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The Coronation

Like every other incident in Raje's life, his Rajya-Abhishek or Coronation was done with great pomp. The coronation was celebrated at Raigad in June 1674 every preparation was made to invest Shivaji's capital with new splendor befitting the occasion. New palaces and room were consecrated by the singing of traditional hymns. In the audience hall, a new throne was raise, surrounded by figures of tigers, lions,elephants and carved around its base with the thirty points of the compass in the symbol of Raje's new imperial claims. From Banaras, the greatest of the Brahmins, Ganga Bhatt came all the way to Raigad to coronate Shivaji. The ceremonies lasted a month . First Raje visited the temple of Mother-Goddess at Pratapgadh, there he presented the shrine with an umbrella of pure gold, forty-two pounds in weight. Then, accompanied by a few followers, he entered the temple and passed many days in prayers. While prostrate in prayer a thin faint voice from his mouth declared the prophecy which the people consider to be the divine prophecy of Mother Goddess, which said that the future of Maratha State, the final collapse of Mughals, the entry of Mughals into Delhi and 27 generations' rule of Shivaji's descendants and finally the voice added "The sceptre shall pass into the hands of strange people with red faces. An embassy of people with red faces apparently an English Deputation was present at Raje's court. Shivaji being absent from Rajgad, the English men were received by his ministers, the arrangement of Shivaji's coronation continued, when Jijabai who was now over eighty years of age was brought in front of Raje he prostrated in front of her publicly and she blessed him. Then began long penance for all the sins he committed consciously or unconsciously. The penance continued for three days. He was invested by Ganga Bhatt, with Sacred Thread, the symbolic representation of being twice-born and in his ear was whispered the invocation to the Sun which only twice-born may learn. In imitation of Mughal royalty, he was weighed against precious metals and jewels, spices, wine, and fruit, all of which was distributed to brahmins. Clad in a white robe, crowned and garlanded with flowers. Raje entered the great hall of his palace, his wife Soyra Bai was beside him, their robes were tied in the token of a union. Behind Shivaji came his mother and his son Sambhaji. Then followed the Astha-Pradhans ( eight ministers), each carrying a gold vessel filled with holy water. He approached his throne, which was covered with a canopy of cloth of gold from which pearls hung in festoons, lotus blossoms of gold and emerald being thrown among the crowds during his slow progress across the hall. He mounted the throne and every gun in the city boomed homage from fort to fort along all the ghats Maratha guns answered the guns of the capital from the plains guns in every Maratha outpost took up the loud stature so that over every mile of the country where Shivaji's writ ran people were aware of their rulers coronation. Sixteen Brahmin women advanced towards Shivaji on his throne and flashed lamps before eyes and swayed them over his head to ensure good fortune.

Raje now rose and put over his simple white dress a heavy robe of purple embroidery  with gold, in place of the chaplet of flowers he put on a turban hung with tassels of jewels. Descending from his throne Shivaji walked across the hall and mounted an elephant of state hung with gold stitched carpets and went in procession through his capital, from every window, women show-lighted lamps, the banners of victorious regiments waved over the procession, waved in the sudden gusts of wind that blew over the town, waved again a mounting pall of cloud, the gold and silver tassels shinning metallically in the last rays of the sun that was soon to be eclipsed by the first storm of the monsoon.

Today, the place is in ruins, the traditional site of Shivaji's throne is marked by a mound and no one approaches it save barefoot. And after over a century finally, we had a ruler who mounted on the throne by performing Hindu Rites and thus we had the very first CHATTRAPATI.



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