Note 10 — DOMESTIC LIFE

Sowing and the ceremonies connected with it. Before anyone can sow his land certain ceremonies have to be performed. The first of these is Thruven, which is performed first by the Puthi, and after him in the course of the next few days by anyone who has dragged a stone or done the Etha ceremony. The procedure is as follows. The Puthi goes with his wife to the spot (Thruvenphen) just outside the village where tradition says this ceremony must be performed, generally near the opya—the post set up and speared at the Oyantsoa ceremony. He takes with him a twig of bamboo (a shoot growing up directly from the ground will not do), some chicken meat, boiled rice, “pita madhu,” ginger, a little seed-rice, and some seeds of a plant with a variegated leaf called orho. After pouring a little “madhu” on the ground, he arranges four pieces of the bamboo twig in the form of a square and puts a large leaf on the ground to his right and another on his left. On the right-hand leaf he puts ten little pieces, and on the left-hand leaf nine little pieces each of thatching grass, ginger, and chicken meat, and sprinkles a little seed-rice over each heap. The heaps are then tied up in the leaves and put in the square of bamboo twigs. Then close by he sows the orho seeds, making a miniature fence round them, the sticks of which are tied together at the top. This is a purely formal act, and it does not seem to matter in the least whether the orho seeds ever come up or not. Next morning the Puthi sows six seeds of rice in his garden plot. This formal sowing of rice is omitted by the other men who do the Thruven ceremony. Sexual intercourse is forbidden the night after this ceremony. When the last man has finished the village keeps one day’s emung. Anyone who has been married the previous winter, and everyone who has done all social “gennas” and dragged a stone performs a further ceremony before sowing his fields. Among the Northern Lhotas it is done as follows. In the morning one of the old women who acted as Ponyiratsen10 at his wedding, or failing her any old man of his clan who has done no social “gennas,” comes to his house, and there ties eight nungyung leaves into two bundles of four. She then goes alone down the path leading to his fields, taking with her the nungyung leaves, two bamboo “chungas,” some rice, and a smouldering brand—for fire is a great protection against evil spirits. She faces towards the fields and lays a bundle of nungyung leaves on each side of the path, with a “chunga” on each bundle, and a little bit of smoking brand behind it. She then goes straight to her own home, taking with her the rice, which is her fee. Next day the owner goes down to the field with his friends and sows a little patch first, praying that his crop may be as close as elephant grass, as spreading as a rubber tree and free from weeds. He must refrain from sexual intercourse the night before he does this, and must neither take food nor speak to anyone in the morning till he has sown the first patch. Among the Southern Lhotas the old man or woman who does the ceremony on the first day puts on each side of the path a little heap of rice husks, a smouldering stick and two crossed yutso leaves, on which are put six pieces of burnt wood, six pieces of pork, a little boiled rice and a sprinkling of “madhu.” The owner of the field must not eat any of the pig which provides the pork used here. The formal act of sowing takes place next day as among the Northern Lhotas. Both on the night preceding and the night after the formal sowing sexual intercourse is forbidden among the Southern Lhotas, and in the morning before going to his fields the man must eat separately from his wife, though she may cook his food. Unlike his neighbours the Aos, the Lhota does not sow broadcast. With the digger (chukchü) held in his right hand he scratches a little hole. His left hand is full of seed-rice, of which he allows four or five grains to drop between the middle and index finger into the hole, which is filled in with a stroke of the digger. Both men and women sow. The day’s supply of seed-rice is carried in a basket on the left hip, the sowers working their way in a line from the bottom of the hill upwards. From the time the crop is sown till it ripens everyone is busy keeping his fields as free from weeds as possible. The weeder (ehe) is a strip of iron about nine inches long and one inch broad, bent into a semicircle and fixed to a short bamboo handle.11 Every field is weeded at least twice, and often as many as six times—the oftener the better. The weeds are collected into heaps along the edges of the fields, or on stony patches where nothing will grow.