DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.31218#0112
THE caste system of northern INDIA
or is touched by a donkey, pig, dog,1 or a child that is
old enough to eat solid food—then he is at once dehled.
Again, contact with a Brahman, who though pure is him-
self eating or has just eaten, will make him impure if he
has not actually begun to eat. He may not read a printed
book at his meal, because printing ink is impure : he may
not read a manuscript book unless it is bound with silk
and the binder has used a special paste of pounded tama-
rind seed. In such circumstances, one begins to wonder
that anybody thinks it worth while to eat at all.
Rules regarding the acceptance of water are on the
whole the same as those regarding the ac-
12. (u) The drink- ceptance of pakka food, but with a tenden-
mg taboo cy to greater laxity. The vessel in which
the water is contained affects the question.
A high caste man will allow a low caste man to fill his
lota (drinking vessel) for him : but he will not drink from
the lota of that low caste man. Or a high caste man will
give anybody (save untouchables) a drink, by pouring
water from his own lola into that of the drinker; all the
men employed at stations to supply railway travellers
with water are Brahmans. All castes will take water
from Barhais, Baris, Bharbhunjas, Halwais, Kahars
and Nais; and of course from higher castes still.
Rules regarding smoking are stricter. It is very sel-
dom that a man will smoke with anybody
ij. (vi) The smok- but a caste fellow : the reason, no doubt,
ing taboo is that smoking with a man usually invol-
ves smoking his pipe, and this involves
much closer contact even than eating food which he has
prepared. So stringent is this rule, indeed, that the fact
that Jats, Ahirs, and Gujars will smoke together has been
regarded as a ground for supposing that they are closely
akin. Some castes, the Kayastha for instance, differenti-
ate between smoking in narial fashion—in which the
hands are closed round the pipe and the smoke is drawn
in without putting the stem actually in the mouth—and
smoking in the usual way.
1 But not a .cat; for nothing will keep a cat away from food.
98
or is touched by a donkey, pig, dog,1 or a child that is
old enough to eat solid food—then he is at once dehled.
Again, contact with a Brahman, who though pure is him-
self eating or has just eaten, will make him impure if he
has not actually begun to eat. He may not read a printed
book at his meal, because printing ink is impure : he may
not read a manuscript book unless it is bound with silk
and the binder has used a special paste of pounded tama-
rind seed. In such circumstances, one begins to wonder
that anybody thinks it worth while to eat at all.
Rules regarding the acceptance of water are on the
whole the same as those regarding the ac-
12. (u) The drink- ceptance of pakka food, but with a tenden-
mg taboo cy to greater laxity. The vessel in which
the water is contained affects the question.
A high caste man will allow a low caste man to fill his
lota (drinking vessel) for him : but he will not drink from
the lota of that low caste man. Or a high caste man will
give anybody (save untouchables) a drink, by pouring
water from his own lola into that of the drinker; all the
men employed at stations to supply railway travellers
with water are Brahmans. All castes will take water
from Barhais, Baris, Bharbhunjas, Halwais, Kahars
and Nais; and of course from higher castes still.
Rules regarding smoking are stricter. It is very sel-
dom that a man will smoke with anybody
ij. (vi) The smok- but a caste fellow : the reason, no doubt,
ing taboo is that smoking with a man usually invol-
ves smoking his pipe, and this involves
much closer contact even than eating food which he has
prepared. So stringent is this rule, indeed, that the fact
that Jats, Ahirs, and Gujars will smoke together has been
regarded as a ground for supposing that they are closely
akin. Some castes, the Kayastha for instance, differenti-
ate between smoking in narial fashion—in which the
hands are closed round the pipe and the smoke is drawn
in without putting the stem actually in the mouth—and
smoking in the usual way.
1 But not a .cat; for nothing will keep a cat away from food.
98