Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 6.djvu/25

Rh have taken to calling themselves Vannikula Kshatriyas or Agnikula Kshatriyas, and others even declare that they are Brāhmans. These last always wear the sacred thread, tie their cloths in the Brāhman fashion (though their women do not follow the Brāhman ladies in this matter), forbid widow remarriage, and are vegetarians."

Some Palli Poligars have very high-sounding names, such as Agni Kudirai Eriya Rāya Rāvutha Minda Nainar, i.e., Nainar who conquered Rāya Rāvutha and mounted a fire horse. This name is said to commemorate a contest between a Palli and a Rāvutha, at which the former sat on a red-hot metal horse. Further names are Sāmidurai Surappa Sozhaganar and Anjāda Singam (fearless lion). Some Pallis have adopted Gupta as a title.

A few Palli families now maintain a temple of their own, dedicated to Srīnivāsa, at the village of Kumalam in the South Arcot district, live round the temple, and are largely dependent on it for their livelihood. Most of them dress exactly like the temple Battars, and a stranger would certainly take them for Battar Brāhmans. Some of them are well versed in the temple ritual, and their youths are being taught the Sandyavandhana (morning prayer) and Vēdas by a Brāhman priest. Ordinary Palli girls are taken by them in marriage, but their own girls are not allowed to marry ordinary Pallis; and, as a result of this practice of hypergamy, the Kumalam men sometimes have to take to themselves more than one wife, in order that their young women may be provided with husbands. These Kumalam Pallis are regarded as priests of the Pallis, and style themselves Kovilar, or temple people. But, by other castes, they are nicknamed Kumalam Brāhmans. They claim to be Kshatriyas, and have adopted the title Rāyar.