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Chapter Two. The Social Structure and its Units |
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history of morungs and distribution of clans |
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Table 1 shows that some clans were confined to one morung, while others were found in two morungs. This can be explained by the history of the five morungs regarding which traditional accounts were unanimous. The Oukheang morung claimed to be the oldest and associated with the founder of Wakching, who was of Shayong-hu clan. Of almost equal antiquity was the Balang morung, which was also established at the time when Wakching was founded. It is significant that no clan was common to these two original morungs. As the village grew, some Oukheang men built the Thepong, which was considered to be closely related to the Oukheang. Similarly, the Bala was regarded as an offshoot of the Balang. Much later the Ang morung was built under circumstances which cannot be completely reconstructed, but involved probably the acquisition of a chief from another village, a process which was at one time as usual as was the establishment of foreign dynasties in European states of the nineteenth century. |
