PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 72 1 



and kistvaens. The pottery also seems to belong to different periods, the larger 

 jars being of a later date than the true funereal urns which are found at a lower 

 level, and contain a few cremated bones, gold ornaments, bronze and iron rings, 

 with beads of glass or agate. These people clearly regarded bronze as an article 

 of luxury, as it appears in the form of ornaments or in the series of splendid 

 vases preserved in the Madras Museum. It is difficult to suppose that these were 

 of local origin; more probably they were imported in the course of trade along 

 the western coast or from more distant regions. 



Another and equally remarkable phase of culture, combining distinctly savage 

 features with a fairly advanced civilisation, is illustrated by the Adittanalur 

 cemetery in the Tinnevelli district recently excavated by Mr. Rea. Two skulls 

 discovered here are prognathous, suggesting a mixture of the Negrito and Dra- 

 vidian types. There is no trace of cremation, and in most cases the smallness of 

 the urn openings implies that the corpses were exposed to birds of prey, and that 

 only such bones as could be discovered after removal of the flesh were collected 

 for interment'; or, according to another interpretation of the facts, we have 

 an instance of the custom of mourners carrying with them, like the modern 

 Andamanese, the relics of the dead. These interments certainly extended over 

 a king period, neolithic weapons being found in some graves, while in others 

 iron arms were discovered fixed point downwards near the urns, as if they had 

 been thrust into the ground by the mourners. In the richer graves gold frontlets, 

 like those of Mycenae and other Greek interments, were fastened over the fore- 

 head of the corpse. These were, like the Greek specimens, of such a flimsy type 

 that they could never have been used in real life. It is a remarkable instance 

 of a survival in custom that at the present day some tribes in this region tie a 

 triangular strip of gold on the forehead of the dead, the import of which, on the 

 analogy of the death masks of Siam, Cambodia, ancient Mexico, and Alaska, we 

 may interpret as an attempt to guard the corpse from the glances of evil spirits 

 while the spirit is on its way to deathland, or to be used in processions of the 

 corpse. 



The question remains : To what races may we attribute these successive 

 phases of culture in southern India? The Tamil literature, as interpreted by 

 Bishop Caldwell and Mr. V. Kanakasabhai, shows the existence of an advanced 

 type of archaic culture in this region ; but the evidence to connect this with the 

 existing remains is as yet wanting. We may reasonably assume that neolithic 

 man survives in the existing population, because we have no evidence of sub- 

 sequent extensive migrations, except the much later arrival of Indo-Aryan 

 colonies from the north, and that of the Todas, whom Dr. Rivers satisfactorily 

 identifies with the Nayars and Nambutiri Brahmans of Malabar. The occurrence 

 of a short-headed strain among some tribes in western India probably represents 

 some prehistoric migration by sea or along the coast line from the direction of 

 Baluchistan or the Persian Gulf. The suggestion that it is the result of a 

 Scythian or Hun retreat from northern India in the face of an advancing Aryan 

 movement is not corroborated by any historical evidence, and is in itself improb- 

 able. The customs of dolmen and kistvaen burial still persist among some of 

 the present tribes, and they display some reverence for the burial-places of their 

 forgotten predecessors. This feeling may, however, be due to the habitual 

 tendency of the Hindu to perform rites of propitiation at places supposed to be 

 the haunts of spirits, and need not necessarily connote racial identity. 



The most primitive type identifiable in the population of south India is the 

 Negrito, which appears among the Veddas of Ceylon, and among the Andaman- 

 ese, who retain the Negrito skin colour and hair, but have acquired, probably 

 from some Mongoloid stock, distinct facial characters. It has been the habit 

 with some writers to exaggerate the Negrito strain in the south. But tribes like 

 the Badagas and Kotas, which have been classed as representative of this type, 

 possess none of the Negrito characters, which appear only among the more 

 primitive Kurumbas, Malayans, Paniyans, and Irulas. In all the modern tribes 

 the distinctive Negrito marks — woolliness of hair, prognathism, lowness of stature, 

 and excessive length of arm — have become modified by miscegenation or the 

 influences of environment. 



The resemblances in culture of the Indian Negrito with the cognate races to 

 the east and south-east of the Peninsula are too striking to be accidental. The 



