THE PEOPLE
three times, are shown the star Arundhati, the emblem of constancy, and then the priest unties the knot in their cloths and the ceremony is over.
Except among the more Bráhmanized castes, divorce and widow remarriage are allowed, but a widow's marriage is a much simpler affair. The party whose conduct occasions the divorce has to repay the other the expenses originally incurred at their wedding.
Funeral ceremonies, like those at weddings, follow one general type but differ in details. Vaishnavites usually burn their dead, while Saivites bury. The latter generally have Jangam Lingáyats as priests, and so follow the Lingáyat custom of burying the dead in a sitting posture. Among some castes only the two days following the death are kept as the days of pollution during which no work should be done. On the third day, called the chinna rózu, the relations meet at the deceased's house, cook food, carry it to the cremation ground, offer some of it to an image made out of the dead man's ashes, and eat the rest. Among other castes, pollution lasts till the twelfth day, or pedda rózu, when the relations, accompanied by a Sátáni, take food to the nearest tank, throw some of it into this, and bathe and return to a dinner. Some castes keep both days.
By far the most numerous caste in Vizagapatam are the Kápus. In 1901 they numbered nearly 525,000 persons (more than in any other district) while with their branches and offshoots (the Velamas, Telagas, Nagarálu, Aiyarakulu and Bagatas mentioned below, three out of which five are also more numerous in this district than in any other) they amounted to no less than 971,000 souls, or one-third of the whole population of the district. They are the great cultivating caste of the community and the word Kápu is often used in the sense of 'ryot,' so that the more civilized sections of the Gadabas and Savaras are called Kápu Gadabas and Kápu Savaras although they have no connection with the Kápu caste proper.
The Kápus are split into numerous endogamous sub-divisions,of which the most prominent in this district are Panta and Gázula. The former are commonest in the coast taluks, and the latter inland, especially round Párvatípur. The word Gázula means 'bangle,' but nowadays Gázula Kápus have nothing to do with bangle-making. They differ from the Panta Kápus in showing signs of totemism. The tiger and cobra are totems of certain septs and are reverenced by these accordingly; but the primal function of the totemism has been dropped and the septs are no longer
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