Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 7.djvu/225

Rh on the bride's neck inside her hut, in front of which kumbu grain is scattered. Betel and a fanam (coin) are placed in the bride's lap. On the third day the bridegroom is dressed up, and, mounting a horse, goes, accompanied by the marriage pots, three times round the huts. He then enters the bride's hut, and she is carried in the arms of the cousins of the bridegroom thrice round the huts. The contracting couple then sit on planks, and the cousins, by order of the Mettu Nāyakan, link their little fingers together. They then enter the bridegroom's hut, and a mock ploughing ceremony is performed. Coming out from the hut, they take up a child, and carry it three times round the huts. This is, it is said, done because, in former days, the Tottiyan bride and bridegroom had to remain in the marriage huts till a child was born, because the Mettu Nāyakan was so busy that he had no time to complete the marriage ceremony until nearly a year had elapsed. At a wedding among the nomad Tottiyans, a fowl is killed near the marriage (aravēni) pots, and with its blood a mark is made on the foreheads of the bride and bridegroom on their entry into the booths. The Vekkiliyans sacrifice a goat or sheep instead of a fowl, and the more advanced among them substitute the breaking of a cocoanut for the animal sacrifice.

In connection with marriage, Mr. Hemingway writes that "the Tottiyans very commonly marry a young boy to a grown woman, and, as among the Konga Vellālas, the boy's father takes the duties of a husband upon himself until the boy is grown up. Married women are allowed to bestow their favours upon their husbands' relations, and it is said to be an understood thing that a man should not enter his dwelling, if he sees another's slippers placed outside as a sign that the owner of them