Note 141 — K (continued 4)

The Kōmatis have for a long time been alleged to be connected with the Mādigas in a variety of ways. “The Kōmatis,” Mr. F. R. Hemingway writes, “do not as a rule deny the fact of this connection. The Mādigas are, indeed, apparently under the protection of the Kōmatis, apply to them for help when in trouble, and obtain loans and other assistance. Some Kōmatis explain the connection with the Mādigas by a story that either Vishnu Vardhana, or his successor Rājarāja Narēndra persecuted the Kōmatis, and that they had to fly for refuge to the Mādigas. The Mādigas took them in, and hid them, and they say that the present favour shown to that caste is only in gratitude for the kindness shown to themselves in the past. The Kōmatis themselves do not admit the title Mid-day Mādigas (applied to them by other castes), but explain it by a story that long ago a Kōmati killed and ate a cow-buffalo, which was really no cow-buffalo, but the wife of a great sage who had transformed her into that shape in order that she might be safe when he was in contemplation. The saint accordingly cursed the caste, and said that they should be Mid-day Mādigas for ever more.” It is possible that the connection between the Kōmatis and Mādigas was originally such as that of the Kammālans, Ambattans, and other castes, with Paraiyans, Vettiyans, and other depressed classes, and that, in later times, weird stories were invented by fertile brains to explain them away. One of these undoubtedly is that which makes the Kōmatis the descendants of the issue of a plain Brāhman and a handsome Mādiga woman. It is said that their children managed a sweetmeat bazar, which the Brāhman kept in a much frequented forest, and, in his absence, pointed with a stick (kōl) to the plates, and thereby told their prices, without polluting the articles with the touch. Hence arose the name Kōlmutti (those who pointed with the stick), which became softened down to Kōmutti. Another story runs to the effect that the Mādiga woman, when she was pregnant with her first child, was gored by a cow, and gave birth to it in the cow-shed. Hence arises the name Gō-mutti, or cow-gored. In days gone by, it was incumbent on the Kōmatis to bear the marriage expenses of the Mādiga families attached to their village, much in the same way that the Chakkiliyan is treated in the Madura district by the Tottiyan caste in return for the services he renders when a Tottiyan girl is under pollution on reaching maturity. In later times, this custom dwindled in some places141 to the payment of the expenses of the marriage of two Mādigas, and even this was abandoned in favour of inviting the Mādigas to their weddings. In the city of Madras, it would appear to have been customary, in the eighteenth century, for the Kōmatis to get the māngalyam or sathamānam (marriage badge) blessed by an aged Mādiga before it was tied on the bride’s neck. Further, it would appear to have then been customary to give the sacred fire, used at marriages for the performance of hōmam, to a Mādiga, and receive it back from him.