A work like the Mahânirvâṇa Tantra presents a refined form of Śâktism modified, so far as may be, in conformity with ordinary Hindu usage.[723] But other features indubitably connect it with aboriginal cults. For instance there is a legend which relates how the body of the Śakti was cut into pieces and scattered over Assam and Bengal. This story has an uncouth and barbarous air and seems out of place even in Puranic mythology. It recalls the tales told of Osiris, Orpheus and Halfdan the Black[724] and may be ultimately traceable to the idea that the dismemberment of a deity or a human representative ensures fertility. Until recently the Khonds of Bengal used to hack human victims in pieces as a sacrifice to the Earth Goddess and throw the shreds of flesh on the fields to secure a good harvest.[725] In Sanskrit literature I have not found any authority for the dismemberment of Satî earlier than the Tantras or Upapurâṇas (_e.g._ Kâlikâ), but this late appearance does not mean that the legend is late in itself but merely that it was not countenanced by Sanskrit writers until medieval times. Various reasons for the dismemberment are given and the incident is rather awkwardly tacked on to other stories. One common version relates that when Satî (one of the many forms of Śakti) died of vexation because her husband Śiva was insulted by her father Daksha, Śiva took up her corpse and wandered distractedly carrying it on his shoulder.[726] In order to stop this penance Vishṇu followed him and cut off pieces from the corpse with his quoit until the whole had fallen to earth in fifty-one pieces. The spots where these pieces touched the ground are held sacred and called pîths. At most of them are shown a rock supposed to represent some portion of the goddess's body and some object called a bhairabi, left by Śiva as a guardian to protect her and often taking the form of a lingam. The most important of these pîths are Kâmâkhyâ near Gauhati, Faljur in the Jaintia Parganas, and Kalighat in Calcutta.[727]