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

and Yasokeni, all played to in a band with drums and
harmoni um. 2000 sewa [ L imbu for namas te (greet ings) , we were
told1 to you, U.lFt-pC~.ia [blood sacrifice1 be yours.
1st Kathmandu, 2nd Ramechap, 3rd Charakot, 4th Bhojpur
[district numbers prior to reorganisat ion1 are all yours.
Chamca besi [an unidentified lowland areal is yours. The
Bagmati and Koshi rivers are yours. The fertile Terai plains
are yours. Pallo Kirb-t, MBjh Kirb-t, P6-c Khumbu and Solu
Khumbu are yours. Satrathum ['Sixteen regions' cf, the
district name Tehrathum 'Thirteen regions', thum being said to
be a Limbu word for region!, Chambon chapmerun [Chambog is the
main dher6 in Tamaphokl and Das majhiye Tamaphok are all
yours. This is all promised. Sarsir) [sarsvij-, Brassica
campestris, 'field mustard'?] is also an incense for
But in all the world's travels the best incense is mugwort.
Sixteen leaf plates, a small earthern lamp (d-), a shot of
raksi. I, cirFi/cvuDi, , bhoTe, the four kings are
ruled by you [these are also the four suits in cards]. You
must have cause to remember, saguni; A big cockerel is good
for you, Done on Wednesday. . . . ,
The Kami family we interviewed as part of our survey reported having
had problems with Sagunf, who caused a boil on one of their daughters.
This they treated by recourse to a Damai dh6mi. This was possible
because Saguni was not seen as a particularly Yakha spirit (as its
provenance reveals), and could be addressed in Nepali. Pokhrel et a1
(2040 V. So : 1283) have a word sagune which is, "in dhhmis' language, a
spirit of sores and boils".
Another example of wider provenance is the story of Af tabdre, which
was said to be the chief of the spirits.
Many years ago, there was a lama and his wife (lamini). While
walking in the jungle, they got lost and disappeared to the
world. The lama was an avatar [being capable of many
incarnations] and sometimes appeared as a pig, somet imes as a
man, sometimes as a demon, the sky or the wind. They
disappeared. Then one day (on a Sunday) a chilaune [Schima
wallichiil tree appeared. The lama and lamini were in the
root, but men could not see them. Only a dhemi knew a deuta
was there, This deuta caused trouble to people and made them
sick, A dhtimi saw the deuta in an augury and asked what it
wanted. It said:
"I want a cockerel, I want milk, I want achita cachet&,
broken rice pieces], I want sindur [red powder1 , I went dhaja