Toda people

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The Toda mund, from, Richard Barron, 1837, "View in India, chiefly among the Neelgherry Hills'. Oil on canvas.
The Toda mund, from, Richard Barron, 1837, "View in India, chiefly among the Neelgherry Hills'. Oil on canvas.

The Toda people are a small pastoral community who live on the isolated Nilgiri plateau of Southern India. Prior to the late eighteenth century, the Toda coexisted locally with other communities, including the Badaga, Kota, and Kurumba, in a loose caste-like community organization in which the Toda were the top ranking.[1] The Toda population has hovered in the range 700 to 900 during the last century.[1] Although an insignificant fraction of the large population of India, the Toda have attracted (since the late eighteenth century), "a most disproportionate amount of attention because of their ethnological aberrancy"[1] and "their unlikeness to their neighbours in appearance, manners, and customs."[1] The study of their culture by anthropologists and linguists would prove important in the creation of the fields of Social Anthropology and Ethnomusicology.

The Toda traditionally live in settlements consisting of three to seven small thatched houses, constructed in the shape of half-barrels and spread across the slopes of the pasture.[2] They traditionally trade dairy products with their Nilgiri neighbour peoples.[2] Toda religion centres on the buffalo; consequently, rituals are performed for all dairy activities as well as for the ordination of dairymen-priests. The religious and funerary rites provide the social context in which complex poetic songs about the cult of the buffalo are composed and chanted.[2] Fraternal polyandry in traditional Toda society was fairly common; however, this has now largely been abandoned. During the last quarter of the twentieth century, some Toda pasture land was lost due to agriculture by outsiders[2] or afforestation by the State Government of Tamil Nadu. This has threatened to undermine Toda culture by greatly diminishing the buffalo herds; however during the last decade both Toda society and culture have also become the focus of an international effort at culturally sensitive environmental restoration.[3] The Toda lands are now a part of The Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO-designated International Biosphere Reserve and is under consideration by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee for selection as a World Heritage Site.[4]


Contents

[edit] Population

Toda woman with her child, The National Geographic Magazine, April 1907
Toda woman with her child, The National Geographic Magazine, April 1907

According to M. B. Emeneau, the successive decennial Census of India figures for the Toda are: 1871 (693), 1881 (675), 1891 (739), 1901 (807), 1911 (676) (corrected from 748), 1951 (879), 1961 (759), 1971 (812). These in his judgment, "justifies concluding that a figure between 700 and 800 is likely to be near the norm, and that variation in either direction is due on the one hand to epidemic disaster and slow recovery thereafter (1921 (640), 1931 (597), 1941 (630)) or on the other hand to an excess of double enumeration (suggested already by census officers for 1901 and 1911, and possibly for 1951). Another factor in the uncertainty in the figures is the declared or undeclared inclusion or exclusion of Christian Todas by the various enumerators ... Giving a figure between 700 and 800 is highly impressionistic, and may for the immediate present and future be pessimistic, since public health efforts applied to the community seem to be resulting in an increased birth rate and consequently, one would expect, in an increased population figure. However, earlier predictions that the community was declining were overly pessimistic and probably never well-founded."[1]

[edit] History

A Toda mund, 1869, Samuel Bourne
A Toda mund, 1869, Samuel Bourne

The origin of the Todas is not very clear. They are one of the original tribes inhabiting the highest regions of the Nilgiris mountain range and have remained secluded for a very long time.

Around 1823, the Collector of Coimbatore, John Sullivan, took a fancy to their land and bought it from them for a mere one rupee. He established a town at the place named Udagamandalam on this land. The interaction with western civilisation caused many changes in the lifestyle of the Todas.


[edit] Culture and society

Photograph of two Toda men and a woman. Nilgiri Hills, 1871.
Photograph of two Toda men and a woman. Nilgiri Hills, 1871.

The Toda dress consists of a single piece of cloth, which is worn like the plaid of a Scottish highlander. Their sole occupation is cattle-herding and dairy-work. They once practiced fraternal polyandry, a practice in which a woman marries all the brothers of a family, but no longer do so.[5][6] The ratio of females to males is about three to five. The Toda are most closely related to the Kota both ethnically and linguistically. The Todas worship their dairy-buffaloes, but they have a whole pantheon of other gods. The only purely religious ceremony they have is Kona Shastra, the annual sacrifice of a male buffalo calf. Toda villages, called munds, usually consist of five buildings or huts, three of which are used as dwellings, one as a dairy and the other as a shelter for the calves at night. The inhabitants of a mund are generally related and consider themselves one family. The Todas numbered 807 in 1901 and their current population stands at around 1,100. See W. H. R. Rivers, The Todas (1906).

[edit] Religion

A Toda temple in Muthunadu Mund near Ooty, India.
A Toda temple in Muthunadu Mund near Ooty, India.
Photograph (1871-72) of a Toda green funeral.
Photograph (1871-72) of a Toda green funeral.

According to the Todas, the goddess Teikirshy and her brother first created the sacred buffalo and then the first Toda man. The first Toda woman was created from the right rib of the first Toda man. The Toda religion also forbids them from walking across bridges, rivers must be crossed on foot, or swimming.

Curiously, while the Todas revere the Pandavas they do not believe in the rest of the Hindu mythology.[citation needed]

Toda temples are constructed in a circular pit lined with stones and are quite similar in appearance and construction to Toda huts.

From Frazer's Golden Bough, 1922:

"Among the Todas of Southern India the holy milkman, who acts as priest of the sacred dairy, is subject to a variety of irksome and burdensome restrictions during the whole time of his incumbency, which may last many years. Thus he must live at the sacred dairy and may never visit his home or any ordinary village. He must be celibate; if he is married he must leave his wife. On no account may any ordinary person touch the holy milkman or the holy dairy; such a touch would so defile his holiness that he would forfeit his office. It is only on two days a week, namely Mondays and Thursdays, that a mere layman may even approach the milkman; on other days if he has any business with him, he must stand at a distance (some say a quarter of a mile) and shout his message across the intervening space. Further, the holy milkman never cuts his hair or pares his nails so long as he holds office; he never crosses a river by a bridge, but wades through a ford and only certain fords; if a death occurs in his clan, he may not attend any of the funeral ceremonies, unless he first resigns his office and descends from the exalted rank of milkman to that of a mere common mortal. Indeed it appears that in old days he had to resign the seals, or rather the pails, of office whenever any member of his clan departed this life. However, these heavy restraints are laid in their entirety only on milkmen of the very highest class".

[edit] Language

The Toda language is a member of the Dravidian family. Like their ethnology, the language is aberrant and difficult phonologically. It is now recognized that Toda (along with its neighbor Kota) is a member of the southern subgroup of the historical family proto-South-Dravidian; it split off from South Dravidian, after Kannada and Telegu, but before Malayam. In modern linguistic terms, the aberrancy of Toda results from disproportionately numerous rules, both early and recent in their ordering, which are not shared by the other South Dravidian languages (and shared only to a small extent by Kota)[1]

[edit] Toda dwellings and lifestyle

The hut of a Toda Tribe of Nilgiris, India. Note the decoration of the front wall, and the very small door.
The hut of a Toda Tribe of Nilgiris, India. Note the decoration of the front wall, and the very small door.

The Todas live in small hamlets called munds. The Toda huts, of an oval, pent-shaped construction, are usually 10 feet (3 m) high, 18 feet (5.5 m) long and 9 feet (2.7 m) wide. They are built of bamboo fastened with rattan and thatched. Each hut is enclosed within a wall of loose stones. The front and back of the hut are usually made of dressed stones (mostly granite). Hut has only a tiny entrance at the front – about 3 feet (90 cm) wide, 3 feet (90 cm) tall. This unusually small entrance is a means of protection from wild animals. The front portion of the hut is decorated with the Toda art forms, a kind of rock mural painting. Thicker bamboo canes are arched to give the hut its basic pent shape. Thinner bamboo canes are tied close and parallel to each other over this frame. Dried grass is stacked over this as thatch.

The forced interaction with civilisation has caused a lot of changes in the lifestyle of the Todas. The Todas used to be a pastoral people but are now increasingly venturing into agriculture and other occupations. They used to be strict vegetarians but some can be now be seen eating non-vegetarian food. Although many Toda have abandoned their traditional distinctive huts for concrete houses,[5] a movement is now afoot to build tradition barrel-vaulted huts and during the last decade forty new huts have been built and many Toda sacred dairies renovated.[7]

A new Toda dwelling being constructed.

Working on the roof.

The house is almost complete.

The completed house is being blessed.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f (Emeneau 1984, pp. 1-2)
  2. ^ a b c d Encyclopædia Britannica. (2007) Toda
  3. ^ Chhabra 2006
  4. ^ World Heritage sites, Tentative lists, April 2007
  5. ^ a b (Walker 2004)
  6. ^ (Walker 1998)
  7. ^ (Chhabra 2005) Quote: "... over the past ten years, we have approached government and private agencies for sponsoring traditional houses. Today, we have been able to assist in funding over forty barrel-vaulted houses. Added to these are the scores of existing temples – two are conical and the rest barrel-vaulted."

[edit] References

Classic Ethnographies
Toda Music, Linguistics, Ethnomusicology
Modern Anthropology, Sociology, History
Toda Traditional Knowledge, Environment, and Modern Science
“ Toda’s quaint barrel vaulted houses, which symbolise the Nilgiris, are today hard to spot. These images have been dry transfered on T-shirts and other products as logos. Seven years ago, there were just a couple of traditional houses remaining in the permanent hamlets. One day, a Toda wanted to build a traditional house for his ailing father. The administration agreed to provide the funds. Quite soon, it was ready and one Sunday morning, the Collector, additional Collector and the Superintendent of police inaugurated the house. The construction was so impressive that advances were paid on the spot for two more houses. Nine houses came up that year. Today, over 35 traditional houses have been constructed. ”

[edit] External links