MANUAL OF THE NILAGIRI DISTRICT. 255 



he permitted sundry of his disciples to preside. These were the CHAP. XI. 

 Saivas, Valshuavas, Sauras, Sdktas, Gdna-patyas, and Kapalikas or ^ 

 Yorjis^ HisTOKY. 



The Saiva form of Brahmanism dominated the south for about 

 four centuries^ when the great Vishnu revival was brought about 

 by the preaching of Eamanuja Acharya^ a native of Sripermatiir, 

 near Madras, educated at Conjeveram, but who established the 

 head-quarters of his sect at Srirangam, near Trichinopoly. As 

 already stated, this apostle reduced the Jains to insignificance. 

 In the Nilagiris the Sivaites now very greatly predominate 

 among the Badagas and in the neighbouring tracts of Mysore. 

 Taking Mysore as a whole, however, the sects are nearly equally 

 divided, there being 2,564,846 Sivaites against 2,242,532 

 Vishnuites. At the period of the revival of the worship of Vishnu, 

 the Preserver, arose the sect of Lingayats, the most revered sect 

 on these hills,^ and the sect peculiar to the Kanarese, just 

 as the sect of Siva belonged to the west and that of Vishnu to 

 the east coast. The Lingayat faith was a compromise between the 

 teaching of the Sivaites and the V ishnuites, and seems indicative 

 of the influence of the nations of the west - and east upon those of 

 the central plateau, just as English Protestantism was the 

 outcome of German, Lutheran, and French Calvinistic Propagan- 

 dism. The compromise was known under the appellation Hari- 

 hara, Hari, Vishnu, Hara, Siva, combined in one person. The 

 founder of this sect was Bassava, a Brahman^ native of Belgam. 

 The name signifies bull, and he was regarded as the incarnation of 

 Nandi, the bull of Siva. The mark of the sect was the Jangama 

 Lingam. Bassava summed up the first principles of religion as 

 the Guru, the Lingam, and the Jangam, i.e., the teacher, the 

 adorable emblem of divine power, and religious union. This faith 

 prevailed extensively in Karnata, and was the state religion of 

 the Wodeas of Mysore from the end of the fourteenth to the 

 beginning of the seventeenth century, when Raja Wodeyar 

 adopted the religion of Vishnu and persecuted the subordinate 

 Wodeas or heads of districts, one of whom fled to the Nilagiris. 

 This flight may account for the number of Wodea settlements on 

 ;he Hills — which is remarkable considering the social pre-eminence 

 :»f the class, it being that of the Mysore Rajas — and the number 

 :>f Lingayat inhabitants. There are, however, still 419,900 

 Lingayats in Mysore, one-third of whom are in the Mysore Division 

 contiguous to the Nilagiris. 



' There are 1,467 Lingayats in the district. 



- Only 1-5 per cent, of the inhabitants of Malabar are Vishnuites, 98o per 

 ent. being Sivaites. lu Coimbatore the proportions are— Vishnuites 228, Sivaites 

 6y, Lingayats -3. 



