﻿( 451 ) 

 XIX. 



An Account of the Bazeegurs, a sect cem- 

 monly denominated Nltts *. 



BY CAPTAIN DAVID RICHARDSON". 



A PERUSAL of Grellman's dissertation on the 

 Gipsies of Europe, in which this Country is consi- 

 dered as having given hirth to that wandering race, 

 induced me to commence an inquiry into the man- 

 ners of a people in Hiiidoostan denominated Nuts, 

 whose mode of hfe seemed somewhat to assimilate 

 with his description. It is my intention, should this, 

 my first endeavour, meet with approbation, to pursue 

 this line of investigation still farther, and from time 

 to time I may be enabled to bring forwards short 

 sketches of the tribes within the Company's pro- 

 vinces, who, being in other respects too insignificant 

 for the pages of the historian, may have hitherto 

 been^passed over unnoticed, although many of their 

 usages and ceremonies may still merit a detail, as de- 

 tached facts in the general history of mankind. Strict- 

 ly speaking, these people might be denominated players 

 or acto7^s, from their Persian name of Bazee-gar, 

 which may be literally rendered di juggler or tricker ; 

 but the appellation o^ Nut extends to several tribes, 

 and properly belongs to many more; each party 

 having blanched out and formed itself into a distinct 

 sect, agreeably to the habits of life or modes of sub- 

 sistence whi(.h necessity and local circumstances may 

 have induced them to adopt, as their own peculiar 

 calling or art. 



The Bazeegurs are subdivided into seven casts, viz. 

 the Charee^ Atji bjiyeefl, Bynsa^ Furhuttee^ Kal- 



G G 5* ' koor 



* For the following and other explanatory notes, 'I am indebted to 

 the kindness of a friend. 



