The Tulu paddanas, long sung narratives, explain how each bhuta came to be worshipped, and Panjurli's is one of the best known. A boar died in the garden of Shiva and Parvati and left a piglet, which the goddess raised. It grew, as boars do, and wrecked the garden; Shiva was ready to kill it when Parvati begged him not to. His answer was to send the animal down to the world with a duty: protect people, and receive their offerings in return. That is the Panjurli whom a masked and possessed dancer embodies in the Bhuta Kola, the coastal night ritual, alongside spirits such as Guliga. In this telling the two great gods are a frame for a local spirit's origin, not the subject.
The divine deities from Kantara: Guliga and Panjurli; Buta Kola — Wikipedia; Epics in the oral genre system of Tulunadu
Sources: The divine deities from Kantara: Guliga and Panjurli; Buta Kola — Wikipedia; Epics in the oral genre system of Tulunadu
The Maitri Upanishad names Brahma, Rudra and Vishnu together as portions of one being, matched to the three gunas.
The sage Atri and his wife Anasuya earn great merit through their conduct and austerity.
Vishnu and Shiva are shown as one figure divided down the middle.
A seven-metre three-faced bust fills the south wall of Elephanta's Cave 1.
Three Pallava shrines on one platform: Shiva in the centre, Vishnu on the right, and a disputed left shrine read as Brahma by Vogel but as Subrahmanya or Brahmasasta by later scholars; a Durga panel stands beside.
Shiva alone exists before the world.
Brahma's body splits into a male and a female half.
Brahma grows a fifth head, and with it pride or a false word.