DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.31218#0111
COMMENSAL ANt) OTHER SlMlLAR RESTRICTlONS OF CASTE
A Hindu sits down to a meal either alone or with his
caste fellows. The women cannot eat
10. (iv) The with the men : they wait till their lords
eating taboos have finished. So long as the meal or a
part of it consists of kachcha food (as it
usually does, since chuppatis appear at most meals), the
man must dine with the precautions of a magic ceremony.
He sits within a square marked off on the ground (chauka)
inside which is the chulha or cooking place. Should a
stranger’s shadow fall upon this square, all cooked with-
in it is polluted and must be thrown away.1 In camp,
Hindu servants may be seen, each well apart from the
rest, each within his own chauka, cooking his food upon
his own mud oven and eating alone; it is only the lowest
castes who ever venture to neglect this very troublesome
custom. In Moradabad are certain Chauhans, who claim
to belong to the famous Rajput cian of that name, but
are regarded as degraded, partly because they practice
widow-marriage, partly because they eat kachcha food in
the fields instead of in the decent privacy of their own
homes and chaukas.
Though the Nagar Brahman is not at home in the
United Provinces, he will serve as an ex-
u. Tke Nagar ample of the lengths to which the ritual of
Brahman eating can go. Before eating he must
bathe and dress himself in clean gar-
ments : if these are of cotton, they too must first be wash-
ed, and dried in a place where nothing impure can touch
them. Numerous accidents may occur to render him im-
pure, and so compel him to desist from his meal. If he
touches an earthen vessel that has contained water : if he
touches a piece of cotton cloth, or of raw cotton that has
been touched by a person who was not himself in a state
of ceremonial purity, or else has not been dipped in oil
or ghi: if he touches leather or bone or paper (unless in
the last case there is Hindi writing on it) : if he touches
1 It is dubious how far in practice this superstition would go. The
entrance of a stranger within the chauka would certainly pollute the
food : but I doubt if any but high castes would object to his shadow.
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A Hindu sits down to a meal either alone or with his
caste fellows. The women cannot eat
10. (iv) The with the men : they wait till their lords
eating taboos have finished. So long as the meal or a
part of it consists of kachcha food (as it
usually does, since chuppatis appear at most meals), the
man must dine with the precautions of a magic ceremony.
He sits within a square marked off on the ground (chauka)
inside which is the chulha or cooking place. Should a
stranger’s shadow fall upon this square, all cooked with-
in it is polluted and must be thrown away.1 In camp,
Hindu servants may be seen, each well apart from the
rest, each within his own chauka, cooking his food upon
his own mud oven and eating alone; it is only the lowest
castes who ever venture to neglect this very troublesome
custom. In Moradabad are certain Chauhans, who claim
to belong to the famous Rajput cian of that name, but
are regarded as degraded, partly because they practice
widow-marriage, partly because they eat kachcha food in
the fields instead of in the decent privacy of their own
homes and chaukas.
Though the Nagar Brahman is not at home in the
United Provinces, he will serve as an ex-
u. Tke Nagar ample of the lengths to which the ritual of
Brahman eating can go. Before eating he must
bathe and dress himself in clean gar-
ments : if these are of cotton, they too must first be wash-
ed, and dried in a place where nothing impure can touch
them. Numerous accidents may occur to render him im-
pure, and so compel him to desist from his meal. If he
touches an earthen vessel that has contained water : if he
touches a piece of cotton cloth, or of raw cotton that has
been touched by a person who was not himself in a state
of ceremonial purity, or else has not been dipped in oil
or ghi: if he touches leather or bone or paper (unless in
the last case there is Hindi writing on it) : if he touches
1 It is dubious how far in practice this superstition would go. The
entrance of a stranger within the chauka would certainly pollute the
food : but I doubt if any but high castes would object to his shadow.
9 7
7