168 
ON THE ORIGINAL INHABITANTS 
the ancestors of the Todas is called Koten,^" and the Huli- 
kaldrug is also named Kodatha-betta, after the god 
Kodatha.si 
The Todas have many customs which are also met with 
among other tribes, e.g., among the Kols. But this coin- 
cidence does not prove the existence of any relationship. The 
same rites and practices often prevail among totally different 
people who live at a great distance from one another. The 
singular custom by which the youngest son becomes heir to 
the property in opposition to the law of primogeniture is 
observed by the Todas in South India as well as by some 
Holstein peasants in North Germany. 
brown monkey kodan {turuni being the black monkej') is hardly a distiactive 
feature of any district on the hills. It is perhaps possible that the Todas 
changed the initial letter of their original name in order to avoid any 
allusion to that of the monkey. 
so About Koten read Breeks' Primitive Tribes of the Nilaffiru pp. 34, 36, 
37 97, 99. Koten is said to have brought the Kotas up to the hills, though 
they are also represented to have been born on the hills, p. 36 : " Koten -went 
to the Kundahs, and established a Tiriari and Pdlah, and placed the Kotas 
at the Kundah Kotagiri, called by the Todas Merkokal "... 3". " After this, 
Koten went to a Kurumba village in Bani Shima, and on his return, when 
bathing in a stream, a hair of a golden colour came to his hand ; he followed 
it up stream to find the owner of the hair, and saw a Swanii woman, by 
name Terkosh, whom he married. After this, Koten returned home to his 
mand near the Avalanche. Koten slept on a deer skin, wore a silver 
ring, and carried a spear, bow, and arrow. On the night of his return he 
went to sleep, and in the morning nothing was found of him but his 
spear and ring and some blood on the deer-skin. He and TSrkosh were 
transformed into two hills, . . on the Sisapara side of the hUls. to which both 
Kurumbas and Todas pay occasional ceremonial visits. The Kurumbas light 
a lamp on the hill Terkosh. ^^^len the Todas see these two hills, they sing 
the song about KotSn. (Thus five gods are connected in these traditions 
with different hills, viz. : — Dirkish, Kodatha, Pursh, Koten, and Terkosh. 
If the Todas originally deified evevj- hill, not an unnatural worship for 
mountaineers, the number of their gods, otherwise astonishing, is accounted 
for. The Todas, in common with the other hiU tribes, still offer ghee to be 
burnt to Maleswaramale)." 
About Kodatha read ibidriii, p. 35: " One day the Gods took counsel, 
saying ' why does the kite come here, let us drive him out '; so one of them, 
Kodatha, took the kite home to KodAtha-botta (Hulikaldiirg-a), and pushed 
him over ; the kite, in falling, caught hold of a bamboo, with which he 
returned, and struck Kodiitha's head, so that it split into thi-ce pieces." 
