THE YAKHA: CULTURE, ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT IN ...

etween the two tribes were to be taken as 'history', then the Yakha and
Limbu had once been more closely related than they now were. Nor had
their subsequent estrangement been marked by any high degree of
isolation. There were long-standing traditions of inter-group marriage
and other social contacts which continued to be strong.
The Yakha language as spoken in Tamaphok undoubtedly contributed to
a sense of ethnic or simply local identity, It also made the local
environment ' social ' . There were, for example, place names for places
in Yakha which outsiders were unlikely to know, Several hamlet names
within the Yakha part of Tamaphok pancEivat (such as Otemmatol,
LugkamalB~ and Lugg~ksw2r) were obviously Ti beto-Burman in origin and
were used by both Yakha and non-Yakha who knew the area. More often it
was the case that a Yakha place name would have its Nepali equivalent,
Thus Tamaphok itself was Tumok in Yakha, and Madi Mulkharka (across the
valley) was Waling. Within Tamaphok itself, the three principal areas
up and down the hill had both Yakha and Nepali names. Thus
Utakhbrukten (literally 'head village') was SirEin~au- ('piilow village')
in Nepali, Ulao ten (1 i teral ly ' leg vi 1 lage' > was PuccharnEiu- (' tai 1
village') in Nepali. Majhagau- was i3icnBu- in Nepali (both translating
as 'middle village'). This last case is interesting because 'majhagau-'
could as well be Nepali as Yakha, since the Yakha ten ('village') is not
used and malh and bit are both Nepal i words with virtual ly synonymous
meanings. Yet people were adamant that if they were speaking Yakha they
would say MBijhgBu- rather than Bicgbu-, Other place names were
obviously a phonological adaptation of a Tibeto-Burmese place name to
Nepali, such as Tellok (the village with a concentration of Brahmins and
Chetris up the valley) which was Tellu' in Yakha, and the Maya river