In the Gazetteer of the Malabar district, the Chembōttis are described as copper-workers, whose traditional business is the roofing of the Sri-kōvil, or inner shrine of the temple with that metal. They are said to have originally formed part of the Kammālan community. “When the great temple at Taliparamba was completed, it was purified on a scale of unprecedented grandeur, no less than a thousand Brāhmans being employed. What was their dismay when the ceremony was well forward, to see a Chembōtti coming from the Sri-kōvil, where he had been putting finishing touches to the roof. This appeared to involve a recommencement of the whole tedious and costly ritual, and the Brāhmans gave vent to their feelings of despair, when a vision from heaven reassured them, and thereafter the Chembōttis have been raised in the social scale, and are not regarded as a polluting caste.”

Chembetti, or Chemmatti, meaning hammer, occurs as an exogamous sept of the Telugu Yānādis.

Chempakarāman.—Recorded, in the Travancore Census Report, 1901, as an honorific title of Nāyars.

Chenchu.—The Chenchus or Chentsus are a Telugu-speaking jungle tribe inhabiting the hills of the Kurnool and Nellore districts. In a letter addressed to the Bengal Asiatic Society,[18] transmitting vocabularies of various tribes inhabiting Vizagapatam, by Mr. Newill, it is stated that “the Chenchu tribe, whose language is almost entirely corrupt Hindi and Urdu with a few exceptions from Bengāli, affords one more example to the many forthcoming of an uncultured aboriginal race having abandoned their own tongue.” The compiler of the Kurnool Manual (1885) remarks that Mr. Newill’s vocabulary “seems to belong to the dialect spoken by Lambādis, who sometimes wander about the hills, and it is not unlikely that he was misled as to the character of the persons from whom his list was taken.” As examples of the words given by Mr. Newill, the following may be quoted:—

Bone, had. Cat, billeyi. Ear, kān. Elephant, hate. Tiger, bāg. One, yek. Ten, das. Far, dūr. Drink, pi. Sweet, mithā.

It is probable that Mr. Newill confused the Chenchus with the Bonthuk Savaras (q.v.) who speak corrupt Oriya, and are called Chenchu vāndlu, and, like the Chenchus, believe that the god Narasimha of Ahōbilam married a girl belonging to their tribe. As a further example of the confusion concerning the Chenchus, I may quote the remarks of Buchanan[19] about the Irulas, who are a Tamil-speaking jungle tribe: “In this hilly tract there is a race of men called by the other natives Cad Eriligaru, but who call themselves Cat Chensu. The language of the Chensu is a dialect of the Tamil, with occasionally a few Karnata or Telinga words intermixed, but their accent is so different from that of Madras that my servants did not at first understand what they said. Their original country, they say, is the Animalaya forest below the ghāts, which is confirmed by their dialect.” In the Census Report, 1901, Chenchu is said to be the name by which Irulas of North Arcot and the Mysore plateau are called sometimes, and, in the Census Report, 1891, Chenchu is given as a sub-division of the Yānādis. There can be little doubt that the Chenchus and Yānādis are descended from the same original stock. Mackenzie, in the local records collected by him, speaks of the Chenchus as being called Yānādi Chenchus. The Chenchus themselves at the present day say that they and the Yānādis are one and the same, and that the tribes intermarry.

In Scott’s ‘Ferishta,’ the Chenchus are described as they appeared before Prince Muhammad Masúm, a son of Aurangzib, who passed through the Kurnool district in 1694, as “exceedingly black, with long hair, and on their heads wore caps made of the leaves of trees. Each man had with him unbarbed arrows and a bow for hunting. They molest no one, and live in caverns or under the shady branches of trees. The prince presented some of them with gold and silver, but they did not seem to put any value on either, being quite unconcerned at receiving it. Upon the firing of a gun, they darted up the mountains with a surprising swiftness uncommon to man. In Taylor’s ‘Catalogue raisonné of Oriental Manuscripts,’ the Chenchus are described as people who “live to the westward of Ahōbalam, Srisailam, and other places, in the woods or wilds, and go about, constantly carrying in their hands bows and arrows. They clothe themselves with leaves, and live on the sago or rice of the bamboo. They rob travellers, killing them if they oppose. This people afflict every living creature (kill for food is supposed to be meant).” It is noted in the Kurnool Manual that in former times the Chenchu headman used to “dispose of murder cases, the murderer, on proof of guilt, being put to death with the same weapons with which the murder was committed.[20] Captain Newbold, writing in 1846, says that, passing through the jungle near Pacharla, he observed a skull bleached by the sun dangling from the branch of a tamarind tree, which he was informed was that of a murderer and hill-robber put to death by the headman. In the time of the Nabobs, some of the Chenchu murderers were caught and punished, but the practice seems to have prevailed among them more or less till the introduction of the new police in 1860, since which time all cases are said to be reported to the nearest police officer.”

A Chenchu Taliāri (village watchman), who came to see me at Nandyal, was wearing a badge with his name engraved on it in Telugu, which had been presented to him by Government in recognition of his shooting with a double-barrelled gun two Donga Oddes who had robbed a village. Another aged Taliāri had a silver bangle bearing a Telugu inscription, which had been given to him in acknowledgment of his capturing a murderer who was wanted by the police, and came to his hut. The casual visitor explained that he was on his way to Hyderabad, but the Chenchu, noticing blood on his clothes, tied him to a post, and gave information that he had secured him. The same man had also received presents for reporting cases of illicit distillation under the Abkāri Act.