ode. The clans of the present day are
nothing more or less than overgrown families, they are bound together
by the religious tie of ancestor-worship in common, and of a common
tribal sepulchre, except in cases of clans which have, owing to their
size, spit up into several sub-divisions, like the Diengdoh clan;
such sub-divisions possessing their own cromlechs. Ancestor-worship
in common and tribal sepulchres in common seem to indicate that the
original unit was the family and not the tribe, for there would be no
reason for the members of a clan to worship the same household gods
and to deposit the remains of the clan members in the same tomb unless
there was some strong tie, such as that of consanguinity, binding them
together. It has been already mentioned that each of these clans is
strictly exogamous; this again supports the family origin theory. A
Khasi can commit no greater sin than to marry within the tribe. Some
of the clans are prohibited moreover from intermarriage with other
clans, because of such clans being of common descent. If the titles
(see Appendix) are carefully examined, it will be seen that some of
them bear the names of animals, such as the _Shrieh_ or monkey clan,
the _Tham_ or crab clan, or of trees, such as the Diengdoh clan
(already referred to). The members of these clans do not apparently
regard the animals or natural objects, from which they derive their
names, as totems, inasmuch as they do not abstain from killing, eating
or utilizing them. The names of these objects are connected generally
with some story, concerning the history of the clan, but there is no
evidence to show that the clans-folk ever regarded the above animals
or objects as their tribal totems. If the lists of the Khyrim and
Cherra clans are examined, it will be seen what a large number bear
the name of _Dkhar_ or its abbreviation _'Khar_. The word _dkhar_
is that applied by a Khasi to an inhabitant of the plains. We come
across names such as _'khar-mukhi, khar sowali_, the first word being
an abbreviation of _dkhar_, and _mukhi_ being the common Bengali name
which occurs in Chandra Mukhi, Surjya Mukhi, &c. Sowali (_chowali_)
is the common Assamese word for a girl. The ancestresses of these
tribes were plains women, carried off, no doubt, in the raids made
by the Khasis over the border into Assam and Sylhet. The word _Jong_
in the list of tribes is a Synteng synonym of _kur_ or _jaid_, and the
War word _khong_, which will oft