Ethnic origin of Kra in China

Introduction

The Kra people are a part of the Kra-Dai people. The Han Chinese called them Liao (僚) during Eastern Han dynasty, Ke-Lau (仡佬)/(犵獠) during Tang dynasty and after. It is interesting to note that the Old Chinese pronunciation for 僚 is Klao which sounds very close to Kelao.

Homeland

The Kra people regards the Hongdu (洪渡) River basin as their homeland and this was their original location in Guizhou. The Hongdu River joins Wujiang River in the north. They are the natives in Guizhou and western Guangxi.

Guizhou province became part of China when Zang Ge (牂牁) commandery was established in 111 BC during Han dynasty.

97% of Kra people live mainly in Zunyi and Tongren prefectures in northern Guizhou; and also Anshun prefecture in southwestern Guizhou.

Original homeland

According to Chinese researcher named Li Jin-Fang, some Kra subgroups have legends that their ancestors came from the east traveling along the Yangtze River by boats before reaching Hongdu River in Guizhou.

Chu history books stated that the ancestors of Kra people were recorded to live in the southwest of Chu kingdom as early as 822 BC. This southwest region included the Qing (清) River basin in southwestern Hubei as well as Yuan (沅) and Li (澧) River basins in northwestern Hunan.

The ancestors of Kra were mistakenly known as Pu (濮) in their earliest history which also refer to the Austroasiatic tribes in Yunnan province.

Yuan river basin in Hunan

In 523 BC, the Chu kingdom finally managed to completely defeat the various Kra tribes in naval battles in northwestern Hunan which triggered their migration westward.

First wave of migration

The ancestors of Kra first migrated westward following the Yangtze River on boats before reaching eastern Sichuan basin. Then they followed the Wujiang River, a tributary of the Yangtze River, downward into northern Guizhou.

Migration path in red

Cinnabar

The Kra people was the first tribe to develop the technology to extract mercury out of cinnabar which is abundantly found in Hongdu River basin. The Kra people made elixir pills out of cinnabar to present as gifts to the Zhou emperors providing evidence that they have been in Guizhou as early as the Zhou dynasty.

Elixir pills as gift to emperor

Red cinnabar was also used to paint the surfaces of sculptures and household objects.

Second wave of migration

Some Kra people migrated from Guizhou to Luzhou in south-eastern Sichuan during the military incursion of the Wu kingdom in the Three Kingdoms period (220-280 AD) . During the Ming dynasty, most of them migrated from Sichuan back to Guizhou.

Distribution of Kra subgroups

During the Ming and Qing dynasty around 17th-18th century AD, due to suppression from the government, the ancestors of Kra people rebelled and the remnants escaped to remote areas in Guizhou and also to Yunnan, Guangxi and northern Vietnam to form the different Kra sub-groups today.

Another subgroup called Gelong (仡隆) migrated to Hainan island sometime after 111 BC (Han dynasty). They became the third non-Han ethnic group to migrate to Hainan after the Hlai and Ong-Be. They live mainly along Changhua river basin.

Kra subgroups

There are two main branches

Northern: Gelao, Lachi

Southern: Laha, Paha, Buyang, Pubiao/Qabiao, Gelong

The Western branch has phonologies of loss of final stops and lack of vowel length contrast whereas the Eastern branch has preserved these features.

Gelong in Hainan

Culture

Kra people celebrate Yelang Bamboo King festival to commemorate the first king of Yelang kingdom when their tribe was one of several tribes living there before the Han dynasty annexed the kingdom.

However, Yelang kingdom was established by the main tribe which is Lolo-Yi tribe, a part of Sino-Tibetan people, according to Lolo-Yi's history book. More details will be revealed in 'Ethnic origin of Lolo-Yi'.

Bamboo king festival

The Kra people don't have their own written script but use the Han Chinese script instead. There is an ancient Kra city called Kra rock city in Zunyi prefecture in northern Guizhou.

Kra rock city

Conclusion

The Kra ethnic group is the earliest Tai-Kadai group to reach Guizhou province and are the natives there for at least 2,500 years. Other Tai-Kadai groups such as Kam-Sui reached the province much later than the Kra.

Kra cultural dance

Sources

https://kknews.cc/history/gvkbmxm.html
History of Hunan. 湖南通鑑. published by 湖南省地方志編纂委員會.
Sea battles of Chu and Pu. https://sa.sogou.com/sgsearch/sgs_tc_news.php?req=-aIzL5S2-Y6HkylqRNstRl1NbBlqeJBg5NdmjqGYFgA=&user_type=1
Lǐ, Jǐn-Fāng 李锦芳. 1999. Bùyāngyǔ Yánjiū 布央语研究 [Studies of the Bùyāng Language]. Běijīng: The Central University of Nationalities Press.
History of Yelang - 夜郎史傳. By Lolo-Li people.
History of the Gelao. http://www.ethnic-china.com/Gelao/gelaohistory.htm
Proto-Kra. By Weera Ostapirat. http://sealang.net/sala/archives/pdf8/weera2000proto.pdf
The Keh Lao of Kweichow and their History. by Inez de Beauclair, Studio, Serica, 5 (1946)
Origin of the Tai People 5―Cradle of the Tai People and the Ethnic Setup Today. By Joachim Schliesinger.
Origin of the Tai People 6―Northern Tai-Speaking People of the Red River. By Joachim Schliesinger.
Kra-Dai and the Proto-history of South China and Vietnam. By James R.Chamberlain. Journal of Siam Society. Vol. 104, 2016.
https://kknews.cc/food/k4pklor.html
https://kknews.cc/travel/oj9az6.html
Origin of Gelong. https://liangdian.cc/d/F4MtIxggAIE
https://kknews.cc/history/vaalm62.html
https://kknews.cc/zh-sg/news/bo8loy6.html

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