Abstract
Śrāddha, or ancestral rites in India and Hinduism, and pitaraḥ, who are worshipped in śrāddha, are translated into Japanese as “Soreisai” and “Sorei,” respectively. However, these concepts and their meanings have not been examined enough. In this paper, I present lists enumerating concrete objects worshipped in śrāddha by studying selected 28 Sūtras, their supplements, and some Smṛtis, which compiled from about third century BCE to third century CE. This process clearly showed that not only pitaraḥ (i.e., father, paternal grandfather, and paternal great-grandfather) were worshipped in śrāddha, but also were their wives and maternal ancestors, especially in the later texts. In the second half of the paper, I focus on how female and maternal ancestors are worshipped. I demonstrate that female ancestors are always worshipped with their husbands, though some regulations refer to female ancestors as wives while others refer to them as mothers. Furthermore, I have supposed that the regulations of rites for maternal ancestors were originally exceptional rules and related to the duty of putrikāputra, or the son of an appointed daughter (putrikā). A putrikā is a brother-less daughter who is given in marriage on condition that her son will become her father’s son.
