Hawaigar
Hawaigar
This section has been extracted from THE TRIBES and CASTES of BENGAL. Ethnographic Glossary. Printed at the Bengal Secretariat Press. 1891. . |
NOTE 1: 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.
NOTE 2: While reading please keep in mind that all posts in this series have been scanned from a very old book. Therefore, footnotes have got inserted into the main text of the article, interrupting the flow. Readers who spot scanning errors are requested to report the correct spelling to the Facebook page, Indpaedia.com. All information used will be gratefully acknowledged in your name.
A maker of fire¬works, always a Mahomedan, often called Golsaz, and in Behar Atash•baz. In Beogal the Hindu maIakar makes a few simple fire-works for weddings, but this is never his exclusive business.
The maker of fireworks, always a Muhammadan, is often called "Gol-saz," but the Persian title of "Atash-baz" is no longer in use. The Hindu Malakar does make a few simple fireworks for weddings, but this is never his exclusive trade.
In Dacca six or seven men are always employed in making fireworks, the most skilful having learned the art in Calcutta. The chief chemicals used by the native pyrotechnist are sulphur, chlorate of potash, nitrate of silver, saltpetre, sulphate of copper, nitrate of strontia, nitrate of baryta, and charcoal. The Hawai-gar is an adept in preparing blue, yellow, red, and green lights; but native crowds prefer seeing the noisy, and more dangerous, fireworks such as the sky-rocket (hawai), squib (murra), cracker (pataka), Catherine-wheel (charki), Kabutari, Tonta, do-damba, and Mahtabi.
