Maratha clan system

Flag of the Maratha Empire

The Marāthā clan system (also referred to as 96 Kuli Marathas or 96K) refers to the network of families and surnames within the Maratha culture of India. The Maratha primarily reside in the Indian states of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Goa and Tamilnadu.^[1] Various lists have been compiled, purporting to list the 96 clans, but these lists are often at great variance with each other.^[2]

Structure

The list of ninety-six clans is divided into five ranked tiers, the highest of which contains the five primary Marathan clans.^[3]

social mobility

The issue is clouded by the fact that members of the Kunbi cultivator class living in Maharashtra also adopted some of the Maratha names, whether to indicate allegiance to a Maratha chief of that name, or as an attempt at upward mobility. As an example of the latter, researcher Rosalind O'Hanlon quoted the Marathi proverb: Kunbi majhala Maratha jhala ("When a kunbi prospers he becomes a Maratha").^[2]

History

These clans have founded various kingdoms like Satavahanas, Chalukyas, Rashtrakutas, Yadavas, Nala, Kadamabas etc.One of the clans, the Bhonsle, launched the Maratha Empire which covered a large part of India in the 17th and 18th centuries.^[4]

See also

• Marathi people
• Maratha Empire
• Maratha
• Marathi language
• Battles involving the Maratha Empire

Notes

1. ^ "Maratha (people)". Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 2009. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/363851/Maratha. 
2. ^ ^{a b} Rosalind O'Hanlon (22 August 2002). Caste, Conflict and Ideology: Mahatma Jotirao Phule and Low Caste Protest in Nineteenth-Century Western India. Cambridge University Press. pp. 17–. ISBN 9780521523080. http://books.google.com/books?id=5kMrsTj1NeYC&pg=PA17. Retrieved 13 May 2011. 
3. ^ Louis Dumont (1980). Homo hierarchicus: the caste system and its implications. University of Chicago Press. pp. 121–. ISBN 9780226169637. http://books.google.com/books?id=XsOtRGdvIigC&pg=PA121. Retrieved 13 May 2011. 
4. ^ "The Marathas". Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 2009. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/285248/India/46986/The-Marathas.