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Chapter One. The Material Background |
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size, distribution and rotation of private plots of land |
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A man's holdings were never contained in a compact block, but were scattered over the village territory. The richest men of Wakching owned 250 plots, and even men considered poor owned land in several places. The Konyak system of shifting cultivation made such a dispersal of holdings necessary, for every year the village took a clearly defined tract under cultivation and it was desirable that within this tract each family should own land sufficient for its needs. In the following year an adjoining tract was cleared of jungle and cultivated concurrently with that tilled the previous year. The result of this system of rotation was that each field was cultivated over a two-year period, and then lay fallow for several years. |
