Castes and Tribes of Southern India. Vol. 3 of 7

by Edgar Thurston

In the building of a house, the services of the Asāri are required throughout. He it is who draws the plan of the building. And, when a door is fixed or beam raised, he receives his perquisite. The completion of a house is signified as a rule by a kutti-poosa. For this ceremony, the owner of the house has to supply the workmen with at least four goats to be sacrificed at the four corners thereof, a number of fowls to be killed so that the blood may be smeared on the walls and ceiling, and an ample meal with liquor. The feast concluded, the workmen receive presents of rings, gold ear-rings, silk and other cloths, of which the Moothasāri or chief carpenter receives the lion’s share. “The village carpenter,” Mr. Gopal Panikkar writes,[80] “has to do everything connected with our architecture, such as fixing poles or wickets at the exact spot where buildings are to be erected, and clearing newly erected buildings of all devils and demons that may be haunting them. This he does by means of pūjas (worship) performed after the completion of the building. But people have begun to break through the village traditions, and to entrust architectural work to competent hands, when the village carpenter is found incompetent for the same.”

It is noted by Canter Visscher[81] that “in commencing the building of a house, the first prop must be put up on the east side. The carpenters open three or four cocoanuts, spilling the juice as little as possible, and put some tips of betel leaves into them; and, from the way these float in the liquid, they foretell whether the house will be lucky or unlucky, whether it will stand for a long or short period, and whether another will ever be erected on its site. I have been told that the heathens say that the destruction of fort Paponetti by our arms was foretold by the builders from these auguries.”

The blacksmith is employed in the manufacture of locks and keys, and ornamental iron and brasswork for the houses of the rich. The smithy is near the dwelling hut, and the wife blows the bellows. The smith makes tyres for wheels, spades, choppers, knives, sickles, iron spoons, ploughshares, shoes for cattle and horses, etc. These he takes to the nearest market, and sells there. In some places there are clever smiths, who make excellent chellams (betel boxes) of brass, and there is one man at Walluvanād who even makes stylographic pens.

The Mūsāri works in bell-metal, and makes all kinds of household utensils, and large vessels for cooking purposes. He is an adept at making such articles with the proper proportions of copper, lead and brass. In some of the houses of the wealthier classes there are cooking utensils, which cost nearly a thousand rupees. Excellent bell-metal articles are made at Cherpalcheri, and Kunhimangalam in North Malabar is celebrated for its bell-metal lamps. The importation of enamelled and aluminium vessels, and lamps made in Europe, has made such inroads into the metal industry of the district that the brazier and blacksmith find their occupation declining.

The goldsmith makes all kinds of gold ornaments worn by Malaiālis. His lot is better than that of the other artisan classes.

It is noted in the Malabar Marriage Commission’s report that “among carpenters and blacksmiths in the Calicut, Walluvanād and Ponnāni taluks, several brothers have one wife between them, although the son succeeds the father amongst them.” Polyandry of the fraternal type is said to be most prevalent among the blacksmiths, who lead the most precarious existence, and have to observe the strictest economy. As with the Nāyars, the tāli-kettu kalyānam has to be celebrated. For this the parents of the child have to find a suitable manavālan or bridegroom by the consultation of horoscopes. An auspicious day is fixed, and new cloths are presented to the manavālan. The girl bathes, and puts on new clothes. She and the manavālan are conducted to a pandal (booth), where the tāli-tying ceremony takes place. This concluded, the manavālan takes a thread from the new cloth, and breaks it in two, saying that his union with the girl has ceased. He then walks away without looking back. When a Kammālan contemplates matrimony, his parents look out for a suitable bride. They are received by the girl’s parents, and enquiries are made concerning her. The visit is twice repeated, and, when an arrangement has been arrived at, the village astrologer is summoned, and the horoscopes of the contracting parties are consulted. It is sufficient if the horoscope of one of the sons agrees with that of the girl. The parents of the sons deposit as earnest money, or āchcharapanam, four, eight, twelve, or twenty-one fanams according to their means, in the presence of the artisans of the village; and a new cloth (kacha) is presented to the bride, who thus becomes the wife of all the sons. There are instances in which the girl, after the āchcharam marriage, is immediately taken to the husband’s house. All the brother-husbands, dressed in new clothes and decorated with ornaments, with a new palmyra leaf umbrella in the hand, come in procession to the bride’s house, where they are received by her parents and friends, and escorted to the marriage pandal. The bride and bridegrooms sit in a row, and the girl’s parents give them fruits and sugar. This ceremony is called mathuram kotukkal. The party then adjourns to the house of the bridegrooms where a feast is held, in the course of which a ceremony called pāl kotukkal is performed. The priest of the Kammālans takes some milk in a vessel, and pours it into the mouths of the bride and bridegrooms, who are seated, the eldest on the right, the others in order of seniority, and lastly the bride. During the nuptials the parents of the bride have to present a water-vessel, lamp, eating dish, cooking vessel, spittoon, and a vessel for drawing water from the well. The eldest brother cohabits with the bride on the wedding day, and special days are set apart for each brother. There seems to be a belief among the Kammālan women that, the more husbands they have, the greater will be their happiness. If one of the brothers, on the ground of incompatibility of temper, brings a new wife, she is privileged to cohabit with the other brothers. In some cases, a girl will have brothers ranging in age from twenty-five to five, whom she has to regard as her husband, so that by the time the youngest reaches puberty she may be well over thirty, and a young man has to perform the duties of a husband with a woman who is twice his age.

If a woman becomes pregnant before the āchchara kalyānam has been performed, her parents are obliged to satisfy the community that her condition was caused by a man of their own caste, and he has to marry the girl. If the paternity cannot be traced, a council is held, and the woman is turned out of the caste. In the sixth or eighth month of pregnancy, the woman is taken to her mother’s house, where the first confinement takes place. During her stay there the pulikudi ceremony is performed. The husbands come, and present their wife with a new cloth. A branch of a tamarind tree is planted in the yard of the house, and, in the presence of the relations, the brother of the pregnant woman gives her conji (rice gruel) mixed with the juices of the tamarind, Spondias mangifera and Hibiscus, to drink. The customary feast then takes place. A barber woman (Mannathi) acts as midwife. On the fourteenth day after childbirth, the Thali-kurup sprinkles water over the woman, and the Mannathi gives her a newly-washed cloth to wear. Purification concludes with a bath on the fifteenth day. On the twenty-eighth day the child-naming ceremony takes place. The infant is placed in its father’s lap, and in front of it are set a measure of rice and paddy (unhusked rice) on a plantain leaf. A brass lamp is raised, and a cocoanut broken. The worship of Ganēsa takes place, and the child is named after its grandfather or grandmother. In the sixth month the chōronu or rice-giving ceremony takes place. In the first year of the life of a boy the ears are pierced, and gold ear-rings inserted. In the case of a girl, the ear-boring ceremony takes place in the sixth or seventh year. The right nostril of girls is also bored, and mukkuthi worn therein.

It is recorded, in the Gazetteer of Malabar, that, “amongst Kammālans, the betrothal ceremony is similar to that of the Tiyans. If more than one brother is to be married, to the same girl, her mother asks how many bridegrooms there are, and replies that there are mats and planks for so many. Cohabitation sometimes begins from the night of the betrothal, the eldest brother having the priority, and the rest in order of seniority on introduction by the bride’s brother. If the girl becomes pregnant, the formal marriage must be celebrated before the pregnancy has advanced six months. At the formal marriage, the bridegrooms are received by the bride’s mother and brothers; two planks are placed before a lighted lamp, before which the bridegrooms and the bride’s brothers prostrate themselves. The bride is dressed in a new cloth, and brought down by the bridegroom’s sister and fed with sweetmeats.

“Next day all the bridegroom’s party visit the Tandān of the bride’s desam (village), who has to give them arrack (liquor) and meat, receiving in his turn a present of two fanams (money). The next day the bride is again feasted in her house by the bridegrooms, and is given her dowry consisting of four metal plates, one spittoon, one kindi (metal vessel), and a bell-metal lamp. The whole party then goes to the bridegroom’s house, where the Tandān proclaims the titles of the parties and their desam. All the brothers who are to share in the marriage sit in a row on a mat with the bride on the extreme left, and all drink cocoanut milk. The presence of all the bridegrooms is essential at this final ceremony, though for the preceding formalities it is sufficient if the eldest is present.”

The Kammalāns burn the corpses of adults, and bury the young. Fifteen days’ pollution is observed, and at the expiration thereof the Thali-kurup pours water, and purification takes place. On the third day the bones of the cremated corpse are collected, and placed in a new earthen pot, which is buried in the grounds of the house of the deceased. One of the sons performs beli (makes offerings), and observes dīksha (hair-growing) for a year. The bones are then carried to Tirunavaya in Ponnāni, Tiruvilamala in Cochin territory, Perūr in Coimbatore, or Tirunelli in the Wynād, and thrown into the river. A final beli is performed, and the srādh memorial ceremony is celebrated. If the deceased was skilled in sorcery, or his death was due thereto, his ghost is believed to haunt the house, and trouble the inmates. To appease it, the village washerman (Mannān) is brought with his drums, and, by means of his songs, forces the devil into one of the members of the household, who is made to say what murthi or evil spirit possesses him, and how it should be satisfied. It is then appeased with the sacrifice of a fowl, and drinking the juice of tender cocoanuts. A further demand is that it must have a place consigned to it in the house or grounds, and be worshipped once a year. Accordingly, seven days later, a small stool representing the deceased is placed in a corner of one of the rooms, and there worshipped annually with offerings of cocoanuts, toddy, arrack, and fowls. In the grounds of some houses small shrines, erected to the memory of the dead, may be seen. These are opened once a year, and offerings made to them.