Legends of the tattooed headhunters

It is easy to let the mind wander over the rolling hills in the distance while listening to Phejin Konyak’s stories. We are perched on a hill ourselves amid tea plantations at her home in Shiyong, in the Mon district of north Nagaland. Back in the day, the Nagas were known as a brave warrior tribe, and the Konyaks the fiercest of them all.

In his book Nagaland , noted anthropologist Verrier Elwin writes about his observations about them in the late 1950s and early ’60s:

“Another factor of great importance is the Naga character or temperament. The Nagas are by nature singularly free and independent, scornful of control, impatient of criticism. Nearly everyone of them has behind him a long history of life in a village at war with its neighbours, a tradition of adventure and courage.”

Each tribe had its own traditions, a few of which were discontinued once a majority of the people embraced Christianity. What set the Konyaks apart back then were their headhunting skills during battle, and a unique tattoo custom — an integral part of warfare which also extended to daily life. The last few of that generation alive today, hold on to the stories of the era gone by. To keep alive the memories of a fast-fading culture, Phejin, a young Konyak woman, set out alongside Dutch photographer Peter Bos and documented her tribe’s past in The Last of the Tattooed Headhunters: The Konyaks .

For Phejin, it involved digging deep into the history of her people, beginning with her great grandfather Ahon — a warrior known for his skills. But for Bos, this was uncharted territory which he had only explored online, until curiosity nudged him to make the long trip to Nagaland.

“Travelling with Phejin and with a clear goal made it easy. Her great grandfather is well known in these parts, which opened quite a few doors for us. I always want to sit with people to hear their stories, ask them several questions about their lives. This creates a comfortable ambience, allowing people to open up and be themselves,” Bos says.

A white man curious to know their stories drew mixed reactions from the local people.

“Most consider white people as Britishers and call them ‘pitish’. At the same time, I once came cross a woman who was following me at a short distance. The family told me she had never seen a white person before,” Bos recalls.

Documenting the tattoos, their meaning and purpose kept Phejin engrossed and Bos trigger-happy. They also recorded folklore, songs and poems in a bid to keep the oral tradition of the Konyaks alive. The duo drove as far as the roads would take them, and then walked to the villages where it wouldn’t — remote corners accessible only after a testing trudge usually high up the Naga Hills. Research also took them to Myanmar, through the Tamu-Moreh Road, where they met the Konyaks across the border.

“As a Konyak, Phejin was able to go over without any papers, I had to get a visa. They wanted to know about every movement I made. I once went to answer nature’s call when a police officer stopped me. Only when I showed my passport could I finish the job,” Bos says.

If treks were brutal, so were the bumpy rides on non-existent roads. A particularly gruelling day at work involved a 10-hour drive on the back of a rickety World War II truck.

“It was overloaded. I had about a square foot to sit on some planks, and I was jealous to see a Buddhist monk on my right in zen mode. But after several hours, even the monk was shifting and trying to find a sweet spot. It took a few days for my feet to feel normal again,” remembers Bos.

Through the four years spent on the project, Phejin and Bos made long-lasting friendships with the folks they met en route, sleeping with them in longhouses and experiencing their way of life. On Bos’s birthday, when a four-wheel drive proved impossible, the duo embarked on a heavenly walk through the forest to get to a village, where they found the only two-neck tattoos of the region.

“It felt like I was at the edge of the world — the perfect birthday gift,” Bos says.

“Another time, I was showing an old warrior some photos on my camera. While flipping (through them), he suddenly stopped at the photo of a man and soon had tears in his eyes. It was his friend, whom he had not seen for several years, as both were unable to walk the steep trails in the village. What for me was a stroll between longhouses was today an impossible obstacle for them,” he says.

Shail Desai is a Mumbai-based writer