Note 20 — INTRODUCTION

Burial is practised by the Angami, Sema, Rengma, Lhota, Sangtam, Yachungr, Tangkhul and Kacha Nagas and by the Kukis, but the burial is not in all cases absolute. Thus the Kukis, in the case of rich or famous men, sometimes detach the head after decomposition and place it in a cleft or hole in the side of a cliff where it could be got at only with great difficulty. This practice is very rare, but certainly exists or existed among some or all clans of Thado Kukis. Again, the Yachungr and some of the Southern Sangtams bury their dead inside the house under the bed, and do not hesitate to disturb the grave and dig out the bones of its last occupant to make room for a new one. The Tangkhuls and some, at any rate, of the Naked Rengmas build small houses over their graves with little ladders up to them for the ghost to inhabit, while the Lhotas, Sangtams and Semas build thatched roofs over their graves, which perhaps suggests that they formerly exposed the bodies in the miniature houses, since Aos who have turned Christian, though they bury the body, build a thatched roof over the grave like that which would be put over a body exposed on a platform if they followed the custom of their unconverted fellow-tribesmen. North of the tribes mentioned exposure on a platform is the rule, the body being in some cases smoked first. Among Aos rich men are smoke-dried in their houses for two months. The platform usually consists of a bamboo shelf thatched over like a house and covered in at the ends, though some Konyaks use a wooden dug-out like a boat to contain the body, reminding one of the Lhota practice of using a dug-out boat-shaped coffin. In the case, however, of the tribes that practise exposure, the practice here again may be described as not absolute. The Phoms and some Konyaks separate the head from the body, wrenching it off after decomposition, the latter in some cases collecting the skulls in pots in a separate place, and in others putting them out on stone platforms, while the Phoms put them in niches in the cliffs. Both Phoms and some Konyaks bring the heads of deceased men into their houses for a time (the Phoms for a year) and treat them while there with some ceremony.20