158 The " Koh" of Chota-Nagpore. 



this Journal* a brief notice of a tribe called " Coour Gooand," and 

 a vocabulary which proves them to be not Gooand at all, but 

 another branch of the great family we are describing, occupying the 

 Gavilghur range of hills near Ellichpore. Dr. Latham mentions 

 in connection with them another tribe which he calls Chunah, but I 

 have no further information about them. If the investigation is 

 carried out, we shall, no doubt, find connecting links in the intervening 

 ranges of hills. 



Thus we have in the Coours of Ellichpoor, the Korewahs of 

 Sirgoojah and Juspore, the Moondahs and the Kheriahs of Chota- 

 Nagpore, the Hos of Singbhoom, the Bhoomij of Manbhoom and 

 Dnulbhoom, and the Sonthals of Manbhoom, Singbhoom, Cuttack, 

 tributary mehals, Hazareebagh and the Sonthal Pergunnahs (the author 

 of the introduction to the Sonthal lauguage, the Rev. J. Phillips, 

 adds " Nakales and Kodas," I do not know where they are to be 

 found,) a kindred people sufficiently numerous, if united, to form 

 a nation of several millions of souls. They were, in all probability, 

 one of the tribes that were most persistent in their hostility to 

 the Arian invaders, and thus earned for themselves tfie epithets of 

 " worshippers of mad gods," " haters of Bramins," " ferocious 

 lookers," "inhuman," "flesh-eaters," " devourers of life," "possessed 

 of magical powers," " changing their shape at will."f To this day, 

 the Arians settled in Chota-Nagpore and Singbhoom firmly believe 

 that the Moondahs have powers as wizards and witches, and can 

 transform themselves into tigers and other beasts of prey, with the 

 view of devouring their enemies, and that they can witch away the 

 lives of man and beast. It is to the wildest and most savage of the 

 tribe that such powers are generally ascribed ; and amongst the Kols 

 themselves the belief in the magic powers of their brethren is so 

 strong, that I have heard converts to Christianity assert they were 

 first induced to turn to our religion, because sorcery had apparently 

 no power over those who were baptized ! The upper classes of the 

 Moondahs, those who aspire to be Zemindars, have assumed the 

 " poita" and taken to Bramins and Kali, but the mass of the people 

 adore their " mad gods" still, after their own primitive fashion. The 

 great propitiatory sacrifices to the local deities or devils are carousals 



* As. Soc. Journal, Vol. XIII, p. 19. f See Muir's Sanscrit texts.. 



