Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India.djvu/493

Rh marriage badge, for example, is the Tamil tāli and not the bottu. Intermarriages between Smarthas and Mādhvas of the same section are common. Mādhvas, excepting the very orthodox, will take food with both Carnātaka and Āndhra Smarthas.

The Mārakas are thus described by Mr. Lewis Rice.* " A caste claiming to be Brāhmans, but not recognised as such. They worship the Hindu triad, but are chiefly Vishnuvites, and wear the trident mark on their foreheads. They call themselves Hale Kannadiga or Hale Karnātaka, the name Marka † being considered as one of reproach, on which account also many have doubtless returned themselves as Brāhmans of one or other sect. They are said to be descendants of some disciples of Sankarāchārya, the original guru of Sringēri, and the following legend is related of the cause of their expulsion from the Brāhman caste to which their ancestors belonged. One day Sankarāchārya, wishing to test his disciples, drank some toddy in their presence, and the latter, thinking it could be no sin to follow their master's example, indulged freely in the same beverage. Soon after, when passing a butcher's shop, Sankarāchārya asked for alms; the butcher had nothing but meat to give, which the guru and his disciples ate. According to the Hindu shāstras, red-hot iron alone can purify a person who has eaten flesh and drunk toddy. Sankarāchārya went to a blacksmith's furnace, and begged from him some red-hot iron, which he swallowed and was purified. The disciples were unable to imitate their master in the matter of