The establishment of these three Gujar kingdoms implies that the Gurjjara tribe from Northern and Central India settled in large numbers in Gujarát. Several Gujar castes survive in Gujarát. Among them are Gujar Vániás or traders, Gujar Sutárs or carpenters, Gujar Sonis or goldsmiths, Gujar Kumbhárs or potters, and Gujar Saláts or masons. All of these are Gujars who taking to different callings have formed separate castes. The main Gujar underlayer are the Lewás and Kaḍwás the two leading divisions of the important class of Gujarát Kaṇbis. The word Kaṇbi is from the Sanskrit Kuṭumbin, that is one possessing a family or a house. From ancient times the title Kuṭumbin has been prefixed to the names of cultivators.[7] This practice still obtains in parts of the North-West Provinces where the peasant proprietors are addressed as Gṛihasthas or householders. As cattle-breeding not cultivation was the original as it still is the characteristic calling of many North Indian Gujars, those of the tribe who settled to cultivation came to be specially known as Kuṭumbin or householders. Similarly Deccan surnames show that many tribes of wandering cattle-owners settled as householders and are now known as Kunbis.[8] During the last
Chapter I.
The Name. twenty years the settlement as Kunbis in Khándesh of tribes of wandering Wanjára herdsmen and grain-carriers is an example of the change through which the Gujarát Kanbis and the Deccan Kunbis passed in early historic times.
Gujars.Besides resembling them in appearance and in their skill both as husbandmen and as cattle-breeders the division of Gujarát Kanbis into Lewa and Kadwa seems to correspond with the division of Málwa Gujars into Dáha and Karád, with the Lewa origin of the East Khándesh Gujars, and with the Lawi tribe of Panjáb Gujars. The fact that the head-quarters of the Lewa Kanbis of Gujarát is in the central section of the province known as the Charotar and formerly under Valabhi supports the view that the founder of Valabhi power was the chief leader of the Gujar tribe. That nearly a fourth of the whole Hindu population of Gujarát are Lewa and Kadwa Kanbis and that during the sixth seventh and eighth centuries three Gujar chiefs divided among them the sway of the entire province explain how the province of Gujarát came to take its name from the tribe of Gujars.[9]
[1] Rája Tarangini (Calc. Edition), V. 150, 155; Cunningham’s Archæological Survey, II. 8. An earlier but vaguer reference occurs about the end of the sixth century in Báṇa’s Śríharshacharita, p. 274, quoted in Ep. Ind. I. 67ff, where Prabhákaravardhana of Thánesar the father of the great Śri Harsha is said to have waged war with several races of whom the Gurjjaras are one. [↑]
[2] Beal’s Buddhist Records of the Western World, I. 165 note 1. [↑]
[3] Cunningham’s Archæological Survey, II. 71. [↑]
[4] Beal’s Buddhist Records, II. 270. [↑]
[5] This identification was first made by the late Col. J. W. Watson, I.S.C. Ind. Ant. VI. 63. Bhinmál or Bhilmál also called Śrímál, is an old town about fifty miles west of Abu, north latitude 25° 4′ east longitude 71° 14′. General Cunningham (Ancient Geography of India, 313) and Professor Beal (Buddhist Records, II. 270) identify Pi-lo-mo-lo with Bálmer or Bádamera (north latitude 71° 10′ east longitude 20° 0′) in the Jodhpur State of West Rájputána. This identification is unsatisfactory. Bálmer is a small town on the slope of a hill in an arid tract with no vestige of antiquity. Hiuen Tsiang notes that the produce of the soil and the manners of the people of Pi-lo-mo-lo resemble those of Suráshṭra. This description is unsuited to so arid a tract as surrounds Bálmer; it would apply well to the fertile neighbourhood of Bhilmál or Bhinmál. Since it is closely associated with Juzr that is Gurjjara the Al Bailáiman of the Arabs (a.d. 750, Elliot’s History, I. 442) may be Bhilmál. A Jain writer (Ind. Ant. XIX. 233) mentions Bhilmál as the seat of king Bhímasena and as connected with the origin of the Gadhia coinage. The date Bhinmál in a M.S. of a.d. 906 (Ditto, page 35) suggests it was then a seat of learning under the Gurjjaras. The prince of Śrímál is mentioned (Rás Málá, I. 58) as accompanying Múla Rájá Solaṅkhi (a.d. 942–997) in an expedition against Sorath. Al Biruni (a.d. 1030, Sachau’s Edn., I. 153, 267) refers to Bhillamála between Multán and Anhilaváda. As late as a.d. 1611 Nicholas Ufflet, an English traveller from Agra to Ahmadádád (Kerr’s Voyages, VIII. 301) notices “Beelmahl as having an ancient wall 24 kos (36 miles) round with many fine tanks going to ruin.” The important sub-divisions of upper class Gujarát Hindus who take their name from it show Śrímál to have been a great centre of population. [↑]
[6] Indian Antiquary, XIII. 70–81. Bühler (Ind. Ant. VII. 62) identifies Nandipuri with a suburb of Broach. [↑]
[7] Bombay Gazetteer, Násik, page 604. Bombay Arch. Survey Sep. Number X. 38. [↑]