Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 4.djvu/254

LAMBADI unmarried woman, fasten a bunch of tassels to her back hair, and girdle her with a tasselled waistband, from which is suspended a little bag, into which the bridegroom puts five rupees. These last two are donned thereafter on great occasions, but are not worn everyday. The next day the girl is taken home by her new husband." It is noted in the Mysore Census Report, 1891, that "one unique custom, distinguishing the Lambāni marriage ceremonial, is that the officiating Brāhman priest is the only individual of the masculine persuasion who is permitted to be present. Immediately after the betrothal, the females surround and pinch the priest on all sides, repeating all the time songs in their mixed Kutni dialect. The vicarious punishment to which the solitary male Brāhman is thus subjected is said to be apt retribution for the cruel conduct, according to a mythological legend, of a Brāhman parent who heartlessly abandoned his two daughters in the jungle, as they had attained puberty before marriage. The pinching episode is notoriously a painful reality. It is said, however, that the Brāhman, willingly undergoes the operation in consideration of the fees paid for the rite." The treatment of the Brāhman as acted before me by Lambādi women at Nandyāl, included an attempt to strip him stark naked. In the Census Report, it is stated that, at Lambādi weddings, the women "weep and cry aloud, and the bride and bridegroom pour milk into an ant-hill, and offer the snake which lives therein cocoanuts, flowers, and so on. Brāhmans are sometimes engaged to celebrate weddings, and, failing a Brāhman, a youth of the tribe will put on the thread, and perform the ceremony." The following variant of the marriage ceremonies was acted before me at Kadūr in Mysore. A pandal