The Kudrpali
The special feature of the kudrpali is that it contains one or more of the bells called mani. This involves several additions to the ceremonial of the dairy, and these are accompanied by more stringent rules of conduct for the dairyman.
Whenever engaged in his work, the kudrpalikartmokh must be naked except for the kuvn. In the cold Nilgiri mornings it must often be a very unpleasant task to have to milk the buffaloes with no covering, and I was told that at some places, and especially at Nòdrs, the people gave up the maintenance of a kudrpali on account of the difficulty experienced in obtaining men to undertake the office of dairyman.
When the kudrpalikartmokh is taking his meals, he must hold his food in his hands till he has finished. He is not allowed to put it down on the ground, as may be done by the dairyman of the tarvali.
Soon after beginning to churn, the kudrpalikartmokh takes up some of the broken-up curd (adrpars) and puts it on the bell (mani) three times, saying “Oñ” each time, and milk from the vessel first brought into the dairy is also put on the bell in the same manner.
At the kudrpali of Kars, the dairyman puts the curd and milk on a board called pato. The bells of this dairy have been lost, and the dairyman puts the milk on the board on which the bells used to hang. The process of putting milk on the bells is properly called terzantirikiti, but the Todas [[67]]often speak of the process as “feeding the bell.” At the kudrpali of Kuzhu, belonging to the Kars clan, milk is put in the same way on a gold bracelet.
FIG. 21.—THE ‘KUDRPALI’ OF KARS, WITH THE ‘KUDRPALIKARTMOKH’ STANDING ON THE WALL. IN THE FOREGROUND IS THE MOUND CALLED ‘IMUDRIKARS’ IN THE BACKGROUND ON THE RIGHT IS THE CALF-HOUSE.
When making butter, it will be remembered that the dairyman of the tarvali makes a certain amount, and then pours away the buttermilk, and repeats this till all the adrpars has been converted into butter and buttermilk. Whenever the kudrpalikartmokh pours away buttermilk, he takes a piece of the bark of the sacred tudr tree (Meliosma pungens and Wightii) and beats three times on the patat, saying “Oñ” each time. This ceremony is called pepeirthti, and is the exclusive privilege of the kudrpalikartmokh. If this ceremony should be omitted, the buttermilk may not be drunk by any one.
The kudrpalikartmokh is allowed to sleep in the ordinary hut, but only on special days—viz., Sunday, Wednesday, and Saturday—and on these days he must, like the tarvalikartmokh, [[68]]avoid touching anything in the hut except the sleeping-place and the floor on pain of losing his office. He is allowed intercourse with any Tarthar woman, but must have nothing to do with the women of his own division, the Teivaliol.
While in office, the kudrpalikartmokh is not allowed to visit the bazaar,[3] and if he does so he becomes an ordinary person at once. One afternoon when I was working with Parkurs (8), one of the elders of the Kars clan, Sakari (7), who had been kudrpalikartmokh at Kuzhu, came to announce that he had visited the bazaar at Ootacamund. He was therefore no longer palikartmokh, and he came to tell Parkurs that a successor must be appointed. It seemed to me in this case that Sakari had visited the bazaar because he was tired of office and wished to become free. I had a suspicion also that he wished to become acquainted with my proceedings, for he came straight to me from the bazaar and was one of my most regular attendants for some time after his deprivation. The kudrpalikartmokh is prohibited from entering a tarvali, though the tarvalikartmokh may enter a kudrpali.
The milk of buffaloes connected with a kudrpali is more sacred than that of buffaloes milked at a tarvali. Any one may drink milk from a tarvali, but the milk of the kudrpali may only be drunk by the palikartmokh. If any one else drinks the milk of the kudrpali it is believed that he will die. I could learn of no case in which a man had taken this milk, but Kòdrner (7) had seen a cat die on the day it had drunk milk of the martir, the buffaloes of the kudrpali of Kars. Kòdrner was somewhat of a sceptic in connexion with many of the beliefs of his people, but he was very much in earnest on this occasion, and when my interpreter said he should like to drink some of the milk, Kòdrner offered to give him one hundred rupees if he drank the milk of martir for four days and remained alive.
The buffaloes tended at the tarvali and kudrpali are of several named kinds. According to tradition, each clan at the original distribution of buffaloes by Teikirzi (see p. [186]) was given a certain kind. To Kars were given the buffaloes [[69]]called martir; to Nòdrs were given nashperthir; to Pan, pineipir; to Melgars, persasir; these buffaloes originally given being called in general nòdrodvaiir; lit. “buffaloes who rule.”
In various ways the buffaloes originally given to one clan have passed into the possession of other clans. This has happened when buffaloes have been purchased, but is chiefly due to the existence of several customs which involve gifts of buffaloes. The tradition also runs that soon after the buffaloes were originally given, the Nòdrs people built the kudrpali with seven rooms to which I have already referred and begged the Kars people for martir to milk at this dairy. Similarly the people of Kanòdrs borrowed martir from Kars to milk at their conical dairy, and similar transferences of buffaloes may have occurred between other clans. In these and possibly in other ways buffaloes have passed from one clan to another, and as the buffaloes have in many cases kept their original names, most clans now possess buffaloes of several kinds.
I was for a long time very doubtful about the relation of the kudrpali and tarvali to one another, and had very great difficulty in finding out which buffaloes belonged to each kind of dairy. Finally, it became quite clear that the same buffaloes might be milked either at a kudrpali or a tarvali, and that the possession of a mani was the chief point which determined whether a given dairy was a kudrpali or a tarvali.
The same kind of buffalo may be milked at one kind of dairy in one clan and at the other kind in another clan. The nashperthir of Nòdrs are milked at the tarvali of that place, but those of Kars are milked at the kudrpali together with the martir. Further, in at least one case, the same buffaloes might be milked in one village of a clan at a kudrpali and in another village at a tarvali. The Pan people now live chiefly at Naters and the chief villages of the clan in the Kundahs, Pan and Kuirsi, are deserted during the greater part of the year. When these villages are occupied the pineipir are milked at their kudrpali dairies, but when the people are at Naters the same buffaloes are milked at the tarvali. The mani is left at Pan, and I was told that if the bell were to be [[70]]brought to Naters a kudrpali would have to be built for its reception and the pineipir would then be milked at this dairy.
At the present time the only clan which has a kudrpali in constant use is that of Kars. The Pan clan only uses its kudrpali during the few months that the villages in the Kundahs are occupied. The Nòdrs clan is said to have had a kudrpali at one time, but the fact that they had to borrow buffaloes for it from Kars points to the especial connexion of the kudrpali with the latter clan.
Although the Karsol and Panol are the only clans which have a kudrpali, the special feature of which is the possession of a mani, these are not the only clans which own these sacred bells. In other cases the mani belongs to the next higher grade of dairy, the wursuli, and the Kars clan itself also possesses mani kept at this grade of dairy. Indeed, although the Kars kudrpali is said to have bells as its special feature, these bells do not really exist, having been stolen some years ago. The fiction of their presence is, however, kept up, and, as we have seen, the place where they should hang is still ‘fed’ with curd and milk.
In one case, that of the Kars kudrpali, I worked out in detail the ownership and care of the buffaloes called martir. There were altogether forty-eight of these buffaloes kept at six places and tended by seven dairymen, who were chosen from the Karsol or from the people of Nòdrs, Pan, Taradr or Keradr.
The distribution at the time of my visit was as follows:—
| Kutadri (7) | possessed | 8 | buffaloes kept at | Kars | tended by | Idjen of Taradr (22) |
| Kutthurs (12) | possessed,, | 8 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Kars,, | tended by,, | Tilipa of Kars (12) |
| Parkurs (8) | possessed,, | 8 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Isharadr | tended by,, | Kosners of Nòdrs (6) |
| Pidrvan (9) | possessed,, | 6 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Pakhalkudr | tended by,, | Tidjkudr of Nòdrs (6) |
| Kuinervan (14) | possessed,, | 6 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Peletkwur | tended by,, | Pons of Keradr (26) |
| Potheners (10) | possessed,, | 6 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Keshker | tended by,, | Palpa of Pan (16) |
| Nudriki (8) | possessed,, | 3 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Kuzhu | tended by,, | Mutkudr of Kars (15) |
| Mongeithi (15) | possessed,, | 3 | buffaloes,, kept at,, | Kuzhu,, | tended by,, | Mutkudr,, of,, Kars (15),, |
It will be noticed that in only two of the dairies did the palikartmokh belong to the Karsol, and in each case he looked after the buffaloes of his own father, Mutkudr also tending the buffaloes of Nudriki. Idjen was the son-in-law of [[71]]Kutadri, and Palpa had married a Kars woman, who was not, however, closely related to Potheners, to whom he was acting as dairyman. Kosners and Tidjkudr were given to me as examples of a practice in which a man of one clan works for one of another,[4] and they received the same wages as in the case of the tarvalikartmokh (see p. [62]).
These facts show clearly that the kudrpalir are not regarded as the property of the whole clan, but belong to different families, and the same is true of the buffaloes milked at the tarvali. Each family possesses its own sacred buffaloes as well as its ordinary buffaloes or putiir, and in some cases the buffaloes of each family have their own dairyman, even when the milk of two herds is churned in the same dairy.