Antique Nagaland Brass Head

murni — Wed, 19 Aug 2020 03:18:14 +0000

Antique Nagaland Brass Head

Material: Brass
Style: Nagaland, India
Size: Height cm, Width cm
Order Number: MHSANBH1

Nagaland is landlocked in the north east of India, one of India’s 28 states, created in 1963, with a population of about 2 million people from 16 Tibetan Burmese tribes, who have nothing in common with the vast majority of Indians. Nobody is quite sure where they came from – the Unrepresented Nations and People’s Organisation says Mongolia in the 10th century.

Each Naga tribe has its own language or dialect. The villages are independent of each other, and self-sufficient.

The Nagas were enthusiastic headhunters. The British criminalised it in the 1920s, but it continued well into the 1960s and even 1980s, although there was mass conversion to Christianity in the late 19th century largely by American missionaries.

They were renowned fighters. The Ahom kings of Thailand conquered neighbouring Assam, but not the Naga Hills, in the 13th century. The Naga Hills were never part of Mughal India, which conquered Assam in the early 17th century.

They are adorned with tattoos and hats decorated with wild boar horns. Tattooing is confined to certain northern and eastern groups. The great hornbill is the national bird. They make great use of cowrie and conch shells in their traditional costumes.

Naga warrior wearing a severed head necklace, early 20th century.

For the Nagas ornaments define the identity of individuals and groups. Also by displaying these symbols they encourage competition. Most have a particular meaning and the right to wear them is controlled. They hold power and are handled carefully. Examples are the Lhota tribe’s head-taker’s boar tusks and ivory armlets and the Ao tribe’s elephant tusk armlets. Hornbill feathers are important for all Naga groups.

Where they are worn on the body can mean different things and the meaning for a man may be different from the meaning for a woman. Further the meaning may vary from tribe to tribe. Some can be worn as of right by being a member of the tribe. Some have to be earned.

All the Nagas have a central belief in fertility revolving around agriculture, sex, death, feasting and head-hunting. It is circular. Fertility and wealth are gained and manifested by these activities. Huge stones are erected to mark the end of a ceremonial Feast of Merit provided by the feast-giver and they become channels of fertility. There are often two stones, one male the other female.

Brass heads worn as chest ornaments indicate head-taking status. So do certain tattoos. Head-hunting was highly ritualised. Head-taking stopped sickness and made the fields fertile and pigs and cattle increase. The Konyak tribe believed they needed a head a year. Skulls were hung from trees and kept on rows of wooden shelves in morung houses.

Headhunter holding trophy with Classic Trophy Necklace decorated with mithan horns and tassels of palmmyra taken by JP Mills 1918-45 from the SOAS Archives in The Nagas, Hill People’s of Northeast India, Julian Jacobs, Thames & Hudson, 1990, page 117.

1937 photo of Naga Warrior wearing Classic Trophy Necklace and a hat decorated with hornbill beaks and boar’s tusks taken by Christoph von Furer-Haimendorf in The Nagas, Hill People’s of Northeast India, Julian Jacobs, Thames & Hudson, 1990, page 69.

Please ask for the price (or make an offer).

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Antique Nagaland Brass Head