dalita, music (was jat community)

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INDOLOGY, "Lynken Ghose" <lynkenghose@h...> wrote:

> From what I understand, the Yadavas are one of the tribes

>mentioned in the Rg Veda, but what was their varna?

 

David McAlpin has proposed that yAdava comes from dravidian

yADu = goat, sheep. In old Tamil, yATu = goat, yATavar = shepherd.

The kula name, yadu was "invented" later to explain the word,

yAdava. yATavar/yAtavar have examples in tamil: eg., a)

paTalai/patalai 'drum', b) kaTavu/katavu 'entrance, gate' etc.

 

Traditionally, Krishna is a vELir chieftain who led velalas to

South, in Tamil texts. The earliest Tamil nighaNTus (eg.,

piGkalantai) record Chalukyas as vELir, and their capital

dvarasamudra and Krishna's dwaraka are toponymically related.

tuvarai is the tamil name for dvaraka, and thuuran is a kula name

among velalas of Kongu country (M. P. "Thooran" was the editor of

the encyclopaedia called kalai-kaLaJciyam, and a carnatic music

sahityakarta). Beluuru and Belagaum have the cognates with tamil

vEL/vELir/vELALA, and telugu vElama castes.

 

Considering that the Skt. portions of kannada inscriptions record

Belagaum as vENugrAma, I wonder about the derivation of vENu in

venugopala in skt. whether vENu is from drav. vEL 'chieftain caste'

or from vE_lam 'bamboo'.

 

> Thanks for your help. Does anyone know the following 2 questions.

>Does Dalit come from the Sanskrit root dal+?

 

From a message to IndianCivilization list, prof. Madhav Deshpande

wrote:

<<

Linguistically, the word dalita in Sanskrit has nothing to do with

either daridra or tala or sthala. It comes from the Sanskrit root

dalati/dalayati "to split apart, crush" and is linguistically related

to Sanskrit daarayati (more commonly seen in vi-daarayati). Lots of

IE cognates cited by Walde-Pokorny (vol. I, pp. 810-812). Related

words in modern IA languages are daal "split (peas)" and the Marathi

verb daLaNe "to grind". As a term referring to the class of down-

trodden people, dalita is of course a new usage. Best, Madhav

Deshpande

>>

 

>Where are musicians usually placed in the

> varna system? It is my understanding that artisans in the South are

>usually considered to be Sudra.

 

paRaiyan drummers were considered untouchables until very recent

times. Anthropologists connect pollution in old India with leather,

carcass handling and funeral rituals. Now, christian, neo-hindu

missionary works and the GOI laws have almost eradicated

untouchability. Sangam tamil works call the funerary ritual priests

cum drummers as "izipiRappALan". V. S. Rajam, A reference grammar of

classical Tamil poetry : 150 B.C.-pre-fifth/sixth

century A.D. Philadelphia, Pa. : American Philosophical Society,

1992. p. 440: "izi 'lowly'; izi piRappALan2 'he of a lowly birth'

(puRa. 170:5)".

 

Another common term among Kerala castes is pulaya and tamil classical

works use the cognate, pulaiyan. This term has ancient tamil usages in

relation to music. Interestingly, washerfolks were called pulaiyans

also in sangam texts.

INDOLOGY/message/1378

 

In the South, many musician castes were classified as dalit

castes. See L. Ananthakrishna Aiyar's volumes for Kerala castes

and E. Thurston and Venkatachari, for Madras Presidency.

Also, the bulky volume, K. S. Singh, Scheduled castes, OUP &

Anthropological survey of India, 1995.

 

vaL = leather belt used in drums in sangam texts, vaLLuvan comes from

this 'vaL' meaning leather. Just like puL 'bird' > puLLuvan 'birder'

also a dalit caste among Kerala bards. vaLLuvar, the great TirukkuRaL

author, was a dalit acc. to medieval tamil texts. See how 19th century

Tamils and Christian missionaries-Tamil scholars treat this problem

in:

Stuart Blackburn (SOAS), Corruption and Redemption: The legend of

Valluvar and Tamil literary history, Modern Asian studies, 34, 2

(2000), pp. 449-482.

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan