Yao Minority

General Information

Yao ethnic group has a population of over 2.6 million, and mainly inhabit in Guangxi, Hunan, Yunnan, Guangzhou, Guizhou and Jiangxi Provinces. Most of the Yao people are farmers living together in small groups distributed widely throughout the mountainous areas. Longsheng, close to Guilin, has a lot of small Yao communities. China Highlights tours to Longsheng, almost without exception, include a chance to visit a Yao village.

In the past, the Yao people were further divided into subgroups based on historical differences in their economic backgrounds, lifestyles, manners and customs. In total, there used to be as many as twenty branches of the Yao ethnic group.

Yao people have their own language, but dialects vary a lot. The variations can be so vast that members of different groups cannot even understand each other. Furthermore, they do not have their own written language, so they have adopted the system of Chinese characters. Because they have lived together and interacted with the Han, Zhuang and Miao nationalities for a very long time, Yao people generally can speak Chinese, and some can also speak Zhuang and Miao languages.

• Marriage customs of ethnic groups are various and unique. Guizhou Museum of Marriage Customs Of Ethnic Minorities is the only museum in China that features marriage customs of ethnic minorities.

History

Origins of the Yao people can be traced back to the Qin Dynasty (221 – 207 BC). After over 2,000 years’ development and migration, the development of their social economies is quite out of balance. It developed very quickly in some areas resulting in economies that paralleled that of Han; however, in the remote mountainous areas, the Yao people just lived in groups around the creeks and valleys and also they did not even have farming. These people made a living by hunting animals in the mountains. As a result of the exploitation, wars and slaughters by the feudal rulers before the establishment of China (1949), some of the Yao people escaped to borders of Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. In the 1970s some of the Yao people living in these countries immigrated to the US, France, Canada and other countries.

Eating Habits

The main foods of the Yao people are rice, corn and sweet potato. Yao people like drinking wines, and Yao males prefer drinking from bowls to cups. They make rice wine of sweet taste. Whenever guests come to visit, they will offer sweet rice wine. By boiling with ginger, brown sugar and eggs, sweet rice wine becomes a restorative tonic for women after accouchement.

Yao people basically have the same eating habits with the Han people, but also have their own featured food – You Cha (oil tea). People first sauté tea leaves in oil, then add water to make soup out of it. Some seasonings, such as ginger, pepper, salt are added. When consumed, the soup is mixed with rice puff, fried beans, peanuts and other materials. The soup is fragrant with bitter taste at first. But after one bowl or two, sweet taste is gradually coming out. Oil tea is a healthy drink that promotes blood flow and warms the body.

Architectural Style

Yao people live in bamboo huts, log cabins, thatched cottages and a few live in houses built with mud walls and tiled roofs. Yao people living in mountainous areas share similar house styles with Zhuang and Miao people. Ganlan style (constructed on pilings rather than entirely on the ground), also called Diaojiaolou (wooden houses projecting over the water) is the most common.

The house is usually two-storied. The lower story consists of pilings that support the house, and bamboos, wood boards are filled between the pilings to form a wall for keeping livestock, storing farm tools, firewood or other sundries. Family members live on the upper story, which is divided into 3 or 5 rooms. Some houses are more complicated with lofts or annexes.

Costumes

The clothes of both men and women of the Yao ethnic group are made of blue and green folk weaves. Men like to wear front opening short robes without collars, together with long pants or knee-length shorts. The men living in Yao villages in Nandan County of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region wear white embroidered trousers. The Yao men living in Liannan Yao Autonomous County of Guangdong Province are fond of making chignons, pronounced "sheen-yon," usually decorated with pheasant feathers for their hair, and wimpling, or wrapping their heads with red cloth. Yao women like to wear side opening jackets without collars and long pants, shorts, or accordion pleated skirts. In addition, they always sew colorful and gorgeous hand-stitching work as well as embroideries on the collars, cuffs, belts and skirt hems, to make them very bright-colored and eye-catching.

The Yao people have many varieties and styles of headdresses. They like to use silver hairpins, silver flowers, strings of silver beads, small arch-shaped silver planks and so on together with colorful ribbons to make head accessories. Judging from the different accessories, one can easily tell whether or not a girl is a maiden, unmarried or married woman.

Yao people respect old people very much. When meeting an elderly person outside, it is necessary to extend greetings and then retreat to the lower part of the road for them to pass. One must dismount if he meets an old person while riding a horse. It is not allowed to sit cross-legged, speak dirty words, or use their names while sitting in front of seniors or old people. While having dinner with old people, one should offer them a higher seat, serve them food, and put the most delicious dishes close to the senior guests.

Generally speaking, the Yao people do not intermarry with other ethnic groups. The custom of having the husband live with the wife's family is quite popular. The young men and women have the freedom of choosing and falling in love with a partner. Through the form of ballads, they seek their lovers during festivals, assemblies, and the slack farming season while visiting different villages. If they both like each other, they will give each other keepsake. This is the tradition of falling in love freely without the intervention of parents. In some areas they need permission from their parents, so a matchmaker will assist in communicating between the two parties before they decide to get married.

Festivals

Yao people share many festivals with Han people, but also have their own unique festivals. The most important ones include Panwang Festival and Danu Festival.

Panwang Festival is the grandest festival among the Yao people. It is said that this is a festival to commemoratehe struggle of their ancestors against the exploitation of ancient hereditary chieftains. Panwang Festival has been commonly referred to as Entertaining God of Panwang and thanking him for making their wishes come true. It is held on October 16th according to the local calendar every three or five years; however, in some areas, the Yao people have this festival once in twelve years. The frequency of this festival depends on the traditions of different Yao branches, how good the harvest is and the health of both people and their livestock. Usually several families or maybe even the whole village celebrate this festival together. During the main ceremony, the folk master will entertain the God of Panwang, pray and sing songs for him, and villagers will play the long-drum dance which asks Panwang for protection.  

Danu festival falls on May 29 on the lunar calendar. In Miao language, Danu means never forget. It is believed that this day is the birthday of Zuniang, an ancestor of the Yao people. As a result, it is also name named Zuniang Festival.　

It is said that Zuniang was actually known as Miluotuo by the ancient Yao people.　Once she asked her third daughter to go to the mountains to reclaim the land. Before her daughter left, she gave her a precious item---the bronze drum. The drum helped the young girl dispel birds and make a good harvest. The third daughter of Zuniang got married with a local Yao man and lived happily in the mountains. Their lives flourished and produced more and more descendants, who were the early ancestors of today's Yao nationality. To commemorate Zuniang, the Yao people celebrated her birthday and named it Danu Festival.　

On this day, all the Yao people from different villages clean their houses and streets; they also make offerings of rice wines, sticky rice cakes, chicken and sheep to worship Zuniang. Young men and women assemble to celebrate the birthday of Zuniang by hitting a big drum which symbolizes the bronze drum that Zuniang had given to her daughter. All of them worship Zuniang piously and pray to her for a good harvest every year as well as a happy and prosperous life to both people and livestock. In addition, they will sing the traditional Miluotuo songs accompanied by dance and music as a tribute to Zuniang and what she had done for the Yao people.

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