Community hub
Recent from talks
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
Qiang people
The Qiang people (Qiangic: Rrmea; Chinese: 羌族; pinyin: Qiāngzú) are an ethnic group in China. They form one of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognised by the People's Republic of China, with a population of approximately 312,981 in 2020. They live mainly in a mountainous region in the northwestern part of Sichuan (Szechwan) on the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau.
The modern Qiang refer to themselves as Rma (/ɹmæː/ or /ɹmɛː/, 尔玛, erma in Chinese or RRmea in Qiang orthography) or a dialect variant of this word. However, they did not define themselves with the Chinese term "Qiang ethnicity" (Chinese: 羌族) until 1950, when they were officially designated Qiāngzú.
Qiang has been a term that has historically referred less to a specific community, but more to the fluid western boundary of Han Chinese settlers. Chinese philosophers of the Warring States period also mentioned a 'Di-Qiang' peoples living on the western edge of Han territory. They were known for their customs of cremation.
People called "Qiang" have been mentioned in ancient Chinese texts since they first appeared in oracle bone inscriptions 3,000 years ago. Recognized as a 'first ancestor culture', there is evidence of the Qiang in northwestern China dating back to the 16th-11th centuries B.C., when they were recorded bringing tribute to the Shang Dynasty. They were primarily known to practice pastoral nomadism, and resisted westward expansion of the Han Empire, gradually shifting to the south-west of their ancestral lands.
However, the name Qiang has been applied to a variety of groups that might not be the same as the modern Qiang. Many of the people formerly designated as "Qiang" were gradually removed from this category in Chinese texts as they become sinicised or reclassified. By the Ming and Qing dynasties, the term "Qiang" denoted only non-Han people living in the upper Min River Valley and Beichuan area, the area now occupied by the modern Qiang. Nonetheless, most modern scholarship assumes that modern Qiang are descended from the historical Qiang people.
During the wars centering on the 1580s, the term "Qiang" or less often "Qiang Fan" was increasingly applied to areas in the southern sections of the Upper Min valley that are identified as Qiang today; and in the same materials the term "Fan" was used for areas to the north and east that are today Zang (Tibetan). The ruins reported by Western travellers in the early 20th century testify to the violence of that official repression. We suggest that the origins of the modern Qiang, who for the past four centuries have cast their lot with Chinese rulers more readily than the people of Shar khog, may be sought in the Ming, beginning with Chinese in-migration at Maozhou in the 15th century and culminating in the violence upriver in the 1580s.
— Xiaofei Kang, Donald S. Sutton
Analysis of Han and Western (European) scholarly sources reveals that in the first half of the twentieth century, there was no coherent 'Qiang' culture in the Upper Min Valley of northwestern Sichuan. Rather, there existed a plethora of inhabited regions with settlers of individual communities identifying themselves as rma. A significant cultural variation was observed even among neighboring communities. In particular, Han and Tibetan influences were prevalent in those rural communities.
Hub AI
Qiang people AI simulator
(@Qiang people_simulator)
Qiang people
The Qiang people (Qiangic: Rrmea; Chinese: 羌族; pinyin: Qiāngzú) are an ethnic group in China. They form one of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognised by the People's Republic of China, with a population of approximately 312,981 in 2020. They live mainly in a mountainous region in the northwestern part of Sichuan (Szechwan) on the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau.
The modern Qiang refer to themselves as Rma (/ɹmæː/ or /ɹmɛː/, 尔玛, erma in Chinese or RRmea in Qiang orthography) or a dialect variant of this word. However, they did not define themselves with the Chinese term "Qiang ethnicity" (Chinese: 羌族) until 1950, when they were officially designated Qiāngzú.
Qiang has been a term that has historically referred less to a specific community, but more to the fluid western boundary of Han Chinese settlers. Chinese philosophers of the Warring States period also mentioned a 'Di-Qiang' peoples living on the western edge of Han territory. They were known for their customs of cremation.
People called "Qiang" have been mentioned in ancient Chinese texts since they first appeared in oracle bone inscriptions 3,000 years ago. Recognized as a 'first ancestor culture', there is evidence of the Qiang in northwestern China dating back to the 16th-11th centuries B.C., when they were recorded bringing tribute to the Shang Dynasty. They were primarily known to practice pastoral nomadism, and resisted westward expansion of the Han Empire, gradually shifting to the south-west of their ancestral lands.
However, the name Qiang has been applied to a variety of groups that might not be the same as the modern Qiang. Many of the people formerly designated as "Qiang" were gradually removed from this category in Chinese texts as they become sinicised or reclassified. By the Ming and Qing dynasties, the term "Qiang" denoted only non-Han people living in the upper Min River Valley and Beichuan area, the area now occupied by the modern Qiang. Nonetheless, most modern scholarship assumes that modern Qiang are descended from the historical Qiang people.
During the wars centering on the 1580s, the term "Qiang" or less often "Qiang Fan" was increasingly applied to areas in the southern sections of the Upper Min valley that are identified as Qiang today; and in the same materials the term "Fan" was used for areas to the north and east that are today Zang (Tibetan). The ruins reported by Western travellers in the early 20th century testify to the violence of that official repression. We suggest that the origins of the modern Qiang, who for the past four centuries have cast their lot with Chinese rulers more readily than the people of Shar khog, may be sought in the Ming, beginning with Chinese in-migration at Maozhou in the 15th century and culminating in the violence upriver in the 1580s.
— Xiaofei Kang, Donald S. Sutton
Analysis of Han and Western (European) scholarly sources reveals that in the first half of the twentieth century, there was no coherent 'Qiang' culture in the Upper Min Valley of northwestern Sichuan. Rather, there existed a plethora of inhabited regions with settlers of individual communities identifying themselves as rma. A significant cultural variation was observed even among neighboring communities. In particular, Han and Tibetan influences were prevalent in those rural communities.