Kurumbas

Language information by source

Kuruba is a Hindu caste native to the Indian state of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.[1] They are the third-largest caste group in Karnataka.[2] The Kuruba community is also known by the names Kuruba, Kuruma, Kurumba, Gadariya. The natives of the Indian states of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are Hindu castes. It is the third largest caste group in Karnataka. Traditionally, these are Gadariya (shepherds) who used to do the work of sheep/goat and animal husbandry, in which they especially raised mixed herds of sheep and goats and cattle.

Oral traditions of the Kurubas or Kuruma indicate their descent from Neolithic farming villages in South India which also kept cattle. Oral traditions indicate some of these original cattle-keeping agriculturalists branched off into new habitats and quickly came to rely on sheep pastoralism, absorbing Mesolithic hunter-gatherers. Rituals associated with hunting presumably came from the integration of these hunter-gatherers into the Neolithic pastoralists. These pastoralists later became almost totally separated from their villager antecedents and interacted with them only based on initial conflict and acculturation.

For pastoralists such as the Kurubas, the horse became an important pack animal after the Iron Age and an animal for fighting. Nanjundaiah claimed the Kurubas were the descendants of the Pallavas.[citation needed] Groups of soldiers from the Kuruba community became important in the armies of Deccan powers in the Medieval era.[5] It is believed that Kurubas are ethnically related to the Kuruvars of Sangam literature. This is also supported by the fact that Kuruvars worshiped Murukan and his Kuruvar wife, Valli whereas Kurubas worship Mailara/Mallanna, who represents Murukan, and his Kuruba wife, Kurubattyavva.