DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16243#0149
SOCIAL TYPES
115
f water no longer applies, the status of a caste depends on the
ature of its occupation and its habits in respect of diet. There
are castes whose touch defiles the twice-born, but who refrain
rom the crowning enormity of eating beef; while below these
again, in the social system of Upper India, are people like
Chamars and Doms who eat beef and various sorts of miscel-
aneous vermin. In Western and Southern India the idea that
the social status of a caste depends on whether Brahmans will
take water and sweetmeats from its members is unknown, for
the higher castes will, as a rule, take water only from persons
pf their own caste and sub-caste. In Madras especially the
idea of ceremonial pollution by the proximity of a member ot
an unclean caste has been developed with much elaboration.
Thus the table of social precedence attached to the Cochin
report* shows that while a Nayar can pollute a man of a higher
caste only by touching him, people of the Kammalan group,
including masons, blacksmiths, carpenters, and workers in
leather, pollute at a distance of twenty-four feet, toddy-drawers
(Huvan or Tiyan) at thirty-six feet, Pulayan or Cheruman culti-
vators at forty-eight feet, while in the case of the Paraiyan
(Pariahs) who eat beef, the range of pollution is stated to be no
less than sixty-four feet. Where these fantastic notions prevail
and the authority of the Brahman is unquestioned, it follows as
a necessary consequence that the unhappy people who diffuse
an atmosphere of impurity wherever they go are forbidden to
enter the high caste quarter of the village, and are compelled
either to leave the road when they see a Brahman coming or to
announce their own approach by a special cry like the lepers
of Europe in the Middle Ages. Such is the logic of intolerance
in parts of Southern India.
The subject of classification is examined fully in some of the
Provincial Census Reports, to which the reader is referred for
further particulars. No attempt was made to grade every
caste. Large classes were formed, and the various groups
included in these were arranged in alphabetical order, so as to
escape the necessity of settling the more delicate questions of
precedence. As an illustration of the method of procedure I
may refer to the table of precedence for Bengal Proper, which
was compiled by me some years ago and has been adopted by
Mr. Gait for the purpose of the Bengal Census Report t after
* [Census Report, Cochin, 1901, vol. i., p. 181, et sej.]
t [1901, vol. i., p. 369, ct stq.~\
115
f water no longer applies, the status of a caste depends on the
ature of its occupation and its habits in respect of diet. There
are castes whose touch defiles the twice-born, but who refrain
rom the crowning enormity of eating beef; while below these
again, in the social system of Upper India, are people like
Chamars and Doms who eat beef and various sorts of miscel-
aneous vermin. In Western and Southern India the idea that
the social status of a caste depends on whether Brahmans will
take water and sweetmeats from its members is unknown, for
the higher castes will, as a rule, take water only from persons
pf their own caste and sub-caste. In Madras especially the
idea of ceremonial pollution by the proximity of a member ot
an unclean caste has been developed with much elaboration.
Thus the table of social precedence attached to the Cochin
report* shows that while a Nayar can pollute a man of a higher
caste only by touching him, people of the Kammalan group,
including masons, blacksmiths, carpenters, and workers in
leather, pollute at a distance of twenty-four feet, toddy-drawers
(Huvan or Tiyan) at thirty-six feet, Pulayan or Cheruman culti-
vators at forty-eight feet, while in the case of the Paraiyan
(Pariahs) who eat beef, the range of pollution is stated to be no
less than sixty-four feet. Where these fantastic notions prevail
and the authority of the Brahman is unquestioned, it follows as
a necessary consequence that the unhappy people who diffuse
an atmosphere of impurity wherever they go are forbidden to
enter the high caste quarter of the village, and are compelled
either to leave the road when they see a Brahman coming or to
announce their own approach by a special cry like the lepers
of Europe in the Middle Ages. Such is the logic of intolerance
in parts of Southern India.
The subject of classification is examined fully in some of the
Provincial Census Reports, to which the reader is referred for
further particulars. No attempt was made to grade every
caste. Large classes were formed, and the various groups
included in these were arranged in alphabetical order, so as to
escape the necessity of settling the more delicate questions of
precedence. As an illustration of the method of procedure I
may refer to the table of precedence for Bengal Proper, which
was compiled by me some years ago and has been adopted by
Mr. Gait for the purpose of the Bengal Census Report t after
* [Census Report, Cochin, 1901, vol. i., p. 181, et sej.]
t [1901, vol. i., p. 369, ct stq.~\