Dao ethnic group

Proper Name: Kim Mien, Kim Mun (jungle people).
Other Names: Man.

Local groups: Dao Do or Red Dao (Dao Coc ngang, Dao sung, Dao Du lay, Dao Dai Ban), Dao Quan Chet or Dao with tied or belted trousers, (Dao Son Dau, Dao Tarn Dao, Dao Nga Hoang, Du Cun), Dao Lo gang. (Dao Thanh phan, Dao Coc Mun), Dao Tien or Dao with silver coins or money (Dao Deo tien, Dao Tieu ban); Dao Quan trang or Dao with white trousers (Dao Ho), Dao Thanh Y or Dao with blue vest, Dao Lan Ten (Dao Tuyen, Dao Ao dai or Dao with long tunics).

Population: 473,945 people.

Language: The Dao language belongs to the language family of Hmong-Dao.

History: Dao people originally came from China, immigrating between the 12th or 13th century and the early 20th century. They claim themselves descendants of Ban Ho (Ban vuong), a famous and holy legendary personality.

Production activities: Dao communities cultivate swidden fields, rocky hollows, and wet-rice paddies. These cultivation activities play a dominant role among different groups and areas. Dao Quan Trang (white trousers) people, Dao Ao dai (long tunic) and Dao Thanh Y (blue clothes) specialize in wet-rice cultivation. Dao Do (Red Dao) people mostly cultivate in rocky hollows. Other Dao groups are nomadic, others are settled agriculturists. Popular
crops are rice, corn and vegetable such as gourds pumpkins, and sweet potatoes. They raise buffaloes, cows, pigs, chickens, horses, goats in the middle regions of mountains and highland areas.
Cotton farming and weaving are popular among the Dao groups. They prefer garments dyed indigo. Most village wards have forge kilns serving for farming tools repairing. In some places, people make matchlock and flintlock rifles and cast-iron bullets. The silversmith trade, handed down through generations, mostly produces necklaces, earrings, rings, silver chains and betel nut boxes.
Dao Do (Red Dao) and Dao Tien (Coin or Money Dao) groups are well-known makers of traditional paper. The paper is used when writing history, story and song books, when making petitions, when sending money for funeral services, and on other occasions. Other Dao groups are noted for pressing certain fruits to extract oils which they use to illuminate their lamps. Sugarcane is also refined.

Diet: Dao people have two main meals a day-lunch and dinner. Breakfast is eaten only
during the busy harvesting season. The Dao eat mostly rice. However, in some places, people eat corn or soup instead of rice. Popular rice mills are made of wood and bamboo. Mortars are divided into several types, such as pillar shaped mortars or water-spout mortars with rice-pounding pestles controlled by hands or feet or by water power. The Dao prefer boiled meat, dried or sour mixed meat and sour bamboo shoot soup. When eating is finished, the Dao have a tradition that they never put the chopsticks on the bowl because this signifies that there is a death in the family. Dao people usually drink distilled alcohol. In some places, they drink a kind of local wine, having a slightly sour and hot taste. Dao people smoke cigarettes or locally grown tobacco with pipes.

Clothing: In the past, men had long hair with chignon or top tuft, with the rest shaved smoothly. Different groups different types of head-scarves and way of wearing them. They wear short or long shirt.

Dao women's clothes are diverse. They usually wear a long blouse with a dress or trousers. Their clothes are colorfully embroidered. When embroidering, they create designs based on their memories. They embroider on one side of the cloth so that the design is seen on the other side. They have several designs such as the letter "van", the pine tree, animals, birds, humans, and leaves. Their method of creating batik garments is unique. They put the batik stylus or pen into hot bee's wax and then draw the design onto the cloth. The portion of the cloth receiving the waxed pattern resists the indigo blue dyeing which follows, creating a cloth of beautiful. blue and white patterns.

Housing: Many Dao communities are found about halfway up most of the northern mountainous regions. However, there are several Dao groups that live in valleys, such as the Dao Quan Trang (white trousers), as well as high-mountain dwellers like the Dao Do (Red Dao). Wards and houses are scattered around. There are a variety of architectural styles, as some Dao build their houses directly on the ground while others build them on stilts. Some Dao houses combine both these elements.

Transportation: Dao people in highland areas use baskets with two straps to transport goods and produce. Those living in the lower elevator carry goods with a pair of containers suspended on each end of a carrying pole that rests on the shoulders. Cotton bags or net back-packs are preferred here.

Social organization: Village relationships are essentially regulated by parentage or by being neighbors. The Dao people have many family surnames, the most popular being Ban, (Dang), Trieu. Each lineage or each branch possesses its own genealogical register and a system of different middle names to distinguish people of different generations.