7. Occupation
The dress of the Savars is of the scantiest. The women wear khilwān or pith ornaments in the ear, and abstain from wearing nose-rings, a traditional method of deference to the higher castes. The proverb has it, ‘The ornaments of the Sawara are gumchi seeds.’ These are the red and black seeds of Abrus precatorius which are used in weighing gold and silver and are called rati. Women are tattooed and sometimes men also to avoid being pierced with a red-hot iron by the god of death. Tattooing is further said to allay the sexual passion of women, which is eight times more intense than that of men. Their occupations are the collection of jungle produce and cultivation. They are very clever in taking honeycombs: ‘It is the Savar who can drive the black bees from their hive.’ The eastern branch of the caste is more civilised than the Saonras of Bundelkhand, who still sow juāri with a pointed stick, saying that it was the implement given to them by Mahādeo for this purpose. In Saugor and Damoh they employ Brāhmans for marriage ceremonies if they can afford it, but on other occasions their own caste priests. In some places they will take food from most castes but in others from nobody who is not a Savar. Sometimes they admit outsiders and in others the children only of irregular unions; thus a Gond woman kept by a Savar would not be recognised as a member of the caste herself but her children would be Savars. A woman going wrong with an outsider of low caste is permanently excommunicated.
[1] This article is principally based on papers by Munshi Gopīnāth, Naib-Tahsīldār, Sonpur, Mr. Kālūrām Pachorē, Assistant Settlement Officer, Sambalpur, and Mr. Hīra Lāl, Assistant Gazetteer Superintendent.
[2] Archaeological Reports, vol. xvii. pp. 120, 122.
[3] India Census Report (1901), p. 283.
[4] Archaeological Reports, vol. xvii. p. 113.
[5] Crooke’s Tribes and Castes of N.W.P., art Savara.
[6] Tribes and Castes of N.W.P., art. Savara.
[7] Tribes and Castes of Bengal, art. Savar.