Kudumi
This article is an excerpt from Government Press, Madras |
Kudumi
Concerning the Kudumi medicine-men. I gather that “the Kudumi is a necessary adjunct to the village. His office implies a more or less intimate acquaintance with the curative herbs and roots in the forests, and their proper application to the different ailments resulting from venomous bites or stings. It is the Kudumi who procures leeches for the gouty Reddi or the phlegmatic Moodeliar, when he finds that some blood-letting will benefit their health. He prays over sprains and cricks, and binds the affected parts with the sacred cord made of the hair taken from the patient’s head. He is an expert practitioner at phlebotomy, and many old Anglo-Indians domiciled in the country will recall the Kudumi when his services were in demand to heal some troublesome limb by the letting of blood. This individual is believed to possess a magic influence over wild animals and snakes, and often comes out in public as a dexterous snake-charmer. It is principally in the case of poisonous bites that the Kudumi’s skill is displayed. It is partly by the application of medicinal leaves ground into a paste, and partly by exercising his magical powers, that he is believed to cure the most dangerous bites of snakes and other venomous animals.” The Kudumi often belongs to the Irula or Jōgi caste.
Kudumi
The kudumi is the tuft of hair, which is left when the head of Hindus is shaved. “For some time past,” Bishop Caldwell writes, “a considerable number of European missionaries in the Tamil country have come to regard the wearing of the tuft as a badge of Hinduism, and hence require the natives employed in their missions to cut off the kudumi as a sine quâ non of their retention of mission employment”. The kudumi, as the Bishop points out, would doubtless have been admired by our grandfathers, who wore a kudumi themselves, viz., the queue which followed the wig. “The Vellalas of the present day,” he continues, “almost invariably wear the kudumi, but they admit that their forefathers wore their hair long. Some of the Maravars wear the kudumi, and others do not. It makes a difference in their social position. The kudumi, which was originally a sign of Aryan nationality, and then of Aryan respectability, has come to be a sign of respectability in general, and hence, whilst the poorer Maravars generally wear their hair long, the wealthier members of the caste generally wear the kudumi. The Pallars in Tinnevelly used to wear their hair long, but most of them have recently adopted the kudumi, and the wearing of the kudumi is now spreading even among the Pariahs. In short, wherever higher notions of civilization, and a regard for appearances extend, the use of the kudumi seems to extend also”. Even a Toda has been known to visit the Nanjengōd temple at the base of the Nīlgiris, to pray for offspring, and return with a shaved head.
