Burma: Census of India 1901 Vol. I - Khamkoo

REPORT ON THE CENSUS OF BURMA.
I 2 I
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I have elsewhere described the Karen country as lying along the whole eastern
frontier of Lower Burma from Mergui to Toungoo, in portions-of the delta of the
Irrawaddy, in the south-west corner of the Southern Shan States, and in the feudatory
States of Karenni. Its general position is indicated in the map which is appended
to this chapter. The three main divisions of the Karens—the Sgau, the Pwo
and the Bghai—are by this time well known. The well-defined linguistic differences
that separate them one from the other do not here concern us ; what is more
important ethnographically is the fact that, as Mr. Smeaton tells us, " although
" there is perfect cordiality and fredom of intercourse between them, intermar-
"riage is not frequent." This shows" that there is no immediate prospect of the
distinction becoming obliterated. The two first divisions are confined for the most
part to Lower Burma. The Bghai preponderate in Karenni and the Upper Province.
Several of the members of the Pwo and Sgau tribes mentioned in the
British Burma Gazetteer should no doubt properly be classed under the Bghai.
The Taroo and Gaikho clans, for instance, placed by Colonel Spearman among
the Pwo, appear to be the Padaungs and Zayeins of the Upper Burma Gazetteer,
who geographically, at any rate, should be included among the Bghai Karens.
There are various sub-dialects of the Pwo and Sgau, but, so far as is at present
known, the variations are not important, and, apart from these differences of speech
(which Mr. Eales tells us are no more marked than are those which exist between
the different county dialects in England), the only distinction between one clan
and another seems to be in the dress worn : here a white blouse without stripes
but with a narrow border of embroidery at the bottom, which varies from village
to village ; there a white blouse with red perpendicular lines ; elsewhere white
trousers with radiating red lines and the like, a method of discrimination that
has led Sir George Scott to compare the list of clans to 'a