History of the Bai

Little of the origin is known about the Bai. There is a good number of different theories. Some say that they are related to the Yi, and they originated therefore much more to the north of his current position. There consider to be others aboriginals of the region of the Lake Erhai. Of what there is no doubt the fact is that the Bai are one of the minorities that has received major Chinese influence.

The Bai enter the history during the dynasty Tang, when together with the Yi they established the Kingdom of Nanzhao, whose first king PULUOGE was called a King of Yunnan.

From the VIIIth century until the XIth century the Kingdom of Nanzhao was the most powerful political structure of the south of China. Thanks to his alliances game with the Chinese and the Tibetan ones, it obtains the mastery of the south of China, the north of the nearby countries, and even big portions of the province of Sichuan. The Kingdom of Nanzhao is an important shopping center, since in him there come together the trade routes that join China with Burma; as well as a religious center where Buddhist blooms the art. Nevertheless, it still has opened a certain debate, I do not exempt of nationalistic connotations on the ethnic group of the founders of this diet. While in China it is assumed the Yi and the Bai to cause it, in Thailand and other countries of the Asian Southeast it is considered that it was a kingdom Shan, established therefore, for its own ancestors.

During this epoch it is constructed in channel Cangshan that allows to irrigate thousands of hectares of ground. The agriculture prospers, the arts and the culture bloom. The Kingdom of Nanzhao disintegrates after 250 years of existence. The inequality inside his society provokes the tension that takes him to the extinction in the year 902.

After a few years of disorder a new center of power arose, the called Kingdom of Dali, (937-1253), which was a tributary of the Chinese during the dynasty Song up to being demolished by the Mongols of Kublai Khan.

The conquest of the Mongols was one of the least violent of his long Asian campaign, de facto, the aristocratic families of the Bai supported the control of his grounds and nations up to the first of the XXth century.

Since then Chinese and Bai live together pacific in the Yunnan region, what has not avoided any occasional raisings, like the Rebellion Panthay of the XIXth century, that in spite of being led by the Muslims, a rebellious administration created in Dali, where the most fierce combats happened.

While the Bai that were living in the outskirts of Dali had a quite developed culture. Those who emigrated it was doing the west in times of the conquest mongola, they have remained more isolated in the mountains and remote areas, suffering a cultural retrogression, which in some epochs has led them to returning to the slavery or to be supported in any case very primitive societies.

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