OF BHARATAVARSA OR INDIA. 
205 
So far as the Kurumbas of Kurg are concerned, we are 
mainly indebted to the Eev. Gr. Eicbter wbo wrote an Ethno- 
forward as an objection, as most of these cairns and cromlechs are huUt of 
huge stones, such as it is believed the Kurumha tribe could not move in the 
absence of suitable appliances. . . Some of the Todas do attribute the cairns 
and cromlechs to the Kurumbas." 
Consiilt further the late Mr. James Wilkinson Breaks' Account of the 
Primitive Tribes and Monuments of the Nilacjiris, pp. 48-66 : " In the Tabu- 
lated Census Eetums they are entered under the foUowing castes or divi- 
sions : — Eda Kurumban, Karmadiya Kurumban, Kurumban, KurumbanOkki- 
liyan, Male Kurumban, Pal Kurumban. . They generally, however, say they 
have no caste, but are divided into bigas or families, which do not intermarry. 
It is difficult to get a complete account of the tribal divisions recognised by 
them. One man wiU name you one (his own) ; another two divisions ; 
another three, and so on. The headman of the village enumerated four ; — 
1. Betta Kurumbas who live on the slopes, and near the Mysore ditch. 
2. Kambale Kurumbas, who make blankets (cambly), and live in the low 
country, in the Konguru (Coimbatore). 3. Mullu Kurumbas (he did not know 
where they lived). 4. A-tida Kurumbas, who, like himself, live on the eastern 
slopes. Pal Kurumbas are also vaguely mentioned sometimes. » Some Kurum- 
bas whom I have met wilh, profess, in answer to inquiries, to worship Siva, 
and occasionally women mark their forehead with the Saiva spot. Others:, 
living near Barliar, worship Kuribattraya (lord of many sheep), and the wife 
of Siva under the name of Musni. They worship also a rough roimd stone 
under the name of Hiriadgva, setting it up either in a cave or in a circle of 
stones like the so-caUed ' Kurumba Kovil ' of the Badagas, which the latter 
seem to have borrowed from the Kurumbas. . They do not consider the stone 
as a lingam, although they profess to be Saivites. . Each Badaga Grama, 
with its group of villages, keeps a Kurxmiba priest called Kdni Kurumba. . The- 
office is hereditary. In April and May, before sowing time, a goat or young 
male buffalo is supplied by the cultivators, and the Kani Kurumba is sum- 
moned to make the sacrifice. Surrounded by the villagers, the officiating: 
priest cuts off the head of the animal, and sprinkles the blood in three direc- 
tions, east, west, and south, and also on a water- worn stone, which is con- 
sidered as a " hutu (natural) lingam.''' No words are spoken, but after 
the sprinkling, the Km'umba clasps his hands behind his head, shouting Do^ 
Do, Bo, three times and bows the head to ' Mother Earth.' The priest gets- 
the head, and the Badagas the body, of the goat, which is taken home and 
eaten. In the Jakaneri Grama this ceremony is performed at the cromlech 
in Tenad, at a rude circle of stone surrounding a water-worn stone for a. 
lingam. They call the place the ' Kurumba Kovil ' (Kurumba Church)... The 
Kurumbas near Kangaswami's Peak told me that some Kurumbas buried, 
their dead, but that they themselves burned theirs, and that the nearest rela- 
tives next day took some boiled rice in a cloth and a small round stone, and 
perhaps a bone from the funeral pile, and deposited them for the dead in the 
Sdvumane (death-house) belonging to the Motta. At Barliar they do the same.. 
These Sdvumanes are small cromlechs of three upright stones and a covering 
slab ; they said they did not now make them, but that they used those made 
ty their forefathers. . They knew of no god peculiar to the Kurumbas, nor 
2t 
