HUMAN SACRIFICE
Major Butler gives the following account[2] of a human sacrifice: “About the 27th July, 1850, Lieutenant Vincent succeeded in effecting, for thirty-seven rupees, the ransom of Tooleram, a Cacharee boy, who had been carried off from the village of Loongee-jair on the 18th February by a marauding party of Angahmee Nagahs. Two other children were at the same time carried off, but had been sold to other villages; a little girl was sold to some Nagahs at Beereh-mah, but could not be traced. The fate of the third boy was horrible; he was purchased by the adjoining tribe of Lotah Nagahs, and a man of the village having died immediately after the purchase, it was considered a bad omen, and that ill luck had befallen them on account of this captive child. They therefore flayed the poor boy alive, cutting off his flesh bit by bit until he died. These cruel and superstitious savages then divided the body, giving a piece of the flesh to each man in the village to put into his dolu, a large corn-basket. By this they suppose all evil will be averted, their good fortune will return, and plentiful crops of grain will be ensured.”
Nagas are always ready to give garbled, not to say scandalous, accounts of the customs of their neighbours, and there can be little doubt that Major Butler was misled by his Angami informants. Lhotas, in common with other tribes, believe in a vague sort of way that the taking of a head brings prosperity to the taker’s village, and the boy was probably killed and his body cut up and distributed, as was done more recently in the case of the Nankam slave [[231]]bought by Akuk. But there is no tradition that it was ever the custom to torture victims before death, and I think the Lhotas must be acquitted of this charge. It would, further, be clean contrary to their customs to put pieces of human flesh in their rice, which would thereby become polluted rather than blessed.[3]
The story goes that long, long ago a rich Lhota was very ill. In vain pigs, cattle and mithan were slaughtered. Finally he had one of his slaves sacrificed in cold blood, in the hope that the slave’s life would be accepted in place of his own. The man died, however, in spite of this last sacrifice, and Lhotas, seeing that it was unavailing, have never imitated his example. This tradition and the practice of spearing the opya at the oyantsoa “genna” point to a time when human sacrifice was practised to avert evil fortune, but it would be safe to say that within historical times no such custom has been followed by them. [[232]]
NAGA-ASSAMESE GLOSSARY
As far as possible Naga-Assamese words have been avoided. For the following, however, no convenient English equivalents exist.
apodia. From the Assamese āpăd (“misfortune”). Certain forms of death by misadventure are spoken of as “apotia” deaths (see p. 160).
chunga. A section of bamboo with a node left intact at one end. Used as a drinking vessel or for carrying water.
dal. Lentils.