Mara (Lakher)
names 18objects 15ISO 639-3 mrh
Spoken in the Lakher country, southern Lushai Hills (now southern Mizoram), the Lakher country, southern Lushai Hills (now southern Mizoram) and the Chin Hills.
tribal 18
See the Mara (Lakher) sky on the chart →
The sky in Mara (Lakher)
| Name | Object | Meaning | Register |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lodo pazo adongpa | Aldebaran | About ten stars representing men catching rats in a lodo — the small fenced rubbish dump beside every Lakher jhum house. | tribal |
| Sohlu vang araipa | Cassiopeia | Five stars formed out of four men and a flying fox's skin which they were stretching out to dry when the great darkness descended. | tribal |
| Awsithleupa | Comets | A herald of disease and famine; Khazangpa sends comets as a warning that bad times are coming. | tribal |
| Latlang, Labeu | Figures with no secure modern identification | A man and his wife who loved each other so much that when she died he followed her to the land of the dead by deliberately desecrating the place of sacrifice, and the two of them then agreed to become stars. | tribal |
| Sahruatong | Figures with no secure modern identification | Three stars representing a threshing-floor that was being made when the great darkness fell. | tribal |
| Awsichakeipa | Mars | 'the tiger star' The tiger that came to eat the mother and daughter at their weaving. It is redder in colour than other stars. | tribal |
| Awsi-ih | Meteors and shooting stars | 'star-dung' Caused by a star defecating, the dung falling to earth. A shooting star can sometimes be picked up afterwards: it looks like a water snail and is green, though nobody has ever seen one actually reach the ground. Finding one has no effect on either men or crops. | tribal |
| Sachhipu | Meteors and shooting stars | The land it falls on is sure to bear a good crop. It differs from the Awsi-ih in that it can be seen to fall to the earth, and from the Lushei Chhawifa in that it comes out of the sky rather than starting from somebody's house. | tribal |
| Thla-shi-pu | Meteors and shooting stars | Where it falls is where next year's swidden should be cut. | tribal |
| Nongsawthaimangchhangpa | Orion | A mother sat down to teach her daughter to weave; a tiger came to eat them; the young men of the village gathered to protect them; and the great eclipse turned the two women, the tiger and the young men all into stars. | tribal |
| Vothawlapiapa | Orion's Belt | Two men going along carrying a pig, caught by the great darkness as they carried it. | tribal |
| Aphilu | Pegasus | Four stars representing the corners of a piece of bamboo matting, which was being made when the great darkness fell. | tribal |
| Sonatachhiarari | The Milky Way | 'rains and dry weather boundary' When a larger expanse of sky is visible north of the Milky Way the rains are approaching; a larger expanse to the south heralds the cold weather. | tribal |
| Awsicharu | The Pleiades | Six men sitting gossiping when the great darkness started. The Lakhers recognise only six. | tribal |
| Meisakupa | The rainbow | The tail of a celestial creature; the account continues past the page quoted here. | tribal |
| Keulachongpa | Ursa Major (the Big Dipper) | A man killed in a raid, whose slayers took his head and his left leg; before his relatives could carry off the corpse the great darkness fell. Four stars form his body and two his thigh and knee; the lowest and smallest is a chicken killed as riha to accompany his soul. Because he died in war his spirit cannot cross the Kolodyne, so these stars turn back instead of completing their circuit and reappear in the same place. Visible from Saiko in December, January and February. | tribal |
| Thlaseu | Venus as evening star | Thlaseu had one sister. He visited her, she killed a pig for him, and one pig does not make a long feast — so he came out of her house early in the evening, and the great darkness caught him as he came out. He still appears early in the evening. | tribal |
| Deiva | Venus as morning star | Deiva had many sisters, and each of them killed a pig when he visited, so the feast ran so late that he did not come out until about four in the morning — and still does. | tribal |
Sources
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 496–497 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 496 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 498 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 497 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 494 link
- J. Shakespear, The Lushei Kuki Clans (London: Macmillan, 1912), Part II (the Lakhers), p. 205 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 495 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 499 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 495–496 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 493 link
- N.E. Parry, The Lakhers (London: Macmillan, 1932), p. 493–494 link