Page:Castes and Tribes of Southern India, Volume 3.djvu/160

Epigraphic records point to the existence of the five classes of Kammālans in Malabar at least as early as the beginning of the ninth century A.D., as a Syrian Christian grant refers to them as Aimvazhi Kammālas. There is a tradition that they were brought to Kērala by Parasu Rāma, but left in a body for Ceylon on being pressed by one of the early Perumāl satraps of Cranganūr to marry into the washerman caste, after they had by a special arrangement of the marriage shed trapped to death a large number of that obnoxious community. The King of Ceylon was requested, as an act of international courtesy, to send back some of the Kammālans. As, however, they were loth to return to their former persecutor, they were sent in charge of some Izhavas, who formed the military caste of the island. The legend is given in detail by Canter Visscher, who writes as follows. " In the time of Cheramperoumal, a woman belonging to the caste of the washermen, whose house adjoined that of an Ajari (the carpenter caste), being occupied as usual in washing a cloth in water mixed with ashes (which is here used for soap), and having no one at hand to hold the other end of it, called to a young daughter of the Ajari, who was alone in the house, to assist her. The child, not knowing that this was an infringement of the laws of her caste, did as she was requested, and then went home. The washer-woman was emboldened by this affair to enter the Ajari's house a few days afterwards; and, upon the latter demanding angrily how she dared to cross his threshold, the woman answered scornfully that he belonged now to the same caste as she did, since his daughter had helped to hold her cloth. The Ajari, learning the disgrace that had befallen him, killed the washerwoman. Upon this, her friends complained to Cheramperoumal, who espoused