Page:Castes and tribes of southern India, Volume 5.djvu/186

NAMBUTIRI BRAHMAN Malabar; the six Vaidikas or expounders of the caste canons, and the Smartas, who preside at the smartavichārams or socio-moral tribunals of Brāhmanical Malabar.

(4) Sāmānyas. — They form the Nambūtiri proletariat, from whom the study of the Vēdas is all that is expected. They take up the study of mantravāda (mystic enchantment), pūja (temple ritual), and reciting the sacred accounts of the Avatāra and astrology.

(5) Jātimatras. — The eight leading physician families of Malabar, or Ashta Vaidyas, are, by an inexcusable misuse of language, called Gatimatras or nominal Nambūtiris. The class of Nambūtiris called Yatrakalikkar (a corruption of Sastrakalikkar) also comes under this head. They are believed to be the Brāhmans, who accepted the profession of arms from their great founder. Those that actually received the territory from the hands of Parasu Rāma, called Grāmani Nambūtiris or Gramani Ādhyas, are also Gatimatras. They were the virtual sovereigns of their respective lands. The physicians, the soldiers, and the landed kings, having other duties to perform, were not able to devote all their time to Vēdic recitations. The mutalmūra or first study was, of course, gone through. In course of time, this fact was unfortunately taken by the religious conscience of the people to lower the Brāhmans who were deputed under the scheme of Parasu Rāma for special functions in the service of the nation in the scale of Nambūtiri society, and to mean a formal prohibition as of men unworthy to be engaged in Vēdic study.

Papagrastas are Nambūtiris, who are supposed to have questioned the divine nature of Parasu Rāma. The Urilparisha Mussus, who too are Brāhmans who received gifts of land from Parasu Rāma, the Nambitis,