DRESS
The most prominent item of Naga dress is the
shawl. It is different for
every tribe and besides, there are varieties and sub-varieties
in every group. A warrior's shawl or shawl of a man who has performed
the Feast of Merit, is different from that
of an ordinary villsager.
The common pattern among the Angamis is
red and yellow (now being replaced by green)
bands, on
black cloth called Lohe. The western Angami villages have their own distinctive
pattern. Lothas have a streamlined gradation of shawls indicating the
number of gennas performed by the wearer. Thus a man who has performed
the first genna wears the phangrhup, its strips being
widened, after the second genna. The third genna
entitles the man to wear the Ethasu, while after the series of feasts is completed and the
stone-dragging done the man can wear the Lungpensu, which is a dark blue cloth with five
stripes of light blue and with narrow marginal stripes on each side.
The Ao warrior shawl called the Tsungkotepsu with figures of
mithun, tiger,
elephant, human head, cock, Dao and spear is strikingly picturesque. Each of
these figures is symbolic; mithun represents wealth of the wearer, the
elephant and tiger denote his prowess in hunting and the human head
signifies success in taking heads. These patterns are painted in black on a
white band, while the cloth itself is of dark blue colour.
Among the
Changs,
the unmarried boys and girls wear the Kaksi nei, while the newly married couple
sport the Silang nei. Another variety of Chang shawl, the Tobu nei has
zig-zag patterns in alternate red and black on a blue band.
The popular
Yimchunger shawls are the Aneak khim
which is black, and Mokhok khim which is white. Rongkhim, a particularly attractive variety
of Yimchunger shawl, may be worn only by one who has taken heads in
war, it has prominent
rectangular red design, red colour signifying the blood of the enemy.
In the past it was possible to identify, by simply looking at the shawl
of the wearer, the tribe he belonged to and occasionally even the group of
villages he came from, his social status and the number of gennas he had
performed. But nowadays this identification is not possible.
Apart from the shawl, the normal working dress is a kilt which is
generally of black colour. It may be embroidered with cowries in which case it
is looked upon as a distinctly male dress. The cowries are rubbed on
stone before being embroidered so that they may stick well, and they are
always sewn by the man using the cloth and never by his wife or anybody else. The cowrie decoration is quite popular among the Nagas and it imparts to the kilt the character of toga
virility, signifying
his success in love or war.
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