the corpses of their victims to avoid detection. The corpses were then hidden or buried. A leader of a gang was called jemadar. Usage of military-style ranks such as jemadar and subedar among Thugs as well as reference to individual members as a "private", suggests that the organisation of their gangs had a military link. They used a jargon known as Ramasee to disguise their true intentions from their targets. Although strangulation is one of their most-recognised methods of murder, they also used blades and poison. The thugs comprised both men who had inherited thuggee as a family vocation, as well as those who were forced to turn to it out of necessity. The leadership of many of the groups tended to be hereditary with family members sometimes serving together in the same band. Such Thugs were known as aseel. Many Thugs insisted, however, that novices were not taught Thuggee by their family but by others who were often more experienced Thugs, sometimes also called a guru. While they usually kept their acts a secret, female thugs also existed and were called baronee in Ramasee, while an important male Thug was called baroo. They would often avoid killing children of victims and instead adopted them. They sometimes tended to murder women and children to eliminate witnesses or in case they had substantial loot. Some of the thugs avoided murdering victims they considered proscribed according to their beliefs and let other unscrupulous members commit the murder or were forced to let them by those who did not believe in their customs like the Muslim thugs. History The earliest known reference to the Thugs as a band or fraternity, rather than ordinary thieves, is found in Ziau-d din Barni's History of Firoz Shah (written about 1356). He narrated an incident of the sultan Jalal-ud-din Khalji having 1,000 arrested thugs being sent to Lakhnauti or Gaur: There were numerous traditions about their origin; however, nothing is concrete. One recorded by D. F. McLeod traced it to some Muslim tribes formed from those who fled Delhi after murdering a physician. Another traced it to some great Muslim families who fled after murdering a favored slave of Akbar. According to this view, the original Muslim Thugs spread Thuggee amongst Hindus. According to other traditions preserved by the Thugs themselves, they were Kanjars or descended from those who worked in the Mughal camps. Others have blamed