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Nair

Nair soldiers with the King of Cochin on an elephant

Nair, also known as Nayar, is a Hindu caste of the Indian state of Kerala[1] on the Malabar Coast.

History

According to some theories, the Nair have Indo-Scythian ancestry.[2][1] During British rule, Nair were known as Nayarkutti and were important in politics, government, medicine, education, and law.[1]

Nair Media

  • Nair soldiers attending the King of Cochin: A 16th century European portrait. The majority of Nair men were trained in arms, and the traditional role of the Nairs was to fight in the continuous wars which characterized Kerala history.[3]

  • Members of the Travancore Nair Brigade, drawn in 1855. The Nair brigade was the remnant of the Travancore Nair army after the takeover of the British.

  • 17th century wooden idol of Kali from Kerala. Kali is the warlike manifestation of Bhagavati, the patron deity of the Nairs.[4][5]

  • A typical tharavad reproduced from Panikkar's article published in 1918. Capital and small letters represent females and males respectively. Supposing that the females A, B and C were dead and the oldest male member karnavan being d, if the male members t, k and others demanded partition, the property would be divided into three parts.

  • Reclining Nayar Woman (1902) by Raja Ravi Varma shows a Nair lady, identified as the character Indulekha, a main character from a Malayalam novel of the same name.[6]

Related pages

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Nāyar (2011). Retrieved 2011-11-15.
  2. ↑ Tyagi, Vidya Prakash. (2009). Martial Races of Undivided India, p. 282; India, Office of the Registrar General. (1965). Census of India, 1961, Vol. 7, p. 16.
  3. ↑ Blankenhorn 2007, p. 106.
  4. ↑ Massey 2004, p. 106.
  5. ↑ Vickery 1998, p. 154.
  6. ↑ Arunima 1995, pp. 161-162.

More reading

  • Fawcett, Fredrick. (1901). Nâyars of Malabar. Madras: Madras Government Press. OCLC 457840401
  • Fuller, Christopher John. (1976). The Nayars Today. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521213011; ISBN 9780521290913; OCLC 2238183
  • Jeffrey, Robin. (1976). The Decline of Nair Dominance: Society and Politics in Travancore 1847-1908. London: Sussex University Press. ISBN 9780856210549; OCLC 461808228
  • Panikkar, Kavalam Madhava. "Some Aspects of Nayar Life," Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, July-December 1918, Vol. 48, pp. 254–293.

Other websites

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