II AHIVĀSI 389 and mendicants now, as has been seen, contribute only a comparatively small minority of the whole caste. The majority of the Brahmans are lawyers, doctors, executive officers of Government and clerks in all kinds of Government, railway and private offices. The defects ascribed to the priesthood apply to these, if at all, only in a very minor degree. The Brahman official has many virtues. He is, as a rule, honest, industrious and anxious to do his work creditably. He spends very little on his own pleasures, and his chief aim in life is to give his children as good an education as he can afford. A half or more of his income may be devoted to this object. If he is well-to-do he helps his poor relations liberally, having the strong fellow-feeling for them which is a relic of the joint family system. He is a faithful husband and an affectionate father. If his outlook on life is narrow and much of his leisure often devoted to petty quarrels and intrigues, this is largely the result of his imperfect, parrotlike education and lack of opportunity for anything better. In this respect it may be anticipated that the excellent education and training now afforded by Government in secondary schools for very small fees will produce a great improvement; and that the next generation of educated Hindus will be considerably more manly and intelligent, and it may be hoped at the same time not less honest, industrious and loyal than their fathers. Brahman, Ahivāsi. A class of persons who claim to be Brahmans, but are generally engaged in cultivation and pack-carriage. They are looked down upon by other Brāhmans, and permit the remarriage of widows. The name means the abode of the snake or dragon, and the caste are said to be derived from a village Sunrakh in Muttra District, where a dragon once lived. For further information Mr. Crooke's article on the caste,1 from which the above details are taken, may be consulted. Brahman, Jijhotia. This is a local subdivision of the Kanaujia subcaste, belonging to Bundelkhand. They take their name from Jajhoti, the classical term for Bundelkhand, 1 Tribes and Castes of the North-West Provinces and Oudh, s.v. and reside in Saugor and the adjoining Districts, where they usually act as priests to the higher castes. The Jijhotia Brahmans rank a little below the Kanaujias proper and the Sarwarias, who are also a branch of the Kanaujia division. The two latter classes take daughters in marriage from Jijhotias, but do not give their daughters to them. But these hypergamous marriages are now rare. Jijhotia Brahmans will plough with their own hands in Saugor. Brahman, Kanaujia, Kanyakubja.—This, the most important division of the northern Brahmans, takes its name from the ancient city of Kanauj in the Farukhābād District on the Ganges, which was on two occasions the capital of India. The great king Harsha Vardhana, who ruled the whole of northern India in the seventh century, had his headquarters here, and when the Chinese pilgrim Hiuen Tsang stayed at Kanauj in A.D. 638 and 643 he found upwards of a hundred monasteries crowded by more than 10,000 Buddhist monks. "Hinduism flourished as well as Buddhism, and could show more than two hundred temples with thousands of worshippers. The city, which was strongly fortified, extended along the east bank of the Ganges for about four miles, and was adorned with lovely gardens and clear tanks. The inhabitants were well-to-do, including some families of great wealth; they dressed in silk, and were skilled in learning and the arts.' When Mahmud of Ghazni appeared before Kanauj in A.D. 1018 the number of temples is said to have risen to 10,000. The Sultan destroyed the temples, but seems to have spared the city. Thereafter Kanauj declined in importance, though still the capital of a Rājpūt dynasty, and the final sack by Shihab-ud-Din in A.D. 1194 reduced it to desolation and insignificance for ever.2 " 1 The Kanaujia Brahmans include the principal body of the caste in Bengal and in the Hindi Districts of the Central Provinces. They are here divided into four subgroups, the Kanaujia proper, Sarwaria, Jijhotia and Sanadhya, which are separately noticed. The Sarwarias are sometimes considered to rank a little higher than the proper Kanaujias. It is said that the two classes are the 1 Early History of India, 3rd ed. p. 376. 2 Ibidem, p. 385. II KHEDĀ WĀL 391 descendants of two brothers, Kanya and Kubja, of whom the former accepted a present from the divine king Rāma of Ayodhya when he celebrated a sacrifice on his return from Ceylon, while the latter refused it. The Sarwarias are descended from Kubja who refused the present and therefore are purer than the Kanaujias, whose ancestor, Kanya, accepted it. Kanya and Kubja are simply the two parts of Kanyakubja, the old name for Kanauj. It may be noted that Kanya means a maiden and also the constellation Virgo, while Kubja is a name of the planet Mars; but it is not known whether the words in this sense are connected with the name of the city. The Kanaujia Brahmans of the Central Provinces practise hypergamy, as described in the general article on Brahman. Mr. Crooke states that in the United Provinces the children of a man's second wife can intermarry with those of his first wife, provided that they are not otherwise related or of the same section. The practice of exchanging girls between families is also permitted there.1 In the Central Provinces the Kanaujias eat meat and sometimes plough with their own hands. The Chhattisgarhi Kanaujias form a separate group, who have been long separated from their brethren elsewhere. As a consequence other Kanaujias will neither eat nor intermarry with them. Similarly in Saugor those who have come recently from the United Provinces will not marry with the older settlers. A Kanaujia Brahman is very strict in the matter of taking food, and will scarcely eat it unless cooked by his own relations, according to the saying, 'Ath Kanaujia, nau chulha,' or 'Eight Kanaujias will want nine places to cook their food.' Brahman, Khedāwāl.—The Khedāwāls are a class of Gujarati Brahmans, who take their name from Kheda or Kaira, the headquarters of the Kaira District, where they principally reside. They have two divisions, known as Inside and Outside. It is said that once the Kaira chief was anxious to have a son and offered them gifts. The majority refused the gifts, and leaving Kaira settled in villages outside the town; while a small number accepted the gifts and 1 Tribes and Castes, art. Kanaujia. |