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Updated: June 29, 2025
Although mention has been made incidentally in various parts of this monograph of Lynngam customs, it has been thought necessary to give the Lynngams a separate chapter, as these people differ so very greatly from the Khasis in their manner of life, and in their customs. Lynngam is the Khasi name; the Garo name for the Lynngams is Megam.
All Lynngams claim to be Khasis, they dislike being called Garos; but although it is true they speak what may be called a dialect of Khasi, and observe some of the Khasi customs, the Lynngams are more Garo than Khasi.
The Synteng and Wár articles of furniture and utensils are the same as those of the Khasis, with different names, a remark which applies also to those of the Bhois and Lynngams. Both the latter, however, use leaves as plates, the Bhoi using the wild plantain and the Lynngam a large leaf called ka 'la mariong. The leaves are thrown away after eating, fresh leaves being gathered for each meal.
The Lynngams possess no head-hunting customs, as far as it has been possible to ascertain. These people are still wild and uncivilized. Although they do not, as a rule, give trouble, from an administrative point of view, a very serious dacoity, accompanied by murder, was committed by certain Lynngams at an Assamese village on the outskirts of the Lynngam country a few years ago.
The Lynngam males wear bead necklaces, the beads being sometimes of cornelian gathered from the beds of the local hill streams, and sometimes of glass obtained from the plains markets of Damra and Moiskhola. The cornelian necklaces are much prized by the Lynngams, and are called by them 'pieng blei, or gods' necklaces.
The Lynngams of Nongsohbar bury the unburnt bones of the deceased within the village, and in front of the house occupied by the deceased when alive; the bones being placed in a hole in the ground, over which is laid a stone, a bamboo mat being nailed over the stone. A bamboo fence three or four feet high is erected round the grave.
It is a garment of a distinctive character and cannot be mistaken; it used to be worn largely by the Khasis, and is still used extensively by the Syntengs and Lynngams and by the Mikirs, and that it should have been found amongst these Eastern Nagas is certainly remarkable.
The Lynngams are half Khasis and half Garos, and the Dkos or Hanas are Garos who observe the Khasi custom of erecting memorial stones.
Such a taboo amongst the Lynngams is not to be wondered at, as they have probably imbibed the notion from their Garo mothers, intermarriages between Lynngams and Garos being common. The Garos, like other Thibeto-Burmans, have numerous taboos. There are numerous instances of special taboos among the Khasis.
The Lynngams have some stories regarding the founders of these clans, of which the following is a specimen: "A woman was asleep under a sohbar tree in the jungle, a flower from which fell on her, and she conceived and bore a female child who was the ancestress of the Nongsohbar clan." Some of the stories of the origins of other clans do not bear repeating.
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