Kuki (Indic people); Lushai (Asian people); Lushai language
The Lamgang and Anal harvest festival is practically the same. In each
case the best crop in the village is reaped by the whole community
going to the field with dance and song, and subsequently the lucky
owner of the crop has to entertain the village for three days. It
would appear that all good Lamgangs and Anals must pray to have the
second best crop. On the second day of the feast the consumption
of meat and tobacco, the carrying of water and wood, and working
with axes or hoes are tabu. The feast closely resembles the "Buh-Ai"
of other clans. The Aimol custom is very different from that of the
other clans. All the men go out in search of game, the flesh of which
is eaten in the evening, and drums are beaten and songs sung while
the rice beer circulates freely, in contrast to the feast at the
sowing time. Dancing is, however, tabu. The harvest feast is called
"Sherh an long."
The Lamgang have an extra feast, or rather period of rest, when the
grain is all garnered, when for ten days no one may enter or leave the
village, and no work can be done, the whole energies of the community
being concentrated on eating and drinking well.
2. Feasts Corresponding with the Thangchhuah Feasts of the Lushai.--The
idea of "Thangchhuah" is found in some form or other in all clans. Even
in those clans who have no very clear conception of a special abode
for the spirits of those who have earned good fortune in the world
beyond the grave by feasts and killing men and animals here below,
we find feasts the giving of which confers on the giver special
consideration among his fellow-villagers and entitles his corpse to
special funeral honours. All these feasts seem more or less connected
with the erection of some form of memorial--either a post, such as
the Lushai "she-lu-pun," which finds its counterpart among several
Old Kuki clans, but among them the erection of the memorial is the
important part of the ceremony, whereas among the Lushais the killing
of the animal is the more important and the feast is named after that,
not after the planting of the post; or a stone or a heap of stones,
or a paved platform. All these are erected during a man's life and are
quite distinct from the memorials erected in memory of the deceased,
and thus connect the Lushai-Kuki race with the Nagas, among whom the
erection of stones is a very important function.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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