Bhatt (last name)

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Bhatt (also spelled Bhat or Butt, ) is a Brahmin title and a surname used in the Indian subcontinent. The shortened form of Bhatt or Brahmabhatt is Bhat.

Etymology

The word "Bhatt" (, ) means "scholar" in Sanskrit. While the original shortened rendition of "Bhatt" was "Bhat" (, ), as few Kashmiri Bhatt Brahmins in medieval times dropped the half “ta” letter () and started writing it as “भट” instead of “भट्ट”, which, when transliterated into English, became “Bhat”, while the transliteration of ‘भट्ट’ remained "Bhatt", despite this, many Kashmiri people bearing the surname "Bhat" today transliterate their surname as "भट्ट" in Devanagari. Many of the Kashmiri Brahmin migrants to the Punjab region started spelling their surname as "Butt", which is the transliteration of the name when written using the Urdu/Persian alphabet (as opposed to Bhatt when using the Devanagari alphabet). Kashmir is widely recognized as the origin of the surname Bhatt.

Geographic distribution

Kashmir

In Kashmir, both the spellings “Bhatt” and “Bhat” are used, as both of them essentially refer to the same word. Batt or Butt (a local Kashmiri language form of Sanskrit language Brahmin title Bhatt) is a generic term used for all Brahmins or Kashmiri Pandit of Kashmir valley irrespective of their individual surnames, as well as the Kashmiri Brahmins who migrated to Punjab a region now divided between India and the neighbouring Pakistan

During the medieval period, from the 14th to mid 18th centuries, due to the instability in the Kashmir Valley and the rise of the Shah Mir dynasty, there was limited migration of Kashmiri Bhatt Brahmins to western or Deccan and southern India, corresponding to present-day states such as Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Rajasthan, while a smaller number migrated to a few regions of Uttar Pradesh, such as Kannauj. During this period, many of these Kashmiri Bhatt migrants further moved through these places to the Central Himalayas as well, especially to regions ruled by the Chand and Parmar dynasties, where they served as advisors or priests.

The Bhatt (or Bhat) Brahmins from the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, migrated in very large numbers to Punjab (including present-day Himachal Pradesh) and the Central Himalayas, corresponding to present-day Uttarakhand (particularly the Kumaon region) and Nepal (especially the Mahakali zone of Sudurpashchim Province), during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, due to the 1878 drought

Punjab and Central Himalayas

The Bhatt ethnic group in present-day regions such as Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Nepal is not the result of locals being granted titles, but rather of migration originating from Kashmir between the 14th and 20th centuries, both directly and indirectly.

In the early 1990s, the Himalayan districts of Uttar Pradesh (present-day Uttarakhand) again witnessed a large number of Kashmiri Pandit Bhatts due to the Kashmiri Pandit exodus, though not in numbers as large as those witnessed during the 1878 famine, and thus it remains an introducing factor of Bhatts in present-day Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and parts of Nepal from Kashmir.

The regions and villages that witnessed significant migration of Kashmiri Pandit Bhatts were the Majha region of the Amritsar–Gurdaspur belt in Punjab, the Bageshwar region of Almora district in the North-Western Provinces (now part of Uttarakhand), and the Baitadi and Darchula districts of the Mahakali Zone in Sudurpashchim Province, Nepal.

Goa

The surname is in use among some Konkani Goud Saraswat Brahmins as well as Konkani Christians (who trace their ancestry to the Gaud Saraswat Brahmins of Goa).

Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh

The word Bhaṭṭa (Kannada: ಭಟ್ಟ) or Bhaṭṭar (Tamil: பட்டர்) or Bhaṭṭu (Telugu: భట్టు) is traditionally used, especially in the states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Telangana, and Andhra Pradesh usually to denote a "learned man" or a "scholar" (Brahmins), but also in other southern states.

It was originally used as an honorific like śāstri or paṇḍita, but has become a surname in parts of the country in modern times used as a family name rather than an honorific. In Southern Karnataka naming convention followed is such that, generally, one's father's name is kept as the surname irrespective of caste and many of these honorifics continue to be used as honorifics.

In earlier times a caste name or village name was used by the Tamils as their last name, but due to the influence of the Dravidian movement, Tamils of all castes have mostly given up caste surnames. However, women frequently adopt their father's or husband's name and take it for successive generations. But, honorific like Bhaṭṭar are still in use in spoken language rather than as a surname.