KHYNDAI JINGKHANG, Nongtalang (Krem)
25.216900,92.070500
Description
NOTE 1: WILKINSON, P (2000: 47) took a photograph captioned »Nine Doors Hole« which was understood to show a so-called »Lindsey K D« but actually does show Lindsay B. Diengdoh from Shillong Mawkhar, the son of Maureen Diengdoh and Brian Dermot »K D« (Kharpran Daly), stooping in a cave passage of vadose origin and characterised by a pronounced ceiling channel. NOTE 2: Among the 69 Cretaceous fossils specifically determined by E. Spengler (1926) are some from the vicinity of Nongtalang (CHANGAKOTI, U N & BARUAH, S K 1964: 702). NOTE 3: "khyndái" (standard Khasi) and "khynda" (Synteng Khasi) is the word for the cardinal number »nine« (SINGH, N 1906: 39; GURDON, P R T 1906: 200, 208, 214; OLDHAM, T 1854 / 1984 appendix C: LXII) but "ka kynda" (Khasi, noun) is the name for what had been »a form of corporal punishment in the old Khasi penal code« (SINGH, N 1906: 53) and "ka khyndew" (Khasi; noun), also found spelled "ka khyndeu" (OLDHAM, T 1854 / 1984 appendix C: lxi), signifies »the earth« (SINGH, N 1906: 39; SINGH, N 1920: 143; BLAH, E 2007: 87) and "ba khyndew" (adjective) means »aground« (SINGH, N 1920: 13) as the adjective »subterranean« has been clothed into the Khasi words "ba shem hapoh ka khyndew" (BLAH, E 2007: 293). NOTE 4: "ka jingkhang" (Khasi; verbal noun), »a door« (SINGH, N 1906: 102; SINGH, N 1920: 137; BLAH, E 2007: 84). NOTE 5: »Nine Doors Cave« (Boyes, P W 2000.02.23 Mss)»Nine Doors Hole« (WILKINSON, P 2000: 47)»Nine Entrances Cave« (Jarratt, Anthony 'Tony' R 1999 Mss: Cave Log, vol. 7: 13/2/99), online: mcra.org.uk/logbooks (accessed 2008.12.05).NOTE 6: »… in the Khasi Pnar tradition of interpretation of dreams, each individual is represented by a number … The number 7 is for a non tribal and 9 is the number for death. … All animal’s are numbered 7 except for the elephant whose number is 9. If one dreams of an elder like the daloi the number is [also] 9 … Perhaps if one understands Thoh-tim and the number associated to it then one can also have a little insight into numerology or people’s understanding of numbers and its usage in the Khasi Pnar tradition. For instance we already see the link between the number 9 and the dead and their abode« (MOHRMEN, H H 2012.06.12: Gambling through archery.- The Shillong Times, 12th June 2012). NOTE 7: »There are things known and things unknown and in between there are the doors« (Jim Morrison). NOTE 8: "ka jingkhang" (Khasi; verbal noun) signifies not only »a door« but also »a barricade; a barrier; a boundary; a check; an embargo; a hall; an obstacle; an obstruction; a taboo« (SINGH, N 1920: 38, 51, 68, 149, 212, 346, 516) and »a prohibition« (SINGH, N 1906: 101). NOTE 9: "ka khyndái pateng ñiamra" (Khasi; noun), also found spelled ”ka khyndai pating niamra” (BHATTACHARYYA 1995: 16), »an infernal abyss« (SINGH, N 1906: 39), »the hell« (SINGH, N 1906: 39, 142; BLAH, E 2007: 129), »a subterranean world where evil spirits are assembled; a hell« (BHATTACHARYYA 1995: 16). NOTE 10: »Krem Lynshyai Duwar (Khyndai Jingkhang or Nine Doors) located at Nongtalang (Jaintia Hills)« (Kharpran Daly, B D 1997.03.13 Mss "25 caves located" item 14). NOTE 11: »door«, from an Indo-European root shared, among others, by the Sanskrit "dvar", Pakrit "dwar", Greek "thura", Latin "foris", Old English "duru, dor", Dutch "deur", and German "Tür" (door) or "Tor" (gate). NOTE 12: The "grid iron" brought by Peter W Boyes, F.R.G.S. (2000.02.23 Mss) all the way from Europe into a far corner in northeastern India is suspected to substitute what is known in common parlance as a grid in the sense of a network of lines that cross each other to form a series of squares or rectangles. NOTE 13: The GPS position (anonymous recorder, undated, Garmin 12) »092°04.416' East 25°12.98' North« (unspecified precision error, obsolete geodetic datum »India / Bngldsh« = Everest 1830) recorded for the whole lot of cave entrances to the Krem Khyndai Jingkhang (Nongtalang) indicates (unknowable reliability) a spot near north east datum format25°12.98' 92°04.416' Everest 1830 DD°MM.MMM'25°13.016': 92°04.228' WGS84 DD°MM.MMM'25°13'01.0”: 92°04'13.7'” WGS84 DD°MM'SS.S” NOTE 14: The Nongtalang Inspection Bungalow has been GPS positioned near (unidentified precision error) 25°12'24.7”N: 92°03'49.4”E (WGS84 modified from the originally recorded Everest 1830 geodetic datum, Boyes 2000.07.21 Mss) and is indicated near (±500 m) 25°12'25”N: 92°04'15”E: 615 m asl (WGS84 modified from 25°12'25”N: 92°04'25”E: 2115 feet, Everest 1830) on the Survey of India Half-Inch series sheet 83-C/SW (edition 1922). NOTE 15: The "shakehole" in the private language of Peter W Boyes, F.R.G.S. is definitely not a shakehole but it remains unknowable if Boyes wanted to refer to a subsidence doline or to a suffosion doline: Shakehole »Small subsidence or suffosion doline formed in the glacial till overlying limestones in the northern Pennies« (LOWE & WALTHAM 1995: 32). Subsidence doline: »A closed depression in karst formed due to local subsidence of the surface rocks and/or soil into cavities formed by widespread dissolution or local collapse of caves. Also known as sinkhole. The type of subsidence doline formed by downwashing of the soil cover is better described as a suffosion doline« (LOWE & WALTHAM 1995: 35). Suffosion doline: »More accurate synonym for a type of –>subsidence doline, indicating formation by suffosion, or downwashing, of the soil into an underlying fissure. Also known as shakehole« (LOWE & WALTHAM 1995: 35). NOTE 16: chert -- (noun) a hard, dark, opaque rock composed of silica (chalcedony) with an amorphous or microscopically fine-grained texture. It occurs as nodules (flint) or, less often, in massive beds. NOTE 17: The Langpar Formation …1978 »… consists of thin alternations of calcareous shale and sandstone and exhibits change in facies laterally. This formation is also uniformly fossiliferous« (BHATTACHARYA & BHATTACHARYA 1978: 10).1977 »The Langpars, which overlie the Mahadeks, range from very impure sandy limestones to argillaceous limestone and shales. These too contain many molluscan shells, casts of which show up clearly wherever the impure limestones have weathered sufficiently. The maximum thickness is seen in the neighbourhood of the Khasimara River (Lat. 25°12 2/3', Long. 91°30') where it reaches a little over 200 metres. Palaeontologically, the Langpars have been regarded as Danians and earlier [and hence had been] included within the Upper Cretaceous. For some years, however, there has been a preference amongst the BOC [Burma Oil Company] palaeontologists (Y. Nagappa and K. N. Mehta) to refer these to the Palaeocene. They have both felt that the main palaeontological changes come in the basal part of what had been mapped as the Langpars« (DAS GUPTA, A B 1977: 6).1974 »The rock consists of calcareous shale, sandy limestone and fine calcareous sandstone« (ROY CHOWDHURY 1974: 76). 1869: »… a fine sandy limestone containing bryozoa« (MEDLICOTT 1869a: 19 = 169). 1869 »… a group the characteristic rock of which is a very fine pale sandstone with very numerous scattered small broken fragments of plants, generally coated with dark brown or black. Everywhere with this sandstone a calcareous ingredient is associated, but in a strangely capricious manner: of two closely adjoining sections one may be strongly calcareous throughout and the other almost quite free from any such admixture. This is the case on two of the paths from Cherra Station down to Nongpriong. Generally the lime is accumulated in discontinuous layers, thick or thin, forming calcareous sandstone and every degree of sandy limestone. In the two coarser varieties of the former Bryozoa are found, and in the purer layers of limestone the weathered sections of shells, mostly of small turrited gastropods are common. … If a name were needed, these beds might be called the Làngpar band, from the spur south of Maosmai [Mawsnai], which is mostly composed of them, although there is here still a capping of the Cherra band« (MEDLICOTT, H B 1869a: 27-28 = 177-178).1856 »… the sandstones have a greenish-brown tint and contain numerous remains of echinodermata. These become calcareous, and then decompose into a brownish-red sandy rock, which on the fresh fracture is a very hard mass of a bluish tint. Where the fossils occur in the grits, they are only casts, or the place of the original shell is filled with a soft yellow impalpable clay; where the rock is calcareous, the shells of the echini are replaced by carbonate of lime. … at the base of these fossiliferous beds there are locally developed some beds of a nodular dark grey shaly sandstone (Mahadeo). These beds containing the echini (Cyrtoma of McClelland) from a well-marked line along the face of the Cherra Valley, where the beds are calcareous, and are again well seen under Mamluh, where they were first noticed by Dr. McClelland. Associated with these echinoderm remains, and occurring also a little below them, are large plicated oysters (Ostrea, allied to O. flagellatum), generally in fragments« (OLDHAM, T 1854 / 1984: 16-17).
Several cave entrances and collapse dolines give access to a joint-controlled, orthogonal maze cave (note 1), which seems to have formed in calcareous Langpar Sandstone of Upper Cretaceous age (note 2) in the course of a sequence of solution processes and collapse events. The tributary cave passages are of dissolutional origin and probably developed only subsequent to the main drain. Compare the neighbouring 2nd Krem –>Khyndai Jingkhang, Nongtalang. ETYMOLOGY: The Khasi cave name "Krem Khyndai Jingkhang" signifies a true exit cave in the strict sense: A site which gives access to a way along which one can leave the conventional world for good. At a first glance, the Khasi expression "khyndai jingkhang" combines the cardinal number "khyndai" or »nine« (note 3) with the word "ka jingkhang" for »an entrance«note 4) and has been translated, quite literally, as »nine entrances« or »nine doors« (note 5). On the other hand, the number 9 is a Khasi allegory for the death (note 6) and "jingkhang" signifies not only »a door« (note 7) but also »an access« (note 8) in the sense of the right or opportunity to use or benefit from something. Thus, "khyndai jingkhang" is a metaphor for "ka khyndái pateng ñiamra" (note 9), »an infernal abyss« (SINGH, N 1906: 39) in the sense of »a subterranean world where evil spirits are assembled; a hell« (BHATTACHARYYA 1995: 16). The alternative name "Krem –>Lynshyai Duwar" (note 10), which was easily simplied into "Krem –>Lynshai Duwar" (Boyes, P W 2000.02.23 Mss), is difficult to interpret insofar as neither "lynshyai" (or so) nor "lynshai" as such is a Khasi word listed by the authorities (SINGH, N 1906, 1920; BLAH, E 2007) but "ka duar" (Khasi; noun) is a synonym for "ka jingkhang" (SINGH, N 1920: 137) and signifies »a door« (note 11). CAVE DESCRIPTION: Multiple entrances in block controlled horizontal resurgence, developed into a »grid iron configuration [note 12]« (after Boyes, P W 2000.02.23 Mss: Nine Doors … 23/2/00; BOYES, P W 2000 s.a.: 5). SITUATION: At a disputable location (note 13) and in an unidentified setting which may lie in a direct line or along a winding route at an estimated distance of »1.2 km north of IB at Nongtalang« (note 14). APPROACH: To get into the vicinity of the metaphorically nine cave entrances, »follow Nongtalang to Jowai road for approximately 2 km, turning right at old hospital to first small settlement -- take forest track just east of settlement and head north. Cave entrances (1.5 m by 1 m) in large shake hole [note 15] after 200 m. Large amount of chert [note 16]. Cave formed in sandy limestone [note 17]« (Boyes, P W 2000.02.23 Mss: Nine Doors … 23/2/00). CAVE LIFE: Spiders (Arachnidae: conf. Araneae), frogs, not one single pealed orange but a pale orange flat worm.
History
EXPLORATION HISTORY: 1997: Brian Dermot Kharpran Daly 1997 (unpublished) had listed the cave name »Krem Khyndai Jingkhang« as no. 14. 2000.02.23: An unidentified guide (no name mentioned) led Lizzie [Elizabeth] Elvidge, Paul Wilkinson, Geoff Smith and Brian Johnson into the entrances of a cave which what was recorded as »Krem Lynshai Duwar« or »Nine Doors Cave« (Peter "Pete" W Boyes 2000.02.23) and »Nine Doors Hole« (WILKINSON 2000: 47).2000.02.24: Peter W Boyes, F.R.G.S., Jon Whitely and Lindsay B. Diengdoh returned and eventually survey and map the cave (BOYES, P W 2000 s.a.: 5).