The Todas
9781465683625
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
The people whose manners and customs I am about to describe live on the undulating plateau of the Nilgiri Hills in Southern India. The hills were visited by a Portuguese missionary in 1602, and have been invaded by Indian tribes on various occasions, but, at the beginning of the last century, the plateau and its inhabitants were absolutely unknown to Europeans. The earliest definite information about the hills at this time is given in a letter from William Keys, an assistant revenue surveyor, written in 1812, but it was not till several years later that further information about the people began to be published. Of the various tribes inhabiting the hills, the Todas excited the greatest interest, and this interest has continued, partly because the people are so different from any other of the races by which they are surrounded, but still more because both they and their customs are so picturesque and, in many ways, so unique. A very large literature has accumulated about the Todas and their customs. This literature is so extensive that when I determined to go to the Nilgiri Hills, I was reproached by more than one anthropologist for going to people about whom we already knew so much; and one even said that, so far as his department of knowledge was concerned, he was sure that we had all the information we could expect to get. A review of the literature, however, showed me that there were certain subjects about which our information was of the scantiest. This was especially the case in matters connected with the social organisation. Little was known of the system of kinship, and it was not known whether there was any definite system of exogamy. The Todas furnish one of the best existing examples of the custom of polyandry, but scarcely anything was known about the various social regulations which must be associated with such a practice. I had not worked long among the Todas before I discovered the existence of many customs and ceremonies previously undescribed, and I was able to obtain much more detailed accounts of others which had already been repeatedly recorded. I found that there was so much to be done that I gave up an intention of working with several different tribes, and devoted the whole of my time to the Todas. This book is not intended to be a complete account of all that is known about the Toda people. Their physical anthropology has been so ably dealt with by Mr. Edgar Thurston that I leave this subject almost untouched, and I omit all but a brief mention of my own psychological observations which I have published in detail elsewhere. The book deals almost exclusively with the religion and sociology of the people. Even here, however, the account will be far from complete. After several months’ work among a people about whom “we knew all there was to be known,” I came away knowing that there were subjects of which I had barely touched the fringe, and many others on which my information could have been made far more complete with greater opportunity. About certain subjects the Todas are extremely reticent, and my information is in consequence very defective. There are many points on which I know my information to be far from complete, and doubtless there are far more numerous examples of deficiency of which I am not aware.
