Tlie " Kols' of Chota-Nagpore. 171 



• 



generally dark and ill- favoured. They have wide mouths, thick lips 

 and projecting maxillary processes, nostrils wide apart, and no elevation 

 of nose to speak of, and low though not in general very receding 

 foreheads. I have seen amongst them heads that in the woolly crispness 

 of the hair completed the similitude of the Oraons to the Negro. It 

 may he said that the class I am describing have degenerated in feature 

 from living a wilder and more savage life than others of their clan ; 

 but I do not find this degeneracy of feature amongst the Jushpore 

 Korewahs, who are to the Moondahs of Chota-Nagpore what the 

 Jushpore Oraons are to the Oraons of the same district.* I found the 

 Korewahs mostly short of stature, but with well knit muscular frames, 

 complexion brown not black, sharp bright deep set eyes, noses not de- 

 ficient in prominency, somewhat high check bones, but without notable 

 maxillary protuberances. In the more civilized parts of the province, 

 both Oraons and Moondahs improve in appearance. The former indeed 

 still retain their somewhat diminutive appearance, but in complexion 

 they arc fairer, in features softer, some even good looking, and the 

 youthful amongst them all pleasing from their usual happy contented 

 expression and imperturbable good humour. 



Driven from the Rhotas hills, the Oraons, according to their own 

 tradition, separated into two great divisions. One of these, moving 

 east, found a final resting-place in the Rajmahal hills ; the other, going 

 south, sought refuge in the Palamow hills, and wandered from valley 

 to valley in those ranges, till they found themselves in Burway, a hill- 

 locked estate in Chota-Nagpore proper. From thence they occupied 

 the highlands of Jushpore and formed the settlements in the vicinity 

 of Lohardugga, on the Chota-Nagpore plateau, where they still 

 constitute the bulk of the population. The Satyomba Moondahs had 

 not effected settlements so far to the west. 



The identity of the language spoken by the Rajmahal hill people 

 (not the Sonthals) and that of the Oraons is full and sufficient 

 confirmation of the tradition of their common origin, and of the 

 division of the tribe spoken of above ; but a comparison of the customs 

 of the Rajmahal hill people, who being isolated must have retained 

 those they brought with them to tire hills, with the customs of the 

 Oraons, demonstrates that the latter are derived from the Moondahs. 

 * Asiatic Society's Journal, Vol. XXXIV. p. 15. 



