Mouding County History
Mouding county (牟定县) is located in Chuxiong Yi Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan province, China.It is situated in the north-central part of Yunnan province.The county is 57.6 kilometers from north to south, and 53.6 kilometers from west to east at most. Within the territory of Mouding County,the highest elevation is 2879 meters, and the lowest elevation is 1140 meters,while the average elevation is 1758 meters in the county town of Gonghe. By 2012, Mouding county has the distribution of ethnic Yi, Bai, Dai, Zhuang, Miao, Hui, Lisu, Lahu, and so on. Yi occupies 20.04% of the total population. Multiple minorities promote the colorful and long-standing history of Mouding county.
The History of Yi Ethnic Group
The Yi or Lolo people[3] are an ethnic group in China, Vietnam, and Thailand. Numbering 8 million, they are the seventh largest of the 55 ethnic minority groups officially recognized by the People’s Republic of China. They live primarily in rural areas ofSichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, and Guangxi, usually in mountainous regions. As of 1999, there were 3,300 “Lô Lô” people living in Hà Giang, Cao Bằng, and Lào Cai provinces in northeastern Vietnam.
The Yi speak various Loloish languages, Sino-Tibetan languages closely related to Burmese. The prestige variety is Nuosu, which is written in the Yi script.
Some scholars believe that the Yi are descended from the ancientQiang people of today’s western China, who are also said to be the ancestors of the Tibetan, Naxi and Qiang peoples. They migrated from southeastern Tibet through Sichuan and into the YunnanProvince, where their largest populations can be found today.
They practice a form of animism, led by a shaman priest known as the Bimaw. They still retain a few ancient religious texts written in their unique pictographic script. Their religion also contains many elements of Daoism and Buddhism.
Many of the Yi in Liangshan and northwestern Yunnan practiced a complicated form of slavery. People were split into the nuohuo or Black Yi (nobles), qunuo or White Yi (commoners), and slaves. White Yi were free and could own property and slaves but were in a way tied to a lord. Other ethnic groups were held as slaves.
