ER III

Laws and Customs

Tribal Organization.

The inhabitants of the Khasi and Jaintia Hills may be said to
be divided into the following sections:--Khasi, Synteng or Pnar,
War, Bhoi, and Lynngam. These divisions represent collections of
people inhabiting several tracts of country and speaking dialects
which, although often deriving their origin from the Khasi roots,
are frequently so dissimilar to the standard language as to be
almost unrecognizable. The above sections may be sub-divided as
follows:--The Khasis into the inhabitants of the central high plateau,
Cherra and Nongstoin, Maharam, Mario, Nongkhlaw, and the neighbouring
Siemships. The Syntengs or Pnars may be divided as follows:--Into
Syntengs proper, Nongtungs and Kharwangs; the Wars into War proper,
and War Pnar; the Bhois into Jinthongs, Mynris, Ryngkhongs, and the
Khasi-Bhois, i.e. Khasis who inhabit the low country to the north
of the district, which is called generally the "Bhoi." The Lynngams
are a separate division. They must not be confused with the Dkos or
Hanas who are Garos. It must, however, be remembered that the Jinthong,
Mynri, and Ryngkhong Sub-divisions of the Bhoi division are not Khasi,
but Mikir, i.e. they belong to the Bodo or Bara group. The Lynngams
are half Khasis and half Garos, and the Dkos or Hanas are Garos who
observe the Khasi custom of erecting memorial stones. The above tribes
and sub-tribes are not strictly endogamous, nor are they strictly
exogamous, but they are more endogamous than exogamous; for instance,
Syntengs more often marry Syntengs than Khasis, and _vice versa_, and
it would be usually considered derogatory for a Khasi of the Uplands
to marry a Bhoi or War woman, and a disgrace to marry a Lynngam. These
divisions are subdivided into a number of septs, taking Mr. Risley's
definition of "sept" as being the largest exogamous division of the
tribe. It will, however, be more convenient to speak of these septs
as "clans," the word "clan" having been used in other parts of this
Monograph and by other writers.

Many of the clans trace their descent from ancestresses or _kiaw_
(grandmothers), who are styled _ki Iawbei-Tynrai_, lit. grandmothers
of the root (i.e. the root of the tree of the clan). In some of the
clans, the name of this ancestress survives; take as instances the
Mylliem-ngap and Mylliem-pdah clans of the Khyrim State, the names
of the ancestresses of the clans being _ka ngap_ (honey, i.e. the
sweet