Table of Contents
- The Ceremonial Cycle: An Overview
- Ritual: Performance and Language
- The Ritual Ownership of Swiddens
- The Rites of Clearing and Planting
- Planting the Ritual Basket of the Yam (Chae’ Lau Nwae Tasae’)
- The Rite of Protection
- The Symbolism of the Toemau’ Reconsidered
- The Rites of Harvesting
- The Rites of the New Year (Lyta Thau Ni Sau)
We have seen in the last chapter that the Palokhi Karen are dependent on swiddening, wet-rice cultivation, and a cash economy for their subsistence needs. Indeed, for several households in Palokhi, the cash sector is crucial in enabling them to meet their subsistence needs. Notwithstanding the extent to which the Palokhi Karen are dependent on an external economy, swidden agriculture is regarded as the dominant form of subsistence production within the community. This particular perception of swiddening is based on two factors: first, an understanding that swidden agriculture predates wet-rice agriculture and is seen as a “Karen” system of cultivation; second, the continuing cultivation of swiddens which has ensured the persistence of a religious and ritual life that remains organised around the swidden cycle.
In this chapter, I present a description of several rites which form part of the cycle of ritual activities in Palokhi in order to show its crucial importance in the community and in relation to swidden agriculture, despite the fact that the Palokhi Karen possess a mixed subsistence system. As these swidden rites form the basis of rites performed in wet-rice fields, I shall not therefore deal with wet-rice agricultural rituals in Palokhi.[1]
The ceremonial cycle in Palokhi consists of a large number of major and minor rites which are performed in swiddens and in the village, in the homes of households which cultivate swiddens. They are held at various times of the year according to various stages in the cycle of swidden cultivation beginning with the selection of swidden sites and culminating with the harvest celebration which marks the transition from one agricultural season to the next. These rites form a major part of a religious system which may well be regarded as a “totalizing” system, to borrow the use of the term from Levi-Strauss (1966:250–62), in which the larger significance of the Head Rite (talykho), certain features of kinship and ‘au’ ma xae, for example, cannot be fully apprehended without reference to agricultural rituals and vice versa.
Figure 6.1 shows when these rites are held according to the cycle of swidden cultivation in Palokhi.
For convenience, these rites may be grouped as follows:
|
The Rites in the Ceremonial Cycle |
Where Performed |
|
The Rites of Clearing and Planting |
|
|
Swidden divination (ka lau hy’) |
Swidden and village |
|
The rite of clearing swiddens (no specific name) |
Swidden |
|
The rite of planting swiddens (ly tho hy’) |
Swidden |
|
Planting the ritual basket of the yam (chae’ lau nwae tasae’) |
Swidden |
|
Drinking the liquor of the rice seed (‘au si’ by chae’ khli) |
Village |
|
The Rite of Protection |
|
|
The rite protecting swiddens (bghau hy’) |
Swidden |
|
The Rites of Harvesting |
|
|
Wrist-tying at the reaping of rice (ki cy’ ku lau by) |
Village |
|
Wrist-tying at the threshing of rice (ki cy’ phau’ lau by) |
Village |
|
Eating of the “Head Rice” (‘au’ by kho) |
Village |
|
Calling up the bird (kau’ thau tho) |
Swidden or village |
|
Drinking the less of the threshing mat (‘au si’ khlaumyda’) |
Village |
|
The Rites of the New Year (The Descent of the Land, The Rising of the New Year) |
|
|
The annual ‘au’ ma xae (no specific name) |
Village |
|
Calling back of souls (phau’ koela) |
Village |
|
Wrist-tying at the descent of the land, the rising of the new year (ki cy’ kau lau wae, thau ni sau) |
Village |
Although the annual ‘au’ ma xae is not an agricultural ritual, nevertheless, it is an integral part of the yearly cycle of ritual activities and its performance needs to be viewed accordingly. That is, it is an essential element in the overall organisation of ritual activities, which are intimately linked with swidden agriculture, within the community.
The chief concern of these rites, with the exception of the annual ‘au’ ma xae, readily apparent from their performances and accompanying ritual texts, is the successful growth of the rice crop. This is effected primarily through the propitiation of various spirits, the most important of which is the Lord of the Water, Lord of the Land. There are, however, other features embedded within these rites, and the overall structure of the ceremonial cycle, which are important. They are specifically: cultural definitions of a certain order which opposes settlement and forest, represented by relations with the Lord of the Water, Lord of the Land, within the domain; the complementary roles of male and female in reproduction symbolically applied to agricultural production; the importance of a “cool state” for the successful growth of rice; the identification of rice with humans; and a general aoristic and proleptic orientation which emphasises continuity through renewal.
As it will not be possible to examine here all the rites which make up the annual ceremonial cycle in Palokhi, I shall therefore consider only what is sufficient to illustrate these features. The rites which I focus on are those which make up the rites of planting, the rite of protection, “wrist tying at the reaping of rice” and “eating the ‘head rice’ ” in the larger body of rites of harvesting, and the rites of the New Year.
In examining these agrarian rites in Palokhi, I take the view implicit in my earlier discussions of rituals that religion consists of a system of ideas and concepts, and an expressive or performative aspect, namely, ritual behaviour. As a general proposition, I think it would not be untenable to say that whatever else religion and ritual behaviour may involve, nevertheless, there is at least one level where they entail conceptual relations which represent some underlying schemata of cognition or cognitive models. As such, these conceptual relations are integrated, that is, coherent or patterned, and meaningful.
[1] In Palokhi, the cycle of wet-rice agricultural rituals is modelled on that of swiddens, but not in its entirety. It is based on a number of key rites such as the rites of planting, the rite of protection and some harvest rites which I discuss in this chapter. There are, in addition, some minor ritual practices which are borrowed from the Northern Thai but these do not provide the key symbolic motifs of the wet-rice ritual cycle. There are, however, two rites which are partly of Northern Thai provenance and they are important. These are, specifically, the rite of “propitiating the spirit of the dam” (known by the macaronic ly faaj) and the “wrist-tying of buffaloes” (ki cy’ poe’na). Both are fitted in within the religious system of the Palokhi Karen in that the supreme spirit which is appeased, and appealed to, is the Lord of the Water, Lord of the Land. Indeed, the cycle of wet-rice agricultural rituals is in fact articulated within the cycle of swidden rites. For example, although the rites of planting and protection must be performed in swiddens and wet-rice fields by households which have both, it is not unusual to find such households performing only harvest rites in swiddens because they deem it sufficient for both fields.