Like their northern Neighbours, the Angamis, the Tangkul Nagas, in number about 27,000 and inhabiting the North east portion of the Native States of Manipurm are grouped in small communities, in villages of. "One house" to over 200 houses, and remain to a great extent isolated on their hill topes. This condition of things strongly favours the growth of dialects, and in this tribe it can be truly said that almost every village, and there are nearly 150, has its separate dialects.
Ukhrul, 'the most important and influential village of the tribe having been decided upon, in 1896 as the headquarters of the mission its dialect has been reduced to writing, and this grammar only professes to be an investigation of that dialect. The Policy of Bringing in from the surrounding villages suitable students to the training School at Ukhrul leads the way to a gradual unifications of the language.
Tangkhul Naga has been place under the Tibetan Burman Family Naga Kuki Sub group by Sir G.A. Grierson of the Linguistic Survey of India. Vol: 3. Part: 2. pages 451-471. Exception of the said Survey by Dr. Grierson.
With a view to help in any possible further investigation of these various naga Groups of languages, the suggestion to very as little as possible with the arrangement of the Manipuri Grammar, published in 1912, and to even use same illustrative sentences, was agreed to, and I trust the comparisons shown between the two language will be found of interest to philologists I Gratefully the interest taken in my labours by Assam Government, through whose kindness this publication also has been made possible.
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