1851.] 



The Migratory Races of India. 



5 



the Aravas know them as Coortee but their designation, among 

 themselves, is Coorroo the rr being pronounced by them with a 

 loud trilling sound. 



I believe them to be a branch of the Korawa people from the 

 similarity of their customs, and from their using similar articles of 

 diet, but the term korawa was quite new to this community who, 

 although familiar with the appellations of the Mahomedans and 

 Hindoos, told me that Coorroo was the only name they ever de- 

 signate themselves by. 



They mentioned, however, that their people are arranged into 

 three divisions — the Sati-Parm ; Ka-Warm, and Mianr-Gotum, 

 and that the families of these divisions all intermarry ; eat toge- 

 ther, and follow the same occupations. 



They live in huts constructed of mats, very neatly woven from 

 a long grass, named in telagoo " zamboo," which grows in the 

 beds of tanks, and which they spread over a bamboo frame work. 

 They are incessantly on the move, wandering about the country, 

 and they never reside inside of towns, but pitch their little camps 

 on open plains three or four miles from some inhabited place. 

 They rarely remain above two or three days in one spot and their 

 journeys are of considerable length as may be supposed when I 

 mention that one community that I fell in with encamped near 

 Bellary, had that day made a march of 30 miles from Sundoor*, 

 and, after halting two days, returned twelve miles back to Coort- 

 nee. 



The value of one of their huts would scarcely amount to half 

 a rupee (one shilling,) asses, goats and pigs constitute their 

 wealth ; the two last of these they use as food and sell for money 

 in towns. They, likewise, earn a little by selling grass mats, and 

 baskets made of canes and bamboos, the handy work of the men, 

 but which are sold by the women who load these articles on the 

 asses and thus drive them to the towns for sale. 



Each family in their communities, lives apart in its own hut, 

 constructed, as above mentioned, by the mats woven by them- 

 selves. 



