Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 6.djvu/331

Rh Among other things, he mentions that Chēraman Perumāl, having come to the resolution of retiring to Mecca, went to Calicut. "He was there met by a Nāyar who was a gallant chief, but who, having been absent at the division, had obtained no share of his master's dominions. Chēraman Perumāl thereupon gave him his sword, and desired him to keep all that he could conquer. From this person's sisters are descended the Tamuri Rajahs or Zamorins." In the second extract, Buchanan sums up the result of enquiries that he had made concerning the Zamorin and his family. He states that the head of the family is the Tamuri Rajah, called by Europeans the Zamorin, and adds: "The Tamuri pretends to be of a higher rank than the Brāhmans, and to be inferior only to the invisible gods, a pretension that was acknowledged by his subjects, but which is held as absurd and abominable by the Brāhmans, by whom he is only treated as a Sūdra."

An important witness said that he knew the plaintiff, and that he was a Sūdra. He stated that he had lived for two years in the Zamorin's kōvilagom, and knew the customs of his family. According to him there was no difference between his own caste customs and those of the Zamorin. He said that Sāmantan means a petty chieftain, and drew attention to the 'Sukra Niti,' edited by Dr. Oppert, where a Sāmantan is said to be "he who gets annually a revenue of from one to three lakhs karshom from his subjects without oppressing them." There are, according to him, some Nāyars who call themselves Sāmantas, and he added that when, in 1887, the Collector of Malabar called for lists of all stanom-holders * in the district, he examined these lists, and found that some of the Nāyar chiefs called themselves Sāmantan.