_Taonla_.--A small non-Aryan caste of the Uriya States. They reside
principally in Bamra and Sonpur, and numbered about 2000 persons in
1901, but since the transfer of these States to Bengal are not found
in the Central Provinces. The name is said to be derived from Talmul,
a village in the Angul District of Orissa, and they came to Bamra
and Sonpur during the Orissa famine of 1866. The Taonlas appear to
be a low occupational caste of mixed origin, but derived principally
from the Khond tribe. Formerly their profession was military service,
and it is probable that like the Khandaits and Paiks they formed the
levies of some of the Uriya Rajas, and gradually became a caste. They
have three subdivisions, of which the first consists of the Taonlas
whose ancestors were soldiers. These consider themselves superior to
the others, and their family names as Naik (leader), Padhan (chief),
Khandait (swordsman), and Behra (master of the kitchen) indicate
their ancestral profession. The other subcastes are called Dangua and
Khond; the Danguas, who are hill-dwellers, are more primitive than the
military Taonlas, and the Khonds are apparently members of that tribe
of comparatively pure descent who marry among themselves and not with
other Taonlas. In Orissa Dr. Hunter says that the Taonlas are allied
to the Savaras, and that they will admit a member of any caste, from
whose hands they can take water, into the community. This is also the
case in Bamra. The candidate has simply to worship Kalapat, the god
of the Taonlas, and after drinking some water in which basil leaves
have been dipped, to touch the food prepared for a caste feast, and
his initiation is complete. As usual among the mixed castes, female
morality is very lax, and a Taonla woman may have a _liaison_ with a
man of her own or any other caste from whom a Taonla can take water
without incurring any penalty whatsoever. A man committing a similar
offence must give a feast to the caste. In Sonpur the Taonlas admit a
close connection with Chasas, and say that some of their families are
descended from the union of Chasa men and Taonla women. They will eat
the leavings of Chasas. The custom may be accounted for by the fact
that the Taonlas are now generally farmservants and field-labourers,
and the Chasas, as cultivators, would be their employers. A similar
close connection is observable among other castes standing in the
same position towards each other as the Panwars and Gonds and the
Rajbhars and Lodhis.
The Taonlas have no exogamous divisions as they all belong to the
same _gotra_, that of the Nag or cobra. Their marriages are therefore
regulated by relationship in the ordinary manner. If two families
find that they have no common ancestor up to the third generation they
consider it lawful to intermarry. The marriage ritual is of the usual
Uriya form. After the marriage the bride and the bridegroom have a
ceremony of throwing a mahua branch into a river together. Divorce and
widow remarriage are permitted. When a woman is divorced she returns
her bangles to her husband, and receives from him a _chhor-chitthi_ or
letter severing connection. Then she goes before the caste _panchayat_
and pronounces her husband's name aloud. This shows that she is no
longer his wife, since so long as she continued to be so, she would
never mention his name.
The tutelary deity of the caste is Kalapat, who resides at Talmul in
Angul District. They offer him a goat at the festival of Nawakhai
when the new rice is first eaten. On this day they also worship a
cattle-goad as the symbol of their vocation. They revere the cobra,
and will not wear wooden sandals because they think that the marks on
a cobra's head are in the form of a sandal. They believe in re-birth,
and when a child is born they proceed to ascertain what ancestor has
become reincarnate by dropping rice grains coloured with turmeric
into a pot of water. As each one is dropped they repeat the name of
an ancestor, and when the first grain floats conclude that the one
named has been born again. The dead are both buried and burnt. At
the head of a grave they plant a bough of the _jamun_ tree (_Eugenia
jambolana_) so that the departed spirit may dwell under this cool
and shady tree in the other world or in his next birth. They have
also a ceremony for bringing back the soul. An earthen pot is placed
upside down on four legs outside the village, and on the eleventh day
after a death they proceed to the place, ringing a bell suspended to
an iron rod. A cloth is spread before the spot on which the spirit
of the deceased is supposed to be sitting, and they wait till an
insect alights on it. This is taken to be the soul of the dead
person, and it is carefully wrapped up in the cloth and carried to
the house. There the cloth is unfolded and the insect allowed to go,
while they proceed to inspect some rice-flour which has been spread
on the ground under another pot in the house. If any mark is found
on the surface of the flour they think that the dead man's spirit
has returned to the house. The carrying back of the insect is thus
an act calculated to assist their belief, by the simple performance
of which they are able to suppose more easily that the invisible
spirit has returned to the house. As already stated, the Taonlas are
now generally farmservants and labourers, and their social position
is low, though they rank above the impure castes and the forest tribes.