Kheng
Encyclopedia
The Kheng people are an ethnic group
Ethnic groups in Bhutan
There are many ethnic groups in Bhutan, and no one group constitutes a majority of the Bhutanese population. The Bhutanese population comprises four main ethnic groups, which themselves are not necessarily exclusive: the politically and culturally dominant Ngalop of western and northern Bhutan; the...

 of Bhutan
Bhutan
Bhutan , officially the Kingdom of Bhutan, is a landlocked state in South Asia, located at the eastern end of the Himalayas and bordered to the south, east and west by the Republic of India and to the north by the People's Republic of China...

, found primarily in the Zhemgang, Trongsa
Trongsa District
Trongsa District is one of the districts of Bhutan. It is the most central district of Bhutan and the geographic centre of Bhutan is located within it at Trongsa Dzong....

, and Mongar District
Mongar District
Mongar District is one of the 20 dzongkhags comprising Bhutan. Mongar is the fastest-developing dzongkhag in eastern Bhutan. A regional hospital has been constructed and the region is bustling with many economic activities. Mongar is noted for its lemon grass, a plant that can be used to produce...

s of south central Bhutan. They speak Khengkha
Khengkha
Khengkha, also called the Kheng language, is a member of the Tibeto-Burman language family spoken in the Zhemgang, Trongsa and Mongar districts of south central Bhutan...

, a member of the extended Tibetan language family; the closest related language appears to be Bumthangkha
Bumthang language
The Bumthang language is an East Bodish language spoken by about 36,500 people in Bumthang and surrounding districts in central Bhutan...

 to the north. By all accounts the Kheng are more closely related to the people of central Bhutan than they are to their neighbors in eastern Bhutan, who are primarily Sharchop
Sharchop
Sharchop is a collective term for the populations of mixed Southeast Asian and South Asian descent that live in the eastern districts of Bhutan.-Ethnicity:...

s. The Kheng still retain special trade relations with the Bumthangpo, including providing winter pasture rights for Bumthang yak
Yak
The yak, Bos grunniens or Bos mutus, is a long-haired bovine found throughout the Himalayan region of south Central Asia, the Tibetan Plateau and as far north as Mongolia and Russia. In addition to a large domestic population, there is a small, vulnerable wild yak population...

s. SIL estimates there are 50,000 Khengkha speakers.

Kheng also refers to the ancient small kingdoms in this area which were autonomous fiefdom
Fiefdom
A fee was the central element of feudalism and consisted of heritable lands granted under one of several varieties of feudal tenure by an overlord to a vassal who held it in fealty in return for a form of feudal allegiance and service, usually given by the...

s prior to the unification of Bhutan in the 17th century.

Like most of Bhutan, the Kheng are devoted followers of Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India . It is the state religion of Bhutan...

 and their cultural practices typically mirror those of the dominant Ngalop
Ngalop
The Ngalop are people of Tibetan origin who migrated to Bhutan as early as the ninth century. For this reason, they are often referred to in literature as "Bhote"...

culture of the country.
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