Indian Antiquary Vol 48

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 68

64
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
(May, 1919
Bengal, Vol. II, pp. 43-44, and also give the following excerpt from the Census of India, 1911, Vol. V, Part I, p. 466:
"Ih Shahabad every goala village has a head-man called 'Mahto'for a group of villages, and in the case of towns for the whole of the town, there is a superior caste official who is called 'Barka-Mahto,' i.e. a 'Mahto' of 12 villages. When a breach of caste rule takes place the village. Mahto 'is first informed about it. In petty cases he gives judgment in consultation with the castemen of the village. In serious cases the Barko-Mahto' is referred to, and general panchayet of all the castemen in the villages under him is convoked. Among other sub-castes (except the Goria), the panchayet's jurisdiction is restricted to a group of villages, the head of which is called a "Mahto,
Russell and Risley make it clear (vide references ante) that this term is very cominon amongst the goalas. However much these may have a tendency recently to group themselves under the third Aryan caste group, the Vaishyas, the following extract from Captain Mackintosh's Account of the Mhadgo Kolies 16 would make it clear that they clutched quite a different tradition about their origin, when modern education had not yet percolated to them, on the strength of which they may be with a fair degree of probability ascribed to be remnants of a pre-Aryan Megalith-rearing race of the Deccan :
“There is a popular tradition among the people in that part of the country, that the Goursees were the original inhabitants of the Dukhan, and that they were displaced from the hilly tracts of the country by the race of Goullies or cowherds. These Goullies, it is said, subsequently rabelled aguinst their lawful prince, who detached an army that continued unceasing in their exertion until they exterminated the entire race of Goullies. It is a common practice with such of the inhabitants of the plains as bury their dead as well as the hill-tribes to erect thurgahs (tombs commonly of a single stone) near the graves of their parents. In the vicinity of some of the Koly villages and near the site of deserted ones, beveral of those thurgahs are occasionally to be seen, especially near the source of the Bhaum river. The people say they belong to the Goursees and Goulties of former times. The stones, with many figures in relief roughly carved upon and one of them holding a drum in his hand and in the act of beating tune on it, are considered to have belonged to the Goursees who are musicians by profession. The other thargahs with a saloonka (one of the emblems of Mhadeo) and a band of women forming a circle round it with large pots on their heads, are said to be Goully monuments. This may be reckoned partly confirmatory of the tradition."
I append below a list of the signs heretofore discovered by me Neolithic scripts of and signs Catalogue number of the pieces on
Locality, which they occur. found by me. IK ..
No. 3177; C. B. P. 124 .. Chota Nagpur. II G174..
C. B. P. 131 ; Neolith No. 998 .. Assam. C. B. P. 131 ; Neolith No. 866..
Assam. .. C. B. P. 74; Neolith No. 2626 .. Bellary, C. B. P. 126; Neolith No. 3294 ..
Behar,
OTE C. B.
Z
XOTE C. B-Catalogue raisonnd of the Prehistoric Antiquities in the Indian M om at Caloutta.
By J. Coggia Brown, M.Sc., F.G.S., edited by Sir John Marshall, Kr., C.L.E., M. A., Litt. D., F.S.A.
(To be continued.) 10 Madros Journal of Literature and Science, Vol. V (1837), p. 251-252.