Assamese Ghosts and Spirits: A Guide to Assam's Folklore Demons
A guide to Assamese demonology — the spirits, exorcism rites, and folk stories recorded in 1905 by Benudhar Rajkhowa in Sibsagar, Assam.
Assamese Ghosts and Spirits: A Guide to Assam's Folklore Demons
Assamese Demonology: The Ghosts, Goblins, and Fallen Gods of Old Assam Picture a district officer in Sibsagar, Assam, sitting down in 1904 and deciding that someone ought to write down what everybody already believed but nobody had bothered to record. That's exactly what Benudhar Rajkhowa did. His short book, Assamese Demonology , published in 1905, isn't a scholarly theory of the supernatural — it's a field notebook. He talked to people, listened to what "fell from the lips of the populace," as he put it, and wrote it down without dressing it up. The result is a strange and oddly systematic catalogue of water-demons, tree-spirits, household ghosts, and gods who got demoted to goblin status. This piece walks through the whole thing: how the spirits are sorted, who they are, how you get rid of them, and the folk stories that made them real to the people who told them. A Hindu Cosmos With Some Gods Fired From Heaven Rajkhowa opens by explaining something that sounds al…
About the author
Subham Halder is the creator and author of True Horror Feed. He researches and writes about true scary stories, paranormal experiences, folklore, urban legends, mythology, and unexplained incidents, with an emphasis on distinguishing documented info…
