Identifier: nativesofnorther00croo (find matches)
Title: Natives of northern India
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Crooke, William, 1848-1923
Subjects: Ethnology -- India India -- Social conditions India -- Description and travel
Publisher: London : A. Constable and Company, ltd.
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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To the north of the Peshawar valley lies a region as
yet imperfectly explored. It is a paradise to the
ethnologist, the one part of the borderland where

62 NATIVES OF NORTHERN INDIA

important discoveries will certainly be made when the
fierce tribes which now occupy it have been reduced to
order. It contains extensive Buddhist remains which
will throw light on the early history of that faith. Of
the Kafirs, for instance, among whom some survivals
of Greek culture have been recognised, we possess, in
spite of the researches of Dr. Leitner and Sir G.
Robertson, only imperfect knowledge. In this wild
region there are, says Mr. Oliver, societies given to
drinking wine and making merry, who lay down
cellars of clarified butter, and do not consider it ripe
till it has acquired the deep red of a century's keeping ;
with whom dancing is for both sexes the national
amusement, and polo the national game; who still
practise the ordeal of fire; and are quite free from
jealousy regarding the honour of their women. But
this borderland lies beyond the limits of this sketch.

No, 7
Text Appearing After Image:

A PANKA, DRAVIDIAN WEAVER, SOUTHERN HILLS (P.136)

CHAPTER IV

THE TRIBES OF THE SOUTHERN HILLS

Kolis: Bhils: Gonds. Status of the hill tribes. Conver-
sion to Hinduism. Oraons : Kols : Mundas : Paharias :
Santals.

In the Dravidian area, including the forest region of
Northern Bombay, the Central India Agency, the
Central Provinces, and the hilly tracts of the United
Provinces, and Bengal, the condition of things is very
different from that of the Himalayan region. The
hills are much lower and more accessible, and the
tribes nowhere display that degree of savagery and
independence which characterises the Nagas or
Pathans.
From the Gulf of Cambay on the west to that point
in the Bengal delta where the hill-country projects
into the valley of the Ganges, we have at least three
groups, which, though geographically distinct, are of a
fairly uniform ethnological type—Kolis and Bhils to
the west; Gonds, Korkus, and Baigas in the centre ;
to the east, Oraons, Mundas, and Santals.

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