[inawarminister]

Isn't the original word for castes Varnas?

As a post-Hindu culture, we used to have the four castes (I think the Balinese still use them for marriages and stuffs), but never as strict as in India. Still, the generation that destroyed it (in the 1600s-1800s) found themselves stuck in another racist-classist caste system of Europeans on the top, "Orientals" on the middle, and natives on the bottom.

The solution to that was inverting the colonial racist system for a while. Fortunately we stopped after only 2-3 generations.

We still don't have perfect equality though - but much better than previously. One can not change his skin, but he can change his wealth level.

[unmole]

> Isn't the original word for castes Varnas?

Caste is used to refer to both Varna and Jati. OP is trying to pretend that the lexical gap implies that the caste system is of foreign origin.

[yinyang_in]

Varna & Jati are different lexicon.

Jati are like “bhel”, “Khasi”. Varna has he mentioned above.

Check local language, it’s gives better perspective rather than imposed idea.

[BBC_Goons]

Caste comes from the Portuguese word "castas", the caste system is widespread in Europe.

The hierarchy in Europe is

Clergy, Nobility, Landowners, Merchants, Tradesmen, Peasants, People working with sewage, carcasses etc...

The fact that the Church had a monopoly on god gave rise to the rigid hierarchies. The king was the representative of god and was conferred powers through the church.

When the colonialists set foot in India, they were faced with a problem there were too many gods & no central authority. The modern hierarchies and pyramids that you are presented with is an oversimplification and invention of the British to centralize their control.

Many European carry their family profession in their surname, this is often understood as caste in modern India.

[yinyang_in]

This is how problems solving attitude would like for real world.

So well put, in terms origin, problem & solutions.