Studies of religions and worldviews

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CONTRIBUTIONS TO SOUTHEAST ASIAN ETHNOGRAPHY Number 5, August 1986

STUDIES OF RELIGIONS AND WORLDVIEWS Edited by Anthony R. Walker

•

Editor’s Introduction

Articles

The Mlabri People of Northern Thailand: Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs Jespet Trier

The Religious Life of the Yao People of Northern Thailand; Some Introductory Remarks Chob Kacha-Ananda

A

Transformations of Buddhism in the Religious Ideas and Practices of a Non-Buddhist Hill People: The Lahu Nyi of the Northern Thai Uplands Anthony R. Walker

Religious Syncretism among the Buddhist Chakma of Southeastern Bangladesh Md. Habibur Rahman

The Besisi and their Religion: An Introduction to the People, the Beliefs and the Ritual Practices of an Aboriginal Community of Coastal Selangor, Malaysia Satkuna Mathur

The Mirek: Islamized Indigenes of Northwestern Sarawak — Part Three Tunku Zainah Tunku Ibrahim

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION

For this fifth number of our journal, Contributions to Southeast Asian Ethnogr(q)hy, we take up the subject of Southeast Asian religions and world­ views. Our ‘examples come from a fairly wide geographical area; we have a paper from the Chittagong Hills of Bangladesh in the far west of the Southeast Asian culture area, three papers from north Thailand (one of which includes data from China’s Yunnan province), one from Peninsular Malaysia and one from Sarawak, East Malaysia. As with the other numbers of Contributions (1 & 4) which I have edited, the ethnographic focus of this issue is on ethnic minority peoples. Naturally, therefore, indigenous Southeast Asian worldviews figure prominently. On the other hand, many of the papers deal very specifically with the input of one or another of the major world religions within the total complex of the people’s belief system and ritual idiom. The great importance of Buddhism, Taoism and Islam for peoples who are themselves not necessarily fullycommitted to any one of these religious traditions is clearly revealed in the papers that make up this collection. We begin in the far north of Southeast Asia (northern Thailand) and with a people who surely have a claim to being among the most truly autochthonous of all Southeast Asian peoples. It is a privilege to begin this issue with Jesper Trier’s fascinating and superbly illustrated account of these — until very recently at least — exceedingly elusive people, the Mlabri. Known to the local Tai and mountain peoples as the Phi Tong Luang or “Spirits of the Yellow Leaves,’’ these timid gatherer-hunters of the upland forests have generally been known to surrounding peoples not in the flesh but through their abandoned, and so yellow-leaved, windscreens. But now we are beginning to learn much more about Mlabri society and culture. Jesper Trier’s paper on Mlabri social organization and supernaturalism represents a major addition to the ethnographic literature on the northern Thai uplands, as well as on remnant Southeast Asian gatherer-hunter societies and cultures. Remaining in the same geographical area, upland north Thailand, we have next a paper by Chob Kacha-Ananda on Yao religion, setting out some of his findings over many years of research irt several of northern Thailand’s Yao communities. Yao religion is an amalgam of tadigenous spirit beliefs and Chinese Taoism. Dr. Chob’s paper deals with both of these facets in some detail and touches upon recent Theravada Buddhist and Christian influences as well. Then comes my own paper, concerned with the way that the Lahu hill people have adopted, adapted and incorporated Buddhist (both Theravada and Mahayana) ideology and practices into their own specifically Lahu cultural idiom. Besides reporting on aspects of my own field research, I use information from Chinese language sources which have hitherto not found reference in the Western language literature on this part of the world. From north Thailand we go south and west to the Chittagong Hill Tracts of the far east of Bangladesh. Of course, Bangladesh is rightly regarded as a South Asian rather than a Southeast Asian nation. But the people with whom we are concerned here are the Chakma, who are Theravada Buddhists, who

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Anthony R. Walker

probably moved into their present homeland from the Arakan region of Burma, and who are physically a Southeast Asian rather than a South Asian people. The paper on the Chakma, by Md. Habibur Rahman, examines how these people - who formally regard themselves as Buddhists, unlike the Lahu people described in my paper - in fact follow a multifarious religious ideology and liturgical practices which include elements of their own animo-polytheism, of the Hinduism of their South Asian neighbours and of Theravada Buddhism. Moving much further south, our next paper, by Satkuna Mathur, treats with the Besisi (often called Mah^leri), an Austroasiatic-speaking aboriginal people who live on the Selangor coast, not far from Malaysia’s capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Among Malaysia’s Orang Asli, or aboriginal peoples, the Besisi are particularly interesting in that, as coastal peoples, they must have inter­ acted for many centuries with their Malay Muslim neighbours. And yet, for the most part, they have actively resisted formal conversion to Islam. Nonetheless, like the non-Buddhist Lahu who have imbibed so much of the Buddhism of their lowland neighbours, the Besisi have accepted several Islamic ideas and practices into their own indigenous Besisi religious system. . Finally, we go to Sarawak, for the third and final part of Tunku Zainah Tunku Ibrahim’s pioneering study of the Mirek people. In this paper, Tunku Zainah takes up the intriguing subject of how these Mirek, all of whom are now Muslims, utilize the legends of their pre-Islamic past, as well as those associated with their conversion to Islam, in order to preserve an ethnic identity distinct from that of other Sarawak Malays. It remains for me to record my thanks to all the contributors for their support of this journal, to my wife, Pauline Hetland Walker, for her proof­ reading skills and to Double-Six Press for their cooperation in seeing this number of Contributions into print. Should there be any errors or omissions in the papers of Drs. Trier and Kacha-Ananda, due to the rush to complete this issue before my departure from Singapore, I offer them my apolo^es and promise to print an -errata in the next issue of Contributions for which I am responsible. Finally, may I ask all our readers, contributors and patrons to take careful note of the change in this journal’s editorial and administrative address. The style of the journal, however, will remain as before. Anthony R. Walker Department of Sociology National University of Singapore 1 August 1986

THE MLABRI PEOPLE OF NORTHERN THAILAND: SOCIAL ORGANIZATION AND SUPERNATURAL BELIEFS JESPER TRIER * CONTENTS

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Introduction Introducing the Mkbri Social Organization, Settlement Patterns and Economic Life Mlabri Supematuralism' Birth, Name-Giving, Sickness, Death and Afterlife Conclusion

1. INTRODUCTION

In 1970, while visiting remote hiU villages in north Thailand, my wife and I heard strange stories about small groups of “primitive” forest gatherers and hunters, said still to be living a secluded life in some of the most inaccessible parts of the hill country.i Soon we realized that these stories referred to those elusive people known to the Thai as the Phi Thong Luang, the “Spirits of the Yellow Leaves”. Seldom seen, even by other hill peoples, the existence of these timid nomads has been known to most outsiders only through their abandoned, and so yellow-leafed, thatched windscreens (Pl. 1). These Phi Thong Luang first appear in the ethnographic record in 1919, in the writings of the Danish amateur ethnographer and long-time resident of Thailand, Erik Seidenfaden (1919; 1926). Some decades later, in 1936, they were visited briefly by the German ethnologist, Hugo Bernatzik (1938). After Bernatzik’s encounter with them, it was to be many years before the Phi Thong Luang were agam contacted by scholars, noUbly in 1962, by a team from the Siam Society led by Kraisri Nimmanahaeminda(Boelesefa/, 1963:133—201). Despite receiving more and more reports about these jungle-dwellers, it was four months before our party stumbled upon the Mlabri one of several groups designated as “Phi Tong Luang”. 2 When, at last, we came upon these Mlabri, or “forest people” (mla, “human beings”, bri, “forest”), we found them to be both shy and timid, but nonetheless a charming folk. Their material possessions were astonishingly few and psychologically they seemed to us very different from any other peoples we had previously known. Since

*Dr. Phil. (Aarhus University); curator. Prehistoric Museum, Moesgard,’ Denmark. 1. I was accompanied on my visits to the Mlabri by my wife, a trained nurse. On two of our visits, we also had the assistance of two friends, one a physician and the ofter a dentist. We received substantia! financial support &om the Danish State Council for the Humanities. 2. The people whom Bernatzik visited in 1936 were a Khon Pa group, but not Mlabri Kraisn Nimmanahaeminda’s party did, however, contact the Mlabri.

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Jesper Trier

1970, we have stayed with the Mlabri on several occasions in 1976 1978 1980 and 1982. When we first met the Mlabri they were still living almost exclusively as forest gatherers and hunters. Occasionally, the men had brief contacts with

Pl. 1. Windscreens of a 15-member band

other mountain peoples, in order to exchange honey and medicinal roots for a little cloth, salt, tobacco and iron. But the Mlabri, because of hostility from rnany sides, were extremely shy and afraid of all outsiders. For this reason their women and chUdren were almost never seen by other mountain peoples until 1976, when the Mlabri started to work regularly for some Hmong villagers, clearing the forest .cover for them in order to make rice swiddens. Today, all the Mlabri families are employed for most of the year in swidden work. But, when they are not working for the Hmong villagers, they continue to roam the dense mountain forests, still maintaining the necessary skills to survive as gatherer-hunters. Nonetheless, their traditional social structure and religious beliefs seem to be rapidly disintegrating. This is due to the dra­ matic changes which have occurred to their environment. Today they have come to depend for their subsistence food on rice obtained from the Hmong. Smce 1982, the Mlabri have received regular visits from various researchers and even from tourists.

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

MAP 1.

NORTHERN THAILAND SHOWING LOCATION OF MLABRI

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Jesper Trier

Right from the beginning of my research among the MJabri, I endeavoured to record aU the most important aspects of their traditional gatherer-hunter hfe. whde It was stiU possible to do so. The main purpose of this paper is to provide some information on Mlabri social organization as well as on their concepts of the supernatural world.

2. INTRODUCING THE MLABRI 2a. Identification, Language and Demography The Thai people, as already menUoned, usually refer to the Mlabri - along with other forest dweUers closely related in language and culture - as Phi

J'^^ng the "Spirits of the Yellow Leaves", or else they call them Khon Pa, Forest People”. This latter name is also the one used for them in Laos Tu of them are said to live in Sayabouri province. T A Mon-Khmer language, but with several loanwords from lai (Northern Thai and Laotian) 3 Their language, which is quite distinct,

Mlabri language, see Boeles et ai.tali (1963:io 180-83) Eeerod or ht’ ProfeSr' S for his valuable advice on linguistic matters. Mlabri words and names mentioned in this paper are transcribed so as to approach M Widi pronunciation. However, to distinguish the foUowing three vowels. I have . a German‘'6", as in "word" and "i", which is more open than bh . Rs are usually rolled.

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

7

also has loanwords from a neighbouring Mon-Knmer-speaking group, the Khamu. Loanwords from other languages are particularly evident when Mlabri are speaking of non-traditional objects. Most Mlabri are able to speak some Northern Thai and some can communicate in Hmong as well. It should be added that they sing both in Thai and in their own language. The text is not fixed; they sing impromtu and often contrapuntally. In 1982, the Mlabri population was about 140. We believe this figure to be more-or-less accurate, since there are only a few Mlabri families that we

Pl. 3.

Mlabri boys

have not seen. Also, we have obtained fingerprints from 105 individuals (not including infants). In 1976 our informants told us that there'were about twenty families and that they traditionally lived in eight bands. This means that there was then an average of about 17 persons per band.

2b. Location and Interaction with Neighbouring Peoples The Mlabri group lives in the mountain range which divides the provinces of Nan and Phrae in northern Thailand (Maps 1 & 2). Traditionally they have

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Jesper Trier

remain at lower elevations whilp r?’

mostly compelled to •

Sayabourye

Phayao

30 Km

PROVINCIAL TOWN

BI5TRICT TOWN MIABRI

AREA

MOUNTAINS

MA N ROAD

R VER

Phra

RS*’ Tha Pla

MAP 2. DETAIL OF THE I"----SETTLEMENT AREA SHOWING also land ^OVE 600 METr’eS ^2,000 FEET)''in"elEV^ TION (HATCHED)

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

9

as some Hmong informants, have related to us how the Mlabri, crossing the river Mekong, arrived in their present homeland from Laos at a time when their oldest member, Patot (in 1982, about 70 years old), was still a child. This, incidentally, would have been about the same time (around 1919) that we first have reports of the Khon Pa living in this area. Before 1919, when Seidenfaden wrote about them, we have almost no information about the relationships existing between fiie Mlabri (and other Khon Pa groups) and their mountain and lowland neighbours. Several older Northern Thai people mentioned that these forest-dwellers were once more numerous than they are today. At the beginning of the present century the various Khon Pa groups 'maintained some connections with the Khamu, Tin and Lahu mountain peoples. But, after the arrival of Hmong, contacts have been more numerous with the latter than with other hill peoples. The Khon Pa have, for quite some time, also interacted with a number of hill-dwelling Thai communities. Present-day Mlabri recount that, for many years, they would only approach small and distant Hmong and Thai villages to procure the most essential goods, such as iron, salt and tobacco. Mountain Thai, as well as Mlabri themselves, told us how the Mlabri would take many precautions before entering a Hmong or Thai settlement, sending one or two emissaries ahead of the main party, never staying overnight and almost never bringing their women and chOdren along with them. Such limited interaction between the Mlabri and their neighbours continued well into the 1970s. But then the Mlabri were compelled to seek regular work from other hill peoples, because first the forest animals began to disappear and, subsequently, the forest itself. Now all the Mlabri work as underpaid land­ workers, mostly employed by the Hmong (who sometimes treat them harshly). During the past few years, the Thai government has started to help the Mlabri in various ways. But their traditional culture, so fragile as it is, is crumbling before our very eyes. The Mlabri themselves realized this several years ago. As Pha, one of their most impressive personages, put it, “When the forest disappears, we will all be punished by the Great Spirit, everything will dry out.” Even today, it is worth noting that, but for a few of the younger men, Mlabri mostly continue to keep to themselves. They still disallow marriage with outsiders. And it is an interesting fact — and-one well worth contem­ plating — that their general name for all non-Mlabri, guarl, means “monkey”. 2c. Physical Characteristics

Physically, the Mlabri are mostly well built, but of short stature (Pls. 2-5). Men average 155 cm, women 144.5 cm. Women and children often have alveolar prognathism; males, frequently have oblong afterheads and adult males, heavy eyebrows. Both sexes have broad cheekbones and a flat nose, imparting a typically triangular impression to their faces. Skin colour is light brown and of a faint reddish tint when they are living in the forest, but it becomes very dark brown when exposed to sunlight for long periods during work in the Hmong swiddens. Teeth are quite small and could be said to be "Melanesian”. Blood samples show a very complex pattern, perhaps due to isolation and genetic drift within these small, purely endogamic groups. Of the 80 persons we

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Jesper Trier

measured (belonging to vanous Khon Pa groups, but mostly Mlabti), aU but ‘wo were of blood group A rh. pos. The exceptions were AB rh. pos. Fingerwhh one^nf “ characteristic, with almost no arch and 04V f percentages of whorls ever recorded (men: whorl 7^2°’1 “‘’P women: whorl ib.b%, ulnar loop 22.6%, radial loop 0.4% and arch 0.4%).

As so oftenI with the application of anthropometry to the peoples of Indochba, the iresults of our measurements of the Mlabri cannot easily be bterpreted. However taken together, they do very much resemble those J c r , ■" iuuuii lesemDie inose AlnnTth Th™ mT® »«ch further south cdhf ^^^-^^^ysian border. The anthropometric data, along with certain cultural evidence, suggests that the various Khon Pa groups are probably ^ ancient Australoid population, once dominant in mabland from Z ^bsequently broken up by massive Mongoloid penetration nT w h h'® undeniable Mongoloid input into Mlabri physical characterists is of relatively recent date. The Mlabri

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

11

themselves say that there is a religious ban against their marriage with other mountain peoples. On the other hand, we do have on record the case of a non-Mlabri Khon Pa group trying to kidnap a girl from an isolated upland village community. As regards their physical wellbeing, young Mlabri seem quite healthy, especially when subsisting on their varied forest diet. But there are almost no old people among them. This is the result of the depredations of tuberculosis, various parasites, tigers and snakes, and even simple fatigue, consequent upon so frequently having to change campsite. In the case of serious illness, Mlabri mostly rely on the help of the spirits, making offerings of meat and roots to

Pl. 5. Mlabri women, fearing capture by strangers, apply mud to faces to make themselves less attractive (1976)

these supernatural beings. But they also use a number of special roots and herbs for curing head, tooth and stomach pains and also for healing wounds and burns. We observed, for example, that one band applied a special kind of larva, which they call dom-gam, to their wounds, probably because it contains antibacterial substances. Today Mlabri do receive some medical treatment, but they also suffer from the heat, from malaria and from other infections while working for the Hmong and Thai peoples.

3. SOCIAL ORGANIZATION, SETTLEMENT PATTERNS AND ECONOMIC LIFE 3a. The Band and its Camp

Until about 1976, the Mlabri lived exclusively as nomadic forest gatherers and hunters, organizing themselves socially and economically on the basis of

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Jesper Trier

bands, each comprising between 12 and 25 people In fact the« n^nnip ni the,:- band organizaUon when they are living by’ttemselves L th^

Wind' screens hearths (•major ■*“minor) 1st. generation 220* (S6:Fafir)

F5*«a!

2 2nd, generation

12F^

adopted

3rd. generation

thin previoa

Fig. 1. The Social Organization of a Mlabri camp

car™ i" ^ont, which carry the lintel, and another two sticks behind to support the back of the creen. which is covered with banana leaves or palm fronds Inside (Pl 7) the floor IS covered with dry leaves or big pieces of the outer bark of trS' As the nmts sAghfly. m order to prevent the windscreen’s sleeping occupmts front shdmg down into the Are built in front of it, the Mlabri set up a wooden plank to act as a foothold. The fires in front of the XSrXs ^d notfcasrtokeen°^^®’ during chiUy nights and mornings ana not least, to keep at bay wild animals and insects. It takes two or thrS people about half an hour to erect such a windscreen. one^^ A'^maU '•‘ffwent kinds of windscreen, from smaU versions to big Se the larvT“ accommodate two Snants and have five or six VUVuDalitb*

*

a windscreen of their own, as do the male friend his wife and two dau^ters. A fourth shelter is occupied by a yo^rw cSei cLnle

lie, the old widowers granddaughter. Finally, in the fifth shelter sleen g*X” 0M“r':™‘*'“ a'"® win^elters have, between them, ten hearths; but only four of these are major hearths used for cooking as weU as for warmth. The Lnarried

Miabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

13

males eat with their respective families and so do not keep a major hearth in front of their windscreen. Within the windscreens, men occupy the flanks to protect the others against wild animals, women are positioned so as to care for their small children, and the older boys and bachelors are stationed somewhat away from the married couples. While relative position may change when the band moves to a new campsite, the general occupation pattern remains consistent with these practical and psychological concerns. The size of a band depends very much upon circumstances. Successful men tend to have big families and may attract other famiUes as weU as individuals

Pl. 6. Constructing a windscreen (1970) to their band. On the other hand, during the dry winter months, when food becomes increasingly difficult to find, a big band may split up. Within the band the only real authority is that held by parents over their children and, to a lesser extent, by grandparents over their grandchildren. (There are no shamans or other religious leaders among the Miabri.) When extra-familial disputes do arise, these are settled by the older men. An im­ portant mechanism for social control is the Miabri principle that, if an in­ dividual or family cannot get along with the other individuals or famiUes within the band, that individual or family is free to join another band. Theft is said to be very rare among the Miabri and nobody to whom we spoke could

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Jesper Trier

Pl. 7.

Inside a windscreen

Pl. 8. Making fire with strike-a-light

recall anything resem­ bling violent crime. (But we did record an in­ teresting case, said to have occurred long ago, of a respected person killing a troublesome band member while out on a pretended hunting expedition.) Although all Mlabri are related to one another in some way or other, there does not at present seem to be any­ thing resembling a com­ prehensive “tribal” socio­ political organization. In the ethnographic record it is mentioned (cf. Young 1962:72; Ahmad 1981) that there would be a fixed annual meeting of all Mlabri. But only one of our in­ formants suggested that this was indeed once the case. Nonetheless, we think it probable that, in the past, the various bands would have got together to allow the younger generation to find marriage partners and the older folk to meet up with one an­ other. In recent times, there have been occa­ sions when two or more bands have camped in close proximity to each other. Thus, in December 1976, we came across four bands, totalling 80 people, who were all camped close to one another. We have discovered no

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

15

real proof of the former existence of a chief of all the Mlabri. But it is possible that such a personage did once exist. One of our informants, Paeng (56 years old in 1982), who is himself an influential person, claims that his father, Nampyng, was the last leader of all the Mlabri. But, even if this was indeed the case, this leader could only have had very limited powers, since he would have had next to no means to enforce his will. 3b. Mating, Marriage and Family

Young boys and girls have little direct contact with one another, because in day-to-day life the girls stay with the women and the boys either play with each other or join the men. However, when they are thirteen to fourteen years old, the two sexes do start to show an interest in one another. They meet when bands meet, or a boy may even get permission to visit another band for the very purpose of finding a girl. Young people are allowed to have sexual con­ tacts before getting married and they select partners on their own. Marriage is an informal affair. When a young couple wish to get married, the boy’s father talks with the girl’s parents, who normally give their consent, provided the couple are not close kin. Nowadays the boy does not need to ^ve the girl’s parents anything, but he will usually offer them some meat, rice, tobacco or cloth. Formerly he had to bring home three to four animals, perhaps even a deer, to show that he was able to support a family of his own. If the girl’s parents do not agree to the match, it won’t occur. Also, we were told, if the boy and girl met a tiger just before their marriage, this was traditionally considered such a bad omen that their union would not take place. If the boy’s parents are against the connection, the boy and girl may decide to elope and stay in the forest by themselves. When they return, about a week later, the parents will have to accept the marriage. Mlabri almost never marry non-Mlabri. They believe that, if this happens, the rain will not come and everything will dry out. We have but one recorded incidence of a Mlabri man marrying a Hmong girl, by whom he had a male child. After a short while, this Hmong wife died from malaria; the child was then adopted by its mother’s family. We have repeatedly asked, and always received the same answer, that there are no ceremonies, nor any celebration connected with marriage. The yoxmg couple simply make their own windscreen, usually in the camp of the girl’s band. It is our experience that, quite often, the marriage is not successful and the couple therefore split up, even if the girl is already pregnant. If, however, the two get along, they receive a joint name, indicating the start of a new nuclear family. But still, no ceremonies are held. After six months to one year, the couple moves to the band of the husband, where they usually remain more pennanently. Later, they may join other bands. The reason why the young couple first joins the wife’s parents may be to lessen the pain of the girl’s departure from her parents, to whom she has very strong bonds. At this point it should be mentioned that there are no tabus with regard to in-laws. When we asked Mlabri about this, they were quite surprised by our question. During pregnancy a woman maintains a normal diet, although each Mlabri of whom we have enquired has mentioned something in particular — primarily

16

Jesper Trier

different kinds of meat — which should be avoided. When a woman is about to deliver, she walks a short distance downhill from the camp, accompanied by another woman who assists her in various ways, such as making a couch, fetching wood and boiling water. The umbilical cord is cut with a bamboo knife and’the afterbirth is dug into the ground, although previously it was just left in a tree. (This roughly corresponds to the disposal of dead persons;

Pl. 9. Two families eating together

now they are buried in the ground on the request of the Hmong, but formerly they were either laid on a pile of leaves or placed in a tree.) The newborn child is placed in a small depression covered with banana leaves. Nowadays the midwife, together with the mother and child, return to the camp on the same day. Previously, the party moved further away from the camp and stayed away for three days, possibly because they feared that the spirits of the camp might harm the spirit of the newborn. Formerly, so we were told, a small hut was made for the expectant mother, a necessity in the cold or rainy seasons.

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

17

At first the Mlabri denied that they ever suffered miscarriages or gave birth to deformed babies, until one of our most reliable informants suddenly announced that deformed or very weak infants were killed and buried by the mother. Even healthy twins are killed because, Mlabri believe, twins share only one spirit. This situation, they believe, would surely lead to disaster if the twins were allowed to live. In case the mother dies during childbirth, the husband buries her. Husband and wife abstain from sexual intercourse for about one month prior to, and for two months after, the birth. Intercourse is also avoided during menses because, Mlabri say, the woman’s blood will cause her husband to sicken.

Pl. 10.

Warming hands over fire in front of windscreen

Our informants did not agree on the details concerning the naming of a newborn child. Possibly this is because it is done in slightly different ways. From our own records, we find that some children do not have their own name before they are five to six years old. The upbringing of children is just as uncomplicated as most other aspects of Mlabri life. They do not receive much instruction, but simply learn by copying others. Parents cherish their children, whom they may scold but

18

Jesper Trier

almost never beat. The children, for their part, treat their parents with con­ siderable respect. Almost all Mlabri marry several times; women usually three or four times, men up to seven times. The average length of a marriage is about five years. There is, however, a wide range of variation in the length of marriages. Some men marry more times than women, because women stop marrying and having children before they are 35 years old. Also, men generally live longer and often marry women much younger than themselves. A man may leave his wife at will and a woman may leave her husband if he is often sick and cannot take proper care of his family. But she is also able to leave him for other reasons. A Mlabri man told us that, if a man stays away for some days, perhaps while hunting, and comes back to find his wife with another man, he will firmly ask the intruder to leave. But if the latter refuses to move, the cuckold may ask his wife to choose between them. In case she prefers her new partner, the husband has to leave the windscreen. Divorce is not a serious a matter for the Mlabri. This is because it is so common and also because there are so few material belongings that a couple shares and so, on divorce, must divide. However, the children may present a problem. Small children stay with their mother until they are six to eight years old, when their father can insist on having them back, because it is accepted that they belong to him. But the present rules are not as rigid as previously and the older children may now choose for themselves where they want to stay. If young children lose both parents, they are adopted, often by an uncle, A divorce may be painful enough, but for a woman the problem may be eased by the fact that there is a surplus of men and, consequently, she will not stay single for long. (Single men, for'the very same reason, sometimes have to wait for a relatively long period until they find a partner.) The Mlabri kinship system is characterized by a very limited number of kinship terms, as shown in Table One. TABLE 1.

MLABRI KINSHIP TERMS

Mlabri Tenn

Identification

mom

father, grandfather (also ta-kam-ruOr, kam, “old”)

mo

mother, grandmother

tar

father’s brother; sometimes also father’s father

jar

father’s sister, mother’s sister; sometimes also mother’s mother

mi-jar ding-buert

mother’s sister

dar-jar

daughter’s husband

ding

elder brother, elder sister

roi

younger brother, younger sister

(cont. on next page)

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

19

(cont. from front page) Mlabri Tenn

Identification

ding-gryt-god

elder sister

roi-gryt-god

younger sister

dlng-baer

elder relative-in-law

roi-baer

younger relative-in-law

rot-buert

brother’s wife (also /I), wife’s sister

roi

father’s brother’s child, mother’s brother’s child, granddiild (nor is also used, from Thai, norn)

man {—knae)

cousin, sister’s husband, daughter’s husband

ae-ta-rush

son

nar

granddiild

at-aeo aem-nish

son’s wife

aem-lar

daughter

It is a bilateral system, with an extended use of classificatory terms, some of them covering two generations. There are not even any exclusive terms for “father” and “mother”, mom being used both for father and grandfather and mo for mother and grandmother. There is, however, a degree of patrifocality within the system, in so far as patrilocality prevails over matrilocality, the nuclear family takes its name from the husband and father, not the wife and mother and, finally, a divorced man may traditionally claim back his child from its mother after it is about seven years old. 3c. Economic Life and Daily Routine

The main diet of the Mlabri has traditionally consisted of easily-captured game animals, like bamboo rats and other rodents, along with forest plants: yams, various roots, bulbs, vegetables and fruits. In the days when wildlife wa§ more plentiful in these northern hills, Mlabri hunters were occasionally able to kill larger game such as deer, gibbon, bear and wild pig. Birds are also a part of their traditional diet. The Mlabri do not fish regularly, being afraid of deep water. But, they do catch small fish, crabs, turtles and frogs in or near streams. The men also climb tall trees, at great risk, in order to collect honey and beeswax. Ranging only a few hundred metres from their temporary camps, Mlabri women would collect mainly yams, roots, crabs and other small animals (Pl. 17). Meanwhile, their menfolk would go hunting farther afield, sometimes staying away for several days at a time. According to early reports on the Mlabri (cf. Seidenfaden 1919:50), and also as mentioned by the people themselves, their traditional weapons and utensils were made entirely of wood and bamboo. The Mlabri claim never to

20

Jesper Trier

have used objects of stone. But during the past 60 years or more, they have also used iron spear tips and dig­ ging tools (Pl. 13). They would obtain the iron from other hill peoples and were able to forge it using a simple double-blowing device made of bam­ boo internodes. In times when they were totally out of contact with settled hill villagers, they were able to obtain small pieces of iron by searching the latter’s abandoned swiddens. Mlabri men traditionally hunt with spears (Pls. 11, 12). They do not use bows and arrows, crossbows or blow­ guns. Until about 1960, Mlabri applied poison to their spear-tips. The poison was made by mixing four ingredients: a rubber-like oil from thejan-nong tree, the white marrow of a young palm tree, called dau, poison from the head and tail of a centipede, and the Pl. II. Paeng, an influential man, poison from a snake. The mixture with his hunting spear was first tried out on a frog, and the spear left in the mixture for two weeks. Others said they would use a poison prepared from the sap of the bark of a tree, possibly Antiaris toxicaria. Until recently the Mlabri firmly believed that, if they made any attempt to cultivate plants, they would be punished by the spirits. Neither do the Mlabri domesticate animals, except for the dog, which they keep mainly to warn them of the presence of tigers, bears, snakes, or human strangers. Mlabri use bam­ boo mternodes to collect and store water, as cooking utensils and as re­ ceptacles for their sparse belongings: tobacco, flint ligh­ ters, spices, etc. As early as 50 years ago, some Mlabri had learned from their Hmong neigh­ bours how to make Pl. 12. Hunting with spear

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

21

Pl. 13. Mlabri possessions: bamboo container, string bag, pipe, spear heads, knife, digging blade nicely-executed baskets, mats, string bags (Pl. 13) and nets of rattan and bam­ boo. But even today, only a few Mlabri are able to produce such items. The

Pl. 14. Mlabri foodstuffs; roots, vegetables, crabs and fruits

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Jesper Trier

Mlabri have never produced their own textiles and there are many indica­ tions that in the past, when staying by themselves, they wore no clothing at all. We were told that, in the past, when the men had to visit a village settlement, they would make a loincloth of bast, while the womenfolk, on their exception­ ally rare appearances, would don a skirt of bamboo leaves. When we enquired of our Mlabri informants why they had not worn animal skins to protect them­ selves against the cold winter weather, they replied that they were unable to do so because they didi not know how. Until recently Mlabri clothing has com­ prised, for the men, a tiny loincloth and, for the women, a sarong. Mlabri artistic expression, as among other Khon Pa groups, is remarkably limited. It is true that they draw some simple geometric designs on their bam­ boo containers, pipes, ect. (which, incidentally, are strikingly similar to,

Pl. 15. Digging for bamboo rats

although not so well executed as, those made by the northern Orang Asli peoples of peninsular Malaysia [cf. Skeat and Blagden 1906,1: Pls. 426—427]). Some of the older Mlabri have elaborate tattooing on breast and back, but this is the handiwork of tattooers from hill communities. Previously, all Mlabri men had a hole in each earlobe, a custom abandoned by the younger men because, they say, they do not wish to be too easily recognized as Mlabri. The Mlabri make no jewellery or other art objects. In the Mlabri’s traditional daily routine, four or five men leave the camp early in the morning to hunt small game, dig out bamboo rats (Pl. 15) collect roots and honey and, occasionally, to catch fish from a small stream. Mean­ while, two or three women and teenage girls collect roots, edible plants, crabs, ect, not far from the campsite (Pls. 16, 17). The womenfolk never go hunting. The rest of the band remain in or near the windscreens, where they tend to the children, the sick and the aged. The children spend the day playing with pieces of wood and even with big knives and fire. Around noon, the women who have been out collecting, return to their

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

23

windscreens to cook for the children, who, even if the adults do not, get three meals a day. As with many gatherer-hunters, the Mlabri eat fruits and herbs as they gather them.

Pl. 16. Digging for roots In the afternoon, when the men return to the camp (sometimes they have been away for two or three days), the food which has been collected and

Pl. 17. Women collecting in deep forest

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Jesper Trier

hunted is shared among all the families. Each nuclear family usually eats separately. After eating, they drink water from long bamboo containers, smoke tobacco and chat. As there are few preparations to be made for the following day, the camp members sleep early. Much of the Mlabri’s time is spent relaxing. One of our biggest surprises, when we first met them, was the way we observed how even children could sit passively watching the forest for hour after hour.

4. MLABRI SUPERNATURALISM The beliefs of the Mlabri have been among the most difficult of the materials with which I have had to work. But they have also been among the most interesting. At first the Mlabri refused to discuss such matters with us. For example, in 1970 when I asked a band elder about tigers and snakes, he said that his band would have to decamp immediately if I persisted in asking such questions. This was because these animals are ..associated with malicious spirits. Eventually, it was possible for us to witness and record several Mlabri ceremonies. But even then, it has been far from easy to tfanslate and interpret what w^ were able to see and record.

Fig. 1. The Mlabri world view (the arrows show main direction of influence, messages or actions; the wind spirit carries sickness; when people die their spirits either go to the mountains or to the jungle)

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

25

4a. Mlabri Spirits: An Introduction I shall be^n my discussion of Mlabri supernaturalism by recording the .names of almost aU the spirits of which we heard. Not all these supernatural beings receive a mention in Mlabri prayers, but all of'them have one charac­ teristic in common: they may harm people who have done wrong. I have repeatedly asked my Mlabri informants to distinguish among the various spirits in whose existence they believe, so that I might begin to categorize them. But I have not been successful. Therefore, I have divided them up .according to their nature and their spheres of influence (Fig. 1). The first group of spirits which I have been able to identify are all charac­ terized by being associated with natural phenomena. The second group in­ cludes spirits which inhabit particular abodes. Both these categories of spirit may be propitiated and requested not to harm people, or else to grant parti­ cular favours. A third group includes a number of animal-spirits. Then there are the spear and knife spirits which, for many reasons, stand by themselves. A fifth group of spirits includes the most popular of all supernatural beings, the ancestral spirits or, better termed, the parental spirits. It is to these parental spirits that Mlabri most frequently address their prayers and make their X)fferings. The individual spirits within these groups are presented in the following table.

TABLE 2. MLABRI SPIRITS English

Thai

Mlabri

sky

pha

glari, garkglarl, glarl ba, marl myl

thunder

pa-Jaek

gyri, gyri basch, wok gyng (Jit. spirit stone sling)

rainbow

hung

bang, dad bang, laeng-ddng (red evening sky)

wind

lum

rui-mud, gul-gvil dae (connected to the wind spirit?)

truth mountain

dol

sja-bo-sjam (high), sja-bo, wok byl (death spirit)

mountain pass

giu

brO‘Wal

mountain wall ---- , hot spring

ba-ang bung, bang {din-pung}

wo (in rivers, lates, waterfalls, springs)

water earth

ru-at, word (connected to the wind spirit)

dini

stone

bae, gark bae

gaeb

tree

mei

forest (lowland)

pa

lam, tam? bri, gry-nal, dro-nal

area around camp

lot?

windscreen

gaeng

fireplace

gla-hin-gae

(cont. on next page)

Jesper Trier

26

(cont. from front page) &iglish

Thai

da kat 1 trees, good spirit) * 1 dtn-jai (in the earth, bad spirit)

miscellaneous* ghost in forest

Mlabri

(pa bel su) (po ka long)

da bang mok fork, ang fork, khon fork

tiger

ro-ai

bear

bae

pig

sfo-bud

porcupine

dS

rhinoceros

bok

hippopotamus (small)

grush

anteater or armadillo

bi, bal

peacock

tro-lot-ba

crocodile

nug

snake

bang, griish (connection with rainbow spirit)

tom-a

scorpion

ba, bak

butterfly

rai-paep, grul-paep

bee

fae-i, /ae (two types)

spear, knife

hok

kot, nau

person, dead

luk=mar, die

wok but, wok da, sin^ri a-bul

father, dead

phor

mom (also yom = man)

mother, dead

tnae

mo (also u-r = woman)

• Thai words only given if used in prayers

In the following pages I shall discuss these various Mlabri spirits, largely in the order in which they appear in the above table. However, in order to visualize the connections between the various groups of spirits mentioned in that table, it may be useful to consult Fig 1. It may be noted here that, when anybody commits a wrong, Mlabri believe that one of the important spirits will send a message in the form of a sign. The sky spirit, for example, sends thunder. If the wrong-doer does not respond to this message by making an appropriate offering, the offended spirit will send more serious punishment, in the form of sickness, insect bite, etc.

4b. Spirits of the Sky and Weather The spirit of the sky, wok glarl (wok, “spirit”, glaH, “sky”) or marl myl (jnarl, “death”, myl, “spirit”) is the most powerful of all. It stands above the other spirits and therefore also above the thunder spirit and the rainbow spirit. The sky spirit, Mlabri believe, sees everything people are doing, even

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

27

at night. The sky spirit (along with the earth spirit), makes people sick when they have done something wrong. It is the sky spirit, Mlabri say, which has commanded them never to grow anything and who will punish them when there is no more jungle and, consequently, no more animals remain. Once I asked an old Mlabri what would happen if one of them killed somebody. He said that the jungle would be raised towards the sky so that the sky would come down on them. The Mlabri make offerings to the sky spirit, but no outsiders are allowed to attend these ceremonies for fear of severe punishment. For our information, therefore, we have had to rely on what our Mlabri informants have told us. In the event of a Mlabri becoming seriously ill, for instance having a swollen body because, as our informant said, he has done something very wrong, a pig has to be sacrificed to ask the sky spirit for forgiveness. A bamboo altar is constructed and this is decorated with flowers and pieces of cotton cloth. Close family members paint their body “somewhere”. Near the windscreen of the sick person, the sacrificial pig is hung up, head downwards. While the other families in the band now have to move above 100 m away, and to keep absolutely quiet, the pig is killed, preferably with a spear. They then feast on the meat. But the head, and some other pieces of the pig’s carcass may not be eaten until three days have passed. We have recorded one of the prayers used at this ceremony: myl gom marl death spirit do

gom do

/war give

dit back

da lun look here

marl wok glarl wok bae da look death spirit sky spirit earth

mar bae give (to) earth

gom do

di djud please help

The purpose of the prayer is to call back the spirit of the sick person, who is about to be taken away by the sky spirit. Should that happen, it is believed that the victim will surely die. Incidently, while we were staying with a band for a week in 1978, a young man of about 18 years old was very ill, possibly from some kidney disease. At any rate, his body was so swollen that he could not move. We said we could take him to a hospital, but his father would not permit it. At that time, we wondered why the sick man’s sister had two big red painted spots, one on each cheek (Pl. 18). We now think that it was probably to call down the pity of the sky spirit. We have enquired of Mlabri dozens of times as to what they believe the sun, moon, planets and stars to be. But they have invariably replied that they do not know. Once, when I asked a man whether Mlabri engage in sexual inter­ course during the daytime, he answered that they do not consider this do be good because “the sun would feel ashamed”. Is the sun believed to be some sort of eye? We have been told that the bright planet (Venus) is good and that the red planet (Mars or Jupiter) is bad. Apparently, in the past, Mlabri would not go out hunting when the red planet was visible. The spirit of thunder, wok gyri, is also feared. The Mlabri believe that this spirit teUs them that someone has done something wrong, for example eaten beef. Even nowadays, I think some of them will say a prayer to ask the thunder

Jesper Trier

28

to leave. In the old days, according to several informants, they would also dance and beat on drums (of bamboo internodes?). If that did not help, they would burn some dry leaves with deer excrement on top, or burn old rags, so the bad smell could tell the thunder spirit that, being poor people, they should not be bothered by lightning, hail, strong winds and falling trees. One of the prayers says.

gyri gom thunder do lam away

hot fall

baer friend

bar now

gam not

gom djak do go di good

djul rui-mud gyri barl valley wind thunder fly

nak much

dje-rom difficult

When the first rain comes at the end of the dry winter season, the Mlabri dance (as do the Thai), but rain and sun at the same time is considered a bad sign, as is a red evening sky, laeng dong. In the old days, our Mlabri in­ formants said, they would “close” their wind­ screens (probably by covering the front with big palm fronds) and say inside, because the thunder spirit was angry. It should also be men­ tioned that Mlabri be­ lieve that, if they start quarreling, hail will beat them. A rainbow is con­ sidered a particularly bad sign. The rainbow is thought to be a spirit, Pl. 18. Ritual painting of cheeks wok bang. Where it descends, all sorts of mischief may take place. The spirit is said to consume the body odour of anybody who happens to be at that place, thus killing the unfortunate person. Alternatively, the victim may be bitten by a tiger or a snake. Mlabri also believe that, if the rainbow comes down near water, a particular animal-spirit, wokgraish, which resembles a crocodile, will be waiting there. One man told us that, in the area where a rainbow is seen, people could get sick, especially from drinking the water. Moreover, because the Mlabri believe that the rainbow can eat the roots and animals of that place, they will quickly abandon the area. One of my best

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

29

informants said that, when he was a child (in about 1950), they also had a ceremony to ask the rainbow spirit to leave. They either put up a sort of doorway of two branches, with “cut-through leaves” (a fern) — a sort of exit for the rainbow — or they wrapped a stone into dirty old rags. Thus, my

Pl. 19. Making offerings to spirits

informant said, when the spirit saw or smelt that they were only poor people, it would leave. His version of the prayer for this occasion was:

dad bang gom djak gom na djak bae la tom-a grab spirit rainbow do go do to go earth where snake bite Another important spirit, wok dae, seems to be connected with the wind. As dae means “right”, or “truth”, and as this spirit does not seem to stay in any particular place, the Mlabri possibly believe that truth is carried around by the wind, just as sickness is thought to be. Wok dae is often mentioned in their prayers, probably because Mlabri place great importance on honesty. 4c. Spirits of Mountains, Earth, Water, Forest, etc. Many of the spirits in this large group of supernatural beings are mentioned in prayers. Some of them are the object of ceremonies. The wind spirit

30

Jesper Trier

(carrying sickness) is frequently asked to go to the mountains. (When people die, their spirits are also requested to go to the mountains.) A mountain pass may also hold a spirit. A much feared spirit, ba-ang, lives in steep mountain waUs; with its long tongue it is said to be able to pull people down while they are climbing the mountain. There is a very special spirit, wok ru-at, connected with hot water springs. Such places, din-pung in 'ITiai, are familiar to Thai hunters, who have always known that animals come there to lick the salty water. It is also at such places that the Mlabri, when out of contact with other peoples, could obtain salt (mixed with earth). To our great surprise, the Mlabri kept denying knowledge of such places, despite having them within their hunting areas. However, at last one Mlabri admitted that they do perform ceremonies at such places, but only three men were said to know the special prayers. One of them said that, when they invited the spirit of the hot spring, they believed that the wind spirit, wokrui-mud, was the carrier. Other water spirits, wok wo, are found in lakes, waterfalls, rivers and streams. The Mlabri know perfectly well that they sometimes get sick from drinking water (which may have been contaminated by, for example, a dead animal). Therefore, they often prefer to make a hole in a wet area and take the water from there, the immediate surroundings acting as a filter. Like the spirit of the sky, the spirit of the earth, wok bae, may inflict sickness on people. This spirit is often mentioned in prayers. Some big stones or big trees are considered to hold spirits. After a child has been born, an offering may be made at such places. Formerly, spear ceremonies were per­ formed under big trees. A boy, about 13 years old, told us that there are small spirits, called da-kat, which may hunt people. If the Mlabri dream about the da-kat, or feel they are nearby, they will offer them a little meat, or some roots. This same boy told us that only old people had seen the da-kat. These elders had described these spirits as having different cplours. The good ones are known as don-jai and are green and stay in trees towards the east. The bad ones, din-jai, are red and stay in earth holes to the west. We have heard other stories from an ‘*old” Mlabri concerning man-like spirits, about 50 cm high, called mok tork, ang tork, or khon tork. Moreover, Mlabri also know stories, similar to those related by the Thai, about the phi ga su, which the Mlabri call wok ba bei su. Not all Mlabri believe in such spirits; somehow they do not seem to belong to the same hierarchy as do the other spirits. In some prayers the spirit of the lowlands, wok bri (wok) "spirit”, bri “forest”), or phi pa (Thai, phi “spirit”, pa "lowland”) is mentioned. For example, sometime after a child has been bom, eggs and rice are offered to this spirit. If this is not done, Mlabri believe, the mother and child will die.

4d. Animal Spirits All the most dangerous animals, as well as those which are poisonous to eat and a few which are of special appearance, are considered to be mani­ festations of spirits, at least when the Great Spirit (sky spirit) sends them

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

31

to punish someone in the band. Normally, however, the Mlabri do not believe either animals or plants to possess magical powers. By far the most feared of all animals are the tiger and a pack of leopards. At present only a few such animals remain. Formerly, however, many Mlabri fell victim to them, especially women and children unable to defend them­ selves. The very reason they had to leave their windscreens after four to ten days was, Mlabri say, because the camp got dirty and tigers could smell them and would start to follow them.

PL 20. The offerings

Several years back, we heard strange stories about what happened to people, two generations ago, who had been wounded by a tiger. At first we could not believe them, but the stories were constantly repeated. They told of wounded persons being just left sitting under a tree because, if the victim was brought back to the windscreen, the band would be followed by the tigers, who would then take more people from their midst. An even more sinister way of getting rid of tigers was also described. Some men lifted the wounded or dead person up into a tree, where the luckless one was tied to the trunk. Then, while

32

Jesper Trier

climbing down, the Mlabri removed the outer bark for two or three metres below the victim, and placed around the tree a circle of eight sharply-pointed bamboo sticks. When the tiger, after attackmg the person — perhaps still alive — tried to get down, its claws could not hold it and so it would fil onto the pointed sticks. When we first met with the Mlabri they were still deadly scared of tigers. Just mentioning the name, or that of another dangerous animal, was enough to be attacked, they believed. Incidentally, our best informant once said that his people formerly believed that, after death, Mlabri could be turned into bears and Hmong into tigers. We have asked the Mlabri many times whether they consider the tiger to be a spirit; they replied that they could not be certain. But if a tiger is difficult to get rid of, most of them think it is a spirit. They also say that a person eaten by a tiger may turn into a ghost. With regard to the other animal-spirits listed in Table Two, there are naturally lots of stories connected with them as well. Snakes, for example, may be spirits. But they are also sometimes killed, the constrictor for its meat and for its fat, which is used for dressing the hair. One of the Mlabri boys said that the killing of a butterfly would give them fever and, if they looked or laughed at copulating animus, the spirits would punish them so that they could not eat. There are also stories about animals not found in the list; a single example should be mentioned to show that not everything in Mlabri life conjures up fear and struggle. When they hear the “ge-^-ge” of a special bird, the do-dae~o, they know that friends are coming to visit them.

4e. The Spear Spirit

Since 1980, the Mlabri have abandoned their hunting spears. However, in the days when they used to use these weapons, certain rules had to be observed. Each spear belonged to one person exclusively. It could be borrowed by another man, but only after a prayer had first been offered to the spear spirit. If this was not done, Mlabri believed, the user would be wounded by a pointed bamboo. Before leaving camp, a Mlabri hunter would, while reciting a prayer, hold his spear over a leaf on which he had put a few minor offerings for the spear spirit. If, subsequently, the hunter could not kill any game, Mlabri believed that it was because he had offered too little. Sometimes a big spear ceremony would be performed. In this case, a small bamboo altar would be set up and a pig sacrificed to the spear spirit. We have had the prayer for the big spear ceremony, as well as that for the smaller “before going hunting” rite, repeated for us a number of times. As with other Mlabri prayers, these invocations are unfixed, either with regard to length or content. I have selected the following version: sin-ri spirit

kot sin'ri spear spirit

nau maen knife you

lae kae come

lam good

ding big

lam good

don look

son hunt

lam good

sae much

klae iron

sae kam-ri sam much sharp fall

mar give

bar bul sin-ri fly kUl spirit am TWfl/- kai raw (fresh meat) give egg kli bor sjom diin iron push fall meat

dae truly

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

gor here

ka is

kar-ohm water-turtle

tae much

scan g\vae need (?)

nae you

djak-sum fall

33

w5l bu lang sar-bar gom do send back (?) land turtle dan nar sjo-bo sjam nja place near much mountain high

nar bar tong baer sjin-dar per-daed-do sjo-bo lorn lean friend say (ask) everything we much now mountain wind away The second line of this prayer says that the people have offered an egg to the spear spirit. The last two Unes are a little difficult to understand. When the word “mountain” is mentioned, it could be because it is there that the spirits of the dead may go after death, as perhaps do those of the. animals. Why the wind is asked to leave is not clear, but the request is often made in prayers, perhaps because Mlabri believe that the wind may bring sickness. The last line just says that the hunter’s band wants to have “all kinds of food”. In connection with the traditional use of spears, it should be noted that, when killing an animal, Mlabri hunters had to be careful not to insert the whole of the spear blade into the animal’s body. Should they have done so, Mlabri believed, it would have been an insult to the spear spirit. And another rule of the hunt was that the man who killed a large game animal was not permitted to eat the meat himself, unless this was consumed exclusively by his own close family. Otherwise, the flesh had to be divided among all the members of the band, with the hunter himself having to eat some other food.

4f. The Ancestor Spirits The last spirits to be discussed in this paper are those of deceased parents. I shall also describe here the ceremony for the ancestors. At present this ceremony is the most popular among the Mlabri and its performance is about the only occasion when these people have a day of celebration. Whenever they can afford to acquire a pig from other mountain peoples, they will perform the ceremony, even though they constantly need many other things. The parents’ spirits are mainly good ones, whom Mlabri address whenever they need something, or else when they are in danger.The ancestor spirits (primarily, Mlabri think of their parents) are said not to be able to fmd food for them­ selves, so their children have to sacrifice to them regularly. If the living fail in this duty, Mlabri believe, the ancestral spirits are likely to vent their anger on their descendants by causing them to sicken, trees to fall on them, etc. We have attended the ancestor spirit ceremony many times, but the following account describes its performance during one. of our early visits to the Mlabri. The pig was brought in at 3 p.m. While the men were collecting dry bamboo trunks for the fires, the women fetched water as well as palm fronds on which to put the meat (Pl. 21). It took three men hardly more than five minutes to tie up and kill the pig, which they did by severing the jugular vein with a long knife, draining the blood into two containers. Then the two most important men of the band divided the meat very carefully (Pl. 22), so that each of the four families had not only the same amount, but similar cuts as well. The meat for the offering was placed on an altar next to one of the windscreens. It consisted of three parts. The oldest person present explained: “We take the head to remind us of the father who led us through the jungle.

34

Jesper Trier

a piece of the breast to remind us of our mother who fed us, and the tail to remind us of our dead sisters and brothers who followed us.” (Others used the head, liver, gullet and intestines). Now, in turn, each of the men recited a prayer while holding a handful of raw meat'in front of his head. After this, all the women, simultaneously,

Pl. 21. Preparing for ancestor ceremony: women fetching water touched the same piece of meat, while also muttering the prayer. This piece of meat was then cooked, by itself, in a bamboo internode. The leader of the band then went up high above the camp, taking with him the cooked piece of meat. As he went he chanted a prayer, which was an invitation to the ancestor spirits to come and receive the offering. The other men followed, each taking a different direction and loudly calling on the spirits to come. After about a quarter of an hour, they all returned to a tall tree, just above the camp, where they had made a crude altar. They put the sacrificial meat on this altar and prayed again (Pl. 23). One of the prayers which we recorded was as follows:

35

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

ae You

mo mother

mom father

djin sjo-bud meat pig

go-do come

gor take

djin meat

bei (?)

rom 0 bar o-bung di good first eat (rice) now eat (meat) di mar bjer-dae-i-do djak guang pan ta-brom maen you good give everything come barking deer big deer (?) bung mae gam go rom mae hark mar d mar I sacrifice give eat (rice) give eat (meat) you not far first djak di mad di djod did rom bae djak ... good see good catch go first earth go (not translated) go

ju bi rice (husked)

Pl. 22.

di good

go-do gor maen come take you

Preparing for ancestor ceremony: butchering the pig

dae-i-dS maerk mar 6 mar bung wok lam everything you? give eat (rice) give eat (meal) spirit good

ding lam don big good look

ki do

ga not

gor take

ding big

In the first line of the above prayer, mention is made of the offering to the spirits of the parents, while almost all the rest is about what their living descendants desire in return. The prayer ends with the request that the ances­ tor spirits should not take the animals and the roots of the area. 1 enquired as to whether people might eat the piece of sacrificial meat. They replied that they could do so, but only after two days had elapsed. My

Jesper Trier

36

informants said they believed the spirits of their dead parents would come to eat the meat in the form of beetles, bro-nau-gae. The Thai people are said to have a similar belief. The ceremony was over at about 5 pjn. Everybody then feasted on the, for once, plentiful meat. The participants told me that it had been a very long time since they had last performed this ceremony. Their spirits were

Pl. 23.

Praying to ancestral spirits at base of tall tree

high and, from our small bamboo forest hut, we could still see the lights of their bonfires until 9.30 p.m.

5. BIRTH, NAME-GIVING, SICKNESS, DEATH AND AFTERLIFE Finally, in this paper, I shall discuss a few ceremonies associated with name-giving, sickness and death. So far as we know there are no ceremonies associated with the attainment of maturity or with marriage. 5a. Birth There are no ceremonies connected with the event of birth itself. One Mlabri informant told us that, three days after its birth, a child is given its name and, after another three days, a ceremony of offering to the spirits is

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

37

performed. According to this informant, the child has a rattan string tied around its left wrist, to hold in its spirit. The child’s father will then call upon the most important spirits, especially that of the jungle, wok bri, saying, “Here is the child, the offering, the father and the mother; spirit, please stay with the child.” The offering consists of eggs, or else a chicken. Mlabri believe that,

Pl. 24.

Altar with offerings

if the child sickens and dies, it is because its spirit has left its body. Every person has his or her spirit. Mlabri believe that while they are dreaming their spirit roams the jungle. Most of our informants said that the ceremonial offering of eggs and rice to the forest spirits in return for the protection of the newborn child takes place, not six days, but two to three months after the birth. These people also told us that the ceremony should take place under a big tree or near a big Slone. Moreover, some informants said that the child would be two to three years old before it received its own name. This is because, up until then, the child will not have a full spirit of its own.

Jesper Trier

38

5b. Sickness As already mentioned, the Mlabri consider the spirits of the sky and earth to be especially responsible for causing sickness. The big offering ceremony to these two spirits has already been described. In less serious cases, Mlabri put a small’offering onto a leaf, which is then tied around the stomach. Then they walk to a sm^ altar, which they set up in the forest, and pray to the spirits of the parents as well as to the sky and the earth spirits. The following prayer is used for a sick boy: kinal dead spirit

go cloud

gae quickly man he

djak go

lae ]liere

mul die

mo mother

gul-gu feel

kom-baer friend

kam old

ra-i-ding father gla sick

go-i cloud

gul-gu feel

sjing-da-i say

jung boy

nam nice na much

bung blow

mal gam dead not

di gdn-di good please

lae come

maerk you?

laeng come

dram near

The translation of this prayer has yet to be finalized. However, we can say that the first word, go, means “shell” or “cloud”. It appears in many prayers. Perhaps the spirits are considered to be like a kind of empty shell, or cloud, having no shape until seen closer. The end of the first line refers to the wind blowing the sickness onto the boy. In the next two lines, reference is made to the happiness of the father when the spirit of his boy comes back. 5c. Deafii

Death ceremonies are not elaborate at all. In fact, we know that many Khon Pa groups simply make a pile of branches and leaves, put the body on top, kneel down and then weep for a while before hurrying away, because they fear that the spirit of death might take another one in their band. We have asked the Mlabri many times whether they once did something similar. They replied that this was so. However, from what we now know, there were various procedures depending on the status of the dead person, as well as on how and when the person died. Under normal circumstances, Mlabri would dispose of their dead as just described, placing a few of the deceased’s belongings beside the body. For men, these would be weapons and, perhaps, a pipe; for women, some house­ hold things; and, for children, nothing except some food. However, in areas with many tigers, they would wrap up the corpse in a bamboo mat and place it in a tree, even sometimes using a sort of a trap, so that the tiger would be stabbed when trying to jump up to the body. Our Thai guide in 1976 said that, a mere ten years earlier, he had seen a Mlabri corpse wrapped up in a rattan mat, weighing down a thick branch of a tree. Other deceased Mlabri were, at times, placed behind rocks; and dead children were often put into holes in trees. We have already mentioned how people, bitten or killed by tigers, were simply left sitting under a tree, or else put up in its branches. By the end of the 1950s, some Mlabri began to bury their dead. This was because both Hmong and Thai complained about their traditional method for disposing of a corpse. Nonetheless, Mlabri continued with the old practice

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

39

when they were Uving in the deep forest, possibly until about 1970. Today Mlabri always bury their dead. A grave ds dug, one to one-and-a-half metres deep. The floor and sides are lined with big pieces of bark or bamboo. The corpse is dressed in some old clothes and wrapped up in a mat before being interred. The body is covered with a roof of wood to prevent the corpse from bending and animals from digging it up. This is then covered with earth and, fmally, with a pile of leaves. When we asked the Mlabri whether they would orientate the corpse in any specific direction, we received conflicting answers. However, the most common answer was that it would be faced eastwards, exactly as the Mlabri prefer to site their windscreens. If the death occurs during daytime, the funeral will take place in the late afternoon and the band will hurry away immediately afterwards. If death occurs during the evening or at night, they will wait until morning to dispose of the corpse. There is a short funeral ceremony, in which an altar is set up. One of the funerary prayers which we recorded went as follows: wok spirit

gi not bae earth

bae earth

a gom I do wok spirit

aek take

si not

dat that

mar want

pa dae truth

sjo-bud pig meat

go nae bar ar is now have mar want

sjo-bo sjum mountain peak

wok pa-dae spirit truth

at (to)

dip stay

wok spirit

sja by

m 'lor human

sjo-bud pig meat

wok djur spirit help

lam away

gom do

bul pa-duk pa-tiang wok die leave (?) spirit wok spirit

na some

tjae-ro small?

mei mul-di-mul di-wal wok tree stay back spirit

aek take

djom bar bul nae bul di lae mar bury now dead is dead good here want

wok spirit wok spirit

dit this

aem small

We are still doubtful about the meaning of some parts of this prayer. But it is clear that the spirit of the mountain is being asked to receive the dead man’s spirit. It seems that some pork has been offered near a tree; also that it is the living’s wish that the dead person stay in the grave and his spirit not follow them back to their camp.

5d. Afterlife The Mlabri do not have any fixed ideas about an afterlife, other than that their dead become spirits which roam the jungle. The parents* spirits help their children against dangers, as well as to obtain food, provided they them­ selves receive regular offerings. Otherwise, these spirits can cause their living descendants many troubles and even kill them. Some informants said that when a person dies face up — that is peacefully — they believe he or she had been a good person and that the spirit will go upwards to the mountains. But if death occurs face down — that is violently — from an animal, snake, or an insect bite, for example — the person is thought to have been less good. In this case the spirit will go to the lowlands, or even become a wicked ghost.

40

Jesper Trier

One Mlabri man said: “Upwards is better, there is more food and life is easier; downwards is more difficult.” 6. CONCLUSION

The material culture of traditional Mlabri society can be characterized by its unparalleled simplicity: windscreens; next to no clothing, very few and simple tools, no decorations except for a hole in each earlope and some tattooing, almost no artifacts, a nomadic search in the forest for food, with division of labour according to sex, so that men alone may hunt (primarily smaller animals), whereas the women collect most of the yams, roots, herbs, fruits and crabs they eat — the bulk of the band’s food supply. Food is never stored longer than overnight. The Mlabri comprise one endogamous group organized into bands, each with a core of a few, closely related, nuclear families. Food and tools are, to a large extent, shared widiin the band. Women have a lower status than men, but there is very little social stratification and no real leaders. Everybody has a high degree of individual freedom. Among the Mlabri themselves, parents are of prime importance. Almost all marriages are monogamous and mostly of limited duration. The Mlabri believe that their great sky spirit will punish their people severely if any of them should have children with other hill peoples. This is one important reason why the Mlabri still remain a more-or-less cohesive group. Every person has a spirit of his or her own which, so it is believed, is formed some months after physical birth and which roams the jungle after death. The spirits of persons and animals are ruled by the spirits of the sky, the mountains, the earth and the jungle which, together with the spirits of deceased parents, and even their spears, are propitiated in order to obtain food and protection. All these spirits can punish thej> Mlabri if they have done something wrong, by sending storms, dangerous animals, or sickness, in which case the wind spirit is believed to be the carrier. There are yet other spirits, for example in trees and in earth holes, which also receive propitiatory offerings in order to prevent them from perpetrating various kinds of mischief. Many elements of the Mlabri supernatural world, for example the concept of the sky spirit, are found among neighbouring peoples and are, to a large extent, part of the general spiritual heritage of this part of the world. There seem to be some interesting parallels between the supernatural beings of the Mlabri (and their material culture) and those of some of the other gatherer­ hunters of the Indochinese peninsula, especially the Orang Asli living along the Thai-Malaysian border. Our anthropometrical measurements of the Mlabri, their language, their intimate knowledge and special use of the forest and its products, and the elaborate system of spirits which they believe to govern their world, all indicate that the Mlabri, along with the other Khon Pa groups, belong to the last autochthonous peoples of this area of northern Southeast Asia.

Mlabri Social Organization and Supernatural Beliefs

41

REFERENCES AHMAD, Khamis 1981 In Search of the Mlabri. Bangkok Post 25 Oct. 1981. BERNATZIK, Hugo Adolf 1938 Die Geister des Gelben Slattern, Munich: Brickmann. BOELES, J.J. er al., 1963 Second Expedition to the Mlabri (“Khon Pa”) of North Thailand. Journal of the Slam Society 51 (2) : 133—201.

EGEROD, S^ren 1982 An Engjish-Mlabri Basic Vocabulary (Preliminary Version). ARIPUC: Annual Newdetter of the Scandinavian Institute of Asian Studies 16:14—20. RISCHEL, Jjirgen 1982 Fieldwork on the Mlabri Language: A Preliminary Sketch of its Phonetics. ARIPUC: Annual Newsletter of the Scandinavian Institute of Asian Studies

16:247-55. SEIDENFADEN, Erik 1919 Further Notes about the Chabun, etc. Journal of the Siam Society 13 (3): 49-51. 1926

The Kha Tong Lu’ang. Journal'of the Siam Society 20(l):41-48.

SKEAT, Walter W. and Charles O. BLAGDEN 1906 Pagan Races of the Malay Peninaila. London: Maonillan. 2 vols. YOUNG, Gordon 1962 The ma Tribes of Northern Thailand. Bangkok: The Siam Society. 2nd ed.

THE RELIGIOUS LIFE OF THE YAO PEOPLE OF NORTHERN THAILAND : SOME INTRODUCTORY REMARKS CHOB KACHA-ANANDA * CONTENTS

1. 2. 3. 4.

Introduction Thailand’s Yao People Yao Religion Rdigious Change: A Note

1. INTRODUCTION My intention in this paper is to provide some introductory materials on the religion of Yao villagers in northern Thailand. I gathered the data between 1966-and 1973, during the course of extended anthropological fieldwork in three Yao villages. These villages (Map 1) were Pulungka (Pong district, Chiang Rai province), Mae Ngon Luang (Fang district, Chiang Mai province) and Khun Haeng (Ngao district, Lampang province). Before I turn to my principal subject matter, Yao religion, I will first introduce the Yao people, as one of several highland minority peoples who have, over the past century or so, made their home in the mountainous northern part of the Thai kingdom. I shall also, briefly, outline the nature of Yao village society as it presently exists in northern Thailand, as the backdrop for my discussion of village religion. I must warn that Yao religion, a fascinating amalgam of indigenous spirit beliefs and Chinese Taoism, is an immensely complex subject and that my own data are far from complete. I hope, therefore, that my paper will be seen as adding a little to the jigsaw puzzle, rather than as an attempt to provide a completed picture of Yao religious ideology and liturgical practice. 2. THAILAND’S YAO PEOPLE

Yao people, whose original homeland and present population centre is in southern China, migrated into Thai' territory from neighbouring Laos and Burma. • Doctoral de Troisieme Cycle en Ethnologie (Paris University); Director, Public Welfare Office, Lampang Province, Northern Thailand, and fomerly Research Officer and Deputy Director, Tribal Research Centre, Chiang Mai.

1. This paper has been extracted, with some additions, from my doctoral thesis. Etude ethnographique du groupe Yao en Thailande du Nord (Kacha-Ananda 1976), with the assistance of Dr. Anthony R. Walker of the Department of Sociology, National University of Singapore. Miss Lee Chor Lin of the Singapore National Museum and Messrs. Wuang Foei and Saen Lin of Khun Haeng (Yao) village assisted me with the Chinese characters. I am greatly appreciative of the help rendered by all these people; I also tixank all my Yao informants who have helped me over many years to understand better their culture and society.

44

map

Chob Kacha-Ananda

1. YAO VILLAGES IN NORTH THAILAND (STUDY VILLAGES BOXED)*

•Source: McKinnon and Bhruksasri (1983).

Yao Religious Life

45

So far as I have been able to determine, there have been three important movements of Yao people into Thailand from Laos and Bunna at different times. The first major group to arrive came from the Muong Sing and Nam Tha regions of Laos. This group, among whom were the Pulangka people, mostly settled in the Pha Chang Noi subdistrict of Pong district, Chiang Rai province, where even today almost all the villages are Yao settlements, interspersed with the odd Hmong community. The second major Yao group to arrive in Thailand came from the southeast of Nam Tha and, crossing the Mekong river at Chiang Khong, settled in Mae Chan district of Chiang Rai province, north of Chiang Rai city. Some of these Mae Chan Yao subsequently moved into the hUls north of Lampang city, while a few migrated much further south into Phitsanulok and Kamphaeng Phet provinces. Because of recent political unrest in the two latter provinces,

Pl. 1.

A section of Khun Haeng village, situated in the lowlands

many of the Yao families who moved this far south have since returned north­ wards to Lampang province. The Khun Haeng people belong to this second group. The last major group of Yao to arrive in Thailand came into the kingdom from Burma. They came to Thailand along with remnant Chinese Kuomintang troops who, driven from Yunnan into Burma, mostly during 1951 and 1952, subsequently, in 1954, fled into northern Thailand (Mote 1967:488). These Yao, along with their Chinese friends, settled first in Fang district, Chiang Mai province, in the hills to the west of the town of Fang. They lived here for

46

Chob Kacha-Ananda

many years, but subsequently migrated into the Fang valley where they divided into two groups, one remaining in Fang district and the other heading for the northern part of Mae Suai district, Chiang Rai province. The Mae Ngon Luang people belong to this third Yao group to come to Thailand. Today, as' a result of the various migrations mentioned above, Yao villages

PI. 2. A section of an upland hamlet of Khun Haeng village showing padi stores and house (far right)

are quite widely scattered through the hills of northern Thailand (Map 1). In 1983, according to Paul and Elaine Lewis (1984:136), there were about 30,000 Yao living in Thai territory (excluding those recent arrivals from Laos living in refugee camps). Their main concentrations are in Mae Chan district of Chiang Rai province and Chiang Kham district of Phayao province, but there are also Yao in Lampang, Nan, Chiang Mai, Phitsanalok and Kamphaeng Phet provinces. In several places a number of Yao villages are clustered together, but very often Hmong, Akha and Karen communities are interspersed with those of Yao. Although the household (pco, ) is the primary social unit for the Yao, the village is their fundamental administrative unit. A Yao family which tried to live totally independent of a village community would place its very existence at risk. In fact, it is the village which is the collective centre for all Yao social affairs. Each Yao village is said to be protected by its own cia mien ( ), or “guardian spirit”, to whom all the villagers must pay their respects and offer annual sacrifice. We will discuss the importance of the village guardian spirit

Yao Religious Life

47

in greater detail below. Here it is enough to note that the village constitutes not only a socio-administrative but also an important ritual unit. The importance for the Yao of the village unit is further clarified when we examine this people’s ideas concerning land tenure. Yao believe that the land around their village is the common property of the community. The right to cultivate that land goes to the person who clears the vegetation and prepares the soil for the crops. But, whenever a Yao farmer abandons a piece of land, it reverts to the village community’s control. Its future use is now at the discretion of the village headman and household elders. Close relatives of the former occupants, in particular, and members of the village community, in general, it is understood, have priority right to the usufruct of village land. Only if there is nobody in the village who wants the land, can the headman allocate it to the inhabitants of a neighbouring community. The Yao people are divided into several named patricians, in turn divided

Pl. 3.

Khun Haeng villagers

into subclans and lineages (cf. Tan 1975:47—49). Clans, subclans and lineages are not localized in single village communities. On the contrary, a Yao village is never made up of members of the same clan. Nonetheless, there is frequently a leading clan in the village, whose members outnumber those of other clans. The leading clan will be that of the village founder. Let me give examples from Mae Ngon Luang and Khun Haeng villages. In 1968, among the 22 households which comprised Mae Ngon Luang village, 14 were led by members of Plan ( ^ ) clan, while the heads of the remaining eight households were divided among no less than six other clans: Tang ( ) and Chi ( ), two households each; Cew ( ), Tau ( ), Ko ( ) and Lo ( ), one household

Chob Kacha-Ananda

48

Pl. 4. An old lady with her embroidery work

Pl. 5.

Smoking water pipe

each. Al Khun Haeng in 1973, there were 39 households, eleven of which were led by mem­ bers of Li ( ) clan, nine by Plan clan, eight by Tang clan, four each by Cew and Fong ( ^ ) clans and three by Yang ( ^ ) clan. In 1972 I estimated that there were 111 Yao villages in Thailand, com­ prising a total of 2,589 households and with a combined population of approximately 20,000. Thus the average Yao village comprised just over 23 houses and 180 persons. In 1972 the largest Yao villages in Thailand were Suan Ya Luang in Pong district with 106 houses, Wawi in Mae Suai district with 99 houses and Huai Dua and Khun Nam Kwan in Chiang Saen district, each with 92 houses. Village size depends primarily on the availability of surrounding arable land. But, in general, Yao do not seem to like living in large villages and only a few settlements comprise more than 23 houses. Writing more than twenty years ago. Young (1962:90) reported that Yao relocate their villages every ten to fifteen years, less frequently than do their Akha, Lisu and Lahu neighbours, but as fre­ quently as the Hmong,

Yao Religious Life

However, some communi­ ties remain in the same place much longer than Young’s statement sug­ gests. By 1969, for example, Pulangka had been established for more than 40 years, as had Suan Ya Luang. In the political domain, the Yao village is con­ trolled by its headman or chief, who has authority over all the villagers. Tradi­ tionally, he is assisted in his duties by a group of elders, who are usually household heads. Some Yao village headmen have authority over several neighbouring village com­ munities, Yao as well as non-Yao. Traditionally, a retiring village headman proposes his successor. Sometimes this will be his son, but not always. Se­ lection depends on the candidate’s maturity and his knowledge of Yao custom. This traditionallyappointed successor may then receive confirmation from the Thai administra­ tive authorities and receive the official Thai title of headmanship, pu yai ban. But sometimes the village elders choose a man fluent in the Thai language to be their official pu yai ban. Consequently, a single village may have two head­ men, traditional and modern, with the former having the greatest authority among the

Pl. 6.

Pl. 7.

Children at Khun Haeng

Women of Khun Haeng

49

50

Chob Kacha-Ananda

villagers themselves, but the latter fulfilling a vital link role between the villagers and the government authorities. If the two leaders'fail to cooperate with one another, it sometimes happens that one of them leads his supporters away from the community to found a new village elsewhere. In the economic sphere, Yao villages in Thailand are dependent, above all, on swidden agriculture. Among Thailand’s Yao, dry padi, maize and opium poppy have traditionally provided the villagers with bodi their subsistence and cash requirements. In more recent times, chilli and potato crops have been commercially culti­ vated in several Yao villages. Thailand’s Yao show a preference for siting their villages on slight inclines of mountains, often near a spring, and at an eleva­ tion of between 600 and 1,050 metres. But Yao also like to settle in valleys throu^ which there is a flowing stream, from which they can channel water to their settlement in bamboo aqueducts. They avoid building on the crest of a hill, for they believe that the line of hill crests is the dwelling place of spirits. Village areas are not fenced around, but their boundaries are well known and there is a point on Pl. 8. A young woman from Mae Chan district every access path which is said to be the entry point to the settlement. Unmarked for most of the year, we will see later that these entry points are blocked by tree branches during the annual propitiation of the village guardian spirit. Within the settlement, individual families build their houses in parallel lines facing the valley and protected from the worst of the mountain winds. The family head is responsible for choosing the actual house site and this he does in consultation with one of the village’s ritual specialists. To begin with, one should never choose a spot on which a house has previously been built. Nor should one build on a spot where one has found wild cat’s faeces, nor at a place where a child has fallen down from some elevated place. Yao say that, if they were to ignore such proscriptions, unhappiness would surely befall

"Yao Religious Life

51

the household members. Once an initial choice of house site has been made, the elder digs a hole on the chosen spot and inserts into it four grains of rice, which he lays out in the pattern of a flower. Then, covering the hole and seeds with a bowl, he leaves the site well alone for a period of three days to a week. Then, returning to the spot, he carefully examines the rice grains. If they are exactly as he left them, unthsturbed and uneaten by ants, the family head reads this as a good omen. Contrarywise, if the grains have been disturbed or eaten, he takes this as a sure indi­ cation that he must not build on this spot, for the omen has shown that it is a spirit pathway. Failure to heed the rice grain omen, Yao say, will result in fre­ quent dispute and deaths among the household mem­ bers. Yao houses, which are preferably of wood or else of bamboo, are usually built directly upon the ground and are rectangular in shape. The main door, sometimes called “the spirit door”, is at the front of the structure and is rarely used except on ritual occasions. Normally, access to the house is by one of the doors at either end of the rectangular building. A Yao house is divided first into back and front sections. The back section is raised a metre or so above the front and divided into several bedPl. 9. Clearing old swidden for reuse rooms. The front section is again divided into men’s and women’s sections, centres respectively of ritual and domestic activity. The occupants of a Yao house often constitute an extended rather than simple nuclear family. The household thus may comprise the family head and his wife, married sons and their wives, and children and unmarried sons and daughters. On the other hand, in 1972, as already mentioned, I estimated that Thailand’s then approximately 20,000 Yao people lived in 2,590 households. This gives an average of only 7.7 persons per house and suggests that there must be many simple nuclear families among these people as well.

52

Chob Kacha-Ananda

3. YAO RELIGION As I observed at the beginning of this paper, Yao religion represents an amalgamation of Chinese Taoism and indigenous animism. But this is not to say that the two traditions have become indistinguishably intertwined. Lemoine-(1983:210) remarks that Yao usually distinguish between the two aspects of their formal religious behaviour, one being ‘religion’ {tsong tse, ie.. Taoist liturgy), and the other being “etiquette’ (/enye), in which they include all the formal behaviour used in dealings with the ancestors, the celebrations of annual festivals, and the rules and ceremonies relating to marriage. Elsewhere, Lemoine remarks (Lemoine and Gibson 1982:23) that even though Yao Taoism seems at first sight to be "a communal cult to which all must adhere”, in fact 'Taoist rituals are expensive, and the ability to perform them emphasizes the power given by a rare combination of initiation and full literarcy which remains the privilege of only a minority ..Illiterate or semi-literate Yao, Lemoine (p. 24) tells us, “must ... remain satisfied with the performance of simple oral rituals which they call sip mien (^# ), ‘dealing with the spirits’.” In the pages that follow, my major concern will indeed be with the sip mien dimension of Yao village religion. On the other hand, I will also have something to say about the Taoist deities worshipped by the Yao and a little about the ritual of initiation into the Taoist cult.

3a. Mankind: Origin and Nature

Yao say that mankind, along with everything else in the universe, was created by the “creator god”, Pian Ku Hung ). He created the sky in the form of an octagon, with thirty-three levels, and the earth in the fonii of a square, with forty-eight levels. At the same time, he created mountains, seas, rivers, trees, rain, fields and rice. And then Pian Ku Hung created human beings. The first men wore hats and the first women waxed their hair and then tied a piece of red cloth around it. Pian Ku Hung placed his human creation upon the highest level of earth. Other creator deities specifically mentioned by my Yao informants were Tua Hung (#i SX)» creator of fire, Tong Hung ( the earth (underworld) deity, who rides a tiger, Sui Fu Ta Ti ( ), the water deity, who rides a dragon, and the god of the human world, Yang KinTaTi( PH^A^ ), whose mount is a horse. Finally, I should mention the lords of the tsiep tin ling hung{ ), or “Ten Tribunals of Hell”, through which a Yao’s soul must pass before eventual reincarnation (cf. Lemoine and Gibson 1982:104—114). The Yao are able to retain a strong visual image of their Taoist pantheon through their possession of sets of “god pictures”, called mien fang ( ). These, often finely-painted, icons have received much attention recently, especially in the writings of Lemoine (1979, 1981), Lemoine and Gibson (1982) and de Groot (1983). Therefore, I shall attempt here no more than a very brief introduction. A set of Yao paintings comprises several individual works, all on scrolls. When the scrolls are unrolled, they are hung, usually vertically. As Lemoine and Gibson tell us (1982:36), Yao regard these paintings quite literally as abodes of the gods. The artist, be he Chinese or Yao, who paints the set performs an “eye-opening” rite, following Chinese religious practice. Addi­ tionally, Yao insist that their own high priests perform a special ceremony to introduce a new set of paintings to the gods. Generally speaking, a set of paintings comprises sixteen long scrolls, four somewhat shorter ones and one very long horizontal one. In additional, there are four painted masks and an elaborately painted headdress worn by the officiating high priest at those ceremonies during which the paintings are displayed (cf. de Groot 1983:10-11). The large scrolls portray all the deities mentioned earlier in this section, with the exception of the governors of this world and the waters and fire governors of heaven and the underworld. These two divine pairs

62

Chob Kacha-Ananda

are represented on two of the shorter scrolls. The longer scrolls also include portraits of the ancestors and a pictorial representation of hell. The two remaining shorter scrolls portray scenes relating to the ancestral deity, Plan Hu. Finally, the long horizontal scroll, called tom to luang tsiou ( ). “The Dragon Bridge of the Great Tao”, depicts the whole pantheon of deities walking in procession to meet the soul of a fully-ordained Yao priest, who has to walk over the bridge from the world of humankind to that of the spirits. This scroll is sometimes hung in the house, above the other scrolls, but its use is essential only for one particular ceremony, held after the death of such a priest. This ceremony is usually held several months after the priest has departed this life (cf. Lemoine and Gibson 1982:135). A set of god pictures is handed down from generation to generation. When not in use (that is for most of the time), the scrolls are wrapped in white cloth and hung from the roof, near their owner’s ancestral altar. In order better to preserve these icons, the Yao make bamboo tube containers for them, which they term mien khab. Owners of a set of gods pictures also set up a special type of ancestral altar in their homes. Unlike the regular rectangular shelf already described, this altar is made in the form of a box. If the owner’s house is built directly on the ground, then this box altar is placed atop four posts. However, if the house is on stilts, then it is usually positioned on top of the regular shelf altar. Inside the box, which is easily opened, one may find a number of ritual objects, a sacred knife, a bell and musical instruments. As noted by Lemoine, in the quotation I cited at the beginning of this section on Yao religion, Taoism is not a religious way immediately open to every Yao. Between the age of twelve (the age at which a Yao is said to receive his wuen or adult souls) and twenty, males should undergo rituals of initiation into the Taoist cult. Tliere are two distinct ceremonies. The first, called kwa tang ( ), or the “hanging of lamps” ceremony, lasts for two days. The second, known as to sai ( ) ca ce (?), or “the sword ladder ca ce”,'is a seven-day affair. But it is possible to hold the two ceremonies together, in which case the combined rites take up seven days. For the ceremonies, the god pictures are removed from their protective containers and set up on the house wall. During the seven days of the cere­ mony, the postulants wear special ritual clothing and observe a meat-free diet. They must also abstain from sexual relations, avoid sleeping with their wives and, if unmarried, refrain from flirting with, or even looking at, the girls. Spouses of the postulants are required to observe similar restrictions. The main purpose of the kwa tang ceremony is to introduce the postulant to the Tao pantheon and permit him to enter the lowest rank of the clerical hierarchy. After having undergone this first ceremony, the initiate receives a new religious name (Lemoine and Gibson 1982:24). The second, more ela­ borate ceremony, involves the postulants being led up a symbolic to sai (^^ ), or “sword ladder”, and having to submit to a number of ritual ordeals (cf. Lemoine and Gibson 1982:26). After this second ceremony, the initiates become more powerful clerics of the Taoist sect, charged “to save the souls of the worthy folk” (Lemoine and Gibson 1982:27). (Beyond this second

Yao Religious Life

63

stage, there are two further levels of priesthood, but by no means all Yao aspire to such clerical heights.)

4. RELIGIOUS CHANGE: A NOTE

Before ending this paper, devoted essentially to traditional aspects of Yao religion, spirit propitiation, reverence for the ancestors and worship of Taoist gods, 1 should remark briefly about religious change among these people. Foreign missionaries of the Christian religion have made several attempts to persuade Yao to convert to their faith. Evidently, their proselytizing efforts have met with little success. But there is certainly one Yao village, Huai Cho, to the west of Mae Chan, whose inhabitants have become Christians. (In 1972 I attended a wedding of a Christian Yao from this village with a non­ Christian from another Yao community. The ceremony was a mixture of traditional and Christian customs.) But several Yao told me that they could not convert to the missionaries’ religion because, if they did so, they would be forced to destroy all the icons of their gods. And, if they were to do this, my informants said, they would never be able to return to the old worship. Buddhism has made some inroads among the Yao, although to exactly what degree is difficult to detennine. Each year a large number of Yao boys become novices and monks. Several years ago a programme was inaugurated with the intention of bringing Buddhism to the Yao and other hill peoples. A certain number of Thai monks were sent to stay in the mountain villages to teach Buddhist discipline. Each year, in June or July, a ceremony is held during which young mountain boys publicly espouse the Buddhist reli^on. After receiving training for at least a year, these youths are sent back to their own communities. There is a temple at the foot of Doi Suthep, on the outskirts of the city of Chiang Mai, which has been especially chosen to take care of young moun­ tain novices. Each year nearly 400 novices stay at this temple in order to further their studies. Several of them are Yao. But it is still far too soon to indicate whether or not the Yao people in general will abandon their tradi­ tional religious practices in favour of those of Theravada Buddhism or, alter­ natively, whether they will simply add another, Buddhist, dimension to their already complex system of religious ideology and liturgical practice.

REFERENCES de GROOT, K. 1983 Sacied Scrolls of the Yao. Sawaddi Sept.-Oct., 8-17.

KACHA-ANANDA, Chob 1976 Etude ethnographlque du groupe Yao en Thailande du Nord. Thesis presented to Paris University for the degree of **Doctorat de trolsleme cycle en ethnologic**.

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LEMOINE, Jacxiues 1979 Images sacrees des Yao. Connaissance des Arts. (August issue.)

Yao Taoist Paintings. Arts of Asia 11(1):61-71.

1981

1983 •

Yao Religion and Society. In of Thailand, John McKinnon and WanatBiuksasri.eds.KuaiaLumpur Oxford University Press. 185-214.

LEMOINE, Jacques, assisted by Donald J. GIBSON 1982 Yao Ceremonial Paintings. Bangkok: White Lotus. LEWIS, Paul and Elaine LEWIS 1984 Peoples of the Golden Triangle: Six Tribes in Thailand. London & New York: Thames and Hudson. MOTE, F.W. 1967 The Rural “Haw" (Yunnanese Chinese) of Northern Thailand. In Southeast Aslan Tribes. Minorities and Nations, Peter Kunstadter, ed. Princeton: Prince­ ton University Press. 487-524. TAN Chee Beng 1975 The Yao Naming System. In Farmers in the Hills: Ethnographic Notes on the Upland Peoples of North Thailand, Anthony R. Walker, ed. Penang: Penerbit Universiti Sains Malaysia. 47-53.

-YOUNG, Gordon 1962 The HUI Tribes of Northern Thailand. Bangkok: The Siam Society.

PHOTOGRAPHIC CREDITS Hs. 1-13, Anthony R. WALKER

TRANSFORMATIONS OF BUDDHISM IN THE RELIGIOUS IDEAS AND PRACTICES OF A NON-BUDDHIST HILL PEOPLE: THE LAHU NYI OF THE NORTHERN THAI UPLANDS ANTHONY R. WALKER* CONTENTS

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Prologue Introducing the Lahu The Lahu Nyi Village and its Temple Temple Personnel and Observances The Construction of a Merit Shelter Discussion: The Buddhist Input and its Lahu Transformations Epilogue

1. PROLOGUE^ Despite authoritative statements to the contrary (cf. Kunstadter 1969:69— 85; Walker 1975a:12-15; 1983a:230; Keyes 1977:19-20; Hickey 1982:122143), many who write about the peoples of mainland Southeast Asia suggest the existence of an overly-great cultural - including religious — divide between the “civilized**, and Buddhist, peoples of the lowlands: Khmer, Tai, Burman; and the so-called “primitive”, and non-Buddhist, peoples of the mountains: Jarai, Kammu, Lisu, Lahu, Wa, Kachin and dozens of other named ethnolinguistic groups. Thus, for example, we find statements like this one, dating from the early 1940s (Hendershot 1943:242), Among the medley of tribes that make up ... the inhabitants of the Shan states, the Tai (Shan) are in a class by themselves. They are more advanced than the ‘lesser breeds" such as the Lahus, Was and Kachins. , . . The Tai have an ethical religion (Buddhism) as against the animism of their neighbors.

Or take the following from the pen of that well-known British social anthro­ pologist and Southeast Asianist, Sir Edmund Leach, who writes (1961:52)^,

•DJhil. (Oxon), senior lecturer in social anthropology. Dept, of Sociology, National University of Singapore. 1. I am grateful, as always, to my wife, Pauline Hetland Walker, for her editorial assist­ ance with this paper. I also owe many thanks to the devoted translation work of Chai^ Ruoh-Min, Wang Chan-Hua and Hsieh Mei-Chuen, all in Taipei, and Lee Chor Lin in Singapore. A version of this paper was first read at the “Sixth International Symposium on Aaan Studies**, Hong Kong, July 1984 and appears here by kind permission of the Asian Research Service, Hqng Kong. 2. I should note that Leach (p. 53) does go on to qualify his statement that “Hill People are never Buddhist**, but we are still left with the observation that “In general... it is only the true Valley People who can afford to be civilized and Buddhist."

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1. LAHU SETTLEMENT AREAS*

Sources: for Yunnan, Song Enchang et al. (1981, 1982); for Burma, LeBar er al. (1964); for Laos, LeBar et al. (1964); for ThaUand, McKinnon and Bhruksasri (1983).

Transformations of Buddhism among the Lahu Nyi

67

Among the “Hill People”. . . the indigenous religion of most groups comes within lyior’s category of animism;.,. true "Hill People” are never Buddhists... The most distinctive cultural characteristic of the Valley People - apart from the practice of wet rice farming - is their adherence to Hinayana Buddhism.

Or, in order to have a more recent example, the following from a book published in 1982 (Ratnam 1982:31); The Laotians are Buddhists . . . [the] tribes all speak . . . different languages and observe ... different customs mostly anirnktic

For myself, I have a thorough distaste for the term “lesser breed” in the first quotation, am wary of the label “tribe” in the first and third (cf. Walker 1975a:12—13), and dislike the implication in all three that it is the “animism” of the hill people which has to be singled out and contrasted to the “Buddhism” of the lowlanders. In fact, both sets of people are thoroughly committed to an animistic worldview.^ But it is not my purpose to dispute the obvious fact that Theravada Buddhism exists as an organized religious tradition al! over the lowlands of northern Southeast Asia, but seldom as such in the hill country. Rather, what I wish to do here is to show the extent to which Buddhist ideas (in this case Mahayana as well as Theravada) can penetrate the fabric of a particular hill culture. My example is the case of the Tibeto-Burman-speaking Lahu Nyi, or Red Lahu, people presently living in the hills of north 'ITiailand. In keeping with the micro-fieldwork tradition of socio-cultural anthropo­ logy, I shall anchor my discussion in one small Lahu Nyi village, the one in which I lived for four years from 1966 to 1970.* I shall make somemore-orless detailed observations concerning the principal ritual edifice in this village, describe some events associated with it and, finally, report on another set of rites which are performed on the occasion of the building of a rest hut. After painting-the ethnographic scene, I shall try to show just how much these typically Lahu buildings and their typically Lahu ritual owe to the long exposure which these people - who are still in no formal sense Buddhists have had to both M^ayana and Theravada Buddhist traditions. In doing this I shall be led from one small village in twentieth century north Thailand to a whole ethnic group in Ming dynasty (and perhaps as far back as Yuan dynasty) southwest China. But first I must say a little more about the Lahu people in general and the Lahu Nyi in particular.

2. INTRODUCING THE LAHU The Lahu Nyi are numerically the largest of several divisions of Lahu people presently living in north Thailand.^ They are the southernmost division, 3. For examples of Tai and Burman animistic worldviews see, in particular, Tambiah (1970) and Spiro (1967). The literature on the subject of animism among Buddhist Southeast Asians is by now so large that it is extraordinary how writers can still reproduce the simple formula: lowlander “ Buddhist, hillman — animist. 4. For further observations on this village community, see Walker (1969,1970). 5. For studies of Thailand’s Lahu people, see Young (1962), Jones (1967), Walker (1969,

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and almost certainly a fairly recent offshoot of the most populous of Lahu divisions, the Lahu Na or Black Lahu (cf. Walker 1974:260). There are several such subethnic categories among the Lahu, but the only other one which will appear in these pages is the Lahu Shi or YeUow Lahu. The Lahu Na - Lahu Shi bifurcation was probably the earliest to occur and survive among this people. AU the others are offshoots of one or the other of these two Lahu ivwions can be more-or-less readily distinguished one from another on the basis of dialectal and sartorial differences. But there are also social and cultural dissimilarities (cf. Walker 1974; Bradley 1979:37-43).

Pl- 1. A Lahu Nyi viUage in North Thailand; left, the haw-yeh^ , or temple 470,000 or so people who caU themselves Lahu, some 304 1 74 live m southwest China (PCC 1982:23), in the Yunnanese prefectures Lmcang and in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture OfG 1980:54; YSM 1980:133). Tn 1954 an autonomous county, Lancang in Simao Prefecture, was named for the Lahu (SCMP 1953: 18-20), whUe the neighbouring Menglian Autonomous County was, in the following year named for the Tai, Lahu and Wa (Chen 1969:46). The Lahu, therefore are essentially a national minority people of China, but have a population which

1970. 1975b. 1975c. 1983a). Chaturabhand (1980:111—126), Fr^er-Lu (1983:3640), Lewis and Lewis (1984:170-201). 6. Acwrdmg to recent Chinese publications (Chen 1964:46; YG 1980:54), the bifurduring an ancient southerly migration of these people, the.Lahu Na tamg a western route and the Lahu Shi (together with the Lahu Hpu or White Lahu) taking an eastern one. '

Transformations of Buddhism among the Lahu Nyi

69

spills into three neighbouring Southeast Asian States: Burma, Laos and Thailand. In the Burmese Shan State there may be today as many as 150,000 Lahu people,*^ in Laos, perhaps 10,000, and in Thailand, for which the data are quite accurate, 40,000 (Lewis and liwis 1984:172). Of the 40,000 Lahu in north Thailand, 46% are Lahu Nyi (Lewis and Lewis 1984:172). Wherever Lahu happen to live (Map 1), they seldom have exclusive occu­ pancy of any large territory. And this is true even in the Lancang Autonomous County named for them. Rather, their village communities are interspersed with those of other ethno-linguistic affiliations. In Yunnan, these neighbours may be Han Chinese, Tai (^Dai), Wa (Va), Yi, Jingpo, or Bulang®, in Burma, mostly Tai, Wa, and Akha^, in Laos, Tai, Kammu, Hmong, Yao and Akha^® , in northern Thailand, Tai, Lisu,Akha, Hmong, Yao and Karen.Everywhere, the Tai neighbours live in the valley bottoms, while all the others (including the Han in Yunnan) live on the sides of the valleys or in the high mountains. In Yunnan and Laos the Tai valley-dwelling neighbours of the Lahu are mostly Tai Nua and Tai Lu, in the Burmese Shan State they are Tai Lu and Tai Khun and in northern Thailand mostly Tai Yuan (LeBar et al. 1964:206— 215). But differences among these various Tai groups are much less pro­ nounced than those among the various hill peoples. All the Tai peoples are sedentary irrigated-rice farmers, participants in a literate tradition based on Theravada Buddhism and, traditionally, providers of the ruling feudal elites. Because Lahu living in different areas have had different histories of asso­ ciation with neighbouring peoples — both in the hills and in the valleys — considerable social and cultural diversity has arisen among what, we may surmise, was once a much more homogeneous people. Nevertheless, they remain a people who recognize a degree of cultural unity, fostered primarily

7. I have previously recorded Burma’s Lahu population as numbering 80,000 (cf. Walker 1983:229n). Paul Lewis,who has investigated the details of Lahu demography in Burma using an educated Lahu informant from that country, tells me personal communication, 1984), that my figure is probably far too small. In his recent book (Lewis and Lewis 1984:172), he gives this new figure of 150,000. Needless to say, there are no recent census figures from Burmese government sources. And, given the present political instability of Burma’s Shan State, it is unlikely that a governmentsponsored count would be of much value anyway. 8. In Lancang, the Lahu’s neighbours in the hills are mostly Wa, Akha and Han Chinese (cf. Anon. 1963:5,16). In Lincang, principal hill neighbours are Wa, Han, Yi, Jinghpaw and Lisu (cf. Anon 1963:112; Song and Wang 1982:26). In Xishuangbanna, the Lahu’s hill nei^bours are Hani and Bulang (Song and Wang 1982:75). 9. See Burma (1925:55ff). Note that Muhso = Lahu (mostly Lahu Na) and Kwi« Lahu Shi. 10. Cf. LeBar and Suddatd (1967:41-43, 259). I infer this datum, since Lahu are not mentioned by name in the aforementioned work. But we know that Laos’ Lahu population is principally located in Nam Tha province (LeBar et at. 1964:30).

11. Cf. the following volumes of the Directory of Tribal Villages in Thailand (DTVT 1971-1977): Changwat Chiang Mai, 1974, pp. 11-12 ff; Changwat Chiang Rai, 1977, pp. 9—12 ff; Changwat Mae Hong Son, 1977, pp. lOff; Changwat Kamphaeng Phet and Changwat Tak, 1972 pp. 28 ff; Changwat Phrae, Changwat Lampang, Changwat Lamphun, 1971, pp. 35 ff.

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by a common language (despite considerable dialectal variation^^ ), and a common geographical origin in China. Although there are many Lahu village communities in Yunnan, and a few elsewhere, whose economic life is either partially or wholly based on irrigated-rice farming (cf. Anon 1963; Song et al. 1982; Song and Wang 1981; Sarliserand and Hoare 1980), in north Thailand the great majority of'these people are slash-and-burn, or swidden, hill farmers (cf. Wongsprasert 1974; Walker 1976a). Ideally, they move their villages every five to ten years in search of more fertile soils (cf. Walker 1983c: 170—74). Traditional Lahu Nyi ideas about the unseen world posit the existence of an all-powerful, pre-eminent, heaven-and-earth creating divinity, whom they call G'uiyj sha.^^ They also believe in numerous lesser supernatural beings. Most of these latter they term ne^, “spirits”, which they frequently conceive as being “masters” or “owners” (sheh-hpd') of particular natural phenomena: hills, streams, rainbow, sun, li^tning, etc. (cf. Walker 1976c,d; 1977a,b,c). Man is said to comprise a physical body and a counterpart spiritual essence or “soul” (the latter frequently conceived as a plurality rather than a single entity). Malicious spirits act upon this “soul” in various ways: attacking it, enticing it away from its material anchor, sometimes even taking up residence in the physical body alongside the soul. In every case, the result of soul dis­ turbance is manifested in physical sickness, which may require the ministra­ tions of a spirit specialist.!^

3. THE LAHU NYI VILLAGE AND ITS TEMPLE Lahu Nyi villages in Thailand are rather small communities, averaging 16 households and 102 people (Lewis 1980:9). Such villages are frequently sited on long, narrow spurs, with the individual houses erected roughly on either side of a main thoroughfare. The houses, raised on piles, are built mostly of bamboo with wood only for the main supports. Their roofs are thatched either with cogon grass or with leaves. Some villages — by no means all — have a building which stands apart, both physically and in design, from the other buildings. This is the haw~yeh\/, literally “palace house”,which is the village temple. It is dedicated principally to the worship of G'Ui'^sha. Sited at the top of the village (Pl. 1), the haw-yeh^ (H. 2) of the village where I lived was a single-roomed structure, built directly on the

12. The. major western study of the Lahu language is Matisoff (1973), which relates to the Lahu Na dialect. The major study of Lahu dialects is Bradley (1979). 13. For a discussion of the etymology of the word G'ui^sha, see Walker (1980:52 n. 12). This and other Lahu words in this paper are transcribed according to a romanization first developed by American Baptist missionaries in Burma and China. For further details see Walker (1980:55). 14. For examples of propitiatory and exorcistic rites respectively, see Walker (1977a, 1976b).

15. Haw~, a loan from Shan, “a prince’s palace”;

, Lahu ‘house”.

Transformations of Buddhism among the Lahu Nyi

71

ground rather than on piles?^ It was enclosed by a stout wooden fence which formed, at the front of the building, an open yard. Around the building, fluttering from long bamboo poles, were a number of white and yellow cloth streamers known as htd^ pa^ (a loan from Tai). The Lahu villagers say that these steamers, symbolizing G'ui^ sha's, power and purity, frighten evil spirits away from the village; a few informants also said that the streamers, fluttering in the wind, cry out (bvuhy ve) for the health and prosperity of the villagers. The colours white and yellow are significant. White symbolizes purity, yellow the sanctity of the Buddhist monkhood. Both colours the Lahu themselves associate with G'ui\/ sha. Although no Lahu informant told me as much, I am certainly tempted to see as the prototypes of these hto'^ pa^, the “victory flags” (tung chai) which the Buddhist Tai lowlanders set up around their temples “to avert ill or evil spirits and secure good fortune” (Rajadhon 1967; 179).

Pl. 2.

A village haw~yehy, or temple

In the open space between the surrounding wall and the single entrance to the haw~yeh.^ were a number of roughly-carved wooden posts (Pl. 3). These the Lahu Nyi called kaw mo'^ taweh- (etym. obsc.). Villagers’ views differed as to what these posts symbolized, but a commonly-held view was that they

16. But I have seen one two-roomed haw~ yeh v and at least three raised on piles, in different Lahu Nyi villages in north Thailand.

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Anthony R. Walker

were replicas of divine prototypes in G'ui^ heaven.My own best guess at pre­ sent, is that they have their origin in the Tai lak muang, or city posts, which symbolize royalty — in the Lahu case, the royalty of sha (cf. Walker 1981:674). 18 The most notable feature of the interior of the haw-yeh\j in my study village was a three-tiered altar (Pl. 4)^^. In fact, my informants impressed upon me, this is not so much an altar (/rf/- in Lahu) as a chair {caw-tcuh\ indeed a replica of G'ui^ sha'3 throne in the heavens. In the far right-hand comer of the building was another altar, comprising a small wooden shelf atop a post (Pl. 5). On it were kept two small porcelain bowls of Chinese design, for offerings respectively of rice and water. Also on that small altar was a loosely-woven bamboo basket, another offering. This altar was dedicated to Gh/'v the spirit-protector of the whole village Other permanent ritual furnishings con­ sisted of long strips of white and yellow cloth and a number of cloth umbrellas, all of which were hung from the temple’s roof beams (Pl, 6). The strips of cloth had the same name,Zrr