56
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
also to do lamjhana. At the marriage, the bridegroom gives the paternal aunt and the mother of the bride a cloth each, and the paternal uncle a pagri. Among both the Gonds and Kirkus, the money is not given to defray the expenses of the marriage cheer and paraphernalia of the bride but for the marriage contract. The Kirk us are divided into four chief divisions
of caste : The Bap cha, Ba oria, Rumba and B on do i ,—the last being the highest. These castes do not intermarry, eat, drink, nor smoke the huká amongst themselves. The G on dis divide into two sections, which call themselves Raj-G on d s and Kh a to 1 a Wala G on d s—the latter wearing the Brahmanical thread or janvi across the shoulder. These two
divisions hold nothing common among them. The Gots which I have alluded to above, I find to be clans, something after the manner of those among our Scottish brethren, and in no instance is intermarriage permitted between men and women of the same Got, but cousins are permitted to marry each other.
How this finds sanction I shall ex
plain : I shall instance a brother and sister of the
[FEB. 2, 1872.
Wika G ot. The sister marries, say, a Dhur w a . She accordingly becomes of the D hur w a clan, while her brother,
of course,
still
retains his
clanship; thus the sister's children being Dhur was and the brother's Wik as, they can intermarry. From this precise explanation it will at once be seen that the marriage of two brothers' children is iu terdicted, because they are of the same clan. I was not successful in collecting the names of many of the G on di Gots worth recording, but I
think I have got a good number of the Kirku clans which are as follows:—Kasda, Bethe, Chuthar, Maosi, Busum, Dharina, Sakoma, Ataker, Akhundi, Tota, Bhendra, Tandil, Kolsa, Suvati, Selu, and Atkom.
This year I met with no archaeological remains which invited my attention ; there is only one place which has its local tradition. I have briefly attempted to enter into the chief points of interest regarding these wild tribes, with out detailing the many other minutiae which relate to them, such as their dancing, their dress, their villages, and many of their customs.-Report on the Topographical Surveys for 1868-69.
EXPLANATION OF WEDIC WORDS. BY PROF. TH. AUFRECHT.
(Translated from the Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft Bd. XXIV.
pp. 205-6.) I.
N. 1 s h T U R.
Hears Indra gladly the singer's call, no longer
Nish tūr is found in the Rigveda only in the tarrying he draws nigh to us.” two forms n is ht ure and n is hit u ra h. The Also from the use of ni star, II. 11, 20.— Asyā suvānāsya mandinas tritāsya ny àrbudam pad a divides thus, nih-ture and nih-turah, vávridháno astah | and thus it is regarded as compounded of tur and “Arbuda, the enemy of this lavish, joyous Trita, the preposition n is. Roth takes this view, and translates it, “He who has no conqueror (the un he violently strikes down.” VII. 18,11.— ékam chayé vinºatim cha gravasyā vaikarnáyor vanquished one).” He forgets that this translation jānān rājā ny àstah | yields no sense in VIII. 32, 27, and that no passage “As the king from desire for fame slew one and occurs in the Veda, in which the root tar is com bined with n is. In my opinion it should be resolv twenty men of the two Waikarna.” ed into n i-stur, which I derive from n i star, to 2. A q va B U D H y A. strike to the ground, prosternere. In the former in
This word occurs three times, and indeed only passage nish tur is active, “felling to the ground"; the first Ash taka. Roth translates it, “notable in the latter, passive," to fall to the ground.” VIII. on account of horses—distinguished," and Benfey, 32, 27. “recognisable by horses.” This interpretation, in
“To the mighty conqueror, to the unvanquished victor cries
Your god-suggested hymn.” VIII. 66, 2.—
which budhya is derived from the root bud h, is unsatisfactory both etymologically and with reference to the sense. Etymologically, because the analogous formations brahim a cháry a, p fºr bhi
“Then spake to him Çavasi : the deadly hater, the dy a , p r a k film Ó dya, bra h m Ó dya, bra h cloud-son My child, these cast to ground do thou.” This interpretation receives confirmation also
m a v š'd y a, man tra ºr út y a , a dim as ādya, talp as ā dya, r a jas ti y a, devah iſ ya, and others, have the accent on the last portion. As re
from a n is h trita in VIII. 33, 9.— gards the sense, because in 92, 7 the distinction “The gallant, never-vanquished hero, fearlessly between a vab udhya and go agra is un equipped for fight, mistakable. The true account of the matter is, that
