SECOND CHAPTER.

ON THE TURANIAN CHARACTER OF THE TAMULIC LANGUAGES.

FIRST SECTION.

The Arian Settlers and Aboriginal Races of India.

THE name by which the whole class of the aboriginal languages of India is best known to us, was given it by the Brahmans. "Dekhan" is a corruption of the Sanskrit "dakshina," which means "right" (dexter). To the Brahman who, in fixing his posi tion, always imagined himself looking toward the rise of the sun, whatever lay to the south of his own country, was "dakshinâ" or "to the right." As the frontiers of the Brahmanic settlements were gradually extended, the meaning of Dakshinâ or Dakshinapatha became more definite, till at last the chain of the Vindhya-mountains was fixed upon as the natural frontier between what the Brahman called his holy-land and the Dekhan. It is now generally admitted that this holy-land of the Brahmans, even within its earliest and narrowest limits, between the Sarasvatî and Drishadvatî, was not the birthplace of the sons of Manu. The Arians were strangers in the land of the Indus and Ganges, but no one can now determine the exact spot whence they came and where they had been previously settled. Traditions, current among the Brahmans as to the northern regions, considered the seats of the blessed, may be construed into something like a recollection of their northern immigration holy places along the rivers of Northern India, where even in later times Brahmans went to learn the purest Sanskrit, may mark the stations of their onward course-the principal capitals of their ancient kingdoms may prove the slow but steady progress toward the mouths of the principal rivers of India - but with the sources of those rivers the homes of the Arian strangers vanish from our sight, even after we have reached the highest points of view accessible on Indian ground.

The countries which the Brahmans took possession of, or rather over which they gained their priestly ascendancy, were inhabited by races of men, who are sometimes represented to us by the Brahmans as mere monkeys or bush-men, sometimes as uncouth giants, sometimes, as in the case of Bribu and Hanuman, as useful allies and faithful servants. In the social scheme of the Brahmans, however, these races could never rise beyond the position of a Sûdra. Exceptions like that of the Ribhus or Rathakaras, are very scarce and confined to the Vaidik age. No Sûdra again, as long as Manu's laws prevailed, could ever rise to the dignity of a twice-born man, and though even as a Sûdra, he had caste, yet the distance between him and the poorest Brahman was so wide and unsurmountable in the eyes of both parties, that we can only explain it by a difference of race, such as we find between the Spaniard and the Negro.

In ancient times the distinction between the twice-born Arians and the Sûdra was probably a distinction of colour also. The very name of caste in Sanskrit is varna, colour. Distinctions of colour, however, fade away and sometimes disappear altogether, even in despite of such barriers as the strict "lex connubii,” interposed between the different ranks of Hindu society. Besides, these laws were not always observed, nor similarly respected in different parts of India. India was conquered and devastated several times-Greeks, Scythians, Arabs and Mongolians, mingled their blood with that of the conquered race, and as the priesthood and their nobility lost strength, it was easier even for the lowest ranks to claim a position, secured not by birth, but by wealth and power. Again, there is that long interval in the history of India, during which caste, at least in its religious sense, was altogether ignored. As long as Buddhism was the state religion of a great portion of India, that is to say from the third century before, to perhaps the sixth century after Christ, the different ranks of society could only be held apart by social prejudice and custom, and not by priestly authority. But in spite of all these changes and social commotions, the traveller in India to the present day, though he would look in vain for the distinctive features of a Brahman, a Kshattriya, or a Vaisya, feels the conviction irresistibly growing upon him, as he passes along the streets of cities, or the roads of villages, whether

north or south of the Vindhya, that everywhere he is brought in contact with at least two races of man, distinct in mind as well as in body. "No sojourner in India," says Dr. Stevenson, in the Journal of the Bombay Branch, January 1852, "can have paid any attention to the physiognomy of the higher and lower orders of natives without being struck with the remarkable difference that exists in the shape of the head, the build of the body, and the colour of the skin, between the higher and lower castes into which the Hindu population is divided. The high forehead, the stout build, and the light copper colour of the Brahmans and other castes allied to them, appear in strong contrast with the somewhat low and wide heads, slight make, and dark bronze of the low castes."

The name of "Dekhan languages," to signify the non-Arian dialects of India, is therefore inconvenient in one respect. According to its etymological and geographical meaning, it can only refer to nations and languages to the right of the Vindhya, while we evidently want a name sufficiently comprehensive to stand for all aboriginal inhabitants of India, wherever they are met with, from the Snows to Cape Comorin. Our highest living authority and best informant on the ethnology and phonology of the native races of India, Mr. B. H. Hodgson, of Darjiling, uses "Tamulian" as the general name for all non-Arian races. I have adopted this name, though it is not altogether free from objections, because it may be used in three different meanings. Originally it would mean one of the languages in the Dekhan, the Tamil; secondly, the Dekhan languages in general; and thirdly, all the aboriginal dialects of India. Mr. Hodgson himself uses it in the second and third senses. I should prefer, therefore, as a general name for all the native languages of India, Nishâda-languages. Nishâda is the oldest name given by the Brahmans to their non-Arian neighbours. It means Assiduus or Ansässig, and is therefore the most appropriate name for people who occupied the soil of India, before they were dispersed by the Arians. It is true the word Nishâda does not occur in the Rigveda, but at the time of Yâska, in the fourth century B. C., the "five races," frequently mentioned in the Veda, are always explained as the four castes and the Nishâdas. In the Brahmanas also and in the epic poems, the word occurs as a general term together with Mlekha.

"Tamulic" might, if this were used, be retained as the general name of the languages now principally spoken south of the Vindhya.

Historical Traces of Nishâdas, or aboriginal Races in India.

On the ethnological state of India during the Vaidik periods, it is very difficult to form a correct opinion, because the scanty allusions to this subject which occur in the hymns are at variance with one another in different portions of the Rigveda. It is a fact, that the four castes existed previous to the collection of the Rigveda;-and

* The materials which I have used are almost entirely contained in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. I subjoin a list of the articles to which I shall have most frequent occasion to refer :

Vol. 1847. p. 1235. B. H. Hodgson, On the Aborigines of the Sub-Himalayas ; p. 1245. B. H. H., Comparative Vocabulary of the several Languages and Dialects of the Eastern Sub-Himalayas, from the Kali or Ghogra to the Dhansri (Subanshiri ?).

Vol. 1848. p. 73. Addenda and Corrigenda of the paper on Aborigines, etc.; p.544. B. H. H. Ethnography and Geography of the Sub-Himalayas.

Vol. 1848. 2. p. 222. B. H. H. On the Tibetan Type of Mankind; p. 550. B. H. H. The Aborigines of Central India; p. 650. B. H. H. On the Chepang and Kusundu Tribes of Nepal.

Vol. 1849. 1. p. 238. B. H. H. A Brief Note on Indian Ethnology; p. 350. B. H. H. Aborigines of Southern India; p. 451. B. H. H. On the Aborigines of North Eastern India.

Vol. 1849. 2. p. 702. B. H. H. On the Origin of the Kocch, Bodo and Dhimal Tribes; p. 761. B. H. H. On the Physical Geography of the Himalayas; p. 967. B. H. H. On the Aborigines of the Eastern Frontier.

Vol. 1850. 1. p. 309. B. H. H. Aborigines of the North East Frontier; p. 461. B. H. H. Aborigines of the South.

While engaged in carrying this Essay through the press, I had the pleasure of making Mr. Hodgson's personal acquaintance in England, and I received at the same time his two important articles published in the Asiatic Journal of Bengal, 1853, Nos. I. and II.

Besides Mr. Hodgson's articles we find in the same Journal some very useful Essays by W. Robinson." Notes on the Languages spoken by the various Tribes inhabiting the Valley of Asam and its Mountain Confines," vol. 1849. 1. p. 183. and 310.

Mr. Walter Elliot's Observations on the language of Goands, published as early as November 1847, in the same Journal, are well known, and have been honoured by a translation by Professor Lassen.

The Rev. J. Stevenson's articles are principally published in the Journal of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society.

therefore previous to any other written authority in India, which might be quoted to disprove their early existence. The hymn in the tenth Mandala, where the castes are mentioned with their technical names, though it may have a modern appearance, if compared with other hymns, is still the most ancient authority we can appeal to, and more ancient than any hymn in the other collections, or any Brâhmana or Sûtra. And further the four social ranks, priests, warriors, house-holders and servants, are clearly distinguishable in many of the hymns of the Rigveda, and in the Brahmanas the Sûdra also is mentioned by name. Though he belongs to a caste, and therefore has rights as well as duties, he is distinctly called non-Arian, for Aryas, as the Satapatha-brâhmana says, are only Brahmans, Kshattriyas and Vaisyas. In addition to these four castes, who formed the body politic in India as early as the times of Vasishtha and Visvamitra, we find in the hymns frequent allusions to the Dasyus. Dasyu means simply enemy, for instance, when Indra is praised because "he destroyed the Dasy us and protected the Arian colour." The "Dasyus" in the Veda may mean non-Arian races in many hymns; yet the mere fact of tribes being called enemies of certain kings or priests, can hardly be said to prove their barbarian origin. Vasishtha himself, the very type of the Arian Brahman, when in feud with Visvamitra, is called not only an enemy, but a “Yâtudhâna,” and other names which in common parlance are only bestowed on barbarian savages and evil spirits. We still have the very hymn in which Vasishtha deprecates such charges with powerful indignation. He says:

"If I had worshipped false gods, or if I had called upon the gods in vain-But why art thou angry with me, o Gâtavedas? May vain talkers fall into thy destruction."

May I die at once, if I be a Yâtudhâna, or if I hurt the life of any man. But may he be cut off from his ten friends, who falsely called me a Yâtudhâna."

"He who called me a Yâtudhâna, or who said I am a bright devil Indra strike him down with his great weapon, may he fall may the lowest of all beings."

In other passages, the word also which I have here translated by devil (rakshas), is clearly applied to barbarous nations. Originally