Page:Castes and tribes of southern India, Volume 5.djvu/194

to be thatched as a protection against the scorching heat of the tropical sun, which a tiled house would only aggravate. In form the house is essentially a square building, consisting of several courtyards in the centre, with rooms on all sides. On the east or west of the courtyard, a room having the space of two ordinary rooms serves as a drawing room and the dormitory of the unmarried members of the house. The rest of the house is zenāna to the stranger. Right on the opposite side of the visitor's room, beyond the central courtyard, is the arappura, of massive wood-work, where the valuables are preserved. On either side of this are two rooms, one of which serves as a storehouse, and the other as a bed-room. The kitchen adjoins the visitor's room, and is tolerably spacious. In the front, which is generally the east of the house, is a spacious yard, square and flat, and leading to it is a flight of steps, generally made of granite. These steps lead to a gate-house, where the servants of the house keep watch at night. The whole house is built of wood, and substantially constructed. Though the houses look antiquated, they have a classical appearance all their own. To the north-east is the gosala, where large numbers of oxen and cows are housed. The furniture of a Nambūtiri is extremely scanty. There are several cots, some made of coir (cocoanut fibre), and others of wooden planks. The kūrmasana is the Nambūtiri's devotional seat, and consists of a jak (Artocarpus integrifolia) plank carved in the form of a tortoise. Other seats, of a round or oblong shape, are also used, and no Brāhman addresses himself to his meal without being seated on one of them. Every Brāhman visitor is offered one, and is even pressed to sit on it. When the writer went to a Brāhman house at Kalati, the native village of Sankarāchārya, and wished the hosts not to trouble themselves about a seat for