Abstract
The paper argues that anthropological understanding of tribal communities in the north-eastern part of India would be insightful in the process of formulation of the ethnohistorical processes as these communities have been or still are in a pre-literate stage. Many of the age old practices considered as extinct facts of archaeology are still continuing in tribal societies as Living Archaeology. Understandably, the paper pleads for methodological innovation in an inter-disciplinary perspective in the discipline of archaeology. Since archaeology is basically concerned with reconstruction of the extinct societies based on material traces the simple facts of material culture of the tribal societies would be immensely helpful in understanding the past present continuum of these societies. In view of this the paper has made use of etnnoarchaeological approach to study the past of a few tribal communities of Assam and adjoining areas.
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Notes
- 1.
Social accomplishment may include events like setting up of a village meeting ground or market place.
- 2.
Menhirs are erected in uneven numbers because the tallest one in the middle is considered as uncle stone erected to commemorate the maternal uncle.
- 3.
The hymns chanted on the occasion of erecting megaliths among the Karbis living in the plains of Assam on translation reveal that there is a wish that the crops and cattle flourish in the village and the family of the deceased.
- 4.
Sarthe or Sarlars according to Stack and Lyall (1997) is village headman or a government recognized land revenue collector.
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Bezbaruah, D. (2020). Ethnography to Archaeology: Tracing the Past of the Tribes of Assam and Adjoining Areas. In: Behera, M. (eds) Tribal Studies in India. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-32-9026-6_9
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