Back to the Wiki
Wiki · Section

Festivals

The seasonal calendar of Assam's communities.

The festivals of spring

The year opens in spring, at the turn of the farming calendar, with the festivals of sowing and the new year.

A young man in a Bihu gamosa headband playing the pepa, a buffalo-horn pipe, in close-up, with a woman dancer in red Bihu costume posed behind him in a field
Festival

Rongali Bihu (Bohag Bihu)

The spring festival of Assam. Seven days of dance, songs, new clothes, and the gamosa. Marks the Assamese new year and the start of the sowing season.

Ambubachi at Kamakhya

The festivals of the rains, the Goddess's season, when devotion draws some of the region's largest gatherings.

Black-and-white close portrait of an elderly sadhu with a long white beard and weathered face gazing toward the camera at the Ambubachi Mela
Festival

Ambubachi Mela

The tantric pilgrimage festival at Kamakhya. The temple closes for three days when the goddess is said to menstruate.

Lamps, and thanksgiving

The festivals of autumn, the lean season before the new crop: austere, lamp-lit prayer set against thanksgiving for the harvest.

An earthen lamp burning atop a bamboo pole, sheltered by a folded banana-leaf hood, against the night
Festival

Kati Bihu (Kongali Bihu)

The austere mid-year Bihu. Granaries empty, the new crop not yet in. Earthen lamps in the paddy fields, prayers for the standing crop.

The harvest, and the ancestors

The festivals of winter, the season of plenty and of remembrance: harvest feasting set beside rites for the dead.

A tall conical thatch-and-bamboo meji pyre ablaze at dawn in a harvested field, with sparks rising into a dawn sky
Festival

Magh Bihu (Bhogali Bihu)

The harvest festival. Bonfires, feasts, traditional games. The Bihu of the granary.

Festivals · Storied Assam