| Morung
The central piece in village was the 'Morung'. It was
a kind of bachelor's dormitory for the village youth and fulfilled
a variety of functions. Women were not allowed inside. A boy who entered
the dormitory at the age of six or seven remained there till he married
and set up his own independent house. It served as a place where human
and animal skulls were kept as relics, as a guardhouse where the village
braves kept their Daos, spears and shields and it was also a meeting place
where important decisions relating to war and peace were taken. Here the
younger generation were reared to manhood, taught folk tales and songs
and it also acted as sanctuary for a culprit who takes refuge in it, as
long as he remained under its roof. The morung was the pride of the village
and was always decorated with trophies of war and finest wood carvings
the villagers were capable of.
But the m orung
is not common for all the Naga tribes. Angamis villages does not have
a morung but the Ao, Lotha, Koyak and the Phom areas, every village
had a morung.
A striking feature of the Ao, Chang, Koyak, Yimchurger
and Sangtam villages are the xylophones or the log drums. It was made
out of the hollowed trunk of a tree with the carving usually of a mithun
head at one end. The drum when beaten with dumb-bells by men lined up
on either side, could be heard for miles. It was primarily a war-drum
and was generally beaten to give an alarm or celebrate a victory, but
it was also used for festivals and ceremonies. The notes for every occasion
would be different. In Chan, Yimchunger and Sangtam areas it formed part
of the morung and the Aos looked upon the drum as almost the village deity.
Social evils like infanticide, slavery and prostitution
existed in the Naga society. The Angamis resorted to infanticide in the
case of children of unmarried girls. It was believed that such children
would bring misfortune to the village. The girls were send to the jungle
for delivery and there the baby was strangled.
Slavery was universal throughout the Ao tribe. These
slaves were generally well treated and considered members of the family.
The barter value of a male slave was one cow and 3 conch shells and of
a female slave three cows and four or 5 conch shells. Female slaves
were not allowed to marry and if they bore a child the offspring was killed.
Occasionally the slaves were used for setting scores in head hunting.
If it was found that one village had taken more heads than the other,
and it was desired to make peace between the two, the accounts would be
squared up by the village having taken more heads giving to the other
village, the deficit number of slaves. These slaves were carried by the
other village in triumph and decapitated.
Prostitutes existed in the Chakhesang area, especially
in Kezabama (Chizami). They were drawn mostly from young widows or unmarried
girls. |
