Indische Palaographie von circa 350 a. Chr. – circa 1300 p. Chr. c48.s2.4.4

c48.s2.4.4

They are not now found south of the Vindhya, where those returned as Gūjar are traders from Gujarāt, who, as stated above, retain traditions of a cognate origin. It is held, indeed; that a Gurjara element underlies all the chief cultivating classes of Gujarāt above those traceable to a distinctly Kōl origin. Returning to the Panjāb, the south of the Salt range tract is the present home of the Avān, who have been there for at least 600 years. They are said to have come up from Mārvāḍ or upper Sindh, and to have belonged to one of the numerous Scythic bands which gave the Jāṭ and other castes to the country further east. Though the Avān are nearly all Muslim, they retain Brāhmanic names in their genealogies, and use Brāhmans as their family priests. They have not spread beyond the north-west corner of the Panjāb, where they share with the Janjhuā Rājput and the Khōkhar the predominant position among the peasantry. The Khōkhar, however, though equally of the faith of Islām, have maintained more fully the tradition of Rājput origin, and return themselves in considerable numbers as a clan of that great caste. Others, again, claim to be Jāṭ. The Gakkhaṛ in the north of the Salt Range plateau are similarly situated to the Avān in the south.