Many low castes have adopted the names of the Rajput clans, either from simple vanity as people may take an aristocratic surname, or because they were in the service of Rajputs, and have adopted the names of their masters or are partly descended from them.

Other names of castes found among exogamous groups probably indicate that an ancestor belonging to that caste was taken into the one in which the group is found.

The Bhaina tribe have clans named after the Dhobi, Ahir, Gond, Mali and Panka castes.

The members of such clans pay respect to any man belonging to the caste after which they are named and avoid picking a quarrel with him; they also worship the family gods of the caste.
Territorial names are very common, and are taken from that of some town or village in which the ancestor of the clan or the members of the clan themselves resided.

[90] The names are frequently distorted, and it seems probable that the majority of the large number of clan names for which no meaning can be discovered were those of villages.