Pdewan: /* Mannewar */

2023-05-30T11:53:21Z

‎Mannewar

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This article was written in 1916 when conditions were different. Even in<br/>1916 its contents related only to Central India and did not claim to be true <br />of all of India. It has been archived for its historical value as well as for<br/>the insights it gives into British colonial writing about the various communities<br/>of India. Indpaedia neither agrees nor disagrees with the contents of this <br/> article. Readers who wish to add fresh information can create a Part II of this <br/> article. The general rule is that if we have nothing nice to say about <br/> communities other than our own it is best to say nothing at all. <br/>

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[[Category:India|M]]
[[Category:Communities|M]]
[[Category:Name|Alphabet]]
[[Category:Name|Alphabet]]
From '''The Tribes And Castes Of The Central Provinces Of India '''

By R. V. Russell

Of The Indian Civil Service

Superintendent Of Ethnography, Central Provinces

Assisted By
Rai Bahadur Hira Lal,
Extra Assistant Commissioner

Macmillan And Co., Limited, London, 1916.

''' NOTE 1: The 'Central Provinces' have since been renamed Madhya Pradesh. '''

NOTE 2: While reading please keep in mind that all articles in this series have been scanned from the original book. Therefore, footnotes have got inserted into the main text of the article, interrupting the flow. Readers who spot these footnotes gone astray might like to shift them to their correct place.

=Mannewar=

A small tribe belonging to the south or
Telugu-speaking portion of the Chanda District, where they
mustered about 1600 persons in 191 1. The home of the
tribe is the Hyderabad State, where it numbers 22,000
persons, and the Mannewars are said to have once been
dominant over a part of that territory.

The name is
derived from a Telugu word inannem^ meaning forest, while
war is the plural termination in Telugu, Mannewar thus
signifying ' the people of the forest.' The tribe appear to
be the inferior branch of the Koya Gonds, and they are
commonly called Mannewar Koyas as opposed to the Koya
Doras or the superior branch, Dora meaning ' lord ' or
master.

The Koya Doras thus correspond to the Raj-
Gonds of the north of the Province and the Mannewar
Koyas to the Dhur or ' dust ' Gonds." The tribe is divided
into three exogamous groups : the Nalugu Velpulu worshipping
four gods, the Ayidu Velpulu worshipping five, and the
Anu Velpulu six.

A man must marry a woman of one of
the divisions worshipping a different number of gods from his
' This article is based on a note - From a glossary published by Mr.
furnished by Mr. M. Aziz, Officiating Gupta, Assistant Director of Ethnology
Naib-Tahsildar, Sironcha. for India.
part
own, but the Mannevvars do not appear to know the names
of these gods, and consequently no veneration can be paid
to them at present, and they survive solely for the purpose
of regulating marriage. When a betrothal is made a day
is fixed for taking an omen. In the early morning the boy
who is to be married has his face washed and turmeric
smeared on his feet, and is seated on a wooden seat inside
the house.

The elders of the village then proceed outside
it towards the rising sun and watch for any omen given by
an animal or bird crossing their path. If this is good the
marriage is celebrated, and if bad the match is broken off.
In the former case five of the elders take their food on
returning from the search for the omen and immediately
proceed to the bride's village. Here they are met by the
Pesamuda or village priest, and stay for three days, when the
amount of the dowry is settled and a date fixed for the
wedding.

The marriage ceremony resembles that of the
low Telugu castes. The couple are seated on a ploughyoke,
and coloured rice is thrown on to their heads, and the
bridegroom ties the mangalya or bead necklace, which is
the sign of marriage, round the neck of the bride. If a girl
is deformed, or has some other drawback which prevents her
from being sought in marriage, she is given away with her
sister to a first cousin ^ or some other near relative, the two
sisters being married to him together.

A widow may
marry any man of the tribe except her first husband's
brothers. If a man takes a widow to his house without
marrying her he is fined three rupees, while for adultery
with a married woman the penalty is twenty rupees. A
divorce can always be obtained, but if the husband demands
it he is mulcted of twenty rupees by the caste committee,
while a wife who seeks a divorce must pay ten rupees.
The Mannewars make an offering of a fowl and some liquor
to the ploughshare on the festival of Ganesh Chaturthi.

After the picking of the flowers of the mahua ^ they worship
that tree, offering to it some of the liquor distilled from the
new flowers, with a fowl and a goat. This is known as the
Burri festival. At the Holi feast the Mannewars make two
human figures to represent Kami and Rati, or the god of
1 Generally the paternal aunt's son. ^ Bassia latifolia.

love and his wife. The male figure is then thrown on to
the Holi fire with a live chicken or an egg. This may be
a reminiscence of a former human sacrifice, which was a
common custom in many parts of the world at the spring
festival. The caste usually bury the dead, but are beginning
to adopt cremation. They do not employ Brahmans for
their ceremonies and eat all kinds of food, including the
flesh of pigs, fowls and crocodiles, but in view of their having
nominally adopted Hinduism, they abstain from beef.

@@ Line 33: / Line 33: @@
 =Mannewar=
 A small tribe belonging to the south or
@@ Line 59: / Line 64: @@
 A man must marry a woman of one of
 the divisions worshipping a different number of gods from his
-' This article is based on a note - From a glossary published by Mr.
+part
-furnished by Mr. M. Aziz, Officiating Gupta, Assistant Director of Ethnology
-Naib-Tahsildar, Sironcha. for India.
-  part
 own, but the Mannevvars do not appear to know the names
 of these gods, and consequently no veneration can be paid
@@ Line 121: / Line 123: @@
 flesh of pigs, fowls and crocodiles, but in view of their having
 nominally adopted Hinduism, they abstain from beef.

Mannewar - Revision history

Pdewan: /* Mannewar */

Pdewan: Created page with " {| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"| This article was written in 1916 when conditions were different. Even in1916 its contents related only ..."

Pdewan: Created page with " {| class="wikitable" |- |colspan="0"|
This article was written in 1916 when conditions were different. Even in
1916 its contents related only ..."