23/03/2018
Marwats Like other Pathans the Marwats are divided into numerous Khels, the most important of which are: Musa Khel with sections Takhti Khel, Januzai and Pasanni Achu Khel with sections Begu Khel, Isa Khel, and Ahmad Khel Khuda Khel with sections Sikandar Khel, and Mammu Khel Bahram with sections Umar Khan Khel and Totezai; the latter with sub-sections Tajazai, Dilkhozai, Land and Ghazni Khel, and lastly Tappi. To the above may be added the Abba Khel Sayads, who are affiliated to the Dreplara Tappa, also the Michan Khels and other Sarhang Niazais scattered throughout Marwat. Though all such are now to all intents and purposes Marwats, they have been shown under their proper ancestral headings in the Settlement report. The tribe thus made up occupies the whole of the Marwat tahsil which is territorially divided into three great tappas, viz., Dreplara, Musa Khel-cum-Tappi, and Bahram. The latter is subdivided into two minor tappas, viz., Umar Khan Khel and Totazai. For administrative purposes a knowledge of the position and limits of each Tappa is not necessary. Taken as a whole the Marwats are as fine and law-abiding a race as any to be found on our border. They are a simple, slow-witted people, and contrast, in all that is manly, most favourably with the Bannuchis. They are strongly attached to their homes, and very averse to travel or to service out of their own country. As the climatic influence due to canal irrigation and marshes has effected the Bannuchis to their detriment, so here, a sandy soil and dry air has had an opposite result on the Marwats, for hard fare and poverty notwithstanding, they are healthy, happy and light hearted. They are Pathans of very pure descent, and as such are naturally proud and fiery. Their passions when once aroused are not easily soothed, but feuds among them are said to be now of rare occurrence. They are tall and muscular, and have almost ruddy complexions, and, specially the women, are fair and handsome. In manners they are frank and open, simple and yet manly. For natives, they are remarkably truthful. Their women enjoy great social freedom; they seldom conceal their faces, and converse readily with strangers, even with Europeans. Upon them, however, falls the labour of water-carrying, which is by no means light. Accompanied generally by a man as an es**rt, they go in troops of ten or twenty to fetch water from the Gambila, often a distance of ten or twelve miles. The Marwats were, at annexation, nomad graziers, wandering about with their herds and camels, and living chiefly in temporary huts of branches of trees, with a wall of thorns and a roof of straw. Even now that they have very largely settled down in permanent villages, the houses are constructed of reeds, twigs, and the branches of trees, the whole village being encircled by a hedge of thorns. This fact they assign, and probably with truth, to the scarcity of water rendering the construction of mud huts impossible. In dress, the only noticeable peculiarity is among the poorest classes, whose sole garment consists of a single large woollen blanket, half of which is worn round the legs like a petticoat, while the other half is thrown over the shoulders, a hole being slit in the blanket for the head to pass through. Chocolate-coloured turbans are also largely affected by the Marwat peasantry.
