The Drâvidian Saturnalia.
Some of the Drâvidian tribes enjoy the Saturnalia in other forms.
Thus, the Gond women have the curious festival known as Gurtûtnâ or “breaking of the sugar.” “A stout pole about twelve or fifteen feet high is set up, and a lump of coarse sugar with a rupee in it placed on the top; round it the Gond women take their stand, each with a little green tamarind rod in her hands. The men collect outside, and each has a kind of shield made of two parallel sticks joined with a cross-piece held in the hand to protect themselves from the blows. They make a rush together, and one of them swarms up the pole, the women all the time plying their rods vigorously; and it is no child’s play, as the men’s backs attest next day. When the man gets to the top, he takes the piece of sugar, slips down, and gets off as rapidly as he can. This is done five or six times over with the greatest good-humour, and generally ends with an attack of the women en masse upon the men. It is the regular Saturnalia for the women, who lose all respect, even for a settlement officer; and on one occasion when he was looking on, he only escaped by the most abject submission and presentation of rupees.”77
The Bhîls of Gujarât plant a small tree or branch firmly in the ground. The women stand near it, and the men outside. One man rushing in tries to uproot the tree, and the men and women fall upon him and beat him so soundly that he has to retire. He is succeeded by another, who is belaboured in the same way, and this goes on till one man succeeds in bearing off the tree, but seldom without a load of blows which cripples him for days.78
All these mock combats have their parallels in English customs, such as the throwing of the hood at Haxey, the football match at Derby, the fighting on Lammas Day at Lothian, and hunting of the ram at Eton.79