and it must be admitted that the Naga, suspicious of strangers as he is, is a little apt to defend himself before he has been attacked at all. However that may be, I can state without reserve that Mr. Mills, during the three and a half years in which he has had to decide their disputes and deal with the Lhotas in various ways, has fully gained their confidence—without it this book could not have been written—and has doubtless found them, as I have myself, very pleasant companions, particularly on the river or in the jungle or after dangerous game.
The Lhota occupies to some extent a midway position [[xiv]]among Naga tribes between the cultures typical of the north and of the south, and is particularly interesting as retaining very clear indications of the composite origin of the tribe. The main body are perhaps of the same origin as the Sangtams, and hence from the south, perhaps from the Chindwin valley in Burma to which the Southern Sangtams trace their origin. Thence there are traditions of Lhota sojourners at Kezakenoma (Keshur) and at Kohima in the present Angami country, and at Themoketsa and the extinct village of the hero Pembvo in the Rengma country. Indeed it is now no longer quite clear whether this chief was a Lhota or a Rengma, and whether he protected against the pursuing Angamis the rearguard of the Lhotas crossing the Dayang northwards, or that of the Rengmas migrating westwards to the Mikir Hills, but the Lhotas of the neighbouring villages jealously preserve his memory and all that touches him, while Chankerhomo, who is associated with him in legend and who slew in one day thirty Angami warriors of Phekekrima, only to be eventually captured and tortured to death by them, was undoubtedly a Lhota and the site of his execution is still shown. Indubitably the Lhotas have been subject to the influence of the same cultures as the Angamis, and it may be seen in their practice of the erection of monoliths on the performance of certain ceremonies, in the practice of burial and in the manner of taking omens, which both Angami and Lhota do by dropping chips cut from a reed instead of by the fire-stick like other Naga tribes. Like that of the Angamis too is the Lhota social organization into three phratries, though it is conceivable that in both tribes the use of the word apfu for mother, as in one phratry, is of southern or eastern origin and the use of azo or oyo by the others is of the western immigration from the plains of Assam, where ayo is still the Assamese word for ‘mother.’ The Rengmas, however, very like the Lhotas in many respects, and having a similar dual system, seem to have migrated generally from east to west, the bulk of the Rengma tribe having moved from the Naga Hills westward across the Dhansiri valley to the Mikir Hills only a hundred years ago. [[xv]]
Alongside the traces of immigration from the south we have the clear tradition among the Lhotas of an origin from the Himalayas and the plains of Assam, and the use of the cross-bow, the tradition of the tsonak and the strictly preserved yanthang “daos” alike connect the Lhota with the north bank of the Brahmaputra, or with the Singphos.
Thirdly, we have stories of fighting stones and of girls that came out of oranges or bamboo shoots[1] almost identical in form with stories told by the Khasis,[2] and traceable perhaps to Bodo or Mon-Khmêr survivals. The Lhotas too are prolific in families descended from “jungle men” caught and kept as slaves.
In the remaining pages of the Introduction I have endeavoured to give a general idea of the composition of the Naga tribes with a view to a better appreciation of the position among them of the Lhota tribe itself, and of the significance of many points in Mr. Mills’ account of that tribe.
It is generally assumed in a vague sort of way that those tribes which are spoken of as Nagas have something in common with each other which distinguishes them from the many other tribes found in Assam and entitles them to be regarded as a racial unit in themselves. It has been asserted that the Naga tribes are marked by a very strong affection for their village sites in contradistinction to the Kukis and perhaps other tribes like the Garos and Hill Kacharis.[3] But this love of old sites, even if true of most Naga tribes, is certainly not true of all and really exists in a very marked degree rather among the Angamis than among Nagas as such, while even the Angamis can recount their genealogies back to a time when their tribe was still in that migratory stage still characteristic, more or less, of [[xvi]]Kukis, Garos and the Sema Nagas, and probably not far distant in the past of the Kacha Naga tribes. The truth is that if not impossible it is exceedingly difficult to propound any test by which a Naga tribe can be distinguished from other Assam and Burma tribes which are not Nagas.[4]
The expression “Naga”[5] is, however, useful as an arbitrary term to denote the tribes living in certain parts of the Assam hills, which may be roughly defined as bounded by the Hukong valley in the north-east, the plains of the Brahmaputra valley to the north-west, of Cachar to the south-west and of the Chindwin to the east. In the south the Manipur valley roughly marks the point of contact between the “Naga” tribes and the very much more closely interrelated group of Kuki tribes—Thado, Lushei, Chin, etc.
This area now occupied by the Naga tribes is known to have been subject to at least three great immigrations of races from different directions. Thus there is known to have been (1) immigration from the direction of Tibet and Nepal;[6] the Singphos are known to have come from this direction, and it is probable that the Akas, Mishmis[7] and other tribes of the north bank of the Brahmaputra did also, while the Bodo tribes—Garos, Mikirs and Kacharis—[[xvii]]certainly came from the same direction. There has also been (2) immigration from the direction of Southern China across the valley of the Irawadi,[8] of which movement the Tai races—Shans, Ahoms, Tamans, etc.—formed part. And at the same time there has been (3) immigration from the south which has barely stopped now, for the Lushei-Kuki migration was still progressing northwards until 1918, when it was only just prevented from spreading into the unexplored area north of the Ti-Ho (Nantaleik) river by driving the newly-formed colonies on the north bank back across the river at the end of the rains in 1918 before the operations against the Kukis opened in the following cold weather. By that time the Kukis in their attempt to migrate north had already attacked Makware.
The Lushei, Thado and other Kuki tribes are perhaps themselves another branch of the northern immigration,[9] but if so they must have turned north again, for they drove up from the south in front of them both the old Kukis—possibly non-Kuki tribes[10] already subjected to Kuki influence—and that very different race which became the predominating factor in the Angami Naga tribe, and which has probably entered to a lesser degree into the composition of a number of its neighbours. The Angamis or the ancestors of a section of what is now the Angami tribe were undoubtedly located far to the south of the present Naga Hills.