Introduction
Contrary to popular beliefs, Thailand is not a mono-ethnic country. There are four main ethnic groups in Thailand in descending order of percentage.
Tai
This group comprises the largest which is around 70-73% of the population. Most of the pure Tai people live in northern Thailand. They are similar to the fair-skinned Tai people in Guangxi, China. As you go south towards central Thailand, the number of intermarriages between ethnic Tai and other ethnic groups increases.
Han Chinese
The Han Chinese constitute the second largest group which is around 17% of the population. They live mainly in the main cities in Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, greater Bangkok and Phuket provinces. Most of the Han Chinese came from the provinces of Guangdong, Yunnan and Fujian in China.
If we include the mixed Chinese-Tai who are recorded as ethnic Tai then this percentage will be much higher. Intermarriage between Han Chinese and Tai are quite common in Thailand.
Mon-Khmer
The Mon and the Khmer tribes are the natives of Thailand and constitute the third largest group at around 7% of the population. The unmixed ones live around the southern part of northeast Thailand (Isaan) near the Cambodian border and there are also significant numbers in central Thailand. They are traditionally Buddhists.
Foreigners used to call people in Thailand as Siamese which comes from this native ethnic group. It is derived from the Sanskrit word Shyam meaning 'dark' (skinned people).
Malays
The Malays constitute around 3% of the population and are traditionally Muslims. They live mostly in southern Thailand in Songkla, Pattani, Yala, Narathiwat provinces which border Malaysia.
Ethnic map of Thailand
The map below shows roughly the distribution of the different ethnicities in Thailand.
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Hello great blog you got there. Who are the Karen most closely related too ? If they speak sino Tibetan, then they are probably related to Burmese. But they don't seem to get along.
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