Re: Sugar, salt
namaste EM.
Wiki article on sugarcane says that crystallized sugar was reported 5,000 years ago in the Indus Valley Civilization, located in modern-day Pakistan and north India.
• Goddess KAmAkShI holds a sugarcane bow and bunch of flowers in the lower two of her arms and has a pAsha (lasso), an angkusha (goad) in her upper two arms.
• KAmadeva, who was burnt to ashes by Shiva, aimed his arrows at Shiva with his bow of sugarcane.
• Among the 64 lIlAs--sports of Shiva that the PurANas speak of, making a stone elephant eat a sugarcane is one.
• The ikSh in the ikShvAku dynasty in which shrI RAma was born, probably refers to sugarcane (wiki).
• Speaking of rearing elephants, agnipurANam says that a food of yava--flour-yielding corns and ikShu--sugarcane will give strength to the elephants. Other PurANas speak of lakes of sugarcane juice in the seven dvIpas--divisions of the terrestrial world.
• In ancient India there were certain social conventions regarding drinking of alcoholic preparations. All those drinks which were intoxicants were not listed as 'Alcohol'. Wine, honey, toddy, juice of sugarcane, juice of Iruppa and Kutampuli, and sweet toddy of palm tree were not considered alcohol. sura (liquor) chiefly meant Paisti (liquor made out of rice paste). Drinking of Sura was banned to the three castes, brAymaNa, kShatriya and vaishya.
Thus it seems that sugarcane has been a ubiquitous sweetener in ancient India, right from the days of RAmAyaNa or even earlier.
रत्नाकरधौतपदां हिमालयकिरीटिनीम् ।
ब्रह्मराजर्षिररत्नाढ्यां वन्दे भारतमातरम् ॥
To her whose feet are washed by the ocean, who wears the Himalayas as her crown, and is adorned with the gems of rishis and kings, to Mother India, do I bow down in respect.
--viShNu purANam
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