Hani people

Hani

An ethnic Hani girl with a typical Hani headgear for children. Near Yuanyang, Yunnan Province, China
Total population
(About 1,750,000)
Regions with significant populations
China	1,440,029 (2000)
Myanmar	200,000 (2007)
Laos	60,000 (2007)
Thailand	60,000 (2007)
Vietnam	21,725 (2009)
Languages
Hani, Hanoish languages
Religion
Animism, Buddhism, Christianity
Related ethnic groups
Akha, Yi, Lahu

The Hani or Ho people (Hani: Haqniq; Chinese: 哈尼族; pinyin: Hānízú; Vietnamese: Người Hà Nhì) are an ethnic group. They form one of the 56 officially recognized nationalities of the People's Republic of China, and one of the 54 officially recognized ethnic groups of Vietnam. In Laos, the Hani are more commonly known as Ho.

There are 12,500 Hani living in Lai Châu Province and Lào Cai Province of Vietnam. The Ho reside in the mountainous northern regions of Phongsaly Province in Laos, near the Chinese and Vietnamese borders.

Over ninety percent of present-day Hani peoples live in the Province of Yunnan in southern China, located across the Ailao Mountains, between the Mekong River and the Red River (Yuanjiang river).

Subdivisions of Hani autonomous counties within prefecture-level cities, and a prefecture, within Yunnan are:

The origins of the Hani are not precisely known, though their ancestors, the ancient Qiang tribe, are believed to have migrated southward from the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau prior to the third century CE.

The Hani oral traditions state that they are descended from the Yi people, and that they split off as a separate tribe fifty generations ago. One of their oral traditions is the recital of the names of Hani ancestors from the first Hani family down to oneself.