Controversy of Nanzhao
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Controversy of Nanzhao is an issue regarding the ethnicity or cultural affiliation of the rulers of the Nanzhao kingdom (738-902) in what is now Yunnan, southwestern China.
Background
British Clergy David proposed that the Kingdom of Nanzhao was founded by Thai, who fled to the south as a result of Mongolian Invasion in mid-14th century.[citation needed] The Thai's early history documents were destroyed during wars with Burma, therefore this theory was quickly taken by Thai people and the World. [citation needed]
Chinese scholars refuted this theory, but they did not take much efforts to clarify the exact ethnicity of the people who ruled the Kingdom.[citation needed]
Some scholars did not agree and they believed that the royal family were of Yi people.[citation needed]
Hypotheses
Tai
The Englishman David proposed that Nanzhao was established by Tai peoples and moved southward to escape invading Mongolian Armies.[citation needed]
The main evidence was that David collected many Bai language vocabularies[citation needed] and compared them with other languages.[citation needed] He found[citation needed] that there were six of them apparently related to the Tai-Kadai languages, to which the Thai language belongs. He thus drew a conclusion that Nanzhao was previously a Tai kingdom.[citation needed]
The clothing, gesture and architecture depicted in old Nanzhao scroll paintings (南诏画卷) are distinctively Thai.[citation needed]
Yi
Some Chinese scholars[who?] believed[when?][why?] that Nanzhao was founded by the Meng family who were Yi people.[citation needed] Evidence[citation needed] was mainly based on the book Manshu (蛮书) written by Fan Chuo in 863.[citation needed] The central evidence of the Yi theory is that Manshu indirectly mentioned[citation needed] that the royal family was of Wu Man ("the wu barbarians"), and Wu Man ("the wu barbarians") were tentatively identified[citation needed] as Yi people.
The main flaws of this theory are:
- Nanzhao family and the entirely Kingdom were Buddhist,[citation needed] whereas modern Yi people are not typically Buddhist.[citation needed]
- Nanzhao was a sinophilic Kingdom,[citation needed] which actively learned and emulated the Chinese system,[citation needed] whereas Yi people were culturally conservative and resisted Chinese Culture.[citation needed]
- Nanzhao used Chinese heavily.[citation needed] No Yi script has been found in Nanzhao documents and relics.[citation needed] Yi people use the Yi script.
Bai
It has been[when?] traditionally believed[who?][citation needed] and is increasingly[citation needed] re-believed by many that Nanzhao was founded and made up as mainstream the Bai people.[citation needed] According to a number of historical documents,[clarification needed] Nanzhao was of Bai nature and certainly the ruling class were Bai, too.[citation needed]
Evidence:
- Nanzhao was a Buddhist country.[citation needed] Bai people were well-known to be the only Buddhists[citation needed] over a long period of time[when?] in history.[citation needed] Even now Buddhists are rare amongst Yi people.[citation needed]
- Many names about cities, towns and culture from Nanzhao were obviously Bai language.[citation needed]
- History books written in Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasty[clarification needed][citation needed] agreed[citation needed] that the royal family were Bai people, which was also supported by Tibetan[citation needed] and Arabic[citation needed] materials generated at same period.