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Pawsey and the surveyor go to map the source of the Zungki river; a Khamti dao; Chingmei houses; fibre cloth; improper to ask for marriage price among Kalyo Kengyu; burial customs; rainbow memorials; bark shields; cattle owning; cattle raiding by Aoshed |
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15th. - Halted at Chingmei. Pawsey and the surveyor went down to the Wokyung below the village, and thence up the range called Poupu (8,000 ft.), east of that, in order to map the sources of the Zungki, here called the Langnyu, at least from the junction of the Wokyung coming from the Yimpang end of the valley, with the Tiekyung coming from the southern end towards Chentang. Unfortunately the day was very cloudy and they were unable to see much. I went to the village (a mile away) and then up to the top of the range behind (the former site of Chingmei), from where I could see into the next valley a little, and was shown the villages of Langyok, Noko and Sanglao. Clearly the map was wrong, and there was a range splitting off from the Patkoi and joining up with the Saramati range and forming the watershed between the Namzalein and the Zungki. It is along this range, probably that the Assam-Burma boundary will ultimately go. [SKETCH |
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I saw a Khamti dao again, here, bought by a Chingmei man from Noklok further east. One of the houses in Chingmei had plank walls and in general the side walls were a good deal higher than is usual in Naga houses, adding much to the space inside. They make a lot of fibre cloth here, using the bark of a prickly shrub which bears small berries like miniature double raspberries along the stem of it. It is called leikin by the Changs. [Mr. N.L. Bor got it identified for me later as one of the Urticacae - Debregeasia velutina. It is used in South India in Wynaad and the Nilgiris for bow-strings and in Ceylon for cordage and fishing lines. It is perhaps also used in Kumaon, Garhwal and Nepal vide Watts, Dict. of the Economic Products of India. s.v. Debregeasia.] [SKETCH |
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Shields of the bark of the sago palm (the edible variety) are common here, and I remember to have seen them also at Yungya, in the Konyak country and at Gwilong in the Kacha Naga country. I have seen them somewhere else in the Chang country on this tour, either at Tuensang or at Hakchang. The Changs of Chingmei are great cattle owners and the land has the jhumed out appearance of the Tizu valley - largely as the result of the great number of mithun and buffaloes kept. These are always being shot with poisoned arrows by raiders from " Aoshed," i.e. Panso or Pansorr, a Kalyu-Kengyu village to the east reputed most formidable in war. They had a head off Chingmei only ten days ago, taken in the fields only 300 yards from the village and we were given all sorts of warnings against them and had several broad hints as to the desirability of our going and slaying them and burning their village. One of the Chingmei chiefs apologized for his mean house on the ground that as Panso had burnt him out three times already it was not worth while building anything better. [SKETCH |
