1337.] 



Khoonds of Ike Gcomsoor Mountains. 



25 



twenty- 





codacauttoo 



hundred 





soyakah 



two hundred 





Reeso 



thousand 





Azarakah 



two thousand 





ree azarah 



small 





cogauiy 



The first word is Sanscrit, with a dialectic termination. It 

 means great chief, prince, or lord, from mahat great and prab'hu 

 a lord, &c. and is so used in, I believe, all the dialects of South- 

 ern India. The second word is Tamil simply for a woman or female, 

 in ordinary acceptation. The word for earth, is one designating place 

 or locality ; and, derived from Sanscrit (if not adopted by it), runs 

 through most of the Hindu languages, with dialectic variations. The 

 word for fire, corresponds nearly with the Tamil ^.q^t^} tanal, great 



heat. The word for tree at first embarrassed me ; but it is evidently 

 only a dialectic variation of the Tamil u^rr^ maram, a tree. The 



word for village is the Tamil nddu, properly country as dis- 



tinguished from town, sometimes denoting a district, and in use 

 nearly synonimous with village : the difference of du and zu, is merely 

 dialectic. The plural form kah, besides differing little from the Tamil 

 plural, kai, is further a close resemblance to the mode in which the 

 plural is enunciated in the extreme south. The word for house va- 

 ries very little from the Tamil ^C/ 5 ® vedu, denoting the same thing. 



The word for cow has in it the Sanscrit root go, or gau. The term for 

 goat is like the Telugu 1§ c&j venla, a sheep or goat : it must I 

 think be the same word. The word for birds, cutting off the plural 

 termination, is the Telugu "^|r° petiaa bird. The next word for 

 animal, is Sanscrit, Telugu, and Tamil, common I believe throughout 

 India. For fowl the word is the Tamil, Q sr rL& com', the Telugu 



letters expressing an imitation of the Tamil sound : the retaining this 

 Tamil peculiarity is favourable to an inference as to the Tamil origin of 

 the Khoonds. Mendah* for sheep is an intermediate sound between the 

 Telugu -gc&> venta, and the Tamil ^^^^ mantai, the former signi- 

 fying a sheep, the latter more properly a flock. The word for mountain, 

 is, setting aside the kah, apparently the Tamil «9^ ijDL | surumpu, or 



* The h in this, or in the other words is not in the Telugu characters hut yimply long « 

 as found in the word after. 



