Page:Castes and tribes of southern India, Volume 5.djvu/195

Rh him, he was told that the contact of a Brāhman's nates with the floor was harmful to the house. Hanging cots, attached to the ceiling by chains of iron, are common things in a Nambūtiri's house, especially in the bed-rooms. Skins of spotted deer, used to sit on during prayers, also form part of the Nambūtiri's furniture."

The Nambūtiris follow the makkatāyam law of inheritance from father to son; not, however, precisely as do the other people who do so. Nor is their system of inheritance the same as that of Brāhmans to the eastward (i.e., of Southern India generally), with whom the family property may be divided up amongst the male members at the instance of any one of them. The Nambūtiri household is described by Mr. Subramani Aiyar as representing a condition intermediate between the impartible matriarchal form of the Nāyars and the divided patriarchal form of the other coast. Among the Nambūtiris, the eldest male member of the family is the Kāranavan or manager of it, and has complete control over all the property. The younger members of the family are entitled to nothing but maintenance. The head of the family may be a female, provided there is none of the other sex. The eldest son alone marries. The accepted practice, as well as the recognised principle among the Nambūtiris, seems to be in consonance with the directions expounded by Manu, viz. —

Immediately on the birth of his first-born, a man is the father of a son, and is free from the debt to the manes. That son is, therefore, worthy to receive the whole estate.

That son alone, on whom he throws his debt, is begotten for (the fulfilment of) the law. All the rest they consider the offspring of desire.