Yaks, cows and status in the Himalayas

The special position of the cow in Hindu religion and society is well known. The symbolic connotations of the cow are varied and complicated. Even so, whatever specific meanings and values pertain within the religious traditions themselves, it is a more general sense of the sacred and inviolable nature of the cow which functions in everyday life. It is the purpose of this paper to examine the impact that this phenomenon, the sacred cow, has had upon non-Hindus living within the boundaries and along the peripheries of Hindu societies.