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TAI GROUP.

other Shn tribes of Assam. They have their own priests, and these, as well as a large proportion of the laity, are literate. The Khmt language closely agrees with Northern Shan. A large proportion of the vocabulary is common to the two languages. The alphabets are nearly identical. It will be remembered that the homs, unlike the Khm- ts, have become Hinduised, and are no longer Buddhists.

　The Phkials or Phk are said to have left Mng Kng for Assam about 1760 A.D., immediately after the subjugation of the kingdom of Png by Alomphra. Before entering Assam they dwelt on the banks of the Turungpn River, and were thus appar- ently near neighbours of the Tairongs. On reaching Assam, they at first resided on the Buri Dihing, whence they were brought by the homs, and settled near Jorhat in the present district of Sibsagar. When the Burmese invaded Assam, they and other Shn tribes were ordered to return to Mng Kng, and they had got as far as their old settle- ment on the Buri Dihing when the Province was taken by the British. Their language closely resembles Khmt, and, like the Khmts and Tairongs. they are Buddhists. They seldom marry outside their own community, and, as this is very small, their physique is said to be deteriorating. They are adepts in the art of dyeing. At the Census of 1891 the total strength of the Phkials was only 565, all of whom inhabited the sadr subdivi- sion of the Lakhimpur District.

　Nor is the name by which the Mng Kng Shns are known to the homs, and frequent references are made to them under that name in the hom chronicles. The persons known to us as Khmjngs or Kmyngs, are a section of that race, who formerly resided on the Patkoi Range, but who, like so many of their congeners, were driven to take refuge in Assam at the beginning of the nineteenth century by the oppression of the Kachins.

　In the sm Buranji we read that the homs were attacked by the Ngs on their way over the Patkoi at a place called Khmjng, and it may be that this place was also the early settlement of the section of the Nors who were subsequently known by that name. The number of Nors counted at the Census of 1891 was 751 (including Khm- jngs). Nearly all of them live in the Jorhat Subdivision of Sibsagar.

　We have seen that the Northern Shns were always spoken of by the other branches of the family as the 'Tai Long' (###) or 'Great Tais'. In Shn the letters l and r are freely interchanged, so that another form of the name is 'Tai Rong'. One section of the Shns who at various times entered Assam has retained this name, and its members are now known as Tairongs, Turngs, or Shm (i.e., Shn) Turngs. They are said to have immigrated into the Province less than eighty years ago. Their own tradition is that they originally came from Mng-mng Khau-shng on the North-East of Upper Burma, and settled on the Turungpn River, which took its name, 'the Tai-Rong Water', from them. While there, they received an invitation from the Nors, who had preceded them and had settled themselves at Jorhat, and in consequence they started across the Patkoi en route for the Brahmaputra Valley. They were, however, taken prisoners by the Kachins, and made to work as slaves, in which condition they say that they remained for five years, but really, probably, for a much longer period. They were released by

　 The above information is based on the account of the tribe contained in Mr. Gait's Census Report, pages 283 and ff.

　 The above is based on the note on page 284 of Mr. Gait's Census Report.