Jatakarma, rites at birth, among others putting ghee into the child's mouth with a golden spoon, before cutting the cord : Namakarana, naming the little one on the eleventh, twelfth, or any other auspicious day : Nishkramana, taking the infant out of the house when three months old to see the moon in the third light fortnight : Suryanilokana, the ceremony of showing the sun to the child when four months old : Annaprashana, feeding the baby with its first dish of rice in the sixth or eighth month : Karnavedha, the ceremony of boring the child's ears, generally performed in odd months after birth : Chudakarana, the rite of shaving the head save one lock, called "Chuda" or crest, in the first or third year, and not later than the fifth year : Upanayana, the investiture with the sacrificial thread, which falls from the left shoulder to the right hip, for a Brahman in the eighth and not later than the sixteenth year ; for a Kshatriya in the eleventh and not later than the twenty-second year ; and for a Vaishya in the twelfth and not later than the twenty-fourth : this ceremony marks the commencement of student-life : Mahanamya, an initiatory rite generally four days after the last, when the Gaetree*[1] is taught and repeated:
- ↑ * "The most sacred and most universally used of all Vedic prayers."
