Blue-eyed Brahmins: Who are they?
Sam Chandra
neighborhood. There was only one other Indian family around us and
they did not look Indian at all; because in addition to being light
skinned, most of them had blue or green eyes! Not only that, most of
their relatives who visited them from India or from elsewhere in the
US had green/blue/hazel eyes. Incidently, their last name was Kelkar.
We have lost touch with the Kelkars after they moved to California
about eight years ago.
I remember about 12 years ago, when we first met them; my father asked
them if they had English blood in their family; and Mr. Kelkar got a
little angry. After my father apologized, Mr Kelkar explained to us
that colored eyes is a common trait of their caste.
My girlfriend was born in Puna (western India) and came to this
country when she was 3. Her mom tells me that there is caste of Brahmins
called "Chittapawan" in western India who speak Marathi, and seemingly
1/3 rd of them have blue or green eyes. Kelkar apparently is a last name
from that community.
Although many of my Punjabi, Kashmiri and even Bengali friends are
very light skinned, I have never seen such a high % of blue or green
eyes among any other community of Indians (or Italians and Jews for
that matter).
Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the spelling is
incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some light on this phenomenon?
NOTE: I do not believe that color of one's skin or eyes says anything
about a person. My interest is only from an anthropological perspective.
Samir Chandra
Sivasankar Chander
: ... there is caste of Brahmins
: called "Chittapawan" in western India who speak Marathi, and seemingly
: 1/3 rd of them have blue or green eyes.
: Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the spelling is
: incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some light on this phenomenon?
Konkanasth Brahmins often have blue-green and blue-grey eyes, but it is
not unique to Maharashtrian Brahmins. Many South Indian Brahmins, especially
from Thanjavur and South Arcot districts of Tamil Nadu, have blue and blue-
grey eyes. Of course, they may have migrated there many centuries ago from
the Konkan region.
Also, there are some hill tribes with *clear* blue eyes (with complexion
ranging all the way from very fair to very dark). Analysis of their DNA may
yield some interesting anthropological results. They were probably the
original native inhabitants of India.
None of the above need be misconstrued as racist flame bait. I am merely
making some factual observations and conjectures.
Sivasankar Chander
"I speak for myself, not for my employer(s)"
Sameer A. Nene
My girlfriend was born in Puna (western India) and came to this
Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the spelling is
incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some light on this phenomenon?
Yes. I am one, although I am not quite sure of the anthropological reasons for
this phenomenon. BTW, the correct spelling is Pune (pronounced Poonay). The
British spelling was Poona.
Sameer.
--
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Sameer A. Nene | Home: (212) 864-5125 |
| Vision Lab | Office: (212) 939-7089 |
| Columbia University | Email: sam...@cs.columbia.edu |
| New York, NY | WWW: http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~sameer |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Camilla Cracchiolo
: Although many of my Punjabi, Kashmiri and even Bengali friends are
: very light skinned, I have never seen such a high % of blue or green
: eyes among any other community of Indians (or Italians and Jews for
: that matter).
I'm not qualified to comment on the Indian persons in question, but
blue eyed (and blonde haired) Italians are very common in the north
of Italy, and even as far south as Rome.
I have also met Jewish people whose ancestors were from northern
Europe who had blue eyes and light hair, although I do think blue
eyed Jewish people are somewhat more rare than blue eyed Italians.
.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Camilla Cracchiolo, RN cam...@netcom.com Los Angeles, CA
Shrine of the Cybernetic Madonna BBS 213-766-1356
"The BBS for the information addict!"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Ashutosh Joglekar
> In article <Csu2I...@lehman.com> scha...@stern.nyu.edu (Sam
Chandra) writes:
>> Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the
>>spelling is incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some
>>light on this phenomenon?
> Yes. I am one, although I am not quite sure of the
> anthropological reasons for this phenomenon.
> BTW, the correct spelling is Pune (pronounced Poonay). The
> British spelling was Poona.
>
> Sameer.
I am pretty sure there's lots of Kobra's on the net. Chittapawans
are known as Konkanastha (since they are usually from the Konkan)
and as Chittapavans. The name Chittapavan means "Chitta + Pavan".
Kobra's came to the Konkan a very long time ago. They were origi-
nally not accepted by the "natives" as Hindu's, although over
time ( I dunno how ) they began to be considered as Brahmins.
I am pretty sure there's lots of Kobra's on the net. Chittapawans
are known as Konkanastha (since they are usually from the Konkan)
and as Chittapavans. The name Chittapavan means "Chitta + Pavan".
Kobra's came to the Konkan a very long time ago. They were origi-
nally not accepted by the "natives" as Hindu's, although over
time ( I dunno how ) they began to be considered as Brahmins.
Even so, they didn't mix very well with the other communities.
It so happened once that there was a very big shortage of nubile
women amongst the Konkanastha's and they were forced to approach
the other communities to allow inter-caste ( or rather inter-
sub-caste, since the other communities were also Brahmin ) mar-
riages. The condition laid down by the other community was that
the Kobra's would have to adopt the family diety of the family
they married into ( or rather from, since the girl went to live
with the husband :-) ). The Kobra's vowed to do so over a fun-
eral pyre ( chita ) and hence were considered "pavan" after their
vow. Hence the name "chittapavan".
I guess this also accounts for the fact that only a third of Ko-
bras still have the very fair skin and light eyes that character-
ise the community.
As to their origins, I have often heard theories that suggest
that Kobras are one of the lost tribes of Israel. Moses set out
with 15(?) tribes, 11 stayed with him, the other 4(?) wanderered
off. Over the years, Israeli anthropologists/historians have
found remnants of 2(?) of these lost tribes. Sometime in the
late 50's a Israeli researcher got a Ph.D trying to prove that
Kobras were one of the other lost tribes. She detected similari-
ties in things as varied as skull measurements, cultural traits
and the Chittapavani and Hebrew languages.
BTW, the Chittapavani language is practically dead now.
Examples of famous Chittapavans would be the Peshwa's, Gopal
Krishna Gokhale, Agarkar, Dhondo Keshav Karve. Also, Ashvini
Bhave, Archana Joglekar, Nitin Bharadwaj.
--
<ashu...@panix.com> aka Ashutosh Joglekar
David Shtemberg
>
>I'm not qualified to comment on the Indian persons in question, but
>blue eyed (and blonde haired) Italians are very common in the north
>of Italy, and even as far south as Rome.
>
I think the original poster was referring to Italian-Americans, majority
of whose ancestors came from southern Italy, and are much swarthier
than the Northern Italians.
>I have also met Jewish people whose ancestors were from northern
>Europe who had blue eyes and light hair, although I do think blue
>eyed Jewish people are somewhat more rare than blue eyed Italians.
Jewish people are originally from middle east. Some Jewish people
(including my family) have north-European looks because we inter-married
with the Europeans. But it is incorrect to say that our "ancestors" came
from northern Europe.
David Shtemberg
Paul J. Gans
: I'm not qualified to comment on the Indian persons in question, but
: blue eyed (and blonde haired) Italians are very common in the north
: of Italy, and even as far south as Rome.
Possibly because the Lombards, a germanic tribe (related to the
Norse, et. al.) settled heavily in the area. In any case northern
Italy has been the subject of *countless* comings and goings of a
variety of germanic peoples.
---- Paul J. Gans [ga...@scholar.chem.nyu.edu]
Robin and Ennien Ashbrook
culture or anthropological background, but am an avid cook :) I have
several cookbooks on East Indian cookery, which go into some details
about Brahmin caste customs. Many of them (according to the Brahmin
authors of these cookbooks :) ) are in honour of their Aryan ancestors.
I have read and been told about this many times before, and it's always
had me wondering if there were any connection between the Brahmin Aryan
ancestors and the Aryans Hitler hyped up (blond hair, blue eyed, etc).
If so, this could explain the blue and green eyed Brahmins.
On the note of blue-eyed Italians, I worked for such a lady once. She
told me that the blue eye genes came from a time when the Romans imported
Scandinavian slave girls. Whether this is true or not is entirely open
to debate.
-==- Ennien
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
| Ennein & Robin Ashbrook | |
| Internet: Gala...@Debug.cuc.ab.ca | " To each, their own. " |
| UUCP: calgary!debug!galatia.9 | |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Prem!
|> My girlfriend was born in Puna (western India) and came to this country
|> when she was 3. Her mom tells me that there is caste of Brahmins called
|> "Chittapawan" in western India who speak Marathi, and seemingly 1/3 rd of
|> them have blue or green eyes. Kelkar apparently is a last name from that
|> community.
|>
|> incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some light on this phenomenon?
I am not a chitpawan brahmin, but a large number of my relatives on my
mother's side (including my mother herself) have blue/green eyes.
The blue/green trait has been traced back along that line to the age of
the Peshwas, who were in (surprise!) Pune. Though my family's history
has been traced back continuously and conclusively through about seven
centuries, the earliest known _male_ instance of this in our family is
Dewan Jwalapati Shastri, who was the "Pradhan" of Peshwa Baji Rao I's
durbar. His father was brown eyed, and his mother was the (green/blue
eyed) daughter of Vittalrao, a Maratha minister from Ratnagiri who was
most likely a Chitpawan, since he was related to Peshwa Bajirao's father.
Balaji Viswanath Bhat was appointed a Peshwa in 1714 by Shivaji's
grandson Shahuji, and it is _confirmed_ that B.V. Bhat was a Chitpawan
brahman. No record exists of the lineage of Dewan Jwalapati's mother,
which could have shed some light on the source of this trait.
Dewan Vittalrao
(related to Peshwa Balaji Viswanath)
(Vijayanagar and Hoysala) (Bhat who was a Chitpawan brahman )
(all brown eyed ancestry) |
Dewan Suryanarayana Shastri Ratnabai (green eyed)
| |
------------------------
|
Jwalapati Shastri (green eyed)
|
(some green eyed descendants to this day)
One of Dewan Jwalapati's brothers was Dewan Ugrappa, also a mantri, and
he and his entire lineage is 100% brown eyed to this day. There have
been some instances of marriage with blue/green eyed locals in a couple
of generations preceding Dewan Jwalapathi, but none of these seem to
have produced any blue/green eyed male heirs until D.J. himself. Dewan
Jwalapati and Dewan Ugrappa migrated to Karnataka after the defeat of
the Peshwas in Panipat (1761). Most of their descendants are now
settled in Bangalore and Mysore.
Peshwa Baji Rao II was later defeated by the Holkars of Indore in 1802,
and forced (under threat of annexation) into the treaty of Bassein with
the British. Approximately 15 years after that, he was deposed by the
British in 1818. Baji Rao II, the last Chitpawan ruler of Pune died
in 1853. Since my family's history had little to do with the Peshwas
after Panipat/1761, I do not know much about what happened after that.
Prem!
ps. In case you are wondering, I get my eyes from my dad's side of the
family, where there is NO recorded instance (in the last 400 years)
of green eyes, except perhaps during times of intense jealousy. :-)
Manohar Karmarkar
>
>Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the spelling is
>incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some light on this phenomenon?
>
>
Yep, there is one right here! A Chittapaawan (aka Konkanastha),
complete with green eyes, brown hair, and freckles. The term for
people like us in Marathi is Ghaare-Gore (green eyed and light
skinned).
Around 15th century, when my ancestors crossed the mountain and came
to Maharashtra from Konkan, they were not considered Hindus, let alone
Brahmins. They did, however, rise through the social strata and attain
Brahmin-hood. But the price they paid for this social promotion was that
they had to marry with other Marathi Brahmins; and therefore
now only about a third of us look Caucasian. They reached the highest
social status when the Peshawas - themselves chittapawans - took over
and extended their empire upto "Atak" near Peshawar. Peshawas were the
first Brahmins to take arms and rule over a large kingdom.
I must warn you of one thing though; only about a third of us have this
look. Last 3-4 of generations have seen another wave of inter-marriages
(which is good) and since colored eyes is a recessive gene, there are
fewer and fewer of us "Ghaare-gore"s.
My fiancee is a Parsee, and her whole family is very light skinned.
However, there is no one in her extended family who has blue eyes.
Obviously, we are not of the same stock as the Parsees, the Punjabis,
or the Kashmiris.
The freedom movement produced many revolutionaries from the Chittapawan
community. Some of the more famous ones are Tilak, Savarkar, Gokhale,
Rajguru, Ranade, Bhave, Agarkar, Chafekar, Kanhere and Godse (Just
kidding about the last one (-: )
Many of the pioneers in India have been Chittapawans. The first
Indians to start the movie, textile, Plastic, Circus industries were
Chittapawans.
Chittapawan girls have always been Bollywood starlets. Today there
are the likes of Madhuri Dixit, Ashwini Bhave, Bhagyashree and Archana
Joglekar.
Manohar Karmarkar
P.S. If any one wants, Khurshid (my fiancee) and I can start a thread
on how it is to live in the US as proud Indians (and a practicing
Hindu in my case) while looking white.
MK
Praveen Murthy
are. It might be interesting to note that blue/green, or generally, non-
black eyes are not considered desireable traits in Mysore at least.
I recall my relatives breathing a huge sigh of relief when my blue-eyed
cousin produced a brown-eyed kid :-).
Praveen
sha...@himachal.rchland.ibm.com
have had to flee Kashmir because of Muslim persecution (the more recent
exodus is not all that new). I know this trait is quite common among
them (one of my grandparents who was half Kashmiri/half Dogra had blue
eyes). It is possible that some of these Marathi Brahmins are
related/descendants of these Kashmiries. Also in Punjab/Himachal/Jammu
(where I am from), one usually comes across a few people
with blue/light eyes and light hair (not just Brahmins). Incidentally,
I think the occurrence of these features increases somewhat as you
go towards the northwest. Among Pathans (who sometimes also claim to
be descended from the lost tribes of Israel or the descendents of
Alexander the Great's army --anything to deny that they were
once 'dhoti' wearing Hindus or Buddhits ;-)) the incidence of these
features is probably higher than the Panjabies to the east. One group in
Afghanistan, the Nuristanis have an extremely high incidence of
light eyes/hair (35-40% ?). BTW, I am told that the Nuristani's
language has a large number of pure Sanskrit words. Also they were
'pagans' until late last century when they were forcibly converted to
Islam. My opinion is that these groups like the Nuristanis and Kailash
(another group in Pakistan --who incidentally are also undergoing
'Islamification') are probably isolated groups of Aryans who have
developed their own distinct culture over the past 4-5000 years.
In article <30492h$b...@overload.lbl.gov>, pr...@prem.lbl.gov (Prem!) writes:
|> scha...@stern.nyu.edu (Sam Chandra) writes:
|> |> My girlfriend was born in Puna (western India) and came to this country
|> |> when she was 3. Her mom tells me that there is caste of Brahmins called
|> |> "Chittapawan" in western India who speak Marathi, and seemingly 1/3 rd of
|> |> them have blue or green eyes. Kelkar apparently is a last name from that
|> |> community.
|> |>
|> |> Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the spelling is
|> |> incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some light on this phenomenon?
|> |> Samir Chandra
|>
|> I am not a chitpawan brahmin, but a large number of my relatives on my
|> mother's side (including my mother herself) have blue/green eyes.
|>
|> The blue/green trait has been traced back along that line to the age of
|> the Peshwas, who were in (surprise!) Pune. Though my family's history
|> has been traced back continuously and conclusively through about seven
|> centuries, the earliest known _male_ instance of this in our family is
|> Dewan Jwalapati Shastri, who was the "Pradhan" of Peshwa Baji Rao I's
|> durbar. His father was brown eyed, and his mother was the (green/blue
|> eyed) daughter of Vittalrao, a Maratha minister from Ratnagiri who was
|> most likely a Chitpawan, since he was related to Peshwa Bajirao's father.
|> Balaji Viswanath Bhat was appointed a Peshwa in 1714 by Shivaji's
|> grandson Shahuji, and it is _confirmed_ that B.V. Bhat was a Chitpawan
Bhat is also a Kashmiri name.
M. R. Sridhar
Sridhar.
--
Sunit Gala
[genealogical history deleted]
pretty cool! thanks for sharing that with us.
cheers,
sunit.
--
Sunit Gala e-mail: unisql!su...@cs.utexas.edu
UniSQL, Inc. work: 512-343-7372, ext. 115
9390 Research Blvd. mesg: 512-343-7297
Austin, TX 78759 home: 512-795-9871
Richard Ottolini
13th century, including a fair number of east Europeans.
Richard M. Alderson III
(M. R. Sridhar) writes:
>What is Boston-Brahmin? Does a word like this exist?
The so-called "Boston Brahmins" were the leading families among the old wealth-
defined society. The idea was that they defined proper culture by their own
actions.
Although Boston had no official caste system, the parallels were obvious to the
educated and thus the term arose.
--
Rich Alderson You know the sort of thing that you can find in any dictionary
of a strange language, and which so excites the amateur philo-
logists, itching to derive one tongue from another that they
know better: a word that is nearly the same in form and meaning
as the corresponding word in English, or Latin, or Hebrew, or
what not.
--J. R. R. Tolkien,
alde...@netcom.com _The Notion Club Papers_
Sunit Gala
[...]
>Around 15th century, when my ancestors crossed the mountain and came
>to Maharashtra from Konkan, they were not considered Hindus, let alone
but how did your ancestors get to the konkan in the first place? are
your origins from shores outside of india, or are you indigenous
people living there for ever?
just curious.
Jaidip Singh
>
>Yep, there is one right here! A Chittapaawan (aka Konkanastha),
>complete with green eyes, brown hair, and freckles. The term for
>people like us in Marathi is Ghaare-Gore (green eyed and light
>skinned).
>
>Around 15th century, when my ancestors crossed the mountain and came
>to Maharashtra from Konkan, they were not considered Hindus, let alone
>Brahmins. They did, however, rise through the social strata and attain
>Brahmin-hood. But the price they paid for this social promotion was that
>they had to marry with other Marathi Brahmins; and therefore
>now only about a third of us look Caucasian. They reached the highest
What a tragic price to pay. Genes got diluted by inferior genes eh?
>social status when the Peshawas - themselves chittapawans - took over
>and extended their empire upto "Atak" near Peshawar.
Really? Attock. Did you read that in an Institute for Rewriting History
publication? I've heard it is based in Pune.
>
>
>My fiancee is a Parsee, and her whole family is very light skinned.
>However, there is no one in her extended family who has blue eyes.
>Obviously, we are not of the same stock as the Parsees, the Punjabis,
>or the Kashmiris.
>
Obviously.
>The freedom movement produced many revolutionaries from the Chittapawan
>
>Manohar Karmarkar
>
>P.S. If any one wants, Khurshid (my fiancee) and I can start a thread
>on how it is to live in the US as proud Indians (and a practicing
>Hindu in my case) while looking white.
>
Since your fiance is the one who thinks that Muslims and Sikhs
(collectively) brought Hindu wrath (perfectly justified) upon
their heads, please tell us about the burning alive of a few
dozen Chitpavans, after Godse killed M.K. Gandhi. Tell us about
how Baji Rao I was virtually ostracized by his community for
replacing his wife with a Muslim girlfriend, and for eating
meat while on campaign. Tell us about how the said girfriend fell
or was pushed to her death after Baji Rao died. Tell us about how the
proud Peshwas disdained an alliance with the low-caste Suraj Mal Jat
and how this led directly to their brilliant battlefield
performance at Panipat. Tell us why their best general at Panipat
was relegated to a lowly role. Couldn't have been because he was
a Muslim.
--Jaidip, green eyed, obviously superior, PROUD Indian
Abhay Ghaisas
No, no flames.
I just want to add some information.
|> Yep, there is one right here! A Chittapaawan (aka Konkanastha),
|> complete with green eyes, brown hair, and freckles. The term for
|> people like us in Marathi is Ghaare-Gore (green eyed and light
|> skinned).
|>
|> Around 15th century, when my ancestors crossed the mountain and came
|> to Maharashtra from Konkan, they were not considered Hindus, let alone
|> Brahmins. They did, however, rise through the social strata and attain
|> Brahmin-hood. But the price they paid for this social promotion was that
I don't think so. There were hardly any marriages between Brahmin subcastes in
those days.
|> they had to marry with other Marathi Brahmins; and therefore
|> now only about a third of us look Caucasian. They reached the highest
|> social status when the Peshawas - themselves chittapawans - took over
|> and extended their empire upto "Atak" near Peshawar. Peshawas were the
|> first Brahmins to take arms and rule over a large kingdom.
Well, about "Atak", let me clarify that the empire of Peshwas never extended
till that. It was only that the cavalary of Peshwas headed by "Ragunathrao"
went till "Atak" while persuing the Persian pillagers.
|>
|> I must warn you of one thing though; only about a third of us have this
|> look. Last 3-4 of generations have seen another wave of inter-marriages
|> (which is good) and since colored eyes is a recessive gene, there are
|> fewer and fewer of us "Ghaare-gore"s.
|>
|> My fiancee is a Parsee, and her whole family is very light skinned.
|> However, there is no one in her extended family who has blue eyes.
|> Obviously, we are not of the same stock as the Parsees, the Punjabis,
|> or the Kashmiris.
|>
|> The freedom movement produced many revolutionaries from the Chittapawan
|> community. Some of the more famous ones are Tilak, Savarkar, Gokhale,
|> Rajguru, Ranade, Bhave, Agarkar, Chafekar, Kanhere and Godse (Just
|> kidding about the last one (-: )
Not to forget "Vasudeo Balavant Phadake", the first revolutionary. And in
social reformers, how can one forget "Dhondo Keshav Karve".
Just to add up some great people in field of education, Bhandarkar, N. C. Kelkar,
Chiplunkar and R. P. Paranjapye ( First Indian senior wrangler at Cambridge ).
|>
|> Many of the pioneers in India have been Chittapawans. The first
|> Indians to start the movie, textile, Plastic, Circus industries were
|> Chittapawans.
|>
|> Chittapawan girls have always been Bollywood starlets. Today there
|> are the likes of Madhuri Dixit, Ashwini Bhave, Bhagyashree and Archana
|> Joglekar.
|>
|> Manohar Karmarkar
|>
|> P.S. If any one wants, Khurshid (my fiancee) and I can start a thread
|> on how it is to live in the US as proud Indians (and a practicing
|> Hindu in my case) while looking white.
|>
|> MK
|>
Abhay.
Abhay Ghaisas
|> Manohar Karmarkar (mkar...@fit.edu) wrote:
|> : >Examples of famous Chittapavans would be the Peshwa's, Gopal
|> : >Krishna Gokhale, Agarkar, Dhondo Keshav Karve.
|>
|> : You also forgot Veer Sawarkar.
|>
|> I think Tilak was a Karhada, not a Koknasta.
Nope, he was a Kokanastha. (Born in Ratnagiri Dist.)
|>
|> --
|> <ashu...@panix.com> aka Ashutosh Joglekar
Abhay.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Abhay A. Ghaisas | Motorola India,
ab...@hpux4.miel.mot.com | Bangalore, Karnataka, India.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
One who doesn't become a communist when young has no heart,
But one who doesn't go away from it later has no brains.
- Yashwantrao Chavan
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sunit Gala
>-Though my family's history has been traced back continuously and
>-conclusively through about seven centuries,.....
>
> < Impressive history deleted >
>
>-Prem!
>
> Uncommon though green eyes are in India, even rarer are people
> with a traceable record of lineage. Prem! must consider
> himself a fortunate exception.
absolutely! perhaps others who know would like to share their
genealogical history with us.
> This is astonishing if you think about it. For a country
> with such a long and rich history, most Indians have no
> awareness of it, either national or personal. Why is that ?
beats me. i can only go back 5 generations. we turned from farmers
into traders into industrialists into professionals, and in my case,
soon to be gainfully unemployed.
Satish Y Deodhar
the Deodhar trophy for one-day matches is named. Of course, he was much
famous before independence and was unfortunate enough not to represent India
on many occasions because in those days, men from the royal houses of the
princly states were always favoured for the team to play against the british.
Prof. Deodhar, making a humble beginning as a teacher, had to make up for that
by playing exceedingly well.
The present day sundries include politicians vitthal Gadgil, Vasant Sathe.
the recent name that appeared in the news was of Karmarkar, who developed a
new method of solving simplex/transportation problem in 1/50 th of the time
required by the traditional method.
Satish Y Deodhar
histories. They publish what they call, "LAST NAME- Kula-wruttanta", and it isupdated i think every 10-15 years. it is quite an interesting reading.
Satish Y. Deodhar
bal...@karuna.tcs.com
> One theory that I heard about how Cobras got their 'gharey-doley' is that
> they have partly Jewish ancestry. Several centuries ago (I forgot how many)
> these Jews landed on the West coast due to shipwrecks and assimilated
> locally. The term 'Cobra' is short for 'Konkanastha Brahman'.
>
According to my sources, the jews who landed near Ratnagiri maintained
their traditions and religion. They adopted certain Indian customs, and like
the Parsis they have lived in a more or less insulated society of their own.
They are the Bene Israelis. Most of them emigrated to Israel after 1948.
Bene Israelis claim they do not have native blood in them. The jews further
south of Ratnagiri (between Mangalore and Kochi) are converts and jews
of mixed blood. So it is unlikely that Kobras have jewish blood in them.
Also, it is only a theory that the Bene Israelis landed near Ratnagiri due to
a shipwreck in the 2 century AD. There is at least one other theory that maintains that the middle-eastern jews who had trading links with the people
on the Malabar coast liked the place so much that many of them decided to stay
back there. (A fascinating book that touches upon this subject is Amitav
Ghosh's, 'In an Antique Land'.)
> Cheers,
> Devesh
Raghu Seshadri
-have long traceable histories and whenever they visit places
-like Beanres each village has a priest in Benares and Puri
-where they record all the births and deaths.
This is good to know.
-My granddad could trace his lineage quite far back
-and supposedly we are direct descendents of a Baba Faraya
-though when this baba/fakir lived I have no idea and since
-he is dead the family history is lost.
This is sad. How come no one nowadays is interested
in keeping their history alive ? Once lost, it can
never be regained, you know.
RS
Richard M. Alderson III
(Robin and Ennien Ashbrook) writes:
>I was giving a little thought to this. I am no authority on Hindi culture or
>anthropological background, but am an avid cook :) I have several cookbooks
>on East Indian cookery, which go into some details about Brahmin caste
>customs. Many of them (according to the Brahmin authors of these cookbooks :)
>) are in honour of their Aryan ancestors. I have read and been told about
>this many times before, and it's always had me wondering if there were any
>connection between the Brahmin Aryan ancestors and the Aryans Hitler hyped up
>(blond hair, blue eyed, etc). If so, this could explain the blue and green
>eyed Brahmins.
The connection is there, but it's not a nice one.
During the 19th century, it was as common to call the related languages of
India and Europe "Aryan" as "Indo-European." This combined with certain racial
views of the time to eventually lead to the Nazi version of the "Aryan hero
race" via Nietzsche and Theosophical writings of the 19th century.
The blue-eyed Brahmins are unrelated to the Nazis' racist fantasies.
>On the note of blue-eyed Italians, I worked for such a lady once. She told me
>that the blue eye genes came from a time when the Romans imported Scandinavian
>slave girls. Whether this is true or not is entirely open to debate.
The Germanic slave girls in Rome probably came from a lot closer than Scandina-
via; besides, there were blue-eyed Celts in Rome before ever they got involved
with the Germanic peoples.
There's also the little matter of the Goths and Alans overrunning Italy in the
5th century CE, the Normans conquering it in the 12th century or thereabouts,
and the Austrians keeping it for themselves for a while as well.
It probably made your employer happy to believe that her blue eyes went back to
the time of the Caesars, but they are much more likely to be the result of some
Austrian landlord's _droit du seigneur_...
Richard M. Alderson III
sha...@himachal.rchland.ibm.com () writes:
>BTW, I am told that the Nuristani's language has a large number of pure
>Sanskrit words. Also they were 'pagans' until late last century when they were
>forcibly converted to Islam. My opinion is that these groups like the
>Nuristanis and Kailash (another group in Pakistan --who incidentally are also
>undergoing 'Islamification') are probably isolated groups of Aryans who have
>developed their own distinct culture over the past 4-5000 years.
There are no "pure Sanskrit words" in the Nuristani languages, any more than
there are "pure Latin words" in modern French or Spanish. Fewer, because
French and Spanish have borrowed Latin words back in (for technical terms and
the like), while the Nuristani languages were never in a position to borrow
from Sanskrit.
The Nuristani languages (of which there are a dozen or more) are spoken by
small groups in the Afghan highlands. They were described by Morgenstierne
around the turn of the century, shortly after the mass conversion to Islam.
What he discovered there was the remnants of a primitive religion similar to
that in the very earliest Vedic and Gathic texts, with some of the same gods
(Indra in particular); unfortunately, the old people who remembered the tales
were dying off, and the young people were now good Moslems and actively
uninterested in learning them.
The Nuristani languages are a third branch of the Indo-Iranian family of
Indo-European languages, related neither more closely to the Indic nor to the
Iranian branch.
Arvind Nair
In article <aldersonC...@netcom.com>, alde...@netcom.com (Richard M. Alderson III) writes:
|> In article <304st1$1i...@locutus.rchland.ibm.com>
|> sha...@himachal.rchland.ibm.com () writes:
|>
|> >BTW, I am told that the Nuristani's language has a large number of pure
|> >Sanskrit words. Also they were 'pagans' until late last century when they were
|> >forcibly converted to Islam. My opinion is that these groups like the
|> >Nuristanis and Kailash (another group in Pakistan --who incidentally are also
|> >undergoing 'Islamification') are probably isolated groups of Aryans who have
|> >developed their own distinct culture over the past 4-5000 years.
|>
I thought the Nuristanis were supposed to be descendants
of the Bactrians, who have survived since the time of Alexander's invasion
of (modern) Persia and Afghanistan. Several of these Indo-Greek kingdoms
survived for long after Alexander himself left the scene - Chandragupta
Maurya is supposed to have taken one of their princesses as wife.
By the way, the other group are the "kafir kalaash" (not kailash), although
as you say, few are still "kafir". I don't know about their "Aryanness" or
lack of it.
|>
|> The Nuristani languages (of which there are a dozen or more) are spoken by
|> small groups in the Afghan highlands. They were described by Morgenstierne
|> around the turn of the century, shortly after the mass conversion to Islam.
|> What he discovered there was the remnants of a primitive religion similar to
|> that in the very earliest Vedic and Gathic texts, with some of the same gods
|> (Indra in particular); unfortunately, the old people who remembered the tales
|> were dying off, and the young people were now good Moslems and actively
|> uninterested in learning them.
|>
|> The Nuristani languages are a third branch of the Indo-Iranian family of
|> Indo-European languages, related neither more closely to the Indic nor to the
|> Iranian branch.
|> --
Arvind
Farook Wadia
>In article <Csxq5...@lehman.com> mkar...@fit.edu writes:
>>>As to their origins, I have often heard theories that suggest
>>>that Kobras are one of the lost tribes of Israel.
>>
>>addition, the yardsticks they used in that study were primitive and
>>outdated. The Chittapawan look is NOT similar to the Mediterranean
>>look.
>
>what is the origin of the term kobra?
It stands for Koknastha Brahmin !!
^^ ^^^
>
>>You also forgot Veer Sawarkar.
>
>i'd venture that that may have been intentional. did you follow
>the recent thread on savarkar?
>
>cheers,
>sunit.
>--
> Sunit Gala e-mail: unisql!su...@cs.utexas.edu
> UniSQL, Inc. work: 512-343-7372, ext. 115
> 9390 Research Blvd. mesg: 512-343-7297
> Austin, TX 78759 home: 512-795-9871
--
**********************************************************
* Farook Wadia, System-Software Programmer, SoftQuad Inc.*
* Tel: 416-239-4801, E-mail: far...@sq.com *
**********************************************************
sha...@himachal.rchland.ibm.com
|> sha...@himachal.rchland.ibm.com () writes:
|>
|> >BTW, I am told that the Nuristani's language has a large number of pure
|> >Sanskrit words. Also they were 'pagans' until late last century when they were
|> >forcibly converted to Islam. My opinion is that these groups like the
|> >Nuristanis and Kailash (another group in Pakistan --who incidentally are also
|> >undergoing 'Islamification') are probably isolated groups of Aryans who have
|> >developed their own distinct culture over the past 4-5000 years.
|>
|> There are no "pure Sanskrit words" in the Nuristani languages, any more than
|> there are "pure Latin words" in modern French or Spanish. Fewer, because
|> French and Spanish have borrowed Latin words back in (for technical terms and
|> the like), while the Nuristani languages were never in a position to borrow
|> from Sanskrit.
I was told this by a prof. who was writing an article on the Nuristani's.
Send me a message if you want his e-mail address.
|>
|> The Nuristani languages (of which there are a dozen or more) are spoken by
|> small groups in the Afghan highlands. They were described by Morgenstierne
|> around the turn of the century, shortly after the mass conversion to Islam.
|> What he discovered there was the remnants of a primitive religion similar to
|> that in the very earliest Vedic and Gathic texts, with some of the same gods
|> (Indra in particular); unfortunately, the old people who remembered the tales
|> were dying off, and the young people were now good Moslems and actively
|> uninterested in learning them.
How can you say this! Islam is the religion of science and learning.
[sarcastic reply --as if any popular religion is the religion of science
and learning] I guess I can't really blame them this time. Their
probably was not any notion that it would be (atleast) of scholarly
interest to know about their culture. Still, this is very sad to me.
pree...@gmail.com
- regards
Preeti Karmakar
Ebrahim Merchant
> Sameer A. Nene (sam...@ober.cs.columbia.edu) wrote:
> > In article <Csu2I...@lehman.com> scha...@stern.nyu.edu (Sam
> >> Are there any of these Chittapawan Brahmins (Sorry if the
> >>spelling is incorrect.) on this net? Could you shed some
> >>light on this phenomenon?
> > anthropological reasons for this phenomenon.
> > BTW, the correct spelling is Pune (pronounced Poonay). The
> > British spelling was Poona.
> >
> > Sameer.
> I am pretty sure there's lots of Kobra's on the net. Chittapawans
> are known as Konkanastha (since they are usually from the Konkan)
> and as Chittapavans. The name Chittapavan means "Chitta + Pavan".
> Kobra's came to the Konkan a very long time ago. They were origi-
> nally not accepted by the "natives" as Hindu's, although over
> time ( I dunno how ) they began to be considered as Brahmins.
> I am pretty sure there's lots of Kobra's on the net. Chittapawans
> are known as Konkanastha (since they are usually from the Konkan)
> and as Chittapavans. The name Chittapavan means "Chitta + Pavan".
> Kobra's came to the Konkan a very long time ago. They were origi-
> nally not accepted by the "natives" as Hindu's, although over
> time ( I dunno how ) they began to be considered as Brahmins.
> Even so, they didn't mix very well with the other communities.
> It so happened once that there was a very big shortage of nubile
> women amongst the Konkanastha's and they were forced to approach
> the other communities to allow inter-caste ( or rather inter-
> sub-caste, since the other communities were also Brahmin ) mar-
> riages. The condition laid down by the other community was that
> the Kobra's would have to adopt the family diety of the family
> they married into ( or rather from, since the girl went to live
> with the husband :-) ). The Kobra's vowed to do so over a fun-
> eral pyre ( chita ) and hence were considered "pavan" after their
> vow. Hence the name "chittapavan".
> I guess this also accounts for the fact that only a third of Ko-
> bras still have the very fair skin and light eyes that character-
> ise the community.
> with 15(?) tribes, 11 stayed with him, the other 4(?) wanderered
> off. Over the years, Israeli anthropologists/historians have
> found remnants of 2(?) of these lost tribes. Sometime in the
> late 50's a Israeli researcher got a Ph.D trying to prove that
> Kobras were one of the other lost tribes. She detected similari-
> ties in things as varied as skull measurements, cultural traits
> and the Chittapavani and Hebrew languages.
> BTW, the Chittapavani language is practically dead now.
> Bhave, Archana Joglekar, Nitin Bharadwaj.
good stuff