THE PEOPLE
'lords of the Khond caste.' They speak a kind of Khond among themselves, worship Jákava, call their priests jannis and their soothsayers dissaris, have exogamous septs which are a mixture of totems and inti pérulu, marry after the low-country fashion but tie no pusti, observe only three days pollution at funerals and make periodical sacrifices to propitiate their ancestors.
The Múka Doras may perhaps be classed as a separate caste.The Páchipenta zamindar is one of them. They speak Telugu,have totems as well as inti pérulu, follow ménarikam, observe at wedding's ceremonies which are an odd mixture of hill rites and low-country practice, seclude girls within an enclosure of arrows when they attain puberty but observe no pollution at subsequent periods, practise a variant of the chinna rózu or pedda rózu ceremonies but also have a feast in honour of their ancestors in general, have taken to pack-bullock trading and give their children Telugu names.
The Savaras, like the Khonds, consist of two differing classes —the primitive race which lives on the hills east and north-east of Gunupur, and the more civilized sections which inhabit the Pálkonda hills and the low country in that corner of the district and are called Pallapu or Kápu Savaras. The two together number 50,000 persons. The former have a distinctive dress, the men using long langútis which hang down in front and behind like tails, wearing a plume of white crane's feathers in their cone-shaped red turbans and carrying a bow and arrows adorned with peacocks' feathers; and the women dressing in one short cloth with a broad red border round their waists and nothing above this except masses of brass wire and bead necklets a foot deep which almost prevent them from turning their heads and into which they stick their cheroots. Among these people are certain occupational subdivisions such as the Arisis, who weave the tribal cloths; the Kundáls, who make baskets; and the Loharas or Múlis, who are iron-workers;but there is no theoretical bar to marriage between these, and there are no totemistic septs among them. The Savaras' careful methods of cultivation are referred to on p. 257 below and the outbreaks amongst them on p. 258. Their remoteness and language hindered the collection of information regarding them,but Mr. F. Fawcett has described elaborately 1[1] the ways of the tribe just across the border in Ganjám (to which district it really belongs) and it will be sufficient to include here a few notes about the more numerous Savaras of the plains.
95
- ↑ 1 Journ. Anthrop. Sec, of Bombay, i, 218.
