The hot land of Guangdong has given birth to a long-standing local culture, which is rooted in the ancient slang people. There are countless fascinating stories hidden in the dust of history, waiting for us to clear the fog one by one. Where did the local guys come from? Where does their bloodline come from? Why did the people of the Song Dynasty call the language of the local guys "鴃tongue", which is difficult to understand like the language of birds? Behind these seemingly ordinary questions lies the origin and origin of Cantonese culture. Let's embark on a journey of discovery, tracing the historical roots of the local guys, unraveling these mysteries, and painting a magnificent picture of Cantonese culture.
The original hometown and migration footprints of the slang people
Tracing back to the roots, the ancestors of the slang people can be traced back to the ancient Baiyue ethnic group. Thousands of years ago, their ancestors took root in the vast lands of southern China. According to molecular anthropological research, the ancestors of the slang people about 20,000 to 30,000 years ago first gathered along the coast of the Beibu Gulf. At that time, the Beibu Gulf was surrounded by a vast and primitive fertile field, and the clear rivers converged into streams that stretched to the sea in the distance. The ancestors of the slang people cultivated, hunted, fished and fished on this fertile soil, and lived a primitive life in harmony with nature.
Thousands of years later, at dawn, the slang people began a long journey south. Centered approximately around the Gulf of Tonkin and divided into two groups, they stretched to both sides along the coastline of the South China Sea. A team migrated westward along the coastline of Guangdong and arrived on the island of Taiwan about 14,000 years ago. Another group advanced south along the coast of Vietnam, which later developed into today's Malay ethnic group.
In the land of Guangdong, the footprints of the slang people are all over the place. About 3,000 years ago, the Nanyue ethnic group in Guangdong differentiated from the Xiou branch, which merged with the indigenous Yueyue ethnic group in Guangxi to give birth to the ancestors of the Zhuang Dai people. The Nanyue ethnic groups in Guangdong and Minyue in Fujian gradually evolved into today's Dong people. The slang people have taken root in Guangdong, and their blood has a long history in this hot land.
Many villages in the Lingnan region of Guangdong Province retain traces of the ancestors of the slang people. From the Hakka Wailong House in Meizhou to the ancient ancestral hall of the Chen family in Bobai Town, from the land surrounded by mountains in western Guangdong to the wealthy towns on the plains of the Pearl River Delta, the descendants of the Slang people are all over the place, blending with other ethnic groups for a long time, but always retaining some of the language and customs of their ancestors.
Genetic evidence of the Guy's ancestry
Fast forward to the late 20th century, and the rapid development of molecular biology has provided us with a new perspective on the lineage of the Gelao people. Rigorous DNA testing has become a powerful tool to solve the mystery, so that the fog of history has begun to gradually dissipate.
The earliest evidence for research comes from 1946, when the famous historian Xu Songshi published the book "Examination of the Tai and Yue Ethnic Groups". Xu Songshi believes that the indigenous people of the Canton area are up to 70% of Zhuang ancestry. This judgment was not unfounded, and was soon strongly corroborated by molecular anthropology.
In 2006, the team of Professor Xu Jieshun of Guangxi University for Nationalities conducted a sequencing analysis of the genes of Zhuang Dai and other ethnic groups in the research of the National Social Science Foundation project "The History of the Origin of Lingnan Nationalities". It was found that 20,000 or 30,000 years ago, the ancestors of the slang had settled in the Beibu Gulf area and lived there for a long time. This coincides with the physical remains of the ancient copper drum culture and other archaeological discoveries.
More direct evidence comes from data published by the online science popularization platform "Lanyue.com". According to DNA testing, only 19 percent of people in the Canton region are of Han Chinese ancestry, while a whopping 69 percent have slang indigenous ancestry. It can be said that the vast majority of Cantonese people have deep roots in this land.
In addition to the dominance of slang ancestry, molecular archaeology has revealed another interesting phenomenon: the matrilineal lineage of the residents of the Canton area is extremely closely related to the Hakka population. This shows that in the long historical process, the Han Hakka immigrants who went south and the local slang aborigines have undergone a large-scale fusion, and finally formed today's unique Gelao culture.
It is not difficult to imagine that those Hakka immigrants from the Central Plains crossed the ocean with the dream of opening up new territory, and when they came to this hot land, the scene they saw must have been quite unfamiliar. They were dressed in coarse cloth and held their hands and sweated in the tropical sun. The slang aborigines slipped out of the sturdy figures on the forest path, greeting each other in a local language that the Hakka people could not understand. Gradually, as they spent more time together and became closer to each other, the immigrants and natives began to understand each other, and marriage deepened racial integration, eventually giving birth to a unique and burly descendant of the local guys.
It is precisely because of the intermarriage between the Han people and the indigenous people that the ethnic groups in the Canton area are diversely blended. The blood of the Gelao people flows with the heroism of the Hakka ancestors and the simplicity and innocence of the slang aborigines, and this unique genetic code has created their characteristics in language and customs. This also makes the local culture a unique and brilliant cultural pearl in the land of Guangfu.
The language of birds written by the literati of the Song Dynasty
In the Song Dynasty, the literati in the pen and ink officialdom also paid great attention to the language of the local people. Their insights into this "language of the natives" have added a lot of interesting conjectures and discussions to later generations.
The earliest person to leave relevant records was the Southern Song Dynasty geographer Zhou Qufei. As an official born in Song Xiaozong's Jinshi, Zhou Qufei served in Qinzhou, Guangxi for six years, and knew the local culture and customs well. In his magnum opus "Lingwai Dai Answer", he made a detailed classification and description of the types of residents in Qinzhou at that time.
Among them, Zhou Qufei divided the "Qinmin" into five categories: Turen, Beiren, Slang Man, Shooter Cultivator, and Shuren Man. For the "natives", he explained that it was "since the old Luo Yue species also." Living in the village, the appearance is wild, and the lips and tongue are mixed as sounds, which are not known, and they are called the language". As for the "slang people", he wrote that it was "the one who is known in history as the slang fang." This kind of self-barbarian dwelling, specializing in monsters, if a beast, the voice is especially unknown."
It can be seen that in Zhou Qufei's eyes, the language spoken by the indigenous people and "slang" in Qinzhou is extremely jerky and difficult to understand, just like the cries of birds and beasts. This impression of indigenous languages is also reflected in other literati posthumous works.
During the Northern Song Dynasty, Su Shi mentioned in his famous poem "The Book of Yan Xing" that what he saw and heard in Guangdong made him feel a lot of emotion: "It is still a few months, and the customs and sounds he sees are completely different from the rumors of the previous generation." Although these words are brief, they reflect the confusion and unfamiliarity of the Central Plains people at that time with the "voice" of Lingnan.
Until modern times, the evaluation of the local language is still the same. Ji Yun, a scholar of the Qing Dynasty, wrote in "Reading the World": "The wide Yi is rampant, and its voice is like a bird, and it is impossible to know." These descriptions, which are prejudiced but also humorous, vividly present the peculiarity and strangeness of the local dialect in the eyes of the upper-class literati.
So, what kind of language is this "bird language"-like indigenous language? In fact, from a linguistic point of view, the origin of the Dilao dialect can be traced back to the ancient slang language family. This language system has no relationship with the Chinese language, its tone is complex and varied, and the pronunciation parts are completely different from the Chinese, which is destined to be particularly jerky and unfamiliar to the ears of the people in the Central Plains.
What's even more interesting is that some experts have found that the local dialect retains a lot of traces of Zhuang-Kam language. For example, there are more than 10 tones in the local dialect, which is much higher than the 4-5 tones in Chinese, which is very similar to the characteristics of the Zhuang-Kam language family. In addition, there are still a large number of unique Zhuang-Kam words in the local dialect. This further shows that the local culture is inextricably linked with the slang and Zhuang cultures.
The integration and collision of diverse ethnic groups
From the Song Dynasty to the Yuan Dynasty, the population of Guangdong gradually stabilized, but the ethnic composition underwent drastic changes. During this period, the mutual influence, integration and collision between the Han immigrants and the slang aborigines further injected rich vitality into the national culture of this hot land.
According to expert research, the main types of immigrants in Guangxi during the Southern Song Dynasty were Hakka, Chao, Su, and Han people in the Central Plains. They are either fleeing the war or seeking new opportunities for development. Whatever the reason, the arrival of waves of Han immigrants has brought new vitality to the local ethnic makeup.
However, this encounter between old and new immigrants and slang natives has not been smooth sailing. The immigrants bear the imprint of the Central Plains culture, and there are obvious differences between them and the local residents in many aspects such as lifestyle, language habits, etc., and contradictions and conflicts are inevitable. According to relevant historical records, there were many conflicts between Han Chinese and indigenous people in Guangxi during the Southern Song Dynasty.
For example, in 1225, an unprecedented scale of "barbarian rebellion" broke out in Guangxi. A large number of slang natives united to fight against the oppression and plunder of Han Chinese immigrants. The armed conflict between the two sides has lasted for several years and has taken a heavy toll on people's lives. Such a state of affairs fully shows that there was a deep estrangement and contradiction between the two ethnic groups at that time.
Still, living in peace is the desire of most people. Over time, immigrants and indigenous people began to learn from each other and gradually moved towards integration. The Han Chinese learned the indigenous farming and hunting skills, while the Slang people were influenced by the Han culture and began to embrace Confucianism and educational concepts.
There are a large number of examples of interracial marriage. For example, the famous Su Jiake, their ancestor Su Yan was originally a Han nationality, but he married a slang woman, and then took root in Guangdong. The descendants of Su Jiake are now all over the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and they all proudly talk about their "ancestor" origins.
It is in this process of mutual tolerance, openness and absorption that the unique culture of the local people has gradually taken shape and developed with great characteristics. They have fully absorbed the essence of Southeast Asian culture and Central Plains culture in terms of household food, clothing and etiquette, and formed their own style characteristics.
For example, the local people like to eat "salted eggs" marinated in salted fish, which is likely to be derived from the seafood processing techniques of the slang people. And their prevailing customs such as confinement and village officials of the three dynasties come from the traditions of the Central Plains. This pluralistic blending of local culture stems from the mutual influence and mutual learning of different ethnic groups over a long period of time.
The unique charm of the local culture
Looking at the long-standing local culture, it is not difficult for us to find that it contains a very unique charm. This charm not only comes from its multi-faceted and integrated characteristics, but also from the tempering of the common weal and woe of the ancestors of the local people in the hot land of Guangfu.
Since ancient times, Canton has been a hot land inhabited by many ethnic groups. People of different ethnic groups such as Slang, Hakka, Chaoshan, and Southern Fujian have taken root here, influenced and infiltrated each other, making the culture here bloom and colorful.
Under the erosion of the long river of history, various ethnic groups have gradually formed a fusion of local culture. The local culture is like a towering tree, deeply rooted in this hot land, absorbing nourishment from all directions, with lush branches and fruits.
As one of the main ethnic groups of Lingnan culture, the most distinctive feature of the local Lao culture is the reverence for ancestors. From the urban and rural dwellings to the temple attics, you can see the exquisite wood carving art of the dragon and phoenix and the carved beams and paintings. Most of these wood carvings are based on Confucian classics in the Central Plains, such as "Three Character Classic" and "Twenty-four Filial Piety", but they are also integrated into the worship of the ancestors of the local people to all things in nature, showing a unique artistic style.
And in the ancestral temple of the local people, you can see the scene of their devout worship of their ancestors. On the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the incense and candles are flowing in a dense stream, which is the time for the clansmen to worship their ancestors. The traditional ancestor worship drama was staged at this time, starring the Cao Ge Hakka opera troupe, with a strong singing voice and dancing posture, telling the great achievements of the ancestors.
In addition to the important feature of ancestor worship, the local culture is also reflected in all aspects of life. The colorful sculpture carving of the main entrance of the Liaojiazong Temple, the carved window facing the street on the floor of the Daliang residence, all kinds of exquisite carvings show the ingenuity of the ancestors of the local people. The unique food culture in the kitchen of Cantonese carries forward the essence of Chinese food culture.
For example, a variety of delicacies such as salted eggs in Houmen, tiger stool foot pot, and Beidi hat are all integrated with the curiosity of the local people and the all-encompassing spirit of tradition. Guangzhou restaurant culture has carried forward this spirit and become a bright pearl in Lingnan food culture.
Once upon a time, in the bloody years, these material symbols carrying cultural genes were also tested and tempered. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, many peasant uprisings brought heavy damage to the Pearl River Delta region, and the city of Guangzhou was burned dozens of times, and a large number of historical sites were reduced to ashes. But just like the perseverance of the Cantonese people, after repeated reconstruction, their cultural spirit is still rooted in Sri Lanka and shines brightly.
end
Yes, the local culture is a precious cultural pearl in the hot land of Guangfu. It shows the brilliance of human nature with the brilliance of its own sails; It uses an all-encompassing and broad demeanor to tell the wisdom and courage of the ancestors. The reason why the local culture can exude such a unique charm is due to the precipitation and accumulation of the ancestors of Guangfu in the long years.