Shepherds caste : Sholapur
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Shepherds caste Sholapur
This is an extract from a British Raj gazetteer pertaining to Sholapur that seems |
SHEPHERDS
Shepherds include two castes with a strength of 59,385, or 11.04 per cent of the Hindu population. Of these 57,704 (males 29,038, females 28,666) were Dhangars and 1681 (males 871, females 810) were Gavlis.
Dhangars
Dhangars, or Shepherds literally Cowkeepers, are returned as numbering 57,704 and as found over the whole district. They are said to have come to Sholapur during the great Durgadevi famine (1396-1408) from the valley of the Man river in north-east Satara. They are divided into Barges or Bandes, Hatgars, and Khutegars or Khutes, who neither eat togother nor intermarry. The chief Dhangar surnames are Bhage, Chendke, Duble, Gadekar, Kore, Murle, and Rayural. They are dark, large, and well-featured. The men wear the top-knot and the moustache. Their home tongue is Marathi. They live in houses of mud and stones with flat roofs, and their house furniture includes brass copper and earthen vessels worth about £2 10s. (Rs. 25). They eat the flesh of goats and sheep and fowls and drink liquor. Their staple food is jvari, pulse, and vegetables, milk, curds, and buttermilk. The men dress in a loincloth, a turban, a jacket and a waistclothor short trousers reaching to the knee. They throw a blanket over the head and let it hang down the back to the knee. The women wear a robe and bodice, and neither use false hair nor deck their heads with flowers. They are neither neat nor clean in their dress. The men are strong, sturdy, simple, hospitable, orderly, dirty, and rough. Their women are brave and hardworking. The Khutegars are weavers and the Hatgars sell milk, butter, clarified butter, and wool, sell sheep and goats, and make and sell country blankets. The Barges are husbandmen. Some Dhangars also work as bricklayers, day labourers, petty shopkeepers, messengers, writers, and a few are moneylenders and cloth merchants. Besides goats and sheep they own cows and buffaloes. They spread all over the district during the fair season, grazing over the whole country, and, for the sake of the manure, are often paid by landholders to pen their flocks- in their fields. Their women take milk and butter to market. The men generally spend their time in grazing sheep and goats, and the women, besides minding the house, spin wool and sell milk, butter, and curds. The wool fetches about 7d. (4⅔ as.) a pound. Many Dhangars buy blankets from their castepeople, add a coloured cotton border, and sell them at a profit of 3d. to 6d. (2-4 as.) on each blanket. The price of a blanket varies according to its texture from 1s. 6d. to 5s. (Rs. ¾ 2½). Exclusive of the material the cost of weaving the two borders of a blanket is about 1d. (⅔ a.). A man will weave borders on four or five blankets in a day. Dhangars who weave blanket borders have generally capital of £30 to £40 (Rs. 300-400). They have credit with moneylenders and borrow at nine per cent a year. Their chief gods are Bahiroba of Raji in the Indi sub-division of Bijapur, Bhuloba, Khandoba of Jejuri, Tukai of Tuljapur, and Yemai of Mardi in Sholapur. Dhangars worship the ghosts of their deceased ancestors and keep ancestral images in their houses. On Dasara Day they go to the temple of the god Hedamdev in waste lands with music, and one of them gets possessed and strikes himself with a naked sword but is not wounded. Those who are present throw wool and pieces of cocoa-kernel over their heads and all dance and sing. They have Brahman priests who officiate at their marriage and death ceremonies. They keep the usual Hindu holidays and fast on the elevenths of every lunar month. After the birth of a child the mother is held impure for twelve days. For five weeks she is not allowed to cook or to enter the cook room. On the fifth day after the birth the goddess Panchvi is worshipped and on the twelfth the child is named. On a lucky day before the boy is three years old his hair is cut in front of the goddess Satvai. A sheep is sacrificed and a feast is held. A lock of hair is left on the child's skull until a brother or sister is born to him. Seven or eight years later the tuft is removed and a proper top-knot is kept on the crown of the head. They marry their boys between five and fifteen and their girls at any time before they come of age. Their marriage customs are the same as those of cultivating Marathas, except that the bride sends to the boy a present of about two hundred stuffed cakes. Most Dhangars bury the dead, but those who can afford it burn them. A woman who dies in childbirth is always buried.. A feast is given on the twelfth day after death. They' have a caste council and settle social disputes at caste meetings. They do not send their boys to school and are a steady people.
Gavlis
Gavlis, or Milkmen, are returned as numbering 1681 and as found all over the district. They are divided into Bijapur Gavlis, Kunbi Gavlis, and Nagarkar Gavlis who neither eat together nor intermarry. The Bijapur and the Nagarkar Gavlis are Lingayats. The Kunbi Gavlis were formerly in the service of the Bijapuris. They have established themselves as Gavlis, but eat drink marry and associate with Kunbis from whom they differ in no respect. The chief surnames among the Bijapur and Nagarkar Gavlis are Aglave, Ajidvani, Bashkar, Bahervadi, Bhaganagdi, Chipkar, Dhajale, Divte, Gadya-Palatukar, Ghule, Ghungre, Gholi, Gisal, Huchche, Jangavli, Kalagate, Lakdya, Langute, Malkunaik, Namdhe, Pangud, Sathe, Shadapure, and Sholapure. The Gavlis look like Marathas and speak Marathi. They are dirty in their habits, but hardworking and thrifty. They keep cattle and sell milk, curds, and cowdung cakes. Their houses are of mud with thatched or tiled roofs and a large yard for cattle, and they have a store of brass vessels. Their staple food includes jvari bread, vegetables, curds, and whey. Their holiday dishes are of sugared milk, wheat bread, and split pulse, and they neither eat flesh nor drink liquor. The men dress in the waistcloth, waistcoat, turban, and blanket; and the women in the ordinary Maratha robe and bodice. The men wear the ling in their turbans. They generally carry betel and tobacco in a pouch orbatva with bells tied to it. Well-to-do men wear earrings and a waistchain, and women ear, nose, arm, and toe rings. The women sit by themselves for three days during their monthly sickness. The men spend their time looking after cattle, cleaning the stable, and with the boys taking the cattle outside of the town to graze. Besides minding the house the women go about selling milk, curds, and cowdung cakes. On the fifth day after the birth of a child the mother worships the goddess Satvai and a Jangam or Lingayat priest ties a ling to the child's cot. On the twelfth day five married women with songs cradle the child and name it, the name being given by the village Brahman. The mother is bathed, new bangles are put on her wrist, and near kinswomen present her with robes and bodices and her child with frocks. The laps of all the married women are filled with boiled gram, which is also given to children and other guests who either eat it on the spot or take it home. If the family are well-to-do the guests are feasted. On a lucky day, when a boy is eight or ten years old, his head is shaved leaving a top-knot. The hair is offered to the village goddess, and a feast to near relations ends the shaving or javal. Before the shaving, the hair is from time to time cut with scissors and kept, and finally offered to the goddess along with the hair shaved off on the lucky day. Some go to the temple of Mankeshvar or Satvai in the Nizam's country to shave their boys' heads for the first time. They marry their girls between six and twelve and their boys some time before they are twenty-five. Before marriage they have the same magni or asking ceremony as among cultivating Marathas. A day before the asking they worship as the marriage guardian or devak a -branch of jambhul, amba, saundad, or babhul. When the marriage is fixed, a millet-stalk booth is raised about fourteen feet by eight. It is cowdunged in the inside and covered with a cloth ceiling. About forty pounds of each of the following articles, molasses, sweet oil, wheat, and jvari are heaped in the middle of the marriage hall. On the heap is set a small stone bull or nandi and five married women worship the heap by throwing turmeric and redpowder over it as a sign of good luck. The married women take a handful of jvari in a winnowing fan, and, after sifting it a little, lay it on the ground near the heap. Some elderly woman of the house presents the five married women with turmeric and redpowder and betel packets and they retire to their houses. During the night, neighbouring women come, sing songs, grind the jvari or millet and wheat, and after the whole has been ground return to their homes. The flour, molasses, oil and other articles brought for the marriage are not taken into the house but kept in the marriage hall until the marriage ceremony is over. Next day the boy's relations go to the market and buy five to eleven turbans, waistcloths, shouldercloths, robes, and bodices, and arrange them in a line in the marriage hall. First they pile the turbans in a heap, then the shouldercloths, then the waistcloths, next to them the robes, and last the bodices. On each heap of men's clothes is laid a bit of silver plate with the image of a god stamped on it, and on each heap of women's clothes a silver plate stamped with the image of a goddess. Then the boy's parents with five married women, lay before each of the heaps turmeric, redpowder, betel, and oil cakes, on each of which is laid a little cooked rice and wheat dough mixed with sugar. Last of all lighted lamps are set before the heaps and the heaps are prayed to be kindly. Near the heaps five plantain posts are set three in a line and two in front of the first and third. An elderly married woman presents each of the five married women with turmeric redpowder and betel, and they retire to their homes.
At night men are again called to grind jvari and wheat. The flour molasses and oil are kept in the marriage hall and are not taken into the house. Next day the boy's relations go to the market to buy five to eleven bodices, waistcloths, turbans and shouldercloths and lay them in a line in the marriage hall; first the heap of turbans, next the heap of shouldercloths, then the robes, and last the bodices. On each heap of men's clothes are laid silver plates with images of gods, and on the heaps of women's clothes silver plates with goddesses stamped on them. The heap in the middle has a plantain flower or kelphul tied to it and across the three plantain posts is tied & jvari stalk. To the jvari stalk are fastened two white Madras robes, and each of the plantain posts is dressed in a robe and bodice and in the ornaments worn by married women including the nose-ring and neck ornaments. The upper part representing the brow is daubed with redpowder, and in front leaning against the posts two stamped silver plates are laid each on a betel leaf.
They take five earthen dishes or parats and laying in each dish an oil cake, a little cooked rice, and some wheat dough, set one dish at each corner post and one between the two robed plantain-goddesses. In each of these five dishes is set a dough lamp with five cotton wicks. Then two pounds of millet seed are pounded in a mortar and cooked, and the dough is spread on a handkerchief in front of the plantain posts and kneaded to make it even and hard. Over the layer of millet are spread two pounds of wheat dough. The wheat dough is kneaded like the millet dough and on it five oil cakes are laid. They take about a pound of wheat flour, rub it with butter and make it into a lamp, roll it in a cloth, and put it in an earthen pot filled with cold water and boil it. When it is boiled the wheat lamp is laid on the oil cakes, and other oil cakes are heaped round it so as to hide its bottom. It is filled with butter and furnished with a cotton wick. A new winnowing fan is taken, twenty-one dough lamps are put into the fan and filled with butter and cotton wicks, and lighted along with the big lamp. A piece of camphor is burned close by on a betel leaf and the whole is worshipped. Cakes and cooked rice and vegetables are offered and lighted camphor is waved in front. This is called the chauk bhojani di or the mother goddess dining in a square. Next day the boy's parents, with kinspeople and music, take in a plate a lighted lamp, an oil can, and three cups holding spices turmeric and redpowder, go to the house of a casteman of a different family stock, and ask him to get them a marriage guardian or devak. The man goes to some waste land and cuts a branch of the babhul, jambhul, mango, or shami tree, generally choosing a mango branch. Both the man and his wife are dressed in their usual clothes and the hems of their garments are knotted together. The man carries a hatchet in his hand and the woman a plate with an oil can and some cups of pink and yellow powder. Four men hold a cloth over their heads, the husband touches the cloth with the hatchet and they start. As they start the boy's father tells them to go to five houses which he names. When they reach one of the houses the woman tells the mistress of the house that So and So ask her to their son's wedding, and, at the same time, she gives the woman whom she asks a little of the oil and some of the coloured powder. When they have asked the five women orjakhins whom the boy's father named, the plate-and-hatchet-bearing couple go back to the boy's. Meanwhile the five wise women or jakhins at whatever inconvenience bathe and go to the boy's. When they come the plate-and-hatchet-bearing husband and wife repeat each other's names and untie their skirts. Bach of the five wise women takes an earthen jar from the potter's, and, marking it with lines of cement and redlead, sets it on her head and starts for a river or stream with music, kinswomen, and servants carrying oil cakes and ten pieces of cocoa-kernel and betel. At the river side they spread a carpet and pick five men whom they call virs or heroes. These five men take the earthen pots from the five married women, fill them with water, and set them on a blanket, covering the pot mouths with earthen lids and decking them with flower garlands. The five men are then presented with pieces of cocoa-kernel and packets of betel. The five wise women are then given turmeric which they rub on their cheeks and redpowder with which they cover their brows. Each is presented with an oil cake, a piece of cocoa-kernel, and a betel packet. Lighted camphor is laid on the lid of each of the earthen jars, and, when it has burnt out, the five women take the earthen pots on their heads and return to the boy's with music and guests. At the boy's the pots are set in a corner of the marriage hall and a feast is held when the guests or the five women are given water from the jars to drink. This ends the wise-woman or jakhin ceremony. On the marriage day the boy is dressed in new clothes, goes on a bullock to the village Maruti with kinsmen and kinswomen friends and music, makes a bow, and goes straight to the girl's house where he and the bride are seated together on a blanket in front of the altar orbahule. Round the couple are piled five heaps of millet and wheat, and on each heap is set a coloured earthen pot with betel and turmeric inside and round the pots a thread is wound. Brahmans repeat verses, and, when the verses are ended, throw rice over the pair and they are husband and wife. The thread that was passed round the earthen pots is cut in two, a turmeric root is tied to each half, and of the two parts one is wound round the right wrist of the boy and the other round the right wrist of the girl. Betel is served and the guests retire. Next day a feast is held at the boy's and on the day after at the girl's. The boy and girl are presented with clothes and seated on the shoulders of two men, who dance while musicians play and the boy and girl pelt each other with sweet scented powder. Then the boy and girl are seated on the shoulders of a man who is called kotvalghoda or the police commissioner's horse and he dances to music. Marriage brow-horns or bhashings are tied to the boy's and girl's foreheads, they are set on a bullock, and go to the boy's with kinsfolk and music. At the boy's the two kinsmen and the double-burdened police horse again dance the couple, betel or wheat bread and rice are served, and the guests retire. Except women who die in childbirth Gavlis bury the dead. The body is carried sitting in a bamboo frame, the grave is dug, and sprinkled with cowdung and cow urine and water in which a Jangam's feet have been washed.
The body is lowered into the grave and the Jangam goes into the grave, drops some water in which his toe has been dipped into the dead mouth, places the lingam which the dead wore in his clasped hands, and comes out. The grave is filled with earth up to the corpse's neck, from that till the head is covered it is filled with salt, and above that with earth. When they come home the mourning family are impure for three days, and on the fourth day are purified by drinking a mixture of cow's urine, dung, milk, curds, sugar, and honey. They worship all the usual Hindu gods, and chiefly Ambabai, Khandoba, and Krishna, and fast on Mondays, on the elevenths of every lunar month, and on Gokulashtami in August and Anantchaturdashi in September. Their priests are Jangams whom they hold in great respect. They call caste meetings to settle social disputes. Caste offences are punished with fine, and after the fine is paid the offender drinks water in which a Jangam's toe has been washed, and is pure. They do not send their boys to school and are a poor people.
