Note 24 — Chapter III

Caste based on occupation. We have thus mainly on the evidence from anthropometry endeavoured to establish the fact that, as we find the existing population, the theory of the ethnological basis of caste must be to a great extent abandoned. We have then to search for some other solution of the question of the origin of our present castes. This can only be found in community of function or occupation. The most able advocate of this theory is Mr. J. C. Nesfield.24 To use his words:—“The bond of sympathy or interest which first drew together the families or tribal fragments, of which a caste is composed, was not, as some writers have alleged, community of creed or community of kinship, but community of function. Function, and function only, as I think, was the foundation upon which the whole caste system of India was built up.”