VIZAGAPATAM.
The Mális (14,000) say they were originally growers of flowers for temples and came from Benares. They are now among the most careful of all the hill cultivators, being especially skilful at raising garden crops. They speak Uriya and drink very little liquor. The caste is said to be split into six endogamous subdivisions which chiefly reside in six different parts of the Agency; namely, Bodo in Pottangi and Koraput, Pondra (which has often been wrongly treated as a separate caste) in Naurangpur and Kótapád, Kosalya in Parlákimedi in Ganjám, Pannara in Jeypore, Sonkuva in Gunupur, and Dongrudiya round Nandapuram. Marriage must take place, under penalty of being outcasted, before puberty, and among the Pondra Mális, if no suitable husband has been found as that time draws near, a mock wedding, without any bridegroom, is held. At ordinary weddings a Bráhman or caste elder officiates and the rites are not peculiar, but at marriages among the Pondra Mális the auspicious moment is awaited by the couple seated on either side of a curtain with their cloths knotted, the makkutas (fillets) on their heads, their hands touching and on them a myrabolam wound in cotton. As the auspicious moment passes the cotton is unwound, the knotted cloths are untied and the curtain is pulled down. These Pondra Mális also practise an unusual ceremony on the ninth day after funerals, the heir digging a hole in the deceased's house and burying in it a light and the remains of his supper.
The Omanaitos (Amanaito, Omaito) are cultivators who reside chiefly about Naurangpur. They have two endogamous divisions called Bodo and Sanno, of whom the latter are the illegitimate children of the former. The Bodos are split into totemistic septs. Their marriage and funeral ceremonies are much the same as usual except that one item in the former is a free -fight with mud for missiles.
The Mattiyas (the name means 'of the soil') are careful cultivators who live chiefly in the north-eastern corner of the Malkanagiri taluk and seem to belong to the original population of the country. They talk Uriya but follow the primitive fashion of naming their children after the day of the week on which they were born. The Mattiyas have totemistic septs, marry after puberty with much the same ceremonies as usual, and burn the dead. The spot where the body was burnt is first marked with a bamboo to which is tied some portion of the deceased's cloth and round which are broken the pots he last used. On the ninth day the ashes are collected and buried in a square pit roughly floored,and over this is erected a kind of small hut.
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