Castes and Tribes of Southern India/Shānān

by Edgar Thurston

Shānān.— The great toddy-drawing caste of the Tamil country, which, a few years ago, came into special prominence owing to the Tinnevelly riots in 1899."These were," the Inspector-General of Police writes,*^[1] "due to the pretensions of the Shānāns to a much higher position in the religio-social scale than the other castes are willing to allow. Among other things, they claimed admission to Hindu temples, and the manager of the Visvanathēswara temple at Sivakāsi decided to close it. This partial victory of the Shānāns was keenly resented by their opponents, of whom the most active were the Maravans. Organised attacks were made on a number of the Shānān villages; the inhabitants were assailed; houses were burnt; and property was looted. The most serious occurrence was the attack on Sivakāsi by a body of over five thousand Maravans. Twenty three murders, 102 dacoities, and many cases of arson were registered in connection with the riots in Sivakāsi, Chinniapuram, and other places. Of 1,958 persons arrested, 552 were convicted, 7 being sentenced to death. One of the ring-leaders hurried by train to distant Madras, and made a clever attempt to prove an alibi by signing his name in the Museum visitor's book. During the disturbance some of the Shānāns are said to have gone into the Muhammadan fold. The men shaved their heads, and grew beards; and the women had to make sundry changes in their dress. And, in the case of boys, the operation of circumcision was performed."

The immediate bone of contention at the time of the Tinnevelly riots was, the Census Superintendent, 1901, writes, "the claim of the Shānāns to enter the Hindu temples, in spite of the rules in the Agama Shāstras that toddy-drawers are not to be allowed into them; but the pretensions of the community date back from 1858, when a riot occurred in Travancore, because female Christian converts belonging to it gave up the caste practice of going about without an upper cloth." On this point Mr. G. T. Mackenzie informs us *^[2] that "in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, the female converts to Christianity in the extreme south ventured, contrary to the old rules for the lower castes, to clothe themselves above the waist. This innovation was made the occasion for threats, violence, and series of disturbances. Similar disturbances arose from the same cause nearly thirty years later, and, in 1859, Sir Charles Trevelyan, Governor of Madras, interfered, and granted permission to the women of the lower castes to wear a cloth over the breasts and shoulders. The following proclamation was issued by the Mahārāja of Travancore: — We hereby proclaim that there is no objection to Shānān women either putting on a jacket like the Christian Shānān women, or to Shānān women of all creeds dressing in coarse cloth, and tying themselves round with it as the Mukkavattigal (fisherwomen) do, or to their covering their bosoms in any manner whatever, but not like women of high castes." " Shortly after 1858, pamphlets began to be written and published by people of the caste, setting out their claims to be Kshatriyas. In 1874 they endeavoured to establish a right to enter the great Mīnākshi temple at Madura, but failed, and they have since claimed to be allowed to wear the sacred thread, and to have palanquins at their weddings. They say they are descended from the Chēra, Chōla and Pāndya kings; they have styled themselves Kshatriyas in legal papers; labelled their schools Kshatriya academy; got Brāhmans of the less particular kind to do purōhit's work for them; had poems composed on their kingly origin; gone through a sort of incomplete parody of the ceremony of investiture with the sacred thread; talked much but ignorantly of their gōtras; and induced needy persons to sign documents agreeing to carry them in palanquins on festive occasions." [During my stay at Nazareth in Tinnevelly, for the purpose of taking measurements of the Shānāns, I received a visit from some elders of the community from Kuttam, who arrived in palanquins, and bearing weapons of old device.] Their boldest stroke was to aver that the coins commonly known as Shānāns' cash were struck by sovereign ancestors of the caste. The author of a pamphlet entitled 'Bishop Caldwell and the Tinnevelly Shānārs' states that he had met with men of all castes who say that they have seen the true Shānār coin with their own eyes, and that a Eurasian gentleman from Bangalore testified to his having seen a true Shānār coin at Bangalore forty years ago. The coin referred to is the gold Venetian sequin, which is still found in considerable numbers in the south, and bears the names of the Doges (Paul Rainer, Aloy Mocen, Ludov Manin, etc.) and a cross, which the Natives mistake for a toddy palm. " If," Mr. Fawcett writes,*^[3] "one asks the ordinary Malayāli (native of Malabar) what persons are represented on the sequin, one gets for answer that they are Rāma and Sīta: between them a cocoanut tree. Every Malayāli knows what an Āmâda is; it is a real or imitation Venetian sequin. I have never heard any explanation of the word Āmâda in Malabar. The following comes from Tinnevelly. Āmâda was the consort of Bhagavati, and he suddenly appeared one day before a Shānār, and demanded food. The Shānār said he was a poor man with nothing to offer but toddy, which he gave in a palmyra leaf. Āmâda drank the toddy, and performing a mantram (consecrated formula) over the leaf, it turned into gold coins, which bore on one side the pictures of Āmâda, the Shānār, and the tree, and these he gave to the Shānār as a reward for his willingness to assist him."

In a petition to myself from certain Shānāns of Nazareth, signed by a very large number of the community, and bearing the title "Short account of the Cantras or Tamil Xātrās, the original but down-trodden royal race of Southern India," they write as follows. " We humbly beg to say that we are the descendants of the Pāndya or Dravida Xatra race, who, shortly after the universal deluge of Noah, first disafforested and colonized this land of South India under the guidance of Agastya Muni. The whole world was destroyed by flood about B.C. 3100 (Dr. Hale's calculation), when Noah, otherwise called Vaivasvata-manu or Satyavrata, was saved with his family of seven persons in an ark or covered ship, which rested upon the highest mountain of the Āryāvarta country. Hence the whole earth was rapidly replenished by his descendants. One of his grandsons (nine great Prajāpatis) was Atri, whose son Candra was the ancestor of the noblest class of the Xatras ranked above the Brahmans, and the first illustrious monarch of the post-diluvian world."

"Apparently," the Census Superintendent continues,"judging from the Shānān's own published statements of their case, they rest their claims chiefly upon etymological derivations of their caste name Shānān, and of Nādān and Grāmani, their two usual titles. Caste titles and names are, however, of recent origin, and little can be inferred from them, whatever their meaning may be shown to be. Brāhmans, for example, appear to have borne the titles of Pillai and Mudali, which are now only used by Sūdras, and the Nāyak kings, on the other hand, called themselves Aiyar, which is now exclusively the title of Saivite Brāhmans. To this day the cultivating Vellālas, the weaving Kaikōlars, and the semi-civilised hill tribe of the Jātapus use equally the title of Mudali, and the Balijas and Telagas call themselves Rao, which is properly the title of Mahrātta Brāhmans. Regarding the derivation of the words Shānān, Nādān and Grāmani, much ingenuity has been exercised. Shānān is not found in the earlier Tamil literature at all. In the inscriptions of Rājarāja Chōla (A.D. 984-1013) toddy-drawers are referred to as Īluvans. According to Pingalandai, a dictionary of the 10th or 11th century, the names of the toddy-drawer castes are Palaiyar, Tuvasar, and Paduvar. To these the Chudamani Nikandu, a Tamil dictionary of the 16th century, adds Saundigar. Apparently, therefore, the Sanskrit word Saundigar must have been introduced (probably by the Brāhmans) between the 11th and 16th centuries, and is a Sanskrit rendering of the word Īluvan. From Saundigar to Shānān is not a long step in the corruption of words. The Shānāns say that Shānān is derived from the Tamil word Sānrār or Sānrōr, which means the learned or the noble. But it does not appear that the Shānāns were ever called Sānrār or Sānrōr in any of the Tamil works. The two words Nādān and Grāmani mean the same thing, namely, ruler of a country or of a village, the former being a Tamil, and the latter a Sanskrit word. Nādān, on the other hand, means a man who lives in the country, as opposed to Ūrān, the man who resides in a village. The title of the caste is Nādān, and it seems most probable that it refers to the fact that the Īluvan ancestors of the caste lived outside the villages. (South Indian Inscriptions, vol. II, part I.) But, even if Nādān and Grāmani both mean rulers, it does not give those who bear these titles any claim to be Kshatriyas. If it did, all the descendants of the many South Indian Poligars, or petty chiefs, would be Kshatriyas."

The Census Superintendent, 1891, states that the "Shānāns are in social position usually placed only a little above the Pallas and the Paraiyans, and are considered to be one of the polluting castes, but of late many of them have put forward a claim to be considered Kshatriyas, and at least 24,000 of them appear as Kshatriyas in the caste tables. This is, of course, absurd, as there is no such thing as a Dravidian Kshatriya. But it is by no means certain that the Shānāns were not at one time a warlike tribe, for we find traces of a military occupation among several toddy-drawing castes of the south, such as the Billavas (bowmen), Halēpaik (old foot soldiers), Kumārapaik (junior foot). Even the Kadamba kings of Mysore are said to have been toddy-drawers. 'The Kadamba tree appears to be one of the palms, from which toddy is extracted. Toddy-drawing is the special occupation of the several primitive tribes spread over the south-west of India, and bearing different names in various parts. They were employed by former rulers as foot-soldiers and bodyguards, being noted for their fidelity.'*^[4] The word Shānān is ordinarily derived from Tamil sāru, meaning toddy; but a learned missionary derives it from sān (a span) and nār (fibre or string), that is the noose, one span in length, used by the Shānāns in climbing palm-trees." The latter derivation is also given by Vellālas.

It is worthy of note that the Tiyans, or Malabar toddy-drawers, addressione another, and are addressed by the lower classes as Shēnēr, which is probably another form of Shānār.*^[5]

The whole story of the claims and pretensions of the Shānāns is set out at length in the judgment in the Kamudi temple case (1898) which was heard on appeal before the High Court of Madras. And I may appropriately quote from the judgment. "There is no sort of proof, nothing, we may say, that even suggests a probability that the Shānārs are descendants from the Kshatriya or warrior castes of Hindus, or from the Pandiya, Chola or Chera race of kings. Nor is there any distinction to be drawn between the Nādars and the Shānārs. Shānār is the general name of the caste, just as Vellāla and Maravar designate castes. 'Nādar' is a mere title, more or less honorific, assumed by certain members or families of the caste, just as Brāhmins are called Aiyars, Aiyangars, and Raos. All 'Nādars' are Shānārs by caste, unless indeed they have abandoned caste, as many of them have by becoming Christians. The Shānārs have, as a class, from time immemorial, been devoted to the cultivation of the palmyra palm, and to the collection of the juice, and manufacture of liquor from it. There are no grounds whatever for regarding them as of Aryan origin. Their worship was a form of demonology, and their position in general social estimation appears to have been just above that of Pallas, Pariahs, and Chucklies (Chakkiliyans), who are on all hands regarded as unclean, and prohibited from the use of the Hindu temples, and below that of Vellālas, Maravans, and other classes admittedly free to worship in the Hindu temples. In process of time, many of the Shānārs took to cultivating, trade, and money-lending, and to-day there is a numerous and prosperous body of Shānārs, who have no immediate concern with the immemorial calling of their caste. In many villages they own much of the land, and monopolise the bulk of the trade and wealth. With the increase of wealth they have, not unnaturally, sought for social recognition, and to be treated on a footing of equality in religious matters. The conclusion of the Sub-Judge is that, according to the Agama Shastras which are received as authoritative by worshippers of Siva in the Madura district, entry into a temple, where the ritual prescribed by these Shāstras is observed, is prohibited to all those whose profession is the manufacture of intoxicating liquor, and the climbing of palmyra and cocoanut trees. No argument was addressed to us to show that this finding is incorrect, and we see no reason to think that it is so . . . . No doubt many of the Shānārs have abandoned their hereditary occupation, and have won for themselves by education, industry and frugality, respectable positions as traders and merchants, and even as vakils (law pleaders) and clerks; and it is natural to feel sympathy for their efforts to obtain social recognition, and to rise to what is regarded as a higher form of religious worship; but such sympathy will not be increased by unreasonable and unfounded pretensions, and, in the effort to rise, the Shānārs must not invade the established rights of other castes. They have temples of their own, and are numerous enough, and strong enough in wealth and education, to rise along their own lines, and without appropriating the institutions or infringing the rights of others, and in so doing they will have the sympathy of all right-minded men, and, if necessary, the protection of the Courts."

In a note on the Shānāns, the Rev. J. Sharrock writes *^[6] that they "have risen enormously in the social scale by their eagerness for education, by their large adoption of the freedom of Christianity, and by their thrifty habits. Many of them have forced themselves ahead of the Maravars by sheer force of character. They have still to learn that the progress of a nation, or a caste, does not depend upon the interpretation of words, or the assumption of a title, but on the character of the individuals that compose it. Evolutions are hindered rather than advanced by such unwise pretensions resulting in violence; but evolutions resulting from intellectual and social development are quite irresistible, if any caste will continue to advance by its own efforts in the path of freedom and progress."

Writing in 1875, Bishop Caldwell remarks †^[7] that "the great majority of the Shānārs who remain heathen wear their hair long; and, if they are not allowed to enter the temples, the restriction to which they are subject is not owing to their long hair, but to their caste, for those few members of the caste, continuing heathens, who have adopted the kudumi — generally the wealthiest of the caste — are as much precluded from entering the temples as those who retain their long hairs. A large majority of the Christian Shānārs have adopted the kudumi together with christianity."

By Regulation XI, 1816, it was enacted that heads of villages have, in cases of a trivial nature, such as abusive language and inconsiderable assaults or affrays, power to confine the offending members in the village choultry (lock-up) for a time not exceeding twelve hours; or, if the offending parties are of the lower castes of the people, on whom it may not be improper to inflict so degrading a punishment, to order them to be put in the stocks for a time not exceeding six hours. In a case which came before the High Court it was ruled that by "lower castes" were probably intended those castes which, prior to the introduction of British rule, were regarded as servile. In a case which came up on appeal before the High Court in 1903, it was ruled that the Shānārs belong to the lower classes, who may be punished by confinement in the stocks.

With the physique of the Shānāns, whom I examined at Nazareth and Sawyerpūram in Tinnevelly, and their skill in physical exercises I was very much impressed. The programme of sports, which were organised in my honour, included the following events: —

Fencing and figure exercises with long sticks of iron-wood (Mesua ferrea).

Figure exercises with sticks bearing flaming rags at each end.

Various acrobatic tricks.

Feats with heavy weights, rice-pounders, and pounding stones.

Long jump.

Breaking cocoanuts with the thrust of a knife or the closed fist.

Crunching whiskey-bottle glass with the teeth.

Running up, and butting against the chest, back,and shoulders.

Swallowing a long silver chain.

Cutting a cucumber balanced on a man's neck in two with a sword.

Falconry. One of the good qualities of Sir Thomas Munro, formerly Governor of Madras, was that, like Rāma and Rob Roy, his arms reached to his knees, or, in other words, he possessed the kingly quality of an Ajānubāhu, which is the heritage of kings, or those who have blue blood in them. This particular anatomical character I have met with myself only once, in a Shānān, whose height was 173 cm. and span of the arms 194 cm.(+ 21 cm.). Rob Roy, it will be remembered, could, without stooping, tie his garters, which were placed two inches below the knee.

For a detailed account of demonolatry among the Shānāns, I would refer the reader to the Rev. R.(afterwards Bishop) Caldwell's now scarce 'Tinnevelly Shanans' (1849), written when he was a young and impulsive missionary, and the publication of which I believe that the learned and kind-hearted divine lived to regret.

Those Shānāns who are engaged in the palmyra (Borassus flabellifer) forests in extracting the juice of the palm-tree climb with marvellous activity and dexterity. There is a proverb that, if you desire to climb trees, you must be born a Shānān. A palmyra climber will, it has been calculated, go up from forty to fifty trees, each forty to fifty feet high, three times a day. The story is told by Bishop Caldwell of a man who was sitting upon a leaf-stalk at the top of a palmyra palm in a high wind, when the stalk gave way, and he came down to the ground safely and quietly, sitting on the leaf, which served the purpose of a natural parachute. Wood-peckers are called Shānāra kurivi by birdcatchers, because they climb trees like Shānārs. "The Hindus," the Rev. (afterwards Canon) A. Margöschis writes,*^[8] "observe a special day at the commencement of the palmyra season, when the jaggery season begins. Bishop Caldwell adopted the custom, and a solemn service in church was held, when one set of all the implements used in the occupation of palmyra-climbing was brought to the church, and presented at the altar. Only the day was changed from that observed by the Hindus. The perils of the palmyra-climber are great, and there are many fatal accidents by falling from trees forty to sixty feet high, so that a religious service of the kind was particularly acceptable, and peculiarly appropriate to our people." The conversion of a Hindu into a Christian ceremonial rite, in connection with the dedication of ex votos, is not devoid of interest. In a note *^[9] on the Pariah caste in Travancore, the Rev. S. Mateer narrates a legend that the Shānāns are descended from Adi, the daughter of a Pariah woman at Karuvur, who taught them to climb the palm tree, and prepared a medicine which would protect them from falling from the high trees. The squirrels also ate some of it, and enjoy a similar immunity.

It is recorded, in the Gazetteer of the Madura district, that Shānān toddy-drawers "employ Pallans, Paraiyans, and other low castes to help them transport the liquor, but Musalmans and Brāhmans have, in several cases, sufficiently set aside the scruples enjoined by their respective faiths against dealings in potent liquor to own retail shops, and (in the case of some Musalmans at least) to serve their customers with their own hands." In a recent note,†^[10] it has been stated that " L.M.S. Shānār Christians have, in many cases, given up tapping the palmyra palm for jaggery and toddy as a profession beneath them; and their example is spreading, so that a real economic impasse is manifesting itself. The writer knows of one village at least, which had to send across the border (of Travancore) into Tinnevelly to procure professional tree-tappers. Consequent on this want of professional men, the palm trees are being cut down, and this, if done to any large extent, will impoverish the country."

In the palmyra forests of Attitondu, in Tinnevelly, I came across a troop of stalwart Shānān men and boys, marching out towards sunset, to guard the ripening chōlum crop through the night, each with a trained dog, with leash made of fibre passed through a ring on the neck-collar. The leash would be slipped directly the dog scented a wild pig, or other nocturnal marauder. Several of the dogs bore the marks of encounters with pigs. One of the party carried a musical instrument made of a 'bison' horn picked up in the neighbouring jungle.

The Shānāns have a great objection to being called either Shānān or Maramēri (tree-climber), and much prefer Nādān. By the Shānāns of Tinnevelly, whom I visited, the following five sub-divisions were returned: —

1. Karukku-pattayar (those of the sharp sword), which is considered to be superior to the rest. In the Census Report, 1891, the division Karukku-mattai (petiole of the palmyra leaf with serrated edges) was returned. Some Shānāns are said to have assumed the name of Karukku-mattai Vellālas.

2. Kalla. Said to be the original servants of the Karukku-pattayar, doing menial work in their houses, and serving as palanquin-bearers.

3. Nattāti. Settled at the village of Nattāti near Sawyerpūram.

4. Kodikkāl. Derived from kodi, a flag. Standard-bearers of the fighting men. According to another version, the word means a betel garden, in reference to those who were betel cultivators.

5. Mēl-nātar (mēl, west). Those who live in the western part of Tinnevelly and in Travancore.

At the census, 1891, Konga (territorial) and Madurai were returned as sub-divisions. The latter apparently receives its name, not from the town of Madura, but from a word meaning sweet juice. At the census, 1901, Tollakkādan (man with a big hole in his ears) was taken as being a sub-caste of Shānān, as the people who returned it, and sell husked rice in Madras, used the title Nādān. Madura and Tinnevelly are eminently the homes of dilated ear-lobes. Some Tamil traders in these two districts, who returned themselves as Pāndyan, were classified as Shānāns, as Nādān was entered as their title. In Coimbatore, some Shānāns, engaged as shop-keepers, have been known to adopt the name of Chetti. In Coimbatore, too, the title Mūppan occurs. This title, meaning headman or elder, is also used by the Ambalakāran, Valayan, Sudarmān, Sēnaikkudaiyān, and other castes. In the Tanjore Manual, the Shānāns are divided into Tennam, Panam, and Ichcham, according as they tap the cocoanut, palmyra, or wild date (Phœnix sylvestris). The name Enādi for Shānāns is derived from Enādi Nayanar, a Saivite saint. But it also means a barber.

The community has, among its members, landowners, and graduates in theology, law, medicine, and the arts. Nine-tenths of the Native clergy in Tinnevelly are said to be converted Shānāns, and Tinnevelly claims Native missionaries working in Madagascar, Natal, Mauritius, and the Straits. The occupations of those whom I saw at Nazareth were merchant, cultiVator, teacher, village munsif, organist, cart-driver, and cooly.

The Shānāns have established a school, called Kshatriya Vidyasala, at Virudupati in Tinnevelly. This is a free school, for attendance at which no fee is levied on the pupils, for the benefit of the Shānān community, but boys of other castes are freely admitted to it. It is maintained by Shānāns from their mahimai fund, and the teachers are Brāhmans, Shānāns, etc. The word mahimai means greatness, glory, or respectability.

1. * Administration Report, 1899.
2. * Christianity in Travancore, 1901.
3. * Madras Museum Bull., III, 3, 1901.
4. • Rice. Mysore Inscriptions, p. 33.
5. * Madras Census Report, 1901.
6. * Madras Mail, 1901.
7. † Ind. Ant., IV, 1875.
8. * Christianity and Caste, 1893.
9. * Journ. Roy. As. Soc, XVI.
10. † Madras Mail, 1907.