BANIANS, a religious sect in the empire of the Mogul, who believe in metempsychosis, and therefore refrain from eating any living creature, or killing even noxious animals, but endeavour to release them when in the hands of others. The name of Banian is used with some diversity, which has occasioned much confusion, and given rise to many mis takes. Sometimes it is taken in a less proper sense, and extended to all the idolaters of India, as contradistinguished from the Mahommedans; in which sense Banians includes the Brahmins and other castes. But Banians, in a more proper sense, is restricted to a peculiar caste or tribe of Indians, whose office or profession is trade and merchandise; in which sense Banians stand contradistinguished from Brahmins, Cuttery, and Wyse, the three other castes into which the Indians are divided. The four castes are absolutely separate as to occupation, relation, marriage, and condition, though all of the same religion, which is more properly denominated the religion of the Brahmins, who constitute the ecclesiastical tribe, than of the Banians, who form the mercantile. The proper Banians are called, in the Shaster, or book of their law, by the name of Shuddery; under which term are comprehended all who live after the manner of merchants, or deal and transact for others, as brokers, exclusively of the mechanics or artificers, who make another caste, called Wyse. These Banians have no peculiar sect or religion, unless it be that two of the eight general precepts given by their legislator Brahma to the Indian nation are, on account of the profession of the Banians, supposed more immediately to relate to them; namely, those which enjoin veracity in their word and dealings, and abstinence from circumvention in buying and selling. The Banians sometimes quit their business, and, retiring from the world, make a regular profession of religion, assume a peculiar habit, and devote themselves more immediately to God, under the denomination of Vertea; and these, although they do not thereby chan their caste, are commonly reckoned Brahmins of a more devout kind; just as monks in the Romish church, although frequently not in orders, are reputed a more sacred order than even the regular clergy. Indeed the name Banian imports as much in the sacred language of India, the depository of their written law; in which it means a people innocent and harmless, void of all guile, so gentle that they cannot endure to see .either a fly or a worm injured, and who, when struck, will patiently bear it, without resisting or returning the blow. Their mien and appearance are thus described by a modern author: “A people presented themselves to my eyes clothed in linen garments, somewhat low descending; of a gesture and garb, as I may say, maidenly, and well nigh effeminate; of a countenance shy and somewhat estranged.” Gemelli Carreri divides the Banians into twenty-two tribes, all distinct, and not allowed to intermarry. The author above quoted affirms that they are divided into eighty-two castes or tribes, corresponding to the castes or divisions of the Brahmins or priests, under whose discipline they are in religious matters; although the generality of the Baniaħs choose to be under the direction of the two Brahminical tribes, the Vi-salnagranaugers and Vulnagranaugers.

The Banians are the great factors, by whom most of the trade of India is managed; in which respect they are comparable to the Jews and Armenians, and not behind either, in point of skill and experience, in whatever relates to commerce. Nothing is bought but by their mediation. They seem to claim a kind oijus divinum, grounded on their sacred books, to the management of the traffic, just as the Brahmins do to that of religion; and for this purpose they are dispersed throughout all parts of Asia, and abound in Persia, particularly at Ispahan and Gombroon, where many of them are extremely rich, yet not above acting as brokers where a penny is to be got by doing so. They act also as bankers, and can give bills of exchange for most cities in the East Indies. Their form of contract in buying and selling is remarkable, being done without words, in the profoundest silence, and only by touching each other’s fingers. The buyer, loosing his pamerin or girdle, spreads it on his knee, and both he and the seller having their hands underneath, by the intercourse of the fingers mark in pounds, shillings, or pence, the price demanded, offered, and at length agreed on. When the seller takes the buyer’s whole hand it denotes a thousand; and as many times as he squeezes it, as many thousand pagodas or rupees, according to the species in question, are demanded. When he takes the five fingers, it denotes five hundred; and when only one, one hundred; half a finger, to the second joint, denotes fifty, and the small end of the finger, to the first joint, stands for ten.