4. Chauhan or Chaumana, 24 branches. The Hera of Harawti, the rajas of Kotah, Bondi, the Khichi of Ragughar, the Deora of Sirohi, the Sonagarba of Jhalore and Pawaicha of Paws ghar.
The unnamed progenitors of the four Agnicula tribes of Rajputs—the Chauhan, Chalukya, or Solunkee, Puar or Pramara, and the Parihara seem to have been invaders who sided with the Brahmans in their warfares, partly with the old Khatri, partly with increasing schismatics, and pray with invading Grmco-Bactrians, and whose warlike merit, as well as timely aid and subsequent conformity, got them enrolled as Fire-born,' in contradistinction to the Solar and Lunar families. The Aguicula are now mainly found in the tract of country extending from Ujjain to Rewah near Benares, and Mount Abu is asserted to be the place of their miraculous birth or appearance.
Colonel Ted was inclined to regard the Agni cula race as of Seythic origin, but Mr. Biphin stone (p. 229) points to the difference in their physical appearance and habits from the Rajputs.
The seat of the Pramara or Puar was amongst the Vindliya, at Ujjain, Dliar, and Mandu. Vikramaditya, the champion of Brahmanism, was, according to common accounts, a I'uar Rajput.
There are several races in Itajputana on whom the surrounding civilisation has made no apparent impression.
The Bhil, an aboriginal race, are entered as numbering 105,870. They are in clans under chiefs, inhabiting long stretches of wild and hilly tracts, where they live almost independent, hold ing together under their own petty chiefs and headmen, paying irregular tribute or rents to the chief of the state, or to the Rajput landowner upon whose estate they may be settled. There are also, of course, a good number of Mils, as of all other half-tamed tribes, who have mixed with the general population. Al the 1881 census they rose in rebellion on the attempt to number them; but their numbers have been supposed to be, in Udaipur, 51,076 ; Partabgarh, 270 ; Dungarpur, 66,952 ; Banswara, 48,045.
The Dade Panihi sect, who have their head quarters in Jeypore, have the armed Naga as one of their sections ; the Ram Sin'h sect prevails in Ulwar and Mewar, and have their headquarters at Shahpura.
Mair have been supposed to have at one time dwelt in the Upper Panjab and in the Indus valley, and they have been conjectured to be a relic of the Died, an Indo-Seythic tribe that crossed into India from Central Asia.
Mewat.—The fierce and turbulent mountaineers of Mewat, though their frontier was within 25 miles of Dehli, were never entirely quieted until the establishment of the British Government.
The Parihara Mina until recently carried out the destruction of their female infants. They traced the practice to an injunction of a woman who be came a sati, also to a curse of Mahadeva. To be a father-in-law is to ensure contempt, and he is looked upon by the bridegroom as an inferior. Their daughters are, however, eagerly sought after by the other tribes of Mina. They worship Siva as Mahadeo, whom they usually designate Baba Adam, father Adam. The Mina are un doubtedly aboriginals.
One of the Mina race puts the tika of investiture on the forehead of the Rajput raja of Nerwar. It is of blood drawn from the face of another Mina.
The tika of investiture put on the forehead of the rana of Udaipur is of the blood of a Bhil.
The Hinduized chiefs of Central India have the tike of investiture of the blood of a pure Kol ; and the head of the Cheri, formerly a great tribe, but now a few families, is invested with the blood tika of the non-Aryans and the title of raja.
Rajput women, even more so than the Musal Irani, are kept strictly concealed, termed gosha or pardah nashin, rarely appearing abroad, and even then, on tho necessity occurring, carefully veiled. A woman exposino. her face is understood to proclaim herself immoral. They are, as a rule, entirely uneducated ; but occasionally a queen or the wife of a Thakur may have a smattering of Hindi. Many of them drink spirituous liquors, and most of them indulge freely in tobacco and opium, the latter drug being given even to infants. They possess great influence over their husbands, and evince the deepest interest in all that redounds to their husband's name and fame. Family pride with them appears the chief motive of every action, and they are at all times ready to brave danger, even to sacrifice their lives, in support of it. This spirit has on occasions led to their affording examples of daring which have placed them as high in the songs of the bards as their fathers and husbands, but at others has led them into long-continued family quarrels, the wives being in constant dispute with each other.