. 02-01-193
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AITONI.
As stated in the General Introduction to the group, the Aitons came into
Assam from M
ng Mau in quite modern times. It is said that there are only
some two hundred of them altogether, some of whom live in the south-west corner
of the Sibsagar District, and the others in the Naga Hills.
Their language, as appears from the specimen, is almost pure Sh
n. In fact,
it is the form of speech illustrated by Dr. Cushing's Grammar of Shn, rather
than that illustrated by Mr. Needham's Grammar of Khmt
. The specimens
which I have received from the local authorities of Sibsagar are evidently carefully
prepared, and it has been easy to make out the meaning of the greater part of
them. Only here and there I have come across a phrase which baffled me, and
this was most probably due to my own ignorance, rather than to any incorrectness
of the text.
The specimens consist of the Parable of the Prodigal Son and of the fable of the boy who cried 'wolf, wolf.' In the translation I have marked with a query any passages which appeared doubtful to me.
The true character of Aitoni is recognised by the people of Assam, who
also call it Shm Don, i.e., 'Shn speech.' In Assamese, don means
'a foreign language', and Shm is the word which the Burmese mispronounce
'Shn'.
Alphabet.-The alphabet used in the following specimens is almost entirely
the Shn, and not the Khmt, one.
Note, in the first place, that the vowel #, which in the specimens is written,
Shn-fashion, #, and which, for the sake of uniformity with the other Tai
languages of Assam, I have transliterated throughout by a, must, in Aitoni,
be pronounced as in Shn, I.e., as if it was a light, 
l. Thus # ha,
give, should be pronounced hl, and so in every other case where the vowel
occurs in the specimens.
As regards consonants, we have the Khmt # ka, instead of the Shn
#, and the Khmt # pha, instead of the Shn #. In every other case,
when the Shn form differs from the Khmt one, the former is used.
Thus we have the Shn # instead of the Khmt # for sa, and the Shn
# instead of the Khmt # for na.
The consonant # wa is used more frequently in composition with other consonants
(as we have seen to be the case in Tairong), than is usual in Khmt.
Thus kau is written ## instead of # or ##. When # is intended to represent the
vowel 
, it is compounded
as in Khmt
and Shn. Thus # khng.
When it retains its own sound of wa in composition, as it often does in Shn,
but never in Khmt,
it takes the form #. Thus # kw, go,
the Aitoni and Shn
word corresponding to the Khmt
# k.
We have noted in Khmt, Tairong, and Nor how the word hit or het,
to do, is always spelt hich or hech, and, under the head of Khmt, I
have pointed out how this is due to the influence of Burmese, in which language
a final ch is pronounced as t. This 2c