BY
PRAPHULLADATTA GOSWAMI, M.A.
Culture
is a term admitting of various interpretations. The consensus of opinion seems
to indicate that it generally transcends the biological individual and deals
with the mass of learned and transmitted habits, techniques, ideas, and
values–and the behaviour they induce in a particular social group. Culture not
only comprehends what is obvious, that is, the arts and crafts and oral or
written literatures and thought currents, but also the basic customs and
traditions, rites and rituals which together foster a certain social pattern
and a certain outlook among the people living in that pattern. Literature and
historical incidents are but what we see from the outside; what gives authenticity
and a convincing colour to any study of a social group is an understanding of
the deeper roots from which it sprouted.
Any study of Assamese culture will include the social and political movements that have occurred from time to time, the conquests and defeats, the invasions and migrations, the records of sculpture and architecture, the cultivation of the arts, the religions of the people, and so on. The social system of the Assamese community will reveal influences of the Indian varnasrama model; the political ideals of Assam kings will show parallels in India; the cultivation of the arts will reveal influences of the Indian standards; the language itself is a Sanskritic language and the old inscriptions prove the acceptance of Sanskrit as a court language; even the land system bears traces of Indian land system. Thus the culture of Assam on the face of it is Indian culture. Where lies the differential. To answer this question will be the responsibility of any study which assumes the analysis of Assamese culture.
Assamese
culture does have its distinctive features. For example, in spite of the
apparent adherence to the varnasrama systems Assamese society does not
admit of caste rigidity and there have been evidences of classes considered as Brahmans
or priests even among non Brahman castes. The process of Hinduisation is
easy and has gone on for centuries. The reason behind this is that Assam is a
melting pot of races, and the fusion of cultures here has been sanctioned
not only by miscegenation but by political necessity. The
army of Bhagadatta was supposed to have been constituted of Kiratas and Cinas,
and during bistorical times, Assam kings gave a tough fight to invaders because
a common national ideal could be fostered among the people. The local customs
were overlaid with customs derived from the Grihyasutra, the local
temper was softened at the touch of the Aryan outlook, and these external
factors thus had a cohesive and harmonising effect on the diverse elements
which apparently confused the social and cultural scenes of the land.
But
the primary step in any discussion of Assamese culture must be this racial
miscegenation and the results consequent on it. At present the land is
inhabited by Aryanised Assamese, Bodos, Nagas and Kukis and their sub-tribes.
The Mongoloid strain is obvious (it includes a Shan element), and if language
is any indication, at one period of the history of the land there were
Austro-Asiatic or Austric settlers–a sub-section of the far-flung Austronesian
race. The Khasi people around Shillong speak an Austric tongue but the people
themselves can no longer be called racially Austronesian. The lower culture of
the land seems to have borne traces of Austronesian influences. There are
numerous traits whose distribution is found from the Naga of Assam to the Batak
of Sumatra and the Ifugao of the Philippines, thus indicating their antiquity.
These traits include: Jhum farming by burning and slashing new pieces of
forest; terrace irrigation of wet rice; keeping of chickens and pigs, sometime
of buffalo also; multifarious use of bamboos for houses, spears and bows,
handles, knives, containers, musical instruments, and what not; raising
dwellings on piles off the ground; here and there, surprising megalithic
monuments; separate men’s or girls’ dormitories, with associated but varied
customs of courtship and trial marriage; strong development of legal
institutions, but weak political ones; blood feud and head hunting; survival of
sacrifice, divination, and ordeals of the types widely prevalent before their
displacement by the great world religions. This summary still holds good in
Assam among the tribes dwelling to the north-east and the east. While the use
of bamboo –its shoots even as food–is universal, some of these traits are to be
observed among people who are within the fold of the Aryanised Assamese, others
are extant among those who form the fringe of
Assamese population.
The Namghar, a centre for congregational prayer as well as for all social
activity, introduced by Sankardev in the 16th century, could be so successful
because the tribal council held in the Bachelors’ Hall was a living tradition
among the people.
The
influence of primitive peoples is probably no less felt on the Indian religions
which penetrated into Assam. Devi worship here was accompanied with animal and
human sacrifices, especially at Kamakhya and Sadiya. That Tantricism could
flourish here was probably owing to the fact that women had few restrictions
put on them; excepting in socio-political matters, women in the Polynesian zone
have always enjoyed a pretty enviable status. In the secret sittings
of certain sections of the population, women even now take a regular share, and
these secret clubs themselves seem to be in the tradition of primitive secret
societies. These clubs have thrived on Buddha-Sahajiya nourishment. The great
Spring festival, known as the Bihu (from Sans. Viswat) itself occasions
an atmosphere which till recently saw the choice of life partners, especially
in upper Assam. While the Bihu dance points to affinities in the Polynesian
zone, the songs accompanying it have spiritual parallels among the Shans and
had such parallels in ancient south-west China. In spite of the vitality of
Hindu forms of worship, a popular festival like the Bihu can be singled out as
one which sends a thrill through the heart of every Assamese.
Linguistically
also, there are evidences of Austronesian influences. The very word tokon, a
bamboo stick which a villager carries about, is an Austric word and current in
at least twelve languages and dialects outside Assam. The town of Gauhati (Guahati)
owes its name an Austric formation, meaning a place where areca nuts grow
in plenty. The great Brahmaputra is popularly known as the Luit, and the
term is traced to Austric sources. Luit was later Sanskritised as Lauhitya.
The study of place names would show the interplay of cultures like the
Austrie and the Bodo (Mongoloid).
Even
folk-literature would throw some light on the lower culture of the people. A
Bihu song which says:
First
God made the world
then
He made the creatures
the
same God made love
why
don’t we?
might point to a
spirit which gave resistance to the onrush of the more powerful Aryan
civilisation. How this spirit proved too strong even in the sixteenth century
could be gathered from the life of the neo-Vaishnavite saint, Sankardev, who
came back baffled in his attempt to preach his tenets in upper Assam.
Thus
a study of the culture of Assam is a complex task and presupposes more than
mere historical knowledge. Mr. R. M. Nath in his impressive work, “The
Background of Assamese Culture,” has made an attempt to do justice to a
difficult subject. Mr. Nath is an engineer by profession and historian and
archaeologist by inclination. His outlook is historical and, for the earliest
portion of his narrative, he has had to fall back upon hypothetical ground. He
starts with the early Austric (Austro-Asiatic) settlers of the land and has
tried to connect several extant groups of the present population with certain names
found elsewhere in India. For example, he connects the Morias (Marias of the
Central Provinces) with the Mataks and Moa-Morias (Mowamariyas), who played a
distinct role in the dissolution of the Assam kingdom in comparatively recent
times. The argument is based on similarity of sounds of terms and not
ethnological investigation or linguistic evidences, and the conclusion seems to
have been pushed back into time. To give another instance, the Kalitas, a caste
in the Assamese community, he connects with a Tamil formation Kal-Taton (stone-worker).
Philology does not sanction the conversion of Kal-Taton to Kalita and the
Kalitas have been known rather as good cultivators. The term Kalita should
perhaps be traced to Moggalana Kalita as found in Buddhist literature. The
conclusions based upon philology of this nature seem to be shaky but those
based on historical records or even historical conjectures stand on firmer ground.
As
regards plausible historical conclusions, the writer sometimes has stretched
his imagination to a considerable extent. A case in point is the reason put
forward for the recall by Harshavardhana of Hinen Tsang from the court of
Bhaskarvarman (p. 39): “Continuance of the Buddhist sage for a long period in
the royal court of Kamarupa was considered a menace to the Hindu religion in
the country and the ears of
Harahavardhana appear to have been poisoned against Bhaskar Varma by
interpreting this special favour to the ambassador of China as an endeavour to
establish political alliance with the emperor of China for gaining ultimately a
political supremacy over the whole of India.” This is a brilliant conjecture,
not unwarranted by the intelligence and capability of Bhaskarvarman and certain
references found in Harshacharita and Mudrarakshasa. The writer
might have mentioned a more historical episode relating to the life of this
liberal king of old Kamarupa. Bhaskarvarman showed a desire to
have first-hand knowledge of things Chinese and requested the Chinese traveller
to let him have a Chinese classic in Sanskrit translation. At a
time hen China showed so much desire to have information relating to India, the
only Indian who returned the compliment was the enlightened Bhaskarvarman of
Kamarupa.
The
writer has done adequate justice to the sculptural side of his subject so far
as records have been unearthed. He has added to the value of the book with a
sufficient number of plates and diagrams and these throw light on the religious
beliefs of the people also. For example, snake pillars are indicative of a
certain trend in the religious beliefs of the people (plates II and III).
The
snake holds an important place in the popular religions of the people and
especially in lower Assam, Goddess Manasa has her due propitiation every year
in the rainy season. Manasa may finally be a Dravidian import, but she has such
a hold on the popular mind that literature has grown around her personality.
The writer is on strong ground when he speaks of religions like Saivism and
Tantricism. It is a common assumption that till the advent of the neo-
Vishnavite saint Sankardev, Assam did not have any trace of the Vasudeva cult.
It is pointed out that Mahabhutivarman was mentioned as a Parama Bhagavata in
a rock inscription dated 554 A.D.
Dr.
B. Kakati has conjectured that Naraka of Mithila was the first man who let in
the stream of Aryanisation into the land (Mother Goddess Kamakhya). In
fact, in the early history of Kamarupa, Narakasur holds a mysterious position.
There are several Narakas in Indian mythology. One of them, found in Kaliki
Purana and Jogini Tantra, two early works dealing with the land and
religious life of Assam, seems to possess fairly strong outline; Dr. Kakati
calls him the Naraka of Mithila. Mr. Nath also considers him as Naraka of
Mithila, an Asura adventurer, who comes to settle in Kamarupa and carves out an
empire around Pragjyotishpur, modern Gauhati. Mr. Nath writes that, owing to
Naraka’s settlement in Kamarupa, “Maithili culture spread in Assam and
gradually influenced the Austria and Bodo cultures–sometimes by annihilation
and sometimes by assimilation. Some of the Bodos and Austrics held their ground
in the hill areas... The Austric Ka-Meikha and the Bodo U-Mei-Ludai were
gradually assimilated to the Hindu pantheon and became goddess Kamakhya and
Siva Umananda...Maithili language with Asura accents mixed with Austric and
Bodo words became the dialect of the common people.” (pp. 27-28). Mr. Nath has
not shown in what ways “Maithili culture” spread into Assam and the way he has
characterised the creation of the “dialect of the common people” is facile and
unhistorical. The Assamese language is Sanskritic, full of tadbhava words
and the percentage of tribal words is small. The language itself cannot be
traced earlier than the ninth century, barring a few words found in Sanskrit
inscriptions. The identification of an earlier Mother Goddess with Kamakhya or
of a wild tribal God with Siva is plausible and herein we might even see the
supersession of an earlier culture by a later one; but to identify modern
formations like Khasi Ka-Meikha with Kamakhya or Bodo U-Mei-Ludai with
Umananda is misleading.
Mr.
Nath is happier when he deals with later periods, which have authentic records.
From about the thirteenth century the history of the land is an uninterrupted
narrative because of the chronicle written by the Ahoms, a section of the
Shans, who came to rule here and later became naturalised as Assamese.
The
writer is also on stronger ground when he describes the arts and crafts of
ancient Assam. These can be deduced from available historical records, mainly
archaeological. Music and the dance find mention in early inscriptions.
Sculptural figures have kept records of social activities of early Assam.
“Males and females danced together in temples and also in gatherings on festive
occasions accompanied by musical instruments like drums, cymbals and flutes,
while aristocratic women played on high-class stringed instruments like the veena.
Gallant young men used to amuse the audience by playing with tamed tigers in
the open. The sculptor used his chisel to record all these minor events of
daily life in black hard stone–that are even now found scattered all over the
present town of Tezpur.” (p. 43). A series of reliefs found near Tezpur (plate
X), where men and women dance to the sound of the drum and the flute, evidence
dance of a popular nature and seem to have affinities with the Bihu dance as
observed even in modern times. The primitive and sexual in character. The
writer describes it as an early Austric festival and gives it a metaphysical
description: “Swaying of the upper part of the body backward and forward with a
sudden jerk, keeping the lower part stiff, was an imitation of the effect of
the storm on trees…..” (p-5) The derivation of Bihu from Dvishu is
open to question; the term Vishu is prevalent also in South India.1
If
culture implies something more than written literature, sculpture, inscriptions
and travellers’ reports and does necessitate an attempt to define the
behaviour-pattern of a particular society, then the popular festivals and the
large body of popular songs and sayings should deserve more careful study. The
hold of the Assamese people, especially of upper Assam. In like manner the
evidence of sayings like the following may not be lightly set aside:
If
folk-literature is any evidence, and it is respectable evidence, the Assamese
people are ease-loving, tending to be apathetic, poetic, and good-humoured.
To
sum up, Mr. Nath’s book, in spite of its shortcomings, would give the reader a
panoramic view of the history, sculptural achievements, religious developments,
and a good deal of the elements which have composed the society of this land.
The plates and diagrams and productions of paintinge are of especial value,
being convincing records of the arts and crafts, popular beliefs, and even
political achievements of the Assamese people. For the lay reader the book
should prove interesting, though something misleading, while for the specialist
it would at least blaze a new path in historical and cultural research. Persons
like Guisseppi Tucci and Paul Levi have spoken well of the book.
1
See P. Goswami, The Bihu Songs of Assam, Eastern Anthropologist, Dec.
1949 and March 1950, pp. 57-100.