The Koltas have both family names or gotras and exogamous sections or
bargas. The gotras are generally named after animals or other objects,
as Dip (lamp), Bachhas (calf), Hasti (elephant), Bharadwaj (blue-jay),
and so on. Members of the Bachhas gotra must not yoke a young bullock
to the plough for the first time, but must get this done by somebody
else. The names of the bargas are generally derived from villages or
from offices or titles. In one or two cases they show the admission of
members of other castes; thus the Rawat barga are the descendants of a
Rawat (herdsman) who was in the service of the Raja of Sambalpur. The
Raja had brought him up from infancy, and, wishing to make him a Kolta,
married him to a Kolta girl, despite the protests of the caste. The
ancestor of the Hinmiya Bhoi barga had a mistress of the Khond tribe,
who left him some property, and is still worshipped in the family. The
number of gotras is smaller than that of the bargas, and some gotras,
as the Nag or cobra, the tortoise and the pipal tree, are common to
many bargas. Marriage is forbidden between members of the same barga,
and between first cousins on the father's side. To have the same
gotra is no bar to marriage.