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The Social Structure of a Tanjore Village Kathleen Gough This is the seventh of a series of village studies published in the earlier issues of The Economic Weekly. WO types of village structure serve the village temple. families, by contrast again, appear T appear to be present in Tan­ Kumbapettai is a fairly typical to demand rather more paddy and jore district. The most prevalent " Brahman village ". One-and-a- less cash; the average income of an is the mirasi village, where the land half miles square, with a popula­ Adi Dravida household may be is owned in small amounts by a tion of about 1200, it lies on a bus estimated very roughly at a value number of separate patrilineal route eight miles from a town. of between Rs 40 and Rs 80 per joint-families. This type appa­ Behind each house in the streets is month. Most Konar families keep rently dates in its essential features a small garden of coconuts and one or two cows, and in addition from the period of the Tamil Chola vegetables, while round the whole milk the cows and do garden work kings, whose power declined with village, for about half a mile, for Brahmans. Their service was the Muslim invasions of the early stretch its double-crop paddy fields, formerly hereditary: the same fami­ fourteenth century, and ended with watered by the intricate system of lies served Brahman families for the invasion from Vijayanagar in irrigation channels from the Kaveri generations and could not change 1534. The other type, the in am and its tributaries. their allegiance without consent village, dates from the Mahratta just off the main road, in the from their original masters. Today, conquest (1674-1799) when the northeast of the village, lies the individual Konar men, like Adi alien Mahratta kings made grants Brahman street of forty-six houses, Dravidas, sometimes become " at­ of whole villages to individual ten of which are now empty, their tached " for a period to a parti­ families of Tamil Brahmans and owners having moved to the towns. cular Brahman landlord through immigrant Mahrattas and to reli­ The tiled-roofed houses adjoin, indebtedness; they borrow money gious institutions. Here, I attempt and the two long rows face each from the landlord and must then to outline the social organization of other across the narrow road. work only for him until the debt a mirasi village in the northwest of Behind the houses, on each side of is repaid. In the old type of ser­ the district, and to indicate what the street, the gardens lead down vice, in which families of Konar seem, after four months of observa­ to irrigation channels bordering the and Adi Dravidas worked by here­ tion, to be the most important paddy fields. Two temples stand ditary right for Brahman families, trends of change. near the agraharam: that to Siva, the servants were called adirnai Tanjore village people divide the in the northeast, and that to (serfs). This word is now seldom many castes of Hindus into three Vishnu, in the west. Nearby are a heard, A few people, both Konar sub-divisions: —Brahman, non-Brah­ bathing tank, a shrine to Ganapathi and Adi Dravida, do however still man and Adi Dravida ("original near which the Brahmans recite work from choice for their tradi­ Dravidians ", sometimes called Hari- daily jabams after performing their tional masters, who distinguish be­ jans, most of whom were once ablutions, and a second shrine tween hereditary servants and hired serfs of the soil). The structure of built over the tomb of a Brahman labourers, and feel greater respons­ a mirasi village varies according to sanyasi of the village. The Brah­ ibility for the former, giving them whether it is a " Brahman" or a mans, with their gardens, temples, gifts at marriages and sending food " non-Brahman village". In the bathing pool and caste-shrines, during sickness. Hereditary ser­ " Brahman village ", the land is thus occupy the northwest corner vants are paid at least partly in owned by the several families of a of the village. A single non-Brah­ paddy, which they prefer. An Brahman street {agraharam). Some man house of Kutthadis, a caste ordinary hired labourer may be of this land is leased in small whose men formerly performed paid daily in the same way, or amounts on an annual tenure to religious puppet plays and whose monthly in cash: he is called a landless families of one or more women are dancing girls,, stands pannaiyal (workman). non-Brahrnan streets, usually of the alone on the northwest boundary of Konar are also tenants to Brah­ " lower" non-Brahman castes of the village. man landlords, usually to the men Ahambadiyas, Padayacchis, Konar, Southwards, across garden and whom they serve. The tenure is Muppanar or Vanniyar. Other paddy land, lie twenty houses, in called kuthakau An annual rent land, retained by the landlords two streets, of the non-Brahman in paddy is fixed according to the (who are called mirasdars), is culti­ Konar caste. The Konar are cow­ fertility of the soil, and paid in two vated directly by labourers from an herds by tradition. Their houses instalments, after the two harvests Adi Dravida street situated at some are smaller than the Brahman in February and October. In a distance from the rest of the village. houses, thatched, and set slightly bumper year, the tenant may retain In the " non-Brahman village", apart in their gardens. Today, one-third or even half the crop the land is owned by joint-families the income (derived from all sour­ after his rent is paid; in a bad of a street of non-Brahmans, ces) of Brahman families living year (like the present one) he may usually of one of the " higher " entirely in the village, varies from lose all or retain just enough for non-Brahman castes of Vellalar or about Rs 80 to about Rs 900 a the next year's seed and cultivation Kallar. Some land may be then month. The average Konar house­ expenses. The landlord may theo­ leased to other, "lower caste" hold, by contrast, appears to earn retically demand the whole rent in non-Brahmam, or more frequently one kalam of paddy per adult per paddy or its equivalent in cash at cultivated directly with the aid of month, plus Rs 20 to Rs 60 in the controlled price, whatever the Adi Dravida servants' In these cash' thus bringing the value of the harvest, and a very few do so. villages there is usually only a single total income to between Rs 50 and Most know their tenants' circum­ Brahman family, of priests who Rs 100 per month. Adi Dravida stances and give small concessions 531 May 24, 1952 THE ECONOMIC WEEKLY in a bad harvest. Always, how­ Finally, half a mile south across Only they may worship her, and ever, the power of eviction puts the paddy fields, lies a large Adi Dra­ she has a separate priest and tenant at his landlord's mercy. A vida , street of about eighty houses. annual festival. few fields in Kumbapettai are given These are the Pallas, a caste of Other ritual symbols and institu­ on varam tenure. The tenant takes adimai (serfs) who were formerly tions emphasize the unity of the a fixed fraction of the crop, usually " owned " by the landlords. Today, caste. Brahmans possess a single one-fifth, and surrenders the rest to they too lease kuthakai lands and cremation ground; Konar now share the owner. Though unprofitable, work in the paddy fields for a theirs with the other incoming non- the tenure is a more certain one daily wage, in some cases for their Brahman castes; and both Pallas for the tenant in a bad year, and traditional masters. Unlike the and Parayas have their separate with the recent succession of poor Konar, they were traditionally burial grounds. Bathing pools, harvests some tenants have come to prohibited from entering the Brah­ again, are distributed between the prefer it. man street, and none do so today. three major groups of castes. Also in the Konar streets live the Conversely, Brahmans may not Births, marriages, deaths, and propi­ village servant castes: one family enter the Adi Dravida street; to do tiations of ancestral spirits, asso­ each of barbers, washermen, car­ so would, it is believed, bring mis­ ciated as they are with the inti­ penters and blacksmiths, and three fortune on its inhabitants, Also in macy of family life, are intra-caste of potters. These all intermarry the south is a small street of Para- events. This is of course in har­ and interdine only in their own yas, the " lowest " Adi Dravida mony with caste endogamy and castes, and so have links with other caste whose traditional work is to with the fact that (with the excep­ villages. Formerly, all landlords remove and sell the carcases of tion of the servant castes who and tenants paid them twice dead animals and to watch over marry between villages) each caste annually in paddy: today, they are the cremation grounds at night. street formed until recently a group often paid in cash after each job Parayas, like Pallas, work for day of intermarrying kin. In the Brah­ of work. wages in the fields, though, unlike man street, caste unity is even more These non-Brahman streets are Pallas, they are not " attached " to apparent than among non-Brah­ traditional in the village, but two particular families of Brahmans. mans. Houses adjoin, and there other streets of non-Brahmans have Having outlined the caste groups, are even holes in the dividing grown up in the past fifty years.

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