10] 
as is still the usual habit of country people of this class 
in Bengal. 
(g) THE CASTES AND TRIBES WHO USE CHANK BANGLES. 
(1) In Northern India. 
(2) In the Madras Presidency. 
In Northern India.—- Although evidence is strong 
in eae of the belief that the custom of wearing chank 
bracelets was in old times prevalent throughout the 
length and breadth of India, more especially in the 
Tamil country, in the Deccan, in Kathiawar, Gujarat, 
and Bengal, at the present day only in Bengal, the 
adjacent hill regions to the west, north, and east and in 
a few Tamil-speaking districts in the extreme south 
of India, does the custom continue to be widely observed 
and of notable social importance. 
In Bengal and wherever in the adjoining Provinces 
of Assam, behar and Orissa there are colonies of the 
Bengali race, every married woman of all castes which 
are thoroughly Hinduised is bound to possess a pair of 
chank bangles lacquered in vermilion as one of the 
visible tokens of her married state; the red sankha or 
TEXT-FIGURE I. 
EDGE AND SIDE VIEWS OF A BENGAL MARRIAGE BANGLE TO SHQW 
THE ORNAMENTATION IN YELLOW UPON A RED LACQUERED 
GROUND. FRoM PABN&’, BENGAL. X 2. 
