Kuki (Indic people); Lushai (Asian people); Lushai language
which half a dozen or more young men pass the night. The young fellows
help their host in his house-building and cultivation, and once a year
he gives them a feast of a pig. This custom prevails in most of the
non-Lushei clans, and also among the Kabui Nagas in the Manipur Hills.
The women do not wear the huge ivory earrings of the Lushai but
cornelians or short lead bars.
The general constitution of the clan and the village is very similar
to that of the Lushais. As regards marriage they are monogamists,
in this particular forming a very remarkable exception to all their
cognates. The marriages of paternal first cousins are allowed--in
fact, among chiefs they are the rule. The parents of a young man
who desires to marry a girl go to her house with an offering of zu,
and if this is accepted the girl is at once taken to their house,
but the bridegroom continues for two or three months to sleep with
his bachelor friends. The marriage is not considered final nor is any
payment made till a child is born, and if this does not occur within
three years the couple separate, but on the birth of a child the full
price agreed on must be paid up and divorce is not countenanced. On
my enquiring what would happen in case the lady subsequently proved
fickle, my informant smiled in a superior manner and said that such
behaviour was unknown among his people. The Vuite object to giving
their girls to the Lushais on account of the tendency of Lushai
husbands to discard their wives on the slightest excuse.
Although the Vuite do not maintain that before marriage their girls
are invariably chaste, yet one who errs is looked down on, and in
consequence abortion and infanticide are said to be common. "Sawnman"
at Rs. 23/- is demanded from the seducer.
As among most non-Lushei tribes, the eldest son inherits. The
punishments for offences are similar to those among the Lushais,
but the Vuite assert that the crime of sodomy is unknown among
them. Murder can be atoned for by the payment of seven mithan to
the heir of the murdered man, and accidental homicide by that of one
mithan and a gun. In the days when war was common they used to ambush
their enemies more than was usual among the Lushais, but they never
went head-hunting simply for honour and glory. As regards "boi,"
they follow Lushai customs closely.
Pathian is acknowledged, and in general their religious beliefs
resemble those of the Lushais, but they have no idea of a separate
abode for the spirits of warriors. They believe that departed spirits
have two or more lives in the land beyond the grave.
For their Sakhua sacrifice a boar is killed on the front verandah
and cooked within the house. The skin of the head, the testicles,
heart, snout, and liver are placed on a bamboo over the verandah,
which must be freshly thatched.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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