Konyak tattoos: maps of memory

Arhen is the last person in her village who was once a tattoo artist.

Sitting outside a traditionally-built Konyak hut – a longish structure with a thatched roof – the octogenarian is singing a song she learnt as a child, one that is sung during tattooing.

The song is of Rhen-am Mannyu, a princess getting tattooed, and Chilam is the name of the morung (traditional meeting place for men).

For the Konyaks (listed as Scheduled Tribe in Nagaland), getting tattoos at different stages of their lives and on different occasions was part of their cultural identity until it slowly faded out in the 1960s and 1970s. The practice continued for about another decade – and the ban came into full effect in the 1970s. It was the advent of Christianity and the impact of the Konyak Students’ Union that brought about its decline and final end.

But till then, all young Konyak girls learn how to make tattoos as a part of their education, says Aloh Ngowang, as his mother continues to sing. He is the current Angh (village chief) of Shianghachingnyu – the village where Arhen, now in her eighties, made her last tattoo in 1967-68.

Half a century later, on a warm April morning, PARI met Arhen and other tattoo artists living in Shianghachingnyu village in the upper region of Mon district. The village lies close to India’s border with Myanmar.

The roughly 5,000 residents were readying to celebrate Aoleang – a six-day festival of the Konyaks. It is held annually in spring when the community gathers to seek blessings from the gods after sowing seeds on new jhum fields, as they pray for a good harvest. In Nagaland, these societies continue to practice jhum (shifting cultivation).

People had flocked to the field near the Angh’s residence from nearby villages. Many were dressed in Konyak traditional attire, especially those who would be performing. The festivities were yet to begin officially; the crisp spring air was slowly coming alive to the sound of music.

Like most Konyak villages in Nagaland, Shianghachingnyu is located on a hilltop, a choice made centuries ago so that the enemy could be spotted from far away. Morungs – once a meeting place reserved for men – dot the village landscape, with skulls of animals adorning the walls – memories of hunts from yesteryears. Women are now free to enter the morung, a spacious hut made of wood and bamboo, but the culture of the morung itself – a place where young boys learnt the ways of Konyak manhood, has passed. Now, it is a resting place, a location for people to meet for a chat.

Like the other Konyak villages in the district, here too, the community continues with a hereditary village chief, and a more recent village council with elected members. The main occupation of the Konyaks is agriculture and the main crop is paddy. The Angh is the custodian of the land, which is owned communally. The people work and live off this land.

People are milling around for the Aoleang festival, and some are resting in the shade.

Arhen ends her song and begins describing the process of tattooing. The first step is heating a piece of coal in the kiln, with an empty vessel resting on top. The smoke rises and leaves a residue inside the pot which is then scraped off and used to make the design of the tattoo on the skin. A thorn from the Ying tree [Strobilanthes penstemonoides] is then used by Konyaks artists to either poke or hammer.

As a young girl and novice at the art, Arhen was very nervous about trying her hand; “My anya [mother] taught me,” recalls the 86-year-old.

“The Ying tree has black ink,” Arhen continues, explaining the intricacies of tattooing. This would be collected, along with the thorns – necessary equipment for tattooing. She would then dip the thorn in ink and begin the hammering. “Blood and ink would mix together to make a dark colour,” she says. A soft cloth dipped in warm water would be used to wipe the spot where the tattoo was inked. It usually took an entire day for a single tattoo.

Arhen has tattooed 140 people, travelling across six villages of which her husband was chief. But she still remembers the first tattoos she ever made. “For a girl on her legs, and for a boy on his chest,” she smiles at what remains only as a memory.

Tattoos for women and men have always been different. Women got tattooed at various phases of their life – upon reaching puberty or getting married. Some of their tattoos also commemorated the achievements of the male members of the family.

“A Konyak woman’s life passes through many changes. Born into her father’s clan, she marries into another. Yet, the tattoo she receives before marriage remains the only thing she carries throughout her life and even after death. It is the one mark that does not change, the mark that tells her who she is and where she comes from,” says Amo Konyak.

A resident of Mon, she recalls seeing tattoos on her grandparents. “As a child, I often heard stories about tattooing, how it was done, how painful it was, and how proud people felt afterwards. These stories were passed down like folktales, always told with awe and respect. To me, these tattoos were like maps of memory, carved not only on their skin but into the very essence of who they were,” the 32-year-old researcher adds fondly.

The Konyaks were traditionally headhunters, and tattoos were etched upon the skin of the men to mark victory after a successful battle. The focus on this has often left women out of the research and stories about Konyak tattoos, says Amo who recalls the tales of tattoos narrated to her by her grandmother, “She often told me how painful the process was, how the skin bled and swelled, yet how proud and beautiful she felt afterwards.”

Not far away in the same village is Ngonphe, now in her seventies, who also learnt the art of tattooing from her elder sister and cousins, who in turn had learnt from their mothers. However, she would never get a chance to practice as that is a privilege only for the ‘queen’ – the first wife. Ngonphe would help the ‘queen’ with tattooing – collecting the thorn cooking for the tattoo artist and holding down the person who was getting the tattoo done, lest they move too much in pain. Ngonphe grimaces as she speaks, imitating the expression of pain. Then bursts out laughing at the now ancient memory.

When PARI went to meet her, she was seated in a bamboo hut, one of many in the Angh’s compound. She speaks softly, her voice sometimes drowned out by the loud cheers coming from the festival grounds. When we asked to take her photos, she happily got up and went off to change into more formal and traditional dress and jewellery.

The tattoos on her shoulder, leg and hands are from before her wedding. The tattoos were like ornaments, she says and adds, “the clothes we wore those days were short in length, so the tattoos were a way of covering our body.” Ngonphe’s favourite tattoo is the one on her shoulder. “It was made by one of my sisters,” she smiles and says, “that’s why it is my favourite.”

She got her first tattoo as a young girl in her native village of Leangha in Nagaland’s Mon district. “It hurt so much, I cried,” she adds.

After marriage, the first tattoo she got was on her thigh, made by the queen, the Angh’s first wife, Arhen who happened to be her own sister. Traditionally, the Konyak chief could marry multiple times although the rest of the community practised monogamy.

As a second wife, Ngonphe never got to make a tu (tattoo). In Shianghachingnyu, she worked in the kitchen and in the fields and also looked after the children of the household.

In Nagaland, villages like Tamlu, Kangching, Wakching, and Wanching, had the earliest contact with the Baptist Mission. The arrival of Christianity marked a significant change in the Konyak way of life. Kaithei Konyak, a farmer from Shianghachingnyu, reminisces about the days when traditional healing practices were the norm in Konyak society. “We did not have doctors or go to hospitals,” he says. “We had healers in the community.”

The Baptist mission produced a new class of educated youth who would go on to form the Konyak Students’ Union in 1946, and decide to promote social and religious activities. The union took a firm stand against tattooing because of its association with headhunting, and a resolution against tattooing was passed in 1960. Tattoos were also marked as a heathen practice, as was animism, their way of worship, writes Phejin Konyak in her book The Konyaks: Last of the Tattooed Headhunters.

Today, according to Amo, most young people of their community choose modern or fashionable tattoo designs inspired by social media, global trends, or personal aesthetics, rather than the traditional Konyak motifs done in the traditional way.

Konyak tattoos now only exist on the skin of the elders of the community; the practice in the hearts of those like Arhen and Ngonphe who learnt it as children, and in their songs, in which princesses are advised to rest after the painful procedure.

The reporter would like to thank Sir Peihwang Wangsa Konyak, Pangnyei W Konyak and Lemnei Konyak for their help with this story