the shrines exclusively dedicated to yakshis are in present-day Alappuzha and Pathanamthitta districts, with one or two in the Kochi region. Some of the shrines would be attached to Bhagavati or the mother goddess temples, as in the case of Panayannarkavu.

Now, these stories, about an encounter with her, the yakshi, the other… on lonely roads… nobody can say whether they are true or not. So be careful out there and travel safe… in the hope that we meet again on What the Folk!