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pop. शिवरात्र f A night on which fasting, vigil, and other observances are held in honor of Shiva. The night appointed is the fourteenth of the dark half of every month, but more especially the fourteenth of Mágha; and the ground of the appointment is a legend, in every body's mouth, of a hunter's obtaining Moksha from Shiva, because he, from a Bilva-tree, up which he had climbed to observe a deer he was pursuing, shook down, through the whole night, leaves uponalingam lying hidden underneath; and thus, though unintentionally and ignorantly, propitiated and won the heart of the god Shiva.
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