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In the caste system throughout India, there is a considerable variation in the extent to which the units of like order in the community are segmented. The basis of segmentation alose varies greatly from one unit to another. Segmentation for example, may be on the basis of occupation, sect, territorial baset etc...But there is a considerable disagreement over the basis of segmentation among the Nadars or Shanars as the community was known in the nineteenth century, as to whether it was territorial, occupational, or of mythological or dynastic orgin.
There were around five endogamous units within the Category "Nadar" were concentrated in different parts of southern districts of Tamil Nadu (then MADRAS STATE). Each was associated with a particular occupation. While the community as a whole was regarded from the out-side as "toddy-tappers", there was significant occupational diversity within the community - although this represented more a division of labour in the cultivation of the palmayra palm. The five units or "jati" were traditionally endogamours, and while there were no commensal restrictions, each was ranked hierarchically within the Nadar Category.
Four of the jati were relatively small, and it was within the largest, of the jati that the most significant distinctions were to be found. Although lacking the sanction of mythology, the unit was sengmented into two basic and effectively endagamous group: the climbers who extracted the juice from the palmyra and the Nadans, the "Land of the Land", the aristorcrats of the community who held sway over the regions of Nadar concentration in the "Tinnevelly" now called "Thirunelveli". There were also traders within the Nadar jati
In the early nineteenth century, as transportation faciliteds opened a wider area of trade, our Nadar Merhcnats pushed north into the Ramnad, the county of the the Maravars. By the 1820s, they had established flourishing trade centers and threatened by a potentially hostile Maravar majority, our Nadar traders created a tightly-knit organisation, the "Uravinmurai", for their protection and advancement.