Parihar


The Parihar, also stated to as Pratihar, and Parhar in Punjab are one of the main gotra of the Rajput caste of India. They claim descent from the mythological Agnivanshi dynasty and, according to Muhnot Nainsi, comprised 35 branches in the 17th century. Some married chiefs from the Kachwaha caste during the Mughal era and, according to the Mancaritra Raso, during that same era some Parihars fought as part of the army of Man Singh I on behalf of the Mughal emperor Akbar.
Some Parihars abandoned their traditional association as Rajputs to become thuggees by hereditary occupation. Those inhabiting what became Etawah district during the early British colonial period had been so for centuries, and were noted at the time of the magistracy of Thomas Erskine Perry as being "always a desperate and lawless community" who resented authority and had defied the armies of the Maratha Empire and of Oudh.