Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 4.djvu/43

Rh Kōttaipaththu.— A sub-division of Agamudaiyans,who believe that they are the same as the Kōttai (fort) Vellālas of Tinnevelly.  Kōttai Vellāla.— "The Kōttai Vellālas," Mr. J. A. Boyle writes,* have been "shut up within narrow walls, the others between two rivers. The result of insulation has been the same, and they have developed from small families into small, but perfectly distinct, castes. In the centre of the town of Srīvaiguntam, in the Tinnevelly district, is a small fort, composed of a mud enclosure, containing the houses of a number of families known as Kōttai (fort) Vellālas, who are separated from social intercourse and intermarriage with other families of the great Vellāla caste. The Traditional origin of this settlement is dated nearly a thousand years ago, when their ancestors were driven by a political revolution from their home in the valley of the Veigay (the river which flows past Madura). Under the Pāndya dynasty of Madura, these Vellālas were, they allege, the chamberlains or treasurers, to whom belonged the hereditary dignity of crowning the newly-succeeded kings. And this is still commemorated by an annual ceremony, performed in one of the Tinne-velly temples, whither the heads of families still repair, and crown the head of the swami (god). Their women never leave the precincts of the mud enclosure. After seven years of age, no girl is allowed to pass the gates, and the restriction is supported by the tradition of a disobedient little girl, who was murdered for a thoughtless breach of this law. Into the fort no male stranger may enter, though there is no hindrance to women of other castes to enter. After marriage, no woman of the caste may be seen by man's eyes, except those of her husband, father, 