KUMMALAR, in the Malealarn country, an artificer. The Ainkudi Kummalar of Malabar are the five artisan castes,—theAshari or carpenter, the Mushari or brazier, the Tattan or goldsmith. the Perning-Kollen or blacksmith, and the Tol Konen or tanner. These five castes follow the custom of marrying one girl among three or four brothers, and this custom is followed in some parts of Malabar by the Iduver, Juver, or Teer, toddy-drawers. Kookel Keloo, a Nair, a district munsiff in Malabar (No. 48 of the Madras Liter ary Society's Journal of 1859,:pp. 52), says the lyuver or Teeyer (toddy-drawers) are a section of the servile class of people who, during the time of the Brahmans and Perumals, came to Malabar from Ceylon to earn their livelihood. It cannot, however, be accounted for, how they in many parts, though not throughout the whole of Mala bar, came to adopt the beastly custom of the Kummalar of the country, of a single girl being married to three and four brothers ; and likewise, in some parts of the country, where this sad custom is not so generally prevalent among them, the practice of taking their deceased brothers' widows for wives, as the Musalman Moplah do. It is only in the taluks of Nidunganad, Kuttanad, Chowghat, and some parts of Vettutnad, and a few adjoining spots in South Malabar alone, that a woman among the Nair is kept at the same time by two or three different men, who are, though, never brothers. It is, however, very possible that the Teeyer may have taken the idea from this latter error, and themselves. fallen into the other and more shameful one ; or perhaps they observe the custom, as they in general are, as a document in its beginning shows, sprung from Kummalar or,the Kummalar from them, through their then frequent intermarriages. The document calls them also Iyuvahaiyer, a word equally low and contemptuous in Malabar, and of the same mean ing as the word Kummalar. `Moreover, amongst the Nair of the whole of North Malabar (that is say, from part of Cooroombranad as far as igalore), though sometimes unchaste practices oe r in their families, yet I can most confidently assert that the above abominable custom of one woman being kept by two or three men at the Heine time, never in ancient or modern time was once known. A Nair there will, though,
occasionally marry two or three women in succession, if the first or second prove barren, or all the children born die, or from any other like cause or domestic difference. Many of the Teeyer also of that part of the country do, in some measure, follow the custom of the Nair ; but the Tcyctte (Teeyer women) of the remaining Tceyer there are notorious harlots, and become the con cubines of strangers of any caste or religion, and this without the least prejudice to their own caste, or any loss of esteem in society ; on the other hand, any such act proved against any females of the other castes, subjects the person to excom munication from caste, banishment from society, and all religious advantages. The Teeyer females of South Malabar do not, though, so readily as those of the north, yield themselves to this dis graceful practice. Owing to the very great number of castes, and the peculiar and different manners and customs in various parts of the country, the superficial inquiries of most foreigners have led them into error, and in their works they generally ascribe the same pernicious practices to all castes and parts of the country indiscrimi nately.' However, the Nair, Teeyer, and, indeed, all the other numerous castes of Malabar (including the Cochin and Travancore countries, these being indeed the most striking in this respect), are in some way or other in a greater or less degree of error ; and reformation therefore is indeed much needed among them all. It is, though, very lamentable to find them dormant in their original state of depression, and not seeking for reforma tion, rather growing blindly proud of their vain and different castes and privileges, and ready to run any risk, even that of hazarding their lives, only to preserve their castes.'-11fadras Lit. Soc. Journal, pp. 52-54 of 1859.