Moirang Salai
Meitei
At a glance
- Called a
- Salai
- Community
- Meitei
- Found in
- Manipur
About
Moirang is one of the seven Meitei salai of Manipur, the clan of the old principality of Moirang in the south of the valley. Hodson (1908) found the Moirang the most self-contained of the clans: settled mainly around their own town, with a king of their own, the Moirang Ningthou, and still keeping rest days (genna) for the whole clan tied to the farming year. It is a Meitei clan in its own system, not a Vedic gotra, though the 1901 list of its yumnaks was entered under the Atreya gotra.
What “Salai” means for the Meitei
A salai (also called a yek) is one of the seven clans of the Meitei of Manipur. Hodson (1908) glossed salei as 'tribe' and yumnak as 'household': each salai is made up of yumnaks, the family names used as surnames, and belonging follows the father's line. Marriage within one's own salai is forbidden.
Every salai of the Meitei, with how the clan system works: the Meitei page.
Name and Origin
The sources checked do not explain the name Moirang. Hodson (1908, p. 100) named Ngangningsing as the tribal deity of the Moirang clan. He quoted McCulloch (1859) that tradition brought the Moirang into the valley from the south, 'the direction of the Kookies' (p. 6). In his book on the Naga tribes of Manipur (1911, p. 72) Hodson set the Moirang apart from the other Meitei clans for their homogeneity, their place in the south of the valley, their independence, and the clan rites they had kept in fuller vigour than any other clan; no Naga clan in the hills bore Moirang as its Manipuri name.
Historical Journey
McCulloch, quoted by Hodson (1908, pp. 5-6), wrote that among the peoples who first held the valley the Koomul (Khuman) were for a time the most powerful, 'and after its declension, the Moirang tribe', until the Meithei brought them all under one rule. Hodson dated the decisive defeat of the Moirang by the Meithei to a great battle in 1431, and found that they kept a large measure of independence until British times (pp. 59, 74). Moirang kept its own officers in order of precedence under the Moirang Ningthou, among them a Khadarakpa, a Senapati and a Mantri (p. 72), and the Moirang Ningthou sat on the Chirap, the chief court of the state (p. 65). The number of Moirang yumnaks differs by source: 66 in the 1901 list printed by Hodson, 67 in the account of the Manipur Science and Technology Council, and 99 to 110 in recent Meitei compilations (the Manipur Mirror list 99, N. Monihar 100, Khomdon Lisam 110).
How the Salai Is Kept
The Meitei are exogamous by salai, so a Moirang may not marry another Moirang. Hodson (1908, p. 75) recorded further bars in his time: the Moirang were not permitted to marry the Khabananba (Kha Nganba) or one or two families of the Chenglei (Sarang Leishangthem), and the Angom did not marry the Moirang. Each clan held some object namungba, forbidden on pain of a mysterious death; for the Moirang it was the buffalo (p. 118). The Moirang kept a clan-wide system of rest days, held periodically and tied to the seasons of cultivation, like the gennas of the hill peoples (p. 119). The yumnak list of 1901 that Hodson printed (Appendix I) heads the clan 'Salei Moirang, Atreya gotra'. No kuldevi or kuldevta in the Hindu sense is attached to the Moirang in the sources checked.
Presence Across Regions
Moirang, Manipur
Meitei
The eponymous town of the clan, around which, Hodson wrote, the Moirang were mainly settled; seat of the Moirang Ningthou.
Stories and Legends
Khamba and Thoibi
The best-known Moirang story is the tale of Khamba and Thoibi. In the version Hodson printed (1908, pp. 134-150), Thoibi is the daughter of Chingkhu Akhuba, heir to Chingkhu Telheiba, king of Moirang, and Khamba is an orphan of the Khuman royal line, brought up by his sister Khamnu. Hodson wrote that Meitei and Moirang alike listened eagerly to the ballad sung to the pena and held it true, 'for to this day are not the clothes worn by these worthies still preserved in the temple at Moirang?' (p. 117).
The clans born from one body
Hodson (1908, pp. 100 and 182) printed two versions of a genealogy that, in his words, 'the Hindu friends of the people' had found for the seven clans, in which they spring from the body of a sage or Guru. In the version a former court officer gave him, the Moirang came from his nostril. In the version a Bengali clerk wrote for him, the clans came from the eyes, ears and nostrils, and the Moirang from the teeth. Hodson thought the neatness of the second version suspect. Meitei texts give each clan its own ancestor.