One family, and the whole village.

Murung is the largest rite a single Apatani household undertakes. The month is January, Murung piilo in Tanii. The hope attached to it is plain: health, a household that holds, and a prosperity that has to be asked for rather than assumed. Writers call it the festival of prosperity. Inside the valley it is also described as a healing, a setting-right between people and the spirits who are believed to withhold or to give.

There is no photograph on this page. A Murung belongs to the family who has taken it on, and we didn't want to turn their altar into a picture for a website.

We are in Mudang Tage. If a house on this lane is inside a Murung, January will be fuller than usual, in a good way. We don't stage it, and a room with us is not a seat at someone else's celebration. If one is happening, we'll tell you how to be a welcome guest.

The expectation, stated by Apatani writers, is that a man performs Murung at least once in his life. It is not an annual fair that every village opens on the same morning. One household hosts. The village, and people from villages around it, come. That is why a rite that starts with one family can fill a lane.

There are two scales. The priest, the nyibu, is the one who says which scale the spirits are asking for. He chants over a chicken, and the liver is read. From that reading he tells the household whether the smaller rite or the larger one is the one to keep.

A mithun is the animal the valley counts as wealth. Offering one is a serious gift, not something done for visitors. The meat is later divided and shared with the clan, the relatives, and the people who came to help. If someone hands you food that week, you're being included. Eat with them, and thank them. Please don't ask to watch the offering itself.

Murung is spoken of as a month. The last days are the concentrated ones. Before that, relatives and neighbours collect firewood. Bamboo, cane, and leaves are brought in. Rice is pounded. Rice beer is brewed by the clan. Ropes, subu-sa, are twisted from cane so the animals can be led and tied. Young men of the clan do a good part of that rope-work on the lapang, the raised community platform that each clan keeps in the village. Mudang Tage has its own lapangs. They are work-floors and meeting-floors for the rest of the year. In a Murung they become the place the animals are brought to and chanted over.

On the night that matters, the animals are at the lapang and the nyibu chants over them. That chant is subu hinii. The sense he is required to speak is that the animals are going to the spirits, not being taken for the household’s appetite. He tells, in the chant, where they are to go. Ginger is held. The words are specialist words. They are not a script a guest is meant to follow along.

In the morning the animals are still at the lapang. Men mark them with rice paste and bamboo shavings, and rice beer is part of that preparation. They are offered after the night’s chant. Chickens are offered in a number tied to the number of mithuns. The meat is then divided and given out. The days around that morning have their own names in Tanii. This page does not turn that sequence into a timetable. The order belongs to the priest and the clan.

Dree has a common day, 5 July, because the valley decided in 1967 to share one. Myoko has a turn, and you can ask which group of villages is hosting. Murung has a household. You find out by being in the village, or by asking the house, not by checking a festival calendar from another state.

It is also not the music festival. A band on a field in September has a ticket and a lineup. Murung has neither, and it doesn't need them. If the lane is full of relatives, you've arrived in the middle of a family celebration. We'll show you a quiet way around, and you're welcome to greet people if they greet you.

January is cold in Ziro, and it isn't automatically a Murung at our house. It becomes one when a family has taken the festival on. Write to us and ask. If one is underway, we'll tell you honestly about the noise, the visitors, the food, and whether we still have a quiet room for you.

Book a room once we've confirmed the dates. The confirmation is for your bed. If a neighbour is hosting Murung, we'll introduce you properly rather than send you to their door.