Sacred Sound

The basket is a traveling altar used by the shamanic groups in Nepal. Filled with rice, the shaman places his 'power objects' onto the rice filled basket. Depending upon tradition, there are dozens of objects that are placed within. Usually always a small statue of Ganesh (represents the first shaman), garnet, sacred herbs, mustard seed, phurbas, and assorted 'tools.' The basket is cleaned prior to filling it with rice by rubbing mugwart (titepati) all around inside to cleanse the altar. These genuine baskets are very hard to locate, we obtain ours from a Tamang family who assists anthropologists in their field studies in Nepal.