58-409: The history of Manipur is reflected by archaeological research, mythology and written history . Historically, Manipur was an independent sovereign kingdom ruled by Meitei dynasty but at different point of time it was invaded and rule over by other state and authority. The Kangleipak State developed under King Loiyumba with its first written constitution in the early 12th century. Manipur under
116-576: A British victory. Japanese bombing in Imphal took place several times in the history of Manipur, thereby creating high casualties to the people of Manipur . The first bombing was in the year 1942, heralding the beginning of the Second World War in Manipur . Meitei mythology Meitei mythology (or Manipuri mythology) ( Meitei : Meitei Mi Lai Tingi Wari ) is a collection of myths, belonging to
174-625: A Treaty of Accession merging the kingdom into India. It was made a union territory in 1956 and a full-fledged state in 21 January 1972. During the latter part of its history, Manipur and its people were known by different names to their neighbours. The Shans or Pongs called the area Cassay, the Burmese Kathe, and the Assamese Meklee. In the first treaty between the British East India Company and Chingthangkhomba signed in 1762,
232-497: A diverse group of foragers since neolithic age, who learned agriculture and animal rearing c. 4000 B.C before migrating eastwards and establishing the Tibeto-Burman (TB) phylum. Hazarika notes the broader region to not show evidence of any significant cultural transformation, upon the dawning of Copper Age (and then, Iron Age ). The state has an abundance of megaliths of various shapes, serving distinct purposes. Sometime before
290-843: A huge family consisting of all the Eurasian languages except the Semitic , "Aryan" ( Indo-European ) and Chinese languages. The third volume of the Linguistic Survey of India was devoted to the Tibeto-Burman languages of British India . Julius Klaproth had noted in 1823 that Burmese, Tibetan and Chinese all shared common basic vocabulary , but that Thai , Mon and Vietnamese were quite different. Several authors, including Ernst Kuhn in 1883 and August Conrady in 1896, described an "Indo-Chinese" family consisting of two branches, Tibeto-Burman and Chinese-Siamese. The Tai languages were included on
348-566: A long period, leaving their affiliations difficult to determine. The grouping of the Bai language , with one million speakers in Yunnan, is particularly controversial, with some workers suggesting that it is a sister language to Chinese. The Naxi language of northern Yunnan is usually included in Lolo-Burmese, though other scholars prefer to leave it unclassified. The hills of northwestern Sichuan are home to
406-576: A primordial dragon god in Meitei mythology, is credited in Ch. K . for having established the Meitei rule by subjugating the "Poireitons". The first seven kings mentioned over Ch. K. – Pakhangpa, Tompok, Taothingmang, Khui Ningngongpa, Pengsipa, Kaokhongpa and Naokhampa – allegedly ruled until 411 CE. Barring Pakhangpa and Taothingmang, the chronicle only records the regnal span of each king. Parratt notes that there's not even any evidence of these seven rulers belonging to
464-496: A rule of twenty eight years, he was succeeded by Aatom Yoirenpa, who ruled for thirteen years. Yoirenpa was soon chased out by his brother and had to take refuge with the Khumans. Under Yiwanthapa, who reigned for thirty two years, a successful war was waged on the Khumans and their chief queen was murdered. The next ruler was Thawanthapa. In a thirty six year long rule, he subdued multiple internal and external threats. Despite allying with
522-524: A valid subgroup in its own right. Most of the Tibeto-Burman languages are spoken in remote mountain areas, which has hampered their study. Many lack a written standard. It is generally easier to identify a language as Tibeto-Burman than to determine its precise relationship with other languages of the group. The subgroupings that have been established with certainty number several dozen, ranging from well-studied groups of dozens of languages with millions of speakers to several isolates , some only discovered in
580-564: A wealth of data on the non-literary languages of the Himalayas and northeast India, noting that many of these were related to Tibetan and Burmese. Others identified related languages in the highlands of Southeast Asia and south-west China. The name "Tibeto-Burman" was first applied to this group in 1856 by James Logan , who added Karen in 1858. Charles Forbes viewed the family as uniting the Gangetic and Lohitic branches of Max Müller 's Turanian ,
638-625: Is Burmese , the national language of Myanmar, with over 32 million speakers and a literary tradition dating from the early 12th century. It is one of the Lolo-Burmese languages , an intensively studied and well-defined group comprising approximately 100 languages spoken in Myanmar and the highlands of Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and southwest China . Major languages include the Loloish languages , with two million speakers in western Sichuan and northern Yunnan ,
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#1733271125937696-591: Is an extensive literature in Classical Tibetan dating from the 8th century. The Tibetic languages are usually grouped with the smaller East Bodish languages of Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh as the Bodish group. Many diverse Tibeto-Burman languages are spoken on the southern slopes of the Himalayas. Sizable groups that have been identified are the West Himalayish languages of Himachal Pradesh and western Nepal,
754-494: Is central to the family in that it contains features of many of the other branches, and is also located around the center of the Tibeto-Burman-speaking area. Since Benedict (1972), many languages previously inadequately documented have received more attention with the publication of new grammars, dictionaries, and wordlists. This new research has greatly benefited comparative work, and Bradley (2002) incorporates much of
812-630: Is known from inscriptions using a variant of the Gupta script . The Tangut language of the 12th century Western Xia of northern China is preserved in numerous texts written in the Chinese-inspired Tangut script . Over eight million people in the Tibetan Plateau and neighbouring areas in Baltistan , Ladakh , Nepal , Sikkim and Bhutan speak one of several related Tibetic languages . There
870-448: Is now accepted by most linguists, with a few exceptions such as Roy Andrew Miller and Christopher Beckwith . More recent controversy has centred on the proposed primary branching of Sino-Tibetan into Chinese and Tibeto-Burman subgroups. In spite of the popularity of this classification, first proposed by Kuhn and Conrady, and also promoted by Paul Benedict (1972) and later James Matisoff , Tibeto-Burman has not been demonstrated to be
928-495: Is spoken in an area from eastern Nepal to western Bhutan. Most of the languages of Bhutan are Bodish, but it also has three small isolates, 'Ole ("Black Mountain Monpa"), Lhokpu and Gongduk and a larger community of speakers of Tshangla . The Tani languages include most of the Tibeto-Burman languages of Arunachal Pradesh and adjacent areas of Tibet. The remaining languages of Arunachal Pradesh are much more diverse, belonging to
986-460: Is then divided into several branches, some of them geographic conveniences rather than linguistic proposals: Matisoff makes no claim that the families in the Kamarupan or Himalayish branches have a special relationship to one another other than a geographic one. They are intended rather as categories of convenience pending more detailed comparative work. Matisoff also notes that Jingpho–Nungish–Luish
1044-449: Is widely used, some historical linguists criticize this classification, as the non-Sinitic Sino-Tibetan languages lack any shared innovations in phonology or morphology to show that they comprise a clade of the phylogenetic tree . During the 18th century, several scholars noticed parallels between Tibetan and Burmese, both languages with extensive literary traditions. In the following century, Brian Houghton Hodgson collected
1102-678: The Akha language and Hani languages , with two million speakers in southern Yunnan, eastern Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, and Lisu and Lahu in Yunnan, northern Myanmar and northern Thailand. All languages of the Loloish subgroup show significant Austroasiatic influence. The Pai-lang songs, transcribed in Chinese characters in the 1st century, appear to record words from a Lolo-Burmese language, but arranged in Chinese order. The Tibeto-Burman languages of south-west China have been heavily influenced by Chinese over
1160-649: The Jingpho–Luish languages , including Jingpho with nearly a million speakers. The Brahmaputran or Sal languages include at least the Boro–Garo and Konyak languages , spoken in an area stretching from northern Myanmar through the Indian states of Nagaland , Meghalaya , and Tripura , and are often considered to include the Jingpho–Luish group. The border highlands of Nagaland , Manipur and western Myanmar are home to
1218-473: The Songlin and Chamdo languages , both of which were only described in the 2010s. New Tibeto-Burman languages continue to be recognized, some not closely related to other languages. Distinct languages only recognized in the 2010s include Koki Naga . Randy LaPolla (2003) proposed a Rung branch of Tibeto-Burman, based on morphological evidence, but this is not widely accepted. Scott DeLancey (2015) proposed
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#17332711259371276-659: The Tamangic languages of western Nepal, including Tamang with one million speakers, and the Kiranti languages of eastern Nepal. The remaining groups are small, with several isolates. The Newar language (Nepal Bhasa) of central Nepal has a million speakers and literature dating from the 12th century, and nearly a million people speak Magaric languages , but the rest have small speech communities. Other isolates and small groups in Nepal are Dura , Raji–Raute , Chepangic and Dhimalish . Lepcha
1334-468: The 18th-century king Pamheiba saw the legendary burning of sacred scripture. Manipur became a princely state under British rule in 1891 after the Anglo-Manipur war , the last of the independent states to be incorporated into British Raj as a princely state. During the Second World War , Manipur was the scene of battles between Japanese and Allied forces. After the war, Maharaja Bodhachandra signed
1392-564: The 21st century but in danger of extinction. These subgroups are here surveyed on a geographical basis. The southernmost group is the Karen languages , spoken by three million people on both sides of the Burma–Thailand border. They differ from all other Tibeto-Burman languages (except Bai) in having a subject–verb–object word order, attributed to contact with Tai–Kadai and Austroasiatic languages . The most widely spoken Tibeto-Burman language
1450-599: The Brahmin people migrated to the kingdom and the volume of Vaishnavists proceeded with the worship of the Pheiya (sacred stone from Pong kingdom) as the Hindu God Vishnu . This was the origin of Meitei Vaishnavism . Kuranganayani was a Manipuri princess who became queen of Ahom in 1768. During the reign of emperor Gharib Niwaz (born Pumbeitha, 1709–1748), the name of the kingdom was changed from Kangleipak to Manipura. It
1508-457: The Burmese Empire and to the present day. The Burmese invaded Manipur several times but the most notable one was in 1819, during the reign of King Marjit. The Burmese occupied Manipur from 1819 to 1826. During this time, Manipur was devastated and there was chaos and anarchy everywhere. This dark period is called Chahi Taret Khuntakpa ( Seven Years Devastation ). There were exploitations of
1566-562: The Chakpas. Khumompa became king in 1263 and went on to ally with the Khumans to successfully ward off an invasion by the rulers of Kabaw Valley . A battle over the mountain-folks of Hao was also waged and their king Maimumpa was captured. Moirampa succeeded him, and again defeated the Khumans as well as Moirangs. Other battles against the Kekes and people of Makihao are noted; Korirong was captured. Thangpi Lanthapa ruled for twenty two years and trounced
1624-706: The Christian era, the valley got inhabited by distinct yeks (clans), who had probably migrated from Southern China during the late Iron Age. The hill-tribes are probably of indigenous origins. There has been a marked absence of historical evidence especially written records governing the span between Iron Age and the first millennium in North East India. Chronicles of other nations mention that trade networks between India proper and South China were likely operating via Manipur; pilgrims are reported to have entered India from China via these territories. The geopolitical history of
1682-429: The Khumans once, in a raid against the villagers of Hairem, he would go on to defeat the Khumans. The next king was Chingthang Lanthapa, who defeated the Khumans as well as Kamus, in his eleven year long rule. Thingpai Senhongpa succeeded him; nothing significant is noted except that he ruled for 5 years. Puranthapa, the next king, re-defeated the Khumans at Pairou, consolidated the territories of Koupa Koutai, and conquered
1740-644: The Manipuri Levy, which was the first standing army of Manipur , born out of the Manipur National Struggle against the Burmese rule during the Seven Years Devastation . In the year 1891, the historic Anglo-Manipuri war (Manipur's National Liberation Struggle) took place. The Manipuri soldiers showed their might in the losing battle, sacrificing their lives for the motherland. The combat ended with
1798-614: The Moirangs as well as the Loipi Haos; Tengkongbi and Marem Namngapa were captured. Kongyapa ascended in 1324 went on to succeed him. He was succeeded by Tenheipa, who reigned for twenty years and engaged in a multitude of warfare. Nothing is mentioned about the next ruler Tonapa, except that he reigned for five years. Then, Tapungpa ascended to the throne and waged successful warfare against the Loipi Marems, before being assassinated by Khamlangpa,
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1856-507: The Nongyai Khumans, Ningthoucheng raided Houkei, Lanthapa captured a group of Luwangs, and Yirengpa defeated the Moirangs as well as Khumans. Loiyumpa was the next king, and Ch. K. records his reign in considerable detail. He is credited with the initiation of the first 'constitution'. He was succeeded by Loitongpa, who emerged successful in some undescribed battles on the eastern fronts, probably waged over autochthonous ethnic groups. After
1914-604: The TB phylum. Hazarika notes the Manipuri sites to have an abundance of three-legged pottery and cord-impressed ware, very similar to the ones found in Southern China and Thailand, and hypothesizes that Manipur might have been the melting pot of Neolithic impulses from adjoining regions. Roger Blench , in agreement with George van Driem 's reconstructions of archeo-linguistic history of Southeast Asia, proposes that Northeast India accommodated
1972-575: The basis of stone tools and pottery (esp. cord-impressed ware); characteristic cultural identifiers of the Neolithic (agriculture, animal rearing etc.) are yet to be located and their development chronology is subject of active research. Hazarika notes the Neolithic culture in Northeast to have begun some four thousand years after that in the Gangetic Plains. Meiteilon , lingua-franca of Meiteis belongs to
2030-572: The basis of vocabulary and typological features shared with Chinese. Jean Przyluski introduced the term sino-tibétain (Sino-Tibetan) as the title of his chapter on the group in Antoine Meillet and Marcel Cohen 's Les Langues du Monde in 1924. The Tai languages have not been included in most Western accounts of Sino-Tibetan since the Second World War, though many Chinese linguists still include them. The link between Tibeto-Burman and Chinese
2088-575: The best known literary sources are: Mythical beings include gods, goddesses, mythical creatures and many others. Tibeto-Burman languages The Tibeto-Burman languages are the non- Sinitic members of the Sino-Tibetan language family , over 400 of which are spoken throughout the Southeast Asian Massif ("Zomia") as well as parts of East Asia and South Asia . Around 60 million people speak Tibeto-Burman languages. The name derives from
2146-399: The classification of Sino-Tibetan and Tibeto-Burman languages, Shafer (1955) and Benedict (1972) , which were actually produced in the 1930s and 1940s respectively. Shafer's tentative classification took an agnostic position and did not recognize Tibeto-Burman, but placed Chinese (Sinitic) on the same level as the other branches of a Sino-Tibetan family. He retained Tai–Kadai (Daic) within
2204-402: The current rule by the Meitei. Parratt as well as Gangmumei Kamei suspect that the initiation date of 33 CE was arrived upon by the scribes via astrological calculations. Ch. K . is also a Meitei chronicle – Meitei being one of the migrant clans, originally named Ningthouja, who (at some unknown point of time) assimilated others into a confederacy, and gained rulership of the monarchy – with
2262-882: The earliest human settlement in Northeast India, and it is generally thought to have been uninhabited by archaic humans prior to late Pleistocene due to unfavorable geographical conditions. This is however disputed and Northeast Corridors are proposed by some scholars to have played a defining role in early hominid migrations and peopling of India . Most scholars don't discuss a paleolithic age in Manipur (and Northeast). However, Manjil Hazarika, in his 2017 survey of prehistory of Northeast India, rejects that there exists any plausible ground to deny presence of Paleolithic culture in Manipur. A few paleolithic sites (Khangkhui, Napachik, Machi, Somgu and Singtom) have been located in Manipur. Though, in absence of good chrono-stratigraphic context of
2320-652: The early sections being essentially themed on the expansion of the Meitei across the valley of Manipur and other exploits. Some local authors have used Puyas , archaic Manipuri manuscripts in their reconstruction of Manipuri History. This tendency has been criticized by Parratt and others; none of these texts are yet dated by professional historians or subject to serious textual-critical scrutiny, and hence are not suitable for purposes other than commenting on Meitei traditions. Scholars have also found Puyas to have been (potentially) forged by Meitei Nationalists in support of their reinvention of history and tradition . Pakhangpa,
2378-488: The family, allegedly at the insistence of colleagues, despite his personal belief that they were not related. A very influential, although also tentative, classification is that of Benedict (1972) , which was actually written around 1941. Like Shafer's work, this drew on the data assembled by the Sino-Tibetan Philology Project, which was directed by Shafer and Benedict in turn. Benedict envisaged Chinese as
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2436-439: The finds and their cohabitation with remains of other ages, accuracy of such identifications remains open to critiques. The existence of Hoabinhian-like complexes remains disputed, as well. Multiple neolithic sites have been identified in Manipur; they include Nongpok Keithelmanbi, Napachik, Laimenai, Naran Siena, and Phunan. Considered to be part of a larger Southeast Asian complex, the identifications are primarily accorded on
2494-416: The first family to branch off, followed by Karen. The Tibeto-Burman family is then divided into seven primary branches: James Matisoff proposes a modification of Benedict that demoted Karen but kept the divergent position of Sinitic. Of the 7 branches within Tibeto-Burman, 2 branches (Baic and Karenic) have SVO -order languages, whereas all the other 5 branches have SOV -order languages. Tibeto-Burman
2552-521: The king of Chingsong, after thirty five years of rule. Again, there is a scarcity of information about the next king Lairenpa; he reigned for five years and there were no king for five, after. Punsipa's reign went until 1432, and was witness to numerous clashes including one with Moirangs. One of the early states of the region was the Kangleipak State , its first constitution, the Loiyumba Sinyen ,
2610-617: The kingdom was recorded as Meckley. Bhagyachandra and his successors issued coins engraved with the title of Manipureshwar, or lord of Manipur and the name Meckley was discarded. Later on, the Sanskritisation work, Dharani Samhita (1825–34) popularized the legends of the derivation of Manipur's name. Archaeological research in Northeast India is severely scarce, mostly limited to surface explorations, and lacking in state-of-the-art methods. Few attempts have been made to establish
2668-454: The most widely spoken of these languages, Burmese and the Tibetic languages , which also have extensive literary traditions, dating from the 12th and 7th centuries respectively. Most of the other languages are spoken by much smaller communities, and many of them have not been described in detail. Though the division of Sino-Tibetan into Sinitic and Tibeto-Burman branches (e.g. Benedict, Matisoff)
2726-551: The newer data. George van Driem rejects the primary split of Sinitic, making Tibeto-Burman synonymous with Sino-Tibetan. The internal structure of Tibeto-Burman is tentatively classified as follows by Matisoff (2015: xxxii, 1123–1127) in the final release of the Sino-Tibetan Etymological Dictionary and Thesaurus (STEDT). The classification of Tujia is difficult due to extensive borrowing. Other unclassified Tibeto-Burman languages include Basum and
2784-411: The next king was Keirencha, who ruled for fifteen years. He was succeeded by Yarepa, who reigned for twenty two years. Nothing else is noted about these two kings. The next four kings were Aayangpa, Ningthoucheng, Chenglei Yipan Lanthapa and Yirengpa, who ruled for a combined total of 253 years. All of them are noted to have emerged victorious in varied kinds of warfare over fellow clans – Aayangpa subdued
2842-483: The region along with the ethno-linguistic background of the inhabitants are largely unknown. The primary source concerning ancient and medieval Manipur has been restricted to the Cheitharol Kumbaba ( Ch. K .) – the court history of the kings of Manipur – which dates the first king to 33 CE. However, the historical record herein up to the reign of King Kyampa (1467–1508 CE) are noted to have been redrafted during
2900-520: The reign of Ching-Thang Khomba (Bhagyachandra) in the mid- to late-18th century because those leaves were "lost". This part of the chronicle remains particularly unreliable. The kings of that period are assigned extraordinary spans of length, and there is a scarcity of objective information. Saroj Nalili Parratt hypothesizes that many of these monarchs were probably borrowed from the cultural pantheon and interspersed with religious myths to fit into their collective memory of intra-clan conquests and legitimize
2958-457: The religious and cultural traditions of the Meitei people , the predominant ethnic group of Manipur . It is associated with traditional Meitei religion of Sanamahism . Meitei myths explain various natural phenomena, how human civilization developed, and the reasons of many events. Mythical narration plays an integral role in nearly every genre of Meitei literature ( Manipuri literature ). Some of
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#17332711259373016-409: The same dynasty, and in all probabilities they were reconstructed from oral legends of varying origins. The chronicle itself mentions that nothing much is known about these "divine"-like kings. Naokhampa was succeeded by Naophangpa, about whom nothing significant is mentioned in the chronicle. He was succeeded by his son Sameirang, who fought a successful battle over Aangom, a fellow clan. The next ruler
3074-658: The small Ao , Angami–Pochuri , Tangkhulic , and Zeme groups of languages, as well as the Karbi language . Meithei , the main language of Manipur with 1.4 million speakers, is sometimes linked with the 50 or so Kuki-Chin languages are spoken in Mizoram and the Chin State of Myanmar. The Mru language is spoken by a small group in the Chittagong Hill Tracts between Bangladesh and Myanmar. There have been two milestones in
3132-461: The small Qiangic and Rgyalrongic groups of languages, which preserve many archaic features. The most easterly Tibeto-Burman language is Tujia , spoken in the Wuling Mountains on the borders of Hunan, Hubei, Guizhou and Chongqing. Two historical languages are believed to be Tibeto-Burman, but their precise affiliation is uncertain. The Pyu language of central Myanmar in the first centuries
3190-481: The small Siangic , Kho-Bwa (or Kamengic), Hruso , Miju and Digaro languages (or Mishmic) groups. These groups have relatively little Tibeto-Burman vocabulary, and Bench and Post dispute their inclusion in Sino-Tibetan. The greatest variety of languages and subgroups is found in the highlands stretching from northern Myanmar to northeast India. Northern Myanmar is home to the small Nungish group, as well as
3248-471: Was Konthoupa and his reign saw some devastating warfare with "Senloi Langmai". After a monarch-less span of five years, Naothingkhong became the next king. During his reign the chieftain of Pong Kingdom is noted to have engaged in an annexation spree before returning via Manipur. Khongtekcha was the next king; a successful battle over the Moirang clan is noted, and he ruled for ten years. After a gap of eleven years,
3306-457: Was during his regime the religion of the entire Meitei ethnicity was forcibly converted from Sanamahism into Hinduism . In 1729, the legendary burning of the sacred scriptures of Sanamahism took place during the reign of Gharib Niwaz. This event is annually commemorated during the Puya Meithaba . The history of modern Manipur covers the history of Manipur from the Seven Years Devastation to
3364-474: Was made during the reign of King Loiyumba in the late 11th century. The early modern period is often called "medieval" by Meitei historians. Ningthoukhompa ruled from 1432 to 1467. He routed out the Moirangs, and repulsed a rebellion by the Tankhnus of the mountains. During the reign of Meidingu Senbi Kiyamba (1467–1507) the ancient Meitei faith, Sanamahism , began to collapse. It was during his reign that
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