Indische Palaographie von circa 350 a. Chr. – circa 1300 p. Chr. c48.s4.3

c48.s4.3

§ 62. **Butchers** (701,800). No such credit, however, is attached to the sale of meat, which, naturally, is chiefly in the hands of a flesh-eating community like the Muslim. It is not to be supposed, from this that Brāhmanists are universally either vegetarians or fish-eaters. Customs differ in this respect in different parts of the country and amongst different castes. Beef and pork, indeed, are eaten by none but the lowest of the community, but in the middle classes, especially in the Dravidian country, the consumption of mutton and goat is considerable, though the mediation of a professional salesman, except in the towns, is comparatively rare. In Vedic times, the Ārya were apparently accustomed to eat meat, and acquired the vegetarian habit as they got acclimatised to the tropics. Nowadays, the only butcher caste not Muslim is the Khāṭik, and this community, though breeding pigs in the north, only slaughters sheep and goats, the skins of which are tanned by its household. In the south, the Khāṭik is merely the professional title of the Muslim mutton butcher. The Kasaī, or Qasāb, of upper India is almost exclusively Muslim, and in the Panjāb is merely a functional branch of the Tēlī, or oilman. Further east there are subdivisions, and that which deals in mutton holds itself above the beef-butcher. This last is, of course, anathema to the Brahmanic world, and in some places is "boycotted" by tradesmen, so that it is obliged to make its purchases through the intermediary of one of the lower Brāhmanic castes.