NAGA CITY - Many believed that the name Naga is taken from Narra
Trees. But this can be easily contested and debunked. History tells us
that the ancient people of Naga City as well as Legaspi City were mostly
Hindu worshipers while others were animist. Perhaps, to understand our
ancient past we can look at the old empire of Majahapit and its
religion. Malay regions and its islands were part of Melayu and the
islands now we call Philippines.
Origin of NAGA
Naga is a Cobra, a
king snake. Nagas was called "Nueva Caceres" or New City in English by
the Spanish Conquistadors and Friars. However, the name Naga is from
Ramayana and Mahabharata. "The Nagas of the Sanskrit literatures may be
identified with the Nagas, who in their climax of glory came to rule in
Northern India, after the fall of the great Kushanas before the rise of
the imperial Guptas in Northern India, the descendants of whom may be
the present Naga Sadhus of central India. Thus it is hard to accept the
theory of "Naga" originating from Sanskrit "Nag" meaning serpent. There
is no snake worship cult among the Nagas, though the Python is revered
sometimes and its killing is done ceremonially and elaborately. Some
have connected the "Naga" with Sanskrit "Nag" meaning mountain as the
people live mostly in the hills, thus implying "hill men." (http://www.angelfire.com/nm/nagalim/origin.htm)
In Sanskrit, a nāgá (नाग) is a cobra, the Indian cobra (Naja naja). A
synonym for nāgá is phaṇin (फणिन्). There are several words for "snake"
in general, and one of the very commonly used ones is sarpá (सर्प).
Sometimes the word nāgá is also used generically to mean "snake". The
word is cognate with English 'snake', Germanic: *snēk-a-, Proto-IE:
*(s)nēg-o- (with s-mobile).
