Maring people (India)

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Maring
Total population
25,800 (2011 Census, by mother tongue)[1]
Regions with significant populations
Manipur (mainly Chandel district and Tengnoupal district)
Languages
Maring (L1);
Meitei language and English (L2)
Religion
Christianity (majority); traditional Maring religion (minority)
Related ethnic groups
Meitei people, Naga people, Tangkhul, Tarao

The Maring are a Tangkhul–Maring–speaking Naga ethnic group of the Indian state of Manipur.[2][3] They live principally in Chandel district along the international border with Myanmar and in Tengnoupal district, with smaller numbers scattered across Senapati, Ukhrul, Tamenglong, Thoubal, and the Imphal valley districts.[4][5] They speak the Maring language, a Tibeto-Burman language of the Tangkhul-Maring branch.[3][6] They identify themselves as a Naga community and are listed as a Scheduled Tribe in the Constitution of India.[7]

The name "Maring" is conventionally derived from two roots in the Maring language: Mi (or Mee), meaning "men" or "people", and Ring, meaning "to live", giving the gloss "the living people". An alternative derivation analyses Mi as a corruption of Mei ("fire") and Ring as "to kindle", yielding "kindlers of fire", a reference to early use of fire by the community.[8] In colonial records, the community appears as Murring or Maring.[4][2]

Distribution and population

At the 2011 Census of India, the Maring language was returned as a mother tongue by approximately 25,800 speakers.[1] The Maring are concentrated mainly in Chandel and Tengnoupal districts of southern Manipur along the international border with Myanmar,[2][7] with smaller settlements reported in Senapati, Ukhrul, Churachandpur, Tamenglong, Thoubal, Imphal East and Imphal West districts.[5][8] A small number of Maring villages also exist at Andro and Waithou in the Manipur valley.[5]

History and origins

The Maring are described in nineteenth-century colonial ethnography as among the oldest Naga tribes of the Manipur hills.[4][2] R. Brown, the British Political Agent in Manipur from 1868 to 1873, recorded that "looking simply at the geographical positions of the tribe, their facial characteristics, customs etc., it may be said that the Naga came originally from the north, the Kuki from the south and east, and the Maring, who closely resembles the Burmese in appearance, from the east".[4] Brown further observed that "the features of the Marings (Murrings) approximate to those of the Burmese; some of them have flat and others have well-shaped noses", and that their stature was generally smaller and lighter than that of the Mao.[4] T. C. Hodson's 1911 The Naga Tribes of Manipur likewise treats the Maring as a long-established Naga community along the south-eastern frontier of Manipur.[2]

In the archaeological record of Manipur, a pebble chopping tool reported from the Maring village of Machi in Chandel district has been described as among the earliest evidence for Stone Age habitation in the region, alongside the Khangkhui Cave finds near Ukhrul and the Song Ring rock shelter at Beyang in Tengnoupal district.[9]

Religion and festival

Christianity, introduced through American Baptist and other Protestant missionary activity in the wider Naga hills during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, is today professed by the great majority of Maring in Manipur.[5] A small minority continues to practise the indigenous Maring religion, which centres on belief in a creator deity and on annual cycles of agricultural ritual conducted by the Khulpu and other village ritualists.[8][5]

Maring ritual life is closely tied to the agricultural cycle of jhum cultivation, and the principal Maring festivals mark the major stages of the cropping year. The most important is Hnungkaap, a community-wide festival celebrated in May once every five years; smaller annual rites include Chimkhe (the worship of the granary), Charan-martam (the ceremony of testing newly harvested rice), Chada (the seed-sowing festival) and Chaalungthui (a rite to prevent insect damage to crops).[5][8] A post-harvest festival known as Kummoi-um is also widely observed in Maring villages.[8] The Maring also participate in Lui-Ngai-Ni, the seed-sowing festival celebrated jointly by the Naga tribes of Manipur, alongside the Anal, Mao, Maram, Tangkhul, Rongmei and other Naga communities.[10]

Society and culture

Maring traditional dress is noted for its colourful handwoven shawls and skirts, with distinct garments worn by men and by ritual officeholders. The shawl, in differentiated forms, is worn by the Themkhui (priests), the Khulpu Khullak (chiefs) and the Laarung (choir directors).[8] A men's festival shirt called Lhouwa Linglik (also known as Kumoilik, "shirt for festival") is a long-sleeved, stand-collared garment in reddish or orange printed cotton bearing peacock motifs at the front and back, worn on special occasions.[8] Men's lower garments include the Lingkham, worn daily and on special occasions by Maring of Machi, Langol, Khunbi and Khudei Khullen villages in Chandel district, and the Langphai, worn in other Maring villages.[8] The Maring do not have a system of hereditary chieftainship in the form found among some neighbouring Naga and Kuki communities; their village headship has historically been an elected or rotating office.[11] Religious and ritual authority within the village resides with a chief priest, the Khulpu, who heads the agricultural and ceremonial rites of the community and is succeeded normally by his eldest son or, in the absence of male issue, by his nearest male kin.[8] Maring villages are also recognised in the wider craft economy of Manipur for cane and bamboo work and for an extensive corpus of ethnobotanical knowledge, including traditional medicines drawn from forest plants.[8]

The Maring language is a Tibeto-Burman language assigned by George Abraham Grierson in the Linguistic Survey of India to the Naga group of Tibeto-Burman.[6] In modern reference works it is placed within the Tangkhul-Maring sub-branch of Sal or "Kuki-Chin-Naga", alongside Tangkhul and related languages.[3] Most Maring also speak Meitei (Manipuri) as a second language for inter-community contact, trade and government, with English used in education and church life.[5]

See also

References

  1. "Census of India 2011: Language" (PDF). Office of the Registrar General of India. 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 July 2018.
  2. Hodson, T. C. (1911). The Naga Tribes of Manipur. London: Macmillan.
  3. Thurgood, Graham (2016), "Sino-Tibetan: Genetic and Areal Subgroups", in Graham Thurgood; Randy J. LaPolla (eds.), The Sino-Tibetan Languages (2 ed.), Taylor & Francis, p. 22, ISBN 9781315399492
  4. Brown, R. (1975) [1873]. Statistical Account of Manipur. Delhi: Sanskaran Prakashak.
  5. "Glimpse of the Indigenous Tribes of Manipur". MyGov Blogs. Government of India. 14 June 2021. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  6. Grierson, George Abraham (1903). Linguistic Survey of India, Volume III: Tibeto-Burman Family. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing.
  7. Kipgen, Nehginpao (October–December 2011), "Ethnic Conflict in India: A Case Study of the Kukis and the Nagas in Manipur", The Indian Journal of Political Science, 72 (4): 1046, JSTOR 41856539
  8. Thoudam, Joymati; Mathur, Ritu (11 May 2021). "Tribal heritage: The traditional textiles and costumes of Maring Naga tribe of Manipur". The Sangai Express. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  9. "Manipur: The Boiling Bowl of Ethnicity". Imphal Times. 18 August 2018. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  10. "Manipur Culture and Traditions: Festivals". Eastern Routes. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  11. Kipgen, Nehginpao (October–December 2011), "Ethnic Conflict in India: A Case Study of the Kukis and the Nagas in Manipur", The Indian Journal of Political Science, 72 (4): 1048, JSTOR 41856539

Further reading

  • Hodson, T. C. (1911). The Naga Tribes of Manipur. London: Macmillan.
  • Brown, R. (1975) [1873]. Statistical Account of Manipur. Delhi: Sanskaran Prakashak.
  • Das, B. M. (1988). The People of Assam. New Delhi: Gyan Publishing House.
  • Singh, O. K. (1984). Stone Age Archaeology of Manipur. Imphal: Amusana Institute of Antiquarian Studies.