Angami

Clans and Kinship

Hutton (1921, pp. 110-117) describes three levels of descent group, all patrilineal and named after ancestors, with no totems. The tribe falls into two halves (kelhu): the Pezoma, descended from Thevo (with the small Satsuma), and the Pepfüma, descended from Thekrono and also called Thekronoma or Cherama; they are named from the words used for mother, and may once have married only each other. Each kelhu is made up of clans (thino), exogamous until shortly before 1921, and each thino of kindreds (putsa), which in Hutton's time were becoming the real exogamous unit; marriage inside the putsa was held to bring barren or sickly offspring. A village is divided into quarters, each the home of one or more thino. There were no real chiefs: the leaders (pehuma) had little authority outside war, and the hereditary kemovo, a descendant of the founder of the village or clan, directed public ceremonies, fixed their days and kept the genealogies. The young men's house (kichüki) was of little importance among the Angami proper.

Hutton (1921) gives no single list for the tribe: clans differ from village to village, and his Appendix X lists them village by village. These are the clans he names in the text for Kohima, Khonoma and Jotsoma, with the kelhu where he gives it.

In the Official Lists

• Scheduled Tribe

  Nagaland, Manipur

  In Nagaland the Angami come within the single entry 'Naga'. In Manipur 'Angami' is an entry of its own.

Checked on 2026-11-06 against the sources below. The lists are amended from time to time and can differ by district; for a certificate, the current order or the state's list is what counts.

Name and Origin

Hutton (1921, p. 14) wrote that 'Angami' is apparently a corruption of Gnamei, the name the Manipuris gave them, and that some of them call themselves Tengima. In Angami tradition the people descend from two men, sometimes called brothers, who came up out of the earth: Thevo, ancestor of the Pezoma half of the tribe, and Thekrono, ancestor of the Pepfüma half; the Memi point to the great stone at Maikel in Manipur as the place. All Angami villages trace their origin to Kezakenoma (now written Khezhakeno), believed to be the first Angami village north of the Mao gap. The Angami are counted among the Tenyimi peoples, with the Chakhesang, Mao, Maram, Poumai, Rengma and Zeme.

History

Hutton divided the Angami of his day into the Tengima, or Western Angami, of the Khonoma, Kohima, Viswema and Chakroma groups of villages, and the Eastern Angami, by which he meant the Chakrima and Kezama and the Memi on their border. The Chakhesang of today were formerly known as the Eastern Angami, and the Angami now speak of four regional divisions: Northern, Southern, Western and Chakhro Angami. Kohima became the headquarters of the Naga Hills district in 1878 and is the capital of Nagaland, which became a state on 1 December 1963. J. H. Hutton, Deputy Commissioner of the Naga Hills, published The Angami Nagas in 1921, the standard early account of the tribe.

Faith and Worship

In the older religion, as Hutton recorded it (pp. 180-187), the chief of the spirits (terhoma) is Kepenopfü, usually called Ukepenopfü, 'birth spirit', the ancestress of men, sometimes spoken of as the creator of living beings. Rest days (genna) were kept by the whole village on days fixed by the kemovo. Most Angami are now Christian; a few still keep the older religion, now called Pfütsana.

Customs

Angami farming is known for its terraces: hillsides are built into wet-rice fields with stone retaining walls, and water is led by channels from terrace to terrace round a whole spur (Hutton, pp. 72-73). Sekrenyi, Hutton's Sekrengi, falls on the second day after the full moon of Keno (February) or of Kezi (March) and is held for the health of the community in the coming year: on its first day every man washes himself, his weapons, tools and clothes at the village spring (pp. 197, 203; details vary by village). Gennas that confer social standing on the giver are held at the Terhengi in the Kohima group and at the Sekrengi in the Viswema group.

Festivals

Stories and Legends