A minor debate on family origins

On my website, under Family History, I assert that the family: "used to reside at 30 Beharipur, Bareilly. From that, we guess that the family originally comes from Bihar, which was once much richer than what became known as the Upper Provinces under British rule (or Uttar Pradesh now)".

One of my relatives, visiting me recently, questions this. So, before anything else, I should amend the entry to read NOT "we guess" BUT "I guess".

Now the grounds for his questioning turns out to be "Beharipur" COULD also mean that the area of the town is dedicated to one of our gods.

My feeling is that there is some contemporary prejudice against Bihar on the part of my relative, as this is now one of the poorest and most lawless parts of the country!

However, to the grounds of his question: IF the area really was dedicated to this god, then there should certainly be a pretty old and massive temple in the middle of the area. As far as I know, though there is of course the usual plethora of temples in "our" area, there is NO "Behari Mandir" or equivalent.

I regard that as a pretty conclusive riposte - though, as always, I am open to fresh light on the subject. Sphere: Related Content