Vol. ee No. 7.] The Stambhesvari. 445 
[N.S.] 
in the asppibtighitben of the Trikalinga Guptas. In one charter 
of Mahabhava Gupta Deva it has been mentioned that a 
Brahman family which came from Odayasrnga (Odsinga) was 
granted a village in the Patna State (B.L., viii, pp. 138-43). 
I have also been informed that some Dumils say that 
they came originally from Khemri or Khemidi in Ganjam. 
My informer Pandit Kasinitha Dani gave me a couplet in 
Oriya, which, he says, the Dumils gave him in narrating their 
history. I have not yet been able to get the a 
oe verified “8 any Dumal. The couplet spoken of is 
follows 
Khemandi rajya nija sthana 
Deda laksha Dumba kala bniyana. 
The meaning is—Khemidi was the original home which 
created or gave rise to the Dumbas or Dumils to the extent of 
one lakh-and-a-half in number. If this is a genuine tradition 
amongst the Dumals, I am inclined to believe that it was Raj 
Sing’s wife of Kimidi Raj family who introduced the goddess 
in the State of Sonpur. 
The Dumals os up their Goddess KhambeSvari by putting 
two posts of black wood in the earth. The Dumals never wear 
any cloth or ornament which is black in colour. They always 
wear dhutis and saris having red border, and it is only red lac 
churis which they wear It is also to be noted that their 
Oriya villages the walls of the houses are painted dark with 
sticky ash-coloured earth; but the Dumals invariably paint 
their house walls with brown-coloured geri mati. They say 
that as their Goddess Khambesvari is black, they do not wear 
anything which is black in colour. 
The Dumal women do not wear any ornament about their 
feet or ankles, as usually women of other castes do. They 
only bore their left nostril to wear a nosering, and perforate the 
lobes of the ear for similar purpose. But they religiously 
obtained for tracing the origin either of the Dumals or of their 
customs. 
The Dumils worship their tribal Goddess Khambeésvari in 
the month of Asvin when the Durga Pija is celebrated by the 
Hindus. In the month of Asvin they worship Khambe§vari 
under the spreading branches of a mahua (bassia latifolia) tree. 
his or her seat under the shade of a tree, is called dimli in the 
Sambalpur tract. May it not be the case that the name Dumal 
has its origin in dimli owing to the fact that these people 
worship a dimli goddess ? 
