Legend of Chiyou and origins According to a Tang dynasty Chinese legend, the Miao who descended from the
Jiuli tribe led by
Chiyou () were defeated at the
Battle of Zhuolu (, a defunct
prefecture on the border of present provinces of
Hebei and
Liaoning) by the military coalition of Huang Di () and Yan Di, leaders of the
Huaxia () tribe as the two tribes struggled for supremacy of the
Yellow River valley. The
San Miao, according to legend, are the descendants of the Jiuli Tribe. Chinese records record a San Miao (
三苗, Three Miao) kingdom around
Dongting Lake. It was defeated by
Yu the Great. Another Miao kingdom may have emerged in
Yunnan around 704 BC that was subjugated by the Chinese in the 3rd century BC. In 2002, the
Chu language has been identified as perhaps having influence from
Tai–Kam and
Miao–Yao languages by researchers at
University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Dispersal The Miao were not mentioned again in Chinese records until the
Tang dynasty (618–907). In the following period, the Miao migrated throughout southern
China and
Southeast Asia. They generally inhabited mountainous or marginal lands and took up swidden or slash-and-burn cultivation techniques to farm these lands. During the
Miao Rebellions of the
Ming dynasty, thousands of Miao were killed by the imperial forces. Mass castrations of Miao boys also took place. depicting a government campaign against the Miao in Hunan, 1795. During the Qing Dynasty the Miao fought three wars against the empire. In 1725, a Miao rebellion in Weining, Guizhou, wa suppressed by the imperial army under the lead of
Ha Yuanzheng The issue was so serious that the Yongzheng emperor sent one of his most important officials,
Ortai, to be the Viceroy of the provinces with significant Miao populations in 1726, and through 1731, he spent his time putting down rebellions. In 1735 in the southeastern province of Guizhou,
the Miao rose up against the government's forced assimilation. Eight counties involving 1,224 villages fought until 1738 when the revolt ended. According to
Xiangtan University Professor Wu half the Miao populations were affected by the war.
The second war (1795–1806) involved the provinces of Guizhou and Hunan. Shi Sanbao and Shi Liudeng led this second revolt. Again, it ended in failure, but it took 11 years to quell the uprising. The greatest of the three wars
occurred from 1854 to 1873. Zhang Xiu-mei led this revolt in Guizhou until his capture and death in Changsha, Hunan. This revolt affected over one million people and all the neighbouring provinces. By the time the war ended Professor Wu said only 30 percent of the Miao were left in their home regions. This defeat led to the Hmong people migrating out of China into Laos and Vietnam. During Qing times, more military garrisons were established in southwest China. Han Chinese soldiers moved into the Taijiang region of
Guizhou, married Miao women, and the children were brought up as Miao. In spite of rebellion against the Han, Hmong leaders made allies with Han merchants. The imperial government had to rely on political means to bring in Hmong people into the government: they created multiple competing positions of substantial prestige for Miao people to participate and assimilate into the Qing government system. During the Ming and Qing times, the official position of
Kiatong was created in Indochina. The Miao would employ the use of the
Kiatong government structure until the 1900s when they entered into French colonial politics in
Indochina.
20th century During the founding of the
People's Republic of China (PRC), the Miao played an important role in its birth when they helped
Mao Zedong to escape the
Kuomintang in the Long March with supplies and guides through their territory. In Vietnam, a powerful Hmong named Vuong Chinh Duc, dubbed the king of the Hmong, aided
Ho Chi Minh's nationalist move against the French, and thus secured the Hmong's position in Vietnam. In
Điện Biên Phủ, Hmongs fought on the side of the communist Viet Minh against the pro-French
Tai Dam aristocrats. During the
Vietnam War, Miao fought on both sides, the Hmong in Laos primarily for the US, across the border in Vietnam for the North-Vietnam coalition, the Chinese-Miao for the Communists. However, after the war the Vietnamese were very aggressive towards the Hmong who suffered many years of reprisals. Most Hmong in Thailand also supported a brief Communist uprising during the war.
Miao clans with Han origins Some of the origins of the Hmong and Miao clan names are a result of the marriage of Hmong women to Han Chinese men, with distinct Han Chinese-descended clans and lineages practicing Han Chinese burial customs. These clans were called "Han Chinese Hmong" ("Hmong Sua") in
Sichuan, and were instructed in military tactics by fugitive Han Chinese rebels. Such Chinese "surname groups" are comparable to the patrilineal Hmong clans and also practice exogamy. Han Chinese male soldiers who fought against the Miao rebellions during the Qing and Ming dynasties were known to have married with non-Han women such as the Miao because Han women were less desirable. The Wang clan, founded among the Hmong in Gongxian county of
Sichuan's Yibin district, is one such clan and can trace its origins to several such marriages around the time of the Ming dynasty suppression of the Ah rebels. Nicholas Tapp wrote that, according to
The Story of the Ha Kings in the village, one such Han ancestor was Wang Wu. It is also noted that the Wang typically sided with the Chinese, being what Tapp calls "cooked" as opposed to the "raw" peoples who rebelled against the Chinese. Hmong women who married Han Chinese men founded a new Xem clan among Northern Thailand's Hmong. Fifty years later in Chiangmai two of their Hmong boy descendants were Catholics. A Hmong woman and Han Chinese man married and founded northern Thailand's Lau2, or Lauj, clan, with another Han Chinese man of the family name Deng founding another Hmong clan. Some scholars believe this lends further credence to the idea that some or all of the present day Hmong clans were formed in this way.
Jiangxi Han Chinese are claimed by some as the forefathers of the southeast
Guizhou Miao, and Miao children were born to the many Miao women married Han Chinese soldiers in
Taijiang in Guizhou before the second half of the 19th century. Xijiang Miao Village.jpg|
Xijiang, a Miao-majority township in Guizhou 1 fenghuang ancient town hunan china.jpg|
Fenghuang,
Hunan a town famous for its Miao culture 文山凤凰广场 - 2023-07-21 03.jpg|
Wenshan, Yunnan, a Miao-majority city ==Archaeology==