Identifier: nativesofnorther00croo (find matches)
Title: Natives of northern India
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Crooke, William, 1848-1923
Subjects: Ethnology -- India India -- Social conditions India -- Description and travel
Publisher: London : A. Constable and Company, ltd.
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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e mainly on what the forest supplies,and they have all the thriftlessness, love of ardentspirits, gaiety, simplicity, honesty, and detestation ofhonest work which characterise the true savage. They amuse themselves with wild jungle dances, inwhich the men dress as women, or imitate variousanimals, bounding backwards and forwards to themusic of their rude instruments, among which a sort ofbagpipe is most popular. Their religion is a gross form of Animism, whichneeds no temple and no regular priest. Sometimesthey raise a flimsy shed over some specially holystone; more usually a few water-worn pebbles piledbeneath a shady tree serve as their place of worship.They believe strongly in witchcraft, and their Barvas,or witch-finders, are supposed to possess the heredi-tary gift of inspiration, which is indicated by a sort ofshamanistic frenzy. As the officiant listens to the wildsongs in honour of the spirits of hill, or tree, or spring,the god comes upon him, and he dances with frantic No. 8
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BaTswars, Dravidian Cultivators, Southern Hills (p. 21) TRIBES OF THE SOUTHERN HH.LS 69 gestures, his long hair floating behind him, until hefaints from sheer exhaustion. While in this ecstaticstate their inarticulate utterances are regarded asoracles, foretelling the prospects of the season, or fore-boding disease and other calamities which are invari-ably attributed to evil spirits. On special occasions they practise the rite of fire-walking, which seems to be confined throughout Indiato the non-Aryan races. A sacrifice is offered, thepriest or medicine-man mutters an incantation, wavesa naked sword over the fire to scare the spirit whichwould scorch the performers, and then calls upon aBhil to walk through a trench filled with blazing char-coal. A European observer who witnessed the ritesatisfied himself that the man escaped injury. Butas the same result followed when his Mohammedanorderly made the attempt, it is clear that no specialprotective was used. It has been suggested that

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