JASPER.
Jaspis, . DAN., DuT., SW. Diaspro, IT.
Jaspe, . FR., PORT., Sr. Jaspia, . . . LAT.
Jaspiss, GER Jaschma, . . . . Rus.
Jasper, a quartzose mineral of a red and yellow colour. Jasper, onyx, common opal, and blood stone are found in abundance in many parts of the Dekhan and amongst the Cambay stones. Yellow jasper occurs on the Tenasserim, but it is not of common occurrence. A soft green jasper, also precious green jasper, and striped jasper, are found in the Burmese provinces.—Mason.
JAT or Zat. HIND. Caste, clan, tribe, occu pation. Jat-bhai, a fellow-countryman, one of the same sect or clan. When a Rajput has children by a Sudra woman, they are called Jat.
JAT, also written Jet, Jit, Jut, and Zj hut, a great race spread throughout all the N.W. of British India, in Afghanistan, the Panjab, all Baluch istan, the valley of the Indus, Sind, the Indian desert, Rajputana, and the N.W. Provinces. Mr. Growse says -the Jat are supposed to be the Xanthii of Strabo, the Xuthii of Dionysius of Samos, the Jatii of Pliny and Ptolemy. They have been identified with the Getre and their great subdivision the Dhe, with the Dahae, whom Strabo places on the shores of the Caspian. The existing division between the Jat and the Dhe has been traced back to the continuity of the Massa Getae, or Great Getie (Massa, PEULAVI, great), and the Dahm, who dwelt by the side of each other in Asia Minor. The weight of authority is in favour of a Scythian origin for the Jat, and a similar descent has been claimed for some of the Rajput tribes.
The parent country of the Jat seems to have been the banks of the Oxus between Bactria, Hyrcania, and Khorasmia. In this position there was a fertile district, irrigated from the Margus river, which Pliny calls Zotale or:Zothale, and General Cunningham believes this to have been the original seat of the Jat, the Jatii of Pliny and Ptolemy, and the Xanthii of Strabo. The term Jat is only their tribal name ; the general name of their horde is Abar. Taking these two names, their course from the Oxus to the Indus may be dimly traced in the Xanthii of Strabo. the Jatii of Pliny and Ptolemy, the Xuthii of Dionysius of Samos, who are coupled with the Arieni, and in the Zuthii of Ptolemy, who occu pied the Karmanian desert on the frontier of Drongiana. Subsequently, the main body of the Jatii seem to have occupied the district of Abiria and the towns of Pardabathra and Bardaxema in Sind or Southern Indo-Scythia, while the Panjab or Northern Indo-Scythia was chiefly colonized by their brethren of the Medes.
In proceeding eastwards by the Bolan pass and other routes, they succeed the Tajak and Dehwar of the west of Afghanistan and the vicinity of Kandahar, and occupy the plains and the hilly country, descending into the plains, spread to the right and left along the Indus and its tribut aries, occupying Upper Sind on one side, and the Panjab on the other. But in the Panjab they are not found in any numbers north of the Salt Range, and in the Himalaya they are wholly unknown, which would seem to show that the Jat did not enter India by that extreme northern route. Also, the Jat does not occupy Lower Sind, and they are not found in Gujerat. The Jat is, however, the prevailing population in all i Upper Sind, and their tongue is the language of the country. They were once the aristocracy of the land, but latterly have been dominated over by other races, and thus have lost somewhat of their position as the higher classes of society. In the south and west of the Panjab, too, they have long been subject to Muhammadan rulers. But latterly, as the Sikh religionists, they became rulers of the whole Panjab and of the country beyond as far as the Upper Jumna, in all which territories they are still, in every way, the pre vailing population. Over great tracts of Hindustan, three villages out of four are Jat, and in each Jat village this race constitute perhaps two thirds of the entire community, the remainder being low-caste predial slaves, with a few traders and artisans. The Jat extend continuously from
the Indus over Rajputana. The great scat of Rajput population and ancient power and glory was on the Ganges • but since vanquished there by Muhammadans, the chief Rajput houses have retired into the comparatively unfruitful countries now known as Rajputana, where, however, the Jat is the most numerous part of the people. They share the lands with the Mina, the remains of the Brahman population, and the dominant Raj put, but they have the largest share of the cultivation. The northern part of Rajputana was partitioned into small Jat republics before the Rajput were driven back from Ajudiah and the Ganges. The southern and more hilly parts of Rajputana are not Jat, but are occupied by the Mbair, Mina, and Bhil ; but in Malwa, again, the Jat are numerous, and seem to share that province with Rajputs and Kunbi. Bhurtpur and Dholpur are Jat principalities. Those of Baluch istan are fine athletic men, with handsome fea tures, but rather dark. Those in Upper Sind, up the course of the Indus, and in the South Western Panjab, arc for the most part of the Muhammadan religion. They have been long subject to foreign rule, and seem to be somewhat inferior to their unconverted brethren. In all the cast of Baluchistan, the Baluch are but a later wave and upper stratum. There, about the lines of communication between India and Western Asia, in the provinces of Seistan and Cute!' Gandava, the Jat form probably the largest portion of the agricultural population, and claim to be the original owners of the soil. In the west, advancing through Rajputana, we meet the Jat of Bhurtpur and Dholpur. Gwalior was a Jat fortress belonging, as is supposed by Mr. Campbell, to the Dholpur chief. They do not go much farther south in this direction. From this point they may be said to occupy the banks of the Juinna, all the way to the hills. The Dehli territory is principally a Jat country, and from Agra upwards the flood of that race has I passed the river in considerable numbers, anti forms a large part of the population of the Upper Donb, in the districts of Alighur, Merut, and Muzaffarnagar. They are just known over the Ganges in the 3foradabad district, but they cannot be said to have crossed that river in any numbers. To sum up, therefore, the Jat country extends on both sides of the Indus from lat. 26° or '27° N. up to the Salt Range. If from the ends of this line two lines be drawn nearly at right angles to the river, but inclining south, so as to reach lat. 23° or 24° N. in Malwa, and lat. 30° on the Jumna, so as to include Upper Sind, Marwar, part of Malwa on one side, and Lahore, Amritsar, and Ambala on the other, then connect the two eastern points by a line which shall include Dholpur, Agra, Alighur, and Merut, and within all that tract the Jat race ethnologically predominates, excepting only the hills of Mewar and the neighbourhood, still held by aboriginal tribes. Advancing eastwards into the Panjab and Rajputana, we find Hindu and Muhammadan Jat much mixed, and it often happens that one half of a village or one branch of a family are Muhammadan and the other Hindus. Farther east, Muhammadan Jat become rarer and rarer, and both about Lahore and all that part of the Panjab along the line of the Upper Sutlej and Jumna, the great mass remain unconverted. In the Panjab, the Jat all take the designation of Singh, and dress somewhat differently from ordinary Ilindu Jats ; but for the most part they only become formally Sikhs where they take service, and that change makes little difference in their laws and social relations. The Jat of Dehli, Bhurtpur, etc., are a very fine race, bear the old Hindu names of Mull and such like, and are not all Singhs. In Rajputana, the Jat are quiet and submissive cultivators. They have now long been subject to an alien rule, and are probably a good deal intermixed by contact with the Mina and others.