Note 1 — DOMESTIC LIFE

The “Morung.” Every village, except the very small ones, is divided into two or more “khels” (yankho). Sometimes, but by no means always, a little strip of open ground marks the division between “khel” and “khel.” In some villages these “khels” mark the divisions of clans. For instance, at Tsingaki there are two Kikung “khels” and one Nguli “khel.” But this is not common. Usually a “khel” appears to be nothing more than a convenient division of a village in which men of various clans live. Sometimes some feature of the site gives the “khel” its name, e.g. Hayili (“level”) khel in Akuk. Sometimes, as in the Wokhayankho (“Wokha men’s khel”) in Pangti, the first inhabitants have given a name to the “khel.” Usually a man lives and dies in the “khel” in which his forefathers lived and died before him. But he is perfectly free to go to another “khel” if he wants to. In every “khel” there is a common bachelors’ house or “morung” (champo),1 a building which plays an important part in Lhota life. In it no woman must set her foot. At the champo raids were planned and discussed, and to it all heads taken were first brought. It is the sleeping-place of every Lhota boy from the time he first puts on his dao-holder till he marries, this rule being only relaxed in the case of boys who are allowed to remain at home and nurse an ailing and widowed mother, or when the champo falls into such a state of disrepair that it is no longer habitable. In the latter case boys are allowed to sleep in a separate room in their parents’ house. The champo usually stands at the end of, and facing down, the village street. Though not to be compared with the huge “morungs” of the Aos and Konyaks, it is the best architectural effort of which the Lhota is capable. In length a typical champo extends to forty feet, with a breadth of fifteen feet at the front and twelve feet at the back. The roof-tree is low in the middle, and curves up to gables at the front and back, that at the front being about sixteen feet high and that at the back a foot or so lower. Two specially fine bamboos are selected for the roof-tree. Part of the root is left on them and forms a horn-like projection at each end of the roof-tree. To each horn is fixed a little cross-piece, from which are hung tassel-like ornaments of reed-stem. The house is thatched with either thatching grass or the leaf of a small palm called oko (Levistonia assamica). The eaves reach almost to the ground and are brought forward in a half-circle in front to form a sort of verandah roof. In the middle of the space covered by this verandah roof stands the front post (humtse), which is elaborately carved with conventional representations of mithan heads and hornbills, and is carried through the roof up to the high gable. Behind it is another carved post (humtse tachungo). At the base of this post are the oha stones on which the good fortune of the champo depends, and to it used to be fastened a piece of skin from the first head taken after a new champo was built. This piece of skin is called humtse lama (“post warmer”). It was believed that it brought strength to the post and luck to the village. So strong was and is this belief, that as late as 1913 Tsingaki was punished for buying a piece of a head to be used as humtse lama from the independent Sema village of Satami.2 At the back of the champo is another carved post.