The Yao Nationality

The Yao nationality has a population of 2,130,000, mainly distributed in over 150 counties in Guangxi, Hunan, Yunnan, Guangdong and Guizhou provinces or prefectures. The majority of the Yaos live in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. They are mainly involved in agriculture, but manage forests as well. They have their own language and have created new written characters of their own. Skilled at dyeing, weaving and embroidery, their costumes and adornments are rich and colorful.

The Yaos live in a subtropical region, some 1,000 to 2,000 meters above sea level. They are an ancient nationality, divided into various branches: the Pan Yao, the mountain-crossing Yao, the tea-mountain Yao, the red-head Yao, the indigo Yao, the back-basket Yao, the white-trouser Yao and so on.

Villages are often built on the tops of high mountains or halfway up the mountain slopes or by the rivers at the foot. Traditional houses are sometimes made of wood planks, or sometimes two-or-three-story buildings made of bamboo and wood. These can be of earth and wood too. The whole family eat, discuss work and do other things round the hearth every day.

Nowadays Yaos usually live in large houses made of earthen walls and tiled roofs. The walls are normally about 3 meters high. These high-ceilinged houses are light and spacious.

The Yaos live on rice, corn, sweet potato and a kind of yam. People enjoy smoking and drinking. "Oil-tea" is popular among the Yaos living in Gongcheng, Sanjiang, Longsheng and Rongshui of Guangxi province. Oil-tea is made like this: first, the tea leaves are fried in oil; then, raw ginger and table salt are added; next, all these are simmered together, or else the ingredients are pounded whilst cooking to make either a thick or thin tea soup; finally, the liquid is poured onto puffed rice, fried soybean and fern chunks.

The costumes and adornments of the Yaos are rich and colorful. The men's upper clothes are buttoned down the front or to the left. They always wear a waistband, and their trousers, are mainly black or blue, Long ones can reach the feet, short ones stop at the knees. white trouser Yao wear white knickerbockers. Others wear their hair long and coil it up, Wrapped with a red cloth and decorated with pheasant tail-feathers. Some Yao women wear collarless short garments together with pleated skirts of different colors and lengths; some wear knee-length upper clothes with buttons down the front, which are hitched up with a long belt, to go with short or long trousers; some Yao women embroider various colored patterns on their collars, cuffs and bottoms of their long trousers. In many places, women's upper clothes are decorated with a silver disc, and they wear silver bracelets, earrings and neck rings as well. Some Yao women attach a tall frame to their heads and then wrap it round with a black cloth with red tassels hanging down. They are called "Red Head Yao."

The coming-of-age rite is an important ceremony for young Yaos. To judge whether a young Yao has been through the initiation rite, you just need to look at his cap or scarf. Usually Yaos wear colored caps in childhood, and at about 16, put on scarves instead. The red-head Yaos wear colored caps at 7 or 8, and change to scarves before marriage, and red scarves after marriage. At the age of 16 or 17, the tea-mountain Yaos wear three silver discs in the shape of an ox horn with a piece of white cloth attached. After the coming-of-age rites, the girls can go courting and choose lovers openly.

Gathering in the singing hall is a custom of the Yao in Guangdong province. It can be held whenever there are guests or passers-by who ask for hospitality. Usually, the host invites the female guests and the hostess with the male guests to different singing halls, where they sit around the fire and sing, one person answering another. After an old man finishes the "Beginning Song," both sides then start to sing out such polite requests as "please sit down," "please have tea" and "please have a smoke." When this is over, the call-and-answer competition can really begin. Most of their songs are about historical stories or traditional practices. At midnight, married people automatically leave the scene, and the young men and women stay to exchange love songs. Just before dawn, both sides reluctantly part after singing the "Song of Day Break."

The Yaos also beat the long drum, celebrating a good harvest and worship their ancestors. The yellow mud drum is made by smearing yellow slurry onto the sides of the drum. The extra humidity and thickness produce two reverberating sounds when the drum is struck. Sonorous and mellow, these sounds can travel for several miles. The yellow mud drum has two forms, the male and the female. The beats of the female drum direct and control the rhythms of the whole dance, and they are often played by old drummers in the village. Keeping in time, the women all sing and dance joyfully. The male drums and the singing and dancing group gradually encircle the female drum; the whole scene is one of great enjoyment.

August the sixteenth on the lunar calendar is the Panwang holiday in memory of the king of the Yaos. This is the biggest and noisiest occasion for the yellow mud drum dance. Yaos living abroad always come back with their wives and daughters to celebrate this grand national holiday on the land they left behind-the Dayao Mountain.