The Kóyas appear to have few festivals now. Formerly those who lived near Dummagúdem used to celebrate one whenever any crop was ripening. They still keep a feast for jonna kotta, 'the new cholam' harvest. The rites seem to vary. Mr. Cain says that a fowl is killed and its blood sprinkled on a stone. In some places the victim is a sheep, and it and the first fruits are offered to the local gods and to ancestors. The mango kotta and sámai kotta are also important. Once a year is celebrated a feast similar to the well-known Chaitra Saturnalia in the Vizagapatam Agency, whereat all the men go out and beat for game and those who return empty-handed are pelted with mud and filth by the women and not allowed to enter the village that night. This is called the Bhúdévi Pandigai, or festival of the earth goddess. In times of drought a festival to Bhíma, which lasts five days, is held. When rain appears, the Kóyas sacrifice a cow or pig to their patron. Dancing plays an important part at all these feasts and also at marriages. The men put on head-dresses of straw into which buffalo-horns are stuck, and accompany themselves with a kind of chant.
In Pólavaram and Bhadráchalam, Kóya villages are divided into groups, sometimes called samutús, over each of which is an hereditary head called the samutú dora or yetimani.
If a Kóya youth is refused by the maiden of his choice he generally carries her off by force. But a boy can reserve a girl baby for himself by giving the mother a pot and a cloth for the baby to lie upon, and then she may not be carried off. Widows and divorced women may remarry. The wedding takes place in the bridegroom's house and lasts five days. A táli and a saffron-coloured thread are tied round the neck of the girl. If the marriage was effected by capture, matters are much simplified. The girl is made to kneel, the boy stoops over her, and water is poured over both of them. The boy then ties a saffron-coloured thread round her neck and the ceremony is over. Girls who consort with a man of low caste are purified by having their tongues branded with a hot golden needle and by being made to pass through seven arches of palmyra leaves, which are afterwards burnt.
The Kóyas generally burn their dead, but infants are buried. Mr. Cain says babies less than a month old are buried close to the house, so that the rain dropping from the eaves may fall upon the grave and cause fertility in the parents. When a Kóya dies, a cow or bullock is slaughtered and the tail is cut off and put in the dead person's hand. The liver is said to be sometimes put in his mouth. His widow's tali is always placed there, and when a married woman dies her tali is put in her mouth, The pyre of a man is lighted by
