Chapter XXIX

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[223] Another name for a man of no clan is pazuli, but I do not know whether this is merely a synonym of padmokh or whether a man can lose the right of belonging to a clan for any other reason than that described above.

[224] P. 132.

[225] A meeting of the council is often spoken of as kûtkûdriti, “the assembly assembles,” or kûtpuniti, “the assembly makes.”

[226] It seemed clear that the term naim is also applied to these clan councils.

[227] For a full account of this controversy see the Manual of the Nilagiri District, by H. B. Grigg, Madras, 1880. See also Thurston, Bull. i. 182.

[228] I am not clear on whom the expense of rebuilding and repairing a dairy would fall when the dairy is situated at a village occupied by one family only, and used exclusively for buffaloes which are the private property of that family.

[229] On p. 70 I have given an example of the ownership of sacred buffaloes in the Kars clan.

[230] Some patterns are given by Mr. Thurston, Bulletin, i. 1896, pl. xii.

[231] This is the fruit of one of the plants (Rubus lasiocarpus) of which the leaves are used in the ordination ceremonies of the dairymen of Taradr and Kanòdrs.

[232] Bulletin, vol. iv., p. 16.

[233] Ashk is one of the Toda words for rice, and the name of the food is therefore derived from this substance.

[234] It might have been expected that the part of the floor near the door used for the dairy operations would be the meilkuter, but it is not so. Meil also means ‘west’ and the explanation may be connected with this.

[235] See Crooke’s Popular Religion and Folk-Lore of Northern India, 1896, vol. ii pp. 187–191.

[236] In India the marks on the moon are frequently supposed to represent a hare.

[237] For another version of this story obtained by Mr. Thurston, see Bulletin, iv. p. 1.

[238] The game is described by Breeks and Thurston under the name of ilata, but this again is certainly not Toda.

[239] Bull. iv. p. 7.

[240] Madras Journ. Lit. and Sci., 1837, vol. v. p. 155.

[241] A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian Languages, 2nd ed., London, 1875, p. 557.

[242] Outlines of the Tuḍa Grammar appended to Marshall’s Phrenologist among the Todas.

[243] London, 1868.

[244] Madras Journ. Lit. and Sci., 1857, N.S., vol. i., p. 104.

[245] These sounds have usually been omitted in the Toda words as written in this book.

[246] For equivalents of these signs in English words see the Phonetic System at the beginning of the book.

[247] Mad, or more usually madth, is also the Toda word for churn, and this word is probably derived indirectly from the Sanscrit mantha.

[248] See story of Kwoto.

[249] The last syllable of the name Meilitars given to Kwoto is probably this word so that the name means ‘superior man.’

[250] This name also occurs in the story of Kwoten.

[251] Mopuvan is named after the hill Mopuvthut, which is mentioned in the legend of Puzi (193).

[252] It will be noticed that, in these two cases, the old names are those which occur in the genealogies. My informant probably remembered these better than the new names, which had been assumed only late in life.

[253] Mav is also the Toda word for sambhar.

[254] According to Harkness, “each burgher, hamlet, or village” gives about two quarts (p. 108), or (p. 135) half a bushel to the ti and half a bushel to the other Todas. According to Breeks (p. 9), the gudu is about one-tenth, one-eighth, or one-fifth of the gross produce.

[255] It is possible that the elucidation of this point might also help towards the explanation of the Badaga account of the Toda clans.

[256] P. 136.

[257] P. 4.

[258] According to Breeks, the Kotas who supply the Todas are known as muḷḷu Kotas.

[259] The Kotas are agriculturists as well as mechanics, and, according to Breeks, they are quite as efficient as the Badagas in this occupation. They also keep buffaloes, though chiefly or entirely for their own use.

[260] It is perhaps noteworthy that some of the Kurumbas of Malabar are still noted for their cleverness in collecting honey, and are known as Tên or honey Kurumbas (Fawcett, Bull. Madras Museum, iii, p. 9).

[261] By this I mean that there are now living thirty females who were born members of the Nòdrsol, but since a woman becomes a member of her husband’s clan, most of these are now members of other clans. I give the numbers of each clan in this form because it brings out several features of interest in relation to the relative fertility of different clans, the proportions of the sexes, &c.

[262] Pidrvan died soon after my visit.

[263] For the story how the Kuudr people came to lose the right of providing the palol for the Nòdrs ti, see p. 114.

[264] This was evidently a council consisting of the members of the clan only.

[265] There is also a place called Devali in the Wainad which may possibly be connected in some way with the Teivaliol.

[266] Grigg (Manual, p. 187) derives the word from tasan, a servant. S or sh is sometimes inserted into the word Tartharol, but it is purely euphonic, and I do not think that this derivation is at all probable.

[267] Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc., 1904, vol. xii, p. 481.

[268] I neglect the first generation on account of the small number of families for which there are data.

[269] Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India, London, 1896.

[270] Cf. Crooke, loc. cit., vol. ii. pp. 187–191.

[271] Dalton, Trans. Ethnol. Soc., London, N.S., 1868, vol. vi, p. 37.

[272] Fawcett, Journ. Anthrop. Soc., Bombay, 1888, vol. i. p. 249.

[273] Loc. cit.

[274] Cain, Ind. Antiq., 1876, vol. v, p. 357.

[275] Kearns, Tribes of South India, p. 51.

[276] The Hindu at Home, Madras, p. 234.

[277] IV. 240.

[278] Crooke, loc. cit., vol. i. p. 269.

[279] Logan’s Malabar Manual, vol. i. p. 141.

[280] See Malabar Marriage Commission and Wigram’s Malabar Law and Custom, 2nd ed., Madras, 1900.

[281] Census of India, 1901, vol. i., Eth. App., p. 136.

[282] Ibid., p. 142.

[283] Madras Gov. Museum Bull., iii. p. 247.

[284] Ibid., p. 70.

[285] Ibid., p. 61. See also Dubois, Hindu Manners, Customs, and Ceremonies, Oxford, 1899, p. 17.

[286] Madras Museum Bull., iii. p. 242.

[287] Cf. Caldwell, A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South-Indian Family of Languages, 2nd ed., London, 1875, p. 23.

[288] It is perhaps worth noting that at present only Teivali diviners are reputed to speak Malayalam.

[289] Journ. Anthrop. Soc., Bombay, 1889, vol. i. p. 535.

[290] Mysore Census Report, 1901, Pt. i. p. 521.

[291] Histoire générale des Races Humaines, Paris, 1889, Introduction, p. 469.

[292] Ethnology, Cambridge, 1896, p. 418.

[293] The Races of Man, London, 1900, p. 412.

[294] In a paper which I have only seen since the above was written (C. R. de la Soc. de Biol., 1905, t. lix, p. 123) M. Louis Lapicque has called attention to the resemblance between Todas and Nairs. He regards the Todas as pure or almost pure examples of one of the two races of which he believes the Dravidian population of India to be composed, the Nairs being more mixed with the negroid element, which forms the other component of the population according to M. Lapicque.

[295] It must also be borne in mind that the figures of the Nambutiris and those of some of the Todas are based on the measurement of twenty-five individuals only in each case.

[296] Some of these measurements are based on the examination of eighty-two men, others are derived from twenty-five men only.

[297] The relations existing between Nair women and Nambutiri men must have brought about an approximation of the two Malabar castes in physical characters, even if they were originally of different ethnical origin.

[298] It is worth noting that they practise male descent, while the Nairs follow the Marumakkattayam system of inheritance.

[299] I should much like to know the ratios between the lengths of different limb bones, such as those shown by the radio-humeral or tibio-femoral indices. The observations on the cubit and the distance from the middle finger to the patella suggest that considerable differences might be found between the Todas and the Malabar castes in these ratios, which do not seem to me to have yet received from the physical anthropologist the attention they deserve.

[300] It will be remembered that the Todas claim to have once possessed a spear which had belonged to their god, Kwoten.

[301] See p. 445.

[302] The argument will hold equally well if the Todas in their previous home had been accustomed to procure their pottery from others, but had when they reached the Nilgiris to rely solely on the Kotas for help in this direction.

[303] See p. 402.

[304] Loc. cit.

[305] Add. MS. 9853, pp. 464–5, MS. 25–26 vol. [Translation].

[306] Or Cattanar, a native priest of the Syrian Church.

[307] Add. MS. 9853, p. 479, MS. 40 vol. [Translation].

[308] In the translation given by Whitehouse the name of this priest is given as Ferreira.

[309] A member of the Errari or cowherd caste.

[310] ? Vaishya.

[311] Whitehouse suggests that this is Melur.

[312] I do not know the meaning of this. One caste of the Badagas is called Torya.

[313] Seventh?

[314] By the context this should be 100 buffalo cows.

[315] Evidently the wursol.