The Dhanwārs are fervent believers in all kinds of magic and witchcraft. Magic is practised both by the Baiga, the village priest or medicine-man, who is always a man and who conducts the worship of the deities mentioned above, and by the tonhi, the regular witch, who may be a man or woman. Little difference appears to exist in the methods of the two classes of magicians, but the Baiga’s magic is usually exercised for the good of his fellow-creatures, which indeed might be expected as he gets his livelihood from them, and he is also less powerful than the tonhi. The Baiga cures ordinary maladies and the bites of snakes and scorpions by mesmeric passes fortified by the utterance of charms. He raises the dead in much the same manner as a witch does, but employs the spirit of the dead person in casting out other evil spirits by which his clients may be possessed. One of the miracles performed by the Baiga is to make his wet cloth stand in the air stiff and straight, holding only the two lower ends. He can cross a river walking on leaves, and change men into beasts. Witches are not very common among the Dhanwārs. A witch, male or female, maybe detected by a sunken and gloomy appearance of the eyes, a passionate temperament, or by being found naked in a graveyard at night, as only a witch would go there to raise a corpse from the dead. The Dhanwārs eat nearly all kinds of food except beef and the leavings of others. They will take cooked food from the hands of Kawars, and the men also from Gonds, but not the women. In some places they will accept food from Brāhmans, but not everywhere. They are not an impure caste, but usually live in a separate hamlet of their own, and are lower than the Gonds and Kawars, who will take water from them but not food. They are a very primitive people, and it is stated that at the census several of them left their huts and fled into the jungle, and were with difficulty induced to return. When an elder man dies his family usually abandon their hut, as it is believed that his spirit haunts it and causes death to any one who lives there.
11. Social rules.
A Kawar is always permitted to become a Dhanwār, and a woman of the Gond, Binjhwār and Rāwat tribes, if such a one is living with a Dhanwār, may be married to him with the approval of the tribe. She does not enjoy the full status of membership herself, but it is accorded to her children. When an outsider is to be admitted a panchāyat of five Dhanwārs is assembled, one of whom must be of the Mājhi sept. The members of the panchāyat hold out their right hands, palm upwards, one below the other, and beneath them the candidate and his wife place their hands. The Mājhi pours water from a brass vessel on to the topmost hand, and it trickles down from one to the other on to those of the candidate and his wife. The blood of a slaughtered goat is mixed with the water in their palms and they sip it, and after giving a feast to the caste are considered as Dhanwārs. Permanent exclusion from caste is imposed only for living with a man or woman of another caste other than those who may become Dhanwārs, or for taking food from a member of an impure caste, the only ones which are lower than the Dhanwārs. Temporary exclusion for an indefinite period is awarded for an irregular connection between a Dhanwār man and woman, or of a Dhanwār with a Kawar, Binjhwār, Rāwat or Gond; on a family which harbours any one of its members who has been permanently expelled; and on a woman who cuts the navel-cord of a newly-born child, whether of her own caste or not. Irregular sexual intimacies are usually kept secret and condoned by marriage whenever possible. A person expelled for any of the above offences cannot claim readmission as a right. He must first please the members of the caste, and to do this he attends every caste feast without being invited, removes their leaf-plates with the leavings of food, and waits on them generally, and continually proffers his prayer for readmission. When the other Dhanwārs are satisfied with his long and faithful service they take him back into the community. Temporary exclusion from caste, with the penalty of one or more feasts for readmission, is imposed for killing a cow or a cat accidentally, or in the course of giving it a beating; for having a cow or bullock in one’s possession whose nostrils or ears get split; for getting maggots in a wound; for being beaten except by a Government official; for taking food from any higher caste other than those from whom food is accepted; and in the case of a woman for saying her husband’s name aloud. This list of offences shows that the Dhanwārs have almost completely adopted the Hindu code in social matters, while retaining their tribal religion. A person guilty of one of the above offences must have his or her head shaved by a barber, and make a pilgrimage to the shrine of Narsingh Nāth in Bodāsāmar zamīndāri; after having accomplished this he is purified by one of the Sonwāni sept, being given water in which gold has been dipped to drink through a bamboo tube, and he provides usually three feasts for the caste-fellows.
12. Dress and tattooing.
The tribe dress in the somewhat primitive fashion prevalent in Chhattīsgarh, and there is nothing distinctive about their clothing. Women are tattooed at their parents’ house before or just after marriage. It is said that the tattoo marks remain on the soul after death, and that she shows them to God, probably for purposes of identification. There is a saying, ‘All other pleasures are transient, but the tattoo marks are my companions through life.’ A Dhanwār will not take water from a woman who is not tattooed.
13. Names of children.
Children are named on the chathi or sixth day after birth, and the parents always ascertain from a wise man whether the soul of any dead relative has been born again in the child so that they may name it after him. It is also thought that the sex may change in transmigration, for male children are sometimes named after women relatives and female after men. Mr. Hīra Lāl notes the following instance of the names of four children in a family. The eldest was named after his grandfather; the second was called Bhālu or bear, as his maternal uncle who had been eaten by a bear was reborn in him; the third was called Ghāsi, the name of a low caste of grass-cutters, because the two children born before him had died; and the fourth was called Kausi, because the sorcerer could not identify the spirit of any relative as having been born again in him. The name Kausi is given to any one who cannot remember his sept, as in the saying, ‘Bhūle bisāre kausi got,’ or ‘A man who has got no got belongs to the Kausi got.’ Kausi is said to mean a stranger. Bad names are commonly given to avert ill-luck or premature death, as Boya, a liar; Labdu, one smeared with ashes; Marha, a corpse; or after some physical defect as Lati, one with clotted hair; Petwa, a stammerer; Lendra, shy; Ghundu, one who cannot walk; Ghunari, stunted; or from the place of birth, as Dongariha or Pahāru, born on a hill; Banjariha, born in brushwood, and so on. A man will not mention the names of his wife, his son’s wife or his sister’s son’s wife, and a woman will not name her husband or his elder brother or parents. As already stated, a woman saying her husband’s name aloud is temporarily put out of caste, the Hindu custom being thus carried to extremes, as is often the case among the lower castes.
14. Occupation.
The tribe consider hunting to have been their proper calling, but many of them are now cultivators and labourers. They also make bamboo matting and large baskets for storing grain, but they will not make small bamboo baskets or fans, because this is the calling of the Turis, on whom the Dhanwār looks down. The women collect the leaves of sāl[6] trees and sell them at the rate of about ten bundles for a pice (farthing) for use as chongis or leaf-pipes. As already stated, the tribe have no language of their own, but speak a corrupt form of Chhattīsgarhi.