Note 1 — GENERAL

The Lhota Nagas are a tribe numbering some twenty thousand souls which occupies a piece of territory that may be roughly described as the drainage area of the Middle and Lower Doyang and its tributaries, down to the point where it emerges into the plains. Their land can show extremes of climate, from the high spurs of Wokha Hill, where frost is not unknown, to the malarious foot-hills bordering on the plains, where the heat radiated from the sandstone makes life almost unbearable in the hot weather. They call themselves Kyŏn, meaning simply “man,” the name Lhota, of which I have been unable to discover any derivation, being that by which they are known to Government. They have long been in contact with the Assamese. Many villages even possess grants of land in the plains given by the Ahom Rajas, on the understanding apparently that the Lhotas in return for the land would refrain from taking Assamese heads. This agreement was loyally kept, and villages such as Khoro, who had no hostile Naga neighbours whom they could raid, used to content themselves with waylaying and killing an occasional Mikir on his way to or from market in the plains. There is no record of any fighting between Lhotas and Assamese, save a raid in 1685 on some villages of the plains near the Doyang by Nagas,1 who were probably Lhotas: Akuk and Lakhuti claim to have met and defeated a force of Burmese at the time of the Burmese invasion of Assam.2 The first recorded meeting between a European and Lhotas is that of Lieut. H. Bigge in 1841, who apparently did not like what little he saw of them. He calls them “a sullen race,” and says that they “are alike filthy in their persons and habits, and have a pompous mode of addressing one which might in some cases be interpreted as insolent.”3 Evidently the gallant officer found the contrast between the suave, sleek plainsman and the easy-going, unwashen hillman rather startling. Captain Brodie, however, the first Englishman to visit the Lhota at home, was more fortunate. He marched along part of the Lakhuti range in 1844 and was given a most friendly reception.4 In 1875 Captain Butler when in charge of a survey party was ambushed by the village of Pangti and mortally wounded. The truth of this disaster is as follows: Captain Butler arranged to march from Lakhuti to Pangti, and ordered the former village to supply men to carry his baggage. Lakhuti, which had old scores to wipe off against Pangti, decided to lay a trap for them, and sent a message asking them to attack the head of the column, while promising that they themselves would throw down their loads and attack the rear. Pangti fell into the snare and ambushed and speared Captain Butler. Lakhuti did nothing, and of course got off scot free, while Pangti was burnt. Naturally Pangti has never forgiven Lakhuti for this piece of treachery. In 1878 a stockade was established at Wokha and all the Ndrung villages,5 i.e. those on the left bank of the Doyang, were annexed. The rest of the tribe was annexed in 1889.