The Nagas

Hill Peoples of Northeast India

Project Introduction The Naga Database

manuscript - Christoph von Furer-Haimendorf notebook nine

caption: mental illness
medium: notes
ethnicgroup: Konyak
location: Wakching
date: 12.3.1937
production:
person: Furer-Haimendorf
date: 29.10.1936-24.3.1937
acquirer:
person: School of Oriental and African Studies Library, London
text: (164) Ya-bu-bu (fly) is a sort of mental disturbance which makes people wander about in the jungle, avoiding men and villages.
text: Ya-nu-long-ba is a spirit who lives in the earth in caves. He is invisible to normal men, but people who are in the state of ya-bu-bu may see him and enter his cave.
text: There is one Aukheang woman, Shoi-ang, of Yanahu, (Thepong) (her husband is not a real Aukheang man, but from Wanching, and entered the Knoknokhu) who went with her son Dau-ben "ya-bu-bu", and stayed one whole year in the jungle. Then her son was quite small.