Rajput: Nikumbh

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This article was written in 1916 when conditions were different. Even in 1916 its contents related only to Central India and did not claim to be true of all of India. It has been archived for its historical value as well as for the insights it gives into British colonial writing about the various communities of India. Indpaedia neither agrees nor disagrees with the contents of this article. Readers who wish to add fresh information can create a Part II of this article. The general rule is that if we have nothing nice to say about communities other than our own it is best to say nothing at all. Readers will be able to edit existing articles and post new articles directly on their online archival encyclopædia only after its formal launch. See examples and a tutorial.

From The Tribes And Castes Of The Central Provinces Of India

By R. V. Russell

Of The Indian Civil Service

Superintendent Of Ethnography, Central Provinces

Assisted By Rai Bahadur Hira Lal, Extra Assistant Commissioner

Macmillan And Co., Limited, London, 1916.

NOTE 1: The 'Central Provinces' have since been renamed Madhya Pradesh.

NOTE 2: While reading please keep in mind that all articles in this series have been scanned from a book. During scanning some errors are bound to occur. Some letters get garbled. Footnotes get inserted into the main text of the article, interrupting the flow. Readers who spot errors might like to correct them, and shift footnotes gone astray to their rightful place.

Rajput:Nikumbh

The Nikumbh is given as one of the thirty-six royal races, but it is also the name of a branch of the Chauhans, and it seems that, as suggested by Sherring,^ it may be an offshoot from the great Chauhan clan. The Nikumbh are said to have been given the title of Sirnet by an emperor of Delhi, because they would not bow their heads on entering his presence, and when he fixed a sword at the door some of them allowed their necks to be cut through by the sword rather than bend the head. The term Sirnet is supposed to mean headless.

A Chauhan column with an inscription of Raja Bisal Deo was erected at Nigumbode, a place of pilgrimage on the Jumna, a few miles below Delhi, and it seems a possible conjecture that the Nikumbhs may have obtained their name from this place.* Mr. Crooke, however, takes the Nikumbh to be a separate clan. The foundation of most of the old forts and cities in Alwar and northern Jaipur is ascribed to them, and two of their inscriptions of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries have been discovered in Khandesh. In northern India some of them are now known as Raghuvansi.^ They are chiefly found in the Hoshangabad and Nimar Districts, and may be connected with the Raghuvansi or Raghwi caste of these Provinces.

1 See article on Kol. Nikumbh. 2 Eastern India, ii. 461, quoted in * Rdjasthdn, ii. p. 417. Mr. Crooke's art. Nagvansi. ^ Mr. Crooke's 'I'ribcs and Castes, 2 Tribes and Castes, vol. i. art. art. Nikumbh.