𑜄𑜩 𑜒𑜑𑜪𑜨 tái ahüm | |
|---|---|
 Ahom Cultural Ethnic Flag | |
| Total population | |
| 1,600,000+[1] | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Assam | 1,464,000 |
| Arunachal Pradesh | 100,000 |
| Languages | |
| Assamese (dominance),[2] and Ahom (only used mainly in religious and educational purposes.[3]) | |
| Religion | |
| Majority: Hinduism Minority: Ahom religion | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Other Tai peoples | |
| Part of a series on the |
| Culture of Assam |
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The Ahom (/ˈɑːhɒm/) (Ahom: 𑜒𑜑𑜪𑜨, ahüm), or Tai Ahom (Ahom: 𑜄𑜩 𑜒𑜑𑜪𑜨, tái ahüm) is an ethnic group from the Indian states of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. The members of this group are admixed descendants of the Tai people who reached the Brahmaputra valley of Assam in 1228 and the local indigenous people who joined them over the course of history. Sukaphaa, the leader of the Tai group and his 9,000 followers established the Ahom kingdom (1228–1826 CE), which controlled much of the Brahmaputra Valley in modern Assam until 1826.
The modern Ahom people and their culture are a syncretism of the original Tai and their culture[7] and local Tibeto-Burman people and their cultures they absorbed in Assam. The local people of different ethnic groups of Assam that took to the Tai way of life and polity were incorporated into their fold which came to be known as Ahom as in the process known as Ahomisation.
Many local ethnic groups that came in contact with the Tai settlers, including the Borahis who were of Tibeto-Burman origin, were completely subsumed into the Ahom community; while members of other communities, based on their allegiance to the Ahom kingdom or the usefulness of their talents, too were accepted as Ahoms. Currently, they represent the largest Tai group in India, with a population of nearly 4.6 million in Assam. Ahom people are found mostly in Upper Assam in the districts of Golaghat, Jorhat, Sibsagar, Charaideo, Dibrugarh, Tinsukia (south of Brahmaputra River); and in Lakhimpur, Sonitpur, Bishwanath,and Dhemaji (north) as well as some area of Nagaon, Guwahati.
Even though the already admixed group[8] Ahom made up a relatively small portion of the kingdom's population, they maintained their original Ahom language and practised their traditional religion till the 17th century, when the Ahom court as well as the commoners adopted the Assamese language.
- ^ "Ahom in India report 2021". Retrieved 15 June 2021.
- ^ Diller, A. (1993). Tai Languages. In International Encyclopedia of Linguistics (Vol. 4, pp. 128-131). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
- ^ (Marwah 2020:76)
- ^ "639 Identifier Documentation: aho – ISO 639-3". SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics). SIL International. Retrieved 29 June 2019.
Ahom [aho]
- ^ "Population by Religious Communities". Census India – 2001. Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Retrieved 1 July 2019.
Census Data Finder/C Series/Population by Religious Communities
- ^ "Population by religion community – 2011". Census of India, 2011. The Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India. Archived from the original on 25 August 2015.
2011census/C-01/DDW00C-01 MDDS.XLS
- ^ "Conclusions" (PDF). Shodganga.
- ^ "The Ahom kingdom’s establishment, traditionally dated at 1228, was done by a group migrating from the southeast, large numbers of whom were male army members, who would have taken local non-Tai speaking wives." (Morey 2014:51–52)