If you're curious about the Lisu, then this book must be read
This article totals 2669 words| is expected to take 9 minutes to read
Pictured: Lisu thousand feet landing thatched hut
Have you ever heard of a people who "go up the mountain of swords and go down to the sea of fire"?
That's right, this nation is
Yunnan's endemic ethnic minority is the Lisu ethnic group.
According to legend, there was a Han hero in ancient times,
Led soldiers and horses stationed in the border areas of Yunnan,
Lead the Lisu youth to practice martial arts,
Make the border people rich and strong, and drive away the invading enemy.
Later, because the emperor listened to the rumors, the hero was poisoned.
In honor of this hero, the Lisu people,
Designate the day of his death as the traditional festival of his nation, the Festival of Knives and Poles,
And use symbolic rituals such as "going up the mountain of swords and going down to the sea of fire",
Express the feelings of wishing to go to the soup to repay the fire.
"Up the mountain of swords, down of the sea of fire",
It is the spiritual expression of the industriousness and bravery of the Lisu people,
It is also a cultural business card of the Lisu people,
Inheriting the light of national culture.
Go up knife mountain
Under the sea of fire
In addition to the "knife rod section",
The Lisu also have a unique culture.
The Lisu people are surrounded by mountains and rivers,
Thriving between great rivers,
Their national culture embodies the Lisu people
naturalness, simplicity and primitiveness,
It is an indispensable part of traditional Chinese culture.
November 2021,
A book that provides a comprehensive introduction to the Lisu people
- "The Battle Song of the Canyon Pride"
Published by our company.
This book not only introduces the customs and culture of the Lisu people,
It also records the process of the Lisu people from poverty and backwardness to rich civilization.
If you are curious about the Lisu people,
Then this book must be read.
01
Shiny and conspicuous "Ore"
There are people who love beauty, and clothing can best reflect the beauty in people's hearts, which is the external expression of men and women's love for beauty.
"Ore" is the main symbol that distinguishes Lisu women from other ethnic groups in their clothing, and it is also one of the most shining and conspicuous symbols in women's clothing.
Lisu maidens
The Lisu people living in the Area of Fugong and Gongshan, women like to use hats embellished with corals, beads, sea shells, and small copper beads - "Ore". When the Lisu woman put on the "Ore", the sea shells above her head were like a stone moon hanging high above, and the beads and copper beads were like stars holding the moon, shining with golden light, and living like the firmament condensed in the human world, like a fairy, beautiful.
"Ore" production is a contest of craftsmanship, selecting more than a dozen white sea shells with a diameter of about two centimeters, drilling small holes, and threading them into a round sleeve that covers the back of the head. A small copper bead is tied under the shell piece in the upper part of the sea shell circle, and then the copper beads are crossed into a string to form a half-moon bead cap with the sea shell string at the back of the head and the copper bead string in front of the forehead as the upper and lower sides, with red and white coral and material bead strings as the center, covering the head and the sideburns of the ears.
Lisu costumes
Women's clothing is generally based on black and white, and generally wears a right collar coat and a long skirt or pants. The top generally has pockets for things, and the lower part of the skirt is decorated with colored lines or patterns, supported to the back ankle, and the skirt has a lot of pleats, commonly known as "pleated skirts". There are two kinds of pleated skirts, long skirts dragged to the foot surface, and short skirts up to the knees.
Married women usually wear large brass rings on their ears, long and hanging down their shoulders, and like to wear several strings of agate and sea shell beads on their chests. Some valuable corsets are worth 1 to 2 cattle.
Lushui Lisu women generally do not wear long skirts, wrap their heads in green cloth, wear short shirts on the top, long to the waist, plackets, four flat necklines, no buttons. The lower body wears pants, the outside of the pants is tied around the waist, and the ears wear ornaments such as small corals.
02
"The biggest tree is the cedar tree, and the biggest person is the uncle"
After entering the Nu River valley, the Lisu settled in the form of clans, and some of them gradually faded in economic life, except for retaining symbolic common names and certain conceptual connections, because of the continuous migration, branching and dispersion of clans. Some clan organizations form villages with families as units, transition from blood to geography, mainly practice extra-ethnic marriage, and villages are inhabited by people of different clans, and this in-law relationship plays an important role in real life.
Until the eve of the founding of the People's Republic of China, some families still had a dual relationship between public ownership and private ownership of the means of production. The property in the family belongs to private property, and the cemetery, forest, wasteland, etc. belong to the family public property. There is a head in the village, and the head of the family is a man of high rank, who can speak the Tao, and who is relatively wealthy. Most of the heads are elected from people with prestige and fairness, and there are also elected people who do not practice hereditary system. The main duties of the head man are: to mediate disputes internally, to preside over sacrifices, to judge affairs, to lead production, to act as witnesses to marriage, to collect tributes on behalf of others, and to mediate and mediate in diplomatic matters.
Lisu families are basically monogamous based on private ownership, with children building new houses and living apart after marriage. "The largest tree is a fir tree, and the biggest person is an uncle", in the Lisu area, the marriage of uncles is more popular.
03
"1000 Feet Floor Plan"
Most of the Lisu houses are mainly dry-column "thousand-foot floor-to-ceiling houses", but there are also a small number of wooden houses and earthen wall houses.
Lisu thousand feet landed in thatched huts
The wise and intelligent Lisu people chose the mid-mountain terrace without the hidden danger of mountain rock flooding as the home for the clan to flourish. Some people in the village built new houses, and the homeowners first prepared wooden stakes, wooden planks, bamboo grates and other building materials, chose an auspicious day, prepared wine and rice, and invited relatives and friends to come to help. On the steep ridge and hill, the piling fixation method is adopted: dozens of long wooden stakes are first punched into the ground as a foundation, and then dozens of short logs are inserted vertically between the long wooden stakes, and the long and short wooden stakes are bundled and fixed with bamboo fences as the pillars of the house. On the horizontal surface, lay wooden planks, use bamboo fences to separate the left, middle and right three rooms, the left and right two smaller, used to pile debris, the middle house is the most spacious, and there is a fire pit in the middle. The roof is covered with thatched or fir planks, the lower level is for livestock, the middle floor is inhabited by people, surrounded by wooden planks or multi-layered bamboo fences, the upper floor stores grain, and there are corridors and wooden ladders in front of the doors.
Because this kind of small building is based on dozens of hundreds of wooden stakes, it is commonly known as "thousand foot landing house", referred to as "thousand foot house".
Lanping Lisu wooden house
There are two types of wooden houses, simple wooden houses are cut into falcons with axes at both ends of the log, the logs are built into walls, and the roof is adult glyph, covered with wooden planks or thatch. Refined wooden house, first cut the fallen log into a heptagonal shape, when building a house, first cut one corner of the hexagonal wood into a sink shape, stuck a corner of the next piece of wood, and built into a tight four-sided wall of the falcon mouth to the falcon mouth, becoming a livable house where the wind cannot blow in and the mosquitoes stop outside the door.
04
Clan totem legend
The Lisu people like to tell the magical story of clan totems and clans and tribal ancestors, and almost every clan has its own clan totem legend.
These clan totem legends reflect the shadow of the early life of human society, are the product of ancestor worship, and provide a rich data basis for the study of the history of the Lisu people.
Ancestor worship is the product of animism, a custom passed down by people in order to pray for the ancestors to bless their descendants and prosper with food and livestock. On holidays, the Lisu people burn incense to honor their ancestors and pray for blessings. However, in social practice, no one can say who this ancestor is, and no one can say his name or surname. Without knowing who their ancestors were, people had to focus on the animals and plants they often interacted with, anthropomorphize them, and worship them as objects of worship, endowed them with magical wisdom and power, and created fantasy clan totem legends to answer the question of what is the ancestor and where the ancestor came from.
Even more subtle, the Lisu believe that these ancestors, even if you sin against it, as long as you prostrate and beg for forgiveness, it will forgive, living like the relationship between father and son in real life. When choosing a clan totem, due to the differences in the psychology of each clan, some like animals such as tigers, snakes, and bears to show the bravery of their clan; some like sheep, bees, birds, fish, etc., to show the kindness, unity, and amiability of their clan; some like buckwheat, bamboo, vegetables, etc., to show that their clan is rich in grains and prosperous. It can be said that clan totem worship has developed into an unconscious religion, which is fundamentally different from the man-made religion that came later.
In the absence of written records, the totem legends and stories of the Lisu clan can be completely preserved to this day through word of mouth, in addition to their strong ancestor worship tradition, it also shows that the Lisu people are a kind and respectable people who know the gratitude and do not forget their original intentions.
05
"Salt can go a day without eating; songs can't go a day without singing."
The folk songs and dances of the Lisu nationality have been tempered by dozens of generations, rooted in the deep soil of national life, and full of distinct national characteristics. Some people have commented that the Lisu people can walk and dance, and when they can talk, they can sing. In the Lisu-inhabited areas, every stone has its own story, and every leaf has its song. Indeed, the Lisu people, whether men, women or children, can sing and dance, and can blow and play. Whenever there are festival gatherings, celebrating the harvest, weddings and funerals, visiting relatives and friends, we must sing and dance to the fullest, and blow the bomb to the fullest. Therefore, there are many kinds of Lisu folk music and dance, rich in content, different styles, and various expression methods.
Play the song Ji Ben
Folk songs are one of the most favorite artistic activities of the Lisu people. They said, "Salt cannot be eaten, and songs cannot be sung." It can be seen that "song" is inseparable from the social life of the Lisu people, who put "song" to the same important position as "salt".
Lisu folk songs, whether they are long songs in major, or short songs, nursery rhymes, almost all have their own unique songs. According to folklore, there were originally seventy-two kinds of lisu folk songs, commonly known as "seventy-two tones", which have not been passed down to many so far. According to the genre and content of today's popular song music, it can be roughly divided into mo guang, yo-leaf, pendulum time, etiquette and other categories.
Lisu folk songs also include "Cut Oh" and "Ceremonial Songs". "Cut Oh" is widely popular in Fugong, Lushui, Lanping and other counties in Nujiang Prefecture. "Liturgical songs" can be roughly divided into categories such as sacrificial songs, ritual songs, and ritual songs.
The sound of nature shook the canyon
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