Note 84 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
24. We have just noticed the fiction by which a bride is supposed to be brought from a distance. This is a standing rule among the Orâons and Kurmis of Bengal,84 and more than one example of it may be found in the present survey, as among the Nâis and Pankas. This repugnance to marriage among people residing in close communities has been taken by Dr. Westermarck to be one of the causes which have led to exogamy.85 In this connection, the system of gang exogamy, prevalent among the gypsy Kanjars and Sânsiyas, with whom it is a rule that the bride must be selected from an encampment different from that of the bridegroom, is most significant. It is possible that here we are very close to exogamy in its most primitive form.86