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In addition to the Khasis there are some members of Bodo tribes inhabiting parts of the district. The Lynngam tribe appears to have been reckoned in 1901 as Khasi, there being no separate record at the last Census of these people. The district is split up into two divisions, the Khasi Hills proper and the Jaintia Hills.
The Lynngam law of inheritance is the same as that of the Khasis. The youngest daughter obtains the largest share of the ancestral property, the remainder being divided between the remaining daughters. The sons do not get any share. The rule is also said to apply with regard to acquired property. Adoption. This is practically adoption.
At the end of the house farthest away from the village path is a platform used for sitting out in the evening, and for spreading chillies and other articles to dry. Some Lynngam houses have only one room in which men, women, and children an all huddled together, the hearth being in the centre, and, underneath the platform, the pigs.
The leaves are thrown away after use, a fresh supply being required for each meal. The Lynngams brew rice beer, they do no distil spirit; the beer is brewed according to the Khasi method. Games they have none, and there are no jovial archery meetings like those of the Khasis. The Lynngam methods of hunting are setting spring guns and digging pitfalls for game.
When the plants have grown to a height of about four inches, water is let in again; then comes the weeding, which has to be done several times. A peculiarity about the Lynngam and the Khasis and Mikirs of the low hills, or Bhois as they are called, is that they reckon it sang, or taboo, to use the sickle. They reap their grain by pulling the ear through the hand.
If outsiders cultivate within the areas set apart for the different Lynngam villages, all of them, including women, have to pay eight annas each to the people of the village in whose circle they cultivate.
The parties merely buy some pig's flesh and perform a puja with a small portion of the flesh of the legs of the animal. Amongst the poor, fish sometimes takes the place of pork at the Iadih-kiad ceremony. The Lamdoh and Iadih-kiad ceremonies take the place of the more elaborate Pynhiar synjat in most places now-a-days. Lynngam Marriages.
At Nartiang I saw an old Khasi gun, which the people say was fired from the shoulder. I also saw a mortar of the same pattern as the one described amongst the Khasi weapons. The Wár and Lynngam weapons are also the same, but with different names.
At the house of the bride, after the fowls and the pig have been sacrificed, the go-between, after drinking liquor himself, pours out some on the floor of the house and then gives some to the bride and bridegroom to drink. The killing of the fowls, the sacrifice of the pig, and the libation of liquor are essentials at a Lynngam marriage.
This feast is an essential, and, cattle being scarce in the Lynngam country, there is often great delay in disposing of the body. Lynngam villages at such a time are best avoided.
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