The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India

 By

 R. V. Russell Of the Indian Civil Service Superintendent of Ethnography, Central Provinces Assisted by Rai Bahadur Hira Lal Extra Assistant Commissioner

 Published Under the Orders of the Central Provinces Administration

 In Four Volumes Vol. II. 

 Macmillan and Co. , Limited St. Martin's Street, London. 

 1916

CONTENTS OF VOLUME II

Articles on Castes and Tribes of the Central Provinces in AlphabeticalOrder

The articles which are considered to be of most general interestare shown in capitals

 Agaria (_Iron-worker_) 3 Agharia (_Cultivator_) 8 Aghori (_Religious mendicant_) 13 AHIR (_Herdsman and milkman_) 18 Andh (_Tribe, now cultivators_) 38 Arakh (_Hunter_) 40 Atari (_Scent-seller_) 42 Audhelia (_Labourer_) 45 BADHAK (_Robber_) 49 BAHNA (_Cotton-cleaner_) 69 Baiga (_Forest tribe_) 77 Bairagi (_Religious mendicants_) 93 Balahi (_Labourer and village watchman_) 105 Balija (_Cultivator_) 108 BANIA (_Merchant and moneylender_) 111 Subcastes of Bania

 Agarwala. Agrahari. Ajudhiabasi. Asathi. Charnagri. Dhusar. Dosar. Gahoi. Golapurab. Kasarwani. Kasaundhan. Khandelwal. Lad. Lingayat. Maheshri. Nema. Oswal. Parwar. Srimali. Umre. 

 BANJARA (_Pack-carrier_) 162 Barai (_Betel-vine grower and seller_) 192 Barhai (_Carpenter_) 199 Bari (_Maker of leaf-plates_) 202 Basdewa (_Cattle-dealer and religious mendicant_) 204 Basor (_Bamboo-worker_) 208 Bedar (_Soldier and public service_) 212 Beldar (_Digger and navvy_) 215 Beria (_Vagabond gipsy_) 220 Bhaina (_Forest tribe_) 225 Bhamta (_Criminal tribe and labourers_) 234 Bharbhunja (_Grain-parcher_) 238 Bharia (_Forest tribe_) 242 BHAT (_Bard and genealogist_) 251 Bhatra (_Forest tribe_) 271 BHIL (_Forest tribe_) 278 Bhilala (_Landowner and cultivator_) 293 Bhishti (_Water-man_) 298 Bhoyar (_Cultivator_) 301 Bhuiya (_Forest tribe_) 305 Bhulia (_Weaver_) 319 Bhunjia (_Forest tribe_) 322 Binjhwar (_Cultivator_) 329 Bishnoi (_Cultivator_) 337 Bohra (_Trader_) 345 BRAHMAN (_Priest_) 351 Subcastes of Brahman

 Ahivasi. Jijhotia. Kanaujia, Kanyakubja. Khedawal. Maharashtra. Maithil. Malwi. Nagar. Naramdeo. Sanadhya. Sarwaria. Utkal. 

 Chadar (_Village watchman and labourer_) 400 CHAMAR (_Tanner and labourer_) 403 Chasa (_Cultivator_) 424 Chauhan (_Village watchman and labourer_) 427 Chhipa (_Dyer and calico-printer_) 429 CHITARI (_Painter_) 432 Chitrakathi (_Picture showman_) 438 Cutchi (_Trader and shopkeeper_) 440 DAHAIT (_Village watchman and labourer_) 444 Daharia (_Cultivator_) 453 Dangi (_Landowner and cultivator_) 457 Dangri (_Vegetable-grower_) 463 DARZI (_Tailor_) 466 Dewar (_Beggar and musician_) 472 Dhakar (_Illegitimate, cultivator_) 477 Dhangar (_Shepherd_) 480 Dhanuk (_Bowman, labourer_) 484 Dhanwar (_Forest tribe_) 488 DHIMAR (_Fisherman, water-carrier, and household servant_) 502 Dhoba (_Forest tribe, cultivator_) 515 DHOBI (_Washerman_) 519 Dhuri (_Grain-parcher_) 527 Dumal (_Cultivator_) 530 Fakir (_Religious mendicant_) 537

ILLUSTRATIONS IN VOLUME II

 31. Aghori mendicant 14 32. Ahirs decorated with cowries for the Stick Dance at Diwali 18 33. Image of Krishna as Murlidhar or the flute-player, with attendant deities 28 34. Ahir dancers in Diwali costume 32 35. Pinjara cleaning cotton 72 36. Baiga village, Balaghat District 88 37. Hindu mendicants with sect-marks 94 38. Anchorite sitting on iron nails 98 39. Pilgrims carrying water of the river Nerbudda 100 40. _Coloured Plate_: Examples of Tilaks or sect-marks worn on the forehead 102 41. Group of Marwari Bania women 112 42. Image of the god Ganpati carried in procession 116 43. The elephant-headed god Ganpati. His conveyance is a rat, which can be seen as a little blob between his feet 120 44. Mud images made and worshipped at the Holi festival 126 45. Bania's shop 128 46. Banjara women with the _singh_ or horn 184 47. Group of Banjara women 188 48. Basors making baskets of bamboo 210 49. Bhat with his _putla_ or doll 256 50. Group of Bhils 278 51. Tantia Bhil, a famous dacoit 282 52. Group of Bohras at Burhanpur (Nimar) 346 53. Brahman worshipping his household gods 380 54. Brahman bathing party 384 55. Brahman Pujaris or priests 390 56. Group of Maratha Brahman men 392 57. Group of Naramdeo Brahman women 396 58. Group of Naramdeo Brahman men 398 59. Chamars tanning and working in leather 416 60. Chamars cutting leather and making shoes 418 61. Chhipa or calico-printer at work 430 62. Dhimar or fisherman's hut 502 63. Fishermen in dug-outs or hollowed tree trunks 506 64. Group of Gurujwale Fakirs 538

PRONUNCIATION

 _a_ has the sound of _u_ in _but_ or _murmur_. _a_ has the sound of _a_ in _bath_ or _tar_. _e_ has the sound of _é_ in _écarté_ or _ai_ in _maid_. _i_ has the sound of _i_ in _bit_, or (as a final letter) of _y_ in _sulky_ _i_ has the sound of _ee_ in _beet_. _o_ has the sound of _o_ in _bore_ or _bowl_. _u_ has the sound of _u_ in _put_ or _bull_. _u_ has the sound of _oo_ in _poor_ or _boot_. 

The plural of caste names and a few common Hindustani words is formedby adding _s_ in the English manner according to ordinary usage, though this is not, of course, the Hindustani plural. 

Note. --The rupee contains 16 annas, and an anna is of the same valueas a penny. A pice is a quarter of an anna, or a farthing. Rs. 1-8signifies one rupee and eight annas. A lakh is a hundred thousand, and a krore ten million. 

PART II

ARTICLES ON CASTES AND TRIBES

AGARIA--FAKIR

Agaria

1. Origin and subdivisions. 

Agaria. [1]--A small Dravidian caste, who are an offshoot of the Gondtribe. The Agarias have adopted the profession of iron-smelting andform a separate caste. They numbered 9500 persons in 1911 and liveon the Maikal range in the Mandla, Raipur and Bilaspur Districts. 

The name probably signifies a worker with _ag_ or fire. An Agariasubcaste of Lohars also exists, many of whom are quite probably Gonds, but they are not included in the regular caste. Similar Dravidiancastes of Agarias are to be found in Mirzapur and Bengal. The Agariasare quite distinct from the Agharia cultivating caste of the Uriyacountry. The Raipur Agarias still intermarry with the RawanbansiGonds of the District. The Agarias think that their caste has existedfrom the beginning of the world, and that the first Agaria madethe ploughshare with which the first bullocks furrowed the primevalsoil. The caste has two endogamous divisions, the Patharia and theKhuntia Agarias. The Patharias place a stone on the mouth of thebellows to fix them in the ground for smelting, while the Khuntiasuse a peg. The two subcastes do not even take water from one another. 

Their exogamous sections have generally the same names as those ofthe Gonds, as Sonwani, Dhurua, Tekam, Markam, Uika, Purtai, Marai, and others. A few names of Hindi origin are also found, as Ahindwar, Ranchirai and Rathoria, which show that some Hindus have probably beenamalgamated with the caste. Ahindwar or Aindwar and Ranchirai meana fish and a bird respectively in Hindi, while Rathoria is a _gotra_both of Rajputs and Telis. The Gond names are probably also those ofanimals, plants or other objects, but their meaning has now generallybeen forgotten. Tekam or _teka_ is a teak tree. Sonwani is a septfound among several of the Dravidian tribes, and the lower Hinducastes. A person of the Sonwani sept is always chosen to performthe ceremony of purification and readmission into caste of personstemporarily excommunicated. His duty often consists in pouring on sucha person a little water in which gold has been placed to make it holy, and hence the name is considered to mean Sonapani or gold-water. TheAgarias do not know the meanings of their section names and thereforehave no totemistic observances. But they consider that all personsbelonging to one _gotra_ are descended from a common ancestor, andmarriage within the _gotra_ is therefore prohibited. As among theGonds, first cousins are allowed to marry. 

2. Marriage. 

Marriage is usually adult. When the father of a boy wishes to arrange amarriage he sends emissaries to the father of the girl. They open theproceedings by saying, 'So-and-so has come to partake of your stalefood. ' [2] If the father of the girl approves he gives his consent bysaying, 'He has come on foot, I receive him on my head. ' The boy'sfather then repairs to the girl's house, where he is respectfullyreceived and his feet are washed. He is then asked to take a drink ofplain water, which is a humble method of offering him a meal. Afterthis, presents for the girl are sent by a party accompanied by tomtomplayers, and a date is fixed for the marriage, which, contrary to theusual Hindu rule, may take place in the rains. The reason is perhapsbecause iron-smelting is not carried on during the rains and theAgarias therefore have no work to do. A few days before the weddingthe bride-price is paid, which consists of 5 seers each of _urad_and til and a sum of Rs. 4 to Rs. 12. The marriage is held on anyMonday, Tuesday or Friday, no further trouble being taken to selectan auspicious day. In order that they may not forget the date fixed, the fathers of the parties each take a piece of thread in whichthey tie a knot for every day intervening between the date when themarriage day is settled and the day itself, and they then untie oneknot for every day. Previous to the marriage all the village godsare propitiated by being anointed with oil by the Baiga or villagepriest. The first clod of earth for the ovens is also dug by theBaiga, and received in her cloth by the bride's mother as a markof respect. The usual procedure is adopted in the marriage. Afterthe bridegroom's arrival his teeth are cleaned with tooth-sticks, and the bride's sister tries to push _saj_ leaves into his mouth, a proceeding which he prevents by holding his fan in front of hisface. For doing this the girl is given a small present. A _paili_[3] measure of rice is filled alternately by the bride and bridegroomtwelve times, the other upsetting it each time after it is filled. Atthe marriage feast, in addition to rice and pulse, mutton curry andcakes of _urad_ pulse fried in oil are provided. _Urad_ is held ingreat respect, and is always given as a food at ceremonial feastsand to honoured guests. The greater part of the marriage ceremonyis performed a second time at the bridegroom's house. Finally, thedecorations of the marriage-shed and the palm-leaf crowns of the brideand bridegroom are thrown into a tank. The bride and bridegroom gointo the water, and each in turn hides a jar under water, which theother must find. They then bathe, change their clothes, and go backto the bridegroom's house, the bride carrying the jar filled withwater on her head. The boy is furnished with a bow and arrows andhas to shoot at a stuffed deer over the girl's shoulder. After eachshot she gives him a little sugar, and if he does not hit the deerin three shots he must pay 4 annas to the _sawasa_ or page. Afterthe marriage the bridegroom does not visit his wife for a month inorder to ascertain whether she is already pregnant. They then livetogether. The marriage expenses usually amount to Rs. 15 for thebridegroom's father and Rs. 40 for the bride's father. Sometimes thebridegroom serves his father-in-law for his wife, and he is then notrequired to pay anything for the marriage, the period of service beingthree years. If the couple anticipate the ceremony, however, theymust leave the house, and then are recalled by the bride's parents, and readmitted into caste on giving a feast, which is in lieu of themarriage ceremony. If they do not comply with the first summons ofthe parents, the latter finally sever connection with them. Widowmarriage is freely permitted, and the widow is expected to marry herlate husband's younger brother, especially if he is a bachelor. Ifshe marries another man with his consent, the new husband gives hima turban and shoulder-cloth. The children by the first husband aremade over to his relatives if there are any. Divorce is permitted foradultery or extravagance or ill-treatment by either party. A divorcedwife can marry again, but if she absconds with another man withoutbeing divorced the latter has to pay Rs. 12 to the husband. 

3. Birth and death ceremonies. 

When a woman becomes pregnant for the first time, her mother goes toher taking a new cloth and cakes and a preparation of milk, whichis looked on as a luxurious food, and which, it is supposed, willstrengthen the child in the womb. After birth the mother is impurefor five days. The dead are usually burnt, but children under sixwhose ears have not been pierced, and persons dying a violent deathor from cholera or smallpox are buried. When the principal man ofthe family dies, the caste-fellows at the mourning feast tie a clothround the head of his successor to show that they acknowledge hisnew position. They offer water to the dead in the month of Kunwar(September-October). 

4. Religion and social customs. 

They have a vague belief in a supreme God but do not pay much attentionto him. Their family god is Dulha Deo, to whom they offer goats, fowls, cocoanuts and cakes. In the forest tracts they also worshipBura Deo, the chief god of the Gonds. The deity who presides overtheir profession is Loha-Sur, the Iron demon, who is supposed to livein the smelting-kilns, and to whom they offer a black hen. Formerly, it is said, they were accustomed to offer a black cow. They worshiptheir smelting implements on the day of Dasahra and during Phagun, and offer fowls to them. They have little faith in medicine, and incases of sickness requisition the aid of the village sorcerer, whoascertains what deity is displeased with them by moving grain to andfro in a winnowing-fan and naming the village gods in turn. He goeson repeating the names until his hand slackens or stops at some name, and the offended god is thus indicated. He is then summoned and entersinto the body of one of the persons present, and explains his reasonfor being offended with the sick person, as that he has passed bythe god's shrine without taking off his shoes, or omitted to make thetriennial offering of a fowl or the like. Atonement is then promisedand the offering made, while the sick person on recovery notes thedeity in question as one of a vindictive temper, whose worship muston no account be neglected. The Agarias say that they do not admitoutsiders into the caste, but Gonds, Kawars and Ahirs are occasionallyallowed to enter it. They refuse to eat monkeys, jackals, crocodiles, lizards, beef and the leavings of others. They eat pork and fowlsand drink liquor copiously. They take food from the higher castesand from Gonds and Baigas. Only Bahelias and other impure castes willtake food from them. Temporary excommunication from caste is imposedfor conviction of a criminal offence, getting maggots in a wound, andkilling a cow, a dog or a cat. Permanent excommunication is imposedfor adultery or eating with a very low caste. Readmission to casteafter temporary exclusion entails a feast, but if the offender isvery poor he simply gives a little liquor or even water. The Agariasare usually sunk in poverty, and their personal belongings are ofthe scantiest description, consisting of a waist-cloth, and perhapsanother wisp of cloth for the head, a brass _lota_ or cup and a fewearthen vessels. Their women dress like Gond women, and have a fewpewter ornaments. They are profusely tattooed with representations offlowers, scorpions and other objects. This is done merely for ornament. 

5. Occupation. 

The caste still follow their traditional occupation of iron-smeltingand also make a few agricultural implements. They get their ore fromthe Maikal range, selecting stones of a dark reddish colour. Theymix 16 lbs. Of ore with 15 lbs. Of charcoal in the furnace, the blastbeing produced by a pair of bellows worked by the feet and conveyedto the furnace through bamboo tubes; it is kept up steadily for fourhours. The clay coating of the kiln is then broken down and the ball ofmolten slag and charcoal is taken out and hammered, and about 3 lbs. Ofgood iron are obtained. With this they make ploughshares, mattocks, axes and sickles. They also move about from village to village with ananvil, a hammer and tongs, and building a small furnace under a tree, make and repair iron implements for the villagers. 

Agharia

1. Origin. 

_Agharia_ [4] (a corruption of Agaria, meaning one who came fromAgra). --A cultivating caste belonging to the Sambalpur District [5]and adjoining States. They number 27, 000 persons in the Raigarh andSarangarh States and Bilaspur District of the Central Provinces, and are found also in some of the Chota Nagpur States transferredfrom Bengal. According to the traditions of the Agharias theirforefathers were Rajputs who lived near Agra. They were accustomedto salute the king of Delhi with one hand only and without bendingthe head. The king after suffering this for a long time determinedto punish them for their contumacy, and summoned all the Agharias toappear before him. At the door through which they were to pass to hispresence he fixed a sword at the height of a man's neck. The haughtyAgharias came to the door, holding their heads high and not seeingthe sword, and as a natural consequence they were all decapitated asthey passed through. But there was one Agharia who had heard about thefixing of the sword and who thought it better to stay at home, sayingthat he had some ceremony to perform. When the king heard that therewas one Agharia who had not passed through the door, he sent again, commanding him to come. The Agharia did not wish to go but felt itimpossible to decline. He therefore sent for a Chamar of his villageand besought him to go instead, saying that he would become a Rajputin his death and that he would ever be held in remembrance by theAgharia's descendants. The Chamar consented to sacrifice himself forhis master, and going before the king was beheaded at the door. Butthe Agharia fled south, taking his whole village with him, and cameto Chhattisgarh, where each of the families in the village founded aclan of the Agharia caste. And in memory of this, whenever an Aghariamakes a libation to his ancestors, he first pours a little water onthe ground in honour of the dead Chamar. According to another versionof the story three brothers of different families escaped and firstwent to Orissa, where they asked the Gajpati king to employ themas soldiers. The king caused two sheaths of swords to be placedbefore them, and telling them that one contained a sword and theother a bullock-goad, asked them to select one and by their choiceto determine whether they would be soldiers or husbandmen. From onesheath a haft of gold projected and from the other one of silver. TheAgharias pulled out the golden haft and found that they had chosen thegoad. The point of the golden and silver handles is obvious, and thestory is of some interest for the distant resemblance which it bearsto the choice of the caskets in _The Merchant of Venice_. Condemned, as they considered, to drive the plough, the Agharias took off theirsacred threads, which they could no longer wear, and gave them tothe youngest member of the caste, saying that he should keep themand be their Bhat, and they would support him with contributionsof a tenth of the produce of their fields. He assented, and hisdescendants are the genealogists of the Agharias and are termedDashanshi. The Agharias claim to be Somvansi Rajputs, a claim whichColonel Dalton says their appearance favours. "Tall, well-made, withhigh Aryan features and tawny complexions, they look like Rajputs, though they are more industrious and intelligent than the generalityof the fighting tribe. " [6]

2. Subdivisions. 

Owing to the fact that with the transfer of the Sambalpur District, a considerable portion of the Agharias have ceased to be residentsof the Central Provinces, it is unnecessary to give the detailsof their caste organisation at length. They have two subdivisions, the Bad or superior Agharias and the Chhote, Sarolia or Sarwaria, the inferior or mixed Agharias. The latter are a cross between anAgharia and a Gaur (Ahir) woman. The Bad Agharias will not eat with oreven take water from the others. Further local subdivisions are nowin course of formation, as the Ratanpuria, Phuljharia and Raigarhiaor those living round Ratanpur, Phuljhar and Raigarh. The caste issaid to have 84 _gotras_ or exogamous sections, of which 60 bearthe title of Patel, 18 that of Naik, and 6 of Chaudhri. The sectionnames are very mixed, some being those of eponymous Brahman _gotras_, as Sandilya, Kaushik and Bharadwaj; others those of Rajput septs, asKarchhul; while others are the names of animals and plants, as Barah(pig), Baram (the pipal tree), Nag (cobra), Kachhapa (tortoise), and a number of other local terms the meaning of which has beenforgotten. Each of these sections, however, uses a different markfor branding cows, which it is the religious duty of an Agharia torear, and though the marks now convey no meaning, they were probablyoriginally the representations of material objects. In the case ofnames whose meaning is understood, traces of totemism survive in therespect paid to the animal or plant by members of the sept which bearsits name. This analysis of the structure of the caste shows that itwas a very mixed one. Originally consisting perhaps of a nucleusof immigrant Rajputs, the offspring of connections with inferiorclasses have been assimilated; while the story already quoted isprobably intended to signify, after the usual Brahmanical fashion, that the pedigree of the Agharias at some period included a Chamar. 

3. Marriage customs. 

Marriage within the exogamous section and also with first cousins isforbidden, though in some places the union of a sister's son witha brother's daughter is permitted. Child marriage is usual, andcensure visits a man who allows an unmarried daughter to arrive atadolescence. The bridegroom should always be older than the bride, at any rate by a day. When a betrothal is arranged some ornamentsand a cloth bearing the _swastik_ or lucky mark are sent to thegirl. Marriages are always celebrated during the months of Maghand Phagun, and they are held only once in five or six years, when all children whose matches can be arranged for are marriedoff. This custom is economical, as it saves expenditure on marriagefeasts. Colonel Dalton also states that the Agharias always employHindustani Brahmans for their ceremonies, and as very few of theseare available, they make circuits over large areas, and conduct allthe weddings of a locality at the same period. Before the marriage akid is sacrificed at the bride's house to celebrate the removal of herstatus of maidenhood. When the bridegroom arrives at the bride's househe touches with his dagger the string of mango-leaves suspended fromthe marriage-shed and presents a rupee and a hundred betel-leavesto the bride's _sawasin_ or attendant. Next day the bridegroom'sfather sends a present of a bracelet and seven small earthen cups tothe bride. She is seated in the open, and seven women hold the cupsover her head one above the other. Water is then poured from abovefrom one cup into the other, each being filled in turn and the wholefinally falling on the bride's head. This probably symbolises thefertilising action of rain. The bride is then bathed and carriedin a basket seven times round the marriage-post, after which sheis seated in a chair and seven women place their heads togetherround her while a male relative winds a thread seven times roundthe heads of the women. The meaning of this ceremony is obscure. Thebridegroom makes his appearance alone and is seated with the bride, both being dressed in clothes coloured yellow with turmeric. Thebridegroom's party follows, and the feet of the couple are washedwith milk. The bride's brother embraces the bridegroom and changescloths with him. Water is poured over the hands of the couple, the girl's forehead is daubed with vermilion, and a red silk clothis presented to her and the couple go round the marriage-post. Thebride is taken for four days to the husband's house and then returns, and is again sent with the usual _gauna_ ceremony, when she is fitfor conjugal relations. No price is usually paid for the bride, andeach party spends about Rs. 100 on the marriage ceremony. Polygamyand widow marriage are generally allowed, the widow being disposedof by her parents. The ceremony at the marriage of a widow consistsin putting vermilion on the parting of her hair and bangles on herwrists. Divorce is allowed on pain of a fine of Rs. 50 if the divorceis sought by the husband, and of Rs. 25 if the wife asks for it. Insome localities divorce and also polygamy are said to be forbidden, and in such cases a woman who commits adultery is finally expelledfrom the caste, and a funeral feast is given to symbolise her death. 

4. Religious and social customs. 

The family god of the Agharias is Dulha Deo, who exists in everyhousehold. On the Haraiti day or the commencement of the agriculturalyear they worship the implements of cultivation, and at Dasahrathe sword if they have one. They have a great reverence for cowsand feed them sumptuously at festivals. Every Agharia has a _guru_or spiritual guide who whispers the _mantra_ or sacred verse intohis ear and is occasionally consulted. The dead are usually burnt, but children and persons dying of cholera or smallpox are buried, males being placed on the pyre or in the grave on their faces andfemales on their backs, with the feet pointing to the south. Onthe third day the ashes are thrown into a river and the bones ofeach part of the body are collected and placed under the pipaltree, while a pot is slung over them, through which water tricklescontinually for a week, and a lighted lamp, cooked food, a leaf-cupand a tooth-stick are placed beside them daily for the use of thedeceased during the same period. Mourning ends on the tenth day, and the usual purification ceremonies are then performed. Childrenare mourned for a shorter period. Well-to-do members of the castefeed a Brahman daily for a year after a death, believing that foodso given passes to the spirit of the deceased. On the anniversary ofthe death the caste-fellows are feasted, and after that the deceasedbecomes a _purkha_ or ancestor and participates in devotions paidat the _shradhh_ ceremony. When the head of a joint family dies, his successor is given a turban and betel-leaves, and his foreheadis marked by the priest and other relations with sandalwood. After abirth the mother is impure for twenty-one days. A feast is given onthe twelfth day, and sometimes the child is named then, but oftenchildren are not named until they are six years old. The names ofmen usually end in _Ram_, _Nath_ or _Singh_, and those of women in_Kunwar_. Women do not name their husbands, their elderly relations, nor the sons of their husband's eldest brother. A man does not namehis wife, as he thinks that to do so would tend to shorten his lifein accordance with the Sanskrit saying, 'He who is desirous of longlife should not name himself, his _guru_, a miser, his eldest son, or his wife. ' The Agharias do not admit outsiders into the caste. Theywill not take cooked food from any caste, and water only from a Gauror Rawat. They refuse to take water from an Uriya Brahman, probablyin retaliation for the refusal of Uriya Brahmans to accept water froman Agharia, though taking it from a Kolta. Both the Uriya Brahmansand Agharias are of somewhat doubtful origin, and both are thereforeprobably the more concerned to maintain the social position to whichthey lay claim. But Kewats, Rawats, Telis and other castes eat cookedfood from Agharias, and the caste therefore is admitted to a fairlyhigh rank in the Uriya country. The Agharias do not drink liquor oreat any food which a Rajput would refuse. 

5. Occupation. 

As cultivators they are considered to be proficient. In the census of1901 nearly a quarter of the whole caste were shown as malguzars orvillage proprietors and lessees. They wear a coarse cloth of homespunyarn which they get woven for them by Gandas; probably in consequenceof this the Agharias do not consider the touch of the Ganda to pollutethem, as other castes do. They will not grow turmeric, onions, garlic, _san_-hemp or tomatoes, nor will they rear tasar silk-cocoons. ColonelDalton says that their women do no outdoor work, and this is true inthe Central Provinces as regards the better classes, but poor womenwork in the fields. 

Aghori

1. General accounts of the caste. 

_Aghori, Aghorpanthi. _ [7]--The most disreputable class of Saivamendicants who feed on human corpses and excrement, and in pasttimes practised cannibalism. The sect is apparently an ancient one, asupposed reference to it being contained in the Sanskrit drama _MalatiMadhava_, the hero of which rescues his mistress from being offeredas a sacrifice by one named Aghori Ghanta. [8] According to Lassen, quoted by Sir H. Risley, the Aghoris of the present day are closelyconnected with the Kapalika sect of the Middle Ages, who wore crownsand necklaces of skulls and offered human sacrifices to Chamunda, a form of Devi. The Aghoris now represent their filthy habits asmerely giving practical expression to the abstract doctrine that thewhole universe is full of Brahma, and consequently that one thing isas pure as another. By eating the most horrible food they utterlysubdue their natural appetites, and hence acquire great power overthemselves and over the forces of nature. It is believed that anAghori can at will assume the shapes of a bird, an animal or a fish, and that he can bring back to life a corpse of which he has eaten apart. The principal resort of the Aghoris appears to be at Benares andat Girnar near Mount Abu, and they wander about the country as solitarymendicants. A few reside in Saugor, and they are occasionally met within other places. They are much feared and disliked by the people owingto their practice of extorting alms by the threat to carry out theirhorrible practices before the eyes of their victims, and by throwingfilth into their houses. Similarly they gash and cut their limbs sothat the crime of blood may rest on those who refuse to give. "For themost part, " Mr. Barrow states, [9] "the Aghorpanthis lead a wanderinglife, are without homes, and prefer to dwell in holes, clefts of rocksand burning-_ghats_. They do not cook, but eat the fragments giventhem in charity as received, which they put as far as may be into thecavity of the skull used as a begging-bowl. The bodies of _chelas_(disciples) who die in Benares are thrown into the Ganges, but thedead who die well off are placed in coffins. As a rule, Aghoris do notcare what becomes of their bodies, but when buried they are placed inthe grave sitting cross-legged. The Aghori _gurus_ keep dogs, whichmay be of any colour, and are said to be maintained for purposes ofprotection. The dogs are not all pariahs of the streets, although some_gurus_ are followed by three or four when on pilgrimage. Occasionallythe dogs seem to be regarded with real affection by their strangemasters. The Aghori is believed to hold converse with all the evilspirits frequenting the burning-_ghats_, and funeral parties mustbe very badly off who refuse to pay him something. In former days heclaimed five pieces of wood at each funeral in Benares; but the Domsinterfere with his perquisites, and in some cases only let him carryoff the remains of the unburned wood from each pyre. When angeredand excited, Aghoris invoke Kali and threaten to spread devastationaround them. Even among the educated classes, who should know better, they are dreaded, and as an instance of the terror which they createamong the ignorant, it may be mentioned that in the Lucknow Districtit is believed that if alms are refused them the Aghoris will causethose who refuse to be attacked with fever. 

"On the other hand, their good offices may secure benefits, as in thecase of a zamindar of Muzaffarnagar, who at Allahabad refused to eat apiece of human flesh offered to him by an Aghori; the latter thereuponthrew the flesh at the zamindar's head, on which it stuck. The zamindarafterwards became so exceedingly wealthy that he had difficulty instoring his wealth. "

2. Instances of cannibalism. 

In former times it is believed that the Aghoris used to kidnapstrangers, sacrifice them to the goddess and eat the bodies, andMr. Barrow relates the following incident of the murder of a boy: [10]"Another horrible case, unconnected with magic and apparently arisingfrom mere blood-thirst, occurred at Neirad in June 1878. An Aghorimendicant of Dwarka staying at the temple of Sitaram Laldas seized aboy of twelve, named Shankar Ramdas, who was playing with two otherboys, threw him down on the _oatla_ of the temple, ripped open hisabdomen, tore out part of his entrails, and, according to the poorlittle victim's dying declaration, began to eat them. The other boyshaving raised an alarm, the monster was seized. When interrogated bythe magistrate as to whether he had committed the crime in order toperform Aghorbidya, the prisoner said that as the boy was Bhakshanhe had eaten his flesh. He added that if he had not been interruptedhe would have eaten all the entrails. He was convicted, but onlysentenced to transportation for life. The High Court, however, altered the sentence and ordered the prisoner to be hanged. "

The following instance, quoted by Mr. Barrow from Rewah, shows how anAghori was hoist with his own petard: "Some years ago, when MaharajaBishnath Singh was Chief of Rewah, a man of the Aghori caste wentto Rewah and sat _dharna_ on the steps of the palace; having madeineffectual demands for alms, he requested to be supplied with humanflesh, and for five days abstained from food. The Maharaja was muchtroubled, and at last, in order to get rid of his unwelcome visitor, sent for Ghansiam Das, another Aghori, a Fakir, who had for someyears lived in Rewah. Ghansiam Das went up to the other Aghori andasked him if it was true that he had asked to be supplied with humanflesh. On receiving a reply in the affirmative, Ghansiam Das said:'Very well, I too am extremely partial to this form of food; here ismy hand, eat it and I will eat you'; and at the same time he seizedhold of the other's hand and began to gnaw at it. The Aghori on thisbecame much alarmed and begged to be excused. He shortly afterwardsleft Rewah and was not heard of again, while Ghansiam Das was rewardedfor his services. "

The following recent instance of an Aghori devouring human corpsesis reported from the Punjab: [11] "The loathsome story of a humanghoul from Patiala shows that the influence of the Aghorpanthi hasnot yet completely died out in this country. It is said that for sometime past human graves have been found robbed of their contents, andthe mystery could not be solved until the other day, when the policesucceeded in arresting a man in the act of desecrating a child's grave, some forty miles distant from the capital (Patiala). The ghoul not onlydid not conceal the undevoured portion of the corpse he had with him, but told his captors the whole story of his gruesome career. He isa low-caste Hindu named Ram Nath, and is, according to a gentlemanwho saw him, 'a singularly mild and respectful-looking man, insteadof a red-eyed and ravenous savage, ' as he had expected to find himfrom the accounts of his disgusting propensities. He became an orphanat five and fell into the hands of two Sadhus of his own caste, whowere evidently Aghorpanthis. They taught him to eat human flesh, which formed the staple of their food. The meat was procured fromthe graves in the villages they passed through. When Ram Nath wasthoroughly educated in this rank the Sadhus deserted him. Since thenhe had been living on human carrion only, roaming about the countrylike a hungry vulture. He cannot eat cooked food, and therefore getstwo seers of raw meat from the State every day. It is also reportedthat the Maharaja has now prohibited his being given anything butcooked food with a view to reforming him. "

Sir J. B. Fuller relates the following incident of the employmentof an Aghori as a servant: [12] "There are actually ten thousandpersons who at census time classed themselves as Aghoris. All of themdo not practise cannibalism and some of them attempt to rise in theworld. One of them secured service as a cook with a British officerof my acquaintance. My friend was in camp in the jungle with hiswife and children, when his other servants came to him in a body andrefused to remain in service unless the cook was dismissed, since theyhad discovered, they declared, that during the night-time he visitedcemeteries and dug up the bodies of freshly buried children. The cookwas absent, but they pointed to a box of his that emitted a sickeningsmell. The man was incontinently expelled, but for long afterwards thefamily were haunted by reminiscences of the curries they had eaten. "

Ahir

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice. _ 2. _Former dominance of the Abhiras. _ 3. _Ahir dialects. _ 4. _The Yadavas and Krishna. _ 5. _The modern Ahirs an occupational caste. _ 6. _Subcastes. _ 7. _The Dauwa or wet-nurse Ahirs. Fosterage. _ 8. _Exogamy. _ 9. _Marriage customs. _ 10. _Birth customs. _ 11. _Funeral rites. Bringing back the soul. _ 12. _Religion. Krishna and other deified cowherds. _ 13. _Caste deities. _ 14. _Other deities. _ 15. _The Diwali festival. _ 16. _Omens. _ 17. _Social customs. _ 18. _Ornaments. _ 19. _Occupation. _ 20. _Preparations of milk. _

1. General notice. 

_Ahir, [13] Gaoli, Guala, Golkar, Gaolan, Rawat, Gahra, Mahakul. _--Thecaste, of cowherds, milkmen and cattle-breeders. In 1911 the Ahirsnumbered nearly 750, 000 persons in the Central Provinces and Berar, being the sixth caste in point of numbers. This figure, however, excludes 150, 000 Gowaris or graziers of the Maratha Districts, and if these were added the Ahirs would outnumber the Telis andrank fifth. The name Ahir is derived from Abhira, a tribe mentionedseveral times in inscriptions and the Hindu sacred books. Goala, a cowherd, from Gopala, [14] a protector of cows, is the Bengaliname for the caste, and Gaoli, with the same signification, is nowused in the Central Provinces to signify a dairyman as opposed toa grazier. The Gaolans appear to be an inferior class of Gaolis inBerar. The Golkars of Chanda may be derived from the Telugu Golars orgraziers, with a probable admixture of Gond blood. They are describedas wild-looking people scattered about in the most thickly forestedtracts of the District, where they graze and tend cattle. Rawat, acorruption of Rajputra or a princeling, is the name borne by the Ahircaste in Chhattisgarh; while Gahra is their designation in the Uriyacountry. The Mahakul Ahirs are a small group found in the JashpurState, and said to belong to the Nandvansi division. The name means'Great family. '

2. Former dominance of the Abhiras. 

The Abhiras appear to have been one of the immigrant tribes fromCentral Asia who entered India shortly before or about the commencementof the Christian era. In the Puranas and Mahabharata they are spokenof as Dasyu or robbers, and Mlechchhas or foreigners, in the storywhich says that Arjuna, after he had burned the dead bodies ofKrishna and Balaram at Dwarka, was proceeding with the widows of theYadava princes to Mathura through the Punjab when he was waylaid bythe Abhiras and deprived of his treasures and beautiful women. [15]An inscription of the Saka era 102, or A. D. 180, speaks of a grantmade by the Senapati or commander-in-chief of the state, who iscalled an Abhira, the locality being Sunda in Kathiawar. Anotherinscription found in Nasik and assigned by Mr. Enthoven to the fourthcentury speaks of an Abhira king, and the Puranas say that after theAndhrabhrityas the Deccan was held by the Abhiras, the west coasttract from the Tapti to Deogarh being called by their name. [16]In the time of Samudragupta in the middle of the fourth centurythe Abhiras were settled in Eastern Rajputana and Malwa. [17] Whenthe Kathis arrived in Gujarat in the eighth century, they found thegreater part of the country in the possession of the Ahirs. [18] In theMirzapur District of the United Provinces a tract known as Ahraura isconsidered to be named after the tribe; and near Jhansi another pieceof country is called Ahirwar. [19] Elliot states that Ahirs were alsoRajas of Nepal about the commencement of our era. [20] In Khandesh, Mr. Enthoven states, the settlements of the Ahirs were important. Inmany castes there is a separate division of Ahirs, such as the AhirSunars, Sutars, Lohars, Shimpis, Salis, Guraos and Kolis. The fortof Asirgarh in Nimar bordering on Khandesh is supposed to have beenfounded by one Asa Ahir, who lived in the beginning of the fifteenthcentury. It is said that his ancestors had held land here for sevenhundred years, and he had 10, 000 cattle, 20, 000 sheep and 1000 mares, with 2000 followers; but was still known to the people, to whomhis benevolence had endeared him, by the simple name of Asa. Thisderivation of Asirgarh is clearly erroneous, as it was known asAsir or Asirgarh, and held by the Tak and Chauhan Rajputs from theeleventh century. But the story need not on that account, Mr. Grantsays, [21] be set down as wholly a fable. Firishta, who records it, has usually a good credit, and more probably the real existence ofa line of Ahir chieftains in the Tapti valley suggested a convenientethnology for the fortress. Other traditions of the past dominationof the pastoral tribes remain in the Central Provinces. Deogarh onthe Chhindwara plateau was, according to the legend, the last seatof Gaoli power prior to its subversion by the Gonds in the sixteenthcentury. Jatba, the founder of the Deogarh Gond dynasty, is said tohave entered the service of the Gaoli rulers, Mansur and Gansur, andsubsequently with the aid of the goddess Devi to have slain them andusurped their kingdom. But a Gaoli chief still retained possession ofthe fort of Narnala for a few years longer, when he also was slain bythe Muhammadans. Similarly the fort of Gawilgarh on the southern crestof the Satpuras is said to be named after a Gaoli chief who foundedit. The Saugor traditions bring down the Gaoli supremacy to a muchlater date, as the tracts of Etawa and Khurai are held to have beengoverned by their chieftains till the close of the seventeenth century. 

3. Ahir dialects. 

Certain dialects called after the Abhiras or Ahirs still remain. One, known as Ahirwati, is spoken in the Rohtak and Gurgaon Districts ofthe Punjab and round Delhi. This is akin to Mewati, one of the formsof Rajasthani or the language of Rajputana. The Malwi dialect ofRajasthani is also known as Ahiri; and that curious form of Gujarati, which is half a Bhil dialect, and is generally known as Khandeshi, also bears the name of Ahirani. [22] The above linguistic facts seemto prove only that the Abhiras, or their occupational successors, the Ahirs, were strongly settled in the Delhi country of the Punjab, Malwa and Khandesh. They do not seem to throw much light on the originof the Abhiras or Ahirs, and necessarily refer only to a small sectionof the existing Ahir caste, the great bulk of whom speak the Aryanlanguage current where they dwell. Another authority states, however, that the Ahirs of Gujarat still retain a dialect of their own, andconcludes that this and the other Ahir dialects are the remains ofthe distinct Abhira language. 

4. The Yadavas and Krishna. 

It cannot necessarily be assumed that all the above traditions relateto the Abhira tribe proper, of which the modern Ahir caste are scarcelymore than the nominal representatives. Nevertheless, it may fairly beconcluded from them that the Abhiras were widely spread over Indiaand dominated considerable tracts of country. They are held to haveentered India about the same time as the Sakas, who settled in Gujarat, among other places, and, as seen above, the earliest records of theAbhiras show them in Nasik and Kathiawar, and afterwards widely spreadin Khandesh, that is, in the close neighbourhood of the Sakas. It hasbeen suggested in the article on Rajput that the Yadava and other lunarclans of Rajputs may be the representatives of the Sakas and othernomad tribes who invaded India shortly before and after the Christianera. The god Krishna is held to have been the leader of the Yadavas, and to have founded with them the sacred city of Dwarka in Gujarat. Themodern Ahirs have a subdivision called Jaduvansi or Yaduvansi, that is, of the race of the Yadavas, and they hold that Krishna was of the Ahirtribe. Since the Abhiras were also settled in Gujarat it is possiblethat they may have been connected with the Yadavas, and that this maybe the foundation for their claim that Krishna was of their tribe. TheDyashraya-Kavya of Hemachandra speaks of a Chordasama prince reigningnear Junagarh as an Abhira and a Yadava. But this is no doubt veryconjectural, and the simple fact that Krishna was a herdsman would bea sufficient reason for the Ahirs to claim connection with him. It ispointed out that the names of Abhira chieftains given in the earlyinscriptions are derived from the god Siva, and this would not havebeen the case if they had at that epoch derived their origin fromKrishna, an incarnation of Vishnu. "If the Abhiras had really beenthe descendants of the cowherds (Gopas) whose hero was Krishna, thename of the rival god Siva would never have formed components of thenames of the Abhiras, whom we find mentioned in inscriptions. Hencethe conclusion may safely be drawn that the Abhiras were by no meansconnected with Krishna and his cowherds even as late as about A. D. 300, to which date the first of the two inscriptions mentioned above isto be assigned. Precisely the same conclusion is pointed to by thecontents of the Harivansha and Bhagwat Purana. The upbringing ofKrishna among the cowherds and his flirtations with the milkmaids areagain and again mentioned in these works, but the word Abhira does notoccur even once in this connection. The only words we find used areGopa, Gopi and Vraja. This is indeed remarkable. For the descriptionsof the removal of Krishna as an infant to Nanda, the cowherd's hut, of his childhood passed in playing with the cowherd boys, and of hisyouth spent in amorous sports with the milkmaids are set forth atgreat length, but the word Abhira is not once met with. From thisonly one conclusion is possible, that is, that the Abhiras did notoriginally represent the Gopas of Krishna. The word Abhira occurs forthe first time in connection with the Krishna legend about A. D. 550, from which it follows that the Abhiras came to be identified withthe Gopas shortly before that date. " [23]

This argument is interesting as showing that Abhira was not originallyan occupational term for a herdsman, nor a caste name, but belongedto an immigrant tribe. Owing apparently to the fact that the Abhiras, like the Gujars, devoted themselves to a pastoral mode of life inIndia, whereas the previous Aryan immigrants had settled down tocultivation, they gave their name to the great occupational casteof herdsmen which was subsequently developed, and of which they mayoriginally have constituted the nucleus. The Gujars, who came to Indiaat a later period, form a parallel case; although the Gujar caste, which is derived from them, is far less important than the Ahir, the Gujars have also been the parents of several Rajput clans. Thereason why the early Mathura legends of Krishna make no mention ofthe Ahirs may be that the deity Krishna is probably compounded of atleast two if not more distinct personalities. One is the hero chief ofthe Yadavas, who fought in the battle of the Pandavas and Kauravas, migrated to Gujarat and was killed there. As he was chief of theYadavas this Krishna must stand for the actual or mythical personalityof some leader of the immigrant nomad tribes. The other Krishna, the boy cowherd, who grazed cattle and sported with the milkmaids ofBrindaban, may very probably be some hero of the indigenous non-Aryantribes, who, then as now, lived in the forests and were shepherdsand herdsmen. His lowly birth from a labouring cowherd, and thefact that his name means black and he is represented in sculptureas being of a dark colour, lend support to this view. The cult ofKrishna, Mr. Crooke points out, was comparatively late, and probablyconnected with the development of the worship of the cow after thedecay of Buddhism. This latter Krishna, who is worshipped with hismother as a child-god, was especially attractive to women, both actualand prospective mothers. It is quite probable therefore that as hisworship became very popular in Hindustan in connection with that ofthe cow, he was given a more illustrious origin by identificationwith the Yadava hero, whose first home was apparently in Gujarat. Inthis connection it may also be noted that the episodes connected withKrishna in the Mahabharata have been considered late interpolations. 

5. The modern Ahirs an occupational caste. 

But though the Ahir caste takes its name and is perhaps partlydescended from the Abhira tribe, there is no doubt that it is nowand has been for centuries a purely occupational caste, largelyrecruited from the indigenous tribes. Thus in Bengal Colonel Daltonremarks that the features of the Mathuravasi Goalas are high, sharpand delicate, and they are of light-brown complexion. Those of theMagadha subcaste, on the other hand, are undefined and coarse. Theyare dark-complexioned, and have large hands and feet. "Seeing thelatter standing in a group with some Singhbhum Kols, there is nodistinguishing one from the other. There has doubtless been muchmixture of blood. " [24] Similarly in the Central Provinces the Ahirsare largely recruited from the Gonds and other tribes. In Chanda theGowaris are admittedly descended from the unions of Gonds and Ahirs, and one of their subcastes, the Gond-Gowaris, are often classed asGonds. Again, the Kaonra Ahirs of Mandla are descended from the unionsof Ahirs either with the Gonds or Kawars, and many of them are probablypure Gonds. They have Gond sept-names and eat pork. Members of oneof their subdivisions, the Gond-Kaonra, will take water from Gonds, and rank below the other Kaonras, from whom they will accept food andwater. As cattle have to go into the thick jungles to graze in the hotweather, the graziers attending them become intimate with the foresttribes who live there, and these latter are also often employed tograze the cattle, and are perhaps after a time admitted to the Ahircaste. Many Ahirs in Mandla are scarcely considered to be Hindus, living as they do in Gond villages in sole company with the Gonds. 

6. Subcastes. 

The principal subcastes of the Ahirs in northern India are theJaduvansi, Nandvansi and Gowalvansi. The Jaduvansi claimed to bedescended from the Yadavas, who now form the Yadu and Jadon-Bhatticlans of Rajputs. The probability of a historical connection betweenthe Abhiras and Yadavas has already been noticed. The Nandvansiconsider their first ancestor to have been Nand, the cowherd, thefoster-father of Krishna; while the name of the Gowalvansi is simplyGoala or Gauli, a milkman, a common synonym for the caste. The KaonraAhirs of Mandla and the Kamarias of Jubbulpore are considered to belongto the Nandvansi group. Other subcastes in the northern Districts arethe Jijhotia, who, like the Jijhotia Brahmans, take their name fromJajhoti, the classical term for Bundelkhand; the Bharotia; and theNarwaria from Narwar. The Rawats of Chhattisgarh are divided into theJhadia, Kosaria and Kanaujia groups. Of these the Jhadia or 'jungly, 'and Kosaria from Kosala, the ancient name of the Chhattisgarh country, are the oldest settlers, while the Kanaujia are largely employed aspersonal servants in Chhattisgarh, and all castes will take waterfrom their hands. The superior class of them, however, refuse toclean household cooking vessels, and are hence known as Thethwar, or exact or pure, as distinguished from the other Rawats, who willperform this somewhat derogatory work. 

7. The Dauwa or wet-nurse Ahirs. Fosterage. 

The Dauwa or wet-nurse Ahirs are descended from the illegitimateoffspring of Bundela Rajput fathers by Ahir mothers who were employedin this capacity in their families. An Ahir woman kept by a Bundelawas known as Pardwarin, or one coming from another house. This isnot considered a disgraceful origin; though the Dauwa Ahirs are notrecognised by the Ahirs proper, they form a separate section of thecaste, and Brahmans will take water from them. The children of suchmothers stood in the relation of foster-brothers to the Rajputs, whom their mothers had nursed. The giving of milk, in accordance withthe common primitive belief in the virtue attaching to an actionin itself, was held to constitute a relation of quasi-maternitybetween the nurse and infant, and hence of fraternity between her ownchildren and her foster-children. The former were called Dhai-bhaisor foster-brothers by the Rajputs; they were often given permanentgrants of land and employed on confidential missions, as for thearrangement of marriages. The minister of a Raja of Karauli washis Dauwa or foster-father, the husband of his nurse. Similarly, Colonel Tod says that the Dhai-bhai or foster-brother of the Rajaof Boondi, commandant of the fortress of Tanagarh, was, like allhis class, devotion personified. [25] A parallel instance of thetie of foster-kinship occurs in the case of the foster-brothers ofConachar or Hector in _The Fair Maid of Perth_. Thus the positionof foster-brother of a Rajput was an honourable one, even thoughthe child might be illegitimate. Ahir women were often employed aswet-nurses, because domestic service was a profession in which theycommonly engaged. Owing to the comparatively humble origin of a largeproportion of them they did not object to menial service, while thepurity of their caste made it possible to use them for the supplyof water and food. In Bengal the Uriya Ahirs were a common class ofservants in European houses. 

The Gaolis or milkmen appear to form a distinct branch of the castewith subcastes of their own. Among them are the Nandvans, common tothe Ahirs, the Malwi from Malwa and the Raghuvansi, called after theRajput clan of that name. The Ranyas take their designation from _ran_, forest, like the Jhadia Rawats. 

8. Exogamy. 

The caste have exogamous sections, which are of the usual low-castetype, with titular or totemistic names. Those of the ChhattisgarhiRawats are generally named after animals. A curious name among theMahakul Ahirs is Mathankata, or one who bit his mother's nipples. Themarriage of persons belonging to the same section and of first cousinsis prohibited. A man may marry his wife's younger sister while hiswife is living, but not her elder sister. The practice of exchanginggirls between families is permissible. 

9. Marriage customs. 

As a rule, girls may be married before or after puberty, but theGolkars of Chanda insist on infant marriage, and fine the parents ifan unmarried girl becomes adolescent. On the other hand, the KaonraAhirs of Mandla make a practice of not getting a girl married tillthe signs of puberty have appeared. It is said that in Mandla if anunmarried girl becomes pregnant by a man of the caste the _panchayat_give her to him and fine him Rs. 20 or 30, which they appropriatethemselves, giving nothing to the father. If an Ahir girl is seducedby an outsider, she is made over to him, and a fine of Rs. 40 or 50is exacted from him if possible. This is paid to the girl's father, who has to spend it on a penalty feast to the caste. Generally, sexual offences within the community are leniently regarded. Thewedding ceremony is of the type prevalent in the locality. Theproposal comes from the boy's family, and a price is usually givenfor the bride. The Kaonra Ahirs of Mandla and the Jharia and KosariaRawats of Chhattisgarh employ a Brahman only to write the _lagun_ orpaper fixing the date of the wedding, and the ceremony is conductedby the _sawasins_ or relatives of the parties. In Chhattisgarh thebridegroom is dressed as a girl to be taken to the wedding. In Betulthe weddings of most Gaolis are held in Magh (January), and that ofthe Ranya subcaste in the bright fortnight of Kartik (October). Atthe ceremony the bride is made to stand on a small stone roller; thebridegroom then takes hold of the roller facing the bride and goesround in a circle seven times, turning the roller with him. Widowremarriage is permitted, and a widow is often expected to marrythe younger brother of her deceased husband. If a bachelor wishesto marry a widow he first goes through the ceremony with a daggeror an earthen vessel. Divorce is freely permitted. In Hoshangabad astrip is torn off the clothes worn by husband and wife as a sign oftheir divorce. This is presumably in contrast to the knotting of theclothes of the couple together at a wedding. 

10. Birth customs. 

Among the Rawats of Chhattisgarh, when a child is shortly to be bornthe midwife dips her hand in oil and presses it on the wall, and itis supposed that she can tell by the way in which the oil tricklesdown whether the child will be a boy or a girl. If a woman is weakand ill during her pregnancy it is thought that a boy will be born, but if she is strong and healthy, a girl. A woman in advanced pregnancyis given whatever she desires to eat, and on one occasion especiallydelicate kinds of food are served to her, this rite being known asSidhori. The explanation of the custom is that if the mother doesnot get the food she desires during pregnancy the child will long forit all through life. If delivery is delayed, a line of men and boysis sometimes made from the door of the house to a well, and a vesselis then passed from hand to hand from the house, filled with water, and back again. Thus the water, having acquired the quality of speedduring its rapid transit, will communicate this to the woman and causeher quick delivery. Or they take some of the clay left unmoulded onthe potter's wheel and give it her to drink in water; the explanationof this is exactly similar, the earth having acquired the quality ofswiftness by the rapid transit on the wheel. If three boys or threegirls have been born to a woman, they think that the fourth shouldbe of the same sex, in order to make up two pairs. A boy or girlborn after three of the opposite sex is called Titra or Titri, and isconsidered very unlucky. To avert this misfortune they cover the childwith a basket, kindle a fire of grass all round it, and smash a brasspot on the floor. Then they say that the baby is the fifth and notthe fourth child, and the evil is thus removed. When one woman givesbirth to a male and another to a female child in the same quarter ofa village on the same day and they are attended by the same midwife, it is thought that the boy child will fall ill from the contagionof the girl child communicated through the midwife. To avoid this, on the following Sunday the child's maternal uncle makes a banghy, which is carried across the shoulders like a large pair of scales, and weighs the child in it against cowdung. He then takes the banghyand deposits it at cross-roads outside the village. The father cannotsee either the child or its mother till after the Chathi or sixth-dayceremony of purification, when the mother is bathed and dressed inclean clothes, the males of the family are shaved, all their clothesare washed, and the house is whitewashed; the child is also named onthis day. The mother cannot go out of doors until after the Barhi ortwelfth-day ceremony. If a child is born at an unlucky astrologicalperiod its ears are pierced in the fifth month after birth as a meansof protection. 

11. Funeral rites. Bringing back the soul. 

The dead are either buried or burnt. When a man is dying they putbasil leaves and boiled rice and milk in his mouth, and a littlepiece of gold, or if they have not got gold they put a rupee in hismouth and take it out again. For ten days after a death, food ina leaf-cup and a lamp are set out in the house-yard every evening, and every morning water and a tooth-stick. On the tenth day they aretaken away and consigned to a river. In Chhattisgarh on the thirdday after death the soul is brought back. The women put a lamp on ared earthen pot and go to a tank or stream at night. The fish areattracted towards the light, and one of them is caught and put inthe pot, which is then filled with water. It is brought home and setbeside a small heap of flour, and the elders sit round it. The sonof the deceased or other near relative anoints himself with turmericand picks up a stone. This is washed with the water from the pot, and placed on the floor, and a sacrifice of a cock or hen is made toit according as the deceased was a man or a woman. The stone is thenenshrined in the house as a family god, and the sacrifice of a fowlis repeated annually. It is supposed apparently that the dead man'sspirit is brought back to the house in the fish, and then transferredto the stone by washing this with the water. 

12. Religion. Krishna and other deified cowherds. 

The Ahirs have a special relation to the Hindu religion, owingto their association with the sacred cow, which is itself reveredas a goddess. When religion gets to the anthropomorphic stage thecowherd, who partakes of the cow's sanctity, may be deified as itsrepresentative. This was probably the case with Krishna, one ofthe most popular gods of Hinduism, who was a cowherd, and, as he isrepresented as being of a dark colour, may even have been held tobe of the indigenous races. Though, according to the legend, he wasreally of royal birth, Krishna was brought up by Nand, a herdsman ofGokul, and Jasoda or Dasoda his wife, and in the popular belief theseare his parents, as they probably were in the original story. Thesubstitution of Krishna, born as a prince, for Jasoda's daughter, in order to protect him from destruction by the evil king Kansa ofMathura, is perhaps a later gloss, devised when his herdsman parentagewas considered too obscure for the divine hero. Krishna's childhood inJasoda's house with his miraculous feats of strength and his amoroussports with Radha and the other milkmaids of Brindawan, are amongthe most favourite Hindu legends. Govind and Gopal, the protectoror guardian of cows, are names of Krishna and the commonest names ofHindus, as are also his other epithets, Murlidhar and Bansidhar, theflute-player; for Krishna and Balaram, like Greek and Roman shepherds, were accustomed to divert themselves with song, to the accompanimentof the same instrument. The child Krishna is also very popular, andhis birthday, the Janam-Ashtami on the 8th of dark Bhadon (August), is a great festival. On this day potsful of curds are sprinkled overthe assembled worshippers. Krishna, however, is not the solitaryinstance of the divine cowherd, but has several companions, humbleindeed compared to him, but perhaps owing their apotheosis to thesame reasons. Bhilat, a popular local godling of the Nerbudda Valley, was the son of an Ahir or Gaoli woman; she was childless and prayedto Parvati for a child, and the goddess caused her votary to haveone by her own husband, the god Mahadeo. Bhilat was stolen away fromhis home by Mahadeo in the disguise of a beggar, and grew up to bea great hero and made many conquests; but finally he returned andlived with his herdsman parents, who were no doubt his real ones. Heperformed numerous miracles, and his devotees are still possessed byhis spirit. Singaji is another godling who was a Gaoli by caste inIndore. He became a disciple of a holy Gokulastha Gosain or ascetic, and consequently a great observer of the Janam-Ashtami or Krishna'sbirthday. [26] On one occasion Singaji was late for prayers on thisday, and the _guru_ was very angry, and said to him, 'Don't show yourface to me again until you are dead. ' Singaji went home and told theother children he was going to die. Then he went and buried himselfalive. The occurrence was noised abroad and came to the ears of the_guru_, who was much distressed, and proceeded to offer his condolencesto Singaji's family. But on the way he saw Singaji, who had beenmiraculously raised from the dead on account of his virtuous act ofobedience, grazing his buffaloes as before. After asking for milk, which Singaji drew from a male buffalo calf, the _guru_ was ableto inform the bereaved parents of their son's joyful reappearanceand his miraculous powers; of these Singaji gave further subsequentdemonstration, and since his death, said to have occurred 350 yearsago, is widely venerated. The Gaolis pray to him for the protectionof their cattle from disease, and make thank-offerings of butter ifthese prayers are fulfilled. Other pilgrims to Singaji's shrine offerunripe mangoes and sugar, and an annual fair is held at it, when it issaid that for seven days no cows, flies or ants are to be seen in theplace. In the Betul district there is a village godling called Dait, represented by a stone under a tree. He is the spirit of any Ahir whoin his lifetime was credited in the locality with having the powers ofan exorcist. In Mandla and other Districts when any buffalo herdsmandies at a very advanced age the people make a platform for him withinthe village and call it Mahashi Deo or the buffalo god. Similarly, when an old cattle herdsman dies they do the same, and call it BalkiDeo or the bullock god. Here we have a clear instance of the processof substituting the spirit of the herdsman for the cow or buffalo asan object of worship. The occupation of the Ahir also lends itself toreligious imaginations. He stays in the forest or waste grass-land, frequently alone from morning till night, watching his herds; andthe credulous and uneducated minds of the more emotional may easilyhear the voices of spirits, or in a half-sleeping condition duringthe heat and stillness of the long day may think that visions haveappeared to them. Thus they come to believe themselves selected forcommunication with the unseen deities or spirits, and on occasionsof strong religious excitement work themselves into a frenzy and areheld to be possessed by a spirit or god. 

13. Caste deities. 

Among the special deities of the Ahirs is Kharak Deo, who is alwayslocated at the _khirkha_, or place of assembly of the cattle, ongoing to and returning from pasture. He appears to be the spirit orgod of the _khirkha_. He is represented by a platform with an imageof a horse on it, and when cattle fall ill the owners offer flourand butter to him. These are taken by the Ahirs in charge, and it isthought that the cattle will get well. Matar Deo is the god of thepen or enclosure for cattle made in the jungle. Three days after theDiwali festival the Rawats sacrifice one or more goats to him, cuttingoff their heads. They throw the heads into the air, and the cattle, smelling the blood, run together and toss them with their horns asthey do when they scent a tiger. The men then say that the animalsare possessed by Matar Deo. Guraya Deo is a deity who lives in thecattle-stalls in the village and is worshipped once a year. A manholds an egg in his hand, and walks round the stall pouring liquidover the egg all the way, so as to make a line round it. The egg isthen buried beneath the shrine of the god, the rite being probablymeant to ensure his aid for the protection of the cattle from diseasein their stalls. A favourite saint of the Ahirs is Haridas Baba. Hewas a Jogi, and could separate his soul from his body at pleasure. Onone occasion he had gone in spirit to Benares, leaving his bodyin the house of one of his disciples, who was an Ahir. When he didnot return, and the people heard that a dead body was lying there, they came and insisted that it should be burnt. When he came backand found that his body was burnt, he entered into a man and spokethrough him, telling the people what had happened. In atonement fortheir unfortunate mistake they promised to worship him. 

14. Other deities. 

The Mahakul Ahirs of Jashpur have three deities, whom they call Mahadeoor Siva, Sahadeo, one of the five Pandava brothers, and the goddessLakshmi. They say that the buffalo is Mahadeo, the cow Sahadeo, and the rice Lakshmi. This also appears to be an instance of thepersonification of animals and the corn into anthropomorphic deities. 

15. The Diwali festival. 

The principal festival of the Ahirs is the Diwali, falling about thebeginning of November, which is also the time when the autumn cropsripen. All classes observe this feast by illuminating their houseswith many small saucer-lamps and letting off crackers and fireworks, and they generally gamble with money to bring them good luck duringthe coming year. The Ahirs make a mound of earth, which is calledGovardhan, that is the mountain in Mathura which Krishna held upsidedown on his finger for seven days and nights, so that all the peoplemight gather under it and be protected from the devastating storms ofrain sent by Indra. After dancing round the mound they drive theircattle over it and make them trample it to pieces. At this time afestival called Marhai is held, at which much liquor is drunk andall classes disport themselves. In Damoh on this day the Ahirs go tothe standing-place for village cattle, and after worshipping the god, frighten the cattle by waving leaves of the basil-plant at them, andthen put on fantastic dresses, decorating themselves with cowries, and go round the village, singing and dancing. Elsewhere at the timeof the Marhai they dance round a pole with peacock feathers tied to thetop, and sometimes wear peacock feathers themselves, as well as apronssewn all over with cowries. It is said that Krishna and Balaram usedto wear peacock feathers when they danced in the jungles of Mathura, but this rite has probably some connection with the worship of thepeacock. This bird might be venerated by the Ahirs as one of theprominent denizens of the jungle. In Raipur they tie a white cockto the top of the pole and dance round it. In Mandla, Khila Mutha, the god of the threshing-floor, is worshipped at this time, withofferings of a fowl and a goat. They also perform the rite of _jagana_or waking him up. They tie branches of a small shrub to a stick andpour milk over the stone which is his emblem, and sing, 'Wake up, Khila Mutha, this is the night of Amawas' (the new moon). Then theygo to the cattle-shed and wake up the cattle, crying, 'Poraiya, god of the door, watchman of the window, open the door, Nand Gowalis coming. ' Then they drive out the cattle and chase them with thebranches tied to their sticks as far as their grazing-ground. NandGowal was the foster-father of Krishna, and is now said to signify aman who has a lakh (100, 000) of cows. This custom of frightening thecattle and making them run is called _dhor jagana_ or _bichkana_, thatis, to wake up or terrify the cattle. Its meaning is obscure, but it issaid to preserve the cattle from disease during the year. In Raipur thewomen make an image of a parrot in clay at the Diwali and place it ona pole and go round to the different houses, singing and dancing roundthe pole, and receiving presents of rice and money. They praise theparrot as the bird who carries messages from a lover to his mistress, and as living on the mountains and among the green verdure, and sing:

"Oh, parrot, where shall we sow _gondla_ grass and where shall wesow rice?

"We will sow _gondla_ in a pond and rice in the field. 

"With what shall we cut _gondla_ grass, and with what shall wecut rice?

"We shall cut _gondla_ with an axe and rice with a sickle. "

It is probable that the parrot is revered as a spirit of the forest, and also perhaps because it is destructive to the corn. The parrotis not, so far as is known, associated with any god, but the Hindusdo not kill it. In Bilaspur an ear of rice is put into the parrot'smouth, and it is said there that the object of the rite is to preventthe parrots from preying on the corn. 

16. Omens. 

On the night of the full moon of Jesth (May) the Ahirs stay awakeall night, and if the moon is covered with clouds they think thatthe rains will be good. If a cow's horns are not firmly fixed inthe head and seem to shake slightly, it is called Maini, and such ananimal is considered to be lucky. If a bullock sits down with threelegs under him and the fourth stretched out in front it is a verygood omen, and it is thought that his master's cattle will increaseand multiply. When a buffalo-calf is born they cover it at once witha black cloth and remove it from the mother's sight, as they thinkthat if she saw the calf and it then died her milk would dry up. Thecalf is fed by hand. Cow-calves, on the other hand, are usually leftwith the mother, and many people allow them to take all the milk, as they think it a sin to deprive them of it. 

17. Social customs. 

The Ahirs will eat the flesh of goats and chickens, and most of themconsume liquor freely. The Kaonra Ahirs of Mandla eat pork, and theRawats of Chhattisgarh are said not to object to field-mice and rats, even when caught in the houses. The Kaonra Ahirs are also said not toconsider a woman impure during the period of menstruation. Neverthelessthe Ahirs enjoy a good social status, owing to their relations withthe sacred cow. As remarked by Eha: "His family having been connectedfor many generations with the sacred animal he enjoys a certainconsciousness of moral respectability, like a man whose uncles aredeans or canons. " [27] All castes will take water from the hands ofan Ahir, and in Chhattisgarh and the Uriya country the Rawats andGahras, as the Ahir caste is known respectively in these localities, are the only caste from whom Brahmans and all other Hindus will takewater. On this account, and because of their comparative purity, they are largely employed as personal servants. In Chhattisgarh theordinary Rawats will clean the cooking-vessels even of Muhammadans, but the Thethwar or pure Rawats refuse this menial work. In Mandla, when a man is to be brought back into caste after a serious offence, such as getting vermin in a wound, he is made to stand in the middleof a stream, while some elderly relative pours water over him. Hethen addresses the members of the caste _panchayat_ or committee, who are standing on the bank, saying to them, 'Will you leave me inthe mud or will you take me out?' Then they tell him to come out, and he has to give a feast. At this a member of the Meliha sept firsteats food and puts some into the offender's mouth, thus taking thelatter's sin upon himself. The offender then addresses the _panchayat_saying, 'Rajas of the Panch, eat. ' Then the _panchayat_ and all thecaste take food with him and he is readmitted. In Nandgaon State thehead of the caste _panchayat_ is known as Thethwar, the title of thehighest subcaste, and is appointed by the Raja, to whom he makes apresent. In Jashpur, among the Mahakul Ahirs, when an offender is putout of caste he has on readmission to make an offering of Rs. 1-4 toBalaji, the tutelary deity of the State. These Mahakuls desire to beconsidered superior to ordinary Ahirs, and their social rules are hencevery strict. A man is put out of caste if a dog, fowl or pig toucheshis water or cooking-pots, or if he touches a fowl. In the lattercase he is obliged to make an offering of a fowl to the local god, and eight days are allowed for procuring it. A man is also put out ofcaste for beating his father. In Mandla, Ahirs commonly have the titleof Patel or headman of a village, probably because in former times, when the country consisted almost entirely of forest and grass land, they were accustomed to hold large areas on contract for grazing. 

18. Ornaments. 

In Chhattisgarh the Rawat women are especially fond of wearing large_churas_ or leg-ornaments of bell-metal. These consist of a longcylinder which fits closely to the leg, being made in two halves whichlock into each other, while at each end and in the centre circularplates project outwards horizontally. A pair of these _churas_ mayweigh 8 or 10 lbs. , and cost from Rs. 3 to Rs. 9. It is probable thatsome important magical advantage was expected to come from the wearingof these heavy appendages, which must greatly impede free progression, but its nature is not known. 

19. Occupation. 

Only about thirty per cent of the Ahirs are still occupied in breedingcattle and dealing in milk and butter. About four per cent are domesticservants, and nearly all the remainder cultivators and labourers. Informer times the Ahirs had the exclusive right of milking the cow, so that on all occasions an Ahir must be hired for this purpose evenby the lowest castes. Any one could, however, milk the buffalo, andalso make curds and other preparations from cow's milk. [28] Thisrule is interesting as showing how the caste system was maintainedand perpetuated by the custom of preserving to each caste a monopolyof its traditional occupation. The rule probably applied also to thebulk of the cultivating and the menial and artisan castes, and nowthat it has been entirely abrogated it would appear that the gradualdecay and dissolution of the caste organisation must follow. Thevillage cattle are usually entrusted jointly to one or more herdsmenfor grazing purposes. The grazier is paid separately for each animalentrusted to his care, a common rate being one anna for a cow orbullock and two annas for a buffalo per month. When a calf is bornhe gets four annas for a cow-calf and eight annas for a she-buffalo, but except in the rice districts nothing for a male buffalo-calf, asthese animals are considered useless outside the rice area. The reasonis that buffaloes do not work steadily except in swampy or wet ground, where they can refresh themselves by frequent drinking. In the northernDistricts male buffalo-calves are often neglected and allowed to die, but the cow-buffaloes are extremely valuable, because their milk isthe principal source of supply of _ghi_ or boiled butter. When a cowor buffalo is in milk the grazier often gets the milk one day outof four or five. When a calf is born the teats of the cow are firstmilked about twenty times on to the ground in the name of the localgod of the Ahirs. The remainder of the first day's milk is taken bythe grazier, and for the next few days it is given to friends. Thevillage grazier is often also expected to prepare the guest-house forGovernment officers and others visiting the village, fetch grass fortheir animals, and clean their cooking vessels. For this he sometimesreceives a small plot of land and a present of a blanket annuallyfrom the village proprietor. Malguzars and large tenants have theirprivate herdsmen. The pasturage afforded by the village waste landsand forest is, as a rule, only sufficient for the plough-bullocks andmore valuable milch-animals. The remainder are taken away sometimesfor long distances to the Government forest reserves, and here theherdsmen make stockades in the jungle and remain there with theiranimals for months together. The cattle which remain in the village aretaken by the owners in the early morning to the _khirkha_ or centralstanding-ground. Here the grazier takes them over and drives them outto pasture. He brings them back at ten or eleven, and perhaps lets themstand in some field which the owner wants manured. Then he separatesthe cows and milch-buffaloes and takes them to their masters' houses, where he milks them all. In the afternoon all the cattle are againcollected and driven out to pasture. The cultivators are very much inthe grazier's hands, as they cannot supervise him, and if dishonest hemay sell off a cow or calf to a friend in a distant village and tellthe owner that it has been carried off by a tiger or panther. Unlessthe owner succeeds by a protracted search or by accident in findingthe animal he cannot disprove the herdsman's statement, and the onlyremedy is to dispense with the latter's services if such losses becomeunduly frequent. On this account, according to the proverbs, the Ahiris held to be treacherous and false to his engagements. They are alsoregarded as stupid because they seldom get any education, retain theirrustic and half-aboriginal dialect, and on account of their solitarylife are dull and slow-witted in company. 'The barber's son learns toshave on the Ahir's head. ' 'The cow is in league with the milkman andlets him milk water into the pail. ' The Ahirs are also hot-tempered, and their propensity for drinking often results in affrays, when theybreak each other's head with their cattle-staffs. 'A Gaoli's quarrel:drunk at night and friends in the morning. '

20. Preparations of milk. 

Hindus nearly always boil their milk before using it, as the tasteof milk fresh from the cow is considered unpalatable. After boiling, the milk is put in a pot and a little old curds added, when the wholebecomes _dahi_ or sour curds. This is a favourite food, and appearsto be exactly the same substance as the Bulgarian sour milk which isnow considered to have much medicinal value. Butter is also made bychurning these curds or _dahi_. Butter is never used without beingboiled first, when it becomes converted into a sort of oil; thishas the advantage of keeping much better than fresh butter, and mayremain fit for use for as long as a year. This boiled butter is knownas _ghi_, and is the staple product of the dairy industry, the bulkof the surplus supply of milk being devoted to its manufacture. Itis freely used by all classes who can afford it, and serves very wellfor cooking purposes. There is a comparatively small market for freshmilk among the Hindus, and as a rule only those drink milk who obtainit from their own animals. The acid residue after butter has beenmade from _dahi_ (curds) or milk is known as _matha_ or butter-milk, and is the only kind of milk drunk by the poorer classes. Milk boiledso long as to become solidified is known as _khir_, and is used byconfectioners for making sweets. When the milk is boiled and some sourmilk added to it, so that it coagulates while hot, the preparation iscalled _chhana_. The whey is expressed from this by squeezing it in acloth, and a kind of cheese is obtained. [29] The liquid which oozesout at the root of a cow's horns after death is known as _gaolochan_and sells for a high price, as it is considered a valuable medicinefor children's cough and lung diseases. 

Andh

_Andh. _ [30]--A low cultivating caste of Berar, who numbered 52, 000persons in 1911, and belong to the Yeotmal, Akola and BuldanaDistricts. The Andhs appear to be a non-Aryan tribe of the Andhra orTamil country, from which they derive their name. The territoriesof the Andhra dynasty extended across southern India from sea tosea in the early part of the Christian era. This designation may, however, have been given to them after migration, emigrants being notinfrequently called in their new country by the name of the place fromwhich they came, as Berari, Purdesi, Audhia (from Oudh), and so on. Atpresent there seems to be no caste called Andh in Madras. Mr. Kitts[31] notes that they still come from Hyderabad across the Pengangariver. 

The caste are divided into two groups, Vartati or pure and Khaltati orillegitimate, which take food together, but do not intermarry. Theyhave a large number of exogamous septs, most of which appear to haveMarathi names, either taken from villages or of a titular character. Afew are called after animals or plants, as Majiria the cat, Ringnia kind of tree, Dumare from Dumar, an ant-hill, Dukare from Dukar, a pig, and Titawe from Titawa, a bird. Baghmare means tiger-killeror one killed by a tiger; members of this sept revere the tiger. Twosepts, Bhoyar and Wanjari, are named after other castes. 

Marriage between members of the same sept is prohibited, and alsobetween first cousins, except that a sister's son may marry a brother'sdaughter. Until recently marriage has been adult, but girls are nowwedded as children, and betrothals are sometimes arranged before theyare born. The ceremony resembles that of the Kunbis. Betrothals arearranged between October and December, and the weddings take placethree or four months later, from January to April. If the bride ismature she goes at once to her husband's house. Polygamy is allowed;and as only a well-to-do man can afford to obtain more than one wife, those who have several are held to be wealthy, and treated withrespect. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are permitted, butthe widow may not marry her husband's brother nor any member of hisclan. If an unmarried girl becomes pregnant by a man of her own or asuperior caste she is fined, and can then be married as a widow. Herfeet are not washed nor besmeared with red powder at the weddingceremony like those of other girls. In some localities Andh womendetected in a criminal intimacy even with men of such impure castesas the Mahars and Mangs have been readmitted into the community. Asubstantial fine is imposed on a woman detected in adultery accordingto her means and spent on a feast to the caste. All the members thushave a personal interest in the detection and punishment of suchoffences. The dead are usually buried, and water and sugar are placedin a dying man's mouth instead of the sacred objects used by Hindus;nor are the dying urged to call on Rama. The dead are buried withthe head to the south, in opposition to the Hindu custom. The Andhswill eat the flesh of fowls and pigs, and even cats, rats and snakesin some localities, though the more civilised have abjured theselatter. They are very fond of pork, and drink liquor, and will takefood from Kunbis, Malis and Kolis, but not from Gonds. They havea caste _panchayat_ or committee, with a headman called Mohtaria, and two officers known as Phopatia and Dukria. When a caste offenceis committed the Dukria goes to call the offender, and is given theearthen pots used at the penalty-feast, while the Phopatia receivesa new piece of cloth. The Mohtaria or headman goes from village tovillage to decide cases, and gets a share of the fine. The caste are_shikaris_ or hunters, and cultivators. They catch antelope, hares, pig and nilgai in their nets, and kill them with sticks and stones, and they dam up streams and net fish. Birds are not caught. Generally, the customs of the Andhs clearly point to an aboriginal origin, butthey are rapidly being Hinduised, and in some tracts can scarcely bedistinguished from Kunbis. 

They have Marathi names; and though only one name is given at birth, Mr. Slaney notes that this is frequently changed for some pet name, and as often as not a man goes regularly by some name other than hisreal one. 

Arakh

_Arakh. _--A small caste of cultivators and labourers foundprincipally in the Chanda District and Berar and scattered over otherlocalities. The Arakhs are considered to be an offshoot of the Pasi orBahelia caste of hunters and fowlers. Mr. Crooke [32] writes of them:"All their traditions connect them with the Pasis and Parasurama, thesixth Avatara of Vishnu. One story runs that Parasurama was bathingin the sea, when a leech bit his foot and caused it to bleed. Hedivided the blood into two parts; out of one part he made the firstPasi and out of the second the first Arakh. Another story is thatthe Pasis were made out of the sweat (_pasina_) of Parasurama. WhileParasurama was away the Pasi shot some animals with his bow, andthe deity was so enraged that he cursed the Pasi, and swore thathis descendants should keep pigs. This accounts for the degradationof the Pasis. Subsequently Parasurama sent for some Pasis to helphim in one of his wars; but they ran away and hid in an _arhar_[33] field and were hence called Arakhs. " This connection with thePasis is also recognised in the case of the Arakhs of Berar, of whomMr. Kitts writes: [34] "The Arakhs found in Morsi are a race akin tothe Bahelias. Their regular occupation is bird-catching and _shikar_(hunting). They do not follow Hindu customs in their marriages, but although they keep pigs, eat flesh and drink spirits, they willnot touch a Chamar. They appear to be a branch of the Pasi tribe, and are described as a semi-Hinduised class of aborigines. " In theChanda District, however, the Arakhs are closely connected with theGond tribe, as is evident from their system of exogamy. Thus theysay that they are divided into the Matia, Tekam, Tesli, Godam, Madai, Sayam and Chorliu septs, worshipping respectively three, four, five, six, seven, eight and twelve gods; and persons who worship the samenumber of gods cannot marry with one another. This system of divisionsaccording to the different number of gods worshipped is found in theCentral Provinces only among the Gonds and one or two other tribeslike the Baigas, who have adopted it from them, and as some of thenames given above are also Gondi words, no doubt need be entertainedthat the Arakhs of Chanda are largely of Gond descent. They areprobably, in fact, the offspring of irregular connections betweenthe Gonds and Pasis, who, being both frequenters of the forests, would naturally come much into contact with each other. And beingdisowned by the true Pasis on account of their defective pedigree, they have apparently set up as a separate caste and adopted the nameof Arakh to hide the deficiencies of their ancestry. 

The social customs of the Arakhs resemble those of other low Hinducastes, and need not be given in detail. Their weddings are heldnear a temple of Maroti, or if there be none such, then at the placewhere the Holi fire was lit in the preceding year. A bride-pricevarying from Rs. 25 to Rs. 40 is usually paid. In the case of themarriage of a widow, the second husband goes to the house of thewoman, where the couple are bathed and seated on two wooden boards, a branch of a cotton-plant being placed near them. The bridegroom thenties five strings of black glass beads round the woman's neck. Thedead are mourned for one day only, and a funeral feast is given tothe caste-fellows. The Arakhs are a very low caste, but their touchdoes not convey impurity. 

Atari

1. General notice. 

_Atari, [35] Gandhi, Bukekari. _--A small Muhammadan caste of retailersof scent, incense, tooth-powder and _kunku_ or pink powder. Atariis derived from _atar_ or _itra_, attar of roses. Gandhi comes from_gandh_, a Sanskrit word for scent. Bukekari is a Marathi word meaninga seller of powder. The Ataris number about two hundred personsin Nagpur, Wardha and Berar. Both Hindus and Muhammadans followthe profession, but the Hindu Ataris are not a separate caste, andbelong to the Teli, Gurao and Beldar castes. The Muhammadan Ataris, to whom this article refers, may marry with other Muhammadans, withthe exception of low-class tradesmen like the Pinjaras, Kasais andKunjras. One instance of an Atari marrying a Rangrez is known, butusually they decline to do so. But since they are not considered tobe the equals of ordinary Muhammadans, they constitute more or lessa distinct social group. They are of the same position as Muhammadantin-workers, bangle-makers and pedlars, and sometimes intermarrywith them. They admit Hindu converts into the community, but thewomen refuse to eat with them, and the better-class families willnot intermarry with converts. A new convert must be circumcised, but if he is of advanced age, or if his foreskin is wanting, assometimes happens, they take a rolled-up betel-leaf and cut it intwo in substitution for the rite. 

2. Marriage customs. 

It is essential that a girl should be married before adolescence, as itis said that when the signs of puberty appear in her before wedlock herparents commit a crime equivalent to the shedding of human blood. Thefather of the boy looks for a bride, and after dropping hints tothe girl's family to see if his proposal is acceptable, he sends somefemale relatives or friends to discuss the marriage. Before the weddingthe boy is presented with a _chhap_ or ring of gold or silver witha small cup-like attachment. A _mehar_ or dowry must be given to thebride, the amount of which is not below Rs. 50 or above Rs. 250. Thebride's parents give her cooking vessels, bedding and a bedstead. Afterthe wedding, the couple are seated on a cot while the women sing songs, and they see each other's face reflected in a mirror. The processionreturns after a stay of four days, and is received by the women ofthe bridegroom's family with some humorous ceremonies bearing on thenature of marriage. A feast called Tamm Walima follows, and the coupleare shut up together in an inner room, even though they may be underage. The marriage includes some Hindu customs, such as the erectionof the _pandal_ or shed, rubbing the couple with turmeric and oil, and the tying on of _kankans_ or wrist-bands. A girl going wrongbefore marriage may be wedded with full rites so long as she has notconceived, but after conception until her child is born she cannot gothrough the ceremony at all. After the birth of the child she may bemarried simply with the rite for widows. She retains the child, but ithas no claim to succeed to her husband's property. A widow may marryagain after an interval of forty days from her first husband's death, and she may wed her younger brother-in-law. Divorce is permitted atthe instance of either party, and for mere disagreement. A man usuallydivorces his wife by vowing in the presence of two witnesses that hewill in future consider intercourse with her as incestuous in the samedegree as with his mother. A divorced woman has a claim to her _mehar_or dowry if not already paid, but forfeits it if she marries again. Aman can marry the daughter of his paternal uncle. The services of aKazi at weddings are paid for with a fee of Rs. 1-4, and well-to-dopersons also give him a pair of turbans. 

3. Religion. 

The Ataris are Muhammadans of the Sunni sect. They revere theMuhammadan saints, and on the night of Shabrat they let off fireworksin honour of their ancestors and make offerings of _halwa_ [36] tothem and place lamps and scent on their tombs. They swear by the pigand abstain from eating its flesh. The dog is considered an uncleananimal and its tail, ears and tongue are especially defiling. If thehair of a dog falls on the ground they cannot pray in that placebecause the souls of the prophets cannot come there. To see a dogflapping its ears is a bad omen, and a person starting on a journeyshould postpone his departure. They esteem the spider, because theysay it spread its web over the mouth of the cave where Hasan andHusain lay concealed from their enemies and thus prevented it frombeing searched. Some of them have Pirs or spiritual preceptors, thesebeing Muhammadan beggars, not necessarily celibate. The ceremony ofadhesion is that a man should drink sherbet from the cup from whichhis preceptor has drunk. They do not observe impurity after a deathnor bathe on returning from a funeral. 

4. Social customs. 

Liquor is of course prohibited to the Ataris as to other Muhammadans, but some of them drink it nevertheless. Some of them eat beef andothers abstain. The blood of animals killed must flow before deathaccording to the rite of _halal_, but they say that fish are anexception, because when Abraham was offering up his son Ishmael andGod substituted a goat, the goat bleated before it was killed, andthis offended Abraham, who threw his sacrificial knife into the sea:the knife struck and killed a fish, and on this account all fishare considered to be _halal_ or lawful food without any furtherrite. The Ataris observe the Hindu law of inheritance, and some ofthem worship Hindu deities, as Mata the goddess of smallpox. As a ruletheir women are not secluded. The Ataris make _missi_ or tooth-powderfrom myrobalans, cloves and cardamoms, and other constituents. Thishas the effect of blackening the teeth. They also sell the _kunku_or red powder which women rub on their foreheads, its constituentsbeing turmeric, borax and the juice of limes. They sell scent andsometimes deal in tobacco. The scents most in demand are _gulab-pani_or rose-water and _phulel_ or essence of tilli or sesamum. Scents areusually sold by the tola of 18 annas silver weight, [37] and a tolaof attar may vary in price from 8 annas to Rs. 80. Other scents aremade from _khas-khas_ grass, the mango, henna and musk, the _bela_flower, [38] the champak [39] and cucumber. Scent is manufacturedby distillation from the flowers boiled in water, and the drops ofcongealed vapour fall into sandalwood oil, which they say is the basisof all scents. Fragrant oils are also sold for rubbing on the hair, made from orange flowers, jasmine, cotton-seed and the flowers ofthe _aonla_ tree. [40] Scent is sold in tiny circular glass bottles, and the oils in little bottles made from thin leather. The Atarisalso retail the little black sticks of incense which are set up andburnt at the time of taking food and in temples, so that the smelland smoke may keep off evil spirits. When professional exorcists arecalled upon to clear any building, such as a hospital, supposed to behaunted by spirits or the ghosts of the dead, they commence operationsby placing these sticks of incense at the entrance and setting themalight as in a temple. 

Audhelia

1. Origin. 

_Audhelia (Audhalia). _--A small hybrid caste found almost exclusivelyin the Bilaspur District, where they number about 1000 persons. Thename is derived from the word Udharia, meaning a person withclandestine sexual intimacies. The Audhelias are a mixed caste andtrace their origin from a Daharia Rajput ancestor, by one Bhuri Bandi, a female slave of unknown caste. This couple is supposed to haveresided in Ratanpur, the old capital of Chhattisgarh, and the femaleancestors of the Audhelias are said to have been prostitutes untilthey developed into a caste and began to marry among themselves. Theirproper avocation at present is the rearing of pigs, while some ofthem are also tenants and farm-labourers. Owing to the base descentand impure occupation of the caste they are held in very low esteem, and their touch is considered to convey pollution. 

2. Marriage. 

The caste have at present no endogamous divisions and still admitmembers of other castes with the exception of the very lowest. Butsocial gradations exist to a certain extent among the membersaccording to the position of their male ancestors, a Daharia Audhelia, for instance, being reluctant to eat or intermarry with a PankaAudhelia. Under these circumstances it has become a rule among theAudhelias not to eat with their caste-fellows excepting their ownrelations. On the occasion of a caste feast, therefore, each guestprepares his own food, taking only uncooked grain from his host. Atpresent seven _gotras_ or exogamous divisions appear to have beenformed in the caste with the names of Pachbhaiya, Chhahri, Kalkhor, Bachhawat, Dhanawat, Bhainsa and Limuan. The following story exists asto the origin of these _gotras_: There were formerly three brothers, Sahasman, Budha and Mangal, who were Sansis or robbers. One eveningthe three brothers halted in a forest and went to look for food. Onebrought back a buffalo-horn, another a peacock's feather and theyoungest, Mangal, brought plums. The other brothers asked Mangal tolet them share his plums, to which he agreed on condition that oneof the brothers should give his daughter to him in marriage. AsMangal and his brothers were of one _gotra_ or section, and themarriage would thus involve splitting up the _gotra_, the brotherswere doubtful whether it could be performed. They sought about forsome sign to determine this difficult question, and decided that ifMangal succeeded in breaking in pieces an iron image of a cat simplyby blows of his naked fist, it would be a sufficient indicationthat they might split up their _gotra_. Mangal was therefore putto the ordeal and succeeded in breaking the image, so the threebrothers split up their _gotra_, the eldest assuming the _gotra_name of Bhainsa because he had found a buffalo-horn, the second thatof Kalkhor, which is stated to mean peacock, and the third that ofChhahri, which at any rate does not mean a plum. The word Chhahrimeans either 'shadow, ' or 'one who washes the clothes of a woman inconfinement. ' If we assume it to have the latter meaning, it may bedue to the fact that Mangal had to wash the clothes of his own wife, not being able to induce a professional washerman to do so on accountof the incestuous nature of the connection. As the eldest brothergave his daughter in an incestuous marriage he was also degraded, andbecame the ancestor of the Kanjars or prostitutes, who, it is said, to the present day do not solicit Audhelias in consideration of theconsanguinity existing between them. The story itself sufficientlyindicates the low and mixed descent of the Audhelias, and its realmeaning may possibly be that when they first began to form a separatecaste they permitted incestuous marriages on account of the paucity oftheir members. A curious point about the story is that the incestuousnature of the connection is not taken to be the most pressing objectionto the marriage of Mangal with his own niece, but the violation of thecaste rule prohibiting marriage within the same _gotra_. Bachhawatand Dhanawat are the names of sections of the Banjara caste, andthe persons of these _gotras_ among the Audhelias are probablythe descendants of illicit connections among Banjaras. The wordPachbhaiya means 'five brothers, ' and this name possibly commemorates apolyandrous connection of some Audhelia woman. Limuan means a tortoise, which is a section of many castes. Several of the section-names arethus totemistic, and, as in other castes, some reverence is paid tothe animal from whom the name is derived. At present the Audheliasforbid marriage within the same _gotra_ and also the union of firstcousins. Girls are married between five and seven years of age as theirnumbers are scarce, and they are engaged as early as possible. Unlessweddings are arranged by exchanging girls between two families, ahigh bride-price, often amounting to as much as Rs. 60, is paid. Nostigma is incurred, however, if a girl should remain unmarried tillshe arrives at adolescence, but, on the contrary, a higher price isthen obtained for her. Sexual licence either before or after marriageis considered a venial offence, but a woman detected in a _liaison_with a man of one of the lowest castes is turned out of caste. Widowmarriage and divorce are freely allowed. 

3. Religion, birth and death. 

The Audhelias venerate Dulha Deo and Devi, to whom they usually offerpigs. Their principal festival is the Holi, at which their women wereformerly engaged to perform as professional dancers. They usually burntheir dead and remove the ashes on the third day, throwing them intothe nearest stream. A few of the bones are picked up and buried undera pipal tree, and a pitcher with a hole in the bottom is hung on thetree so that water may trickle down on to them. On the tenth day thecaste-people assemble and are shaved and bathe and rub their bodieswith oil under the tree. Unmarried men and persons dying of choleraare buried, the head being placed to the north. They consider that ifthey place the corpse in the reverse position it would be an insultto the Ganges equivalent to kicking the holy river, as the feet ofthe body would then be turned towards it. 

Badhak

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Introductory notice. _ 2. _The Badhak dacoits. _ 3. _Instances of dacoities. _ 4. _Further instances of dacoities. _ 5. _Disguise of religious mendicants. _ 6. _Countenance and support of landowners. _ 7. _Pride in their profession. _ 8. _Caste rules and admission of outsiders. _ 9. _Religion. Offerings to ancestors. _ 10. _The wounded haunted by spirits. _ 11. _Pious funeral observances. _ 12. _Taking the omens. _ 13. _Suppression of dacoity. _ 14. _The Badhaks or Baoris at the present time. _ 15. _Lizard-hunting. _ 16. _Social observances. _ 17. _Criminal practices. _

1. Introductory notice. 

_Badhak, Bagri, Baoria. _--A famous tribe of dacoits who flourishedup to about 1850, and extended their depredations over the wholeof Northern and Central India. The Bagris and Baorias or Bawariasstill exist and are well known to the police as inveterate criminals;but their operations are now confined to ordinary burglary, theft andcheating, and their more interesting profession of armed gang-robberyon a large scale is a thing of the past. The first part of this articleis entirely compiled from the Report on their suppression drawn upby Colonel Sleeman, [41] who may be regarded as the virtual founderof the Thuggee and Dacoity Department. Some mention of the existingBagri and Baoria tribes is added at the end. 

2. The Badhak dacoits. 

The origin of the Badhaks is obscure, but they seem to have belongedto Gujarat, as their peculiar dialect, still in use, is a form ofGujarati. The most striking feature in it is the regular substitutionof _kh_ for _s_. They claimed to be Rajputs and were divided into clanswith the well-known Rajput names of Solanki, Panwar, Dhundhel, Chauhan, Rathor, Gahlot, Bhatti and Charan. Their ancestors were supposed tohave fled from Chitor on one of the historical occasions on which itwas assaulted and sacked. But as they spoke Gujarati it seems moreprobable that they belonged to Gujarat, a fertile breeding-place ofcriminals, and they may have been descended from the alliances ofRajputs with the primitive tribes of this locality, the Bhils andKolis. The existing Bagris are of short stature, one writer statingthat none of them exceed five feet two inches in height; and thisseems to indicate that they have little Rajput blood. It may besurmised that the Badhaks rose into importance and found scope fortheir predatory instincts during the period of general disorder andabsence of governing authority through which northern India passedafter the decline of the Mughal Empire. And they lived and robbed withthe connivance or open support of the petty chiefs and landholders, to whom they gave a liberal share of their booty. The principal bandswere located in the Oudh forests, but they belonged to the wholeof northern India including the Central Provinces; and as ColonelSleeman's Report, though of much interest, is now practically unknown, I have thought it not out of place to compile an article by means ofshort extracts from his account of the tribe. 

In 1822 the operations of the Badhaks were being conducted on such ascale that an officer wrote: "No District between the Brahmaputra, the Nerbudda, the Satlej and the Himalayas is free from them; andwithin this vast field hardly any wealthy merchant or manufacturercould feel himself secure for a single night from the depredationsof Badhak dacoits. They had successfully attacked so many of thetreasuries of our native Sub-Collectors that it was deemed necessary, all over the North-Western Provinces, to surround such buildings withextensive fortifications. In many cases they carried off our publictreasure from strong parties of our regular troops and mounted police;and none seemed to know whence they came or whither they fled withthe booty acquired. " [42]

3. Instances of dacoities. 

Colonel Sleeman thus described a dacoity in the town of Narsinghpurwhen he was in charge of that District: [43] "In February 1822, in the dusk of the evening, a party of about thirty persons, withnothing seemingly but walking-sticks in their hands, passed thepiquet of sepoys on the bank of the rivulet which separates thecantonment from the town of Narsinghpur. On being challenged bythe sentries they said they were cowherds and that their cattle werefollowing close behind. They walked up the street; and coming oppositethe houses of the most wealthy merchants, they set their torchesin a blaze by blowing suddenly on pots filled with combustibles, stabbed everybody who ventured to move or make the slightest noise, plundered the houses, and in ten minutes were away with their booty, leaving about twelve persons dead and wounded on the ground. No traceof them was discovered. " Another well-known exploit of the Badhakswas the attack on the palace of the ex-Peshwa, Baji Rao, at Bithurnear Cawnpore. This was accomplished by a gang of about eighty men, who proceeded to the locality in the disguise of carriers of Gangeswater. Having purchased a boat and a few muskets to intimidatethe guard they crossed the Ganges about six miles below Bithur, and reached the place at ten o'clock at night; and after woundingeighteen persons who attempted resistance they possessed themselvesof property, chiefly in gold, to the value of more than two and ahalf lakhs of rupees; and retiring without loss made their way insafety to their homes in the Oudh forests. The residence of thisgang was known to a British police officer in the King of Oudh'sservice, Mr. Orr, and after a long delay on the part of the courtan expedition was sent which recovered a portion of the treasureand captured two or three hundred of the Badhaks. But none of therecovered property reached the hands of Baji Rao and the prisonerswere soon afterwards released. [44] Again in 1839, a gang of aboutfifty men under a well-known leader, Gajraj, scaled the walls ofJhansi and plundered the Surafa or bankers' quarter of the town fortwo hours, obtaining booty to the value of Rs. 40, 000, which theycarried off without the loss of a man. The following account of thisraid was obtained by Colonel Sleeman from one of the robbers: [45]"The spy (_hirrowa_) having returned and reported that he had found amerchant's house in Jhansi which contained a good deal of property, we proceeded to a grove where we took the auspices by the processof _akut_ (counting of grains) and found the omens favourable. Wethen rested three days and settled the rates according to which thebooty should be shared. Four or five men, who were considered toofeeble for the enterprise, were sent back, and the rest, well armed, strong and full of courage, went on. In the evening of the fourth daywe reached a plain about a mile from the town, where we rested to takebreath for an hour; about nine o'clock we got to the wall and remainedunder it till midnight, preparing the ladders from materials which wehad collected on the road. They were placed to the wall and we enteredand passed through the town without opposition. A marriage processionwas going on before us and the people thought we belonged to it. Wefound the bankers' shops closed. Thana and Saldewa, who carried theaxes, soon broke them open, while Kulean lighted up his torch. Gajrajwith twenty men entered, while the rest stood posted at the differentavenues leading to the place. When all the property they could findhad been collected, Gajraj hailed the god Hanuman and gave orders forthe retreat. We got back safely to Mondegri in two days and a half, and then reposed for two or three days with the Raja of Narwar, with whom we left five or six of our stoutest men as a guard, andthen returned home with our booty, consisting chiefly of diamonds, emeralds, gold and silver bullion, rupees and about sixty poundsof silver wire. None of our people were either killed or wounded, but whether any of the bankers' people were I know not. "

4. Further instances of dacoities. 

Colonel Sleeman writes elsewhere [46] of the leader of the aboveexploit: "This Gajraj had risen from the vocation of a _bandarwala_(monkey showman) to be the Robin Hood of Gwalior and the adjacentStates; he was the governor-general of banditti in that country ofbanditti and kept the whole in awe; he had made himself so formidablethat the Durbar appointed him to keep the _ghats_ or ferries overthe Chambal, which he did in a very profitable manner to them andto himself, and none entered or quitted the country without payingblackmail. " A common practice of the Badhaks, when in need of a littleready money, was to lie in wait for money-changers on their returnfrom the markets. These men take their bags of money with them to theimportant bazars at a distance from their residence and return homewith them after dusk. The dacoits were accustomed to watch for themin the darkest and most retired places on the roads and fell themto the ground with their bludgeons. This device was often practisedand usually succeeded. [47] Of another Badhak chief, Meherban, it isstated [48] that he hired a discharged sepoy to instruct his followersin the European system of drill, that they might travel with him inthe disguise of regular soldiers, well armed and accoutred. Duringthe rains Meherban's spies (_hirrowa_) were sent to visit the greatcommercial towns and report any despatches of money or other valuables, which were to take place during the following open season. His ownfavourite disguise was that of a Hindu prince, while the remainderof the gang constituted his retinue and escort. On one occasion, assuming this character, he followed up a boat laden with Spanishdollars which was being sent from Calcutta to Benares; and havingattacked it at its moorings at Makrai, he killed one and wounded tenmen of the guard and made off with 25, 000 Spanish dollars and Rs. 2600of the Company's coinage. A part of the band were sent direct to therendezvous previously arranged, while Meherban returned to the grovewhere he had left his women and proceeded with them in a more leisurelyfashion to the same place. Retaining the character of a native princehe halted here for two days to celebrate the Holi festival. Marchingthence with his women conveyed in covered litters by hired bearerswho were changed at intervals, he proceeded to his bivouac in theOudh forests; and at Seosagar, one of his halting-places, he gavea large sum of money to a gardener to plant a grove of mango treesnear a tank for the benefit of travellers, in the name of RajaMeherban Singh of Gaur in Oudh; and promised him further alms onfuture occasions of pilgrimage if he found the work progressing well, saying that it was a great shame that travellers should be compelledas he had been to halt without shade for themselves or their familiesduring the heat of the day. He arrived safely at his quarters in theforest and was received in the customary fashion by a procession ofwomen in their best attire, who conducted him with dancing and music, like a victorious Roman Proconsul, to his fort. [49]

5. Disguise of religious mendicants. 

But naturally not all the Badhaks could do things in the style ofMeherban Singh. The disguise which they most often assumed in the northwas that of carriers of Ganges water, while in Central India they oftenpretended to be Banjaras travelling with pack-bullocks, or pilgrims, or wedding-parties going to fetch the bride or bridegroom. Sometimesalso they took the character of religious mendicants, the leader beingthe high priest and all the rest his followers and disciples. Onesuch gang, described by Colonel Sleeman, [50] had four or fivetents of white and dyed cloth, two or three pairs of _nakkaras_or kettle-drums and trumpets, with a great number of buffaloes, cows, goats, sheep and ponies. Some were clothed, but the bodiesof the greater part were covered with nothing but ashes, paint anda small cloth waistband. But they always provided themselves withfive or six real Bairagis, whose services they purchased at a veryhigh price. These men were put forward to answer questions in caseof difficulty and to bully the landlords and peasantry; and if thepeople demurred to the demands of the Badhaks, to intimidate them bytricks calculated to play upon the fears of the ignorant. They heldin their hands a preparation of gunpowder resembling common ashes; andwhen they found the people very stubborn they repeated their _mantras_over this and threw it upon the thatch of the nearest house, to whichit set fire. The explosion was caused by a kind of fusee held in thehand which the people could not see, and taking it for a miraclethey paid all that was demanded. Another method was to pretend tobe carrying the bones of dead relatives to the Ganges. The bones orashes of the deceased, says [51] Colonel Sleeman, are carried to theGanges in bags, coloured red for females and white for males. Thesebags are considered holy, and are not allowed to touch the groundupon the way, and during halts in the journey are placed on poles ortriangles. The carriers are regarded with respect as persons engagedupon a pious duty, and seldom questioned on the road. When a gangassumed this disguise they proceeded to their place of rendezvousin small parties, some with red and some with white bags, in whichthey carried the bones of animals most resembling those of the humanframe. These were supported on triangles formed of the shafts on whichthe spear-heads would be fitted when they reached their destinationand had prepared for action. 

6. Countenance and support of landowners. 

It would have been impossible for the Badhaks to exist and flourishas they did without the protection of the landowners on whose estatesthey lived; and this they received in full measure in return for aliberal share of their booty. When the chief of Karauli was called uponto dislodge a gang within his territory, he expressed apprehensionthat the coercion of the Badhaks might cause a revolution in theState. He was not at all singular, says Colonel Sleeman, in his fearof exasperating this formidable tribe of robbers. It was common toall the smaller chiefs and the provincial governors of the largerones. They everywhere protected and fostered the Badhaks, as did thelandholders; and the highest of them associated with the leaders ofgangs on terms of equality and confidence. It was very common for achief or the governor of a district in times of great difficulty andpersonal danger to require from one of the leaders of such gangs anight-guard or _palang ki chauki_: and no less so to entertain largebodies of them in the attack and defence of forts and camps wheneverunusual courage and skill were required. The son of the Raja of Chardaexchanged turbans with a Badhak leader, Mangal Singh, as a mark of themost intimate friendship. This episode recalls an alliance of similarcharacter in _Lorna Doone_; and indeed it would not be difficult tofind several points of resemblance between the careers of the moreenterprising Badhak leaders and the Doones of Bagworthy; but Indiaproduced no character on the model of John Ridd, and it was reservedfor an Englishman, Colonel Sleeman, to achieve the suppression of theBadhaks as well as that of the Thugs. After the fortress and territoryof Garhakota in Saugor had been taken by the Maharaja Sindhia, ZalimSingh, a cousin of the dispossessed Bundela chief, collected a forceof Bundelas and Pindaris and ravaged the country round Garhakotain 1813. In the course of his raid he sacked and burnt the townof Deori, and 15, 000 persons perished in the flames. Colonel JeanBaptiste, Sindhia's general, obtained a number of picked Badhaks fromRajputana and offered them a rich reward for the head of Zalim Singh;and after watching his camp for three months they managed to come onhim asleep in the tent of a dancing-girl, who was following his camp, and stabbed him to the heart. For this deed they received Rs. 20, 000from Baptiste with other valuable presents. Their reputation wasindeed such that they were frequently employed at this period both bychiefs who desired to take the lives of others and by those who wereanxious for the preservation of their own. When it happened that agang was caught after a robbery in a native State, the custom wasnot infrequently to make them over to the merchant whose propertythey had taken, with permission to keep them in confinement untilthey should refund his money; and in this manner by giving up thewhole or a part of the proceeds of their robbery they were enabledto regain their liberty. Even if they were sent before the courts, justice was at that time so corrupt as to permit of easy avenues ofescape for those who could afford to pay; and Colonel Sleeman recordsthe deposition of a Badhak describing their methods of bribery:"When police officers arrest Badhaks their old women get round themand give them large sums of money; and they either release them orget their depositions so written that their release shall be orderedby the magistrates. If they are brought to court, their old women, dressed in rags, follow them at a distance of three or four mileswith a thousand or two thousand rupees upon ponies; and these rupeesthey distribute among the native officers of the court and get theBadhaks released. These old women first ascertain from the people ofthe villages who are the Nazirs and Munshis of influence, and waitupon them at their houses and make their bargains. If the officialscannot effect their release, they take money from the old women andsend them off to the Sadar Court, with letters of introduction to theirfriends, and advice as to the rate they shall pay to each accordingto his supposed influence. This is the way that all our leaders getreleased, and hardly any but useless men are left in confinement. " [52]

7. Pride in their profession. 

It may be noticed that these robbers took the utmost pleasure in theircalling, and were most averse to the idea of giving it up and takingto honest pursuits. "Some of the men with me, " one magistrate wrote, [53] "have been in jail for twenty, and one man for thirty years, and still do not appear to have any idea of abandoning their illegalvocation; even now, indeed, they look on what we consider an honestmeans of livelihood with the most marked contempt; and in relatingtheir excursions talk of them with the greatest pleasure, much inthe way an eager sportsman describes a boar-chase or fox-hunt. Whiletalking of their excursions, which were to me really very interesting, their eyes gleamed with pleasure; and beating their hands on theirforeheads and breasts and muttering some ejaculation they bewailedthe hardness of their lot, which now ensured their never again beingable to participate in such a joyous occupation. " Another Badhak, on being examined, said he could not recall a case of one of thecommunity having ever given up the trade of dacoity. "None ever did, I am certain of it, " he continued. [54] "After having been arrested, on our release we frequently take lands, to make it appear we haveleft off dacoity, but we never do so in reality; it is only done asa feint and to enable our zamindars (landowners) to screen us. " Theysometimes paid rent for their land at the rate of thirty rupeesan acre, in return for the countenance and protection afforded bythe zamindars. "Our profession, " another Badhak remarked, [55] "hasbeen a _Padshahi Kam_ (a king's trade); we have attacked and seizedboldly the thousands and hundreds of thousands that we have freelyand nobly spent; we have been all our lives wallowing in wealth andbasking in freedom, and find it hard to manage with the few copperpice a day we get from you. " At the time when captures were numerous, and the idea was entertained of inducing the dacoits to settle invillages and supporting them until they had been trained to labour, several of them, on being asked how much they would require to supportthemselves, replied that they could not manage on less than two rupeesa day, having earned quite that sum by dacoity. This amount would bemore than twenty times the wages of an ordinary labourer at the sameperiod. Another witness put the amount at one to two rupees a day, remarking, 'We are great persons for eating and drinking, and we keepseveral wives according to our means. ' Of some of them Colonel Sleemanhad a high opinion, and he mentions the case of one man, Ajit Singh, who was drafted into the native army and rose to be commander of acompany. "I have seldom seen a man, " he wrote, [56] "whom I wouldrather have with me in scenes of peril and difficulty. " An attempt ofthe King of Oudh's, however, to form a regiment of Badhaks had endedin failure, as after a short time they mutinied, beat their commandantand other officers and turned them out of the regiment, giving astheir reason that the officers had refused to perform the same dutiesas the men. And they visited with the same treatment all the otherofficers sent to them, until they were disbanded by the British onthe province of Allahabad being made over to the Company. ColonelSleeman notes that they were never known to offer any other violenceor insult to females than to make them give up any gold ornaments thatthey might have about their persons. "In all my inquiries into thecharacter, habits and conduct of these gangs, I have never found aninstance of a female having been otherwise disgraced or insulted bythem. They are all Hindus, and this reverence for the sex pervadesall Hindu society. " [57] According to their own account also theynever committed murder; if people opposed them they struck and killedlike soldiers, but this was considered to be in fair fight. It maybe noted, nevertheless, that they had little idea of clan loyalty, and informed very freely against their fellows when this course wasto their advantage. They also stated that they could not settle intowns; they had always been accustomed to live in the jungles andcommit dacoities upon the people of the towns as a kind of _shikar_(sport); they delighted in it, and they felt living in towns or amongother men as a kind of prison, and got quite confused (_ghabraye_), and their women even more than the men. 

8. Caste rules and admission of outsiders. 

The Badhaks had a regular caste organisation, and members of thedifferent clans married with each other like the Rajputs afterwhom they were named. They admitted freely into the communitymembers of any respectable Hindu caste, but not the impure castesor Muhammadans. But at least one instance of the admission ofa Muhammadan is given. [58] The Badhaks were often known to thepeople as Siarkhawa or jackal-eaters, or Sabkhawa, those who eateverything. And the Muhammadan in question was given jackal's fleshto eat, and having partaken of it was considered to have become amember of the community. This indicates that the Badhaks were probablyaccustomed to eat the flesh of the jackal at a sacrificial meal, and hence that they worshipped the jackal, revering it probablyas the deity of the forests where they lived. Such a venerationwould account for the importance attached to the jackal's cry as anomen. The fact of their eating jackals also points to the conclusionthat the Badhaks were not Rajputs, but a low hunting caste like thePardhis and Bahelias. The Pardhis have Rajput sept names as well as theBadhaks. No doubt a few outcaste Rajputs may have joined the gangs andbecome their leaders. Others, however, said that they abstained fromthe flesh of jackals, snakes, foxes and cows and buffaloes. Childrenwere frequently adopted, being purchased in large numbers in timeof famine, and also occasionally kidnapped. They were brought up tothe trade of dacoity, and if they showed sufficient aptitude for itwere taken out on expeditions, but otherwise left at home to managethe household affairs. They were married to other adopted childrenand were known as Ghulami or Slave Badhaks, like the Jangar Banjaras;and like them also, after some generations, when their real origin hadbeen forgotten, they became full Badhaks. It was very advantageous toa Badhak to have a number of children, because all plunder obtained wasdivided in regularly apportioned shares among the whole community. Menwho were too old to go on dacoity also received their share, and allchildren, even babies born during the absence of the expedition. TheBadhaks said that this rule was enforced because they thought it anadvantage to the community that families should be large and theirnumbers should increase; from which statement it must be concludedthat they seldom suffered any stringency from lack of spoil. Theyalso stated that Badhak widows would go and find a second husbandfrom among the regular population, and as a rule would sooner orlater persuade him to join the Badhaks. 

9. Religion: offerings to ancestors. 

Like other Indian criminals the Badhaks were of a very religiousor superstitious disposition. They considered the gods of the Hinducreed as favouring their undertakings so long as they were suitablypropitiated by offering to their temples and priests, and the spiritsof the most distinguished of their ancestors as exercising a vicariousauthority under these deities in guiding them to their prey and warningthem of danger. [59] The following is an account of a Badhak sacrificegiven to Colonel Sleeman by the Ajit Singh already mentioned. It wasin celebration of a dacoity in which they had obtained Rs. 40, 000, out of which Rs. 4500 were set aside for sacrifices to the gods andcharity to the poor. Ajit Singh said: "For offerings to the gods wepurchase goats, sweet cakes and spirits; and having prepared a feastwe throw a handful of the savoury food upon the fire in the name ofthe gods who have most assisted us; but of the feast so consecratedno female but a virgin can partake. The offering is made through theman who has successfully invoked the god on that particular occasion;and, as my god had guided us this time, I was employed to prepare thefeast for him and to throw the offering upon the fire. The offeringmust be taken up before the feast is touched and put upon the fire, and a little water must be sprinkled on it. The savoury smell of thefood as it burns reaches the nostrils of the god and delights him. Onthis as on most occasions I invoked the spirit of Ganga Singh, mygrandfather, and to him I made the offering. I considered him to bethe greatest of all my ancestors as a robber, and him I invoked on thissolemn occasion. He never failed me when I invoked him, and I had thegreatest confidence in his aid. The spirits of our ancestors can easilysee whether we shall succeed in what we are about to undertake; andwhen we are to succeed they order us on, and when we are not they makesigns to us to desist. " Their mode [60] of ascertaining which of theirancestors interested himself most in their affairs was commonly this, that whenever a person talked incoherently in a fever or an epilepticfit, the spirit of one or other of his ancestors was supposed to beupon him. If they were in doubt as to whose spirit it was, one of themthrew down some grains of wheat or coloured glass beads, a pinch ata time, saying the name of the ancestor he supposed the most likelyto be at work and calling odd or even as he pleased. If the numberproved to be as he called it several times running while that namewas repeated, they felt secure of their family god, and proceeded atonce to sacrifice a goat or something else in his name. When they werebeing hunted down and arrested by Colonel Sleeman and his assistants, they ascribed their misfortunes to the anger of the goddess Kali, because they had infringed her rules and disregarded her signs, andsaid that their forefathers had often told them they would one daybe punished for their disobedience. [61]

10. The wounded haunted by spirits. 

Whenever one of the gang was wounded and was taken with his woundsbleeding near a place haunted by a spirit, they believed the spiritgot angry and took hold of him, [62] in the manner described byAjit Singh as follows: "The spirit comes upon him in all kinds ofshapes, sometimes in that of a buffalo, at others in that of a woman, sometimes in the air above and sometimes from the ground below; but noone can see him except the wounded person he is angry with and wantsto punish. Upon such a wounded person we always place a naked swordor some other sharp steel instrument, as spirits are much afraid ofweapons of this kind. If there be any good conjurer at hand to charmaway the spirits from the person wounded he recovers, but nothing elsecan save him. " In one case a dacoit named Ghisa had been severelywounded in an encounter and was seized by the spirit of a banyantree as he was being taken away: "We made a litter with our ropesand cloaks thrown over them and on this he was carried off by fourof our party; at half a mile distant the road passed under a largebanyan tree and as the four men carried him along under the tree, the spirit of the place fell upon him and the four men who carriedhim fell down with the shock. They could not raise him again, so muchwere they frightened, and four other men were obliged to lift him andcarry him off. " The man died of his wounds soon after they reachedthe halting-place, and in commenting on this Ajit Singh continued:"When the spirit seized Ghisa under the tree we had unfortunately noconjurer, and he, poor fellow, died in consequence. It was evident thata spirit had got hold of him, for he could not keep his head upright;it always fell down upon his right or left shoulder as often as wetried to put it right; and he complained much of a pain in the regionof the liver. We therefore concluded that the spirit had broken hisneck and was consuming his liver. "

11. Pious funeral observances. 

Like pious Hindus as they were, the Badhaks were accustomed, wheneverit was possible, to preserve the bones of their dead after the bodyhad been burnt and carry them to the Ganges. If this was not possible, however, and the exigencies of their profession obliged them to makeaway with the body without the performance of due funeral rites, they cut off two or three fingers and sent these to the Ganges tobe deposited instead of the whole body. [63] In one case a dacoit, Kundana, was killed in an affray, and the others carried off his bodyand thrust it into a porcupine's hole after cutting off three of thefingers. "We gave Kundana's fingers to his mother, " Ajit Singh stated, "and she sent them with due offerings and ceremonies to the Gangesby the hands of the family priest. She gave this priest money topurchase a cow, to be presented to the priests in the name of herdeceased son, and to distribute in charity to the poor and to holymen. She got from us for these purposes eighty rupees over and aboveher son's share of the booty, while his widow and children continuedto receive their usual share of the takings of the gang so long asthey remained with us. "

12. Taking the omens. 

Before setting out on an expedition it was their regular customto take the omens, and the following account may be quoted of thepreliminaries to an expedition of the great leader, Meherban Singh, who has already been mentioned: "In the latter end of that year, Meherban and his brother set out and assembled their friends on thebank of the Bisori river, where the rate at which each member of theparty should share in the spoil was determined in order to secure tothe dependants of any one who should fall in the enterprise their dueshare, as well as to prevent inconvenient disputes during and afterthe expedition. The party assembled on this occasion, including womenand children, amounted to two hundred, and when the shares had beendetermined the goats were sacrificed for the feast. Each leader andmember of the gang dipped his finger in the blood and swore fidelityto his engagements and his associates under all circumstances. Thewhole feasted together and drank freely till the next evening, whenMeherban advanced with about twenty of the principal persons to a spotchosen a little way from the camp on the road they proposed to take inthe expedition, and lifting up his hands in supplication said aloud, 'If it be thy will, O God, and thine, Kali, to prosper our undertakingfor the sake of the blind and the lame, _the widow and the orphan_, who depend upon our exertions for subsistence, vouchsafe, we pray thee, the call of the female jackal. ' All his followers held up their handsin the same manner and repeated these words after him. All then satdown and waited in silence for the reply or spoke only in whispers. Atlast the cry of the female jackal was heard three times on the left, and believing her to have been inspired by the deity for their guidancethey were all much rejoiced. " The following was another more elaboratemethod of taking omens described by Ajit Singh: "When we speak ofseeking omens from our gods or Devi Deota, we mean the spirits of thoseof our ancestors who performed great exploits in dacoity in their day, gained a great name and established lasting reputations. For instance, Mahajit, my grandfather, and Sahiba, his father, are called godsand admitted to be so by us all. We have all of us some such godsto be proud of among our ancestors; we propitiate them and ask forfavourable omens from them before we enter upon any enterprise. Wesometimes propitiate the Suraj Deota (sun god) and seek good omensfrom him. We get two or three goats or rams, and sometimes even tenor eleven, at the place where we determine to take the auspices, andhaving assembled the principal men of the gang we put water into themouth of one of them and pray to the sun and to our ancestors thus:'O thou Sun God! And O all ye other Gods! If we are to succeed inthe enterprise we are about to undertake we pray you to cause thesegoats to shake their bodies. ' If they do not shake them after thegods have been thus duly invoked, the enterprise must not be enteredupon and the goats are not sacrificed. We then try the auspices withwheat. We burn frankincense and scented wood and blow a shell; andtaking out a pinch of wheat grains, put them on the cloth and countthem. If they come up odd the omen is favourable, and if even it isbad. After this, which we call the auspices of the Akut, we take thatof the Siarni or female jackal. If it calls on the left it is good, but if on the right bad. If the omens turn out favourable in all threetrials then we have no fear whatever, but if they are favourable inonly one trial out of the three the enterprise must be given up. "

13. Suppression of dacoity. 

Between 1837 and 1849 the suppression of the regular practice ofarmed dacoity was practically achieved by Colonel Sleeman. A numberof officers were placed under his orders, and with small bodies ofmilitary and police were set to hunt down different bands of dacoits, following them all over India when necessary. And special Acts werepassed to enable the offence of dacoity, wherever committed, to betried by a competent magistrate in any part of India as had been donein the case of the Thugs. Many of the Badhaks received conditionalpardons, and were drafted into the police in different stations, andan agricultural labour colony was also formed, but does not seem tohave been altogether successful. During these twelve years more than1200 dacoits in all were brought to trial, while some were killedduring the operations, and no doubt many others escaped and took toother avocations, or became ordinary criminals when their armed gangswere broken up. In 1825 it had been estimated that the Oudh forestsalone contained from 4000 to 6000 dacoits, while the property stolenin 1811 from known dacoities was valued at ten lakhs of rupees. 

14. The Badhaks or Baoris at the present time. 

The Badhaks still exist, and are well known as one of the worst classesof criminals, practising ordinary house-breaking and theft. The nameBadhak is now less commonly used than those of Bagri and Baori orBawaria, both of which were borne by the original Badhaks. The wordBagri is derived from a tract of country in Malwa which is knownas the Bagar or 'hedge of thorns, ' because it is surrounded on allsides by wooded hills. [64] There are Bagri Jats and Bagri Rajputs, many of whom are now highly respectable landholders. Bawaria orBaori is derived from _banwar_, a creeper, or the tendril of a vine, and hence a noose made originally from some fibrous plant and usedfor trapping animals, this being one of the primary occupations ofthe tribe. [65] The term Badhak signifies a hunter or fowler, hencea robber or murderer (Platts). The Bagris and Bawarias are sometimesconsidered to be separate communities, but it is doubtful whether thereis any real distinction between them. In Bombay the Bagris are knownas Vaghris by the common change of _b_ into _v_. A good descriptionof them is contained in Appendix C to Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam's volume_Hindus of Gujarat_ in the _Bombay Gazetteer_. He divides them into theChunaria or lime-burners, the Datonia or sellers of twig tooth-brushes, and two other groups, and states that, "They also keep fowls and selleggs, catch birds and go as _shikaris_ or hunters. They traffic ingreen parrots, which they buy from Bhils and sell for a profit. "

15. Lizard-hunting. 

Their strength and powers of endurance are great, the same writerstates, and they consider that these qualities are obtained by theeating of the _goh_ and _sandha_ or iguana lizards, which a Vaghriprizes very highly. This is also the case with the Bawarias of thePunjab, who go out hunting lizards in the rains and may be seenreturning with baskets full of live lizards, which exist for dayswithout food and are killed and eaten fresh by degrees. Their methodof hunting the lizard is described by Mr. Wilson as follows: [66]"The lizard lives on grass, cannot bite severely, and is sluggishin his movements, so that he is easily caught. He digs a hole forhimself of no great depth, and the easiest way to take him is tolook out for the scarcely perceptible airhole and dig him out; butthere are various ways of saving oneself this trouble. One, which Ihave seen, takes advantage of a habit the lizard has in cold weather(when he never comes out of his hole) of coming to the mouth forair and warmth. The Chuhra or other sportsman puts off his shoes andsteals along the prairie till he sees signs of a lizard's hole. Thishe approaches on tiptoe, raising over his head with both hands amallet with a round sharp point, and fixing his eyes intently uponthe hole. When close enough he brings down his mallet with all hismight on the ground just behind the mouth of the hole, and is oftensuccessful in breaking the lizard's back before he awakes to a senseof his danger. Another plan, which I have not seen, is to tie a wispof grass to a long stick and move it over the hole so as to make arustling noise. The lizard within thinks, 'Oh here's a snake! I mayas well give in, ' and comes to the mouth of the hole, putting outhis tail first so that he may not see his executioner. The sportsmanseizes his tail and snatches him out before he has time to learn hismistake. " This common fondness for lizards is a point in favour ofa connection between the Gujarat Vaghris and the Punjab Bawarias. 

16. Social observances. 

In Sirsa the great mass of the Bawarias are not given to crime, and in Gujarat also they do not appear to have special criminaltendencies. It is a curious point, however, that Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparamemphasises the chastity of the women of the Gujarat Vaghris. [67]"When a family returns home after a money-making tour to Bombayor some other city, the women are taken before Vihat (Devi), andwith the women is brought a buffalo or a sheep that is tethered infront of Vihat's shrine. They must confess all, even their slightestshortcomings, such as the following: 'Two weeks ago, when begging inParsi Bazar-street, a drunken sailor caught me by the hand. Anotherday a Miyan or Musalman ogled me, and forgive me, Devi, my looksencouraged him. ' If Devi is satisfied the sheep or buffalo shivers, and is then sacrificed and provides a feast for the caste. " [68]On the other hand, Mr. Crooke states [69] that in northern India, "The standard of morality is very low because in Muzaffarnagar it isextremely rare for a Bawaria woman to live with her husband. Almostinvariably she lives with another man: but the official husband isresponsible for the children. " The great difference in the standardof morality is certainly surprising. 

In Gujarat [70] the Vaghris have _gurus_ or religious preceptors oftheir own. These men take an eight-anna silver piece and whisper in theear of their disciples "Be immortal. "... "The Bhuvas or priest-mediumsplay an important part in many Vaghri ceremonies. A Bhuva is a malechild born after the mother has made a vow to the goddess Vihator Devi that if a son be granted to her she will devote him to theservice of the goddess. No Bhuva may cut or shave his hair on painof a fine of ten rupees, and no Bhuva may eat carrion or food cookedby a Muhammadan. "

17. Criminal practices. 

The criminal Bagris still usually travel about in the disguise ofGosains and Bairagis, and are very difficult of detection except toreal religious mendicants. Their housebreaking implement or jemmyis known as _Gyan_, but in speaking of it they always add _Das_, so that it sounds like the name of a Bairagi. [71] They are usuallyvery much afraid of the _gyan_ being discovered on their persons, and are careful to bury it in the ground at each halting-place, while on the march it may be concealed in a pack-saddle. The means ofidentifying them, Mr. Kennedy remarks, [72] is by their family _deo_or god, which they carry about when wandering with their families. Itconsists of a brass or copper box containing grains of wheat and theseeds of a creeper, both soaked in _ghi_ (melted butter). The box witha peacock's feather and a bell is wrapped in two white and then intwo red cloths, one of the white cloths having the print of a man'shand dipped in goat's blood upon it. The grains of wheat are usedfor taking the omens, a few being thrown up at sun-down and countedafterwards to see whether they are odd or even. When even, two grainsare placed on the right hand of the omen-taker, and if this occursthree times running the auspices are considered to be favourable. [73]Mr. Gayer [74] notes that the Badhaks have usually from one to threebrands from a hot iron on the inside of their left wrist. Those ofthem who are hunters brand the muscles of the left wrist in order tosteady the hand when firing their matchlocks. The customs of wearinga peculiar necklace of small wooden beads and a kind of gold pinfixed to the front teeth, which Mr. Crooke [75] records as havingbeen prevalent some years ago, have apparently been since abandoned, as they are not mentioned in more recent accounts. The Dehliwal andMalpura Baorias have, Mr. Kennedy states, [76] an interesting system ofsigns, which they mark on the walls of buildings at important corners, bridges and cross-roads and on the ground by the roadside with a stick, if no building is handy. The commonest is a loop, the straight lineindicating the direction a gang or individual has taken:

 ________________________ / / /---\ ( ( /// ) \ \---/ \________

The addition of a number of vertical strokes inside the loop signifiesthe number of males in a gang. If these strokes are enclosed by acircle it means that the gang is encamped in the vicinity; whilea square inside a circle and line as below means that property hasbeen secured by friends who have left in the direction pointed by theline. It is said that Baorias will follow one another up for fiftyor even a hundred miles by means of these hieroglyphics. The signsare bold marks, sometimes even a foot or more in length, and aremade where they will at once catch the eye. When the Marwari Baoriasdesire to indicate to others of their caste, who may follow in theirfootsteps, the route taken, a member of the gang, usually a woman, trails a stick in the dust as she walks along, leaving a spiral trackon the ground. Another method of indicating the route taken is toplace leaves under stones at intervals along the road. [77] The formof crime most in favour among the ordinary Baoris is housebreakingby night. Their common practice is to make a hole in the wall besidethe door through which the hand passes to raise the latch; and onlyoccasionally they dig a hole in the base of the wall to admit of thepassage of a man, while another favoured alternative is to break inthrough a barred window, the bars being quickly and forcibly bent anddrawn out. [78] One class of Marwari Bagris are also expert coiners. 

 /-------\ / +---+ \ | | | |--------------------- \ +---+ / \-------/

Bahna

1. Nomenclature and internal structure. 

_Bahna, Pinjara, Dhunia. _ [79]--The occupational caste ofcotton-cleaners. The Bahnas numbered 48, 000 persons in the CentralProvinces and Berar in 1911. The large increase in the numberof ginning-factories has ruined the Bahna's trade of cleaninghand-ginned cotton, and as no distinction attaches to the name ofBahna it is possible that members of the caste who have taken toother occupations may have abandoned it and returned themselves simplyas Muhammadans. The three names Bahna, Pinjara, Dhunia appear to beused indifferently for the caste in this Province, though in otherparts of India they are distinguished. Pinjara is derived from theword _pinjan_ used for a cotton-bow, and Dhunia is from _dhunna_, to card cotton. The caste is also known as Dhunak Pathani. Thoughprofessing the Muhammadan religion, they still have many Hinducustoms and ceremonies, and in the matter of inheritance our courtshave held that they are subject to Hindu and not Muhammadan law. [80]In Raipur a girl receives half the share of a boy in the division ofinherited property. The caste appears to be a mixed occupational group, and is split into many territorial subcastes named after the differentparts of the country from which its members have come, as Badharia fromBadhas in Mirzapur, Sarsutia from the Saraswati river, Berari of Berar, Dakhni from the Deccan, Telangi from Madras, Pardeshi from northernIndia, and so on. Two groups are occupational, the Newaris of Saugor, who make the thick _newar_ tape used for the webbing of beds, andthe Kanderas, who make fireworks and generally constitute a separatecaste. There is considerable ground for supposing that the Bahnasare mainly derived from the caste of Telis or oil-pressers. In thePunjab Sir D. Ibbetson says [81] that the Penja or cotton-scutcher isan occupational name applied to Telis who follow this profession; andthat the Penja, Kasai and Teli are all of the same caste. Similarlyin Nasik the Telis and Pinjaras are said to form one community, under the government of a single _panchayat_. In cases of disputeor misconduct the usual penalty is temporary excommunication, whichis known as the stopping of food and water. [82] The Telis are anenterprising community of very low status, and would therefore benaturally inclined to take to other occupations; many of them areshopkeepers, cultivators and landholders, and it is quite probablethat in past times they took up the Bahna's profession and changedtheir religion with the hope of improving their social status. TheTelis are generally considered to be quarrelsome and talkative, and the Bahnas or Dhunias have the same characteristics. If one manabusing another lapses into Billingsgate, the other will say to him, '_Hamko Julaha Dhunia neh jano_, ' or 'Don't talk to me as if I wasa Julaha or a Dhunia. '

2. Marriage. 

Some Bahnas have exogamous sections with Hindu names, while othersare without these, and simply regulate their marriages by rules ofrelationship. They have the primitive Hindu custom of allowing asister's son to marry a brother's daughter, but not _vice versa_. Aman cannot marry his wife's younger sister during her lifetime, norher elder sister at any time. Children of the same foster-mother arealso not allowed to marry. Their marriages are performed by a Kaziwith an imitation of the Nikah rite. The bridegroom's party sit underthe marriage-shed, and the bride with the women of her party insidethe house. The Kazi selects two men, one from the bride's party, whois known as the Nikahi Bap or 'Marriage Father, ' and the other fromthe bridegroom's, who is called the Gowah or 'Witness. ' These twomen go to the bride and ask her whether she accepts the bridegroom, whose name is stated, for her husband. She answers in the affirmative, and mentions the amount of the dowry which she is to receive. Thebridegroom, who has hitherto had a veil (_mukhna_) over his face, nowtakes it off, and the men go to him and ask him whether he accepts thebride. He replies that he does, and agrees to pay the dowry demandedby her. The Kazi reads some texts and the guests are given a mealof rice and sugar. Many of the preliminaries to a Hindu marriageare performed by the more backward members of the caste, and untilrecently they erected a sacred post in the marriage-shed, but nowthey merely hang the green branch of a mango tree to the roof. Theminimum amount of the _mehar_ or dowry is said to be Rs. 125, but itis paid to the girl's parents as a bride-price and not to herself, as among the Muhammadans. A widow is expected, but not obliged, tomarry her deceased husband's younger brother. Divorce is permittedby means of a written deed known as 'Farkhati. '

3. Religious and other customs. 

The Bahnas venerate Muhammad, and also worship the tombs of Muhammadansaints or _Pirs_. A green sheet or cloth is spread over the tomb anda lamp is kept burning by it, while offerings of incense and flowersare made. When the new cotton crop has been gathered they lay somenew cotton by their bow and mallet and make an offering of _malida_or cakes of flour and sugar to it. They believe that two angels, onegood and one bad, are perched continually on the shoulders of everyman to record his good and evil deeds. And when an eclipse occurs theysay that the sun and moon have gone behind a pinnacle or tower of theheavens. For exorcising evil spirits they write texts of the Koranon paper and burn them before the sufferer. The caste bury the deadwith the feet pointing to the south. On the way to the grave eachone of the mourners places his shoulder under the bier for a time, partaking of the impurity communicated by it. Incense is burnt dailyin the name of a deceased person for forty days after his death, withthe object probably of preventing his ghost from returning to hauntthe house. Muhammadan beggars are fed on the tenth day. Similarly, after the birth of a child a woman is unclean for forty days, andcannot cook for her husband during that period. A child's hair iscut for the first time on the tenth or twelfth day after birth, thisbeing known as Jhalar. Some parents leave a lock of hair to grow onthe head in the name of the famous saint Sheikh Farid, thinking thatthey will thus ensure a long life for the child. It is probably inreality a way of preserving the Hindu _choti_ or scalp-lock. 

4. Occupation. 

The hereditary calling [83] of the Bahna is the cleaning or scutchingof cotton, which is done by subjecting it to the vibration of abow-string. The seed has been previously separated by a hand-gin, but the ginned cotton still contains much dirt, leaf-fibre and otherrubbish, and to remove this is the Bahna's task. The bow is somewhatin the shape of a harp, the wide end consisting of a broad piece ofwood over which the string passes, being secured to a straight woodenbar at the back. At the narrow end the bar and string are fixed to aniron ring. The string is made of the sinew of some animal, and thisrenders the implement objectionable to Hindus, and may account forthe Bahnas being Muhammadans. The club or mallet is a wooden implementshaped like a dumb-bell. The bow is suspended from the roof so as tohang just over the pile of loose cotton; and the worker twangs thestring with the mallet and then draws the mallet across the string, each three or four times. The string strikes a small portion of thecotton, the fibre of which is scattered by the impact and thrown offin a uniform condition of soft fluff, all dirt being at the same timeremoved. This is the operation technically known as teasing. Buchananremarked that women frequently did the work themselves at home, usinga smaller kind of bow called _dhunkara_. The clean cotton is made upinto balls, some of which are passed on to the spinner, while othersare used for the filling of quilts and the padded coats worn in thecold weather. The ingenious though rather clumsy method of the Bahnahas been superseded by the ginning-factory, and little or no cottondestined for the spindle is now cleaned by him. The caste have beenforced to take to cultivation or field labour, while many have becomecartmen and others are brokers, peons or constables. Nearly everyhouse still has its _pinjan_ or bow, but only a desultory use ismade of this during the winter months. As it is principally used by aMuhammadan caste it seems a possible hypothesis that the cotton-bowwas introduced into India by invaders of that religion. The name ofthe bow, _pinjan_, is, however, a Sanskrit derivative, and this isagainst the above theory. It has already been seen that the fact ofanimal sinew being used for the string would make it objectionable toHindus. The Bahnas are subjected to considerable ridicule on accountof their curious mixture of Hindu and Muhammadan ceremonies, amountingin some respects practically to a caricature of the rites of Islam;and further, they share with the weaver class the contempt shown tothose who follow a calling considered more suitable for women thanmen. It is related that when the Mughal general Asaf Khan first made anexpedition into the north of the Central Provinces he found the famousGond-Rajput queen Durgavati of the Garha-Mandla dynasty governing withsuccess a large and prosperous state in this locality. He thought acountry ruled by a woman should fall an easy prey to the Muhammadanarms, and to show his contempt for her power he sent her a goldenspindle. The queen retorted by a present of a gold cotton-cleaner'sbow, and this so enraged the Mughal that he proceeded to attack theGond kingdom. The story indicates that cotton-carding is considereda Muhammadan profession, and also that it is held in contempt. 

5. Proverbs about Bahnas. 

Various sayings show that the Bahna is not considered a properMuhammadan, as

 Turuk to Turuk Aur Bahna Turuk, or 'A Muhammadan (Turk) is a Muhammadan and the Bahna is also aMuhammadan'; and again--

 Achera, [84] Kachera, Pinjara, Muhammad se dur, Din se niyara, or 'The Kachera and Pinjara are lost to Muhammad and far from thefaith'; and again--

 Adho Hindu adho Musalman Tinkhon kahen Dhunak Pathan, or 'Half a Hindu and half a Muhammadan, that is he who is a DhunakPathan. ' They have a grotesque imitation of the Muhammadan rite of_halal_, or causing an animal's blood to flow on to the ground withthe repetition of the _kalma_ or invocation; thus it is said that whena Bahna is about to kill a fowl he addresses it somewhat as follows:

 Kahe karkarat hai? Kahe barbarat hai? Kahe jai jai logon ka dana khat hai? Tor kiamat mor niamat, Bismillah hai tuch, or "Why do you cackle? Why do you crow? Why do you eat other people'sgrain? Your death is my feast; I touch you in the name of God. " Andsaying this he puts a knife to the fowl's throat. The vernacular verseis a good imitation of the cackling of a fowl. And again, they sliceoff the top of an egg as if they were killing an animal and repeat theformula, "White dome, full of moisture, I know not if there is a maleor female within; in the name of God I kill you. " A person whose memoryis not good enough to retain these texts will take a knife and proceedto one who knows them. Such a man will repeat the texts over the knife, blowing on it as he does so, and the Bahna considers that the knifehas been sanctified and retains its virtue for a week. Others do notthink this necessary, but have a special knife, which having once beenconsecrated is always kept for killing animals, and descends as anheirloom in the family, the use of this sacred knife being consideredto make the repetition of the _kalma_ unnecessary. These customs are, however, practised only by the ignorant members of the caste in Raipurand Bilaspur, and are unknown in the more civilised tracts, wherethe Bahnas are rapidly conforming to ordinary Muhammadan usage. Suchprimitive Bahnas perform their marriages by walking round the sacredpost, keep the Hindu festivals, and feed Brahmans on the tenth dayafter a death. They have a priest whom they call their Kazi, but electhim themselves. In some places when a Bahna goes to the well to drawwater he first washes the parapet of the well to make it ceremoniallyclean, and then draws his water. This custom can only be comparedwith that of the Raj-Gonds who wash the firewood with which they areabout to cook their food, in order to make it more pure. RespectableMuhammadans naturally look down on the Bahnas, and they retaliateby refusing to take food or water from any Muhammadan who is nota Bahna. By such strictness the more ignorant think that they willenhance their ceremonial purity and hence their social consideration;but the intelligent members of the caste know better and are glad toimprove themselves by learning from educated Muhammadans. The othermenial artisan castes among the Muhammadans have similar ideas, andit is reported that a Rangrez boy who took food in the house of oneof the highest Muhammadan officers of Government in the Province wastemporarily put out of caste. Another saying about the Bahnas is--

 Sheikhon ki Sheikhi, Pathanon ki tarr, Turkon ki Turkshahi, Bahnon ki bharrr ... 

or 'Proud as a Sheikh, obstinate as a Pathan, royal as a Turk, buzzinglike a Bahna. ' This refers to the noise of the cotton-cleaning bow, the twang of which as it is struck by the club is like a quail flying;and at the same time to the Bahna's loquacity. Another story is thata Bahna was once going through the forest with his cotton-cleaning bowand club or mallet, when a jackal met him on the path. The jackal wasafraid that the Bahna would knock him on the head, so he said, "Withthy bow on thy shoulder and thine arrow in thy hand, whither goestthou, O King of Delhi?" The Bahna was exceedingly pleased at this andreplied, 'King of the forest, eater of wild plums, only the great canrecognise the great. ' But when the jackal had got to a safe distancehe turned round and shouted, "With your cotton-bow on your shoulder andyour club in your hand, there you go, you sorry Bahna. " It is said alsothat although the Bahnas as good Muhammadans wear beards, they do notcultivate them very successfully, and many of them only have a growthof hair below the chin and none on the under-lip, in the fashion knownas a goat's beard. This kind of beard is thus proverbially describedas '_Bahna kaisi darhi_' or 'A Bahna's beard. ' It may be repeated inconclusion that much of the ridicule attaching to the Bahnas arisessimply from the fact that they follow what is considered a feminineoccupation, and the remainder because in their ignorance they parodythe rites of Islam. It may seem ill-natured to record the sayingsin which they are lampooned, but the Bahnas cannot read English, and these have an interest as specimens of popular wit. 

Baiga

List of Paragraphs

 1. _The tribe and its offshoots. _ 2. _Tribal legends. _ 3. _Tribal subdivisions. _ 4. _Marriage. _ 5. _Birth and funeral rites. _ 6. _Religion. _ 7. _Appearance and mode of life. _ 8. _Dress and food. _ 9. _Occupation. _ 10. _Language. _

1. The tribe and its offshoots. 

_Baiga. _ [85]--A primitive Dravidian tribe whose home is on the easternSatpura hills in the Mandla, Balaghat and Bilaspur Districts. Thenumber of the Baigas proper was only 30, 000 in 1911. But the Binjhalsor Binjhwars, a fairly numerous caste in the Chhattisgarh Division, andespecially in the Sambalpur District, appear to have been originallyBaigas, though they have dropped the original caste name, becomeHinduised, and now disclaim connection with the parent tribe. Areason for this may be found in the fact that Sambalpur containsseveral Binjhwar zamindars, or large landowners, whose families wouldnaturally desire a more respectable pedigree than one giving them thewild Baigas of the Satpuras for their forefathers. And the evolution ofthe Binjhwar caste is a similar phenomenon to the constitution of theRaj-Gonds, the Raj-Korkus, and other aristocratic subdivisions amongthe forest tribes, who have been admitted to a respectable positionin the Hindu social community. The Binjhwars, however, have been sosuccessful as to cut themselves off almost completely from connectionwith the original tribe, owing to their adoption of another name. Butin Balaghat and Mandla the Binjhwar subtribe is still recognised asthe most civilised subdivision of the Baigas. The Bhainas, a smalltribe in Bilaspur, are probably another offshoot, Kath-Bhaina beingthe name of a subtribe of Baigas in that District, and Rai-Bhainain Balaghat, though the Bhainas too no longer admit identity withthe Baigas. A feature common to all three branches is that they haveforgotten their original tongue, and now speak a more or less corruptform of the Indo-Aryan vernaculars current around them. Finally, the term Bhumia or 'Lord of the soil' is used sometimes as the nameof a separate tribe and sometimes as a synonym for Baiga. The fact isthat in the Central Provinces [86] Bhumia is the name of an office, that of the priest of the village and local deities, which is heldby one of the forest tribes. In the tract where the Baigas live, they, as the most ancient residents, are usually the priests of theindigenous gods; but in Jubbulpore the same office is held by anothertribe, the Bharias. The name of the office often attaches itself tomembers of the tribe, who consider it as somewhat more respectablethan their own, and it is therefore generally true to say that thepeople known as Bhumias in Jubbulpore are really Bharias, but inMandla and Bilaspur they are Baigas. 

In Mandla there is also found a group called Bharia-Baigas. Theseare employed as village priests by Hindus, and worship certain Hindudeities and not the Gond gods. They may perhaps be members of theBharia tribe of Jubbulpore, originally derived from the Bhars, whohave obtained the designation of Baiga, owing to their employmentas village priests. But they now consider themselves a part of theBaiga tribe and say they came to Mandla from Rewah. In Mandla thedecision of a Baiga on a boundary dispute is almost always consideredas final, and this authority is of a kind that commonly emanates fromrecognised priority of residence. [87] There seems reason to supposethat the Baigas are really a branch of the primitive Bhuiya tribeof Chota Nagpur, and that they have taken or been given the name ofBaiga, the designation of a village priest, on migration into theCentral Provinces. There is reason to believe that the Baigas wereonce dominant in the Chhattisgarh plain and the hills surrounding itwhich adjoin Chota Nagpur, the home of the Bhuiyas. The considerationsin favour of this view are given in the article on Bhuiya, to whichreference may be made. 

2. Tribal legends. 

The Baigas, however, are not without some conceit of themselves, as the following legend will show. In the beginning, they say, Godcreated Nanga Baiga and Nangi Baigin, the first of the human race, and asked them by what calling they would choose to live. They at oncesaid that they would make their living by felling trees in the jungle, and permission being accorded, have done so ever since. They had twosons, one of whom remained a Baiga, while the other became a Gondand a tiller of the soil. The sons married their own two sisters whowere afterwards born, and while the elder couple are the ancestorsof the Baigas, from the younger are descended the Gonds and all theremainder of the human race. In another version of the story thefirst Baiga cut down two thousand old _sal_ [88] trees in one day, and God told him to sprinkle a few grains of kutki on the ashes, andthen to retire and sleep for some months, when on his return he wouldbe able to reap a rich harvest for his children. In this manner thehabit of shifting cultivation is accorded divine sanction. Accordingto Binjhwar tradition Nanga Baiga and Nangi Baigin dwelt on the_kajli ban pahar_, which being interpreted is the hill of elephants, and may well refer to the ranges of Mandla and Bilaspur. It isstated in the _Ain-i-Akbari_ [89] that the country of Garha-Mandlaabounded in wild elephants, and that the people paid their tributein these and gold mohurs. In Mandla the Baigas sometimes hang outfrom their houses a bamboo mat fastened to a long pole to representa flag which they say once flew from the palace of a Baiga king. Itseems likely that the original home of the tribe may have been theChhattisgarh plain and the hill-ranges surrounding it. A number ofestates in these hills are held by landowners of tribes which areoffshoots of the Baigas, as the Bhainas and Binjhwars. The point isfurther discussed in the article on Bhuiya. Most of the Baigas speaka corrupt form of the Chhattisgarhi dialect. When they first cameunder the detailed observation of English officers in the middle ofthe nineteenth century, the tribe were even more solitary and retiredthan at present. Their villages, it is said, were only to be foundin places far removed from all cleared and cultivated country. Noroads or well-defined paths connected them with ordinary lines oftraffic and more thickly inhabited tracts, but perched away in snugcorners in the hills, and hidden by convenient projecting spurs anddense forests from the country round, they could not be seen exceptwhen nearly approached, and were seldom visited unless by occasionalenterprising Banias and vendors of country liquor. Indeed, without aBaiga for a guide many of the villages could hardly be discovered, for nothing but occasional notches on the trees distinguished thetracks to them from those of the sambhar and other wild animals. 

3. Tribal subdivisions. 

The following seven subdivisions or subtribes are recognised: Binjhwar, Bharotia, Narotia or Nahar, Raibhaina, Kathbhaina, Kondwan or Kundi, and Gondwaina. Of these the Binjhwar, Bharotia and Narotia are thebest-known. The name of the Binjhwars is probably derived from theVindhyan range, which in turn comes from the Sanskrit _vindhya_, a hunter. The rule of exogamy is by no means strictly observed, and in Kawardha it is said that these three subcastes intermarrythough they do not eat together, while in Balaghat the Bharotiasand Narotias both eat together and intermarry. In both places theBinjhwars occupy the highest position, and the other two subtribeswill take food from them. The Binjhwars consider themselves as Hindusand abjure the consumption of buffalo's and cow's flesh and rats, while the other Baigas will eat almost anything. The Bharotiaspartially shave their heads, and in Mandla are apparently known asMundia or Mudia, or "shaven. " The Gondwainas eat both cow's fleshand monkeys, and are regarded as the lowest subcaste. As shown bytheir name they are probably the offspring of unions between Baigasand Gonds. Similarly the Kondwans apparently derive their name fromthe tract south of the Mahanadi which is named after the Khond tribe, and was formerly owned by them. 

Each subtribe is divided into a number of exogamous septs, the names ofwhich are identical in many cases with those of the Gonds, as Markam, Maravi, Netam, Tekam and others. Gond names are found most frequentlyamong the Gondwainas and Narotias, and these have adopted from theGonds the prohibition of marriage between worshippers of the samenumber of gods. Thus the four septs above mentioned worship seven godsand may not intermarry. But they may marry among other septs such asthe Dhurua, Pusam, Bania and Mawar who worship six gods. The Baigas donot appear to have assimilated the further division into worshippersof five, four, three and two gods which exist among the Gonds in somelocalities, and the system is confined to the lower subtribes. Themeanings of the sept names have been forgotten and no instances oftotemism are known. And the Binjhwars and Bharotias, who are more orless Hinduised, have now adopted territorial names for their septs, as Lapheya from Lapha zamindari, Ghugharia from Ghughri village inMandla, and so on. The adoption of Gond names and septs appears toindicate that Gonds were in former times freely admitted into the Baigatribe; and this continues to be the case at present among the lowersubtribes, so far that a Gond girl marrying a Baiga becomes a regularmember of the community. But the Binjhwars and Bharotias, who havea somewhat higher status than the others, refuse to admit Gonds, andare gradually adopting the strict rule of endogamy within the subtribe. 

4. Marriage. 

A Baiga must not take a wife from his own sept or from another oneworshipping the same number of gods. But he may marry within hismother's sept, and in some localities the union of first cousins ispermitted. Marriage is adult and the proposal comes from the parents ofthe bride, but in some places the girl is allowed to select a husbandfor herself. A price varying from five to twenty rupees is usuallypaid to the bride's parents, or in lieu of this the prospectivehusband serves his father-in-law for a period of about two years, the marriage being celebrated after the first year if his conductis satisfactory. Orphan boys who have no parents to arrange theirmarriages for them often take service for a wife. Three ceremoniesshould precede the marriage. The first, which may take place atany time after the birth of both children, consists merely in thearrangement for their betrothal. The second is only a ratificationof the first, feasts being provided by the boy's parents on bothoccasions. While on the approach of the children to marriageable agethe final betrothal or _barokhi_ is held. The boy's father gives alarge feast at the house of the girl and the date of the wedding isfixed. To ascertain whether the union will be auspicious, two grainsof rice are dropped into a pot of water, after various preliminarysolemnities to mark the importance of the occasion. If the pointsof the grains meet almost immediately it is considered that themarriage will be highly auspicious. If they do not meet, a secondpair of grains are dropped in, and should these meet it is believedthat the couple will quarrel after an interval of married life andthat the wife will return to her father's house. While if neitherof the two first essays are successful and a third pair is required, the regrettable conclusion is arrived at that the wife will run awaywith another man after a very short stay with her husband. But itis not stated that the betrothal is on that account annulled. Thewedding procession starts from the bridegroom's house [90] and isreceived by the bride's father outside the village. It is consideredessential that he should go out to meet the bride's party riding on anelephant. But as a real elephant is not within the means of a Baiga, two wooden bedsteads are lashed together and covered with blankets witha black cloth trunk in front, and this arrangement passes muster foran elephant. The elephant makes pretence to charge and trample downthe marriage procession, until a rupee is paid, when the two partiesembrace each other and proceed to the marriage-shed. Here the brideand bridegroom throw fried rice at each other until they are tired, and then walk three or seven times round the marriage-post with theirclothes tied together. It is stated by Colonel Ward that the couplealways retired to the forest to spend the wedding night, but thiscustom has now been abandoned. The expenditure on a marriage variesbetween ten and fifty rupees, of which only about five rupees fallon the bride's parents. The remarriage of widows is permitted, andthe widow is expected, though not obliged, to wed her late husband'syounger brother, while if she takes another husband he must pay herbrother-in-law the sum of five rupees. The ceremony consists merely ofthe presentation of bangles and new clothes by the suitor, in tokenof her acceptance of which the widow pours some tepid water stainedwith turmeric over his head. Divorce may be effected by the husbandand wife breaking a straw in the presence of the caste _panchayat_or committee. If the woman remains in the same village and doesnot marry again, the husband is responsible for her maintenance andthat of her children, while a divorced woman may not remarry withoutthe sanction of the _panchayat_ so long as her husband is alive andremains single. Polygamy is permitted. 

5. Birth and funeral rites. 

A woman is unclean for a month after childbirth, though the Binjhwarsrestrict the period to eight days. At the ceremony of purification afeast is given and the child is named, often after the month or dayof its birth, as Chaitu, Phagu, Saoni, and so on, from the monthsof Chait, Phagun and Shrawan. Children who appear to be physicallydefective are given names accordingly, such as Langra (lame), or Bahira(deaf). The dead are usually buried, the bodies of old persons beingburnt as a special honour and to save them from the risk of beingdevoured by wild animals. Bodies are laid naked in the grave with thehead pointing to the south. In the grave of a man of importance twoor three rupees and some tobacco are placed. In some places a rupeeis thrust into the mouth of the dying man, and if his body is burnt, the coin is recovered from the pyre by his daughter or sister, whowears it as an amulet. Over the grave a platform is made on whicha stone is erected. This is called the Bhiri of the deceased and isworshipped by his relatives in time of trouble. If one of the familyhas to be buried elsewhere, the relatives go to the Bhiri of thegreat dead and consign his spirit to be kept in their company. At afuneral the mourners take one black and one white fowl to a streamand kill and eat them there, setting aside a portion for the deadman. Mourning is observed for a period of from two to nine days, and during this time labour and even household work are stopped, foodbeing supplied by the friends of the family. When a man is killed bya tiger the Baiga priest goes to the spot and there makes a smallcone out of the blood-stained earth. This must represent a man, either the dead man or one of his living relatives. His companionshaving retired a few paces, the priest goes on his hands and kneesand performs a series of antics which are supposed to represent thetiger in the act of destroying the man, at the same time seizing thelump of blood-stained earth in his teeth. One of the party then runsup and taps him on the back with a small stick. This perhaps meansthat the tiger is killed or otherwise rendered harmless; and theBaiga immediately lets the mud cone fall into the hands of one of theparty. It is then placed in an ant-hill and a pig is sacrificed overit. The next day a small chicken is taken to the place, and aftera mark supposed to be the dead man's name is made on its head withred ochre, it is thrown back into the forest, the priest exclaiming, 'Take this and go home. ' The ceremony is supposed to lay the deadman's spirit and at the same time to prevent the tiger from doingany further damage. The Baigas believe that the ghost of the victim, if not charmed to rest, resides on the head of the tiger and inciteshim to further deeds of blood, rendering him also secure from harmby his preternatural watchfulness. [91]

They also think that they can shut up the tiger's _dar_ or jaws, so that he cannot bite them, by driving a nail into a tree. Theforest track from Kanha to Kisli in the Banjar forest reserve ofMandla was formerly a haunt of man-eating tigers, to whom a numberof the wood-cutters and Baiga coolies, clearing the jungle paths, fell victims every year. In a large tree, at a dangerous point in thetrack, there could recently be seen a nail, driven into the trunk bya Baiga priest, at some height from the ground. It was said that thisnail shut the mouth of a famous man-eating tiger of the locality andprevented him from killing any more victims. As evidence of the truthof the story there were shown on the trunk the marks of the tiger'sclaws, where he had been jumping up the tree in the effort to pullthe nail out of the trunk and get his man-eating powers restored. 

6. Religion. 

Although the Binjhwar subcaste now profess Hinduism, the religion ofthe Baigas is purely animistic. Their principal deity is Bura Deo, [92]who is supposed to reside in a _saj_ tree (_Terminalia tomentosa_); heis worshipped in the month of Jeth (May), when goats, fowls, cocoanuts, and the liquor of the new mahua crop are offered to him. Thakur Deois the god of the village land and boundaries, and is propitiatedwith a white goat. The Baigas who plough the fields have a ceremonycalled Bidri, which is performed before the breaking of the rains. Ahandful of each kind of grain sown is given by each cultivator to thepriest, who mixes the grains together and sows a little beneath thetree where Thakur Deo lives. After this he returns a little to eachcultivator, and he sows it in the centre of the land on which cropsare to be grown, while the priest keeps the remainder. This ceremonyis believed to secure the success of the harvest. Dulha Deo is thegod who averts disease and accident, and the offering made to himshould consist of a fowl or goat of reddish colour. Bhimsen is thedeity of rainfall, and Dharti Mata or Mother Earth is considered to bethe wife of Thakur Deo, and must also be propitiated for the successof the crops. The grain itself is worshipped at the threshing floorby sprinkling water and liquor on to it. Certain Hindu deities arealso worshipped by the Baigas, but not in orthodox fashion. Thus itwould be sacrilege on the part of a Hindu to offer animal sacrificesto Narayan Deo, the sun-god, but the Baigas devote to him a specialoblation of the most unclean animal, the pig. The animal to besacrificed is allowed to wander loose for two or three years, and isthen killed in a most cruel manner. It is laid across the threshold ofa doorway on its back, and across its stomach is placed a stout plankof _saj_-wood. Half a dozen men sit or stand on the ends of this, andthe fore and hind feet of the pig are pulled backwards and forwardsalternately over the plank until it is crushed to death, while allthe men sing or shout a sacrificial hymn. The head and feet are cutoff and offered to the deity, and the body is eaten. The forests arebelieved to be haunted by spirits, and in certain localities _pats_or shrines are erected in their honour, and occasional offerings aremade to them. The spirits of married persons are supposed to live instreams, while trees afford a shelter to the souls of the unmarried, who become _bhuts_ or malignant spirits after death. Nag Deo or thecobra is supposed to live in an ant-hill, and offerings are made tohim there. Demoniacal possession is an article of faith, and a popularremedy is to burn human hair mixed with chillies and pig's dung nearthe person possessed, as the horrible smell thus produced will driveaway the spirit. Many and weird, Mr. Low writes, are the simpleswhich the Baiga's travelling scrip contains. Among these a dried bathas the chief place; this the Baiga says he uses to charm his netswith, that the prey may catch in them as the bat's claws catch inwhatever it touches. As an instance of the Baiga's pantheism it maybe mentioned that on one occasion when a train of the new Satpurarailway [93] had pulled up at a wayside forest station, a Baiga wasfound offering a sacrifice to the engine. Like other superstitiouspeople they are great believers in omens. A single crow bathing ina stream is a sign of death. A cock which crows in the night shouldbe instantly killed and thrown into the darkness, a custom which somewould be glad to see introduced into much more civilised centres. Thewoodpecker and owl are birds of bad omen. The Baigas do not appear tohave any idea of a fresh birth, and one of their marriage songs says, "O girl, take your pleasure in going round the marriage-post once andfor all, for there is no second birth. " The Baigas are generally thepriests of the Gonds, probably because being earlier residents ofthe country they are considered to have a more intimate acquaintancewith the local deities. They have a wide knowledge of the medicinalproperties of jungle roots and herbs, and are often successful ineffecting cures when the regular native doctors have failed. Theirvillage priests have consequently a considerable reputation as skilledsorcerers and persons conversant with the unseen world. A case isknown of a Brahman transferred to a jungle station, who immediatelyafter his arrival called in a Baiga priest and asked what forest godshe should worship, and what other steps he should take to keep welland escape calamity. Colonel Ward states that in his time Baigas werecommonly called in to give aid when a town or village was attackedby cholera, and further that he had seen the greatest benefit toresult from their visit. For the people had so much confidence intheir powers and ceremonies that they lost half their fright at once, and were consequently not so much predisposed to an attack of thedisease. On such an occasion the Baiga priest goes round the villageand pulls out a little straw from each house-roof, afterwards burningthe whole before the shrine of Khermata, the goddess of the village, to whom he also offers a chicken for each homestead. If this remedyfails goats are substituted for chickens, and lastly, as a forlornhope, pigs are tried, and, as a rule, do not fail, because by thistime the disease may be expected to have worked itself out. It issuggested that the chicken represents a human victim from each house, while the straw stands for the house itself, and the offering hasthe common idea of a substituted victim. 

7. Appearance and mode of life. 

In stature the Baigas are a little taller than most other tribes, and though they have a tendency to the flat nose of the Gonds, their foreheads and the general shape of their heads are of a bettermould. Colonel Ward states that the members of the tribe inhabitingthe Maikal range in Mandla are a much finer race than those livingnearer the open country. [94] Their figures are very nearly perfect, says Colonel Bloomfield, [95] and their wiry limbs, unburdened bysuperfluous flesh, will carry them over very great distances andover places inaccessible to most human beings, while their compactbodies need no other nutriment than the scanty fare afforded by theirnative forests. They are born hunters, hardy and active in the chase, and exceedingly bold and courageous. In character they are naturallysimple, honest and truthful, and when their fear of a stranger hasbeen dissipated are most companionable folk. A small hut, 6 or 7 feethigh at the ridge, made of split bamboos and mud, with a neat verandain front thatched with leaves and grass, forms the Baiga's residence, and if it is burnt down, or abandoned on a visitation of epidemicdisease, he can build another in the space of a day. A rough earthenvessel to hold water, leaves for plates, gourds for drinking-vessels, a piece of matting to sleep on, and a small axe, a sickle and a spear, exhaust the inventory of the Baiga's furniture, and the money valueof the whole would not exceed a rupee. [96] The Baigas never live ina village with other castes, but have their huts some distance awayfrom the village in the jungle. Unlike the other tribes also, theBaiga prefers his house to stand alone and at some little distancefrom those of his fellow-tribesmen. While nominally belonging tothe village near which they dwell, so separate and distinct arethey from the rest of people that in the famine of 1897 cases werefound of starving Baiga hamlets only a few hundred yards away fromthe village proper in which ample relief was being given. On beingquestioned as to why they had not caused the Baigas to be helped, the other villagers said, 'We did not remember them'; and when theBaigas were asked why they did not apply for relief, they said, 'We did not think it was meant for Baigas. '

8. Dress and food. 

Their dress is of the most simple description, a small strip of ragbetween the legs and another wisp for a head-covering sufficing forthe men, though the women are decently covered from their shouldersto half-way between the thighs and knees. A Baiga may be known by hisscanty clothing and tangled hair, and his wife by the way in whichher single garment is arranged so as to provide a safe sitting-placein it for her child. Baiga women have been seen at work in the fieldtransplanting rice with babies comfortably seated in their cloth, one sometimes supported on either hip with their arms and legs out, while the mother was stooping low, hour after hour, handling the riceplants. A girl is tattooed on the forehead at the age of five, and overher whole body before she is married, both for the sake of ornament andbecause the practice is considered beneficial to the health. The Baigasare usually without blankets or warm clothing, and in the cold seasonthey sleep round a wood fire kept burning or smouldering all night, stray sparks from which may alight on their tough skins without beingfelt. Mr. Lampard relates that on one occasion a number of Baiga menwere supplied by the Mission under his charge with large new clothsto cover their bodies with and make them presentable on appearance inchurch. On the second Sunday, however, they came with their clothsburnt full of small holes; and they explained that the damage hadbeen done at night while they were sleeping round the fire. 

A Baiga, Mr. Lampard continues, is speedily discerned in a forestvillage bazar, and is the most interesting object in it. His almostnude figure, wild, tangled hair innocent of such inventions as brushor comb, lithe wiry limbs and jungly and uncivilised appearance, mark him out at once. He generally brings a few mats or baskets whichhe has made, or fruits, roots, honey, horns of animals, or otherjungle products which he has collected, for sale, and with the sumobtained (a few pice or annas at the most) he proceeds to make hisweekly purchases, changing his pice into cowrie shells, of which hereceives eighty for each one. He buys tobacco, salt, chillies andother sundries, besides as much of kodon, kutki, or perhaps rice, ashe can afford, always leaving a trifle to be expended at the liquorshop before departing for home. The various purchases are tied up inthe corners of the bit of rag twisted round his head. Unlike piecesof cloth known to civilisation, which usually have four corners, the Baiga's headgear appears to be nothing but corners, and when theshopping is done the strip of rag may have a dozen minute bundlestied up in it. 

In Baihar of Balaghat buying and selling are conducted on perhapsthe most minute scale known, and if a Baiga has one or two pice [97]to lay out he will spend no inconsiderable time over it. Grain issold in small measures holding about four ounces called _baraiyas_, but each of these has a layer of mud at the bottom of varying degreesof thickness, so as to reduce its capacity. Before a purchase can bemade it must be settled by whose _baraiya_ the grain is to be measured, and the seller and purchaser each refuse the other's as being unfairto himself, until at length after discussion some neutral person's_baraiya_ is selected as a compromise. Their food consists largelyof forest fruits and roots with a scanty allowance of rice or thelight millets, and they can go without nourishment for periods whichappear extraordinary to civilised man. They eat the flesh of almostall animals, though the more civilised abjure beef and monkeys. Theywill take food from a Gond but not from a Brahman. The Baiga dearlyloves the common country liquor made from the mahua flower, and this isconsumed as largely as funds will permit of at weddings, funerals andother social gatherings, and also if obtainable at other times. Theyhave a tribal _panchayat_ or committee which imposes penalties forsocial offences, one punishment being the abstention from meat for afixed period. A girl going wrong with a man of the caste is punishedby a fine, but cases of unchastity among unmarried Baiga girls arerare. Among their pastimes dancing is one of the chief, and in theirfavourite dance, known as _karma_, the men and women form long linesopposite to each other with the musicians between them. One of theinstruments, a drum called _mandar_, gives out a deep bass note whichcan be heard for miles. The two lines advance and retire, everybodysinging at the same time, and when the dancers get fully into thetime and swing, the pace increases, the drums beat furiously, thevoices of the singers rise higher and higher, and by the light of thebonfires which are kept burning the whole scene is wild in the extreme. 

9. Occupation. 

The Baigas formerly practised only shifting cultivation, burning downpatches of jungle and sowing seed on the ground fertilised by theashes after the breaking of the rains. Now that this method has beenprohibited in Government forest, attempts have been made to train themto regular cultivation, but with indifferent success in Balaghat. Anidea of the difficulties to be encountered may be obtained from thefact that in some villages the Baiga cultivators, if left unwatched, would dig up the grain which they had themselves sown as seed intheir fields and eat it; while the plough-cattle which were given tothem invariably developed diseases in spite of all precautions, as aresult of which they found their way sooner or later to the Baiga'scooking-pot. But they are gradually adopting settled habits, and inMandla, where a considerable block of forest was allotted to themin which they might continue their destructive practice of shiftingsowings, it is reported that the majority have now become regularcultivators. One explanation of their refusal to till the ground isthat they consider it a sin to lacerate the breast of their motherearth with a ploughshare. They also say that God made the jungle toproduce everything necessary for the sustenance of men and made theBaigas kings of the forest, giving them wisdom to discover the thingsprovided for them. To Gonds and others who had not this knowledge, theinferior occupation of tilling the land was left. The men never becomefarmservants, but during the cultivating season they work for hire atuprooting the rice seedlings for transplantation; they do no otheragricultural labour for others. Women do the actual transplantationof rice and work as harvesters. The men make bamboo mats and baskets, which they sell in the village weekly markets. They also collectand sell honey and other forest products, and are most expert at allwork that can be done with an axe, making excellent woodcutters. Butthey show no aptitude in acquiring the use of any other implement, and dislike steady continuous labour, preferring to do a few days'work and then rest in their homes for a like period before beginningagain. Their skill and dexterity in the use of the axe in huntingis extraordinary. Small deer, hares and peacocks are often knockedover by throwing it at them, and panthers and other large animalsare occasionally killed with a single blow. If one of two Baigasis carried off by a tiger, the survivor will almost always make adetermined and often successful attempt to rescue him with nothingmore formidable than an axe or a stick. They are expert trackers, and are also clever at setting traps and snares, while, like Korkus, they catch fish by damming streams in the hot weather and throwing intothe pool thus formed some leaf or root which stupefies them. Even ina famine year, Mr. Low says, a Baiga can collect a large basketful ofroots in a single day; and if the bamboo seeds he is amply providedfor. Nowadays Baiga cultivators may occasionally be met with who havetaken to regular cultivation and become quite prosperous, owning anumber of cattle. 

10. Language. 

As already stated, the Baigas have completely forgotten their ownlanguage, and in the Satpura hills they speak a broken form of Hindi, though they have a certain number of words and expressions peculiarto the caste. 

Bairagi

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Definition of name and statistics. _ 2. _The four Sampradayas or main orders. _ 3. _The Ramanujis. _ 4. _The Ramanandis. _ 5. _The Nimanandis. _ 6. _The Madhavacharyas. _ 7. _The Vallabhacharyas. _ 8. _Minor sects. _ 9. _The seven Akharas. _10. _The Dwaras. _11. _Initiation, appearance and customs. _12. _Recruitment of the order and its character. _13. _Social position and customs. _14. _Bairagi monasteries. _15. _Married Bairagis. _

1. Definition of name and statistics. 

_Bairagi_, [98] _Sadhu_. --The general term for members of the Vishnuitereligious orders, who formerly as a rule lived by mendicancy. TheBairagis have now, however, become a caste. In 1911 they numbered38, 000 persons in the Provinces, being distributed over all Districtsand States. The name Bairagi is supposed to come from the SanskritVairagya and to signify one who is free from human passions. Bairaga isalso the term for the crutched stick which such mendicants frequentlycarry about with them and lean upon, either sitting or standing, andwhich in case of need would serve them as a weapon. Platts considers[99] that the name of the order comes from the Sanskrit abstractterm, and the crutch therefore apparently obtained its name frombeing used by members of the order. Properly, a religious mendicantof any Vishnuite sect should be called a Bairagi. But the term is notgenerally applied to the more distinctive sects as the Kabirpanthi, Swami-Narayan, Satnami and others, some of which are almost separatedfrom Hinduism, nor to the Sikh religious orders, nor the Chaitanyasect of Bengal. A proper Bairagi is one whose principal deity iseither Vishnu or either of his great incarnations, Rama and Krishna. 

2. The four Sampradayas or main orders. 

It is generally held that there are four Sampradayas or main sectsof Bairagis. These are--

(_a_) The Ramanujis, the followers of the first prominent Vishnuitereformer Ramanuj in southern India, with whom are classed theRamanandis or adherents of his great disciple Ramanand in northernIndia. Both these are also called Sri Vaishnava, that is, the principalor original Vaishnava sect. 

(_b_) The Nimanandi, Nimat or Nimbaditya sect, followers of a saintcalled Nimanand. 

(_c_) The Vishnu-Swami or Vallabhacharya sect, worshippers of Krishnaand Radha. 

(_d_) The Madhavacharya sect of southern India. 

It will be desirable to give a few particulars of each of these, mainly taken from Wilson's _Hindu Sects_ and Dr. Bhattacharya's _HinduCastes and Sects_. 

3. The Ramanujis. 

Ramanuj was the first great Vishnuite prophet, and lived in southernIndia in the eleventh or twelfth century on an island in the Kaveririver near Trichinopoly. He preached the worship of a supreme spirit, Vishnu and his consort Lakshmi, and taught that men also had soulsor spirits, and that matter was lifeless. He was a strong opponentof the cult of Siva, then predominant in southern India, and ofphallic worship. He, however, admitted only the higher castes intohis order, and cannot therefore be considered as the founder of theliberalising principle of Vishnuism. The superiors of the Ramanujasect are called Acharya, and rank highest among the priests of theVishnuite orders. The most striking feature in the practice of theRamanujis is the separate preparation and scrupulous privacy of theirmeals. They must not eat in cotton garments, but must bathe, and thenput on wool or silk. The teachers allow their select pupils to assistthem, but in general all the Ramanujis cook for themselves, and shouldthe meal during this process, or while they are eating, attract eventhe look of a stranger, the operation is instantly stopped and theviands buried in the ground. The Ramanujis address each other with thesalutation Dasoham, or 'I am your slave, ' accompanied with the Pranamor slight inclination of the head and the application of joined handsto the forehead. To the Acharyas or superiors the other members of thesect perform the Ashtanga or prostration of the body with eight partstouching the ground. The _tilak_ or sect-mark of the Ramanujis consistsof two perpendicular white lines from the roots of the hair to the topof the eyebrows, with a connecting white line at the base, and a thirdcentral line either of red or yellow. The Ramanujis do not recognisethe worship of Radha, the consort of Krishna. The mendicant ordersof the Satanis and Dasaris of southern India are branches of this sect. 

4. The Ramanandis

Ramanand, the great prophet of Vishnuism in northern India, and thereal founder of the liberal doctrines of the cult, lived at Benaresat the end of the fourteenth century, and is supposed to have been afollower of Ramanuj. He introduced, however, a great extension of hispredecessor's gospel in making his sect, nominally at least, open toall castes. He thus initiated the struggle against the social tyrannyand exclusiveness of the caste system, which was carried to greaterlengths by his disciples and successors, Kabir, Nanak, Dadu, Rai Dasand others. These afterwards proclaimed the worship of one unseen godwho could not be represented by idols, and the religious equality ofall men, their tenets no doubt being considerably influenced by theirobservance of Islam, which had now become a principal religion ofIndia. Ramanand himself did not go so far, and remained a good Hindu, inculcating the special worship of Rama and his consort Sita. TheRamaaandis consider the Ramayana as their most sacred book, and makepilgrimages to Ajodhia and Ramnath. [100] Their sect-mark consists oftwo white lines down the forehead with a red one between, but they arecontinued on to the nose, ending in a loop, instead of terminating atthe line of the eyebrows, like that of the Ramanujis. The Ramanandissay that the mark on the nose represents the Singasun or lion's throne, while the two white lines up the forehead are Rama and Lakhshman, andthe centre red one is Sita. Some of their devotees wear ochre-colouredclothes like the Sivite mendicants. 

5. The Nimanandis. 

The second of the four orders is that of the Nimanandis, calledafter a saint Nimanand. He lived near Mathura Brindaban, and on oneoccasion was engaged in religious controversy with a Jain ascetictill sunset. He then offered his visitor some refreshment, but theJain could not eat anything after sunset, so Nimanand stopped thesun from setting, and ordered him to wait above a _nim_ tree till themeal was cooked and eaten under the tree, and this direction the sunduly obeyed. Hence Nimanand, whose original name was Bhaskaracharya, was called by his new name after the tree, and was afterwards heldto have been an incarnation of Vishnu or the Sun. 

The doctrines of the sect, Mr. Growse states, [101] are of a veryenlightened character. Thus their tenet of salvation by faith isthought by many scholars to have been directly derived from theGospels; while another article in their creed is the continuance ofconscious individual existence in a future world, when the highestreward of the good will not be extinction, but the enjoyment ofthe visible presence of the divinity whom they have served whileon earth. The Nimanandis worship Krishna, and were the first sect, Dr. Bhattacharya states, [102] to associate with him as a divineconsort Radha, the chief partner of his illicit loves. 

Their headquarters are at Muttra, and their chief festival is theJanam-Ashtami [103] or Krishna's birthday. Their sect-mark consists oftwo white lines down the forehead with a black patch in the centre, which is called Shiambindini. Shiam means black, and is a name ofKrishna. They also sometimes have a circular line across the nose, which represents the moon. 

6. The Madhavacharyas. 

The third great order is that of the Madhavas, named after a saintcalled Madhavacharya in southern India. He attempted to reconcile thewarring Sivites and Vishnuites by combining the worship of Krishna withthat of Siva and Parvati. The doctrine of the sect is that the humansoul is different from the divine soul, and its members are thereforecalled dualists. They admit a distinction between the divine soul andthe universe, and between the human soul and the material world. Theydeny also the possibility of Nirvana or the absorption and extinctionof the human soul in the divine essence. They destroy their threadat initiation, and also wear red clothes like the Sivite devotees, and like them also they carry a staff and water-pot. The _tilak_of the Madhavacharyas is said to consist of two white lines down theforehead and continued on to the nose where they meet, with a blackvertical line between them. 

7. The Vallabhacharyas. 

The fourth main order is the Vishnu-Swami, which is much better knownas the Vallabhacharya sect, called after its founder Vallabha, whowas born in A. D. 1479. The god Krishna appeared to him and orderedhim to marry and set up a shrine to the god at Gokul near Mathura(Muttra). The sect worship Krishna in his character of Bala Gopalaor the cowherd boy. Their temples are numerous all over India, andespecially at Mathura and Brindaban, where Krishna was brought upas a cowherd. The temples at Benares, Jagannath and Dwarka are richand important, but the most celebrated shrine is at Sri Nathadwarain Mewar. The image is said to have transported itself thitherfrom Mathura, when Aurangzeb ordered its temple at Mathura to bedestroyed. Krishna is here represented as a little boy in the act ofsupporting the mountain Govardhan on his finger to shelter the peoplefrom the storms of rain sent by Indra. The image is splendidly dressedand richly decorated with ornaments to the value of several thousandpounds. The images of Krishna in the temples are commonly known asThakurji, and are either of stone or brass. At all Vallabhacharyatemples there are eight daily services: the Mangala or morning _levée_, a little after sunrise, when the god is taken from his couch andbathed; the Sringara, when he is attired in his jewels and seated onhis throne; the Gwala, when he is supposed to be starting to grazehis cattle in the woods of Braj; the Raj Bhog or midday meal, which, after presentation, is consumed by the priests and votaries whohave assisted at the ceremonies; the Uttapan, about three o'clock, when the god awakes from his siesta; the Bhog or evening collation;the Sandhiya or disrobing at sunset; and the Sayan or retiring torest. The ritual is performed by the priests and the lay worshipperis only a spectator, who shows his reverence by the same forms as hewould to a human superior. [104]

The priests of the sect are called Gokalastha Gosain or Maharaja. Theyare considered to be incarnations of the god, and divine honoursare paid to them. They always marry, and avow that union with thegod is best obtained by indulgence in all bodily enjoyments. Thisdoctrine has led to great licentiousness in some groups of the sect, especially on the part of the priests or Maharajas. Women were taughtto believe that the service of and contact with the priest were themost real form of worshipping the god, and that intercourse with himwas equivalent to being united with the god. Dr. Bhattacharya quotes[105] the following tariff for the privilege of obtaining differentdegrees of contact with the body of the Maharaja or priest:

 For homage by sight Rs. 5. For homage by touch Rs. 20. For the honour of washing the Maharaja's foot Rs. 35. For swinging him Rs. 40. For rubbing sweet unguents on his body Rs. 42. For being allowed to sit with him on the same couch Rs. 60. For the privilege of dancing with him Rs. 100 to 200. For drinking the water in which he has bathed Rs. 17. For being closeted with him in the same room Rs. 50 to 500. 

The public disapprobation caused by these practices and their badeffect on the morality of women culminated in the great Maharaj libelsuit in the Bombay High Court in 1862. Since then the objectionablefeatures of the cult have to a large extent disappeared, while it hasproduced some priests of exceptional liberality and enlightenment. The_tilak_ of the Vallabhacharyas is said to consist of two white linesdown the forehead, forming a half-circle at its base and a white dotbetween them. They will not admit the lower castes into the order, but only those from whom a Brahman can take water. 

8. Minor sects. 

Besides the main sects as described above, Vaishnavism has producedmany minor sects, consisting of the followers of some saint of specialfame, and mendicants belonging to these are included in the body ofBairagis. One or two legends concerning such saints may be given. Acommon order is that of the Bendiwale, or those who wear a dot. Theirfounder began putting a red dot on his forehead between the two whitelines in place of the long red line of the Ramanandis. His associatesasked him why he had dared to alter his _tilak_ or sect-mark. He saidthat the goddess Janki had given him the dot, and as a test he wentand bathed in the Sarju river, and rubbed his forehead with water, and all the sect-mark was rubbed out except the dot. So the othersrecognised the special intervention of the goddess, and he founded asect. Another sect is called the Chaturbhuji or four-armed, Chaturbhujbeing an epithet of Vishnu. He was taking part in a feast when hisloin-cloth came undone behind, and the others said to him that asthis had happened, he had become impure at the feast. He replied, 'Let him to whom the _dhoti_ belongs tie it up, ' and immediatelyfour arms sprang from his body, and while two continued to take food, the other two tied up his loin-cloth behind. Thus it was recognisedthat the Chaturbhuji Vishnu had appeared in him, and he was venerated. 

9. The seven Akharas. 

Among the Bairagis, besides the four Sampradayas or main orders, there are seven Akharas. These are military divisions or schools fortraining, and were instituted when the Bairagis had to fight with theGosains. Any member of one of the four Sampradayas can belong to anyone of the seven Akharas, and a man can change his Akhara as often ashe likes, but not his Sampradaya. The Akharas, with the exception ofthe Lasgaris, who change the red centre line of the Ramanandis intoa white line, have no special sect-marks. They are distinguished bytheir flags or standards, which are elaborately decorated with goldthread embroidered on silk or sometimes with jewels, and cost twoor three hundred rupees to prepare. These standards were carriedby the Naga or naked members of the Akhara, who went in front andfought. Once in twelve years a great meeting of all the seven Akharasis held at Allahabad, Nasik, Ujjain or Hardwar, where they bathe andwash the image of the god in the water of the holy rivers. The quarrelsbetween the Bairagis and Gosains usually occurred at the sacred rivers, and the point of contention was which sect should bathe first. Thefollowing is a list of the seven Akharas: Digambari, Khaki, Munjia, Kathia, Nirmohi, Nirbani or Niranjani and Lasgari. 

The name of the Digamber or Meghdamber signifies sky-clad orcloud-clad, that is naked. They do penance in the rainy seasonby sitting naked in the rain for two or three hours a day with anearthen pot on the head and the hands inserted in two others so thatthey cannot rub the skin. In the dry season they wear only a littlecloth round the waist and ashes over the rest of the body. The ashesare produced from burnt cowdung picked up off the ground, and notmixed with straw like that which is prepared for fuel. 

The Khaki Bairagis also rub ashes on the body. During the four hotmonths they make five fires in a circle, and kneel between them withthe head and legs and arms stretched towards the fires. The fires arekindled at noon with little heaps of cowdung cakes, and the penitentstays between them till they go out. They also have a block of woodwith a hole through it, into which they insert the organ of generationand suspend it by chains in front and behind. They rub ashes on thebody, from which they probably get their name of Khaki or dust-colour. 

The Munjia Akhara have a belt made of _munj_ grass round the waist, and a little apron also of grass, which is hung from it, and passedthrough the legs. Formerly they wore no other clothes, but now theyhave a cloth. They also do penance between the fires. 

The Kathias have a waist-belt of bamboo fibre, to which is suspendedthe wooden block for the purpose already described. Their namesignifies wooden, and is probably given to them on account of thiscustom. 

The Nirmohi carry a _lota_ or brass vessel and a little cup, in whichthey receive alms. 

The Nirbani wear only a piece of string or rope round the waist, towhich is attached a small strip of cloth passing through the legs. Whenbegging, they carry a _kawar_ or banghy, holding two baskets coveredwith cloth, and into this they put all their alms. They never removethe cloth, but plunge their hands into the basket at random whenthey want something to eat. They call the basket Kamdhenu, the nameof the cow which gave inexhaustible wealth. These Bairagis commonlymarry and accumulate property. 

The Lasgari are soldiers, as the name denotes. [106] They wear threestraight lines of sandalwood up the forehead. It is said that on oneoccasion the Bairagis were suddenly attacked by the Gosains when theyhad only made the white lines of the sect-mark, and they fought asthey were. In consequence of this, they have ever since worn threewhite lines and no red one. 

Others say that the Lasgari are a branch of the Digambari Akhara, and that the Munjia and Kathia are branches of the Khaki Akhara. Theygive three other Akharas--Niralankhi, Mahanirbani and Santokhi--aboutwhich nothing is known. 

10. The Dwaras. 

Besides the Akharas, the Bairagis are said to have fifty-two Dwarasor doors, and every man must be a member of a Dwara as well as of aSampradaya and Akhara. The Dwaras seem to have no special purpose, but in the case of Bairagis who marry, they now serve as exogamoussections, so that members of the same Dwara do not intermarry. 

11. Initiation, appearance and customs. 

A candidate for initiation has his head shaved, is invested with anecklace of beads of the _tulsi_ or basil, and is taught a _mantra_or text relating to Vishnu by his preceptor. The initiationtext of the Ramanandis is said to be _Om Ramaya Namah_, or _Om_, Salutation to Rama. _Om_ is a very sacred syllable, having much magicalpower. Thereafter the novice must journey to Dwarka in Gujarat and havehis body branded with hot iron or copper in the shape of Vishnu's fourimplements: the _chakra_ or discus, the _guda_ or club, the _shank_ orconch-shell and the _padma_ or lotus. Sometimes these are not brandedbut are made daily on the arms with clay. The sect-mark should be madewith Gopichandan or the milkmaid's sandalwood. This is supposed to beclay taken from a tank at Dwarka, in which the Gopis or milkmaids whohad been Krishna's companions drowned themselves when they heard of hisdeath. But as this can seldom be obtained any suitable whitish clay isused instead. The Bairagis commonly let their hair grow long, afterbeing shaved at initiation, to imitate the old forest ascetics. Ifa man makes a pilgrimage on foot to some famous shrine he may havehis head shaved there and make an offering of his hair. Others keeptheir hair long and shave it only at the death of their _guru_ orpreceptor. They usually wear white clothes, and if a man has a clothon the upper part of the body it should be folded over the shouldersand knotted at the neck. He also has a _chimta_ or small pair of tongs, and, if he can obtain it, the skin of an Indian antelope, on which hewill sit while taking his food. The skin of this animal is held to besacred. Every Bairagi before he takes his food should dip a sprig of_tulsi_ or basil into it to sanctify it, and if he cannot get this heuses his necklace of _tulsi_-beads for the purpose instead. The casteabstain from flesh and liquor, but are addicted to the intoxicatingdrugs, _ganja_ and _bhang_ or preparations of Indian hemp. A Hinduon meeting a Bairagi will greet him with the phrase 'Jai Sitaram, 'and the Bairagi will answer, 'Sitaram. ' This word is a conjunctionof the names of Rama and his consort Sita. When a Bairagi receivesalms he will present to the giver a flower and a sprig of _tulsi_. 

12. Recruitment of the order and its character. 

A man belonging to any caste except the impure ones can be initiatedas a Bairagi, and the order is to a large extent recruited fromthe lower castes. Theoretically all members of the order shouldeat together; but the Brahmans and other high castes belongingto it now eat only among themselves, except on the occasion of aGhosti or special religious assembly, when all eat in common. As amatter of fact the order is a very mixed assortment of people. Manypersons who lost their caste in the famine of 1897 from eating inGovernment poor-houses, joined the order and obtained a respectableposition. Debtors who have become hopelessly involved sometimes findin it a means of escape from their creditors. Women of bad character, who have been expelled from their caste, are also frequently enrolledas female members, and in monasteries live openly with the men. Thecaste is also responsible for a good deal of crime. Not only is thedisguise a very convenient one for thieves and robbers to assume ontheir travels, but many regular members of the order are criminallydisposed. Nevertheless large numbers of Bairagis are men who have givenup their caste and families from a genuine impulse of self-sacrifice, and the desire to lead a religious life. 

13. Social position and customs. 

On account of their sanctity the Bairagis have a fairly good socialposition, and respectable Hindu castes will accept cooked foodfrom them. Brahmans usually, but not always, take water. They actas _gurus_ or spiritual guides to the laymen of all castes who canbecome Bairagis. They give the Ram and Gopal Mantras, or the textsof Rama and Krishna, to their disciples of the three twice-borncastes, and the Sheo Mantra or Siva's text to other castes. The lastis considered to be of smaller religious efficacy than the others, and is given to the lower castes and members of the higher ones whodo not lead a particularly virtuous life. They invest boys with thesacred thread, and make the sect-mark on their foreheads. When theygo and visit their disciples they receive presents, but do not askthem to confess their sins nor impose penalties. 

If a mendicant Bairagi keeps a woman it is stated that he is expelledfrom the community, but this rule does not seem to be enforced inpractice. If he is detected in a casual act of sexual intercoursea fine should be imposed, such as feeding two or three hundredBairagis. The property of an unmarried Bairagi descends to a selected_chela_ or disciple. The bodies of the dead are usually burnt, butthose of saints specially famous for their austerities or piety areburied, and salt is put round the body to preserve it. Such men areknown as Bhakta. 

14. Bairagi monasteries. 

The Bairagis [107] have numerous _maths_ or monasteries, scatteredover the country and usually attached to temples. The Math comprises aset of huts or chambers for the Mahant or superior and his permanentpupils; a temple and often the Samadhi or tomb of the founder, orof some eminent Mahant; and a Dharmsala or charitable hostel forthe accommodation of wandering members of the order, and of othertravellers who are constantly visiting the temple. Ingress and egressare free to all, and, indeed, a restraint on personal liberty seemsnever to have entered into the conception of any Hindu religiouslegislator. There are, as a rule, a small number of resident _chelas_or disciples who are scholars and attendants on the superiors, and also out-members who travel over the country and return to themonastery as a headquarters. The monastery has commonly some smallendowment in land, and the resident _chelas_ go out and beg for almsfor their common support. If the Mahant is married the headship maydescend in his family; but when he is unmarried his successor is oneof his disciples, who is commonly chosen by election at a meeting ofthe Mahants of neighbouring monasteries. Formerly the Hindu governorof the district would preside at such an election, but it is now, of course, left entirely to the Bairagis themselves. 

15. Married Bairagis. 

Large numbers of Bairagis now marry and have children, and haveformed an ordinary caste. The married Bairagis are held to beinferior to the celibate mendicants, and will take food from them, but the mendicants will not permit the married Bairagis to eat withthem in the _chauka_ or place purified for the taking of food. Thecustoms of the married Bairagis resemble those of ordinary Hinducastes such as the Kurmis. They permit divorce and the remarriageof widows, and burn the dead. Those who have taken to cultivationdo not, as a rule, plough with their own hands. Many Bairagis haveacquired property and become landholders, and others have extensivemoneylending transactions. Two such men who had acquired possessionof extensive tracts of zamindari land in Chhattisgarh, in satisfactionof loans made to the Gond zamindars, and had been given the zamindaristatus by the Marathas, were subsequently made Feudatory Chiefs ofthe Nandgaon and Chhuikhadan States. These chiefs now marry and theStates descend in their families by primogeniture in the ordinarymanner. As a rule, the Bairagi landowners and moneylenders are notfound to be particularly good specimens of their class. 

Balahi

1. General notice. 

_Balahi. _ [108]--A low functional caste of weavers and villagewatchmen found in the Nimar and Hoshangabad Districts and in CentralIndia. They numbered 52, 000 persons in the Central Provinces in1911, being practically confined to the two Districts alreadymentioned. The name is a corruption of the Hindi _bulahi_, one whocalls, or a messenger. The Balahis seem to be an occupational group, probably an offshoot of the large Kori caste of weavers, one ofwhose subdivisions is shown as Balahi in the United Provinces. Inthe Central Provinces they have received accretions from the spinnercaste of Katias, themselves probably a branch of the Koris, andfrom the Mahars, the great menial caste of Bombay. In Hoshangabadthey are known alternatively as Mahar, while in Burhanpur they arecalled Bunkar or weaver by outsiders. The following story which theytell about themselves also indicates their mixed origin. They saythat their ancestors came to Nimar as part of the army of Raja Manof Jodhpur, who invaded the country when it was under Muhammadanrule. He was defeated, and his soldiers were captured and orderedto be killed. [109] One of the Balahis among them won the favour ofthe Muhammadan general and asked for his own freedom and that of theother Balahis from among the prisoners. The Musalman replied thathe would be unable to determine which of the prisoners were reallyBalahis. On this the Balahi, whose name was Ganga Kochla, repliedthat he had an effective test. He therefore killed a cow, cooked itsflesh and invited the prisoners to partake of it. So many of themas consented to eat were considered to be Balahis and liberated; butmany members of other castes thus obtained their freedom, and they andtheir descendants are now included in the community. The subcastesor endogamous groups distinctly indicate the functional characterof the caste, the names given being Nimari, Gannore, Katia, Kori andMahar. Of these Katia, Kori and Mahar are the names of distinct castes, Nimari is a local subdivision indicating those who speak the peculiardialect of this tract, and the Gannore are no doubt named after theRajput clan of that name, of whom their ancestors were not improbablythe illegitimate offspring. The Nimari Balahis are said to rank lowerthan the rest, as they will eat the flesh of dead cattle which theothers refuse to do. They may not take water from the village well, and unless a separate one can be assigned to them, must pay othersto draw water for them. Partly no doubt in the hope of escaping fromthis degraded position, many of the Nimari group became Christians inthe famine of 1897. They are considered to be the oldest residentsof Nimar. At marriages the Balahi receives as his perquisite theleaf-plates used for feasts with the leavings of food upon them;and at funerals he takes the cloth which covers the corpse on itsway to the burning-_ghat_. In Nimar the Korkus and Balahis eachhave a separate burying-ground which is known as Murghata. [110] TheKatias weave the finer kinds of cloth and rank a little higher thanthe others. In Burhanpur, as already stated, the caste are known asBunkar, and they are probably identical with the Bunkars of Khandesh;Bunkar is simply an occupational term meaning a weaver. 

2. Marriage. 

The caste have the usual system of exogamous groups, some of whichare named after villages, while the designations of others areapparently nicknames given to the founder of the clan, as Bagmar, atiger-killer, Bhagoria, a runaway, and so on. They employ a Brahman tocalculate the horoscopes of a bridal couple and fix the date of theirwedding, but if he says the marriage is inauspicious, they merelyobtain the permission of the caste _panchayat_ and celebrate it ona Saturday or Sunday. Apparently, however, they do not consult realBrahmans, but merely priests of their own caste whom they call BalahiBrahmans. These Brahmans are, nevertheless, said to recite the SatyaNarayan Katha. They also have _gurus_ or spiritual preceptors, beingmembers of the caste who have joined the mendicant orders; and Bhatsor genealogists of their own caste who beg at their weddings. Theyhave the practice of serving for a wife, known as Gharjamai orLamjhana. When the pauper suitor is finally married at the expenseof his wife's father, a marriage-shed is erected for him at the houseof some neighbour, but his own family are not invited to the wedding. 

After marriage a girl goes to her husband's house for a few days andreturns. The first Diwali or Akha-tij festival after the wedding mustalso be passed at the husband's house, but consummation is not effecteduntil the _aina_ or _gauna_ ceremony is performed on the attainmentof puberty. The cost of a wedding is about Rs. 80 to the bridegroom'sfamily and Rs. 20 to the bride's family. A widow is forbidden to marryher late husband's brother or other relatives. At the wedding she isdressed in new clothes, and the foreheads of the couple are markedwith cowdung as a sign of purification. They then proceed by night tothe husband's village, and the woman waits till morning in some emptybuilding, when she enters her husband's house carrying two water-potson her head in token of the fertility which she is to bring to it. 

3. Other customs. 

Like the Mahars, the Balahis must not kill a dog or a cat under painof expulsion; but it is peculiar that in their case the bear is heldequally sacred, this being probably a residue of some totemisticobservance. The most binding form of oath which they can use is byany one of these animals. The Balahis will admit any Hindu into thecommunity except a man of the very lowest castes, and also Gondsand Korkus. The head and face of the neophyte are shaved clean, andhe is made to lie on the ground under a string-cot; a number of theBalahis sit on this and wash themselves, letting the water drip fromtheir bodies on to the man below until he is well drenched; he thengives a feast to the caste-fellows, and is considered to have becomea Balahi. It is reported also that they will receive back into thecommunity Balahi women who have lived with men of other castes andeven with Jains and Muhammadans. They will take food from members ofthese religions and of any Hindu caste, except the most impure. 

Balija

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Balija, Balji, Gurusthulu, Naidu. _--A large trading caste of theMadras Presidency, where they number a million persons. In the CentralProvinces 1200 were enumerated in 1911, excluding 1500 Perikis, who though really a subcaste and not a very exalted one of Balijas, [111] claim to be a separate caste. They are mainly returned fromplaces where Madras troops have been stationed, as Nagpur, Jubbulporeand Raipur. The caste are frequently known as Naidu, a corruptionof the Telugu word Nayakdu, a prince or leader. Their ancestorsare supposed to have been Nayaks or kings of Madura, Tanjore andVijayanagar. The traditional occupation of the caste appears to havebeen to make bangles and pearl and coral ornaments, and they havestill a subcaste called Gazulu, or a bangle-seller. In Madras theyare said to be an offshoot of the great cultivating castes of Kammaand Kapu and to be a mixed community recruited from these and otherTelugu castes. Another proof of their mixed descent may be inferredfrom the fact that they will admit persons of other castes or thedescendants of mixed marriages into the community without much scruplein Madras. [112] The name of Balija seems also to have been appliedto a mixed caste started by Basava, the founder of the Lingayat sectof Sivites, these persons being known in Madras as Linga Balijas. 

2. Marriage. 

The Balijas have two main divisions, Desa or Kota, and Peta, the Desasor Kotas being those who claim descent from the old Balija kings, while the Petas are the trading Balijas, and are further subdividedinto groups like the Gazulu or bangle-sellers and the Periki orsalt-sellers. The subdivisions are not strictly endogamous. Everyfamily has a surname, and exogamous groups or _gotras_ also exist, but these have generally been forgotten, and marriages are regulatedby the surnames, the only prohibition being that persons of the samesurname may not intermarry. Instances of such names are: Singiri, Gudari, Jadal, Sangnad and Dasiri. In fact the rules of exogamyare so loose that an instance is known of an uncle having marriedhis niece. Marriage is usually infant, and the ceremony lasts forfive days. On the first day the bride and bridegroom are seated ona yoke in the _pandal_ or marriage pavilion, where the relativesand guests assemble. The bridegroom puts a pair of silver ringson the bride's toes and ties the _mangal-sutram_ or flat circularpiece of gold round her neck. On the next three days the bridegroomand bride are made to sit on a plank or cot face to face with eachother and to throw flowers and play together for two hours in themornings and evenings. On the fourth day, at dead of night, they areseated on a cot and the jewels and gifts for the bride are presented, and she is then formally handed over to the bridegroom's family. InMadras Mr. Thurston [113] states that on the last day of the marriageceremony a mock ploughing and sowing rite is held, and during this, the sister of the bridegroom puts a cloth over the basket containingearth, wherein seeds are to be sown by the bridegroom, and will notallow him to go on with the ceremony till she has extracted a promisethat his first-born daughter shall marry her son. No bride-price ispaid, and the remarriage of widows is forbidden. 

3. Occupation and social status. 

The Balijas bury their dead in a sitting posture. In the CentralProvinces they are usually Lingayats and especially worship Gauri, Siva's wife. Jangams serve them as priests. They usually eat fleshand drink liquor, but in Chanda it is stated that both these practicesare forbidden. In the Central Provinces they are mainly cultivators, but some of them still sell bangles and salt. Several of them are inGovernment service and occupy a fairly high social position. 

In Madras a curious connection exists between the Kapus and Balijasand the impure Mala caste. It is said that once upon a time the Kapusand Balijas were flying from the Muhammadans and came to the northernPallar river in high flood. They besought the river to go down and letthem across, but it demanded the sacrifice of a first-born child. Whilethe Kapus and Balijas were hesitating, the Malas who had followed themboldly sacrificed one of their children. Immediately the river dividedbefore them and they all crossed in safety. Ever since then the Kapusand Balijas have respected the Malas, and the Balijas formerly evendeposited the images of the goddess Gauri, of Ganesha, and of Siva'sbull with the Malas, as the hereditary custodians of their gods. [114]

Bania

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice. _ 2. _The Banias a true caste: use of the name. _ 3. _Their distinctive occupation. _ 4. _Their distinctive status. _ 5. _The endogamous divisions of the Banias. _ 6. _The Banias derived from the Rajputs. _ 7. _Banias employed as ministers in Rajput courts. _ 8. _Subcastes. _ 9. _Hindu and Jain subcastes: divisions among subcastes. _ 10. _Exogamy and rules regulating marriage. _ 11. _Marriage customs. _ 12. _Polygamy and widow-marrriage. _ 13. _Disposal of the dead and mourning. _ 14. _Religion: the god Ganpati or Ganesh. _ 15. _Diwali festival. _ 16. _Holi festival. _ 17. _Social customs: rules about food. _ 18. _Character of the Bania. _ 19. _Dislike of the cultivators towards him. _ 20. _His virtues. _ 21. _The moneylender changed for the worse. _ 22. _The enforcement of contracts. _ 23. _Cash coinage and the rate of interest. _ 24. _Proprietary and transferable rights in land. _ 25. _The Bania as a landlord. _ 26. _Commercial honesty. _

List of Subordinate Articles on Subcastes

 1. Agarwala, Agarwal. 2. Agrahari. 3. Ajudhiabasi, Audhia. 4. Asathi. 5. Charnagri, Channagri, Samaiya. 6. Dhusar, Bhargava Dhusar. 7. Dosar, Dusra. 8. Gahoi. 9. Golapurab, Golahre. 10. Kasarwani. 11. Kasaundhan. 12. Khandelwal. 13. Lad. 14. Lingayat. 15. Maheshri. 16. Nema. 17. Oswal. 18. Parwar. 19. Srimali. 20. Umre. 

1. General notice. 

_Bania, Bani, Vani, Mahajan, Seth, Sahukar. _--The occupationalcaste of bankers, moneylenders and dealers in grain, _ghi_ (butter), groceries and spices. The name Bania is derived from the Sanskrit_vanij_, a merchant. In western India the Banias are always calledVania or Vani. Mahajan literally means a great man, and being appliedto successful Banias as an honorific title has now come to signify abanker or moneylender; Seth signifies a great merchant or capitalist, and is applied to Banias as an honorific prefix. The words _Sahu_, _Sao_ and _Sahukar_ mean upright or honest, and have also, curiouslyenough, come to signify a moneylender. The total number of Banias inthe Central Provinces in 1911 was about 200, 000, or rather over oneper cent of the population. Of the above total two-thirds were Hindusand one-third Jains. The caste is fairly distributed over the wholeProvince, being most numerous in Districts with large towns and aconsiderable volume of trade. 

2. The Banias a true caste: use of the name. 

There has been much difference of opinion as to whether the nameBania should be taken to signify a caste, or whether it is merely anoccupational term applied to a number of distinct castes. I ventureto think it is necessary and scientifically correct to take it as acaste. In Bengal the word Banian, a corruption of Bania, has probablycome to be a general term meaning simply a banker, or person dealingin money. But this does not seem to be the case elsewhere. As arule the name Bania is used only as a caste name for groups who areconsidered both by themselves and outsiders to belong to the Baniacaste. It may occasionally be applied to members of other castes, as in the case of certain Teli-Banias who have abandoned oil-pressingfor shop-keeping, but such instances are very rare; and these Teliswould probably now assert that they belonged to the Bania caste. Thatthe Banias are recognised as a distinct caste by the people is shownby the number of uncomplimentary proverbs and sayings about them, which is far larger than in the case of any other caste. [115] Inall these the name Bania is used and not that of any subdivision, and this indicates that none of the subdivisions are looked uponas distinctive social groups or castes. Moreover, so far as I amaware, the name Bania is applied regularly to all the groups usuallyclassified under the caste, and there is no group which objects to thename or whose members refuse to describe themselves by it. This is byno means always the case with other important castes. The Rathor Telisof Mandla entirely decline to answer to the name of Teli, though theyare classified under that caste. In the case of the important Ahir orgrazier caste, those who sell milk instead of grazing cattle are calledGaoli, but remain members of the Ahir caste. An Ahir in Chhattisgarhwould be called Rawat and in the Maratha Districts Gowari, but mightstill be an Ahir by caste. The Barai caste of betel-vine growers andsellers is in some localities called Tamboli and not Barai; elsewhereit is known only as Pansari, though the name Pansari is correctlyan occupational term, and, where it is not applied to the Barais, means a grocer or druggist by profession and not a caste. Bania, on the other hand, over the greater part of India is applied onlyto persons who acknowledge themselves and are generally recognisedby Hindu society to be members of the Bania caste, and there is noother name which is generally applied to any considerable section ofsuch persons. Certain of the more important subcastes of Bania, asthe Agarwala, Oswal and Parwar, are, it is true, frequently known bythe subcaste name. But the caste name is as often as not, or even moreoften, affixed to it. Agarwala, or Agarwala Bania, are names equallyapplied to designate this subcaste, and similarly with the Oswals andParwars; and even so the subcaste name is only applied for greateraccuracy and for compliment, since these are the best subcastes;the Bania's quarter of a town will be called Bania Mahalla, and itsresidents spoken of as Banias, even though they may be nearly allAgarwals or Oswals. Several Rajput clans are similarly spoken of bytheir clan names, as Rathor, Panwar, and so on, without the additionof the caste name Rajput. Brahman subcastes are usually mentionedby their subcaste name for greater accuracy, though in their casetoo it is usual to add the caste name. And there are subdivisions ofother castes, such as the Jaiswar Chamars and the Somvansi Mehras, who invariably speak of themselves only by their subcaste name, and discard the caste name altogether, being ashamed of it, but arenevertheless held to belong to their parent castes. Thus in the matterof common usage Bania conforms in all respects to the requirementsof a proper caste name. 

3. Their distinctive occupation. 

The Banias have also a distinct and well-defined traditionaloccupation, [116] which is followed by many or most members ofpractically every subcaste so far as has been observed. This occupationhas caused the caste as a body to be credited with special mentaland moral characteristics in popular estimation, to a greater extentperhaps than any other caste. None of the subcastes are ashamed oftheir traditional occupation or try to abandon it. It is true that afew subcastes such as the Kasaundhans and Kasarwanis, sellers of metalvessels, apparently had originally a somewhat different profession, though resembling the traditional one; but they too, if they onceonly sold vessels, now engage largely in the traditional Bania'scalling, and deal generally in grain and money. The Banias, no doubtbecause it is both profitable and respectable, adhere more generallyto their traditional occupation than almost any great caste, exceptthe cultivators. Mr. Marten's analysis [117] of the occupations ofdifferent castes shows that sixty per cent of the Banias are stillengaged in trade; while only nineteen per cent of Brahmans followa religious calling; twenty-nine per cent of Ahirs are graziers, cattle-dealers or milkmen; only nine per cent of Telis are engagedin all branches of industry, including their traditional occupationof oil-pressing; and similarly only twelve per cent of Chamars workat industrial occupations, including that of curing hides. In respectof occupation therefore the Banias strictly fulfil the definition ofa caste. 

4. Their distinctive status. 

The Banias have also a distinctive social status. They are considered, though perhaps incorrectly, to represent the Vaishyas or third greatdivision of the Aryan twice-born; they rank just below Rajputs andperhaps above all other castes except Brahmans; Brahmans will takefood cooked without water from many Banias and drinking-water fromall. Nearly all Banias wear the sacred thread; and the Banias aredistinguished by the fact that they abstain more rigorously andgenerally from all kinds of flesh food than any other caste. Theirrules as to diet are exceptionally strict, and are equally observedby the great majority of the subdivisions. 

5. The endogamous divisions of the Banias. 

Thus the Banias apparently fulfil the definition of a caste, asconsisting of one or more endogamous groups or subcastes with adistinct name applied to them all and to them only, a distinctiveoccupation and a distinctive social status; and there seems no reasonfor not considering them a caste. If on the other hand we examine thesubcastes of Bania we find that the majority of them have names derivedfrom places, [118] not indicating any separate origin, occupation orstatus, but only residence in separate tracts. Such divisions areproperly termed subcastes, being endogamous only, and in no otherway distinctive. No subcaste can be markedly distinguished from theothers in respect of occupation or social status, and none apparentlycan therefore be classified as a separate caste. There are no doubtsubstantial differences in status between the highest subcastes ofBania, the Agarwals, Oswals and Parwars, and the lower ones, theKasaundhan, Kasarwani, Dosar and others. But this difference is notso great as that which separates different groups included in suchimportant castes as Rajput and Bhat. It is true again that subcasteslike the Agarwals and Oswals are individually important, but notmore so than the Maratha, Khedawal, Kanaujia and Maithil Brahmans, orthe Sesodia, Rathor, Panwar and Jadon Rajputs. The higher subcastesof Bania themselves recognise a common relationship by taking foodcooked without water from each other, which is a very rare customamong subcastes. Some of them are even said to have intermarried. Ifon the other hand it is argued, not that two or three or more of theimportant subdivisions should be erected into independent castes, but that Bania is not a caste at all, and that every subcaste shouldbe treated as a separate caste, then such purely local groups asKanaujia, Jaiswar, Gujarati, Jaunpuri and others, which are found inforty or fifty other castes, would have to become separate castes;and if in this one case why not in all the other castes where theyoccur? This would result in the impossible position of having fortyor fifty castes of the same name, which recognise no connection ofany kind with each other, and make any arrangement or classificationof castes altogether impracticable. And in 1911 out of 200, 000 Baniasin the Central Provinces, 43, 000 were returned with no subcaste atall, and it would therefore be impossible to classify these underany other name. 

6. The Banias derived from the Rajputs. 

The Banias have been commonly supposed to represent the Vaishyas orthird of the four classical castes, both by Hindu society generallyand by leading authorities on the subject. It is perhaps this view oftheir origin which is partly responsible for the tendency to considerthem as several castes and not one. But its accuracy is doubtful. Theimportant Bania groups appear to be of Rajput stock. They nearly allcome from Rajputana, Bundelkhand or Gujarat, that is from the homesof the principal Rajut clans. Several of them have legends of Rajputdescent. The Agarwalas say that their first ancestor was a Kshatriyaking, who married a Naga or snake princess; the Naga race is supposedto have signified the Scythian immigrants, who were snake-worshippersand from whom several clans of Rajputs were probably derived. TheAgarwalas took their name from the ancient city of Agroha or possiblyfrom Agra. The Oswals say that their ancestor was the Rajput kingof Osnagar in Marwar, who with his followers was converted by a Jainmendicant. The Nemas state that their ancestors were fourteen youngRajput princes who escaped the vengeance of Parasurama by abandoningthe profession of arms and taking to trade. The Khandelwals taketheir name from the town of Khandela in Jaipur State of Rajputana. TheKasarwanis say they immigrated from Kara Manikpur in Bundelkhand. Theorigin of the Umre Banias is not known, but in Gujarat they are alsocalled Bagaria from the Bagar or wild country of the Dongarpur andPertabgarh States of Rajputana, where numbers of them are stillsettled; the name Bagaria would appear to indicate that they aresupposed to have immigrated thence into Gujarat. The Dhusar Baniasascribe their name to a hill called Dhusi or Dhosi on the border ofAlwar State. The Asatis say that their original home was TikamgarhState in Bundelkhand. The name of the Maheshris is held to be derivedfrom Maheshwar, an ancient town on the Nerbudda, near Indore, whichis traditionally supposed to have been the earliest settlement of theYadava Rajputs. The headquarters of the Gahoi Banias is said to havebeen at Kharagpur in Bundelkhand, though according to their own legendthey are of mixed origin. The home of the Srimalis was the old townof Srimal, now Bhinmal in Marwar. The Palliwal Banias were from thewell-known trading town of Pali in Marwar. The Jaiswal are said to taketheir name from Jaisalmer State, which was their native country. Theabove are no doubt only a fraction of the Bania subcastes, but theyinclude nearly all the most important and representative ones, fromwhom the caste takes its status and character. Of the numerous othergroups the bulk have probably been brought into existence throughthe migration and settlement of sections of the caste in differentparts of the country, where they have become endogamous and obtained afresh name. Other subcastes may be composed of bodies of persons who, having taken to trade and prospered, obtained admission to the Baniacaste through the efforts of their Brahman priests. But a number ofmixed groups of the same character are also found among the Brahmansand Rajputs, and their existence does not invalidate arguments derivedfrom a consideration of the representative subcastes. It may be saidthat not only the Banias, but many of the low castes have legendsshowing them to be of Rajput descent of the same character as thosequoted above; and since in their case these stories have been adjudgedspurious and worthless, no greater importance should be attached tothose of the Banias. But it must be remembered that in the case of theBanias the stories are reinforced by the fact that the Bania subcastescertainly come from Rajputana; no doubt exists that they are of highcaste, and that they must either be derived from Brahmans or Rajputs, or themselves represent some separate foreign group; but if they arereally the descendants of the Vaishyas, the main body of the Aryanimmigrants and the third of the four classical castes, it might beexpected that their legends would show some trace of this instead ofbeing unitedly in favour of their Rajput origin. 

Colonel Tod gives a catalogue of the eighty-four mercantile tribes, whom he states to be chiefly of Rajput descent. [119] In this listthe Agarwal, Oswal, Srimal, Khandelwal, Palliwal and Lad subcastesoccur; while the Dhakar and Dhusar subcastes may be represented by thenames Dhakarwal and Dusora in the lists. The other names given by Todappear to be mainly small territorial groups of Rajputana. Elsewhere, after speaking of the claims of certain towns in Rajputana to becentres of trade, Colonel Tod remarks: "These pretensions we maythe more readily admit, when we recollect that nine-tenths of thebankers and commercial men of India are natives of Marudesh, [120]and these chiefly of the Jain faith. The Oswals, so termed from thetown of Osi, near the Luni, estimate one hundred thousand familieswhose occupation is commerce. All these claim a Rajput descent, a factentirely unknown to the European inquirer into the peculiarities ofHindu manners. " [121]

Similarly, Sir D. Ibbetson states that the Maheshri Banias claimRajput origin and still have subdivisions bearing Rajput names. [122]Elliot also says that almost all the mercantile tribes of Hindustanare of Rajput descent. [123]

It would appear, then, that the Banias are an offshoot from theRajputs, who took to commerce and learnt to read and write forthe purpose of keeping accounts. The Charans or bards are anotherliterate caste derived from the Rajputs, and it may be noticed thatboth the Banias and Charans or Bhats have hitherto been contentwith the knowledge of their own rude Marwari dialect and evinced nodesire for classical learning or higher English education. Mattersare now changing, but this attitude shows that they have hitherto notdesired education for itself but merely as an indispensable adjunctto their business. 

7. Banias employed as ministers in Rajput courts. 

Being literate, the Banias were not infrequently employed as ministersand treasurers in Rajput states. Forbes says, in an account ofan Indian court: "Beside the king stand the warriors of Rajputrace or, equally gallant in the field and wiser far in council, the Wania (Bania) Muntreshwars, already in profession puritansof peace, and not yet drained enough of their fiery Kshatriyablood.... It is remarkable that so many of the officers possessinghigh rank and holding independent commands are represented to havebeen Wanias. " [124] Colonel Tod writes that Nunkurn, the Kachhwahachief of the Shekhawat federation, had a minister named Devi Das ofthe Bania or mercantile caste, and, like thousands of that caste, energetic, shrewd and intelligent. [125] Similarly, Muhaj, the JadonBhatti chief of Jaisalmer, by an unhappy choice of a Bania minister, completed the demoralisation of the Bhatti state. This minister wasnamed Sarup Singh, a Bania of the Jain faith and Mehta family, whosedescendants were destined to be the exterminators of the laws andfortunes of the sons of Jaisal. [126] Other instances of the employmentof Bania ministers are to be found in Rajput history. Finally, itmay be noted that the Banias are by no means the only instance of amercantile class formed from the Rajputs. The two important tradingcastes of Khatri and Bhatia are almost certainly of Rajput origin, as is shown in the articles on those castes. 

8. Subcastes. 

The Banias are divided into a large number of endogamous groups orsubcastes, of which the most important have been treated in theannexed subordinate articles. The minor subcastes, mainly formedby migration, vary greatly in different provinces. Colonel Tod gavea list of eighty-four in Rajputana, of which eight or ten only canbe identified in the Central Provinces, and of thirty mentioned byBhattacharya as the most common groups in northern India, about a thirdare unknown in the Central Provinces. The origin of such subcasteshas already been explained. The main subcastes may be classifiedroughly into groups coming from Rajputana, Bundelkhand and the UnitedProvinces. The leading Rajputana groups are the Oswal, Maheshri, Khandelwal, Saitwal, Srimal and Jaiswaal. These groups are commonlyknown as Marwari Bania or simply Marwari. The Bundelkhand or CentralIndia subcastes are the Gahoi, Golapurab, Asati, Umre and Parwar;[127] while the Agarwal, Dhusar, Agrahari, Ajudhiabasi and otherscome from the United Provinces. The Lad subcaste is from Gujarat, while the Lingayats originally belonged to the Telugu and Canaresecountry. Several of the subcastes coming from the same locality willtake food cooked without water from each other, and occasionally twosubcastes, as the Oswal and Khandelwal, even food cooked with water or_katchi_. This practice is seldom found in other good castes. It isprobably due to the fact that the rules about food are less strictlyobserved in Rajputana. 

9. Hindu and Jain subcastes: divisions among subcastes. 

Another classification may be made of the subcastes according asthey are of the Hindu or Jain religion; the important Jain subcastesare the Oswal, Parwar, Golapurab, Saitwal and Charnagar, and one ortwo smaller ones, as the Baghelwal and Samaiya. The other subcastesare principally Hindu, but many have a Jain minority, and similarlythe Jain subcastes return a proportion of Hindus. The difference ofreligion counts for very little, as practically all the non-Jain Baniasare strict Vaishnava Hindus, abstain entirely from any kind of fleshmeat, and think it a sin to take animal life; while on their side theJains employ Brahmans for certain purposes, worship some of the localHindu deities, and observe the principal Hindu festivals. The Jain andHindu sections of a subcaste have consequently, as a rule, no objectionto taking food together, and will sometimes intermarry. Several of theimportant subcastes are subdivided into Bisa and Dasa, or twenty andten groups. The Bisa or twenty group is of pure descent, or twentycarat, as it were, while the Dasas are considered to have a certainamount of alloy in their family pedigree. They are the offspring ofremarried widows, and perhaps occasionally of still more irregularunions. Intermarriage sometimes takes place between the two groups, and families in the Dasa group, by living a respectable life andmarrying well, improve their status, and perhaps ultimately getback into the Bisa group. As the Dasas become more respectable theywill not admit to their communion newly remarried widows or coupleswho have married within the prohibited degrees, or otherwise made a_mésalliance_, and hence a third inferior group, called the Pacha orfive, is brought into existence to make room for these. 

10. Exogamy and rules regulating marriage. 

Most subcastes have an elaborate system of exogamy. They areeither divided into a large number of sections, or into a few_gotras_, usually twelve, each of which is further split up intosubsections. Marriage can then be regulated by forbidding a man totake a wife from the whole of his own section or from the subsectionof his mother, grandmothers and even greatgrandmothers. By this meansthe union of persons within five or more degrees of relationshipeither through males or females is avoided, and most Banias prohibitintermarriage, at any rate nominally, up to five degrees. Suchpractices as exchanging girls between families or marrying twosisters are, as a rule, prohibited. The _gotras_ or main sectionsappear to be frequently named after Brahman Rishis or saints, whilethe subsections have names of a territorial or titular character. 

11. Marriage customs. 

There is generally no recognised custom of paying a bride- orbridegroom-price, but one or two instances of its being done are givenin the subordinate articles. On the occasion of betrothal, among somesubcastes, the boy's father proceeds to the girl's house and presentsher with a _mala_ or necklace of gold or silver coins or coral, and a_mundri_ or silver ring for the finger. The contract of betrothal ismade at the village temple and the caste-fellows sprinkle turmeric andwater over the parties. Before the wedding the ceremony of Benaiki isperformed; in this the bridegroom, riding on a horse, and the bride ona decorated chair or litter, go round their villages and say farewellto their friends and relations. Sometimes they have a procession inthis way round the marriage-shed. Among the Marwari Banias a _toran_or string of mango-leaves is stretched above the door of the house onthe occasion of a wedding and left there for six months. And a woodentriangle with figures perched on it to represent sparrows is tiedover the door. The binding portion of the wedding is the processionseven times round the marriage altar or post. In some Jain subcastesthe bridegroom stands beside the post and the bride walks seven timesround him, while he throws sugar over her head at each turn. After thewedding the couple are made to draw figures out of flour sprinkledon a brass plate in token of the bridegroom's occupation of keepingaccounts. It is customary for the bride's family to give _sidha_ oruncooked food sufficient for a day's consumption to every outsiderwho accompanies the marriage party, while to each member of the casteprovisions for two to five days are given. This is in addition to theevening feasts and involves great expense. Sometimes the wedding lastsfor eight days, and feasts are given for four days by the bridegroom'sparty and four days by the bride's. It is said that in some placesbefore a Bania has a wedding he goes before the caste _panchayat_and they ask him how many people he is going to invite. If he saysfive hundred, they prescribe the quantity of the different kinds ofprovisions which he must supply. Thus they may say forty maunds (3200lbs. ) of sugar and flour, with butter, spices, and other articles inproportion. He says, 'Gentlemen, I am a poor man; make it a littleless'; or he says he will give _gur_ or cakes of raw cane sugarinstead of refined sugar. Then they say, 'No, your social positionis too high for _gur_; you must have sugar for all purposes. ' Themore guests the host invites the higher is his social consideration;and it is said that if he does not maintain this his life is not worthliving. Sometimes the exact amount of entertainment to be given at awedding is fixed, and if a man cannot afford it at the time he mustgive the balance of the feasts at any subsequent period when he hasmoney; and if he fails to do this he is put out of caste. The bride'sfather is often called on to furnish a certain sum for the travellingexpenses of the bridegroom's party, and if he does not send this moneythey do not come. The distinctive feature of a Bania wedding in thenorthern Districts is that women accompany the marriage procession, and the Banias are the only high caste in which they do this. Hence ahigh-caste wedding party in which women are present can be recognisedto be a Bania's. In the Maratha Districts women also go, but herethis custom obtains among other high castes. The bridegroom's partyhire or borrow a house in the bride's village, and here they erecta marriage-shed and go through the preliminary ceremonies of thewedding on the bridegroom's side as if they were at home. 

12. Polygamy and widow-marriage. 

Polygamy is very rare among the Banias, and it is generally the rulethat a man must obtain the consent of his first wife before takinga second one. In the absence of this precaution for her happiness, parents will refuse to give him their daughter. The remarriage ofwidows is nominally prohibited, but frequently occurs, and remarriedwidows are relegated to the inferior social groups in each subcaste asalready described. Divorce is also said to be prohibited, but it isprobable that women put away for adultery are allowed to take refugein such groups instead of being finally expelled. 

13. Disposal of the dead and mourning. 

The dead are cremated as a rule, and the ashes are thrown intoa sacred river or any stream. The bodies of young children and ofpersons dying from epidemic disease are buried. The period of mourningmust be for an odd number of days. On the third day a leaf plate withcooked food is placed on the ground where the body was burnt, and onsome subsequent day a feast is given to the caste. Rich Banias willhire people to mourn. Widows and young girls are usually employed, and these come and sit before the house for an hour in the morningand sometimes also in the evening, and covering their heads withtheir cloths, beat their breasts and make lamentations. Rich menmay hire as many as ten mourners for a period of one, two or threemonths. The Marwaris, when a girl is born, break an earthen pot toshow that they have had a misfortune; but when a boy is born theybeat a brass plate in token of their joy. 

14. Religion: the god Ganpati or Ganesh. 

Nearly all the Banias are Jains or Vaishnava Hindus. An account of theJain religion has been given in a separate article, and some noticeof the retention of Hindu practices by the Jains is contained in thesubordinate article on Parwar Bania. The Vaishnava Banias no lessthan the Jains are strongly averse to the destruction of animal life, and will not kill any living thing. Their principal deity is the godGanesh or Ganpati, the son of Mahadeo and Parvati, who is the god ofgood-luck, wealth and prosperity. Ganesh is represented in sculpturewith the head of an elephant and riding on a rat, though the rat is nowcovered by the body of the god and is scarcely visible. He has a smallbody like a child's with a fat belly and round plump arms. Perhapshis body signifies that he is figured as a boy, the son of Parvatior Gauri. In former times grain was the main source of wealth, andfrom the appearance of Ganesh it can be understood why he is the godof overflowing granaries, and hence of wealth and good fortune. Theelephant is a sacred animal among Hindus, and that on which the kingrides. To have an elephant was a mark of wealth and distinction amongBanias, and the Jains harness the cars of their gods to elephants attheir great _rath_ or chariot festival. Gajpati or 'lord of elephants'is a title given to a king; Gajanand or 'elephant-faced' is an epithetof the god Ganesh and a favourite Hindu name. Gajvithi or the trackof the elephant is a name of the Milky Way, and indicates that thereis believed to be a divine elephant who takes this course through theheavens. The elephant eats so much grain that only a comparativelyrich man can afford to keep one; and hence it is easy to understandhow the attribute of plenty or of wealth was associated with the divineelephant as his special characteristic. Similarly the rat is connectedwith overflowing granaries, because when there is much corn in aHindu house or store-shed there will be many rats; thus a multitudeof rats implied a rich household, and so this animal too came to be asymbol of wealth. The Hindus do not now consider the rat sacred, butthey have a tenderness for it, especially in the Maratha country. Themore bigoted of them objected to rats being poisoned as a means ofchecking plague, though observation has fully convinced them that ratsspread the plague; and in the Bania hospitals, formerly maintained forpreserving the lives of animals, a number of rats were usually to befound. The rat, in fact, may now be said to stand to Ganpati in theposition of a disreputable poor relation. No attempt is made to denyhis existence, but he is kept in the background as far as possible. Thegod Ganpati is also associated with wealth of grain through hisparentage. He is the offspring of Siva or Mahadeo and his wife Devior Gauri. Mahadeo is in this case probably taken in his beneficentcharacter of the deified bull; Devi in her most important aspect asthe great mother-goddess is the earth, but as mother of Ganesh sheis probably imagined in her special form of Gauri, the yellow one, that is, the yellow corn. Gauri is closely associated with Ganesh, andevery Hindu bridal couple worship Gauri Ganesh together as an importantrite of the wedding. Their conjunction in this manner lends colour tothe idea that they are held to be mother and son. In Rajputana Gauriis worshipped as the corn goddess at the Gangore festival about thetime of the vernal equinox, especially by women. The meaning of Gauri, Colonel Tod states, is yellow, emblematic of the ripened harvest, when the votaries of the goddess adore her effigies, in the shapeof a matron painted the colour of ripe corn. Here she is seen asAna-purna (the corn-goddess), the benefactress of mankind. "The ritescommence when the sun enters Aries (the opening of the Hindu year), by a deputation to a spot beyond the city to bring earth for the imageof Gauri. A small trench is then excavated in which barley is sown;the ground is irrigated and artificial heat supplied till the graingerminates, when the females join hands and dance round it, invokingthe blessings of Gauri on their husbands. The young corn is then takenup, distributed and presented by the females to the men, who wear itin their turbans. " [128] Thus if Ganesh is the son of Gauri he is theoffspring of the bull and the growing corn; and his genesis from theelephant and the rat show him equally as the god of full granaries, andhence of wealth and good fortune. We can understand therefore how heis the special god of the Banias, who formerly must have dealt almostentirely in grain, as coined money had not come into general use. 

15. Diwali festival. 

At the Diwali festival the Banias worship Ganpati or Ganesh, inconjunction with Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth. Lakshmi is consideredto be the deified cow, and, as such, the other main source of wealth, both as mother of the bull, the tiller of the soil, and the giverof milk from which _ghi_ (clarified butter) is made; this is anotherstaple of the Bania's trade, as well as a luxurious food, of which heis especially fond. At Diwali all Banias make up their accounts forthe year, and obtain the signatures of clients to their balances. Theyopen fresh account-books, which they first worship and adorn with animage of Ganesh, and perhaps an invocation to the god on the frontpage. A silver rupee is also worshipped as an emblem of Lakshmi, but in some cases an English sovereign, as a more precious coin, has been substituted, and this is placed on the seat of the goddessand reverence paid to it. The Banias and Hindus generally think itrequisite to gamble at Diwali in order to bring good luck duringthe coming year; all classes indulge in a little speculation atthis season. 

16. Holi festival. 

In the month of Phagun (February), about the time of the Holi, theMarwaris make an image of mud naked, calling it Nathu Ram, who wassupposed to be a great Marwari. They mock at this and throw mud atit, and beat it with shoes, and have various jests and sports. Themen and women are divided into two parties, and throw dirty waterand red powder over each other, and the women make whips of clothand beat the men. After two or three days, they break up the imageand throw it away. The Banias, both Jain and Hindu, like to begin theday by going and looking at the god in his temple. This is consideredan auspicious omen in the same manner as it is commonly held to be agood omen to see some particular person or class of person the firstthing in the morning. Others begin the day by worshipping the sacred_tulsi_ or basil. 

17. Social customs: rules about food. 

The Banias are very strict about food. The majority of them abstainfrom all kinds of flesh food and alcoholic liquor. The Kasarwanis arereported to eat the flesh of clean animals, and perhaps others of thelower subcastes may also do so, but the Banias are probably stricterthan any other caste in their adherence to a vegetable diet. Manyof them eschew also onions and garlic as impure food. Banias takethe lead in the objection to foreign sugar on account of the storiestold of the impure ingredients which it contains, and many of them, until recently, at any rate, still adhered to Indian sugar. Drugs arenot forbidden, but they are not usually addicted to them. Tobaccois forbidden to the Jains, but both they and the Hindus smoke, andtheir women sometimes chew tobacco. The Bania while he is poor isvery abstemious, and it is said that on a day when he has made nomoney he goes supperless to bed. But when he has accumulated wealth, he develops a fondness for _ghi_ or preserved butter, which oftencauses him to become portly. Otherwise his food remains simple, andas a rule he confined himself until recently to two daily meals, at midday and in the evening; but Banias, like most other classeswho can afford it, have now begun to drink tea in the morning. Indress the Bania is also simple, adhering to the orthodox Hindugarb of a long white coat and a loin-cloth. He has not yet adoptedthe cotton trousers copied from the English fashion. Some Banias intheir shops wear only a cloth over their shoulders and another roundtheir waist. The _kardora_ or silver waist-belt is a favourite Baniaornament, and though plainly dressed in ordinary life, rich Marwaariswill on special festival occasions wear costly jewels. On his head theMarwari wears a small tightly folded turban, often coloured crimson, pink or yellow; a green turban is a sign of mourning and also black, though the latter is seldom seen. The Banias object to taking thelife of any animal. They will not castrate cattle even through theirservants, but sell the young bulls and buy oxen. In Saugor, a Baniais put out of caste if he keeps buffaloes. It is supposed that goodHindus should not keep buffaloes nor use them for carting or ploughing, because the buffalo is impure, and is the animal on which Yama, the god of death, rides. Thus in his social observances generallythe Bania is one of the strictest castes, and this is a reason whyhis social status is high. Sometimes he is even held superior to theRajput, as the local Rajputs are often of impure descent and lax intheir observance of religious and social restrictions. Though he soonlearns the vernacular language of the country where he settles, theMarwari usually retains his own native dialect in his account-books, and this makes it more difficult for his customers to understand them. 

18. Character of the Bania. 

The Bania has a very distinctive caste character. From early boyhoodhe is trained to the keeping of accounts and to the view that itis his business in life to make money, and that no transactionshould be considered successful or creditable which does not showa profit. As an apprentice, he goes through a severe training inmental arithmetic, so as to enable him to make the most intricatecalculations in his head. With this object a boy commits to memory anumber of very elaborate tables. For whole numbers he learns by heartthe units from one to ten multiplied as high as forty times, and thenumbers from eleven to twenty multiplied to twenty times. There arealso fractional tables, giving the results of multiplying 1/4, 1/2, 3/4, 1 1/4, 1 1/2, 2 1/2, 3 1/2 into units from one to one hundred;interest-tables showing the interest due on any sum from one toone thousand rupees for one month, and for a quarter of a month attwelve per cent; tables of the squares of all numbers from one toone hundred, and a set of technical rules for finding the price of apart from the price of the whole. [129] The self-denial and tenacitywhich enable the Bania without capital to lay the foundations of abusiness are also remarkable. On first settling in a new locality, aMarwari Bania takes service with some shopkeeper, and by dint of thestrictest economy puts together a little money. Then the new traderestablishes himself in some village and begins to make grain advancesto the cultivators on high rates of interest, though occasionally onbad security. He opens a shop and retails grain, pulses, condiments, spices, sugar and flour. From grain he gradually passes to sellingcloth and lending money, and being keen and exacting, and havingto deal with ignorant and illiterate clients, he acquires wealth;this he invests in purchasing villages, and after a time blossomsout into a big Seth or banker. The Bania can also start a retailbusiness without capital. The way in which he does it is to buya rupee's worth of stock in a town, and take it out early in themorning to a village, where he sits on the steps of the templeuntil he has sold it. Up till then he neither eats nor washes hisface. He comes back in the evening after having eaten two or threepice worth of grain, and buys a fresh stock, which he takes out toanother village in the morning. Thus he turns over his capital witha profit two or three times a week according to the saying, "If aBania gets a rupee he will have an income of eight rupees a month, "or as another proverb pithily sums up the immigrant Marwari's career, 'He comes with a _lota_ [130] and goes back with a lakh. ' The Banianever writes off debts, even though his debtor may be a pauper, butgoes on entering them up year by year in his account-books and takingthe debtor's acknowledgment. For he says, '_Purus Parus_', or man islike the philosopher's stone, and his fortune may change any day. 

19. Dislike of the cultivators towards him. 

The cultivators rarely get fair treatment from the Banias, as the oddsare too much against them. They must have money to sow their land, andlive while the crops are growing, and the majority who have no capitalare at the moneylender's mercy. He is of a different caste, and oftenof a different country, and has no fellow-feeling towards them, andtherefore considers the transaction merely from the business point ofview of getting as much profit as possible. The debtors are illiterate, often not even understanding the meaning of figures, or the result ofpaying compound interest at twenty-five or fifty per cent; they canneither keep accounts themselves nor check their creditor's. Hencethey are entirely in his hands, and in the end their villages or land, if saleable, pass to him, and they decline from landlord to tenant, or from tenant to labourer. They have found vent for their feelingsin some of the bitterest sayings ever current: 'A man who has aBania for a friend has no need of an enemy. ' 'Borrow from a Baniaand you are as good as ruined. ' 'The rogue cheats strangers and theBania cheats his friends. ' 'Kick a Bania even if he is dead. ' "Hisheart, we are told, is no bigger than a coriander seed; he goes inlike a needle and comes out like a sword; as a neighbour he is asbad as a boil in the armpit. If a Bania is on the other side of ariver you should leave your bundle on this side for fear he shouldsteal it. If a Bania is drowning you should not give him your hand;he is sure to have some pecuniary motive for drifting down-stream. ABania will start an auction in a desert. If a Bania's son tumblesdown he is sure to pick up something. He uses light weights andswears that the scales tip up of themselves; he keeps his accountsin a character that no one but God can read; if you borrow from himyour debt mounts up like a refuse-heap or gallops like a horse; ifhe talks to a customer he debits the conversation in his accounts;and when his own credit is shaky he writes up his transactions onthe wall so that they can easily be rubbed out. " [131]

20. His virtues. 

Nevertheless there is a good deal to be said on the other side, and the Bania's faults are probably to a large extent produced byhis environment, like other people's. One of the Bania's virtues isthat he will lend on security which neither the Government nor thebanks would look at, or on none at all. Then he will always waita long time for his money, especially if the interest is paid. Nodoubt this is no loss to him, as he keeps his money out at goodinterest; but it is a great convenience to a client that his debtcan be postponed in a bad year, and that he can pay as much as helikes in a good one. The village moneylender is indispensable toits economy when the tenants are like school-boys in that moneyburns a hole in their pocket; and Sir Denzil Ibbetson states thatit is surprising how much reasonableness and honesty there is in hisdealings with the people, so long as he can keep his transactions outof a court of justice. [132] Similarly, Sir Reginald Craddock writes:"The village Bania is a much-abused individual, but he is as a rule aquiet, peaceable man, a necessary factor in the village economy. Heis generally most forbearing with his clients and customers, and isnot the person most responsible for the indebtedness of the ryot. Itis the casual moneylender with little or no capital who lives byhis wits, or the large firms with shops and agents scattered overthe face of the country who work the serious mischief. These latterencourage the people to take loans and discourage repayment until thedebt has increased by accumulation of interest to a sum from whichthe borrower cannot easily free himself. " [133]

21. The moneylender changed for the worse. 

The progress of administration, bringing with it easy and safe transitall over the country; the institution of a complete system of civiljustice and the stringent enforcement of contracts through the courts;the introduction of cash coinage as the basis of all transactions;and the grant of proprietary and transferable rights in land, appear to have at the same time enhanced the Bania's prosperityand increased the harshness and rapacity of his dealings. When themoneylender lived in the village he had an interest in the solvencyof the tenants who constituted his clientèle and was also amenableto public opinion, even though not of his own caste. For it wouldclearly be an impossibly unpleasant position for him to meet no onebut bitter enemies whenever he set foot outside his house, and to goto bed in nightly fear of being dacoited and murdered by a combinationof his next-door neighbours. He therefore probably adopted the mottoof live and let live, and conducted his transactions on a basis ofcustom, like the other traders and artisans who lived among thevillage community. But with the rise of the large banking-houseswhose dealings are conducted through agents over considerable tractsof country, public opinion can no longer act. The agent looks mainlyto his principal, and the latter has no interest in or regard forthe cultivators of distant villages. He cares only for his profit, and his business is conducted with a single view to that end. Hehimself has no public opinion to face, as he lives in a town among acommunity of his caste-fellows, and here absolutely no discredit isattached to grinding the faces of the poor, but on the contrary thehonour and consideration accruing to him are in direct proportion tohis wealth. The agent may have some compunction, but his first aim isto please his principal, and as he is often a sojourner liable to earlytransfer he cares little what may be said or thought about him locally. 

22. The enforcement of contracts. 

Again the introduction of the English law of contract and transferof property, and the increase in the habit of litigation have greatlyaltered the character of the money-lending business for the worse. Thedebtor signs a bond sometimes not even knowing the conditions, more often having heard them but without any clear idea of theireffect or of the consequences to himself, and as readily allows itto be registered. When it comes into court the witnesses, who arethe moneylender's creatures, easily prove that it was a genuine and_bona fide_ transaction, and the debtor is too ignorant and stupidto be able to show that he did not understand the bargain or that itwas unconscionable. In any case the court has little or no power togo behind a properly executed contract without any actual evidence offraud, and has no option but to decree it in terms of the deed. Thisevil is likely to be remedied very shortly, as the Government ofIndia have announced a proposal to introduce the recent English Actand allow the courts the discretion to go behind contracts, and torefuse to decree exorbitant interest or other hard bargains. Thisurgently needed reform will, it may be hoped, greatly improve thecharacter of the civil administration by encouraging the courts torealise that it is their business to do justice between litigants, and not merely to administer the letter of the law; and at the sametime it should have the result, as in England, of quickening the publicconscience and that of the moneylenders themselves, which has indeedalready been to some extent awakened by other Government measures, including the example set by the Government itself as a creditor. 

23. Cash coinage and the rate of interest. 

Again the free circulation of metal currency and its adoption as amedium for all transactions has hitherto been to the disadvantageof the debtors. Interest on money was probably little in vogue amongpastoral peoples, and was looked upon with disfavour, being prohibitedby both the Mosaic and Muhammadan codes. The reason was perhaps thatin a pastoral community there existed no means of making a profiton a loan by which interest could be paid, and hence the result ofusury was that the debtor ultimately became enslaved to his creditor;and the enslavement of freemen on any considerable scale was againstthe public interest. With the introduction of agriculture a system ofloans on interest became a necessary and useful part of the publiceconomy, as a cultivator could borrow grain to sow land and supporthimself and his family until the crop ripened, out of which theloan, principal and interest, could be repaid. If, as seems likely, this was the first occasion for the introduction of the systemof loan-giving on a large scale, it would follow that the rate ofinterest would be based largely on the return yielded by the earthto the seed. Support is afforded to this conjecture by the fact thatin the case of grain loans in the Central Provinces the interest onloans of grain of the crops which yield a comparatively small return, such as wheat, is twenty-five to fifty per cent, while in the caseof those which yield a large return, such as juari and kodon, it isone hundred per cent. These high rates of interest were not of muchimportance so long as the transaction was in grain. The grain wasmuch less valuable at harvest than at seed time, and in addition thelender had the expense of storing and protecting his stock of grainthrough the year. It is probable that a rate of twenty-five per centon grain loans does not yield more than a reasonable profit to thelender. But when in recent times cash came to be substituted forgrain it would appear that there was no proportionate reduction inthe interest. The borrower would lose by having to sell his grain forthe payment of his debt at the most unfavourable rate after harvest, and since the transaction was by a regular deed the lender no longertook any share of the risk of a bad harvest, as it is probable that hewas formerly accustomed to do. The rates of interest for cash loansafforded a disproportionate profit to the lender, who was put to nosubstantial expense in keeping money as he had formerly been in thecase of grain. It is thus probable that rates for cash loans were fora considerable period unduly severe in proportion to the risk, andinvolved unmerited loss to the borrower. This is now being remediedby competition, by Government loans given on a large scale in timeof scarcity, and by the introduction of co-operative credit. But ithas probably contributed to expedite the transfer of land from thecultivating to the moneylending classes. 

24. Proprietary and transferable rights in land. 

Lastly the grant of proprietary and transferable right toland has afforded a new incentive and reward to the successfulmoneylender. Prior to this measure it is probable that no considerabletransfers of land occurred for ordinary debt. The village headman mightbe ousted for non-payment of revenue, or simply through the greed ofsome Government official under native rule, and of course the villageswere continually pillaged and plundered by their own and hostile armiessuch as the Pindaris, while the population was periodically decimatedby famine. But apart from their losses by famine, war and the badnessof the central government, it is probable that the cultivators wereheld to have a hereditary right to their land, and were not liable toejectment on the suit of any private person. It is doubtful whetherthey had any conception of ownership of the land, and it seems likelythat they may have thought of it as a god or the property of the god;but the cultivating castes perhaps had a hereditary right to cultivateit, just as the Chamar had a prescriptive right to the hides of thevillage cattle, the Kalar to the mahua-flowers for making his liquor, the Kumhar to clay for his pots, and the Teli to press the oil-seedsgrown in his village. The inferior castes were not allowed to holdland, and it was probably never imagined that the village moneylendershould by means of a piece of stamped paper be able to oust thecultivators indebted to him and take their land himself. With thegrant of proprietary right to land such as existed in England, and theapplication of the English law of contract and transfer of property, a new and easy road to wealth was opened to the moneylender, of whichhe was not slow to take advantage. The Banias have thus ousted numbersof improvident proprietors of the cultivating castes, and many of themhave become large landlords. A considerable degree of protection hasnow been afforded to landowners and cultivators, and the process hasbeen checked, but that it should have proceeded so far is regrettable;and the operation of the law has been responsible for a large amountof unintentional injustice to the cultivating castes and especiallyto proprietors of aboriginal descent, who on account of their extremeignorance and improvidence most readily fall a prey to the moneylender. 

25. The Bania as a landlord. 

As landlords the Banias were not at first a success. They did notcare to spend money in improving their property, and ground theirtenants to the utmost. Sir R. Craddock remarks of them: [134] "Greator small they are absolutely unfitted by their natural instincts tobe landlords. Shrewdest of traders, most business-like in the matterof bargains, they are unable to take a broad view of the duties oflandlord or to see that rack-renting will not pay in the long run. "

Still, under the influence of education, and the growth of moralfeeling, as well as the desire to stand well with Government officersand to obtain recognition in the shape of some honour, many ofthe Marwari proprietors are developing into just and progressivelandlords. But from the cultivator's point of view, residence ontheir estates, which are managed by agents in charge of a numberof villages for an absent owner, cannot compare with the system ofthe small cultivating proprietor resident among tenants of his owncaste, and bound to them by ties of sympathy and caste feeling, which produces, as described by Sir R. Craddock, the ideal village. 

26. Commercial honesty. 

As a trader the Bania formerly had a high standard of commercialprobity. Even though he might show little kindliness or honesty indealing with the poorer class of borrowers, he was respected andabsolutely reliable in regard to money. It was not unusual for peopleto place their money in a rich Bania's hands without interest, evenpaying him a small sum for safe-keeping. Bankruptcy was considereddisgraceful, and was visited with social penalties little less severethan those enforced for breaches of caste rules. There was a firmbelief that a merchant's condition in the next world depended on thedischarge of all claims against him. And the duty of paying ancestraldebts was evaded only in the case of helpless or hopeless poverty. Oflate, partly owing to the waning power of caste and religious feelingin the matter, and partly to the knowledge of the bankruptcy laws, the standard of commercial honour has greatly fallen. Since thecase of bankruptcy is governed and arranged for by law, the traderthinks that so long as he can keep within the law he has done nothingwrong. A banker, when heavily involved, seldom scruples to become abankrupt and to keep back money enough to enable him to start afresh, even if he does nothing worse. This, however, is probably a transitoryphase, and the same thing has happened in England and America at onestage of commercial development. In time it may be expected thatthe loss of the old religious and caste feeling will be made goodby a new standard of commercial honour enforced by public opinionamong merchants generally. The Banias are very good to their owncaste, and when a man is ruined will have a general subscription andprovide funds to enable him to start afresh in a small way. Beggarsare very rare in the caste. Rich Marwaris are extremely generous intheir subscriptions to objects of public utility, but it is said thatthe small Bania is not very charitably inclined, though he doles outhandfuls of grain to beggars with fair liberality. But he has a systemby which he exacts from those who deal with him a slight percentageon the price received by them for religious purposes. This is calledDeodan or a gift to God, and is supposed to go into some public fundfor the construction or maintenance of a temple or similar object. Inthe absence of proper supervision or audit it is to be feared that theBania inclines to make use of it for his private charity, thus savinghimself expense on that score. The system has been investigated byMr. Napier, Commissioner of Jubbulpore, with a view to the applicationof these funds to public improvements. 

Bania, Agarwala

_Bania, Agarwala, Agarwal. _--This is generally considered to bethe highest and most important subdivision of the Banias. Theynumbered about 25, 000 persons in the Central Provinces in 1911, being principally found in Jubbulpore and Nagpur. The name is probablyderived from Agroha, a small town in the Hissar District of the Punjab, which was formerly of some commercial importance. Buchanan records thatwhen any firm failed in the city each of the others contributed a brickand five rupees, which formed a stock sufficient for the merchant torecommence trade with advantage. The Agarwalas trace their descentfrom a Raja Agar Sen, whose seventeen sons married the seventeendaughters of Basuki, the king of the Nagas or snakes. Elliot considersthat the snakes were really the Scythian or barbarian immigrants, the Yueh-chi or Kushans, from whom several of the Rajpat clans as theTak, Haihayas and others, who also have the legend of snake ancestry, were probably derived. Elliot also remarks that Raja Agar Sen, being aking, must have been a Kshatriya, and thus according to the legend theAgarwalas would have Rajput ancestry on both sides. Their appearance, Mr. Crooke states, indicates good race and breeding, and would lendcolour to the theory of a Rajput origin. Raja Agar Sen is said to haveruled over both Agra and Agroha, and it seems possible that the nameof the Agarwalas may also be connected with Agra, which is a muchmore important place than Agroha. The country round Agra and Delhiis their home, and the shrine of the tutelary goddess of some of theAgarwalas in the Central Provinces is near Delhi. The memory of theNaga princess who was their ancestor is still, Sir H. Risley states, held in honour by the Agarwalas, and they say, 'Our mother's house isof the race of the snake. ' [135] No Agarwala, whether Hindu or Jain, will kill or molest a snake, and the Vaishnava Agarwalas of Delhipaint pictures of snakes on either side of the outside doors of theirhouses, and make offerings of fruit and flowers before them. 

In the Central Provinces, like other Bania subcastes, they aredivided into the Bisa and Dasa or twenty and ten subdivisions, which marry among themselves. The Bisa rank higher than the Dasa, the latter being considered to have some flaw in their pedigree, such as descent from a remarried widow. The Dasas are sometimessaid to be the descendants of the maidservants who accompanied theseventeen Naga or snake princesses on their marriages to the sons ofRaja Agar Sen. A third division has now come into existence in theCentral Provinces, known as the Pacha or fives; these are apparentlyof still more doubtful origin than the Dasas. The divisions tend tobe endogamous, but if a man of the Bisa or Dasa cannot obtain a wifefrom his own group he will sometimes marry in a lower group. 

The Agarwalas are divided into seventeen and a half _gotras_ orexogamous sections, which are supposed to be descended from theseventeen sons of Raja Agar Sen. The extra half _gotra_ is accountedfor by a legend, but it probably has in reality also something todo with illegitimate descent. Some of the _gotras_, as given byMr. Crooke, are as a matter of fact named after Brahmanical saintslike those of the Brahmans; instances of these are Garga, Gautama, Kaushika, Kasyapa and Vasishtha; the others appear to be territorialor titular names. The prohibitions on marriage between relations arefar-reaching among the Agarwalas. The detailed rules are given inthe article on Bania, and the effect is that persons descended froma common ancestor cannot intermarry for five generations. When thewedding procession is about to start the Kumhar brings his donkeyand the bridegroom has to touch it with his foot, or, according toone version, ride upon it. The origin of this custom is obscure, butthe people now say that it is meant to emphasise the fact that thebridegroom is going to do a foolish thing. The remarriage of widowsis prohibited, and divorce is not recognised. Most of the Agarwalasare Vaishnava by religion, but a few are Jains. Intermarriage betweenmembers of the two religions is permitted in some localities, andthe wife adopts that of her husband. The Jain Agarwalas observe theHindu festivals and employ Brahmans for their ceremonies. In Nimarthe caste have some curious taboos. It is said that a married womanmay not eat wheat until a child has been born to her, but only juari;and if she has no child she may not eat wheat all her life. If a sonis born to her she must go to Mahaur, a village near Delhi where thetutelary goddess of the caste has her shrine. This goddess is calledMohna Devi, and she is the deified spirit of a woman who burnt herselfwith her husband. After this the woman may eat wheat; but if a secondson is born she must stop eating wheat until she has been to the shrineagain. But if she has a daughter she may at once and always eat wheatwithout visiting the shrine. These rules, as well as the venerationof a snake, from which they believe themselves to be descended on themother's side, may perhaps, as suggested by Sir H. Risley, be a relicof the system of matriarchal descent. It is said that when Raja AgarSen or his sons married the Naga princesses, he obtained permissionas a special favour from the goddess Lakshmi that the children shouldbear their father's name and not their mother's. [136]

In Nimar some Agarwalas worship Goba Pir, the god of the sweepers. Heis represented by a pole some 30 feet long on which are hung a clothand cocoanuts. The sweepers carry this through the city almost dailyduring the month of Shrawan (July), and people offer cocoanuts, tyingthem on to the pole. Some Agarwalas offer vermilion to the god in tokenof worship, and a few invite it to the compounds of their houses andkeep it there all night for the same purpose. When a feast is given inthe caste the Agarwalas do not take their own brass vessels accordingto the usual practice, but the host gives them little earthen potsto drink from which are afterwards broken, and leaf-plates for theirfood. The Agarwalas will take food cooked without water (_pakki_) fromOswal, Maheshri and Khandelwal Banias. The Agarwalas of the CentralProvinces hold some substantial estates in Chhattisgarh; these wereobtained at the first settlements during 1860-70, when considerabledepression existed, and many of the village headmen were unwilling toaccept the revenue assessed on their villages. The more enterprisingBanias stepped in and took them, and have profited enormously owing tothe increase in the value of land. Akbar's great minister, Todar Mal, who first introduced an assessment of the land-revenue based on themeasurement and survey of the land, is said to have been an Agarwala. 

Bania, Agrahari

_Bania, Agrahari. _ [137]--This subcaste numbered nearly 2000 personsin 1911, resident principally in Jubbulpore, Raipur and Bilaspur, and some of the Feudatory States. Mr. Crooke states that they claimpartly a Vaishya and partly a Brahmanical descent, and wear the sacredthread. Like that of the Agarwala Banias their name has been connectedwith the cities of Agra and Agroha. There is no doubt that they areclosely connected with the Agarwalas, and Mr. Nesfield suggests thatthe two groups must have been sections of one and the same castewhich quarrelled on some trifling matter connected with cooking oreating, and have remained separate ever since. The Agrahari Baniasare Hindus, and some of them belong to the Nanakpanthi sect. Theyare principally dealers in provisions, and they have acquired somediscredit as compared with their kinsfolk the Agarwalas, throughnot secluding their women and allowing them to attend the shop. Theyalso retail various sweet-smelling woods which are used in religiousceremonies, such as aloe-wood and sandalwood, besides a number ofmedicines and simples. The richer members of the caste are bankers, dealers in grain and pawnbrokers. 

Bania, Ajudhiabasi

_Bania, Ajudhiabasi, Audhia_. --A subcaste of Bania, whose namesignifies a resident of Ajodhia, the old name of Oudh. Outsiders oftenshorten the name to Audhia, but, as will be seen, the name Audhiais regularly applied to a criminal class, who may have been derivedfrom the Ajudhiabasi Banias, but are now quite distinct from them. TheAjudhiabasis numbered nearly 2000 persons in 1911, belonging chieflyto the Jubbulpore, Narsinghpur and Hoshangabad Districts. This totalincludes any persons who may have returned themselves as Audhia. TheAjudhiabasis are nearly all Hindus with a small Jain minority. ThoughOudh was their original home they are now fairly numerous in Cawnporeand Bundelkhand as well, and it may have been from this last localitythat they entered the Central Provinces. Here they form a separateendogamous group and do not marry with their caste-fellows in northernIndia. They have exogamous sections, and marriage is prohibitedwithin the section and also between first cousins. They permit theremarriage of widows, but are said not to recognise divorce, and toexpel from the caste a woman guilty of adultery. It may be doubted, however, whether this is correct. Brahmans serve as their priests, and they invest boys with the sacred thread either at marriage or ata special ceremony known as Gurmukh. The dead are either buried orburnt; in the case of burial men are laid on the face and women onthe back, the body being first rubbed with salt, clarified butter, turmeric and milk. A little earth from the grave is carried away andthrown into a sacred river, and when the dead are burnt the ashes aresimilarly disposed of. Their principal deity is the goddess Devi, and at the Dasahra festival they offer a goat to her, the flesh ofwhich is distributed among members of the caste. 

The Audhias are a well-known criminal tribe, whose headquarters isin the Fatehpur District. They say that they are Banias, and use thename Ajudhiabasi in speaking of themselves, and from their customs andcriminal methods it seems not unlikely that they may originally havebeen an offshoot from the Ajudhiabasi Banias. They are now, however, perfectly distinct from this group, and any confusion between themwould be very unjust to the latter. In northern India it is said thatthe Audhias deal largely in counterfeit coin and false jewellery, andnever commit crimes of violence; [138] but in Bombay they have takento housebreaking, though they usually select an empty house. [139]From their homes in the United Provinces they wander over CentralIndia, the Central Provinces, Bengal and Bombay; they are said toavoid the Punjab and Sind owing to difficulties of working, and theyhave made it a caste offence to commit any crime in the Ganges-JumnaDoab, probably because this is their home. It is said also that ifany one of them is imprisoned he is put out of caste. They wanderabout disguised as religious mendicants, Brahmans or Bairagis. Theycarry their bedding tied on their back with a cloth, and a large bagslung over the shoulders which contains food, cooking-vessels andother articles. Sometimes they pretend to be Banias and hawk aboutsweets and groceries, or one of the gang opens a shop, which servesas a rendezvous and centre for collecting information. [140] In theDistricts where they reside they are perfectly well-behaved. They arewell-to-do and to all appearance respectable in their habits. Theirwomen are well-dressed with plenty of ornaments on their persons. Theyhave no apparent means of support; they neither cultivate landnor trade; and all that appears on the surface is that most of themen and boys go off after the rains and return at the end of thecold weather. If asked how they support themselves they reply bybegging. Their marriage rules are those of high-caste Hindus. Theyare divided into two classes, Unch or high and Nich or low, theformer being of pure blood, and the latter the descendants of keptwomen. These are practically endogamous. A man may not have more thantwo wives. If a girl is detected in immorality before marriage, sheis permanently excommunicated, and a married woman can be turned outby her husband on proof of adultery. A bridegroom-price is usuallypaid, the father of the bride visiting the bridegroom and givinghim the money in secret. The dead are burnt, and Brahmans are dulyfed. If a man has died through an accident or from cholera, smallpox, poison or leprosy, the corpse, if available, is at once consigned tothe Ganges or other river, and during the course of the next twelvemonths a Mahabrahman is paid to make an image of the deceased ingram-flour, which is cremated with the usual rites. As in the caseof the Ajudhiabasi Banias, the tribal deity of the Audhias is thegoddess Devi. [141]

Bania, Asathi

_Bania, Asathi. _--This subcaste numbers about 2500 persons in theCentral Provinces, belonging principally to the Damoh and JubbulporeDistricts. They say that their original home was the Tikamgarh Statein Bundelkhand. They do not rank very high, and are sometimes saidto be the descendants of an Ahir who became a Bania. The great bulkare Hindus and a small minority Jains. It is told of the Asathis thatthey first bury their dead, in accordance presumably with a formerpractice, and then exhume and burn the bodies; and there is a saying--

 Ardha jale, ardha gare Jinka nam Asathi pare, or, 'He who is an Asathi is half buried and half burnt. ' But thispractice, if it ever really existed, has now been abandoned. 

Bania, Charnagri

_Bania, Charnagri, Channagri, Samaiya. _--The Charnagris are a smallJain subcaste which numbered about 2500 persons in 1911, residingprincipally in the Damoh and Chhindwara Districts. They are thefollowers of one Taran Swami, who is said to have lived about fivecenturies ago. He preached against the worship of the images of theJain Tirthakars, and said that this should be abandoned and onlythe sacred books be revered. The chief sacred place of the sectis Malhargarh in Gwalior State; here the tomb of their prophet issituated and there is also a large temple in which the Jain scripturesare enshrined. In the month of Phagun (February) a fair is held here, and Charnagris dance in the temples, holding lighted lamps in theirhands. Nowadays the Charnagris also visit the ordinary Jain templeswhen their own are not available. They are practically all derived fromParwar Banias, and formerly would sometimes give their daughters toParwars in marriage, but this practice is said to have stopped. Likeother Bania subcastes, they are divided into Bisa and Dasa, or twentyand ten sections, the Dasa being of irregular descent. Intermarriagebetween the two sections occasionally occurs, and the Dasa will takefood from the Bisa section, but the latter do not reciprocate exceptat caste feasts. 

Bania, Dhusar

_Bania, Dhusar, Bhargava Dhusar. _--The origin of this group is muchdisputed. They are usually classed as a subcaste of Bania, but claimto be Brahmans. They take their name from a hill called Dhusi orDhosi, near Narnaul on the border of Alwar State. The title Bhargavasignifies a descendant of Bhrigu, one of the famous eponymous Rishisor Brahmanical saints, to whom Manu confided his institutes, callinghim his son. If this was their original name, it would show that theywere Brahmans, but its adoption appears to be somewhat recent. Theirclaim to be Brahmans is, however, admitted by many members of thatcaste, and it is stated that they perform the functions of Brahmansin their original home in Rajputana. Mr. Burn wrote of them: [142]"In his book on castes published in 1872 Mr. Sherring does not refer toany claim to kinship with Brahmans, though in his description of DhusarBanias he appears to include the people under consideration. Both theDhusar Bhargavas and Dhusar Banias assert that Himu, the capable Vazirof Muhammad Shah Suri, belonged to their community, and such a claimby the former is if anything in favour of the view that they are notBrahmans, since Himu is variously described by Muhammadan writers asa corn-chandler, a weighman and a Bania. Colonel Dow in his historyof Hindustan calls him a shopkeeper who was raised by Sher Shah to beSuperintendent of Markets. It is not improbable that Himu's successlaid the foundation for a claim to a higher position, but the matterdoes not admit of absolute proof, and I have therefore accepted thedecision of the majority of the caste-committees and considered themas a caste allied to Brahmans. " In the Punjab the Dhusars appear to bein some places Brahmans and in others Banias. "They take their foodbefore morning prayer, contrary to the Hindu rule, but of late yearsthey have begun to conform to the orthodox practice. The BrahmanDhusar marries with his caste-fellows and the Bania with Banias, avoiding always the same family (_gotra_) or one having the samefamily deity. " [143] From the above accounts it would appear thatthe Dhusars may have originally been a class of Brahmans who tookto trade, like the Palliwal Brahmans of Marwar, and have lost theirposition as Brahmans and become amalgamated with the Bania caste;or they may have been Banias, who acted as priests to others of thecommunity, and hence claimed to be Brahmans. The caste is important andinfluential, and is now making every effort to recover or substantiateits Brahman status. One writer states that they combine the officeaptitude and hard-heartedness to a debtor characteristic of theBania. The Dhusars are rigid in the maintenance of the purity oftheir order and in the performance of Hindu ceremonies and duties, and neither eat meat nor drink any kind of spirit. In Delhi theywere distinguished for their talent as singers, and cultivated apeculiar strain or measure, in which they were unsurpassed. [144]In the Central Provinces the Dhusars are a flourishing body, theirleaders being Rai Bahadur Bihari Lal Khizanchi of Jubbulpore and RaiSahib Seth Sundar Lal of Betul. They have founded the Bhargava bankof Jubbulpore, and shown considerable public spirit; to the lattergentleman's generosity a large part of the success of the recentdebt-conciliation proceedings in the Betul District must be attributed. 

Bania, Dosar

_Bania, Dosar, Dusra. _ [145]--This subcaste numbers about 600persons. The original name is Dusra or second, and the Dosar or Dusraare a section of the Ummar Banias, who were so called because theypermit widows to make a second marriage. Their home is the Ganges-JumnaDoab and Oudh, and in the United Provinces they are classed as aninferior subcaste of the Ummars. Here they say that the Ummars aretheir elder brothers. In the Central Provinces they are said to beforming three local endogamous groups according as their homes were inthe Doab, Oudh or the Allahabad country; and members of each of thesemarry among themselves. The Dosars say that they all belong to theKashyap [146] _gotra_ or clan, but for the purpose of marriage theyhave territorial or titular exogamous sections; instances of these areGangapari, a native of Oudh; Sagarah, a resident of Saugor; Makraha, a seller of _makka_ or maize, and Tamakhuha, a tobacco-seller. Theypay a bridegroom-price, the full recognised amount of which is Rs. 211, either in cash or brass cooking-vessels. Those who cannot afford thissum give half of it or Rs. 105, and the poorest classes pay anythingthey can afford. The Dosars are Vaishnava Hindus and employ SanadhyaBrahmans as their priests. These Brahmans will take food withoutwater from their clients, but they are an inferior class and arelooked down upon by other Brahmans. The caste are mainly shopkeepers, and they deal in gold and silver ornaments, as well as grain, tobaccoand all kinds of groceries. 

Bania, Gahoi

_Bania, Gahoi. _ [147]--This Hindu subcaste numbered nearly 7000persons in 1911, belonging principally to the Saugor, Jubbulpore andNarsinghpur Districts. Their home is the Bundelkhand country, whichthese Districts adjoin, and they say that their original headquarterswas at Kharagpur in Bundelkhand, whence they have spread over thesurrounding country. They tell a curious story of their origin to theeffect that once upon a time there was a certain schoolmaster, oneBiya Pande Brahman, who could foretell the future. One day he was inhis school with his boys when he foresaw that there was about to be anearthquake. He immediately warned his boys to get out of the building, and himself led the way. Only twelve of the boys had followed, and theothers were still hesitating, when the earthquake began, the schoolfell in, and they were all buried in the ruins. The schoolmasterformed the boys who had escaped into one caste, calling them Gahoi, which is supposed to mean that which is left or the residue; and hedetermined that he and his descendants would be the priests of thenew caste. At the weddings of the Gahois an image of the schoolmasteris painted on the house wall, and the bridegroom worships it withofferings of butter and flowers. The story indicates clearly thatthe Gahois are of mixed descent from several castes. 

The subcaste has twelve _gotras_ or sections, and seventy-two _al_or _anken_, which are subsections of the _gotras_. Several of the_al_ names appear to be of a titular or totemistic character, as Morpeacock, Sohania beautiful, Nagaria a drummer, Paharia a hillman, Matele the name of a village headman in Bundelkhand, Piparvania fromthe pipal tree, Dadaria a singer. The rule of exogamy is said to bethat a man must not marry in his own _gotra_ nor in the _al_ of hismother or either grandmother. [148] Their weddings are held only atthe bride's house, no ceremonies being performed at the bridegroom's;at the ceremony the bridegroom stands in the centre of the shed bythe marriage-post and the bride walks seven times round him. At theirweddings the Gahois still use the old rupees of the Nagpur kingdom forpresents and payments to menials, and they hoard them up, when theycan get them, for this special purpose. The rupee is sacred with theBania, and this is an instance of the preservation of old accessoriesfor religious ceremonies when they have been superseded in ordinaryuse. Polygamy is permitted, but is rare. The Gahois employ BhargavaBrahmans for their priests, and these are presumably the descendantsof the schoolmaster who founded the caste. At the thirteenth-day feastafter a death the Brahmans must be fed first before the members of thecaste. On this occasion thirteen brass or earthen vessels are filledwith flour, and a piece of money, and presented to thirteen Brahmans, while the family priest receives a bed and piece of cloth. The priestsare said to be greedy, and to raise quarrels over the value of thepresents given to them. At the Diwali festival the Gahois worship theimplements of their trade, pen and ink, and their account-books. TheGahois are Vaishnava Hindus, and abstain from all flesh and alcoholicliquor. They trade in grain and groceries, and are bankers andmoneylenders. They are considered to be cunning in business, and aproverb says that a Gahoi will deceive even his own father. 

Bania, Golapurab

_Bania, Golapurab, Golahre. _--This Jain subcaste numbers about 6000persons in the Central Provinces, and belongs mainly to the Saugor, Damoh and Narsinghpur Districts. Its distribution is nearly thesame as that of the Gahois, and it is probably also a Bundelkhandgroup. The Golapurabs are practically all Digambari Jains with a smallHindu minority. In some localities they intermarry with Parwar Baniaswho are also Digambari Jains; and they will take food cooked withoutwater from the Nema subcaste who are Hindus. According to one storythe Golapurabs were the offspring of a Purabia, that is probably aBais Rajput, by a kept woman of the Ahir caste. This fits in verywell with the name, as Golak means a bastard, and the termination_purab_ would be from Purabia; but it is probably the name which hasgiven rise to the story, or at any rate to the supposed descent froma Purabia. In the United Provinces a small subcaste of Bania calledGolahre exists, belonging to the Jhansi District, that is the countryof the Golapurabs, and Jain by religion. There is no doubt that thisgroup is the same as the Golapurabs, and Mr. Crooke derives [149]the name from _gola_, a grain-mart, which seems more probable thanthe derivation suggested above. But it is an interesting fact thatthere is also a caste of cultivators called Golapurab in the UnitedProvinces, found only in the Agra District. It is suggested thatthese people are the illegitimate offspring of Sanadhya Brahmans, with whom they appear to be closely connected. From their sept-names, however, which include those of several Rajput clans and also sometitular terms of a low-caste type, Mr. Crooke thinks their Brahmanicalorigin improbable. It is noticeable that these Golapurabs though acultivating caste have, like the Banias, a subcaste called Dasa, comprising persons of irregular descent; they also prohibit theremarriage of widows, and abstain from all flesh and from onions andgarlic. Such customs are peculiar in a cultivating caste, and resemblethose of Banias. It seems possible that a detailed investigationmight give ground for supposing that both the Golahre and Golapurabsubcastes of Banias in the United and Central Provinces respectivelyare connected with this cultivating caste of Golapurabs. The lattermight have abandoned the Jain religion on taking to cultivation, as a Jain cannot well drive the plough, which involves destructionof animal life; or the Bania section might have adopted Jainism inorder to obtain a better social position and differentiate themselvesfrom the cultivators. Unfortunately no detailed information aboutthe Golapurabs of the Central Provinces is available, from which theprobability or otherwise of this hypothesis could be tested. 

Bania, Kasarwani

_Bania, Kasarwani_. [150]--This Hindu subcaste numbers about 6500persons in the Central Provinces, who belong mainly to Saugor, Jubbulpore and the three Chhattisgarh Districts. The name is probablyderived from _kansa_, bell-metal, as these Banias retail brass andbell-metal vessels. The Kasarwanis may therefore not improbablybe an occupational group formed from persons who engaged in thetrade, and in that case they may be wholly or partly derived fromthe Kasars and Tameras, the castes which work in brass, copper andbell-metal. The Kasarwanis are numerous in Allahabad and Mirzapur, and they may have come to Chhattisgarh from Mirzapur, attracted by thebell-metal industries in Ratanpur and Drug. In Saugor and also in theUnited Provinces they say that they came from Kara Manikpur severalgenerations ago. If the selling of metal vessels was their originalcalling, many, or the majority of them, have now abandoned it, anddeal in grain and groceries, and lend money like other Banias. TheKasarwanis do not observe the same standard of strictness as the goodBania subcastes in their social rules. They eat the flesh of goats, sheep, birds and fish, though they abstain from liquor. They permit theremarriage of widows and divorce; and women who have been divorced canmarry again in the caste by the same rite as widows. They also allowthe exchange of girls in marriage between two families. They do not asa rule wear the sacred thread. Their priests are Sarwaria Brahmans, and these Brahmans and a few Bania subcastes, such as the Agarwalas, Umres and Gahois, can take food cooked without water from them, butother Brahmans and Rajputs will not take any kind of food. Matchesare arranged in the presence of the head of the caste _panchayat_, who is known as Chaudhri. The parents on each side give their consent, and in pledge of it six pice (farthings) are taken from both of them, mixed together and given to their family priests and barbers, fourpice to the priests and two to the barbers. The following is a localderivation of the name; the word _kasar_ means more or the increase, and _bhata_ means less; and _Hamara kya kasar bhata?_ means 'Howdoes my account stand?' Hence Kasarbani is one who keeps accounts, that is a Bania. 

Bania, Kasaundhan

_Bania, Kasaundhan. _--This subcaste numbers about 5500 persons in theCentral Provinces and is returned principally from the Bilaspur, Raipurand Jubbulpore Districts. The name is derived [151] by Mr. Crooke from_kansa_, bell-metal, and _dhana_, wealth, and it would appear that theKasaundhans like the Kasarwanis are an occupational group, made up ofshopkeepers who dealt in metal vessels. Like them also the Kasaundhansmay have originally been constituted from the metal-working castes, and indeed they may be only a local branch of the Kasarwanis, though noinformation is available which would decide this point. In the UnitedProvinces both the Kasarwanis and Kasaundhans are divided into thePurbia or eastern and Pachhaiyan or western subcastes. Dharam Das, the great disciple of Kabir, who founded the Kabirpanthi sect in theCentral Provinces, was a Kasaundhan Bania, and the Kabirpanthi Mahantsor high-priests of Kawardha are of this caste. It is probable that agood many of the Kasaundhan Banias in Bilaspur and Raipur belong tothe Kabirpanthi sect. The remainder are ordinary Hindus. 

Bania, Khandelwal

_Bania, Khandelwal. _--This subcaste numbers about 1500 persons inthe Central Provinces; they are most numerous in the Hoshangabad andAmraoti Districts, but are scattered all over the Province. They taketheir name from the town of Khandela in the Jaipur State of Rajputana, which was formerly the capital of the Shekhawati federation. There isalso a Khandelwal subcaste of the Brahman caste, found in the UnitedProvinces. [152] Mr. Bhattacharya says of them: [153] "The KhandelwalBanias are not inferior to any other division of the caste either inwealth or refinement. There are both Vaishnavites and Jains amongthem, and the Vaishnavite Khandelwals wear the sacred thread. Themillionaire Seths of Mathura are Khandelwal Banias. "

Bania, Lad

_Bania, Lad. _--This subcaste numbers about 5000 persons in theCentral Provinces, being settled in Nimar, Nagpur and all the BerarDistricts. The Lad Banias came from Gujarat, and Lad is derived fromLat-desh, the old name for Gujarat. Like other Banias they are dividedinto the Bisa and Dasa groups or twenties and tens, the Dasa beingof irregular descent. Their family priests are Khedawal Brahmans, and their caste deity is Ashapuri of Ashnai, near Petlad. Lad women, especially those of Baroda, are noted for their taste in dress. TheLad Banias are Hindus of the Vallabhacharya sect, who worship Krishna, and were formerly addicted to sexual indulgence. [154]

Bania, Lingayat

_Bania, Lingayat. _--The Lingayat Banias number nearly 8000 persons inthe Central Provinces, being numerous in Wardha, Nagpur and all theBerar Districts. A brief account of the Lingayat sect has been givenin a separate article. The Lingayat Banias form a separate endogamousgroup, and they do not eat or intermarry either with other Banias orwith members of other castes belonging to the Lingayat sect. But theyretain the name and occupation of Banias. They have five subdivisions, Pancham, Dikshawant, Chilliwant, Takalkar and Kanade. The Pancham orPanchamsalis are the descendants of the original Brahman convertsto the Lingayat sect. They are the main body of the communityand are initiated by what is known as the eight-fold sacrament or_eshta-varna_. The Dikshawant, from _diksha_ or initiation, are asubdivision of the Panchamsalis, who apparently initiate discipleslike the Dikshit Brahmans. The Takalkar are said to take their namefrom a forest called Takali, where their first ancestress bore achild to the god Siva. The Kanade are from Canara. The meaning ofthe term Chilliwant is not known; it is said that a member of thissubcaste will throw away his food or water if it is seen by any onewho is not a Lingayat, and they shave the whole head. The above formendogamous subcastes. The Lingayat Banias also have exogamous groups, the names of which are mainly titular, of a low-caste type. Instancesof them are Kaode, from _kawa_ a crow, Teli an oil-seller, Thubri adwarf, Ubadkar an incendiary, Gudkari a sugar-seller and Dhamankarfrom Dhamangaon. They say that the _maths_ or exogamous groups are nolonger regarded, and that marriage is now prohibited between personshaving the same surname. It is stated that if a girl is not marriedbefore adolescence she is finally expelled from the caste, but thisrule has probably become obsolete. The proposal for marriage comesfrom either the boy's or girl's party, and sometimes the bridegroomreceives a small sum for his travelling expenses, while at other timesa bride-price is paid. At the wedding, rice coloured red is put inthe hands of the bridegroom and juari coloured yellow in those of thebride. The bridegroom places the rice on the bride's head and she laysthe juari at his feet. A dish full of water with a golden ring in it isput between them, and they lay their hands on the ring together underthe water and walk five times round a decorative little marriage-shederected inside the real one. A feast is given, and the bridal couplesit on a little dais and eat out of the same dish. The remarriage ofwidows is permitted, but the widow may not marry a man belonging tothe section either of her first husband or of her father. Divorce isrecognised. The Lingayats bury the dead in a sitting posture withthe _lingam_ or emblem of Siva, which has never left the dead manduring his lifetime, clasped in his right hand. Sometimes a platformis made over the grave with an image of Siva. They do not shave thehead in token of mourning. Their principal festival is Shivratri orSiva's night, when they offer the leaves of the bel tree and ashesto the god. A Lingayat must never be without the _lingam_ or phallicsign of Siva, which is carried slung round the neck in a littlecase of silver, copper or brass. If he loses it, he must not eat, drink nor smoke until he finds it or obtains another. The Lingayatsdo not employ Brahmans for any purpose, but are served by their ownpriests, the Jangams, [155] who are recruited both by descent and byinitiation from members of the Pancham group. The Lingayat Banias arepractically all immigrants from the Telugu country; they have Telugunames and speak this language in their homes. They deal in grain, cloth, groceries and spices. 

Bania, Maheshri

_Bania, Maheshri. _--This important subcaste of Banias numberedabout 14, 000 persons in the Central Provinces in 1911, of whom 8000belonged to the Berar Districts, and the remainder principally toHoshangabad, Nimar, Wardha and Nagpur. The name is said to be derivedfrom Maheshwar, an ancient town on the Nerbudda, near Indore, and oneof the earliest Rajput settlements. But some of them say that theiroriginal home is in Bikanir, and tell a story to the effect that theirancestor was a Raja who was turned into stone with his seventy-twofollowers by some ascetics whose devotions they had interrupted inthe forest. But when their wives came to commit _sati_ by the stonefigures the god Siva intervened and brought them to life again. Hetold them to give up the profession of arms and take to trade. So theseventy-two followers were the ancestors of the seventy-two _gotras_or sections of the Maheshris, and the Raja became their tribal_Bhat_ or genealogist, and they were called Maheshri or Maheswari, from Mahesh, a name of Siva. In Gujarat the term Maheshri or Meshriappears to be used for all Banias who are not Jains, including theother important Hindu subcastes. [156] This is somewhat peculiar, and perhaps tends to show that several of the local subcastes areof recent formation. But though they profess to be named after Siva, the Maheshris, like practically all other Hindu Banias, are Vaishnavaby sect, and wear the _kunti_ or necklace of beads of basil. A smallminority are Jains. It is to be noticed that both the place of theirorigin, an early Rajput settlement of the Yadava clan, and their ownlegend tend to show that they were derived from the Rajput caste;for as their ancestors were attendants on a Raja and followed theprofession of arms, which they were told to abandon, they could benone other than Rajputs. The Maheshris also have the Rajput custom ofsending a cocoanut as a symbol of a proposal of marriage. In Nimar theMaheshri Banias say they belong to the Dhakar subcaste, a name whichusually means illegitimate, though they themselves explain that it isderived from a place called Dhakargarh, from which they migrated. Asalready stated they are divided into seventy-two exogamous clans, the names of which appear to be titular or territorial. It is saidthat at their weddings when the bridegroom gets to the door of themarriage-shed, the bride's mother ties a scarf round his neck andtakes hold of his nose and drags him into the shed. Sometimes they makethe bridegroom kneel down and pay reverence to a shoe as a joke. Theydo not observe the custom of the _pangat_ or formal festal assembly, which is usual among Hindu castes; according to this, none can beginto eat until all the guests have assembled, when they all sit down atonce. Among the Maheshris the guests sit down as they come in, and areserved and take their food and go. They only have the _pangat_ feaston very rare occasions. The Maheshris are one of the richest, mostenterprising and influential classes of Banias. They are intelligent, of high-bred appearance, cleanly habits and courteous manners. Thegreat bankers, Sir Kasturchand Daga of Kamptee, of the firm of BansiLal Abirchand, and Rai Bahadur Seth Jiwan Das and Diwan Bahadur SethBallabh Das, of Jubbulpore, belong to this subcaste. 

Bania, Nema

_Bania, Nema. _--This subcaste numbers nearly 4000 persons, the bulk ofwhom reside in the Saugor, Damoh, Narsinghpur and Seoni Districts. TheNemas are most largely returned from Central India, and are probablya Bundelkhand group; they will eat food cooked without water withGolapurab Banias, who are also found in Bundelkhand. They aremainly Hindus, with a small minority of Jains. The origin of thename is obscure; the suggestion that it comes from Nimar appearsto be untenable, as there are very few Nemas in that District. Theysay that when Parasurama was slaying the Kshatriyas fourteen youngRajput princes, who at the time were studying religion with theirfamily priests, were saved by the latter on renouncing their Kshatriyastatus and declaring themselves to be Vaishyas. These fourteen princeswere the ancestors of the fourteen _gotras_ of the Nema subcaste, but the _gotras_ actually bear the names of the fourteen Rishis orsaints who saved their lives. These sections appear to be of theusual Brahmanical type, but marriage is regulated by another set offifty-two subsections, with names which are apparently titular orterritorial. Like other Bania groups the Nemas are divided into Bisaand Dasa subdivisions or twenties and tens, the Bisa being of pureand the Dasa of irregular descent. There is also a third group ofPacha or fives, who appear to be the offspring of kept women. Aftersome generations, when the details of their ancestry are forgotten, the Pachas probably obtain promotion into the Dasa group. The Bisaand Dasa groups take food together, but do not intermarry. TheNemas wear the sacred thread and apparently prohibit the remarriageof widows. The Nemas are considered to be very keen business men, and a saying about them is, "Where a sheep grazes or a Nema trades, what is there left for anybody else?"

Bania, Oswal

_Bania, Oswal. _--This is perhaps the most important subdivision of theBanias after the Agarwala. The Oswals numbered nearly 10, 000 personsin the Central Provinces in 1911, being found in considerable numbersin all the Berar Districts, and also in Nimar, Wardha and Raipur. Thename is derived from the town of Osia or Osnagar in Marwar. Accordingto one legend of their origin the Raja of Osnagar had no son, andobtained one through the promise of a Jain ascetic. The people thendrove the ascetic from the town, fearing that the Raja would become aJain; but Osadev, the guardian goddess of the place, told the ascetic, Sri Ratan Suri, to convert the Raja by a miracle. So she took a smallhank (_puni_) of cotton and passed it along the back of the saint, when it immediately became a snake and bit Jaichand, the son of theRaja, in the toe, while he was asleep beside his wife. Every meanswas tried to save his life, but he died. As his corpse was aboutto be burnt, the ascetic sent one of his disciples and stopped thecremation. Then the Raja came with the body of his son and stoodwith hands clasped before the saint. He ordered that it was to betaken back to the place where the prince had been bitten, and thatthe princess was to lie down beside it as before. At midnight thesnake returned and licked the bite, when the prince was restored tolife. Then the Raja, with all his Court and people, became a Jain. Heand his family founded the _gotra_ or section now known as Sri Srimalor most noble; his servants formed that known as Srimal or excellent, while the other Rajputs of the town became ordinary Oswals. When theBrahmans of the place heard of these conversions they asked the sainthow they were to live, as all their clients had become Jains. Thesaint directed that they should continue to be the family priestsof the Oswals and be known as Bhojak or 'eaters. ' Thus the Oswals, though Jains, continue to employ Marwari Brahmans as their familypriests. Another version of the story is that the king of Srimali[157] allowed no one who was not a millionaire to live within his citywalls. In consequence of this a large number of persons left Srimal, and, settling in Mandovad, called it Osa or the frontier. Among themwere Srimali Banias and also Bhatti, Chauhan, Gahlot, Gaur, Yadava, and several other clans of Rajputs, and these were the people whowere subsequently converted by the Jain ascetic, Sri Ratan Suri, and formed into the single caste of Oswal. [158] Finally, ColonelTod states that the Oswals are all of pure Rajput descent, of nosingle tribe, but chiefly Panwars, Solankis and Bhattis. [159] Fromthese legends and the fact that their headquarters are in Rajputana, it may safely be concluded that the Oswal Banias are of Rajput origin. 

The large majority of the Oswals are Jain by religion, but a few areVaishnava Hindus. Intermarriage between the Hindu and Jain sections ispermitted. Like the Agarwalas, the Oswals are divided into Bisa, Dasaand Pacha sections or twenties, tens and fives, according to the purityof their lineage. The Pacha subcaste still permit the remarriage ofwidows. The three groups take food together but do not intermarry. InBombay, Dasa Oswals intermarry with the Dasa groups of Srimali andParwar Banias, [160] and Oswals generally can marry with other goodBania subcastes so long as both parties are Jains. The Oswals aredivided into eighty-four _gotras_ or exogamous sections for purposesof marriage, a list of which is given by Mr. Crooke. [161] Most ofthese cannot be recognised, but a few of them seem to be titular, asLorha a caste which grows hemp, Nunia a salt-refiner, Seth a banker, Daftari an office-boy, Vaid a physician, Bhandari a cook, and Kukaraa dog. These may indicate a certain amount of admixture of foreignelements in the caste. As stated from Benares, the exogamous ruleis that a man cannot marry in his own section, and he cannot marry agirl whose father's or mother's section is the same as that of eitherhis father or mother. This would bar the marriage of first cousins. 

Though Jains the Oswals perform their weddings by walking round thesacred fire and observe certain Hindu rites, including the worshipof the god Ganpati. [162] They also revere other Hindu deities andthe sun and moon. The dead are burnt, but they do not observe anyimpurity after a death nor clean the house. On the day after thedeath the mourning family, both men and women, visit Parasnath'stemple, and lay one seer (2 lbs. ) of Indian millet before the god, bow to him and go home. They do not gather the ashes of the dead norkeep the yearly death-day. Their only observance is that on someday between the twelfth day after a death and the end of a year, the caste-people are treated to a dinner of sweetmeats and the dead'are then forgotten. ' [163] The Oswals will take food cooked withwater (_katchi_) only from Brahmans, and that cooked without water(_pakki_) from Agarwala and Maheshri Banias. In the Central Provincesthe principal deity of the Oswals is the Jain Tirthakar Parasnath, and they spend large sums in the erection of splendid temples. TheOswals are the most prominent trading caste in Rajputana; and theyhave also frequently held high offices, such as Diwan or minister, and paymaster in Rajput States. [164]

Bania, Parwar

1. Origin. 

_Bania, Parwar. _ [165]--This Jain subcaste numbered nearly 29, 000persons in 1911. They belong almost entirely to the Jubbulporeand Nerbudda Divisions, and the great bulk are found in the Saugor, Damoh and Jubbulpore Districts. The origin of the Parwars and of theirname is not known, but there is some reason to suppose that they arefrom Rajputana. Their women wear on the head the _bij_, a Rajputanaornament, and use the _charu_, a deep brass plate for drinking, whichalso belongs there. Their songs are said to be in the Rajasthanidialect. It seems likely that the Parwars may be identical with thePorawal subcaste found in other Provinces, which, judging from thename, may belong to Rajputana. In the northern Districts the Parwarsspeak Bundeli, but in the south their language is said to be Marwari. 

2. Subdivisions. 

Among the Parwars the Samaiya or Channagri form a separate sectarianJain group. They do not worship the images of the Jain Tirthakars, but enshrine the sacred books of the Jains in their temples, andworship these. The Parwars will take daughters in marriage from theChannagris, and sometimes give their daughters in consideration ofa substantial bride-price. Among the Parwars themselves there is asocial division between the Ath Sake and the Chao Sake; the formerwill not permit the marriage of persons related more nearly thaneight degrees, while the latter permit it after four degrees. TheAth Sake have the higher position, and if one of them marries a ChaoSake he is degraded to that group. Besides this the Parwars have aninferior division called Benaikia, which consists of the offspring ofirregular unions and of widows who have remarried. Persons who havecommitted a caste offence and cannot pay the fine imposed on them forit also go into this subcaste. The Benaikias [166] themselves aredistributed into four groups of varying degrees of respectability, and families who live correctly and marry as well as they can tendto rise from one to the other until after several generations theymay again be recognised as Parwars proper. 

3. Exogamy. 

The Parwars have twelve _gotras_ or main sections, and each _gotra_has, or is supposed to have, twelve _muls_ or subsections. A Parwarmust not marry in his own _gotra_ nor in the _mul_ of his mother, orany of his grandmothers or greatgrandmothers. This practically barsmarriage within seven degrees of relationship. But a man's sister anddaughter may be married in the same family, and even to two brothers, and a man can marry two sisters. 

4. Marriage customs. 

As a rule no bride-price is paid, but occasionally an old mandesiring a wife will give something substantial to her father insecret. There are two forms of marriage, called Thinga and Dajanha;in the former, women do not accompany the wedding procession, and theyhave a separate marriage-shed at the bridegroom's house for their owncelebrations; while in the latter, they accompany it and erect sucha shed at the house in the bridegroom's village or town where theyhave their lodging. Before the wedding, the bridegroom, mounted ona horse, and the bride, carried in a litter, proceed together roundthe marriage-shed. The bridegroom then stands by the sacred post inthe centre and the bride walks seven times round him. In the eveningthere was a custom of dressing the principal male relatives of thebridegroom in women's clothes and making them dance, but this is nowbeing discarded. On the fifth day is held a rite called Palkachar. Anew cot is provided by the bride's father, and on it is spread a redcloth. The couple are seated on this with their hands entwined, andtheir relations come and make them presents. If the bridegroom catcheshold of the dress of his mother- or father-in-law, they are expectedto make him a handsome present. In other respects the wedding followsthe ordinary Hindu ritual. Widow-marriage and divorce are forbiddenamong the Parwars proper, and those who practise them go into thelower Benaikia group. 

5. Religion: Hindu observances. 

The Parwars are practically all Jains of the Digambari sect. Theybuild costly and beautiful temples for their Tirthakars, especially fortheir favourite Parasnath. They have also many Hindu practices. Theyobserve the Diwali, Rakshabandhan and Holi festivals; they say thatat the Diwali the last Tirthakar Mahavira attained beatitude and thegods rained down jewels; the little lamps now lighted at Diwali areheld to be symbolic of these jewels. They tie the threads round thewrist on Rakshabandhan to keep off evil spirits. They worship SitalaDevi, the Hindu goddess of smallpox, and employ Brahmans to choosenames for their children and fix the dates of their wedding and otherceremonies, though not at the ceremonies themselves. 

6. Disposal of the dead. 

The caste burn the dead, with the exception of the bodies of youngchildren, which are buried. The corpse is sometimes placed sitting ina car to be taken to the cremation ground, but often laid on a bierin the ordinary manner. The sitting posture is that in which all theTirthakars attained paradise, and their images always represent themin this posture. The corpse is naked save for a new piece of clothround the waist, but it is covered with a sheet. The Jains do notshave their hair in token of mourning, nor do they offer sacrificialcakes to the dead. When the body is burnt they bathe in the nearestwater and go home. Neither the bearers nor the mourners are held tobe impure. Next day the mourning family, both men and women, visitParasnath's temple, lay two pounds of Indian millet before the godand go home. [167] But in the Central Provinces they whitewash theirhouses, get their clothes washed, throw away their earthen pots andgive a feast to the caste. 

7. Social rules and customs. 

The Parwars abstain from eating any kind of flesh and from drinkingliquor. They have a _panchayat_ and impose penalties for offencesagainst caste rules like the Hindus. Among the offences are thekilling of any living thing, unchastity or adultery, theft or otherbad conduct, taking cooked food or water from a caste from whichthe Parwars do not take them, and violation of any rule of theirreligion. To get vermin in a wound, or to be beaten by a low-casteman or with a shoe, incidents which entail serious penalties amongthe Hindus, are not offences with the Parwars. When an offender isput out of caste the ordinary deprivation is that he is not allowedto enter a Jain temple, and in serious cases he may also not eat nordrink with the caste. The Parwars are generally engaged in the tradein grain, _ghi_, and other staples. Several of them are well-to-doand own villages. 

Bania, Srimali

_Bania, Srimali. _--This subcaste takes its name from the town ofSrimal, which is now Bhinmal in Marwar. They numbered 600 persons inthe Central Provinces in 1911, most of whom belonged to the HoshangabadDistrict. More than two-thirds were Hindus and the remainderJains. Colonel Tod writes of Bhinmal and an adjoining town, Sanchor:"These towns are on the high road to Cutch and Gujarat, which has giventhem from the most remote times a commercial celebrity. Bhinmal is saidto contain about 1500 houses and Sanchor half that number. Very wealthy_mahajans_ or merchants used to reside here, but insecurity both withinand without has much injured these cities. " From Bhinmal the Srimalisappear to have gone to Gujarat, where they are found in considerablenumbers. Their legend of origin is that the goddess Lakshmi createdfrom a flower-garland 90, 000 families to act as servants to the90, 000 Srimali Brahmans, and these were the ancestors of the SrimaliBanias. [168] Both the Jain and Hindu sections of the Srimali Baniasemploy Srimali Brahmans as priests. Like other classes of Banias, theSrimali are divided into two sections, the Bisa and Dasa, or twentyand ten, of which the Bisa are considered to be of pure and the Dasa ofsomewhat mixed descent. In Gujarat they also have a third territorialgroup, known as Ladva, from Lad, the old name of Gujarat. All threesubdivisions take food together but do not intermarry. [169] The twohighest sections of the Oswal Banias are called Sri Srimal and Srimal, and it is possible that further investigation might show the Srimalsand Oswals to have been originally of one stock. 

Bania, Umre

_Bania, Umre. _--This Hindu subcaste belongs to Damoh andJubbulpore. They are perhaps the same as the Ummar Banias of the UnitedProvinces, who reside in the Meerut, Agra and Kumaon Divisions. Thename Umre is found as a subdivision of several castes in the CentralProvinces, as the Telis and others, and is probably derived fromsome town or tract of country in northern or central India, but noidentification has been made. Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam states that inGujarat the Ummar Banias are also known as Bagaria from the Bagaror wild country, comprised in the Dongarpur and Pertabgarh States ofRajputana, where considerable numbers of them are still settled. Theirheadquarters is at Sagwara, near Dongarpur. [170] In Damoh the UmreBanias formerly cultivated the _al_ plant, [171] which yielded awell-known dye, and hence they lost caste, as in soaking the rootsof the plant to extract the dye the numerous insects in them arenecessarily destroyed. The Dosar subcaste [172] are a branch of theUmre, who allow widow-remarriage. 

Banjara

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Historical notice of the caste. _ 2. _Banjaras derived from the Charans or Bhats. _ 3. _Charan Banjaras employed with the Mughal armies. _ 4. _Internal structure. _ 5. _Minor subcastes. _ 6. _Marriage: betrothal. _ 7. _Marriage. _ 8. _Widow-remarriage. _ 9. _Birth and death. _ 10. _Religion: Banjari Devi. _ 11. _Mithu Bhukia. _ 12. _Siva Bhaia. _ 13. _Worship of cattle. _ 14. _Connection with the Sikhs. _ 15. _Witchcraft. _ 16. _Human sacrifice. _ 17. _Admission of outsiders: kidnapped children and slaves. _ 18. _Dress. _ 19. _Social customs. _ 20. _The Naik or headman. Banjara dogs. _ 21. _Criminal tendencies of the caste. _ 22. _Their virtues. _

1. Historical notice of the caste. 

_Banjara, Wanjari, Lahana, Mukeri_. [173]--The caste of carriers anddrivers of pack-bullocks. In 1911 the Banjaras numbered about 56, 000persons in the Central Provinces and 80, 000 in Berar, the caste beingin greater strength here than in any part of India except Hyderabad, where their total is 174, 000. Bombay comes next with a figureapproaching that of the Central Provinces and Berar, and the castebelongs therefore rather to the Deccan than to northern India. Thename has been variously explained, but the most probable derivationis from the Sanskrit _banijya kara_, a merchant. Sir H. M. Elliotheld that the name Banjara was of great antiquity, quoting a passagefrom the Dasa Kumara Charita of the eleventh or twelfth century. Butit was subsequently shown by Professor Cowell that the name Banjaradid not occur in the original text of this work. [174] Banjaras aresupposed to be the people mentioned by Arrian in the fourth centuryB. C. , as leading a wandering life, dwelling in tents and letting outfor hire their beasts of burden. [175] But this passage merely provesthe existence of carriers and not of the Banjara caste. Mr. Crookestates [176] that the first mention of Banjaras in Muhammadan historyis in Sikandar's attack on Dholpur in A. D. 1504. [177] It seemsimprobable, therefore, that the Banjaras accompanied the differentMuhammadan invaders of India, as might have been inferred from thefact that they came into the Deccan in the train of the forces ofAurangzeb. The caste has indeed two Muhammadan sections, the Turkiaand Mukeri. [178] But both of these have the same Rajput clan namesas the Hindu branch of the caste, and it seems possible that they mayhave embraced Islam under the proselytising influence of Aurangzeb, or simply owing to their having been employed with the Muhammadantroops. The great bulk of the caste in southern India are Hindus, and there seems no reason for assuming that its origin was Muhammadan. 

2. Banjaras derived from the Charans or Bhats. 

It may be suggested that the Banjaras are derived from the Charanor Bhat caste of Rajputana. Mr. Cumberlege, whose _Monograph_ on thecaste in Berar is one of the best authorities, states that of the fourdivisions existing there the Charans are the most numerous and byfar the most interesting class. [179] In the article on Bhat it hasbeen explained how the Charans or bards, owing to their readinessto kill themselves rather than give up the property entrusted totheir care, became the best safe-conduct for the passage of goodsin Rajputana. The name Charan is generally held to mean 'Wanderer, 'and in their capacity of bards the Charans were accustomed to travelfrom court to court of the different chiefs in quest of patronage. Theywere first protected by their sacred character and afterwards by theircustom of _traga_ or _chandi_, that is, of killing themselves whenattacked and threatening their assailants with the dreaded fate ofbeing haunted by their ghosts. Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam [180] remarks:"After Parasurama's dispersion of the Kshatris the Charans accompaniedthem in their southward flight. In those troubled times the Charanstook charge of the supplies of the Kshatri forces and so fell to theirpresent position of cattle-breeders and grain-carriers.... " Most ofthe Charans are graziers, cattle-sellers and pack-carriers. ColonelTod says: [181] "The Charans and Bhats or bards and genealogists arethe chief carriers of these regions (Marwar); their sacred characteroverawes the lawless Rajput chief, and even the savage Koli and Bhiland the plundering Sahrai of the desert dread the anathema of thesesingular races, who conduct the caravans through the wildest andmost desolate regions. " In another passage Colonel Tod identifiesthe Charans and Banjaras [182] as follows: "Murlah is an excellenttownship inhabited by a community of Charans of the tribe Cucholia(Kacheli), who are Bunjarris (carriers) by profession, though poets bybirth. The alliance is a curious one, and would appear incongruous werenot gain the object generally in both cases. It was the sanctity oftheir office which converted our _bardais_ (bards) into _bunjarris_, for their persons being sacred, the immunity extended likewise totheir goods and saved them from all imposts; so that in process oftime they became the free-traders of Rajputana. I was highly gratifiedwith the reception I received from the community, which collectivelyadvanced to meet me at some distance from the town. The procession washeaded by the village elders and all the fair Charanis, who, as theyapproached, gracefully waved their scarfs over me until I was fairlymade captive by the muses of Murlah! It was a novel and interestingscene. The manly persons of the Charans, clad in the flowing white robewith the high loose-folded turban inclined on one side, from whichthe _mala_ or chaplet was gracefully suspended; and the _naiques_or leaders, with their massive necklaces of gold, with the imageof the _pitriswar_ (_manes_) depending therefrom, gave the whole anair of opulence and dignity. The females were uniformly attired in askirt of dark-brown camlet, having a bodice of light-coloured stuff, with gold ornaments worked into their fine black hair; and all had thefavourite _churis_ or rings of _hathidant_ (elephant's tooth) coveringthe arm from the wrist to the elbow, and even above it. " A littlelater, referring to the same Charan community, Colonel Tod writes:"The _tanda_ or caravan, consisting of four thousand bullocks, hasbeen kept up amidst all the evils which have beset this land throughMughal and Maratha tyranny. The utility of these caravans as generalcarriers to conflicting armies and as regular tax-paying subjects hasproved their safeguard, and they were too strong to be pillaged by anypetty marauder, as any one who has seen a Banjari encampment will beconvinced. They encamp in a square, and their grain-bags piled overeach other breast-high, with interstices left for their matchlocks, make no contemptible fortification. Even the ruthless Turk, JamshidKhan, set up a protecting tablet in favour of the Charans of Murlah, recording their exemption from _dind_ contributions, and that thereshould be no increase in duties, with threats to all who should injurethe community. As usual, the sun and moon are appealed to as witnessesof good faith, and sculptured on the stone. Even the forest Bhil andmountain Mair have set up their signs of immunity and protection tothe chosen of Hinglaz (tutelary deity); and the figures of a cow andits _kairi_ (calf) carved in rude relief speak the agreement thatthey should not be slain or stolen within the limits of Murlah. "

In the above passage the community described by Colonel Tod wereCharans, but he identified them with Banjaras, using the namealternatively. He mentions their large herds of pack-bullocks, for themanagement of which the Charans, who were graziers as well as bards, would naturally be adapted; the name given to the camp, _tanda_, isthat generally used by the Banjaras; the women wore ivory bangles, which the Banjara women wear. [183] In commenting on the way in whichthe women threw their scarves over him, making him a prisoner, ColonelTod remarks: "This community had enjoyed for five hundred years theprivilege of making prisoner any Rana of Mewar who may pass throughMurlah, and keeping him in bondage until he gives them a _got_ orentertainment. The patriarch (of the village) told me that I was injeopardy as the Rana's representative, but not knowing how I mighthave relished the joke had it been carried to its conclusion, theylet me escape. " Mr. Ball notes a similar custom of the Banjara womenfar away in the Bastar State of the Central Provinces: [184] "TodayI passed through another Banjara hamlet, from whence the women andgirls all hurried out in pursuit, and a brazen-faced powerful-lookinglass seized the bridle of my horse as he was being led by the _sais_in the rear. The _sais_ and _chaprasi_ were both Muhammadans, andthe forward conduct of these females perplexed them not a little, and the former was fast losing his temper at being thus assaulted by awoman. " Colonel Mackenzie in his account of the Banjara caste remarks:[185] "It is certain that the Charans, whoever they were, first roseto the demand which the great armies of northern India, contendingin exhausted countries far from their basis of supply, created, viz. The want of a fearless and reliable transport service.... Thestart which the Charans then acquired they retain among Banjaras tothis day, though in very much diminished splendour and position. Asthey themselves relate, they were originally five brethren, Rathor, Turi, Panwar, Chauhan and Jadon. But fortune particularly smiled onBhika Rathor, as his four sons, Mersi, Multasi, Dheda and Khamdar, great names among the Charans, rose immediately to eminence ascommissariat transporters in the north. And not only under theDelhi Emperors, but under the Satara, subsequently the Poona Raj, and the Subahship of the Nizam, did several of their descendants riseto consideration and power. " It thus seems a reasonable hypothesisthat the nucleus of the Banjara caste was constituted by the Charansor bards of Rajputana. Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam [186] also identifiesthe Charans and Banjaras, but I have not been able to find the exactpassage. The following notice [187] by Colonel Tone is of interestin this connection:

"The vast consumption that attends a Maratha army necessarilysuperinduces the idea of great supplies; yet, notwithstanding this, the native powers never concern themselves about providing for theirforces, and have no idea of a grain and victualling department, which forms so great an object in a European campaign. The Baniasor grain-sellers in an Indian army have always their servants aheadof the troops on the line of march, to purchase in the circumjacentcountry whatever necessaries are to be disposed of. Articles ofconsumption are never wanting in a native camp, though they aregenerally twenty-five per cent dearer than in the town bazars;but independent of this mode of supply the Vanjaris or itinerantgrain-merchants furnish large quantities, which they bring onbullocks from an immense distance. These are a very peculiar race, and appear a marked and discriminated people from any other I haveseen in this country. Formerly they were considered so sacred thatthey passed in safety in the midst of contending armies; of late, however, this reverence for their character is much abated and theyhave been frequently plundered, particularly by Tipu. "

The reference to the sacred character attaching to the Banjaras acentury ago appears to be strong evidence in favour of their derivationfrom the Charans. For it could scarcely have been obtained by any bodyof commissariat agents coming into India with the Muhammadans. Thefact that the example of disregarding it was first set by a Muhammadanprince points to the same conclusion. 

Mr. Irvine notices the Banjaras with the Mughal armies in similarterms: [188] "It is by these people that the Indian armies in thefield are fed, and they are never injured by either army. The grainis taken from them, but invariably paid for. They encamp for safetyevery evening in a regular square formed of the bags of grain ofwhich they construct a breastwork. They and their families are in thecentre, and the oxen are made fast outside. Guards with matchlocks andspears are placed at the corners, and their dogs do duty as advancedposts. I have seen them with droves of 5000 bullocks. They do notmove above two miles an hour, as their cattle are allowed to grazeas they proceed on the march. "

One may suppose that the Charans having acted as carriers for theRajput chiefs and courts, both in time of peace and in their continuousintestinal feuds, were pressed into service when the Mughal armiesentered Rajputana and passed through it to Gujarat and the Deccan. Inadopting the profession of transport agents for the imperial troopsthey may have been amalgamated into a fresh caste with other Hindus andMuhammadans doing the same work, just as the camp language formed bythe superposition of a Persian vocabulary on to a grammatical basisof Hindi became Urdu or Hindustani. The readiness of the Charansto commit suicide rather than give up property committed to theircharge was not, however, copied by the Banjaras, and so far as I amaware there is no record of men of this caste taking their own lives, though they had little scruple with those of others. 

3. Charan Ranjarans employed with the Mughal armies. 

The Charan Banjaras, Mr. Cumberlege states, [189] first came to theDeccan with Asaf Khan in the campaign which closed with the annexationby the Emperor Shah Jahan of Ahmadnagar and Berar about 1630. Theirleaders or Naiks were Bhangi and Jhangi of the Rathor [190] and BhagwanDas of the Jadon clan. Bhangi and Jhangi had 180, 000 pack-bullocks, and Bhagwan Das 52, 000. It was naturally an object with Asaf Khan tokeep his commissariat well up with his force, and as Bhangi and Jhangimade difficulties about the supply of grass and water to their cattle, he gave them an order engraved on copper in letters of gold to thefollowing effect:

 Ranjan ka pani Chhappar ka ghas Din ke tin khun muaf; Aur jahan Asaf Jah ke ghore Wahan Bhangi Jhangi ke bail, which may be rendered as follows: "If you can find no water elsewhereyou may even take it from the pots of my followers; grass you maytake from the roofs of their huts; and I will pardon you up to threemurders a day, provided that wherever I find my cavalry, Bhangiand Jhangi's bullocks shall be with them. " This grant is still inthe possession of Bhangi Naik's descendant who lives at Musi, nearHingoli. He is recognised by the Hyderabad Court as the head Naik ofthe Banjara caste, and on his death his successor receives a _khillat_or dress-of-honour from His Highness the Nizam. After Asaf Khan'scampaign and settlement in the Deccan, a quarrel broke out betweenthe Rathor clan, headed by Bhangi and Jhangi, and the Jadons underBhagwan Das, owing to the fact that Asaf Khan had refused to giveBhagwan Das a grant like that quoted above. Both Bhangi and BhagwanDas were slain in the feud and the Jadons captured the standard, consisting of eight _thans_ (lengths) of cloth, which was annuallypresented by the Nizam to Bhangi's descendants. When Mr. Cumberlegewrote (1869), this standard was in the possession of Hatti Naik, a descendant of Bhagwan Das, who had an estate near Muchli Bunder, in the Madras Presidency. Colonel Mackenzie states [191] that theleaders of the Rathor clan became so distinguished not only in theirparticular line but as men of war that the Emperors recognisedtheir carrying distinctive standards, which were known as _dhal_by the Rathors themselves. Jhangi's family was also representedin the person of Ramu Naik, the _patel_ or headman of the villageof Yaoli in the Yeotmal District. In 1791-92 the Banjaras wereemployed to supply grain to the British army under the Marquis ofCornwallis during the siege of Seringapatam, [192] and the Duke ofWellington in his Indian campaigns regularly engaged them as part ofthe commissariat staff of his army. On one occasion he said of them:"The Banjaras I look upon in the light of servants of the public, of whose grain I have a right to regulate the sale, always takingcare that they have a proportionate advantage. " [193]

4. Internal structure. 

Mr. Cumberlege gives four main divisions of the caste in Berar, theCharans, Mathurias, Labhanas and Dharis. Of these the Charans areby far the most numerous and important, and included all the famousleaders of the caste mentioned above. The Charans are divided intothe five clans, Rathor, Panwar, Chauhan, Puri and Jadon or Burthia, all of these being the names of leading Rajput clans; and as theCharan bards themselves were probably Rajputs, the Banjaras, whoare descended from them, may claim the same lineage. Each clan orsept is divided into a number of subsepts; thus among the Rathorsthe principal subsept is the Bhurkia, called after the Bhika Rathoralready mentioned; and this is again split into four groups, Mersi, Multasi, Dheda and Khamdar, named after his four sons. As a rule, members of the same clan, Panwar, Rathor and so on, may not intermarry, but Mr. Cumberlege states that a man belonging to the Banod or Bhurkiasubsepts of the Rathors must not take a wife from his own subsept, but may marry any other Rathor girl. It seems probable that the samerule may hold with the other subsepts, as it is most unlikely thatintermarriage should still be prohibited among so large a body as theRathor Charans have now become. It may be supposed therefore that thedivision into subsepts took place when it became too inconvenientto prohibit marriage throughout the whole body of the sept, ashas happened in other cases. The Mathuria Banjaras take their namefrom Mathura or Muttra and appear to be Brahmans. "They wear thesacred thread, [194] know the _Gayatri Mantra_, and to the presentday abstain from meat and liquor, subsisting entirely on grain andvegetables. They always had a sufficiency of Charans and servants(_Jangar_) in their villages to perform all necessary manual labour, and would not themselves work for a remuneration otherwise than bycarrying grain, which was and still is their legitimate occupation;but it was not considered undignified to cut wood and grass for thehousehold. Both Mathuria and Labhana men are fairer than the Charans;they wear better jewellery and their loin-cloths have a silk border, while those of the Charans are of rough, common cloth. " The Mathuriasare sometimes known as Ahiwasi, and may be connected with the Ahiwasisof the Hindustani Districts, who also drive pack-bullocks and callthemselves Brahmans. But it is naturally a sin for a Brahman to loadthe sacred ox, and any one who does so is held to have derogatedfrom the priestly order. The Mathurias are divided according toMr. Cumberlege into four groups called Pande, Dube, Tiwari and Chaube, all of which are common titles of Hindustani Brahmans and signifya man learned in one, two, three and four Vedas respectively. It isprobable that these groups are exogamous, marrying with each other, but this is not stated. The third division, the Labhanas, may derivetheir name from _lavana_, salt, and probably devoted themselves moreespecially to the carriage of this staple. They are said to be Rajputs, and to be descended from Mota and Mola, the cowherds of Krishna. Thefourth subdivision are the Dharis or bards of the caste, who rankbelow the others. According to their own story [195] their ancestorwas a member of the Bhat caste, who became a disciple of Nanak, the Sikh apostle, and with him attended a feast given by the MughalEmperor Humayun. Here he ate the flesh of a cow or buffalo, and inconsequence became a Muhammadan and was circumcised. He was employedas a musician at the Mughal court, and his sons joined the Charans andbecame the bards of the Banjara caste. "The Dharis, " Mr. Cumberlegecontinues, "are both musicians and mendicants; they sing in praiseof their own and the Charan ancestors and of the old kings of Delhi;while at certain seasons of the year they visit Charan hamlets, wheneach family gives them a young bullock or a few rupees. They areMuhammadans, but worship Sarasvati and at their marriages offer upa he-goat to Gaji and Gandha, the two sons of the original Bhat, whobecame a Muhammadan. At burials a Fakir is called to read the prayers. "

5. Minor subcastes. 

Besides the above four main divisions, there are a number of others, the caste being now of a very mixed character. Two principal Muhammadangroups are given by Sir H. Elliot, the Turkia and Mukeri. The Turkiahave thirty-six septs, some with Rajput names and others territorial ortitular. They seem to be a mixed group of Hindus who may have embracedIslam as the religion of their employers. The Mukeri Banjaras assertthat they derive their name from Mecca (Makka), which one of theirNaiks, who had his camp in the vicinity, assisted Father Abraham inbuilding. [196] Mr. Crooke thinks that the name may be a corruptionof Makkeri and mean a seller of maize. Mr. Cumberlege says of them:"Multanis and Mukeris have been called Banjaras also, but have nothingin common with the caste; the Multanis are carriers of grain and theMukeris of wood and timber, and hence the confusion may have arisenbetween them. " But they are now held to be Banjaras by common usage;in Saugor the Mukeris also deal in cattle. From Chanda a different setof subcastes is reported called Bhusarjin, Ladjin, Saojin and Kanhejin;the first may take their name from _bhusa_, the chaff of wheat, whileLad is the term used for people coming from Gujarat, and Sao meansa banker. In Sambalpur again a class of Thuria Banjaras is found, divided into the Bandesia, Atharadesia, Navadesia and Chhadesia, orthe men of the 52 districts, the 18 districts, the 9 districts andthe 6 districts respectively. The first and last two of these takefood and marry with each other. Other groups are the Guar Banjaras, apparently from Guara or Gwala, a milkman, the Guguria Banjaras, whomay, Mr. Hira Lal suggests, take their name from trading in _gugar_, a kind of gum, and the Bahrup Banjaras, who are Nats or acrobats. InBerar also a number of the caste have become respectable cultivatorsand now call themselves Wanjari, disclaiming any connection withthe Banjaras, probably on account of the bad reputation for crimeattached to these latter. Many of the Wanjaris have been allowedto rank with the Kunbi caste, and call themselves Wanjari Kunbis inorder the better to dissociate themselves from their parent caste. Theexisting caste is therefore of a very mixed nature, and the originalBrahman and Charan strains, though still perfectly recognisable, cannot have maintained their purity. 

6. Marriage: betrothal. 

At a betrothal in Nimar the bridegroom and his friends come and stayin the next village to that of the bride. The two parties meet on theboundary of the village, and here the bride-price is fixed, whichis often a very large sum, ranging from Rs. 200 to Rs. 1000. Untilthe price is paid the father will not let the bridegroom into hishouse. In Yeotmal, when a betrothal is to be made, the parties goto a liquor-shop and there a betel-leaf and a large handful of sugarare distributed to everybody. Here the price to be paid for the brideamounts to Rs. 40 and four young bullocks. Prior to the wedding thebridegroom goes and stays for a month or so in the house of the bride'sfather, and during this time he must provide a supply of liquor dailyfor the bride's male relatives. The period was formerly longer, but nowextends to a month at the most. While he resides at the bride's housethe bridegroom wears a cloth over his head so that his face cannot beseen. Probably the prohibition against seeing him applies to the brideonly, as the rule in Berar is that between the betrothal and marriageof a Charan girl she may not eat or drink in the bridegroom's house, or show her face to him or any of his relatives. Mathuria girls mustbe wedded before they are seven years old, but the Charans permitthem to remain single until after adolescence. 

7. Marriage. 

Banjara marriages are frequently held in the rains, a season forbiddento other Hindus, but naturally the most convenient to them, becausein the dry weather they are usually travelling. For the marriageceremony they pitch a tent in lieu of the marriage-shed, and on theground they place two rice-pounding pestles, round which the bride andbridegroom make the seven turns. Others substitute for the pestlesa pack-saddle with two bags of grain in order to symbolise theircamp life. During the turns the girl's hand is held by the Joshior village priest, or some other Brahman, in case she should fall;such an occurrence being probably a very unlucky omen. Afterwards, the girl runs away and the Brahman has to pursue and catch her. InBhandara the girl is clad only in a light skirt and breast-cloth, and her body is rubbed all over with oil in order to make histask more difficult. During this time the bride's party pelt theBrahman with rice, turmeric and areca-nuts, and sometimes even withstones; and if he is forced to cry with the pain, it is consideredlucky. But if he finally catches the girl, he is conducted to a daisand sits there holding a brass plate in front of him, into which thebridegroom's party drop presents. A case is mentioned of a Brahmanhaving obtained Rs. 70 in this manner. Among the Mathuria Banjarasof Berar the ceremony resembles the usual Hindu type. [197] Beforethe wedding the families bring the branches of eight or ten differentkinds of trees, and perform the _hom_ or fire sacrifice with them. ABrahman knots the clothes of the couple together, and they walk roundthe fire. When the bride arrives at the bridegroom's hamlet after thewedding, two small brass vessels are given to her; she fetches waterin these and returns them to the women of the boy's family, who mixthis with other water previously drawn, and the girl, who up to thisperiod was considered of no caste at all, becomes a Mathuria. [198]Food is cooked with this water, and the bride and bridegroom areformally received into the husband's _kuri_ or hamlet. It is possiblethat the mixing of the water may be a survival of the blood covenant, whereby a girl was received into her husband's clan on her marriageby her blood being mixed with that of her husband. [199] Or it may besimply symbolical of the union of the families. In some localitiesafter the wedding the bride and bridegroom are made to stand on twobullocks, which are driven forward, and it is believed that whicheverof them falls off first will be the first to die. 

8. Widow remarriage. 

Owing to the scarcity of women in the caste a widow is seldom allowedto go out of the family, and when her husband dies she is taken eitherby his elder or younger brother; this is in opposition to the usualHindu practice, which forbids the marriage of a woman to her deceasedhusband's elder brother, on the ground that as successor to theheadship of the joint family he stands to her, at least potentially, in the light of a father. If the widow prefers another man and runsaway to him, the first husband's relatives claim compensation, andthreaten, in the event of its being refused, to abduct a girl fromthis man's family in exchange for the widow. But no case of abductionhas occurred in recent years. In Berar the compensation claimed inthe case of a woman marrying out of the family amounts to Rs. 75, with Rs. 5 for the Naik or headman of the family. Should the widowelope without her brother-in-law's consent, he chooses ten or twelveof his friends to go and sit _dharna_ (starving themselves) beforethe hut of the man who has taken her. He is then bound to supplythese men with food and liquor until he has paid the customary sum, when he may marry the widow. [200] In the event of the second husbandbeing too poor to pay monetary compensation, he gives a goat, whichis cut into eighteen pieces and distributed to the community. [201]

9. Birth and death. 

After the birth of a child the mother is unclean for five days, andlives apart in a separate hut, which is run up for her use in the_kuri_ or hamlet. On the sixth day she washes the feet of all thechildren in the _kuri_, feeds them and then returns to her husband'shut. When a child is born in a moving _tanda_ or camp, the samerule is observed, and for five days the mother walks alone after thecamp during the daily march. The caste bury the bodies of unmarriedpersons and those dying of smallpox and burn the others. Their ritesof mourning are not strict, and are observed only for three days. TheBanjaras have a saying: "Death in a foreign land is to be preferred, where there are no kinsfolk to mourn, and the corpse is a feastfor birds and animals"; but this may perhaps be taken rather as anexpression of philosophic resignation to the fate which must be instore for many of them, than a real preference, as with most peoplethe desire to die at home almost amounts to an instinct. 

10. Religion: Banjari Devi. 

One of the tutelary deities of the Banjaras is Banjari Devi, whoseshrine is usually located in the forest. It is often represented by aheap of stones, a large stone smeared with vermilion being placed onthe top of the heap to represent the goddess. When a Banjara passesthe place he casts a stone upon the heap as a prayer to the goddessto protect him from the dangers of the forest. A similar practice ofoffering bells from the necks of cattle is recorded by Mr. Thurston:[202] "It is related by Moor that he passed a tree on which werehanging several hundred bells. This was a superstitious sacrifice ofthe Banjaras (Lambaris), who, passing this tree, are in the habitof hanging a bell or bells upon it, which they take from the necksof their sick cattle, expecting to leave behind them the complaintalso. Our servants particularly cautioned us against touching thesediabolical bells, but as a few of them were taken for our own cattle, several accidents which happened were imputed to the anger of thedeity to whom these offerings were made; who, they say, inflicts thesame disorder on the unhappy bullock who carries a bell from the tree, as that from which he relieved the donor. " In their houses the BanjariDevi is represented by a pack-saddle set on high in the room, andthis is worshipped before the caravans set out on their annual tours. 

11. Mithu Bhukia. 

Another deity is Mithu Bhukia, an old freebooter, who lived in theCentral Provinces; he is venerated by the dacoits as the most cleverdacoit known in the annals of the caste, and a hut was usuallyset apart for him in each hamlet, a staff carrying a white flagbeing planted before it. Before setting out for a dacoity, the menengaged would assemble at the hut of Mithu Bhukia, and, burning alamp before him, ask for an omen; if the wick of the lamp droopedthe omen was propitious, and the men present then set out at once onthe raid without returning home. They might not speak to each othernor answer if challenged; for if any one spoke the charm would bebroken and the protection of Mithu Bhukia removed; and they shouldeither return to take the omens again or give up that particulardacoity altogether. [203] It has been recorded as a characteristictrait of Banjaras that they will, as a rule, not answer if spokento when engaged on a robbery, and the custom probably arises fromthis observance; but the worship of Mithu Bhukia is now frequentlyneglected. After a successful dacoity a portion of the spoil would beset apart for Mithu Bhukia, and of the balance the Naik or headman ofthe village received two shares if he participated in the crime; theman who struck the first blow or did most towards the common objectalso received two shares, and all the rest one share. With MithuBhukia's share a feast was given at which thanks were returned tohim for the success of the enterprise, a burnt offering of incensebeing made in his tent and a libation of liquor poured over theflagstaff. A portion of the food was sent to the women and children, and the men sat down to the feast. Women were not allowed to sharein the worship of Mithu Bhukia nor to enter his hut. 

12. Siva Bhaia. 

Another favourite deity is Siva Bhaia, whose story is given by ColonelMackenzie [204] as follows: "The love borne by Mari Mata, the goddessof cholera, for the handsome Siva Rathor, is an event of our owntimes (1874); she proposed to him, but his heart being pre-engaged herejected her; and in consequence his earthly bride was smitten sickand died, and the hand of the goddess fell heavily on Siva himself, thwarting all his schemes and blighting his fortunes and possessions, until at last he gave himself up to her. She then possessed him andcaused him to prosper exceedingly, gifting him with supernatural poweruntil his fame was noised abroad, and he was venerated as the saintlySiva Bhaia or great brother to all women, being himself unable tomarry. But in his old age the goddess capriciously wished him to marryand have issue, but he refused and was slain and buried at Pohur inBerar. A temple was erected over him and his kinsmen became priests ofit, and hither large numbers are attracted by the supposed efficacyof vows made to Siva, the most sacred of all oaths being that takenin his name. " If a Banjara swears by Siva Bhaia, placing his righthand on the bare head of his son and heir, and grasping a cow's tailin his left, he will fear to perjure himself, lest by doing so heshould bring injury on his son and a murrain on his cattle. [205]

13. Worship of cattle. 

Naturally also the Banjaras worshipped their pack-cattle. [206] "Whensickness occurs they lead the sick man to the feet of the bullockcalled Hatadiya. [207] On this animal no burden is ever laid, buthe is decorated with streamers of red-dyed silk, and tinkling bellswith many brass chains and rings on neck and feet, and silken tasselshanging in all directions; he moves steadily at the head of the convoy, and at the place where he lies down when he is tired they pitch theircamp for the day; at his feet they make their vows when difficultiesovertake them, and in illness, whether of themselves or their cattle, they trust to his worship for a cure. "

14. Connection with the Sikhs. 

Mr. Balfour also mentions in his paper that the Banjaras callthemselves Sikhs, and it is noticeable that the Charan subcaste saythat their ancestors were three Rajput boys who followed Guru Nanak, the prophet of the Sikhs. The influence of Nanak appears to have beenwidely extended over northern India, and to have been felt by largebodies of the people other than those who actually embraced the Sikhreligion. Cumberlege states [208] that before starting to his marriagethe bridegroom ties a rupee in his turban in honour of Guru Nanak, which is afterwards expended in sweetmeats. But otherwise the modernBanjaras do not appear to retain any Sikh observances. 

15. Witchcraft. 

"The Banjaras, " Sir A. Lyall writes, [209] "are terribly vexedby witchcraft, to which their wandering and precarious existenceespecially exposes them in the shape of fever, rheumatism anddysentery. Solemn inquiries are still held in the wild jungles wherethese people camp out like gipsies, and many an unlucky hag has beenstrangled by sentence of their secret tribunals. " The business ofmagic and witchcraft was in the hands of two classes of Bhagats ormagicians, one good and the other bad, [210] who may correspond tothe European practitioners of black and white magic. The good Bhagatis called Nimbu-katna or lemon-cutter, a lemon speared on a knifebeing a powerful averter of evil spirits. He is a total abstainerfrom meat and liquor, and fasts once a week on the day sacred to thedeity whom he venerates, usually Mahadeo; he is highly respected andnever panders to vice. But the Janta, the 'Wise or Cunning Man, ' isof a different type, and the following is an account of the devilryoften enacted when a deputation visited him to inquire into the causeof a prolonged illness, a cattle murrain, a sudden death or othermisfortune. A woman might often be called a Dakun or witch in spite, and when once this word had been used, the husband or nearest malerelative would be regularly bullied into consulting the Janta. Orif some woman had been ill for a week, an avaricious [211] husbandor brother would begin to whisper foul play. Witchcraft would bementioned, and the wise man called in. He would give the sufferer aquid of betel, muttering an incantation, but this rarely effected acure, as it was against the interest of all parties that it shoulddo so. The sufferer's relatives would then go to their Naik, tell himthat the sick person was bewitched, and ask him to send a deputationto the Janta or witch-doctor. This would be at once despatched, consisting of one male adult from each house in the hamlet, withone of the sufferer's relatives. On the road the party would burya bone or other article to test the wisdom of the witch-doctor. Buthe was not to be caught out, and on their arrival he would bid thedeputation rest, and come to him for consultation on the followingday. Meanwhile during the night the Janta would be thoroughly coachedby some accomplice in the party. Next morning, meeting the deputation, he would tell every man all particulars of his name and family; namethe invalid, and tell the party to bring materials for consulting thespirits, such as oil, vermilion, sugar, dates, cocoanut, _chironji_, [212] and sesamum. In the evening, holding a lamp, the Janta wouldbe possessed by Mariai, the goddess of cholera; he would mentionall particulars of the sick man's illness, and indignantly inquirewhy they had buried the bone on the road, naming it and describingthe place. If this did not satisfy the deputation, a goat would bebrought, and he would name its sex with any distinguishing marks on thebody. The sick person's representative would then produce his _nazar_or fee, formerly Rs. 25, but lately the double of this or more. TheJanta would now begin a sort of chant, introducing the names of thefamilies of the _kuri_ other than that containing her who was to beproclaimed a witch, and heap on them all kinds of abuse. Finally, hewould assume an ironic tone, extol the virtues of a certain family, become facetious, and praise its representative then present. Thisman would then question the Janta on all points regarding his ownfamily, his connections, worldly goods, and what gods he worshipped, ask who was the witch, who taught her sorcery, and how and why shepractised it in this particular instance. But the witch-doctor, havingtaken care to be well coached, would answer everything correctly andfix the guilt on to the witch. A goat would be sacrificed and eatenwith liquor, and the deputation would return. The punishment forbeing proclaimed a Dakun or witch was formerly death to the womanand a fine to be paid by her relatives to the bewitched person'sfamily. The woman's husband or her sons would be directed to killher, and if they refused, other men were deputed to murder her, andbury the body at once with all the clothing and ornaments then onher person, while a further fine would be exacted from the familyfor not doing away with her themselves. But murder for witchcrafthas been almost entirely stopped, and nowadays the husband, afterbeing fined a few head of cattle, which are given to the sick man, is turned out of the village with his wife. It is quite possible, however, that an obnoxious old hag would even now not escape death, especially if the money fine were not forthcoming, and an instanceis known in recent times of a mother being murdered by her threesons. The whole village combined to screen these amiable young men, and eventually they made the Janta the scapegoat, and he got sevenyears, while the murderers could not be touched. Colonel Mackenziewrites that, "Curious to relate, the Jantas, known locally as Bhagats, in order to become possessed of their alleged powers of divination andprophecy, require to travel to Kazhe, beyond Surat, there to learn andbe instructed by low-caste Koli impostors. " This is interesting as aninstance of the powers of witchcraft being attributed by the Hindus orhigher race to the indigenous primitive tribes, a rule which Dr. Tylorand Dr. Jevons consider to hold good generally in the history of magic. 

16. Human sacrifice. 

Several instances are known also of the Banjaras having practisedhuman sacrifice. Mr. Thurston states: [213] "In former times theLambadis, before setting out on a journey, used to procure a littlechild and bury it in the ground up to the shoulders, and then drivetheir loaded bullocks over the unfortunate victim. In proportion tothe bullocks thoroughly trampling the child to death, so their beliefin a successful journey increased. " The Abbé Dubois describes anotherform of sacrifice: [214]

"The Lambadis are accused of the still more atrocious crime of offeringup human sacrifices. When they wish to perform this horrible act, itis said, they secretly carry off the first person they meet. Havingconducted the victim to some lonely spot, they dig a hole in which theybury him up to the neck. While he is still alive they make a sort oflamp of dough made of flour, which they place on his head; this theyfill with oil, and light four wicks in it. Having done this, the menand women join hands and, forming a circle, dance round their victim, singing and making a great noise until he expires. " Mr. Cumberlegerecords [215] the following statement of a child kidnapped by a Banjaracaravan in 1871. After explaining how he was kidnapped and the tipof his tongue cut off to give him a defect in speech, the Kunbi lad, taken from Sahungarhi, in the Bhandara District, went on to say that, "The _tanda_ (caravan) encamped for the night in the jungle. In themorning a woman named Gangi said that the devil was in her and thata sacrifice must be made. On this four men and three women took a boyto a place they had made for _puja_ (worship). They fed him with milk, rice and sugar, and then made him stand up, when Gangi drew a sword andapproached the child, who tried to run away; caught and brought backto this place, Gangi, holding the sword with both hands and standingon the child's right side, cut off his head with one blow. Gangicollected the blood and sprinkled it on the idol; this idol is madeof stone, is about 9 inches high, and has something sparkling inits forehead. The camp marched that day, and for four or five daysconsecutively, without another sacrifice; but on the fifth day a youngwoman came to the camp to sell curds, and having bought some, theBanjaras asked her to come in in the evening and eat with them. Shedid come, and after eating with the women slept in the camp. Earlynext morning she was sacrificed in the same way as the boy had been, but it took three blows to cut off her head; it was done by Gangi, andthe blood was sprinkled on the stone idol. About a month ago Sitaram, a Gond lad, who had also been kidnapped and was in the camp, told meto run away as it had been decided to offer me up in sacrifice at thenext Jiuti festival, so I ran away. " The child having been broughtto the police, a searching and protracted inquiry was held, which, however, determined nothing, though it did not disprove his story. 

17. Admission of outsiders: kidnapped children and slaves. 

The Banjara caste is not closed to outsiders, but the general ruleis to admit only women who have been married to Banjara men. Womenof the lowest and impure castes are excluded, and for some unknownreason the Patwas [216] and Nunias are bracketed with these. InNimar it is stated that formerly Gonds, Korkus and even Balahis [217]might become Banjaras, but this does not happen now, because the castehas lost its occupation of carrying goods, and there is therefore noinducement to enter it. In former times they were much addicted tokidnapping children--these were whipped up or enticed away whenever anopportunity presented itself during their expeditions. The childrenwere first put into the _gonis_ or grain bags of the bullocks and socarried for a few days, being made over at each halt to the care ofa woman, who would pop the child back into its bag if any strangerpassed by the encampment. The tongues of boys were sometimes slit orbranded with hot gold, this last being the ceremony of initiation intothe caste still used in Nimar. Girls, if they were as old as seven, were sometimes disfigured for fear of recognition, and for thispurpose the juice of the marking-nut [218] tree would be smearedon one side of the face, which burned into the skin and entirelyaltered the appearance. Such children were known as Jangar. Girlswould be used as concubines and servants of the married wife, andboys would also be employed as servants. Jangar boys would be marriedto Jangar girls, both remaining in their condition of servitude. Butsometimes the more enterprising of them would abscond and settle downin a village. The rule was that for seven generations the childrenof Jangars or slaves continued in that condition, after which theywere recognised as proper Banjaras. The Jangar could not draw insmoke through the stem of the huqqa when it was passed round in theassembly, but must take off the stem and inhale from the bowl. TheJangar also could not eat off the bell-metal plates of his master, because these were liable to pollution, but must use brass plates. Atone time the Banjaras conducted a regular traffic in female slavesbetween Gujarat and Central India, selling in each country the girlswhom they had kidnapped in the other. [219]

18. Dress. 

Up to twelve years of age a Charan girl only wears a skirt with ashoulder-cloth tucked into the waist and carried over the left armand the head. After this she may have anklets and bangles on theforearm and a breast-cloth. But until she is married she may nothave the _wankri_ or curved anklet, which marks that estate, nor wearbone or ivory bangles on the upper arm. [220] When she is ten yearsold a Labhana girl is given two small bundles containing a nut, somecowries and rice, which are knotted to two corners of the _dupatta_or shoulder-cloth and hung over the shoulder, one in front and onebehind. This denotes maidenhood. The bundles are considered sacred, are always knotted to the shoulder-cloth in wear, and are only removedto be tucked into the waist at the girl's marriage, where they areworn till death. These bundles alone distinguish the Labhana fromthe Mathuria woman. Women often have their hair hanging down besidethe face in front and woven behind with silver thread into a plaitdown the back. This is known as Anthi, and has a number of cowries atthe end. They have large bell-shaped ornaments of silver tied overthe head and hanging down behind the ears, the hollow part of theornament being stuffed with sheep's wool dyed red; and to these areattached little bells, while the anklets on the feet are also hollowand contain little stones or balls, which tinkle as they move. Theyhave skirts, and separate short cloths drawn across the shouldersaccording to the northern fashion, usually red or green in colour, and along the skirt-borders double lines of cowries are sewn. Theirbreast-cloths are profusely ornamented with needle-work embroidery andsmall pieces of glass sewn into them, and are tied behind with cords ofmany colours whose ends are decorated with cowries and beads. Stringsof beads, ten to twenty thick, threaded on horse-hair, are worn roundthe neck. Their favourite ornaments are cowries, [221] and they havethese on their dress, in their houses and on the trappings of theirbullocks. On the arms they have ten or twelve bangles of ivory, or in default of this lac, horn or cocoanut-shell. Mr. Ball statesthat he was "at once struck by the peculiar costumes and brilliantclothing of these Indian gipsies. They recalled to my mind theappearance of the gipsies of the Lower Danube and Wallachia. " [222]The most distinctive ornament of a Banjara married woman is, however, a small stick about 6 inches long made of the wood of the _khair_ orcatechu. In Nimar this is given to a woman by her husband at marriage, and she wears it afterwards placed upright on the top of the head, the hair being wound round it and the head-cloth draped over it ina graceful fashion. Widows leave it off, but on remarriage adopt itagain. The stick is known as _chunda_ by the Banjaras, but outsiderscall it _singh_ or horn. In Yeotmal, instead of one, the women havetwo little sticks fixed upright in the hair. The rank of the woman issaid to be shown by the angle at which she wears this horn. [223] Thedress of the men presents no features of special interest. In Nimarthey usually have a necklace of coral beads, and some of them carry, slung on a thread round the neck, a tin tooth-pick and ear-scraper, while a small mirror and comb are kept in the head-cloth so thattheir toilet can be performed anywhere. 

Mr. Cumberlege [224] notes that in former times all Charan Banjaraswhen carrying grain for an army placed a twig of some tree, the sacred_nim_ [225] when available, in their turban to show that they wereon the war-path; and that they would do the same now if they hadoccasion to fight to the death on any social matter or under anysupposed grievance. 

19. Social customs. 

The Banjaras eat all kinds of meat, including fowls and pork, and drinkliquor. But the Mathurias abstain from both flesh and liquor. MajorGunthorpe states that the Banjaras are accustomed to drink beforesetting out for a dacoity or robbery and, as they smoke after drinking, the remains of leaf-pipes lying about the scene of action may indicatetheir handiwork. They rank below the cultivating castes, and Brahmanswill not take water to drink from them. When engaged in the carryingtrade, they usually lived in _kuris_ or hamlets attached to suchregular villages as had considerable tracts of waste land belongingto them. When the _tanda_ or caravan started on its long carryingtrips, the young men and some of the women went with it with theworking bullocks, while the old men and the remainder of the womenand children remained to tend the breeding cattle in the hamlet. InNimar they generally rented a little land in the village to givethem a footing, and paid also a carrying fee on the number of cattlepresent. Their spare time was constantly occupied in the manufactureof hempen twine and sacking, which was much superior to that obtainablein towns. Even in Captain Forsyth's [226] time (1866) the constructionof railways and roads had seriously interfered with the Banjaras'calling, and they had perforce taken to agriculture. Many of themhave settled in the new ryotwari villages in Nimar as Governmenttenants. They still grow _tilli_ [227] in preference to other crops, because this oilseed can be raised without much labour or skill, and during their former nomadic life they were accustomed to sow iton any poor strip of land which they might rent for a season. Someof them also are accustomed to leave a part of their holding untilledin memory of their former and more prosperous life. In many villagesthey have not yet built proper houses, but continue to live in mudhuts thatched with grass. They consider it unlucky to inhabit a housewith a cement or tiled roof; this being no doubt a superstition arisingfrom their camp life. Their houses must also be built so that the mainbeams do not cross, that is, the main beam of a house must never bein such a position that if projected it would cut another main beam;but the beams may be parallel. The same rule probably governed thearrangement of tents in their camps. In Nimar they prefer to live atsome distance from water, probably that is of a tank or river; and thisseems to be a survival of a usage mentioned by the Abbé Dubois: [228]"Among other curious customs of this odious caste is one that obligesthem to drink no water which is not drawn from springs or wells. Thewater from rivers and tanks being thus forbidden, they are obligedin case of necessity to dig a little hole by the side of a tank orriver and take the water filtering through, which, by this means, issupposed to become spring water. " It is possible that this rule mayhave had its origin in a sanitary precaution. Colonel Sleeman notes[229] that the Banjaras on their carrying trips preferred by-pathsthrough jungles to the high roads along cultivated plains, as grass, wood and water were more abundant along such paths; and when they couldnot avoid the high roads, they commonly encamped as far as they couldfrom villages and towns, and upon the banks of rivers and streams, with the same object of obtaining a sufficient supply of grass, wood and water. Now it is well known that the decaying vegetation inthese hill streams renders the water noxious and highly productive ofmalaria. And it seems possible that the perception of this fact ledthe Banjaras to dig shallow wells by the sides of the streams fortheir drinking-water, so that the supply thus obtained might be insome degree filtered by percolation through the intervening soil andfreed from its vegetable germs. And the custom may have grown intoa taboo, its underlying reason being unknown to the bulk of them, and be still practised, though no longer necessary when they do nottravel. If this explanation be correct it would be an interestingconclusion that the Banjaras anticipated so far as they were able thesanitary precaution by which our soldiers are supplied with portablefilters when on the march. 

20. The Naik or headman. Banjara dogs. 

Each _kuri_ (hamlet) or _tanda_ (caravan) had a chief or leader withthe designation of Naik, a Telugu word meaning 'lord' or 'master. ' Theoffice of Naik [230] was only partly hereditary, and the choice alsodepended on ability. The Naik had authority to decide all disputes inthe community, and the only appeal from him lay to the representativesof Bhangi and Jhangi Naik's families at Narsi and Poona, and to BurthiaNaik's successors in the Telugu country. As already seen, the Naikreceived two shares if he participated in a robbery or other crime, and a fee on the remarriage of a widow outside her family and onthe discovery of a witch. Another matter in which he was speciallyinterested was pig-sticking. The Banjaras have a particular breedof dogs, and with these they were accustomed to hunt wild pig onfoot, carrying spears. When a pig was killed, the head was cut offand presented to the Naik or headman, and if any man was injuredor gored by the pig in the hunt, the Naik kept and fed him withoutcharge until he recovered. 

The following notice of the Banjaras and their dogs may be reproduced:[231] "They are brave and have the reputation of great independence, which I am not disposed to allow to them. The Wanjari indeed isinsolent on the road, and will drive his bullocks up against a Sahibor any one else; but at any disadvantage he is abject enough. Iremember one who rather enjoyed seeing his dogs attack me, whom hesupposed alone and unarmed, but the sight of a cocked pistol madehim very quick in calling them off, and very humble in praying fortheir lives, which I spared less for his entreaties than because theywere really noble animals. The Wanjaris are famous for their dogs, of which there are three breeds. The first is a large, smooth dog, generally black, sometimes fawn-coloured, with a square heavy head, most resembling the Danish boarhound. This is the true Wanjaridog. The second is also a large, square-headed dog, but shaggy, more like a great underbred spaniel than anything else. The thirdis an almost tailless greyhound, of the type known all over India bythe various names of Lat, Polygar, Rampuri, etc. They all run both bysight and scent, and with their help the Wanjaris kill a good deal ofgame, chiefly pigs; but I think they usually keep clear of the oldfighting boars. Besides sport and their legitimate occupations theWanjaris seldom stickle at supplementing their resources by theft, especially of cattle; and they are more than suspected of infanticide. "

The Banjaras are credited with great affection for their dogs, andthe following legend is told about one of them: Once upon a time aBanjara, who had a faithful dog, took a loan from a Bania (moneylender)and pledged his dog with him as security for payment. And some timeafterwards, while the dog was with the moneylender, a theft wascommitted in his house, and the dog followed the thieves and saw themthrow the property into a tank. When they went away the dog broughtthe Bania to the tank and he found his property. He was therefore verypleased with the dog and wrote a letter to his master, saying that theloan was repaid, and tied it round his neck and said to him, 'Now, go back to your master. ' So the dog started back, but on his way hemet his master, the Banjara, coming to the Bania with the money forthe repayment of the loan. And when the Banjara saw the dog he wasangry with him, not seeing the letter, and thinking he had run away, and said to him, 'Why did you come, betraying your trust?' and hekilled the dog in a rage. And after killing him he found the letterand was very grieved, so he built a temple to the dog's memory, whichis called the Kukurra Mandhi. And in the temple is the image of adog. This temple is in the Drug District, five miles from Balod. Asimilar story is told of the temple of Kukurra Math in Mandla. 

21. Criminal tendencies of the caste. 

The following notice of Banjara criminals is abstracted from MajorGunthorpe's interesting account: [232] "In the palmy days of the tribedacoities were undertaken on the most extensive scale. Gangs of fiftyto a hundred and fifty well-armed men would go long distances fromtheir _tandas_ or encampments for the purpose of attacking housesin villages, or treasure-parties or wealthy travellers on the highroads. The more intimate knowledge which the police have obtainedconcerning the habits of this race, and the detection and punishmentof many criminals through approvers, have aided in stopping the heavyclass of dacoities formerly prevalent, and their operations are now ona much smaller scale. In British territory arms are scarcely carried, but each man has a good stout stick (_gedi_), the bark of which ispeeled off so as to make it look whitish and fresh. The attack isgenerally commenced by stone-throwing and then a rush is made, thesticks being freely used and the victims almost invariably struckabout the head or face. While plundering, Hindustani is sometimesspoken, but as a rule they never utter a word, but grunt signals toone another. Their loin-cloths are braced up, nothing is worn on theupper part of the body, and their faces are generally muffled. In housedacoities men are posted at different corners of streets, each witha supply of well-chosen round stones to keep off any people comingto the rescue. Banjaras are very expert cattle-lifters, sometimestaking as many as a hundred head or even more at a time. This kindof robbery is usually practised in hilly or forest country where thecattle are sent to graze. Secreting themselves they watch for theherdsman to have his usual midday doze and for the cattle to strayto a little distance. As many as possible are then driven off to agreat distance and secreted in ravines and woods. If questioned theyanswer that the animals belong to landowners and have been given intotheir charge to graze, and as this is done every day the questionerthinks nothing more of it. After a time the cattle are quietly soldto individual purchasers or taken to markets at a distance. "

22. Their virtues. 

The Banjaras, however, are far from being wholly criminal, and thenumber who have adopted an honest mode of livelihood is continuallyon the increase. Some allowance must be made for their having beendeprived of their former calling by the cessation of the continualwars which distracted India under native rule, and the extensionof roads and railways which has rendered their mode of transportby pack-bullocks almost entirely obsolete. At one time practicallyall the grain exported from Chhattisgarh was carried by them. In1881 Mr. Kitts noted that the number of Banjaras convicted in theBerar criminal courts was lower in proportion to the strength ofthe caste than that of Muhammadans, Brahmans, Koshtis or Sunars, [233] though the offences committed by them were usually moreheinous. Colonel Mackenzie had quite a favourable opinion of them:"A Banjara who can read and write is unknown. But their memories, from cultivation, are marvellous and very retentive. They carry intheir heads, without slip or mistake, the most varied and complicatedtransactions and the share of each in such, striking a debtor andcreditor account as accurately as the best-kept ledger, while theirhistory and songs are all learnt by heart and transmitted orally fromgeneration to generation. On the whole, and taken rightly in theirclannish nature, their virtues preponderate over their vices. In themain they are truthful and very brave, be it in war or the chase, andonce gained over are faithful and devoted adherents. With the prideof high descent and with the right that might gives in unsettled andtroublous times, these Banjaras habitually lord it over and contemn thesettled inhabitants of the plains. And now not having foreseen theirown fate, or at least not timely having read the warnings given by ayearly diminishing occupation, which slowly has taken their bread away, it is a bitter pill for them to sink into the ryot class or, oftenerstill, under stern necessity to become the ryot's servant. But theyare settling to their fate, and the time must come when all theirpeculiar distinctive marks and traditions will be forgotten. "

Barai

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Barai, [234] Tamboli, Pansari. _--The caste of growers and sellers ofthe betel-vine leaf. The three terms are used indifferently for thecaste in the Central Provinces, although some shades of variation inthe meaning can be detected even here--Barai signifying especially onewho grows the betel-vine, and Tamboli the seller of the prepared leaf;while Pansari, though its etymological meaning is also a dealer in_pan_ or betel-vine leaves, is used rather in the general sense ofa druggist or grocer, and is apparently applied to the Barai castebecause its members commonly follow this occupation. In Bengal, however, Barai and Tamboli are distinct castes, the occupationsof growing and selling the betel-leaf being there separatelypractised. And they have been shown as different castes in theIndia Census Tables of 1901, though it is perhaps doubtful whetherthe distinction holds good in northern India. [235] In the CentralProvinces and Berar the Barais numbered nearly 60, 000 persons in1911. They reside principally in the Amraoti, Buldana, Nagpur, Wardha, Saugor and Jubbulpore Districts. The betel-vine is grown principallyin the northern Districts of Saugor, Damoh and Jubbulpore and inthose of Berar and the Nagpur plain. It is noticeable also that thegrowers and sellers of the betel-vine numbered only 14, 000 in 1911out of 33, 000 actual workers of the Barai caste; so that the majorityof them are now employed in ordinary agriculture, field-labour andother avocations. No very probable derivation has been obtained forthe word Barai, unless it comes from _bari_, a hedge or enclosure, and simply means 'gardener. ' Another derivation is from _barana, _to avert hailstorms, a calling which they still practise in northernIndia. _Pan_, from the Sanskrit _parna_ (leaf), is _the_ leaf _parexcellence_. Owing to the fact that they produce what is perhaps themost esteemed luxury in the diet of the higher classes of nativesociety, the Barais occupy a fairly good social position, and onelegend gives them a Brahman ancestry. This is to the effect that thefirst Barai was a Brahman whom God detected in a flagrant case oflying to his brother. His sacred thread was confiscated and beingplanted in the ground grew up into the first betel-vine, which hewas set to tend. Another story of the origin of the vine is givenlater in this article. In the Central Provinces its cultivation hasprobably only flourished to any appreciable extent for a period ofabout three centuries, and the Barai caste would appear to be mainlya functional one, made up of a number of immigrants from northernIndia and of recruits from different classes of the population, including a large proportion of the non-Aryan element. 

2. Caste subdivisions. 

The following endogamous divisions of the caste have been reported:Chaurasia, so called from the Chaurasi pargana of the MirzapurDistrict; Panagaria from Panagar in Jubbulpore; Mahobia from Mahobain Hamirpur; Jaiswar from the town of Jais in the Rai Bareli Districtof the United Provinces; Gangapari, coming from the further side ofthe Ganges; and Pardeshi or Deshwari, foreigners. The above divisionsall have territorial names, and these show that a large proportionof the caste have come from northern India, the different batchesof immigrants forming separate endogamous groups on their arrivalhere. Other subcastes are the Dudh Barais, from _dudh_, milk;the Kuman, said to be Kunbis who have adopted this occupation andbecome Barais; the Jharia and Kosaria, the oldest or jungly Barais, and those who live in Chhattisgarh; the Purania or old Barais; theKumhardhang, who are said to be the descendants of a potter on whosewheel a betel-vine grew; and the Lahuri Sen, who are a subcaste formedof the descendants of irregular unions. None of the other subcasteswill take food from these last, and the name is locally derived from_lahuri_, lower, and _sen_ or _shreni_, class. The caste is alsodivided into a large number of exogamous groups or septs which maybe classified according to their names as territorial, titular andtotemistic. Examples of territorial names are: Kanaujia of Kanauj, Burhanpuria of Burhanpur, Chitoria of Chitor in Rajputana, Deobijhathe name of a village in Chhattisgarh, and Kharondiha from Kharondor Kalahandi State. These names must apparently have been adopted atrandom when a family either settled in one of these places or removedfrom it to another part of the country. Examples of titular namesof groups are: Pandit (priest), Bhandari (store-keeper), Patharha(hail-averter), Batkaphor (pot-breaker), Bhulya (the forgetful one), Gujar (a caste), Gahoi (a caste), and so on. While the following aretotemistic groups: Katara (dagger), Kulha (jackal), Bandrele (monkey), Chikhalkar (from _chikhal_, mud), Richharia (bear), and others. Wherethe group is named after another caste it probably indicates that aman of that caste became a Barai and founded a family; while the factthat some groups are totemistic shows that a section of the casteis recruited from the indigenous tribes. The large variety of namesdiscloses the diverse elements of which the caste is made up. 

3. Marriage

Marriage within the _gotra_ or exogamous group and within threedegrees of relationship between persons connected through femalesis prohibited. Girls are usually wedded before adolescence, butno stigma attaches to the family if they remain single beyond thisperiod. If a girl is seduced by a man of the caste she is married tohim by the _pat_, a simple ceremony used for widows. In the southernDistricts a barber cuts off a lock of her hair on the banks of atank or river by way of penalty, and a fast is also imposed on her, while the caste-fellows exact a meal from her family. If she has anillegitimate child, it is given away to somebody else, if possible. Agirl going wrong with an outsider is expelled from the caste. 

Polygamy is permitted and no stigma attaches to the taking of a secondwife, though it is rarely done except for special family reasons. Amongthe Maratha Barais the bride and bridegroom must walk five timesround the marriage altar and then worship the stone slab and rollerused for pounding spices. This seems to show that the trade of thePansari or druggist is recognised as being a proper avocation of theBarai. They subsequently have to worship the potter's wheel. After thewedding the bride, if she is a child, goes as usual to her husband'shouse for a few days. In Chhattisgarh she is accompanied by a fewrelations, the party being known as Chauthia, and during her stay inher husband's house the bride is made to sleep on the ground. Widowmarriage is permitted, and the ceremony is conducted according to theusage of the locality. In Betul the relatives of the widow take thesecond husband before Maroti's shrine, where he offers a nut and somebetel-leaf. He is then taken to the malguzar's house and presentsto him Rs. 1-4-0, a cocoanut and some betel-vine leaf as the priceof his assent to the marriage. If there is a Deshmukh [236] of thevillage, a cocoanut and betel-leaf are also given to him. The nutoffered to Maroti represents the deceased husband's spirit, and issubsequently placed on a plank and kicked off by the new bridegroomin token of his usurping the other's place, and finally buried tolay the spirit. The property of the first husband descends to hischildren, and failing them his brother's children or collateral heirstake it before the widow. A bachelor espousing a widow must first gothrough the ceremony of marriage with a swallow-wort plant. When awidower marries a girl a silver impression representing the deceasedfirst wife is made and worshipped daily with the family gods. Divorceis permitted on sufficient grounds at the instance of either party, being effected before the caste committee or _panchayat_. If a husbanddivorces his wife merely on account of bad temper, he must maintain herso long as she remains unmarried and continues to lead a moral life. 

4. Religion and social status. 

The Barais especially venerate the Nag or cobra and observe thefestival of Nag-Panchmi (Cobra's fifth), in connection with whichthe following story is related. Formerly there was no betel-vine onthe earth. But when the five Pandava brothers celebrated the greathorse sacrifice after their victory at Hastinapur, they wanted some, and so messengers were sent down below the earth to the residence ofthe queen of the serpents, in order to try and obtain it. Basuki, the queen of the serpents, obligingly cut off the top joint of herlittle finger and gave it to the messengers. This was brought upand sown on the earth, and _pan_ creepers grew out of the joint. Forthis reason the betel-vine has no blossoms or seeds, but the jointsof the creepers are cut off and sown, when they sprout afresh; andthe betel-vine is called Nagbel or the serpent-creeper. On the dayof Nag-Panchmi the Barais go to the _bareja_ with flowers, cocoanutsand other offerings, and worship a stone which is placed in it andwhich represents the Nag or cobra. A goat or sheep is sacrificed andthey return home, no leaf of the _pan_ garden being touched on thatday. A cup of milk is also left, in the belief that a cobra will comeout of the _pan_ garden and drink it. The Barais say that members oftheir caste are never bitten by cobras, though many of these snakesfrequent the gardens on account of the moist coolness and shadewhich they afford. The Agarwala Banias, from whom the Barais willtake food cooked without water, have also a legend of descent froma Naga or snake princess. 'Our mother's house is of the race of thesnake, ' say the Agarwals of Bihar. [237] The caste usually burn thedead, with the exception of children and persons dying of leprosyor snake-bite, whose bodies are buried. Mourning is observed forten days in the case of adults and for three days for children. InChhattisgarh if any portion of the corpse remains unburnt on theday following the cremation, the relatives are penalised to theextent of an extra feast to the caste-fellows. Children are namedon the sixth or twelfth day after birth either by a Brahman or bythe women of the household. Two names are given, one for ceremonialand the other for ordinary use. When a Brahman is engaged he givesseven names for a boy and five for a girl, and the parents selectone out of these. The Barais do not admit outsiders into the caste, and employ Brahmans for religious and ceremonial purposes. They areallowed to eat the flesh of clean animals, but very rarely do so, and they abstain from liquor. Brahmans will take sweets and waterfrom them, and they occupy a fairly good social position on accountof the important nature of their occupation. 

5. Occupation. 

"It has been mentioned, " says Sir H. Risley, [238] "that the gardenis regarded as almost sacred, and the superstitious practices invogue resemble those of the silk-worm breeder. The Barui will notenter it until he has bathed and washed his clothes. Animals foundinside are driven out, while women ceremonially unclean dare not enterwithin the gate. A Brahman never sets foot inside, and old men have aprejudice against entering it. It has, however, been known to be usedfor assignations. " The betel-vine is the leaf of _Piper betel_ L. , the word being derived from the Malayalam _vettila_, 'a plain leaf, 'and coming to us through the Portuguese _betre_ and _betle_. Theleaf is called _pan_, and is eaten with the nut of _Areca catechu_, called in Hindi _supari_. The vine needs careful cultivation, thegardens having to be covered to keep off the heat of the sun, whileliberal treatment with manure and irrigation is needed. The joints ofthe creepers are planted in February, and begin to supply leaves inabout five months' time. When the first creepers are stripped aftera period of nearly a year, they are cut off and fresh ones appear, the plants being exhausted within a period of about two years afterthe first sowing. A garden may cover from half an acre to an acreof land, and belongs to a number of growers, who act in partnership, each owning so many lines of vines. The plain leaves are sold at from2 annas to 4 annas a hundred, or a higher rate when they are out ofseason. Damoh, Ramtek and Bilahri are three of the best-known centresof cultivation in the Central Provinces. The Bilahri leaf is describedin the _Ain-i-Akbari_ as follows: "The leaf called Bilahri is white andshining, and does not make the tongue harsh and hard. It tastes bestof all kinds. After it has been taken away from the creeper, it turnswhite with some care after a month, or even after twenty days, whengreater efforts are made. " [239] For retail sale _bidas_ are prepared, consisting of a rolled betel-leaf containing areca-nut, catechu andlime, and fastened with a clove. Musk and cardamoms are sometimesadded. Tobacco should be smoked after eating a _bida_ according tothe saying, 'Service without a patron, a young man without a shield, and betel without tobacco are alike savourless. ' _Bidas_ are soldat from two to four for a pice (farthing). Women of the caste oftenretail them, and as many are good-looking they secure more custom;they are also said to have an indifferent reputation. Early in themorning, when they open their shops, they burn some incense beforethe bamboo basket in which the leaves are kept, to propitiate Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth. 

Barhai

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Strength and local distribution. _ 2. _Internal structure. _ 3. _Marriage customs. _ 4. _Religion. _ 5. _Social position. _ 6. _Occupation. _

1. Strength and local distribution. 

_Barhai, Sutar, Kharadi, Mistri. _--The occupational caste ofcarpenters. The Barhais numbered nearly 110, 000 persons in the CentralProvinces and Berar in 1911, or about 1 in 150 persons. The casteis most numerous in Districts with large towns, and few carpentersare to be found in villages except in the richer and more advancedDistricts. Hitherto such woodwork as the villagers wanted foragriculture has been made by the Lohar or blacksmith, while thecountry cots, the only wooden article of furniture in their houses, could be fashioned by their own hands or by the Gond woodcutter. In theMandla District the Barhai caste counts only 300 persons, and aboutthe same in Balaghat, in Drug only 47 persons, and in the fourteenChhattisgarh Feudatory States, with a population of more than twomillions, only some 800 persons. The name Barhai is said to be fromthe Sanskrit Vardhika and the root _vardh_, to cut. Sutar is a commonname of the caste in the Maratha Districts, and is from Sutra-kara, one who works by string, or a maker of string. The allusion may be tothe Barhai's use of string in planing or measuring timber, or it maypossibly indicate a transfer of occupation, the Sutars having firstbeen mainly string-makers and afterwards abandoned this calling forthat of the carpenter. The first wooden implements and articles offurniture may have been held together by string before nails came intouse. Kharadi is literally a turner, one who turns woodwork on a lathe, from _kharat_, a lathe. Mistri, a corruption of the English Mister, is an honorific title for master carpenters. 

2. Internal structure. 

The comparatively recent growth of the caste in these Provinces isshown by its subdivisions. The principal subcastes of the HindustaniDistricts are the Pardeshi or foreigners, immigrants from northernIndia, and the Purbia or eastern, coming from Oudh; other subcastes arethe Sri Gaur Malas or immigrants from Malwa, the Beradi from Berar, and the Mahure from Hyderabad. We find also subcastes of Jat andTeli Barhais, consisting of Jats and Telis (oil-pressers) who havetaken to carpentering. Two other caste-groups, the Chamar Barhais andGondi Barhais, are returned, but these are not at present included inthe Barhai caste, and consist merely of Chamars and Gonds who workas carpenters but remain in their own castes. In the course of somegenerations, however, if the cohesive social force of the caste systemcontinues unabated, these groups may probably find admission intothe Barhai caste. Colonel Tod notes that the progeny of one Makur, a prince of the Jadon Rajput house of Jaisalmer, became carpenters, and were known centuries after as Makur Sutars. They were apparentlyconsidered illegitimate, as he states: "Illegitimate children cannever overcome this natural defect among the Rajputs. Thus we findamong all classes of artisans in India some of royal but spuriousdescent. " [240] The internal structure of the caste seems thereforeto indicate that it is largely of foreign origin and to a certaindegree of recent formation in these Provinces. 

3. Marriage customs. 

The caste are also divided into exogamous septs named aftervillages. In some localities it is said that they have no septs, but only surnames, and that people of the same surname cannotintermarry. Well-to-do persons marry their daughters before pubertyand others when they can afford the expense of the ceremony. Brahmanpriests are employed at weddings, though on other occasions theirservices are occasionally dispensed with. The wedding ceremony isof the type prevalent in the locality. When the wedding processionreaches the bride's village it halts near the temple of Maroti orHanuman. Among the Panchal Barhais the bridegroom does not weara marriage crown but ties a bunch of flowers to his turban. Thebridegroom's party is entertained for five days. Divorce and theremarriage of widows are permitted. In most localities it is said thata widow is forbidden to marry her first husband's younger as well ashis elder brother. Among the Pardeshi Barhais of Betul if a bachelordesires to marry a widow he must first go through the ceremony witha branch or twig of the _gular_ tree. [241]

4. Religion. 

The caste worship Viswakarma, the celestial architect, and veneratetheir trade implements on the Dasahra festival. They consider thesight of a mongoose and of a light-grey pigeon or dove as luckyomens. They burn the dead and throw the ashes into a river or tank, employing a Maha-Brahman to receive the gifts for the dead. 

5. Social position. 

In social status the Barhais rank with the higher artisancastes. Brahmans take water from them in some localities, perhapsmore especially in towns. In Betul for instance Hindustani Brahmansdo not accept water from the rural Barhais. In Damoh where both theBarhai and Lohar are village menials, their status is said to be thesame, and Brahmans do not take water from Lohars. Mr. Nesfield saysthat the Barhai is a village servant and ranks with the Kurmi, withwhom his interests are so closely allied. But there seems no specialreason why the interests of the carpenter should be more closelyallied with the cultivator than those of any other village menial, and it may be offered as a surmise that carpentering as a distincttrade is of comparatively late origin, and was adopted by Kurmis, towhich fact the connection noticed by Mr. Nesfield might be attributed;hence the position of the Barhai among the castes from whom a Brahmanwill take water. In some localities well-to-do members of the castehave begun to wear the sacred thread. 

6. Occupation. 

In the northern Districts and the cotton tract the Barhai works as avillage menial. He makes and mends the plough and harrow (_bakhar_)and other wooden implements of agriculture, and makes new ones whensupplied with the wood. In Wardha he receives an annual contributionof 100 lbs. Of grain from each cultivator. In Betul he gets 67 lbs. Ofgrain and other perquisites for each plough of four bullocks. Formaking carts and building or repairing houses he must be separatelypaid. At weddings the Barhai often supplies the sacred marriage-postand is given from four annas to a rupee. At the Diwali festival heprepares a wooden peg about six inches long, and drives it into thecultivator's house inside the threshold, and receives half a poundto a pound of grain. 

In cities the carpenters are rapidly acquiring an increased degreeof skill as the demand for a better class of houses and furniturebecomes continually greater and more extensive. The carpentershave been taught to make English furniture by such institutions asthe Friends' Mission of Hoshangabad and other missionaries; and aGovernment technical school has now been opened at Nagpur, in whichboys from all over the Province are trained in the profession. Verylittle wood-carving with any pretensions to excellence has hithertobeen done in the Central Provinces, but the Jain temples at Saugor andKhurai contain some fair woodwork. A good carpenter in towns can earnfrom 12 annas to Rs. 1-8 a day, and both his earnings and prospectshave greatly improved within recent years. Sherring remarks of theBarhais: "As artisans they exhibit little or no inventive powers: butin imitating the workmanship of others they are perhaps unsurpassedin the whole world. They are equally clever in working from designsand models. " [242]

Bari

_Bari. _--A caste of household servants and makers of leaf-plates, belonging to northern India. The Baris numbered 1200 persons inthe Central Provinces in 1911, residing mainly in Jubbulpore andMandla. Sir H. Risley remarks of the caste: [243] "Mr. Nesfieldregards the Bari as merely an offshoot from a semi-savage tribeknown as Banmanush and Musahar. He is said still to associate withthem at times, and if the demand for leaf-plates and cups, owing tosome temporary cause, such as a local fair or an unusual multitudeof marriages, happens to become larger than he can at once supply, he gets them secretly made by his ruder kinsfolk and retails them ata higher rate, passing them off as his own production. The strictestBrahmans, those at least who aspire to imitate the self-denying lifeof the ancient Indian hermit, never eat off any other plates than thosemade of leaves. " "If the above view is correct, " Sir H. Risley remarks, "the Baris are a branch of a non-Aryan tribe who have been given afairly respectable position in the social system in consequence of thedemand for leaf-plates, which are largely used by the highest as wellas the lowest castes. Instances of this sort, in which a non-Aryanor mixed group is promoted on grounds of necessity or convenience toa higher status than their antecedents would entitle them to claim, are not unknown in other castes, and must have occurred frequentlyin outlying parts of the country, where the Aryan settlements werescanty and imperfectly supplied with the social apparatus demanded bythe theory of ceremonial purity. " There is no reason why the originof the Bari from the Banmanush (wild man of the woods) or Musahar(mouse-eater), a forest tribe, as suggested by Mr. Nesfield fromhis observation of their mutual connection, should be questioned. Themaking of leaf-plates is an avocation which may be considered naturallyto pertain to the tribes frequenting jungles from which the leaves aregathered; and in the Central Provinces, though in the north the Naior barber ostensibly supplies the leaf-plates, probably buying theleaves and getting them made up by Gonds and others, in the MarathaDistricts the Gond himself does so, and many Gonds make their livingby this trade. The people of the Maratha country are apparently lessstrict than those of northern India, and do not object to eat offplates avowedly the handiwork of Gonds. The fact that the Bari hasbeen raised to the position of a pure caste, so that Brahmans will takewater from his hands, is one among several instances of this elevationof the rank of the serving castes for purposes of convenience. Thecaste themselves have the following legend of their origin: Once upona time Parmeshwar [244] was offering rice milk to the spirits of hisancestors. In the course of this ceremony the performer has to presenta gift known as Vikraya Dan, which cannot be accepted by others withoutloss of position. Parmeshwar offered the gift to various Brahmans, but they all refused it. So he made a man of clay, and blew upon theimage and gave it life, and the god then asked the man whom he hadcreated to accept the gift which the Brahmans had refused. This man, who was the first Bari, agreed on condition that all men should drinkwith him and recognise his purity of caste. Parmeshwar then told himto bring water in a cup, and drank of it in the presence of all thecastes. And in consequence of this all the Hindus will take waterfrom the hands of a Bari. They also say that their first ancestor wasnamed Sundar on account of his personal beauty; but if so, he failedto bequeath this quality to his descendants. The proper avocationof the Baris is, as already stated, the manufacture of the leaf-cupsand plates used by all Hindus at festivals. In the Central Provincesthese are made from the large leaves of the _mahul_ creeper (_BauhiniaVahlii_), or from the _palas_ (_Butea frondosa_). The caste also act aspersonal servants, handing round water, lighting and carrying torchesat marriages and other entertainments and on journeys, and performingother functions. Some of them have taken to agriculture. Their womenact as maids to high-caste Hindu ladies, and as they are always aboutthe zenana, are liable to lose their virtue. A curious custom prevailsin Marwar on the birth of an heir to the throne. An impression of thechild's foot is taken by a Bari on cloth covered with saffron, andis exhibited to the native chiefs, who make him rich presents. [245]The Baris have the reputation of great fidelity to their employers, anda saying about them is, 'The Bari will die fighting for his master. '

Basdewa

_Basdewa, [246] Wasudeo, Harbola, Kaparia, Jaga, Kapdi. _--A wanderingbeggar caste of mixed origin, who also call themselves Sanadhya orSanaurhia Brahmans. The Basdewas trace their origin to Wasudeo, the father of Krishna, and the term Basdewa is a corruption ofWasudeo or Wasudeva. Kaparia is the name they bear in the Antervedor country between the Ganges and Jumna, whence they claim to havecome. Kaparia has been derived from _kapra_, cloth, owing to the customof the Basdewas of having several dresses, which they change rapidlylike the Bahrupia, making themselves up in different characters as ashow. Harbola is an occupational term, applied to a class of Basdewaswho climb trees in the early morning and thence vociferate praisesof the deity in a loud voice. The name is derived from _Har_, God, and _bolna_, to speak. As the Harbolas wake people up in the morningthey are also called Jaga or Awakener. The number of Basdewas inthe Central Provinces and Berar in 1911 was 2500, and they are foundprincipally in the northern Districts and in Chhattisgarh. They haveseveral territorial subcastes, as Gangaputri or those who dwell onthe banks of the Ganges; Khaltia or Deswari, those who belong tothe Central Provinces; Parauha, from _para_, a male buffalo calf, being the dealers in buffaloes; Harbola or those who climb trees andsing the praises of God; and Wasudeo, the dwellers in the MarathaDistricts who marry only among themselves. The names of the exogamousdivisions are very varied, some being taken from Brahman _gotras_ andRajput septs, while others are the names of villages, or nicknames, or derived from animals and plants. It may be concluded from thesenames that the Basdewas are a mixed occupational group recruitedfrom high and low castes, though they themselves say that they donot admit any outsiders except Brahmans into the community. In Bombay[247] the Wasudevas have a special connection with Kumhars or potters, whom they address by the term of _kaka_ or paternal uncle, and at whosehouses they lodge on their travels, presenting their host with the twohalves of a cocoanut. The caste do not observe celibacy. A price ofRs. 25 has usually to be given for a bride, and a Brahman is employedto perform the ceremony. At the conclusion of this the Brahman investsthe bridegroom with a sacred thread, which he thereafter continues towear. Widow marriage is permitted, and widows are commonly married towidowers. Divorce is also permitted. When a man's wife dies he shaveshis moustache and beard, if any, in mourning and a father likewisefor a daughter-in-law; this is somewhat peculiar, as other Hindus donot shave the moustache for a wife or daughter-in-law. The Basdewasare wandering mendicants. In the Maratha Districts they wear a plumeof peacock's feathers, which they say was given to them as a badgeby Krishna. In Saugor and Damoh instead of this they carry during theperiod from Dasahra to the end of Magh or from September to January abrass vessel called _matuk_ bound on their heads. It is surmounted bya brass cone and adorned with mango-leaves, cowries and a piece of redcloth, and with figures of Rama and Lakshman. Their stock-in-trade forbegging consists of two _kartals_ or wooden clappers which are struckagainst each other; _ghungrus_ or jingling ornaments for the feet, worn when dancing; and a _paijna_ or kind of rattle, consisting oftwo semicircular iron wires bound at each end to a piece of wood withrings slung on to them; this is simply shaken in the hand and givesout a sound from the movement of the rings against the wires. Theyworship all these implements as well as their beggar's wallet onthe Janam-Ashtami or Krishna's birthday, the Dasahra, and the fullmoon of Magh (January). They rise early and beg only in the morningfrom about four till eight, and sing songs in praise of Sarwan andKaran. Sarwan was a son renowned for his filial piety; he maintainedand did service to his old blind parents to the end of their lives, much against the will of his wife, and was proof against all hermachinations to induce him to abandon them. Karan was a proverbiallycharitable king, and all his family had the same virtue. His wife gaveaway daily rice and pulse to those who required it, his daughter gavethem clothes, his son distributed cows as alms and his daughter-in-lawcocoanuts. The king himself gave only gold, and it is related of himthat he was accustomed to expend a maund and a quarter [248] weightof gold in alms-giving before he washed himself and paid his morningdevotions. Therefore the Basdewas sing that he who gives early in themorning acquires the merit of Karan; and their presence at this timeaffords the requisite opportunity to anybody who may be desirous ofemulating the king. At the end of every couplet they cry 'Jai Ganga'or 'Har Ganga, ' invoking the Ganges. 

The Harbolas have each a beat of a certain number of villages whichmust not be infringed by the others. Their method is to ascertain thename of some well-to-do person in the village. This done, they climba tree in the early morning before sunrise, and continue chantinghis praises in a loud voice until he is sufficiently flatteredby their eulogies or wearied by their importunity to throw down apresent of a few pice under the tree, which the Harbola, descending, appropriates. The Basdewas of the northern Districts are now commonlyengaged in the trade of buying and selling buffaloes. They take theyoung male calves from Saugor and Damoh to Chhattisgarh, and thereretail them at a profit for rice cultivation, driving them in largeherds along the road. For the capital which they have to borrow tomake their purchases, they are charged very high rates of interest. TheBasdewas have here a special veneration for the buffalo as the animalfrom which they make their livelihood, and they object strongly tothe calves being taken to be tied out as baits for tiger, refusing, it is said, to accept payment if the calf should be killed. Theirsocial status is not high, and none but the lowest castes will takefood from their hands. They eat flesh and drink liquor, but abstainfrom pork, fowls and beef. Some of the caste have given up animal food. 

Basor

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Numbers and distribution. _ 2. _Caste traditions. _ 3. _Subdivisions. _ 4. _Marriage. _ 5. _Religion and social status. _ 6. _Occupation. _

1. Numbers and distribution. 

_Basor, [249] Bansphor, Dhulia, Burud. _--The occupational caste ofbamboo-workers, the two first names being Hindi and the last theterm used in the Maratha Districts. The cognate Uriya caste is calledKandra and the Telugu one Medara. The Basors numbered 53, 000 personsin the Central Provinces and Berar in 1911. About half the totalnumber reside in the Saugor, Damoh and Jubbulpore Districts. The wordBasor is a corruption of Bansphor, 'a breaker of bamboos. ' Dhulia, from _dholi_, a drum, means a musician. 

2. Caste traditions. 

The caste trace their origin from Raja Benu or Venu who ruled atSingorgarh in Damoh. It is related of him that he was so pious thathe raised no taxes from his subjects, but earned his livelihood bymaking and selling bamboo fans. He could of course keep no army, but he knew magic, and when he broke his fan the army of the enemybroke up in unison. Venu is a Sanskrit word meaning bamboo. But amythological Sanskrit king called Vena is mentioned in the Puranas, from whom for his sins was born the first Nishada, the lowest of humanbeings, and Manu [250] states that the bamboo-worker is the issue ofa Nishada or Chandal father and a Vaideha [251] mother. So that thelocal story may be a corruption of the Brahmanical tradition. Anotherlegend relates that in the beginning there were no bamboos, andthe first Basor took the serpent which Siva wore round his neck andgoing to a hill planted it with its head in the ground. A bamboo atonce sprang up on the spot, and from this the Basor made the firstwinnowing fan. And the snake-like root of the bamboo, which no doubtsuggested the story to its composer, is now adduced in proof of it. 

3. Subdivisions. 

The Basors of the northern Districts are divided into a number ofsubcastes, the principal of which are: the Purania or Juthia, whoperhaps represent the oldest section, Purania being from _purana_ old;they are called Juthia because they eat the leavings of others; theBarmaiya or Malaiya, apparently a territorial group; the Deshwari orBundelkhandi who reside in the _desh_ or native place of Bundelkhand;the Gudha or Gurha, the name being derived by some from _guda_a pigsty; the Dumar or Dom Basors; the Dhubela, perhaps from theDhobi caste; and the Dharkar. Two or three of the above names appearto be those of other low castes from which the Basor caste may havebeen recruited, perhaps at times when a strong demand existed forbamboo-workers. The Buruds do not appear to be sufficiently numerousto have subcastes. But they include a few Telenga Buruds who arereally Medaras, and the caste proper are therefore sometimes known asMaratha Buruds to distinguish them from these. The caste has numerous_bainks_ or exogamous groups or septs, the names of which may chieflybe classified as territorial and totemistic. Among the former areMahobia, from the town of Mahoba; Sirmaiya, from Sirmau; Orahia, from Orai, the battlefield of the Banaphar generals, Alha and Udal;Tikarahia from Tikari, and so on. The totemistic septs include theSanpero from _sanp_ a snake, the Mangrelo from _mangra_ a crocodile, the Morya from _mor_ a peacock, the Titya from the _titehri_ birdand the Sarkia from _sarki_ or red ochre, all of which worship theirrespective totems. The Katarya or 'dagger' sept worship a real orpainted dagger at their marriage, and the Kemia, a branch of the _kem_tree (_Stephegyne parvifolia_). The Bandrelo, from _bandar_, worship apainted monkey. One or two groups are named after castes, as Bamhnelofrom Brahman and Bargujaria from Bargujar Rajput, thus indicating thatmembers of these castes became Basors and founded families. One septis called Marha from Marhai, the goddess of cholera, and the membersworship a picture of the goddess drawn in black. The name of theKulhantia sept means somersault, and these turn a somersault beforeworshipping their gods. So strong is the totemistic idea that someof the territorial groups worship objects with similar names. Thusthe Mahobia group, whose name is undoubtedly derived from the townof Mahoba, have adopted the mahua tree as their totem, and digginga small hole in the ground place in it a little water and the liquormade from mahua flowers, and worship it. This represents the processof distillation of country liquor. Similarly, the Orahia group, who derive their name from the town of Orai, now worship the _urai_or _khaskhas_ grass, and the Tikarahia from Tikari worship a _tikli_or glass spangle. 

4. Marriage. 

The marriage of persons belonging to the same _baink_ or sept and alsothat of first cousins is forbidden. The age of marriage is settledby convenience, and no stigma attaches to its postponement beyondadolescence. Intrigues of unmarried girls with men of their own orany higher caste are usually overlooked. The ceremony follows thestandard Hindi and Marathi forms, and presents no special features. Abride-price called _chari_, amounting to seven or eight rupees, is usually paid. In Betul the practice of _lamjhana_ or serving thefather-in-law for a term of years before marrying his daughter, issometimes followed. Widow-marriage is permitted, and the widow isexpected to wed her late husband's younger brother. The Basors aremusicians by profession, but in Betul the _narsingha_, a peculiarkind of crooked trumpet, is the only implement which may be playedat the marriage of a widow. A woman marrying a second time forfeitsall interest in the property of her late husband, unless she iswithout issue and there are no near relatives of her husband to takeit. Divorce is effected by the breaking of the woman's bangles inpublic. If obtained by the wife, she must repay to her first husbandthe expenditure incurred by him for her marriage when she takes asecond. But the acceptance of this payment is considered derogatoryand the husband refuses it unless he is poor. 

5. Religion and social status. 

The Basors worship the ordinary Hindu deities and also ghosts andspirits. Like the other low castes they entertain a special venerationfor Devi. They profess to exorcise evil spirits and the evil eye, and to cure other disorders and diseases through the agency of theirincantations and the goblins who do their bidding. They burn theirdead when they can afford it and otherwise bury them, placing thecorpse in the grave with its head to the north. The body of a womanis wrapped in a red shroud and that of a man in a white one. Theyobserve mourning for a period of three to ten days, but in Jubbulporeit always ends with the fortnight in which the death takes place;so that a person dying on the 15th or 30th of the month is mournedonly for one day. They eat almost every kind of food, includingbeef, pork, fowls, liquor and the leavings of others, but abjurecrocodiles, monkeys, snakes and rats. Many of them have now givenup eating cow's flesh in deference to Hindu feeling. They will takefood from almost any caste except sweepers, and one or two others, as Joshi and Jasondhi, towards whom for some unexplained reason theyentertain a special aversion. They will admit outsiders belongingto any caste from whom they can take food into the community. Theyare generally considered as impure, and live outside the village, and their touch conveys pollution, more especially in the MarathaDistricts. The ordinary village menials, as the barber and washerman, will not work for them, and services of this nature are performed bymen of their own community. As, however, their occupation is not initself unclean, they rank above sweepers, Chamars and Dhobis. Temporaryexclusion from caste is imposed for the usual offences, and the almostinvariable penalty for readmission is a feast to the caste-fellows. Aperson, male or female, who has been convicted of adultery must havethe head shaved, and is then seated in the centre of the caste-fellowsand pelted by them with the leavings of their food. Basor women arenot permitted to wear nose-rings on pain of exclusion from caste. 

6. Occupation. 

The trade of the Basors is a very essential one to the agriculturalcommunity. They make numerous kinds of baskets, among which may bementioned the _chunka_, a very small one, the _tokni_, a basketof middle size, and the _tokna_, a very large one. The _dauri_is a special basket with a lining of matting for washing rice ina stream. The _jhanpi_ is a round basket with a cover for holdingclothes; the _tipanna_ a small one in which girls keep dolls; and the_bilahra_ a still smaller one for holding betel-leaf. Other articlesmade from bamboo-bark are the _chalni_ or sieve, the _khunkhuna_ orrattle, the _bansuri_ or wooden flute, the _bijna_ or fan, and the_supa_ or winnowing-fan. All grain is cleaned with the help of the_supa_ both on the threshing-floor and in the house before consumption, and a child is always laid in one as soon as it is born. In townsthe Basors make the bamboo matting which is so much used. The onlyimplement they employ is the _banka_, a heavy curved knife, with whichall the above articles are made. The _banka_ is duly worshipped atthe Diwali festival. The Basors are also the village musicians, and aband of three or four of them play at weddings and on other festiveoccasions. Some of them work as pig-breeders and others are villagewatchmen. The women often act as midwives. One subcaste, the Dumar, will do scavenger's work, but they never take employment as _saises_, because the touch of horse-dung is considered as a pollution, entailingtemporary excommunication from caste. 

Bedar

1. General notice. 

_Bedar. [252]_--A small caste of about 1500 persons, belongingto Akola, Khandesh and Hyderabad. Their ancestors were Pindaris, apparently recruited from the different Maratha castes, and when thePindaris were suppressed they obtained or were awarded land in thelocalities where they now reside, and took to cultivation. The morerespectable Bedars say that their ancestors were Tirole Kunbis, butwhen Tipu Sultan invaded the Carnatic he took many of them prisonersand ordered them to become Muhammadans. In order to please him theytook food with Muhammadans, and on this account the Kunbis put them outof caste until they should purify themselves. But as there were a largenumber of them, they did not do this, and have remained a separatecaste. The real derivation of the name is unknown, but the caste saythat it is _be-dar_ or 'without fear, ' and was given to them on accountof their bravery. They have now obtained a warrant from the descendantof Shankar Acharya, or the high priest of Sivite Hindus, permittingthem to describe themselves as Put Kunbi or purified Kunbi. [253]The community is clearly of a most mixed nature, as there are alsoDher or Mahar Bedars. They refuse to take food from other Mahars andconsider themselves defiled by their touch. The social position ofthe caste also presents some peculiar features. Several of them havetaken service in the army and police, and have risen to the rank ofnative officer; and Rao Sahib Dhonduji, a retired Inspector of Police, is a prominent member of the caste. The Raja of Surpur, near Raichur, is also said to be a Bedar, while others are ministerial officialsoccupying a respectable position. Yet of the Bedars generally it issaid that they cannot draw water freely from the public wells, and inNasik Bedar constables are not considered suitable for ordinary duty, as people object to their entering houses. The caste must thereforeapparently have higher and lower groups, differing considerablyin position. 

2. Subdivisions and marriage customs. 

They have three subdivisions, the Maratha, Telugu and Kande Bedars. Thenames of their exogamous sections are also Marathi. Neverthelessthey retain one or two northern customs, presumably acquired fromassociation with the Pindaris. Their women do not tuck the body-clothin behind the waist, but draw it over the right shoulder. They wearthe _choli_ or Hindustani breast-cloth tied in front, and have a hoopedsilver ornament on the top of the head, which is known as _dhora_. Theyeat goats, fowls and the flesh of the wild pig, and drink liquor, andwill take food from a Kunbi or a Phulmali, and pay little heed to therules of social impurity. But Hindustani Brahmans act as their priests. 

Before a wedding they call a Brahman and worship him as a god, theceremony being known as Deo Brahman. The Brahman then cooks food in thehouse of his host. On the same occasion a person specially nominatedby the Brahman, and known as Deokia, fetches an earthen vessel fromthe potter, and this is worshipped with offerings of turmeric andrice, and a cotton thread is tied round it. Formerly it is said theyworshipped the spent bullets picked up after a battle, and especiallyany which had been extracted from the body of a wounded person. 

3. Funeral rites. 

When a man is about to die they take him down from his cot and layhim on the ground with his head in the lap of a relative. The deadare buried, a person of importance being carried to the grave in asitting posture, while others are laid out in the ordinary manner. Awoman is buried in a green cloth and a breast-cloth. When the corpsehas been prepared for the funeral they take some liquor, and after afew drops have been poured into the mouth of the corpse the assembledpersons drink the rest. While following to the grave they beat drumsand play on musical instruments and sing religious songs; and if aman dies during the night, since he is not buried till the morning, they sit in the house playing and singing for the remaining hours ofdarkness. The object of this custom must presumably be to keep awayevil spirits. After the funeral each man places a leafy branch ofsome tree or shrub on the grave, and on the thirteenth day they putfood before a cow and also throw some on to the roof of the house asa portion for the crows. 

Beldar

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice. _ 2. _Beldars of the northern Districts. _ 3. _Odias of Chhattisgarh. _ 4. _Other Chhattisgarhi Beldars. _ 5. _Munurwar and Telenga. _ 6. _Vaddar. _ 7. _Pathrot. _ 8. _Takari. _

1. General notice. 

_Beldar, [254] Od, Sonkar, Raj, Larhia, Karigar, Matkuda, Chunkar, Munurwar, Thapatkari, Vaddar, Pathrot, Takari. _--The term Beldaris generically applied to a number of occupational groups of moreor less diverse origin, who work as masons or navvies, build theearthen embankments of tanks or fields, carry lime and bricks andin former times refined salt. Beldar means one who carries a _bel_, a hoe or mattock. In 1911 a total of 25, 000 Beldars were returnedfrom the Central Provinces, being most numerous in the Nimar, Wardha, Nagpur, Chanda and Raipur districts. The Nunia, Murha and Sansia(Uriya) castes, which have been treated in separate articles, arealso frequently known as Beldar, and cannot be clearly distinguishedfrom the main caste. If they are all classed together the total ofthe earth- and stone-working castes comes to 35, 000 persons. 

It is probable that the bulk of the Beldars and allied castes arederived from the non-Aryan tribes. The Murhas or navvies of thenorthern Districts appear to be an offshoot of the Bind tribe; thepeople known as Matkuda (earth-digger) are usually Gonds or Pardhans;the Sansias and Larhias or Uriyas of Chhattisgarh and the Uriya countryseem to have originated from the Kol, Bhuiya and Oraon tribes, the Kolsespecially making excellent diggers and masons; the Oddes or Vaddarsof Madras are a very low caste, and some of their customs point to asimilar origin, though the Munurwar masons of Chanda appear to havebelonged originally to the Kapu caste of cultivators. 

The term Raj, which is also used for the Beldars in the northernDistricts, has the distinctive meaning of a mason, while Chunkarsignifies a lime-burner. The Sonkars were formerly occupied in Saugorin carrying lime, bricks and earth on donkeys, but they have nowabandoned this calling in Chhattisgarh and taken to growing vegetables, and have been given a short separate notice. In Hoshangabad someMuhammadan Beldars are now also found. 

2. Beldars of the northern Districts. 

The Beldars of Saugor say that their ancestors were engaged inrefining salt from earth. A divine saint named Nona Rishi (_non_, salt) came down on earth, and while cooking his food mixed somesaline soil with it. The bread tasted much better in consequence, andhe made the earth into a ball or _goli_ and taught his followers toextract the salt from it, whence their descendants are known as GoliBeldars. The customs of these Beldars are of the ordinary low-castetype. The wedding procession is accompanied by drums, fireworks and, if means permit, a nautch-girl. If a man puts away his wife withoutadequate cause the caste _panchayat_ may compel him to support herso long as she remains of good conduct. The party seeking a divorce, whether husband or wife, has to pay Rs. 7 to the caste committeeand the other partner Rs. 3, irrespective of where the blame rests, and each remains out of caste until he or she pays. 

These Beldars will not take food from any caste but their own, and willnot take water from a Brahman, though they will accept it from Kurmis, Gujars and similar castes. Sir H. Risley notes that their women alwaysremove earth in baskets on the head. "The Beldars regard this mode ofcarrying earth as distinctive of themselves, and will on no accounttransport it in baskets slung from the shoulders. They work veryhard when paid by the piece, and are notorious for their skill inmanipulating the pillars (_sakhi_, witness) left to mark work done, so as to exaggerate the measurement. On one occasion while workingfor me on a large lake at Govindpur, in the north of the ManbhumDistrict, a number of Beldars transplanted an entire pillar duringthe night and claimed payment for several thousand feet of imaginaryearthwork. The fraud was most skilfully carried out, and was onlydetected by accident. " [255] The Beldars are often dishonest in theirdealings, and will take large advances for a tank or embankment, andthen abscond with the money without doing the work. During the openseason parties of the caste travel about in camp looking for work, their furniture being loaded on donkeys. They carry grain in earthenpots encased in bags of netting, neatly and closely woven, and grindtheir wheat daily in a small mill set on a goat-skin. Butter is madein one of their pots with a churning-stick, consisting of a coggedwheel fixed on to the end of a wooden rod. 

3. Odias of Chhattisgarh. 

The Beldars of Chhattisgarh are divided into the Odia or Uriya, Larhia, Kuchbandhia, Matkuda and Karigar groups. Uriya and Larhia are localnames, applied to residents of the Uriya country and Chhattisgarhrespectively. Odia is the name of a low Madras caste of masons, but whether it is a corruption of Uriya is not clear. Karigar meansa workman, and Kuchbandhia is the name of a separate caste, who makeloom-combs for weavers. The Odias pretend to be fallen Rajputs. Theysay that when Indra stole the sacrificial horse of Raja Sagar andkept it in the underworld, the Raja's thousand sons dug great holesthrough the earth to get it. Finally they arrived at the underworldand were all reduced to ashes by the Rishi Kapil Muni, who dweltthere. Their ghosts besought him for life, and he said that theirdescendants should always continue to dig holes in the earth, whichwould be used as tanks; and that whenever a tank was dug by them, andits marriage celebrated with a sacrifice, the savour of the sacrificewould descend to the ghosts and would afford them sustenance. The Odiassay that they are the descendants of the Raja's sons, and unless a tankis dug and its marriage celebrated by them it remains impure. TheseOdias have their tutelary deity in Rewah State, and at his shrine is aflag which none but an Odia of genuine descent from Raja Sagar's sonscan touch without some injury befalling him. If any Beldaar thereforeclaims to belong to their caste they call on him to touch the flag, and if he does so with impunity they acknowledge him as a brother. 

4. Other Chhattisgarhi Beldars. 

The other group of Chattisgarhi Beldars are of lower status, andclearly derived from the non-Aryan tribes. They eat pigs, and atintervals of two or three years they celebrate the worship of GosainDeo with a sacrifice of pigs, the deity being apparently a deifiedascetic or mendicant. On this occasion the Dhimars, Gonds, and allother castes which eat pig's flesh join in the sacrifice, and consumethe meat together after the fashion of the rice at Jagannath's temple, which all castes may eat together without becoming impure. TheseBeldars use asses for the transport of their bricks and stones, andon the Diwali day they place a lamp before the ass and pay reverenceto it. They say that at their marriages a bride-price of Rs. 100or Rs. 200 must always be paid, but they are allowed to give one ortwo donkeys and value them at Rs. 50 apiece. They make grindstones(_chakki_), combs for straightening the threads on the loom, andframes for stretching the threads. These frames are called _dongi_, and are made either wholly or partly from the horns of animals, a fact which no doubt renders them impure. 

5. Munurwar and Telenga. 

In Chanda the principal castes of stone-workers are the Telengas(Telugus), who are also known as Thapatkari (tapper or chiseller), Telenga Kunbi and Munurwar. They occupy a higher position than theordinary Beldar, and Kunbis will take water from them and sometimesfood. They say that they came into Chanda from the Telugu country alongthe Godavari and Pranhita rivers to build the great wall of Chandaand the palaces and tombs of the Gond kings. There is no reason todoubt that the Munurwars are a branch of the Kapu cultivating casteof the Telugu country. Mr. A. K. Smith states that they refuse to eatthe flesh of an animal which has been skinned by a Mahar, a Chamar, or a Gond; the Kunbis and Marathas also consider flesh touched by aMahar or Chamar to be impure, but do not object to a Gond. Like theBerar Kunbis, the Telengas prefer that an animal should be killed bythe rite of _halal_ as practised by Muhammadan butchers. The reasonno doubt is that the _halal_ is a method of sacrificial slaughter, and the killing of the animal is legitimised even though by the ritualof a foreign religion. The Thapatkaris appear to be a separate group, and their original profession was to collect and retail jungle fruitsand roots having medicinal properties. Though the majority have becomestone- and earth-workers some of them still do this. 

6. Vaddar. 

The Vaddars or Wadewars are a branch of the Odde caste of Madras. Theyare almost an impure caste, and a section of them are professionalcriminals. Their women wear glass bangles only on the left arm, thoseon the right arm being made of brass or other metal. This rule has nodoubt been introduced because glass bangles would get broken when theywere supporting loads on the head. The men often wear an iron bangleon the left wrist, which they say keeps off the lightning. Mr. Thurstonstates that "Women who have had seven husbands are much respected amongthe Oddes, and their blessing on a bridal pair is greatly prized. Theywork in gangs on contract, and every one, except very old and veryyoung, shares in the labour. The women carry the earth in baskets, while the men use the pick and spade. The babies are usually tied upin cloths, which are suspended, hammock-fashion, from the boughs oftrees. A woman found guilty of immorality is said to have to carrya basketful of earth from house to house before she is readmitted tothe caste. The stone-cutting Vaddars are the principal criminals, andby going about under the pretence of mending grindstones they obtainmuch useful information as to the houses to be looted or parties oftravellers to be attacked. In committing a highway robbery or dacoitythey are always armed with stout sticks. " [256]

7. Pathrot. 

In Berar besides the regular Beldars two castes of stone-workers arefound, the Pathrawats or Pathrots (stone-breakers) and the Takaris, who should perhaps be classed as separate castes. Both make andsharpen millstones and grindstones, and they are probably onlyoccupational groups of recent formation. The Takaris are connectedwith the Pardhi caste of professional hunters and fowlers and maybe a branch of them. The social customs of the Pathrots resemblethose of the Kunbis. "They will take cooked food from a Sutar or aKumbhar. Imprisonment, the killing of a cow or criminal intimacy of aman with a woman of another caste is punished by temporary outcasting, readmission involving a fine of Rs. 4 or Rs. 5. Their chief deityis the Devi of Tuljapur and their chief festival Dasahra; theimplements of the caste are worshipped twice a year, on Gudhi Padwaand Diwali. Women are tattooed with a crescent between the eyebrowsand dots on the right side of the nose, the right cheek, and the chin, and a basil plant or peacock is drawn on their wrists. " [257]

8. Takari. 

"The Takaris take their name from the verb _takne_, to reset orrechisel. They mend the handmills (_chakkis_) used for grinding corn, an occupation which is sometimes shared with them by the LangotiPardhis. The Takari's avocation of chiselling grindstones gives himexcellent opportunities for examining the interior economy of houses, and the position of boxes and cupboards, and for gauging the wealth ofthe inmates. They are the most inveterate house-breakers and dangerouscriminals. A form of crime favoured by the Takari, in common withmany other criminal classes, is that of decoying into a secludedspot outside the village the would-be receiver of stolen property androbbing him of his cash--a trick which carries a wholesome lesson withit. " [258] The chisel with which they chip the grindstones furnishes, as stated by Mr. D. A. Smyth, D. S. P. , an excellent implement forbreaking a hole through the mud wall of a house. 

Beria, Bedia. 

[_Bibliography_: Sir H. Risley's _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_;Rajendra Lal Mitra in _Memoirs, Anthropological Society of London_, iii. P. 122; Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes of the North-WesternProvinces and Oudh_; Mr. Kennedy's _Criminal Classes of the BombayPresidency_; Major Gunthorpe's _Criminal Tribes_; Mr. Gayer's _Lectureson some Criminal Tribes of the Central Provinces_; Colonel Sleeman's_Report on the Badhak or Bagri Dacoits_. ]

1. Historical notice. 

A caste of gipsies and thieves who are closely connected with theSansias. In 1891 they numbered 906 persons in the Central Provinces, distributed over the northern Districts; in 1901 they were notseparately classified but were identified with the Nats. "They say thatsome generations ago two brothers resided in the Bhartpur territory, ofwhom one was named Sains Mul and the other Mullanur. The descendantsof Sains Mul are the Sansias and those of Mullanur the Berias orKolhatis, who are vagrants and robbers by hereditary profession, living in tents or huts of matting, like Nats or other vagrant tribes, and having their women in common without any marriage ceremoniesor ties whatsoever. Among themselves or their relatives the Sansiasor descendants of Sains Mul, they are called Dholi or Kolhati. Thedescendants of the brothers eat, drink and smoke together, and join inrobberies, but never intermarry. " So Colonel Sleeman wrote in 1849, and other authorities agree on the close connection or identity ofthe Berias and Sansias of Central India. The Kolhatis belong mainlyto the Deccan and are apparently a branch of the Berias, namedafter the _Kolhan_ or long pole with which they perform acrobaticfeats. The Berias of Central India differ in many respects from thoseof Bengal. Here Sir H. Risley considers Beria to be 'the generic nameof a number of vagrant, gipsy-like groups'; and a full description ofthem has been given by Babu Rajendra Lal Mitra, who considers them toresemble the gipsies of Europe. "They are noted for a light, elastic, wiry make, very uncommon in the people of this country. In agilityand hardness they stand unrivalled. The men are of a brownish colour, like the bulk of Bengalis, but never black. The women are of lightercomplexion and generally well-formed; some of them have considerableclaims to beauty, and for a race so rude and primitive in their habitsas the Berias, there is a sharpness in the features of their womenwhich we see in no other aboriginal race in India. Like the gipsiesof Europe they are noted for the symmetry of their limbs; but theiroffensive habits, dirty clothing and filthy professions give them arepulsive appearance, which is heightened by the reputation they haveof kidnapping children and frequenting burial-grounds and places ofcremation.... Familiar with the use of bows and arrows and great adeptsin laying snares and traps, they are seldom without large supplies ofgame and flesh of wild animals of all kinds. They keep the dried bodiesof a variety of birds for medical purposes; mongoose, squirrels andflying-foxes they eat with avidity as articles of luxury. Spirituousliquors and intoxicating drugs are indulged in to a large extent, and chiefs of clans assume the title of Bhangi or drinkers of hemp(_bhang_) as a mark of honour.... In lying, thieving and knaverythe Beria is not a whit inferior to his brother gipsy of Europe. TheBeria woman deals in charms for exorcising the devil and palmistryis her special vocation. She also carries with her a bundle of herbsand other real or pretended charms against sickness of body or mind;and she is much sought after by village maidens for the sake ofthe philtre with which she restores to them their estranged lovers;while she foretells the date when absent friends will return and thesex of unborn children. They practise cupping with buffalo horns, pretend to extract worms from decayed teeth and are commonly employedas tattooers. At home the Beria woman makes mats of palm-leaves, while her lord alone cooks.... Beria women are even more circumspectthan European gipsies. If a wife does not return before the jackal'scry is heard in the evening, she is subject to severe punishment. Itis said that a _faux pas_ among her own kindred is not consideredreprehensible; but it is certain that no Berini has ever been known tobe at fault with any one not of her own caste. " This last statementis not a little astonishing, inasmuch as in Central India and inBundelkhand Berni is an equivalent term for a prostitute. A similardiversity of conjugal morality has been noticed between the Bagrisof northern India and the Vaghris of Gujarat. [259]

2. Criminal tendencies in the Central Provinces. 

In other respects also the Berias of Bengal appear to be morerespectable than the remainder of the caste, obtaining their livelihoodby means which, if disreputable, are not actually dishonest; whilein Central India the women Berias are prostitutes and the menhouse-breakers and thieves. These latter are so closely connectedwith the Sansias that the account of that caste is also applicableto the Berias. In Jubbulpore, Mr. Gayer states, the caste are experthouse-breakers, bold and daring, and sometimes armed with swords andmatchlocks. They sew up stolen property in their bed-quilts and secreteit in the hollow legs of their sleeping-cots, and the women habituallyconceal jewels and even coins in the natural passages of the body, inwhich they make special _saos_ or receptacles by practice. The Beriawomen go about begging, and often break open the doors of unoccupiedhouses in the daytime and steal anything they can find. [260] BothSansia and Beria women wear a _laong_ or clove in the left nostril. 

3. Social customs. 

As already stated, the women are professional prostitutes, but thesedo not marry, and on arrival at maturity they choose the life whichthey prefer. Mr. Crooke states, [261] however, that regular marriagesseldom occur among them, because nearly all the girls are reservedfor prostitution, and the men keep concubines drawn from any fairlyrespectable caste. So far is this the rule that in some localities ifa man marries a girl of the tribe he is put out of caste or obligedto pay a fine to the tribal council. This last rule does not seemto obtain in the Central Provinces, but marriages are uncommon. Ina colony of Berias in Jubbulpore [262] numbering sixty families itwas stated that only eight weddings could be remembered as havingoccurred in the last fifty years. The boys therefore have to obtainwives as best they can; sometimes orphan girls from other castes aretaken into the community, or any outsider is picked up. For a bridefrom the caste itself a sum of Rs. 100 is usually demanded, and thesame has to be paid by a Beria man who takes a wife from the Nat orKanjar castes, as is sometimes done. When a match is proposed theyask the expectant bridegroom how many thefts he has committed withoutdetection; and if his performances have been inadequate they refuseto give him the girl on the ground that he will be unable to supporta wife. At the betrothal the boy's parents go to the girl's house, taking with them a potful of liquor round which a silver ring isplaced and a pig. The ring is given to the girl and the head ofthe pig to her father, while the liquor and the body of the pigprovide a feast for the caste. They consult Brahmans at their birthand marriage ceremonies. Their principal deities appear to be theirancestors, whom they worship on the same day of the month and yearas that on which their death took place. They make an offering of apig to the goddess Dadaju or Devi before starting on their annualpredatory excursions. Some rice is thrown into the animal's earbefore it is killed, and the direction in which it turns its head isselected as the one divinely indicated for their route. Prostitutionis naturally not regarded as any disgrace, and the women who haveselected this profession mix on perfectly equal terms with thosewho are married. They occupy, in fact, a more independent position, as they dispose absolutely of their own earnings and property, and ontheir death it devolves on their daughters or other female relatives, males having no claim to it, in some localities at least. Among thechildren of married couples daughters inherit equally with sons. Aprostitute is regarded as the head of the family so far as her childrenare concerned. Outsiders are freely admitted into the caste on givinga feast to the community. In Saugor the women of the caste, knownas Berni, are the village dancing-girls, and are employed to giveperformances in the cold weather, especially at the Holi festival, where they dance the whole night through, fortified by continuouspotations of liquor. This dance is called _rai_, and is accompaniedby most obscene songs and gestures. 

Bhaina

List of Paragraphs

 1. _The tribe derived from the Baigas. _ 2. _Closely connected with the Kawars. _ 3. _Internal structure. Totemism. _ 4. _Marriage. _ 5. _Religious superstitions. _ 6. _Admission of outsiders and caste offences. _ 7. _Social customs. _

1. The tribe derived from the Baigas. 

_Bhaina. _ [263]--A primitive tribe peculiar to the Central Provincesand found principally in the Bilaspur District and the adjoining area, that is, in the wild tract of forest country between the Satpurarange and the south of the Chota Nagpur plateau. In 1911 about 17, 000members of the tribe were returned. The tribe is of mixed descent andappears to have been derived principally from the Baigas and Kawars, having probably served as a city of refuge to persons expelled fromthese and other tribes and the lower castes for irregular sexualrelations. Their connection with the Baigas is shown by the fact thatin Mandla the Baigas have two subdivisions, which are known as Raior Raj-Bhaina, and Kath, or catechu-making Bhaina. The name thereforewould appear to have originated with the Baiga tribe. A Bhaina is alsonot infrequently found to be employed in the office of village priestand magician, which goes by the name of Baiga in Bilaspur. And a Bhainahas the same reputation as a Baiga for sorcery, it being said of him--

 Mainhar ki manjh Bhaina ki pang

or 'The magic of a Bhaina is as deadly as the powdered _mainhar_fruit, ' this fruit having the property of stupefying fish when throwninto the water, so that they can easily be caught. This reputationsimply arises from the fact that in his capacity of village priest theBhaina performs the various magical devices which lay the ghosts ofthe dead, protect the village against tigers, ensure the prosperityof the crops and so on. But it is always the older residents of anylocality who are employed by later comers in this office, because theyare considered to have a more intimate acquaintance with the localdeities. And consequently we are entitled to assume that the Bhainasare older residents of the country where they are found than theirneighbours, the Gonds and Kawars. There is other evidence to the sameeffect; for instance, the oldest forts in Bilaspur are attributed tothe Bhainas, and a chief of this tribe is remembered as having ruledin Bilaigarh; they are also said to have been dominant in Pendra, where they are still most numerous, though the estate is now heldby a Kawar; and it is related that the Bhainas were expelled fromPhuljhar in Raipur by the Gonds. Phuljhar is believed to be a GondState of long standing, and the Raja of Raigarh and others claim to bedescended from its ruling family. A manuscript history of the Phuljharchiefs records that that country was held by a Bhaina king when theGonds invaded it, coming from Chanda. The Bhaina with his soldierstook refuge in a hollow underground chamber with two exits. But thesecret of this was betrayed to the Gonds by an old Gond woman, andthey filled up the openings of the chamber with grass and burnt theBhainas to death. On this account the tribe will not enter Phuljharterritory to this day, and say that it is death to a Bhaina to doso. The Binjhwars are also said to have been dominant in the hillsto the east of Raipur District, and they too are a civilised branchof the Baigas. And in all this area the village priest is commonlyknown as Baiga, the deduction from which is, as already stated, thatthe Baigas were the oldest residents. [264] It seems a legitimateconclusion, therefore, that prior to the immigration of the Gondsand Kawars, the ancient Baiga tribe was spread over the whole hillcountry east and north of the Mahanadi basin. 

2. Closely connected with the Kawars. 

The Bhainas are also closely connected with the Kawars, who still ownmany large estates in the hills north of Bilaspur. It is said thatformerly the Bhainas and Kawars both ate in common and intermarried, but at present, though the Bhainas still eat rice boiled in water fromthe Kawars, the latter do not reciprocate. But still, when a Kawaris celebrating a birth, marriage or death in his family, or when hetakes in hand to make a tank, he will first give food to a Bhainabefore his own caste-men eat. And it may safely be assumed that thisis a recognition of the Bhaina's position as having once been lord ofthe land. A Kawar may still be admitted into the Bhaina community, and it is said that the reason of the rupture of the former equalrelations between the two tribes was the disgust felt by the Kawarsfor the rude and uncouth behaviour of the Bhainas. For on one occasiona Kawar went to ask for a Bhaina girl in marriage, and, as the men ofthe family were away, the women undertook to entertain him. And asthe Bhainas had no axes, the daughter proceeded to crack the stickson her head for kindling a fire, and for grass she pulled out a wispof thatch from the roof and broke it over her thigh, being unable tochop it. This so offended the delicate susceptibilities of the Kawarthat he went away without waiting for his meal, and from that time theKawars ceased to marry with the Bhainas. It seems possible that thestory points to the period when the primitive Bhainas and Baigas didnot know the use of iron and to the introduction of this metal by thelater-coming Kawars and Gonds. It is further related that when a Kawaris going to make a ceremonial visit he likes always to take with himtwo or three Bhainas, who are considered as his retainers, though notbeing so in fact. This enhances his importance, and it is also saidthat the stupidity of the Bhainas acts as a foil, through which thesuperior intelligence of the Kawar is made more apparent. All thesedetails point to the same conclusion that the primitive Bhainas firstheld the country and were supplanted by the more civilised Kawars, and bears out the theory that the settlement of the Munda tribes wasprior to those of the Dravidian family. 

3. Internal structure: Totemism. 

The tribe has two subdivisions of a territorial nature, Laria orChhattisgarhi, and Uriya. The Uriya Bhainas will accept food cookedwithout water from the Sawaras or Saonrs, and these also from them;so that they have probably intermarried. Two other subdivisionsrecorded are the Jhalyara and Ghantyara or Ghatyara; the formerbeing so called because they live in _jhalas_ or leaf huts in theforest, and the latter, it is said, because they tie a _ghanta_ orbell to their doors. This, however, seems very improbable. Anothertheory is that the word is derived from _ghat_, a slope or descent, and refers to a method which the tribe have of tattooing themselveswith a pattern of lines known as _ghat_. Or it is said to mean a lowor despised section. The Jhalyara and Ghatyara divisions comprise theless civilised portion of the tribe, who still live in the forests;and they are looked down on by the Uriya and Laria sections, who belongto the open country. The exogamous divisions of the tribe show clearlyenough that the Bhainas, like other subject races, have quite failedto preserve any purity of blood. Among the names of their _gots_or septs are Dhobia (a washerman), Ahera (cowherd), Gond, Mallin(gardener), Panika (from a Panka or Ganda) and others. The members ofsuch septs pay respect to any man belonging to the caste after whichthey are named and avoid picking a quarrel with him. They also worshipthe family gods of this caste. The tribe have also a number of totemsepts, named after animals or plants. Such are Nag the cobra, Baghthe tiger, Chitwa the leopard, Gidha the vulture, Besra the hawk, Bendra the monkey, Kok or Lodha the wild dog, Bataria the quail, Durgachhia the black ant, and so on. Members of a sept will not injurethe animal after which it is named, and if they see the corpse of theanimal or hear of its death, they throw away an earthen cooking-potand bathe and shave themselves as for one of the family. Members ofthe Baghchhal or tiger sept will, however, join in a beat for tigerthough they are reluctant to do so. At weddings the Bhainas have aceremony known as the _gotra_ worship. The bride's father makes animage in clay of the bird or animal of the groom's sept and placesit beside the marriage-post. The bridegroom worships the image, lighting a sacrificial fire before it, and offers to it the vermilionwhich he afterwards smears upon the forehead of the bride. At thebridegroom's house a similar image is made of the bride's totem, and on returning there after the wedding she worships this. Womenare often tattooed with representations of their totem animal, andmen swear by it as their most sacred oath. A similar respect is paidto the inanimate objects after which certain septs are named. Thusmembers of the Gawad or cowdung sept will not burn cowdung cakes forfuel; and those of the Mircha sept do not use chillies. One sept isnamed after the sun, and when an eclipse occurs these perform thesame formal rites of mourning as the others do on the death of theirtotem animal. Some of the groups have two divisions, male and female, which practically rank as separate septs. Instances of these are theNagbans Andura and the Nagbans Mai or male and female cobra septs;the Karsayal Singhara and Karsayal Mundi or stag and doe deer septs;and the Baghchhal Andura and Baghchhal Mai or tiger and tigresssepts. These may simply be instances of subdivisions arising owingto the boundaries of the sept having become too large for convenience. 

4. Marriage. 

The tribe consider that a boy should be married when he has learnt todrive the plough, and a girl when she is able to manage her householdaffairs. When a father can afford a bride for his son, he and hisrelatives go to the girl's village, taking with them ten or fifteencakes of bread and a bottle of liquor. He stays with some relative andsends to ask the girl's father if he will give his daughter to theinquirer's son. If the former agrees, the bread and liquor are sentover to him, and he drinks three cups of the spirit as a pledge ofthe betrothal, the remainder being distributed to the company. This isknown as _Tatia kholna_ or 'the opening of the door, ' and is followedsome days afterwards by a similar ceremonial which constitutes theregular betrothal. On this occasion the father agrees to marry hisdaughter within a year and demands the bride-price, which consistsof rice, cloth, a goat and other articles, the total value beingabout five rupees. A date is next fixed for the wedding, the dayselected being usually a Monday or Friday, but no date or month isforbidden. The number of days to the wedding are then counted, andtwo knotted strings are given to each party, with a knot for eachday up to that on which the anointings with oil and turmeric willcommence at the bridegroom's and bride's houses. Every day one knotis untied at each house up to that on which the ceremonies begin, and thus the correct date for them is known. The invitations to thewedding are given by distributing rice coloured yellow with turmericto all members of the caste in the locality, with the intimationthat the wedding procession will start on a certain day and that theywill be pleased to attend. During the four days that they are beinganointed the bride and bridegroom dance at their respective housesto the accompaniment of drums and other instruments. For the weddingceremony a number of Hindu rites have been adopted. The eldest sisterof the bridegroom or bride is known as the _sawasin_ and her husband asthe _sawasa_, and these persons seem to act as the representatives ofthe bridal couple throughout the marriage and to receive all presentson their behalf. The custom is almost universal among the Hindus, and it is possible that they are intended to act as substitutes andto receive any strokes of evil fortune which may befall the bridalpair at a season at which they are peculiarly liable to it. Thecouple go round the sacred post, and afterwards the bridegroom daubsthe bride's forehead with red lead seven times and covers her headwith her cloth to show that she has become a married woman. Afterthe wedding the bridegroom's parents say to him, "Now your parentshave done everything they could for you, and you must manage yourown house. " The expenditure on an average wedding is about fifteenor twenty rupees. A widow is usually taken in marriage by her latehusband's younger brother or Dewar, or by one of his relatives. Ifshe marries an outsider, the Dewar realises twelve rupees from himin compensation for her loss. But if there is no Dewar this sum isnot payable to her first husband's elder brother or her own father, because they could not have married her and hence are not held to beinjured by a stranger doing so. If a woman is divorced and anotherman wishes to marry her, he must make a similar payment of twelverupees to the first husband, together with a goat and liquor for thepenal feast. The Bhainas bury or burn the dead according as theirmeans permit. 

5. Religious superstitions. 

Their principal deity in Bilaspur is Nakti Devi [265] or the 'NoselessGoddess. ' For her ritual rice is placed on a square of the floorwashed with cowdung, and _ghi_ or preserved butter is poured on it andburnt. A hen is made to eat the rice, and then its head is cut off andlaid on the square. The liver is burnt on the fire as an offering tothe deity and the head and body of the animal are then eaten. Afterthe death of a man a cock is offered to Nakti Devi and a hen afterthat of a woman. The fowl is made to pick rice first in the yard ofthe house, then on the threshold, and lastly inside the house. ThakurDeo is the deity of cultivation and is worshipped on the day beforethe autumn crops are sown. On this day all the men in the villagego to his shrine taking a measure of rice and a ploughshare. At thesame time the Baiga or village priest goes and bathes in the tank andis afterwards carried to the assembly on a man's shoulders. Here hemakes an offering and repeats a charm, and then kneeling down strikesthe earth seven times with the ploughshare, and sows five handfuls ofrice, sprinkling water over the seed. After him the villagers walkseven times round the altar of the god in pairs, one man turning upthe earth with the ploughshare and the other sowing and watering theseed. While this is going on the Baiga sits with his face coveredwith a piece of cloth, and at the end the villagers salute the Baigaand go home. When a man wishes to do an injury to another he makesan image of him with clay and daubs it with vermilion and worshipsit with an offering of a goat or a fowl and liquor. Then he praysthe image that his enemy may die. Another way of injuring an enemyis to take rice coloured with turmeric, and after muttering charmsthrow it in the direction in which the enemy lives. 

6. Admission of outsiders and caste offences. 

Outsiders are not usually admitted, but if a Bhaina forms a connectionwith a woman of another tribe, they will admit the children of sucha union, though not the woman herself. For they say: 'The seed isours and what matters the field on which it was sown. ' But a manof the Kawar tribe having intimacy with a Bhaina woman may be takeninto the community. He must wait for three or four months after thematter becomes known and will beg for admission and offer to givethe penalty feast. A day is fixed for this and invitations are sentto members of the caste. On the appointed day the women of the tribecook rice, pulse, goat's flesh and urad cakes fried in oil, and inthe evening the people assemble and drink liquor and then go to taketheir food. The candidate for admission serves water to the men andhis prospective wife to the women, both being then permitted to takefood with the tribe. Next morning the people come again and the womanis dressed in a white cloth with bangles. The couple stand togethersupported by their brother-in-law and sister-in-law respectively, and turmeric dissolved in water is poured over their heads. Theyare now considered to be married and go round together and give thesalutation or Johar to the people, touching the feet of those whoare entitled to this mark of respect, and kissing the others. Amongthe offences for which a man is temporarily put out of caste isgetting the ear torn either accidentally or otherwise, being beatenby a man of very low caste, growing san-hemp (_Crotalaria juncea_), rearing tasar silk-worms or getting maggots in a wound. This last isalmost as serious an offence as killing a cow, and, in both cases, before an offender can be reinstated he must kill a fowl and swallowa drop or two of its blood with turmeric. Women commonly get the lobeof the ear torn through the heavy ear-rings which they wear; and ina squabble another woman will often seize the ear-ring maliciouslyin order to tear the ear. A woman injured in this way is put out ofcaste for a year in Janjgir. To grow turmeric or garlic is also anoffence against caste, but a man is permitted to do this for his ownuse and not for sale. A man who gets leprosy is said to be permanentlyexpelled from caste. The purification of delinquents is conductedby members of the Sonwani (gold-water) and Patel (headman) septs, whose business it is to give the offender water to drink in whichgold has been dipped and to take over the burden of his sins by firsteating food with him. But others say that the Hathi or elephant septis the highest, and to its members are delegated these duties. Andin Janjgir again the president of the committee gives the gold-water, and is hence known as Sonwan; and this office must always be held bya man of the Bandar or monkey sept. 

7. Social customs. 

The Bhainas are a comparatively civilised tribe and have largelyadopted Hindu usages. They employ Brahmans to fix auspicious daysfor their ceremonies, though not to officiate at them. They liveprincipally in the open country and are engaged in agriculture, thoughvery few of them hold land and the bulk are farm-labourers. They nowdisclaim any connection with the primitive Baigas, who still preferthe forests. But their caste mark, a symbol which may be affixed todocuments in place of a signature or used for a brand on cattle, isa bow, and this shows that they retain the recollection of hunting astheir traditional occupation. Like the Baigas, the tribe have forgottentheir native dialect and now speak bad Hindi. They will eat pork andrats, and almost anything else they can get, eschewing only beef. Butin their intercourse with other castes they are absurdly strict, andwill take boiled rice only from a Kawar, or from a Brahman if it iscooked in a brass and not in an earthen vessel, and this only froma male and not from a female Brahman; while they will accept baked_chapatis_ and other food from a Gond and a Rawat. But in Sambalpurthey will take this from a Savar and not from a Gond. They rank belowthe Gonds, Kawars and Savars or Saonrs. Women are tattooed with arepresentation of their sept totem; and on the knees and ankles theyhave some figures of lines which are known as _ghats_. These theysay will enable them to climb the mountains leading to heaven in theother world, while those who have not such marks will be pierced withspears on their way up the ascent. It has already been suggested thatthese marks may have given rise to the name of the Ghatyara divisionof the tribe. 

Bhamta or Bhamtya

1. Occupation. 

_Bhamta or Bhamtya. _ [266]--A caste numbering 4000 persons in theCentral Provinces, nearly all of whom reside in the Wardha, Nagpurand Chanda Districts of the Nagpur Division. The Bhamtas are alsofound in Bombay, Berar and Hyderabad. In Bombay they are known by thenames of Uchla or 'Lifter' and Ganthachor or 'Bundle-thief. ' [267]The Bhamtas were and still are notorious thieves, but many of thecaste are now engaged in the cultivation of hemp, from which theymake ropes, mats and gunny-bags. Formerly it was said in Wardha thata Bhamta girl would not marry unless her suitor had been arrested notless than fourteen times by the police, when she considered that hehad qualified as a man. The following description of their methodsdoes not necessarily apply to the whole caste, though the bulk ofthem are believed to have criminal tendencies. But some colonies ofBhamtas who have taken to the manufacture of sacking and gunny-bagsfrom hemp-fibre may perhaps be excepted. They steal only during thedaytime, and divide that part of the Province which they frequent intoregular beats or ranges. They adopt many disguises. Even in their owncottages one dresses as a Marwari Bania, another as a Gujarat Jain, a third as a Brahman and a fourth as a Rajput. They keep to someparticular disguise for years and often travel hundreds of miles, entering and stealing from the houses of the classes of persons whosedress they adopt, or taking service with a merchant or trader, andhaving gained their employer's confidence, seizing an opportunity toabscond with some valuable property. Sometimes two or three Bhamtasvisit a large fair, and one of them dressed as a Brahman mingles withthe crowd of bathers and worshippers. The false Brahman notices someornament deposited by a bather, and while himself entering the waterand repeating sacred verses, watches his opportunity and spreads outhis cloth near the ornament, which he then catches with his toes, and dragging it with him to a distance as he walks away buries it inthe sand. The accomplices meanwhile loiter near, and when the ownerdiscovers his loss the Brahman sympathises with him and points outthe accomplices as likely thieves, thus diverting suspicion fromhimself. The victim follows the accomplices, who make off, and thereal thief meanwhile digs the ornament out of the sand and escapesat his leisure. Women often tie their ornaments in bundles at suchbathing-fairs, and in that case two Bhamtas will go up to her, oneon each side, and while one distracts her attention the other makesoff with the bundle and buries it in the sand. A Bhamta rarely retainsthe stolen property on his person while there is a chance of his beingsearched, and is therefore not detected. They show considerable loyaltyto one another, and never steal from or give information against amember of the caste. If stolen property is found in a Bhamta's house, and it has merely been deposited there for security, the real thiefcomes forward. An escaped prisoner does not come back to his friendslest he should get them into trouble. A Bhamta is never guilty ofhouse-breaking or gang-robbery, and if he takes part in this offencehe is put out of caste. He does not steal from the body of a personasleep. He is, however, expert at the theft of ornaments from theperson. He never steals from a house in his own village, and thevillagers frequently share directly or indirectly in his gains. TheBhamtas are now expert railway thieves. [268] Two of them will getinto a carriage, and, engaging the other passengers in conversation, find out where they are going, so as to know the time available foraction. When it gets dark and the travellers go to sleep, one ofthe Bhamtas lies down on the floor and covers himself with a largecloth. He begins feeling some bag under the seat, and if he cannotopen it with his hands, takes from his mouth the small curved knifewhich all Bhamtas carry concealed between their gum and upper lip, and with this he rips up the seams of the bag and takes out whathe finds; or they exchange bags, according to a favourite device ofEnglish railway thieves, and then quickly either leave the train orget into another carriage. If attention is aroused they throw thestolen property out of the window, marking the place and afterwardsgoing back to recover it. Another device is to split open and pickthe pockets of people in a crowd. Besides the knife they often havea needle and thread and an iron nut-cutter. 

2. Subdivisions and marriage customs. 

Members of other castes, as Chhatri, Kanjar, Rawat and others, whohave taken to stealing, are frequently known as Bhamtas, but unlessthey have been specially initiated do not belong to the caste. TheBhamtas proper have two main divisions, the Chhatri Bhamtas, who areusually immigrants from Gujarat, and those of the Maratha country, who are often known as Bhamtis. The former have a dialect which isa mixture of Hindi, Marathi and Gujarati, while the latter speakthe local form of Marathi. The sections of the Chhatri Bhamtas arenamed after Rajput septs, as Badgujar, Chauhan, Gahlot, Bhatti, Kachhwaha and others. They may be partly of Rajput descent, as theyhave regular and pleasing features and a fair complexion, and are wellbuilt and sturdy. The sections of the Bhamtis are called by Marathasurnames, as Gudekar, Kaothi, Bailkhade, Satbhaia and others. TheChhatri Bhamtas have northern customs, and the Bhamtis those of theMaratha country. Marriage between persons of the same _gotra_ orsurname is prohibited. The Chhatris avoid marriage between relationshaving a common greatgrandparent, but among the Bhamtis the custom ofMehunchar is prevalent, by which the brother's daughter is married tothe sister's son. Girls are usually married at ten and eleven years ofage or later. The betrothal and marriage customs of the two subcastesdiffer, the Chhatris following the ceremonial of the northern Districtsand the Bhamtis that of the Maratha country. The Chhatris do not paya bride-price, but the Bhamtis usually do. Widow-marriage is allowed, and while the Chhatris expect the widow to marry her deceased husband'sbrother, the Bhamtis do not permit this. Among both subdivisions aprice is paid for the widow to her parents. Divorce is only permittedfor immoral conduct on the part of the wife. A divorced woman mayremarry after giving a feast to the caste _panchayat_ or committee, and obtaining their consent. 

3. Religion and social customs. 

The goddess Devi is the tutelary deity of the caste, as of all thosewho ply a disreputable profession. Animals are sacrificed to heror let loose to wander in her name. The offerings are appropriatedby the village washerman. In Bombay the rendezvous of the Bhamtisis the temple of Devi at Konali, in Akalkot State, near Sholapur, and here the gangs frequently assemble before and after their raidsto ask the goddess that luck may attend them and to thank her forsuccess obtained. [269] They worship their rope-making implements onthe Dasahra day. They both bury and burn the dead. Ghosts and spiritsare worshipped. If a man takes a second wife after the death of hisfirst, the new wife wears a _putli_ or image of the first wife ona piece of silver on her neck, and offers it the _hom_ sacrificeby placing some _ghi_ on the fire before taking a meal. In cases ofdoubt and difficulty she often consults the _putli_ by speaking to it, while any chance stir of the image due to the movement of her bodyis interpreted as approval or disapproval. In the Central Provincesthe Bhamtis say that they do not admit outsiders into the caste, butthis is almost certainly untrue. In Bombay they are said to admit allHindus [270] except the very lowest castes, and also Muhammadans. Thecandidate must pass through the two ceremonies of admission into thecaste and adoption into a particular family. For the first he pays anadmission fee, is bathed and dressed in new clothes, and one of theelders drops turmeric and sugar into his mouth. A feast follows, duringwhich some elders of the caste eat out of the same plate with him. Thiscompletes the admission ceremony, but in order to marry in the castea candidate must also be adopted into a particular family. The Bhamtawho has agreed to adopt him invites the caste people to his house, and there takes the candidate on his knee while the guests dropturmeric and sugar into his mouth. The Bhamtas eat fish and fowl butnot pork or beef, and drink liquor. This last practice is, however, frequently made a caste offence by the Bhamtis. They take cookedfood from Brahmans and Kunbis and water from Gonds. The keeping ofconcubines is also an offence entailing temporary excommunication. Themorality of the caste is somewhat low and their women are addictedto prostitution. The occupation of the Bhamta is also looked down on, and it is said, _Bhamta ka kam sub se nikam_, or 'The Bhamta's work isthe worst of all. ' This may apply either to his habits of stealing orto the fact that he supplies a bier made of twine and bamboo sticks ata death. In Bombay the showy dress of the Bhamta is proverbial. Womenare tattooed before marriage on the forehead and lower lip, and onother parts of the body for purposes of adornment. The men have thehead shaved for three inches above the top of the forehead in frontand an inch higher behind, and they wear the scalp-lock much thickerthan Brahmans do. They usually have red head-cloths. 

Bharbhunja

1. General notice

_Bharbhunja. _ [271]--The occupational caste of grain-parchers. Thename is derived from the Sanskrit _bhrastra_, a frying-pan, and_bharjaka_, one who fries. The Bharbhunjas numbered 3000 persons in1911, and belong mainly to the northern Districts, their headquartersbeing in Upper India. In Chhattisgarh the place of the Bharbhunjas istaken by the Dhuris. Sir H. Elliot [272] remarks that the caste aretraditionally supposed to be descended from a Kahar father and a Sudramother, and they are probably connected with the Kahars. In Saugorthey say that their ancestors were Kankubja Brahmans who were orderedto parch rice at the wedding of the great Rama, and in consequenceof this one of their subcastes is known as Kanbajia. But Kankubja isone of the commonest names of subcastes among the people of northernIndia, and merely indicates that the bearers belong to the tractround the old city of Kanauj; and there is no reason to suppose thatit means anything more in the case of the Bharbhunjas. Another groupare called Kaitha, and they say that their ancestors were Kayasths, who adopted the profession of grain-parching. It is said that in Bhopalproper Kayasths will take food from Kaitha Bharbhunjas and smoke fromtheir huqqa; and it is noticeable that in northern India Mr. Crookegives [273] not only the Kaitha subcaste, but other groups calledSaksena and Srivastab, which are the names of well-known Kayasthsubdivisions. It is possible, therefore, that the Kaitha group mayreally be connected with the Kayasths. Other subcastes are the Benglah, who are probably immigrants from Bengal; and the Kandu, who may alsocome from that direction, Kandu being the name of the correspondingcaste of grain-parchers in Bengal. 

2. Social customs. 

The social customs of the Bharbhunjas resemble those of Hindustanicastes of fairly good position. [274] They employ Brahmans for theirceremonies, and the family priest receives five rupees for officiatingat a wedding, three rupees for a funeral, one rupee for a birth, and four annas on ordinary occasions. No price is paid for a bride, and at their marriages the greater part of the expense falls on thegirl's father, who has to give three feasts as against two provided bythe bridegroom's father. After the wedding the bridegroom's father putson women's clothes given by the bride's father and dances before thefamily. Rose-coloured water and powder are sprinkled over the guestsand the proceeding is known as _Phag_, because it is considered to havethe same significance as the Holi festival observed in Phagun. Thisis usually done on the bank of a river or in some garden outsidethe village. At the _gauna_ or going-away ceremony the bride andbridegroom take their seats on two wooden boards and then changeplaces. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are permitted. The unionof a widow with her deceased husband's younger brother is considereda suitable match, but is not compulsory. When a bachelor marries awidow, he first goes through the proper ceremony either with a stickor an ear-ring, and is then united to the widow by the simple ritualemployed for widow remarriage. A girl who is seduced by a member ofthe caste may be married to him as if she were a widow, but if herlover is an outsider she is permanently expelled from the caste. 

3. Occupation. 

The Bharbhunjas occupy a fairly high social position, analogous tothat of the Barais, Kahars and other serving castes, the explanationbeing that all Hindus require the grain parched by them; this, as itis not cooked with water, may be eaten abroad, on a journey or in themarket-place. This is known as _pakki_ food, and even Brahmans willtake it from their hands. But Mr. Crooke notes [275] that the workthey do, and particularly the sweeping up of dry leaves for fuel, tends to lower them in the popular estimation, and it is a favouritecurse to wish of an enemy that he may some day come to stoke the kilnof a grain-parcher. Of their occupation Sir H. Risley states that"Throughout the caste the actual work of parching grain is usuallyleft to the women. The process is a simple one. A clay oven is built, somewhat in the shape of a bee-hive, with ten or twelve round holes atthe top. A fire is lighted under it and broken earthen pots containingsand are put on the holes. The grain to be parched is thrown in withthe sand and stirred with a flat piece of wood or a broom until it isready. The sand and parched grain are then placed in a sieve, throughwhich the former escapes. The wages of the parcher are a proportionof the grain, varying from one-eighth to one-fourth. In Bengal thecaste was spoken of by early English travellers under the quaint nameof the frymen. " [276] In the Central Provinces also grain-parchingis distinctly a woman's industry, only twenty-two per cent of thoseshown as working at it being men. There are two classes of tradesmen, those who simply keep ovens and parch grain which is brought to them, and those who keep the grain and sell it ready parched. The rates forparching are a pice a seer or an eighth part of the grain. Gram andrice, husked or unhusked, are the grains usually parched. When parched, gram is called _phutana_ (broken) and rice _lahi_. The Bharbhunjas alsoprepare _sathu_, a flour made by grinding parched gram or wheat, whichis a favourite food for a light morning meal, or for travellers. Itcan be taken without preparation, being simply mixed with water anda little salt or sugar. The following story is told about _sathu_to emphasise its convenience in this respect. Once two travellerswere about to take some food before starting in the morning, ofwhom one had _sathu_ and the other _dhan_ (unhusked rice). The onewith the _dhan_ knew that it would take him a long time to pound, and then cook and eat it, so he said to the other, "My poor friend, I perceive that you only have _sathu_, which will delay you becauseyou must find water, and then mix it, and find salt, and put it in, before your _sathu_ can be ready, while rice--pound, eat and go. Butif you like, as you are in a greater hurry than I am, I will change myrice for your _sathu_. " The other traveller unsuspectingly consented, thinking he was getting the best of the bargain, and while he was stilllooking for a mortar in which to pound his rice, the first travellerhad mixed and eaten the _sathu_ and proceeded on his journey. In thevernacular the point is brought out by the onomatopoeic characterof the lines, which cannot be rendered in English. The caste are nowalso engaged in selling tobacco and sweetmeats and the manufacture offireworks. They stoke their ovens with any refuse they can collectfrom the roads, and hence comes the saying, '_Bhar men dalna_', 'To throw into the oven, ' meaning to throw away something or to makeducks and drakes with it; while _Bhar-jhokna_ signifies to lightor heat the oven, and, figuratively, to take up a mean occupation(Platts). Another proverb quoted by Mr. Crooke is, '_Bharbhunja kalarki kesar ka tika_, ' or 'The Bharbhunja's slut with saffron on herforehead, ' meaning one dressed in borrowed plumes. Another saying is, '_To tum kya abhi tak bhar bhunjte rahe_, ' or 'Have you been stokingthe oven all this time?'--meaning to imply that the person addressedhas been wasting his time, because the profits from grain-parchingare so small. The oven of the Psalmist into which the grass was castno doubt closely resembled that of the Bharbhunjas. 

Bharia

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin and tribal legend. _ 2. _Tribal subdivisions. _ 3. _Marriage. _ 4. _Childbirth. _ 5. _Funeral ceremonies. _ 6. _Religion and magic. _ 7. _Social life and customs. _ 8. _Occupation. _

1. Origin and tribal legend. 

_Bharia, Bharia-Bhumia. _ [277]--A Dravidian tribe numbering about50, 000 persons and residing principally in the Jubbulpore District, which contains a half of the total number. The others are found inChhindwara and Bilaspur. The proper name of the tribe is Bharia, but they are often called Bharia-Bhumia, because many of them holdthe office of Bhumia or priest of the village gods and of the lowercastes in Jubbulpore, and the Bharias prefer the designation of Bhumiaas being the more respectable. The term Bhumia or 'Lord of the soil'is an alternative for Bhuiya, the name of another Dravidian tribe, and no doubt came to be applied to the office of village priestbecause it was held by members of this tribe; the term Baiga has asimilar signification in Mandla and Balaghat, and is applied to thevillage priest though he may not belong to the Baiga tribe at all. TheBharias have forgotten their original affinities, and several storiesof the origin of the tribe are based on far-fetched derivations ofthe name. One of these is to the effect that Arjun, when matters weregoing badly with the Pandavas in their battle against the Kauravas, took up a handful of _bharru_ grass and, pressing it, produced ahost of men who fought in the battle and became the ancestors of theBharias. And there are others of the same historical value. But thereis no reason to doubt that Bharia is the contemptuous form of Bhar, asTelia for Teli, Jugia for Jogi, Kuria for Kori, and that the Bhariasbelong to the great Bhar tribe who were once dominant in the easternpart of the United Provinces, but are now at the bottom of the socialscale, and relegated by their conquerors to the degrading officeof swineherds. The Rajjhars, who appear to have formed a separatecaste as the landowning subdivision of the Bhars, like the Raj-Gondsamong Gonds, are said to be the descendants of a Raja and a Bhariawoman. The Rajjhars form a separate caste in the Central Provinces, and the Bharias acknowledge some connection with them, but refuse totake water from their hands, as they consider them to be of impureblood. The Bharias also give Mahoba or Bandhogarh as their formerhome, and these places are in the country of the Bhars. Accordingto tradition Raja Karna Deva, a former king of Dahal, the classicalname of the Jubbulpore country, was a Bhar, and it may be that theimmigration of the Bharias into Jubbulpore dates from his period, whichis taken as 1040 to 1080 A. D. While then it may be considered as fairlycertain that the Bharias are merely the Bhar tribe with a variantof the name, it is clear from the titles of their family groups, which will shortly be given, that they are an extremely mixed classand consist largely of the descendants of members of other castes, who, having lost their own social position, have taken refuge amongthe Bharias at the bottom of the social scale. Mr. Crooke says of theBhars: [278] "The most probable supposition is that the Bhars werea Dravidian race closely allied to the Kols, Cheros and Seoris, whoat an early date succumbed to the invading Aryans. This is borne outby their appearance and physique, which closely resemble that of theundoubted non-Aryan aborigines of the Vindhyan-Kaimur plateau. " Inthe Central Provinces the Bharias have been so closely associatedwith the Gonds that they have been commonly considered to belongto that tribe. Thus Mr. Drysdale says of them: [279] 'The Bhariaswere the wildest of the wild Gonds and were inveterate _dhaya_ [280]cutters. ' Although, however, they have to some extent intermarriedwith the Gonds, the Bharias were originally quite a distinct tribe, and would belong to the Kolarian or Munda group but that they haveentirely forgotten their own language and speak only Hindi, though witha peculiar intonation especially noticeable in the case of their women. 

2. Tribal subdivisions. 

The structure of the tribe is a very loose one, and though theBharias say that they are divided into subcastes, there are nonein reality. Members of all castes except the very lowest may becomeBharias, and one Bharia will recognise another as a fellow-tribesmanif he can show relationship to any person admitted to occupy thatposition. But a division is in process of formation in Bilaspurbased on the practice of eating beef, from which some abstain, and in consequence look down on the others who are addicted to it, and call them Dhur Bharias, the term _dhur_ meaning cattle. Theabstainers from beef now refuse to marry with the others. The tribeis divided into a number of exogamous groups, and the names of theseindicate the very heterogeneous elements of which it consists. Out offifty-one groups reported not less than fifteen or sixteen have namesderived from other castes or clans, showing almost certainly that suchgroups were formed by a mixed marriage or the admission of a family ofoutsiders. Such names are: Agaria, from the Agarias or iron-workers:this clan worships Loha-Sur, the god of the Agarias; Ahirwar, or thedescendants of an Ahir: this clan worships the Ahir gods; Bamhania, born of a Brahman ancestor; Binjhwar or Binjha, perhaps from thetribe of that name; Chandel, from a Rajput clan; Dagdoha, a synonymof Basor: persons of this sept hang a piece of bamboo and a curvedknife to the waist of the bride at their marriages; Dhurua, born ofa Dhurua Gond; Kuanpa, born of an Ahir subcaste of that name; Kurka, of Korku parentage; Maravi, the name of a Gond clan; Rathor from aRajput clan; Samarba from a Chamar; and Yarkara, the name of a Gondclan. These names sufficiently indicate the diverse elements of whichthe tribe is made up. Other group names with meanings are: Gambhele, or those who seclude their women in a separate house during themenstrual period; Kaitha, from the _kaith_ tree (_Feronia elephantum_);Karondiha, from the _karonda_ plant (_Carissa Carandas_); Magarha, from _magar_ a crocodile: members of this group worship an image ofa crocodile made with flour and fried in oil; Sonwani, from _sona_gold: members of this group perform the ceremony of readmission ofpersons temporarily put out of caste by sprinkling on them a littlewater in which gold has been dipped. Any person who does not know hisclan name calls himself a Chandel, and this group, though bearing thename of a distinguished Rajput clan, is looked upon as the lowest. Butalthough the rule of exogamy in marriage is recognised, it is by nomeans strictly adhered to, and many cases are known in which unionshave taken place between members of the same clan. So long as peoplecan recollect a relationship between themselves, they do not permittheir families to intermarry. But the memory of the Bharia does notextend beyond the third generation. 

3. Marriage. 

Marriages are adult, and the proposal comes from the boy's father, who has it conveyed to the girl's father through some friend in hisvillage. If a betrothal is arranged the bride's father invites thefather and friends of the bridegroom to dinner; on this occasionthe boy's father brings some necklaces of lac beads and spangles andpresents them to the bride's female relatives, who then come out andtie the necklaces round his neck and those of his friends, placethe spangles on their foreheads, and then, catching hold of theircheeks, press and twist them violently. Some turmeric powder is alsothrown on their faces. This is the binding portion of the betrothalceremony. The date of marriage is fixed by a Brahman, this beingthe only purpose for which he is employed, and a bride-price varyingfrom six to twelve rupees is paid. On this occasion the women drawcaricatures with turmeric or charcoal on the loin-cloth of the boy'sfather, which they manage to purloin. The marriage ceremony followsgenerally the Hindu form. The bridegroom puts on women's ornamentsand carries with him an iron nut-cracker or dagger to keep off evilspirits. After the wedding, the _midua_, a sort of burlesque dance, is held. The girl's mother gets the dress of the boy's father and putsit on, together with a false beard and moustaches, and dances, holdinga wooden ladle in one hand and a packet of ashes in the other. Everytime she approaches the bridegroom's father on her rounds she spillssome of the ashes over him, and occasionally gives him a crack onthe head with her ladle, these actions being accompanied by bursts oflaughter from the party and frenzied playing by the musicians. Whenthe party reach the bridegroom's house on their return, his mother andthe other women come out and burn a little mustard and human hair in alamp, the unpleasant smell emitted by these articles being consideredpotent to drive away evil spirits. Every time the bride leaves herfather's house she must weep, and must cry separately with each one ofher caste-sisters when taking leave of them. When she returns home shemust begin weeping loudly on the boundary of the village, and continuedoing so until she has embraced each of her relatives and friends, a performance which in a village containing a large number of Bhariasmay take from three to six hours. These tears are, however, consideredto be a manifestation of joy, and the girl who cannot produce enough ofthem is often ridiculed. A prospective son-in-law who serves for hiswife is known as Gharjian. The work given him is always very heavy, and the Bharias have a saying which compares his treatment with thatawarded to an ox obtained on hire. If a girl is seduced by a man ofthe tribe, she may be married to him by the ceremony prescribed forthe remarriage of a widow, which consists merely in the placing ofbangles on the wrists and a present of a new cloth, together witha feast to the caste-fellows. Similarly if she is seduced by a manof another caste who would be allowed to become a Bharia, she canbe married as a widow to any man of the tribe. A widow is expectedto marry her late husband's younger brother, but no compulsion isexercised. If a bachelor espouses a widow, he first goes through theceremony of marriage with a ring to which a twig of the date-palm istied, by carrying the ring seven times round the marriage post. Thisis necessary to save him from the sin of dying unmarried, as theunion with a widow is not reckoned as a true marriage. In Jubbulporedivorce is said to be allowed only for conjugal misbehaviour, and aBharia will pass over three transgressions on his wife's part beforefinally turning her out of his house. A woman who wishes to leave herhusband simply runs away from him and lives with somebody else. Inthis case the third party must pay a goat to the husband by way ofcompensation and give a feast to the caste-fellows. 

4. Childbirth. 

The carelessness of the Bharias in the matter of childbirth isnotorious, and it is said that mothers commonly went on working upto the moment of childbirth and were delivered of children in thefields. Now, however, the woman lies up for three days, and someceremonies of purification are performed. In Chhattisgarh infantsare branded on the day of their birth, under the impression that thiswill cause them to digest the food they have taken in the womb. Thechild is named six months after birth by the father's sister, andits lips are then touched with cooked food for the first time. 

5. Funeral ceremonies. 

The tribe both burn and bury the dead, and observe mourning for anadult for ten days, during which time they daily put out a leaf-cupcontaining food for the use of the deceased. In the third year afterthe death, the _mangan_ or caste beggar visits the relatives of thedeceased, and receives what they call one limb (_ang_), or half hisbelongings; the _ang_ consists of a loin-cloth, a brass vessel anddish, an axe, a scythe and a wrist-ring. 

6. Religion and magic. 

The Bharias call themselves Hindus and worship the village deitiesof the locality, and on the day of Diwali offer a black chickento their family god, who may be Bura Deo, Dulha Deo or Karua, thecobra. For this snake they profess great reverence, and say that he wasactually born in a Bharia family. As he could not work in the fieldshe was usually employed on errands. One day he was sent to the house, and surprised one of his younger brother's wives, who had not heardhim coming, without her veil. She reproached him, and he retired indudgeon to the oven, where he was presently burnt to death by anotherwoman, who kindled a fire under it not knowing that he was there. Sohe has been deified and is worshipped by the tribe. The Bharias alsovenerate Bagheshwar, the tiger god, and believe that no tiger will eata Bharia. On the Diwali day they invite the tiger to drink some gruelwhich they place ready for him behind their houses, at the same timewarning the other villagers not to stir out of doors. In the morningthey display the empty vessels as a proof that the tiger has visitedthem. They practise various magical devices, believing that they cankill a man by discharging at him a _muth_ or handful of charmed objectssuch as lemons, vermilion and seeds of urad. This ball will travelthrough the air and, descending on the house of the person at whomit is aimed, will kill him outright unless he can avert its power bystronger magic, and perhaps even cause it to recoil in the same manneron the head of the sender. They exorcise the Sudhiniyas or the drinkersof human blood. A person troubled by one of these is seated near theBharia, who places two pots with their mouths joined over a fire. Herecites incantations and the pots begin to boil, emitting blood. Thisresult is obtained by placing a herb in the pot whose juice stains thewater red. The blood-sucker is thus successfully exorcised. To driveaway the evil eye they burn a mixture of chillies, salt, human hairand the husks of kodon, which emits a very evil smell. Such devicesare practised by members of the tribe who hold the office of Bhumiaor village priest. The Bharias are well-known thieves, and they saythat the dark spots on the moon are caused by a banyan tree, which Godplanted with the object of diminishing her light and giving thievesa chance to ply their trade. If a Bhumia wishes to detect a thief, he sits clasping hands with a friend, while a pitcher is supported ontheir hands. An oblation is offered to the deity to guide the ordealcorrectly, and the names of suspected persons are recited one by one, the name at which the pitcher topples over being that of the thief. Butbefore employing this method of detection the Bhumia proclaims hisintention of doing so on a certain date, and in the meantime places aheap of ashes in some lonely place and invites the thief to depositthe stolen article in the ashes to save himself from exposure. Bycommon custom each person in the village is required to visit theheap and mingle a handful of ashes with it, and not infrequentlythe thief, frightened at the Bhumia's powers of detection, takes thestolen article and buries it in the ash-heap where it is duly found, the necessity for resorting to the further method of divination beingthus obviated. Occasionally the Bharia in his character of a Hinduwill make a vow to pay for a recitation of the Satya Narayan Kathaor some other holy work. But he understands nothing of it, and ifthe Brahman employed takes a longer time than he had bargained forover the recitation he becomes extremely bored and irritated. 

7. Social life and customs. 

The scantiness of the Bharia's dress is proverbial, and the saying is'_Bharia bhwaka, pwanda langwata_', or 'The Bharia is verily a devil, who only covers his loins with a strip of cloth. ' But lately he hasassumed more clothing. Formerly an iron ring carried on the wrist toexorcise the evil spirits was his only ornament. Women wear usuallyonly one coarse cloth dyed red, spangles on the forehead and ears, beadnecklaces, and cheap metal bracelets and anklets. Some now have Hinduornaments, but in common with other low castes they do not usuallywear a nose-ring, out of respect to the higher castes. Women, thoughthey work in the fields, do not commonly wear shoes; and if theseare necessary to protect the feet from thorns, they take them off andcarry them in the presence of an elder or a man of higher caste. Theyare tattooed with various devices, as a cock, a crown, a native chair, a pitcher stand, a sieve and a figure called _dhandha_, which consistsof six dots joined by lines, and appears to be a representation ofa man, one dot standing for the head, one for the body, two forthe arms and two for the legs. This device is also used by othercastes, and they evince reluctance if asked to explain its meaning, so that it may be intended as a representation of the girl's futurehusband. The Bharia is considered very ugly, and a saying about himis: 'The Bharia came down from the hills and got burnt by a cinder, so that his face is black. ' He does not bathe for months together, and lives in a dirty hovel, infested by the fowls which he loves torear. His food consists of coarse grain, often with boiled leaves as avegetable, and he consumes much whey, mixing it with his scanty portionof grain. Members of all except the lowest castes are admitted to theBharia community on presentation of a _pagri_ and some money to theheadman, together with a feast to the caste-fellows. The Bharias do noteat monkeys, beef or the leavings of others, but they freely consumefowls and pork. They are not considered as impure, but rank abovethose castes only whose touch conveys pollution. For the slaughterof a cow the Bilaspur Bharias inflict the severe punishment of ninedaily feasts to the caste, or one for each limb of the cow, the limbsbeing held to consist of the legs, ears, horns and tail. They havean aversion for the horse and will not remove its dung. To accountfor this they tell a story to the effect that in the beginning Godgave them a horse to ride and fight upon. But they did not know howto mount the horse because it was so high. The wisest man among themthen proposed to cut notches in the side of the animal by which theycould climb up, and they did this. But God, when he saw it, was veryangry with them, and ordered that they should never be soldiers, butshould be given a winnowing-fan and broom to sweep the grain out ofthe grass and make their livelihood in that way. 

8. Occupation. 

The Bharias are usually farmservants and field-labourers, and theirservices in these capacities are in much request. They are hardy andindustrious, and so simple that it is an easy matter for their mastersto involve them in perpetual debt, and thus to keep them bound toservice from generation to generation. They have no understandingof accounts, and the saying, 'Pay for the marriage of a Bharia andhe is your bond-slave for ever, ' sufficiently explains the methodsadopted by their employers and creditors. 

Bhat

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin of the Bhats. _ 2. _Bhats and Charans. _ 3. _Lower-class Bhats. _ 4. _Social status of the caste. _ 5. _Social customs. _ 6. _The Bhat's business. _ 7. _Their extortionate practices. _ 8. _The Jasondhis. _ 9. _The Charans as carriers. _ 10. _Suicide and the fear of ghosts. _ 11. _Instances of haunting and laying ghosts. _ 12. _The Charans as sureties. _ 13. _Suicide as a means of revenge. _ 14. _Dharna. _ 15. _Casting out spirits. _ 16. _Sulking. Going bankrupt. _ 17. _Bhat songs. _

1. Origin of the Bhats. 

_Bhat, Rao, Jasondhi. _--The caste of bards and genealogists. In1911 the Bhats numbered 29, 000 persons in the Central Provincesand Berar, being distributed over all Districts and States, witha slight preponderance in large towns such as Nagpur, Jubbulporeand Amraoti. The name Bhat is derived from the Sanskrit Bhatta, a lord. The origin of the Bhats has been discussed in detail by SirH. Risley. Some, no doubt, are derived from the Brahman caste as statedby Mr. Nesfield: "They are an offshoot from those secularised Brahmanswho frequented the courts of princes and the camps of warriors, recitedtheir praises in public, and kept records of their genealogies. Such, without much variation, is the function of the Bhat at the presentday. The Mahabharata speaks of a band of bards and eulogists marchingin front of Yudishthira as he made his progress from the field ofKurukshetra towards Hastinapur. But these very men are spoken of in thesame poem as Brahmans. Naturally as time went on these courtier priestsbecame hereditary bards, receded from the parent stem and founded a newcaste. " "The best modern opinion, " Sir H. Risley states, [281] "seemsdisposed to find the germ of the Brahman caste in the bards, ministersand family priests, who were attached to the king's household in Vedictimes. The characteristic profession of the Bhats has an ancient anddistinguished history. The literature of both Greece and India owesthe preservation of its oldest treasures to the singers who recitedpoems in the households of the chiefs, and doubtless helped in somemeasure to shape the masterpieces which they handed down. Their placewas one of marked distinction. In the days when writing was unknown, the man who could remember many verses was held in high honour bythe tribal chief, who depended upon the memory of the bard for hispersonal amusement, for the record of his own and his ancestors'prowess, and for the maintenance of the genealogy which establishedthe purity of his descent. The bard, like the herald, was not lightlyto be slain, and even Odysseus in the heat of his vengeance sparesthe aoidos Phemius, 'who sang among the wooers of necessity. '" [282]

2. Bhats and Charans. 

There is no reason to doubt that the Birm or Baram Bhats are anoffshoot of Brahmans, their name being merely a corruption of the termBrahman. But the caste is a very mixed one, and another large section, the Charans, are almost certainly derived from Rajputs. Malcolm statesthat according to the fable of their origin, Mahadeo first createdBhats to attend his lion and bull; but these could not prevent theformer from killing the latter, which was a source of infinite vexationand trouble, as it compelled Mahadeo to create new ones. He thereforeformed the Charan, equally devout with the Bhat, but of bolder spirit, and gave him in charge these favourite animals. From that time no bullwas ever destroyed by the lion. [283] This fable perhaps indicatesthat while the peaceful Bhats were Brahmans, the more warlikeCharans were Rajputs. It is also said that some Rajputs disguisedthemselves as bards to escape the vengeance of Parasurama. [284] TheMaru Charans intermarry with Rajputs, and their name appears to bederived from Maru, the term for the Rajputana desert, which is alsofound in Marwar. Malcolm states [285] that when the Rajputs migratedfrom the banks of the Ganges to Rajputana, their Brahman priests didnot accompany them in any numbers, and hence the Charans arose andsupplied their place. They had to understand the rites of worship, particularly of Siva and Parvati, the favourite deities of the Rajputs, and were taught to read and write. One class became merchants andtravelled with large convoys of goods, and the others were the bardsand genealogists of the Rajputs. Their songs were in the rudest metre, and their language was the local dialect, understood by all. All thisevidence shows that the Charans were a class of Rajput bards. 

3. Lower-class Bhats. 

But besides the Birm or Brahman Bhats and the Rajput Charans there isanother large body of the caste of mixed origin, who serve as bardsof the lower castes and are probably composed to a great extent ofmembers of these castes. These are known as the Brid-dhari or beggingBhats. They beg from such castes as Lodhis, Telis, Kurmis, Ahirs andso on, each caste having a separate section of Bhats to serve it;the Bhats of each caste take food from the members of the caste, but they also eat and intermarry with each other. Again, there areBairagi Bhats who beg from Bairagis, and keep the genealogies ofthe temple-priests and their successors. Yet another class are theDasaundhis or Jasondhis, who sing songs in honour of Devi, play onmusical instruments and practise astrology. These rank below thecultivating castes and sometimes admit members of such castes whohave taken religious vows. 

4. Social status of the caste. 

The Brahman or Birm-Bhats form a separate subcaste, and the Rajputsare sometimes called Rajbhat. These wear the sacred thread, which theBrid-Bhats and Jasondhis do not. The social status of the Bhats appearsto vary greatly. Sir H. Risley states that they rank immediately belowKayasths, and Brahmans will take water from their hands. The Charansare treated by the Rajputs with the greatest respect; [286] the highestruler rises when one of this class enters or leaves an assembly, and the Charan is invited to eat first at a Rajput feast. He smokesfrom the same huqqa as Rajputs, and only caste-fellows can do this, asthe smoke passes through water on its way to the mouth. In past timesthe Charan acted as a herald, and his person was inviolable. He wasaddressed as Maharaj, [287] and could sit on the Singhasan or Lion'sHide, the ancient term for a Rajput throne, as well as on the hidesof the tiger, panther and black antelope. The Rajputs held him inequal estimation with the Brahman or perhaps even greater. [288] Thiswas because they looked to him to enshrine their heroic deeds in hissongs and hand them down to posterity. His sarcastic references to adefeat in battle or any act displaying a want of courage inflamed theirpassions as nothing else could do. On the other hand, the Brid-Bhats, who serve the lower castes, occupy an inferior position. This isbecause they beg at weddings and other feasts, and accept cookedfood from members of the caste who are their clients. Such an actconstitutes an admission of inferior status, and as the Bhats eattogether their position becomes equivalent to that of the lowestgroup among them. Thus if other Bhats eat with the Bhats of Telis orKalars, who have taken cooked food from their clients, they are allin the position of having taken food from Telis and Kalars, a thingwhich only the lowest castes will do. If the Bhat of any caste, suchas the Kurmis, keeps a girl of that caste, she can be admitted intothe community, which is therefore of a very mixed character. Such acaste as the Kurmis will not even take water from the hands of theBhats who serve them. This rule applies also where a special sectionof the caste itself act as bards and minstrels. Thus the Pardhansare the bards of the Gonds, but rank below ordinary Gonds, who givethem food and will not take it from them. And the Sansias, the bardsof the Jats, and the Mirasis, who are employed in this capacity bythe lower castes generally, occupy a very inferior position, and aresometimes considered as impure. 

5. Social customs. 

The customs of the Bhats resemble those of other castes ofcorresponding status. The higher Bhats forbid the remarriage ofwidows, and expel a girl who becomes pregnant before marriage. Theycarry a dagger, the special emblem of the Charans, in order to bedistinguished from low-class Bhats. The Bhats generally display the_chaur_ or yak-tail whisk and the _chhadi_ or silver-plated rod onceremonial occasions, and they worship these emblems of their callingon the principal festivals. The former is waved over the bridegroomat a wedding, and the latter is borne before him. The Brahman Bhatsabstain from flesh of any kind and liquor, and other Bhats usually havethe same rules about food as the caste whom they serve. Brahman Bhatsand Charans alone wear the sacred thread. The high status sometimesassigned to this division of the caste is shown in the saying:

 Age Brahman pichhe Bhat take pichhe aur jat, or, 'First comes the Brahman, then the Bhat, and after them theother castes. '

6. The Bhat's business. 

The business of a Bhat in former times is thus described by Forbes:[289] "When the rainy season closes and travelling becomes practicable, the bard sets off on his yearly tour from his residence in theBhatwara or bard's quarter of some city or town. One by one hevisits each of the Rajput chiefs who are his patrons, and from whomhe has received portions of land or annual grants of money, timinghis arrival, if possible, to suit occasions of marriage or otherdomestic festivals. After he has received the usual courtesies heproduces the Wai, a book written in his own crabbed hieroglyphicsor in those of his father, which contains the descent of the housefrom its founder, interspersed with many a verse or ballad, the darksayings contained in which are chanted forth in musical cadence toa delighted audience, and are then orally interpreted by the bardwith many an illustrative anecdote or tale. The Wai, however, is notmerely a source for the gratification of family pride or even of loveof song; it is also a record by which questions of relationship aredetermined when a marriage is in prospect, and disputes relating to thedivision of ancestral property are decided, intricate as these lastnecessarily are from the practice of polygamy and the rule that allthe sons of a family are entitled to a share. It is the duty of thebard at each periodical visit to register the births, marriages anddeaths which have taken place in the family since his last circuit, as well as to chronicle all the other events worthy of remark whichhave occurred to affect the fortunes of his patron; nor have we everheard even a doubt suggested regarding the accurate, much less thehonest fulfilment of this duty by the bard. The manners of the bardictribe are very similar to those of their Rajput clients; their dressis nearly the same, but the bard seldom appears without the _katar_or dagger, a representation of which is scrawled beside his signature, and often rudely engraved upon his monumental stone, in evidence ofhis death in the sacred duty of _traga_ (suicide). " [290]

7. Their extortionate practices. 

The Bhat thus fulfilled a most useful function as registrar of birthsand marriages. But his merits were soon eclipsed by the evils producedby his custom of extolling liberal patrons and satirising those whogave inadequately. The desire of the Rajputs to be handed down to famein the Bhat's songs was such that no extravagance was spared to satisfyhim. Chand, the great Rajput bard, sang of the marriage of Prithwi Raj, king of Delhi, that the bride's father emptied his coffers in gifts, but he filled them with the praises of mankind. A lakh of rupees[291] was given to the chief bard, and this became a precedent forsimilar occasions. "Until vanity suffers itself to be controlled, "Colonel Tod wrote, [292] "and the aristocratic Rajputs submit torepublican simplicity, the evils arising from nuptial profusionwill not cease. Unfortunately those who should check it find theirinterest in stimulating it, namely, the whole crowd of _mangtas_or beggars, bards, minstrels, jugglers, Brahmans, who assembleon these occasions, and pour forth their epithalamiums in praiseof the virtue of liberality. The bards are the grand recorders offame, and the volume of precedent is always resorted to by citingthe liberality of former chiefs; while the dread of their satire[293] shuts the eyes of the chief to consequences, and they are onlyanxious to maintain the reputation of their ancestors, though fraughtwith future ruin. " Owing to this insensate liberality in the desireto satisfy the bards and win their praises, a Rajput chief who hadto marry a daughter was often practically ruined; and the desireto avoid such obligations led to the general practice of femaleinfanticide, formerly so prevalent in Rajputana. The importance ofthe bards increased their voracity; Mr. Nesfield describes them as"Rapacious and conceited mendicants, too proud to work but not tooproud to beg. " The Dholis [294] or minstrels were one of the sevengreat evils which the famous king Sidhraj expelled from AnhilwadaPatan in Gujarat; the Dakans or witches were another. [295] Malcolmstates that "They give praise and fame in their songs to those whoare liberal to them, while they visit those who neglect or injurethem with satires in which the victims are usually reproached withillegitimate birth and meanness of character. Sometimes the Bhat, if very seriously offended, fixes an effigy of the person he desiresto degrade on a long pole and appends to it a slipper as a mark ofdisgrace. In such cases the song of the Bhat records the infamy of theobject of his revenge. This image usually travels the country tillthe party or his friends purchase the cessation of the curses andridicule thus entailed. It is not deemed in these countries withinthe power of the prince, much less any other person, to stop a Bhator even punish him for such a proceeding. In 1812 Sevak Ram Seth, a banker of Holkar's court, offended one of these Bhats, pushinghim rudely out of the shop where the man had come to ask alms. Theman made a figure [296] of him to which he attached a slipper andcarried it to court, and everywhere sang the infamy of the Seth. Thelatter, though a man of wealth and influence, could not prevent him, but obstinately refused to purchase his forbearance. His friendsafter some months subscribed Rs. 80 and the Bhat discontinued hisexecrations, but said it was too late, as his curses had taken effect;and the superstitious Hindus ascribe the ruin of the banker, whichtook place some years afterwards, to this unfortunate event. " Theloquacity and importunity of the Bhats are shown in the saying, 'Four Bhats make a crowd'; and their insincerity in the proverbquoted by Mr. Crooke, "The bard, the innkeeper and the harlot haveno heart; they are polite when customers arrive, but neglect thoseleaving (after they have paid)" [297] The Bhat women are as bold, voluble and ready in retort as the men. When a Bhat woman passes amale caste-fellow on the road, it is the latter who raises a pieceof cloth to his face till the woman is out of sight. [298]

8. The Jasondhis. 

Some of the lower classes of Bhats have become religious mendicantsand musicians, and perform ceremonial functions. Thus the Jasondhis, who are considered a class of Bhats, take their name from the _jas_or hymns sung in praise of Devi. They are divided into varioussections, as the Nakib or flag-bearers in a procession, the Nazir orushers who introduced visitors to the Raja, the Nagaria or players onkettle-drums, the Karaola who pour sesamum oil on their clothes andbeg, and the Panda, who serve as priests of Devi, and beg carryingan image of the goddess in their hands. There is also a section ofMuhammadan Bhats who serve as bards and genealogists for Muhammadancastes. Some Bhats, having the rare and needful qualification ofliteracy so that they can read the old Sanskrit medical works, have, like a number of Brahmans, taken to the practice of medicine and areknown as Kaviraj. 

9. The Charans as carriers. 

As already stated, the persons of the Charans in the capacity of bardand herald were sacred, and they travelled from court to court withoutfear of molestation from robbers or enemies. It seems likely that theCharans may have united the breeding of cattle to their calling ofbard; but in any case the advantage derived from their sanctity was soimportant that they gradually became the chief carriers and traders ofRajputana and the adjoining tracts. They further, in virtue of theirholy character, enjoyed a partial exemption from the perpetual andharassing imposts levied by every petty State on produce entering itsterritory; and the combination of advantages thus obtained was suchas to give them almost a monopoly in trade. They carried merchandiseon large droves of bullocks all over Rajputana and the adjoiningcountries; and in course of time the carriers restricted themselvesto their new profession, splitting off from the Charans and formingthe caste of Banjaras. 

10. Suicide and the fear of ghosts. 

But the mere reverence for their calling would not have sufficed fora permanent safeguard to the Charans from destitute and unscrupulousrobbers. They preserved it by the customs of _Chandi_ or _Traga_ and_Dharna_. These consisted in their readiness to mutilate, starve orkill themselves rather than give up property entrusted to their care;and it was a general belief that their ghosts would then haunt thepersons whose ill deeds had forced them to take their own lives. Itseems likely that this belief in the power of a suicide or murderedman to avenge himself by haunting any persons who had injured him orbeen responsible for his death may have had a somewhat wide prevalenceand been partly accountable for the reprobation attaching in earlytimes to the murderer and the act of self-slaughter. The hauntedmurderer would be impure and would bring ill-fortune on all who hadto do with him, while the injury which a suicide would inflict on hisrelatives in haunting them would cause this act to be regarded as a sinagainst one's family and tribe. Even the ordinary fear of the ghostsof people who die in the natural course, and especially of those whoare killed by accident, is so strong that a large part of the funeralrites is devoted to placating and laying the ghost of the dead man;and in India the period of observance of mourning for the dead isperhaps in reality that time during which the spirit of the dead manis supposed to haunt his old abode and render the survivors of hisfamily impure. It was this fear of ghosts on which the Charans relied, nor did they hesitate a moment to sacrifice their lives in defence ofany obligation they had undertaken or of property committed to theircare. When plunderers carried off any cattle belonging to the Charans, the whole community would proceed to the spot where the robbersresided; and in failure of having their property restored would cut offthe heads of several of their old men and women. Frequent instancesoccurred of a man dressing himself in cotton-quilted cloths steepedin oil which he set on fire at the bottom, and thus danced againstthe person against whom _traga_ was performed until the miserablecreature dropped down and was burnt to ashes. On one occasion a Cutchchieftain, attempting to escape with his wife and child from a village, was overtaken by his enemy when about to leap a precipice; immediatelyturning he cut off his wife's head with his scimitar and, flourishinghis reeking blade in the face of his pursuer, denounced against himthe curse of the _traga_ which he had so fearfully performed. [299]In this case it was supposed that the wife's ghost would haunt theenemy who had driven the husband to kill her. 

11. Instances of haunting and laying ghosts. 

The following account in the _Rasmala_ [300] is an instance of suicideand of the actual haunting by the ghost: A Charan asserted a claimagainst the chief of Siela in Kathiawar, which the latter refused toliquidate. The bard thereupon, taking forty of his caste with him, went to Siela with the intention of sitting _Dharna_ at the chief'sdoor and preventing any one from coming out or going in until theclaim should be discharged. However, as they approached the town, the chief, becoming aware of their intention, caused the gates tobe closed. The bards remained outside and for three days abstainedfrom food; on the fourth day they proceeded to perform _traga_ asfollows: some hacked their own arms; others decapitated three oldwomen of the party and hung their heads up at the gate as a garland;certain of the women cut off their own breasts. The bards also piercedthe throats of four of their old men with spikes, and they took twoyoung girls by the heels, and dashed out their brains against thetown gate. The Charan to whom the money was due dressed himself inclothes wadded with cotton which he steeped in oil and then set onfire. He thus burned himself to death. But as he died he cried out, "I am now dying; but I will become a headless ghost (_Kuvis_) in thepalace, and will take the chiefs life and cut off his posterity. " Afterthis sacrifice the rest of the bards returned home. 

On the third day after the Charan's death his Bhut (ghost) threw theRani downstairs so that she was very much injured. Many other personsalso beheld the headless phantom in the palace. At last he enteredthe chief's head and set him trembling. At night he would throw stonesat the palace, and he killed a female servant outright. At length, inconsequence of the various acts of oppression which he committed, nonedared to approach the chief's mansion even in broad daylight. In orderto exorcise the Bhut, Jogis, Fakirs and Brahmans were sent for frommany different places; but whoever attempted the cure was immediatelyassailed by the Bhut in the chief's body, and that so furiouslythat the exorcist's courage failed him. The Bhut would also causethe chief to tear the flesh off his own arms with his teeth. Besidesthis, four or five persons died of injuries received from the Bhut;but nobody had the power to expel him. At length a foreign Jyotishi(astrologer) came who had a great reputation for charms and magic, and the chief sent for him and paid him honour. First he tied allround the house threads which he had charged with a charm; then hesprinkled charmed milk and water all round; then he drove a charmediron nail into the ground at each corner of the mansion, and two at thedoor. He purified the house and continued his charms and incantationsfor forty-one days, every day making sacrifices at the cemetery to theBhut's spirit. The Joshi lived in a room securely fastened up; butpeople say that while he was muttering his charms stones would falland strike the windows. Finally the Joshi brought the chief, who hadbeen living in a separate room, and tried to exorcise the spirit. Thepatient began to be very violent, but the Joshi and his people sparedno pains in thrashing him until they had rendered him quite docile. Asacrificial fire-pit was made and a lemon placed between it and thechief. The Joshi commanded the Bhut to enter the lime. The possessed, however, said, 'Who are you; if one of your Deos (gods) were to come, I would not quit this person. ' Thus they went on from morning tillnoon. At last they came outside, and, burning various kinds of incenseand sprinkling many charms, the Bhut was got out into the lemon. Whenthe lemon began to jump about, the whole of the spectators praisedthe Joshi, crying out: 'The Bhut has gone into the lemon! The Bhuthas gone into the lemon!' The possessed person himself, when he sawthe lemon hopping about, was perfectly satisfied that the Bhut hadleft his body and gone out into the lemon. The Joshi then drove thelemon outside the city, followed by drummers and trumpeters; if thelemon left the road, he would touch it with his stick and put it intothe right way again. On the track they sprinkled mustard and salt andfinally buried the lemon in a pit seven cubits deep, throwing intothe hole above it mustard and salt, and over these dust and stones, and filling in the space between the stones with lead. At each corner, too, the Joshi drove in an iron nail, two feet long, which he hadpreviously charmed. The lemon buried, the people returned home, and notone of them ever saw the Bhut thereafter. According to the recorderof the tale, the cure was effected by putting quicksilver into thelemon. When a man is attacked with fever or becomes speechless orappears to have lockjaw, his friends conclude from these indicationsthat he is possessed by a Bhut. 

In another case some Bhats had been put in charge, by the chief of asmall State, of a village which was coveted by a neighbouring prince, the Rana of Danta. The latter sent for the Bhats and asked them toguard one or two of his villages, and having obtained their absenceby this pretext he raided their village, carrying off hostages andcattle. When the Bhats got back they collected to the number of ahundred and began to perform _Dharna_ against the Rana. They setout from their village, and at every two miles as they advanced theyburned a man, so that by the time they got to the Rana's territoryseven or eight men had been burnt. They were then pacified by hispeople and induced to go back. The Rana offered them presents, butthey refused to accept them, as they said the guilt of the death oftheir fellows who had been burned would thereby be removed from theRana. The Rana lost all the seven sons born to him and died childless, and it was generally held to be on account of this sin. [301]

12. The Charans as sureties. 

Such was the certainty attaching to the Charan's readiness to forfeithis life rather than prove false to a trust, and the fear entertainedof the offence of causing him to do so and being haunted by his ghost, that his security was eagerly coveted in every kind of transaction. "Notraveller could journey unattended by these guards, who for a smallsum were satisfied to conduct him in safety. [302] The guards, calledValavas, were never backward in inflicting the most grievous woundsand even causing the death of their old men and women if the robberspersisted in plundering those under their protection; but this seldomhappened, as the wildest Koli, Kathi or Rajput held the person of aCharan sacred. Besides becoming safeguards to travellers and goods, they used to stand security to the amount of many lakhs of rupees. Whenrents and property were concerned, the Rajputs preferred a Charan'sbond to that of the wealthiest banker. They also gave security for goodbehaviour, called _chalu zamin_, and for personal attendance in courtcalled _hazar zamin_. The ordinary _traga_ went no farther than a cuton the arm with the _katar_ or crease; the forearms of those who werein the habit of becoming security had generally several cuts from theelbow downwards. The Charans, both men and women, wounded themselves, committed suicide and murdered their relations with the most completeself-devotion. In 1812 the Marathas brought a body of troops to imposea payment on the village of Panchpipla. [303] The Charans resisted thedemand, but finding the Marathas determined to carry their point, aftera remonstrance against paying any kind of revenue as being contrary totheir occupation and principles, they at last cut the throats of tenyoung children and threw them at the feet of the Marathas, exclaiming, 'These are our riches and the only payment we can make. ' The Charanswere immediately seized and confined in irons at Jambusar. "

As was the case with the Bhat and the Brahman, the source of theCharan's power lay in the widespread fear that a Charan's bloodbrought ruin on him who caused the blood to be spilt. It was alsosometimes considered that the Charan was possessed by his deity, and the caste were known as Deoputra or sons of God, the favouritedwelling of the guardian spirit. 

13. Suicide as a means of revenge. 

Such a belief enhanced the guilt attaching to the act of causingor being responsible for a Charan's death. Suicide from motives ofrevenge has been practised in other countries. "Another common formof suicide which is admired as heroic in China is that committed forthe purpose of taking revenge upon an enemy who is otherwise out ofreach--according to Chinese ideas a most effective mode of revenge, not only because the law throws the responsibility of the deed on himwho occasioned it, but also because the disembodied soul is supposedto be better able than the living man to persecute the enemy. " [304]Similarly, among the Hos or Mundas the suicide of young married womenis or was extremely common, and the usual motive was that the girl, being unhappy in her husband's house, jumped down a well or otherwisemade away with herself in the belief that she would take revenge onhis family by haunting them after her death. The treatment of thesuicide's body was sometimes directed to prevent his spirit fromcausing trouble. "According to Jewish custom persons who had killedthemselves were left unburied till sunset, perhaps for fear lest thespirit of the deceased otherwise might find its way back to the oldhome. " [305] At Athens the right hand of a person who had taken hisown life was struck off and buried apart from the rest of the body, evidently in order to make him harmless after death. [306] Similarly, in England suicides were buried with a spike through the chest toprevent their spirits from rising, and at cross-roads, so that theghost might not be able to find its way home. This fear appears tohave partly underlain the idea that suicide was a crime or an offenceagainst society and the state, though, as shown by Dr. Westermarck, the reprobation attaching to it was far from universal; while inthe cultured communities of ancient Greece and Rome, and among suchmilitary peoples as the Japanese suicide was considered at all times alegitimate and, on occasion, a highly meritorious and praiseworthy act. 

That condition of mind which leads to the taking of one's ownlife from motives of revenge is perhaps a fruit of ignorance andsolitude. The mind becomes distorted, and the sufferer attributes theunhappiness really caused by accident or his own faults or defects tothe persecution of a malignant fate or the ill-will of his neighboursand associates. And long brooding over his wrongs eventuates in histaking the extreme step. The crime known as running amok appears to bethe outcome of a similar state of mind. Here too the criminal considershis wrongs or misery as the result of injury or unjust treatmentfrom his fellow-men, and, careless of his own life, determines to berevenged on them. Such hatred of one's kind is cured by education, leading to a truer appreciation of the circumstances and environmentwhich determine the course of life, and by the more cheerful temperengendered by social intercourse. And these crimes of vengeance tendto die out with the advance of civilisation. 

14. _Dharna. _

Analogous to the custom of _traga_ was that of _Dharna_, which wasfrequently and generally resorted to for the redress of wrongs andoffences at a time when the law made little provision for either. Theordinary method of _Dharna_ was to sit starving oneself in front ofthe door of the person from whom redress was sought until he gave itfrom fear of causing the death of the suppliant and being hauntedby his ghost. It was, naturally, useless unless the person seekingredress was prepared to go to extremes, and has some analogy to themodern hunger-strike with the object of getting out of jail. Anothercommon device was to thrust a spear-blade through both cheeks, and in this state to dance before the person against whom _Dharna_was practised. The pain had to be borne without a sign of suffering, which, if displayed, would destroy its efficacy. Or a creditor wouldproceed to the door of his debtor and demand payment, and if notappeased would stand up in his presence with an enormous weight uponhis head, which he had brought with him for the purpose, swearing neverto alter his position until satisfaction was given, and denouncing atthe same time the most horrible execrations on his debtor, should hesuffer him to expire in that situation. This seldom failed to producethe desired effect, but should he actually die while in _Dharna_, thedebtor's house was razed to the earth and he and his family sold forthe satisfaction of the creditor's heirs. Another and more desperateform of _Dharna_, only occasionally resorted to, was to erect a largepile of wood before the house of the debtor, and after the customaryapplication for payment had been refused the creditor tied on thetop of the pile a cow or a calf, or very frequently an old woman, generally his mother or other relation, swearing at the same timeto set fire to it if satisfaction was not instantly given. All thetime the old woman denounced the bitterest curses, threatening topersecute the wretched debtor both here and hereafter. [307]

The word _dharna_ means 'to place or lay on, ' and hence 'apledge. ' Mr. Hira Lal suggests that the standing with a weight on thehead may have been the original form of the penance, from which theother and severer methods were subsequently derived. Another customknown as _dharna_ is that of a suppliant placing a stone on theshrine of a god or tomb of a saint. He makes his request and, layingthe stone on the shrine, says, "Here I place this stone until youfulfil my prayer; if I do not remove it, the shame is on you. " If theprayer is afterwards fulfilled, he takes away the stone and offers acocoanut. It seems clear that the underlying idea of this custom is thesame as that of standing with a stone on the head as described above, but it is difficult to say which was the earlier or original form. 

15. Casting out spirits. 

As a general rule, if the guilt of having caused a suicide was at aman's door, he should expiate it by going to the Ganges to bathe. Whena man was haunted by the ghost of any one whom he had wronged, whethersuch a person had committed suicide or simply died of grief at beingunable to obtain redress, it was said of him _Brahm laga_, or thatBrahma had possessed him. The spirit of a Brahman boy, who has diedunmarried, is also accustomed to haunt any person who walks over hisgrave in an impure condition or otherwise defiles it, and when a man ishaunted in such a manner it is called _Brahm laga_. Then an exorcistis called, who sprinkles water over the possessed man, and this burnsthe Brahm Deo or spirit inside him as if it were burning oil. Thespirit cries out, and the exorcist orders him to leave the man. Thenthe spirit states how he has been injured by the man, and refuses toleave him. The exorcist asks him what he requires on condition ofleaving the man, and he asks for some good food or something else, and is given it. The exorcist takes a nail and goes to a _pipal_tree and orders the Brahm Deo to go into the tree. Brahm Deo obeys, and the exorcist drives the nail into the tree and the spirit remainsimprisoned there until somebody takes the nail out, when he will comeout again and haunt him. The Hindus think that the god Brahma livesin the roots of the _pipal_ tree, Siva in its branches, and Vishnuin the _choti_ or scalp-knot, that is the topmost foliage. 

16. Sulking. Going bankrupt. 

Another and mild form of _Dharna_ is that known as _Khatpati_. When awoman is angry with her husband on account of his having refused hersome request, she will put her bed in a corner of the room and go andlie on it, turning her face to the wall, and remain so, not answeringwhen spoken to nor taking food. The term Khatpati signifies keepingto one side of the bed, and there she will remain until her husbandaccedes to her request, unless indeed he should decide to beat herinstead. This is merely an exaggerated form of the familiar displayof temper known as sulking. It is interesting to note the use of thephrase turning one's face to the wall, with something of the meaningattached to it in the Bible. 

A custom similar to that of _Dharna_ was called _Diwala nikalna_ orgoing bankrupt. When a merchant had had heavy losses and could notmeet his liabilities, he would place the lock of his door outside, reversing it, and sit in the veranda with a piece of sackcloth overhim. Or he wrapped round him the floor-carpet of his room. When hehad displayed these signs of ruin and self-abasement his creditorswould not sue him, but he would never be able to borrow money again. 

17. Bhat songs. 

In conclusion a few specimens of Bhat songs may be given. Thefollowing is an account of the last king of Nagpur, Raghuji III. , commonly known as Baji Rao:

 They made a picture of Baji Rao; Baji Rao was the finest king to see; The Brahmans told lies about him, They sent a letter from Nagpur to Calcutta, They made Baji Rao go on a pilgrimage. Brothers! the great Sirdars who were with him, They brought a troop of five hundred horse! The Tuesday fair in Benares was held with fireworks, They made the Ganges pink with rose-petals. Baji Rao's gifts were splendid, His turban and coat were of brocaded silk, A pair of diamonds and emeralds He gave to the Brahmans of Benares. Oh brothers! the Raja sat in a covered howdah bound on an elephant! Many fans waved over his head; How charitable a king he was!

In the above song a note of regret is manifest for the paradeand display of the old court of Nagpur, English rule being lesspicturesque. The next is a song about the English:

 The English have taken the throne of Nagpur, The fear of the English is great. In a moment's time they conquer countries. The guns boomed, the English came strong and warlike, They give wealth to all. They ram the ramrods in the guns. They conquered also Tippoo's dominions, The English are ruling in the fort of Gawilgarh. 

The following is another song about the English, not quite socomplimentary:

 The English became our kings and have made current the _kaldar_ (milled) rupee. The menials are favoured and the Bhats have lost their profession, The mango has lost its taste, the milk has lost its sweetness, The rose has lost its scent. Baji Rao of Nagpur he also is gone, No longer are the drums beaten at the palace gate. Poona customs have come in. Brahmans knowing the eighteen Purans have become Christians; The son thinks himself better than his father, The daughter-in-law no longer respects her mother-in-law. The wife fights with her husband. The English have made the railways and telegraphs; The people wondered at the silver rupees and all the country prospered. 

The following is a song about the Nerbudda at Mandla, Rewa beinganother name for the river:

 The stream of the world springs out breaking apart the hills; The Rewa cuts her path through the soil, the air is darkened with her spray. All the length of her banks are the seats of saints; hermits and pilgrims worship her. On seeing the holy river a man's sins fall away as wood is cut by a saw; By bathing in her he plucks the fruit of holiness. When boats are caught in her flood, the people pray: 'We are sinners, O Rewa, bring us safely to the bank!' When the Nerbudda is in flood, Mandla is an island and the people think their end has come: The rain pours down on all sides, earth and sky become dark as smoke, and men call on Rama. The bard says: 'Let it rain as it may, some one will save us as Krishna saved the people of Brindawan!'

This is a description of a beautiful woman:

 A beautiful woman is loved by her neighbours, But she will let none come to her and answers them not. They say: 'Since God has made you so beautiful, open your litter and let yourself be seen!' He who sees her is struck as by lightning, she shoots her lover with the darts of her eyes, invisible herself. She will not go to her husband's house till he has her brought by the Government. When she goes her father's village is left empty. She is so delicate she faints at the sight of a flower, Her body cannot bear the weight of her cloth, The garland of jasmine-flowers is a burden on her neck, The red powder on her feet is too heavy for them. 

It is interesting to note that weakness and delicacy in a womanare emphasised as an attraction, as in English literature of theeighteenth century. 

The last is a gentle intimation that poets, like other people, haveto live:

 It is useless to adorn oneself with sandalwood on an empty belly, Nobody's body gets fat from the scent of flowers; The singing of songs excites the mind, But if the body is not fed all these are vain and hollow. 

All Bhats recite their verses in a high-pitched sing-song tone, which renders it very difficult for their hearers to grasp thesense unless they know it already. The Vedas and all other sacredverses are spoken in this manner, perhaps as a mark of respect and todistinguish them from ordinary speech. The method has some resemblanceto intoning. Women use the same tone when mourning for the dead. 

Bhatra

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice and structure of the caste. _ 2. _Admission of outsiders. _ 3. _Arrangement of marriages. _ 4. _The Counter of Posts. _ 5. _Marriage customs. _ 6. _Propitiation of ghosts. _ 7. _Religion. Ceremonies at hunting. _ 8. _Superstitious remedies. _ 9. _Occupation. _10. _Names. _

1. General notice and structure of the caste. 

_Bhatra. _ [308]--A primitive tribe of the Bastar State and the southof Raipur District, akin to the Gonds. They numbered 33, 000 personsin 1891, and in subsequent enumerations have been amalgamated withthe Gonds. Nothing is known of their origin except a legend that theycame with the Rajas of Bastar from Warangal twenty-three generationsago. The word Bhatra is said to mean a servant, and the tribe areemployed as village watchmen and household and domestic servants. Theyhave three divisions, the Pit, Amnait and San Bhatras, who rank onebelow the other, the Pit being the highest and the San the lowest. ThePit Bhatras base their superiority on the fact that they decline tomake grass mats, which the Amnait Bhatras will do, while the SanBhatras are considered to be practically identical with the MuriaGonds. Members of the three groups will eat with each other beforemarriage, but afterwards they will take only food cooked without waterfrom a person belonging to another group. They have the usual set ofexogamous septs named after plants and animals. Formerly, it is said, they were tattooed with representations of the totem plant and animal, and the septs named after the tiger and snake ate the flesh of theseanimals at a sacrificial meal. These customs have fallen into abeyance, but still if they kill their totem animal they will make apologies toit, and break their cooking-pots, and bury or burn the body. A man ofsubstance will distribute alms in the name of the deceased animal. Insome localities members of the Kachhun or tortoise sept will not eat apumpkin which drops from a tree because it is considered to resemble atortoise. But if they can break it immediately on touching the groundthey may partake of the fruit, the assumption being apparently thatit has not had time to become like a tortoise. 

2. Admission of outsiders. 

Outsiders are not as a rule admitted. But a woman of equal or highercaste who enters the house of a Bhatra will be recognised as his wife, and a man of the Panara, or gardener caste, can also become a member ofthe community if he lives with a Bhatra woman and eats from her hand. 

3. Arrangement of marriages. 

In Raipur a girl should be married before puberty, and if no husbandis immediately available, they tie a few flowers into her cloth andconsider this as a marriage. If an unmarried girl becomes pregnant sheis debarred from going through the wedding ceremony, and will simplygo and live with her lover or any other man. Matches are usuallyarranged by the parents, but if a daughter is not pleased with theprospective bridegroom, who may sometimes be a well-to-do man mucholder than herself, she occasionally runs away and goes through theceremony on her own account with the man of her choice. 

If no one has asked her parents for her hand she may similarly selecta husband for herself and make her wishes known, but in that case sheis temporarily put out of caste until the chosen bridegroom signifieshis acquiescence by giving the marriage feast. What happens if hedefinitely fails to respond is not stated, but presumably the youngwoman tries elsewhere until she finds herself accepted. 

4. The Counter of Posts. 

The date and hour of the wedding are fixed by an official known asthe Meda Gantia, or Counter of Posts. He is a sort of illiteratevillage astrologer, who can foretell the character of the rainfall, and gives auspicious dates for sowing and harvest. He goes throughsome training, and as a test of his capacity is required by histeacher to tell at a glance the number of posts in an enclosure whichhe has not seen before. Having done this correctly he qualifies asa Meda Gantia. Apparently the Bhatras, being unable at one time tocount themselves, acquired an exaggerated reverence for the facultyof counting, and thought that if a man could only count far enoughhe could reckon into the future; or it might be thought that as hecould count and name future days, he thus obtained power over them, and could tell what would happen on them just as one can obtain powerover a man and work him injury by knowing his real name. 

5. Marriage customs. 

At a wedding the couple walk seven times round the sacred post, whichmust be of wood of the mahua [309] tree, and on its conclusion the postis taken to a river or stream and consigned to the water. The Bhatras, like the Gonds, no doubt revere this tree because their intoxicatingliquor is made from its flowers. The couple wear marriage crownsmade from the leaves of the date palm and exchange these. A littleturmeric and flour are mixed with water in a plate, and the bride, taking the bridegroom's right hand, dips it into the coloured pasteand strikes it against the wall. The action is repeated five times, and then the bridegroom does the same with the bride's hand. By thisrite the couple pledge each other for their mutual behaviour duringmarried life. From the custom of making an impression of the handon a wall in token of a vow may have arisen that of clasping handsas a symbol of a bargain assented to, and hence of shaking hands, by persons who meet, as a pledge of amity and the absence of hostileintentions. Usually the hand is covered with red ochre, which isprobably a substitute for blood; and the impression of the hand is madeon the wall of a temple in token of a vow. This may be a survival ofthe covenant made by the parties dipping their hands in the blood ofthe sacrifice and laying them on the god. A pit about a foot deep isdug close to the marriage-shed, and filled with mud or wet earth. Thebride conceals a nut in the mud and the bridegroom has to find it, and the hiding and finding are repeated by both parties. This rite mayhave the signification of looking for children. The remainder of theday is spent in eating, drinking and dancing. On the way home afterthe wedding the bridegroom has to shoot a deer, the animal beingrepresented by a branch of a tree thrown across the path by one ofthe party. But if a real deer happens by any chance to come by he hasto shoot this. The bride goes up to the real or sham deer and pullsout the arrow, and presents her husband with water and a tooth-stick, after which he takes her in his arms and they dance home together. Onarrival at the house the bridegroom's maternal uncle or his son liesdown before the door covering himself with a blanket. He is askedwhat he wants, and says he will have the daughter of the bridegroomto wife. The bridegroom promises to give a daughter if he has one, and if he has a son to give him for a friend. The tribe consider thata man has a right to marry the daughter of his maternal uncle, andformerly if the girl was refused by her parents he abducted her andmarried her forcibly. The bride remains at her husband's house for afew days and then goes home, and before she finally takes up her abodewith him the _gauna_ or going-away ceremony must be performed. Thehands of the bride and bridegroom are tied together, and an arrow isheld upright on them and some oil poured over it. The foreheads ofthe couple are marked with turmeric and rice, this rite being knownas _tika_ or anointing, and presents are given to the bride's family. 

6. Propitiation of ghosts. 

The dead are buried, the corpse being laid on its back with the headto the north. Some rice, cowrie-shells, a winnowing-fan and otherarticles are placed on the grave. The tribe probably consider thewinnowing-fan to have some magical property, as it also forms one ofthe presents given to the bride at the betrothal. If a man is killedby a tiger his spirit must be propitiated. The priest ties strips oftiger-skin to his arms, and the feathers of the peacock and blue jayto his waist, and jumps about pretending to be a tiger. A package ofa hundred seers (200 lbs. ) of rice is made up, and he sits on thisand finally takes it away with him. If the dead man had any ornamentsthey must all be given, however valuable, lest his spirit should hankerafter them and return to look for them in the shape of the tiger. Thelarge quantity of rice given to the priest is also probably intendedas a provision of the best food for the dead man's spirit, lest itbe hungry and come in the shape of the tiger to satisfy its appetiteupon the surviving relatives. The laying of the ghosts of personskilled by tigers is thus a very profitable business for the priests. 

7. Religion. Ceremonies at hunting. 

The tribe worship the god of hunting, who is known as Mati Deoand resides in a separate tree in each village. At the Bijphutni(threshing) or harvest festival in the month of Chait (March) they havea ceremonial hunting party. All the people of the village collect, each man having a bow and arrow slung to his back and a hatcheton his shoulder. They spread out a long net in the forest and beatthe animals into this, usually catching a deer, wild pig or hare, and quails and other birds. They return and cook the game before theshrine of the god and offer to him a fowl and a pig. A pit is dugand water poured into it, and a person from each house must standin the mud. A little seed taken from each house is also soaked inthe mud, and after the feast is over this is taken and returned tothe householder with words of abuse, a small present of two or threepice being received from him. The seed is no doubt thus consecratedfor the next sowing. The tribe also have joint ceremonial fishingexcursions. Their ideas of a future life are very vague, and theyhave no belief in a place of reward or punishment after death. Theypropitiate the spirits of their ancestors on the 15th of Asarh (June)with offerings of a little rice and incense. 

8. Superstitious remedies. 

To cure the evil eye they place a little gunpowder in water andapply it to the sufferer's eyes, the idea perhaps being that thefiery glance from the evil eye which struck him is quenched like thegunpowder. To bring on rain they perform a frog marriage, tying twofrogs to a pestle and pouring oil and turmeric over them as in a realmarriage. The children carry them round begging from door to door andfinally deposit them in water. They say that when rain falls and thesun shines together the jackals are being married. Formerly a womansuspected of being a witch was tied up in a bag and thrown into ariver or tank at various places set apart for the purpose. If shesank she was held to be innocent, and if she floated, guilty. In thelatter case she had to defile herself by taking the bone of a cowand the tail of a pig in her mouth, and it was supposed that thisdrove out the magic-working spirit. In the case of illness of theirchildren or cattle, or the failure of crops, they consult the Pujarior priest and make an offering. He applies some flowers or grains ofrice to the forehead of the deity, and when one of these falls downhe diagnoses from it the nature of the illness, and gives it to thesufferer to wear as a charm. 

9. Occupation. 

The tribe are cultivators and farmservants, and practise shiftingcultivation. They work as village watchmen and also as the Majhi orvillage headman and the Pujari or village priest. These officialsare paid by contributions of grain from the cultivators. And asalready seen, the Bhatras are employed as household servants andwill clean cooking-vessels. Since they act as village priests, itmay perhaps be concluded that the Bhatras like the Parjas are olderresidents of Bastar than the bulk of the Gonds, and they have becomethe household servants of the Hindu immigrants, which the Gonds wouldprobably disdain to do. Some of them wear the sacred thread, but informer times the Bastar Raja would invest any man with this for afee of four or five rupees, and the Bhatras therefore purchased thesocial distinction. They find it inconvenient, however, and lay itaside when proceeding to their work or going out to hunt. If a manbreaks his thread he must wait till a Brahman comes round, when hecan purchase another. 

10. Names. 

Among a list of personal names given by Mr. Baijnath the followingare of some interest: Pillu, one of short stature; Matola, onewho learnt to walk late; Phagu, born in Phagun (February); Ghinu, dirty-looking; Dasru, born on the Dasahra festival; Ludki, one witha fleshy ear; Dalu, big-bellied; Mudi, a ring, this name having beengiven to a child which cried much after birth, but when its nose waspierced and a ring put in it stopped crying; Chhi, given to a childwhich sneezed immediately after birth; Nunha, a posthumous child;and Bhuklu, a child which began to play almost as soon as born. Theabove instances indicate that it is a favourite plan to select thename from any characteristic displayed by the child soon after birth, or from any circumstance or incident connected with its birth. Amongnames of women are: Cherangi, thin; Fundi, one with swollen cheeks;Kandri, one given to crying; Mahina (month), a child born a month late;Batai, one with large eyes; Gaida, fat; Pakli, of fair colour; Boda, one with crooked legs; Jhunki, one with small eyes; Rupi, a girl whowas given a nose-ring of silver as her brothers had died; Paro, bornon a field-embankment; Dango, tall. A woman must not call by theirnames her father-in-law, mother-in-law, her husband's brothers andelder sisters and the sons and daughters of her husband's brothersand sisters. 

Bhil

List of Paragraphs

1. _General notice. The Bhils a Kolarian tribe. _2. _Rajputs deriving their title to the land from the Bhils. _3. _Historical notice. _4. _General Outram and the Khandesh Bhil Corps. _5. _Subdivisions. _6. _Exogamy and marriage customs. _7. _Widow-marriage, divorce and polygamy. _8. _Religion. _9. _Witchcraft and amulets. _10. _Funeral rites. _11. _Social customs. _12. _Appearance and characteristics. _13. _Occupation. _14. _Language. _

1. General notice. The Bhils a Kolarian tribe. 

_Bhil. _ [310]--An indigenous or non-Aryan tribe which has been muchin contact with the Hindus and is consequently well known. The homeof the Bhils is the country comprised in the hill ranges of Khandesh, Central India and Rajputana, west from the Satpuras to the sea inGujarat. The total number of Bhils in India exceeds a million and ahalf, of which the great bulk belong to Bombay, Rajputana and CentralIndia. The Central Provinces have only about 28, 000, practically all ofwhom reside in the Nimar district, on the hills forming the western endof the Satpura range and adjoining the Rajpipla hills of Khandesh. Asthe southern slopes of these hills lie in Berar, a few Bhils are alsofound there. The name Bhil seems to occur for the first time aboutA. D. 600. It is supposed to be derived from the Dravidian word fora bow, which is the characteristic weapon of the tribe. It has beensuggested that the Bhils are the Pygmies referred to by Ktesias (400B. C. ) and the Phyllitae of Ptolemy (A. D. 150). The Bhils are recognisedas the oldest inhabitants of southern Rajputana and parts of Gujarat, and are usually spoken of in conjunction with the Kolis, who inhabitthe adjoining tracts of Gujarat. The most probable hypothesis of theorigin of the Kolis is that they are a western branch of the Kol orMunda tribe who have spread from Chota Nagpur, through Mandla andJubbulpore, Central India and Rajputana to Gujarat and the sea. Ifthis is correct the Kolis would be a Kolarian tribe. The Bhils havelost their own language, so that it cannot be ascertained whetherit was Kolarian or Dravidian. But there is nothing against its beingKolarian in Sir G. Grierson's opinion; and in view of the length ofresidence of the tribe, the fact that they have abandoned their ownlanguage and their association with the Kolis, this view may be takenas generally probable. The Dravidian tribes have not penetrated sofar west as Central India and Gujarat in appreciable numbers. 

2. Rajputs deriving their title to the land from the Bhils. 

The Rajputs still recognise the Bhils as the former residents andoccupiers of the land by the fact that some Rajput chiefs must bemarked on the brow with a Bhil's blood on accession to the _Gaddi_ orregal cushion. Tod relates how Goha, [311] the eponymous ancestor ofthe Sesodia Rajputs, took the state of Idar in Gujarat from a Bhil:"At this period Idar was governed by a chief of the savage race ofBhils. The young Goha frequented the forests in company with the Bhils, whose habits better assimilated with his daring nature than those ofthe Brahmans. He became a favourite with these _vena-putras_ or sons ofthe forest, who resigned to him Idar with its woods and mountains. TheBhils having determined in sport to elect a king, their choice fellon Goha; and one of the young savages, cutting his finger, appliedthe blood as the badge (_tika_) of sovereignty to his forehead. Whatwas done in sport was confirmed by the old forest chief. The sequelfixes on Goha the stain of ingratitude, for he slew his benefactor, and no motive is assigned in the legend for the deed. " [312]

The legend is of course a euphemism for the fact that the Rajputsconquered and dispossessed the Bhils of Idar. But it is interestingas an indication that they did not consider themselves to derive aproper title to the land merely from the conquest, but wished also toshow that it passed to them by the designation and free consent ofthe Bhils. The explanation is perhaps that they considered the godsof the Bhils to be the tutelary guardians and owners of the land, whom they must conciliate before they could hope to enjoy it inquiet and prosperity. This token of the devolution of the land fromits previous holders, the Bhils, was till recently repeated on theoccasion of each succession of a Sesodia chief. "The Bhil landholdersof Oguna and Undri still claim the privilege of performing the _tika_for the Sesodias. The Oguna Bhil makes the mark of sovereignty on thechief's forehead with blood drawn from his own thumb, and then takesthe chief by the arm and seats him on the throne, while the Undri Bhilholds the salver of spices and sacred grains of rice used in makingthe badge. " [313] The story that Goha killed the old Bhil chief, his benefactor, who had adopted him as heir and successor, whichfits in very badly with the rest of the legend, is probably basedon another superstition. Sir J. G. Frazer has shown in _The GoldenBough_ that in ancient times it was a common superstition that anyone who killed the king had a right to succeed him. The belief wasthat the king was the god of the country, on whose health, strengthand efficiency its prosperity depended. When the king grew old andweak it was time for a successor, and he who could kill the kingproved in this manner that the divine power and strength inherentin the late king had descended to him, and he was therefore the fitperson to be king. [314] An almost similar story is told of the wayin which the Kachhwaha Rajputs took the territory of Amber State fromthe Mina tribe. The infant Rajput prince had been deprived of Narwarby his uncle, and his mother wandered forth carrying him in a basket, till she came to the capital of the Minas, where she first obtainedemployment in the chiefs kitchen. But owing to her good cooking sheattracted his wife's notice and ultimately disclosed her identity andtold her story. The Mina chief then adopted her as his sister and theboy as his nephew. This boy, Dhola Rai, on growing up obtained a fewRajput adherents and slaughtered all the Minas while they were bathingat the feast of Diwali, after which he usurped their country. [315]The repetition both of the adoption and the ungrateful murder showsthe importance attached by the Rajputs to both beliefs as necessaryto the validity of their succession and occupation of the land. 

The position of the Bhils as the earliest residents of the countrywas also recognised by their employment in the capacity of villagewatchmen. One of the duties of this official is to know the villageboundaries and keep watch and ward over them, and it was supposedthat the oldest class of residents would know them best. The Bhilsworked in the office of Mankar, the superior village watchman, inNimar and also in Berar. Grant Duff states [316] that the Ramosi orBhil was employed as village guard by the Marathas, and the Ramosiswere a professional caste of village policemen, probably derived fromthe Bhils or from the Bhils and Kolis. 

3. Historical notice. 

The Rajputs seem at first to have treated the Bhilsleniently. Intermarriage was frequent, especially in the families ofBhil chieftains, and a new caste called Bhilala [317] has arisen, which is composed of the descendants of mixed Rajput and Bhilmarriages. Chiefs and landholders in the Bhil country now belong tothis caste, and it is possible that some pure Bhil families may havebeen admitted to it. The Bhilalas rank above the Bhils, on a levelwith the cultivating castes. Instances occasionally occurred in whichthe children of Rajput by a Bhil wife became Rajputs. When Colonel Todwrote, Rajputs would still take food with Ujla Bhils or those of pureaboriginal descent, and all castes would take water from them. [318]But as Hinduism came to be more orthodox in Rajputana, the Bhilssank to the position of outcastes. Their custom of eating beef hadalways caused them to be much despised. A tradition is related thatone day the god Mahadeo or Siva, sick and unhappy, was reclining in ashady forest when a beautiful woman appeared, the first sight of whomeffected a cure of all his complaints. An intercourse between thegod and the strange female was established, the result of which wasmany children; one of whom, from infancy distinguished alike by hisugliness and vice, slew the favourite bull of Mahadeo, for which crimehe was expelled to the woods and mountains, and his descendants haveever since been stigmatised by the names of Bhil and Nishada. [319]Nishada is a term of contempt applied to the lowest outcastes. MajorHendley, writing in 1875, states: "Some time since a Thakur (chief)cut off the legs of two Bhils, eaters of the sacred cow, and plungedthe stumps into boiling oil. " [320] When the Marathas began to occupyCentral India they treated the Bhils with great cruelty. A Bhil caughtin a disturbed part of the country was without inquiry flogged andhanged. Hundreds were thrown over high cliffs, and large bodies ofthem, assembled under promise of pardon, were beheaded or blown fromguns. Their women were mutilated or smothered by smoke, and theirchildren smashed to death against the stones. [321] This treatment mayto some extent have been deserved owing to the predatory habits andcruelty of the Bhils, but its result was to make them utter savageswith their hand against every man, as they believed that every one'swas against them. From their strongholds in the hills they laid wastethe plain country, holding villages and towns to ransom and driving offcattle; nor did any travellers pass with impunity through the hillsexcept in convoys too large to be attacked. In Khandesh, during thedisturbed period of the wars of Sindhia and Holkar, about A. D. 1800, the Bhils betook themselves to highway robbery and lived in bandseither in mountains or in villages immediately beneath them. Therevenue contractors were unable or unwilling to spend money in themaintenance of soldiers to protect the country, and the Bhils in a veryshort time became so bold as to appear in bands of hundreds and attacktowns, carrying off either cattle or hostages, for whom they demandedhandsome ransoms. [322] In Gujarat another writer described the Bhilsand Kolis as hereditary and professional plunderers--'Soldiers ofthe night, ' as they themselves said they were. [323] Malcolm saidof them, after peace had been restored to Central India: [324]"Measures are in progress that will, it is expected, soon completethe reformation of a class of men who, believing themselves doomedto be thieves and plunderers, have been confirmed in their destinyby the oppression and cruelty of neighbouring governments, increasedby an avowed contempt for them as outcasts. The feeling this systemof degradation has produced must be changed; and no effort has beenleft untried to restore this race of men to a better sense of theircondition than that which they at present entertain. The common answerof a Bhil when charged with theft or robbery is, 'I am not to blame;I am the thief of Mahadeo'; in other words, 'My destiny as a thiefhas been fixed by God. '" The Bhil chiefs, who were known as Bhumia, exercised the most absolute power, and their orders to commit themost atrocious crimes were obeyed by their ignorant but attachedsubjects without a conception on the part of the latter that theyhad an option when he whom they termed their Dhunni (Lord) issued themandates. [325] Firearms and swords were only used by the chiefs andheadmen of the tribe, and their national weapon was the bamboo bowhaving the bowstring made from a thin strip of its elastic bark. Thequiver was a piece of strong bamboo matting, and would contain sixtybarbed arrows a yard long, and tipped with an iron spike eitherflattened and sharpened like a knife or rounded like a nail; otherarrows, used for knocking over birds, had knob-like heads. Thus armed, the Bhils would lie in wait in some deep ravine by the roadside, andan infernal yell announced their attack to the unwary traveller. [326]Major Hendley states that according to tradition in the Mahabharatathe god Krishna was killed by a Bhil's arrow, when he was fightingagainst them in Gujarat with the Yadavas; and on this account it wasordained that the Bhil should never again be able to draw the bow withthe forefinger of the right hand. "Times have changed since then, butI noticed in examining their hands that few could move the forefingerwithout the second finger; indeed the fingers appeared useless asindependent members of the hands. In connection with this may bementioned their apparent inability to distinguish colours or countnumbers, due alone to their want of words to express themselves. " [327]

4. General Outram and the Khandesh Bhil Corps. 

The reclamation and pacification of the Bhils is inseparably associatedwith the name of Lieutenant, afterwards Sir James, Outram. The KhandeshBhil Corps was first raised by him in 1825, when Bhil robber bandswere being hunted down by small parties of troops, and those who werewilling to surrender were granted a free pardon for past offences, and given grants of land for cultivation and advances for the purchaseof seed and bullocks. When the first attempts to raise the corps weremade, the Bhils believed that the object was to link them in linelike galley-slaves with a view to extirpate the race, that blood wasin high demand as a medicine in the country of their foreign masters, and so on. Indulging the wild men with feasts and entertainments, anddelighting them with his matchless urbanity, Captain Outram at lengthcontrived to draw over to the cause nine recruits, one of whom was anotorious plunderer who had a short time before successfully robbedthe officer commanding a detachment sent against him. This infantcorps soon became strongly attached to the person of their new chiefand entirely devoted to his wishes; their goodwill had been won by hiskind and conciliatory manners, while their admiration and respect hadbeen thoroughly roused and excited by his prowess and valour in thechase. On one occasion, it is recorded, word was brought to Outramof the presence of a panther in some prickly-pear shrubs on theside of a hill near his station. He went to shoot it with a friend, Outram being on foot and his friend on horseback searching through thebushes. When close on the animal, Outram's friend fired and missed, onwhich the panther sprang forward roaring and seized Outram, and theyrolled down the hill together. Being released from the claws of thefurious beast for a moment, Outram with great presence of mind drew apistol which he had with him, and shot the panther dead. The Bhils, on seeing that he had been injured, were one and all loud in theirgrief and expressions of regret, when Outram quieted them with theremark, 'What do I care for the clawing of a cat?' and this sayinglong remained a proverb among the Bhils. [328] By his kindness andsympathy, listening freely to all that each single man in the corpshad to say to him, Outram at length won their confidence, convincedthem of his good faith and dissipated their fears of treachery. Soonthe ranks of the corps became full, and for every vacant place therewere numbers of applicants. The Bhils freely hunted down and capturedtheir friends and relations who continued to create disturbances, and brought them in for punishment. Outram managed to check theirpropensity for liquor by paying them every day just sufficient fortheir food, and giving them the balance of their pay at the end ofthe month, when some might have a drinking bout, but many preferredto spend the money on ornaments and articles of finery. With theassistance of the corps the marauding tendencies of the hill Bhilswere suppressed and tranquillity restored to Khandesh, which rapidlybecame one of the most fertile parts of India. During the Mutiny theBhil corps remained loyal, and did good service in checking the localoutbursts which occurred in Khandesh. A second battalion was raisedat this time, but was disbanded three years afterwards. After this thecorps had little or nothing to do, and as the absence of fighting andthe higher wages which could be obtained by ordinary labour ceasedto render it attractive to the Bhils, it was finally converted intopolice in 1891. [329]

5. Subdivisions. 

The Bhils of the Central Provinces have now only two subdivisions, theMuhammadan Bhils, who were forcibly converted to Islam during the timeof Aurangzeb, and the remainder, who though retaining many animisticbeliefs and superstitions, have practically become Hindus. TheMuhammadan Bhils only number about 3000 out of 28, 000. They areknown as Tadvi, a name which was formerly applied to a Bhil headman, and is said to be derived from _tad_, meaning a separate branch orsection. These Bhils marry among themselves and not with any otherMuhammadans. They retain many Hindu and animistic usages, and arescarcely Muhammadan in more than name. Both classes are divided intogroups or septs, generally named after plants or animals to whichthey still show reverence. Thus the Jamania sept, named after the_jaman_ tree, [330] will not cut or burn any part of this tree, andat their weddings the dresses of the bride and bridegroom are takenand rubbed against the tree before being worn. Similarly the Rohinisept worship the _rohan_ [331] tree, the Avalia sept the _aonla_[332] tree, the Meheda sept the _bahera_ [333] tree, and so on. TheMori sept worship the peacock. They go into the jungle and look forthe tracks of a peacock, and spreading a piece of red cloth before thefootprint, lay their offerings of grain upon it. Members of this septmay not be tattooed, because they think the splashes of colour on thepeacock's feathers are tattoo-marks. Their women must veil themselvesif they see a peacock, and they think that if any member of the septirreverently treads on a peacock's footprints he will fall ill. TheGhodmarya (Horse-killer) sept may not tame a horse nor ride one. TheMasrya sept will not kill or eat fish. The Sanyan or cat sept have atradition that one of their ancestors was once chasing a cat, whichran for protection under a cover which had been put over the stonefigure of their goddess. The goddess turned the cat into stone andsat on it, and since then members of the sept will not touch a catexcept to save it from harm, and they will not eat anything which hasbeen touched by a cat. The Ghattaya sept worship the grinding mill attheir weddings and also on festival days. The Solia sept, whose nameis apparently derived from the sun, are split up into four subsepts:the Ada Solia, who hold their weddings at sunrise; the Japa Solia, who hold them at sunset; the Taria Solia, who hold them when stars havebecome visible after sunset; and the Tar Solia, who believe their nameis connected with cotton thread and wrap several skeins of raw threadround the bride and bridegroom at the wedding ceremony. The Mohariasept worship the local goddess at the village of Moharia in IndoreState, who is known as the Moharia Mata; at their weddings they applyturmeric and oil to the fingers of the goddess before rubbing them onthe bride and bridegroom. The Maoli sept worship a goddess of thatname in Barwani town. Her shrine is considered to be in the shapeof a kind of grain-basket known as _kilia_, and members of the septmay never make or use baskets of this shape, nor may they be tattooedwith representations of it. Women of the sept are not allowed to visitthe shrine of the goddess, but may worship her at home. Several septshave the names of Rajput clans, as Sesodia, Panwar, Mori, and appearto have originated in mixed unions between Rajputs and Bhils. 

6. Exogamy and marriage customs. 

A man must not marry in his own sept nor in the families of hismothers and grandmothers. The union of first cousins is thusprohibited, nor can girls be exchanged in marriage between twofamilies. A wife's sister may also not be married during the wife'slifetime. The Muhammadan Bhils permit a man to marry his maternaluncle's daughter, and though he cannot marry his wife's sisterhe may keep her as a concubine. Marriages may be infant or adult, but the former practice is becoming prevalent and girls are oftenwedded before they are eleven. Matches are arranged by the parentsof the parties in consultation with the caste _panchayat_; but inBombay girls may select their own husbands, and they have also arecognised custom of elopement at the Tosina fair in the month of theMahi Kantha. If a Bhil can persuade a girl to cross the river therewith him he may claim her as his wife; but if they are caught beforegetting across he is liable to be punished by the bride's father. [334]The betrothal and wedding ceremonies now follow the ordinary ritual ofthe middle and lower castes in the Maratha country. [335] The bridemust be younger than the bridegroom except in the case of a widow. Abride-price is paid which may vary from Rs. 9 to 20; in the case ofMuhammadan Bhils the bridegroom is said to give a dowry of Rs. 20 to25. When the ovens are made with the sacred earth they roast some ofthe large millet juari [336] for the family feast, calling this JuariMata or the grain goddess. Offerings of this are made to the familygods, and it is partaken of only by the members of the bride's andbridegroom's septs respectively at their houses. No outsider may evensee this food being eaten. The leavings of food, with the leaf-plateson which it was eaten, are buried inside the house, as it is believedthat if they should fall into the hands of any outsider the death orblindness of one of the family will ensue. When the bridegroom reachesthe bride's house he strikes the marriage-shed with a dagger or othersharp instrument. A goat is killed and he steps in its blood as heenters the shed. A day for the wedding is selected by the priest, but it may also take place on any Sunday in the eight fine months. Ifthe wedding takes place on the eleventh day of Kartik, that is onthe expiration of the four rainy months when marriages are forbidden, they make a little hut of eleven stalks of juari with their cobs inthe shape of a cone, and the bride and bridegroom walk round this. Theservices of a Brahman are not required for such a wedding. Sometimesthe bridegroom is simply seated in a grain basket and the bride ina winnowing-fan; then their hands are joined as the sun is half set, and the marriage is completed. The bridegroom takes the basket and fanhome with him. On the return of the wedding couple, their _kankans_or wristbands are taken off at Hanuman's temple. The Muhammadan Bhilsperform the same ceremonies as the Hindus, but at the end they call inthe Kazi or registrar, who repeats the Muhammadan prayers and recordsthe dowry agreed upon. The practice of the bridegroom serving forhis wife is in force among both classes of Bhils. 

7. Widow--marriage, divorce and polygamy. 

The remarriage of widows is permitted, but the widow may not marryany relative of her first husband. She returns to her father's house, and on her remarriage they obtain a bride-price of Rs. 40 or 50, aquarter of which goes in a feast to the tribesmen. The wedding of awidow is held on the Amawas or last day of the dark fortnight of themonth, or on a Sunday. A wife may be divorced for adultery withoutconsulting the _panchayat_. It is said that a wife cannot otherwisebe divorced on any account, nor can a woman divorce her husband, butshe may desert him and go and live with a man. In this case all thatis necessary is that the second husband should repay to the firstas compensation the amount expended by the latter on his marriagewith the woman. Polygamy is permitted, and a second wife is sometimestaken in order to obtain children, but this number is seldom if everexceeded. It is stated that the Bhil married women are generally chasteand faithful to their husbands, and any attempt to tamper with theirvirtue on the part of an outsider is strongly resented by the man. 

8. Religion. 

The Bhils worship the ordinary Hindu deities and the village godlingsof the locality. The favourite both with Hindu and Muhammadan Bhilsis Khande Rao or Khandoba, the war-god of the Marathas, who is oftenrepresented by a sword. The Muhammadans and the Hindu Bhils alsoto a less extent worship the Pirs or spirits of Muhammadan saintsat their tombs, of which there are a number in Nimar. Major Hendleystates that in Mewar the seats or _sthans_ of the Bhil gods are on thesummits of high hills, and are represented by heaps of stones, solidor hollowed out in the centre, or mere platforms, in or near which arefound numbers of clay or mud images of horses. [337] In some placesclay lamps are burnt in front of the images of horses, from whichit may be concluded that the horse itself is or was worshipped as agod. Colonel Tod states that the Bhils will eat of nothing white incolour, as a white sheep or goat; and their grand adjuration is 'Bythe white ram. ' [338] Sir A. Lyall [339] says that their principaloath is by the dog. The Bhil sepoys told Major Hendley that theyconsidered it of little use to go on worshipping their own gods, asthe power of these had declined since the English became supreme. Theythought the strong English gods were too much for the weak deitiesof their country, hence they were desirous of embracing Brahmanism, which would also raise them in the social scale and give them a betterchance of promotion in regiments where there were Brahman officers. 

9. Witchcraft and amulets. 

They wear charms and amulets to keep off evil spirits; the charmsare generally pieces of blue string with seven knots in them, whichtheir witch-finder or Badwa ties, reciting an incantation on each; theknots were sometimes covered with metal to keep them undefiled and thecharms were tied on at the Holi, Dasahra or some other festival. [340]In Bombay the Bhils still believe in witches as the agents of anymisfortunes that may befall them. If a man was sick and thought somewoman had bewitched him, the suspected woman was thrown into a streamor swung from a tree. If the branch broke and the woman fell andsuffered serious injury, or if she could not swim across the streamand sank, she was considered to be innocent and efforts were madeto save her. But if she escaped without injury she was held to be awitch, and it frequently happened that the woman would admit herselfto be one either from fear of the infliction of a harder ordeal, orto keep up the belief in her powers as a witch, which often securedher a free supper of milk and chickens. She would then admit thatshe had really bewitched the sick man and undertake to cure him onsome sacrifice being made. If he recovered, the animal named by thewitch was sacrificed and its blood given her to drink while stillwarm; either from fear or in order to keep up the character she woulddrink it, and would be permitted to stay on in the village. If, on theother hand, the sick person died, the witch would often be driven intothe forest to die of hunger or to be devoured by wild animals. [341]These practices have now disappeared in the Central Provinces, thoughoccasionally murders of suspected witches may still occur. The Bhilsare firm believers in omens, the nature of which is much the same asamong the Hindus. When a Bhil is persistently unlucky in hunting, he sometimes says '_Nat laga_, ' meaning that some bad spirit iscausing his ill-success. Then he will make an image of a man inthe sand or dust of the road, or sometimes two images of a man andwoman, and throwing straw or grass over the images set it alight, andpound it down on them with a stick with abusive yells. This he callskilling his bad luck. [342] Major Hendley notes that the men dancedbefore the different festivals and before battles. The men dancedin a ring holding sticks and striking them against each other, muchlike the Baiga dance. Before battle they had a war-dance in whichthe performers were armed and imitated a combat. To be carried onthe shoulders of one of the combatants was a great honour, perhapsbecause it symbolised being on horseback. The dance was probably inthe nature of a magical rite, designed to obtain success in battleby going through an imitation of it beforehand. The priests are thechief physicians among the Bhils, though most old men were supposedto know something about medicine. [343]

10. Funeral rites. 

The dead are usually buried lying on the back, with the head pointingto the south. Cooked food is placed on the bier and deposited onthe ground half-way to the cemetery. On return each family of thesept brings a wheaten cake to the mourners and these are eaten. Onthe third day they place on the grave a thick cake of wheaten flour, water in an earthen pot and tobacco or any other stimulant which thedeceased was in the habit of using in his life. 

11. Social customs. 

The Hindu Bhils say that they do not admit outsiders into the caste, but the Muhammadans will admit a man of any but the impure castes. Theneophyte must be shaved and circumcised, and the Kazi gives himsome holy water to drink and teaches him the profession of beliefin Islam. If a man is not circumcised, the Tadvi or Muhammadan Bhilswill not bury his body. Both classes of Bhils employ Brahmans at theirceremonies. The tribe eat almost all kinds of flesh and drink liquor, but the Hindus now abjure beef and the Muhammadans pork. Some Bhilsnow refuse to take the skins off dead cattle, but others will doso. The Bhils will take food from any caste except the impure ones, and none except these castes will now take food from them. Temporaryor permanent exclusion from caste is imposed for the same offencesas among the Hindus. 

12. Appearance and characteristics. 

The typical Bhil is small, dark, broad-nosed and ugly, but well builtand active. The average height of 128 men measured by Major Hendleywas 5 feet 6. 4 inches. The hands are somewhat small and the legsfairly developed, those of the women being the best. "The Bhil is anexcellent woodsman, knows the shortest cuts over the hills, can walkthe roughest paths and climb the steepest crags without slipping orfeeling distressed. He is often called in old Sanskrit works Venaputra, 'child of the forest, ' or Pal Indra, 'lord of the pass. ' Thesenames well describe his character. His country is approached throughnarrow defiles (_pal_), and through these none could pass without hispermission. In former days he always levied _rakhwali_ or blackmail, and even now native travellers find him quite ready to assert what hedeems his just rights. The Bhil is a capital huntsman, tracking andmarking down tigers, panthers and bears, knowing all their haunts, thebest places to shoot them, the paths they take and all those points soessential to success in big-game shooting; they will remember for yearsthe spots where tigers have been disposed of, and all the circumstancesconnected with their deaths. The Bhil will himself attack a leopard, and with his sword, aided by his friends, cut him to pieces. " [344]Their agility impressed the Hindus, and an old writer says: "SomeBhil chieftains who attended the camp of Sidhraj, king of Gujarat, astonished him with their feats of activity; in his army they seemedas the followers of Hanuman in attendance upon Ram. " [345]

13. Occupation. 

The Bhils have now had to abandon their free use of the forests, which was highly destructive in its effects, and their indiscriminateslaughter of game. Many of them live in the open country and havebecome farmservants and field-labourers. A certain proportion aretenants, but very few own villages. Some of the Tadvi Bhils, however, still retain villages which were originally granted free of revenueon condition of their keeping the hill-passes of the Satpuras openand safe for travellers. These are known as Hattiwala. Bhils alsoserve as village watchmen in Nimar and the adjoining tracts of theBerar Districts. Captain Forsyth, writing in 1868, described theBhils as follows: "The Muhammadan Bhils are with few exceptions amiserable lot, idle and thriftless, and steeped in the deadly viceof opium-eating. The unconverted Bhils are held to be tolerablyreliable. When they borrow money or stock for cultivation they seldomabscond fraudulently from their creditors, and this simple honestyof theirs tends, I fear, to keep numbers of them still in a statelittle above serfdom. " [346]

14. Language. 

The Bhils have now entirely abandoned their own language and speak acorrupt dialect based on the Aryan vernaculars current around them. TheBhil dialect is mainly derived from Gujarati, but it is influencedby Marwari and Marathi; in Nimar especially it becomes a corruptform of Marathi. Bhili, as this dialect is called, contains a numberof non-Aryan words, some of which appear to come from the Mundari, and others from the Dravidian languages; but these are insufficientto form any basis for a deduction as to whether the Bhils belongedto the Kolarian or Dravidian race. [347]

Bhilala

1. General notice. 

_Bhilala_, [348]--A small caste found in the Nimar and HoshangabadDistricts of the Central Provinces and in Central India. The totalstrength of the Bhilalas is about 150, 000 persons, most of whom residein the Bhopawar Agency, adjoining Nimar. Only 15, 000 were returned fromthe Central Provinces in 1911. The Bhilalas are commonly considered, and the general belief may in their case be accepted as correct, to bea mixed caste sprung from the alliances of immigrant Rajputs with theBhils of the Central India hills. The original term was not improbablyBhilwala, and may have been applied to those Rajput chiefs, a numerousbody, who acquired small estates in the Bhil country, or to those whotook the daughters of Bhil chieftains to wife, the second course beingoften no doubt a necessary preliminary to the first. Several Bhilalafamilies hold estates in Nimar and Indore, and their chiefs now claimto be pure Rajputs. The principal Bhilala houses, as those of Bhamgarh, Selani and Mandhata, do not intermarry with the rest of the caste, butonly among themselves and with other families of the same standing inMalwa and Holkar's Nimar. On succession to the _Gaddi_ or headship ofthe house, representatives of these families are marked with a _tika_or badge on the forehead and sometimes presented with a sword, andthe investiture may be carried out by custom by the head of anotherhouse. Bhilala landholders usually have the title of Rao or Rawat. Theydo not admit that a Bhilala can now spring from intermarriage betweena Rajput and a Bhil. The local Brahmans will take water from them andthey are occasionally invested with the sacred thread at the timeof marriage. The Bhilala Rao of Mandhata is hereditary custodianof the great shrine of Siva at Onkar Mandhata on an island in theNerbudda. According to the traditions of the family, their ancestor, Bharat Singh, was a Chauhan Rajput, who took Mandhata from NathuBhil in A. D. 1165, and restored the worship of Siva to the island, which had been made inaccessible to pilgrims by the terrible deities, Kali and Bhairava, devourers of human flesh. In such legends may berecognised the propagation of Hinduism by the Rajput adventurers andthe reconsecration of the aboriginal shrines to its deities. BharatSingh is said to have killed Nathu Bhil, but it is more probable thathe only married his daughter and founded a Bhilala family. Similaralliances have taken place among other tribes, as the Korku chiefsof the Gawilgarh and Mahadeo hills, and the Gond princes of GarhaMandla. The Bhilalas generally resemble other Hindus in appearance, showing no marked signs of aboriginal descent. Very probably they haveall an infusion of Rajput blood, as the Rajputs settled in the Bhilcountry in some strength at an early period of history. The caste have, however, totemistic group names; they will eat fowls and drink liquor;and they bury their dead with the feet to the north, all these customsindicating a Dravidian origin. Their subordinate position in past timesis shown by the fact that they will accept cooked food from a Kunbior a Gujar; and indeed the status of all except the chief's familieswould naturally have been a low one, as they were practically theoffspring of kept women. As already stated, the landowning familiesusually arrange alliances among themselves. Below these comes thebody of the caste and below them is a group known as the Chhoti Tador bastard Bhilalas, to which are relegated the progeny of irregularunions and persons expelled from the caste for social offences. 

2. Marriage. 

The caste, for the purpose of avoiding marriages between relations, are also divided into exogamous groups called _kul_ or _kuri_, several of the names of which are of totemistic origin or derivedfrom those of animals and plants. Members of the Jamra _kuri_ willnot cut or burn the _jamun_ [349] tree; those of the Saniyar _kuri_will not grow _san_-hemp, while the Astaryas revere the _sona_ [350]tree and the Pipaladya, the _pipal_ tree. Some of the _kuris_ haveRajput sept names, as Mori, Baghel and Solanki. A man is forbidden totake a wife from within his own sept or that of his mother, and theunion of first cousins is also prohibited. The customs of the Bhilalasresemble those of the Kunbis and other cultivating castes. At theirweddings four cart-yokes are arranged in a square, and inside thisare placed two copper vessels filled with water and considered torepresent the Ganges and Jumna. When the sun is half set, the brideand the bridegroom clasp hands and then walk seven times round thesquare of cart-yokes. The water of the pots is mixed and this isconsidered to represent the mingling of the bride's and bridegroom'spersonalities as the Ganges and Jumna meet at Allahabad. A sum of aboutRs. 60 is usually paid by the parents of the bridegroom to those ofthe bride and is expended on the ceremony. The ordinary Bhilalas have, Mr. Korke states, a simple form of wedding which may be gone throughwithout consulting a Brahman on the Ekadashi or eleventh of Kartik(October); this is the day on which the gods awake from sleep andmarks the commencement of the marriage season. A cone is erected ofeleven plants of juari, roots and all, and the couple simply walkround this seven times at night, when the marriage is complete. Theremarriage of widows is permitted. The woman's forehead is markedwith cowdung by another widow, probably as a rite of purification, and the cloths of the couple are tied together. 

3. Social customs. 

The caste commonly bury the dead and erect memorial stones at theheads of graves which they worship in the month of Chait (April), smearing them with vermilion and making an offering of flowers. Thismay either be a Dravidian usage or have been adopted by imitationfrom the Muhammadans. The caste worship the ordinary Hindu deities, but each family has a _Kul-devi_ or household god, Mr. Korke remarks, to which they pay special reverence. The offerings made to the Kul-devimust be consumed by the family alone, but married daughters are allowedto participate. They employ Nimari Brahmans as their priests, and alsohave _gurus_ or spiritual preceptors, who are Gosains or Bairagis. Theywill take food cooked with water from Brahmans, Rajputs, Munda Gujarsand Tirole Kunbis. The last two groups are principal agriculturalcastes of the locality and the Bhilalas are probably employed by themas farmservants, and hence accept cooked food from their masters inaccordance with a common custom. The local Brahmans of the Nagar, Naramdeo, Baisa and other subcastes will take water from the hand ofa Bhilala. Temporary excommunication from caste is imposed for theusual offences, such as going to jail, getting maggots in a wound, killing a cow, a dog or a squirrel, committing homicide, being beatenby a man of low caste, selling shoes at a profit, committing adultery, and allowing a cow to die with a rope round its neck; and further, fortouching the corpses of a cow, cat or horse, or a Barhai (carpenter) orChamar (tanner). They will not swear by a dog, a cat or a squirrel, andif either of the first two animals dies in a house, it is considered tobe impure for a month and a quarter. The head of the caste committeehas the designation of Mandloi, which is a territorial title borneby several families in Nimar. He receives a share of the fine leviedfor the _Sarni_ or purification ceremony, when a person temporarilyexpelled is readmitted into caste. Under the Mandloi is the Kotwalwhose business is to summon the members to the caste assemblies;he also is paid out of the fines and his office is hereditary. 

4. Occupation and character. 

The caste are cultivators, farmservants and field-labourers, and aBhilala also usually held the office of Mankar, a superior kind ofKotwar or village watchman. The Mankar did no dirty work and would nottouch hides, but attended on any officer who came to the village andacted as a guide. Where there was a village _sarai_ or rest-house, it was in charge of the Mankar, who was frequently also known aszamindar. This may have been a recognition of the ancient rights ofthe Bhilalas and Bhils to the country. 

5. Character. 

Captain Forsyth, Settlement Officer of Nimar, had a very unfavourableopinion of the Bhilalas, whom he described as proverbial fordishonesty in agricultural engagements and worse drunkards than anyof the indigenous tribes. [351] This judgment was probably somewhattoo severe, but they are poor cultivators, and a Bhilala's field mayoften be recognised by its slovenly appearance. [352]

A century ago Sir J. Malcolm also wrote very severely of the Bhilalas:"The Bhilala and Lundi chiefs were the only robbers in Malwa whom underno circumstances travellers could trust. There are oaths of a sacredbut obscure kind among those that are Rajputs or who boast their blood, which are almost a disgrace to take, but which, they assert, the basestwas never known to break before Mandrup Singh, a Bhilala, and some ofhis associates, plunderers on the Nerbudda, showed the example. Thevanity of this race has lately been flattered by their having riseninto such power and consideration that neighbouring Rajput chiefs foundit their interest to forget their prejudices and to condescend so faras to eat and drink with them. Hatti Singh, Grassia chief of Nowlana, a Khichi Rajput, and several others in the vicinity cultivated thefriendship of Nadir, the late formidable Bhilala robber-chief ofthe Vindhya range; and among other sacrifices made by the Rajputs, was eating and drinking with him. On seeing this take place in mycamp, I asked Hatti Singh whether he was not degraded by doing so;he said no, but that Nadir was elevated. " [353]

Bhishti

_Bhishti. _--A small Muhammadan caste of water-bearers. Only 26Bhishtis were shown in the Central Provinces in 1901 and 278 in1891. The tendency of the lower Muhammadan castes, as they obtainsome education, is to return themselves simply as Muhammadans, thecaste name being considered derogatory. The Bhishtis are, however, a regular caste numbering over a lakh of persons in India, the bulkof whom belong to the United Provinces. Many of them are convertsfrom Hinduism, and they combine Hindu and Muhammadan practices. Theyhave _gotras_ or exogamous sections, the names of which indicatethe Hindu origin of their members, as Huseni Brahman, Samri Chauhan, Bahmangour and others. They prohibit marriage within the section andwithin two degrees of relationship on the mother's side. Marriages areperformed by the Muhammadan ritual or Nikah, but a Brahman is sometimesasked to fix the auspicious day, and they erect a marriage-shed. Thebridegroom goes to the bride's house riding on a horse, and when hearrives drops Rs. 1-4 into a pot of water held by a woman. The bridewhips the bridegroom's horse with a switch made of flowers. Duringthe marriage the bride sits inside the house and the bridegroom inthe shed outside. An agent or Vakil with two witnesses goes to thebride and asks her whether she consents to marry the bridegroom, and when she gives her consent, as she always does, they go out andformally communicate it to the Kazi. The dowry is then settled, andthe bond of marriage is sealed. But when the parents of the bride arepoor they receive a bride-price of Rs. 30, from which they pay thedowry. The Bhishtis worship their leather bag (_mashk_) as a sort offetish, and burn incense before it on Fridays. [354] The traditionaloccupation of the Bhishti is to supply water, and he is still engagedin this and other kinds of domestic service. The name is said to bederived from the Persian _bihisht_, 'paradise, ' and to have been givento them on account of the relief which their ministrations affordedto the thirsty soldiery. [355] Perhaps, too, the grandiloquent namewas applied partly in derision, like similar titles given to othermenial servants. They are also known as Mashki or Pakhali, aftertheir leathern water-bag. The leather bag is a distinctive sign ofthe Bhishti, but when he puts it away he may be recognised from thepiece of red cloth which he usually wears round his waist. There isan interesting legend to the effect that the Bhishti who saved theEmperor Humayun's life at Chausa, and was rewarded by the tenureof the Imperial throne for half a day, employed his short lease ofpower by providing for his family and friends, and caused his leatherbag to be cut up into rupees, which were gilded and stamped with therecord of his date and reign in order to perpetuate its memory. [356]The story of the Bhishti obtaining his name on account of the solacewhich he afforded to the Muhammadan soldiery finds a parallel in thecase of the English army:

 The uniform 'e wore Was nothin' much before, An' rather less than 'arf o' that be'ind, For a piece o' twisty rag An' a goatskin water-bag Was all the field-equipment 'e could find. 

 With 'is mussick on 'is back, 'E would skip with our attack, An' watch us till the bugles made 'Retire, ' An' for all 'is dirty 'ide 'E was white, clear white, inside When 'e went to tend the wounded under fire. [357]

An excellent description of the Bhishti as a household servant iscontained in Eha's _Behind the Bungalow_, [358] from which thefollowing extract is taken: "If you ask: Who is the Bhishti? Iwill tell you. Bihisht in the Persian tongue means Paradise, and aBihishtee is therefore an inhabitant of Paradise, a cherub, a seraph, an angel of mercy. He has no wings; the painters have misconceivedhim; but his back is bowed down with the burden of a great goat-skinswollen to bursting with the elixir of life. He walks the land whenthe heaven above him is brass and the earth iron, when the trees andshrubs are languishing and the last blade of grass has given up thestruggle for life, when the very roses smell only of dust, and allday long the roaming dust-devils waltz about the fields, whirlingleaf and grass and cornstalk round and round and up and away intothe regions of the sky; and he unties a leather thong which chokesthe throat of his goat-skin just where the head of the poor old goatwas cut off, and straightway, with a life-reviving gurgle, the streamcalled _thandha pani_ gushes forth, and plant and shrub lift up theirheads and the garden smiles again. The dust also on the roads is laid, and a grateful incense rises from the ground, the sides of the water_chatti_ grow dark and moist and cool themselves in the hot air, and through the dripping interstices of the _khaskhas_ tattie achilly fragrance creeps into the room, causing the mercury in thethermometer to retreat from its proud place. I like the Bhishti andrespect him. As a man he is temperate and contented, eating _bajri_bread and slaking his thirst with his own element. And as a servanthe is laborious and faithful, rarely shirking his work, seeking it outrather. For example, we had a bottle-shaped filter of porous stoneware, standing in a bucket of water which it was his duty to fill daily;but the good man, not content with doing his bare duty, took theplug out of the filter and filled it too. And all the station knowshow assiduously he fills the rain-gauge. " With the construction ofwater-works in large stations the Bhishti is losing his occupation, and he is a far less familiar figure to the present generation ofAnglo-Indians than to their predecessors. 

Bhoyar

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Bhoyar, [359] Bhoir_ (Honorific titles, Mahajan and Patel). --Acultivating caste numbering nearly 60, 000 persons in 1911, and residingprincipally in the Betul and Chhindwara Districts. The Bhoyars are notfound outside the Central Provinces. They claim to be the descendantsof a band of Panwar Rajputs, who were defending the town of Dharanagrior Dhar in Central India when it was besieged by Aurangzeb. Their postwas on the western part of the wall, but they gave way and fled intothe town as the sun was rising, and it shone on their faces. Hencethey were called Bhoyar from a word _bhor_ meaning morning, becausethey were seen running away in the morning. They were put out ofcaste by the other Rajputs, and fled to the Central Provinces. Thename may also be a variant of that of the Bhagore Rajputs. And anotherderivation is from _bhora_, a simpleton or timid person. Their claimto be immigrants from Central India is borne out by the fact that theystill speak a corrupt form of the Malwi dialect of Rajputana, whichis called after them Bhoyari, and their Bhats or genealogists comefrom Malwa. But they have now entirely lost their position as Rajputs. 

2. Subcastes and sections. 

The Bhoyars are divided into the Panwari, Dholewar, Chaurasia andDaharia subcastes. The Panwars are the most numerous and the highest, as claiming to be directly descended from Panwar Rajputs. Theysometimes called themselves Jagdeo Panwars, Jagdeo being the nameof the king under whom they served in Dharanagri. The Dholewarstake their name from Dhola, a place in Malwa, or from _dhol_, adrum. They are the lowest subcaste, and some of them keep pigs. Itis probable that these subcastes immigrated with the Malwa Rajas inthe fifteenth century, the Dholewars being the earlier arrivals, and having from the first intermarried with the local Dravidiantribes. The Daharias take their name from Dahar, the old name ofthe Jubbulpore country, and may be a relic of the domination ofthe Chedi kings of Tewar. The name of the Chaurasias is probablyderived from the Chaurasi or tract of eighty-four villages formerlyheld by the Betul Korku family of Chandu. The last two subdivisionsare numerically unimportant. The Bhoyars have over a hundred _kuls_or exogamous sections. The names of most of these are titular, butsome are territorial and a few totemistic. Instances of such namesare Onkar (the god Siva), Deshmukh and Chaudhari, headman, Hazari (aleader of 1000 horse), Gore (fair-coloured), Dongardiya (a lamp on ahill), Pinjara (a cotton-cleaner), Gadria (a shepherd), Khaparia (atyler), Khawasi (a barber), Chiknya (a sycophant), Kinkar (a slave), Dukhi (penurious), Suplya toplya (a basket and fan maker), Kasai (abutcher), Gohattya (a cow-killer), and Kalebhut (black devil). Amongthe territorial sections may be mentioned Sonpuria, from Sonpur, and Patharia, from the hill country. The name Badnagrya is alsoreally territorial, being derived from the town of Badnagar, butthe members of the section connect it with the _bad_ or banyan tree, the leaves of which they refrain from eating. Two other totemisticgotras are the Baranga and Baignya, derived from the _barang_ plant(_Kydia calycina_) and from the brinjal respectively. Some sectionshave the names of Rajput septs, as Chauhan, Parihar and Panwar. Thiscuriously mixed list of family names appears to indicate that theBhoyars originate from a small band of Rajputs who must have settledin the District about the fifteenth century as military colonists, and taken their wives from the people of the country. They may havesubsequently been recruited by fresh bands of immigrants who havepreserved a slightly higher status. They have abandoned their old highposition, and now rank below the ordinary cultivating castes likeKunbis and Kurmis who arrived later; while the caste has probablyin times past also been recruited to a considerable extent by theadmission of families of outsiders. 

3. Marriage. 

Marriage within the _kul_ or family group is forbidden, as also theunion of first cousins. Girls are usually married young, and sometimesinfants of one or two months are given in wedlock, while contractsof betrothal are made for unborn children if they should be of theproper sex, the mother's womb being touched with _kunku_ or red powderto seal the agreement. A small _dej_ or price is usually paid for thebride, amounting to Rs. 5 with 240 lbs. Of grain, and 8 seers of _ghi_and oil. At the betrothal the Joshi or astrologer is consulted to seewhether the names of the couple make an auspicious conjunction. He asksfor the names of the bride and bridegroom, and if these are found to beinimical another set of names is given, and the experiment is continueduntil a union is obtained which is astrologically auspicious. In orderto provide for this contingency some Bhoyars give their children tenor twelve names at birth. If all the names fail, the Joshi invents newones of his own, and in some way brings about the auspicious unionto the satisfaction of both parties, who consider it no businessof theirs to pry into the Joshi's calculations or to question hismethods. After the marriage-shed is erected the family god must beinvoked to be present at the ceremony. He is asked to come and takehis seat in an earthen pot containing a lighted wick, the pot beingsupported on a toy chariot made of sticks. A thread is coiled roundthe neck of the jar, and the Bhoyars then place it in the middle ofthe house, confident that the god has entered it, and will ward offall calamities during the marriage. This is performed by the _bhanwar_ceremony, seven earthen pots being placed in a row, while the bride andbridegroom walk round in a circle holding a basket with a lighted lampin it. As each circle is completed, one pot is removed. This alwaystakes place at night. The Dholewars do not perform the _bhanwar_ceremony, and simply throw sacred rice on the couple, and this isalso done in Wardha. Sometimes the Bhoyars dispense with the presenceof the Brahman and merely get some rice and juari consecrated byhim beforehand, which they throw on the heads of the couple, andthereupon consider the marriage complete. Weddings are generallyheld in the bright fortnight of Baisakh (April-May), and sometimescan be completed in a single day. Widow-marriage is allowed, but itis considered that the widow should marry a widower and not a bachelor. 

4. Occupation. 

The regular occupation of the Bhoyars is agriculture, and they aregood cultivators, growing much sugar-cane with well-irrigation. Theyare industrious, and their holdings on the rocky soils of the plateauDistricts are often cleared of stones at the cost of much labour. Theirwomen work in the fields. In Betul they have the reputation of beingmuch addicted to drink. 

5. Social status. 

They do not now admit outsiders, but their family names show that atone time they probably did so, and this laxity of feeling survives inthe toleration with which they readmit into caste a woman who has gonewrong with an outsider. They eat flesh and fowls, and the Dholewars eatpork, while as already stated they are fond of liquor. To have a shoethrown on his house by a caste-fellow is a serious degradation for aBhoyar, and he must break his earthen pots, clean his house and givea feast. To be beaten with a shoe by a low caste like Mahar entailsshaving the moustaches and paying a heavy fine, which is spent on afeast. The Bhoyars do not take food from any caste but Brahmans, butno caste higher than Kunbis and Malis will take water from them. Insocial status they rank somewhat below Kunbis. In appearance they arewell built, and often of a fair complexion. Unmarried girls generallywear skirts instead of _saris_ or cloths folding between the legs;they also must not wear toe-rings. Women of the Panwar subcaste wearglass bangles on the left hand, and brass ones on the right. Allwomen are tattooed. They both burn and bury the dead, placing thecorpse on the pyre with its head to the south or west, and in Wardhato the north. Here they have a peculiar custom as regards mourning, which is observed only till the next Monday or Thursday whicheverfalls first. Thus the period of mourning may extend from one to fourdays. The Bhoyars are considered in Wardha to be more than ordinarilytimid, and also to be considerable simpletons, while they stand in muchawe of Government officials, and consider it a great misfortune to bebrought into a court of justice. Very few of them can read and write. 

Bhuiya

List of Paragraphs

 1. _The tribe and its name. _ 2. _Distribution of the tribe. _ 3. _Example of the position of the aborigines in Hindu society. _ 4. _The Bhuiyas a Kolarian tribe. _ 5. _The Baigas and the Bhuiyas. Chhattisgarh the home of the Baigas. _ 6. _The Baigas a branch of the Bhuiyas. _ 7. _Tribal subdivisions. _ 8. _Exogamous septs. _ 9. _Marriage customs. _10. _Widow-marriage and divorce. _11. _Religion. _12. _Religious dancing. _13. _Funeral rites and inheritance. _14. _Physical appearance and occupation. _15. _Social customs. _

1. The tribe and its name. 

_Bhuiya, Bhuinhar, Bhumia. _ [360]--The name of a very important tribeof Chota Nagpur, Bengal and Orissa. The Bhuiyas numbered more than22, 000 persons in the Central Provinces in 1911, being mainly foundin the Sarguja and Jashpur States. In Bengal and Bihar the Bhuiyasproper count about half a million persons, while the Musahar andKhandait castes, both of whom are mainly derived from the Bhuiyas, total together well over a million. 

The name Bhuiya means 'Lord of the soil, ' or 'Belonging to the soil, 'and is a Sanskrit derivative. The tribe have completely forgottentheir original name, and adopted this designation conferred on themby the immigrant Aryans. The term Bhuiya, however, is also employedby other tribes and by some Hindus as a title for landholders, beingpractically equivalent to zamindar. And hence a certain confusionarises, and classes or individuals may have the name of Bhuiya withoutbelonging to the tribe at all. "In most parts of Chota Nagpur, "Sir H. Risley says, "there is a well-known distinction between aBhuiya by tribe and a Bhuiya by title. The Bhuiyas of Bonai andKeonjhar described by Colonel Dalton belong to the former category;the Bhuiya Mundas and Oraons to the latter. The distinction will bemade somewhat clearer if it is explained that every 'tribal Bhuiya'will as a matter of course describe himself as Bhuiya, while a memberof another tribe will only do so if he is speaking with reference toa question of land, or desires for some special reason to lay stresson his status as a landholder or agriculturist. "

We further find in Bengal and Benares a caste of landholders known asBhuinhar or Babhan, who are generally considered as a somewhat mixedand inferior group of Brahman and Rajput origin. Both Sir H. Risleyand Mr. Crooke adopt this view and deny any connection between theBhuinhars and the Bhuiya tribes. Babhan appears to be a corrupt formof Brahman. Mr. Mazumdar, however, states that Bhuiya is never used inBengali as an equivalent for zamindar or landholder, and he considersthat the Bhuinhars and also the Barah Bhuiyas, a well-known group oftwelve landholders of Eastern Bengal and Assam, belonged to the Bhuiyatribe. He adduces from Sir E. Gait's _History of Assam_ the fact thatthe Chutias and Bhuiyas were dominant in that country prior to itsconquest by the Ahoms in the thirteenth century, and considers thatthese Chutias gave their name to Chutia or Chota Nagpur. I am unableto express any opinion on Mr. Mazumdar's argument, and it is alsounnecessary as the question does not concern the Central Provinces. 

2. Distribution of the tribe. 

The principal home of the Bhuiya tribe proper is the south of theChota Nagpur plateau, comprised in the Gangpur, Bonai, Keonjhar andBamra States. "The chiefs of these States, " Colonel Dalton says, "now call themselves Rajputs; if they be so, they are strangelyisolated families of Rajputs. The country for the most part belongsto the Bhuiya sub-proprietors. They are a privileged class, holding ashereditaments the principal offices of the State, and are organised asa body of militia. The chiefs have no right to exercise any authoritytill they have received the _tilak_ or token of investiture from theirpowerful Bhuiya vassals. Their position altogether renders their claimto be considered Rajputs extremely doubtful, and the stories told toaccount for their acquisition of the dignity are palpable fables. Theywere no doubt all Bhuiyas originally; they certainly do not look likeRajputs. " Members of the tribe are the household servants of the BamraRaja's family, and it is said that the first Raja of Bamra was a childof the Patna house, who was stolen from his home and anointed king ofBamra by the Bhuiyas and Khonds. Similarly Colonel Dalton records thelegend that the Bhuiyas twenty-seven generations ago stole a childof the Moharbhanj Raja's family, brought it up amongst them and madeit their Raja. He was freely admitted to intercourse with Bhuiyagirls, and the children of this intimacy are the progenitors of theRajkuli branch of the tribe. But they are not considered first amongBhuiyas because they are not of pure Bhuiya descent. Again the Raja ofKeonjhar is always installed by the Bhuiyas. These facts indicate thatthe Bhuiyas were once the rulers of Chota Nagpur and are recognisedas the oldest inhabitants of the country. From this centre they havespread north through Lohardaga and Hazaribagh and into southern Bihar, where large numbers of Bhuiyas are encountered on whom the opprobriousdesignation of Musahar or 'rat-eater' has been conferred by theirHindu neighbours. Others of the tribe who travelled south from ChotaNagpur experienced more favourable conditions, and here the tendencyhas been for the Bhuiyas to rise rather than to decline in socialstatus. "Some of their leading families, " Sir H. Risley states, "have come to be chiefs of the petty States of Orissa, and have nowsunk the Bhuiya in the Khandait or swordsman, a caste of admittedrespectability in Orissa and likely in course of time to transformitself into some variety of Rajput. "

3. Example of the position of the aborigines in Hindu society. 

The varying status of the Bhuiyas in Bihar, Chota Nagpur and Orissais a good instance of the different ways in which the primitivetribes have fared in contact with the immigrant Aryans. Where thecountry has been completely colonised and populated by Hindus, asin Bihar, the aboriginal residents have commonly become transformedinto village drudges, relegated to the meanest occupations, anddespised as impure by the Hindu cultivators, like the Chamars ofnorthern India and the Mahars of the Maratha Districts. Where theHindu immigration has only been partial and the forests have notbeen cleared, as in Chota Nagpur and the Central Provinces, they maykeep their old villages and tribal organisation and be admitted asa body into the hierarchy of caste, ranking above the impure castesbut below the Hindu cultivators. This is the position of the Gonds, Baigas and other tribes in these tracts. While, if the Hindus comeonly as colonists and not as rulers, the indigenous residents mayretain the overlordship of the soil and the landed proprietors amongthem may be formed into a caste ranking with the good cultivatingcastes of the Aryans. Instances of such are the Khandaits of Orissa, the Binjhwars of Chhattisgarh and the Bhilalas of Nimar and Indore. 

4. The Bhuiyas a Kolarian tribe. 

The Bhuiyas have now entirely forgotten their own language and speakHindi, Uriya and Bengali, according as each is the dominant vernacularof their Hindu neighbours. They cannot therefore on the evidenceof language be classified as a Munda or Kolarian or as a Dravidiantribe. Colonel Dalton was inclined to consider them as Dravidian: [361]"Mr. Stirling in his account of Orissa classes them among the Kols;but there are no grounds that I know of for so connecting them. As Ihave said above, they appear to me to be linked with the Dravidianrather than with the Kolarian tribes. " His account, however, doesnot appear to contain any further evidence in support of this view;and, on the other hand, he identifies the Bhuiyas with the Savarsor Saonrs. Speaking of the Bendkars or Savars of Keonjhar, he says:"It is difficult to regard them otherwise than as members of the greatBhuiya family, and thus connecting them we link the Bhuiyas and Savarasand give support to the conjecture that the former are Dravidian. " Butit is now shown in the _Linguistic Survey_ that the Savars have a Mundadialect. In Chota Nagpur this has been forgotten, and the tribe speakHindi or Uriya like the Bhuiyas, but it remains in the hilly tracts ofGanjam and Vizagapatam. [362] Savara is closely related to Kharia andJuang, the dialects of two of the most primitive Munda tribes. TheSavars must therefore be classed as a Munda or Kolarian tribe, andsince Colonel Dalton identified the Bhuiyas with the Savars of ChotaNagpur, his evidence appears really to be in favour of the Kolarianorigin of the Bhuiyas. He notes further that the ceremony of namingchildren among the Bhuiyas is identical with that of the Mundas andHos. [363] Mr. Mazumdar writes: "Judging from the external appearanceand general physical type one would be sure to mistake a Bhuiya for aMunda. Their habits and customs are essentially Mundari. The Bhuiyaswho live in and around the District of Manbhum are not much ashamedto admit that they are Kol people; and Bhumia Kol is the name thathas been given them there by the Hindus. The Mundas and Larka-Kols ofChota Nagpur tell us that they first established themselves there bydriving out the Bhuiyas; and it seems likely that the Bhuiyas formedthe first batch of the Munda immigrants in Chota Nagpur and becamegreatly Hinduised there, and on that account were not recognised bythe Mundas as people of their kin. " If the tradition of the Mundas andKols that they came to Chota Nagpur after the Bhuiyas be accepted, andtradition on the point of priority of immigration is often trustworthy, then it follows that the Bhuiyas must be a Munda tribe. For the maindistinction other than that of language between the Munda and Dravidiantribes is that the former were the earlier and the latter subsequentimmigrants. The claim of the Bhuiyas to be the earliest residents ofChota Nagpur is supported by the fact that they officiate as priestsin certain temples. Because in primitive religion the jurisdiction ofthe gods is entirely local, and foreigners bringing their own godswith them are ignorant of the character and qualities of the localdeities, with which the indigenous residents are, on the other hand, well acquainted. Hence the tendency of later comers to employ theselatter in the capacity of priests of the godlings of the earth, corn, forests and hills. Colonel Dalton writes: [364] "It is strange thatthese Hinduised Bhuiyas retain in their own hands the priestly dutiesof certain old shrines to the exclusion of Brahmans. This custom hasno doubt descended in Bhuiya families from the time when Brahmans werenot, or had obtained no footing amongst them, and when the religion ofthe land and the temples were not Hindu; they are now indeed dedicatedto Hindu deities, but there are evidences of the temples having beenoriginally occupied by other images. At some of these shrines humansacrifices were offered every third year and this continued till thecountry came under British rule. " And again of the Pauri Bhuiyas ofKeonjhar: "The Pauris dispute with the Juangs the claim to be thefirst settlers in Keonjhar, and boldly aver that the country belongsto them. They assert that the Raja is of their creation and that theprerogative of installing every new Raja on his accession is theirs, and theirs alone. The Hindu population of Keonjhar is in excess of theBhuiya and it comprises Gonds and Kols, but the claim of the Pauristo the dominion they arrogate is admitted by all; even Brahmans andRajputs respectfully acknowledge it, and the former by the additionof Brahmanical rites to the wild ceremonies of the Bhuiyas affirmand sanctify their installation. " In view of this evidence it seemsa probable hypothesis that the Bhuiyas are the earliest residents ofthese parts of Chota Nagpur and that they are a Kolarian tribe. 

5. The Baigas and the Bhuiyas. Chhattisgarh the home of the Baigas. 

There appears to be considerable reason for supposing that theBaiga tribe of the Central Provinces are really a branch of theBhuiyas. Though the Baigas are now mainly returned from Mandla andBalaghat, it seems likely that these Districts were not their originalhome, and that they emigrated from Chhattisgarh into the Satpura hillson the western borders of the plain. The hill country of Mandla and theMaikal range of Balaghat form one of the wildest and most inhospitabletracts in the Province, and it is unlikely that the Baigas would havemade their first settlements here and spread thence into the fertileplain of Chhattisgarh. Migration in the opposite direction would bemore natural and probable. But it is fairly certain that the Baigatribe were among the earliest if not the earliest residents of theChhattisgarh plain and the hills north and east of it. The Bhaina, Bhunjia and Binjhwar tribes who still reside in this country canall be recognised as offshoots of the Baigas. In the article onBhaina it is shown that some of the oldest forts in Bilaspur areattributed to the Bhainas and a chief of this tribe is rememberedas having ruled in Bilaigarh south of the Mahanadi. They are saidto have been dominant in Pendra where they are still most numerous, and to have been expelled from Phuljhar in Raipur by the Gonds. TheBinjhwars or Binjhals again are an aristocratic subdivision of theBaigas, belonging to the hills east of Chhattisgarh and the Uriya plaincountry of Sambalpur beyond them. The zamindars of Bodasamar, Rampur, Bhatgaon and other estates to the south and east of the Chhattisgarhplain are members of this tribe. Both the Bhainas and Binjhwars arefrequently employed as priests of the village deities all over thisarea, and may therefore be considered as older residents than theGond and Kawar tribes and the Hindus. Sir G. Grierson also statesthat the language of the Baigas of Mandla and Balaghat is a form ofChhattisgarhi, and this is fairly conclusive evidence of their firsthaving belonged to Chhattisgarh. [365] It seems not unlikely that theBaigas retreated into the hills round Chhattisgarh after the Hinduinvasion and establishment of the Haihaya Rajput dynasty of Ratanpur, which is now assigned to the ninth century of the Christian era; justas the Gonds retired from the Nerbudda valley and the Nagpur plainbefore the Hindus several centuries later. Sir H. Risley states thatthe Binjhias or Binjhwars of Chota Nagpur say that their ancestorscame from Ratanpur twenty generations ago. [366]

6. The Baigas a branch of the Bhuiyas. 

But the Chhattisgarh plain and the hills north and east of it areadjacent to and belong to the same tract of country as the ChotaNagpur States, which are the home of the Bhuiyas. Sir H. Risleygives Baiga as a name for a sorcerer, and as a synonym or title ofthe Khairwar tribe in Chota Nagpur, possibly having reference to theidea that they, being among the original inhabitants of the country, are best qualified to play the part of sorcerer and propitiate thelocal gods. It has been suggested in the article on Khairwar that thattribe are a mongrel offshoot of the Santals and Cheros, but the pointto be noticed here is the use of the term Baiga in Chota Nagpur for asorcerer; and a sorcerer may be taken as practically equivalent for apriest of the indigenous deities, all tribes who act in this capacitybeing considered as sorcerers by the Hindus. If the Bhuiyas of ChotaNagpur had the title of Baiga, it is possible that it may have beensubstituted for the proper tribal name on their migration to theCentral Provinces. Mr. Crooke distinguishes two tribes in Mirzapurwhom he calls the Bhuiyas and Bhuiyars. The Bhuiyas of Mirzapur seemto be clearly a branch of the Bhuiya tribe of Chota Nagpur, with whomtheir section-names establish their identity. [367] Mr. Crooke statesthat the Bhuiyas are distinguished with very great difficulty from theBhuiyars with whom they are doubtless very closely connected. [368]Of the Bhuiyars [369] he writes that the tribe is also known as Baiga, because large numbers of the aboriginal local priests are derivedfrom this caste. He also states that "Most Bhuiyars are Baigas andofficiate in their own as well as allied tribes; in fact, as alreadystated, one general name for the tribe is Baiga. " [370] It seems notunlikely that these Bhuiyars are the Baigas of the Central Provincesand that they went to Mirzapur from here with the Gonds. Their originalname may have been preserved or revived there, while it has droppedout of use in this Province. The name Baiga in the Central Provincesis sometimes applied to members of other tribes who serve as villagepriests, and, as has already been seen, it is used in the same sense inChota Nagpur. The Baigas of Mandla are also known as Bhumia, which isonly a variant of Bhuiya, having the same meaning of lord of the soilor belonging to the soil. Both Bhuiya and Bhumia are in fact nearlyequivalent to our word 'aboriginal, ' and both are names given to thetribe by the Hindus and not originally that by which its members calledthemselves. It would be quite natural that a branch of the Bhuiyas, who settled in the Central Provinces and were commonly employed asvillage priests by the Hindus and Gonds should have adopted the nameof the office, Baiga, as their tribal designation; just as the titleof Munda or village headman has become the name of one branch of theKol tribe, and Bhumij, another term equivalent to Bhuiya, of a secondbranch. Mr. A. F. Hewitt, Settlement Officer of Raipur, consideredthat the Buniyas of that District were the same tribe as the Bhuiyasof the Garhjat States. [371] By Buniya he must apparently have meantthe Bhunjia tribe of Raipur, who as already stated are an offshootof the Baigas. Colonel Dalton describes the dances of the Bhuiyasof Chota Nagpur as follows: [372] "The men have each a wide kind oftambourine. They march round in a circle, beating these and singinga very simple melody in a minor key on four notes. The women danceopposite to them with their heads covered and bodies much inclined, touching each other like soldiers in line, but not holding hands orwreathing arms like the Kols. " This account applies very closely tothe Sela and Rina dances of the Baigas. The Sela dance is dancedby men only who similarly march round in a circle, though theydo not carry tambourines in the Central Provinces. Here, however, they sometimes carry sticks and march round in opposite directions, passing in and out and hitting their sticks against each other asthey meet, the movement being exactly like the grand chain in theLancers. Similarly the Baiga women dance the Rina dance by themselves, standing close to each other and bending forward, but not holding eachother by the hands and arms, just as described by Colonel Dalton. TheGonds now also have the Sela and Rina dances, but admit that they arederived from the Baigas. Another point of some importance is that theBhuiyas of Chota Nagpur and the Baigas and the tribes derived fromthem in the Central Provinces have all completely abandoned their ownlanguage and speak a broken form of that of their Hindu neighbours. Ashas been seen, too, the Bhuiyas are commonly employed as priests inChota Nagpur, and there seems therefore to be a strong case for theoriginal identity of the two tribes. [373] Both the Baigas and Bhuiyas, however, have now become greatly mixed with the surrounding tribes, the Baigas of Mandla and Balaghat having a strong Gond element. 

7. Tribal sub-divisions. 

In Singhbhum the Bhuiyas call themselves _Pawan-bans_ or 'The Childrenof the Wind, ' and in connection with Hanuman's title of _Pawan-ka-put_or 'The Son of the Wind, ' are held to be the veritable apes ofthe Ramayana who, under the leadership of Hanuman, the monkey-god, assisted the Aryan hero Rama on his expedition to Ceylon. This may becompared with the name given to the Gonds of the Central Provincesof Rawanbansi, or descendants of Rawan, the idea being that theirancestors were the subjects of Rawan, the demon king of Ceylon, who wasconquered by Rama. "All Bhuiyas, " Sir H. Risley states, "affect greatreverence for the memory of Rikhmun or Rikhiasan, whom they regard, some as a patron deity, others as a mythical ancestor, whose namedistinguishes one of the divisions of the tribe. It seems probable thatin the earliest stage of belief Rikhmun was the bear-totem of a sept ofthe tribe, that later on he was transformed into an ancestral hero, andfinally promoted to the rank of a tribal god. " The Rikhiasan Mahatwarsubtribe of the Bhuiyas in the Central Provinces are named after thishero Rikhmun; the designation of Mahatwar signifies that they are theMahtos or leaders of the Bhuiyas. The Khandaits or Paiks are anothersubcaste formed from those who became soldiers; in Orissa they are now, as already stated, a separate caste of fairly high rank. The Parjaor 'subject people' are the ordinary Bhuiyas, probably those livingin Hindu tracts. The Dhur or 'dust' Gonds, and the Parja Gonds ofBastar may be noted as a parallel in nomenclature. The Rautadi are aterritorial group, taking their name from a place called Raotal. TheKhandaits practise hypergamy with the Rautadi, taking daughters fromthem, but not giving their daughters to them. The Pabudia or Madhaiare the hill Bhuiyas, and are the most wild and backward portion ofthe tribe. Dalton writes of them in Keonjhar: "They are not boundto fight for the Raja, though they occasionally take up arms againsthim. Their duty is to attend on him and carry his loads when he travelsabout, and so long as they are satisfied with his person and his rule, no more willing or devoted subjects could be found. They are then inKeonjhar, as in Bonai, a race whom you cannot help liking and takingan interest in from the primitive simplicity of their customs, theiramenability and their anxiety to oblige; but unsophisticated as theyare they wield an extraordinary power in Keonjhar, and when they takeit into their heads to use that power, the country may be said to begoverned by an oligarchy composed of the sixty chiefs of the PawriDesh, the Bhuiya Highlands. A knotted string passed from village tovillage in the name of the sixty chiefs throws the entire country intocommotion, and the order verbally communicated in connection withit is as implicitly obeyed as if it emanated from the most potentdespot. " This knotted string is known as _Ganthi_. The Pabudias saythat their ancestors were twelve brothers belonging to Keonjhar, of whom eight went to an unknown country, while the remaining fourdivided among themselves all the territory of which they had knowledge, this being comprised in the four existing states of Keonjhar, Bamra, Palahara and Bonai. Any Pabudia who takes up his residence permanentlybeyond the boundaries of these four states is considered to lose hiscaste, like Hindus in former times who went to dwell in the foreigncountry beyond the Indus. [374] But if the wandering Pabudia returnsin two years, and proves that he has not drunk water from any othercaste, he is taken back into the fold. Other subdivisions are the Katior Khatti and the Bathudia, these last being an inferior group whoare said to be looked down on because they have taken food from otherlow castes. No doubt they are really the offspring of irregular unions. 

8. Exogamus septs. 

In Raigarh the Bhuiyas appear to have no exogamous divisions. Whenthey wish to arrange a marriage they compare the family gods of theparties, and if these are not identical and there is no recollection ofa common ancestor for three generations, the union is permitted. InSambalpur, however, Mr. Mazumdar states, all Bhuiyas are dividedinto the following twelve septs: Thakur, or the clan of royal blood;Saont, from _samanta_, a viceroy; Padhan, a village headman; Naik, a military leader; Kalo, a wizard or priest; Dehri, also a priest;Chatria, one who carried the royal umbrella; Sahu, a moneylender;Majhi, a headman; Behra, manager of the household; Amata, counsellor;and Dandsena, a police official. The Dehrin sept still worship thevillage gods on behalf of the tribe. 

9. Marriage customs. 

Marriage is adult, but the more civilised Bhuiyas are graduallyadopting Hindu usages, and parents arrange matches for their childrenwhile they are still young. Among the Pabudias some primitive customssurvive. They have the same system as the Oraons, by which allthe bachelors of the village sleep in one large dormitory; this isknown as Dhangarbasa, _dhangar_ meaning a farmservant or young man, or Mandarghar, the house of the drums, because these instruments arekept in it. "Some villages, " Colonel Dalton states, "have a Dhangariabasa, or house for maidens, which, strange to say, they are allowed tooccupy without any one to look after them. They appear to have verygreat liberty, and slips of morality, so long as they are confinedto the tribe, are not much heeded. " This intimacy between boys andgirls of the same village does not, however, commonly end in marriage, for which a partner should be sought from another village. For thispurpose the girls go in a body, taking with them some ground ricedecorated with flowers. They lay this before the elders of the villagethey have entered, saying, 'Keep this or throw it into the water, as you prefer. ' The old men pick up the flowers, placing them behindtheir ears. In the evening all the boys of the village come and dancewith the girls, with intervals for courtship, half the total number ofcouples dancing and sitting out alternately. This goes on all night, and in the morning any couples who have come to an understandingrun away together for a day or two. The boy's father must present arupee and a piece of cloth to the girl's mother, and the marriage isconsidered to be completed. 

Among the Pabudia or Madhai Bhuiyas the bride-price consists of twobullocks or cows, one of which is given to the girl's father andthe other to her brother. The boy's father makes the proposal formarriage, and the consent of the girl is necessary. At the weddingturmeric and rice are offered to the sun; some rice is then placedon the girl's head and turmeric rubbed on her body, and a brass ringis placed on her finger. The bridegroom's father says to him, "Thisgirl is ours now: if in future she becomes one-eyed, lame or deaf, she will still be ours. " The ceremony concludes with the usual feastand drinking bout. If the boy's father cannot afford the bride-pricethe couple sometimes run away from home for two or three days, whentheir parents go in search of them and they are brought back andmarried in the boy's house. 

10. Widow-marriage and divorce. 

A widow is often taken by the younger brother of the deceased husband, though no compulsion is exerted over her. But the match is commonbecause the Bhuiyas have the survival of fraternal polyandry, whichconsists in allowing unmarried younger brothers to have access to anelder brother's wife during his lifetime. [375] Divorce is allowedfor misconduct on the part of the wife or mutual disagreement. 

11. Religion. 

The Bhuiyas commonly take as their principal deity the spirit of thenearest mountain overlooking their village, and make offerings to itof butter, rice and fowls. In April they present the first-fruitsof the mango harvest. They venerate the sun as Dharam Deota, butno offerings are made to him. Nearly all Bhuiyas worship the cobra, and some of them call it their mother and think they are descendedfrom it. They will not touch or kill a cobra, and do not swear byit. In Rairakhol they venerate a goddess, Rambha Devi, who may be acorn-goddess, as the practice of burning down successive patches ofjungle and sowing seed on each for two or three years is here knownas _rambha_. They think that the sun and moon are sentient beings, and that fire and lightning are the children of the sun, and the starsthe children of the moon. One day the moon invited the sun to dinnerand gave him very nice food, so that the sun asked what it was. Themoon said she had cooked her own children, and on this the sun wenthome and cooked all his children and ate them, and this is the reasonwhy there are no stars during the day. But his eldest son, fire, went and hid in a _rengal_ tree, and his daughter, the lightning, darted hither and thither so that the sun could not catch her. Andwhen night came again, and the stars came out, the sun saw how themoon had deceived him and cursed her, saying that she should die forfifteen days in every month. And this is the reason for the waxingand waning of the moon. Ever since this event fire has remained hiddenin a _rengal_ tree, and when the Bhuiyas want him they rub two piecesof its wood together and he comes out. This is the Bhuiya explanationof the production of fire from the friction of wood. 

12. Religious dancing. 

In the month of Kartik (October), or the next month, they bring fromthe forest a branch of the _karm_ tree and venerate it and performthe _karma_ dance in front of it. They think that this worship anddance will cause the _karma_ tree, the mango, the jack-fruit and themahua to bear a full crop of fruit. Monday, Wednesday and Friday areconsidered the proper days for worshipping the deities, and childrenare often named on a Friday. 

13. Funeral rites and inheritance. 

The dead are either buried or burnt, the corpse being placed alwayswith the feet pointing to its native village. On the tenth day thesoul of the dead person is called back to the house. But if a man iskilled by a tiger or by falling from a tree no mourning is observedfor him, and his soul is not brought back. To perish from snake-biteis considered a natural death, and in such cases the usual obsequiesare awarded. This is probably because they revere the cobra as theirfirst mother. The Pabudia Bhuiyas throw four to eight annas' worthof copper on to the pyre or into the grave, and if the deceased hada cow some _ghi_ or melted butter. No division of property can takeplace during the lifetime of either parent, but when both have diedthe children divide the inheritance, the eldest son taking two sharesand the others one equal share each. 

14. Physical appearance and occupation. 

Colonel Dalton describes the Bhuiyas as, "A dark-brown, well-proportioned race, with black, straight hair, plentiful onthe head, but scant on the face, of middle height, figures wellknit and capable of enduring great fatigue, but light-framed likethe Hindu rather than presenting the usual muscular development ofthe hillman. " Their dress is scanty, and in the Tributary StatesDalton says that the men and women all wear dresses of brown cottoncloth. This may be because white is a very conspicuous colour in theforests. They wear ornaments and beads, and are distinctive in thatneither men nor women practise tattooing, though in some localitiesthis rule is not observed by the women. To keep themselves warm atnight they kindle two fires and sleep between them, and this customhas given rise to the saying, 'Wherever you see a Bhuiya he always hasa fire. ' In Bamra the Bhuiyas still practise shifting cultivation, for which they burn the forest growth from the hillsides and sowoilseeds in the fresh soil. This method of agriculture is calledlocally Khasrathumi. They obtain their lands free from the Raja inreturn for acting as luggage porters and coolies. In Bamra they willnot serve as farm-servants or labourers for hire, but elsewhere theyare more docile. 

15. Social customs. 

A woman divorced for adultery is not again admitted to casteintercourse. Her parents take her to their village, where she hasto live in a separate hut and earn her own livelihood. If any Bhuiyasteals from a Kol, Ganda or Ghasia he is permanently put out of caste, while for killing a cow the period of expulsion is twelve years. Theemblem of the Bhuiyas is a sword, in reference to their employment assoldiers, and this they affix to documents in place of their signature. 

Bhulia

_Bhulia, [376] Bholia, Bhoriya, Bholwa, Mihir, Mehar. _--A caste ofweavers in the Uriya country. In 1901 the Bhulias numbered 26, 000persons, but with the transfer of Sambalpur and the Uriya States toBengal this figure has been reduced to 5000. A curious fact about thecaste is that though solely domiciled in the Uriya territories, manyfamilies belonging to it talk Hindi in their own houses. According toone of their traditions they immigrated to this part of the countrywith the first Chauhan Raja of Patna, and it may be that they aremembers of some northern caste who have forgotten their origin andtaken to a fresh calling in the land of their adoption. The Koshtas ofChhattisgarh have a subcaste called Bhoriya, and possibly the Bhuliashave some connection with these. The caste sometimes call themselvesDevang, and Devang or Devangan is the name of another subcaste ofKoshtis. Various local derivations of the name are current, generallyconnecting it with _bhulna_, to forget. The Bhulias occupy a higherrank than the ordinary weavers, corresponding with that of the Koshtiselsewhere, and this is to some extent considered to be an unwarrantedpretension. Thus one saying has it: "Formerly a son was born from aChandal woman; at that time none were aware of his descent or rank, and so he was called Bhulia (one who is forgotten). He took the loomin his hands and became the brother-in-law of the Ganda. " The objecthere is obviously to relegate the Bhulia to the same impure statusas the Ganda. Again the Bhulias affect the honorific title of Meher, and another saying addresses them thus: "Why do you call yourselfMeher? You make a hole in the ground and put your legs into it andare like a cow with foot-and-mouth disease struggling in the mud. " Theallusion here is to the habit of the weaver of hollowing out a hole forhis feet as he sits before the loom, while cattle with foot-and-mouthdisease are made to stand in mud to cool and cleanse the feet. 

The caste have no subcastes, except that in Kalahandi a degradedsection is recognised who are called Sanpara Bhulias, and with whomthe others refuse to intermarry. These are, there is little reasonto doubt, the progeny of illicit unions. They say that they have two_gotras_, Nagas from the cobra and Kachhap from the tortoise. But thesehave only been adopted for the sake of respectability, and exerciseno influence on marriage, which is regulated by a number of exogamousgroups called _vansa_. The names of the _vansas_ are usually eitherderived from villages or are titles or nicknames. Two of them, Bagh(tiger) and Kimir (crocodile), are totemistic, while two more, Kumhar(potter) and Dhuba (washerman), are the names of other castes. Examplesof titular names are Bankra (crooked), Ranjujha (warrior), Kodjit(one who has conquered a score of people) and others. The territorialnames are derived from those of villages where the caste reside atpresent. Marriage within the _vansa_ is forbidden, but some of the_vansas_ have been divided into _bad_ and _san_, or great and small, and members of these may marry with each other, the subdivision havingbeen adopted when the original group became so large as to includepersons who were practically not relations. The binding portion ofthe wedding ceremony is that the bridegroom should carry the bridein a basket seven times round the _hom_ or sacrificial fire. If hecannot do this, the girl's grandfather carries them both. After theceremony the pair return to the bridegroom's village, and are made tosleep on the same bed, some elder woman of the family lying betweenthem. After a few days the girl goes back to her parents and doesnot rejoin her husband until she attains maturity. The remarriageof widows is permitted, and in Native States is not less costly tothe bridegroom than the regular ceremony. In Sonpur the suitor mustproceed to the Raja and pay him twenty rupees for his permission, which is given in the shape of a present of rice and nuts. Similarsums are paid to the caste-fellows and the parents of the girl, andthe Raja's rice and nuts are then placed on the heads of the couple, who become man and wife. Divorce may be effected at the instance of thehusband or the wife's parents on the mere ground of incompatibility oftemper. The position of the caste corresponds to that of the Koshtas;that is, they rank below the good cultivating castes, but above themenial and servile classes. They eat fowls and the flesh of wild pig, and drink liquor. A _liaison_ with one of the impure castes is theonly offence entailing permanent expulsion from social intercourse. Acurious rule is that in the case of a woman going wrong with a man ofthe caste, the man only is temporarily outcasted and forced to pay afine on readmission, while the woman escapes without penalty. Theyemploy Brahmans for ceremonial purposes. They are consideredproverbially stupid, like the Koris in the northern Districts, butvery laborious. One saying about them is: "The Kewat catches fishbut himself eats crabs, and the Bhulia weaves loin-cloths but himselfwears only a rag"; and another: "A Bhulia who is idle is as uselessas a confectioner's son who eats sweetmeats, or a moneylender's sonwith a generous disposition, or a cultivator's son who is extravagant. "

Bhunjia

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Bhunjia. [377]_--A small Dravidian tribe residing in theBindranawagarh and Khariar zamindaris of the Raipur District, andnumbering about 7000 persons. The tribe was not returned outside thisarea in 1911, but Sherring mentions them in a list of the hill tribesof the Jaipur zamindari of Vizagapatam, which touches the extremesouth of Bindranawagarh. The Bhunjias are divided into two branches, Chaukhutia and Chinda, and the former have the following legend oftheir origin. On one occasion a Bhatra Gond named Bachar cast a netinto the Pairi river and brought out a stone. He threw the stone backinto the river and cast his net again, but a second and yet a thirdtime the stone came out. So he laid the stone on the bank of theriver and went back to his house, and that night he dreamt that thestone was Bura Deo, the great God of the Gonds. So he said: 'If thisdream be true let me draw in a deer in my net to-morrow for a sign';and the next day the body of a deer appeared in his net. The stonethen called upon the Gond to worship him as Bura Deo, but the Gonddemurred to doing so himself, and said he would provide a substituteas a devotee. To this Bura Deo agreed, but said that Bachar, the Gond, must marry his daughter to the substituted worshipper. The Gond thenset out to search for somebody, and in the village of Lafandi hefound a Halba of the name of Konda, who was a cripple, deaf and dumb, blind, and a leper. He brought Konda to the stone, and on reachingit he was miraculously cured of all his ailments and gladly beganto worship Bura Deo. He afterwards married the Gond's daughter andthey had a son called Chaukhutia Bhunjia, who was the ancestor ofthe Chaukhutia division of the tribe. Now the term Chaukhutia inChhattisgarhi signifies a bastard, and the story related above isobviously intended to signify that the Chaukhutia Bhunjias are ofmixed descent from the Gonds and Halbas. It is clearly with thisend in view that the Gond is made to decline to worship the stonehimself and promise to find a substitute, an incident which is whollyunnatural and is simply dragged in to meet the case. The Chaukhutiasubtribe especially worship Bura Deo, and sing a song relating tothe finding of the stone in their marriage ceremony as follows:

 Johar, johar Thakur Deota, Tumko lagon, Do matia ghar men dine tumhare nam. Johar, johar Konda, Tumko lagon, Do matia ghar men, etc. Johar, johar Bachar Jhakar Tumko lagon, etc. Johar, johar Budha Raja Tumko lagon, etc. Johar, johar Lafandi Mati Tumko lagon, etc. Johar, johar Anand Mati Tumko lagon, etc. 

which may be rendered:

 I make obeisance to thee, O Thakur Deo, I bow down to thee! In thy name have I placed two pots in my house (as a mark of respect). I make obeisance to thee, O Konda Pujari, I bow down to thee! In thy name have I placed two pots in my house. I make obeisance to thee, O Bachar Jhakar! In thy name have I placed two pots in my house. I make obeisance to thee, O Budha Raja! In thy name have I placed two pots in my house. I make obeisance to thee, O Soil of Lafandi! In thy name have I placed two pots in my house. I make obeisance to thee, O Happy Spot! In thy name have I placed two pots in my house. 

The song refers to the incidents in the story. Thakur Deo is thetitle given to the divine stone, Konda is the Halba priest, andBachar the Gond who cast the net. Budha Raja, otherwise Singh Sei, is the Chief who was ruling in Bindranawagarh at the time, Lafandi thevillage where Konda Halba was found, and the Anand Mati or Happy Spotis that where the stone was taken out of the river. The majority ofthe sept-names returned are of Gond origin, and there seems no doubtthat the Chaukhutias are, as the story says, of mixed descent fromthe Halbas and Gonds. It is noticeable, however, that the Bhunjias, though surrounded by Gonds on all sides, do not speak Gondi but adialect of Hindi, which Sir G. Grierson considers to resemble that ofthe Halbas, and also describes as "A form of Chhattisgarhi which ispractically the same as Baigani. It is a jargon spoken by Binjhwars, Bhumias and Bhunjias of Raipur, Raigarh, Sarangarh and Patna in theCentral Provinces. " [378] The Binjhwars also belong to the countryof the Bhunjias, and one or two estates close to Bindranawagarh areheld by members of this tribe. The Chinda division of the Bhunjiashave a saying about themselves: '_Chinda Raja, Bhunjia Paik'_; andthey say that there was originally a Kamar ruler of Bindranawagarh whowas dispossessed by Chinda. The Kamars are a small and very primitivetribe of the same locality. _Paik_ means a foot-soldier, and it seemstherefore that the Bhunjias formed the levies of this Chinda, who mayvery probably have been one of themselves. The term Bhunjia may perhapssignify one who lives on the soil, from _bhum_, the earth, and _jia_, dependent on. The word _Birjia_, a synonym for Binjhwar, is similarlya corruption of _bewar jia_, and means one who is dependent on _dahia_or patch cultivation. Sir H. Risley gives Birjia, Binjhia and Binjhwar[379] as synonymous terms, and Bhunjia may be another corruption ofthe same sort. The Binjhwars are a Hinduised offshoot of the ancientBaiga tribe, who may probably have been in possession of the hillsbordering the Chhattisgarh plain as well as of the Satpura range beforethe advent of the Gonds, as the term Baiga is employed for a villagepriest over a large part of this area. It thus seems not improbablethat the Chinda Bhunjias may have been derived from the Binjhwars, and this would account for the fact that the tribe speaks a dialectof Hindi and not Gondi. As already seen, the Chaukhutia subcasteappear to be of mixed origin from the Gonds and Halbas, and as theChindas are probably descended from the Baigas, the Bhunjias may beconsidered to be an offshoot from these three important tribes. 

2. Subdivisions. 

Of the two subtribes already mentioned the Chaukhutia are recognisedto be of illegitimate descent. As a consequence of this they strive toobtain increased social estimation by a ridiculously strict observanceof the rules of ceremonial purity. If any man not of his own castetouches the hut where a Chaukhutia cooks his food, it is entirelyabandoned and a fresh one built. At the time of the census theythreatened to kill the enumerator if he touched their huts to affix thecensus number. Pegs had therefore to be planted in the ground a littlein front of the huts and marked with their numbers. The Chaukhutiawill not eat food cooked by other members of his own community, andthis is a restriction found only among those of bastard descent, whereevery man is suspicious of his neighbour's parentage. He will not takefood from the hands of his own daughter after she is married; as soonas the ceremony is over her belongings are at once removed from thehut, and even the floor beneath the seat of the bride and bridegroomduring the marriage ceremony is dug up and the surface earth thrownaway to avoid any risk of defilement. Only when it is remembered thatthese rules are observed by people who do not wash themselves from oneweek's end to the other, and wear the same wisp of cloth about theirloins until it comes to pieces, can the full absurdity of such customsas the above be appreciated. But the tendency appears to be of thesame kind as the intense desire for respectability so often noticedamong the lower classes in England. The Chindas, whose pedigree ismore reliable, are far less particular about their social purity. 

3. Marriage. 

As already stated, the exogamous divisions of the Bhunjias are derivedfrom those of the Gonds. Among the Chaukhutias it is considered agreat sin if the signs of puberty appear in a girl before she ismarried, and to avoid this, if no husband has been found for her, they perform a 'Kand Byah' or 'Arrow Marriage': the girl walks seventimes round an arrow fixed in the ground, and is given away withoutceremony to the man who by previous arrangement has brought thearrow. If a girl of the Chinda group goes wrong with an outsiderbefore marriage and becomes pregnant, the matter is hushed up, butif she is a Chaukhutia it is said that she is finally expelled fromthe community, the same severe course being adopted even when she isnot pregnant if there is reason to suppose that the offence has beencommitted. A proposal for marriage among the Chaukhutias is made onthe boy's behalf by two men who are known as Mahalia and Jangalia, andare supposed to represent a Nai (barber) and Dhimar (water-carrier), though they do not actually belong to these castes. As among theGonds, the marriage takes place at the bridegroom's village, andthe Mahalia and Jangalia act as stewards of the ceremony, and areentrusted with the rice, pulse, salt, oil and other provisions, thebridegroom's family having no function in the matter except to payfor them. The provisions are all stored in a separate hut, and whenthe time for the feast has come they are distributed raw to all theguests, each family of whom cook for themselves. The reason for thisis, as already explained, that each one is afraid of losing statusby eating with other members of the tribe. The marriage is solemnisedby walking round the sacred post, and the ceremony is conducted by ahereditary priest known as Dinwari, a member of the tribe, whose lineit is believed will never become extinct. Among the Chinda Bhunjiasthe bride goes away with her husband, and in a short time returns withhim to her parents' house for a few days, to make an offering to thedeities. But the Chaukhutias will not allow her, after she has livedin her father-in-law's house, to return to her home. In future if shegoes to visit her parents she must stay outside the house and cookher food separately. Widow-marriage and divorce are permitted, buta husband will often overlook transgressions on the part of his wifeand only put her away when her conduct has become an open scandal. Insuch a case he will either quietly leave house and wife and settlealone in another village, or have his wife informed by means of aneighbour that if she does not leave the village he will do so. Itis not the custom to bring cases before the tribal committee or toclaim damages. A special tie exists between a man and his sister'schildren. The marriage of a brother's son or daughter to a sister'sdaughter or son is considered the most suitable. A man will not allowhis sister's children to eat the leavings of food on his plate, thoughhis own children may do so. This is a special token of respect to hissister's children. He will not chastise his sister's children, eventhough they deserve it. And it is considered especially meritorious fora man to pay for the wedding ceremony of his sister's son or daughter. 

4. Religion. 

Every third year in the month of Chait (March) the tribe offer agoat and a cocoanut to Mata, the deity of cholera and smallpox. Theybow daily to the sun with folded hands, and believe that he is ofspecial assistance to them in the liquidation of debt, which theBhunjias consider a primary obligation. When a debt has been paidoff they offer a cocoanut to the sun as a mark of gratitude forhis assistance. They also pay great reverence to the tortoise. Theycall the tortoise the footstool (_pidha_) of God, and have adoptedthe Hindu theory that the earth is supported by a tortoise swimmingin the midst of the ocean. Professor Tylor explains as follows howthis belief arose: [380] "To man in the lower levels of science theearth is a flat plain over which the sky is placed like a dome as thearched upper shell of the tortoise stands upon the flat plate below, and this is why the tortoise is the symbol or representative of theworld. " It is said that Bhunjia women are never allowed to sit eitheron a footstool or a bed-cot, because these are considered to be theseats of the deities. They consider it disrespectful to walk acrossthe shadow of any elderly person, or to step over the body of any humanbeing or revered object on the ground. If they do this inadvertently, they apologise to the person or thing. If a man falls from a tree hewill offer a chicken to the tree-spirit. 

5. Social rules. 

The tribe will eat pork, but abstain from beef and the flesh ofmonkeys. Notwithstanding their strictness of social observance, theyrank lower than the Gonds, and only the Kamars will accept food fromtheir hands. A man who has got maggots in a wound is purified bybeing given to drink water, mixed with powdered turmeric, in whichsilver and copper rings have been dipped. Women are secluded duringthe menstrual period for as long as eight days, and during this timethey may not enter the dwelling-hut nor touch any article belonging toit. The Bhunjias take their food on plates of leaves, and often a wholefamily will have only one brass vessel, which will be reserved forproduction on the visit of a guest. But no strangers can be admittedto the house, and a separate hut is kept in the village for theiruse. Here they are given uncooked grain and pulse, which they preparefor themselves. When the women go out to work they do not leave theirbabies in the house, but carry them tied up in a small rag under thearm. They have no knowledge of medicine and are too timid to enter aGovernment dispensary. Their panacea for most diseases is branding theskin with a hot iron, which is employed indifferently for headache, pains in the stomach and rheumatism. Mr. Pyare Lal notes that oneof his informants had recently been branded for rheumatism on bothknees and said that he felt much relief. 

Binjhwar

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin and tradition. _ 2. _Tribal subdivisions. _ 3. _Marriage. _ 4. _The marriage ceremony. _ 5. _Sexual morality. _ 6. _Disposal of the dead. _ 7. _Religion. _ 8. _Festivals. _ 9. _Social customs. _

1. Origin and tradition. 

_Binjhwar, Binjhal. _ [381]--A comparatively civilised Dravidiantribe, or caste formed from a tribe, found in the Raipur and BilaspurDistricts and the adjoining Uriya country. In 1911 the Binjhwarsnumbered 60, 000 persons in the Central Provinces. There is littleor no doubt that the Binjhwars are an offshoot of the primitiveBaiga tribe of Mandla and Balaghat, who occupy the Satpura or Maikalhills to the north of the Chhattisgarh plain. In these Districts aBinjhwar subdivision of the Baigas exists; it is the most civilisedand occupies the highest rank in the tribe. In Bhandara is found theInjhwar caste who are boatmen and cultivators. This caste is derivedfrom the Binjhwar subdivision of the Baigas, and the name Injhwaris simply a corruption of Binjhwar. Neither the Binjhwars nor theBaigas are found except in the territories above mentioned, and itseems clear that the Binjhwars are a comparatively civilised sectionof the Baigas, who have become a distinct caste. They are in fact thelandholding section of the Baigas, like the Raj-Gonds among the Gondsand the Bhilalas among Bhils. The zamindars of Bodasamar, Rampur, Bhatgaon and other estates to the south and east of the Chhattlsgarhplain belong to this tribe. But owing to the change of name theirconnection with the parent Baigas has now been forgotten. The nameBinjhwar is derived from the Vindhya hills, and the tribe still worshipthe goddess Vindhyabasini of these hills as their tutelary deity. Theysay that their ancestors migrated from Binjhakop to Lampa, which may beeither Lamta in Balaghat or Laphagarh in Bilaspur. The hills of Mandla, the home of perhaps the most primitive Baigas, are quite close to theVindhya range. The tribe say that their original ancestors were _Barahbhai betkar_, or the twelve Brother Archers. They were the sons ofthe goddess Vindhyabasini. One day they were out shooting and let offtheir arrows, which flew to the door of the great temple at Puri andstuck in it. Nobody in the place was able to pull them out, not evenwhen the king's elephants were brought and harnessed to them; tillat length the brothers arrived and drew them forth quite easily withtheir hands, and the king was so pleased with their feat that he gavethem the several estates which their descendants now hold. The storyrecalls that of Arthur and the magic sword. According to another legendthe mother of the first Raja of Patna, a Chauhan Rajput, had fled fromnorthern India to Sambalpur after her husband and relations had beenkilled in battle. She took refuge in a Binjhwar's hut and bore a sonwho became Raja of Patna; and in reward for the protection afforded tohis mother he gave the Binjhwar the Bodasamar estate, requiring onlyof him and his descendants the tribute of a silk cloth on accession tothe zamindari; and this has been rendered ever since by the zamindarsof Bodasamar to the Rajas of Patna as a mark of fealty. It is furtherstated that the twelve archers when they fired the memorable arrows inthe forest were in pursuit of a wild boar; and the landholding class ofBinjhwars are called Bariha from _barah_, a boar. As is only fitting, the Binjhwars have taken the arrow as their tribal symbol or mark;their cattle are branded with it, and illiterate Binjhwars sign itin place of their name. If a husband cannot be found for a girl sheis sometimes married to an arrow. At a Binjhwar wedding an arrowis laid on the trunk of mahua [382] which forms the marriage-post, and honours are paid to it as representing the bridegroom. 

2. Tribal subdivisions. 

The tribe have four subdivisions, the Binjhwars proper, the Sonjharas, the Birjhias and the Binjhias. The Sonjharas consist of those whotook to washing for gold in the sands of the Mahanadi, and it maybe noted that a separate caste of Sonjharas is also in existence inthis locality besides the Binjhwar group. The Birjhias are those whopractised _bewar_ or shifting cultivation in the forests, the namebeing derived from _bewarjia_, one living by _bewar_-sowing. Binjhia issimply a diminutive form of Binjhwar, but in Bilaspur it is sometimesregarded as a separate caste. The zamindar of Bhatgaon belongs tothis group. The tribe have also exogamous divisions, the names ofwhich are of a diverse character, and on being scrutinised show amixture of foreign blood. Among totemistic names are Bagh, a tiger;Pod, a buffalo; Kamalia, the lotus flower; Panknali, the water-crow;Tar, the date-palm; Jal, a net, and others. Some of the sectionsare nicknames, as Udhar, a debtor; Marai Meli Bagh, one who carrieda dead tiger; Ultum, a talker; Jalia, a liar; Kessal, one who hasshaved a man, and so on. Several are the names of other castes, asLohar, Dudh Kawaria, Bhil, Banka and Majhi, indicating that membersof these castes have become Binjhwars and have founded families. Thesept names also differ in different localities; the Birjhia subtribewho live in the same country as the Mundas have several Munda namesamong their septs, as Munna, Son, Solai; while the Binjhwars who areneighbours of the Gonds have Gond sept names, as Tekam, Sonwani, andothers. This indicates that there has been a considerable amount ofintermarriage with the surrounding tribes, as is the case generallyamong the lower classes of the population in Chhattisgarh. Even now ifa woman of any caste from whom the Binjhwars will take water to drinkforms a connection with a man of the tribe, though she herself mustremain in an irregular position, her children will be considered asfull members of it. The Barhias or landowning group have now adoptednames of Sanskrit formation, as Gajendra, an elephant, Rameswar, thegod Rama, and Nageshwar, the cobra deity. Two of their septs are namedLohar (blacksmith) and Kumhar (potter), and may be derived from membersof these castes who became Binjhwars or from Binjhwars who took up theoccupations. At a Binjhwar wedding the presence of a person belongingto each of the Lohar and Kumhar septs is essential, the reason beingprobably the estimation in which the two handicrafts were held whenthe Binjhwars first learnt them from their Hindu neighbours. 

3. Marriage. 

In Sambalpur there appears to be no system of exogamous groups, andmarriage is determined simply by relationship. The union of agnatesis avoided as long as the connection can be traced between them, buton the mother's side all except first cousins may marry. Marriageis usually adult, and girls are sometimes allowed to choose theirown husbands. A bride-price of about eight _khandis_ (1400 lbs. ) ofunhusked rice is paid. The ceremony is performed at the bridegroom'shouse, to which the bride proceeds after bidding farewell to herfamily and friends in a fit of weeping. Weddings are avoided duringthe four months of the rainy season, and in Chait (March) because itis inauspicious, Jeth (May) because it is too hot, and Pus (December)because it is the last month of the year among the Binjhwars. Themarriage ceremony should begin on a Sunday, when the guests arewelcomed and their feet washed. On Monday the formal reception of thebride takes place, the Gandsan or scenting ceremony follows on Tuesday, and on Wednesday is the actual wedding. At the scenting ceremony sevenmarried girls dressed in new clothes dyed yellow with turmeric conductthe bridegroom round the central post; one holds a dish containingrice, mango leaves, myrobalans and betel-nuts, and a second sprinkleswater from a small pot. At each round the bridegroom is made to throwsome of the condiments from the dish on to the wedding-post, and afterthe seven rounds he is seated and is rubbed with oil and turmeric. 

4. The marriage ceremony. 

Among the Birjhias a trunk of mahua with two branches is erected inthe marriage-shed, and on this a dagger is placed in a winnowing-fanfilled with rice, the former representing the bridegroom and thelatter the bride. The bride first goes round the post seven timesalone, and then the bridegroom, and after this they go round ittogether. A plough is brought and they stand upon the yoke, and sevencups of water having been collected from seven different houses, four are poured over the bridegroom and three over the bride. Somemen climb on to the top of the shed and pour pots of water down on tothe couple. This is now said to be done only as a joke. Next morningtwo strong men take the bridegroom and bride, who are usually grownup, on their backs, and the parties pelt each other with unhuskedrice. Then the bridegroom holds the bride in his arms from behind andthey stand facing the sun, while some old man ties round their feeta thread specially spun by a virgin. The couple stand for some timeand then fall to the ground as if dazzled by his rays, when water isagain poured over their bodies to revive them. Lastly, an old mantakes the arrow from the top of the marriage-post and draws threelines with it on the ground to represent the Hindu trinity, Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, and the bridegroom jumps over these holding the bridein his arms. The couple go to bathe in a river or tank, and on theway home the bridegroom shoots seven arrows at an image of a sambhardeer made with straw. At the seventh shot the bride's brother takesthe arrow, and running away and hiding it in his cloth lies down atthe entrance of the bridegroom's house. The couple go up to him, andthe bridegroom examines his body with suspicion, pretending to thinkthat he is dead. He draws the arrow out of his cloth and points tosome blood which has been previously sprinkled on the ground. Aftera time the boy gets up and receives some liquor as a reward. Thisprocedure may perhaps be a symbolic survival of marriage by capture, the bridegroom killing the bride's brother before carrying her off, or more probably, perhaps, the boy may represent a dead deer. Insome of the wilder tracts the man actually waylays and seizes thegirl before the wedding, the occasion being previously determined, and the women of her family trying to prevent him. If he succeeds incarrying her off they stay for three or four days in the forest andthen return and are married. 

5. Sexual morality. 

If a Binjhwar girl is seduced and rendered pregnant by a man of thetribe, the people exact a feast and compel them to join their handsin an informal manner before the caste committee, the tie thus formedbeing considered as indissoluble as a formal marriage. Polygamy ispermitted; a Binjhwar zamindar marries a new wife, who is known asPat Rani, to celebrate his accession to his estates, even though hemay have five or six already. 

Divorce is recognised but is not very common, and a married womanhaving an intrigue with another Binjhwar is often simply made overto him and they live as husband and wife. If this man does not wishto take her she can live with any other, conjugal morality being veryloose in Sambalpur. In Bodasamar a fine of from one to ten rupees ispayable to the zamindar in the case of each divorce, and a feast mustalso be given to the caste-fellows. 

6. Disposal of the dead. 

The tribe usually bury the dead, and on the third day they place onthe grave some uncooked rice and a lighted lamp. As soon as an insectflies to the lamp they catch it, and placing it in a cake of flourcarry this to a stream, where it is worshipped with an offering ofcoloured rice. It is then thrust into the sand or mud in the bed ofthe stream with a grass broom. This ceremony is called Kharpani or'Grass and Water, ' and appears to be a method of disposing of thedead man's spirit. It is not performed at all for young children, while, on the other hand, in the case of respected elders a secondceremony is carried out of the same nature, being known as Badapani or'Great Water. ' On this occasion the _jiva_ or soul is worshipped withgreater pomp. Except in the case of wicked souls, who are supposedto become malignant ghosts, the Binjhwars do not seem to have anydefinite belief in a future life. They say, '_Je maris te saris_, 'or 'That which is dead is rotten and gone. '

7. Religion. 

The tribe worship the common village deities of Chhattisgarh, and extend their veneration to Bura Deo, the principal god of theGonds. They venerate their daggers, spears and arrows on the day ofDasahra, and every third year their tutelary goddess Vindhyabasini iscarried in procession from village to village. Mr. Mian Bhai gives thefollowing list of precepts as forming the Binjhwar's moral code:--Notto commit adultery outside the caste; not to eat beef; not to murder;not to steal; not to swear falsely before the caste committee. Thetribe have _gurus_ or spiritual preceptors, whom he describes asthe most ignorant Bairagis, very little better than impostors. Whena boy or girl grows up the Bairagi comes and whispers the _Karnmantra_ or spell in his ear, also hanging a necklace of _tulsi_(basil) beads round his neck; for this the _guru_ receives a cloth, a cocoanut and a cash payment of four annas to a rupee. Thereafter hevisits his disciples annually at harvest time and receives a presentof grain from them. 

8. Festivals. 

On the 11th of Bhadon (August) the tribe celebrate the _karma_festival, which is something like May-Day or a harvest feast. Theyouths and maidens go to the forest and bring home a young _karma_tree, singing, dancing and beating drums. Offerings are made to thetree, and then the whole village, young and old, drink and danceround it all through the night. Next morning the tree is taken tothe nearest stream or tank and consigned to it. After this the younggirls of five or six villages make up a party and go about to thedifferent villages accompanied by drummers and Ganda musicians. Theyare entertained for the night, and next morning dance for five orsix hours in the village and then go on to another. 

9. Social customs. 

The tribe are indiscriminate in their diet, which includes pork, snakes, rats, and even carnivorous animals, as panthers. They refuseonly beef, monkeys and the leavings of others. The wilder Binjhwars ofthe forests will not accept cooked food from any other caste, but thosewho live in association with Hindus will take it when cooked withoutwater from a few of the higher ones. The tribe are not considered asimpure. Their dress is very simple, consisting as a rule only of onedirty white piece of cloth in the case of both men and women. Theirhair is unkempt, and they neither oil nor comb it. A genuine Binjhwarof the hills wears long frizzled hair with long beard and moustaches, but in the open country they cut their hair and shave the chin. EveryBinjhwar woman is tattooed either before or just after her marriage, when she has attained to the age of adolescence. A man will not touchor accept food from a woman who is not tattooed on the feet. Theexpenses must be paid either by the woman's parents or her brothersand not by her husband. The practice is carried to an extreme, andmany women have the upper part of the chest, the arms from shoulder towrist, and the feet and legs up to the knee covered with devices. Onthe chest and arms the patterns are in the shape of flowers and leaves, while along the leg a succession of zigzag lines are pricked. TheBinjhwars are usually cultivators and labourers, while, as alreadystated, several zamindari and other estates are owned by members of thetribe. Binjhwars also commonly hold the office of Jhankar or priestof the village gods in the Sambalpur District, as the Baigas do inMandla and Balaghat. In Sambalpur the Jhankar or village priest is auniversal and recognised village servant of fairly high status. Hisbusiness is to conduct the worship of the local deities of the soil, crops, forests and hills, and he generally has a substantial holding, rent free, containing some of the best land in the village. It issaid locally that the Jhankar is looked on as the founder of thevillage, and the representative of the old owners who were oustedby the Hindus. He worships on their behalf the indigenous deities, with whom he naturally possesses a more intimate acquaintance thanthe later immigrants; while the gods of these latter cannot be reliedon to exercise a sufficient control over the works of nature in theforeign land to which they have been imported, or to ensure that theearth and the seasons will regularly perform their necessary functionsin producing sustenance for mankind. 

Bishnoi

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin of the sect. _ 2. _Precepts of Jhambaji. _ 3. _Customs of the Bishnois in the Punjab. _ 4. _Initiation and baptism. _ 5. _Nature of the sect. _ 6. _Bishnois in the Central Provinces. _ 7. _Marriage. _ 8. _Disposal of the dead. _ 9. _Development into a caste. _

1. Origin of the sect. 

_Bishnoi. _ [383]--A Hindu sect which has now developed into acaste. The sect was founded in the Punjab, and the Bishnois areimmigrants from northern India. In the Central Provinces theynumbered about 1100 persons in 1911, nearly all of whom belongedto the Hoshangabad District. The best description of the sect iscontained in Mr. Wilson's _Sirsa Settlement Report_ (quoted in SirE. Maclagan's _Census Report of the Punjab_ for 1891), from which thefollowing details are taken: "The name Bishnoi means a worshipper ofVishnu. The founder of the sect was a Panwar Rajput named Jhambaji, who was born in a village of Bikaner State in A. D. 1451. His fatherhad hitherto remained childless, and being greatly oppressed by thismisfortune had been promised a son by a Muhammadan Fakir. After ninemonths Jhambaji was born and showed his miraculous origin in variousways, such as producing sweets from nothing for the delectationof his companions. Until he was thirty-four years old he spoke noword and was employed in tending his father's cattle. At this timea Brahman was sent for to get him to speak, and on confessing hisfailure, Jhambaji showed his power by lighting a lamp with a snapof his fingers and spoke his first word. He adopted the life of ateacher and went to reside on a sandhill some thirty miles south ofBikaner. In 1485 a fearful famine desolated the country, and Jhambajigained an enormous number of disciples by providing food for allwho would declare their belief in him. He is said to have died onhis sandhill at the good old age of eighty-four, and to have beenburied at a spot about a mile distant from it. A further accountsays that his body remained suspended for six months in the bierwithout decomposing. His name Jhambaji was a contraction of Achambha(The Wonder), with the honorific suffix _ji_. 

2. Precepts of Jhambaji. 

"The sayings (_shabd_) of Jhambaji, to the number of one hundred andtwenty, were recorded by his disciples, and have been handed down ina book (_pothi_) which is written in the Nagari character, and in aHindu dialect similar to Bagri and therefore probably a dialect ofRajasthani. The following is a translation of the twenty-nine preceptsgiven by him for the guidance of his followers: 'For thirty daysafter childbirth and five days after a menstrual discharge a womanmust not cook food. Bathe in the morning. Commit no adultery. Becontent. Be abstemious and pure. Strain your drinking-water. Becareful of your speech. Examine your fuel in case any living creaturebe burnt with it. Show pity to living creatures. Keep duty presentto your mind as the teacher bade. Do not steal. Do not speak evilof others. Do not tell lies. Never quarrel. Avoid opium, tobacco, _bhang_ and blue clothing. Flee from spirits and flesh. See that yourgoats are kept alive (not sold to Musalmans, who will kill them forfood). Do not plough with bullocks. Keep a fast on the day before thenew moon. Do not cut green trees. Sacrifice with fire. Say prayers;meditate. Perform worship and attain heaven. ' And the last of thetwenty-nine duties prescribed by the teacher: 'Baptise your childrenif you would be called a true Bishnoi. ' [384]

3. Customs of the Bishnois in the Punjab. 

"Some of these precepts are not strictly obeyed. For instance, thoughordinarily they allow no blue in their clothing, yet a Bishnoi, if he is a police constable, is allowed to wear a blue uniform;and Bishnois do use bullocks, though most of their farming is donewith camels. They also seem to be generally quarrelsome (in words)and given to use bad language. But they abstain from tobacco, drugsand spirits, and are noted for their regard for animal life, which issuch that not only will they not themselves kill any living creature, but they do their utmost to prevent others from doing so. Consequentlytheir villages are generally swarming with antelope and other animals, and they forbid their Musalman neighbours to kill them, and try todissuade European sportsmen from interfering with them. They wanted tomake it a condition of their settlement that no one should be allowedto shoot on their land, but at the same time they asked that theymight be assessed at lower rates than their neighbours, on the groundthat the antelope, being thus left undisturbed, did more damage totheir crops; but I told them that this would lessen the merit (_pun_)of their actions in protecting the animals, and they must be treatedjust as the surrounding villages were. They consider it a good deed toscatter grain to pigeons and other birds, and often have a large numberof half-tame birds about their villages. The day before the new moon(Amawas) they observe as a Sabbath and fast-day, doing no work in thefields or in the house. They bathe and pray three times a day, in themorning, afternoon and evening, saying 'Bishnu! Bishnu!' instead ofthe ordinary Hindu 'Ram! Ram. ' Their clothing is the same as that ofother Bagris, except that their women do not allow the waist to beseen, and are fond of wearing black woollen clothing. They are moreparticular about ceremonial purity than ordinary Hindus are, and it isa common saying that if a Bishnoi's food is on the first of a string oftwenty camels and a man of another caste touches the last camel of thestring, the Bishnoi would consider his food defiled and throw it away. "

4. Initiation and baptism. 

The ceremony of initiation is as follows: "A number of representativeBishnois assemble, and before them a Sadh or Bishnoi priest, afterlighting a sacrificial fire (_hom_), instructs the novice in the dutiesof the faith. He then takes some water in a new earthen vessel, overwhich he prays in a set form (_Bishno gayatri_), stirring it the whilewith his string of beads (_mala_), and after asking the consent ofthe assembled Bishnois he pours the water three times into the handsof the novice, who drinks it off. The novice's scalp-lock (_choti_)is then cut off and his head shaved, for the Bishnois shave the wholehead and do not leave a scalp-lock like the Hindus, but they allow thebeard to grow, only shaving the chin on the father's death. Infantbaptism is also practised, and thirty days after birth the child, whether boy or girl, is baptised by the priest (Sadh) in much thesame way as an adult; only the set form of prayer is different, andthe priest pours a few drops of water into the child's mouth, andgives the child's relatives each three handfuls of the consecratedwater to drink; at the same time the barber clips off the child'shair. The baptismal ceremony has the effect of purifying the house, which has been made impure by the birth (_sutak_). 

"The Bishnois do not revere Brahmans, but have priests of their ownknown as Sadh, who are chosen from among the laity. The priests area hereditary class, and do not intermarry with other Bishnois, fromwhom, like Brahmans, they receive food and offerings. The Bishnois donot burn their dead, but bury them below the cattle-shed or in someplace like a pen frequented by cattle. They make pilgrimages to theplace where Jhambaji is buried to the south of Bikaner; here a tomband temple have been erected to his memory, and gatherings are heldtwice a year. The sect observe the Holi in a different way from otherHindus. After sunset on that day they fast till the next forenoonwhen, after hearing read the account of how Prahlad was tortured byhis infidel father, Hrianya Kasipu, for believing in the god Vishnu, until he was delivered by the god himself in his incarnation ofNarsingh, the Man-lion, and mourning over Prahlad's sufferings, theylight a sacrificial fire and partake of consecrated water, and afterdistributing sugar (_gur_) in commemoration of Prahlad's deliveryfrom the fire into which he was thrown, they break their fast. "

5. Nature of the sect. 

The above interesting account of the Bishnois by Mr. Wilson shows thatJhambaji was a religious reformer, who attempted to break loose fromthe debased Hindu polytheism and arrogant supremacy of the Brahmansby choosing one god, Vishnu, out of the Hindu pantheon and exaltinghim into the sole and supreme deity. In his method he thus differedfrom Kabir and other reformers, who went outside Hinduism altogether, preaching a monotheistic faith with one unseen and nameless deity. Thecase of the Manbhaos, whose unknown founder made Krishna the onegod, discarding the Vedas and the rest of Hinduism, is analogousto Jhambaji's movement. His creed much resembles that of the otherHindu reformers and founders of the Vaishnavite sects. The extremetenderness for animal life is a characteristic of most of them, and would be fostered by the Hindu belief in the transmigration ofsouls. The prohibition of liquor is another common feature, to whichJhambaji added that of all kinds of drugs. His mind, like those ofKabir and Nanak, was probably influenced by the spectacle of thecomparatively liberal creed of Islam, which had now taken root innorthern India. Mr. Crooke remarks that the Bishnois of Bijnor appearto differ from those of the Punjab in using the Muhammadan form ofsalutation, _Salam alaikum_, and the title of Shaikhji. They accountfor this by saying they murdered a Muhammadan Kazi, who preventedthem from burning a widow, and were glad to compound the offenceby pretending to adopt Islam. But it seems possible that on theirfirst rupture with Hinduism they were to some extent drawn towardsthe Muhammadans, and adopted practices of which, on tending again toconform to their old religion, they have subsequently become ashamed. 

6. Bishnois in the Central Provinces. 

In northern India the members of different castes who have becomeBishnois have formed separate endogamous groups, of which Mr. Crookegives nine; among these are the Brahman, Bania, Jat, Sunar, Ahir andNai Bishnois. Only members of comparatively good castes appear to havebeen admitted into the community, and in the Punjab they are nearlyall Jats and Banias. In the Central Provinces the caste forms onlyone endogamous group. They have _gotras_ or exogamous sections, thenames of which appear to be of the titular or territorial type. Someof the _gotras_, Jhuria, Ajna, Sain and Ahir, [385] are consideredto be lower than the others, and though they are not debarred fromintermarriage, a connection with them is looked upon as something ofa _mésalliance_. They are not consulted in the settlement of tribaldisputes. No explanation of the comparatively degraded position ofthese septs is forthcoming, but it may probably be attributed tosome blot in their ancestral escutcheon. The Bishnois celebratetheir marriages at any period of the year, and place no relianceon astrology. According to their saying, "Every day is as good asSankrant, [386] every day is as good as Amawas. [387] The Ganges flowsevery day, and he whose preceptor has taught him the most truth willget the most good from bathing in it. "

7. Marriage. 

Before a wedding the bride's father sends, by the barber, a cocoanutand a silver ring tied round it with a yellow thread. On the threadare seven, nine, eleven or thirteen knots, signifying the number ofdays to elapse before the ceremony. The barber on his arrival standsoutside the door of the house, and the bridegroom's father sendsround to all the families of his caste. The men go to the house andthe women come singing to the barber, and rub turmeric on the boy. Amarried woman touches the cocoanut and waves a lighted lamp seventimes round the bridegroom's head. This is meant to scare off evilspirits. On arrival at the bride's village the bridegroom touchesthe marriage-shed with the branch of a _ber_ or wild plum tree. Themother of the bride gives him some sugar, rubs lamp-black on hiseyes and twists his nose. The bride and bridegroom are seated side byside on wooden boards, and after the caste priest (Sadh) has chantedsome sacred verses, water is poured nine times on to the palms ofthe bridegroom, and he drinks it. They do not perform the ceremonyof walking round the sacred pole. Girls are usually married at a veryearly age, sometimes when they are only a few months old. Subsequently, when the bridegroom comes to take his bride, her family present herwith clothing and a spinning-wheel, this implement being still infavour among the Bishnois. When a widow is to be married again sheis taken to her new husband's house at night, and there grinds aflour-mill five times, being afterwards presented with lac bangles. 

8. Disposal of the dead. 

The dead are never burnt, but their bodies are weighted with sand-bagsand thrown into a stream. The practice which formerly prevailed amongthe Bishnois of burying their dead in the courtyard of the house bythe cattle-stalls has now fallen into desuetude as being insanitary. Ared cloth is spread over the body of a woman, and if her maternalrelatives are present each of them places a piece of cloth on thebier. After the funeral the mourning party proceed to a river tobathe, and then cook and eat their food on the bank. This custom isalso followed by the Panwar Rajputs of the Wainganga Valley, but isforbidden by most of the good Hindu castes. No period of impurity isobserved after a death, but on some day between the fourth and tenthdays afterwards a feast is given to the caste-fellows. 

9. Development into a caste. 

The Bishnois of the Central Provinces are gradually becoming anordinary Hindu caste, a fate which has several times befallen theadherents of Hindu reformers. Many of the precepts of Jhambaji areneglected. They still usually strain their water and examine their fuelbefore burning it to remove insects, and they scatter flour to feed theants and grain for peacocks and pigeons. The wearing of blue cloth isavoided by most, blue being for an obscure reason a somewhat unluckycolour among the Hindus. But they now use bullocks for ploughing, andcut green trees except on the Amawas day. Many of them, especiallythe younger generation, have begun to grow the Hindu _choti_ orscalp-lock. They go on pilgrimage to all the Hindu sacred places, andno doubt make presents there to Brahman priests. They offer _pindas_or sacrificial cakes to the spirits of their deceased ancestors. Theyobserve some of the ordinary Hindu festivals, as the Anant Chaturthi, and some of them employ Brahmans to read the Satya Narayan Katha, the favourite Hindu sacred book. They still retain their specialobservance of the Holi. The admission of proselytes has practicallyceased, and they marry among themselves like an ordinary Hindu caste, in which light they are gradually coming to be regarded. The Bishnoisare usually cultivators or moneylenders by calling. 

Bohra

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin of the sect. _ 2. _Their religious tenets. _ 3. _The Mullahs. _ 4. _Bohra graveyards. _ 5. _Religious customs. _ 6. _Occupation. _ 7. _Houses and dress. _

1. Origin of the sect. 

_Bohra, Bohora. _ [388]--A Muhammadan caste of traders who comefrom Gujarat and speak Gujarati. At the last census they numberednearly 5000 persons, residing principally in the Nimar, Nagpur andAmraoti Districts, Burhanpur being the headquarters of the sect inthe Central Provinces. The name is probably derived from the Hindi_byohara_, a trader. Members of the caste are honorifically addressedas Mullaji. According to the received account of the rise of theBohras in Gujarat a missionary, Abdulla, came from Yemen to Cambayin A. D. 1067. By his miracles he converted the great king Sidhrajof Anhilvada Patan in Gujarat, and he with numbers of his subjectsembraced the new faith. For two centuries and a half the Bohrasflourished, but with the establishment of Muzaffar Shah's power(A. D. 1390-1413) in that country the spread of Sunni doctrines wasencouraged and the Bohra and other Shia sects suppressed. Since then, with gradually lessening numbers, they have passed through severalbitter persecutions, meeting with little favour or protection, till atthe close of the eighteenth century they found shelter under Britishrule. In 1539 the members of the sect living in Arabia were expelledfrom there and came to Gujarat, where they were hospitably received bytheir brethren, the headquarters of the sect being thenceforward fixedat Surat. The Bohras are Shias of the great Ismailia sect of Egypt. TheIsmailia sect split off from the orthodox Shias on the question of thesuccession to the sixth Imam, Jafar Sadik, in A. D. 765. The disputewas between his eldest son's son Ismail and his second son Musi, the Ismailias being those who supported the former and the orthodoxShias the latter. The orthodox Shias are distinguished as believersin twelve Imams, the last of whom is still to come. The Ismailiasagain divided on a similar dispute as to the succession to theKhalifa Almustansir Billah by his eldest son Nazar or his younger sonAlmustaali. The Bohras are descended from the Mustaalians or supportersof the younger son and the Khojas from the Nazarians who supportedthe elder son. [389] All these distinctions appear somewhat trivial. 

2. Their religious tenets. 

Gujarat contains two classes of Bohras: the traders who are allShias and are the only immigrants into the Central Provinces, and alarge class of cultivating Bohras who are Sunnis. The latter may bethe descendants of the earliest converts and may have been forced tobecome Sunnis when this sect was dominant in Gujarat as noticed above, while the Shias are perhaps descended from the later immigrants fromArabia. The Shia Bohras themselves are further divided into severalsects of which the Daudi are the principal. 

Mr. Faridi writes of them: [390] "They are attentive to their religiousduties, both men and women knowing the Koran. They are careful tosay their prayers, to observe Muharram as a season of mourning andto go on pilgrimage to Mecca and Kerbala. They strictly abstainfrom music and dancing and from using or dealing in intoxicatingdrinks or drugs. Though fierce sectarians, keenly hating and hatedby the regular Sunnis and other Muhammadans than those of theirown sect, their reverence for Ali and for their high priest seemsto be further removed from adoration than among the Khojahs. Theywould appear to accept the ordinary distinctions of right and wrong, punishing drunkenness, adultery and other acts generally considereddisgraceful. Of the state beyond death they hold that, after passinga time of freedom as evil spirits, unbelievers go to a place oftorment. Believers, but apparently only believers of the Ismailifaith, after a term of training enter a state of perfection. Amongthe faithful each disembodied spirit passes the term of training incommunion with the soul of some good man. The spirit can suggestgood or evil to the man and may learn from his good deeds to lovethe right; when the good man dies the spirits in communion with hissoul are, if they have gained by their training, attached to somemore perfect man, or if they have lost by their opportunities aresent back to learn; spirits raised to a higher degree of knowledgeare placed in communion with the High Priest on earth; and on hisdeath are with him united to the Imams, and when through the Imamsthey have learnt what they still require to know they are absorbedin perfection. Except for some peculiarities in their names; thatthey attach special importance to circumcision; that the sacrificeor _alsikah_ ceremony is held in the Mullah's house; that at marriagethe bride and bridegroom when not of age are represented by sponsorsor _walis_; that at death a prayer for pity on his soul and body islaid in the dead man's hands; and that on certain occasions the HighPriest feeds the whole community--Bohra customs do not so far as hasbeen ascertained differ from those of ordinary Muhammadans. 

3. The Mullahs. 

"Their leader, both in things religious and social, is the head Mullahof Surat. The ruling Mullah names his successor, generally, but itis said not always, from among the members of his own family. Shortof worship the head Mullah is treated with the greatest respect. Helives in much state and entertains with the most profuse liberality. Onboth religious and civil questions his authority is final. Disciplineis enforced in religious matters by fine, and in case of adultery, drunkenness and other offences, by fine, excommunication and rarely byflogging. On ceremonial occasions the head Mullah sits on his throne, and in token of his power has the flyflapper, _chauri_, held beforehim. As the Bohras enter they make three prostrations, _salaams_, close their hands and stand before him. To such as are worthy he says'Be seated, ' to others 'Stand. ' Once a year, on the 18th Rajjab, every Daudi lays his palm within the head Mullah's hand and takesan oath to be faithful. On this day when he goes to the mosque theBohras are said to kiss the Mullah's footsteps and to apply the dusthe treads to their heads and eyes. " Each considerable settlement ofthe sect has a deputy Mullah of its own. 

4. Bohra graveyards. 

The Sahadra or burial-place of the Bohras at Burhanpur containsthe tombs of three of the Surat Mullahs who happened to die whenthey were at Burhanpur. The tombs are in shell-lime and are fairlyhandsome erections. The Bohras support here by voluntary subscriptiona rest-house, where members of the sect coming to the city can obtainfree board and lodging for as long as they like to stay. Mr. Conollysays of their graveyards: [391]

"Their burial-grounds have a pleasing appearance, the tombs beingregularly arranged in streets, east and west. The tombs themselves, which are, of course, north and south, the corpse resting on its rightside, differ in no respect from those of Sunnis, with the exceptionof a small _chiragh takia_ or lamp-socket, cut out of the north face, just like the cavity for the inscription of our own tombs. "

5. Religious customs. 

Of their religion Mr. Kitts writes: [392] "In prayers they differboth from Shias and Sunnis in that they follow their Mullah, prayingaloud after him, but without much regularity of posture. The times forcommencing their devotions are about five minutes later than thoseobserved by Sunnis. After the midday and sunset supplications theyallow a short interval to elapse, remaining themselves in the mosquemeanwhile. They then commence the afternoon and evening prayers andthus run five services into three. "

Mr. Thurston notes that the Bohras consider themselves so superiorto other sects that if another Muhammadan enters their mosquethey afterwards clean the spot which he has occupied during hisprayers. [393] They show strictness in other ways, making theirown sweetmeats at home and declining to eat those of the Halwai(confectioner). It is said also that they will not have their clotheswashed by a Dhobi, nor wear shoes made by a Chamar, nor take foodtouched by any Hindu. They are said to bathe only on Fridays, and someof them not on every Friday. If a dog touches them they are uncleanand must change their clothes. They celebrate the Id and Ramazan aday before other Muhammadans. At the Muharram their women break alltheir bangles and wear new bangles next day to show that they havebeen widowed, and during this period they observe mourning by goingwithout shoes and not using umbrellas. Mr. Conolly says of them:"I must not omit to notice that a fine of 20 cowries (equally forrich and poor) punishes the non-attendance of a Bohra at the dailyprayers. A large sum is exacted for remissness during the Ramazan, and it is said that the dread of loss operates powerfully upon aclass of men who are particularly penny-wise. The money collectedthus is transmitted by the Ujjain Mullah to his chief at Surat, who devotes it to religious purposes such as repairing or buildingmosques, assisting the needy of his subjects and the like. Severalother offences have the same characteristic punishment, such asfornication, drunkenness, etc. But the cunning Bohras elude many of thefines and daily indulge in practices not sanctioned by their creed;thus in their shops pictures and figures may be purchased though itis against the commandments to sell the likeness of any living thing. "

It has been seen that when a Bohra is buried a prayer for pity on hissoul and body is laid in the dead man's hands, of which Mr. Faridigives the text. But other Muhammadans tell a story to the effect thatthe head Mullah writes a letter to the archangel Gabriel in which heis instructed to supply a stream of honey, a stream of milk, waterand some fruit trees, a golden building and a number of houris, theextent of the order depending on the amount of money which has beenpaid to the Mullah by the departed in his lifetime; and this letteris placed beneath the dead man's head in the grave, the Bohras havingno coffins. The Bohras indignantly repudiate any such version of theletter, and no doubt if the custom ever existed it has died out. 

6. Occupation. 

The Bohras, Captain Forsyth remarks, though bigoted religionists, are certainly the most civilised and enterprising and perhaps alsothe most industrious class in the Nimar District. They deal generallyin hardware, piece-goods and drugs, and are very keen traders. Thereis a proverb, "He who is sharper than a Bohra must be mad, and hewho is fairer than a Khatri must be a leper. " Some of them are onlypedlars and hawkers, and in past times their position seems to havebeen lower than at present. An old account says: [394] "The Bohras arean inferior set of travelling merchants. The inside of a Bohra's boxis like that of an English country shop; spelling-books, prayer-books, lavender-water, soap, tapes, scissors, knives, needles and thread makebut a small part of the variety. " And again: "In Bombay the Bohras goabout the town as the dirty Jews do in London early and late, carryinga bag and inviting by the same nasal tone servants and others to fillit with old clothes, empty bottles, scraps of iron, etc. " [395]

7. Houses and dress. 

Of their method of living Malcolm wrote: [396] "I visited severalof the houses of this tribe at Shahjahanpur, where a colony of themare settled, and was gratified to find not only in their apartments, but in the spaciousness and cleanliness of their kitchens, in thewell-constructed chimney, the neatly arranged pantries, and thepolished dishes and plates as much of real comfort in domesticarrangements as could be found anywhere. We took the parties wevisited by surprise and there could have been no preparation. " TheBohras do not charge interest on loans, and they combine to supportindigent members of the community, never allowing one of their casteto beg. The caste may easily be known from other Muhammadans by theirsmall, tightly wound turbans and little skull-caps, and their longflowing robes, and loose trousers widening from the ankle upwards andgathered in at the waist with a string. The women dress in a colouredcotton or silk petticoat, a short-sleeved bodice and a coloured cottonhead-scarf. When they go out of doors they throw a dark cloak overthe head which covers the body to the ankles, with gauze openingsfor the eyes. 

Brahman [397]

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin and development of the caste. _ 2. _Their monopoly of literature. _ 3. _Absence of central authority. _ 4. _Mixed elements in the caste. _ 5. _Caste subdivisions. _ 6. _Miscellaneous groups. _ 7. _Sectarian divisions. _ 8. _Exogamy. _ 9. _Restrictions on marriage. _ 10. _Hypergamy. _ 11. _Marriage customs. _ 12. _Polygamy, divorce and treatment of widows. _ 13. _Sati or burning of widows. _ 14. _Funeral rites and mourning. _ 15. _Religion. _ 16. _Daily ritual. _ 17. _The sacred thread. _ 18. _Social position. _ 19. _Titles. _ 20. _Caste panchayat and offences. _ 21. _Rules about food. _ 22. _Dress. _ 23. _Tattooing. _ 24. _Occupation. _ 25. _Character of Brahmans. _

List of Subordinate Articles on Subcastes

 1. Ahivasi. 2. Jijhotia. 3. Kanaujia, Kanyakubja. 4. Khedawal. 5. Maharashtra, Maratha. 6. Maithil. 7. Malwi. 8. Nagar. 9. Naramdeo. 10. Sanadhya, Sanaurhia. 11. Sarwaria. 12. Utkal. 

1. Origin and development of the caste. 

_Brahman, Baman. _--The well-known priestly caste of India and thefirst of the four traditional castes of the Hindu scriptures. In 1911the Brahmans numbered about 450, 000 persons in the Central Provincesand Berar, or nearly 3 per cent of the population. This is less thanthe average strength for India as a whole, which is about 4 1/2 percent. The caste is spread over the whole Province, but is in greatestnumbers in proportion to the population in Saugor and Jubbulpore, and weakest in the Feudatory States. 

The name Brahman or Brahma is said to be from the root _brih_ or_vrih_, to increase. The god Brahma is considered as the spiritand soul of the universe, the divine essence and source of allbeing. Brahmana, the masculine numerative singular, originally denotedone who prays, a worshipper or the composer or reciter of a hymn. [398]It is the common term used in the Vedas for the officiating priest. SirH. Risley remarks on the origin of the caste: [399] "The best modernopinion seems disposed to find the germ of the Brahman caste in thebards, ministers and family priests who were attached to the king'shousehold in Vedic times. Different stages of this institution may beobserved. In the earliest ages the head of every Aryan household washis own priest, and even a king would himself perform the sacrificeswhich were appropriate to his rank. By degrees families or guildsof priestly singers arose, who sought service under the kings, andwere rewarded by rich presents for the hymns or praise and prayerrecited and sacrifices offered by them on behalf of their masters. Astime went on the sacrifices became more numerous and more elaborate, and the mass of ritual grew to such an extent that the king could nolonger cope with it unaided. The employment of _purohits_ or familypriests, formerly optional, now became a sacred duty if the sacrificeswere not to fall into disuse. The Brahman obtained a monopoly ofpriestly functions, and a race of sacerdotal specialists arosewhich tended continually to close its ranks against the intrusionof outsiders. " Gradually then from the household priests and thosewho made it their business to commit to memory and recite the sacredhymns and verses handed down orally from generation to generationthrough this agency, an occupational caste emerged, which arrogatedto itself the monopoly of these functions, and the doctrine developedthat nobody could perform them who was not qualified by birth, thatis, nobody could be a Brahman who was not the son of a Brahman. Whenreligious ritual became more important, as apparently it did, a desirewould naturally arise among the priests to make their revered andlucrative profession a hereditary monopoly; and this they were easilyand naturally able to do by only teaching the sacred songs and thesacrificial rules and procedure to their own descendants. The processindeed would be to a considerable extent automatic, because the priestswould always take their own sons for their pupils in the first place, and in the circumstances of early Indian society a married priesthoodwould thus naturally evolve into a hereditary caste. The Levitesamong the Jews and the priests of the Parsis formed similar hereditaryorders, and the reason why they did not arise in other great religionswould appear to have been the prescription or encouragement of therule of celibacy for the clergy and the foundation of monasteries, to which admission was free. But the military landed aristocraciesof Europe practically formed hereditary castes which were analogousto the Brahman and Rajput castes, though of a less stereotyped andprimitive character. The rise of the Brahman caste was thus perhapsa comparatively simple and natural product of religious and socialevolution, and might have occurred independently of the developmentof the caste system as a whole. The former might be accounted for byreasons which would be inadequate to explain the latter, even thoughas a matter of fact the same factors were at work in both cases. 

2. Their monopoly of literature. 

The hereditary monopoly of the sacred scriptures would be strengthenedand made absolute when the Sanskrit language, in which they had beencomposed and handed down, ceased to be the ordinary spoken languageof the people. Nobody then could learn them unless he was taught bya Brahman priest. And by keeping the sacred literature in an unknownlanguage the priesthood made their own position absolutely secure andgot into their own hands the allocation of the penalties and rewardspromised by religion, for which these books were the authority, thatis to say, the disposal of the souls of Hindus in the afterlife. They, in fact, held the keys of heaven and hell. The jealousy with which theyguarded them is well shown by the Abbé Dubois: [400] "To the Brahmansalone belongs the right of reading the Vedas, and they are so jealousof this, or rather it is so much to their interest to prevent othercastes obtaining any insight into their contents, that the Brahmanshave inculcated the absurd theory, which is implicitly believed, thatshould anybody of any other caste be so highly imprudent as even toread the title-page his head would immediately split in two. The veryfew Brahmans who are able to read those sacred books in the original, only do so in secret and in a whisper. Expulsion from caste, withoutthe smallest hope of re-entering it, would be the lightest punishmentof a Brahman who exposed those books to the eyes of the profane. " Itwould probably be unfair, however, to suppose that the Vedas werekept in the original Sanskrit simply from motives of policy. Itwas probably thought that the actual words of the sacred text hadthemselves a concrete force and potency which would be lost in atranslation. This is the idea underlying the whole class of beliefsin the virtue of charms and spells. 

But the Brahmans had the monopoly not only of the sacred Sanskritliterature, but practically of any kind of literacy or education. Theywere for long the only literate section of the people. Subsequentlytwo other castes learnt to read and write in response to an economicdemand, the Kayasths and the Banias. The Kayasths, it has beensuggested in the article on that caste, were to a large extent theoffspring and inmates of the households of Brahmans, and were no doubttaught by them, but only to read and write the vernacular for thepurpose of keeping the village records and accounts of rent. They wereexcluded from any knowledge of Sanskrit, and the Kayasths subsequentlybecame an educated caste in spite of their Brahman preceptors, bylearning Persian under their Muhammadan, and English under theirEuropean employers. The Banias never desired nor were encouragedto attain to any higher degree of literacy than that necessaryfor keeping accounts of sale and loan transactions. The Brahmansthus remained the only class with any real education, and acquireda monopoly not only of intellectual and religious leadership, butlargely of public administration under the Hindu kings. No literatureexisted outside their own, which was mainly of a sacerdotal character;and India had no heritage such as that bequeathed by Greece and Rometo mediaeval Europe which could produce a Renaissance or revival ofliteracy, leading to the Reformation of religion and the breakingof the fetters in which the Roman priesthood had bound the humanmind. The Brahmans thus established, not only a complete religious, but also a social ascendancy which is only now beginning to breakdown since the British Government has made education available to all. 

3. Absence of central authority. 

The Brahman body, however, lacked one very important element ofstrength. They were apparently never organised nor controlled byany central authority such as that which made the Roman church sopowerful and cohesive. Colleges and seats of learning existed atBenares and other places, at which their youth were trained in theknowledge of religion and of the measure of their own pretensions, and the means by which these were to be sustained. But probablyonly a small minority can have attended them, and even these whenthey returned home must have been left practically to themselves, spread as the Brahmans were over the whole of India with no means ofpostal communication or rapid transit. And by this fact the chaoticcharacter of the Hindu religion, its freedom of belief and worship, its innumerable deities, and the almost complete absence of dogmasmay probably be to a great extent explained. And further the Brahmancaste itself cannot have been so strictly organised that outsiders andthe priests of the lower alien religions never obtained entrance toit. As shown by Mr. Crooke, many foreign elements, both individualsand groups, have at various times been admitted into the caste. 

4. Mixed elements in the caste. 

The early texts indicate that Brahmans were in the habit of formingconnections with the widows of Rajanyas and Vaishyas, even if theydid not take possession of the wives of such men while they werestill alive. [401] The sons of Angiras, one of the great ancestralsages, were Brahmans as well as Kshatriyas. The descendants of Garga, another well-known eponymous ancestor, were Kshatriyas by birth butbecame Brahmans. Visvamitra was a Kshatriya, who, by the force ofhis austerities, compelled Brahma to admit him into the Brahmanicalorder, so that he might be on a level with Vasishtha with whom hehad quarrelled. According to a passage in the Mahabharata all castesbecome Brahmans when once they have crossed the Gomti on a pilgrimageto the hermitage of Vasishtha. [402] In more recent times there arelegends of persons created Brahmans by Hindu Rajas. Sir J. Malcolm inCentral India found many low-caste female slaves in Brahman houses, theowners of which had treated them as belonging to their own caste. [403]

It would appear also that in some cases the caste priests of differentcastes have become Brahmans. Thus the Saraswat Brahmans of the Punjabare the priests of the Khatri caste. They have the same complicatedarrangement of exogamy and hypergamy as the Khatris, and will takefood from that caste. It seems not improbable that they are reallydescendants of Khatri priests who have become Brahmans. [404]

Similarly such groups as the Oswal, Srimal and Palliwal Brahmans ofRajputana, who are priests of the subcastes of Banias of the samename, may originally have been caste priests and become Brahmans. TheNaramdeo Brahmans, or those living on the Nerbudda River, are said tobe descendants of a Brahman father by a woman of the Naoda or Dhimarcaste; and the Golapurab Brahmans similarly of a Brahman father andAhir mother. In many cases, such as the island of Onkar Mandhata inthe Nerbudda in Nimar, and the Mahadeo caves at Pachmarhi, the placesof worship of the non-Aryan tribes have been adopted by Hinduism andthe old mountain or river gods transformed into Hindu deities. Atthe same time it is not improbable that the tribal priests of theold shrines have been admitted into the Brahman caste. 

5. Caste subdivisions. 

The Brahman caste has ten main territorial divisions, forming twogroups, the Panch-Gaur or five northern, and the Panch-Dravida or fivesouthern. The boundary line between the two groups is supposed tobe the Nerbudda River, which is also the boundary between Hindustanand the Deccan. But the Gujarati Brahmans belong to the southerngroup, though Gujarat is north of the Nerbudda. The five northerndivisions are:

(_a_) _Saraswat. _--These belong to the Punjab and are named afterthe Saraswati river of the classical period, on whose banks they aresupposed to have lived. 

(_b_) _Gaur. _--The home of these is the country round Delhi, butthey say that the name is from the old Gaur or Lakhnauti kingdomof Bengal. If this is correct, it is difficult to understand howthey came from Bengal to Delhi contrary to the usual tendency ofmigration. General Cunningham has suggested that Gaura was also thename of the modern Gonda District, and it is possible that the term wasonce used for a considerable tract in northern India as well as Bengal, since it has come to be applied to all the northern Brahmans. [405]

(_c_) _Kankubja or Kanaujia. _--These are named after the old town ofKanauj on the Ganges near Cawnpore, once the capital of India. TheKanaujia are the most important of the northern groups and extend fromthe west of Oudh to beyond Benares and into the northern Districts ofthe Central Provinces. Here they are subdivided into four principalgroups--the Kanaujia, Jijhotia, Sarwaria and Sanadhya, which aretreated in annexed subordinate articles. 

(_d_) _Maithil. _--They take their name from Mithila, the old termfor Bihar or Tirhut, and belong to this tract. 

(_e_) _Utkal. _--These are the Brahmans of Orissa. 

The five groups of the Panch-Dravida are as follows:

(_a_) _Maharashtra. _--These belong to the Maratha country orBombay. They are subdivided into three main territorial groups--theDeshasth, or those of the home country, that is the Poona tract abovethe Western Ghats; the Konkonasth, who belong to the Bombay Konkanor littoral; and the Karhara, named after a place in the SataraDistrict. [406]

(_b_) _Tailanga or Andhra. _--The Brahmans of the Telugu country, Hyderabad and the northern part of Madras. This territory was knownas Andhra and governed by an important dynasty of the same name inearly times. 

(_c_) _Dravida. _--The Brahmans of the Tamil country or the southof Madras. 

(_d_) _Karnata. _--The Brahmans of the Carnatic, or the Canaresecountry. The Canarese area comprises the Mysore State, and the BritishDistricts of Canara, Dharwar and Belgaum. 

(_e_) _Gurjara. _--The Brahmans of Gujarat, of whom two subcastes arefound in the Central Provinces. The first consists of the Khedawals, named after Kheda, a village in Gujarat, who are a strictly orthodoxclass holding a good position in the caste. And the second are theNagar Brahmans, who have been long settled in Nimar and the adjacenttracts, and act as village priests and astrologers. Their socialstatus is somewhat lower. 

There are, however, a large number of other subcastes, and thetendency to fissure in a large caste, and to the formation of smalllocal groups which marry among themselves, is nowhere more strikinglyapparent than among the Brahmans. This is only natural, as they, more than any other caste, attach importance to strict ceremonialobservance in matters of food and the daily ritual of prayer, andany group which was suspected of backsliding in respect of these onemigration to a new locality would be debarred from intermarriagewith the parent caste at home. An instance of this is found among theChhattisgarhi Brahmans, who have been long settled in this backwardtract and cut off from communication with northern India. Theyare mainly of the Kanaujia division, but the Kanaujias of Oudh willneither take food nor intermarry with them, and they now constitute aseparate subcaste of Kanaujias. Similarly the Malwi Brahmans, whosehome is in Malwa, whence they have spread to Hoshangabad and Betul, are believed to have been originally a branch of the Gaur or Kanaujia, but have now become a distinct subcaste, and have adopted many of thecustoms of Maratha Brahmans. Mandla contains a colony of Sarwaria [407]Brahmans who received grants of villages from the Gond kings and havesettled down there. They are now cultivators, and some have taken tothe plough, while they also permit widow-remarriage in all but thename. They are naturally cut off from intercourse with the orthodoxSarwarias and marry among themselves. The Harenia Brahmans of Saugorare believed to have immigrated from Hariana some generations ago andform a separate local group; and also the Laheria Brahmans of the sameDistrict, who, like the Mandla Sarwarias, permit widows to marry. InHoshangabad there is a small subcaste of Bawisa or 'Twenty-two'Brahmans, descended from twenty-two families from northern India, who settled here and have since married among themselves. A similardiversity of subcastes is found in other Provinces. The Brahmans ofBengal are also mainly of the Kanaujia division, but they are dividedinto several local subcastes, of which the principal are Rarhi andBarendra, named after tracts in Bengal, and quite distinct from thesubdivisions of the Kanaujia group in the Central Provinces. 

6. Miscellaneous groups. 

Another class of local subdivisions consists of those Brahmans wholive on the banks of the various sacred rivers or at famous shrines, and earn their livelihood by conducting pilgrims through the seriesof ceremonies and acts of worship which are performed on a visit tosuch places; they receive presents from the pilgrims and the offeringsmade at the shrines. The most prominent among these are the Gayawals ofGaya, the Prayagwals of Allahabad (Prayag), the Chaubes of Mathura, theGangaputras (Sons of the Ganges) of Benares, the Pandarams of southernIndia and the Naramdeo Brahmans who hold charge of the many temples onthe Nerbudda. As such men accept gifts from pilgrims they are generallylooked down on by good Brahmans and marry among themselves. Many ofthem have a character for extortion and for fleecing their clients, a propensity commonly developed in a profession of this kind. Sucha reputation particularly attaches to the Chaubes of Mathura andBrindaban, the holy places of the god Krishna. They are strong andfinely built men, but gluttonous, idle and dissolute. Some of theBenares Brahmans are known as Sawalakhi, or having one and a quarterlakhs, apparently on account of the wealth they amass from pilgrims. Amuch lower group are the Maha-Brahmans (great Brahmans), who are alsoknown as Patit (degraded) or Katia. These accept the gifts offered bythe relatives after a death for the use of the dead man in the nextworld during the period of mourning; they also eat food which it issupposed will benefit the dead man, and are considered to representhim. Probably on this account they share in the impurity attaching tothe dead, and are despised by all castes and sometimes not permitted tolive in the village. Other Brahmans are degraded on account of theirhaving partly adopted Muhammadan practices. The Husaini Brahmans ofwestern India are so called as they combine Muhammadan with Hindurites. They are principally beggars. And the Kalanki Brahmans ofWardha and other Districts are looked down upon because, it is said, that at the bidding of a Muhammadan governor they make a figure ofa cow from sugar and eat it up. Probably they may have really actedas priests to Muhammadans who were inclined to adopt certain Hindurites on the principle of imitation, and with a view to please theirdisciples conformed to some extent to Islam. 

7. Sectarian divisions. 

Brahmans have also sectarian divisions according to the differentVedas, which they especially study. It is held that the ancient Rishisor saints, like the Jewish patriarchs, lived far beyond the ordinaryspan of existence, and hence had time to learn all the Vedas andtheir commentaries. But this was impossible for their shorter-liveddescendants, and hence each Veda has been divided into a number ofShakhas or branches, and the ordinary Brahman only learns one Shakha ofone Veda. Most Brahmans of the Central Provinces are either Rigvedisor Yajurvedis, and these commonly marry only followers of their ownVeda, thus forming a sort of cross set of endogamous divisions. Therestriction on marriage may also extend to the Shakha, so that aman can only marry in a family of the same Shakha as himself. Thisapplies in the Central Provinces mainly to the Yajurvedis, who havethree well-known Shakhas or branches called Kannava, Apastambha andMadhyandina. These are derived from the Shukla or White Yajurveda, which can be understood, while the Black Yajurveda is obscure andunintelligible. The Rigvedis and Yajurvedis have some differences intheir methods of recitation. The Rigvedis are said to move the headup and down when they recite and not to use the hands; while theYajurvedis swing the hands and body from side to side. It is saidthat a Madhyandina cannot say his prayers nor take his food beforemidday, and hence the name, which means half the day. These pointsof distinction are given as stated by the local Brahmans, and it isnot known whether they would be endorsed by the Pandits. The MarathaBrahmans of the Central Provinces are usually Rigvedis and the KanaujiaBrahmans Yajurvedis. Followers of the other two Vedas are practicallynot found. Among Kanaujia Brahmans it is also customary to ask thehead of a family with which a marriage is proposed whether he tiesa knot in the right or left half of his Shikha or scalp-lock duringhis prayers and whether he washes his right or left foot first inthe performance of a religious ceremony. 

8. Exogamy. 

The exogamous arrangements of the Brahmans are also very complex. Itis said that the Brahmans are descended from the seven sons ofthe god Brahma, who were Bhrigu, Angirasa, Marichi, Atri, Pulaha, Pulastya and Vasishtha. But Pulaha only begot demons and Pulastyagiants, while Vasishtha died and was born again as a descendantof Marichi. Consequently the four ancestors of the Brahmans wereBhrigu, Angirasa, Marichi and Atri. But according to another accountthe ancestors of the Brahmans were the seven Rishis or saints whoform the constellation of the Great Bear. These were Jamadagni, Bharadwaj, Gautam, Kashyap, Vasishtha, Agastya, Atri and Visvamitra, who makes the eighth and is held to be descended from Atri. Theselatter saints are also said to be the descendants of the four originalones, Atri appearing in both lists. But the two lists taken togethermake up eleven great saints, who were the eponymous ancestors ofthe Brahmans. All the different subcastes have as a rule exogamousclasses tracing their descent from these saints. But each group, such as that of Bhrigu or Angirasa, contains a large number ofexogamous sections usually named after other more recent saints, andintermarriage is sometimes prohibited among the different sections, which are descended from the same son of Brahma or star of theGreat Bear. The arrangement thus bears a certain resemblance to theclassification system of exogamy found among primitive races, onlythat the number of groups is now fairly large; but it is said thatoriginally there were only four, from the four sons of Brahma whogave birth to Brahmans. The names of other important saints, afterwhom exogamous sections are most commonly called, are Garg, Sandilya, Kaushik, Vatsya and Bhargava. These five appear sometimes to be heldas original ancestors in addition to the eleven already mentioned. Itmay be noted that some of the above names of saints have a totemisticcharacter; for instance, Bharadwaj means a lark; Kashyap resemblesKachhap, the name for a tortoise; Kaushik may come from the _kusha_grass; Agastya from the _agasti_ flower, and so on. Within the maingroup exogamy sometimes also goes by titles or family names. Thusthe principal titles of the Kanaujias are: Pande, a wise man; Dube, learned in two Vedas; Tiwari, learned in three Vedas; Chaube, learnedin four Vedas; Sukul, white or pure; Upadhya, a teacher; Agnihotri, the priest who performs the fire-sacrifice; Dikshit, the initiator, and so on. Marriage between persons bearing the same family nametends to be prohibited, as they are considered to be relations. 

9. Restrictions on marriage. 

The prohibition of marriage within the _gotra_ or exogamous sectionbars the union of persons related solely through males. In additionto this, according to Hindu law a Brahman must not marry a girl of hismother's or maternal grandfather's _gotra_, or one who is a _sapinda_of his father or maternal grandfather. Mr. Joshi states that _sapindas_are persons related through being particles of the same body. It isalso understood that two persons are said to be _sapindas_ when theycan offer _pindas_ or funeral cakes to the same ancestor. The rulebarring the marriage of _sapindas_ is that two persons cannot marryif they are both as near as fourth in descent from a common ancestor, and the relationship is derived through the father of either party. Ifeither is more remote than fourth in descent they apparently couldmarry. If the relationship of the couple is through their mothersin each case, then they cannot marry if they are third in descentfrom the same ancestor, but may do so in the fourth or subsequentgenerations. It is of no importance whether the intervening linksbetween the common ancestor and the proposed couple are male or female;descent is considered to be male if through the father, and femaleif through the mother. In practice, marriages are held to be validbetween persons fourth in descent from a common ancestor in the caseof male relationship, and third in the case of female relationship, that is, persons having a common greatgrandparent in the male lineor a common grandparent in the female line can marry. 

Other rules are that girls must not be exchanged in marriage betweentwo families, and a man may not marry two sisters, though he canmarry his deceased wife's sister. The bride should be both youngerin age and shorter in stature than the bridegroom. A younger sistershould not be married while her elder sister is single. 

10. Hypergamy. 

The practice of hypergamy is, or was until recently, common amongBrahmans. This is the rule by which the social estimation of afamily is raised if its girls are married into a class of highersocial status than its own. Members of the superior classes will takedaughters from the lower classes on payment usually of a substantialbride-price, but will not give their daughters to them. Accordingto Manu, men of the higher castes were allowed to take wives fromthe lower ones but not to give daughters to them. The origin of thecustom is obscure. If caste was based on distinctions of race, thenapparently the practice of hypergamy would be objectionable, becauseit would destroy the different racial classes. If, on the otherhand, the castes consisted of groups of varying social status, thedistinction being that those of the lower ones could not participatein the sacramental or communal meals of the higher ones, then themarriage of a daughter into a higher group, which would carry withit participation at the sacramental marriage feast of this group, might well be a coveted distinction. The custom of hypergamy prevailssomewhat largely in northern India between different subcastes, groupsof different social status in the same subcaste, and occasionallyeven between different castes. The social results of hypergamy, whencommonly practised, are highly injurious. Men of the higher subcastesget paid for marrying several wives, and indulge in polygamy, whilethe girls of the higher subcastes and the boys of the lower onesfind it difficult and sometimes even impossible to obtain husbandsand wives. The custom attained its most absurd development among theKulin Brahmans of eastern Bengal, as described by Sir H. Risley. [408]Here the Brahmans were divided by a Hindu king, Ballal Sen, intotwo classes, the Kulin (of good family), who had observed the entirenine counsels of perfection; and the Srotriya, who, though regularstudents of the Vedas, had lost sanctity by intermarrying with familiesof inferior birth. The latter were further subdivided into threeclasses according to their degree of social purity, and each higherclass could take daughters from the next one or two lower ones. Thedoctrine known as Kula-gotra was developed, whereby the reputation ofa family depended on the character of the marriages made by its femalemembers. In describing the results of the system Sir H. Risley states:"The rush of competition for Kulin husbands on the part of the inferiorclasses became acute. In order to dispose of the surplus of women inthe higher groups polygamy was resorted to on a very large scale:it was popular with the Kulins because it enabled them to make ahandsome income by the accident of their birth; and it was acceptedby the parents of the girls concerned as offering the only means ofcomplying with the requirements of the Hindu religion. Tempted by a_pan_ or premium, which often reached the sum of two thousand rupees, Swabhava Kulins made light of their _kul_ and its obligations, andmarried girls, whom they left after the ceremony to be taken care of bytheir parents. Matrimony became a sort of profession, and the honourof marrying a girl to a Kulin is said to have been so highly valuedin eastern Bengal that as soon as a boy was ten years old his friendsbegan to discuss his matrimonial prospects, and before he was twentyhe had become the husband of many wives of ages varying from five tofifty. " The wives were commonly left at home to be supported by theirparents, and it is said that when a Kulin Brahman had a journey tomake he usually tried to put up for the night at the house of one ofhis fathers-in-law. All the marriages were recorded in the registersof the professional Ghataks or marriage-brokers, and each party wassupplied with an extract. On arrival at his father-in-law's house theKulin would produce his extract showing the date on which his marriagetook place; and the owner of the house, who was often unfamiliar withthe bridegroom's identity, would compare it with his own extract. Whenthey agreed he was taken in and put up for the night, and enjoyed thesociety of his wife. The system thus entailed the greatest misery tolarge numbers of women, both those who were married to husbands whomthey scarcely ever saw, and those of the higher classes who got nohusbands at all. It is now rapidly falling into abeyance. Hypergamyis found in the Central Provinces among the subcastes of KanaujiaBrahmans. The Sarwaria subcaste, which is the highest, takes daughtersfrom Kanaujias and Jijhotias, and the Kanaujias take them from theJijhotias. These and other subcastes such as the Khedawals are alsooften divided into two groups of different status, the higher ofwhich takes daughters from the lower. Usually the parents of thegirl pay a liberal bridegroom-price in money or ornaments. It hasnever, however, been carried to the same length here as in Bengal, and two, or in some cases three, wives are the limit for a man ofthe higher classes. One division of Kanaujias is called the Satkul orseven families, and is the highest. Other Kanaujias, who are known asPachhadar, pay substantial sums for husbands for this group, and it isreported that if such a marriage takes place and the bridegroom-priceis not paid up, the husband will turn his wife out and send her hometo her father. Certain subcastes of Sunars also have hypergamy and, as between different castes, it exists between the Dangis and Rajputs, pure Rajputs being held willing to take daughters in marriage fromthe highest clans of Dangis. 

11. Marriage customs. 

A text of Manu prescribes: [409] "If a young woman marry while she ispregnant, whether her pregnancy be known or unknown, the male child inher womb belongs to the bridegroom and is called a son received withhis bride. " But at present a Brahman girl who is known to be pregnantwill be wholly debarred from the sacrament of marriage. An invitationto a wedding is sent by means of grains of rice coloured yellow withturmeric and placed in a brass bowl with areca-nuts over them. Allthe members of the caste or subcaste who eat food with the host andare resident in the same town or close at hand are as a rule invited, and all relatives of the family who reside at a distance. The head ofthe family goes himself to the residence of the guests and invitesthem with expressions of humility to honour his home. Before thewedding the ancestors of the family and also the divine mothers areworshipped, these latter consisting of the consorts of the principalgods. In front of the wedding procession are carried _kalashas_ orearthen jars filled to the brim with water, and with green shootsand branches floating on the top. The _kalasha_ is said to representthe universe and to contain the principal gods and divine mothers, while the waters in it are the seven seas. All these are witnessesto the wedding. Among other ceremonies, presents of fruit, food, ornaments and jewellery are exchanged between the parties, and theseare called _choli-ka-bharana_ or filling the bride's breast-cloth. Theoriginal object of giving these presents was thus, it would appearfrom the name, to render the bride fertile. The father then giveshis daughter away in a set form of speech. After reciting the exactmoment of time, the hour, the day, the minute according to solarand lunar reckoning, the year and the epoch, he proceeds: "In thename of Vishnu (repeating the name three times), the supreme spirit, father and creator of the universe, and in furtherance of his wish forthe propagation of the human species, I (specifying his full name andsection, etc. ), in the company of my married wife, do hereby offer thehand of my daughter--may she live long--full of all virtuous qualities, image of Lakshmi, wife of Vishnu, anxious of union in lawful wedlock, ornamented and dressed, brought up and instructed according to the bestof my means, by name (naming her and repeating the full descriptionof ancestors, class, etc. ) in the solemn presence of the Brahmans, Gurus, fire and deities, to you--may you live long--(repeating thebridegroom's name and full description), anxious to obtain a wifewith a view to secure the abode of bliss and eternal happiness inthe heaven of Brahma. Accept her with _kusha_ grass, grains of rice, water and presents of money. " Afterwards the father asks the bridegroomnever to disregard the feelings and sentiments of his wife in mattersof religion, social pleasures and the acquisition of money, and thebridegroom agrees. The binding portion of the ceremony consists inwalking seven times round the sacred post, and when the seventh roundis completed the marriage is irrevocable. Among the Maratha Brahmansthe bridegroom is called Nawar Deo or the new god. During the fivedays of the wedding he is considered to be a sort of king, and isput in the highest place, and everybody defers to him. They make thebridegroom and bride name each other for a joke, as they are ashamedto do this, and will not untie their clothes to let them bathe untilthey have done it. At all the feasts the bride and bridegroom aremade to eat out of the same plate, and they put pieces of food ineach other's mouth, which is supposed to produce affection betweenthem. The wedding expenses in an ordinary Kanaujia Brahman's family, whose income is perhaps Rs. 20 to 40 a month, are estimated at Rs. 200for the bridegroom's party and Rs. 175 for the bride's, exclusiveof any bride- or bridegroom-price. The bulk of the expenditure is onfeasts to the caste. The bride does not live with her husband untilafter she arrives at puberty, but it is thought desirable that sheshould spend long visits with his family before this, in order thatshe may assimilate their customs and be trained by her mother-in-law, according to the saying, 'Tender branches are easily bent. ' Amongsome Maratha Brahmans, when the bride arrives at puberty a ceremonycalled Garhbhadan is performed, and the husband confesses whether hehas cohabited with his wife before her puberty, and if so, he is fineda small sum. Such instances usually occur when the signs of pubertyare delayed. If the planet Mangal or Mars is adverse to a girl in herhoroscope, it is thought that her husband will die. The women of herfamily will, therefore, first marry her secretly to a pipal-tree, so that the tree may die instead. But they do not tell this to thebridegroom. In Saugor, girls whose horoscope is unfavourable to thehusband are first married to the _arka_ or swallow-wort plant. Ifa Brahman has not sufficient funds to arrange for the marriage ofhis daughter he will go about and beg, and it is considered thatalms given for this purpose acquire special merit for the donor, nor will any good Brahman refuse a contribution according to his means. 

12. Polygamy, divorce and treatment of widows. 

Polygamy conveys no stigma among Brahmans, but is uncommon. Divorceis not recognised, a woman who is put away by her husband being turnedout of the caste. The remarriage of widows is strictly prohibited. Itis said that marriage is the only sacrament (Sanskar) for a woman, and she can only go through it once. The holy nuptial texts may notbe repeated except for a virgin. The prohibition of the remarriageof widows has become a most firmly rooted prejudice among the higherclasses of Hindus, and is the last to give way before the inroads ofliberal reform. Only a small minority of the most advanced Brahmanshave recognised widow-remarriage, and these are generally held tobe excluded from the caste, though breaches of the rules against theconsumption of prohibited kinds of meat, and the drinking of aeratedwaters and even alcoholic liquor, are now winked at and not visitedwith the proper penalty. Nevertheless, many classes of Brahmans, who live in the country and have taken to cultivation, allow widowsto live with men without putting the family out of caste. Wherethis is not permitted, surreptitious intercourse may occasionallytake place with members of the family. The treatment of widows isalso becoming more humane. Only Maratha and Khedawal Brahmans inthe Central Provinces still force them to shave their heads, andthese will permit a child-widow to retain her hair until she growsup, though they regard her as impure while she has it. A widow isusually forbidden to have a cot or bed, and must sleep on the groundor on a plank. She may not chew betel-leaves, should eat only oncea day, and must rigorously observe all the prescribed fasts. Shewears white clothes only, no glass bangles, and no ornaments on herfeet. She is subject to other restrictions and is a general drudgein the family. It is probable that the original reason for suchtreatment of a widow was that she was considered impure through beingperpetually haunted by her husband's ghost. Hindus say that a widowis half-dead. She should not be allowed to cook the household food, because while cooking it she will remember her husband and the foodwill become like a corpse. The smell of such food will offend the gods, and it cannot be offered to them. A widow is not permitted to worshipthe household god or the ancestors of the family. It was no doubt anadvantage under the joint family system that a widow should not claimany life-interest in her husband's property. The modern tendency ofwidows, who are left in possession, to try and alienate the propertyfrom the husband's relatives has been a fruitful cause of litigationand the ruin of many old landed families. The severe treatment ofwidows was further calculated to suppress any tendency on the partof wives to poison their husbands. These secondary grounds may havecontributed something to the preservation and enforcement of an ideabased originally on superstitious motives. 

13. _Sati_ or burning of widows. 

For a widow to remain single and lead an austere and joyless life washeld to confer great honour on her family; and this was enormouslyenhanced when she decided to become _sati_ and die with her husbandon the funeral pyre. Though it is doubtful whether this practice isadvocated by the Vedas, subsequent Hindu scriptures insist stronglyon it. It was said that a widow who was burnt with her husband wouldenjoy as many years in paradise as there are hairs on the human head, that is to say, thirty-five million. Conversely, one who insistedon surviving him would in her next birth go into the body of someanimal. By the act of _sati_ she purified all her husband's ancestors, even from the guilt of killing a Brahman, and also those of her ownfamily. If a man died during an absence from home in another countryhis wife was recommended to take his slippers or any other articleof dress and burn herself with them tied to her breast. [410]

Great honour was paid to a Sati, and a temple or memorial stone wasalways erected to her at which her spirit was venerated, and thisencouraged many pious women not only to resign themselves to thisterrible death but ardently to desire it. The following account givenby Mr. Ward of the method of a _sati_ immolation in Bengal may bereproduced: [411]

"When the husband's life is despaired of and he is carried to thebank of the Ganges, the wife declares her resolution to be burntwith him. In this case she is treated with great respect by herneighbours, who bring her delicate food, and when her husband is deadshe again declares her resolve to be burnt with his body. Havingbroken a small branch from a mango tree she takes it with her andproceeds to the body, where she sits down. The barber then paintsthe sides of her feet red, after which she bathes and puts on newclothes. During these preparations the drum beats a certain sound bywhich it is known that a widow is about to be burnt with the corpseof her husband. A hole is dug in the ground round which posts aredriven into the earth, and thick green stakes laid across to form akind of bed; and upon these are laid in abundance dry faggots, hemp, clarified butter and pitch. The officiating Brahman now causes thewidow to repeat the prayer that as long as fourteen Indras reign, or as many years as there are hairs on her head, she may abide inheaven with her husband; that during this time the heavenly dancersmay wait on her and her husband; and that by this act of merit allthe ancestors of her mother and husband may ascend to heaven. Shenow presents her ornaments to her friends, ties some red cotton onboth wrists, puts two new combs in her hair, paints her forehead, and takes into the end of the cloth that she wears some parchedrice and cowries. The dead body is bathed, anointed with butter, and dressed in new clothes. The son takes a handful of boiled riceand offers it in the name of his deceased father. Ropes and anotherpiece of cloth are spread on the wood, and the dead body is laidupon the pile. The widow next walks round the pyre seven times, as she did round the marriage-post at her wedding, strewing parchedrice and cowries as she goes, which the spectators catch and keepunder the belief that they will cure diseases. The widow then liesdown on the fatal pile by the side of the dead body. The bodies arebound together with ropes and the faggots placed over them. The son, averting his head, puts fire to the face of his father, and at thesame moment several persons light the pile at different sides, whenthe women and mourners set up cries. More faggots are hastily broughtand thrown over the pile, and two bamboo levers are pressed over themto hold down the bodies and the pile. Several persons are employed inholding down these levers. More clarified butter, pitch and faggotsare thrown on to the pile till the bodies are consumed. This maytake about two hours, but I conceive the woman must be dead in a fewminutes after the fire has been kindled. "

As showing the tenacity with which women sometimes adhered to theirresolve to be burned with their husbands, and thus, as they believed, resume their conjugal life in heaven, the following account by SirWilliam Sleeman, in his _Rambles and Recollections_, of a _sati_at Jubbulpore may be given:

"At Gopalpur on the Nerbudda are some very pretty temples builtfor the most part to the memory of women who have burned themselveswith the remains of their husbands, and on the very spot where thecremation occurred. Among them was one recently raised over the ashesof one of the most extraordinary old bodies I had ever seen, whoburned herself in my presence in 1829. In March 1828 I had issued aproclamation prohibiting any one from aiding or assisting in _sati_, and distinctly stating that to bring one ounce of wood for thepurpose would be considered as so doing. Subsequently, on Tuesday, 24th November, I had an application from the heads of the mostrespectable and most extensive family of Brahmans in the District, to suffer this old woman to burn herself with the remains of herhusband, Umeid Singh Upadhya, who had that morning died upon thebanks of the Nerbudda. I threatened to enforce my order and punishseverely any man who assisted; and placed a police guard for thepurpose of seeing that no one did so. The old woman remained by theedge of the water without eating or drinking. Next day the body of herhusband was burned in the presence of several thousand spectators, who had assembled to see the _sati_. The sons and grandsons of theold woman remained with her, urging her to desist from her resolve, while her other relatives surrounded my house urging me to allow herto burn. All the day she remained sitting upon a bare rock in the bedof the Nerbudda, refusing every kind of sustenance, and exposed tothe intense heat of the sun by day and the severe cold of the night, with only a thin sheet thrown over her shoulders. On the next day, Thursday, to cut off all hope of her being moved from her purpose, she put on the _dhujja_ or coarse red turban and broke her braceletsin pieces, by which she became dead in law and for ever excluded fromcaste. Should she choose to live after this she could never returnto her family. On the morning of Saturday, the fourth day after thedeath, I rode out ten miles to the spot, and found the poor old widowsitting with the _dhujja_ round her head, a brass plate before herwith undressed rice and flowers, and a cocoanut in each hand. Shetalked very collectedly, telling me that she had determined to mix herashes with those of her departed husband, and should patiently awaitmy permission to do so, assured that God would enable her to sustainlife till that was given, though she dared not eat or drink. Lookingat the sun, then rising before her over a long and beautiful reach ofthe Nerbudda, she said calmly: 'My soul has been for five days withmy husband's near that sun; nothing but my earthly frame is left, and this I know you will in time suffer to be mixed with the ashesof his in yonder pit, because it is not in your nature wantonlyto prolong the miseries of a poor old woman. ' I told her that myobject and duty was to save and preserve her; I was come to urge herto live and keep her family from the disgrace of being thought hermurderers. I tried to work upon her pride and fears. I told her thatthe rent-free lands on which her family had long subsisted might beresumed by Government if her children permitted her to do this act;and that no brick or stone should ever mark the place of her death;but if she would live, a splendid habitation should be made for heramong the temples, and an allowance given her from the rent-freelands. She smiled, but held out her arm and said, 'My pulse has longceased to beat, for my spirit has departed, and I have nothing leftbut a little earth that I wish to mix with the ashes of my husband. Ishall suffer nothing in burning, and if you wish proof order some fire, and you shall see this arm consumed without giving me any pain. ' Idid not attempt to feel her pulse, but some of my people did, anddeclared that it had ceased to be perceptible. At this time everynative present believed that she was incapable of suffering pain, and her end confirmed them in their opinion. Satisfied myself thatit would be unavailing to attempt to save her life, I sent for allthe principal members of the family, and consented that she should besuffered to burn herself if they would enter into engagements that noother member of their family should ever do the same. This they allagreed to, and the papers having been drawn out in due form aboutmidday, I sent down notice to the old lady, who seemed extremelypleased and thankful. The ceremonies of bathing were gone throughbefore three, while the wood and other combustible materials for astrong fire were collected and put into the pit. After bathing shecalled for a _pan_ (betel-leaf) and ate it, then rose up, and with onearm on the shoulder of her eldest son, and the other on that of hernephew, approached the fire. As she rose up fire was set to the pile, and it was instantly in a blaze. The distance was about one hundredand fifty yards; she came on with a calm and cheerful countenance, stopped once, and casting her eyes upwards said, 'Why have they keptme five days from thee, my husband?' On coming to the sentries hersupports stopped, she walked round the pit, paused a moment; and whilemuttering a prayer threw some flowers into the fire. She then walkeddeliberately and steadily to the brink, stepped into the centre ofthe flame, sat down, and leaning back in the midst as if reposingupon a couch, was consumed without uttering a shriek or betrayingone sign of agony. "

In cases, however, where women shrank from the flames they werefrequently forced into them, as it was a terrible disgrace to theirfamilies that they should recoil on the scene of the sacrifice. Opiumand other drugs were also administered to stupefy the woman and preventher from feeling pain. Widows were sometimes buried alive with theirdead husbands. The practice of _sati_ was finally prohibited in 1829, without exciting the least discontent. 

14. Funeral rites and mourning. 

The bodies of children dying before they are named, or before thetonsure ceremony is performed on them, are buried, and those of otherpersons are burnt. In the grave of a small child some of its mother'smilk, or, if this is not available, cow's milk in a leaf-cup or earthenvessel, is placed. Before a body is burnt cakes of wheat-flour are puton the face, breast and both shoulders, and a coin is always depositedfor the purchase of the site. Mourning or impurity is observed forvarying periods, according to the nearness of relationship. For achild, relatives other than the parents have only to take a bath toremove the impurity caused by the death. In a small town or village allBrahmans of the same subcaste living in the place are impure from thetime of the death until cremation has taken place. After the funeralthe chief mourner performs the _shraddh_ ceremony, offering _pindas_or cakes of rice, with libations of water, to the dead. Presents aremade to Brahmans for the use of the dead man in the other world, andthese are sometimes very valuable, as it is thought that the spiritwill thereby be profited. Such presents are taken by the Maha-Brahman, who is much despised. When a late zamindar of Khariar died, Rs. 2000were given to the Maha-Brahman for the use of his soul in the nextworld. The funeral rites are performed by an ordinary Brahman, knownas Malai, who may receive presents after the period of impurity hasexpired. Formerly a calf was let loose in the name of the deceasedafter being branded with the mark of a trident to dedicate it to Siva, and allowed to wander free thenceforth. Sometimes it was formallymarried to three or four female calves, and these latter were presentedto Brahmans. Sometimes the calf was brought to stand over the dyingman and water poured down its tail into his mouth. The practice ofletting loose a male calf is now declining, as these animals are agreat nuisance to the crops, and cultivators put them in the pound. Thecalf is therefore also presented to a Brahman. It is believed that the_shraddh_ ceremony is necessary to unite the dead man's spirit withthe Pitris or ancestors, and without this it wanders homeless. Somethink that the ancestors dwell on the under or dark side of themoon. Those descendants who can offer the _pindas_ or funeral cakesto the same ancestor are called Sapindas or relatives, and the manwho fills the office of chief mourner thereby becomes the dead man'sheir. Persons who have died a violent death or have been executed arenot entitled to the ordinary funeral oblations, and cannot at once beunited with the ancestors. But one year after the death an effigy ofthe deceased person is made in _kusha_ grass and burnt, with all theordinary funeral rites, and offerings are made to his spirit as ifhe had died on this occasion. If the death was caused by snake-bitea gold snake is made and presented to a Brahman before this ceremonyis begun. This is held to be the proper funeral ceremony which uniteshis spirit with the ancestors. Formerly in Madras if a man died duringthe last five days of the waning of the moon it was considered veryunlucky. In order to escape evil effects to the relatives a specialopening was made in the wall of the house, through which the bodywas carried, and the house itself was afterwards abandoned for threeto six months. [412] A similar superstition prevails in the CentralProvinces about a man dying in the Mul Nakshatra or lunar asterism, which is perhaps the same or some similar period. In this case it isthought that the deaths of four other members of the household areportended, and to avert this four human figures are made of flour orgrass and burnt with the corpse. According to the Abbé Dubois if aman died on a Saturday it was thought that another death would occurin the family, and to avert this a living animal, such as a ram, goat or fowl, was offered with the corpse. [413]

15. Religion. 

The religion of the Brahmans is Hinduism, of which they are thepriests and exponents. Formerly the Brahman considered himself asa part of Brahma, and hence a god. This belief has decayed, but thegods are still held to reside in the body; Siva in the crown of thehead, Vishnu in the chest, Brahma in the navel, Indra in the genitalsand Ganesh in the rectum. Most Brahmans belong to a sect worshippingespecially Siva or Vishnu, or Rama and Krishna, the incarnations ofthe latter god, or Sakti, the female principle of energy of Siva. Butas a rule Brahmans, whether of the Sivite or Vishnuite sects, abstainfrom flesh meat and are averse to the killing of any living thing. Thefollowing account of the daily ritual prayers of a Benares Brahmanmay be reproduced from M. André Chevrillon's _Romantic India_, [414]as, though possibly not altogether accurate in points of detail, it gives an excellent idea of their infinitely complicated nature:

16. Daily ritual. 

"Here is the daily life of one of the twenty-five thousand Brahmansof Benares. He rises before the dawn, and his first care is to lookat an object of good omen. If he sees a crow at his left, a kite, a snake, a cat, a hare, a jackal, an empty jar, a smoking fire, a wood-pile, a widow, a man blind of one eye, he is threatened withgreat dangers during the day. If he intended to make a journey, heputs it off. But if he sees a cow, a horse, an elephant, a parrot, alizard, a clear-burning fire, a virgin, all will go well. If he shouldsneeze once, he may count upon some special good fortune; but if twicesome disaster will happen to him. If he yawns some demon may enter hisbody. Having avoided all objects of evil omen, the Brahman drops intothe endless routine of his religious rites. Under penalty of renderingall the day's acts worthless, he must wash his teeth at the bank ofa sacred stream or lake, reciting a special _mantra_, which ends inthis ascription: 'O Ganges, daughter of Vishnu, thou springest fromVishnu's foot, thou art beloved by him! Remove from us the stains ofsin and birth, and until death protect us thy servants!' He then rubshis body with ashes, saying: 'Homage to Siva, homage to the source ofall birth! May he protect me during all births!' He traces the sacredsigns upon his forehead--the three vertical lines representing thefoot of Vishnu, or the three horizontal lines which symbolise thetrident of Siva--and twists into a knot the hair left by the razoron the top of his head, that no impurity may fall from it to pollutethe sacred river. 

"He is now ready to begin the ceremonies of the morning (_sandhya_), those which I have just observed on the banks of the river. Minutelyand mechanically each Brahman performs by himself these rites ofprescribed acts and gestures. First the internal ablution: theworshipper takes water in the hollow of his hand, and, letting itfall from above into his mouth, cleanses his body and soul. Meanwhilehe mentally invokes the names of Vishnu, saying, 'Glory to Keshava, to Narayana, to Madhava, to Govinda, ' and so on. 

"The second rite is the exercise or 'discipline' of the respiration(_prajayama_). Here there are three acts: first, the worshippercompresses the right nostril with the thumb, and drives the breaththrough the left; second, he inhales through the left nostril, then compresses it, and inhales through the other; third, he stopsthe nose completely with thumb and forefinger, and holds his breathas long as possible. All these acts must be done before sunrise, andprepare for what is to follow. Standing on the water's edge, he utterssolemnly the famous syllable OM, pronouncing it _aum_, with a lengthequalling that of three letters. It recalls to him the three personsof the Hindu trinity: Brahma, who creates; Vishnu, who preserves;Siva, who destroys. More noble than any other word, imperishable, says Manu, it is eternal as Brahma himself. It is not a sign, but abeing, a force; a force which constrains the gods, superior to them, the very essence of all things. Mysterious operations of the mind, strange associations of ideas, from which spring conceptions likethese! Having uttered this ancient and formidable syllable, the mancalls by their names the three worlds: earth, air, sky; and the foursuperior heavens. He then turns towards the east, and repeats the verse[415] from the Rig-Veda: 'Let us meditate upon the resplendent glory ofthe divine vivifier, that it may enlighten our minds. ' As he says thelast words he takes water in the palm of his hand and pours it upon thetop of his head. 'Waters, ' he says, 'give me strength and vigour thatI may rejoice. Like loving mothers, bless us, penetrate us with yoursacred essence. We come to wash ourselves from the pollution of sins:make us fruitful and prosperous. ' Then follow other ablutions, other_mantras_, verses from the Rig-Veda, and this hymn, which relates theorigin of all things: 'From the burning heat came out all things. Yes, the complete order of the world; Night, the throbbing Ocean, and afterthe throbbing Ocean, Time, which separates Light from Darkness. Allmortals are its subjects. It is this which disposes of all things, and has made, one after another, the sun, the sky, the earth, theintermediate air. ' This hymn, says Manu, thrice repeated, effacesthe gravest sins. 

"About this time, beyond the sands of the opposite shore of the Ganges, the sun appears. As soon as its brilliant disc becomes visible themultitude welcome it, and salute it with 'the offering of water. ' Thisis thrown into the air, either from a vase or from the hand. Thricethe worshipper, standing in the river up to his waist, flings thewater towards the sun. The farther and wider he flings it, the greaterthe virtue attributed to this act. Then the Brahman, seated upon hisheels, fulfils the most sacred of his religious duties: he meditatesupon his fingers. For the fingers are sacred, inhabited by differentmanifestations of Vishnu; the thumb by Govinda, the index-finger byMadhava, the middle finger by Hrikesa, the third by Trivikama and thelittle finger by Vishnu himself. 'Homage to the two thumbs, ' saysthe Brahman, 'to the two index-fingers, to the two middle fingers, to the two "unnamed fingers, " to the two little fingers, to the twopalms, to the two backs of the hands. ' Then he touches the variousparts of the body, and lastly, the right ear, the most sacred of all, where reside fire, water, the sun and the moon. He then takes a redbag (_gomukhi_), into which he plunges his hand, and by contortionsof the fingers rapidly represents the chief incarnations of Vishnu:a fish, a tortoise, a wild boar, a lion, a slip-knot, a garland. [416]

"The second part of the service is no less rich than the firstin ablutions and _mantras_. The Brahman invokes the sun, 'Mitra, who regards all creatures with unchanging gaze, ' and the Dawns, 'brilliant children of the sky, ' the earliest divinities of our Aryanrace. He extols the world of Brahma, that of Siva, that of Vishnu;recites passages from the Mahabharata, the Puranas, all the firsthymn of the Rig-Veda, the first lines of the second, the first wordsof the principal Vedas, of the Yajur, the Sama, and the Atharva, thenfragments of grammar, inspired prosodies, and, in conclusion, the firstwords of the book of the Laws of Yajnavalkya, the philosophic Sutras:and finally ends the ceremony with three kinds of ablutions, which arecalled the refreshing of the gods, of the sages and of the ancestors. 

"First, placing his sacred cord upon the left shoulder, the Brahmantakes up water in the right hand, and lets it run off his extendedfingers. To refresh the sages, the cord must hang about the neck, and the water run over the side of the hand between the thumb and theforefinger, which is bent back. For the ancestors, the cord passesover the right shoulder, and the water falls from the hand in thesame way as for the sages. 'Let the fathers be refreshed, ' says theprayer, 'may this water serve all those who inhabit the seven worlds, as far as to Brahma's dwelling, even though their number be greaterthan thousands of millions of families. May this water, consecratedby my cord, be accepted by the men of my race who have left no sons. '

"With this prayer the morning service ends. Now, remember thatthis worship is daily, that these formulas must be pronounced, these movements of the hands made with mechanical precision; thatif the worshipper forgets one of the incarnations of Vishnu whichhe is to figure with his fingers, if he stop his left nostril whenit should be the right, the entire ceremony loses its efficacy;that, not to go astray amid this multitude of words and gesturesrequired for each rite, he is obliged to use mnemotechnic methods;that there are five of these for each series of formulas; that hisattention always strained and always directed toward the externalsof the cult, does not leave his mind a moment in which to reflectupon the profound meaning of some of these prayers, and you willcomprehend the extraordinary scene that the banks of the Ganges atBenares present every morning; this anxious and demented multitude, these gestures, eager and yet methodical, this rapid movement of thelips, the fixed gaze of these men and women who, standing in the water, seem not even to see their neighbours, and count mentally like men inthe delirium of a fever. Remember that there are ceremonies like thesein the afternoon and also in the evening, and that in the intervals, in the street, in the house at meals, when going to bed, similar ritesno less minute pursue the Brahman, all preceded by the exercises ofrespiration, the enunciation of the syllable OM, and the invocation ofthe principal gods. It is estimated that between daybreak and noon hehas scarcely an hour of rest from the performance of these rites. Afterthe great powers of nature, the Ganges, the Dawn, and the Sun, hegoes to worship in their temples the representations of divinity, the sacred trees, finally the cows, to whom he offers flowers. Inhis own dwelling other divinities await him, five black stones, [417] representing Siva, Ganesa, Surya, Devi and Vishnu, arrangedaccording to the cardinal points: one towards the north, a second tothe south-east, a third to the south-west, a fourth to the north-west, and one in the centre, this order changing according as the worshipperregards one god or another as most important; then there is a shell, a bell--to which, kneeling, he offers flowers--and, lastly, a vase, whose mouth contains Vishnu, the neck Rudra, the paunch Brahma, whileat the bottom repose the three divine mothers, the Ganges, the Indus, and the Jumna. 

"This is the daily cult of the Brahman of Benares, and on holidaysit is still further complicated. Since the great epoch of Brahmanismit has remained the same. Some details may alter, but as a whole ithas always been thus tyrannical and thus extravagant. As far backas the Upanishads appears the same faith in the power of articulatespeech, the same imperative and innumerable prescriptions, the samesingular formulas, the same enumeration of grotesque gestures. Everyday, for more than twenty-five hundred years, since Buddhism was aprotest against the tyranny and absurdity of rites, has this racemechanically passed through this machinery, resulting in what mentalmalformations, what habitual attitudes of mind and will, the race isnow too different from ourselves for us to be able to conceive. "

Secular Brahmans now, however, greatly abridge the length of theirprayers, and an hour or an hour and a half in the morning sufficesfor the daily bath and purification, the worship of the householddeities and the morning meal. 

17. The sacred thread. 

Brahman boys are invested with the sacred thread between the ages offive and nine. The ceremony is called Upanayana or the introduction toknowledge, since by it the boy acquires the right to read the sacredbooks. Until this ceremony he is not really a Brahman, and is not boundto observe the caste rules and restrictions. By its performance hebecomes Dvija or twice-born, and the highest importance is attachedto the change or initiation. He may then begin to acquire divineknowledge, and perhaps in past times it was thought that he obtainedthe divine character belonging to a Brahman. The sacred thread ismade of three strands of cotton, which should be obtained from thecotton tree growing wild. Sometimes a tree is grown in the yard ofthe house for the provision of the threads. It has several knotsin it, to which great importance is attached, the number of knotsbeing different for a Brahman, a Kshatriya and a Vaishya, the threetwice-born castes. The thread hangs from the left shoulder, fallingon to the right hip. Sometimes, when a man is married, he wears adouble thread of six strands, the second being for his wife; and afterhis father dies a treble one of nine strands. At the investiture theboy's nails are cut and his hair is shaved, and he performs the _hom_or fire sacrifice for the first time. He then acquires the status ofa Brahmachari or disciple, and in former times he would proceed tosome religious centre and begin to study the sacred books. The ideaof this is preserved by a symbolic ritual. Some Brahmans shave theboy's head completely, make a girdle of _kusha_ or _munj_ grass roundhis waist, provide him with a begging-bowl and tongs and the skin ofan antelope to sit on and make him go and beg from four houses. Amongothers the boy gets on to a wooden horse and announces his intentionof going off to Benares to study. His mother then sits on the edge ofa well and threatens to throw herself in if he will not change hismind, or the maternal uncle promises to give the boy his daughterin marriage. Then the boy relinquishes his intention and agrees tostay at home. The sacred thread must always be passed through thehand before saying the Gayatri text in praise of the sun, the mostsacred Brahmanical text. The sacred thread is changed once a year onthe day of Rakshabandhan; the Brahman and all his family change ittogether. The word Rakshabandhan means binding or tying up the devils, and it would thus appear that the sacred thread and the knots in itmay have been originally intended to some extent to be a protectionagainst evil spirits. It is also changed on the occasion of a birthor death in the family, or of an eclipse, or if it breaks. The oldthreads are torn up or sewn into clothes by the very poor in theMaratha districts. It is said that the Brahmans are afraid that theKunbis will get hold of their old threads, and if they do get onethey will fold it into four strings, holding a lamp in the middle, and wave it over any one who is sick. The Brahmans think that if thisis done all the accumulated virtue which they have obtained by manyrepetitions of the Gayatri or sacred prayer will be transferred tothe sick Kunbi. Many castes now wear the sacred thread who have noproper claim to do so, especially those who have become landholdersand aspire to the status of Rajputs. 

18. Social position. 

The Brahman is of course supreme in Hindu society. He never bows hishead in salutation to any one who is not a Brahman, and acknowledgeswith a benediction the greetings of all other classes. No memberof another caste, Dr. Bhattacharya states, can, consistently withHindu etiquette and religious beliefs, refuse altogether to bow toa Brahman. "The more orthodox Sudras carry their veneration for thepriestly caste to such an extent that they will not cross the shadowof a Brahman, and it is not unusual for them to be under a vow notto eat any food in the morning before drinking Brahman nectar, [418]or water in which the toe of a Brahman has been dipped. On the otherhand, the pride of the Brahman is such that he does not bow even tothe images of the gods in a Sudra's house. When a Brahman invites aSudra the latter is usually asked to partake of the host's _prasada_or favour in the shape of the leavings of his plate. Orthodox Sudrasactually take offence if invited by the use of any other formula. NoSudra is allowed to eat in the same room or at the same time withBrahmans. " [419]

A man of low caste meeting a Brahman says 'Pailagi' or 'I fall atyour feet, ' and touches the Brahman's foot with his hand, which hethen carries to his own forehead to signify this. A man wishing toask a favour in a humble manner stands on one leg and folds his clothround his neck to show that his head is at his benefactor's disposal;and he takes a piece of grass in his mouth by which he means to say, 'I am your cow. ' Brahmans greeting each other clasp the hands and say'Salaam, ' this method of greeting being known as Namaskar. Sincemost Brahmans have abandoned the priestly calling and are engagedin Government service and the professions, this exaggerated displayof reverence is tending to disappear, nor do the educated members ofthe caste set any great store by it, preferring the social estimationattaching to such a prominent secular position as they often attainfor themselves. 

19. Titles. 

Any Brahman is, however, commonly addressed by other castes asMaharaj, great king, or else as Pandit, a learned man. I had a Brahmanchuprassie, or orderly, who was regularly addressed by the rest of thehousehold as Pandit, and on inquiring as to the literary attainmentsof this learned man, I found he had read the first two class-books ina primary school. Other titles of Brahmans are Dvija, or twice-born, that is, one who has had the thread ceremony performed; Bipra, appliedto a Brahman learned in the Shastras or scriptures; and Srotriya, a learned Brahman who is engaged in the performance of Vedic rites. 

20. Caste _panchayat_ and offences. 

The Brahmans have a caste _panchayat_, but among the educated classesthe tendency is to drop the _panchayat_ procedure and to refermatters of caste rules and etiquette to the informal decision of afew of the most respected local members. In northern India there isno supreme authority for the caste, but the five southern divisionsacknowledge the successor of the great reformer Shankar Acharya astheir spiritual head, and important caste questions are referred tohim. His headquarters are at the monastery of Sringeri on the Cauveryriver in Mysore. Mr. Joshi gives four offences as punishable withpermanent exclusion from caste: killing a Brahman, drinking prohibitedwine or spirits, committing incest with a mother or step-mother orwith the wife of one's spiritual preceptor, and stealing gold from apriest. Some very important offences, therefore, such as murder of anyperson other than a Brahman, adultery with a woman of impure caste andtaking food from her, and all offences against property, except thosementioned, do not involve permanent expulsion. Temporary exclusion isinflicted for a variety of offences, among which are teaching the Vedasfor hire, receiving gifts from a Sudra for performing fire-worship, falsely accusing a spiritual preceptor, subsisting by the harlotry of awife, and defiling a damsel. It is possible that some of the offencesagainst morality are comparatively recent additions. Brahmans whocross the sea to be educated in England are readmitted into casteon going through various rites of purification; the principal ofthese is to swallow the five products of the sacred cow, milk, _ghi_or preserved butter, curds, dung and urine. But the small minoritywho have introduced widow-marriage are still banned by the orthodox. 

21. Rules about food. 

Brahmans as a rule should not eat meat nor drink intoxicatingliquor. But it is said that the following indulgences have beenrecognised: for residents in eastern India the eating of flesh anddrinking liquor; for those of northern India the eating of flesh; forthose in the west the use of water out of leather buckets; and in thesouth marriage with a first cousin on the mother's side. HindustaniBrahmans eat meat, according to Mr. Joshi, and others are now alsoadopting this custom. The kinds of meat permitted are mutton andvenison, scaly, but not scaleless, fish, hares, and even the tortoise, wild boar, wild buffalo and rhinoceros. Brahmans are said even toeat domestic fowls, though not openly, and wild jungle fowls arepreferred, but are seldom obtainable. Maratha Brahmans will not eatmeat openly. Formerly only the flesh of animals offered in sacrificecould be eaten, but this rule is being disregarded and some Brahmansbuy mutton from the butchers. A Brahman should not eat even _pakkirasoi_ or food cooked without water, such as sweetmeats and cakes friedin butter or oil, except when cooked by his own family and in his ownhome. But these are now partaken of abroad, and also purchased fromthe Halwai or confectioner on the assumption that he is a Brahman. ABrahman should take food cooked with water only from his own relationsand in his own home after the place has been purified and spreadwith cowdung. He bathes before eating, and wears only a yellow silkor woollen cloth round his waist, which is kept specially for thispurpose, cotton being regarded as impure. But these rules are tendingto become obsolete, as educated Brahmans recognise more and more whata hindrance they cause to any social enjoyment. Boys especially whoreceive an English education in high schools and universities arerapidly becoming more liberal. They will drink soda-water or lemonadeof which they are very fond, and eat European sweets and sometimesbiscuits. The social intercourse of boys of all castes and religionsin school and games, and in the latter the frequent association withEuropeans, are having a remarkable effect in breaking down casteprejudice, the results of which should become very apparent in a fewyears. A Brahman also should not smoke, but many now do so, and whenthey go to see a friend will take their own huqqa with them as theycannot smoke out of his. Maratha and Khedawal Brahmans, however, as a rule do not smoke, but only chew tobacco. 

22. Dress. 

A Brahman's dress should be white, and he can have a coloured turban, preferably red. Maratha Brahmans were very particular about thesecuring of their _dhoti_ or loin-cloth, which always had to havefive tucks, three into the waistband at the two sides and in front, while the loose ends were tucked in in front and behind. Buttons hadto be avoided as they were made of bone, and shoes were consideredto be impure as being of leather. Formerly a Brahman never entereda house with his shoes on, as he would consider the house to bedefiled. According to the old rule, if a Brahman touches a man ofan impure caste, as a Chamar (tanner) or Basor (basket-maker), heshould bathe and change his loin-cloth, and if he touches a sweeperhe should change his sacred thread. Now, however, educated Brahmansusually wear white cotton trousers and black or brown coats of cloth, alpaca or silk with the normal allowance of buttons, and Europeanshoes and boots which they keep on indoors. Boys are even discardingthe _choti_ or scalp-lock and simply cut their hair short in imitationof the English. For the head small felt caps have become fashionablein lieu of turbans. 

23. Tattooing. 

Men are never tattooed, but women are freely tattooed on the faceand body. One dot is made in the centre of the forehead and threeon the left nostril in the form of a triangle. All the limbs and thefingers and toes may also be tattooed, the most common patterns beinga peacock with spread wings, a fish, cuckoo, scorpion, a child'sdoll, a sieve, a pattern of Sita's cookroom and representations ofall female ornaments. Some women think that they will be able to sellthe ornaments tattooed on their bodies in the next world and subsiston the proceeds. 

24. Occupation. 

In former times the Brahman was supposed to confine himself to priestlyduties, learning the Vedas and giving instruction to the laity. Hissubsistence was to be obtained from gleaning the fields after thecrop had been cut and from unsolicited alms, as it was disgracefulfor him to beg. But if he could not make a living in this mannerhe was at liberty to adopt a trade or profession. The majority ofBrahmans have followed the latter course with much success. They werethe ministers of Hindu kings, and as these were usually illiterate, most of the power fell into the Brahmans' hands. In Poona the MarathaBrahmans became the actual rulers of the State. They have profitedmuch from gifts and bequests of land for charitable purposes and areone of the largest landholding castes. In Mewar it was recorded that afifth of the State revenue from land was assigned in religious grants, [420] and in the deeds of gift, drawn up no doubt by the Brahmansthemselves, the most terrible penalties were invoked on any one whoshould interfere with the grant. One of these was that such an impiousperson would be a caterpillar in hell for sixty thousand years. [421]Plots of land and mango groves are also frequently given to Brahmansby village proprietors. A Brahman is forbidden to touch the ploughwith his own hands, but this rule is falling into abeyance and manyBrahman cultivators plough themselves. Brahmans are also prohibitedfrom selling a large number of articles, as milk, butter, cows, saltand so on. Formerly a Brahman village proprietor refused paymentfor the supplies of milk and butter given to travellers, and somewould expend the whole produce of their cattle in feeding religiousmendicants and poor Brahmans. But these scruples, which tended tomultiply the number of beggars indefinitely, have happily vanished, and Brahmans will even sell cows to a butcher. Mr. Joshi relatesthat a suit was brought by a Brahman in his court for the hide of acow sold by him for slaughter. A number of Brahmans are employed aspersonal servants, and these are usually cooks, a Brahman cook beingvery useful, since all Hindus can eat the food which he prepares. Norhas this calling hitherto been considered derogatory, as food isheld to be sacred, and he who prepares it is respected. Many live oncharitable contributions, and it is a rule among Hindus that a Brahmancoming into the house and asking for a present must be given somethingor his curse will ruin the family. Liberality is encouraged by therecitation of legends, such as that of the good king Harischandra whogave away his whole kingdom to the great Brahman saint Visvamitra, and retired to Benares with a loin-cloth which the recipient allowedhim to retain from his possessions. But Brahmans who take gifts at thetime of a death, and those who take them from pilgrims at the sacredshrines, are despised and considered as out of caste, though not thepriests in charge of temples. The rapacity of all these classes isproverbial, and an instance may be given of the conduct of the Pandasor temple-priests of Benares. These men were so haughty that theynever appeared in the temple unless some very important visitor wasexpected, who would be able to pay largely. It is related that whenthe ex-Peshwa of Poona came to Benares after the death of his fatherhe solicited the Panda of the great temple of Viseshwar to assist himin the performance of the ceremonies necessary for the repose of hisfather's soul. But the priest refused to do so until the Maharaja hadfilled with coined silver the _hauz_ or font of the temple. The demandwas acceded to and Rs. 125, 000 were required to fill the font. [422]Those who are very poor adopt the profession of a Maha-Brahman orMahapatra, who takes gifts for the dead. Respectable Brahmans willnot accept gifts at all, but when asked to a feast the host usuallygives them one to four annas or pence with betel-leaf at the time oftheir departure, and there is no shame in accepting this. A very richman may give a gold mohar (guinea) to each Brahman. Other Brahmansact as astrologers and foretell events. They pretend to be ableto produce rain in a drought or stop excessive rainfall when it isinjuring the crops. They interpret dreams and omens. In the case ofa theft the loser will go to a Brahman astrologer, and after learningthe circumstances the latter will tell him what sort of person stolethe property and in what direction the property is concealed. Butthe large majority of Brahmans have abandoned all priestly functions, and are employed in all grades of Government service, the professionsand agriculture. In 1911 about fifty-three per cent of Brahmans inthe Central Provinces were supported by agriculture as landowners, cultivators and labourers. About twenty-two per cent were engagedin the arts and professions, seven per cent in Government service, including the police which contains many Brahman constables, andonly nineteen per cent were returned under all occupations connectedwith religion. 

25. Character of Brahmans. 

Many hard things have been said about the Brahman caste and havenot been undeserved. The Brahman priesthood displayed in a markeddegree the vices of arrogance, greed, hypocrisy and dissimulation, which would naturally be engendered by their sacerdotal pretensionsand the position they claimed at the head of Hindu society. Butthe priests and mendicants now, as has been seen, contribute only acomparatively small minority of the whole caste. The majority of theBrahmans are lawyers, doctors, executive officers of Government andclerks in all kinds of Government, railway and private offices. Thedefects ascribed to the priesthood apply to these, if at all, only ina very minor degree. The Brahman official has many virtues. He is, asa rule, honest, industrious and anxious to do his work creditably. Hespends very little on his own pleasures, and his chief aim in life isto give his children as good an education as he can afford. A half ormore of his income may be devoted to this object. If he is well-to-dohe helps his poor relations liberally, having the strong fellow-feelingfor them which is a relic of the joint family system. He is a faithfulhusband and an affectionate father. If his outlook on life is narrowand much of his leisure often devoted to petty quarrels and intrigues, this is largely the result of his imperfect, parrot-like educationand lack of opportunity for anything better. In this respect it maybe anticipated that the excellent education and training now affordedby Government in secondary schools for very small fees will produce agreat improvement; and that the next generation of educated Hindus willbe considerably more manly and intelligent, and it may be hoped at thesame time not less honest, industrious and loyal than their fathers. 

Brahman, Ahivasi

_Brahman, Ahivasi. _--A class of persons who claim to be Brahmans, butare generally engaged in cultivation and pack-carriage. They are lookeddown upon by other Brahmans, and permit the remarriage of widows. Thename means the abode of the snake or dragon, and the caste are said tobe derived from a village Sunrakh in Muttra District, where a dragononce lived. For further information Mr. Crooke's article on the caste, [423] from which the above details are taken, may be consulted. 

Brahman, Jijhotia

_Brahman, Jijhotia. _--This is a local subdivision of the Kanaujiasubcaste, belonging to Bundelkhand. They take their name from Jajhoti, the classical term for Bundelkhand, and reside in Saugor and theadjoining Districts, where they usually act as priests to the highercastes. The Jijhotia Brahmans rank a little below the Kanaujias properand the Sarwarias, who are also a branch of the Kanaujia division. Thetwo latter classes take daughters in marriage from Jijhotias, but donot give their daughters to them. But these hypergamous marriages arenow rare. Jijhotia Brahmans will plough with their own hands in Saugor. 

Brahman, Kanaujia, Kanyakubja

_Brahman, Kanaujia, Kanyakubja. _--This, the most important divisionof the northern Brahmans, takes its name from the ancient city ofKanauj in the Farukhabad District on the Ganges, which was on twooccasions the capital of India. The great king Harsha Vardhana, whoruled the whole of northern India in the seventh century, had hisheadquarters here, and when the Chinese pilgrim Hiuen Tsang stayed atKanauj in A. D. 638 and 643 he found upwards of a hundred monasteriescrowded by more than 10, 000 Buddhist monks. "Hinduism flourished aswell as Buddhism, and could show more than two hundred temples withthousands of worshippers. The city, which was strongly fortified, extended along the east bank of the Ganges for about four miles, andwas adorned with lovely gardens and clear tanks. The inhabitants werewell-to-do, including some families of great wealth; they dressed insilk, and were skilled in learning and the arts. " [424] When Mahmudof Ghazni appeared before Kanauj in A. D. 1018 the number of templesis said to have risen to 10, 000. The Sultan destroyed the temples, but seems to have spared the city. Thereafter Kanauj declined inimportance, though still the capital of a Rajput dynasty, and thefinal sack by Shihab-ud-Din in A. D. 1194 reduced it to desolationand insignificance for ever. [425]

The Kanaujia Brahmans include the principal body of the caste inBengal and in the Hindi Districts of the Central Provinces. They arehere divided into four sub-groups, the Kanaujia proper, Sarwaria, Jijhotia and Sanadhya, which are separately noticed. The Sarwariasare sometimes considered to rank a little higher than the properKanaujias. It is said that the two classes are the descendants of twobrothers, Kanya and Kubja, of whom the former accepted a present fromthe divine king Rama of Ayodhya when he celebrated a sacrifice on hisreturn from Ceylon, while the latter refused it. The Sarwarias aredescended from Kubja who refused the present and therefore are purerthan the Kanaujias, whose ancestor, Kanya, accepted it. Kanya and Kubjaare simply the two parts of Kanyakubja, the old name for Kanauj. It maybe noted that Kanya means a maiden and also the constellation Virgo, while Kubja is a name of the planet Mars; but it is not known whetherthe words in this sense are connected with the name of the city. TheKanaujia Brahmans of the Central Provinces practise hypergamy, as described in the general article on Brahman. Mr. Crooke statesthat in the United Provinces the children of a man's second wife canintermarry with those of his first wife, provided that they are nototherwise related or of the same section. The practice of exchanginggirls between families is also permitted there. [426] In the CentralProvinces the Kanaujias eat meat and sometimes plough with their ownhands. The Chhattisgarhi Kanaujias form a separate group, who havebeen long separated from their brethren elsewhere. As a consequenceother Kanaujias will neither eat nor intermarry with them. Similarlyin Saugor those who have come recently from the United Provinces willnot marry with the older settlers. A Kanaujia Brahman is very strictin the matter of taking food, and will scarcely eat it unless cookedby his own relations, according to the saying, '_Ath Kanaujia, nauchulha_' or 'Eight Kanaujias will want nine places to cook their food. '

Brahman, Khedawal

_Brahman, Khedawal. _--The Khedawals are a class of Gujarati Brahmans, who take their name from Kheda or Kaira, the headquarters of the KairaDistrict, where they principally reside. They have two divisions, known as Inside and Outside. It is said that once the Kaira chief wasanxious to have a son and offered them gifts. The majority refused thegifts, and leaving Kaira settled in villages outside the town; whilea small number accepted the gifts and remained inside, and hence twoseparate divisions arose, the outside group being the higher. [427]It is said that the first Khedawal who came to the Central Provinceswas on a journey from Gujarat to Benares when, on passing throughPanna State, he saw some diamonds lying in a field. He stopped andpicked up as many as he could and presented them to the Raja of Panna, who made him a grant of an estate, and from this time other Khedawalscame and settled. A considerable colony of them now exists in Saugorand Damoh. The Khedawals are clever and astute, and many of them arethe agents of landowners and moneylenders, while a large proportionare in the service of the Government. They do not as a rule performpriestly functions in the Central Provinces. Their caste observancesare strict. Formerly it is said that a Khedawal who was sent to jailwas permanently expelled from caste, and though the rule has beenrelaxed the penalties for readmission are still very heavy. Theydo not smoke, but only chew tobacco. Widows must dress in white, and their heads are sometimes shaved. They are said to consider acamel as impure as a donkey, and will not touch either animal. Oneof their common titles is Mehta, meaning great. The Khedawals of theCentral Provinces formerly married only among themselves, but sincethe railway has been opened intermarriage with their caste-fellowsin Gujarat has been resumed. 

Brahman, Maharashtra

_Brahman, Maharashtra, Maratha. _--The Maratha Brahmans, or thoseof the Bombay country, are numerous and important in the CentralProvinces. The northern Districts were for a period governed byMaratha Brahmans on behalf of the Peshwa of Poona, and under theBhonsla dynasty of Nagpur in the south they took a large part in theadministration. The Maratha Brahmans have three main subcastes, theDeshasth, Konkonasth and Karhada. The Deshasth Brahmans belong to thecountry of Poona above the Western Ghats, which is known as the _desh_or home country. They are numerous in Berar and Nagpur. The Konkonasthare so called because they reside in the Konkan country along theBombay coast. They have noticeably fair complexions, good featuresand often grey eyes. According to a legend they were sprung from thecorpses of a party of shipwrecked foreigners, who were raised to lifeby Parasurama. [428] This story and their fine appearance have givenrise to the hypothesis that their ancestors were shipwrecked sailorsfrom some European country, or from Arabia or Persia. They are alsoknown as Chitpavan, which is said to mean the pure in heart, but aderivation suggested in the _Bombay Gazetteer_ is from Chiplun orChitapolan, a place in the Konkan which was their headquarters. ThePeshwa of Poona was a Konkonasth Brahman, and there are a number ofthem in Saugor. The Karhada Brahmans take their name from the townof Karhad in the Satara District. They show little difference fromthe Deshasths in customs and appearance. 

Formerly the above three subcastes were endogamous and married onlyamong themselves. But since the railway has been opened they havebegun to intermarry with each other to a limited extent, havingobtained sanction to this from the successor of Shankar Acharya, whom they acknowledge as their spiritual head. 

The Maratha Brahmans are also divided into sects, according to theVeda which they follow. Most of them are either Rigvedis or Yajurvedis, and these two sects marry among themselves. These Brahmans are strictin the observance of caste rules. They do not take water from anybut other Brahmans, and abstain from flesh and liquor. They will, however, eat with any of the Panch-Dravid or southern divisions ofBrahmans except those of Gujarat. They usually abstain from smoking, and until recently have made widows shave their heads; but this rule isperhaps now relaxed. As a rule they are well educated, and the majorityof them look to Government service for a career, either as clerksin the public offices or as officers of the executive and judicialservices. They are intelligent and generally reliable workers. Thefull name of a Maratha or Gujarati Brahman consists of his own name, his father's name and a surname. But he is commonly addressed by hisown name, followed by the honorific termination Rao for Raja, a king, or Pant for Pandit, a wise man. 

Brahman, Maithil

_Brahman, Maithil. _--One of the five Panch-Gaur or northern divisions, comprising the Brahmans of Bihar or Tirhut. There are some MaithilBrahman families settled in Mandla, who were formerly in the serviceof the Gond kings. They have the surname of Ojha, which is one of thoseborne by the caste and signifies a soothsayer. The Maithil Brahmans aresaid to have at one time practised magic. Mithila or Bihar has also, from the earliest times, been famous for the cultivation of Sanskrit, and the great lawgiver Yajnavalkya is described as a native of thiscountry. [429] The head of the subcaste is the Maharaja of Darbhanga, to whom family disputes are sometimes referred for decision. TheMaithil Brahmans are said to be mainly Sakti worshippers. They eatflesh and fish, but do not drink liquor or smoke tobacco. [430]

Brahman, Malwi

_Brahman, Malwi. _--This is a local class of Brahmans from Malwain Central India, who are found in the Hoshangabad and BetulDistricts. They are said to have been invited here by the Gond kings ofKherla in Betul six or more centuries ago, and are probably of impuredescent. Malwa is north of the Nerbudda, and they should thereforeproperly belong to the Panch-Gaur division, but they speak Marathi andtheir customs resemble those of Maratha Brahmans, who will take foodcooked without water from them. The Malwi Brahmans usually belong tothe Madhyandina branch of the Yajurvedi sect. They work as villageaccountants (_patwaris_) and village priests, and also cultivate land. 

Brahman, Nagar

_Brahman, Nagar. _--A class of Gujarati Brahmans found in the NimarDistrict. The name is said to be derived from the town of Vadnagar ofGujarat, now in Baroda State. According to one account they acceptedgrants of land from a Rajput king, and hence were put out of casteby their fellows. Another story is that the Nagar Brahman womenwere renowned for their personal beauty and also for their skill inmusic. The emperor Jahangir, hearing of their fame, wished to seethem and sent for them, but they refused to go. The emperor thenordered that all the men should be killed and the women be taken tohis Court. A terrible struggle ensued, and many women threw themselvesinto tanks and rivers and were drowned, rather than lose their modestyby appearing before the emperor. A body of Brahmans numbering 7450(or 74 1/2 hundred) threw away their sacred threads and became Sudrasin order to save their lives. Since this occurrence the figure 741/2 is considered very unlucky. Banias write 74 1/2 in the beginningof their account-books, by which they are held to take a vow that ifthey make a false entry in the book they will be guilty of the sinof having killed this number of Brahmans. The same figure is alsowritten on letters, so that none but the person to whom they areaddressed may dare to open them. [431]

The above stories seem to show that the Nagar Brahmans are partly ofimpure descent. In Gujarat it is said that one section of them calledBarud are the descendants of Nagar Brahman fathers who were unableto get wives in their own caste and took them from others. The Barudsection also formerly permitted the remarriage of widows. [432] Thisseems a further indication of mixed descent. The Nagars settled inthe Central Provinces have for a long time ceased to marry with thoseof Gujarat owing to difficulties in communication. But now that therailway has been opened they have petitioned the Rao of Bhaunagar, who is the head of the caste, and a Nagar Brahman, to introduceintermarriage again between the two sections of the caste. Many NagarBrahmans have taken to secular occupations and are land-agents andcultivators. 

Formerly the Nagar Brahmans observed very strict rules about defilementwhen in the state called _Nuven_, that is, having bathed and purifiedthemselves prior to taking food. A Brahman in this condition wasdefiled if he touched an earthen vessel unless it was quite new andhad never held water. If he sat down on a piece of cotton cloth or ascrap of leather or paper he became impure unless Hindu letters hadbeen written on the paper; these, as being the goddess Saraswati, wouldpreserve it from defilement. But cloth or leather could not be purifiedthrough being written on. Thus if the Brahman wished to read any bookbefore or at his meal it had to be bound with silk and not with cotton;leather could not be used, and instead of paste of flour and water thebinder had to employ paste of pounded tamarind seed. A printed bookcould not be read, because printing-ink contained impure matter. Rawcotton did not render the Brahman impure, but if it had been twistedinto the wick of a lamp by any one not in a state of purity he becameimpure. Bones defiled, but women's ivory armlets did not, except inthose parts of the country where they were not usually worn, and thenthey did. The touch of a child of the same caste who had not learnedto eat grain did not defile, but if the child ate grain it did. Thetouch of a donkey, a dog or a pig defiled; some said that the touchof a cat also defiled, but others were inclined to think it did not, because in truth it was not easy to keep the cat out. [433]

If a Brahman was defiled and rendered impure by any of the abovemeans he could not proceed with his meal. 

Brahman, Naramdeo

_Brahman, Naramdeo. _--A class of Brahmans who live in the Hoshangabadand Nimar Districts near the banks of the Nerbudda, from which rivertheir name is derived. According to their own account they belong tothe Gurjara or Gujarati division, and were expelled from Gujarat by aRaja who had cut up a golden cow and wished them to accept pieces of itas presents. This they refused to do on account of the sin involved, and hence were exiled and came to the Central Provinces. A locallegend about them is to the effect that they are the descendantsof a famous Rishi or saint, who dwelt beside the Nerbudda, and ofa Naoda or Dhimar woman who was one of his disciples. The NaramdeoBrahmans have for the most part adopted secular occupations, thoughthey act as village priests or astrologers. They are largely employedas village accountants (_patwaris_), clerks in Government offices, andagents to landowners, that is, in very much the same capacity as theKayasths. As land-agents they show much astuteness, and are reputedto have enriched themselves in many cases at the expense of theirmasters. Hence they are unpopular with the cultivators just as theKayasths are, and very uncomplimentary proverbs are current about them. 

Brahman, Sanadhya

_Brahman, Sanadhya, Sanaurhia. _--The Sanadhyas are considered in theCentral Provinces to be a branch of the Kanaujia division. Theirhome is in the Ganges-Jumna Doab and Rohilkhand, between the GaurBrahmans to the north-west and the Kanaujias to the east. Mr. Crookestates that in some localities the Sanadhyas intermarry with boththe Kanaujia and Gaur divisions. But formerly both Kanaujias andGaurs practised hypergamy with the Sanadhyas, taking daughters fromthem in marriage but not giving their daughters to them. [434] Thisfact indicates the inferiority of the Sanadhya group, but marriageis now becoming reciprocal. In Bengal the Sanadhyas account for theirinferiority to the other Kanaujias by saying that their ancestors onone occasion at the bidding of a Raja partook of a sacrificial feastwith all their clothes on, instead of only their loin-cloths accordingto the rule among Brahmans, and were hence degraded. The Sanadhyasthemselves have two divisions, the _Sarhe-tin ghar_ and _Dasghar_, or Three-and-a-half houses and Ten houses, of whom the former aresuperior, and practise hypergamy with the latter. Further, it is saidthat the Three-and-a-half group were once made to intermarry with thedegraded Kataha or Maha-Brahmans, who are funeral priests. [435] Thisfurther indicates the inferior status of the Sanadhyas. The Sanaurhiacriminal caste of pickpockets are supposed to be made up of a nucleusof Sanadhya Brahmans with recruits from all other castes, but this isnot certain. In the Central Provinces a number of Sanadhyas took tocarrying grain and merchandise on pack-bullocks, and are hence knownas Belwar. They form a separate subcaste, ranking below the otherSanadhyas and marrying among themselves. Mr. Crooke notes that attheir weddings the Sanadhyas worship a potter's wheel. Some make animage of it on the wall of the house, while others go to the potter'shouse and worship his wheel there. In the Central Provinces afterthe wedding they get a bed newly made with _newar_ tape and seat thebride and bridegroom on it, and put a large plate at their feet, inwhich presents are placed. The Sanadhyas differ from the Kanaujias inthat they smoke tobacco but do not eat meat, while the Kanaujias eatmeat but do not smoke. They greet each other with the word Dandawat, adding Maharaj to an equal or superior. 

Brahman, Sarwaria

_Brahman, Sarwaria. _--This is the highest class of the KanaujiaBramans, who take their name from the river Sarju or Gogra in Oudh, where they have their home. They observe strict rules of ceremonialpurity, and do not smoke tobacco nor plough with their own hands. Anorthodox Sarwaria Braman will not give his daughter in marriage in avillage from which his family has received a girl, and sometimes willnot even drink the water of that village. The Sarwarias make widowsdress in white and sometimes shave their heads. In some tracts theyintermarry with the Kanaujia Brahmans, and in others take daughters inmarriage but do not give their own daughters to them. In Dr. Buchanan'stime, a century ago, the Sarwaria Brahmans would not eat rice sold inthe bazar which had been cleaned in boiling water, as they consideredthat it had thereby become food cooked with water; and they carriedtheir own grain to the grain-parcher to be prepared for them. Whenthey ate either parched grain or sweetmeats from a confectioner inpublic they must purify the place on which they sat down with cowdungand water. [436] This may be compared with a practice observed by verystrict Brahmans even now, of adding water to the medicine which theyobtain from a Government dispensary, to purify it before drinking it. 

Brahman, Utkal

_Brahman, Utkal. _--These are the Brahmans of Orissa and one ofthe Panch-Gaur divisions. They are divided into two groups, theDakshinatya or southern and the Jajpuria or northern clan. The UtkalBrahmans, who first settled in Sambalpur, are known as Jharia orjungly, and form a separate subcaste, marrying among themselves, as the later immigrants refuse to intermarry with them. Anothergroup of Orissa Brahmans have taken to cultivation, and are known asHalia, from _hal_, a plough. They grow the betel-vine, and in Orissathe areca and cocoanuts, besides doing ordinary cultivation. Theyhave entirely lost their sacerdotal character, but glory in theiroccupation, and affect to despise the Bed or Veda Brahmans, who liveupon alms. [437] A third class of Orissa Brahmans are the Pandas, who serve as priests and cooks in the public temples and also inprivate houses, and travel about India touting for pilgrims to visitthe temple at Jagannath. Dr. Bhattacharya describes the procedure ofthe temple-touts as follows: [438]

"Their tours are so organised that during their campaigning season, which commences in November and is finished by the car-festival at thebeginning of the rains, very few villages of the adjoining Provincesescape their visits and taxation. Their appearance causes a disturbancein every household. Those who have already visited 'The Lord of theWorld' at Puri are called upon to pay an instalment towards the debtcontracted by them while at the sacred shrine, which, though paidmany times over, is never completely satisfied. That, however, is asmall matter compared with the misery and distraction caused by the'Jagannath mania, ' which is excited by the preachings and pictures ofthe Panda. A fresh batch of old ladies become determined to visit theshrine, and neither the waitings and protestations of the children northe prospect of a long and toilsome journey can dissuade them. Thearrangements of the family are for the time being altogether upset, and the grief of those left behind is heightened by the fact thatthey look upon the pilgrims as going to meet almost certain death.... "

This vivid statement of the objections to the habit of pilgrimage froma Brahman writer is very interesting. Since the opening of the railwayto Puri the danger and expense as well as the period of absence havebeen greatly reduced; but the pilgrimages are still responsible fora large mortality, as cholera frequently breaks out among the vastassembly at the temple, and the pilgrims, hastily returning to allparts of India, carry the disease with them, and cause epidemics inmany localities. All castes now eat the rice cooked at the temple ofJagannath together without defilement, and friendships are cementedby eating a little of this rice together as a sacred bond. 

Chadar

_Chadar, [439] Kotwar. _--A small caste of weavers and villagewatchmen resident in the Districts of Saugor, Damoh, Jubbulpore andNarsinghpur. They numbered 28, 000 persons in 1911. The caste is notfound outside the northern Districts of the Central Provinces. Thename is derived from the Sanskrit _chirkar_, a weaver, and belongsto Bundelkhand, but beyond this the Chadars have no knowledge ortraditions of their origin. They are probably an occupational groupformed from members of the Dravidian tribes and others who took to theprofession of village watchmen. A number of other occupational castesof low status are found in the northern Districts, and their existenceis probably to be accounted for by the fact that the forest tribeswere subjected and their tribal organisation destroyed by the invadingBundelas and other Hindus some centuries ago. They were deprivedof the land and relegated to the performance of menial and servileduties in the village, and they have formed a new set of divisionsinto castes arising from the occupations they adopted. The Chadarshave two subcastes based on differences of religious practice, theParmesuria or worshippers of Vishnu, and Athia or devotees of Devi. Itis doubtful, however, whether these are strictly endogamous. Theyhave a large number of exogamous septs or _bainks_, which are namedafter all sorts of animals, plants and natural objects. Instances ofthese names are Dhana (a leaf of the rice plant), Kasia (bell-metal), Gohia (a kind of lizard), Bachhulia (a calf), Gujaria (a milkmaid), Moria (a peacock), Laraiya (a jackal), Khatkira (a bug), Sugaria(a pig), Barraiya (a wasp), Neora (a mongoose), Bhartu Chiraiya (asparrow), and so on. Thirty-nine names in all are reported. Membersof each sept draw the figure of the animal or plant after which itis named on the wall at marriages and worship it. They usually refuseto kill the totem animal, and the members of the Sugaria or pig septthrow away their earthen vessels if a pig should be killed in theirsight, and clean their houses as if on the death of a member of thefamily. Marriage between members of the same sept is forbidden andalso between first cousins and other near relations. The Chadars saythat the marriages of persons nearly related by blood are unhappy, andoccasion serious consequences to the parties and their families. Girlsare usually wedded in the fifth, seventh, ninth, or eleventh yearof their age and boys between the ages of eight and sixteen. If anunmarried girl is seduced by a member of the caste she is marriedto him by the simple form adopted for the wedding of a widow. Butif she goes wrong with an outsider of low caste she is permanentlyexpelled. The remarriage of widows is permitted and divorce is alsoallowed, a deed being executed on stamped paper before the _panchayat_or caste committee. If a woman runs away from her husband to anotherman he must repay to the husband the amount expended on her weddingand give a feast to the caste. A Brahman is employed to fix the dateof a wedding and sometimes for the naming of children, but he is onlyconsulted and is never present at the ceremony. The caste venerate thegoddess Devi, offering her a virgin she-goat in the month of Asarh(June-July). They worship their weaving implements at the Diwaliand Holi festivals, and feed the crows in Kunwar (September-October)as representing the spirits of their ancestors. This custom is basedon the superstition that a crow does not die of old age or disease, but only when it is killed. To cure a patient of fever they tie ablue thread, irregularly knotted, round his wrist. They believe thatthunder-bolts are the arrows shot by Indra to kill his enemies in thelower world, and that the rainbow is Indra's bow; any one pointing atit will feel pain in his finger. The dead are mourned for ten days, and during that time a burning lamp is placed on the ground at somedistance from the house, while on the tenth day a tooth-stick and waterand food are set out for the soul of the dead. They will not throw thefirst teeth of a child on to a tiled roof, because they believe that ifthis is done his next teeth will be wide and ugly like the tiles. Butit is a common practice to throw the first teeth on to the thatchedroof of the house. The Chadars will admit members of most castes ofgood standing into the community, and they eat flesh, including porkand fowls, and drink liquor, and will take cooked food from most of thegood castes and from Kalars, Khangars and Kumhars. The social statusof the caste is very low, but they rank above the impure castes andare of cleanly habits, bathing daily and cleaning their kitchensbefore taking food. They are employed as village watchmen and asfarmservants and field-labourers, and also weave coarse country cloth. 

Chamar

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice of the caste. _ 2. _Endogamous divisions. _ 3. _Subcastes continued. _ 4. _Exogamous divisions. _ 5. _Marriage. _ 6. _Widow-marriage and divorce. _ 7. _Funeral customs. _ 8. _Childbirth. _ 9. _Religion. _ 10. _Occupation. _ 11. _The tanning process. _ 12. _Shoes. _ 13. _Other articles made of leather. _ 14. _Customs connected with shoes. _ 15. _The Chamar as general village drudge. _ 16. _Social status. _ 17. _Character. _

1. General notice of the caste. 

_Chamar, Chambhar. _ [440]--The caste of tanners and menial labourersof northern India. In the Central Provinces the Chamars numbered about900, 000 persons in 1911. They are the third caste in the Province innumerical strength, being exceeded by the Gonds and Kunbis. About600, 000 persons, or two-thirds of the total strength of the castein the Province, belong to the Chhattisgarh Division and adjacentFeudatory States. Here the Chamars have to some extent emancipatedthemselves from their servile status and have become cultivators, andoccasionally even malguzars or landed proprietors; and between themand the Hindus a bitter and long-standing feud is in progress. OutsideChhattisgarh the Chamars are found in most of the Hindi-speakingDistricts whose population has been recruited from northern andcentral India, and here they are perhaps the most debased class ofthe community, consigned to the lowest of menial tasks, and theirspirit broken by generations of servitude. In the Maratha country theplace of the Chamars is taken by the Mehras or Mahars. In the wholeof India the Chamars are about eleven millions strong, and are thelargest caste with the exception of the Brahmans. The name is derivedfrom the Sanskrit Charmakara, a worker in leather; and, accordingto classical tradition, the Chamar is the offspring of a Chandal orsweeper woman by a man of the fisher caste. [441] The superior physicaltype of the Chamar has been noticed in several localities. Thus inthe Kanara District of Bombay [442] the Chamar women are said to befamed for their beauty of face and figure, and there it is statedthat the Padminis or perfect type of women, middle-sized with finefeatures, black lustrous hair and eyes, full breasts and slim waists, [443] are all Chamarins. Sir D. Ibbetson writes [444] that their womenare celebrated for beauty, and loss of caste is often attributed totoo great a partiality for a Chamarin. In Chhattisgarh the Chamarsare generally of fine stature and fair complexion; some of them arelighter in colour than the Chhattisgarhi Brahmans, and it is on recordthat a European officer mistook a Chamar for a Eurasian and addressedhim in English. This, however, is by no means universally the case, and Sir H. Risley considers [445] that "The average Chamar is hardlydistinguishable in point of features, stature or complexion from themembers of those non-Aryan races from whose ranks we should primarilyexpect the profession of leather-dressers to be recruited. " Again, SirHenry Elliot, writing of the Chamars of the North-Western Provinces, says: "Chamars are reputed to be a dark race, and a fair Chamar issaid to be as rare an object as a black Brahman:

 Karia Brahman, gor Chamar, Inke sath na utariye par, that is, 'Do not cross a river in the same boat with a black Brahmanor a fair Chamar, ' both being of evil omen. " The latter descriptionwould certainly apply to the Chamars of the Central Provinces outsidethe Chhattisgarh Districts, but hardly to the caste as a whole withinthat area. No satisfactory explanation has been offered of thisdistinction of appearance of some groups of Chamars. It is possiblethat the Chamars of certain localities may be the descendants of arace from the north-west, conquered and enslaved by a later wave ofimmigrants; or that their physical development may owe something toadult marriage and a flesh diet, even though consisting largely ofcarrion. It may be noticed that the sweepers, who eat the broken foodfrom the tables of the Europeans and wealthy natives, are sometimesstronger and better built than the average Hindu. Similarly, theKasais or Muhammadan butchers are proverbially strong and lusty. Butno evidence is forthcoming in support of such conjectures, and theproblem is likely to remain insoluble. 

"The Chamars, " Sir H. Risley states, [446] "trace their own pedigreeto Ravi or Rai Das, the famous disciple of Ramanand at the endof the fourteenth century, and whenever a Chamar is asked whathe is, he replies a Ravi Das. Another tradition current among themalleges that their original ancestor was the youngest of four Brahmanbrethren who went to bathe in a river and found a cow struggling in aquicksand. They sent the youngest brother in to rescue the animal, butbefore he could get to the spot it had been drowned. He was compelled, therefore, by his brothers to remove the carcase, and after he haddone this they turned him out of their caste and gave him the nameof Chamar. " Other legends are related by Mr. Crooke in his articleon the caste. 

2. Endogamous divisions. 

The Chamars are broken up into a number of endogamous subcastes. Ofthese the largest now consists of the members of the Satnami sectin Chhattisgarh, who do not intermarry with other Chamars. Theyare described in the article on that sect. The other Chamars callthe Satnamis Jharia or 'jungly', which implies that they are theoldest residents in Chhattisgarh. The Satnamis are all cultivators, and have given up working in leather. The Chungias (from _chungi_, a leaf-pipe) are a branch of the Satnamis who have taken to smoking, a practice which is forbidden by the rules of the sect. In Chhattisgarhthose Chamars who still cure hides and work in leather belong eitherto the Kanaujia or Ahirwar subcastes, the former of whom take theirname from the well-known classical town of Kanauj in northern India, while the latter are said to be the descendants of unions betweenChamar fathers and Ahir mothers. The Kanaujias are much addicted todrink, and though they eat pork they do not rear pigs. The Ahirwars, or Erwars as they are called outside Chhattisgarh, occupy a somewhathigher position than the Kanaujias. They consider themselves to be thedirect descendants of the prophet Raidas or Rohidas, who, they say, had seven wives of different castes; one of them was an Ahir woman, and her offspring were the ancestors of the Ahirwar subcaste. Boththe Kanaujias and Ahirwars of Chhattisgarh are generally known tooutsiders as Paikaha, a term which indicates that they still followtheir ancestral calling of curing hides, as opposed to the Satnamis, who have generally eschewed it. Those Chamars who are curriers have, as a rule, the right to receive the hides of the village cattle inreturn for removing the carcases, each family of Chamars havingallotted to them a certain number of tenants whose dead cattlethey take, while their women are the hereditary midwives of thevillage. Such Chamars have the designation of Meher. The Kanaujiasmake shoes out of a single piece of leather, while the Ahirwars cutthe front separately. The latter also ornament their shoes with fancywork consisting of patterns of silver thread on red cloth. No Ahirwargirl is married until she has shown herself proficient in this kind ofneedlework. [447] Another well-known group, found both in Chhattisgarhand elsewhere, are the Jaiswaras, who take their name from the oldtown of Jais in the United Provinces. Many of them serve as grooms, and are accustomed to state their caste as Jaiswara, consideringit a more respectable designation than Chamar. The Jaiswaras mustcarry burdens on their heads only and not on their shoulders, andthey must not tie up a dog with a halter or neck-rope, this articlebeing venerated by them as an implement of their calling. A breachof either of these rules entails temporary excommunication from casteand a fine for readmission. Among a number of territorial groups maybe mentioned the Bundelkhandi or immigrants from Bundelkhand; theBhadoria from the Bhadawar State; the Antarvedi from Antarved or theDoab, the country lying between the Ganges and Jumna; the Gangaparior those from the north of the Ganges; and the Pardeshi (foreigners)and Desha or Deswar (belonging to the country), both of which groupscome from Hindustan. The Deswar Chamars of Narsinghpur [448] are nowall agriculturists and have totally abjured the business of working inleather. The Mahobia and Khaijraha take their names from the towns ofMahoba and Khaijra in Central India. The Ladse or Ladvi come from southGujarat, which in classical times was known as Lat; while the Maratha, Beraria and Dakhini subdivisions belong to southern India. There area number of other territorial groups of less importance. 

3. Subcastes continued. 

Certain subcastes are of an occupational nature, and among these may bementioned the Budalgirs of Chhindwara, who derive their name from the_budla_, or leather bag made for the transport and storage of oil and_ghi_. The _budla_, Mr. Trench remarks, [449] has been ousted by thekerosene oil tin, and the industry of the Budalgirs has consequentlyalmost disappeared; but the _budlas_ are still used by barbers tohold oil for the torches which they carry in wedding processions. TheDaijanya subcaste are so named because their women act as midwives(_dai_), but this business is by no means confined to one particulargroup, being undertaken generally by Chamar women. The Kataua orKatwa are leather-cutters, the name being derived from _katna_, tocut. And the Gobardhua (from _gobar_, cowdung) collect the droppingsof cattle on the threshing-floors and wash out and eat the undigestedgrain. The Mochis or shoemakers and Jingars [450] or saddlemakers andbookbinders have obtained a better position than the ordinary Chamars, and have now practically become separate castes; while, on the otherhand, the Dohar subcaste of Narsinghpur have sunk to the very loweststage of casual labour, grass-cutting and the like, and are lookeddown on by the rest of the caste. [451] The Korchamars are said to bethe descendants of alliances between Chamars and Koris or weavers, andthe Turkanyas probably have Turk or Musalman blood in their veins. InBerar the Romya or Haralya subcaste claim the highest rank and saythat their ancestor Harlya was the primeval Chamar who stripped offa piece of his own skin to make a pair of shoes for Mahadeo. [452]The Mangya [453] Chamars of Chanda and the Nona Chamars of Damoh aregroups of beggars, who are the lowest of the caste and will take foodfrom the hands of any other Chamar. The Nona group take their namefrom Nona or Lona Chamarin, a well-known witch about whom Mr. Crookerelates the following story: [454] "Her legend tells how Dhanwantari, the physician of the gods, was bitten by Takshaka, the king of thesnakes, and knowing that death approached he ordered his sons to cookand eat his body after his death, so that they might thereby inherithis skill in medicine. They accordingly cooked his body in a cauldron, and were about to eat it when Takshaka appeared to them in the formof a Brahman and warned them against this act of cannibalism. Sothey let the cauldron float down the Ganges, and as it floated down, Lona the Chamarin, who was washing on the bank of the river, took thevessel out in ignorance of its contents, and partook of the ghastlyfood. She at once obtained power to cure diseases, and especiallysnake-bite. One day all the women were transplanting rice, and itwas found that Lona could do as much work as all her companions puttogether. So they watched her, and when she thought she was alone shestripped off her clothes (nudity being an essential element in magic), muttered some spells, and threw the plants into the air, when theyall settled down in their proper places. Finding she was observed, shetried to escape, and as she ran the earth opened, and all the water ofthe rice-fields followed her and thus was formed the channel of theLoni River in the Unao District. " This Lona or Nona has obtained theposition of a nursery bogey, and throughout Hindustan, Sir H. Risleystates, parents frighten naughty children by telling them that NonaChamarin will carry them off. The Chamars say that she was the motheror grandmother of the prophet Ravi Das, or Rai Das already referred to. 

4. Exogamous divisions. 

The caste is also divided into a large number of exogamous groupsor sections, whose names, as might be expected, present a greatdiversity of character. Some are borrowed from Rajput clans, asSurajvansi, Gaharwar and Rathor; while others, as Marai, are takenfrom the Gonds. Instances of sections named after other castes areBanjar (Banjara), Jogi, Chhipia (Chhipi, a tailor) and Khairwar(a forest tribe). The Chhipia section preserve the memory of theircomparatively illustrious descent by refusing to eat pork. Instancesof sections called after a title or nickname of the reputed founderare Maladhari, one who wears a garland; Machhi-Mundia or fly-headed, perhaps the equivalent of feather-brained; Hathila, obstinate; Baghmar, a tiger-killer; Mangaya, a beggar; Dhuliya, a drummer; Jadkodiha, onewho digs for roots, and so on. There are numerous territorial groupsnamed after the town or village where the ancestor of the clan maybe supposed to have lived; and many names also are of a totemisticnature, being taken from plants, animals or natural objects. Amongthese are Khunti, a peg; Chandaniha, sandalwood; Tarwaria, a sword;Borbans, plums; Miri, chillies; Chauria, a whisk; Baraiya, a wasp;Khalaria, a hide or skin; Kosni, _kosa_ or tasar silk; and Purain, the lotus plant. Totemistic observances survive only in one or twoisolated instances. 

5. Marriage. 

A man must not take a wife from his own section, nor in some localitiesfrom that of his mother or either of his grandmothers. Generally theunion of first cousins is prohibited. Adult marriage is the rule, butthose who wish to improve their social position have taken to disposingof their daughters at an early age. Matches are always arranged by theparents, and it is the business of the boy's father to find a bride forhis son. A bride-price is paid which may vary from two pice (farthings)to a hundred rupees, but usually averages about twenty rupees. InChanda the amount is fixed at Rs. 13 and it is known as _hunda_, but if the bride's grandmother is alive it is increased to Rs. 15-8, and the extra money is given to her. The marriage ceremony follows thestandard type prevalent in the locality. On his journey to the girl'shouse the boy rides on a bullock and is wrapped up in a blanket. InBilaspur a kind of sham fight takes place between the parties, whichis a reminiscence of the former practice of marriage by capture and isthus described as an eye-witness by the Rev. E. M. Gordon of Mungeli:[455]

"As the bridegroom's party approached the home of the bride the boy'sfriends lifted him up on their shoulders, and, surrounding him onevery side, they made their way to the bride's house, swinging roundtheir sticks in a threatening manner. On coming near the house theycrossed sticks with the bride's friends, who gradually fell back andallowed the bridegroom's friends to advance in their direction. Thewomen of the house gathered with baskets and fans and some threw aboutrice in pretence of self-defence. When the sticks of the bridegroom'sparty struck the roof of the bride's house or of the marriage-shed herfriends considered themselves defeated and the sham fight was at anend. " Among the Maratha Chamars of Betul two earthen pots full of waterare half buried in the ground and worship is paid to them. The brideand bridegroom then stand together and their relatives take out waterfrom the pots and pour it on to their heads from above. The idea isthat the pouring of the sacred water on to them will make them grow, and if the bride is much smaller than the bridegroom more water ispoured on to her in order that she may grow faster. The practice maysymbolise the fertilising influence of rain. Among the Dohar Chamarsof Narsinghpur the bride and bridegroom are seated on a plough-yokewhile the marriage ceremony is performed. Before the wedding thebride's party take a goat's leg in a basket with other articles to the_janwasa_ or bridegroom's lodging and present it to his father. Thebride and bridegroom take the goat's leg and beat each other with italternately. Another ceremony, known as Pendpuja, consists in placingpieces of stick with cotton stuck to the ends in an oven and burningthem in the name of the deceased ancestors; but the significance, ifthere be any, of this rite is obscure. Some time after the weddingthe bride is taken to her husband's house to live with him, and onthis occasion a simple ceremony known as Chauk or Pathoni is performed. 

6. Widow-marriage and divorce. 

Widows commonly remarry, and may take for their second husband anybodythey please, except their own relatives and their late husband'selder brother and ascendant relations. In Chhattisgarh widows areknown either as _barandi_ or _randi_, the _randi_ being a widowin the ordinary sense of the term and the _barandi_ a girl who hasbeen married but has not lived with her husband. Such a girl is notrequired to break her bangles on her husband's death, and, being morein demand as a second wife, her father naturally obtains a good pricefor her. To marry a woman whose husband is alive is known as _chhandwebanana_, the term _chhandwe_ implying that the woman has discarded, or has been discarded by, her husband. The second husband must inthis case repay to the first husband the expenses incurred by himon his wedding. The marriage ceremony for a widow is of the simplestcharacter, and consists generally of the presentation to her by hernew husband of those articles which a married woman may use, but whichshould be forsworn by a widow, as representing the useless vanitiesof the world. Thus in Saugor the bridegroom presents his bride withnew clothes, vermilion for the parting of her hair, a spangle for herforehead, lac dye for her feet, antimony for the eyes, a comb, glassbangles and betel-leaves. In Mandla and Seoni the bridegroom givesa ring, according to the English custom, instead of bangles. Whena widow marries a second time her first husband's property remainswith his family and also the children, unless they are very young, when the mother may keep them for a few years and subsequently sendthem back to their father's relatives. Divorce is permitted for avariety of causes, and is usually effected in the presence of thecaste _panchayat_ or committee by the husband and wife breaking astraw as a symbol of the rupture of the union. In Chanda an imageof the divorced wife is made of grass and burnt to indicate that toher husband she is as good as dead; if she has children their headsand faces are shaved in token of mourning, and in the absence ofchildren the husband's younger brother has this rite performed; whilethe husband gives a funeral feast known as _Marti Jiti ka Bhat_, or'The feast of the living dead woman. ' In Chhattisgarh marriage tiesare of the loosest description, and adultery is scarcely recognisedas an offence. A woman may go and live openly with other men andher husband will take her back afterwards. Sometimes, when two menare in the relation of Mahaprasad or nearest friend to each other, that is, when they have vowed friendship on rice from the temple ofJagannath, they will each place his wife at the other's disposal. TheChamars justify this carelessness of the fidelity of their wives bythe saying, 'If my cow wanders and comes home again, shall I not lether into her stall?' In Seoni, if a Chamar woman is detected in amisdemeanour with a man of the caste, both parties are taken to thebank of a tank or river, where their heads are shaved in the presenceof the caste _panchayat_ or committee. They are then made to bathe, and the shoes of all the assembled Chamars made up into two bundlesand placed on their heads, while they are required to promise thatthey will not repeat the offence. 

7. Funeral customs. 

The caste usually bury the dead with the feet to the north, like theGonds and other aboriginal tribes. They say that heaven is situatedtowards the north, and the dead man should be placed in a position tostart for that direction. Another explanation is that the head of theearth lies towards the north, and yet another that in the Satyug orbeginning of time the sun rose in the north; and in each succeedingYug or era it has veered round the compass until now in the Kali Yugor Iron Age it rises in the east. In Chhattisgarh, before burying acorpse, they often make a mark on the body with butter, oil or soot;and when a child is subsequently born into the same family theylook for any kind of mark on the corresponding place on its body. Ifany such be found they consider the child as a reincarnation of thedeceased person. Still-born children, and those who die before theChathi or sixth-day ceremony of purification, are not taken to theburial-ground, but their bodies are placed in an earthen pot andinterred below the doorway or in the courtyard of the house. Insuch cases no funeral feast is demanded from the family, and somepeople believe that the custom tends in favour of the mother bearinganother child; others say, however, that its object is to preventthe _tonhi_ or witch from getting hold of the body of the child androusing its spirit to life to do her bidding as Matia Deo. [456] InSeoni a curious rule obtains to the effect that the bodies of thosewho eat carrion or the flesh of animals dying a natural death shouldbe cremated. In the northern Districts a bier painted white is usedfor a man and a red one for a woman. 

8. Childbirth. 

Among the better-class Chamars it is customary to place a newborn childin a winnowing-fan on a bed of rice. The nurse receives the rice andshe also goes round to the houses of the headman of the village andthe relatives of the family and makes a mark with cowdung on theirdoors as an announcement of the birth, for which she receives a smallpresent. In Chhattisgarh a woman is given nothing to eat or drinkon the day that a child is born and for two days afterwards. On thefourth day she receives a liquid decoction of ginger, the roots ofthe _orai_ or _khaskhas_ grass, areca-nut, coriander and turmericand other hot substances, and in some places a cake of linseed orsesamum. She sometimes goes on drinking this mixture for as longas a month, and usually receives solid food for the first time onthe sixth day after the birth, when she bathes and her impurityis removed. The child is not permitted to suckle its mother untilthe third day after it is born, but before this it receives a smallquantity of a mixture made by boiling the urine of a calf with somemedicinal root. In Chhattisgarh it is a common practice to brand achild on the stomach on the name-day or sixth day after its birth;twenty or more small burns may be made with the point of a _hansia_or sickle on the stomach, and it is supposed that this operation willprevent it from catching cold. Another preventive for convulsionsand diseases of the lungs is the rubbing of the limbs and body withcastor-oil; the nurse wets her hands with the oil and then warms thembefore a fire and rubs the child. It is also held in the smoke ofburning _ajwain_ plants (_Carum copticum_). Infants are named on theChathi or sixth day, or sometimes on the twelfth day after birth. Thechild's head is shaved, and the hair, known as Jhalar, thrown away, themother and child are washed and the males of the family are shaved. Themother is given her first regular meal of grain and pulse cooked withpumpkins. A pregnant woman who is afraid that her child will die willsometimes sell it to a neighbour before its birth for five or sixcowries. [457] The baby will then be named Pachkouri or Chhekouri, andit is thought that the gods, who are jealous of the lives of children, will overlook one whose name shows it to be valueless. Children areoften nicknamed after some peculiarity as Kanwa (one-eyed), Behra(deaf), Konda (dumb), Khurwa (lame), Kari (black), Bhuri (fair). Itdoes not follow that a child called Konda is actually dumb, but itmay simply have been late in learning to speak. Parents are jealousof exposing their children to the gaze of strangers and especiallyof a crowd, in which there will almost certainly be some malignantperson to cast the evil eye upon them. Young children are thereforenot infrequently secluded in the house and deprived of light and airto an extent which is highly injurious to them. 

9. Religion. 

The caste worship the ordinary Hindu and village deities ofthe localities in which they reside, and observe the principalfestivals. In Saugor the Chamars have a family god, known as Marri, who is represented by a lump of clay kept in the cooking-room of thehouse. He is supposed to represent the ancestors of the family. TheSeoni Chamars especially worship the castor-oil plant. Generallythe caste revere the _rampi_ or skinning-knife with offerings offlour-cakes and cocoanuts on festival days. In Chhattisgarh more thanhalf the Chamars belong to the reformed Satnami sect, by which theworship of images is at least nominally abolished. This is separatelytreated. Mr. Gordon states [458] that it is impossible to form a clearconception of the beliefs of the village Chamars as to the hereafter:"That they have the idea of hell as a place of punishment may begathered from the belief that if salt is spilt the one who does thiswill in Patal--or the infernal region--have to gather up each grain ofsalt with his eyelids. Salt is for this reason handed round with greatcare, and it is considered unlucky to receive it in the palm of thehand; it is therefore invariably taken in a cloth or in a vessel. Thereis a belief that the spirit of the deceased hovers round familiarscenes and places, and on this account, whenever it is possible, it is customary to destroy or desert the house in which any one hasdied. If a house is deserted the custom is to sweep and plaster theplace, and then, after lighting a lamp, to leave it in the house andwithdraw altogether. After the spirit of the dead has wandered aroundrestlessly for a certain time it is said that it will again becomeincarnate and take the form of man or of one of the lower animals. "

10. Occupation. 

The curing and tanning of hides is the primary occupation of theChamar, but in 1911 only 80, 000 persons, or about a seventh of theactual workers of the caste, were engaged in it, and by Satnamis thetrade has been entirely eschewed. The majority of the ChhattisgarhiChamars are cultivators with tenant right, and a number of them haveobtained villages. In the northern Districts, however, the casteare as a rule miserably poor, and none of them own villages. Avery few are tenants, and the vast majority despised and bulliedhelots. The condition of the leather-working Chamars is describedby Mr. Trench as lamentable. [459] Chief among the causes of theirruin has been the recently established trade in raw hides. Formerlythe bodies of all cattle dying within the precincts of the villagenecessarily became the property of the Chamars, as the Hindu ownerscould not touch them without loss of caste. But since the rise ofthe cattle-slaughtering industry the cultivator has put his religiousscruples in his pocket, and sells his old and worn-out animals to thebutchers for a respectable sum. "For a mere walking skeleton of a cowor bullock from two to four rupees may be had for the asking, and solong as he does not actually see or stipulate for the slaughter of thesacred animal, the cultivator's scruples remain dormant. No one lamentsthis lapse from orthodoxy more sincerely than the outcaste Chamar. Hissituation may be compared with that of the Cornish pilchard-fishers, for whom the growing laxity on the part of continental Roman Catholiccountries in the observance of Lent is already more than an omen ofcoming disaster. " [460]

11. The tanning process. 

When a hide is to be cured the inside is first cleaned with the_rampi_, a chisel-like implement with a short blade four inches broadand a thick short handle. It is then soaked in a mixture of waterand lime for ten or twelve days, and at intervals scraped clean offlesh and hair with the _rampi_. "The skill of a good tanner appearsin the absence of superfluous inner skin, fat or flesh, remaining tobe removed after the hide is finally taken out of the lime-pit. Nextthe hard berries of the _ghont_ [461] tree are poured into a largeearthen vessel sunk in the ground, and water added till the mixtureis so thick as to become barely liquid. In this the folded hide isdipped three or four times a day, undergoing meanwhile a vigorousrubbing and kneading. The average duration of this process is eightdays, and it is followed by what is according to European ideas thereal tanning. Using as thread the roots of the ubiquitous _palas_[462] tree, the Chamar sews the hide up into a mussack-shaped bagopen at the neck. The sewing is admirably executed, and when drawntight the seams are nearly, but purposely not quite, water-tight. Thehide is then hung on low stout scaffolding over a pit and filled witha decoction of the dried and semi-powdered leaves of the _dhaura_[463] tree mixed with water. As the decoction trickles slowly throughthe seams below, more is poured on from above, and from time to timethe position of the hide is reversed in such a way that the tanningpermeates each part in turn. Sometimes only one reversal of the hidetakes place half-way through the process, which occupies as a rulesome eight days. But energetic Chamars continually turn and refillthe skin until satisfied that it is thoroughly saturated with thetanning. After a washing in clean water the hide is now consideredto be tanned. " [464]

12. Shoes. 

In return for receiving the hides of the village cattle the Chamarhad to supply the village proprietor and his family with a pairof shoes each free of payment once a year, and sometimes also thevillage accountant and watchman; but the cultivators had usuallyto pay for them, though nowadays they also often insist on shoesin exchange for their hides. Shoes are usually worn in the wheatand cotton growing areas, but are less common in the rice country, where they would continually stick in the mud of the fields. TheSaugor or Bundelkhandi shoe is a striking specimen of footgear. Thesole is formed of as many as three layers of stout hide, and may benearly an inch thick. The uppers in a typical shoe are of black softleather, inlaid with a simple pattern in silver thread. These arecovered by flaps of stamped yellow goat-skin cut in triangular andhalf-moon patterns, the interstices between the flaps being filledwith red cloth. The heel-piece is continued more than half-way up thecalf behind. The toe is pointed, curled tightly over backwards andsurmounted by a brass knob. The high frontal shield protects the instepfrom mud and spear-grass, and the heel-piece ensures the retention ofthe shoe in the deepest quagmire. Such shoes cost one or two rupeesa pair. [465] In the rice Districts sandals are often worn on theroad, and laid aside when the cultivator enters his fields. Women gobare-footed as a rule, but sometimes have sandals. Up till recentlyonly prostitutes wore shoes in public, and no respectable woman woulddare to do so. In towns boots and shoes made in the English fashion atCawnpore and other centres have now been generally adopted, and withthese socks are worn. The Mochis and Jingars, who are offshoots fromthe Chamar caste, have adopted the distinctive occupations of makingshoes and horse furniture with prepared leather, and no longer curehides. They have thus developed into a separate caste, and considerthemselves greatly superior to the Chamars. 

13. Other articles made of leather. 

Other articles made of leather are the thongs and nose-strings forbullocks, the buckets for irrigation wells, rude country saddlery, and _mussacks_ and _pakhals_ for carrying water. These last aresimply hides sewn into a bag and provided with an orifice. To makea pair of bellows a goat-skin is taken with all four legs attached, and wetted and filled with sand. It is then dried in the sun, thesand shaken out, the sticks fitted at the hind-quarters for blowing, and the pair of bellows is complete. 

14. Customs connected with shoes. 

The shoe, as everybody in India knows, is a symbol of the greatestdegradation and impurity. This is partly on account of its manufacturefrom the impure leather or hide, and also perhaps because it is wornand trodden under foot. All the hides of tame animals are polluted andimpure, but those of certain wild animals, such as the deer and tiger, are not so, being on the contrary to some extent sacred. This lastfeeling may be due to the fact that the old anchorites of the forestswere accustomed to cover themselves with the skins of wild animals, andto use them for sitting and kneeling to pray. A Bairagi or Vaishnavareligious mendicant much likes to carry a tiger-skin on his body ifhe can afford one; and a Brahman will have the skin of a black-buckspread in the room where he performs his devotions. Possibly the sininvolved in killing tame animals has been partly responsible for theimpurity attaching to their hides, to the obtaining of which the deathof the animal must be a preliminary. Every Hindu removes his shoesbefore entering a house, though with the adoption of English boots abreach is being made in this custom. So far as the houses of Europeansare concerned, the retention of shoes is not, as might be imagined, of recent origin, but was noticed by Buchanan a hundred years ago:"Men of rank and their attendants continue to wear their shoes loosefor the purpose of throwing them off whenever they enter a room, which they still continue to do everywhere except in the houses ofEuropeans, in which all natives of rank now imitate our example. " Inthis connection it must be remembered that a Hindu house is alwayssacred as the shrine of the household god, and shoes are removedbefore stepping across the threshold on to the hallowed ground. Thisconsideration does not apply to European houses, and affords groundfor dispensing with the removal of laced shoes and boots. 

To be beaten or sometimes even touched with a shoe by a man oflow caste entails temporary social excommunication to most Hindus, and must be expiated by a formal purification and caste feast. Theoutcaste Mahars punish a member of their community in the same mannereven if somebody should throw a shoe on to the roof of his house, and the Pharasaical absurdities of the caste system surely find theirculminating point in this rule. Similarly if a man touches his shoewith his hand and says 'I have beaten you, ' to a member of any ofthe lower castes in Seoni, the person so addressed is considered astemporarily out of caste. If he then immediately goes and informs hiscaste-fellows he is reinstated with a nominal fine of grain worthone or two pice. But if he goes back to his house and takes food, and the incident is subsequently discovered, a penalty of a goat islevied. A curious exception recognised is that of the _Sirkari juta_, or shoe belonging to a Government servant, and to be beaten with thisshoe does not entail social punishment. 

15. The Chamar as general village drudge. 

In return for his perquisite of the hides of cattle the Chamar hasto act as the general village drudge in the northern Districts and isalways selected for the performance of _bigar_ or forced labour. Whena Government officer visits the village the Chamar must look afterhim, fetch what grass or fuel he requires, and accompany him as faras the next village to point out the road. He is also the bearerof official letters and messages sent to the village. The specialChamar on whom these duties are imposed usually receives a plot ofland rent-free from the village proprietor. Another of the functionsof the Chamar is the castration of the young bullocks, which task thecultivators will not do for themselves. His method is most primitive, the scrotum being held in a cleft bamboo or a pair of iron pincers, while the testicles are bruised and rubbed to pulp with a stone. Theanimal remains ill for a week or a fortnight and is not worked for twomonths, but the operation is rarely or never fatal. In the northernDistricts the Chamars are said to be very strong and to make thebest farmservants and coolies for earthwork. It is a proverb that'The Chamar has half a rib more than other men. ' Notwithstanding hisstrength, however, he is a great coward, this characteristic havingprobably been acquired through centuries of oppression. Many Chamarwomen act as midwives. In Raipur the cultivators give her five annasat the birth of a boy and four annas for a girl, while well-to-dopeople pay a rupee. When the first child of a rich man is born, the midwife, barber and washerman go round to all his friends andrelations to announce the event and obtain presents. It is a regularfunction of the Chamars to remove the carcases of dead cattle, whichthey eat without regard to the disease from which the animal may havedied. But a Chamar will not touch the corpse of a pony, camel, cat, dog, squirrel or monkey, and to remove the bodies of such animalsa Mehtar (sweeper) or a Gond must be requisitioned. In Raipur it issaid that the Chamars will eat only the flesh of four-legged animals, avoiding presumably birds and fish. When acting as a porter the Chamarusually carries a load on his head, whereas the Kahar bears it on hisshoulders, and this distinction is proverbial. In Raipur the Chamarshave become retail cattle-dealers and are known as Kochias. Theypurchase cattle at the large central markets of Baloda and Bamnidihand retail them at the small village bazars. It is said that thistrade could only flourish in Chhattisgarh, where the cultivatorsare too lazy to go and buy their cattle for themselves. Many Chamarshave emigrated from Chhattisgarh to the Assam tea-gardens, and othershave gone to Calcutta and to the railway workshops at Kharagpur andChakardharpur. Many of them work as porters on the railway. It isprobable that their taste for emigration is due to the resentmentfelt at their despised position in Chhattisgarh. 

16. Social status. 

The Chamar ranks at the very bottom of the social scale, and contactwith his person is considered to be a defilement to high-casteHindus. He cannot draw water from the common well and usuallylives in a hamlet somewhat removed from the main village. But inseveral localities the rule is not so strict, and in Saugor a Chamarmay go into all parts of the house except the cooking and eatingrooms. This is almost necessary when he is so commonly employedas a farmservant. Here the village barber will shave Chamars andthe washerman will wash their clothes. And the Chamar himself willnot touch the corpse of a horse, a dog or any animal whose feet areuncloven; and he will not kill a cow though he eats its flesh. It isstated indeed that a Chamar who once killed a calf accidentally hadto go to the Ganges to purify himself. The crime of cattle-poisoningis thus rare in Saugor and the other northern Districts, but in theeast of the Provinces it is a common practice of the Chamars. As isusual with the low castes, many Chamars are in some repute as Gunias orsorcerers, and in this capacity they are frequently invited to enterthe houses of Hindus to heal persons possessed of evil spirits. Whenchildren fall ill one of them is called in and he waves a branch ofthe _nim_ [466] tree over the child and taking ashes in his handblows them at it; he is also consulted for hysterical women. Whena Chamar has had something stolen and wishes to detect the thief, he takes the wooden-handled needle used for stitching leather andsticks the spike into the sole of a shoe. Then two persons standingin the relation of maternal uncle and nephew hold the needle and shoeup by placing their forefingers under the wooden handle. The namesof all suspected persons are pronounced, and he at whose name theshoe turns on the needle is taken to be the thief. 

The caste do not employ Brahmans for their ceremonies, but consultthem for the selection of auspicious days, as this business can beperformed by the Brahman at home and he need not enter the Chamar'shouse. But poor and despised as the Chamars are they have a pride oftheir own. When the Dohar and Maratha Chamars sell shoes to a Maharthey will only allow him to try on one of them and not both, and this, too, he must do in a sitting posture, as an indication of humility. TheHarale or Maratha Chamars of Berar [467] do not eat beef nor work withuntanned leather, and they will not work for the lowest castes, asMahars, Mangs, Basors and Kolis. If one of these buys a pair of shoesfrom the Chamar the seller asks no indiscreet questions; but he willnot mend the pair as he would for a man of higher caste. The Satnamisof Chhattisgarh have openly revolted against the degraded position towhich they are relegated by Hinduism and are at permanent feud withthe Hindus; some of them have even adopted the sacred thread. But thisinteresting movement is separately discussed in the article on Satnami. 

17. Character. 

In Chhattisgarh the Chamars are the most criminal class of thepopulation, and have made a regular practice of poisoning cattle witharsenic in order to obtain the hides and flesh. They either mix thepoison with mahua flowers strewn on the grazing-ground, or make itinto a ball with butter and insert it into the anus of the animal whenthe herdsman is absent. They also commit cattle-theft and frequentlyappear at the whipping-post before the court-house. The estimation inwhich they are held by their neighbours is reflected in the proverb, 'Hemp, rice and a Chamar; the more they are pounded the better theyare. ' "The caste, " Mr. Trench writes, "are illiterate to a man, and their intellectual development is reflected in their style ofliving. A visit to a hamlet of tanning Chamars induces doubt as towhence the appalling smells of the place proceed--from the hides orfrom the tanners. Were this squalor invariably, as it is occasionally, accompanied by a sufficiency of the necessaries of life, victuals andclothing, the Chamar would not be badly off, but the truth is that inthe northern Districts at all events the Chamar, except in years ofgood harvest, does not get enough to eat. This fact is sufficientlyindicated by a glance at the perquisites of the village Chamar, whois almost invariably the shoemaker and leather-worker for his littlecommunity. In one District the undigested grain left by the gorgedbullocks on the threshing-floor is his portion, and a portion forwhich he will sometimes fight. Everywhere he is a carrion-eater, paying little or no regard to the disease from which the animalmay have died. " The custom above mentioned of washing grain fromthe dung of cattle is not so repugnant to the Hindus, owing to thesacred character of the cow, as it is to us. It is even sometimesconsidered holy food:--"The zamindar of Idar, who is named Naron Das, lives with such austerity that his only food is grain which has passedthrough oxen and has been separated from their dung; and this kindof aliment the Brahmans consider pure in the highest degree. " [468]Old-fashioned cultivators do not muzzle the bullocks treading outthe corn, and the animals eat it the whole time, so that much passesthrough their bodies undigested. The Chamar will make several maunds(80 lbs. ) of grain in this way, and to a cultivator who does notmuzzle his bullocks he will give a pair of shoes and a plough-rein andyoke-string. Another duty of the Chamar is to look after the _banda_or large underground masonry chamber in which grain is kept. Afterthe grain has been stored, a conical roof is built and plastered overwith mud to keep out water. The Chamar looks after the repairs of themud plaster and in return receives a small quantity of grain, whichusually goes bad on the floor of the store-chamber. They prepare thethreshing-floors for the cultivators, making the surface of the soillevel and beating it down to a smooth and hard surface. In returnfor this they receive the grain mixed with earth which remains onthe threshing-floor after the crop is removed. 

Like all other village artisans the Chamar is considered by thecultivators to be faithless and dilatory in his dealings with them;and they vent their spleen in sayings such as the following:--"TheKori, the Chamar and the Ahir, these are the three biggest liars thatever were known. For if you ask the Chamar whether he has mended yourshoes he says, 'I am at the last stitch, ' when he has not begun them;if you ask the Ahir whether he has brought back your cow from thejungle he says, 'It has come, it has come, ' without knowing or caringwhether it has come or not; and if you ask the Kori whether he hasmade your cloth he says, 'It is on the loom, ' when he has not so muchas bought the thread. " Another proverb conveying the same sense is, 'The Mochi's to-morrow never comes. ' But no doubt the uncertaintyand delay in payment account for much of this conduct. 

Chasa

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Chasa_, [469] _Tasa_ (also called Alia in the Sonpur and PatnaStates). --The chief cultivating caste of Orissa. In 1901 morethan 21, 000 Chasas were enumerated in Sambalpur and the adjoiningFeudatory States, but nearly all these passed in 1905 to Bengal. TheChasas are said [470] by Sir H. Risley to be for the most part ofnon-Aryan descent, the loose organisation of the caste system amongthe Uriyas making it possible on the one hand for outsiders to beadmitted into the caste, and on the other for wealthy Chasas whogave up ploughing with their own hands and assumed the respectabletitle of Mahanti to raise themselves to membership among the lowerclasses of Kayasths. This passage indicates that the term Mahanti isor was a broader one than Karan or Uriya Kayasth, and was applied toeducated persons of other castes who apparently aspired to admissionamong the Karans, in the same manner as leading members of thewarlike and landholding castes lay claim to rank as Rajputs. Forthis reason probably the Uriya Kayasths prefer the name of Karanto that of Mahanti, and the Uriya saying, 'He who has no caste iscalled a Mahanti, ' supports this view. The word Chasa has the genericmeaning of 'a cultivator, ' and the Chasas may in Sambalpur be merelyan occupational group recruited from other castes. This theory issupported by the names of their subdivisions, three of which, Kolta, Khandait and Ud or Orh are the names of distinct castes, while thefourth, Benatia, is found as a subdivision of several other castes. 

2. Exogamous divisions. 

Each family has a _got_ or sept and a _varga_ or family name. The_vargas_ are much more numerous than the _gots_, and marriages arearranged according to them, unions of members of the same _varga_ onlybeing forbidden. The sept names are totemistic and the family namesterritorial or titular. Among the former are _bachhas_ (calf), _nagas_(cobra), _hasti_ or _gaj_ (elephant), _harin_ (deer), _mahumachhi_(bee), _dipas_ (lamp), and others; while instances of the _varga_names are Pitmundia, Hulbulsingia, Giringia and Dumania, all names ofvillages in Angul State; and Nayak (headman), Mahanti (writer), Dehri(worshipper), Behera (cook), Kandra (bamboo-worker), and others. Thedifferent _gots_ or septs revere their totems by drawing figuresof them on their houses, and abstaining from injuring them in anyway. If they find the footprints of the animal which they worship, they bow to the marks and obliterate them with the hand, perhaps withthe view of affording protection to the totem animal from huntersor of preventing the marks from being trampled on by others. Theybelieve that if they injured the totem animal they would be attackedby leprosy and their line would die out. Members of the _dipas_ septwill not eat if a lamp is put out at night, and will not touch alamp with unclean hands. Those of the _mahumachhi_ or bee sept willnot take honey from a comb or eat it. Those of the _gaj_ sept willnot join an elephant kheddah. Some of the septs have an Ishta Devataor tutelary Hindu deity to whom worship is paid. Thus the elephantsept worship Ganesh, the elephant-headed god, and also do not killrats because Ganesh rides on this animal. Similarly the _harin_ ordeer sept have Pawan, the god of the wind, as their Ishta Devata, because a deer is considered to be as swift as the wind. It wouldappear then that the septs, each having its totem, were the originaldivisions for the restriction of marriage, but as these increased insize they were felt to debar the union of persons who had no realrelationship and hence the smaller family groups were substitutedfor them; while in the case of the old septs, the substitution of theHindu god representing the animal worshipped by the sept for the animalitself as the object of veneration is an instance of the process ofabandoning totem or animal worship and conforming to Hinduism. In oneor two cases the _vargas_ themselves have been further subdivided forthe purpose of marriage. Thus certain families of the Padhan (leader, chief) _varga_ were entrusted with the duty of readmitting personstemporarily put out of caste to social intercourse, for which theyreceived the remuneration of a rupee and a piece of cloth in eachcase. These families were called the Parichha or 'Scrutinisers' andhave now become a separate _varga_, so that a Parichha Padhan maymarry another Padhan. This is a further instance of the process ofsubdivision of exogamous groups which must take place as the groupsincrease in size and numbers, and the original idea of the commonancestry of the group vanishes. Until finally the primitive system ofexogamy disappears and is replaced by the modern and convenient methodof prohibition of marriage within certain degrees of relationship. 

3. Status and customs of the caste. 

The Chasas do not marry within the same _varga, _ but a man may usuallytake a wife from his mother's _varga_. A girl must always be weddedbefore arriving at adolescence, the penalty for breach of this rulebeing the driving out of the girl to seclusion in the forest for aday and a half, and a feast to the caste-fellows. If no husband isavailable she may be married to an arrow or a flower, or she goesthrough the form of marriage with any man in the caste, and when asuitable partner is subsequently found, is united with him by theform of widow-marriage. Widows may marry again and divorce is alsoallowed. The dead are usually buried if unmarried, and burnt whenmarried. The Chasas worship the Hindu deities and also the villagegod Gramsiri, who is represented by a stone outside the village. Atfestivals they offer animal sacrifices to their agriculturalimplements, as hoes and hatchets. They employ Brahmans for religiousceremonies. They have an aversion to objects of a black colour, andwill not use black umbrellas or clothes woven with black thread. Theydo not usually wear shoes or ride horses, even when they can affordthese latter. Cultivation is the traditional occupation of the caste, and they are tenants, farmservants and field-labourers. They take foodfrom Rajputs and Brahmans, and sometimes from Koltas and Sudhs. Theyeat flesh and fish, but abjure liquor, beef, pork and fowls. Theirsocial position is a little below that of the good agricultural castes, and they are considered somewhat stupid, as shown by the proverb:

 Chasa, ki jane pasar katha, Padili bolai dons;

or 'What does the Chasa know of the dice? At every throw he calls out"twenty. "'

Chauhan

_Chauhan. _ [471]--A small caste of village watchmen and labourersin the Chhattisgarh Division. They are also known as Chandel byoutsiders. In 1911 the Chauhans numbered 7000 persons in the Raipurand Bilaspur Districts, and the adjoining Feudatory States. Thecaste claim themselves to be of Rajput origin, and say that theirancestors came from Mainpuri, which is the home of the Chauhan clan ofRajputs. A few of their section names are taken from those of Rajputclans, but the majority are of a totemistic nature, being calledafter animals and plants, as Nag the cobra, Neora the mongoose, Kolhia the jackal, Kamal the lotus, Pat silk, Chanwar rice, Khandaa sword, and so on. Members of each sept worship the object afterwhich it is named at the time of marriage, and if the tree or animalitself is not readily available, they make a representation of itin flour and pay their respects to that. Thus members of the Bednaor sugarcane sept make a stick of flour and worship it. They willnot kill or eat their sept totem, but in some cases, as in that ofthe Chanwar or rice sept, this rule is impossible of observance, sothe members of this sept content themselves with abstaining from asingle variety of rice, the kind called Nagkesar. Families who belongto septs named after heroic ancestors make an image in flour of theancestral saint or hero and worship it. The caste employ Brahmansfor their marriage and other ceremonies, and will not take food fromany caste except Brahmans and their Bairagi _gurus_ or spiritualpreceptors. But their social position is very low, as none exceptthe most debased castes will take food or water from their hands, andtheir hereditary calling of village watchman would not be practisedby any respectable caste. By outsiders they are considered little, if at all, superior to the Pankas and Gandas, and the most probabletheory of their origin is that they are the descendants of irregularalliances between immigrant Rajput adventurers and the women of thecountry. Their social customs resemble those of other low castes inChhattisgarh. Before the bridegroom starts for a wedding, they havea peculiar ceremony known as Naodori. Seven small earthen cups fullof water are placed on the boy's head, and then poured over him insuccession. A piece of new cloth is laid on his head, and afterwardsplaced seven times in contact with the earth. During this ritual theboy keeps his eyes shut, and it is believed that if he should openthem before its completion, his children would be born blind. Whenthe bride leaves her father's house she and all her relatives mournand weep noisily, and the bride continues doing so until she is wellover a mile from her own village. Similarly on the first three orfour visits which she pays to her parents after her wedding, shebegins crying loudly a mile away from their house, and continuesuntil she reaches it. It is the etiquette also that women shouldcry whenever they meet relatives from a distance. In such caseswhen two women see each other they cry together, each placing herhead on the other's shoulder and her hands at her sides. While theycry they change the position of their heads two or three times, andeach addresses the other according to their relationship, as mother, sister, and so on. Or if any member of the family has recently died, they call upon him or her, exclaiming 'O my mother! O my sister! Omy father! Why did not I, unfortunate one, die instead of thee?' Awoman when weeping with a man holds to his sides and rests her headagainst his breast. The man exclaims at intervals, 'Stop crying, do not cry. ' When two women are weeping together it is a point ofetiquette that the elder should stop first and then beg her companionto do so, but if it is doubtful which is the elder, they sometimesgo on crying for an hour at a time, exciting the younger spectatorsto mirth, until at length some elder steps forward and tells one ofthem to stop. The Chauhans permit the remarriage of widows, and awoman is bound by no restrictions as to her choice of a second husband. 

The goddess Durga or Devi is chiefly revered by the caste, who observefasts in her honour in the months of Kunwar (September) and Chait(March). When they make a _badna_ or vow, they usually offer goatsto the goddess, and sow the _Jawaras_ or Gardens of Adonis in hername, but except on such occasions they present less costly articles, as cocoanuts, betel-leaves, areca-nuts and flowers. On the Dasahrafestival they worship the _lathi_ or stick which is the badge ofoffice of the village watchman. They were formerly addicted to pettytheft, and it is said that they worshipped the _khunta_ or pointedrod for digging through the wall of a house. The caste usually burnthe dead, but children whose ears or noses have not been pierced areburied. Children who die before they have begun to eat grain are notmourned at all, while for older children the period of mourning isthree to seven days, and for adults ten days. On the tenth day theyclean their houses, shave themselves and offer balls of rice to thedead under the direction of a Brahman, to whom they present eatingand drinking vessels, clothes, shoes and cattle with the belief thatthe articles will thus become available for the use of the dead manin the other world. The Chauhans will not eat fowls, pork or beef, and in some places they abstain from drinking liquor. 

Chhipa

1. Constitution of the caste. 

_Chhipa, Rangari, Bhaosar, Nirali, Nilgar. _--The Hindu caste of cottonprinters and dyers. They are commonly known as Chhipa in the northernDistricts and Rangari or Bhaosar in the Maratha country. The Chhipasand Rangaris together number about 23, 000 persons. In the south ofthe Central Provinces and Berar cotton is a staple crop, and thecotton-weaving industry is much stronger than in the north, and as anecessary consequence the dyers also would be more numerous. Though theChhipas and Rangaris do not intermarry or dine together, no essentialdistinction exists between them. They are both of functional origin, pursue exactly the same occupation, and relate the same story aboutthemselves, and no good reason therefore exists for considering themas separate castes. Nilgar or Nirali is a purely occupational termapplied to Chhipas or Rangaris who work in indigo (_nil_); whileBhaosar is another name for the Rangaris in the northern Districts. 

2. Its origin and position. 

The Rangaris say that when Parasurama, the Brahman, was slaying theKshatriyas, two brothers of the warrior caste took refuge in a templeof Devi. One of them, called Bhaosar, threw himself upon the image, while the other hid behind it. The goddess saved them both and toldthem to adopt the vocation of dyers. The Rangaris are descended fromthe brother who was called Bhaosar and the Chhipas from the otherbrother, because he hid behind the image (_chhipna_, to hide). The wordis really derived from _chhapna_, to print, because the Chhipas printcoloured patterns on cotton cloths with wooden stamps. Rangari comesfrom the common word _rang_ or colour. The Chhipas have a slightlydifferent version of the same story, according to which the goddessgave one brother a needle and a piece of thread, and the other somered betel-leaf which she spat at him out of her mouth; and told one tofollow the vocation of a tailor, and the other that of a dyer. Hencethe first was called Chhipi or Shimpi and the second Chhipa. Thisstory indicates a connection between the dyeing and tailoring castesin the Maratha Districts, which no doubt exists, as one subcaste ofthe Rangaris is named after Namdeo, the patron saint of the Shimpisor tailors. Both the dyeing and tailoring industries are probably ofconsiderably later origin than that of cotton-weaving, and both areurban rather than village industries. And this consideration perhapsaccounts for the fact that the Chhipas and Rangaris rank higher thanmost of the weaving castes, and no stigma or impurity attaches to them. 

3. Caste subdivisions. 

The caste have a number of subdivisions, such as the Malaiyas orimmigrants from Malwa, the Gujrati who come from Gujarat, the Goliasor those who dye cloth with _goli ka rang_, the fugitive aniline dyes, the Namdeos who belong to the sect founded by the Darzi or tailor ofthat name, and the Khatris, these last being members of the Khatricaste who have adopted the profession. 

4. Marriage and other customs. 

Marriage is forbidden between persons so closely connected as to have acommon ancestor in the third generation. In Bhandara it is obligatoryon all members of the caste, who know the bride or bridegroom, toask him or her to dine. The marriage rite is that prevalent amongthe Hindustani castes, of walking round the sacred post. Divorceand the marriage of widows are permitted. In Narsinghpur, when abachelor marries a widow, he first goes through a mock ceremony bywalking seven times round an earthen vessel filled with cakes; thisrite being known as Langra Biyah or the lame marriage. The caste burntheir dead, placing the head to the north. On the day of Dasahra theChhipas worship their wooden stamps, first washing them and then makingan offering to them of a cocoanut, flowers and an image consistingof a bottle-gourd standing on four sticks, which is considered torepresent a goat. The Chhipas rank with the lower artisan castes, from whose hands Brahmans will not take water. Nevertheless some ofthem wear the sacred thread and place sect-marks on their foreheads. 

5. Occupation. 

The bulk of the Chhipas dye cloths in red, blue or black, withornamental patterns picked out on them in black and white. Formerlytheir principal agent was the _al_ or Indian mulberry (_Morindacitrifolia_), from which a rich red dye is obtained. But thisindigenous product has been ousted by alizarin, a colouring agentmade from coal-tar, which is imported from Germany, and is aboutthirty per cent cheaper than the native dye. Chhipas prepare _saris_or women's wearing-cloths, and floor and bed cloths. The dye stampsare made of teakwood by an ordinary carpenter, the flat surface ofthe wood being hollowed out so as to leave ridges which form eithera design in curved lines or the outlines of the figures of men, elephants and tigers. There is a great variety of patterns, as manyas three hundred stamps having been found in one Chhipa's shop. Thestamps are usually covered with a black ink made of sulphate of iron, and this is fixed by myrobalans; the Nilgars usually dye a plain bluewith indigotin. No great variety or brilliancy of colours is obtainedby the Hindu dyers, who are much excelled in this branch of the artby the Muhammadan Rangrez. In Gujarat dyeing is strictly forbiddenby the caste rules of the Chhipas or Bhaosars during the four rainymonths, because the slaughter of insects in the dyeing vat adds tothe evil and ill-luck of that sunless time. [472]

Chitari

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin and traditions. _ 2. _Social customs. _ 3. _Birth and childhood. _ 4. _The evil eye. _ 5. _Cradle-songs. _ 6. _Occupation. _

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Chitari, Chiter, Chitrakar, Maharana. _--A caste of painters onwood and plaster. Chiter is the Hindustani, and Chitari the Marathiname, both being corruptions of the Sanskrit Chitrakar. Maharanais the term used in the Uriya country, where the caste are alsoknown as Phal-Barhai, or a carpenter who only works on one side ofthe wood. Chitari is further an occupational term applied to Mochisand Jingars, or leather-workers, who have adopted the occupation ofwall-painting, and there is no reason to doubt that the Chitaris wereoriginally derived from the Mochis, though they have now a somewhathigher position. In Mandla the Chitrakars and Jingars are separatecastes, and do not eat or intermarry with one another. Neither branchwill take water from the Mochis, who make shoes, and some Chitrakarseven refuse to touch them. They say that the founder of their castewas Biskarma, [473] the first painter, and that their ancestorswere Rajputs, whose country was taken by Akbar. As they were withoutoccupation Akbar then assigned to them the business of making saddlesand bridles for his cavalry and scabbards for their swords. It is notunlikely that the Jingar caste did really originate or first becomedifferentiated from the Mochis and Chamars in Rajputana owing to thedemand for such articles, and this would account for the Mochis andJingars having adopted Rajput names for their sections, and makinga claim to Rajput descent. The Chitrakars of Mandla say that theirancestors belonged to Garha, near Jubbulpore, where the tomb of awoman of their family who became _sati_ is still to be seen. Garha, which was once the seat of an important Gond dynasty with a garrison, would also naturally have been a centre for their craft. 

Another legend traces their origin from Chitrarekha, a nymph whowas skilled in painting and magic. She was the friend of a princessUsha, whose father was king of Sohagpur in Hoshangabad. Usha fellin love with a beautiful young prince whom she saw in a dream, and Chitrarekha drew the portraits of many gods and men for her, until finally Usha recognised the youth of her dream in the portraitof Aniruddha, the grandson of Krishna. Chitrarekha then by her magicpower brought Aniruddha to Usha, but when her father found him in thepalace he bound him and kept him in prison. On this Krishna appearedand rescued his grandson, and taking Usha from her father marriedthem to each other. The Chitaris say that as a reward to Chitrarekha, Krishna promised her that her descendants should never be in want, and hence members of their caste do not lack for food even in faminetime. [474] The Chitaris are declining in numbers, as their paintingsare no longer in demand, the people preferring the cheap colouredprints imported from Germany and England. 

2. Social customs. 

The caste is a mixed occupational group, and those of Maratha, Telugu and Hindustani extraction marry among themselves. A few wearthe sacred thread, and abstain from eating flesh or drinking liquor, while the bulk of them do not observe these restrictions. 

Among the Jingars women accompany the marriage procession, but notwith the Chitaris. 

Widow-marriage is allowed, but among the Maharanas a wife who has livedwith her husband may not marry any one except his younger brother, and if there are none she must remain a widow. In Mandla, if a widowmarries her younger brother-in-law, half her first husband's propertygoes to him finally, and half to the first husband's children. If shemarries an outsider she takes her first husband's property and childrenwith her. Formerly if a wife misbehaved the Chitari sometimes soldher to the highest bidder, but this custom has fallen into abeyance, and now if a man divorces his wife her father usually repays to himthe expenses of his marriage. These he realises in turn from anyman who takes his daughter. A second wife worships the spirit ofthe dead first wife on the day of Akhatij, offering some food and abreast-cloth, so that the spirit may not trouble her. 

3. Birth and childhood. 

A pregnant woman must stay indoors during an eclipse; if she goes outand sees it they believe that her child will be born deformed. Theythink that a woman in this condition must be given any food whichshe takes a fancy for, so far as may be practicable, as to thwart herdesires would affect the health of the child. Women in this conditionsometimes have a craving for eating earth; then they will eat eitherthe scrapings or whitewash from the walls, or black clay soil, orthe ashes of cowdung cakes to the extent of a small handful a day. Awoman's first child should be born in her father-in-law's or husband'shouse if possible, but at any rate not in her father's house. And ifshe should be taken with the pangs of travail while on a visit to herown family, they will send her to some other house for her child to beborn. The ears of boys and the ears and nostrils of girls are pierced, and until this is done they are not considered to be proper membersof the caste and can take food from any one's hand. The Chitaris ofMandla permit a boy to do this until he is married. A child's hair isnot shaved when it is born, but this should be done once before it isthree years old, whether it be a boy or girl. After this the hair maybe allowed to grow, and shaved off or simply cut as they prefer. Exceptin the case of illness a girl's hair is only shaved once, and thatof an adult woman is never cut, unless she becomes a widow and makesa pilgrimage to a sacred place, when it is shaved off as an offering. 

4. The evil eye. 

In order to avert the evil eye they hang round a child's neck a nutcalled _bajar-battu_, the shell of which they say will crack andopen if any one casts the evil eye on the child. If it is placed inmilk the two parts will come together again. They also think thatthe nut attracts the evil eye and absorbs its effect, and the childis therefore not injured. If they think that some one has cast theevil eye on a child, they say a charm, '_Ishwar, Gauri, Parvati ke annazar dur ho jao_, ' or 'Depart, Evil Eye, in the name of Mahadeo andParvati, ' and as they say this they blow on the child three times;or they take some salt, chillies and mustard in their hand and waveit round the child's head and say, '_Telin ki lagi ho, Tamolin kilagi ho, Mararin ki ho, Gorania (Gondin) ki ho, oke, oke, parparakephut jawe_, ' 'If it be a Telin, Tambolin, Mararin or Gondin who hascast the evil eye, may her eyes crack and fall out. ' And at the sametime they throw the mustard, chillies and salt on the fire so thatthe eyes of her who cast the evil eye may crack and fall out as thesethings crackle in the fire. 

If tiger's claws are used for an amulet, the points must be turnedoutwards. If any one intends to wish luck to a child, he says, '_Toribalayan leun_, ' and waves his hands round the child's head severaltimes to signify that he takes upon himself all the misfortunes whichare to happen to the child. Then he presses the knuckles of his handsagainst the sides of his own head till they crack, which is a luckyomen, averting calamity. If the knuckles do not crack at the firstattempt, it is repeated two or three times. When a man sneezes he willsay 'Chatrapati, ' which is considered to be a name of Devi, but isonly used on this occasion. But some say nothing. After yawning theysnap their fingers, the object of which, they say, is to drive awaysleep, as otherwise the desire will become infectious and attack otherspresent. But if a child yawns they sometimes hold one of their handsin front of his mouth, and it is probable that the original meaningof the custom was to prevent evil spirits from entering through thewidely opened mouth, or the yawner's own soul or spirit from escaping;and the habit of holding the hand before the mouth from politenesswhen yawning inadvertently may be a reminiscence of this. 

5. Cradle-songs. 

The following are some cradle-songs taken down from a Chitrakar, but probably used by most of the lower Hindu castes:

 1. Mother, rock the cradle of your pretty child. What is the cradle made of, and what are its tassels made of? The cradle is made of sandalwood, its tassels are of silk. Some Gaolin (milkwoman) has overlooked the child, he vomits up his milk. Dasoda [475] shall wave salt and mustard round his head, and he shall play in my lap. My baby is making little steps. O Sunar, bring him tinkling anklets! The Sunar shall bring anklets for him, and my child will go to the garden and there we will eat oranges and lemons. 

 2. My Krishna's tassel is lost, Tell me, some one, where it is. My child is angry and will not come into my arms. The tears are falling from his eyes like blossoms from the _bela_ [476] flower. He has bangles on his wrists and anklets on his feet, on his head a golden crown and round his waist a silver chain. 

The _jhumri_ or tassel referred to above is a tassel adorned withcowries and hung from the top of the cradle so that the child maykeep his eyes on it while the cradle is being rocked. 

 3. Sleep, sleep, my little baby; I will wave my hands round your head [477] on the banks of the Jumna. I have cooked hot cakes for you and put butter in them; all the night you lay awake, now take your fill of sleep. The little mangoes are hanging on the tree; the rope is in the well; sleep thou till I go and come back with water. I will hang your cradle on the banyan tree, and its rope to the pipal tree; I will rock my darling gently so that the rope shall never break. 

The last song may be given in the vernacular as a specimen:

 4. Ram ki Chireya, Ram ko khet. Khaori Chireya, bhar, bhar pet. Tan munaiyan kha lao khet, Agao, labra, gali det; Kahe ko, labra, gali de; Apni bhuntia gin, gin le. 

or--

 The field is Rama's, the little birds are Rama's; O birds, eat your fill; the little birds have eaten up the corn. The surly farmer has come to the field and scolds them; the little birds say, 'O farmer, why do you scold us? count your ears of maize, they are all there. '

This song commemorates a favourite incident in the life of Tulsi Das, the author of the Ramayana, who when he was a little boy was oncesent by his _guru_ to watch the crop. But after some time the _guru_came and found the field full of birds eating the corn and Tulsi Daswatching them. When asked why he did not scare them away, he said, 'Are they not as much the creatures of Rama as I am? how should Ideprive them of food?'

6. Occupation. 

The Chitaris pursue their old trade, principally in Nagpur city, where the taste for wall-paintings still survives; and they decoratethe walls of houses with their crude red and blue colours. Butthey have now a number of other avocations. They paint pictureson paper, making their colours from the tins of imported anilinedyeing-powders which are sold in the bazar; but there is littledemand for these. They make small pictures of the deities whichthe people hang on their walls for a day and then throw away. Theyalso paint the bodies of the men who pretend to be tigers at theMuharram festival, for which they charge a rupee. They make the claypaper-covered masks of monkeys and demons worn by actors who play theRamlila or story of Rama on the Ramnaomi festival in Chait (March);they also make the _tazias_ or representations of the tomb of Hussainand paper figures of human beings with small clay heads, which arecarried in the Muharram procession. They make marriage crowns; theframes of these are of conical shape with a half-moon at the top, made from strips of bamboo; they are covered with red paper pickedout with yellow and green and with tinfoil, and are ornamented withborders of date-palm leaves. The crowns cost from four annas to arupee each. They make the artificial flowers used at weddings; theseare stuck on a bamboo stick and at the arrival and departure of thebridegroom are scrambled for by the guests, who take them home askeepsakes or give them to their children for playthings. The flowerscopied are the lotus, rose and chrysanthemum, and the imitations arequite good. Sometimes the bridegroom is surrounded by trays or boxesof flowers, carried in procession and arranged so as to look as ifthey were planted in beds. Other articles made by the Chitrakar arepaper fans, paper globes for hanging to the roofs of houses, Chineselanterns made either of paper or of mica covered with paper, andsmall caps of velvet embroidered with gold lace. At the Akti festival[478] they make pairs of little clay dolls, dressing them as male andfemale, and sell them in red lacquered bamboo baskets, and the girlstake them to the jungle and pretend that they are married. Formerlythe Chitrakars made clay idols for temples, but these have beensupplanted by marble images imported from Jaipur. The Jingars makethe cloth saddles on which natives ride, and some of them bind books, the leather for which is made from goat-skin, and is not considered soimpure as that made from the hides of cattle. But one class of them, who are considered inferior, make leather harness from cow-hide andbuffalo-hide. 

Chitrakathi

_Chitrakathi, Hardas. _ [479]--A small caste of religious mendicantsand picture showmen in the Maratha Districts. In 1901 they numbered 200persons in the Central Provinces and 1500 in Berar, being principallyfound in the Amraoti District. The name, Mr. Enthoven writes, [480]is derived from _chitra, _ a picture, and _katha_, a story, and theprofessional occupation of the caste is to travel about exhibitingpictures of heroes and gods, and telling stories about them. Thecommunity is probably of mixed functional origin, for in Bombaythey have exogamous section-names taken from those of the Marathas, as Jadhow, More, Powar and so on, while in the Central Provincesand Berar an entirely different set is found. Here several sectionsappear to be named after certain offices held or functions performedby their members at the caste feasts. Thus the Atak section are thecaste headmen; the Mankari appear to be a sort of substitute for theAtak or their grand viziers, the word Mankar being primarily a titleapplied to Maratha noblemen, who held an official position at court;the Bhojni section serve the food at marriage and other ceremonies;the Kakra arrange for the lighting; the Kotharya are store-keepers; andthe Ghoderao (from _ghoda_, a horse) have the duty of looking after thehorses and bullock-carts of the castemen who assemble. The Chitrakathisare really no doubt the same caste as the Chitaris or Chitrakars(painters) of the Central Provinces, and, like them, a branch of theMochis (tanners), and originally derived from the Chamars. But as theBerar Chitrakathis are migratory instead of settled, and in otherrespects differ from the Chitaris, they are treated in a separatearticle. Marriage within the section is forbidden, and, besides this, members of the Atak and Mankari sections cannot intermarry as they areconsidered to be related, being divisions of one original section. Thesocial customs of the caste resemble those of the Kunbis, but theybury their dead in a sitting posture, with the face to the east, andon the eighth day erect a platform over the grave. At the festivalof Akhatij (3rd of light Baisakh) [481] they worship a vessel ofwater in honour of their dead ancestors, and in Kunwar (September)they offer oblations to them. Though not impure, the caste occupy alow social position, and are said to prostitute their married womenand tolerate sexual licence on the part of unmarried girls. Mr. Kitts[482] describes them as "Wandering mendicants, sometimes suspectedof associating with Kaikaris for purposes of crime; but they seemnevertheless to be a comparatively harmless people. They travel aboutin little huts like those used by the Waddars; the men occasionallysell buffaloes and milk; the women beg, singing and accompanyingthemselves on the _thali_. The old men also beg, carrying a flag intheir hand, and shouting the name of their god, Hari Vithal (fromwhich they derive their name of Hardas). They are fond of spirits, and, when drunk, become pot-valiant and troublesome. " The _thali_or plate on which their women play is also known as _sarthada_, andconsists of a small brass dish coated with wax in the centre; this isheld on the thigh and a pointed stick is moved in a circle so as toproduce a droning sound. The men sometimes paint their own pictures, and in Bombay they have a caste rule that every Chitrakathi must havein his house a complete set of sacred pictures; this usually includesforty representations of Rama's life, thirty-five of that of the sonsof Arjun, forty of the Pandavas, forty of Sita and Rawan, and fortyof Harishchandra. The men also have sets of puppets representing theabove and other deities, and enact scenes with them like a Punch andJudy show, sometimes aided by ventriloquism. 

Cutchi

1. General notice. 

_Cutchi_ or _Meman, Kachhi, Muamin. _--A class of Muhammadan merchantswho come every year from Gujarat and Cutch to trade in the towns ofthe Central Provinces, where they reside for eight months, returning totheir houses during the four months of the rainy season. In 1911 theynumbered about 2000 persons, of whom five-sixths were men, this factindicating the temporary nature of their settlements. Nevertheless alarge proportion of the trade of the Province is in their hands. Thecaste is fully and excellently described by Khan Bahadur FazalullahLutfullah Faridi, Assistant Collector of Customs, Bombay, in the_Bombay Gazetteer_. [483] He remarks of them: "As shopkeepers andmiscellaneous dealers Cutchis are considered to be the most successfulof Muhammadans. They owe their success in commerce to their freedomfrom display and their close and personal attention to and keeninterest in business. The richest Meman merchant does not disdain todo what a Parsi in his position would leave to his clerks. Their hopeand courage are also excellent endowments. They engage without fear inany promising new branch of trade and are daring in their ventures, a trait partly inherited from their Lohana ancestors, and partly dueto their faith in the luck which the favour of their saints securesthem. " Another great advantage arises from their method of tradingin small corporations or companies of a number of persons eitherrelations or friends. Some of these will have shops in the greatcentres of trade, Bombay and Calcutta, and others in different placesin the interior. Each member then acts as correspondent and agent forall the others, and puts what business he can in their way. Many arealso employed as assistants and servants in the shops; but at the endof the season, when all return to their native Gujarat, the profitsfrom the different shops are pooled and divided among the membersin varying proportion. By this method they obtain all the advantageswhich are recognised as attaching to co-operative trading. 

2. Origin of the caste. 

According to Mr. Faridi, from whose description the remainder ofthis article is mainly taken, the Memans or more correctly Muamins or'Believers' are converts from the Hindu caste of Lohanas of Sind. Theyvenerate especially Maulana Abdul Kadir Gilani who died at Baghdad inA. D. 1165. His sixth descendant, Syed Yusufuddin Kordiri, was in 1421instructed in a dream to proceed to Sind and guide its people intothe way of Islam. On his arrival he was received with honour by thelocal king, who was converted, and the ruler's example was followedby one Manikji, the head of one of the _nukhs_ or clans of the Lohanacommunity. He with his three sons and seven hundred families of thecaste embraced Islam, and on their conversion the title of Muamin or'Believer' was conferred on them by the saint. It may be noted thatColonel Tod derives the Lohanas from the Rajputs, remarking of them:[484] "This tribe is numerous both in Dhat and Talpura; formerlythey were Rajputs, but betaking themselves to commerce have falleninto the third class. They are scribes and shopkeepers, and objectto no occupation that will bring a subsistence; and as to food, touse the expressive idiom of this region where hunger spurns at law, 'Excepting their cats and their cows they will eat anything. '" In hisaccount of Sind, Postans says of the Lohanas: "The Hindu merchants andbankers have agents in the most remote parts of Central Asia and couldnegotiate bills upon Candahar, Khelat, Cabul, Khiva, Herat, Bokhara orany other marts of that country. These agents, in the pursuit of theircalling, leave Sind for many years, quitting their families to locatethemselves among the most savage and intolerant tribes. " This accountcould equally apply to the Khatris, who also travel over Central Asia, as shown in the article on that caste; and if, as seems not improbable, the Lohanas and Khatris are connected, the hypothesis that the former, like the latter, are derived from Rajputs would receive some support. 

The present Pir or head of the community is Sayyid Jafir Shah, who isnineteenth in descent from Yusufuddin and lives partly in Bombay andpartly in Mundra of South Cutch. "At an uncertain date, " Mr. Faridicontinues, "the Lohana or Cutchi Memans passed from Cutch south throughKathiawar to Gujarat. They are said to have been strong and wealthyin Surat during the period of its prosperity (1580-1680). As Suratsank the Cutchi Memans moved to Bombay. Outside Cutch and Kathiawar, which may be considered their homes, the Memans are scattered over thecities of north and south Gujarat and other Districts of Bombay. Beyondthat Presidency they have spread as traders and merchants and formedsettlements in Calcutta, Madras, the Malabar Coast, South Burma, Siam, Singapore and Java; in the ports of the Arabian Peninsula, except Muscat, where they have been ousted by the Khojas; and inMozambique, Zanzibar and the East African Coast. " [485] They havetwo divisions in Bombay, known as Cutchi or Kachhi and Halai. 

3. Social customs. 

Cutchis and Memans retain some non-Muhammadan usages. The principalof these is that they do not allow their daughters and widows toinherit according to the rule of Muhammadan law. [486] They conducttheir weddings by the Nikah form and the _mehar_ or dowry is alwaysthe same sum of a hundred and twenty-five rupees, whatever may be theposition of the parties and in the case of widows also. They say thateither party may be divorced by the other for conjugal infidelity, butthe _mehar_ or dowry must always be paid to the wife in the case of adivorce. The caste eat flesh and fowls and abstain from liquor. Mostof them also decline to eat beef as a consequence of their Hinduancestry and they will not take food from Hindus of low caste. 

Dahait [487]

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin of the caste. _ 2. _Internal structure: totemism. _ 3. _Marriage and other customs. _ 4. _Social position. _ 5. _Former occupations, door-keeper and mace-bearer. _ 6. _The umbrella. _ 7. _Significance of the umbrella. _

1. Origin of the caste. 

_Dahait, Dahayat. _--A mixed caste of village watchmen of the Jubbulporeand Mandla Districts, who are derived from the cognate caste ofKhangars and from several of the forest tribes. In 1911 the Dahaitsnumbered about 15, 000 persons in the Central Provinces, of whom thelarge majority were found in the Jubbulpore District and the remainderin Bilaspur, Damoh and Seoni. Outside the Province they reside onlyin Bundelkhand. According to one story the Dahaits and Khangars had acommon ancestor, and in Mandla again they say that their ancestors werethe door-keepers of the Rajas of Mahoba, and were known as Chhadidar orDarwan; and they came to Mandla about 200 years ago, during the timeof Raja Nizam Shah of the Raj-Gond dynasty of that place. In Mandlathe names of their subdivisions are given as Rawatia or Rautia, Kol, Mawasi, Sonwani and Rajwaria. Of these Kol and Rajwar are the namesof separate tribes; Mawasi is commonly used as a synonym for Korku, another tribe; Sonwani is the name of a sept found among several ofthe primitive tribes; while Rawat is a title borne by the Saonrs andGonds. The names Rautia and Rajwaria are found as subdivisions of theKol tribe in Mirzapur, [488] and it is not improbable that the Dahaitsare principally derived from this tribe. The actual name Dahait is alsogiven by Mr. Crooke as a subdivision of the Kols, and he states it tohave the meaning of 'villager, ' from _dehat_, a village. The Dahaitswere a class of personal attendants on the chief or Raja, as will beseen subsequently. They stood behind the royal cushion and fanned him, ran in front of his chariot or litter to clear the way, and acted asdoor-keepers and ushers. Service of this kind is of a menial natureand, further, demands a considerable degree of physical robustness;and hence members of the non-Aryan forest tribes would naturallybe selected for it. And it would appear that these menial servantsgradually formed themselves into a caste in Bundelkhand and became theDahaits. They obtained a certain rise in status, and now rank in theposition of village menials above their parent tribes. In the CentralProvinces the Dahaits have commonly been employed as village watchmen, a post analogous to that of door-keeper or porter. The caste are alsoknown as Bhaldar or spearmen, and Kotwar or village watchmen. 

2. Internal structure: totemism. 

The subcastes returned from the Mandla District have already beenmentioned. In Bilaspur they have quite different ones, of which two, Joharia and Pailagia, are derived from methods of greeting. Joharis the salutation which a Rajput prince sends to a vassal or chiefof inferior rank, and Pailagi or 'I fall at your feet' is that withwhich a member of a lower caste accosts a Brahman. How such namescame to be adopted as subcastes cannot be explained. The caste havea number of exogamous groups named after plants and animals. Membersof the Bel, [489] Rusallo and Chheola [490] septs revere the treesafter which these septs are named. They will not cut or injurethe tree, and at the time of marriage they go and invite it to bepresent at the ceremony. They offer to the tree the _maihar_ cake, which is given only to the members of the family and the husbandsand children of daughters. Those belonging to the Nagotia sept [491]will not kill a snake, and at the time of marriage they deposit the_maihar_ cake at a snake-hole. Members of the Singh (lion) and Bagh(tiger) septs will not kill a tiger, and at their weddings they drawhis image on a wall and offer the cake to it, being well aware thatif they approached the animal himself, he would probably repudiatethe relationship and might not be satisfied with the cake for his meal. 

3. Marriage and other customs. 

Prior to a marriage a bride-price, known as _sukh_ or _chari_, and consisting of six rupees with some sugar, turmeric and sesamumoil, must be paid by the parents of the bridegroom to those of thebride; and in the absence of this they will decline to perform theceremony. At the wedding the couple go round the sacred post, and thenthe bridegroom mingles the flames of two burning lamps and pierces thenose of the image of a bullock made in flour. This rite is performedby several castes, and is said to be in commemoration of Krishna'shaving done so on different occasions. It is probably meant to excuseor legitimise the real operation, which should properly be consideredas sinful in view of the sacred character of the animal. And it maybe mentioned here that the people of the Vindhyan or BundelkhandDistricts where the Dahaits live do not perforate the nostrils ofbullocks, and drive them simply by a rope tied round the mouth. Inconsequence they have little control over them and are quite unableto stop a cart going downhill, which simply proceeds at the willof the animals until it reaches the level or bangs up against someobstacle. In Bilaspur a widow is expected to remain single for fiveyears after her husband's death, and if she marries within that timeshe is put out of caste. Divorce is permitted, but is not of frequentoccurrence. The caste will excuse a married woman caught in adulteryonce, but on a second offence she must be expelled. If a woman leavesher husband and goes to live with another man, the latter must repay toher husband the amount expended on his marriage. But in such a case, if the woman was already a widow or _kari aurat_, [492] no penaltyis incurred by a man who takes her from her second husband. A man ofany good cultivating caste who has a _liaison_ with a Dahait womanwill be admitted into the community. An outsider who desires tobecome a member of the caste must clean his house, break his earthencooking-pots and buy new ones, and give a meal to the caste-fellowsat his house. He sits and takes food with them, and when the mealis over he takes a grain of rice from the leaf-plate of each guestand eats it, and drinks a drop of water from his leaf-cup. This actis equivalent to eating the leavings of food, and after it he cannotre-enter his own caste. On such occasions a rupee and a piece of clothmust be given to the headman of the caste, and a piece of cloth toeach member of the _panchayat_ or committee. The headman is knownas Mirdhan, and a member of the committee as Diwan, the offices ofboth being hereditary. The caste worship the Hindu and village godsof the locality. They have a curious belief that the skull of a manof the Kayasth (writer) caste cannot be burnt in fire, and that ifit is placed in a dwelling-house the inmates will quarrel. A child'sfirst teeth, if found, are thrown into a sacred river or on to theroof of a house with a few grains of rice, in order that the secondteeth may grow white and pointed like the rice. The Jhalar or firsthair of a boy or girl is cut between two and ten years of age and iswrapped in a piece of dough and thrown into a sacred river. Women aretattooed on the back of the hands, and also sometimes on the shoulderand the arms above the elbow, but not on the feet or face. 

4. Social position. 

The Dahaits are now commonly employed as village watchmen and as guardsor porters (_chaukidar_) of houses. In Bilaspur they also carry littersand work as navvies and stonebreakers like the Kols. Here they willeat pork, but in Jubbulpore greater regard is paid to Hindu prejudice, and they have given up pork and fowls and begun to employ Brahmansfor their ceremonies. The men of the caste will accept cooked foodfrom any man of the higher castes or those cultivators from whom aBrahman will take water, but the women are more strict and will onlyaccept it from a Brahman, Bania, Lodhi or Kurmi. 

5. Former occupations: door-keeper and mace-bearer. 

In past times the Dahaits were the personal attendants on theking. They fanned him with the _chaur_ or yak-tail whisk when he sat instate on the royal cushion. This implement is held sacred and is alsoused by Brahmans to fan the deities. On ordinary occasions the Rajawas fanned by a pankha made of _khaskhas_ grass and wetted, but notso that the water fell on his head. They also acted as gate-keepersof the palace, and had the title of Darwan. The gate-keeper's postwas a responsible one, as it lay on him to see that no one with evilintentions or carrying secret arms was admitted to the palace. Whenevera chief or noble came to visit the king he deposited his arms withthe porter or door-keeper. The necessity of a faithful door-keeper isshown in the proverb: "With these five you must never quarrel: yourGuru, your wife, your gate-keeper, your doctor and your cook. " Thereasons for the inclusion of the others are fairly clear. On theother hand the gate-porter had usually to be propitiated beforeaccess was obtained to his master, like the modern chuprassie; and theresentment felt at his rapacity is shown in the proverb: "The broker, the octroi moharrir, the door-keeper and the bard: these four willsurely go to hell. " The Darwan or door-keeper would be given theright to collect dues, equivalent to those of a village watchman, from forty or fifty villages. The Dahaits also carried the _chob_or silver mace before the king. This was about five feet long witha knob at the upper end as thick as a man's wrist. The mace-bearerwas known as Chobdar, and it was his duty to carry messages andannounce visitors; this latter function he performed with a degree ofpomposity truly Asiatic, dwelling with open mouth very audibly on someof the most sounding and emphatic syllables in a way that appeared tostrangers almost ludicrous, [493] as shown in the following instance:"On advancing, the Chobdars or heralds proclaimed the titles of thisprincely cow-keeper in the usual hyperbolical style. One of the mostinsignificant-looking men I ever saw then became the destroyer ofnations, the leveller of mountains, the exhauster of the ocean. Aftercommanding every inferior mortal to make way for this exalted prince, the heralds called aloud to the animal creation, 'Retire, ye serpents;fly, ye locusts; approach not, iguanas, lizards and reptiles, whileyour lord and master condescends to set his foot on the earth. '" [494]The Dahaits ran before the Raja's chariot or litter to clear the wayfor him and announce his coming; and it was also a principal businessof the caste to carry the royal umbrella above the head of the king. 

6. The umbrella. 

The umbrella was the essential symbol of sovereignty in Asia like thecrown in Europe. "Among the ancient Egyptians the umbrella carriedwith it a mark of distinction, and persons of quality alone could useit. The Assyrians reserved it for royal personages only. The umbrellaor parasol, says Layard, that emblem of royalty so universallyadopted by Eastern nations, was generally carried over the king intime of peace and sometimes even in war. In shape it resembled veryclosely those now in common use; but it is always seen open in thesculptures. It was edged with tassels and usually decorated at the topby a flower or some other ornament. The Greeks used it as a mysticsymbol in some of their sacred festivals, and the Romans introducedthe custom of hanging an umbrella in the basilican churches as a partof the insignia of office of the judge sitting in the basilica. It issaid that on the judgment hall being turned into a church the umbrellaremained, and in fact occupied the place of the canopy over thronesand the like; and Beatian, an Italian herald, says that a vermilionumbrella in a field argent symbolises dominion. It is also believedthat the cardinal's hat is a modification of the umbrella in thebasilican churches. The king of Burma is proud to call himself The Lordof Twenty-four Umbrellas, and the Emperor of China carries that numbereven to the hunting-field. " [495] In Buddhist architecture the 'Wheelof Light' symbolising Buddha is overshadowed by an umbrella, itselfadorned with garlands. At Sanchi we find sculptured representationsof two and even three umbrellas placed one above the other over thetemples, the double and triple canopies of which appear to be fixedto the same handle or staff as in the modern state umbrellas of Chinaand Burma. Thus we have the primary idea of the accumulated honour ofstone or metal discs which subsequently became such a prominent featureof Buddhist architecture, culminating in the many-storied pagodas ofChina and Japan. [496] Similarly in Hindu temples the pinnacle oftenstands on a circular stone base, probably representing an umbrella. 

The umbrella of state was apparently not black like its successor ofcommerce, but of white or another colour, though the colour is seldomrecorded. Sometimes it was of peacock's feathers, the symbol of theIndian war-god, and as seen above, in Italy it was of red, the royalcolour. It has been suggested that the halo originally representedan umbrella, and there is no reason to doubt that the umbrella wasthe parent of the state canopy. 

7. Significance of the umbrella. 

It has been supposed that the reason for carrying the umbrella abovethe king's head was to veil his eyes from his subjects, and preventthem from being injured by the magical power of his glance. [497]But its appearance on temples perhaps rather militates against thisview. Possibly it may have merely served as a protection or coveringto the king's head, the head being considered especially sacredas the seat of life. The same idea is perhaps at the root of theobjection felt by Hindus to being seen abroad without a covering onthe head. It seems likely that the umbrella may have been held to bea representation of the sky or firmament. The Muhammadans conjoinedwith it an _aftada_ or sun-symbol; this was an imitation of the sun, embroidered in gold upon crimson velvet and fixed on a circularframework which was borne aloft upon a gold or silver staff. [498]Both were carried over the head of any royal personage, and theassociation favours the idea that the umbrella represents the sky, while the king's head might be considered analogous to the sun. Whenone of the early Indian monarchs made extensive conquests, the annexedterritories were described as being brought under his umbrella;of the king Harsha-Vardhana (606-648 A. D. ) it is recorded that heprosecuted a methodical scheme of conquest with the deliberate objectof bringing all India under one umbrella, that is, of constitutingit into one state. This phrase seems to support the idea that theumbrella symbolised the firmament. Similarly, when Visvamitra sentbeautiful maidens to tempt the good king Harischandra he instructedthem to try and induce the king to marry them, and if he would not dothis, to ask him for the Puchukra Undi or State Umbrella, which wasthe emblem of the king's protecting power over his kingdom, with theidea that that power would be destroyed by its loss. Chhatrapati orLord of the Umbrella was the proudest title of an Indian king. WhenSivaji was enthroned in 1674 he proclaimed himself as Pinnacleof the Kshatriya race and Lord of the Royal Umbrella. All theseinstances seem to indicate that some powerful significance, such asthat already suggested, attached to the umbrella. Several tribes, as the Gonds and Mundas, have a legend that their earliest king wasborn of poor parents, and that one day his mother, having left thechild under some tree while she went to her work, returned to find acobra spreading its hood over him. The future royal destiny of theboy was thus predicted. It is commonly said that the cobra spreadits hood over the child to guard it from the heat of the sun, butsuch protection would perhaps scarcely seem very important to sucha people as the Gonds, and the mother would naturally also leave thechild in the shade. It seems a possible hypothesis that the cobra'shood really symbolised the umbrella, the principal emblem of royalrank, and it was in this way that the child's great destiny waspredicted. In this connection it may be noticed that one of the JainTirthakars, Parasnath, is represented in sculpture with an umbrellaover his head; but some Jains say that the carving above the saint'shead is not an umbrella but a cobra's hood. Even after it had ceasedto be the exclusive appanage of the king, the umbrella was a sign ofnoble rank, and not permitted to the commonalty. 

The old Anglo-Indian term for an umbrella was 'roundel, ' an earlyEnglish word, applied to a variety of circular objects, as a matunder a dish, or a target, and in its form of 'arundel' to the conicalhandguard on a lance. [499] An old Indian writer says: "Roundels arein these warm climates very necessary to keep the sun from scorchinga man, they may also be serviceable to keep the rain off; most menof account maintain one, two or three roundeliers, whose officeis only to attend their master's motion; they are very light butof exceeding stiffness, being for the most part made of rhinoceroshide, very decently painted and guilded with what flowers they bestadmire. Exactly in the midst thereof is fixed a smooth handle madeof wood, by which the Roundelier doth carry it, holding it a foot ormore above his master's head, directing the centre thereof as oppositeto the sun as possibly he may. Any man whatever that will go to thecharge of it, which is no great matter, may have one or more Katysolsto attend him but not a Roundel; unless he be a Governor or one ofthe Council. The same custom the English hold good amongst their ownpeople, whereby they may be distinguished by the natives. " [500] TheKatysol was a Chinese paper and bamboo sunshade, and the use of themwas not prohibited. It was derived from the Portuguese _quito-sol_, or that which keeps off the sun. [501] An extract from the _MadrasStanding Orders_, 1677-78, prescribed: "That except by the membersof this Council, those that have formerly been in that quality, Chiefs of Factories, Commanders of Ships out of England, and theChaplains, Rundells shall not be worn by any men in this town, andby no woman below the degree of Factors' Wives and Ensigns' Wives, except by such as the Governor shall permit. " [502] Another writerin 1754 states: "Some years before our arrival in the country, they(the E. I. Co. ) found such sumptuary laws so absolutely necessary, that they gave the strictest orders that none of these young gentlemenshould be allowed even to hire a Roundel boy, whose business it isto walk by his master and defend him with his Roundel or umbrellafrom the heat of the sun. A young fellow of humour, upon this lastorder coming over, altered the form of his Umbrella from a round toa square, called it a Squaredel instead of a Roundel, and insistedthat no order yet in force forbade him the use of it. " [503] The factthat the Anglo-Indians called the umbrella a roundel and regarded itas a symbol of sovereignty or nobility indicates that it was not yetused in England; and this Mr. Skeat shows to be correct. "The firstumbrella used in England by a man in the open street for protectionagainst rain is usually said to have been that carried by Jonas Hanway, a great traveller, who introduced it on his return from Paris about1750, some thirty years before it was generally adopted. 

"Some kind of umbrella was, however, occasionally used by ladies atleast so far back as 1709; and a fact not generally known is thatfrom about the year 1717 onwards, a 'parish' umbrella, resembling themore recent 'family' umbrella of the nineteenth century, was employedby the priest at open-air funerals, as the church accounts of manyplaces testify. " [504] This ecclesiastical use of the umbrella mayhave been derived from its employment as a symbol in Italian churches, as seen above. The word umbrella is derived through the Italian fromthe Latin _umbra_, shade, and in mediaeval times a state umbrellawas carried over the Doge or Duke at Venice on the occasion of anygreat ceremony. [505]

Even recently it is said that in Saugor no Bania dare go past a BundelaRajput's house without getting down from his pony and folding up hisumbrella. In Hindu slang a 'Chhatawali' or carrier of an umbrella was aterm for a smart young man; as in the line, 'An umbrella has two kindsof ribs; two women are quarrelling for the love of him who carriesit. ' Now that the umbrella is free to all, and may be bought for arupee or less in the bazar, the prestige which once attached to ithas practically disappeared. But some flavour of its old associationsmay still cling to it in the minds of the sais and ayah who proudlyparade to a festival carrying umbrellas spread over them to shadetheir dusky features from the sun; though the Raja, in obedience tothe dictates of fashion, has discarded the umbrella for a _sola-topi_. 

Daharia

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Daharia. _ [506]--A caste of degraded Rajputs found in Bilaspur andRaipur, and numbering about 2000 persons. The Daharias were originallya clan of Rajputs but, like several others in the Central Provinces, they have now developed into a caste and marry among themselves, thustransgressing the first rule of Rajput exogamy. Colonel Tod includedthe Daharias among the thirty-six royal races of Rajasthan. [507]Their name is derived from Dahar or Dahal, the classical term forthe Jubbulpore country at the period when it formed the dominionof the Haihaya or Kalachuri Rajput kings of Tripura or Tewar nearJubbulpore. This dynasty had an era of their own, commencing inA. D. 248, and their line continued until the tenth or eleventhcentury. The Arabian geographer Alberuni (born a. D. 973) mentions thecountry of Dahal and its king Gangeya Deva. His son Karna Daharia isstill remembered as the builder of temples in Karanbel and Bilahriin Jubbulpore, and it is from him that the Daharia Rajputs taketheir name. The Haihaya dynasty of Ratanpur were related to theKalachuri kings of Tewar, and under them the ancestors of the DahariaRajputs probably migrated from Jubbulpore into Chhattisgarh. Butthey themselves have forgotten their illustrious origin, and tell adifferent story to account for their name. They say that they came fromBaghelkhand or Rewah, which may well be correct, as Rewah lies betweenChhattisgarh and Jubbulpore, and a large colony of Kalachuri Rajputsmay still be found about ten miles north-east of Rewah town. TheDaharias relate that when Parasurama, the great Brahman warrior, wasslaying the Kshatriyas, a few of them escaped towards Ratanpur and werecamping in the forest by the wayside. Parasurama came up and askedthem who they were, and they said they were _Daharias_ or wayfarers, from _dahar_ the Chhattisgarhi term for a road or path; and thus theysuccessfully escaped the vengeance of Parasurama. This futile fictiononly demonstrates the real ignorance of their Brahman priests, who, ifthey had known a little history, need not have had recourse to theirinvention to furnish the Daharias with a distinguished pedigree. Athird derivation is from a word _dahri_ or gate, and they say that thename of Dahria or Daharia was conferred on them by Bimbaji Bhonsla, because of the bravery with which they held the gates of Ratanpuragainst his attack. But history is against them here, as it recordsthat Ratanpur capitulated to the Marathas without striking a blow. 

2. Sept and subsept. 

As already stated, the Daharias were originally a clan of Rajputs, whose members must take wives or husbands from other clans. Theyhave now become a caste and marry among themselves, but within thecaste they still have exogamous groups or septs, several of which arenamed after Rajput clans as Bais, Chandel, Baghel, Bundela, MainpuriChauhan, Parihar, Rathor and several others. Certain names are not ofRajput origin, and probably record the admission of outsiders into thecaste. Like the Rajputs, within the sept they have also subsepts, someof which are taken from the Brahmans, as Parasar, Bharadwaj, Sandilya, while others are nicknames, as Kachariha (one who does not care abouta beating), Atariha, Hiyas and others. The divisions of the septs andsubsepts are very confused, and seem to indicate that at differenttimes various foreign elements have been received into the community, including Rajputs of many different clans. According to rule, a manshould not take a wife whose sept or subsept are the same as his own, but this is not adhered to; and in some cases the Daharias, on accountof the paucity of their numbers and the difficulty of arrangingmatches, have been driven to permit the marriage of first cousins, which among proper Rajputs is forbidden. They also practise hypergamy, as members of the Mainpuri Chauhan, Hiyas, Bisen, Surkhi and Bais septsor subsepts will take girls in marriage from families of other septs, but will not give their daughters to them. This practice leads topolygamy among the five higher septs, whose daughters are all marriedin their own circle, while in addition they receive girls from theother groups. Members of these latter also consider it an honour tomarry a daughter into one of the higher septs, and are willing to paya considerable price for such a distinction. It seems probable that thesmall Daraiha caste of Bilaspur are an inferior branch of the Daharias. 

3. Social customs. 

The Daharias, in theory at any rate, observe the same rules inregard to their women as Brahmans and Rajputs. Neither divorce northe marriage of widows is permitted, and a woman who goes wrong isfinally expelled from the caste. Their social customs resemble thoseof the higher Hindustani castes. When the bridegroom starts for thewedding he is dressed in a long white gown reaching to the ankles, with new shoes, and he takes with him a dagger; this serves thedouble purpose of warding off evil spirits, always prone to attackthe bridal party, and also of being a substitute for the bridegroomhimself, as in case he should for some unforeseen reason be renderedunable to appear at the ceremony, the bride could be married to thedagger as his representative. It may also be mentioned that, beforethe bridegroom starts for the wedding, after he has been rubbed withoil and turmeric for five days he is seated on a wooden plank overa hole dug in the courtyard and bathed. He then changes his clothes, and the women bring twenty-one small _chukias_ or cups full of waterand empty them over him. His head is then covered with a piece ofnew cloth, and a thread wound round it seven times by a Brahman. Thethread is afterwards removed, and tied round an iron ring with somemango leaves, and this ring forms the _kankan_ which is tied to thebridegroom's wrist, a similar one being worn by the bride. Before thewedding the bride goes round to the houses of her friends, accompaniedby the women of her party singing songs, and by musicians. At eachhouse the mistress appears with her forehead and the parting ofher hair profusely smeared with vermilion. She rubs her foreheadagainst the bride's so as to colour it also with vermilion, whichis now considered the symbol of a long and happy married life. Thebarber's wife applies red paint to the bride's feet, the gardener'swife presents her with a garland of flowers, and the carpenter'swife gives her a new wooden doll. She must also visit the potter'sand washerman's wives, whose benisons are essential; they give her anew pot and a little rice respectively. When the bridegroom comes totouch the marriage-shed with his dagger he is resisted by the bride'ssister, to whom he must give a rupee as a present. The binding portionof the marriage consists in the couple walking seven times round themarriage-post. At each turn the bridegroom seizes the bride's righttoe and with it upsets one of seven little cups of rice placed nearthe marriage-post. This is probably a symbol of fertility. Afterit they worship seven pairs of little wooden boxes smeared withvermilion and called _singhora_ and _singhori_ as if they were maleand female. The bridegroom's father brings two little dough imagesof Mahadeo and Parvati as the ideal married pair, and gives them tothe couple. The new husband applies vermilion to his wife's forehead, and covers and uncovers her head seven times, to signify to her that, having become a wife, she should henceforth be veiled when she goesabroad. The bride's maid now washes her face, which probably requiresit, and the wedding is complete. The Daharias usually have a _guru_ orspiritual preceptor, but husband and wife must not have the same one, as in that case they would be in the anomalous position of brother andsister, a _guru's_ disciples being looked upon as his children. TheDaharias were formerly warriors in the service of the Ratanpur kings, and many families still possess an old sword which they worship onthe day of Dasahra. Their names usually end in Singh or Lal. Theyare now engaged in cultivation, and many of them are proprietors ofvillages, and tenants. Some of them are employed as constables andchuprassies, but few are labourers, as they may not touch the ploughwith their own hands. They eat the flesh of clean animals, but do notdrink liquor, and avoid onions and tomatoes. They have good featuresand fair complexions, the traces of their Rajput blood being quiteevident. Brahmans will take water from them, but they now rank belowRajputs, on a level with the good cultivating castes. 

Dangi

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Dangi. _--A cultivating caste found almost exclusively in theSaugor District, which contained 23, 000 persons out of a total of24, 000 of the caste in the Central Provinces in 1911. There are alsoconsiderable numbers of them in Rajputana and Central India, fromwhich localities they probably immigrated into the Saugor Districtduring the eleventh century. The Dangis were formerly dominant inSaugor, a part of which was called Dangiwara after them. The kings ofGarhpahra or old Saugor were Dangis, and their family still remains atthe village of Bilehra, which with a few other villages they hold asa revenue-free grant. The name of the caste is variously derived. Thetraditional story is that the Rajput king of Garhpahra detained thepalanquins of twenty-two married women of different castes and keptthem as his wives. The issue of the illicit intercourse were namedDangis, and there are thus twenty-two subdivisions of the caste, besides three other subdivisions who are held to be descended frompure Rajputs. The name is said to be derived from _dang_, fraud, on account of the above deception. A more plausible derivation isfrom the Persian _dang_, a hill, the Dangis being thus hillmen; andthey may not improbably have been a set of robbers and freebooters inthe Vindhyan Hills, like the Gujars and Mewatis in northern India, naturally recruiting their band from all classes of the population, as is shown by ingenious implication in this story itself. '_Khet menbami, gaon men Dangi_, ' or 'A Dangi in the village is like the holeof a snake in one's field' is a proverb which shows the estimationin which they were formerly held. The three higher septs may havebeen their leaders and may well have been Rajputs. Since they havesettled down as respectable cultivators and enjoy a good repute amongtheir neighbours, the Dangis have disowned the above story, and nowsay that they are descended from Raja Dang, a Kachhwaha Rajput kingof Narwar in Central India. Nothing is known of Raja Dang except arude couplet which records how he was cheated by a horse-dealer:

 Jitki ghori tit gayi Dang hath karyari rahi, 'The mare bolted to the seller again, leaving in Dang's hand nothingexcept the reins. '

The Dangis have a more heroic version of this story to the effectthat the mare was a fairy of Indra's court, who for some reason hadbeen transformed into this shape and was captured by Raja Dang. Herefused to give her up to Indra and a battle was about to ensue, when the mare besought them to place her on a pyre and sacrifice herinstead of fighting. They agreed to do this, and out of the flamesof the pyre the fairy emerged and floated up to heaven, leaving onlythe reins and bridle of the mare in Raja Dang's hand. Yet a thirdstory is that their original ancestor was Raja Nipal Singh of Narwar, and when he was fighting with Indra over the fairy, Krishna came toIndra's assistance. But Nipal Singh refused to bow down to Krishna, and being annoyed at this and wishing to teach him a lesson the godsummoned him to his court. At the gate through which Nipal Singhhad to pass, Krishna fixed a sword at the height of a man's neck, so that he must bend or have his head cut off. But Nipal Singh sawthe trick, and, sitting down, propelled himself through the doorwaywith his head erect. The outwitted god remarked, '_Tum bare dandiho_, ' or 'You are very cunning, ' and the name Dandi stuck to NipalSingh and was afterwards corrupted to Dangi. There can be littledoubt that the caste are an offshoot of Rajputs of impure blood, and with a large admixture of other classes of the population. Someof their sept names indicate their mixed descent, as Rakhya, bornof a potter woman, Dhoniya, born of a washerwoman, and Pavniya, bornof a weaver woman. In past times the Dangis served in the Rajput andMaratha armies, and a small isolated colony of them is found in onevillage of Indora in the Nagpur District, the descendants of Dangiswho engaged in military service under the Bhonsla kings. 

2. Caste subdivisions. 

The Dangis have no subcastes distinguished by separate names, but theyare divided into three classes, among whom the principle of hypergamyprevails. As already seen, there were formerly twenty-five clans, ofwhom the three highest, the Nahonias, Bhadonias and Nadias, claimedto be pure Rajputs. The other twenty-two clans are known as Baisa (22)or Prithwipat Dangis, after the king who is supposed to have been theancestor of all the clans. Each of his twenty-two wives is said to havebeen given a village for her maintenance, and the clans are named afterthese villages. But there are now only thirteen of these local clansleft, and below them is a miscellaneous group of clans, representingapparently later accretions to the caste. Some of them are named fromthe places from which they came, as Mahobia, from Mahoba, Narwaria, from Narwar, and so on. The Solakhia sept is named after the SolankiRajputs, of whom they may be the partly illegitimate descendants. TheParnami sept are apparently those who have the creed of the Dhamis, the followers of Prannath of Panna. And as already seen, some are namedfrom women of low caste, from whom by Dangi fathers they are supposedto be descended. The whole number of septs is thus divided into threegroups, the highest containing the three quasi-Rajput septs alreadymentioned, the next highest the thirteen septs of Prithwipat Dangis, and the lowest all the other septs. Pure Rajputs will take daughtersin marriage from the highest group, and this in turn takes girls ofthe Prithwipat Dangis of the thirteen clans, though neither will givedaughters in return; and the Prithwipat Dangis will similarly acceptthe daughters of the miscellaneous septs below them in marriage withtheir sons. Matches are, however, not generally arranged according tothe above system of hypergamy, but each group marries among its ownmembers. Girls who are married into a higher group have to be givena larger dowry, the fathers often being willing to pay Rs. 500 orRs. 1000 for the social distinction which such an alliance conferson the family. Among the highest septs there is a further differencebetween those whose ancestors accepted food from Raja Jai Singh, the founder of Jaisinghnagar, and those who refused it. The formerare called Sakrodia or those who ate the leavings of others, andthe latter _Deotaon ki sansar_, or the divine Dangis. Pure Rajputswill take daughters only from the members of the latter group in eachsept. Marriage within the sept or _baink_ is prohibited, and as a rulea man does not marry a wife belonging to the same sept as his motheror grandmother. Marriage by exchange also is not allowed, that is, a girl cannot be married into the same family as that in which herbrother has married. 

3. Marriage. 

Girls are generally married between seven and twelve and boysbetween ten and twenty, but no stigma attaches to a family allowingan unmarried girl to exceed the age of puberty. The bridegroom shouldalways be older than the bride. Matches are arranged by the parents, the horoscopes of the children being compared among the well-to-do. Thezodiacal sign of the boy's horoscope should be stronger than that ofthe girl's, so that she may be submissive to him in after-life. Thusa girl whose zodiac sign is the lion should not be married to a boywhose sign is the ram, because in that case the wife would dominatethe husband. There is no special rule as to the time of the betrothal, and the ceremony is very simple, consisting in the presentation of acocoanut by the bride's father to the bridegroom's father, and thedistribution of sweets to the caste-fellows. The betrothal is notconsidered to have any particularly binding force and either party maybreak through it. Among the Dangis a bridegroom-price is usually paid, which varies according to the social respectability of the boy's sept, as much as Rs. 2000 having been given for a bridegroom of higherclass according to the rule of hypergamy already described. But novalue is placed on educational qualifications, as is the case amongBrahmans and Kayasths. The marriage ceremony is conducted accordingto the ritual prevalent in the northern Districts, and presents nospecial features. Two feasts are given by the bride's father to thecaste-fellows, one consisting of _katchi_ food or that which is cookedwith water, and another of _pakki_ food cooked with _ghi_ (butter). Ifthe bride is of marriageable age the _gauna_ or sending away ceremonyis performed at once, otherwise it takes place in the third or fifthyear after marriage. At the _gauna_ ceremony the bride's cloth is tiedto that of the bridegroom, and they change seats. Widow-marriage is notfashionable, and the caste say that it is not permitted, but severalinstances are known of its having occurred. Divorce is not allowed, and a woman who goes wrong is finally expelled from the caste. Polygamyis allowed, and many well-to-do persons have more than one wife. 

4. Religious and social customs. 

The Dangis pay special reverence to the goddess Durga or Devi as thepresiding deity of war. They worship her during the months of Kunwar(September) and Chait (March), and at the same time pay reverence totheir weapons of war, their swords and guns, or if they have not gotthese, to knives and spears. They burn their dead, but children areusually buried. They observe mourning for three days for a child andfor ten days for an adult, and on the 13th day the caste-fellows arefeasted. Their family priests, who are Jijhotia Brahmans, used formerlyto shave the head and beard when a death occurred among their clientsas if they belonged to the family, but this practice was consideredderogatory by other Brahmans, and they have now stopped it. The Dangisperform the _shradhh_ ceremony in the month of Kunwar. The caste wearthe sacred thread, but it is said that they were formerly not allowedto do so in Bundelkhand. They eat fish and flesh, including that ofwild boars, but not fowls or beef, and they do not drink liquor. Theytake _pakki_ food or that cooked without water from Kayasths andGahoi Banias, and _katchi_ food, cooked with water, from Jijhotiaand Sanadhya Brahmans. Jijhotia Brahmans formerly took _pakki_ foodfrom Dangis, but have now ceased to do so. The Dangis require theservices of Brahmans at all ceremonies. They have a caste _panchayat_or committee. A person who changes his religion or eats with a lowcaste is permanently expelled, while temporary exclusion is awardedfor the usual delinquencies. In the case of the more serious offences, as murder or killing of a cow, the culprit must purify himself by apilgrimage to a sacred river. 

5. Occupation and character. 

The Dangis were formerly, as already stated, of a quarrelsometemperament, but they have now settled down and, though spirited, are of a good disposition, and hard-working cultivators. They rankslightly above the representative cultivating castes owing to theirformer dominant position, and are still considered to have a goodconceit of themselves, according to the saying:

 Tin men neh terah men, Mirdang bajawe dere men, or 'Though he belong neither to the three septs nor the thirteen septs, yet the Dangi blows his own trumpet in his own house. ' They are still, too, of a fiery disposition, and it is said that the favourite dishof gram-flour cooked with curds, which is known as _karhi_, is neverserved at their weddings. Because the word _karhi_ also signifiesthe coming out of a sword from its sheath, and when addressed toanother man has the equivalent of the English word 'Draw' in theduelling days. So if one Dangi said it to another, meaning to askhim for the dish, it might result in a fight. They are very backwardin respect of education and set no store by it. They consider theirtraditional occupation to be military service, but nearly all of themare now engaged in agriculture. At the census of 1901 over 2000 werereturned as supported by the ownership of land and 3000 as labourersand farmservants. Practically all the remainder are tenants. Theyare industrious, and their women work in the fields. The only cropswhich they object to grow are _kusum_ or safflower and san-hemp. TheNahonia Dangis, being the highest subcaste, refuse to sell milk or_ghi_. The men usually have Singh as a termination to their names, like Rajputs. Their dress and ornaments are of the type common inthe northern Districts. The women tattoo their bodies. 

Dangri

_Dangri. _ [508]--A small caste of melon and vegetable growers, whosename is derived from _dangar_ or _dangra_, a water-melon. They residein the Wardha and Bhandara Districts, and numbered about 1800 personsin 1911. The caste is a mixed one of functional origin, and appears tobe an offshoot from the Kunbis with additions from other sources. InWardha they say that their ancestor was one of two brothers to whomMahadeo gave the seeds of a juari plant and a water-melon respectivelyfor sowing. The former became the ancestor of the Kunbis and the latterof the Dangris. On one occasion when Mahadeo, assuming the guise of abeggar, asked the Dangri brother for a water-melon, he refused to giveit, and on this account his descendants were condemned to perpetualpoverty. In fact, the Dangris, like the other market-gardening castes, are badly off, possibly on account of their common habit of marryinga number of wives, whom they utilise as labourers in their vegetablegardens; for though a wife is better than a hired labourer for theirparticular method of cultivation, where supervision is difficultand the master may be put to serious loss from bad work and pettypilfering, while there is also much scope for women workers; yet onthe other hand polygamy tends to the breeding of family quarrels andto excessive subdivision of property. The close personal supervisionwhich is requisite perhaps also renders it especially difficult tocarry on the business of market-gardening on a large scale. In anycase the agricultural holdings of the Malis and Dangris are as arule very small. The conclusion indicated by the above story that theDangris are an offshoot from the Kunbi caste of cultivators appearsto be correct; and it is supported by the fact that they will acceptfood cooked with water from the Baone Kunbis. But their subcastesshow that even this small body is of very heterogeneous composition;for they are divided into the Teli, the Kalar, the Kunbi and theGadiwan Dangris, thus showing that the caste has received recruitsfrom the Telis or oilmen and the Kalars or liquor-sellers. TheGadiwan, as their name denotes, are a separate section who haveadopted the comparatively novel occupation of cart-driving for alivelihood. In Wardha there is also a small class of Panibhar orwaterman Dangris who are employed as water-bearers, this occupationarising not unnaturally from that of growing melons and other cropsin river-beds. And a few members of the caste have taken to workingin iron. The bulk of the Dangris, however, grow melons, chillies andbrinjals on the banks or in the beds of rivers; but as the melon cropis raised in a period of six weeks during the hot season, they canalso undertake some ordinary cultivation. When the melons ripen thefirst fruits are offered to Mahadeo and given to a Brahman to ensurethe success of the crop. When the melon plants are in flower, a womanmust not enter the field during the period of her monthly impurity, as it is believed that she would cause the crop to wither. While itmay safely be assumed that the Dangris originated from the great Kunbicaste, it may be noted that some of them tell a story to the effectthat their original home was Benares, and that they came from thereinto the Central Provinces; hence they call themselves Kashi Dangri, Kashi being the classical name for Benares. This legend appears tobe entirely without foundation, as their family names, speech andcustoms are alike of purely Marathi origin. But it is found amongother castes also that they like to pretend that they came fromBenares, the most sacred centre of Hinduism. The social customs ofthe Dangris resemble those of the Kunbis, and it is unnecessary todescribe them in detail. Before their weddings they have a curiousceremony known as Dewat Puja. The father of the bridegroom, with anaxe over his shoulder and accompanied by his wife, goes to a wellor a stream. Here they clean a small space with cow-dung and makean offering of rice, flowers, turmeric and incense, after whichthe man, breaking his bangle from off his wrist, throws it into thewater, apparently as a propitiatory offering for the success of themarriage. It is not stated what the bangle is made of, but it may beassumed that a valuable one would not thus be thrown away. As amongsome of the other Maratha castes, the bridegroom must be wrapped in ablanket on his journey to the bride's village. If a bachelor desiresto espouse a widow he must first go through the ceremony of marriagewith a swallow-wort plant. Polygamy is freely permitted, and someDangris are known to have as many as five wives. As already stated, wives are of great assistance in gardening work, which demands muchhand-labour. Divorce and the remarriage of widows are allowed. TheDangris commonly bury the dead, and they place cotton leaves over theeyes and ears of the corpse. In Bhandara they say that this is donewhen it is believed the dead person was possessed by an evil spirit, and there is possibly some idea of preventing the escape of the spiritfrom the body. In Wardha the Dangris have rather a bad reputation, and a saying current about them is '_Dangri beta puha chor_, ' or'A Dangri will steal even a shred of cotton'; but this may be a libel. 

Darzi

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice. _ 2. _Subdivisions. _ 3. _Sewn clothes not formerly worn. _ 4. _Occupation. _ 5. _Religion. _

1. General notice. 

_Darzi, Shimpi, Chhipi, Suji. _--The occupational caste of tailors. In1911 a total of 51, 000 persons were returned as belonging to the castein the Central Provinces and Berar. The Darzis are an urban caste andare most numerous in Districts with large towns. Mr. Crooke derivesthe word Darzi from the Persian _darz_, meaning a seam. The name Sujifrom _sui_, a needle, was formerly more common. Shimpi is the Marathaname, and Chhipi, from Chhipa a calico-printer or dyer, is anothername used for the caste, probably because it is largely recruited fromthe Chhipas. In Bombay they say that when Parasurama was destroyingthe Kshatriyas, two Rajput brothers hid themselves in a temple andwere protected by the priest, who set one of them to sew dresses forthe idol and the other to dye and stamp them. The first brother wascalled Chhipi and from him the Darzis are descended, the name beingcorrupted to Shimpi, and the second was called Chhipa and was theancestor of the dyers. The common title of the Darzis is Khalifa, anArabic word meaning 'The Successor of the Prophet. ' Colonel Templesays that it is not confined to them but is also used by barbers, cooks and monitors in schools. [509] The caste is of comparativelyrecent formation. In fact Sir D. Ibbetson wrote [510] that "Darzi, or its Hindi equivalent Suji, is purely an occupational term, andthough there is a Darzi guild in every town, there is no Darzi castein the proper acceptation of the word. The greater number of Darzisbelong perhaps to the Dhobi and Chhimba castes, more especially tothe latter. "

2. Subdivisions. 

The Darzis, however, are now recognised as a distinct caste, buttheir mixed origin is shown by the names of their subcastes andexogamous sections. Thus they have a Baman subdivision named after theBrahman caste. These will not take food from any other caste exceptBrahmans and are probably an offshoot from them. They are consideredto be the highest subdivision, and next to them come the Rai orRaj Darzis. Another subcaste is named Kaithia, after the Kayasths, and a third Srivastab, which is the name of a well-known subcasteof Kayasths derived from the town of Sravasti, now Sahet Mahet inthe Gonda District. [511] In Betul the Srivastab Darzis are reportedto forbid the remarriage of widows, thus showing that they desire tolive up to their distinguished ancestry. A third subcaste is known asChamarua and appears to be derived from the Chamars. Other subcastesare of the territorial type as Malwi, Khandeshi, Chhattisgarhi, Mathuria and so on, and the section or family names are usuallytaken from villages. Among them, however, we find Jugia from Jogi, Thakur or Rajput, Gujar, Khawas or barber, and Baroni, the title ofa female Dhimar. Mr. Crooke gives several other names. 

3. Sewn clothes not formerly worn. 

It may thus reasonably be concluded that the Darzis are a casteof comparatively recent origin, and the explanation is probablythat the use of the needle and thread in making clothes is a newfashion. Buchanan remarks: "The needle indeed seems to have beentotally unknown to the Hindus, and I have not been able to learnany Hindi word for sewing except that used to express passing theshuttle in the act of weaving.... " "Cloth composed of several piecessewn together is an abomination to the Hindus, so that every woman ofrank when she eats, cooks or prays, must lay aside her petticoat andretain only the wrapper made without the use of scissors or needle";and again, "The dress of the Hindu men of rank has become nearly thesame with that of the Muhammadans [512] who did not allow any officeremployed by them to appear at their _levées_ (Durbars) except in properdress. At home, however, the Hindu men, and on all occasions theirwomen, retain almost entirely their native dress, which consists ofvarious pieces of cloth wrapped round them without having been sewntogether in any form, and only kept in their place by having theirends thrust under the folds. " And elsewhere he states: "The floweringof cotton cloth with the needle has given a good deal of employmentto the Muhammadan women of Maldeh as the needle has never been used bythe Hindus. " [513] Darzi, as has been seen, is a Persian word, and innorthern India many tailors are Muhammadans. And it seems, therefore, a possible hypothesis that the needle and the art of sewing werebrought into general use by the Moslem invaders. It is true that inhis _Indo-Aryans_ [514] Mr. Rajendra Lal Mitra combats this hypothesisand demonstrates that made-up clothes were known to the Aryans ofthe Rig-Veda and are found in early statuary. But he admits that theinstances are not numerous, and it seems likely that the use of suchclothes may have been confined to royal and aristocratic families. Itis possible also that the Scythian invasions of the fifth centurybrought about a partial relapse from civilisation, during which certainarts and industries, and among them that of cutting and sewing cloth, were partially or completely lost. The tailor is not the familiarfigure in Hindu social life that he is, for example, in England. Herehe is traditionally an object or butt for ridicule as in the saying, 'Nine tailors make a man, ' and so on; and his weakness is no doubtsupposed to be due to the fact that he pursues a sedentary indooroccupation and one more adapted to women than men, the needle beingessentially a feminine implement. A similar ridicule, based no doubton exactly the same grounds, attaches in India to the village weaver, as is evidenced by the proverbs given in the articles on Bhulia, Kori, and Jolaha. No reason exists probably for the contempt in which theweaver class is held other than that their work is considered to bemore fitting for women than men. Thus in India the weaver appears totake the place of the tailor, and this leads to the conclusion thatwoven and not sewn clothes have always been commonly worn. 

In the Central Provinces, at least, the Darzi caste is practicallyconfined to the towns, and though cotton jackets are worn even bylabourers and shirts by the better-to-do, these are usually boughtready-made at the more important markets. Women, more conservative intheir dress than men, have only one garment prepared with the needle, the small bodice known as _choli_ or _angia_. And in Chhattisgarh, a landlocked tract very backward in civilisation, the _choli_ hashitherto not been worn and is only now being introduced. Though hefirst copied the Muhammadan and now shows a partiality for the Englishstyle of dress for outdoor use, the Hindu when indoors still reverts tothe one cloth round the waist and a second over the shoulders, whichwas probably once the regular garb of his countrymen. For meals thelatter is discarded, and this costume, so strange to English ideas, while partly based on considerations of ceremonial purity, may alsobe due to a conservative adherence to the ancient fashion, when sewnclothes were not worn. It is noticeable also that high-caste Hindus, though they may wear a coat of cloth or tasar silk and cotton trousers, copying the English, still often carry the _dupatta_ or shoulder-clothhanging round the neck. This now appears a useless encumbrance, butmay be the relic of the old body-cloth and therefore interesting as asurvival in dress, like the buttons on the back of our tail-coats towhich the flaps were once hooked up for riding, or the seams on thebacks of gloves, a relic of the time when the glove consisted simplyof finger-lengths sewn together. [515] More recently the _dupatta_ hasbeen made to fulfil the function of a pocket-handkerchief, while theeducated are now discarding the _dupatta_ and carry their handkerchiefsin their pockets. The old dress of ceremony for landowners is the_angarkha_, a long coat reaching to the knees and with flaps foldingover the breast and tied with strings. This is worn with pyjamas and isprobably the Muhammadan ceremonial costume as remarked by Buchanan. Inits correct form, at, least it has no buttons, and recalls the timewhen a similar state of things prevailed in English dress and the'trussing of his points' was a laborious daily task for every Englishgentleman. The _ghundis_ or small pieces of cloth made up into a ball, which were the precursors of the button, may still be seen on thecotton coats of rustics in the rural area. 

The substitution of clothes cut and sewn to fit the body for drapedclothes is a matter of regret from an artistic or picturesque pointof view, as the latter have usually a more graceful appearance. Thisis shown by the difficulty of reproducing modern clothes in statuary, trousers being usually the despair of the sculptor. But sewn clothes, when once introduced, must always prevail from considerations ofcomfort. When a Hindu pulls his _dhoti_ or loin-cloth up his legs andtucks it in round his hips in order to run or play a game he presumablyperforms the act described in the Bible as 'girding up his loins. '

4. Occupation. 

The social customs of the Darzis present no features of specialinterest and resemble those of the lower castes in their locality. Theyrank below the cultivating castes, and Brahmans will not take waterfrom their hands. Though not often employed by the Hindu villagerthe Darzi is to Europeans one of the best known of all castes. He ison the whole a capable workman and especially good at copying from apattern. His proficiency in this respect attracted notice so long agoas 1689, as shown in an interesting quotation in the _Bombay Gazetteer_referring to the tailors of Surat: [516] "The tailors here fashionclothes for the Europeans, either men or women, according to every modethat prevails, and fit up the commodes and towering head-dresses forthe women with as much skill as if they had been an Indian fashion, or themselves had been apprenticed at the Royal Exchange. (The commodewas a wire structure to raise the cap and hair. )" Since then the Darzihas no doubt copied in turn all the changes of English fashions. Heis a familiar figure in the veranda of the houses of Europeans, and his idiosyncrasies have been delightfully described by Eha in_Behind the Bungalow_. His needles and pins are stuck into the foldsof his turban, and Eha says that he is bandy-legged because of theposition in which he squats on his feet while sewing. In Gujaratthe tailor is often employed in native households. "Though even inwell-to-do families, " Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam writes, [517] "women sewtheir bodices and young children's clothes for everyday wear, everyfamily has its own tailor. As a rule tailors sew in their own houses, and in the tailor's shop may be seen workmen squatting in rows on apalm-leaf mat or on cotton-stuffed quilts. The wives and sons' wivesof the head of the establishment sit and work in the shop along withthe men. Their busy time is during the marriage season from Novemberto June. A village tailor is paid either in cash or grain and is notinfrequently a member of the village establishment. During the rains, the tailor's slack season, he supplements his earnings by tillage, holding land which Government has continued to him on payment ofone-half the ordinary rental. In south Gujarat, in the absence ofBrahmans, a Darzi officiates at Bhawad marriages, and in some Brahmanmarriages a Darzi is called with some ceremony to sew a bodice for thebride. On the other hand, in the Panch Mahals and Rewa Kantha, besidestailoring Darzis blow trumpets at marriage and other processions andhold so low a position that even Dhedas object to eat their food. " Itseems clear that in Gujarat the Darzi caste is of older standingthan in northern India, and it is possible that the art of sewingmay have been acquired through the sea trade which was carried onbetween the western coast and Arabia and the Persian Gulf. Here theDarzi has become a village menial, which he is not recorded as beingin any other part of India. 

5. Religion. 

Like the weaver, the Darzi is of a somewhat religious turn of mind, probably on account of his sedentary calling which gives him plentyof time for reflection. Many of them belong to the Namdeo sect, originated by a Chhipa or dyer, Namdeo Sadhu. Namdeo is said to havebeen a contemporary of Kabir and to have flourished in the twelfthor thirteenth century. He was a great worshipper of the god Vithobaof Pandharpur and is considered by the Marathas to be their oldestwriter, being the author of many Abhangs, or sacred hymns. [518] Hepreached the unity of God, recognising apparently Vithoba or Vishnuas the one deity, and the uselessness of ceremonial. His followersare mainly Dhobis and Chhipas, the two principal castes from whomthe Darzis have originated. [519] Namdeo's sect was thus apparently aprotest on the part of the Chhipas and Dhobis against their inferiorposition in the caste system and the tyranny of the Brahmans, andresembled the spiritual revolt of the weavers under Kabir and of theChamars under Ghasi Das and Jagjiwan Das. 

In Berar it is stated [520] that "the Simpi caste has twelve and ahalf divisions; of these the chief are known as the Jain, Marathiand Telugu Simpis. The Jain Simpis claim the hero Riminath as acaste-fellow, while the Marathas are often Lingayats and the Telugudivision generally Vaishnavas. " Before beginning work in the morningthe Darzi bows to his scissors or needle and prays to them for hislivelihood for that day. 

The Darzi's occupation, Mr. Crooke remarks, is a poor one and heldrather in contempt. The village proverb runs, '_Darzi ka put jab takjita tab tak sita_, ' 'The tailor's boy will do nothing but sew all hislife long. ' Another somewhat more complimentary saying is, '_Tanak sisuiya tak tak kare aur lakh taka ko banj kare_, ' or 'The tiny needlegoes _tuk tuk_, and makes merchandise worth a lakh of rupees. ' TheHindustani version of both proverbs is obviously intended to give thesound of a needle passing through cloth, and it is possible that ourword 'tuck' has the same origin. 

Dewar

1. General notice. 

_Dewar. _ [521]--(Derived from Devi, whom they worship, or from Diabar, 'One who lights a lamp, ' because they always practise magic witha lighted lamp. ) A Dravidian caste of beggars and musicians. Theynumbered about 2500 persons in 1911 and are residents of theChhattisgarh plain. The Dewars themselves trace their origin from aBinjhia named Gopal Rai, who accompanied Raja Kalyan Sai of Ratanpuron a visit to the Court of Delhi in Akbar's time. Gopal Rai wasa great wrestler, and while at Delhi he seized and held a _mast_elephant belonging to the Emperor. When the latter heard of it heordered a wrestling match to be arranged between Gopal Rai and hisown champion wrestler. Gopal Rai defeated and killed his opponent, and Kalyan Sai ordered him to compose a triumphal song and sing it inhonour of the occasion. He composed his song in favour of Devi MahaMai, or Devi the Great Mother, and the composition and recitation ofsimilar songs has ever since been the profession of his descendantsthe Dewars. The caste is, as is shown by the names of its sections, of mixed origin, and its members are the descendants of Gonds andKawars reinforced probably by persons who have been expelled fromtheir own caste and have become Dewars. They will still admit personsof any caste except the very lowest. 

2. Subdivisions. 

The caste has two principal divisions according to locality, namedRaipuria and Ratanpuria, Raipur and Ratanpur having been formerlythe two principal towns of Chhattisgarh. Within these are severalother local subdivisions, _e. G. _ Navagarhia or those belonging toNawagarh in Bilaspur, Sonakhania from Sonakhan south of the Mahanadi, Chatarrajiha from Chater Raj, in Raipur, and Sarangarhia from SarangarhState. Some other divisions are either occupational or social; thusthe Baghurra Dewars are those who tame tigers and usually live inthe direction of Bastar, the Baipari Dewars are petty traders inbrass or pewter ornaments which they sell to Banjara women, and theLohar and Jogi Dewars may be so called either because their ancestorsbelonged to these castes, or because they have adopted the professionof blacksmiths and beggars respectively. Probably both reasons arepartly applicable. These subdivisions are not strictly endogamous, but show a tendency to become so. The two main subcastes, Raipuriaand Ratanpuria, are distinguished by the musical instruments whichthey play on while begging. That of the Raipurias is a sort of rudefiddle called _sarangi_, which has a cocoanut shell as a resonatorwith horsehair strings, and is played with a bow. The Ratanpuriashave an instrument called _dhungru_, which consists of a piece ofbamboo about three feet long with a hollow gourd as a resonator andcatgut strings. In the latter the resonator is held uppermost andrests against the shoulder of the player, while in the former it isat the lower end and is placed against his waist. The section namesof the Dewars are almost all of Dravidian origin. Sonwania, Markam, Marai, Dhurwa, Ojha, Netam, Salam, Katlam and Jagat are the names ofwell-known Gond septs which are also possessed by the Dewars, andTelasi, Karsayal, Son-Mungir and others are Kawar septs which theyhave adopted. They admit that their ancestors were members of thesesepts among the Gonds and Kawars. Where the name of the ancestorhas a meaning which they understand, some totemistic observancessurvive. Thus the members of the Karsayal sept will not kill or eata deer. The septs are exogamous, but there is no other restrictionon marriage and the union of first cousins is permissible. 

3. Marriage customs. 

Adult marriage is usual, and if a husband cannot be found for agirl who has reached maturity she is given to her sister's husbandas a second wife, or to any other married person who will take herand give a feast to the caste. In some localities the boy who isto be married is sent with a few relatives to the girl's house. Onarrival he places a pot of wine and a nut before the girl's father, who, if he is willing to carry out the marriage, orders the nut tobe pounded up. This is always done by a member of the Sonwani sept, a similar respect being paid to this sept among some of the Dravidiantribes. The foreheads of the betrothed couple are smeared with the nutand with some yellow-coloured rice and they bow low to the elders ofthe caste. Usually a bride-price of Rs. 5 or 10 is then paid to theparents of the girl together with two pieces of cloth intended fortheir use. A feast follows, which consists merely of the distributionof uncooked food, as the Dewars, like some other low castes, willnot take cooked food from each other. Pork and wine are essentialingredients in the feast or the ceremony cannot be completed. Ifliquor is not available, water from the house of a Kalar (distiller)will do instead, but there is no substitute for pork. This, however, is as a rule easily supplied as nearly all the Dewars keep pigs, which are retailed to the Gonds for their sacrifices. The marriageceremony is performed within three or four months at most afterthe betrothal. Before entering the Mandwa or marriage-shed thebridegroom must place a jar of liquor in front of his prospectivefather-in-law. The bridegroom must also place a ring on the littlefinger of the bride's right hand, while she resists him as much asshe can, her hand having previously been smeared with castor oil inorder to make the task more difficult. Before taking the bride awaythe new husband must pay her father Rs. 20, and if he cannot do this, and in default of arrangements for remission which are sometimes made, must remain domiciled in his house for a certain period. As the brideis usually adult there is no necessity for a _gauna_ ceremony, andshe leaves for her husband's house once for all. Thereafter when shevisits the house of her parents she does so as a stranger, and theywill not accept cooked food at her hands nor she at theirs. Neitherwill her husband's parents accept food from her, and each couple withtheir unmarried children form an exclusive group in this respect. Sucha practice is found only among the low castes of mixed origin wherenobody is certain of his neighbour's standing. If a woman has gonewrong before marriage, most of the ceremonies are omitted. In such acase the bridegroom catches hold of the bride by the hair and givesher a blow by way of punishment for her sin, and they then walkseven times round the sacred pole, the whole ceremony taking lessthan an hour. The bride-price is under these circumstances reduced toRs. 15. Widow-marriage is permitted, and while in some localities thenew husband need give nothing, in others he must pay as much as Rs. 50to the relatives of the deceased husband. If a woman runs away fromher husband to another man, the latter must pay to the husband doublethe ordinary amount payable for a widow. If he cannot afford this, hemust return the woman with Rs. 10 as compensation for the wrong he hasdone. The Dewars are also reported to have the practice of mortgagingtheir wives or making them over temporarily to a creditor in returnfor a loan. Divorce is allowed for the usual causes and by mutualconsent. The husband must give a feast to the caste, which is lookedon as the funeral ceremony of the woman so far as he is concerned;thereafter she is dead to him and he cannot marry her again on painof the permanent exclusion of both from the caste. But a divorcedwoman can marry any other Dewar. Polygamy is freely allowed. 

4. Religion and social practices. 

The Dewars especially worship Devi Maha Mai and Dulha Deo. To theformer they offer a she-goat and to the latter a he-goat which must beof a dark colour. They worship their _dhungru_ or musical instrumenton the day of Dasahra. They consider the sun and the moon to be brotherand sister, and both to be manifestations of the deity. They bury theirdead, but those who are in good circumstances dig up the bones after ayear or two and burn them, taking the ashes to a sacred river. Mourninglasts for seven or ten days according as the deceased is unmarried ormarried, and during this time they abjure flesh and oil. Their socialrules are peculiar. Though considered impure by the higher castes, they will not take cooked food from a Brahman, whom they call aKumhati Kida, or an insect which effects the metamorphosis of othersinto his own form, and who will therefore change them into his owncaste. Nor will they take cooked food from members of their own caste, but they accept it from several of the lower castes including Gonds, whose leavings they will eat. This is probably because they beg fromGonds and attend their weddings. They keep pigs and pork is theirfavourite food, but they do not eat beef. They have a tribal councilwith a headman called Gaontia or Jemadar, who always belongs eitherto the Sonwani or Telasi section. Among offences for which a man istemporarily put out of caste is that of naming his younger brother'swife. He must also abstain from going into her room or touching herclothes. This rule does not apply to an elder brother's wife. 

5. Occupation. 

The Dewars are professional beggars, and play on the musicalinstruments called _dhungru_ and _sarangi_ which have already beendescribed. The Ratanpurias usually celebrate in an exaggerated stylethe praises of Gopal Rai, their mythical ancestor. One of his exploitswas to sever with a single sword-stroke the stalk of a plantaininside which the Emperor of Delhi had caused a solid bar of iron to beplaced. The Raipurias prefer a song, called Gujrigit, about curds andmilk. They also sing various songs relating how a woman is beloved bya Raja who tries to seduce her, but her chastity is miraculously savedby some curious combination of circumstances. They exorcise ghosts, train monkeys, bears and tigers for exhibition, and sell ornamentsof base metal. In Raipur the men take about performing monkeys andthe women do tattooing, for which they usually receive payment in theshape of an old or new cloth. A few have settled down to cultivation, but as a rule they are wanderers, carrying from place to place theirscanty outfit of a small tent and mattress, both made of old rags, and a few vessels. They meet at central villages during the Holifestival. The family is restricted to the parents and unmarriedchildren, separation usually taking place on marriage. 

Dhakar

1. Origin and subdivisions. 

_Dhakar. _ [522]--A small caste belonging solely to the Bastar State. In1911 they numbered 5500 persons in Bastar, and it is noticeablethat there were nearly twice as many women as men. The term Dhakarconnotes a man of illegitimate descent and is applied to the Kirarsof the Central Provinces and perhaps to other castes of mixed Rajputorigin. But in Bastar it is the special designation of a considerableclass of persons who are the descendants of alliances between Brahmanand Rajput immigrants and women of the indigenous tribes. They aredivided, like the Halbas, into two groups--Purait or pure, and Suraitor mixed. The son of a Brahman or Rajput father by a Rawat (herdsman)or Halba mother is a Purait, but one born from a woman of the Muria, Marar, Nai or Kalar castes is a Surait. But these latter can becomePuraits after two or three generations, and the same rule applies tothe son of a Dhakar father by a Halba or Rawat woman, who also ranks inthe first place as a Surait. Descendants of a Dhakar father by a Muriaor other low-caste woman, however, always remain Suraits. The Puraitsand Suraits form endogamous groups, and the latter will accept cookedfood from the former. The more respectable Dhakars round Jagdalpurare now tending, however, to call themselves Rajputs and refuse toadmit any one of mixed birth into their community. 

One legend of their origin is that the first Dhakar was the offspringof a Brahman cook of the Raja of Bastar with a Kosaria Rawat woman;and though this is discredited by the Dhakars it is probably a fairlycorrect version of the facts. An inferior branch of the caste existswhich is known as Chikrasar; it is related of them that their ancestorsonce went out hunting and set the forest on fire as a method of drivingthe game, as they occasionally do still. They came across the roastedbody of a dog in the forest and ate it without knowing what animal itwas. In the stomach, however, some cooked rice was found, and hence itwas known as a dog and they were branded as dog-eaters. As a penaltythe Raja imposed on them the duty of thatching a hut for him at theDasahra festival, which their descendants still perform. The otherDhakars refuse to marry or eat with them, and it is clear from thecustom of thatching the Raja's hut that they are a primitive andjungly branch of the caste. 

2. Marriage. 

If a girl becomes with child by a member of the caste she is made overto him without a marriage, or to the man to whom she was previouslybetrothed if he is still willing to take her. Neither is she expelledif the same event occurs with a man of any higher caste, but if hebe of lower caste she is thrown out. Marriages are usually arrangedby the parents but an adult girl may choose her own husband, and sheis then wedded to him with abbreviated rites so that her family mayavoid the disgrace of her entering his house like a widow or keptwoman. Formerly a Dhakar might marry his granddaughter, but this isno longer done. When the signs of puberty first appear in a girl sheis secluded and must not see or be seen by any man. They think thatthe souls of dead ancestors are reborn in children, and if a childrefuses to suck they ask which of their ancestors he is and whathe wants, or they offer it some present such as a silver bangle, and if the child then takes to the breast they give away the bangleto a Brahman. The sixth day after a child is born the paternal auntprepares lamp-black from a lamp fed with melted butter and rubs iton the child's eyes and receives a small present. 

3. Funeral rites. 

The period of mourning or impurity after a death must terminatewith a feast to the caste-men, and it continues until this isgiven. Consequently the other caste-men subscribe for a poor member, so that he may give the feast and resume his ordinary avocations. Onthis occasion one of the guests puts a small fish in a leaf-cup fullof water, which no doubt represents the spirit of the deceased, andall the mourners touch this cup and are freed from their impurity. ABrahman is also invited, who lights a lamp fed with melted butter andthen asks for a cow or some other valuable present as a recompense forhis service of blowing out the lamp. Until this is done the Dhakarsthink that the soul of the departed is tortured by the flame of thelamp. If the Brahman is pleased, he pours some curds over the lampand this acts as a cooling balm to the soul. When a member of thefamily dies the mourners shave the whole head with beard and moustache. 

4. Occupation and social status. 

The Dhakars are mainly engaged in cultivation as farmservants andlabourers. Like the Halbas, they consider it a sin to heat or forgeiron, looking upon the metal as sacred. They eat the flesh of cleananimals, but abstain from both pigs and chickens, and some also do noteat the peacock. A man as well as a woman is permanently expelled foradultery with a person of lower caste, the idea of this rule beingno doubt to prevent degradation in the status of the caste from theadmission of the offspring of such unions. If one Dhakar beats anotherwith a shoe, both are temporarily put out of caste. But if a manseduces a caste-man's wife and is beaten with a shoe by the husband, he is permanently expelled, while the husband is readmitted aftera feast. On being received back into caste intercourse an offenderis purified by drinking water in which the image of a local god hasbeen dipped or the Raja of Bastar has placed his toe. Like other lowcastes of mixed origin, they are very particular about each other'sstatus and will only accept cooked food from families who are wellknown to them. At caste feasts each family or group of families cooksfor itself, and in some cases parents refuse to eat with the familyinto which their daughter has married and hence cannot do so withthe girl herself. 

Dhangar

1. Traditions and structure of the caste. 

_Dhangar. _ [523]--The Maratha caste of shepherds and blanket-weavers, numbering 96, 000 persons in the Central Provinces and Berar. Theyreside principally in the Nagpur, Wardha, Chanda and Nimar Districtsof the Central Provinces and in all Districts of Berar. The Dhangarsare a very numerous caste in Bombay and Hyderabad. The name is derivedeither from the Sanskrit _dhenu_, a cow, or more probably from _dhan_, [524] wealth, a term which is commonly applied to flocks of sheepand goats. It is said that the first sheep and goats came out of anant-hill and scattering over the fields began to damage the crops ofthe cultivators. They, being helpless, prayed to Mahadeo to rescuethem from this pest and he thereupon created the first Dhangar to tendthe flocks. The Dhangars consequently revere an ant-hill, and neverremove one from their fields, while they worship it on the Diwali daywith offerings of rice, flowers and part of the ear of a goat. Whentending and driving sheep and goats they ejaculate 'Har, Har, ' whichis a name of Mahadeo used by devotees in worshipping him. The Dhangarsfurnished a valuable contingent to Sivaji's guerilla soldiery, andthe ruling family of Indore State belong to this caste. It is dividedinto the following subcastes: Varadi or Barade, belonging to Berar;Kanore or Kanade, of Kanara; Jhade, or those belonging to the Bhandara, Balaghat and Chhindwara Districts, called the Jhadi or hill country;Ladse, found in Hyderabad; Gadri, from _gadar_, a sheep, a divisionprobably consisting of northerners, as the name for the cognatecaste of shepherds in Hindustan is Gadaria; Telange, belonging tothe Telugu country; Marathe, of the Maratha country; Mahurai fromMahur in Hyderabad, and one or two others. Eleven subcastes in allare reported. For the purposes of marriage a number of exogamousgroups or septs exist which may be classified according to theirnomenclature as titular and totemistic, many having also the namesof other castes. Examples of sept names are: Powar, a Rajput sept;Dokra, an old man; Marte, a murderer or slayer; Sarodi, the name ofa caste of mendicants; Mhali, a barber; Kaode, a crow; Chambhade, aChamar; Gujde, a Gujar; Juade, a gambler; Lamchote, long-haired; Bodke, bald-headed; Khatik, a butcher; Chandekar, from Chanda; Dambhade, onehaving pimples on the body; Halle, a he-buffalo; Moya, a grass, andothers. The sept names show that the caste is a functional one of verymixed composition, partly recruited from members of other castes whohave taken to sheep-tending and generally from the non-Aryan tribes. 

2. Marriage. 

A man must not marry within his own sept or that of his mother, nor may he marry a first cousin. He may wed a younger sisterof his wife during her lifetime, and the practice of marrying agirl and boy into the same family, called Anta Santa or exchange, is permitted. Occasionally the husband does service for his wifein his father-in-law's house. In Wardha the Dhangars measure theheights of a prospective bride and bridegroom with a piece of stringand consider it a suitable match if the husband is taller than thewife, whether he be older or not. Marriages may be infant or adult, and polygamy is permitted, no stigma attaching to the taking of asecond wife. Weddings may be celebrated in the rains up to the monthof Kunwar (September), this provision probably arising from the factthat many Dhangars wander about the country during the open season, and are only at home during the rainy months. Perhaps for the samereason the wedding may, if the officiating priest so directs, be heldat the house of a Brahman. This happens only when the Brahman has sownan offering of rice, called Gag, in the name of the goddess Rana Devi, the favourite deity of the Dhangars. On his way to the bride's housethe bridegroom must be covered with a black blanket. Nowadays thewedding is sometimes held at the bridegroom's house and the bridecomes for it. The caste say that this is done because there are notinfrequently among the members of the bridegroom's family widows whohave remarried or women who have been kept by men of higher castes orbeen guilty of adultery. The bride's female relatives refuse to washthe feet of these women and this provokes quarrels. To meet such casesthe new rule has been introduced. At the wedding the priest sits on theroof of the house facing the west, and the bride and bridegroom standbelow with a curtain between them. As the sun is half set he claps hishands and the bridegroom takes the clasped hands of the bride withinhis own, the curtain being withdrawn. The bridegroom ties round thebride's neck a yellow thread of seven strands, and when this is doneshe is married. Next morning a black bead necklace is substituted forthe thread. The expenses of the bridegroom's party are about Rs. 50, and of the bride's about Rs. 30. The remaining procedure follows thecustomary usage of the Maratha Districts. Widows are permitted tomarry again, but must not take a second husband from the sept to whichthe first belonged. A considerable price is paid for a widow, and itis often more expensive to marry one than a girl. A Brahman and themalguzar (village proprietor) should be present at the ceremony. If abachelor marries a widow he must first go through the ceremony witha silver ring, and if the ring is subsequently lost or broken, itsfuneral rites must be performed. Divorce is allowed in the presence ofthe caste _panchayat_ at the instance of either party for sufficientreason, as the misconduct or bad temper of the wife or the impotencyof the husband. 

3. Religion. 

Mahadeo is the special deity of the Dhangars, and they also observethe ordinary Hindu festivals. At Diwali they worship their goats bydyeing their horns and touching their feet. One Bahram of Nachangaonnear Pulgaon is the tutelary deity of the Wardha Dhangars and theprotector of their flocks. On the last day of the month of Maghthey perform a special ceremony called the Deo Puja. A Dhimar actsas priest to the caste on this occasion and fashions some figuresof idols out of rice to which vermilion and flowers are offered. Hethen distributes the grains of rice to the Dhangars who are present, pronouncing a benediction. The Dhimar receives his food and a present, and it is essential that the act of worship should be performed byone of this caste. In their houses they have Kul-Devi and Khandobathe Maratha hero, who are the family deities. But in large familiesthey are kept only in the house of the eldest brother. Kul-Devi or thegoddess of the family is worshipped at weddings, and a goat is offeredto her in the month of Chait (March). The head is buried beneath hershrine inside the house and the body is consumed by members of thefamily only. Khandoba is worshipped on Sundays and they identify himwith the sun. Vithoba, a form of Vishnu, is revered on Wednesdays, and Balaji, the younger brother of Rama, on Fridays. Many familiesalso make a representation of some deceased bachelor relative, whichthey call Munjia, and of some married woman who is known as Mairnior Sasin, and worship them daily. 

4. Birth, death and social status. 

The Dhangars burn their dead unless they are too poor to purchase woodfor fuel, in which case burial is resorted to. Unmarried children andpersons dying from smallpox, leprosy, cholera and snake-bite are alsoburied. At the pyre the widow breaks her bangles and throws her glassbeads on to her husband's body. On returning from the burning _ghat_the funeral party drink liquor. Some ganja, tobacco and anything elsewhich the deceased may have been fond of during his life are leftnear the grave on the first day. Mourning is observed during ten dayson the death of an adult and for three days for a child. Children areusually named on the twelfth day after birth, the well-to-do employinga Brahman for the purpose. On this day the child must not see a lamp, as it is feared that if he should do so he will afterwards have asquint. Only one name is given as a rule, but subsequently when thechild comes to be married, if the Brahman finds that its name does notmake the marriage auspicious, he substitutes another and the childis afterwards known by this new name. The caste employ Brahmans forceremonies at birth and marriage. They eat flesh including fowls andwild pig, and drink liquor, but abstain from other unclean food. Theywill take food from a Kunbi, Phulmali or a Sunar, and water from anyof the good cultivating castes. A Kunbi will take water from them. Thewomen of the caste wear bracelets of lead or brass on the right wristand glass bangles on the left. Permanent or temporary excommunicationfrom caste is imposed for the usual offences, and among those visitedwith the minor penalty are selling shoes, touching the carcase ofa dog or cat, and killing a cow or buffalo, or allowing one to diewith a rope round its neck. No food is cooked for five weeks in ahouse in which a cat has died. The social standing of the caste is low. 

5. Occupation. 

The traditional occupation of the Dhangars is to tend sheep and goats, and they also sell goats' milk, make blankets from the wool of sheep, and sometimes breed and sell stock for slaughter. They generallylive near tracts of waste land where grazing is available. Sheep arekept in open and goats in roofed folds. Like English shepherds theycarry sticks or staffs and have dogs to assist in driving the flocks, and they sometimes hunt hares with their dogs. Their dress consistsfrequently only of a loin-cloth and a blanket, and having to bearexposure to all weathers, they are naturally strong and hardy. Inappearance they are dark and of medium size. They eat three timesa day and bathe in the evening on returning from work, though theirablutions are sometimes omitted in the cold weather. 

Dhanuk

1. Original and classical records. 

_Dhanuk. _--A low caste of agriculturists found principally in theNarsinghpur District, which contained three-fourths of the totalof nearly 7000 persons returned in 1911. The headquarters of thecaste are in the United Provinces, which contains more than a lakhof Dhanuks. The name is derived from the Sanskrit _dhanuska_, anarcher, and the caste is an ancient one, its origin as given inthe Padma Purana, quoted by Sir Henry Elliot, being from a Chamarfather and a Chandal or sweeper mother. Another pedigree makes themother a Chamar and the father an outcaste Ahir. Such statements, Sir H. Risley remarks in commenting on this genealogy, [525] serveto indicate in a general way the social rank held by the Dhanuks atthe time when it was first thought necessary to enrol them among themixed castes. Dr. Buchanan [526] says that the Dhanuks were in formertimes the militia of the country. He states that all the Dhanuks wereat one time probably slaves and many were recruited to fill up themilitary ranks--a method of security which had long been prevalentin Asia, the armies of the Parthians having been composed entirelyof slaves. A great many Dhanuks, at the time when Buchanan wrote, were still slaves, but some annually procured their liberty by theinability of their masters to maintain them and their unwillingness tosell their fellow-creatures. It may be concluded, therefore, that theDhanuks were a body of servile soldiery, recruited as was often thecase from the subject Dravidian tribes; following the all-powerfultendency of Hindu society they became a caste, and owing to thecomparatively respectable nature of their occupation obtained a risein social position from the outcaste status of the subject Dravidiansto the somewhat higher group of castes who were not unclean but fromwhom a Brahman would not accept water. They did not advance so faras the Khandaits, another caste formed from military service, whowere also, Sir H. Risley shows, originally recruited from a subjecttribe, probably because the position of the Dhanuks was always moresubordinate and no appreciable number of them came to be officersor leaders. The very debased origin of the caste already mentionedas given in the Padma Purana may be supposed as in other cases to bean attempt on the part of the priestly chronicler to repress what heconsidered to be unfounded claims to a rise in rank. But the Dhanuks, not less than the other soldier castes, have advanced a pretensionto be Kshatriyas, those of Narsinghpur sometimes calling themselvesDhankarai Rajputs, though this claim is of course in their casea pure absurdity. It is not necessary to suppose that the Dhanuksof the Central Provinces are the lineal descendants of the castewhose genealogy is given in the Puranas; they may be a much morerecent offshoot from a main caste, formed in a precisely similarmanner from military service. [527] Mr. Crooke [528] surmises thatthey belonged to the large impure caste of Basors or basket-makers, who took to bow-making and thence to archery; and some connectionis traceable between the Dhanuks and Basors in Narsinghpur. Such aseparation must probably have occurred in comparatively recent times, inasmuch as some recollection of it still remains. The fact thatLodhis are the only caste besides Brahmans from whom the Dhanuks ofNarsinghpur will take food cooked without water may indicate thatthey formed the militia of Lodhi chieftains in the Nerbudda valley, a hypothesis which is highly probable on general grounds. 

2. Marriage. 

In the Central Provinces the Dhanuks have no subcastes. [529] Thenames of their _gotras_ or family groups, though they themselvescannot explain them, are apparently territorial: as Maragaiyan fromMaragaon, Benaikawar from Benaika village, Pangarya from Panagar, Binjharia from Bindhya or Vindhya, Barodhaya from Barodha village, andso on. Marriages within the same _gotra_ and between first cousins areprohibited, and child-marriage is usual. The father of the boy alwaystakes the initiative in arranging a match, and if a man wants to finda husband for his daughter he must ask the assistance of his relativesto obtain a proposal, as it would be derogatory to move in the matterhimself. The contract for marriages is made at the boy's house and isnot inviolable. Before the departure of the bridegroom for the bride'svillage, he stands at the entrance of the marriage-shed, and his mothercomes up and places her breast to his mouth and throws rice balls andashes over him. The former action signifies the termination of hisboyhood, while the latter is meant to protect him on his importantjourney. The bridegroom in walking away treads on a saucer in whicha little rice is placed. Widow-marriage and divorce are permitted. 

3. Social rank and customs. 

A few members of the caste are tenants and the bulk of themfarmservants and field-labourers. They also act as villagewatchmen. The Dhanuks eat flesh and fish, but not fowls, beef or pork, and they abstain from liquor. They will take food cooked without waterfrom a Brahman and a Lodhi, but not from a Rajput; but in Nimar thestatus of the caste is distinctly lower, and they eat pig's fleshand the leavings of Brahmans and Rajputs. The mixed nature of thecaste is shown by the fact that they will receive into the communityillegitimate children born of a Dhanuk father and a woman of a highercaste such as Lodhi or Kurmi. They rank as already indicated justabove the impure castes. 

Dhanwar

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Origin and traditions. _ 2. _Exogamous septs. _ 3. _Marriage. _ 4. _Festivities of the women of the bridegroom's party. _ 5. _Conclusion of the marriage. _ 6. _Widow-marriage and divorce. _ 7. _Childbirth. _ 8. _Disposal of the dead. _ 9. _Religion. _ 10. _Magic and witchcraft. _ 11. _Social rules. _ 12. _Dress and tattooing. _ 13. _Names of children. _ 14. _Occupation. _

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Dhanwar, Dhanuhar. _ [530]--A primitive tribe living in the wild hillycountry of the Bilaspur zamindari estates, adjoining Chota Nagpur. Theynumbered only 19, 000 persons in 1911. The name Dhanuhar means a bowman, and the bulk of the tribe have until recently been accustomed toobtain their livelihood by hunting with bow and arrows. The name isthus merely a functional term and is analogous to those of Dhangar, or labourer, and Kisan, or cultivator, which are applied to theOraons, and perhaps Halba or farmservant, by which another tribeis known. The Dhanwars are almost certainly not connected with theDhanuks of northern India, though the names have the same meaning. Theyare probably an offshoot of either the Gond or the Kawar tribe or amixture of both. Their own legend of their origin is nearly the sameas that of the Gonds, while the bulk of their sept or family names areidentical with those of the Kawars. Like the Kawars, the Dhanwars haveno language of their own and speak a corrupt form of ChhattisgarhiHindi. Mr. Jeorakhan Lal writes of them:--"The word Dhanuhar is acorrupt form of Dhanusdhar or a holder of a bow. The bow consists ofa cleft piece of bamboo and the arrow is made of wood of the _dhaman_tree. [531] The pointed end is furnished with a piece or a nail ofiron called _phani_, while to the other end are attached feathersof the vulture or peacock with a string of tasar silk. Dhanuhar boyslearn the use of the bow at five years of age, and kill birds with itwhen they are seven or eight years old. At their marriage ceremonythe bridegroom carries an arrow with him in place of a dagger asamong the Hindus, and each household has a bow which is worshipped atevery festival. " According to their own legend the ancestors of theDhanuhars were two babies whom a tigress unearthed from the ground whenscratching a hole in her den, and brought up with her own young. Theywere named Naga Lodha and Nagi Lodhi, _Naga_ meaning naked and _Lodha_being the Chhattisgarhi word for a wild dog. Growing up they livedfor some time as brother and sister, until the deity enjoined themto marry. But they had no children until Naga Lodha, in obedience tothe god's instructions, gave his wife the fruit of eleven trees toeat. From these she had eleven sons at a birth, and as she observeda fortnight's impurity for each of them the total period was five anda half months. In memory of this, Dhanuhar women still remain impurefor five months after delivery, and do not worship the gods for thatperiod. Afterwards the couple had a twelfth son, who was born witha bow and arrows in his hand, and is now the ancestral hero of thetribe, being named Karankot. One day in the forest when Karankot wasnot with them, the eleven brothers came upon a wooden palisade, insidewhich were many deer and antelope tended by twelve Gaoli (herdsmen)brothers with their twelve sisters. The Lodha brothers attacked theplace, but were taken prisoners by the Gaolis and forced to removedung and other refuse from the enclosure. After a time Karankotwent in search of his brothers and, coming to the place, defeatedthe Gaolis and rescued them and carried off the twelve sisters. Thetwelve brothers subsequently married the twelve Gaoli girls, Karankothimself being wedded to the youngest and most beautiful, whose namewas Maswasi. From each couple is supposed to be descended one of thetribes who live in this country, as the Binjhwar, Bhumia, Korwa, Majhi, Kol, Kawar and others, the Dhanuhars themselves being theprogeny of Karankot and Maswasi. The bones of the animals killed byKarankot were thrown into ditches dug round the village and form thepits of _chhui mithi_ or white clay now existing in this tract. 

2. Exogamous septs. 

The Dhanuhars, being a small tribe, have no endogamous divisions, but are divided into a number of totemistic exogamous septs. Many ofthe septs are called after plants or animals, and members of the septrefrain from killing or destroying the animal or plant after which itis named. The names of the septs are generally Chhattisgarhi words, though a few are Gondi. Out of fifty names returned twenty are alsofound in the Kawar tribe and four among the Gonds. This makes itprobable that the Dhanuhars are mainly an offshoot from the Kawarswith an admixture of Gonds and other tribes. A peculiarity worthnoticing is that one or two of the septs have been split up into anumber of others. The best instance of this is the Sonwani sept, which is found among several castes and tribes in Chhattisgarh;its name is perhaps derived from _Sona pani_ (Gold water), and itsmembers have the function of readmitting those temporarily expelledfrom social intercourse by pouring on them a little water into whicha piece of gold has been dipped. Among the Dhanuhars the Sonwanisept has become divided into the Son-Sonwani, who pour the goldwater over the penitent; the Rakat Sonwani, who give him to drinka little of the blood of the sacrificial fowl; the Hardi Sonwani, who give turmeric water to the mourners when they come back froma funeral; the Kari Sonwani, who assist at this ceremony; and oneor two others. The totem of the Kari Sonwani sept is a black cow, and when such an animal dies in the village members of the septthrow away their earthen pots. All these are now separate exogamoussepts. The Deswars are another sept which has been divided in thesame manner. They are, perhaps, a more recent accession to the tribe, and are looked down on by the others because they will eat the fleshof bison. The other Dhanwars refuse to do this because they say thatwhen Sita, Rama's wife, was exiled in the jungles, she could not finda cow to worship and so revered a bison in its stead. And they saythat the animal's feet are grey because of the turmeric water whichSita poured on them, and that the depression on its forehead is themark of her hand when she placed a _tika_ or sign there with colouredrice. The Deswars are also called Dui Duaria or 'Those having twodoors, ' because they have a back door to their huts which is usedonly by women during their monthly period of impurity and kept shutat all other times. One of the septs is named Manakhia, which means'man-eater, ' and it is possible that its members formerly offered humansacrifices. Similarly, the Rakat-bund or 'Drop of blood Deswars' maybe so called because they shed human blood. A member of the Telasi or'Oil' sept, when he has killed a deer, will cut off the head and bringit home; placing it in his courtyard, he suspends a burning lamp overthe head and places grains of rice on the forehead of the deer; andhe then considers that he is revering the oil in the lamp. Members ofthe Surajgoti or sun sept are said to have stood as representativesof the sun in the rite of the purification of an offender. 

3. Marriage. 

Marriage within the sept is prohibited, and usually also betweenfirst cousins. Girls are commonly married a year or two after theyarrive at maturity. The father of the boy looks out for a suitablegirl for his son and sends a friend to make the proposal. If thisis accepted a feast is given, and is known as Phul Phulwari or 'Thebursting of the flower. ' The betrothal itself is called Phaldan or'The gift of the fruit'; on this occasion the contract is ratifiedand the usual presents are exchanged. Yet a third ceremony, prior tothe marriage, is that of the Barokhi or inspection, when the brideand bridegroom are taken to see each other. On this occasion theyexchange copper rings, placing them on each other's finger, and theboy offers vermilion to the earth, and then rubs it on the bride'sforehead. When the girl is mature the date of the wedding is fixed, a small bride-price of six rupees and a piece of cloth being usuallypaid. If the first signs of puberty appear in the girl during thebright fortnight of the month, the marriage is held during the darkfortnight and vice versa. The marriage-shed is built in the form ofa rectangle and must consist of either seven or nine posts in threelines. The bridegroom's party comprises from twenty to forty persons ofboth sexes. When they arrive at the bride's village her father comesout to meet them and gives them leaf-pipes to smoke. He escorts theminside the village where a lodging has been prepared for them. Theceremony is based on that of the local Hindus with numerous pettyvariations in points of detail. In the actual ceremony the bride andbridegroom are first supported on the knees of two relatives. A sheetis held between them and each throws seven handfuls of parched riceover the other. They are then made to stand side by side; a knotis made of their cloths containing a piece of turmeric, and thebride's left hand is laid over the bridegroom's right one, and onit a _sendhaura_ or wooden box for vermilion is placed. The bride'smother moves seven times round the pair holding a lighted lamp, atwhich she warms her hand and then touches the marriage-crowns of thebride and bridegroom seven times in succession. And finally the couplewalk seven times round the marriage-post, the bridegroom followingthe bride. The marriage is held during the day, and not, as is usual, at night or in the early morning. Afterwards, the pair are seated inthe marriage-shed, the bridegroom's leg being placed over that of thebride, with their feet in a brass dish. The bride's mother then washestheir great toes with milk and the rest of their feet with water. Thebridegroom applies vermilion seven times to the marriage-post and tohis wife's forehead at the parting of her hair. The couple are fedwith rice and pulses one after the other out of the same leaf-plates, and the parties have a feast. Next morning, before their departure, the father of the bride asks the bridegroom to do his best to put upwith his daughter, who is thievish, gluttonous and so slovenly thatshe lets her food drop on to the floor; but if he finds he cannotendure her, to send her home. In the same manner the father of theboy apologises for his son, saying that he cares only for mischiefand pleasure. The party then returns to the bridegroom's house. 

4. Festivities of the women of the bridegroom's party. 

During the absence of the wedding party the women of the bridegroom'shouse with others in the village sing songs at night in themarriage-shed constructed at his house. These are known as Dindwa, aterm applied to a man who has no wife, whether widower or bachelor. Asthey sing, the women dance in two lines with their arms interlaced, clapping their hands as they move backwards and forwards. The songs areof a lewd character, treating of intrigues in love mingled with abuseof their relatives and of other men who may be watching the proceedingsby stealth. No offence is taken on such occasions, whatever may besaid. In Upper India, Mr. Jeorakhan Lal states such songs are sungat the time of the marriage and are called _Naktoureki louk_ or theceremony of the useless or shameless ones, because women, however shyand modest, become at this time as bold and shameless as men are at theHoli festival. The following are a few lines from one of these songs:

 The wheat-cake is below and the urad-cake is above. Do you see my brother's brother-in-law watching the dance in the narrow lane. [532]

 A sweetmeat is placed on the wheat-cake; a handsome young black-guard has climbed on to the top of the wall to see the dance. 

 When a woman sees a man from afar he looks beautiful and attractive: but when he comes near she sees that he is not worth the trouble. 

 I went to the market and came back with my salt. Oh, I looked more at you than at my husband who is wedded to me. 

5. Conclusion of the marriage. 

Several of the ceremonies are repeated at the bridegroom's houseafter the return of the wedding party. On the day following them thecouple are taken to a tank walking under a canopy held up by theirfriends. Here they throw away their marriage-crowns, and play athiding a vessel under the water. When they return to the house a goatis sacrificed to Dulha Deo and the bride cooks food in her new housefor the first time, her husband helping her, and their relatives andfriends in the village are invited to partake of it. After this theconjugal chamber is prepared by the women of the household, and thebride is taken to it and told to consider her husband's house as herown. The couple are then left together and the marriage is consummated. 

6. Widow-marriage and divorce. 

The remarriage of widows is permitted but it is not considered as areal marriage, according to the saying: "A woman cannot be anointedtwice with the marriage oil, as a wooden cooking-vessel cannot be puttwice on the fire. " A widow married again is called a _Churiyahi Dauki_or 'Wife made by bangles, ' as the ceremony may be completed by puttingbangles on her wrists. When a woman is going to marry again she leavesher late husband's house and goes and lives with her own people orin a house by herself. The second husband makes his proposal to herthrough some other women. If accepted he comes with a party of hismale friends, taking with him a new cloth and some bangles. They arereceived by the widow's guardian, and they sit in her house smoking andchewing tobacco while some woman friend retires with her and investsher with the new cloth and bangles. She comes out and the new husbandand wife bow to all the Dhanwars, who are subsequently regaled withliquor and goats' flesh, and the marriage is completed. Polygamy ispermitted but is not common. A husband may divorce his wife for failingto bear him issue, for being ugly, thievish, shrewish or a witch, orfor an intrigue with another man. If a married woman commits adulterywith another man of the tribe they are pardoned with the exactionof one feast. If her paramour is a Gond, Rawat, Binjhwar or Kawar, he is allowed to become a Dhanwar and marry her on giving severalfeasts, the exact number being fixed by the village Baiga or priestin a _panchayat_ or committee. With these exceptions a married womanhaving an intrigue with a man of another caste is finally expelled. Awife who desires to divorce her husband without his agreement is alsoturned out of the caste like a common woman. 

7. Childbirth. 

After the birth of a child the mother receives no food for the firstand second, and fourth and fifth days, while on the third she is givenonly a warm decoction to drink. On the sixth day the men of the houseare shaved and their impurity ceases. But the mother cooks no foodfor two months after bearing a female child and for three monthsif it is a male. The period has thus been somewhat reduced from thetraditional one of five and a half months, [533] but it must stillbe highly inconvenient. At the expiration of the time of impuritythe earthen pots are changed and the mother prepares a meal for thewhole household. During her monthly period of impurity a woman cooksno food for six days. On the seventh day she bathes and cleans herhair with clay, and is then again permitted to touch the drinkingwater and cook food. 

8. Disposal of the dead. 

The tribe bury the dead. The corpse is wrapped in an old cloth andcarried to the grave on a cot turned upside down. On arrival thereit is washed with turmeric and water and wrapped in a new cloth. Thebearers carry the corpse seven times round the open grave, saying, 'This is your last marriage, ' that is, with the earth. The malerelatives and friends fill in the grave with earth, working withtheir hands only and keep their backs turned to the grave so as toavoid seeing the corpse. It is said that each person should throwonly five handfuls. Other people then come up and fill in the grave, trampling down the surface as much as possible. For three days after adeath the bereaved family do not cook for themselves but are suppliedwith food by their friends. These, however, do not give them any saltas it is thought that the craving for salt will divert their mindsfrom dwelling on their loss. The tribe do not perform the _shraddh_ceremony, but in the month of Kunwar, on the day corresponding to thaton which his father died, a man feeds the caste-fellows in memory ofhim. And at this period he offers libations to his ancestors, pouringa double handful of water on the ground for each one that he canremember and then one for all the others. While doing this he standsfacing the east and does not turn to three different directions as theHindu custom is. The spirit of a man who has been killed by a tigerbecomes Baghia Masan or the tiger imp, and that of a woman who dies inchildbirth becomes a Churel. Both are very troublesome to the living. 

9. Religion. 

The principal deities of the Dhanwars are Thakur Deo, the god ofagriculture, and Dulha Deo, the deity of the family and hearth. Twicea year the village Baiga or medicine-man, who is usually a Gond, offers a cocoanut to Thakur Deo. He first consecrates it to thegod by placing it in contact with water and the small heap of ricewhich lies in front of his shrine, and then splits it asunder on astone, saying, '_Jai Thakur Deo_, ' or 'Victory to Thakur Deo. ' Whenany serious calamity befalls the tribe a goat is offered to thedeity. It must also be first consecrated to him by eating his rice;its body is then washed in water and some of the sacred _dub_ [534]grass is placed on it, and the Baiga severs the head from the bodywith an axe. Dulha Deo is the god of the family and the marriage-bed, and when a Dhanwar is married or his first son is born, a goat isoffered to the deity. Another interesting deity is Maiya Andhiyari, or the goddess of the dark fortnight of the month. She is worshippedin the house conjointly by husband and wife on any Tuesday in thedark fortnight of Magh (January-February), all the relatives of thefamily being invited. On the day of worship the husband and wifeobserve a fast, and all the water which is required for use in thehouse during the day and night must be brought into it in the earlymorning. A circular pit is dug inside the house, about three feet deepand as many wide. A she-goat which has borne no young is sacrificedto the goddess in the house in the same manner as in the sacrifice toThakur Deo. The goat is skinned and cut up, the skin, bones and otherrefuse being thrown into the hole. The flesh is cooked and eatenwith rice and pulse in the evening, all the family and relatives, men and women, eating together at the same time. After the meal, all the remaining food and the water including that used for cooking, and the new earthen pots used to carry water on that day are throwninto the pit. The mouth of the pit is then covered with wooden boardsand plastered over with mud with great care to prevent a child fallinginto it; as it is held that nothing which has once gone into the pitmay be taken out, even if it were a human being. It is said thatonce in the old days a man who happened to fall into the pit wasburied alive, its mouth being covered over with planks of wood; andhe was found alive when the pit was reopened next year. This is aninstance of the sacrificial meal, common to many primitive peoples, at which the sacred animal was consumed by the worshippers, skin, bones and all. But now that such a course has become repugnant totheir more civilised digestions, the refuse is considered sacredand disposed of in some such manner as that described. The goddessis also known as Rat Devi or the goddess of the night; or Rat Mai, the night mother. The goddess Maswasi was the mythical ancestress ofthe Dhanwars, the wife of Karankot, and also the daughter of MaiyaAndhiyari or Rat Mai. She too is worshipped every third year in thedark fortnight of the month of Magh on any Tuesday. Her sacrifice isoffered in the morning hours in the forest by men only, and consistsalso of a black she-goat. A site is chosen under a tree and cleanedwith cowdung, the bones of animals being placed upon it in a heapto represent the goddess. The village Baiga kills the goat with anaxe and the body is eaten by the worshippers. Maswasi is invoked bythe Dhanwars before they go hunting, and whenever they kill a wildboar or a deer they offer it to her. She is thus clearly the goddessof hunting. The tribe also worship the spirits of hills and woodsand the ghosts of the illustrious dead. The ghosts of dead Baigasor medicine-men are believed to become spirits attending on ThakurDeo, and when he is displeased with the Dhanwars they interveneto allay his anger. The brothers of Maswasi, the twelve Gaolis, are believed to be divine hunters and to haunt the forests, wherethey kill beasts and occasionally men. Six of them take post and theother six drive the beasts or men towards these through the forest, when they are pierced as with an arrow. The victim dies after a fewdays, but if human he may go to a sorcerer, who can extract the arrow, smaller than a grain of rice, from his body. In the month of Aghan(November), when the grass of the forests is to be cut, the membersof the village collectively offer a goat to the grass deity, in orderthat none of the grass-cutters may be killed by a tiger or bitten bya snake or other wild animal. 

10. Magic and witchcraft. 

The Dhanwars are fervent believers in all kinds of magic andwitchcraft. Magic is practised both by the Baiga, the village priestor medicine-man, who is always a man and who conducts the worship ofthe deities mentioned above, and by the _tonhi_, the regular witch, who may be a man or woman. Little difference appears to exist in themethods of the two classes of magicians, but the Baiga's magic isusually exercised for the good of his fellow-creatures, which indeedmight be expected as he gets his livelihood from them, and he is alsoless powerful than the _tonhi_. The Baiga cures ordinary maladies andthe bites of snakes and scorpions by mesmeric passes fortified by theutterance of charms. He raises the dead in much the same manner as awitch does, but employs the spirit of the dead person in casting outother evil spirits by which his clients may be possessed. One of themiracles performed by the Baiga is to make his wet cloth stand in theair stiff and straight, holding only the two lower ends. He can crossa river walking on leaves, and change men into beasts. Witches arenot very common among the Dhanwars. A witch, male or female, maybedetected by a sunken and gloomy appearance of the eyes, a passionatetemperament, or by being found naked in a graveyard at night, asonly a witch would go there to raise a corpse from the dead. TheDhanwars eat nearly all kinds of food except beef and the leavingsof others. They will take cooked food from the hands of Kawars, andthe men also from Gonds, but not the women. In some places they willaccept food from Brahmans, but not everywhere. They are not an impurecaste, but usually live in a separate hamlet of their own, and arelower than the Gonds and Kawars, who will take water from them butnot food. They are a very primitive people, and it is stated that atthe census several of them left their huts and fled into the jungle, and were with difficulty induced to return. When an elder man dieshis family usually abandon their hut, as it is believed that hisspirit haunts it and causes death to any one who lives there. 

11. Social rules. 

A Kawar is always permitted to become a Dhanwar, and a woman ofthe Gond, Binjhwar and Rawat tribes, if such a one is living with aDhanwar, may be married to him with the approval of the tribe. She doesnot enjoy the full status of membership herself, but it is accordedto her children. When an outsider is to be admitted a _panchayat_of five Dhanwars is assembled, one of whom must be of the Majhisept. The members of the _panchayat_ hold out their right hands, palmupwards, one below the other, and beneath them the candidate and hiswife place their hands. The Majhi pours water from a brass vessel onto the topmost hand, and it trickles down from one to the other on tothose of the candidate and his wife. The blood of a slaughtered goat ismixed with the water in their palms and they sip it, and after givinga feast to the caste are considered as Dhanwars. Permanent exclusionfrom caste is imposed only for living with a man or woman of anothercaste other than those who may become Dhanwars, or for taking foodfrom a member of an impure caste, the only ones which are lower thanthe Dhanwars. Temporary exclusion for an indefinite period is awardedfor an irregular connection between a Dhanwar man and woman, or ofa Dhanwar with a Kawar, Binjhwar, Rawat or Gond; on a family whichharbours any one of its members who has been permanently expelled;and on a woman who cuts the navel-cord of a newly-born child, whetherof her own caste or not. Irregular sexual intimacies are usuallykept secret and condoned by marriage whenever possible. A personexpelled for any of the above offences cannot claim readmission as aright. He must first please the members of the caste, and to do thishe attends every caste feast without being invited, removes theirleaf-plates with the leavings of food, and waits on them generally, and continually proffers his prayer for readmission. When the otherDhanwars are satisfied with his long and faithful service they takehim back into the community. Temporary exclusion from caste, with thepenalty of one or more feasts for readmission, is imposed for killinga cow or a cat accidentally, or in the course of giving it a beating;for having a cow or bullock in one's possession whose nostrils or earsget split; for getting maggots in a wound; for being beaten except bya Government official; for taking food from any higher caste otherthan those from whom food is accepted; and in the case of a womanfor saying her husband's name aloud. This list of offences shows thatthe Dhanwars have almost completely adopted the Hindu code in socialmatters, while retaining their tribal religion. A person guilty of oneof the above offences must have his or her head shaved by a barber, and make a pilgrimage to the shrine of Narsingh Nath in Bodasamarzamindari; after having accomplished this he is purified by one ofthe Sonwani sept, being given water in which gold has been dippedto drink through a bamboo tube, and he provides usually three feastsfor the caste-fellows. 

12. Dress and tattooing. 

The tribe dress in the somewhat primitive fashion prevalentin Chhattisgarh, and there is nothing distinctive about theirclothing. Women are tattooed at their parents' house before or justafter marriage. It is said that the tattoo marks remain on the soulafter death, and that she shows them to God, probably for purposes ofidentification. There is a saying, 'All other pleasures are transient, but the tattoo marks are my companions through life. ' A Dhanwar willnot take water from a woman who is not tattooed. 

13. Names of children. 

Children are named on the _chathi_ or sixth day after birth, andthe parents always ascertain from a wise man whether the soul ofany dead relative has been born again in the child so that they mayname it after him. It is also thought that the sex may change intransmigration, for male children are sometimes named after womenrelatives and female after men. Mr. Hira Lal notes the followinginstance of the names of four children in a family. The eldest wasnamed after his grandfather; the second was called Bhalu or bear, as his maternal uncle who had been eaten by a bear was reborn in him;the third was called Ghasi, the name of a low caste of grass-cutters, because the two children born before him had died; and the fourthwas called Kausi, because the sorcerer could not identify the spiritof any relative as having been born again in him. The name Kausiis given to any one who cannot remember his sept, as in the saying, '_Bhule bisare kausi got_, ' or 'A man who has got no _got_ belongsto the Kausi _got_. ' Kausi is said to mean a stranger. Bad namesare commonly given to avert ill-luck or premature death, as Boya, aliar; Labdu, one smeared with ashes; Marha, a corpse; or after somephysical defect as Lati, one with clotted hair; Petwa, a stammerer;Lendra, shy; Ghundu, one who cannot walk; Ghunari, stunted; or fromthe place of birth, as Dongariha or Paharu, born on a hill; Banjariha, born in brushwood, and so on. A man will not mention the names of hiswife, his son's wife or his sister's son's wife, and a woman will notname her husband or his elder brother or parents. As already stated, a woman saying her husband's name aloud is temporarily put out ofcaste, the Hindu custom being thus carried to extremes, as is oftenthe case among the lower castes. 

14. Occupation. 

The tribe consider hunting to have been their proper calling, butmany of them are now cultivators and labourers. They also make bamboomatting and large baskets for storing grain, but they will not makesmall bamboo baskets or fans, because this is the calling of the Turis, on whom the Dhanwar looks down. The women collect the leaves of _sal_[535] trees and sell them at the rate of about ten bundles for a pice(farthing) for use as _chongis_ or leaf-pipes. As already stated, the tribe have no language of their own, but speak a corrupt formof Chhattisgarhi. 

Dhimar [536]

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice. _ 2. _Subcastes. _ 3. _Exogamous groups. _ 4. _Marriage. _ 5. _Childbirth. _ 6. _Disposal of the dead. _ 7. _Religion. _ 8. _Occupation: fisherman. _ 9. _Water-carrier. _ 10. _Palanquin-bearer and personal servant. _ 11. _Other occupations. _ 12. _Social status. _ 13. _Legend of the caste. _

1. General notice. 

_Dhimar, Kahar, Bhoi, Palewar, Baraua, Machhandar. _--The caste offishermen and palanquin-bearers. In 1911 the Dhimars numbered 284, 000persons in the Central Provinces and Berar, being most numerous in theMaratha Districts. In the north of the Province we find in place ofthe Dhimars the Kahars and Mullahs, and in the east or Chhattisgarhcountry the Kewats. But the distinction between these castes is nomore than nominal, for in some localities both Kahar and Kewat arereturned as subcastes of Dhimar. In some parts of India the Bhoisand Dhimars are considered as separate castes, but in the CentralProvinces they are not to be distinguished, both names being appliedindiscriminately to the same persons. The name of Bhoi perhaps belongsmore particularly to those who carry litters or palanquins, and thatof Dhimar to the fishermen. The word Dhimar is a corruption of theSanskrit Dhivara, a fisherman. Bhoi is a South Indian word (Teluguand Malayalam _boyi_, Tamil _bovi_), and in the Konkan people of thisclass are known as Kahar Bhui. Among the Gonds Bhoi is considered asan honorific name or title; and this indicates that a large number ofGonds have become enrolled in the Dhimar or Kahar caste, and considerit a rise in status. Palewar is the name of the Telugu fishermen ofChanda. Machhandar signifies one who catches fish. 

2. Subcastes. 

The caste has a large number of subdivisions of a local or occupationalnature; among occupational names may be mentioned the Singaria or thosewho cultivate the _singara_ nut, the Nadha or those who live on thebanks of streams, the Tankiwalas or sharpeners of grindstones, theJhingas or prawn-catchers, the Bansias and Saraias or anglers (from_bansi_ or _sarai_, a bamboo fishing-rod), the Bandhaiyas or thosewho make ropes and sacking of hemp and fibre, and the Dhurias who sellparched rice. These last say that their original ancestors were createdby Mahadeo out of a handful of dust (_dhur_) for carrying the palanquinof Parvati when she was tired. They are probably the same people asthe Dhuris who also parch grain, and in Chhattisgarh are consideredas a separate caste. Similarly the Sonjhara Dhimars wash for gold, the calling of the separate Sonjhara caste. The Kasdhonia Dhimars washthe sands of the sacred rivers to find the coins which pious pilgrimsfrequently drop or throw into the river as an offering when they bathein it. The Gondia subcaste is clearly an offshoot from the Gond tribe, but a large proportion of the whole caste in the Central Provincesis probably derived from the Gonds or Kols, members of this lattertribe being especially proficient as palanquin-bearers. The Suvarhasubcaste is named after the _suar_ or pig, because members of thissubcaste breed and eat the unclean animal; they are looked down onby the others. Similarly the Gadhewale Dhimars keep donkeys, and aredespised by the other subcastes who will not take food from them. Theyuse donkeys for carrying loads of wood, and the bridegroom rides tohis wedding on this animal; and among them a donkey is the only animalthe corpse of which can be touched without conveying pollution. TheBhanare Dhimars appear to be named after the town of Bhandara. 

3. Exogamous groups. 

A large number of exogamous groups are also returned, either of atitular or totemistic nature: such are Baghmar, a tiger-slayer; Ojhwa, from Ojha, or sorcerer; Guru pahchan, one who knows his teacher;Midoia, a guardian of boundaries, from _med_, a boundary or border;Gidhwe, a vulture; Kolhe, or jackal; Gadhekhaya, a donkey-eater; andKasture, musk; a few names are from towns or villages, as Tumsarefrom Tumsar, Nagpurkar from Nagpur; and a few from other castes asMadgi, Bhoyar, Pindaria from Pindari, a freebooter; Gondia (Gond)and Gondhali; and Kachhwaha, a sept of Rajputs. 

4. Marriage. 

Marriage is prohibited between members of the same sept and alsobetween first cousins. In many localities families do not intermarry solong as they remember any relationship to have existed between them. InMandla, Mr. Govind Moreshwar states, the Nadha and Kehera subcastesdo not intermarry; but if a man desires a girl of the other subcastehe can be admitted into it on giving a feast to the caste-fellowsaccording to his means, and thus marry her. Two families may exchangedaughters in marriage. A maiden who goes wrong with a man of thecaste or of any higher caste may be readmitted to the community underpenalty of a feast to the caste and of having a lock of her hair cutoff. In the Hindustani Districts women do not accompany the marriageprocession, but in the Maratha Districts they do. Among the BhanaraDhimars of Chanda the wedding may be held either at the bride's or thebridegroom's house. In the former case a bride-price of Rs. 16 is paid, and in the latter one of Rs. 20, because the expenses of the bride'sfamily are increased if the wedding is held at her house. A customexists among the poorer Dhimars in Chanda of postponing the marriageceremony to avoid expense; a man will thus simply take a girl for hiswife, making a payment of Rs. 1-4 or twenty pence to her father andgiving a feast to the community. She will then live in his house as hiswife, and at some subsequent date, perhaps in old age, the religiousceremony will be held so that the couple may have been properly marriedbefore they die. In this fashion the weddings of grandparents, parentsand children have all been celebrated simultaneously. The SingariaDhimars of Chhindwara grow _singara_ or water-nut in tanks, and attheir weddings a crocodile must be killed and eaten. The Sonjharasor gold-washers must also have a crocodile, but they keep it aliveand worship it, and when the ceremony is concluded let it go backagain to the river. It is natural that castes whose avocations areconnected with rivers and tanks should in a manner deify the mostprominent or most ferocious animal contained in their waters. Andthe ceremonial eating of a sacred animal has been recorded amongdivers peoples all over the world. At a Dhimar marriage in Bhandaraa net is given to the bridegroom, and _sidori_ or cooked food, tiedin a piece of cloth, to the bride, and they walk out together as ifgoing to a river to fish, but the bride's brother comes up and stopsthem. After a wedding in Mandla they kill a pig and bury it before thedoor of the bridegroom's house, covering it with earth, and the brideand bridegroom step over its body into the house. Widow-marriage isfreely permitted; in Mandla the marriage of a widow may be held onthe night of any day except Sunday, Tuesday and Saturday. Divorce isallowed, but is of rare occurrence. Adultery on the part of a wifewill be frequently overlooked, and the extreme step of divorcing heris only taken if she creates a public scandal. In such a case theparties appear before a meeting of the caste, and the headman asksthem whether they have determined to separate. He then breaks a strawin token of the disruption of the union, and the husband and wifemust pronounce each other's names in an audible voice. [537] A fee ofRs. 1-4 is paid to the headman, and the divorce is completed. [538]In some localities the woman's bangles are also broken. In Jhansithe fine for keeping a widow is ten rupees and for living with thewife of another man sixty rupees. 

5. Childbirth

Children are named either on the day of birth or the twelfth dayafterwards. The women place the child in a cradle, spreading boiledwheat and gram over its body, and after swinging it to and fro thename is given. Sweets or boiled wheat and gram are distributed to thosepresent. In Berar on the third day after a birth cakes of juari flourand buttermilk are distributed to other children; on the fifth daythe slab and roller used for grinding the household corn are washed, anointed and worshipped; on the twelfth day the child is named andshortly after this its head is shaved. [539]

6. Disposal of the dead. 

The bodies of the dead are usually buried, cremation being beyond themeans of Dhimars. Children whose ears have not been pierced are mournedonly for one day, and others for ten days. When a body has been burntthe ashes are consigned to a tank or river on the third day, or ifthe third day be a Sunday or a Wednesday, then on the fifth day. InBerar, Mr. Kitts remarks, [540] the funeral ceremony of the Dhimarsresembles that of the Gonds. After a burial the mourners repair to thedeceased's house to drink; and subsequently each fetches his own dinnerand dines with the chief mourner. At this time he and his family areimpure and the others cannot take food prepared by him; but ten daysafterwards when the mourning is over and the chief mourner has bathedand shaved they again dine with him, and on the next day the caste isfeasted. During the period of mourning a lighted lamp is daily placedoutside the house. When the period of mourning expires all the clothesof the family are washed and their house is newly whitewashed. There isno subsequent annual performance of funeral rites as among the higherHindus; but at the Akshayatritiya or commencement of the agriculturalyear the head of the household throws at each meal a little food intothe fire, in honour of his dead ancestors. 

7. Religion. 

One of the principal deities of the Dhimars [541] as of other lowcastes is Dulha Deo, the deified bridegroom. They fashion his image of_kadamb_ [542] wood and besmear it with red lead. In Berar they alsopray to Anna Purna, the Corn-giving goddess of Madras correspondingto Durga or Devi, whose form with that of her horse is engraved ona brass plate and anointed with yellow and red turmeric. When aboutto enter a river or tank for fishing or other purposes they pray tothe water-god to save them from being drowned or molested by itsdenizens. They address a river as Ganga Mai or 'Mother Ganges' inorder to propitiate it by this flattery. Those who are employed onferry-boats especially venerate Ghatoia [543] Deo, the god of ferriesand river-crossings. His shrine is near the place where the boats aretied up, and ferry contractors keep a live chicken in their boat to beoffered to Ghatoia on the first occasion when the river is sufficientlyin flood to be crossed by ferry after the breaking of the rains. Otherlocal godlings are the Bare Purakh or Great men, a collective term fortheir deceased ancestors, of whom they make silver images; Parihar, the soul of the village priest; Baram Deo, the spirit of the banyantree; and Gosain Deo, a deified ascetic. To the goddess Devi theyoffer a black she-goat which is eaten ceremonially, and when they havefinished, the bones, skin and all the other remains of the animal areplaced in a pit inside the house. If anything should fall into thispit it must be buried with the remains of the offering and not takenout. And they relate that on one occasion a child fell into the pit, and the parents, setting obedience to the law of the goddess abovethe life of their child, buried it alive. But next year when thesacrifice was again made and the pit was opened, the child was foundin it alive and playing. So they say that the goddess will save thelife of any one who is buried in the pit with her offering. When awidower marries a second time his wife sometimes wears a _tawiz_ oramulet in the shape of a silver box containing charms round her neckin order to ward off the evil machinations of her predecessor's spirit. 

8. Occupation: fisherman. 

The occupations of the Dhimar are many and various. He is primarilya fisherman and boatman, and has various kinds of nets for takingfish. One of these is of triangular shape about 150 feet wide atthe base and 80 feet in height to the apex. The meshes vary froman inch wide at the top to three inches at the bottom. The ends ofthe base are weighted with stones and the net is then sunk into ariver so that the base rests on its bed and the top is held by menin boats at the surface. Then other Dhimars beat the surface of thewater for some distance with long bamboos on both sides of the net, driving the fish towards it. They call this a _kheda_, the term usedfor a beat of the forest for game. 

Another method is to stretch a long rope or cord across the river, secured on either bank, with baited hooks attached to it at shortintervals. It is left for some hours and then drawn in. When the riveris shallow one wide-bottomed boat will be paddled up the stream and aline of men will wade on each side beating the water with bamboos soas to make the small fish jump into the boat. Or they put a littlecotton-seed on a stone in shallow water, and when the fish collectto eat the seed a long circular net weighted with pieces of ironis let down over the stone. Then the upper end is drawn tight andthe fishermen put their hands inside and seize the little fish. TheDhimar is also regularly employed as a worker on ferries. His primitiveboat made from the hollowed trunk of a tree and sometimes lashed incouples for greater stability may still be seen on all rivers. He makeshis own fishing-nets, knitting them on a stick at his leisure whilehe is walking along or sitting down to smoke and talk. He worshipshis fishing-nets at the Diwali festival, and his reverence for theknitted thread is such that he will not touch or wear a shoe made ofthread, because he thinks that the sacred article is debased by beingsewn into leather. When engaged in road-work the Dhimars have unsewnsandals secured to the feet with strips of leather. It is a specialdegradation to a Dhimar to be struck with a shoe. He has a monopolyof growing _singara_ [544] or water-nuts in tanks. The fruit of thisplant has a taste somewhat between a cocoanut and a potato, with aflavour of soap. It can be taken raw and is therefore a favouritecomestible for fast days when cooked food is forbidden. It is alsosold at railway stations and the fresh fruit is prescribed by villagedoctors as easy of digestion. The Dhimar grows melons, cucumbers andother vegetables on the sandy stretches along the banks of streams, but at agriculture proper he does not excel. 

9. Water-carrier. 

The Dhimar's connection with water has led to his becoming thewater-carrier for Hindus, or that section of the community whichcan afford to employ one. This is more especially the case in theHindustani Districts where women are frequently secluded and thereforecannot draw water for the household, while in the Maratha Districtswhere the women go to the well no water-bearer is required. In thiscapacity the Dhimar is usually the personal servant of the villageproprietor, but in large villages every house has a _ghinochi_, eitheran earthen platform or wooden stand just outside the house, on whichfour or five earthen water-pots are kept. These the Dhimar fills upmorning and evening and receives two or three annas or pence a monthfor doing so. He also brings water for Government servants when theycome to the village, and cleans their cooking-vessels and preparesthe hearth with fresh cowdung and water in order to cleanse it. 

If he cleans the malguzar's vessels he gets his food for doing so. Whenthe tenants have marriages he performs the same duties for the wholewedding party and receives a present of one or two rupees and someclothes if the families are well off, and also his food every daywhile the marriage is in progress. In his capacity of waterman thetitle Baraua is used to him as an honorific method of address; and tohis wife Baroni. In a hot country like India water is revered as thesource of relief, comfort and life itself, like fire in cold countries, and the waterman participates in the regard paid to his element. 

Another business of the Dhimar's is to take sweet potatoes andboiled plums to the fields at harvest-time and sell them. He supplieswater for drinking to the reapers and receives three sheaves a dayin payment. On the fifteenth of Jesth (May) the Dhimar goes roundto the cultivators, throwing his fishing-net over their heads andreceives a small present. 

10. Palanquin-bearer and personal servant. 

At the period prior to the introduction of wheeled transport whenpalanquins or litters were largely used for travelling, the carriersbelonged to the Kahar caste in northern India and to the Dhimarsor Bhois in the south. Though litters are now practically not usedfor travelling except occasionally by high-caste women, a survivalof the old custom is retained in the marriage ceremony, the brideand bridegroom being always carried back from the marriage-shed tothe temporary lodging of the bridegroom in a _palki_, though forthe longer journey to the bridegroom's village some less cumbrousconveyance is utilised. Four Dhimars carry the _palki_ and receiveRs. 1-4. Well-to-do people will be carried in procession round thetown. When employed by the village proprietor the Dhimar accompanieshim on his journey, carrying his cooking-vessels and other necessariesin a _banhgi_ or wooden cross-bar slung across the shoulders, fromwhich two baskets are suspended by loops of rope. Water he willalways carry in a _banhgi_ and never on his head or shoulders. Fromwaterman and litter-carrier the Dhimar has become a personal servant;it is he to whom the term 'bearer' as designating a body-servant wasfirst applied because he bears or carries his master in a _palki_and his clothes in a _banhgi_. He is commonly so employed in nativehouses, but rarely by Europeans, whether because he is too stupidor on account of caste objections of his own. When employed as acook the Dhimar or his wife is permitted to knead flour with waterand make it into a cake which the Brahman will then take and put onto the girdle with his own hands. He can also boil water and pourpulse into the cooking-pot from above so long as he does not touchthe vessel after the food has been placed in it. He or she will alsotake any remains of food which is left in the cooking-pot as thisis not considered to be polluted, food only becoming polluted whenthe hand touches it on the dish after having touched the mouth. Whenthis has happened all the food on the dish becomes _jutha_ or leavingsof food, and as a general rule no caste except the sweepers will eatthe leavings of food of another caste or of another person of theirown. Only the wife, whose meal follows her husband's, will eat hisleavings. As a servant the Dhimar is very familiar with his master;he may enter any part of the house, including the cooking-place andthe women's rooms, and he addresses his mistress as 'Mother. ' Innorthern India Mr. Crooke states that the Kahars are sometimes knownas Mahra, from the Sanskrit Mahila, a woman, because they have theentry of the female apartments. When he lights his master's pipe hetakes the first pull himself to show that it has not been tamperedwith, and then presents it to him with his left hand placed underhis right elbow in token of respect. Maid-servants also frequentlybelong to the Dhimar caste, and it often happens that the master ofthe household has illicit intercourse with them. Hence there is aproverb, 'The king's son draws water and the water-bearer's son sitson the throne, ' similar intrigues on the part of high-born women withtheir servants being not unknown. The Dhimar often acts as a pimp, this being an incident of his profession of indoor servant. 

11. Other occupations. 

Another occupation of the Dhimar's is to sell parched grain and riceto travellers in markets and railway stations like the Bharbhunjaand Dhuri. This he can do because of his comparative socialpurity, as all castes will take water and cakes and sweetmeatsfrom his hands. Some Dhimars and Kewats also weave hemp-mattingand gunny-bags, but such members of the caste rank lower than theothers and Brahmans will not take water from them. Another callingby which a few Dhimars find support is that of breeding pigs. Onewould think it a difficult matter to make a living out of the villagepig, an animal abhorred by both Hindus and Muhammadans as the mostunclean of the brute creation, and equally abjured by Europeans asunfit for food. But the pig is in considerable demand by the foresttribes for sacrifice to their deities. The Dhimar participates in thesacrifice to Narayan Deo described in the article on Mahar, when apig is eaten in concert by several of the lower castes. Lastly, thebusiness of rearing the cocoons of the tasar silk-worm is usually inthe hands of Dhimars and Kewats. While the caterpillars are feedingon leaves and spinning their cocoons these men live in the forestsfor two months together and watch the _kosa-baris_ or silk-gardens, that is the blocks of trees which are set apart for the purpose ofrearing the caterpillars. During this period they eat only once a day, abstain from meat and lentils, do not get shaved and do not visit theirwives. When the eggs of the caterpillars are to be placed on the treesthey tie a silk thread round the first tree to be used and worship itas Pat Deo or the god of silk thread. On this subject Mr. Ball writes:[545] "The trees which it is intended to stock are carefully pollardedbefore the rains, and in early spring the leaves are stocked with youngcaterpillars which have been hatched in the houses. The men in chargeerect wigwams and remain on the spot, isolated from their families, who regard them for the time being as unclean. During the daytimethey have full occupation in guarding the large green caterpillarsfrom the attacks of kites and other birds. The cocoons are collectedsoon after they are spun and boiled in a lye of wood-ash, and theextracted chrysalids must then be eaten by the caretakers, who haveto undergo certain ceremonial rites before they are readmitted intothe society of their fellows. The effect of the boiling in the lyeis the removal of the glutinous matter, which renders it possibleto wind off the silk. " The eating of the caterpillars is no doubt aceremonial observance like that of the crocodile at weddings. Theyare killed by the boiling of the cocoons and on this account membersof good castes will not engage in the business of rearing them. Theabstention from conjugal intimacy while engaged in some importantbusiness is a very common phenomenon. 

12. Social status. 

The social status of the Dhimar is somewhat peculiar. Owing to hisemployment as palanquin-bearer, cook and household servant he hasbeen promoted to the group of castes who are ceremonially clean, so that Brahmans in northern India will take water and food cookedin butter from his hands. But by origin he no doubt belongs to theprimitive or non-Aryan tribes, a fact which he shows by his appearanceand also by his customs. In diet he is the reverse of fastidious, eating crocodiles, tortoises and crabs, and also pork in the MarathaDistricts, though in the north where he is employed by Brahmansas a personal servant he abstains from this food. With all this, however, the Dhimars practise in some social matters a pharasaicalstrictness. In Jubbulpore Mr. Pancham Lal records that among the foursubcastes of Rekwar, Bant, Barmaian and Pabeha a woman of one subcastewill not partake of any food cooked by one of another division. A manwill take any kind of food cooked by a man of another subcaste, butfrom a woman only such as is not mixed with water. A woman will drinkthe water held in the metal vessel of a woman of another division, but not in an earthen vessel; and in a metal vessel only providedthat it is brought straight from the well and not taken from the_ghinochi_ or water-stand of such woman's house. A man will take waterto drink from the metal or earthen vessel of any other Dhimar, male orfemale. In Berar again Mr. Kitts states [546] that a Bhoi considersit pollution to eat or drink at the house of a Lohar (blacksmith), a Sutar (carpenter), a Bhat (bard), a washerman or a barber; he willnot even carry their palanquins at a marriage. 

Once a year at the Muharram festival the Dhimars will eat at thehands of Muhammadans. They go round and beg for offerings of foodand take them to the Fakir, who places a little before the _tazia_ ortomb of Husain and distributes the remainder to the Dhimars and otherHindus and Muhammadans who have been begging. Except on this occasionthey will eat nothing touched by a Muhammadan. The Dhimar, the Nai orbarber, and the Bari or indoor servant are the three household menialsof the northern Districts, and are known as Pauni Parja. Sometimesthe Ahir or grazier is an indoor servant and takes the place of theDhimar or the Bari. These menials are admitted to the wedding andother family feasts and allowed to eat at them. They sit in a lineapart from the members of the caste and one member of the family isdeputed to wait on them. Their food is brought to them in separatedishes and no food from these dishes is served to guests of the caste. 

Permanent expulsion [547] from caste is inflicted only for marrying, or eating regularly, with a man or woman of some other low caste;but in the case of unmarried persons the latter offence may also beexpiated. Temporary exclusion is imposed for killing a cat, dog orsquirrel, getting maggots in a wound, being sentenced to imprisonment[548] or committing adultery with a person of any low caste. Onewho has committed any of the above offences must be purified by theBatta of the caste, that is a person who takes the sins of othersupon himself. The Batta conducts the culprit to a river and thencauses him to bathe, cuts off a lock of his hair, breaks a cocoanutas a sacrifice, and gives him a little cowdung and milk to eat. Thenthey proceed to eat together; the Batta eats five mouthfuls firstand declares that he has taken the sin of the offender on himself;the latter gives the Batta Rs. 1-4 as his fee, and is once more aproper member of the community. In Berar a Bhoi who has been putout of caste is received back by his fellows when he has drunk thewater touched by a Brahman's toe, and has feasted them with a boutof liquor. In towns the caste are generally addicted to drink, andno marriage or other social function is held without a sufficientsupply of liquor. They also smoke _ganja_ (Indian hemp). 

13. Legend of the caste. 

The Dhimars are proverbially of a cheerful disposition, though simpleand easily cheated. When carrying _palkis_ or litters at night theytalk continually or sing monotonous songs to lighten the tedium of theway. In illustration of these qualities the following story is told:One day when Mahadeo and Parvati were travelling the goddess becamevery tired, so Mahadeo created four men from the dust, who bore herin a litter. On the way they talked and laughed, and Parvati was verypleased with them, so when she got home she told them to wait while shesent them out a reward. The Bhois found that they could get plenty ofliquor, so they went on drinking it and forgot all about going for thereward. In the meantime a Marwari Bania who had heard what the goddesssaid, waited at the door of the palace, and when the servants broughtout a bag of money he pretended that he was one of the Bhois and gotthem to give him the money, with which he made off. After a time theBhois remembered about the reward and went to the door of the palace toget it, when the goddess came out and found out what had happened. TheBhois then wept and asked for another reward, but the goddess refusedand said that as they had been so stupid their caste would always bepoor, but at the same time they would be cheerful and happy. 

Dhoba

List of Paragraphs

 1. _General notice. _ 2. _Exogamous divisions. _ 3. _Marriage customs. _ 4. _Funeral rites. _ 5. _Caste panchayat and social penalties. _ 6. _Occupation and social customs. _

1. General notice. 

_Dhoba. _ [549]--A small caste belonging to the Mandla District andapparently an offshoot from one of the primitive tribes. They havenever been separately classified at the census but always amalgamatedwith the Dhobi or washerman caste. But the Mandla Dhobas acknowledgeno connection with Dhobis, nor has any been detected. One Dhoba hasindeed furnished a story to the Rev. E. Price that the first ancestorof the caste was a foundling boy, by appearance of good lineage, who was brought up by some Dhobis, and, marrying a Dhobi girl, madea new caste. But this is not sufficient to demonstrate the commonorigin of the Dhobas and Dhobis. The Dhobas reside principally in afew villages in the upper valley of the Burhner River, and membersof the caste own two or three villages. They are dark in complexionand have, though in a less degree, the flat features, coarse noseand receding forehead of the Gond; but they are taller in statureand not so strongly built, and are much less capable of exertion. 

2. Exogamous divisions. 

The caste has twelve exogamous septs, though the list is probablynot complete. These appear to be derived from the names ofvillages. Marriage is forbidden between the Baghmar and Baghchariasepts, the Maratha and Khatnagar and Maralwati septs and the Sonwaniand Sonsonwani septs. These septs are said to have been subdivided andto be still related. The names Baghmar and Baghcharia are both derivedfrom the tiger; Sonnwani is from Sona-pani or gold-water, and theSonsonwani sept seems therefore to be the aristocratic branch or _crêmede la crême_ of the Sonwanis. The children of brothers and sistersmay marry but not those of two sisters, because a man's maternal auntor _mausi_ is considered as equivalent to his mother. A man may alsomarry his step-sister on the mother's side, that is the daughter ofhis own mother by another husband either prior to or subsequent tohis father, the step-sister being of a different sept. This relaxationmay have been permitted on account of the small numbers of the casteand the consequent difficulty of arranging marriages. 

3. Marriage customs. 

The bridegroom goes to the bride's house for the wedding, whichis conducted according to the Hindu ritual of walking round thesacred post. The cost of a marriage in a fairly well-to-do family, including the betrothal, may be about Rs. 140, of which a quarterfalls on the bride's people. Divorce and the remarriage of widowsare permitted. A pregnant woman stops working after six months andgoes into retirement. After a birth the woman is impure for five orsix days. She does not appear in public for a month, and takes nopart in outdoor occupations or field-work until the child is weaned, that is six months after its birth. 

4. Funeral rites. 

The dead are usually buried, and all members of the dead man's septare considered to be impure. After the funeral they bathe and comehome and have their food cooked for them by other Dhobas, partaking ofit in the dead man's house. On the ninth, eleventh or thirteenth day, when the impurity ends, the male members of the sept are shaved on thebank of a river and the hair is left lying there. When they start homethey spread some thorns and two stones across the path. Then, as thefirst man steps over the thorns, he takes up one of the stones in hishand and passes it behind him to the second, and each man successivelypasses it back as he steps over the thorns, the last man throwing thestone behind the thorns. Thus the dead man's spirit in the shape ofthe stone is separated from the living and prevented from accompanyingthem home. Then a feast is held, all the men of the dead man's septsitting opposite to the _panchayat_ at a distance of three feet. Nextday water in which gold has been dipped is thrown over the dead man'shouse and each member of the sept drinks a little and is pure. 

5. Caste _panchayat_ and social penalties. 

The head of the caste is always a member of the Sonwani sept and isknown as Raja. It is his business to administer water in which gold hasbeen dipped (_sona-pani_) to offenders as a means of purification, andfrom this the name of the sept is derived. The Raja has no deputy, andofficiates in all ceremonies of the caste; he receives no contributionfrom the caste, but a double share of food and sweetmeats when theyare distributed. The other members of the Panch he is at libertyto choose from any _got_ or sept he likes. When a man has been putout of caste for a serious offence he has to give three feasts forreadmission. The first meal consists of a goat with rice and pulse, and is eaten on the bank of a stream; on this occasion the head of theoffender is shaved clean and all the hair thrown into the stream. Thesecond meal is eaten in the yard of his house, and consists of cakesfried in butter with rice and pulse. The offender is not allowedto partake of either the first or second meal. On the third day theRaja gives the offender gold-water, and he is then considered to bepurified and cooks food himself, which the caste-people eat with himin his house. A man is not put out of caste when he is sent to jail, as this is considered to be an order of the Government. A man keepinga woman of another caste is expelled and not reinstated until he hasput her away, and even then it is said that they will consider hischaracter before taking him back. A man who gets maggots in a woundmay be readmitted to caste only during the months of Chait and Pus. 

6. Occupation and social customs. 

The Dhobas act as priests of the Gonds and are also cultivators. Theirsocial position is distinctly higher than that of the Gonds and someof them have begun to employ Brahmans for their ceremonies. Theywill eat the flesh of most animals, except those of the cow-tribe, and also field-mice, and most of them drink liquor, though the moreprominent members have begun to abstain. The origin of the caste isvery obscure, but it would appear that they must be an offshoot ofone of the Dravidian tribes. In this connection it is interestingto note that Chhattisgarh contains a large number of Dhobis, thoughthe people of this tract have until recently worn little in the wayof clothing, and usually wash it themselves when this operation isjudged necessary. Many of the Dhobis of Chhattisgarh are cultivators, and it seems possible that a proportion of them may also really belongto this Dhoba caste. 

Dhobi

List of Paragraphs

 1. _Character and structure of the caste. _ 2. _Marriage customs. _ 3. _Other social customs. _ 4. _Religion. _ 5. _Occupation: washing clothes. _ 6. _Social position. _ 7. _Proverbs about the Dhobi. _ 8. _Wearing and lending the clothes of customers. _

1. Character and structure of the caste. 

_Dhobi, Warthi, Baretha, Chakla, Rajak, Parit. _--The professionalcaste of washermen. The name is derived from the Hindi _dhona_, and the Sanskrit _dhav_, to wash. Warthi is the Maratha name for thecaste, and Bareth or Baretha is an honorific or complimentary term ofaddress. Rajak and Parit are synonyms, the latter being used in theMaratha Districts. The Chakla caste of Madras are leather-workers, but in Chanda a community of persons is found who are known as Chaklaand are professional washermen. In 1911 the Dhobis numbered 165, 000persons in the Central Provinces and Berar, or one to every hundredinhabitants. They are numerous in the Districts with large towns andalso in Chhattisgarh, where, like the Dhobas of Bengal, they have toa considerable extent abandoned their hereditary profession and takento cultivation and other callings. No account worth reproduction hasbeen obtained of the origin of the caste. In the Central Provincesit is purely functional, as is shown by its subdivisions; theseare generally of a territorial nature, and indicate that the Dhobislike the other professional castes have come here from all parts ofthe country. Instances of the subcastes are: Baonia and Beraria fromBerar; Malwi, Bundelkhandi, Nimaria, Kanaujia, Udaipuria from Udaipur;Madrasi, Dharampuria from Dharampur, and so on. A separate subcasteis formed of Muhammadan Dhobis. The exogamous groups known as _khero_are of the usual low-caste type, taking their names from villages ortitular or professional terms. 

2. Marriage customs. 

Marriage within the _khero_ is prohibited and also the union of firstcousins. It is considered disgraceful to accept a price for a bride, and it is said that this is not done even by the parents of poor girls, but the caste will in such cases raise a subscription to defray theexpenses of her marriage. In the northern Districts the marriages ofDhobis are characterised by continuous singing and dancing at thehouses of the bridegroom and bride, these performances being knownas _sajnai_ and _birha_. Some man also puts on a long coat, tightdown to the waist and loose round the hips, to have the appearanceof a dancing-girl, and dances before the party, while two or threeother men play. Mr. Crooke considers that this ritual, which isfound also among other low castes, resembles the European custom ofthe False Bride and is intended to divert the evil eye from the realbride. He writes: [550] "Now there are numerous customs which havebeen grouped in Europe under the name of the False Bride. Thus amongthe Esthonians the false bride is enacted by the bride's brotherdressed in woman's clothes; in Polonia by a bearded man called theWilde Braut; in Poland by an old woman veiled in white and lame;again among the Esthonians by an old woman with a brickwork crown;in Brittany, where the substitutes are first a little girl, then themistress of the house, and lastly the grandmother. 

"The supposition may then be hazarded in the light of the Indianexamples that some one assumes on this occasion the part of thebride in order to divert on himself from her the envious glance ofthe evil eye. " Any further information on this interesting customwould be welcome. 

The remarriage of widows is allowed, and in Betul the bridegroom goesto the widow's house on a dark night wrapped up in a black blanket, and presents the widow with new clothes and bangles, and spangles andred lead for the forehead. Divorce is permitted with the approval ofthe caste headman by the execution of a deed on stamped paper. 

3. Other social customs. 

After a birth the mother is allowed no food for some days exceptcountry sugar and dates. The child is given some honey and castor-oilfor the first two days and is then allowed to suckle the mother. Apit is dug inside the lying-in room, and in this are deposited waterand the first cuttings of the nails and hair of the child. It isfilled up and on her recovery the mother bows before it, praying forsimilar safe deliveries in future and for the immunity of the childfrom physical ailments. After the birth of a male child the motheris impure for seven days and for five days after that of a female. 

4. Religion. 

The principal deity of the Dhobis is Ghatoia, the god of the_ghat_ or landing-place on the river to which they go to wash theirclothes. Libations of liquor are made to him in the month of Asarh(June), when the rains break and the rivers begin to be flooded. Beforeentering the water to wash the clothes they bow to the stone on whichthese are beaten out, asking that their work may be quickly finished;and they also pray to the river deity to protect them from snakes andcrocodiles. They worship the stone on the Dasahra festival, makingan offering to it of flowers, turmeric and cooked food. The Dhobi'swashing-stone is believed to be haunted by the ghosts of departedDhobis when revisiting the glimpses of the moon, and is held to havemagical powers. If a man requires a love-charm he should steal a_supari_ or areca-nut from the bazar at night or on the occasion ofan eclipse. The same night he goes to the Dhobi's stone and sets thenut upon it. He breaks an egg and a cocoanut over the stone and burnsincense before it. Then he takes the nut away and gives it to the womanof his fancy, wrapped up in betel-leaf, and she will love him. Theirchief festivals are the Holi and Diwali, at which they drink a greatdeal. The dead are buried or burnt as may be convenient, and mourningis observed for three days only, the family being purified on theSunday or Wednesday following the death. They have a caste committeewhose president is known as Mehtar, while other officials are theChaudhri or vice-president, and the Badkur, who appoints dates forthe penal feasts and issues the summons to the caste-fellows. Theseposts are hereditary and their holders receive presents of a rupeeand a cloth when members of the caste have to give expiatory feasts. 

5. Occupation: washing clothes. 

Before washing his clothes the Dhobi steams them, [551] hangingthem in a bundle for a time over a cauldron of boiling water. Afterthis he takes them to a stream or pond and washes them roughly withfuller's earth. The washerman steps nearly knee-deep into the water, and taking a quantity of clothes by one end in his two hands he raisesthem aloft in the air and brings them down heavily upon a huge stoneslab, grooved, at his feet. This threshing operation he repeats untilhis clothes are perfectly clean. In Saugor the clothes are rubbedwith wood-ashes at night and beaten out in water with a stick in themorning. Silk clothes are washed with the nut of the _ritha_ tree(_Sapindus emarginatus_) which gives a lather like soap. Sir H. Risleywrites of the Dacca washermen: [552] "For washing muslins and othercoloured garments well or spring water is alone used; but if thearticles are the property of a poor man or are commonplace, the waterof the nearest tank or river is accounted sufficiently good. Indigo isin as general use as in England for removing the yellowish tinge andwhitening the material. The water of the wells and springs borderingon the red laterite formation on the north of the city has been forcenturies celebrated, and the old bleaching fields of the Europeanfactories were all situated in this neighbourhood. Various plantsare used by the Dhobis to clarify water such as the _nirmali_(_Strychnos potatorum_), the _piu_ (_Basella_), the _nagphani_(_Cactus indicus_) and several plants of the mallow family. Alum, though not much valued, is sometimes used. " In most Districts ofthe Central Provinces the Dhobi is employed as a village servant andis paid by annual contributions of grain from the cultivators. Forordinary washing he gets half as much as the blacksmith or carpenter, or 13 to 20 lbs. Of grain annually from each householder, withabout another 10 lbs. At seedtime or harvest. When he brings theclothes home he also receives a meal or a _chapati_, and well-to-dopersons give him their old clothes as a present. In return for thishe washes all the clothes of the family two or three times a month, except the loin-cloths and women's bodices which they themselves washdaily. The Dhobi is also employed on the occasion of a birth or adeath. These events cause impurity and hence all the clothes of allthe members of the family must be washed when the impurity ceases. InSaugor when a man dies the Dhobi receives eight annas and for a womanfour annas, and similar rates in the case of the birth of a male orfemale child. When the first son is born in a family the Dhobi andbarber place a brass vessel on the top of a pole and tie a flag toit as a cloth and take it round to all the friends and relations ofthe family, announcing the event. They receive presents of grain andmoney which they expend on a drinking-bout. 

6. Social position. 

The Dhobi is considered to be impure, and he is not allowedto come into the houses of the better castes nor to touch theirwater-vessels. In Saugor he may come as far as the veranda but not intothe house. His status would in any case be low as a village menial, buthe is specially degraded, Mr. Crooke states, by his task of washing theclothes of women after child-birth and his consequent association withpuerperal blood, which is particularly abhorred. Formerly a Brahmandid not let the Dhobi wash his clothes, or, if he did, they wereagain steeped in water in the house as a means of purification. Nowhe contents himself with sprinkling the clean clothes with water inwhich a piece of gold has been dipped. The Dhobi is not so impure asthe Chamar and Basor, and if a member of the higher castes toucheshim inadvertently it is considered sufficient to wash the face andhands only and not the clothes. 

Colonel Tod writes [553] that in Rajputana the washermen's wells dug atthe sides of streams are deemed the most impure of all receptacles. Andone of the most binding oaths is that a man as he swears should dropa pebble into one of these wells, saying, "If I break this oath mayall the good deeds of my forefathers fall into the washerman's welllike this pebble. " Nevertheless the Dhobi refuses to wash the clothesof some of the lowest castes as the Mang, Mahar and Chamar. Likethe Teli the Dhobi is unlucky, and it is a bad omen to see him whenstarting on a journey or going out in the morning. But among some ofthe higher castes on the occasion of a marriage the elder members ofthe bridegroom's family go with the bride to the Dhobi's house. Hiswife presents the bride with betel-leaf and in return is given clotheswith a rupee. This ceremony is called _sohag_ or good fortune, andthe present from the Dhobin is supposed to be lucky. In Berar theDhobi is also a Balutedar or village servant. Mr. Kitts writes of him:[554] "At a wedding he is called upon to spread the clothes on whichthe bridegroom and his party alight on coming to the bride's house;he also provides the cloth on which the bride and bridegroom are tosit and fastens the _kankan_ (bracelet) on the girl's hand. In theYeotmal District the barber and the washerman sometimes take the placeof the maternal uncle in the _jhenda_ dance; and when the bridegroom, assisted by five married women, has thrown the necklace of black beadsround the bride's neck and has tied it with five knots, the barberand the washerman advance, and lifting the young couple on theirthighs dance to the music of the _wajantri_, while the bystandersbesprinkle them with red powder. "

In Chhattisgarh the Dhobis appear to have partly abandonedtheir hereditary profession and taken to agriculture and othercallings. Sir Benjamin Robertson writes of them: [555] "The castelargely preponderates in Chhattisgarh, a part of the country where, at least to the superficial observer, it would hardly seem as if itsservices were much availed of; the number of Dhobis in Raipur andBilaspur is nearly 40, 000. In both Districts the washerman is oneof the recognised village servants, but as a rule he gets no fixedpayment, and the great body of cultivators dispense with his servicesaltogether. According to the _Raipur Settlement Report_ (Mr. Hewett), he is employed by the ryots only to wash the clothes of the dead, andhe is never found among a population of Satnamis. It may thereforebe assumed that in Chhattisgarh the Bareth caste has largely takento cultivation. " In Bengal Sir H. Risley states [556] that "the Dhobioften gives up his caste trade and follows the profession of a writer, messenger or collector of rent (_tahsildar_), and it is an old nativetradition that a Bengali Dhobi was the first interpreter the Englishfactory at Calcutta had, while it is further stated that our earlycommercial transactions were carried on solely through the agency oflow-caste natives. The Dhobi, however, will never engage himself asan indoor servant in the house of a European. "

7. Proverbs about the Dhobi. 

Like the other castes who supply the primary needs of the people, the Dhobi is not regarded with much favour by his customers, and theyrevenge themselves in various sarcasms at his expense for the injurycaused to their clothes by his drastic measures. The following arementioned by Sir G. Grierson: [557] '_Dhobi par Dhobi base, tab kaprepar sabun pare_', or 'When many Dhobis compete, then some soap getsto the clothes, ' and 'It is only the clothes of the Dhobi's fatherthat never get torn. ' The Dhobi's donkey is a familiar sight asone meets him on the road still toiling as in the time of Issacharbetween two bundles of clothes each larger than himself, and he hasalso become proverbial, '_Dhobi ka gadha neh ghar ka neh ghat ka_, ''The Dhobi's donkey is always on the move'; and 'The ass has onlyone master (a washerman), and the washerman has only one steed (anass). ' The resentment felt for the Dhobi by his customers is notconfined to his Indian clients, as may be seen from Eha's excellentdescription of the Dhobi in _Behind the Bungalow_; and it may perhapsbe permissible to introduce here the following short excerpt, thoughit necessarily loses in force by being detached from the context:"Day after day he has stood before that great black stone and wreakedhis rage upon shirt and trouser and coat, and coat and trouser andshirt. Then he has wrung them as if he were wringing the necks ofpoultry, and fixed them on his drying line with thorns and spikes, and finally he has taken the battered garments to his torture chamberand ploughed them with his iron, longwise and crosswise and slantwise, and dropped glowing cinders on their tenderest places. Son has followedfather through countless generations in cultivating this passion fordestruction, until it has become the monstrous growth which we seeand shudder at in the Dhobi. "

8. Wearing and lending the clothes of customers. 

It is also currently believed that the Dhobi wears the clothes of hiscustomers himself. Thus, 'The Dhobi looks smart in other people'sclothes'; and '_Rajache shiri, Paritache tiri_, ' or 'The king'sheadscarf is the washerman's loin-cloth. ' On this point Mr. Thurstonwrites of the Madras washerman: "It is an unpleasant reflectionthat the Vannans or washermen add to their income by hiring outthe clothes of their customers for funeral parties, who lay themon the path before the pall-bearers, so that they may not step uponthe ground. On one occasion a party of Europeans, when out shootingnear the village of a hill tribe, met a funeral procession on itsway to the burial-ground. The bier was draped in many folds of cleancloth, which one of the party recognised by the initials as one ofhis bed-sheets. Another identified as his sheet the cloth on whichthe corpse was lying. He cut off the corner with the initial, and afew days later the sheet was returned by the Dhobi, who pretendedignorance of the mutilation, and gave as an explanation that itmust have been done in his absence by one of his assistants. " [558]And Eha describes the same custom in the following amusing manner:"Did you ever open your handkerchief with the suspicion that you hadgot a duster into your pocket by mistake, till the name of De Souzablazoned on the corner showed you that you were wearing some oneelse's property? An accident of this kind reveals a beneficent branchof the Dhobi's business, one in which he comes to the relief of needyrespectability. Suppose yourself (if you can) to be Mr. Lobo, enjoyingthe position of first violinist in a string band which performs atParsi weddings and on other festive occasions. _Noblesse oblige_; youcannot evade the necessity for clean shirt-fronts, ill able as yourprecarious income may be to meet it. In these circumstances a Dhobiwith good connections is what you require. He finds you in shirts ofthe best quality at so much an evening, and you are saved all risk andoutlay of capital; you need keep no clothes except a greenish-blacksurtout and pants and an effective necktie. In this way the wealthof the rich helps the want of the poor without their feeling itor knowing it--an excellent arrangement. Sometimes, unfortunately, Mr. Lobo has a few clothes of his own, and then, as I have hinted, the Dhobi may exchange them by mistake, for he is uneducated andhas much to remember; but if you occasionally suffer in this way yougain in another, for Mr. Lobo's family are skilful with the needle, and I have sent a torn garment to the wash which returned carefullyrepaired. " [559]

Dhuri

1. Origin and Subdivisions. 

_Dhuri. _ [560]--A caste belonging exclusively to Chhattisgarh, whichnumbered 3000 persons in 1911. Dhuri is an honorific abbreviationfrom Dhuriya as Bani from Bania. The special occupation of the casteis rice-parching, and they are an offshoot from Kahars, though inChhattisgarh the Dhuris now consider the Kahars as a subcaste oftheir own. In Bengal the Dhuriyas are a subcaste of the Kandus orBharbhunjas. Sir H. Risley states that "the Dhurias rank lowest ofall the subcastes of Kandus, owing either to their having taken upthe comparatively menial profession of palanquin-bearing, or to theirbeing a branch of the Kahar caste who went in for grain-parching andthus came to be associated with the Kandus. " [561] The caste haveimmigrated to Chhattisgarh from the United Provinces. In Kawardhathey believe that the Raja of that State brought them back with himon his return from a pilgrimage. In Bilaspur and Raipur they saythey came from Badhar, a pargana in the Mirzapur District, adjoiningRewah. Badhar is mentioned in one of the Rajim inscriptions, and is aplace remembered by other castes of Chhattisgarh as their ancestralhome. The Dhuris of Chhattisgarh relate their origin as follows:Mahadeo went once to the jungle and the damp earth stuck to hisfeet. He scraped it off and made it into a man, and asked him whatcaste he would like to belong to. The man said he would leave it toMahadeo, who decided that he should be called Dhuri from _dhur, _dust. The man then asked Mahadeo to assign him an occupation, andMahadeo said that as he was made from dust, which is pounded earth, his work should be to prepare _cheora_ or pounded rice, and added as aspecial distinction that all castes including Brahmans should eat thepounded rice prepared by him. All castes do eat _cheora_ because it isnot boiled with water. The Dhuris have two subcastes, a higher and alower, but they are known by different names in different tracts. InKawardha they are called Raj Dhuri and Cheorakuta, the Raj Dhurisbeing the descendants of personal servants in the Raja's family andranking above the Cheorakutas or rice-pounders. In Bilaspur they arecalled Badharia and Khawas, and in Raipur Badharia and Desha. TheKhawas and Desha subcastes do menial household service and rankbelow the Badharias, who are perhaps later immigrants and refuse toengage in this occupation. The names of their exogamous sections arenearly all territorial, as Naugahia from Naogaon in Bilaspur District, Agoria from Agori, a pargana in Mirzapur District, Kashi or Benares, and a number of other names derived from villages in Bilaspur. But thecaste do not strictly enforce the rule forbidding marriage within the_gotra_ or section, and are content with avoiding three generationsboth on the father's and mother's side. They have probably been drivento modify the rule on account of the paucity of their numbers and thedifficulty of arranging marriages. For the same reason perhaps theylook with indulgence on the practice, as a rule strictly prohibited, of marriage with a woman of another caste of lower social rank, andwill admit the children of such a marriage into the caste, thoughnot the woman herself. 

2. Marriage. 

Infant-marriage is in vogue, and polygamy is permitted only if thefirst wife be barren. The betrothal is cemented by an exchange ofbetel-leaves and areca-nuts between the fathers of the engagedcouple. A bride-price of from ten to twenty rupees is usuallypaid. Some rice, a pice coin, 21 cowries and 21 pieces of turmericare placed in the hole in which the marriage post is erected. Whenthe wedding procession arrives at the girl's house the bridegroomgoes to the marriage-shed and pulls out the festoons of mangoleaves, the bride's family trying to prevent him by offering hima winnowing-fan. He then approaches the door of the house, behindwhich his future mother-in-law is standing, and slips a piece ofcloth through the door for her. She takes this and retires withoutbeing seen. The wedding consists of the _bhanwar_ ceremony or walkinground the sacred pole. During the proceedings the women tie a newthread round the bridegroom's neck to avert the evil eye. Afterthe wedding the bride and bridegroom, in opposition to the usualcustom, must return to the latter's house on foot. In explanationof this they tell a story to the effect that the married couplewere formerly carried in a palanquin. But on one occasion when awedding procession came to a river, everybody began to catch fish, leaving the bride deserted, and the palanquin-bearers, seeing this, carried her off. To prevent the recurrence of such a mischance thecouple now have to walk. Widow-marriage is permitted, and the widowusually marries her late husband's younger brother. Divorce is onlypermitted for misconduct on the part of the wife. 

3. Religious beliefs. 

The Dhuris principally worship the goddess Devi. Nearly all membersof the caste belong to the Kabirpanthi sect. They believe that thesun on setting goes through the earth, and that the milky way is thepath by which the elephant of the heavens passes from south to northto feed on the young bamboo shoots, of which he is very fond. Theythink that the constellation of the Great Bear is a cot with threethieves tied to it. The thieves came to steal the cot, which belongedto an old woman, but God caught them and tied them down there forever. Orion is the plough left by one of the Pandava brothers afterhe had finished tilling the heavens. The dead are burnt. They observemourning during nine or ten days for an adult and make libations to thedead at the usual period in the month of Kunwar (September-October). 

4. Occupation and social status. 

The proper occupation of the caste is to parch rice. The rice is huskedand then parched in an earthen pan, and subsequently bruised with amallet in a wooden mortar. When prepared in this manner it is called_cheora_. The Dhuris also act as _khidmatgars_ or household servants, but the members of the Badharia subcaste refuse to do this work. Somemembers of the caste are fishermen, and others grow melons and sweetpotatoes. Considering that they live in Chhattisgarh, the caste aresomewhat scrupulous in the matter of food, neither eating fowls nordrinking liquor. The Kawardha Dhuris, however, who are later immigrantsthan the others, do not observe these restrictions, the reason forwhich may be that the Dhuris think it necessary to be strict in thematter of food, so that no one may object to take parched rice fromthem. Rawats and Gonds take food from their hands in some places, and their social status in Chhattisgarh is about equivalent to thatof the Rawats or Ahirs. A man of the caste who kills a cow or getsvermin in a wound must go to Amarkantak to bathe in the Nerbudda. 

Dumal

1. Origin and traditions. 

_Dumal. _ [562]--An agricultural caste found in the Uriya countryand principally in the Sonpur State, recently transferred to Biharand Orissa. In 1901, 41, 000 Dumals were enumerated in the CentralProvinces, but only a few persons now remain. The caste originallycame from Orissa. They themselves say that they were formerly a branchof the Gaurs, with whom they now have no special connection. Theyderive their name from a village called Dumba Hadap in the AthmalikState, where they say that they lived. Another story is that Dumalis derived from Duma, the name of a gateway in Baud town, near whichthey dwelt. Sir H. Risley says: "The Dumals or Jadupuria Gaura seem tobe a group of local formation. They cherish the tradition that theirancestors came to Orissa from Jadupur, but this appears to be nothingmore than the name of the Jadavas or Yadavas, the mythical progenitorsof the Goala caste transformed into the name of an imaginary town. "

2. Subdivisions. 

The Dumals have no subcastes, but they have a complicated system ofexogamy. This includes three kinds of divisions or sections, the _got_or sept, the _barga_ or family title and the _mitti_ or earth fromwhich they sprang, that is, the name of the original village of theclan. Marriage is prohibited only between persons who have the same_got_, _barga_ and _mitti_; if any one of these is different it isallowed. Thus a man of the Nag _got_, Padhan _barga_ and Hindolsai_mitti_ may marry a girl of the Nag _got_, Padhan _barga_ and Kandhpada_mitti_; or one of the Nag _got_, Karmi _barga_ and Hindolsai _mitti_;or one of the Bud _got_, Padhan _barga_ and Hindolsai _mitti_. The_bargas_ are very numerous, but the _gots_ and _mittis_ are few andcommon to many _bargas_; and many people have forgotten the nameof their _mitti_ altogether. Marriage therefore usually depends onthe _bargas_ being different. The following table shows the _got_, _barga_ and _mitti_ of a few families:

Got. Barga. Mitti. 

Nag (cobra) Padhan (chief) HindolsaiNag Karmi (manager) Unda (a village in Athmalik)Nag Behra (Palki-bearer) Kandhpada (a village in Athmalik)Nag Mahakul (great family) Do. Do. Nag Mesua (shepherd) Dalpur (a village in Baud)Nag Karan (writer) Kandhpada (a village in Athmalik)Nag or Nagesh Mahakul (great family) Bamanda (a village in Baud)Bud (a fish) Kolta (caste) Kandhpada (a village in Athmalik)Bud (a fish) Baghar (buffalo) Do. Do. Bichhu (scorpion) Mahakul (great family) Bamada (a village in Baud)

The only other _gots_ besides those given above are Kachhap (tortoise), Uluk (owl) and Limb (_nim_-tree). The _gots_ are thus totemistic, and the animal or plant giving its name to the _got_ is veneratedand worshipped. The names of _bargas_ are diverse. Some are titlesindicating the position of the founder of the family in life, as Naik(leader), Padhan (chief), Karmi (manager), Mahakul (great family) andso on. Others are derived from functions performed in sacrifices, as Amayat (one who kills the animal in the sacrifice), Gurandi(one who makes a preparation of sugar for it), Dehri (priest), Barik(one who carries the god's umbrella), Kamp (one who is in charge ofthe baskets containing the sacred articles of the temple). Anotherset of _bargas_ are names signifying the performance of menialfunctions in household service, as Gejo (kitchen-cleaner), Chaulia(rice-cleaner), Gadua (_lota_-bearer), Dang (spoon-bearer), Ghusri(cleaner of the dining-place with cowdung). Other names of _bargas_are derived from the caste's traditional occupation of grazing cattle, as Mesua or Mendli (shepherd), Gaigariya (milkman), Chhand (one whoties a rope to the legs of a cow when milking her). These names areinteresting as showing that the Dumals before taking to their presentoccupation of agriculture were temple servants, household menialsand cattle-herds, thus fulfilling the functions now performed by theRawat or Gaur caste of graziers in Sambalpur. The names of the _mittis_or villages show that their original home was in the Orissa TributaryMahals, while the totemistic names of _gots_ indicate their Dravidianorigin. The marriage of first cousins is prohibited. 

3. Marriage. 

Girls must be married before adolescence, and in the event of theparents failing to accomplish this, the following heavy penalty isimposed on the girl herself. She is taken to the forest and tied to atree with thread, this proceeding signifying her permanent exclusionfrom the caste. Any one belonging to another caste can then take heraway and marry her if he chooses to do so. In practice, however, thispenalty is very rarely imposed, as the parents can get out of it bymarrying her to an old man, whether he is already married or not, theparents bearing all the expenses, while the husband gives two to fourannas as a nominal contribution. After the marriage the old man caneither keep the girl as his wife or divorce her for a further nominalpayment of eight annas to a rupee. She then becomes a widow and canmarry again, while her parents will get ten or twenty rupees for her. 

The boy's father makes the proposal for the marriage according tothe following curious formula. Taking some fried grain he goes to thehouse of the father of the bride and addresses him as follows in thepresence of the neighbours and the relatives of both parties: "I hearthat the tree has budded and a blossom has come out; I intend to pluckit. " To which the girl's father replies: "The flower is delicate; it isin the midst of an ocean and very difficult to approach: how will youpluck it?" To which the reply is: 'I shall bring ships and _dongas_(boats) and ply them in the ocean and fetch the flower. ' And again:"If you do pluck it, can you support it? Many difficulties may stand inthe way, and the flower may wither or get lost; will it be possible foryou to steer the flower's boat in the ocean of time, as long as it isdestined to be in this world?" To which the answer is: 'Yes, I shall, and it is with that intention that I have come to you. ' On which thegirl's father finally says: 'Very well then, I have given you theflower. ' The question of the bride's price is then discussed. Thereare three recognised scales--Rs. 7 and 7 pieces of cloth, Rs. 9 and9 pieces of cloth, and Rs. 18 and 18 pieces of cloth. The rupees inquestion are those of Orissa, and each of them is worth only two-thirdsof a Government rupee. In cases of extreme poverty Rs. 2 and 2 piecesof cloth are accepted. The price being fixed, the boy's father goes topay it after an interval; and on this occasion he holds out his cloth, and a cocoanut is placed on it and broken by the girl's father, whichconfirms the betrothal. Before the marriage seven married girls go outand dig earth after worshipping the ground, and on their return let itall fall on to the head of the bridegroom's mother, which is protectedonly by a cloth. On the next day offerings are made to the ancestors, who are invited to attend the ceremony as village gods. The bridegroomis shaved clean and bathed, and the Brahman then ties an iron ringto his wrist, and the barber puts the turban and marriage-crown onhis head. The procession then starts, but any barber who meets it onthe way may put a fresh marriage-crown on the bridegroom's head andreceive eight annas or a rupee for it, so that he sometimes arrivesat his destination wearing four or five of them. The usual ceremoniesattend the arrival. At the marriage the couple are blindfolded andseated in the shed, while the Brahman priest repeats _mantras_ orverses, and during this time the parents and the parties must continueplacing nuts and pice all over the shed. These are the perquisitesof the Brahman. The hands of the couple are then tied together with_kusha_ grass (_Eragrostis cynosuroides_), and water is poured overthem. After the ceremony the couple gamble with seven cowries and sevenpieces of turmeric. The boy then presses a cowrie on the ground withhis little finger, and the girl has to take it away, which she easilydoes. The girl in her turn holds a cowrie inside her clenched hand, and the boy has to remove it with his little finger, which he findsit impossible to do. Thus the boy always loses and has to promise thegirl something, either to give her an ornament or to take her on apilgrimage, or to make her the mistress of his house. On the fifthor last day of the ceremony some curds are placed in a small pot, and the couple are made to churn them; this is probably symbolical ofthe caste's original occupation of tending cattle. The bride goes toher husband's house for three days, and then returns home. When sheis to be finally brought to her husband's house, his father with somerelatives goes to the parents of the girl and asks for her. It is nowstrict etiquette for her father to refuse to send her on the firstoccasion, and they usually have to call on him three or four times atintervals of some days, and selecting the days given by the astrologeras auspicious. Occasionally they have to go as many as ten times;but finally, if the girl's father proves very troublesome, they sendan old woman who drags away the girl by force. If the father sends heraway willingly he gives her presents of several basket-loads of grain, oil, turmeric, cooking-pots, cloth, and if he is well off a cow andbullocks, the value of the presents amounting to about Rs. 50. Thegirl's brother takes her to her husband's house, where a repetition ofthe marriage ceremony on a small scale is performed. Twice again afterthe consummation of the marriage she visits her parents for periodsof one and six months, but after this she never again goes to theirhouse unaccompanied by her husband. Widow-marriage is allowed, and thewidow may marry the younger brother of her late husband or not as shepleases. But if she marries another man he must pay a sum of Rs. 10to Rs. 20 for her, of which Rs. 5 go to the Panua or headman of thecaste, and Rs. 2 to their tutelary goddess Parmeshwari. The childrenby the first husband are kept either by his relatives or the widow'sparents, and do not go to the new husband. When a bachelor marries awidow, he is first married to a flower or _sahara _tree. A widow whohas remarried cannot take part in any worship or marriage ceremonyin her house, not even in the marriage of her own sons. Divorce isallowed, and is effected in the presence of the caste _panchayat_or committee. A divorced woman may marry again. 

4. Religious and social customs. 

The caste worship the goddess Parmeshwari, the wife of Vishnu, andJagannath, the Uriya incarnation of Vishnu. Parmeshwari is worshippedby Brahmans, who offer bread and _khir_ or rice and milk to her;goats are also offered by the Dehri or Mahakul, the caste priest, who receives the heads of the goats as his remuneration. They believein witches, who they think drink the blood of children, and employsorcerers to exorcise them. They worship a stick on Dasahra day inremembrance of their old profession of herding cattle, and they worshipcows and buffaloes at the full moon of Shrawan (July-August). DuringKunwar, on the eighth day of each fortnight, two festivals areheld. At the first each girl in the family wears a thread containingeighteen knots twisted three times round her neck. All the girls fastand receive presents of cloths and grain from their brothers. This iscalled Bhaijiuntia, or the ceremony for the welfare of the brothers. Onthe second day the mother of the family does the same, and receivespresents from her sons, this being Puajiuntia, or the ceremony for thewelfare of sons. The Dumals believe that in the beginning water coveredthe earth. They think that the sun and moon are the eyes of God, andthat the stars are the souls of virtuous men, who enjoy felicity inheaven for the period measured by the sum of their virtuous actions, and when this has expired have to descend again to earth to suffer theagonies of human life. When a shooting star is seen they think it isthe soul of one of these descending to be born again on earth. Theyboth burn and bury their dead according to their means. After a bodyis buried they make a fire over the grave and place an empty pot onit. Mourning is observed for twelve days in the case of a marriedand for seven in the case of an unmarried person. Children dyingwhen less than six days old are not mourned at all. During mourningthe persons of the household do not cook for themselves. On the thirdday after the death three leaf-plates, each containing a little rice, sugar and butter, are offered to the spirit of the deceased. On thefourth day four such plates are offered, and on the fifth day five, and so on up to the ninth day when the Pindas or sacrificial cakesare offered, and nine persons belonging to the caste are invited, foodand a new piece of cloth being given to each. Should only one attend, nine plates of food would be served to him, and he would be givennine pieces of cloth. If two or more persons in a family are killedby a tiger, a Sulia or magician is called in, and he pretends to bethe tiger and to bite some one in the family, who is then carried asa corpse to the burial-place, buried for a short time and taken outagain. All the ceremonies of mourning are observed for him for oneday. This proceeding is believed to secure immunity for the family fromfurther attacks. In return for his services the Sulia gets a shareof everything in the house corresponding to what he would receive, supposing he were a member of the family, on a partition. Thus ifthe family consisted of only two persons he would get a third partof the whole property. 

The Dumals eat meat, including wild boar's flesh, but not beef, fowls or tame pigs. They do not drink liquor. They will take foodcooked with water from Brahmans and Sudhs, and even the leavings offood from Brahmans. This is probably because they were formerly thehousehold servants of Brahmans, though they have now risen somewhatin position and rank, together with the Koltas and Sudhs, as a goodcultivating caste. Their women and girls can easily be distinguished, the girls because the hair is shaved until they are married, and thewomen because they wear bangles of glass on one arm and of lac on theother. They never wear nose-rings or the ornament called _pairi_ onthe feet, and no ornaments are worn on the arm above the elbow. Theydo not wear black clothing. The women are tattooed on the hands, feetand breast. Morality within the caste is lax. A woman going wrongwith a man of her own caste is not punished, because the Dumals livegenerally in Native States, where it is the business of the Raja tofind the seducer. But she is permanently excommunicated for a _liaison_with a man of another caste. Eating with a very low caste is almostthe only offence which entails permanent exclusion for both sexes. TheDumals have a bad reputation for fidelity, according to a saying:'You cannot call the jungle a plain, and you should not call theDumal a brother, ' that is, do not trust a Dumal. Like the Ahirs theyare somewhat stupid, and when enquiry was being made from them as towhat crops they did not grow, one of them replied that they did notsow salt. They are good cultivators, and will grow anything excepthemp and turmeric. In some places they still follow their traditionaloccupation of grazing cattle. 

Fakir

1. General notice. 

_Fakir. _ [563]--The class of Muhammadan beggars. In the CentralProvinces the name is practically confined to Muhammadans, but inUpper India Hindus also use it. Nearly 9000 Fakirs were returnedin 1911, being residents mainly of Districts with large towns, asJubbulpore, Nagpur and Amraoti. Nearly two-fifths of the Muhammadansof the Central Provinces live in towns, and Muhammadan beggarswould naturally congregate there also. The name is derived from theArabic _fakr_, poverty. The Fakirs are often known as Shah, Lord, or Sain, a corruption of the Sanskrit Swami, master. Muhammad didnot recognise religious ascetism, and expressly discouraged it. Buteven during his lifetime his companions Abu Bakr and Ali establishedreligious orders with Zikrs or special exercises, and all MuhammadanFakirs trace their origin to Abu Bakr or Ali subsequently the firstand fourth Caliphs. [564] The Fakirs are divided into two classes, the Ba Shara or those who live according to the rules of Islam andmarry; and the Be Shara or those without the law. These latter haveno wives or homes; they drink intoxicating liquor, and neither fast, pray nor rule their passions. But several of the orders contain bothmarried and celibate groups. 

2. Principal orders. 

The principal classes of Fakirs in the Central Provinces arethe Madari, Gurujwale or Rafai, Jalali, Mewati, Sada Sohagal andNakshbandia. All of these except the Nakshbandia are nominally atleast Be Shara, or without the law, and celibate. 

The Madari are the followers of one Madar Shah, a converted Jewof Aleppo, whose tomb is supposed to be at Makhanpur in the UnitedProvinces. Their characteristic badge is a pair of pincers. Some, inorder to force people to give them alms, go about dragging a chain orlashing their legs with a whip. Others are monkey- and bear-trainersand rope-dancers. The Madaris are said to be proof against snakes andscorpions, and to have power to cure their bites. They will leap intoa fire and trample it down, crying out, '_Aam Madar, Aam Madar_. ' [565]

The Gurujwale or Rafai have as their badge a spiked iron club withsmall chains attached to the end. The Fakir rattles the chains ofhis club to announce his presence, and if the people will not givehim alms strikes at his own cheek or eye with the sharp point of hisclub, making the blood flow. They make prayers to their club once ayear, so that it may not cause them serious injury when they strikethemselves with it. 

The Jalalias are named after their founder, Jalal-ud-din of Bokhara, and have a horse-whip as their badge, with which they sometimesstrike themselves on the hands and feet. They are said to consumelarge quantities of _bhang_, and to eat snakes and scorpions; theyshave all the hair on the head and face, including the eyebrows, except a small scalp-lock on the right side. 

The Mewati appear to be a thieving order. They are also known asKulchor or thieves of the family, and appear to have been originallya branch of the Madari, who were perhaps expelled on account of theirthieving habits. Their distinguishing mark is a double bag like apack-saddle, which they hang over their shoulders. The Sada or MusaSohag are an order who dress like women, put on glass bangles, havetheir ears and noses pierced for ornaments, and wear long hair, butretain their beards and moustaches. They regard themselves as bridesof God or of Hussan, and beg in this guise. 

The Nakshbandia are the disciples of Khwaja Mir Muhammad, who wascalled Nakshband or brocade-maker. They beg at night-time, carrying anopen brass lamp with a short wick. Children are fond of the Nakshband, and go out in numbers to give him money. In return he marks them on thebrow with oil from his lamp. They are quiet and well behaved, belongingto the Ba Shara class of Fakirs, and having homes and families. 

The Kalandaria or wandering dervishes, who are occasionally met with, were founded by Kalandar Yusuf-ul-Andalusi, a native of Spain. Havingbeen dismissed from another order, he founded this as a new one, withthe obligation of perpetual travelling. The Kalandar is a well-knownfigure in Eastern stories. [566]

The Maulawiyah are the well-known dancing dervishes of Constantinopleand Cairo, but do not belong to India. 

The different orders of Fakirs are not strictly endogamous, andmarriages can take place between their members, though the Madarisprefer to confine marriage to their own order. Fakirs as a bodyare believed to marry among themselves, and hence to form somethingin the nature of a caste, but they freely admit outsiders, whetherMuhammadans or proselytised Hindus. 

3. Rules and customs. 

Every Fakir must have a Murshid or preceptor, and be initiated byhim. This applies also to boys born in the order, and a father cannotinitiate his son. The rite is usually simple, the novice havingto drink sherbet from the same cup as his preceptor and make him apresent of Rs. 1-4; but some orders insist that the whole body ofa novice should be shaved clean of hair before he is initiated. Theprincipal religious exercise of Fakirs is known as Zikr, and consistsin the continual repetition of the names of God by various methods, itbeing supposed that they can draw the name from different parts of thebody. The exercise is so exhausting that they frequently faint underit, and is varied by repetition of certain chapters of the Koran. TheFakir has a _tasbih_ or rosary, often consisting of ninety-nine beads, on which he repeats the ninety-nine names of God. The Fakirs begboth from Hindus and Muhammadans, and are sometimes troublesome andimportunate, inflicting wounds on themselves as a means of extortingalms. One beggar in Saugor said that he would give every one who gavehim alms five strokes with his whip, and attracted considerable customby this novel expedient. Some of them are in charge of Muhammadancemeteries and receive fees for a burial, while others live at thetombs of saints. They keep the tomb in good repair, cover it witha green cloth and keep a lighted lamp on it, and appropriate theofferings made by visitors. Owing to their solitude and continuousrepetition of prayers many Fakirs fall into a distraught condition, when they are known as _mast_, and are believed to be possessed ofa spirit. At such a time the people attach the greatest importanceto any utterances which fall from the Fakir's lips, believing thathe has the gift of prophecy, and follow him about with presents toinduce him to make some utterance. 

End of vol. II

NOTES

[1] This article is compiled from papers by Mr. Mir Padshah, Tahsildarof Bilaspur, and Kanhya Lal, clerk in the Gazetteer office. 

[2] _Basi_ or rice boiled in water the previous day. 

[3] A measure containing about 2 1/2 lbs. Of grain. 

[4] This article is mainly compiled from papers by the lateMr. Baikunth Nath Pujari, Extra Assistant Commissioner, Sambalpur;Sitaram, Head Master of the Raigarh English School, and Kanhya Lal, clerk in the Gazetteer office. 

[5] Now transferred to Bengal. 

[6] Dalton's _Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 322. 

[7] This article is mainly based on a paper on _Aghorisand Aghorpanthis_, by Mr. H. W. Barrow, in the _JournalAnthr. Soc. Bombay_, iii. P. 197. 

[8] Bhattacharya, _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 392. 

[9] _Aghoris and Aghorpanthis_, pp. 224, 226. 

[10] Page 208. 

[11] _The Tribune_ (Lahore), November 29, 1898, quoted in Oman's_Mystics, Ascetics and Saints of India_, pp. 164, 165. 

[12] _Studies of Indian Life and Sentiment_, p. 44. 

[13] The information about birth customs in this article is from apaper by Mr. Kalika Prasad, Tahsildar, Raj-Nandgaon State. 

[14] _Go_, _gau_ or _gai_, an ox or cow, and _pal_ or _palak_, guardian. 

[15] _Ind. Ant. _ (Jan. 1911), 'Foreign Elements in the HinduPopulation, ' by Mr. D. R. Bhandarkar. 

[16] Elliot, _Supplemental Glossary_, _s. V. _ Ahir. 

[17] _Early History of India_, 3rd ed. P. 286. 

[18] Elliot, _ibidem. _

[19] _Bombay Monograph on Ahir. _

[20] Elliot, _ibidem. _

[21] _Central Provinces Gazetteer_ (1871), Introduction. 

[22] _Linguistic Survey of India_, vol. Ix. Part ii. P. 50. 

[23] _Bombay Ethnographic Survey. _

[24] Quoted in _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Goala. 

[25] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 639. 

[26] Gokul was the place where Krishna was brought up, and theGokulastha Gosains are his special devotees. 

[27] _Behind the Bungalow. _

[28] _Eastern India_, ii. P. 467. 

[29] Buchanan, _Eastern India_, ii. Pp. 924, 943. 

[30] This article is mainly based on a paper by Mr. W. S. Slaney, E. A. C. , Akola. 

[31] _Berar Census Report_ (1881). 

[32] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Arakh. 

[33] _Cajanus indicus. _

[34] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 157. 

[35] Based on papers by Mr. Bijai Bahadur Royzada, Naib-TahsildarHinganghat, and Munshi Kanhya Lal of the Gazetteer office. 

[36] A preparation of raisins and other fruits and rice. 

[37] The ordinary tola is a rupee weight or two-fifths of an ounce. 

[38] _Jasminum zambac. _

[39] _Michelia champaca. _

[40] _Phyllanthus emblica. _

[41] _Report on the Badhak or Bagri Dacoits and the Measures adoptedby the Government of India for their Suppression_, printed in 1849. 

[42] Sleeman, p. 10. 

[43] Sleeman, p. 10. 

[44] Sleeman, p. 57. 

[45] Sleeman, p. 95. 

[46] Sleeman, p. 231. 

[47] Sleeman, p. 217. 

[48] Sleeman, p. 20. 

[49] Sleeman, p. 21. 

[50] Sleeman, p. 81. 

[51] Sleeman, p. 82. 

[52] Sleeman, p. 152. 

[53] Sleeman, p. 127. This passage is from a letter written by amagistrate, Mr. Ramsay. 

[54] Sleeman, p. 129. 

[55] Sleeman, p. 112. 

[56] Sleeman, p. 124. 

[57] Sleeman, p. 125. 

[58] Sleeman, p. 147. 

[59] Sleeman, p. 104. 

[60] Sleeman, p. 110. 

[61] Sleeman, p. 131. 

[62] Sleeman, p. 205. 

[63] Sleeman, p. 106. 

[64] Malcolm's _Memoir of Central India_, ii. P. 479. 

[65] Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Bawaria. 

[66] _Sirsa Settlement Report. _

[67] It would appear that the Gujarat Vaghris are a distinct classfrom the criminal section of the tribe. 

[68] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Gujarat Hindus_, p. 514. 

[69] Art. Bawaria, quoting from _North Indian Notes and Queries_, i. 51. 

[70] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 574. 

[71] Gunthorpe's _Criminal Tribes_. 

[72] _Criminal Classes in the Bombay Presidency_, p. 151. 

[73] Gunthorpe's _Criminal Tribes_, art. Badhak. 

[74] _C. P. Police Lectures_, art. Badhak. 

[75] Art. Bawaria, para. 12. 

[76] _Criminal Classes in the Bombay Presidency_, p. 179. 

[77] Kennedy, _loc. Cit. _ p. 208. 

[78] Kennedy, _loc. Cit. _ p. 185. 

[79] This article is partly based on a paper by Munshi Kanhya Lal ofthe Gazetteer office. 

[80] Sir B. Robertson's _C. P. Census Report_ (1891), p. 203. 

[81] _Punjab Census Report_ (1881), paras. 646, 647. 

[82] _Nasik Gazetteer_, pp. 84, 85. 

[83] Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Bahna. 

[84] The word Achera is merely a jingle put in to make the rhymecomplete. Kachera is a maker of glass bangles. 

[85] This article is based largely on a monograph by theRev. J. Lampard, missionary, Baihar, and also on papers by MuhammadHanif Siddiqi, forest ranger, Bilaspur, and Mr. Muhammad Ali Haqqani, B. A. , Tahsildar, Dindori. Some extracts have been made from ColonelWard's _Mandla Settlement Report_ (1869), and from Colonel Bloomfield's_Notes on the Baigas_. 

[86] In Bengal the Bhumia or Bhumij are an important tribe. 

[87] Colonel Ward's _Mandla Settlement Report_ (1868-69), p. 153. 

[88] _Shorea robusta. _

[89] Jarrett's _Ain-i-Akbari_, vol. Ii. P. 196. 

[90] Colonel Ward gives the bride's house as among the Gonds. Butinquiry in Mandla shows that if this custom formerly existed it hasbeen abandoned. 

[91] Forsyth's _Highlands of Central India_, p. 377. 

[92] The Great God. The Gonds also worship Bura Deo, resident in a_saj_ tree. 

[93] Opened in 1905. 

[94] _Mandla Settlement Report_ (1868-69), p. 153. 

[95] _Notes on the Baigas_, p. 4. 

[96] Mr. Lampard's monograph. 

[97] Farthings. 

[98] This article contains material from Sir E. Maclagan's _PunjabCensus Report_ (1891), and Dr. J. N. Bhattacharya's _Hindu Castesand Sects_ (Thacker, Spink & Co. , Calcutta). 

[99] _Dictionary_, s. V. 

[100] Sir E. Maclagan's _Punjab Census Report_ (1891), p. 122. 

[101] _Memoir of Mathura. _

[102] _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 449. 

[103] Lit. The birth on the eighth day, as Krishna was born on the8th of dark Bhadon. 

[104] Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Vallabhacharya. 

[105] _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 457. 

[106] From _laskkar_, an army. 

[107] This paragraph is taken from Professor Wilson's _Account ofHindu Sects in the Asiatic Researches_. 

[108] This article is based on papers by Mr. Habib Ullah, Pleader, Burhanpur, Mr. W. Bagley, Subdivisional Officer, and Munsh Kanhya Lal, of the Gazetteer office. 

[109] This legend is probably a vague reminiscence of the historicalfact that a Malwa army was misled by a Gond guide in the Nimar forestsand cut up by the local Muhammadan ruler. The well-known Raja Man ofJodhpur was, it is believed, never in Nimar. 

[110] The _ghat_ or river-bank for the disposal of corpses. 

[111] _Madras Census Report_ (1891), p. 277. 

[112] _Ibidem_ (1891), p. 226. 

[113] _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_, p. 16. 

[114] _Madras Census Report_ (1891), p. 277. 

[115] See para. 19 below. 

[116] See commencement of article. 

[117] _C. P. Census Report_ (1911), Occupation Chapter, SubsidiaryTable I. P. 234. 

[118] For examples, the subordinate articles on Agarwal, Oswal, Maheshri, Khandelwal, Lad, Agrahari, Ajudhiabasi, and Srimali may beconsulted. The census lists contain numerous other territorial names. 

[119] _Rajasthan_, i. Pp. 76, 109. 

[120] That is Marwar. But perhaps the term here is used in the widersense of Rajputana. 

[121] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 145. 

[122] _Punjab Census Report_ (1881), p. 293. 

[123] _Supplemental Glossary_, p. 110. 

[124] _Rasmala_, i. Pp. 240, 243. 

[125] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 360. 

[126] _Ibid. _ ii. P. 240. 

[127] The Parwars probably belonged originally to Rajputana; seesubordinate article. 

[128] _Rajasthan_, i. P. 491. 

[129] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 80. 

[130] The common brass drinking-vessel. 

[131] Sir H. H. Risley's _Peoples of India_, p. 127, and AppendixI. P. 8. 

[132] _Punjab Census Report_ (1881), p. 291. 

[133] _Nagpur Settlement Report_ (1900), para. 54. 

[134] _Nagpur Settlement Report_ (1900), para. 54. 

[135] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Agarwala. 

[136] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Agarwala. 

[137] The information on this subcaste is taken from Mr. Crooke'sarticle on it in his _Tribes and Castes_. 

[138] Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Audhia. 

[139] Kennedy's _Criminal Classes of the Bombay Presidency_, art. Audhia. 

[140] Kennedy, _ibidem. _

[141] Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Audhia. 

[142] _United Provinces Census Report_ (1901), p. 220. 

[143] Atkinson, _Himalayan Gazetteer_, ii. P. 473, quoted inMr. Crooke's article Dhusar. 

[144] Sherring, _Hindu Castes_, i. P. 293. 

[145] This account is based on a paper furnished by Mr. Jeorakhan Lal, Deputy Inspector of Schools, Bilaspur. 

[146] Kashyap was a Brahman saint, but the name is perhaps derivedfrom Kachhap, a tortoise. 

[147] This article is mainly based on a paper by Mr. Pancham Lal, Naib-Tahsildar Sihora. 

[148] Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Gahoi. 

[149] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Golahre. 

[150] The above notice is partly based on a paper by Mr. Sant Prasad, schoolmaster, Nandgaon. 

[151] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Kasaundhan. 

[152] Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Khandelwal. 

[153] _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 209. 

[154] See article Bairagi for some notice of the sect. 

[155] See separate article on Jangam. 

[156] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 70. 

[157] A town near Jhalor in Marwar, now called Bhinmal. 

[158] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 97. 

[159] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 210, footnote. 

[160] _Hindus of Gujarat_, _loc. Cit. _, and _Bombay Gazetteer_, xvi. 45. 

[161] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Oswal. 

[162] _Bombay Gazetteer_, vol. Xvii. P. 51. 

[163] _Ibidem. _

[164] Bhattacharya, _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 207. 

[165] This article is based on papers by Mr. Pancham Lal, Naib-Tahsildar Sihora, and Munshi Kanhya Lal, of the Gazetteer office. 

[166] See also notice of Benaikias in article on Vidur. 

[167] _Bombay Gazetteer_, vol. Xvii. P. 81. 

[168] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 99. 

[169] _Ibidem. _

[170] _Ibidem. _ p. 98. 

[171] _Merinda citrifolia_, see art. Alia. 

[172] See article. 

[173] This article is based principally on a _Monograph on the BanjaraClan_, by Mr. N. F. Cumberlege of the Berar Police, believed to havebeen first written in 1869 and reprinted in 1882; notes on the Banjaraswritten by Colonel Mackenzie and printed in the _Berar Census Report_(1881) and the _Pioneer_ newspaper (communicated by Mrs. Horsburgh);Major Gunthorpe's _Criminal Tribes_; papers by Mr. M. E. Khare, Extra-Assistant Commissioner, Chanda; Mr. Narayan Rao, Tahr. , Betul;Mr. Mukund Rao, Manager, Pachmarhi Estate; and information on thecaste collected in Yeotmal and Nimar. 

[174] Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Banjara, para. 1. 

[175] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 150. 

[176] _Ibidem_, para. 2, quoting Dowson's Elliot, v. 100. 

[177] Khan Bahadur Fazalullah Lutfullah Faridi in the _BombayGazetteer_ (_Muhammadans of Gujarat_, p. 86) quoting from GeneralBriggs (_Transactions Bombay Literary Society_, vol. I. 183) saysthat "as carriers of grain for Muhammadan armies the Banjaras havefigured in history from the days of Muhammad Tughlak (A. D. 1340)to those of Aurangzeb. "

[178] Sir H. M. Elliot's _Supplemental Glossary_. 

[179] _Monograph on the Banjara Clan_, p. 8. 

[180] _Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 214 _et seq. _

[181] _Rajasthan_, i. 602. 

[182] _Ibidem_, ii. 570, 573. 

[183] This custom does not necessarily indicate a special connectionbetween the Banjaras and Charans, as it is common to severalcastes in Rajputana; but it indicates that the Banjaras came fromRajputana. Banjara men also frequently wear the hair long, down tothe neck, which is another custom of Rajputana. 

[184] _Jungle Life in India_, p. 517. 

[185] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 152. 

[186] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat. _

[187] _Letter on the Marathas_ (1798), p. 67, _India Office Tracts. _

[188] _Army of the Indian Mughals_, p. 192. 

[189] _Monograph_, p. 14, and _Berar Census Report_ (1881) (Kitts), p. 151. 

[190] These are held to have been descendants of the Bhika Rathorreferred to by Colonel Mackenzie above. 

[191] See note 3, p. 168. 

[192] General Briggs quoted by Mr. Faridi in _Bombay Gazetteer, Muhammadans of Gujarat_, p. 86. 

[193] A. Wellesley (1800), quoted in Mr. Crooke's edition of_Hobson-Jobson_, art. Brinjarry. 

[194] Cumberlege, _loc. Cit. _

[195] Cumberlege, pp. 28, 29. 

[196] Elliot's _Races_, quoted by Mr. Crooke, _ibidem. _

[197] Cumberlege, pp. 4, 5. 

[198] Cumberlege, _l. C. _

[199] This custom is noticed in the article on Khairwar. 

[200] Cumberlege, p. 18. 

[201] Mr. Hira Lal suggests that this custom may have something todo with the phrase _Athara jat ke gayi_, or 'She has gone to theeighteen castes, ' used of a woman who has been turned out of thecommunity. This phrase seems, however, to be a euphemism, eighteencastes being a term of indefinite multitude for any or no caste. Thenumber eighteen may be selected from the same unknown associationwhich causes the goat to be cut into eighteen pieces. 

[202] _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_, p. 344, quoting fromMoor's _Narrative of Little's Detachment_. 

[203] Cumberlege, p. 35. 

[204] _Berar Census Report_, 1881. 

[205] Cumberlege, p. 21. 

[206] The following instance is taken from Mr. Balfour's article, 'Migratory Tribes of Central India, ' in _J. A. S. B. _, new series, vol. Xiii. , quoted in Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_. 

[207] From the Sanskrit Hatya-adhya, meaning 'That which it is mostsinful to slay' (Balfour). 

[208] _Monograph_, p. 12. 

[209] _Asiatic Studies_, i. P. 118 (ed. 1899). 

[210] Cumberlege, p. 23 _et seq. _ The description of witchcraft iswholly reproduced from his _Monograph_. 

[211] His motive being the fine inflicted on the witch's family. 

[212] The fruit of _Buchanania latifolia_. 

[213] _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_, p. 507, quoting fromthe Rev. J. Cain, _Ind. Ant. _ viii. (1879). 

[214] _Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies_, p. 70. 

[215] _Monograph_, p. 19. 

[216] The Patwas are weavers of silk thread and the Nunias are masonsand navvies. 

[217] An impure caste of weavers, ranking with the Mahars. 

[218] _Semecarpus Anacardium. _

[219] Malcolm, _Memoir of Central India_, ii. P. 296. 

[220] Cumberlege, p. 16. 

[221] Small double shells which are still used to a slight extent asa currency in backward tracts. This would seem an impossibly cumbrousmethod of carrying money about nowadays, but I have been informed bya comparatively young official that in his father's time, change fora rupee could not be had in Chhattisgarh outside the two principaltowns. As the cowries were a form of currency they were probablyheld sacred, and hence sewn on to clothes as a charm, just as goldand silver are used for ornaments. 

[222] _Jungle Life in India_, p. 516. 

[223] Brewer's _Dictionary of Phrase and Fable_ contains the followingnotice of horns as an article of dress: "Mr. Buckingham says of aTyrian lady, 'She wore on her head a hollow silver horn rearing itselfup obliquely from the forehead. It was some four inches in diameter atthe root and pointed at the extremity. This peculiarity reminded meforcibly of the expression of the Psalmist: "Lift not up your horn onhigh; speak not with a stiff neck. All the horns of the wicked alsowill I cut off, but the horns of the righteous shall be exalted"(Ps. Lxxv. 5, 10). ' Bruce found in Abyssinia the silver horns ofwarriors and distinguished men. In the reign of Henry V. The hornedheadgear was introduced into England and from the effigy of Beatrice, Countess of Arundel, at Arundel Church, who is represented with thehorns outspread to a great extent, we may infer that the length ofthe head-horn, like the length of the shoe-point in the reign of HenryVI. , etc. , marked the degree of rank. To cut off such horns would beto degrade; and to exalt and extend such horns would be to add honourand dignity to the wearer. " Webb (_Heritage of Dress_, p. 117) writes:"Mr. Elworthy in a paper to the British Association at Ipswich in1865 considered the crown to be a development from horns of honour. Hemaintained that the symbols found in the head of the god Serapis werethe elements from which were formed the composite head-dress calledthe crown into which horns entered to a very great extent. " Thisseems a doubtful speculation, but still it may be quite possiblethat the idea of distinguishing by a crown the leader of the tribewas originally taken from the antlers of the leader of the herd. Thehelmets of the Vikings were also, I believe, decorated with horns. 

[224] _Monograph_, p. 40. 

[225] _Melia indica. _

[226] Author of the _Nimar Settlement Report_. 

[227] _Sesamum. _

[228] _Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies_, p. 21. 

[229] _Report on the Badhak or Bagri Dacoits_, p. 310. 

[230] Colonel Mackenzie's notes. 

[231] Mr. W. F. Sinclair, C. S. , in _Ind. Ant. _ iii. P. 184 (1874). 

[232] _Notes on Criminal Tribes frequenting Bombay, Berar and theCentral Provinces_ (Bombay, 1882). 

[233] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 151. 

[234] This notice is compiled principally from a good paperby Mr. M. C. Chatterji, retired Extra Assistant Commissioner, Jubbulpore, and from papers by Professor Sada Shiva Jai Ram, M. A. , Government College, Jubbulpore, and Mr. Bhaskar Baji Rao Deshmukh, Deputy Inspector of Schools, Nagpur. 

[235] Sherring, _Hindu Tribes and Castes_, i. P. 330. Nesfield, _Brief View_, p. 15. _N. W. P. Census Report_ (1891), p 317. 

[236] The name of a superior revenue office; under the Marathas, now borne as a courtesy title by certain families. 

[237] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Agarwal. 

[238] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Barui. 

[239] Blochmann, _Ain-i-Akbari_, i. P. 72, quoted in Crooke's _Tribesand Castes_, art. Tamboli. 

[240] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 210. 

[241] _Ficus glomerata. _

[242] _Hindu Castes_, i. P. 316. 

[243] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Bari. 

[244] Vishnu. 

[245] Sherring, _Tribes and Castes_, i. Pp. 403, 404. 

[246] This article is compiled from papers by Mr. W. N. Maw, DeputyCommissioner, Damoh, and Murlidhar, Munsiff of Khurai in Saugor. 

[247] _Bombay Gazetteer_, xvii. P. 108. 

[248] About 100 lbs. 

[249] Compiled from papers by Mr. Ram Lal, B. A. , Deputy Inspector ofSchools, Saugor; Mr. Vishnu Gangadhar Gadgil, Tahsildar, Narsinghpur;Mr. Devi Dayal, Tahsildar, Hatta; Mr. Kanhya Lal, B. A. , DeputyInspector of Schools, Betul; Mr. Keshava Rao, Headmaster, MiddleSchool, Seoni; and Bapu Gulab Singh, Superintendent, Land Records, Betul. 

[250] Chapter x. 37, and Shudra Kamlakar, p. 284. 

[251] A Vaideha was the child of a Vaishya father and a Brahman mother. 

[252] Based on a paper by Rao Sahib Dhonduji, retired Inspector ofPolice, Akola, and information collected by Mr. Aduram Chaudhri ofthe Gazetteer office. 

[253] Mr. Marten's _C. P. Census Report_ (1911), p. 212. 

[254] This article is based on papers by Mr. A. K. Smith, C. S. , Mr. Khande Rao, Superintendent of Land Records, Raipur, and MunshiKanhiya Lal, of the Gazetteer office. 

[255] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Beldar. 

[256] _The Castes and Tribes of Southern India_, art. Odde. 

[257] _Akola District Gazetteer_ (Mr. C. Brown), pp. 132, 133. 

[258] _Amraoti District Gazetteer_ (Messrs. Nelson and Fitzgerald), p. 146. 

[259] See article on Badhak. 

[260] Kennedy, p. 247. 

[261] Crooke, art. Beria. 

[262] The following particulars are taken from a note byMr. K. N. Date, Deputy Superintendent, Reformatory School, Jubbulpore. 

[263] This article is based principally on a paper by Panna Lal, Revenue Inspector, Bilaspur, and also on papers by Mr. Syed Sher Ali, Naib-Tahsildar, Mr. Hira Lal and Mr. Aduram Chaudhri of the Gazetteeroffice. 

[264] For the meaning of the term Baiga and its application to thetribe, see also article on Bhuiya. 

[265] It is or was, of course, a common practice for a husband tocut off his wife's nose if he suspected her of being unfaithful tohim. But whether the application of the epithet to the goddess shouldbe taken to imply anything against her moral character is not known. 

[266] This article is mainly compiled from a paper by Pyare Lal Misra, Ethnographic Clerk. 

[267] _Bombay Gazetteer_ (Campbell), xviii. P. 464. 

[268] The following particulars are taken from Colonel Portman's_Report on the Bhamtas of the Deccan_ (Bombay, 1887). 

[269] Portman, _loc. Cit. _

[270] _Bombay Gazetteer_ (Campbell), xviii. P. 465. 

[271] This article contains some information from a paper by Mr. GopalParmanand, Deputy Inspector of Schools, Saugor. 

[272] _Memoirs of the Races of the N. W. P. _ vol. I. P. 35. 

[273] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Bharbhunja. 

[274] See article on Kurmi. The remainder of this section is takenfrom Mr. Gopal Parmanand's notes. 

[275] _Ibidem. _

[276] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Kandu. 

[277] This article is compiled from notes taken by Mr. Hira Lal, Assistant Gazetteer Superintendent in Jubbulpore, and from a paperby Ram Lal Sharma, schoolmaster, Bilaspur. 

[278] _Tribes and Castes of the N. W. P. _, art. Bhar. 

[279] _C. P. Census Report_, 1881, p. 188. 

[280] _Dhaya_ means the system of shifting cultivation, which untilprohibited was so injurious to the forests. 

[281] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Brahman. 

[282] Art. Bhat. 

[283] Malcolm, _Central India_, ii. P. 132. 

[284] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 406. 

[285] Malcolm, ii. P. 135. 

[286] _Rajasthan_, ii. Pp. 133, 134. 

[287] Great King, the ordinary method of address to Brahmans. 

[288] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 175. 

[289] _Rasmala_, ii. Pp. 261, 262. 

[290] See later in this article. 

[291] This present of a lakh of rupees is known as Lakh Pasaru, and it is not usually given in cash but in kind. It is made up ofgrain, land, carriages, jewellery, horses, camels and elephants, and varies in value from Rs. 30, 000 to Rs. 70, 000. A living bard, Mahamahopadhyaya Murar Das, has received three Lakh Pasarus from theRajas of Jodhpur and has refused one from the Rana of Udaipur in viewof the fact that he was made _ayachaka_ by the Jodhpur Raja. _Ayachaka_means literally 'not a beggar, ' and when a bard has once been made_ayachaka_ he cannot accept gifts from any person other than his ownpatron. An _ayachaka_ was formerly known as _polpat_, as it becamehis bounden duty to sing the praises of his patron constantly fromthe gate (_pol_) of the donor's fort or castle. (Mr. Hira Lal. )

[292] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 548. 

[293] _Viserva_, lit. Poison. 

[294] From _dhol_, a drum. 

[295] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 184. 

[296] Lit. _putli_ or doll. 

[297] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Bhat. 

[298] _Ibidem. _ Veiling the face is a sign of modesty. 

[299] Postans. _Cutch_, p. 172. 

[300] Vol. Ii. Pp. 392-394. 

[301] _Rasmala_, ii. Pp. 143, 144. 

[302] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Hindus of Gujarat_, Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam, pp. 217, 219. 

[303] In Broach. 

[304] Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, ii. P. 242. 

[305] Westermarck, _ibidem_, p. 246. 

[306] Westermarck, _ibidem_, p. 248. 

[307] The above account of _Dharna_ is taken from Colonel Tone's_Letter on the Marathas_ (India Office Tracts). 

[308] This article is compiled from papers drawn up by Rai BahadurPanda Baijnath, Superintendent, Bastar State; Mr. Ravi Shankar, Settlement Officer, Bastar; and Mr. Gopal Krishna, AssistantSuperintendent, Bastar. 

[309] _Bassia latifolia_. 

[310] The principal authorities on the Bhils are: _An Account of theMewar Bhils_, by Major P. H. Hendley, _J. A. S. B. _ vol. Xliv. , 1875, pp. 347-385; the _Bombay Gazetteer_, vol. Ix. , _Hindus of Gujarat_;and notices in Colonel Tod's _Rajasthan_, Mr. A. L. Forbes's _Rasmala_, and _The Khandesh Bhil Corps_, by Mr. A. H. A. Simcox, C. S. 

[311] The old name of the Sesodia clan, Gahlot, is held to be derivedfrom this Goha. See the article Rajput Sesodia for a notice of thereal origin of the clan. 

[312] _Rajasthan_, i. P. 184. 

[313] _Ibidem_, p. 186. 

[314] Reference may be made to _The Golden Bough_ for the fullexplanation and illustration of this superstition. 

[315] _Rajasthan_, ii. Pp. 320, 321. 

[316] _History of the Marathas_, i. P. 28. 

[317] See article. 

[318] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 466. 

[319] Malcolm, _Memoir of Central India_, i. P. 518. 

[320] _An Account of the Bhils, J. A. S. B. _ (1875), p. 369. 

[321] _Hyderabad Census Report_ (1891), p. 218. 

[322] _The Khandesh Bhil Corps_, by Mr A. H. A. Simcox. 

[323] Forbes, _Rasmala_, i. P. 104. 

[324] _Memoir of Central India_, i. Pp. 525, 526. 

[325] _Ibidem_, i. P. 550. 

[326] _Hobson-Jobson_, art. Bhil. 

[327] _An Account of the Bhils_, p. 369. 

[328] _The Khandesh Bhil Corps_, p. 71. 

[329] _Ibidem_, p. 275. 

[330] _Eugenia jambolana. _

[331] _Soymida febrifuga. _

[332] _Phyllanthus emblica. _

[333] _Terminalia belerica. _

[334] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 309. 

[335] See article Kunbi. 

[336] _Sorghum vulgare. _

[337] _Loc. Cit. _ p. 347. 

[338] _Western India. _

[339] _Asiatic Studies_, 1st series, p. 174. 

[340] _Asiatic Studies_, 1st series, p. 352. 

[341] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 302. 

[342] _Bombay Gazetteer_, vol. Xii. P. 87. 

[343] _An Account of the Bhils_, pp. 362, 363. 

[344] _Account of the Mewar Bhils_, pp. 357, 358. 

[345] Forbes, _Rasmala_, i. P. 113. 

[346] _Nimar Settlement Report_, pp. 246, 247. 

[347] Sir G. Grierson, _Linguistic Survey of India_, vol. Ix. Partiii. Pp. 6-9. 

[348] This article is based mainly on Captain Forsyth's _NimarSettlement Report_, and a paper by Mr. T. T. Korke, Pleader, Khandwa. 

[349] _Eugenia jambolana. _

[350] _Bauhinia racemosa. _

[351] _Settlement Report_ (1869), para. 411. 

[352] Mr. Montgomerie's _Nimar Settlement Report_. 

[353] _Memoir of Central India_, ii. P. 156. 

[354] Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Bhishti. 

[355] Elliott's _Memoirs of the North-Western Provinces_, i. P. 191. 

[356] Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, ii. P. 100. 

[357] Rudyard Kipling, _Barrack-Room Ballads_, 'Gunga Din. '

[358] Thacker and Co. , London. 

[359] This article is mainly compiled from papers by Mr. PandurangLakshman Bakre, pleader, Betul, and Munshi Pyare Lal, ethnographicclerk. 

[360] This article is compiled partly from Colonel Dalton's _Ethnologyof Bengal_ and Sir H. Risley's _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_; amonograph has also been furnished by Mr. B. C. Mazumdar, pleader, Sambalpur, and papers by Mr. A. B. Napier, Deputy Commissioner, Raipur, and Mr. Hira Lal. 

[361] _Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 140. 

[362] _Linguistic Survey_, vol. Xiv. _Munda and Dravidian Languages_, p. 217. 

[363] Page 142. 

[364] _Ibidem_, p. 141. 

[365] In the article on Binjhwar, it was supposed that the Baigasmigrated east from the Satpura hills into Chhattisgarh. But theevidence adduced above appears to show that this view is incorrect. 

[366] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Binjhia. 

[367] Crooke, _Tribes and Castes_, art. Bhuiya, para. 4. 

[368] _Ibidem_, para. 3. 

[369] _Ibidem_, art. Bhuiyar, para. 1. 

[370] _Ibidem_, para. 16. 

[371] Dalton, p. 147. 

[372] Page 142. 

[373] The question of the relation of the Baiga tribe to Mr. Crooke'sBhuiyars was first raised by Mr. E. A. H. Blunt, Census Superintendent, United Provinces. 

[374] Mr. Mazumdar's monograph. 

[375] From Mr. Mazumdar's monograph. 

[376] This article is compiled from a paper taken by Mr. Hira Lalat Sonpur. 

[377] This article is based on papers by Mr. Hira Lal, Mr. GokulPrasad, Tahsildar, Dhamtari, Mr. Pyare Lal Misra of the Gazetteeroffice, and Munshi Ganpati Giri, Superintendent, Bindranawagarh estate. 

[378] From the _Index of Languages and Dialects_, furnished by SirG. Grierson for the census. 

[379] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Binjhia. 

[380] _Early History of Mankind_, p. 341. 

[381] This article is based on a paper by Mr. Mian Bhai Abdul Hussain, Extra Assistant Commissioner, Sambalpur. 

[382] _Bassia latifolia_. 

[383] This article is compiled from Mr. Wilson's account of theBishnois as reproduced in Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, and fromnotes taken by Mr. Aduram Chaudhri in the Hoshangabad District. 

[384] The total number of precepts as given above is only twenty-five, but can be raised to twenty-nine by counting the prohibition of opium, tobacco, _bhang_, blue clothing, spirits and flesh separately. 

[385] Jhuria may be Jharia, jungly; Sain is a term applied to beggars;the Ahir or herdsman sept may be descended from a man of this castewho became a Bishnoi. 

[386] The day when the sun passes from one zodiacal sign into another. 

[387] The New Moon day or the day before. 

[388] This article is largely based on Mr. F. L. Faridi's fulldescription of the sect in the _Bombay Gazetteer, Muhammadans ofGujarat_, and on a paper by Mr. Habib Ullah, pleader, Burhanpur. 

[389] _Bombay Gazetteer, Muhammadans of Gujarat_, p. 30. SirH. T. Colebrooke and Mr. Conolly thought that the Bohras were trueShias and not Ismailias. 

[390] _Ibidem_, pp. 30-32. 

[391] _J. A. S. B. _ vol. Vi. (1837), part ii. P. 847. 

[392] _Berar Census Report_ (1818), p. 70. 

[393] _Castes and Tribes of Southern India_, art. Bohra. 

[394] Crooke's edition of _Hobson-Jobson_, art. Bohra. 

[395] Moor's _Hindu Infanticide_, p. 168. 

[396] _Memoir of Central India_, ii. P. 111. 

[397] This article is mainly compiled from a full and excellent accountof the caste by Mr. Gopal Datta Joshi, Civil Judge, Saugor, C. P. , towhom the writer is much indebted. Extracts have also been taken fromMr. W. Crooke's and Sir H. Risley's articles on the caste in theirworks on the _Tribes and Castes_ of the United Provinces and Bengalrespectively; from Mr. J. N. Bhattacharya's _Hindu Castes and Sects_(Thacker, Spink & Co. , Calcutta, 1896), and from the Rev. W. Ward's_View of the History, Literature and Religion of the Hindus_ (London, 1817). 

[398] Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Brahman, quoting ProfessorEggeling in _Encyclopædia Britannica_, s. V. Brahmanism. 

[399] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Brahman. 

[400] _Hindu Manners, Customs, and Ceremonies_, 3rd ed. P. 172. 

[401] Muir, _Ancient Sanskrit Texts_, i. 282 _sq. _

[402] Quoted in Mr. Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Brahman. 

[403] Quoted by Mr. Crooke. 

[404] _Tribes and Castes of the Punjab_, by Mr. H. A. Rose, vol. Ii. P. 123. 

[405] See also article Rajput-Gaur. 

[406] See subordinate articles. 

[407] A section of the Kanaujia. See above. 

[408] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Brahman. 

[409] Chap. Ix. V. 173. 

[410] Ward's _Hindus_, vol. Ii. P. 97. 

[411] _Ibidem_, pp. 98, 100. 

[412] _Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies_, by the Abbé Dubois, 3rd ed. P. 499. 

[413] _Ibidem_, p. 500. 

[414] London, Heinemann (1897), pp. 84-91. 

[415] This is the famous Gayatri. 

[416] It is not known how a slip-knot and a garland are connectedwith any incarnation of Vishnu. For the incarnations see articlesVaishnava sect. 

[417] In the Central Provinces Ganpati is represented by a roundred stone, Surya by a rock crystal or the Swastik sign, Devi by animage in brass or by a stone brought from her famous temple at Mahur, and Vishnu by the round black stone or Saligram. Besides these everyBrahman will have a special family god, who may be one of the aboveor another deity, as Rama or Krishna. 

[418] _Bipracharanamrita. _

[419] _Hindu Castes and Sects_, pp. 19-21. 

[420] _Rajasthan_, i. P. 487. 

[421] _Rajasthan_, i. P. 698. 

[422] At that time £12, 500 or more, now about £8000. 

[423] _Tribes and Castes of the North-West Provinces and Oudh_, s. V. 

[424] _Early History of India_, 3rd ed. P. 376. 

[425] _Ibidem_, p. 385. 

[426] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Kanaujia. 

[427] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 11. 

[428] _Bombay Gazetteer, Satara_, p. 54. 

[429] Bhattacharya, _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 47. 

[430] _Ibidem_, p. 48. 

[431] From Mr. Gopal Datta Joshi's paper. 

[432] _Rasmala_, ii. P. 233. 

[433] _Rasmala_, ii. P. 259. 

[434] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Sanadhya. 

[435] Crooke, _ibidem_, paras. 3 and 6. 

[436] _Eastern India_, ii. 472, quoted in Mr. Crooke's art. Sarwaria. 

[437] Stirling's description of Orissa in _As. Res_. Vol. Xv. P. 199, quoted in _Hindu Castes and Sects_. 

[438] _Hindu Castes and Sects_, p. 63. 

[439] This article is compiled from papers by Mr. Wali Muhammad, Tahsildar of Khurai, and Kanhya Lal, clerk in the Gazetteer office. 

[440] This article is based on the Rev. E. M. Gordon's _IndianFolk-Tales_ (London, Elliott & Stock, 1908), and the CentralProvinces _Monograph on the Leather Industry_, by Mr. C. G. ChenevixTrench, C. S. ; with extracts from Sir H. H. Risley's and Mr. Crooke'sdescriptions of the caste, and from the _Berar Census Report_ (1881);on information collected for the District Gazetteers; and papersby Messrs. Durga Prasad Pande, Tahsildar, Raipur; Ram Lal, DeputyInspector of Schools, Saugor; Govind Vithal Kane, Naib-Tahsildar, Wardha; Balkrishna Ramchandra Bakhle, Tahsildar, Mandla; Sitaram, schoolmaster, Balaghat; and Kanhya Lal of the Gazetteer office. Someof the material found in Mr. Gordon's book was obtained independentlyby the writer in Bilaspur before its publication and is thereforenot specially acknowledged. 

[441] There are other genealogies showing the Chamar as the offspringof various mixed unions. 

[442] _Bombay Gazetteer_, vol. Xv. Kanara, p. 355. 

[443] The Hindus say that there are five classes of women, Padmini, Hastini, Chitrani and Shunkhini being the first four, and of thesePadmini is the most perfect. No details of the other classes aregiven. _Rasmala_, i. P. 160. 

[444] _Punjab Census Report_ (1881), p. 320. 

[445] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Chamar. 

[446] _Loc. Cit. _

[447] From Mr. Gordon's paper. 

[448] _Monograph on Leather Industries_, p. 9. 

[449] _Ibidem. _

[450] See articles on these castes. 

[451] _Monograph on Leather Industries_, p. 3. 

[452] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 149. 

[453] From _mangna_, to beg. 

[454] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Chamar. 

[455] _Indian Folk-Tales. _

[456] _Indian Folk-Tales_, pp. 49, 50. 

[457] Shells which were formerly used as money. 

[458] _Indian Folk-Tales_, pp. 49, 50. 

[459] _Monograph_, p. 3. 

[460] _Monograph on Leather Industries_, p. 5. 

[461] _Zizyphus xylopera. _

[462] _Butea frondosa. _

[463] _Anogeissus latifolia. _

[464] The above is an abridgment of the description in Mr. Trench's_Monograph_, to which reference may be made for further details. 

[465] _Monograph on the Leather Industries_, pp. 10, 11. 

[466] _Melia indica. _

[467] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 149. 

[468] _Rasmala_, i. 395, quoting from the _Ain-i-Akbari_. 

[469] From papers by Mr. Parmeshwar Misra, Settlement Superintendent, Rairakhol, and Mr. Rasanand, Sireshtedar, Bamra. 

[470] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Chasa. 

[471] This article is based principally on notes taken by Mr. HiraLal at Bhatgaon. 

[472] _Bombay Gazetteer_, _Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 178. 

[473] A corruption for Viswakarma, the divine artificer and architect. 

[474] The story, however, really belongs to northern India. Usha isthe goddess of dawn. 

[475] Krishna's mother. 

[476] Little white flowers like jasmine. This simile would be unlikelyto occur to the ordinary observer who sees a Hindu child crying. 

[477] _Tori balayan leun. _ For explanation see above. 

[478] Commencement of the agricultural year. 

[479] This article is partly based on a paper by Mr. Bijai Bahadur, Naib-Tahsildar, Balaghat. 

[480] _Bombay Ethnographic Survey_, draft article on Chitrakathi. 

[481] May-June. The Akhatij is the beginning of the agricultural year. 

[482] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), paragraph 206. The passage isslightly altered and abridged in reproduction. 

[483] Vol. Ix. Part. Ii. _Muhammadans of Gujarat_, p. 57. 

[484] _Rajasthan_, ii. P. 292. 

[485] _Bombay Gazetteer, l. C. _

[486] In recording this point Mr. Faridi gives the following note:"In 1847 a case occurred which shows how firmly the Memans clingto their original tribal customs. The widow of Haji Nur Muhammadof the Lakariya family demanded a share of her deceased husband'sproperty according to Muhammadan law. The _jama-at_ or communitydecided that a widow had no claim to share her husband's estatesunder the Hindu law. Before the High Court, in spite of the ridiculeof other Sunnis, the elders of the Cutchi Memans declared that theircaste rules denied the widow's claim. The matter caused and is still(1896) causing agitation, as the doctors of the Sunni law at Meccahave decided that as the law of inheritance is laid down by the holyKoran, a wilful departure from it is little short of apostasy. TheMemans are contemplating a change, but so far they have not foundthemselves able to depart from their tribal practices. "

[487] This article is based on papers by Mr. Vithal Rao, Naib-Tahsildar, Bilaspur, and Messrs. Kanhya Lal and Pyare Lal Misraof the Gazetteer office. 

[488] Crooke, _Tribes and Castes_, art. Kol. 

[489] _Aegle Marmelos. _

[490] _Butea frondosa. _

[491] _Nag_, a cobra. 

[492] Kept woman, a term applied to a widow. 

[493] Moor's _Hindu Infanticide_, p. 133. 

[494] James Forbes, _Oriental Memoirs_, i. P. 313. 

[495] Rajendra Lal Mitra, _Indo-Aryans_, i. P. 263. 

[496] _Journal of Indian Art and Industry_, xvi. , April 1912, p. 3. 

[497] Dr. Jevons, _Introduction to the History of Religion_, p. 60. 

[498] _Private Life of an Eastern King_, p. 294. 

[499] _Hobson-Jobson, s. V. _ 'Roundel. '

[500] Old English manuscript quoted by Sir R. Temple in _Ind. Ant. _(December 1904), p. 316. 

[501] _Hobson-Jobson, s. V. _ 'Kittysol. '

[502] _Hobson-Jobson, s. V. _ 'Roundel. '

[503] _Hobson-Jobson, ibidem. _

[504] W. W. Skeat, _The Past at our Doors_. 

[505] Skeat, _ibidem_, p. 95. 

[506] This article is compiled from papers by Mr. Bahmanji Muncherji, Extra Assistant Commissioner; Mr. Jeorakhan Lal, Deputy Inspector ofSchools, and Pandit Pyare Lal Misra, ethnographic clerk. The historicalnotice is mainly supplied by Mr. Hira Lal. 

[507] Tod's _Rajasthan_, i. P. 128. 

[508] This article is based on notes taken by Pandit Pyare Lal Misrain Wardha, and Mr. Hira Lal in Bhandara. 

[509] _Proper Names of the Punjabis_, p. 74. 

[510] _Punjab Census Report_ (1881), para. 645. 

[511] Crooke's _Tribes and Castes_, art. Darzi. 

[512] Buchanan's _Eastern India_, Martin's edition, ii. Pp. 417, 699. 

[513] _Ibidem_, p. 977. 

[514] Vol. I. Pp. 178-184. 

[515] Webb's _Heritage of Dress_, p. 33. 

[516] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 180, quoting fromOvington, _Voyage to Surat_, p. 280. 

[517] _Bombay Gazetteer, Hindus of Gujarat_, p. 180. 

[518] _Bombay Gazetteer, Nasik_, p. 50. 

[519] According to another account Namdeo belonged toMarwar. Mr. Maclagan's _Punjab Census Report_ (1891), p. 144. 

[520] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), para. 231. 

[521] This article is partly based on a note by Mr. Gokul Prasad, Tahsildar, Dhamtari. 

[522] This article is based entirely on a paper by Rai Bahadur PandaBaijnath, Superintendent, Bastar State. 

[523] Compiled mainly from a paper by Kanhya Lal, clerk in theGazetteer office. 

[524] Cf. The two meanings of the word 'stock' in English. 

[525] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Dhanuk. 

[526] _Eastern India_, i. 166, as quoted in Crooke's _Tribes andCastes_. 

[527] Cf. The two perfectly distinct groups of Paiks or foot-soldiersfound in Jubbulpore and the Uriya country. 

[528] _Tribes and Castes of the N. W. P. And Oudh_, art. Basor. 

[529] The following particulars are from a paper by Kanhya Lal, aclerk in the Gazetteer office belonging to the Educational Department. 

[530] This article is based almost entirely on a monograph byMr. Jeorakhan Lal, Deputy Inspector of Schools, Bilaspur. 

[531] _Grewia vestita. _

[532] The term brother's brother-in-law is abusive in the same senseas brother-in-law (_sala_) said by a man. 

[533] See commencement of this article. 

[534] _Cynodon dactylon. _

[535] _Shorea robusta. _

[536] This article is based partly on papers by Mr. Govind Moreshwar, Head Clerk, Mandla, and Mr. Pancham Lal, Naib-Tahsildar, Sihora. Muchof the interesting information about the occupations of the castewas given to the writer by Babu Kali Prasanna Mukerji, Pleader, Saugor. 

[537] As a rule a husband and wife never address each other by name. 

[538] Among Hindus it is customary to give a little more than theproper sum on ceremonial occasions in order to show that there is nostint. Thus Rs. 1-4 is paid instead of a rupee. 

[539] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 133. 

[540] _Ibidem_, _l. C. _

[541] _Ibidem_, _l. C. _

[542] _Anthocephalus kadamba. _

[543] From _ghat_, a steep hillside or slope; hence a river-crossingbecause of the banks sloping down to it. 

[544] _Trapa bispinosa. _

[545] _Jungle Life in India_, p. 137. 

[546] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 132. 

[547] The following notice of caste offences is from Mr. GovindMoreshwar's paper. 

[548] Not probably on account of the commission of a crime, but becausebeing sentenced to imprisonment involves the eating of ceremoniallyimpure food. These rules are common to most Hindu castes, and theDhimars are taken only as a typical example. They seem to have littleor no connection with ordinary morality. But in Jhansi Mr. Crookeremarks that a Kahar is put out of caste for theft in his master'shouse. This again, however, might be considered as an offence againstthe community, tending to lower their corporate character in theirbusiness, and as such deserving of social punishment. 

[549] This article is partly based on an account of the castefurnished by Mr. H. F. E. Bell and drawn up by Mr. F. R. R. Rudmanin the _Mandla District Gazetteer_. 

[550] _Folklore of Northern India_, vol. Ii. P. 8. 

[551] Sherring's _Hindu Castes_, i. 342-3. 

[552] _Tribes and Castes_, art. Dhobi. 

[553] _Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan. _

[554] _Berar Census Report_ (1881), p. 155. 

[555] _Central Provinces Census Report_ (1891), p. 202. 

[556] _Loc. Cit. _

[557] _Bihar Peasant Life, s. V. _ Dhobi. 

[558] _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_, p. 226. 

[559] _Behind the Bungalow. _

[560] This article is mainly compiled from papers by Mr. GokulPrasad, Naib-Tahsildar, Dhamtari, and Pyare Lal Misra, a clerk inthe Gazetteer office. 

[561] _Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, art. Kandu. 

[562] This article is taken almost entirely from a paper drawn up byMr. Hira Lal, Extra Assistant Commissioner. 

[563] This article is mainly compiled from Sir E. D. Maclagan's_Punjab Census Report_ (1891), pp. 192-196, the article on Fakirin the Rev. T. P. Hughes' _Dictionary of Islam_, and the volume on_Muhammadans of Gujarat_ in the _Bombay Gazetteer_, pp. 20-24. 

[564] Hughes, p. 116. 

[565] _Punjab Census Report_ (1891), p. 196. 

[566] Hughes' _Dictionary of Islam_, art. Fakir.