8. The Tribes

by George Weber

 

Table of Contents   1. The Andamanese Negrito 2. Great Andamanese 3. The Onge 4.. The Jarawa 5. The Jangil (Rutland Jarawa) 6.. The Sentineli 7. The Aryoto-Eremtaga Split

1. The Andamanese Negrito

Chapter 1 has already given a very brief overview of the four distinct groups of Andamanese Negrito. Here we will go into more detail and add a historical dimension. We have mentioned the Great Andamanese, the Onge, the Jarawa, the Jangil and the Sentineli, without explaining what these groups are (or were), how they differ from each other and how they might be related.

Firstly, it should be made clear that the Andamanese "tribes" are not tribes in the way the term is normally understood is ethnological and anthropological literature: the Andamanese tribes had very little power structure, they had "chiefs" only in times of trouble, they had no tribally-owned territory, no clans and not much in the way of revered common tribal ancestors. Indeed, it is easier to define the Andamanese tribes by what they are not, rather than by what they are (or were).

Basically, each Andamanese "tribe" is merely a collection of independent local groups that speak the same language, share a common culture and tradition and are bound to each other by bonds of family and tradition. There is no tribal territory, only a number of hunting territories each owned by a local group. The Andamanese were fully aware of the linguistic basis of their "tribes". All Greater Andaman tribal names contain the prefix Aka-, Akar-, A- or Oko-. In the various tribal languages these meant "from the mouth" or "language." A member of the Akar-Bale tribe, therefore, was someone coming from the tribe speaking the Bale language.

How the tribes are related.

 

Andamanese tribal societies were first disrupted by the British and the penal colony they set up there in 1858 in the wake of the "Great Mutiny" of northern India. During the later 19th century and until the 1930s, the penal settlement was used for all sorts of people from criminals to politicians opposed to British rule in India. The effect on the Andamanese was dramatic and wholly destructive, as the following map illustrates

The first outsiders to take a scientific interest in the Andamanese and to record their findings were not aware of the existence of any sub-divisions among them. The Andamanese were thought to be one large tribe, all speaking the same language. It took the permanent settlement of 1858 for the British to realize that this was not so. Much of what had at first been thought to be unpredictable behaviour - friendly one day and hostile the next - turned out in the light of growing knowledge to have been contact with more or less closely related but quite separate and independent groups. Initially, every newly-discovered group was called a "tribe." When more and more were found, confusion reigned for a few decades until it was realized that there was a complex hierarchy of groupings.

At least among the Great Andamanese, the hierarchy of groups started with the nuclear family at the bottom and went up through the local group (a few families ) through the "sept" (a few local groups) to the largest unit known to the Andamanese, the "tribe" (a collection of septs, sometimes friendly, sometimes quarrelling with each other at times). Early literature is full of confused references to local groups, septs and tribes, the terms often used interchangeably. We discuss these social units in more detail in the following chapters. The separate and extinct subdivision of tribes into Aryoto (shore dwellers) and Eremtaga (forest dwellers) groups will be dealt with later in this chapter. Suffice it to say that because of the very limited geographical mobility of individuals living within their local groups, traditional life took place almost entirely within remarkably restricted geographical limits. The enormous productivity of plant and animal life exploited by the traditional Andamanese made this possible over, we think, tens of thousands of years.

Among the other three major groups - the Onge, the Jarawa, the Jangil and the Sentineli - a similar hierarchy may operate (or have operated) but details are sketchy and known with any certainty only for the Onges. Among the Onge the hierarchy seems to be simpler than it had been among traditional Great Andamanese groups. The Onge, for example, never separated into different linguistically different "tribes" as the Great Andamanese did. The Jarawa also may be organised rather like the Onge while nothing whatsoever is known about the way the Jangil have grouped and Sentineli still group themselves.

The languages of the Great Andamanese tribes form a "linguistic continuum" - each language is relatively closely related to its geographical neighbours on either side of a long line of languages, with languages further apart also being further apart linguistically. The two languages at the extreme ends of the continuum (Aka-Bea and Aka-Cari) were mutually unintelligible. Such a continuum is known from other societies and is an indication of a very long and undisturbed settlement of the area by the groups involved.

There is not much to be gained by listing local groups and septs within the different tribes. The lists compiled by early researchers were necessarily incomplete and by the 1890s the accessible Great Andamanese groups were rapidly dissolving. None of the Onge-Jarawa groups had at that time been studied in any depth and even today their internal structuring is far from clear. It is also conceivable that there have been entire tribes that died out from disease before they could be discovered and recorded. The Jangil discussed later in this chapter seem to be such a case, and there could have been others.

As a purely linguistic and cultural entity, the traditional tribe was not an entity of great relevance in the daily life of a traditional community before the 1860s. When communication, intermarriage and travel between the tribes increased under the impact of the rapidly growing British-Indian cultural influence, membership of a tribal group assumed greater importance. In 1980 of the 23 surviving Great Andamanese persons (all of mixed Indian/Burmese/Andamanese ancestry) one person each claimed Aka-Cari, Aka-Kora, A-Pucikwar and Akar-Bale while three claimed Aka-Bo and the remainder Aka-Jeru tribal affiliations. Because of intermarriage between Indians and Burmese as well as between different Andamanese tribes, these claims had little cultural meaning but were (and today still are) a source of pride in their own history and tradition on the part of a people on the edge of extinction. The language of the present-day Great Andamanese is a mixture of a number of Great Andamanese languages (especially Aka-Jeru), Hindi and English that is called "Andamanese", "New Aka-Jeru" or "Jero".

There is also a grouping above the tribe: on the one hand, there were the ten Great Andamanese tribes and on the other hand the four tribes of the Jarawa-Onge group. The only place where these groups were in direct contact with each other at the time the first British researchers showed up in the 19th century was in the southern part of Great Andaman. The meeting of the two groups was not friendly: the Aka-Bea and the Jarawa seem to have slaughtered each other in a bitter jungle war that may have been going on for a long time, perhaps centuries, before the British arrived.

There is some genetic evidence that the Andamanese have been largely isolated from the rest of humanity (though not necessarily living on the Andaman islands all the time) for 60,000 years. Around 30,000 years ago, there appears to have bee some mixing with another group (again, maybe not yet on the islands). Whether the two main groups (Great Andamanese and Onge-Jarawa) represent this partial merging 30,000 years ago is an open question. For more details see Chapter 6 (especially Endicott et al.). If it does, it means that one of the two groups (most likely the Great Andamanese) were already settled on the islands when the ancestors of the Onge-Jarawa arrived. Much more research is needed before these questions can be answered with any certainty. What makes answering the questions important is the fact that the Andamanese are among the oldest (if not the oldest) surviving group of living humans. What can be found out about their prehistory and origins is of great interest and relevance to the prehistory and origins of mankind as a whole.

The differences between the Andamanese groups at all levels groups that were found in the 19th century must have evolved more or less in situ over a long period of time. It seems likely that, once the ancestors of at least the Andamanese had arrived in the islands, the various groups diverged more and more while staying in roughly the same place. We will discuss these and other questions relating to Andamanese origins and prehistory in later chapters.

The differences between the Onge language on the one hand and the Great Andamanese languages on the other are considerable. A vocabulary of several hundred Onge words was found to share less than a dozen common roots and stems with the Great Andamanese. The relationship also is not obvious and can be brought to light only by a detailed linguistic analysis. Although clearly related in varying degrees, the tribal languages were (and those surviving today still are) quite distinct and separate languages. They should not be called "dialects". Linguistic change in static societies is slow and there cannot have been many societies more static and long-lived than those of the Andamanese. On linguistic grounds alone, therefore, the tribes must be ancient. They differ not only linguistically but also in many cultural details: from the form of their huts, their bows and arrows, their canoes, their ornaments, their utensils, their traditions. In the following chapters we shall try to explain some of the more obvious and important differences between them.

2. The Great Andamanese

It is conventional practice to classify the Great Andamanese into two or three groups: the northern and the southern groups with sometimes a middle group added. This classification is convenient but is based on geography rather than linguistic or cultural criteria. The ten tribes of this group clearly and obviously form one related group.

As mentioned above, the Great Andamanese languages form a linguistic continuum from north to south with neighbouring languages more closely related than those further away from each other. The Aka-Bea and Akar-Bale languages were closest, being mutually intelligible to some extent. It is known that the two tribes felt closely related and the names they had for each other (as listed in the table below) confirm this. While most Great Andamanese tribes had practically no contact with each other, the two southernmost tribes are known to have had what in Andamanese circumstances must be called intensive relations before 1858. It is possible that we have here an example of a tribe in an early stage of the process of splitting into two smaller tribes.  

At the other extreme within the Great Andamanese grouping, the differences between Aka-Bea in the south and Aka-Cari in the far north were substantial and the two languages - in the unlikely event of individuals meeting before 1858 - were mutually unintelligible.

The differences between the Great Andamanese languages involved mostly the vocabulary and pronunciation rather than grammar and syntax. The myths and legends of all the Great Andaman tribes also give the same picture: they differed in many details but were recognizably from the same stock. The so-called Wot-a-emi legend is particularly interesting. The legend related the belief (common to the tribes living around the A-Pucikwar: the Aka-Bea, Akar-Bale, Aka-Kol and Aka-Kede) that the fire was acquired from the mythical being Biliku at Wot-a-emi on Baratang Island in A-Pucikwar territory. The A-Pucikwar were regarded as the original tribe and they were called "the people who speak Andamanese." Our sources do not name the tribes that did not know of this legend - it could hardly have been current among those who were not aware of the A-Pucikwar's existence.

A Great Andamanese group resting on the beach (note the characteristic rest position of the arms). The "tails" worn by some are a well-known feature of traditional Great Andamanese attire and may have contributed significantly to the myth of the "monkey-tailed people of the Andamans" as told by foreign sailors who may have seen the Andamanese only from afar. The picture was taken during the German India expedition of the mid-1920s

 Names some Great Andamanese tribes had for each other:

Name and translation	Aka-Bea	Akar-Bale	A-Pucikwar	Oko-Juwoi	Aka-Kol
Aka-Bea fresh water	Aka-Bea-da	Akat-Bea	O-Bea-da	Aukau-Beye-lekile	O-Bea-che
Akar-Bale on the opposite side of the sea	Aka-Balawa	Akar-Bale	O -Pole-da	Aukau-Pole-lekile	O-Pole-che
A-Pucikwar they speak Andamanese	Aka-Bojigyab-da	Akat-Bojig-yuab-nga	O-Pucikwar-da	Aukau-Pucik-yar-lekile	O-Pucikwar-che
Oko-Juwoi they cut pattern in their bows	Aka-Juwai-da	Akat-Juwai	O-Juwai-da	Aukau-Juwoi-lekile	O-Juwai-che
Aka-Kol bitter or salty taste	Aka-Kol-da	Akat-Kol	O-Kol-da	Aukau-Kol-lekile	O-Kol-che

 

It does seem that the Great Andamanese had a seemingly irrepressible tendency to split into ever smaller units. Before the British arrived, there was little contact between the various tribes. Each tribe resembled a self-contained, self-sufficient and rather self-satisfied club with membership figures of between 200 and 700. Yet even these tiny tribelets managed to split still further into the minuscule sub-groups of jungle-dwelling and shore-dwelling septs that did not mix much The possible existence of a third sub-group of creek-dwellers within the Eremtagas, might indicate that at least the forest dwellers were in the process of splitting up still further. Whatever was happening to the tribes before 1858, that fateful year changed everything.

One is left to wonder just how far the Great Andamanese, had they been left to their own devices, would have carried the process of splitting. Taken to its ultimate degree, it would have meant the self-extinction of the race. Their often violent dislike of outsiders, of things foreign and of having their traditional way of life disturbed in any way was an adaptation that had been successful for thousands of years at preventing outsiders from overrunning the islands. While such xenophobia would have been a useful defensive adaptation, it may well have grown out of control to the point when the "we and they" among Andamanese groups became so restricted that it excluded all but the members of the local group and a few friendly neighbouring groups. We do not how how these attitudes developed but it was what the British found in 1858.

I is true that among Greater Andamanese, local groups situated directly at the tribal border show some evidence of cross-border traffic but nothing is known on the nature of such contacts. We have a brief report on linguistic seepage across tribal borders, colouring the local dialect on either side of it - no more.

Very little is known, too, about the cultural differences between the ten Great Andamanese tribes. Best known from the writings of Man and Portman are the Aka-Bea. Later researchers investigating the northern tribes could only salvage what they could from groups that were close to dissolution. Radcliffe-Brown, our major source for the northern tribes, was primarily interested in presenting his interpretation of the available evidence and only secondarily in the collection of new data. He tended to refer to the northern tribes as a whole, showing more interest in what they had in common than it what divided them. To the Greater Andamanese themselves, their tribal differences, of course, loomed large and seemed enormously important - until 1858 when truly different outsiders moved in.

Today, all that is left of the Great Andamanese is a tiny group of roughly two dozen people living on Straits Island reservation with their material needs taken care of by Indian government social workers.

A web site dealing with the present situation of the Great Andamanese (Jero) has been set up by Prof. Vaisha Narang of Jawaharlal Nehru University and is recommended for further reading.

Unlike their northern cousins on Great Andaman, the other major grouping among Andamanese, known as the ONGE-JARAWA GROUP does not form a close linguistic, cultural or geographic unit. Its four members (the Onge, the Jarawa, the Jangil and the Sentineli) differ widely in many respects and are (or were) separated by varying expanses of sea. Geographical separation over long periods (certainly into the thousands of years) is most likely to be responsible for this state of affairs. Nevertheless, both the Great Andamanese and all members of the Onge-Jarawa group are of the same race: they are all unquestionably Negritos.

3. The Onge

The Onge are the only easily accessible tribe of the Onge-Jarawa group today. Because of their friendliness and relative accessibility for the past 100 years, more is known about the Onge than about any other living Andamanese group. Almost all of the research on them was done and published after 1950 by scientists working for the Indian Anthropological Survey.

Sadly, the Onge like other Andamanese groups, also seem to be on their way to extinction. Friendliness in the Andaman islands has not historically been a helpful trait in the struggle for survival.

Until the late 1940s, the Onge were the sole permanent occupants of Little Andaman. Before that time, they led a largely traditional way of life despite indications of some traditional trading activity with outsiders (probably Malay and/or Burmese).

The British controlled the island after the late 1890s. M.V. Portman enforced a degree of British authority over the Onge and establish direct contact with a tribe that until his arrival had been hostile. From the early 1900s onwards, the Onge had only intermittent contact with their nominal British overlords and continued their traditional life undisturbed. On their part, the British were only concerned to keep the island peaceful and out of the hands of other powers, only interfering if they felt their own position threatened or when shipwrecked sailors were molested by Onge goups. During the Japanese occupation of the islands (1942-1945) the short-lived new masters took the same attitude, stationing only a few soldiers on the island to observe shipping movements. They largely ignored the Onge.

Non-Onge began to settle on Little Andaman in large numbers in the early 1950s when the Indian government moved thousands of mainland refugees to the island. They brought new diseases and caused ecological disturbances that quickly led to a precipitous decline in the number of Onges (refer to Chapter 7 for the relevant statistics).

When the newly established Indian government took over, it meant well. Unfortunately, it was also inexperienced and as the next 50 years showed, it was exceedingly slow to learn from its mistakes. British neglect of the Onge was not well-meant but it worked for the benefit of the Onge who were left to conduct their traditional way of life undisturbed. Indian do-goodery, on the other hand, was not. Swarms of social workers totally untrained and unprepared for dealing with a hunter-gatherer culture, unsuitable prefabricated housing, inappropriate government-issue clothing, acculturisation programs, alcoholism and drugs all became daily facts in the bewildered hunter-gatherers lives. Infertility and child mortality remain serious problems today with the reasons for them remaining obscure. Indian efforts to bring modern medicine to the island have not made a noticeable dent in the many problems, including the declining numbers. The issues of British and Indian interference with the Andamanese tribes and the policies behind it are discussed in much greater detail by C. Krebs in an article published on this web site.

The Onge are now settled in a reservation while the rest of the island is populated by Indian and Nicobarese farmers. Although the administration has corrected many of the early mistakes, it is doubtful whether the Onge can survive as a distinct group. A culture as well-adapted to their environment, as primitive and alien as theirs can only survive in isolation, an isolation that is no longer feasible even if it was seriously attempted.

The tsunami of 24th December 2004 did not affect the Onge much. They knew what to do and suffered no known losses. Dr. Vishvajit Pandya has reported (on 20 February 2005 in our Tsunami News) that the Onge have special ceremonies against tsunamies which are enacted after an earthquake.

The Onge, alone among all Andamanese groups, also had acquired (or perhaps retained from ancient times) some skills of seamanship - and with them the ability to travel some distance across the open sea. Onges fished and hunted regularly on and around the uninhabited islands between Little Andaman and Rutland Island. For a few decades during the late 19th and the early 20th centuries they even had a sort of outlying colony on Rutland Island. That similar migrations must has taken place in ancient times and long before the 19th century is indicated by the presence on Great Andaman, North Sentinel island and Rutland island of people related to the Onge: the Jarawa, the Sentineli and the Jangil. The Onge "colonists" of the late 19th century certainly were replacing the fading Great Andamanese of the Aka-Bea tribe when the British first became aware of the situation in the 1890s.

It is likely that the drive of the Onge towards northern hunting grounds after 1890 was caused by the presence of the British and their Indian prisoners in southern Great Andaman. The local tribes there had been weakened by more than 30 years of contact with outsiders and their alien diseases. That the Onge drive towards the north also faded away after some decades could have been for the very same reason.

The Onge have always been less inward-looking and more enterprising than the other Andamanese groups. Their flexibility may have had something to do with their long-term contacts with the outside world.  

Onge population distribution on Little Andaman during the 1930s. Black dots: known communal huts (not all necessarily occupied at the same time). Communal huts were used mostly during the rainy seasons (summer monsoon) by groups of families. Hut symbols: known temporary settlements (not all necessarily occupied at the same time). Temporary settlements were used by small hunting parties.

Onge fishing grounds and the expansion of the Onge into the southern parts of South Great Andaman in the wake of the disappearing Great Andamanese tribes, around 1890 to 1930. 1 South Brother island 2 North Brother island 3 Sister islands 4 Passage island 5 Cinque islands 6 Rutland islands 7 Twin islands 8 Labyrinth islands The yellowish line marks the maximum known penetration of the Onge during the period 1890-1930.

After their island was "opened to settlement" by the Indian authorities in the 1950s the Onge were moved into four areas. Light gray area: Two Onge populations (including the one at Jackson Creek) were moved to the South Bay reservation in the 1970s (medium grey area). After the devastating tsunami of 24 December 2004 the survivors of South Bay reservation was moved to Dugong Creek reservation (dark gray area) which is now the only remaining Onge area. Green area: land used by Indian settlers. Dotted line: main road. Red dot: Administrative headquarters of the Indian administration.

Onge women wearing the "brushes", the characteristic traditional Onge attire as well as facial painting. Anonymous photographer, 1980s.

An Onge hunter saying farewell to his family before setting out. Anonymous photographer, 1980s.

Onge family life. Note the traditional attire of the woman on the right and the Indian-style dress of that on the left. Anonymous photographer, 1980s.

4. The Jarawa

Jarawa group ca. 2004 Photo courtesy Wilhelm Klein

Jarawa (also sometimes spelt Jarwa, which is closer to the original pronunciation) means "stranger" in the language of the Great Andamanese Aka-Bea . The Jarawa call themselves Ya-eng-nga (which, invevitably, means "human being". Without the characteristic Jarawa prefix ya- this is very close to what the Onge call themselves: en-nge, and which in Onge also has the same meaning as in Jarawa, a major piece of evidence for the long-suspected relationship between the two groups.

The Jarawa are the quintessentially "hostile Andamanese". They seem to have been at war with the Great Andamanese in general and with their main enemy, the Great Andamanese Aka-Bea tribes, for a very long time.

When the British landing party established itself at Port Blair in order to set up a penal colony in 1858 it knew nothing of the Jarawa. They soon heard about them, from their their new Great Andamanese Aka-Bea allies that there was a ferocious tribe hiding in the interior of South Great Andaman. The British paid little attention, being wholly preoccupied with the difficult task of establishing their new penal colony in a climate that seemed to them more hostile than any new tribe could be.

After things had settled down at the new headquarters in Port Blair, time and energy became available for exploratory expeditions into the territory of the mythical Jarawa. While one Great Andamanese tribe after the other was contacted, their lands explored and friendly relations established and new diseases spread to all and sundry, the Jarawa remained stubbornly hostile and resistant to all attempts at establishing contact.

With hindsight, we can now see that a major reason for the relentless hostility was the use of Aka-Bea trackers by the British. These were paid with food, tobacco and alcohol and even issued with arms and ammunition. The British never seem to have questioned the practice on the principle that Andamanese = Andamanese. It took a long time before the British realized (and the realisation never had practical consequences) that Jarawa and the Great Andamanese were hereditary enemies. The British were perpetually disappointed when their Aka-Bea allies found nothing but deserted Jarawa villages. They also soon discovered that a Jarawa village, once it had been entered by outsiders, was abandoned by its owners. It was merely chance when, occasionally, elderly men, or women with children were surprised and captured. Such captives were then taken to Port Blair to be "questioned" and given food and gifts. Most soon sickened and many died before they could be returned to the place where they had been captured. This practice of casual kidnapping did nothing to endear the British to the Jarawa and the hostilities continued until the last years of the 20th century.

In 1858, Aka-Bea and Jarawa were hereditary enemies that had been fighting each other for a long time, probably centuries. It is an odd fact that when the British in 1790 made contact with natives in the region of Port Blair they found one group hostile and another friendly without realizing that they dealt with two entirely different tribes. Lt. Colebrooke even took some friendly natives with him to Calcutta and to the Nicobars. More than a century later M.V. Portman realized that these early "friendlies" had been Jarawa:

On reading Lieutenant Colebrooke's account... it became evident to me that the aborigines with whom the people in Lieutenant Blair's settlement on the South Andaman in 1790 et seq., were friendly,... were members of the South Andaman Jarawa tribe. The description of their habits, weapons and utensils, and the vocabulary given, leaves no room for doubt on this point.

The "hostiles" of those early days must have been the Aka-Bea who 70 years later would become the first and closest allies of the British. The colonizing power could not win the friendship of both groups:

From the Aka-Bea-da I [Portman] have learnt that in former times the Jarawas were more numerous and powerful than they are now, and they inhabited the Southern part of the Harbour of Port Blair, the Western part, and much of the neighbouring interior. Many "Kitchen-Middens" on the shores of the Harbour have been pointed out to me as the sites of Jarawa villages, and the Aka-Bea-da further prove their contention by showing that these shell-heaps contain the refuse of articles which the Jarawa eat, but which the Aka-Bea-da will not touch.

The disappearance of the Jarawa from the Port Blair region after the 1790s almost certainly is connected with their early contacts to the British. The diseases that a century later would extinguish their hereditary enemies, quite possibly reduced the number of Jarawa and allowed the Aka-Bea to gain the upper hand. As one British administrator wrote:

... how swift the disastrous effects of our relations with the Andamanese have been to them. 

Jarawa and Jangil territories at various times in history. The extent of the Jarawa territory until the mid-20th century is only very approximately known. Red: Jarawa territory Grey: Jangil territory (assumed) Green: Uninhabited or inhabited by Great Andamanese tribes (around Port Blair also by the British and their mostly Indian prisoners)

After things had settled down at the new British headquarters in Port Blair, time and energy became available in the 1860s, for exploratory expeditions into the territory of the mythical Jarawa. While one Great Andamanese tribe after the other was contacted, their lands explored, friendly relations established and new diseases spread, the Jarawa remained stubbornly hostile and resistant to gifts offered.

With hindsight, we can now see that a major reason for the relentless hostility was the use of Aka-Bea trackers by the British. These were paid with food, tobacco and alcohol and even issued with arms and ammunition. The British never seem to have questioned the practice on the principle that Andamanese = Andamanese. It took a long time before they realized (and the realisation never had practical consequences) that Jarawa and the Great Andamanese were not only Andamanese but hereditary enemies. The British were perpetually disappointed when their Aka-Bea allies found nothing but deserted Jarawa villages. They also soon discovered that a Jarawa village, once it had been entered by outsiders, was abandoned by its owners. It was merely chance when, occasionally, elderly men, or a woman with children were captured. Such captives were taken to Port Blair to be "questioned" and given food and gifts. Most of the captives soon sickened and some died before they could be returned to the place where they had been captured. The practice of kidnapping, of course, did nothing to endear the British to the Jarawa and the hostilities continued until the end of the 20th century.

British attempts at teaching the rare male Jarawa captives Hindi or English and then setting them free to be intermediaries never worked, either.

On 25th March 1884 a British expedition chanced on a male Jarawa group that collected honey in the jungle. A fight ensued that was conducted with bows and arrows on the Jarawa side while the British used knives and guns. One Jarawa man was killed and one wounded in the leg. The wounded prisoner, named Talai, was taken to Port Blair and tended at the hospital there. He recovered and was soon on friendly terms with the British. He kept busy by learning the Hindi language and made himself agreeable to the Officer in Charge of the Andamanese, Mr. Portman, in whose house he lived. Talai accompanied Portman wherever he went and also fraternized with Great Andamanese at Port Blair. In June Mr. Portman led an expedition of 30 Indian convicts and 70 Great Andamanese (in this context a small army rather than a mere expedition) to the elusive Jangil tribe on Rutland island in yet another attempt to track down Jarawa (the Jangil at that time were thought to be Jarawa). Talai accompanied the expedition and was placed under no restraint. He was last seen shooting fish with two Great Andamanese boys . He then quietly absented himself and disappeared. Later it was established that he had gone to the northern end of Rutland Island where he had made a raft and crossed the straight to south Great Andaman. Mr. Portman had high hopes that he would turn into a useful intermediary but Talai was never seen or heard of again. In 1888, a Jarawa boy named Ike was captured and kept much as Talai had been. His behaviour in semi-captivity was friendly, he learnt Hindi and was popular among other Andamanese at Port Blair. Then he disappeared, only to reappear briefly and violently as a member of a Jarawa raiding party. During a skirmish Ike was recognized when he used his linguistic knowledge by abusing his opponents in foul Hindi. After this incident Ike, just as Talai, was never seen again.

Portman, after his diplomatic success with the Onge on Little Andaman (see the section on the Onge above), had been hoping to repeat it with the Jarawa, especially since he thought them to be closely related groups. It did not work. In 1884 the British authorities gave up trying to be friendly and concentrated on containing the Jarawa problem by force. Portman received orders to step up the fight and to re-motivate the Aka-Bea trackers by withholding their rewards until they had some successes to show.

In 1872 the Jarawa had gone on the attack for the first time by raiding the settlement at Port Blair. The year marks the beginning of what the British later called the Jarawa Wars. This war ended only in 1997. During 125 years, hardly a year has passed when the Jarawas did not conduct at least a few raids on the British, other Andamanese tribes or Indian settlers and officials. Mr. Portman had a genuine if authoritarian love and understanding for the Andamanese, including the Jarawa, and seems to have implemented his new instructions with some reluctance and restraint. When he retired in 1900, the Jarawa war became much more brutal. Portman's successor was actually killed during a skirmish with Jarawas in 1902. Calls for their extermination had been heard before but Mr. Portman's moderating influence persisted until 1901.

With the restraint gone, the genocidal party soon gained the upper hand, helped along by a string of bloody Jarawa attacks. Many punitive expeditions between 1910 and the 1920s were in fact undeclared attempts at extermination. As Portman had warned his successors: it could not work. Despite repeated heavy losses, the Jarawa are still living in their jungles and were fighting until 1997 (see also chapter 1). It should be noted, however, that genocide was never official government policy even if it was indeed "fact" on the ground. The slaughter was in the nature of a desperate attempt by mediocre colonial administrators to solve a problem by any means in a penal colony that was becoming itself increasingly brutal.

The worst attempts at exterminating the Jarawa took place during the 1920s but they are - unsurprisingly - virtually documented. The few documents that dealt with these dark events were kept locally at Port Blair and were destroyed during the Japanese occupation of the islands (1942-1945).

In 1997 the Jarawa wars suddenly came to an end: the Jarawa, without any warning or negotiations, came out of their jungle hideouts and wandered - stark naked as is their wont - through Indian villages (where nudity is an absolute taboo). Wherever they went, the Jarawa (mostly young men) helped themselves to everything that took their fancy. They had no concept of money and were used to getting free "friendship gifts" from the authorities. Their sudden acceptance of the friendship that had been offered them since the 1950s threw the authorities into confusion and panic. They were still discussing options and action plans when the Jarawa, in 2004, announced, just as mysteriously as they had come out of the jungle, that they would withdraw again and that they needed no further gifts and wished no further contact. And that was that. It left all non-Jarawa, from administration officials and researchers to eco-activists and NGOs, open-mouthed with astonishment.

A group of cheerful Jarawa youngsters on their beach. Anonymous photographer, 1980s.

Jarawa visitors taking an excursion on an Indian boat. Anonymous photographer, 1980s.

 

Jarawa women in traditional attire. Anonymous photographer, 1980s.

Confusing terminology: The section of a map by E.H. Man dated from the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society 1880 (re-published by E.H. Man in the Journal of Anthropological Studies of 7 March 1882, opposite p. 68) shows the areas occupied by the various Andamanese groups in the 1870s. Note the difference in terminology which is causing such confusion today: the Onge (on Little Andaman) are called Jarawa. In a caption (not shown here) the map states that the "Jarawa" lived in "the Sentinels, and parts of South Andaman"). Note also that the Jangil of Rutland island are shown in "Jarawa" colours but not named and not listed in the caption. yellow: "Jarawa" in the sense of the Onge-Jarawa group red: Great Andamanese

5. The Jangil (Rutland Jarawa)

The interior of the large and hilly island of Rutland, lying just off the south coast of Southern Great Andaman, was home to the most obscure of all Andamanese tribes. For reasons that are not entirely clear, Andamanologists do not so much deny this tribe's separate existence as simply ignore it. On the rare occasions when the Rutland-Jarawa or Rutland-Onge are mentioned at all, it is simply assumed that they were ordinary Jarawa resp. Onge. The interchangeability of the terms "Jarawa" and "Onge" during the 19th century and into the 1930s has done nothing to resolve the confusion.

The last time the Jangil tribe of Rutland was officially mentioned (as far as we know) was in the Census of India, 1931, where on page 8 it is stated

In addition there was a fourth clan of Jarawas of which nothing has been seen since 1907.

The mention of four "Jarawa" tribes does not refer to what we today call Jarawas. It meant all members of the Onge-Jarawa group: the Onge, the Sentineli, the Jarawa proper as well as the Jangil. 

What the meagre evidence suggests is that Rutland Island until the late 19th and perhaps into the early 20th century not only had Aka-Bea (Great Andamanese) and Onge fishing and hunting communities along its coasts but also a Jarawa- or Onge-like tribe living in the interior. The vegetation of Rutland Island is unlike the nearly impenetrable jungle in which the Jarawa tribes of Great Andamans or the Onge of Little Andaman lived. Though hilly, Rutland Island has, like North Sentinel Island, mostly dry, sandy soils that is overgrown with relatively open jungle and brush.

The Andaman Association has in its collection a photograph by M.V. Portman that must have been taken in the 1890s. It is simply labeled in Portman's own handwriting "a Rutland hut". It shows two fairly sizable structures, rather quickly built for short-term usage. The two huts resemble Sentineli communal huts and some Onge constructions more than anything else. They do not look like known Great Andamanese or Jarawa constructions. If so, this would strengthen the idea that the Jangil were more closely related to the Sentineli or Onge rather than to the Jarawa.

The enigmatic photograph with two constructions reported by M.V. Portman as "Jangil huts" in the 1890s. The human figures that can just be made out in the photograph are most unlikely to be Jangil and far more likely members of Portman's Rutland expedition making themselves useful while Portman set up his voluminous photographic equipment and while he took some pictures. Jangil would not have stayed around to be photographed but would have fled at the merest hint of an approaching expedition.

To the best of our knowledge there does not exist a single photograph of a Jangil person.

We only have one source for the existence of a distinct Andamanese group in the interior of Rutland Island. But this solitary source is of such quality that there can be little doubt as to the tribe's existence. Mr. M.V. Portman was in no doubt about the Jangil. As he wrote in 1899:

It must be remembered that at this time [1874] it was thought that the Jarawas on the South Andaman, and those of Rutland Island, were one tribe.

Clearly, in 1899 when he wrote this, he did not think so anymore. It was Portman who recorded the fact that the Great Andamanese Aka-Bea called the Rutlanders "strangers" (Jarawa) or Jangil. In order to distinguish the Rutlanders from the Jarawa living on Great Andaman, we shall use the term Jangil here. The meaning of the term (which Portman himself puts into quotation marks) is not explained and remains unknown.

Throughout the 1880s and for some years later expeditions went into what was then thought of as "Jarawa country", including Rutland island, in search of elusive groups. As far as the Jangil are concerned, only traces of recent occupation, occasionally with signs of a hurried departure and still burning home fires, but no people were ever found. The failure of so many search parties criss-crossing the islands was later justified towards higher authority as a measure to accustom the Jarawa to the British presence. The early expeditions, including those led by Portman himself, had a distinct military flavour but were (before 1900) generally peaceful attempts at making contact. Portman himself suggested in the mid-1890s that the Jangil, "who have not been much molested by us" should be rather more "molested" in future. This was rather out of character for someone normally so sympathetic and understanding of the Andamanese. Portman even went so far as to suggest the construction of a network of supply tracks through the jungle from Portman Bay in order to facilitate molestation. Nothing came of it and the interior of Rutland Island with its Jangil seems to have been forgotten after 1901 when Portman retired and left for England. The Jangil never suffered the genocidal military expeditions mounted by local authorities during the first three decades of the 20th century against the Jarawa of Great Andaman.

In July 1884 an expedition did finally capture a Jangil, male and aged around 30 years. The captive man called himself Habia and it was assumed that this was his name. He was brought to Port Blair where it was found that he spoke a language different from that spoken by the Jarawa of Great Andaman. Habia himself was described as "friendly but half-witted." After a fortnight at Port Blair he fell sick and was returned to Rutland Island and - as usual with such captives - never to been seen again.

Portman says that Habia

could not speak the same language as the tribe of Jarawas on the mainland, and that he was an Aryoto and not an Eremtaga, as they are. I [Portman] could, however, distinguish a connection between the two languages, and at some former period they were undoubtedly the same."

It is infuriating that Portman does not give more detail than this on Habia's language although he must have studied it fairly closely to make such a remark. The cryptic reference to Habia being an "Aryoto" must remain unexplained. It may be a printing error, transposing the two terms, or perhaps it meant merely that Habia was different from the "ordinary" Jarawa who, in Portman's time, were all Eremtaga (for an explanation of these terms see below the Aryoto-Eeremtaga Split). Portman himself later calls the Jangil Eremtaga. The possibility that the captive was an Onge visitor to Rutland can be discounted. Mr. Portman had visited Onges on Little Andaman many times since 1880 would have recognized the Onge language when he heard it.

It took another ten years before the Jangils appeared again in the records. In 1894 a small boat returning from collecting edible birds' nests sailed under the cliff on the southeastern corner of Rutland Island. A group of Jangil surprised the owner of the boat, Moung Yu, by waving at him from their clifftop lookout. However, when he turned his boat towards them he was given unmistakable signs that they wanted no closer contact. Mr. Portman remarked on this incident that Moung Yu had the sense not to land or annoy the Jangil in any way. Interestingly, Portman added that he knew there was a Jangil village on that particular cliff and that he had often visited it and left presents, but that he had never met anybody there.

The third and last recorded contact with the Jangil tribe took place in 1895 when a party of Aka-Bea captured an elderly couple on Rutland Island near the place of Moung Yu's experience. The two were the only people found in a village and probably no longer capable of running away. They were brought to Port Blair and handed over to the inevitable Portman who was eager to take them to Little Andaman to see whether they could converse with the Onge. The plan had to be abandoned when both captives began to sicken and pine in the well-known Andamanese way. Both were hurriedly returned to the place where they had been captured. All that could be established in the short time available was that in personal appearance, in their weapons and ornaments, the Jangil resembled the Onge and not the Jarawa - but also that they were definitively not Onge. The question of the Jangil language remained unsettled, much to Portman's chagrin. The captives spoke so rapidly and indistinctly with each other that no recognizable words could be made out.

The Jangil couple's attitude towards their situation, surroundings and to each other was peculiar. As Portman observed

While at my house, the man, who was surly and evil-tempered, kept begging my Andamanese to kill him by throttling him or cutting his throat, and rejected all overtures of friendship. His wife appeared to be more friendly and was pleasant looking, but when she was willing to make friends with us her husband abused and beat her, and once tried to kill her when she went away for a short distance with an Andamanese woman, being only prevented from doing so by his guards.

Although the Jangil are reported as having been "numerous in former times" it can only mean that they were more numerous in the days before the British became aware of their existence. The interior of the small and not very fertile Rutland Island with little or no access to the resources of the sea would not have provided a living from more than a small group at the best of times. It is conceivable that before the arrival of the great Andamanese Aka-Bea coastal settlers the Jangil controlled the entire island and then could indeed have been much more numerous. The fact is that we just do not know. We also have no idea whether the Jangils' relationship to the Aka-Bea was as hostile as was that of the Jarawa on Great Andaman. From the fact that the Jangil vanished shortly after the turn of the century at roughly the same time as the Aka-Bea, makes it possible that there was some intercourse between the two groups, enough to allow the penetration of newly introduced diseases into their community.

All we know about the Jangils' later fate is that in 1907 the last contact was made (though we have found no details on what happened then). During in the early 1920s a British expedition searched the interior of Rutland Island found no trace of any human habitation.

Additional information on the Jangil from Dr. Vishvajit Pandya, supplied to us 19th February 2005: "I believe that the Jangil were an off-shoot of Onge and Jarawa - getting together at Rutland. This was once indicated to me by an old Onge, Teelai, who had travelled to Rutland in his childhood and heard about it from his father, the late Teelai, who in 1983 must have been more than 85 years old."

6. The Sentineli

It was very rare in the 20th and is quite unique in the 21st century for the representatives of a sovereign government to wade ashore on a small tropical island in order to place cheap baubles on the beach, only to withdraw again in some haste, dodging arrows from natives lurking in the bushes.

Most would connect such a scene with the Age of Discovery, with Columbus, Vasco da Gama or Captain Cook. When, moreover, visiting near-royalty is prevented from landing by a lone warrior on the beach, the story must surely come from the realms of fantasy. Not so. For precisely this scene took place in 1974. The island so difficult to approach for royalty and commoner alike is North Sentinel island. Ex-king Leopold III of Belgium, attended by the chief administrator of the Andaman and Nicobar islands, in that year made an unsuccessful attempt to land there. The royal party was faced down by a lone warrior armed with bow and arrow and clad in nothing but a scowl and a few personal decorative items.

Indian exploratory parties under orders to establish "friendly relations" with the islanders have made brief landings on the islands every few years since 1967. Unencumbered by security worries for a royal dignitary, they could take higher risks. Their usual reception, however, was just as unfriendly as the one for the ex-king. It was all the visitors could do to place gifts of coconuts, plastic buckets, iron tools and other marvels of modern civilization on the beach before they had to scramble back into their dinghy, sometimes under a shower of seriously hostile arrows. Blood was drawn at least once, in March 1974, when an arrow met its mark in the left thigh of the visiting team's cameraman. On seeing that he had scored a hit, the marksman on the beach laughed happily before stalking away to sit proudly in the shade of a tree. He clearly considered that he had done his duty by his people, as indeed he had.

For the past century all sorts of people, ranging from anthropologists to policemen, from to self-important politicians, administrators, naval officers,to private and occasionally blue-blooded busybodies, have tried to land on the island and make friendly contact. The estimated 50 to 400 Sentinelis on their 72 sq.km (28 sq.miles) island would not hear of it.

The earliest known mention of the Sentineli was published by the British surveyor John Ritchie who wrote down the following observation in 1771:

... and if we may judge from the multitude of lights seen upon the shore at night, it is well inhabited...

Until 1880 no known attempt to investigate the island went further than a circumnavigation of the dangerous reefs surrounding it. The islanders themselves were seen only by their torches at night or glimpsed as tiny specks on the beach from afar. In 1880 an expedition under M.V. Portman successfully accomplished the first known landing and exploration of North Sentinel island (see below).

The Sentineli are the quintessential Andamanese: to this day they live their primitive but comfortable and unhurried lives in complete isolation on a small island, they are hostile to all outsiders and they do not wish to change this state of affairs. Violence is the traditional way to ensure the undisturbed enjoyment of their way of life. In the 21st century, they will kill strangers outright and they hide from landing parties that look too strong to fight. If the landing parties offer coconuts and other goods, they will condescend to accept these, but as soon as the feel they have received enough, an obscene gesture makes clear that the outsiders are no longer tolerated and had better leave in a hurry:

A Sentineli man has had enough of the government "friendship visit" and signals all too clearly that they should, erh, go away (Photo courtesy KAS Film 1993)		This is the closest photograph of any Sentineli ever taken. A woman collects coconuts thrown from boats of an Indian goverment "friendship mission" into the water for the Sentineli to pick up. After the Jarawa debacle caused by just such plan- and pointless visits, the visits to the Sentineli were suspended (Photo courtesy KAS Film 1993)

The effect of the tsunami of December 2004 on North Sentinel island - geographically - was devastating. For maps on how much the little island was geologically affected by the earthquake see Tsunami Maps - Sentinel island. The coastline of the entire island was change through a massive tectonic uplift! It is a pity that we do not know what the Sentineli themselves make of it all.

As far as can be observed from afar, all this geological uproar did not affect the Sentineli much, nor has it softened their attitude towards meddlesome outsiders. They might have suffered some losses from the tsunami (we do not know) and they might have had food supply and other problems (we do not know either), but they quite obviously adjusted with amazing speed to their re-shaped island and its changed conditions. It is just as well they did since the outside authorities for months after the major event were fully occupied by first getting their act together and then by keeping an Indian population totally unprepared for such a calamity alive and above the water line.The contrast between the "primitive" but adaptable Sentineli and a modern civilization with all its fragile infrastructure was, and still is, astonishing.

Picture below:
Sentineli on their island. They observe the approach of a boat with an Indian "friendship" mission with grave suspicion and will not allow a much closer approach.
The picture also gives a good impression of the nature and density of forests on North Sentinel island.(Photo taken with a teleobjective in the late 1980s).

We do not know how long the Sentinelis have been on their island or how long they have been isolated there. There are a few Sentineli skulls in collections at Natural History museums that are now being analysed for traces of DNA. The results will be interesting and will be reported here when they come out.

It has been observed that turtles have learnt to avoid the Sentinelis who try to catch them. Since turtles are not among the world's fastest learners this must be an argument of sorts for a long-term human settlement on the island. Be that as it may, from the type of their body decorations and from what little is known of their behavior and handicrafts, they undoubtedly belong to the Onge-Jarawa group and probably also to the enigmatic Jangil of Rutland island (extinct since the early 20th century, see above). However, Onges who have been brought to North Sentinel Island by the British during the 19th century could not understand the Sentineli language so that a considerable time of separation is likely.

The Onge had a name for North Sentinel Island and knew of the island's existence; they also appear to have recognized some degree of relationship when brought into contact with Sentineli. The Jarawa and Jangil lived in their jungles and did not venture onto the open seas (at least as far as is known) so recent contact with them is most unlikely. A comparison of the languages could perhaps answer this question but with the Sentineli language virtually inaccessible, there is nothing to compare with.  

Suggestion to Linguistic researchers: It has frequently been claimed by linguists that the Sentineli language could not be recorded or investigated since contact with the Sentineli has been virtually impossible. This is true as far as it goes. However, advances in technology have invalidated the argument: there are now highly developed directional microphones available that could record any talk among Sentineli on their beaches from a considerable distance (say, from a boat off-shore) without disturbing the Sentineli or endangering the researchers. The recorded conversations could later be analyzed in the safety of the linguists' own laboratories. George Weber

In 1880 the British administrator M.V. Portman became the first outsider known to have landed and explored North Sentinel island. There were some Greater Andamanese Aka-Bea tribesmen on this first of Portman's several expeditions and they warned of the Sentinelis' hostile intent. The British did not at this early time appreciate the many and complex enmities existing among the natives. To increase the confusion, the Andamanese themselves were not too clear about other groups who were not their immediate neighbours. The Aka-Bea on this trip may well have confused the Jarawa (who were their direct neighbors and ancient enemies on Greater Andaman) with the Sentinelis (who probably had little or no contact with the Aka-Bea). Taking Aka-Bea along was counterproductive and may actually have strengthened Sentineli hostility. In 1974 there was a repetition of this scene when the Indians brought three Onge tribesmen (who are thought to be much more closely related to the Sentinelis than the Aka-Bea had been) to the island but found them of little help. The Onge were terrified of the Sentinelis and the frustrated scientists could not even clearly establish from the shouted exchange between Onge and Sentinelis (the Onge with the boat's loudspeaker at their disposal) whether the latter understood at least a little of the formers' possibly related language. The Onge were too far from the beach to understand what the Sentinelis were shouting back at them while their own amplified protestation of desired friendship in the Onge language did not seem to go down well with the Sentineli.

To return to Portman's expedition: it is rather out of character for him to have left us no report on his Sentineli expedition. All that we have been able to find are a number of photographs kept by the Anthropological Survey of India at Calcutta. These are of little scientific value since all those that depict more than just vegetation show Portman's Aka-Bea trackers as "Sentineli" in what Portman must have fancied "typical situations" such as cooking, sleeping, keeping on the lookout for enemies. Portman obviously let his imagination run free and allowed his Aka-Bea poseurs to ham it up to a quite hilarious degree. Entertaining as these photographs are, the lack of any surviving report on the scientific findings made by Portman's expedition is rather unfortunate. Today, little more is known about the Sentineli than was in 1880.

The second recorded landing on North Sentinel island was brought about by a very unusual event. Beginning at nine in the evening of 26th August 1883 distant gunfire was heard at irregular intervals and this was interpreted as the distress signal of a ship. On the morning of the next day the same Portman went out to search for the troubled vessel in the area of Rutland Island, the Labyrinth group and North Sentinel Island. He landed on the latter but found only deserted villages and no sign of a distressed vessel. The natives had melted away again in the face of superior numbers and firepower. The landing party left gifts and then returned to Port Blair. The gunfire continued, streams dried up briefly and the sea receded and advanced several times in a most unusual way. Only when the telegrams arrived did it become clear to the bewildered officials at Port Blair what had happened: the "gunfire" was the final volcanic cataclysm of Krakatoa, exploding 2500 km (1500 miles) away near Java.

North Sentinel island is not only defended to this day by its warriors but also by rough and unpredictable seas, aided and abetted by a nearly unbroken ring of treacherous coral reefs. The reefs make the island all but inaccessible by sea for 10 out of 12 months and fairly dangerous to approach during the remaining two. The island has long been known and feared by sailors for its manifold defenses. Decades would pass between visits, with the Sentineli living their simple lives dreamily undisturbed - for the moment.

Unrecorded successful landings are likely but they cannot have been numerous. Occasional poachers landing on the island and contributing to the continued hostility of the Sentinelis are a distinct possibility. It would be one explanation for the inexplicable changes in Sentineli behavior from one visit to the next, not too far from downright friendly one time, violently and implacably hostile the next. Shipwrecked sailors may also have caused trouble on the island from time to time throughout its history. As late as March 1970 a wreck was spotted on a coral reef off the SE coast of the island. On inspection it was found to have been lying there for 7 or 8 months. There was no sign of the crew.

At least one escaped Indian convict from Port Blair is known to have made his way to North Sentinel Island in 1896. Two others with him were drowned on the reefs surrounding the island. The lone survivor's luck did not hold: he was killed by the Sentinelis and left on the beach where his body was spotted and retrieved by a visiting British party.

None of the recorded landings prior to the 1990s had been successful at establishing friendly relations. The Sentinelis had first demonstrated their standard pattern of avoiding visitors known since the 1880s and were still following it in the 1990s. Small visiting parties were seen off on the beaches. Whenever a larger number of visitors threatened a landing, the islanders took to their forests and did not return to the beaches until the intruders had left. Gifts left behind initially seem only to have fed suspicions. The Sentinelis may never have heard of Greeks but they clearly understand the ancient warning of Greeks bearing gifts. As Indian anthropologists admit privately today: how right they are!

Today, more than a century after the first known landing, the Sentinelis are still the undisputed lords of their island. British India has long since faded into history but the writ of independent India applies to the island only in the sense that it has erected a territorial slab on this oddest speck of land under its sovereignty.

Immediaterly following the earthquake and tsunami of 26 December 2004 there were fears that the Andamanese negrito tribes had been wiped out. The authorities were busy looking after their own and could not be bothered to check on the "natives" until 3 days after the disaster had struck. Then a helicopter was sent to fly over North Sentinel island to check for survivors and if necessary to offer assistance. The crew of the helicopter was confronted by a Sentineli warrior shooting arrows at the machine while others were throwing rocks. The message could not be misunderstood: the Sentineli had lost none of their pre-disaster self-confidence and they still did not want any help or contact whatsoever. It wass the most cheerful news to come out of what was otherwise a devastating disaster. Whether the Sentineli are safe in the longer run is not sure. The earthquake has tiled the islands, some coral reefs have sunk wile others have been raised with hardto estimate damage to thei Sentineli fishing grounds (see the section on North Sentinel island of Tsunami Maps).

What can be said with a reasonable degree of certainty is that Sentinels came - in a deliberate migration or as the result of a group drifting off-course - from Little Andaman. There is also the story of a Sentineli who grew up among Onge, best told in the unavoidable Portman's own words. The story illustrates the degree of uncertainty surrounding things Andamanese even when one of the best-informed authority in the field is involved:

The North Sentinel Island was visited on the 15th of February 1895, and I took some Onges over there from the Quince Islands, as I had learnt at their camp there that one of them was a Sentinels, who had, some years before, left the North Sentinel in a canoe and come across, via Rutland Island, to the Quince Islands and the Little Andamans.

After a search on the 15th and 16th on the coast of the Island, some of the inhabitants were seen near the north-west point in a canoe; though called to be the Onges, and by their own countryman, whom we had brought with us, they showed the usual signs of fright and hostility, and as we did not wish to provoke an encounter, the search party returned without getting close to them.

From my very slight knowledge of the Onge language, it is quite likely that I misunderstood the supposed Sentinels, and he may either have been driven away from the Sentinel in a storm, possibly as a child, and have been adopted by the Onges when he reached them on the Quince Islands, (the adults with him being killed), or there may really be occasional intercourse either between the Sentinel Jarawa and those on Rutland Island, or between the former and the Onge.

It was interesting to note that, unlike their behavior when in the jungles of the Great Andaman, the Onges on each occasion that they have been on the North Sentinel, have taken the lead in searching the forest for Jarawa [=Sentineli], and seemed to have no fear of them.

Like the Onge but unlike the Jarawa, the Sentineli still make canoes. That they build them in a style reminiscent of but not identical to that of the Onge is another pointer at their origin. The Sentineli do not use their canoes much and none has ever been seen outside the protective coral reef surrounding their island.

The island and its inhabitants have enjoyed a peculiarly charmed existence. Apart from a few brief visits during their 90-year rule, the British took very little interest in the island and for decades at a time seemed to forget its existence altogether. The Japanese were not long enough in the Andamans to meddle, especially since the island had no strategic importance. The Indians, too, took some years before noticing their forgotten island. The first official census after independence 1949 in 1951 failed to mention the Sentineli altogether.

Sentineli fishermen. Their outrigger canoe is similar (but not identical) to the outrigger canoes still used by the Onge. Photo taken with a teleobjective in the 1980s.

 

Repeated gifts left for them have mellowed the Sentineli a little in the 1990s and a few visits during which landing parties on the beach were not immediately chased away have taken place. But the Sentineli are still on a short fuse. On one occasion a high-ranking official pulled rank on the anthropologists and insisted on staying longer and going closer to the Sentineli than the scientists recommended. Binoculars on the visitors' boats had spotted a number of warriors hiding in the bushes; they made no hostile moves and seemed to be there just to observe the meeting on the beach but their presence was unsuspected by the visiting party on the beach. When that party had overstayed its welcome and even tried to move closer to the Sentineli, an invisible red line must have been crossed. Warning arrow shots were fired while the hidden warriors stepped from their hiding places. In the rush to the boats, the official responsible for the mess was in such a hurry that his boat overturned and he had to be pulled in, dripping wet. This seemed to amuse the Sentineli as much as it did the accompanying anthropologists - though the latter would have been well-advised to hide their mirth. Unfortunately, at that moment the official's armed guards panicked and a shot was fired into the air. This went down very badly with the Sentineli (who clearly knew what guns were for) and seriously hostile arrows began to fly. Luckily for the visitors, their boats by that time were already out of range.

There was a plan to set up coconut plantations on North Sentinel island as reported in a revealingly casual way by two Indian scientists in 1990 (one of them connected to the Max Planck Institute in Germany):

Recently, there has been some sign of hope for cultivating friendship with the Sentinelese which is pursued by the Andaman and Nicobar Administration. Gifts are kept on the shore which they hesitantly take away. Proposal is also under consideration for the coconut plantation in the island.

The ubiquitous M.V. Portman - otherwise a fairly humane man by the standards of his time and place - shows another side of his character and colonial attitude when he started the evil ball rolling. He suggested that the island should be turned into a coconut plantation and its inhabitants forcibly accustomed to a British presence. In his opinion North Sentinel Island was "admirably adapted" to the planting of coconuts, adding that

if the government decide to convert the whole island into a coconut plantation or if, for scientific or other reasons, it is considered that the aborigines should be tamed, then... search parties should go through the jungle and catch some of the male Jarawas [Sentinelis] and should keep them in the camp... they should be given presents and half the number caught should, after a few days, be allowed to return to their villages... if others do not come willingly... they must be captured and this procedure must be persevered in until the majority of the people on the island have spent some days in the camp, are accustomed to us, and find that they are well fed and not injured."

Happily, theses ghastly suggestions were not acted upon. When we asked the Indian authorities in 1998 what had happened to the reported plans for North Sentinel island, we received the following communication:

Clearly this letter is based on what is official policy: the government's own "Master Plan 1991-2021 for Welfare of Primitive Tribes of Andaman and Nicobar Islands" by S.A. Awaradi (former assistant commissioner of the Nicobars and director of tribal welfare in the Port Blair administration) published in January 1990 by the Andaman and Nicobar Administration at Port Blair. It was to be official government policy - until the Tsunami came along and stopped it all. It is nevertheless a historical document and is reproduced here in full. About the Sentineli Awaradi's report had the following to say: 

Section II / Chapter 21 MASTER PLAN FOR THE SENTINELESE The Sentinelese situation is unique with their existing eco-cultural system and the dynamic eco-cultural equilibrium. The ubiquitous incubus phenomenon of destabilization of eco-cultural equilibrium, in contrast to all other negrito tribes of Andaman Islands, has not yet succeeded to descend on the Sentinelese. The present state of situation with regard to all other primitive tribes viz, the Great Andamanese, the Onge, the Jarawa and the Shompen of Andaman and Nicobar Islands is the consequence of the historical expediency due to the nation's socio-political history, The British India government fought to befriend the hostile Great Andamanese in early years of the Penal Settlement when they decided to found such settlement in the Andamans following the Great Mutiny of 1857. The free India government usurped the territory of the Jarawas and Onges to settle the refugees following the partition of the Greater India in 1947. Similarly the Shompen territory in Great Nicobar Island was usurped to settle the Indian ex-servicemen, as it was thought expedient to inhabit this frontier and most strategic island with such people also though it was inhabited by the tribes i.e. the Shompen and the Nicobarese. Fortunately no such historical and socio-political expediency has crept up affecting the North Sentinel Island. And precisely on account of this the Sentinelese are beyond the reach of the arms of the modern society and hence they continue to be of their own making. 21.2. The above analysis of the tribal situation in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands brings us to the crucial crossroad and the question as to whether we are unwittingly bringing about or Creating the "ideological expediency", the "modern man's burden" to spread everywhere his culture and value system and "share" the"fruits" of the modern cvilization. Or is it the modern man's unending inquisition to uncover the unknown phenomena and people? But as the long experience goes these ethnocentric endeavours have done more harm expecially to the small and isolated primitive communities than any good. Despite all this, the contact expeditions are organised to the Sentinelese with the mission to befriend them. It appears that the genesis of the practice of organisation of contact expeditions is the modified form of the earlier practice of the British lndia government. The British tried to "win" the friendship of the autochthons often through battles while free India government tried to "earn" the friendship and not in the battle field. In case of the Jarawa, as noted above, it might have been expedient to solve the "Jarawa problem" by establishing the friendly relations so that the loss of life and property of the settlers caused by the Jarawas is curbed. However, this purpose/motif of the contact expedition has not been fully accomplished as the Jarawas continue to inflict terror on the non-autochthons and thus able to keep them at bay on the eastern part of the Great Andaman Island. And it appears that the mission to befriend the aborigines (Jarawa) has simply been extended to the hostile Sentinelese too though there was no expediency to do so. Once started, it becomes a bureaucratic precedent and continues as a matter of practice. .21.3. Though there is a specified contact team consisting of the Secretary of Tribal Welfare, Superintendent of Police (Bush Police) Deputy Director of Anthropological Survey of India, Port Blair, Medical Officer, Executive Secretary and the Senior Social Worker of AAJVS, in practice, as in the case of the Jarawas, the special visitors/VIP also accompany the team, creating similar situations as discussed in paragraphs 19.21 and 19,24. The gifts of coconut, machetes are dropped on the beach of the island. This new item of food may cause complication in digestive and. other systems of the Sentinelese. There is the possibility of the danger due to consumption of spoiled coconuts. At times the "adventurous" members of the contact team may cause the mishap like the one that happened a decade ago when the Sentinelese shot the arrows at the "daring" member and the latter had to fire in self defence, and escaped narrowly and fortunately he opened fire in the air that time (paragraph 20.4). Therefore, the basic question is why at all these contact expeditions? The Sentinelese do not require the benevolence of the modern civilization and if at all they require any thing, it is the non-interference, The continuation of the practice of organising the regular contact expedition to the Sentinelese would raise certain fundamental questions like for instance, what right does the modern man have got to interfere in the totally isolated tribal life of the. Sentinelese? What right does he got to decide unilaterally to impose his "friendship" on the Sentinelese who have been vehemently resisting it? Is it not their fundamental community right to live their own way, which they have been enjoying time immemorial? What is the logic in, meddling with their independent and the perfect eco-cultural equilibrium (may be unwittingly) first, and then attempt to run to restabilize the equilibrium? 21.4. Therefore the practice of organizing the contact expedition to the Sentinelese requires a review and modification as under. The expedition shall be organised occasionally to the North Sentinel Island only to observe the Sentinelese and their number from the respectable distance say 50 metres from the shore. No gifts of any kind shall be dropped. The authorised team shall also assess the efficacy of the total isolation of the Sentinelese enforced by the armed forces. A constant surveillance by the Indian Coast Guard,' Indian Navy and Police over this isolated island is kept so that no outsiders approach it. These forces too shall not land or go very near the beach of the North Sentinel Island. 21.5. Two international shipping liners viz. M.V. Primrose and M.V. Rusley have wrecked by agrounding on the coral beds in the coastal waters of the North Sentinel Island recently. The Sentinelese took away some iron pieces from these wrecked ships when they were abandoned following the rescue of crew. Subsequently these two ships have been auctioned away to the scrap dealers by the Andaman and Nicobar Administration. A portion of scrap has already been retrieved by the dealer while major chunk is still left there. The scrapping of ship involves the use of powerful metal cutters, explosives and manpower, thus resulting in intense human activities by the non-autochthons. It would be imperative to stall all such activities near North Sentinel Island. Nevertheless, such grounded ships can not be abandoned either because their hull plates will rust due to long sea water action and ship bottom may wreck spilling the cargo. The cargo spilth (especially the chemicals and oil) could be hazardous to marine life around the North Sentinel Island and in turn the Sentinelese who subsist on it. Therefore in such cases the cargo should be loaded to another ship so that the grounded ships float again and thereafter they are towed to safe place to scrap. Such mishaps may occur here in future also hence the environmental experts shall be consulted before the wreckage is salvaged quickly. If wrecks are to be auctioned, the suitable terms and conditions for the protection of environment and isolation of Sentinelese shall be incorporated in the agreement.

Admirable sentiments and reasonable policies. But the policies must be carried out it and not just pronounced into the void. It has been one of the major shortcomings of a succession of Lieutenant-Governors and their administrations at Port Blair to let discussions on "tribal" matters ramble on and on - with no clear decision ever taken, still less implemented. The "isolators" argued with the "civilizers" within the Anthropological Survey as much as within the administration and so the matter was left for decades. Those interested in a more detailed overview of former British and present-day Indian policies towards the Andamanese negrito are refered to an original publication on the subject Befriending the Jarawa...

Official policies are one thing, reality on the ground another and nowhere more so than in the Andamans. Attempts at contacting the Sentineli by the Port Blair authorities to establish "friendship" through gift giving continued in the 1990s and meet with some success (if that is quite the right word). The same methods used on the Jarawa since 1974 were used on the Sentineli: repeated gift-giving visits (including VIP visitors) to accustom the Sentineli to the alien presence with steadily closer physical contact and increasing dependence on gifts. After the mid-1990s the Sentineli had mellowed sufficiently to allow visitors on their beaches and gifts could be handed over with actual physical touching (and consequent risk of passing disease! the sientists worried about it, the VIP visitors did not).

However, the embarrassment to the administration caused by the "Jarawa crisis" starting in late 1997 grounded the dubious "friendship" campaign towards the Sentineli. The visits to North Sentinel Island ceased abruptly and have not been resumed. It is possible that the authorities at Port Blair have learned from their mistakes in handling the Jarawa, especially since some new personnel isnow involved at decisionmaking level - but on past performance one should not bet on it. Indian Supreme Court judgments and increasing international attention have put the breaks on the local authorities. They are no longer free to misbehave in the privacy of their own islands while hiding behind a screen of admirable sentiments and vague policies.

Optimists were delighted, pessimists wondered what the administration would come up with to simultanenously comply and sabotage the Supreme Court's intentions. It is early days yet but it looks as if the pessimists will have it. The trick used now is to inundate the Jarawa with researchers, researchers' assistants, hangers on and servants. For details on this developing official wheeze to kill off the Jarawa.

The practical problems surrounding North Sentinel Island are indeed formidable and would test the capabilities of even the most competent government. On the supply side there are growing numbers of illegal fishing boats, coral collectors not averse to blowing up reefs with dynamite and "businessmen" ferrying sightseers around the island for a fee. On the demand side there are well-heeled tourists on yachts looking for the "last challenge", nosey parkers and thrill-seekers of all kinds plus, of course, journalists after a story. The Indian Navy's job is to keep such visitors away from the island but it cannot patrol there around the clock, not with the few vessels available and the gun-running, smuggling and poaching going on elsewhere in Andamanese waters. 

Sentineli warrior shoots with bow and arrows at the helicopter sent to find out if any of the isolated tribe there had survived. They had - and they made it very clear that they did not want any visitors or help. The healthy self-confidence of the islanders had survived, too. A less happy message is given by the ground on which this warrier stands: exposed coral reef, lifted out of the sea. The giant earthquake that caused the tsunami also tilted part of North Sentinel island, drowning some reefs and exposing others. The protected fishing ground within the Sentineli reefs has been severely disturbed and it remains to be seen how soon the local environment recovers and whether the hunting and gathering economy. For tectonic changes observed on North Sentinel island see Tsunami maps, section 4.2.

The Sentineli problem has vanished - but not been solved - for the moment because the Port Blair authorities have found themselves confronted with two new problems: on 21 October 1997 they had to face the consequences of their own policies when the Jarawa came to town. And on 26 December 2004 the tsunami struck and changed everything.

While all Andamanese groups seem to have survived the tsunami remarkably well - much better than the Indian settlers - their long-term survival is far from being assured. The shock of the tsunami has had a few positive effects. New and much more reasonable government policies towards the aboriginal tribes are on the drawing board and the relentless pressure of ever more settlers has subsided. The islands are now feared as dangerous.

Whether they have much of a future or not is not clear but despite the uncertainty, North Sentinel Island remains the most amazing human time capsule anywhere on our planet.

7. The Aryoto-Eremtaga Split

Apart from the tribal divisions described above, there had been an additional division among Andamanese before the arrival of outsiders in the mid-19th century. It was a division that went across tribal lines. It separated the shore-dwelling Aryotos from the forest-dwelling Eremtagas (there was also a third group, the creek-dwelling Adajigs who seem to have been the cause of somewhat specialized Eremtagas and about whom nothing further is known). The division was particularly marked among the Great Andamanese where it seems to have been the cause of some tension within tribes. The Aryoto-Eremtaga split also still causes problems in scientific literature where the two groupings are sometimes confused with tribes. While the real tribes were based on language, the Aryoto/Eremtaga dichotomy was based on different economic environments and resulting different ways of life. The Onge on Little Andaman had the same division (known in Onge as shore-dwelling Embelakwe and forest-welling Engeakwe, respectively) but in a much milder form with no specific hostilities between the two groups known. What follows, therefore, is relevant mostly to the Great Andamanese prior to around 1900 when the Aryoto-Eremtaga split had largely disappeared in the cultural collapse.

Among Great Andamanese the Aryoto looked down on the Eremtaga in a way that one could call "stone age snobbery". There was competition and some ill-feeling betrween the groups besides much interaction, such as the exchange of gifts that went for trade among Andamanese. We do not know how, when or why the division between people living exclusively in the thick forests inland and those living along the shores arose within the tribes nor why most tribes should be split in this peculiar way. Archaeology may one day be able to trace and date this development since the different food resources of the two groups are reflected in the composition of their kitchen-midden. The Aryoto and Eremtaga groups within each tribe spoke dialectal variations of the same language. The little-known but predominantly Eremtaga tribe of Aka-Bo had territories that included a long stretch of coast and even off-shore islands but they seem to have made little use of the additional resources. Living next to the sea, the Aka-Bo remained stubbornly Eremtaga.

The Aryoto are far better known than their forest counterparts. The earliest researchers were not even aware of the existence of the Eremtaga, reporting the inland jungles as empty and unsuitable for human habitation. While most Aryoto local groups had been discovered before they died out or merged with other groups, the same is not true of the Eremtaga. It is no coincidence that the last tribe discovered just before 1901, the Aka-Bo, was mostly Eremtaga. The territories held by many Aryoto local groups are known but are mostly unknown for the Eremtagas. The information collected by the three great early researchers in matters Andamanese came almost exclusively from Aryotos and may not always be valid for Eremtagas - a limitation rarely acknowledged in scientific literature.

The Aryoto-Eremtaga split among the tribes:

Tribe	Divisions of 1858
Aka-Cari Aka-Kora Aka-Bo Aka-Jeru Aka-Kede Aka-Kol Oko-Juwoi A-Pucikwar Akar-Bale Aka-Bea	exclusively Aryoto partly Eremtaga, partly Aryoto mostly Eremtaga, a few Aryoto partly Eremtaga, party Aryoto partly Eremtaga, partly Aryoto exclusively Aryoto mostly Aryoto, a few Eremtaga partly Eremtaga, partly Aryoto exclusively Aryoto mostly Aryoto, a few Eremtaga
Onge	partly Embelakwe , partly Engeakwe
Jarawa	exclusively Engeakwe (some groups may have been Embelakwe prior to the late 18th century and could have been exterminated by disease contracted from outsiders)
Jangil	unknown
Sentineli	unknown

The Aryotos were said to be the more daring and adaptable of the two. They exploited not one or two but five or more different environments: that of the sea, the beaches, the coastal forests as well as the mangrove swamps and creeks. Such flexibility gave them far more resources and consequently a larger margin of safety in times of drought and stress. They also had a more healthily varied diet. This could explain why the Aryoto were physically stronger than the Eremtaga. Also, any contact with outsiders touched the Aryoto first; they were raided by slavers and they attacked vessels trying to land on the islands. The Aryotos could do anything that the Eremtagas could and more, but not always quite so well. The Eremtagas were more specialized: they were expert trackers and hunters in the forest. Their Aryoto competitors regarded them as stealthy, cunning, timid and sometimes accused them of cannibalism (just as the Aryoto themselves were accused by outsiders). When not actively quarreling, the two groups had little contact with each other beyond a limited exchange of goods.

An Eremtaga child could be adopted into an Aryoto group but adoption in the other direction was not acceptable to the Aryoto.

We may note here in passing that snobbery appears to be an ancient, deeply rooted and widespread human trait. 

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