Toda Garments and Embroidery

Abstract

THE GARMENTS worn by Toda men are three in number: the [kutu: n] or perineal cloth, the [torp] or waisteloth, and the [pu:txulj] or cloak. Women wear the latter two. Rivers' has given pictures of the various ways in which the [pu :txulj] is worn. Men wear the [torp] by carrying one of the long edges completely round the waist and tucking the end of this edge in at the left side, letting the garment fall straight to the knees (Rivers, fig. 15, p. 51). The garment is adjusted so that it falls only as far as the knees by folding over a sufficient quantity of material at the top before carrying it around the waist. Women wear the [torp] by passing it in the same way around the body under the armpits; in Rivers' fig. 11, p. 33, the standing woman is wearing a cloth in this way with both arms free. Children until puberty wear only a [torp], draping it as their elders do the [pu txulj].2