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Chinese Name: 彝族
English Name: The Yi people,
Languages: Yi language 彝语, Chinese 汉语
Total population: 8.71*106 (China mainland 2022)
Distribution: Guangxi, Guangdong, Yunnan, Guizhou, Hunan, etc.
Brief introduction
The Yi people 彝族 is the sixth largest ethnic group in China. The national language is Yi, which belongs to the Sino-Tibetan language family 汉藏语系. The Yi people are mainly distributed between the plateaus and coastal hills of Yunnan, Sichuan and Guizhou. The largest Yi inhabited area in the country is located in Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture 凉山彝族自治州.
The history of the Yi people
Although there are different opinions on the origin of the Yi nationality, the academic circles have a relatively consistent view on the origin of the Yi nationality. According to historical records in Chinese and Yi languages, the ancestors of the Yi people have a close relationship with the ancient Qiang people in the west, and the Yi people are mainly derived from the ancient Qiang people. According to the historical legends of the Yi people, their ancestors went south to the Jinsha River 金沙江 and Anning River 安宁河basins in ancient times.
The religion of the Yi people
The religious beliefs of the Yi people are basically still at the stage of primitive religion. For example, nature worship is still widespread in society. The Yi people’s worship of nature comes from the concept of animism. Due to the low productivity in the past Yi areas, people lacked the ability to control nature, so they regarded everything as a spiritual thing, with the same life and will as human beings. This worship of nature developed at the same time as the worship of the human soul.
The Yi people believe that the soul is attached to the body at birth, and the soul leaves the body and exists after death. From this concept of soul, it is inferred that everything in the world has a soul, and their activities or natural phenomena are regarded as the result of the soul’s domination, thus forming the worship of nature.
The Cultures of the Yi people
Yi clothing 彝族服饰
The Yi nationality has many branches, scattered living, a complex natural environment, and unbalanced social and economic development. Their clothing has formed obvious regional characteristics in terms of texture, style and pattern. Generally, it can be divided into six types according to the settlements of the Yi people in Liangshan 凉山, Wumengshan 乌蒙山, Red River 红河, southeastern Yunnan 滇东南, western Yunnan 滇西, and Chuxiong 楚雄. Here we mainly introduce the national costumes of the Yi people in Liangshan.
Speaking of the traditional costumes of the Yi nationality in Liangshan, both men and women wear a large-breasted jacket with a right hem, wrapped in leggings, usually lame, and hemp shoes in winter. The man’s head is wrapped in a bun, and the left ear is wearing honey wax beads, silver earrings and other accessories.
Women wear pleated skirts and headbands. After giving birth, they can wear hats or wrappings. They like to wear earrings, bracelets, and silver badges. The traditional clothing is mainly self-woven and self-dyed wool and linen, and the traditional colours are black, red and yellow. The patterns and decorations are mostly animals, plants and living items such as cockscombs, horns, fire sickles, ferns, and panes.
Yi architecture 彝族建筑
The Yi dwellings in Liangshan are “tile houses”; the northern and central parts of Guizhou and Yunnan are “Tuzhang houses 土掌房”, “square watchtowers 方型碉楼”, “stacked wooden houses 垛木房” and “Xiafang houses 厦片房”; Guangxi and eastern Yunnan are “Ganlan” dwellings.
The villages of the Yi ethnic group generally live in groups and are mostly located on the hillsides, which are surrounded by mountains and rivers, sheltered from the sun and the wind, with lush trees, fertile land, and open terrain, which are conducive to farming and grazing and military defence. They live in scattered places in the high mountains, and in the mid-mountain and river valleys. A family of blood relatives live together to form a natural village, ranging from a few households to dozens of households.
The valleys are slightly different from the alpine regions. Most of the river valley areas are earthen houses, with mud for walls and wood for shingles, wooden boards for internal partitions, and wooden tenons for the connection of beams, columns and rafters. Bamboo walls and slabs are often used in alpine areas, and bamboo walls are also used for internal intervals. The beams, columns and rafters are mostly made of bamboo or bamboo and wood, and bamboo strips and vines are often used for binding. The slabs are compacted with stones, and the floor is generally rammed earth.
Yi diets 彝族饮食
The staple foods of the Yi people are potatoes, corn, buckwheat, and rice. Non-staple foods include meat, beans, vegetables, seasonings, and beverages. Meat food is dominated by cattle, sheep, pigs and chickens, and it is necessary to kill animals to entertain guests. Killing cattle is the most expensive, followed by sheep and pigs.
Yi Torch Festival 彝族火把节
The Torch Festival is a traditional festival of the Yi nationality, which falls on the 24th day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar every year. During the festival, people dressed in costumes gather on the flat dams or gentle slopes near the villages to sing, dance, race horses, bullfights, sheep fights, wrestling, beauty pageants, etc. The content of the activities is colorful and lively. In the morning, people would kill animals to sacrifice to their ancestors; in the evening, they would swim around the crops with torches, meaning to burn the pests and pray for a good harvest.
