The tribes and castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, Volume 2 (of 4)Crooke, William
History
The tribes and castes of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, Volume 2 (of 4)
Crooke, William
Caste -- India -- History; Hindus -- India; Tribes -- India -- History
[Appearance.] 3. Colonel Dalton’s description of the Orâons applies
very closely to their cognates the Mirzapur Dhângars. “Although the
Orâons when young are pleasant to look upon from their good humoured
and guileless expression, they are on the whole to be regarded as a
dark complexioned and by no means well-favoured race. When we see
numbers of them massed together in a market, the features we find to
predominate are excess of jaws and mouth, thick lips pushed out by the
projection of the jaws, a defect which age increases, the teeth
becoming more and more porrect till they appear to radiate outwards
from the upper jaw. The forehead is low and narrow, but not as a rule
receding; and the eyes have nothing very peculiar about them, often
bright and full, with long lashes and straight set, sometimes small and
dim, but not oblique. These upper features give them a human and
intelligent expression notwithstanding the Simian characteristic of the
lower. There is the indentation usual in the Turanian races between the
frontal and nasal bones, but the latter are more pronounced than we
find them in the Lohitic tribes. The colour of the majority is darkest
brown approaching to black. [301]” Mr. Risley adds that no signs of
Mongolian affinities can be detected in the relative positions of the
nasal and malar bones; the average naso-malar index for a hundred
Orâons, measured on the system recommended by Mr. Oldfield Thomas,
comes to 113·6. [302]
[Traditions.] 4. The Mirzapur Dhângars say they emigrated from a place
named Barwai somewhere to the south about nine or ten generations ago.
They say that they occupied a narrow valley called Sathorwa, where they
used to beset and rob travellers. At last a General of the Emperor made
terms with their leaders, Jura Mahto and Buddhu Bhagat, and on promise
of giving them a rent-free estate (jâgîr) induced the tribe to lay down
their arms, and then ordered a general massacre. The few survivors
escaped to Mirzapur. These two leaders, Jura and Buddhu, are the
deified heroes of the tribe. It is said that their heads spoke seven
days after they were decapitated, and advised them to emigrate.
[Tribal council.] 5. They have a tribal council (panchâyat) presided
over by a hereditary president, the Chaudhari, which meets for caste
business on occasions of marriages and deaths. For caste offences the
punishment is usually the providing of a feast including rice, one or
two goats and ten bottles of liquor. If a girl intrigues with a
clansman, her father has to provide two dinners to the clansmen, and
she is then restored to caste. Her lover has to provide the same feast
if he seduces an unmarried girl in the tribe. The pair are then
married. If a girl is detected in an intrigue with an outsider she is
permanently expelled, and so with a man who intrigues with a strange
woman.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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