tusk

 When the asura Hiranyaksha stole the earth and hid her in the primordial waters, Vishnu appeared as Varaha to rescue her. Varaha slew the asura, and retrieved the Earth from the ocean, lifting it on his tusks, and restored Bhudevi to her place in the universe.

The Yuddha Kanda book of the epic praises Rama (the hero of the epic, who is identified with Vishnu) as "the single-tusked boar",

in the Mahabharata, the single-tusked (Eka-shringa) Varaha (identified with Narayana-Vishnu) lifts the earth, which sinks under the burden of overpopulation when Vishnu assumes the duties of Yama (the god of Death) and death seizes on earth.

The Linga Purana continues further: Later, Vishnu discards his boar body and returns to his heavenly abode; the earth cannot bear the weight of his tusk. Shiva relieves the earth by using the same as an ornament.