Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 20, 1909.djvu/152

 HEAD-HUNTING AMONG THE HILL TRIBES OF ASSAM.

(Read at Meeting, February 17th, 1909.)

knowledge of head-hunting as an incident of life on the frontier of Assam dates from a visit,—in an official capacity, with an appropriate escort of military police,—to a village in the remotest corner of the State of Manipur. My friends, as they afterwards became, did not oppose, but did nothing to facilitate, my entry, and even thought it necessary to pay us the compliment of distributing panjis, or sharpened bamboo stakes, in the pathways leading to the village. By careful strategy, and neglect of the usual methods of frontal attack, we got inside unscathed, and at once proceeded to diplomatic negotiations. Two heads had been taken, and with us was the uncle of one of the gentlemen who had come to his end in the row. The first interesting fact I learnt was that, in this village, it was customary not to keep the heads of enemies inside the village, but to place them in a tree outside. Here I may observe that, among the naked tribes of Tamlu, in the hills north of Kohima, the headquarters of the Nāga Hills District, and among the Kukis south of Manipur, and again south among the