There were two large-scale migration movements in the history of the Ming Dynasty, in addition to the Hongdong locust tree migration as we know it, the other time was the "Thirty-six Surnames of the Min People".
Compared with the former, the scale of the "Thirty-six Surnames of the Min People" is far less than that of the great locust tree immigrants, but this migration created an overseas trade base for the Ming Dynasty a hundred years later.
In 1368, Zhu Yuanzhang took the throne as emperor and established the Ming Dynasty. In the edict, Zhu Yuanzhang said: "Emperor Dai, who is the emperor of the emperor, will have the title of Daming and Jianyuan Hongwu." It is to send envoys to foreign countries, to spread the meaning of the people, and to send messengers to the place, and the barbarian chieftains to pay tribute." However, due to the long distance, a small island country 1800 miles east of Fujian did not know the news of the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, and this small country was Ryukyu.
In the fifth year of Hongwu (1372), Yang Zai, an envoy of the Ming Dynasty, went to Ryukyu on the orders of Zhu Yuanzhang to proclaim the edict. When Yang Zai arrived at this island through all kinds of difficulties, he found that Ryukyu was the poorest of the ten islands in Dongying, and his shipbuilding ability was still in the primitive stage of "binding bamboo for rafts, not driving boats", from the king down to the people.
Not only that, this island country, which is only half the area of Nanjing, the capital of Daming, is divided into three kingdoms of Shannan, Zhongshan and Shanbei on the three sides, and they are constantly fighting each other. However, its unique geographical location in the sea still made Zhu Yuanzhang keenly aware of its transit role in Daming's overseas trade.
In the twenty-fifth year of Hongwu (1392), Zhu Yuanzhang gave Ryukyu "thirty-six surnames of the Min people who are good at handling boats and making tributes to each other", these Ming Dynasty people who were selected from the Fujian coast who were familiar with waterways, good at controlling ships and literate, were sent by Zhu Yuanzhang to Ryukyu to be responsible for educating the local people and spreading the poetry and ritual music of the Ming Dynasty.
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The Chronicle of the Ryukyu Kingdom
It is recorded that "there are more than 3,000 people living in the Middle Dynasty", covering many surnames such as Liang, Zheng, Jin, Cai, Mao, Chen, Lin, etc., and is generally known as "thirty-six surnames".
The King of Zhongshan attached great importance to this, and built a city in Naha Harbor for the thirty-six surnames of the Min people who came from afar, and after the Min people came to live, they were called "Tang Ying", and later renamed "Kume" (meaning to enjoy Feng Lu permanently). Among them, the zhishu was named the Ryukyu Daimyō Nagashi, and the sea habitual person was made the general manager, and the hereditary replacement.
This official migration of the Ming Dynasty brought Ryukyu advanced science and technology handicrafts and Confucian culture, and just a century later, Ryukyu has leapt from a "boat-not-like" island country to a transit station for trade between the Ming Dynasty and Southeast Asia, with the reputation of "All Nations Jinliang".
According to history, in the Ming Dynasty, Ryukyu paid tribute to the Ming Dynasty as many as 171 times, and Ryukyu merchant ships traveled to and from Fujian and Thailand, Vietnam, Malacca and other places, transporting Ming goods to various places in the century, and Ming Dynasty merchant ships also used Ryukyu as a base for supply in the middle of the way. On the eve of the 20th year of the Wanli Dynasty (1592), the Ming Dynasty's Jinyi Guards detected Toyotomi Hideyoshi's troop movements through Ryukyu, which bought time for the mobilization of the Ming Dynasty.
It is worth mentioning that in order to operate this overseas territory of the Ming Dynasty, the thirty-six surnames of the Min people have also paid a tragic price for more than 200 years, some were buried in the sea wind and waves, some were killed because of diseases, and had to supplement the four surnames of Wang, Ruan, Mao and Chen during the Wanli period.
But unfortunately, the trade territories painstakingly operated by the Ming Dynasty were discarded during the Qing Dynasty.
In the first year of Guangxu (1875), the Japanese armed control of Ryukyu, the Ryukyu king Shangtai secretly sent envoys to the Qing Dynasty to ask for help, but until 1879, Japan announced that Ryukyu was changed to Okinawa Prefecture, the Qing Dynasty did not make any actual move, and gave up this overseas territory of "Wanguo Jinliang".
After the fall of the Ryukyu Empire, the descendants of the 36 surnames of the Min people who lived in Kume still adhere to The Chinese customs to this day, such as the Qingming Festival Family Festival, the Dragon Boat Festival to eat rice dumplings and hang Pu Ai, the July 15 burning paper sacrifice, the Jiujiu Chongyang drinking chrysanthemum wine, the roof decorated with stone lions to ward off evil spirits, the T-shaped intersection with Shi Dangdang, and the belief in Mazu and Baosheng The Great.
Because it is connected to Fujian, the cultural customs are very similar to Fujian, so it is also called "Little Fujian" by tourists.
In addition, Okinawan dialect is full of food, Ama Longan, cat, urn, etc. are exactly the same as Hokkien dialect. At the annual music festival, okinawan performances still use the ming court band. Many households enshrine Zhu Yuanzhang's six sacred sayings as their own life guide.
Since the 1980s, the descendants of the 36 surnames of the Min people have embarked on a journey to Fujian with family trees to find their roots and ancestors, and as of now, the verification of the ancestral lands of Cai, Lin, Jin, Liang and other surnames has been completed. Unfortunately, due to the long age, coupled with the Qing Dynasty in the Southern Ming Dynasty in order to eliminate Zheng Chenggong and the implementation of border relocation along the Fujian coast, resulting in a large number of losses of folk genealogical materials in Fujian, many descendants of the Okinawa Min people have not been able to find their ancestral roots, which has to be said to be a pity.