Caste and Race in India c5.55

c5.55

In Dravidian India the disabilities of the lower castes went so far as to prescribe what sort of houses they should build and what material they might employ in the construction thereof. The Shanars and Izhavas, toddy-tappers of the eastern and the western coasts, were not allowed to build houses above one storey in height.⁴ In Malabar the house is called by different names according to the occupant's caste; and peoples of inferior castes dare not refer to their own homes in the presence of Nambudiri Brahmin in more flattering terms than as "dung-heaps".⁵