CHAPTER XXIX
TEIVALIOL AND TARTHAROL
The existence of these two divisions of the Toda people raises one of the most interesting problems of their social organisation. The fact that the Todas are an Indian people at once suggests that we have to do here with some form of the institution of caste. Each division is endogamous, as is the caste, and each is divided into a number of exogamous septs resembling the gotras of a caste. Again, there is some amount of specialisation of function, the Teivaliol being the division from which the most sacred of the dairymen are chosen.
The names of the two divisions probably correspond with this differentiation of function. The Teivaliol evidently derive their name from the sacred office, deva, of Sanskrit origin, being in common use in South India for ‘sacred,’ while devalayam means a temple. [265] The origin of Tartharol [266] is more doubtful, but I believe that the word carries the idea of ordinary, târ being used sometimes in this sense.
There is little restriction on social intercourse between the two divisions. So far as I am aware, they can eat together, and a member of one division can receive food from any member of another.
Though intermarriage is forbidden, the irregular unions in which the man is the mokhthodvaiol of the woman (see Chap. XXII) are frequent and, indeed, it seems to be the rule for connexions of this kind to be formed between members of the two divisions.
The only definite restriction on social intercourse is that a Teivali woman may not visit a Tarthar village, so that if a Tarthar man becomes the mokhthodvaiol of a Teivali woman, he has to visit her at her home, or may go to live at her village altogether or for long periods. There is no similar restriction on the visits of Tarthar women to Teivali villages, and at the time of my visit at least one Tarthar woman was living altogether at the village of her Teivali consort.
The prohibition of the visits of Teivali women to Tarthar villages is said to have had its origin in the misbehaviour of certain Teivali women who once visited the village of Nòdrs, but I did not learn in what their offence consisted.
The most obvious features which mark off the two divisions from one another occur in connexion with the dairy organisation. The most important dairy institutions of the Todas belong to the Tartharol, but their dairymen are Teivaliol. This applies not only to the ti dairies, but also to the wursuli dairies of the Tarthar villages. The highest dairy office, that of palol, can only be held by a Teivali man, while the lower offices of kaltmokh and wursol must be held by them or by one of the Melgars clan of the Tartharol. According to tradition, the members of the Melgarsol were also at one time capable of holding the office of palol, but lost the right owing to the misbehaviour of one of their number. As I have already suggested, the Melgarsol may have been formerly a Teivali clan, but on repeated inquiry, it seemed clear that they had always been Tartharol, so that at one time in Toda history certain Tartharol were permitted to hold the highest dairy office as well as the lower grades for which they are still eligible. The position of the Melgars clan is, however, so much of a mystery in itself that it can contribute little to the understanding of our present difficulties.
Although the Teivaliol hold the highest dairy offices, and while holding them have a very high degree of sanctity, it is quite clear that, apart from the holding of these offices, they have no sanctity whatever. A Teivali man who, while holding office as palol, is so sacred that he may not be touched by nor touch anyone, and may be visited even by his nearest relatives on two days of the week only, becomes an ordinary person, with absolutely no restrictions on intercourse, the moment he ceases to hold office.
Further, the fact that the Teivaliol hold these sacred offices does not lead to any respect being shown by Tartharol towards Teivaliol; there is not the slightest trace of the belief that their right to exert the highest priestly functions gives the Teivaliol any superiority, nor, it seemed clear to me, did the right inspire the Teivaliol themselves with any feeling of superiority. Indeed, it was distinctly the other way. The Tartharol always boasted that they were the superior people and that the Teivaliol were their servants, and the Teivaliol always seemed to me to acquiesce, though unwillingly, in this opinion. Whenever I asked a Tarthar man why he regarded his division as superior, he always answered, “We have the ti and we appoint the Teivaliol to act as our servants.” In the case of the Teivali dairyman acting as wursol at the Tarthar villages, I had definite evidence in more than one instance that the priest was regarded as a paid servant, to be treated with scant respect except in the special points prescribed by custom. The fact that the Teivali dairyman living at a Tarthar village may not touch any of the Tartharol puts him very much at the mercy of the latter, and the dairyman has, so far as I know, no redress for any wrong, real or fancied, which he may receive.
The inferiority of the Teivaliol came out in one very striking point to which I shall return later. I learnt from the Tartharol that there were certain differences in language between the two divisions; that the Teivaliol used certain words as names of objects which were not used by the Tartharol. I obtained a list of these, and later approached a Teivali man on the matter. When I opened the subject he was very much taken aback, and then became very angry because I had been told of the difference, though its existence was not denied. His whole attitude was that of a man ashamed of his lowly origin. Far more indignation was shown by him and by other Teivaliol because I had been told of their peculiarities of language than was ever shown after the exposure of deeds distinctly immoral even from the Toda point of view. I shall return to this subject again shortly; I mention it here because it seemed to me to afford the clearest evidence that the Teivaliol were conscious of their own inferiority in the social scale.
In the story of Kwoten we find that the Tarthar hero is accompanied by Erten of Keadr, a Teivali man, and the latter was said to have been the servant of the former. This suggests the possibility that at one time the Teivaliol may have acted as servants to the Tartharol, even more definitely than at present.
At the present time there are some features of the social organisation and social life which might be held to weigh strongly against the idea that the Teivaliol are the inferior division. The monegar of the Todas is one of the Teivaliol, and the most influential member of the naim, or council, at the present time is a Teivali man. I believe the monegarship, however, to be a recent institution, possibly dating only from the advent of Europeans to the hills. The chief duty of the monegar is the collection of the assessment made by the Government, and it is quite consistent with Toda ideas that this troublesome, and from their point of view menial duty should be handed over to one of the Teivaliol. The great power of the Teivaliol in the naim is probably still more recent and due to the influence of one man. The Teivaliol should have only one representative on the naim, while the Tartharol should have three, and it is entirely owing to the powerful personality of Kuriolv that this balance has been disturbed, and that the influence of the Teivaliol is so predominant. It is possible that Kuriolv will do much to obliterate the social inequality of the two divisions, though I suspect from what the Todas told me that it is intended to revert to the old order as soon as he dies.
There is one custom which shows very clearly that it is only as dairymen that the Teivaliol have any sanctity. If the sacred buffaloes (pasthir) of the Teivaliol go to a Tarthar village, they may be milked either at a wursuli or a tarvali, and the Tarthar people may use the milk. If Tarthar buffaloes, however, go to a Teivali village, the Teivaliol may neither milk them nor use their milk or its products. Thus buffaloes which are normally milked by a Teivali dairyman when at their own village may not be milked by Teivaliol at a Teivali village, while there is no restriction on the milking of Teivali buffaloes by the Tartharol.
Although the Tartharol are in the habit of speaking of the Teivali dairymen as their servants, they have no means of enforcing service. The post of dairyman of any kind is one of profit, and, as we have seen, when the post, even of palol, ceases to bring a sufficient income, the Tartharol fail to obtain people to occupy it.
In the ceremonial of the dairy, the relation between the two divisions is entirely one-sided. The Tartharol own the buffaloes and the dairies, and the Teivaliol do the work. In certain other ceremonies, there is more reciprocity in the relations of the two divisions to one another.
The Tartharol have certain definite duties at a Teivali funeral and the Teivaliol at a Tarthar funeral, and in most cases the duties are thoroughly reciprocal and the two divisions appear to act on equal terms. Thus, in the earth-throwing ceremony, the earth is dug by a Teivali man at a Tarthar funeral, and the Tarthar men before they throw ask the Teivaliol whether they may do so. At a Teivali funeral these positions are reversed. Similarly, the buffaloes are caught by Tartharol for Teivaliol and vice versa.
On the other hand, there are some ceremonies in which the Teivaliol have definite duties to perform at a Tarthar funeral which are not reciprocated. In the earth-throwing ceremony of the Tartharol, earth is first thrown by the Teivali wursol, but he does this as dairyman and not as one of the Teivaliol. The koòtiti ceremony of the second funeral is, however, only performed at a Tarthar funeral, and in it a Teivali man plays an important part, wearing the cloak which has been covering the relics and adorning himself with women’s ornaments. He hangs on the neck of the calf the bell called tukulir mani and touches the relics with the bow and arrow after asking the Tartharol if he may do so. It is said that this ceremony is performed at a Tarthar funeral in order to purify the Tartharol with tudr before they go to Amnòdr, and the prominent position of the Teivaliol in this ceremony is evidently due to the use of this sacred substance.
After a funeral the Tartharol in general shave their heads, and this is not done by the Teivaliol, but it is also not done by the Melgarsol, which shows that the difference is connected with the different relations of the two divisions to the dairy ritual.
One important difference between the funeral ceremonies of the two divisions is that the mani, or sacred bell, is not used by the Teivaliol, except by the Piedr clan, and in this case the bell is hung on the neck of the buffalo about to be slaughtered by a Tarthar man belonging to the Nòdrs clan. The use of a mani at the funeral appears to be pre-eminently a Tarthar custom.
A further distinction between the two divisions is a consequence of the last difference. The Teivaliol do not purify the dairy after the funeral ceremonies because nothing has been taken from the dairy to be defiled. Similarly, the fact that the Teivaliol and Melgarsol use a male buffalo calf for the ceremony of purifying the various funeral places is connected in some way with the use of tudr by these divisions, while the general body of the Tartharol who are not purified with tudr use the blood of an adult female buffalo.
It will thus be seen that there is definite reciprocity between the two divisions as regards certain funeral duties, while the differences between the procedures of the two divisions are largely, if not altogether, connected with the use of the mani among the Tartharol and of the tudr tree among the Teivaliol, and each of these are points at which the funeral ceremonies come into relation with the dairy ritual. The differences in funeral rites would seem to be chiefly due to the different organisation of the dairy and its ritual in the two divisions.
There are other ceremonies in which the duties of the two divisions are reciprocal. In the ceremony of ear-piercing, a Tarthar man pierces one ear of a Teivali boy and a Teivali man performs the same service for a Tarthar boy, and in the ceremony called putkuli tâzâr ütiti (see p. 503), a man belonging to one division acts when the girl undergoing the ceremony belongs to the other.
One of the most obscure of Toda ceremonies is that called tersampipimi which is performed together with or later than the ceremony of name-giving when a child is about three months old. The chief feature of the ceremony is that a lock of the child’s hair is cut by the maternal uncle of the child, the hair of a Tarthar child being cut with a piece of sharpened iron called kanab, while the hair of a Teivali child is cut with an ordinary knife. The special interest, however, for our present purpose lies in the fact that this ceremony must be performed on the day after the second funeral of a Tarthar man, and this whether the child be Tarthar or Teivali.
This ceremony points to the existence of a belief in the influence of the spirit of the dead man, and I have already (p. 404) given reasons why it is probable that this influence should be regarded as good rather than bad. But, whether good or bad, we are left wholly without a clue why this influence should be exerted by the ghosts of the Tartharol and not by those of the Teivaliol.
In the ceremonies connected with childbirth the ritual of one division differs from that of the other more widely than in any other case. The most striking difference is that the ceremonial of the artificial dairy is limited to the Tartharol, and here again it is possible that the difference is a secondary consequence of the difference in dairy organisation. In the chapter dealing with these ceremonies, I have thrown out the conjecture that the use of an artificial dairy, and of threads from the madtuni, or sacred dairy garment, may be a survival of a time when women had more to do with the dairy ritual than they have at present; and if there is anything in this conjecture, it would point to this connexion of women with the dairy having been limited to the Tartharol, or to its having persisted longer in this division.
The fact that a Tarthar woman drinks milk drawn by a Melgars man, while a Teivali woman drinks water which is assumed to be the milk of a pregnant buffalo, again brings the differences into relation with the dairy ritual, but another difference between the two divisions in the hand-burning ceremony is entirely foreign to this ritual. This is the ceremony of invoking Pirn and Piri, and there is no evident reason why this rite should be practised by the members of one division and not by those of the other. Similarly, the ceremony of offering to Namav by a Teivali woman when going to the seclusion-hut after childbirth stands entirely apart from the dairy ritual.
Both of these ceremonies are unlike the ordinary run of Toda ritual, and it is, on the whole, most probable that they have been borrowed.
We have thus seen that a large number of the ceremonial differences between the two divisions may be regarded as secondary consequences of the differences in the dairy ritual and that the few ceremonies which stand in no relation to the dairy ritual may have been borrowed.
Taking the differences of ceremonial as a whole, it is tempting to surmise that some of them may have arisen owing to differences of environment during some past stage of Toda history. The Todas now form so small a community, living in so small a space and knowing so much about each other, that it seems improbable that the differences can have come altogether into existence while they have been on the Nilgiri Hills. In so far as they can be explained as secondary consequences of the dairy organisation, it is possible that they may have arisen since the Todas have been on the Nilgiris, but when the practices have no relation to the dairy ritual it seems improbable that one division would have adopted a custom quite independently of the other.
Such a view would involve the consequence that at some time in their history the two divisions of the Toda people have had a different environment, and if the Todas are derived from one tribe or caste, this could only have come about if the two divisions came to the hills at different times, the interval having been sufficiently long to enable differences of ceremonial to have arisen. The differences would perhaps be still more readily explicable if we suppose the Tartharol and Teivaliol to have been derived from two different castes or tribes which reached the hills at different times, and I will now proceed to give some evidence which points to this having really happened.
Perhaps the strongest evidence in this direction is the existence of the differences of language to which I have already referred. The chief differences are as follows:—
Tarthar. Teivali.
Wooden spoon chudi or sudi kîrstegi Basket tòdri putukêri Food vessel paterkh tòdriterkh Round metal vessel kûdikunm kûdichakh Milking-vessel pun kònipun A dairy vessel tat kashtat Iron instrument pòditch pòtch Comb tîrkòli siekhkòli Small boy’s cloak kuchâr kupichâr Roof pòdri idrnpòdri Western side of hut meilmerkal meilkushkòni Eastern side of hut kîmerkal kîkushkòni Mushroom kiûn âlabi A tree tipöti ketak A black fruit kalpom akatpom To-morrow morning pelikhaski pedrkhaski
I was given one sentence as quite different in the two divisions. This was “Bring a piece of ragged cloth to the dairy!” By the Tartharol this would be rendered, Palivorsk pari evâ! but by the Teivaliol, Kutanpari palivorsk panmeiliteivâ! the chief difference here being in the verb.
Though these are all the differences in vocabulary of which I could obtain a record, I was told by the Tartharol that formerly there were many more, and that they were diminishing in number because “the Teivaliol were now learning to speak properly.”
I think it possible that a phonologist might also detect many differences in pronunciation and accent in the two divisions. I thought that I detected such differences myself—that the Tartharol used a k when the Teivaliol used a g, for instance—but I am so uncertain about this that I do not feel entitled to lay any emphasis on it. In one case, however, the Todas themselves told me of a difference in pronunciation. They said that the usual word for dairy was pronounced as I have written it in this book but that by the Tartharol it was rather püli.
Scanty as the evidence is, there can be no doubt of the existence of dialectical differences between the two divisions of the Toda people.
Another indication that the Todas are two tribes or castes which have coalesced is of a different and more doubtful kind. There is some reason to believe that people sometimes preserve a relic of their migrations in the belief concerning the path taken by the dead in their journey to the next world. We have seen that the Todas believe that the dead journey to the west, but the special point of interest in the present connexion is that the dead Teivaliol are believed to travel by a path different from that traversed by the Tartharol.
I must reserve till the next chapter the full consideration of the path by which the Todas reached the hills, but I hope to show then that there is a great probability that the Todas came from Malabar. If this view be correct, it is not impossible that in the belief as to the different paths traversed by the dead, we may have a relic of two independent migrations.
A third indication is one about which I am still more doubtful, because I have no exact observations to support it. When on the hills I was struck at times by differences in the general appearance of the people of the two divisions. Towards the end of my visit I sometimes made a successful guess that an unknown village I was entering was a Teivali village, and this guess was founded, so far as I could tell, on a difference in the appearance of the people. The Teivaliol seemed to me to be, on the whole, darker, and to have a lower type of face. My surmises in this direction only took shape towards the end of my visit, when it was too late to make any exact observations. I know how dangerous such impressions are, and I do not wish to lay any stress on them, and I mention them hoping that more exact observations on the point may be made at some future time.
The idea that the two divisions of the Toda community reached the hills at different times is perhaps supported by their distribution on the Nilgiri plateau. In Fig. 73 I give a plan of the district, giving all the villages from which the Toda clans take their names, the Tarthar villages being in Roman type and those of the Teivaliol in italics. I have omitted the chief villages of those clans which I know to have arisen in recent times by splitting off from other clans, and I have included two villages of which I can only give the approximate positions. These are Piedr and Kusharf, which are now rarely occupied, and are situated off the main plateau, near the Badaga village of Hullatti. I also give Pirspurs, the old etudmad of the Pämol. In Fig. 74 I give a second plan, showing the positions of all the villages which I know to be ancient, either because they possess sacred dairies or because they are mentioned in legend.
It will be seen that the greater part of the hills is occupied by the Tartharol, while the Teivali villages lie chiefly in the north-west part of the hills. The chief exception is the village of Keadr, which is situated some way south of the rest.
If, in coming to the hills, the Todas followed the routes now supposed to be traversed by the dead, the position of Keadr would suggest that this clan was assigned a seat soon after the Teivaliol had crossed the Pakhwar, and that the others journeyed on northwards.
The plans certainly make it clear that there is a difference in the geographical distribution of the two divisions, and the nature of this distribution is consistent with the advent of the two divisions at different times. It will be noticed in both plans that one Tarthar clan has its seat in the middle of what would otherwise be exclusively a Teivali district. This clan is that of Taradr, and it is perhaps significant that the Taradrol have many features which differentiate them from Tarthar clans in general, especially in their possession of the kugvalir and in the possession of their own Amnòdr, though, as we have seen, the latter feature may merely be a later consequence of their isolated position.
It is known that when two tribes coalesce to form a community, the inferior people may act as the sorcerers and wizards of the community. At the present time the majority of the teuol, or diviners, belong to the Teivaliol, but this branch of sacred function is not limited to that division. The magical powers of the sorcerer seem to be now almost equally divided among the two divisions, and there is no evidence that magical powers in the past have been attributed to one division more than to the other.
In the preceding pages I have put together the chief evidence which throws any light on the problem raised by the existence of the two divisions of the Toda people. It is far from conclusive, but I incline to the view that the present organisation of the Todas is due to the coalescence of two tribes or castes which came to the hills at different times. It seems probable that the Tartharol arrived first and occupied the hills widely. When later the Teivaliol came, it seems possible that they were placed by the Tartharol in those priestly offices which, though honourable, involved many hardships and restrictions, and were assigned dwelling-places and pastures in a comparatively limited district of the hills.
The analysis of the genealogical record has brought out some interesting differences between the two divisions. The data compiled from the genealogical tables by Mr. Punnett [267] would seem to show that the preponderance of males was and is still greater among the Teivaliol than among the Tartharol. The tables provide statistics roughly for four generations. In the second of these, [268] the number of males for every hundred females was 159·7 among the Tartharol, 259 among the Teivaliol. For the last generation, these numbers have sunk to 129·2 and 171 respectively. These figures almost certainly mean that female infanticide was more in vogue among the Teivaliol and is still practised by them to a greater extent than by the Tartharol.
This would seem to show that the Teivaliol have clung more closely to the old custom of infanticide and may be taken as an indication of the greater conservativeness of the priestly caste, but the Teivaliol chiefly occupy those parts of the hills furthest removed from the European settlements, and the greater freedom from external influence is probably an important reason for the greater frequency of infanticide among them at present, though it will not explain the greater prevalence in the earlier generations.
The Teivaliol are now much the smaller of the two divisions, the numbers at the most liberal estimate being less than half of those of the Tartharol, and this difference is certainly of long standing. It may be due to original disproportion of numbers, but if female infanticide has long been more frequent among the Teivaliol, this might furnish a cause of their smaller population. It is perhaps significant in this connexion that the only extinct clan of which I have a record is a Teivali clan, the Kemenol, which is said to have become extinct about a hundred years ago, and the causes which led to its extinction may well have produced a great diminution of numbers in other branches of the Teivaliol.
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