Hey Prime members, you can listen to Tides of History, add free on Amazon Music.

Download the app today. The woman sneezed, cursing the bundles of freshly cut grass she was in the process of

scattering over the dry cropped down pasture.

The grass always made her eyes water, her nose clog up, and her throat itch.

But at least this way, she thought.

She couldn't smell the overpowering odor of cattle manure and horse droppings that permeated the air.

The herds were close, neighing and mooing and bellowing, all across the open area that surrounded

the unyoked carts.

Her vise, her clan, had been joined by many others, all of them drawn together to

perform a soma sacrifice to the god Indra. If they were lucky, the hymns of praise were worded well, and nobody else nearby was offering something better,

then Indra himself would make his presence felt at the sacrifice.

The God would bestow his blessings on the young men who were readying themselves to steal

cattle and make war on their neighbors. The Rajan himself would lead the sacrifice, providing

the payment to the poet the Brahman, a wealth of cattle and gold objects. This Brahmin was said to be the best from a long lineage of poets,

all of whom composed verses with such clarity and beauty that they contained the very essence of truth, Erthah.

Indra would have no choice but to appear.

Hence the grass, this a cursed sacred grass

that the woman was currently strewing over the lumpy earth

that the herds had long since grazed away.

If Indra was to appear, then things would have to be done in exactly the proper way.

The hymn mattered, of course, but the grass was essential, and so were the three sacred fires and

so was the precise method of pressing the soma plant to release the intoxicating

...