Brought up on traditions which were untrue besides being most wicked, the Lamanites, Mormon in his abridgment notes, were in and of themselves a hard and ungracious people. But many Nephites who had become dissatisfied with their own people and had aligned themselves with the Lamanites were still harder. The venom so often seen in apostates was in them deeply infused. By stories of Nephite atrocities and Nephite intentions towards them, the Lamanites were goaded on to seek revenge on them for injustices never perpetrated. Under the constant urging of the Amalekite and Amulonite apostates the Lamanites grew more and more in the wicked intents of their hearts; the Sacred Record says, "that they should wax strong in wickedness and their abominations."
The Amalekites were a sect of Nephite apostates whose origin is not given. Very early in the days of the Republic they had affiliated with the Lamanites, and with them, as we have noted, built a large city which they called Jerusalem. They were exceedingly crafty and hard-hearted. They, a short time afterward, led in the massacres of the Christian Lamanites, or people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi. In later years, the Lamanite commanders were in the habit of placing them in high positions in their armies, evidently because of their greater force of character, their intense hatred of their former brethren, and also their more wicked and murderous disposition. In the Sacred Record they are generally associated with the Zoramites and Amulonites.
The Amulonites were the descendants of Amulon and his associate wicked priests of King Noah. They were Nephites on their father's side, and Lamanites on their mother's, but by association and education, were of the latter race.
Many of them, however, were displeased with the conduct of their fathers and took upon themselves the name of Nephites, and were considered among that people ever after. Of those who remained Amulonites, many became followers of Nehor and were scattered in the Lands of Amulon, Helam, and Jerusalem, all of which appear to have been districts in the same region of country. It is recorded of them that not one repented and received the Gospel Message that was preached by the sons of King Mosiah; on the contrary, they became leaders in the persecution carried on against the suffering people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi, and were those who, with the Amalekites, slew the greater number of that unoffending people who thus suffered martyrdom.
In the succeeding war with the Nephites (81 B.C.), when Ammonihah was destroyed, nearly all the Amulonites were killed in the battle in which Zoram, the Nephite commander, defeated the Lamanites. The remainder of the Amulonites fled into the East Wilderness where they usurped power over the people of Laman, and in their bitter hatred of the truth, caused many of the latter to be burned to death because of their belief in the Gospel. These outrages aroused the Lamanites, and they in turn, began to hunt the Amulonites to put them to death. This was in fulfillment of the words of the Prophet Abinadi, who, as he suffered martyrdom by fire at the hands of Amulon and his associates, told them, "What ye shall do unto me, shall be a type of things to come"; by which he meant that many should suffer death by fire as he was suffering.
And he said unto the priests of Noah that their seed should cause many to be put to death in the like manner as he was, and that they should be scattered abroad and slain, even as a sheep having no shepherd is driven and slain by wild beasts; and now behold, these words were verified, for they were driven by the Lamanites, and they were smitten. (Alma 25:12.)