Tay (people)
Tay women
|
|
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| 1,626,392 (2009) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Northern Vietnam: Cao Bằng, Lạng Sơn, Bắc Kạn, Thái Nguyên, Quảng Ninh, Bắc Ninh, Bắc Giang Provinces | |
| Languages | |
| Tày | |
| Religion | |
| Then,Buddhism |
| Tay people | |
| Vietnamese name | |
|---|---|
| Vietnamese | Người Tày |
| Hán-Nôm | |
The Tày people speak a language of the Central Tai language group, and live in northern Vietnam. They are sometimes also called Thô, T'o, Tai Tho, Ngan, Phen, Thu Lao, or Pa Di.
There are about 1.7 million Tày people living in Vietnam (based on the 2009 census and 5 years of population growth). This makes them the second largest ethnic group in Vietnam after the majority Viet ethnic group. Most are in northern Vietnam in particular in the Cao Bằng, Lạng Sơn, Bắc Kạn, Thái Nguyên, and Quảng Ninh Provinces, where they live along the valleys and the lower slopes of the mountains. They also live in some regions of the Bắc Ninh and Bắc Giang provinces. They inhabit fertile plains and are generally agriculturalists, mainly cultivating rice. They also cultivate maize, and sweet potato among other things.
Tày villages are usually based at the feet of mountains and are often named after a mountain, field or river. Each village has about 15-20 households.
The Tày are closely related to the Nùng and the Zhuang on the Chinese side of the Vietnamese-Chinese border.
It is common for Tày woman to wear skirts or sarongs which go down to the knee, and are split up the right side with five buttons along the armpit and narrow sleeves.
Tày songs include the "Lượn", which is a kind of duet between lovers and a kind of poem.
The majority of the Tay practices Then, an indigenous religion involving the worship of tutelary gods, gods of the natural environment, and ancestors and progenitors of human groups. The patterns of this religion are inherited from Taoism and the Chinese folk religion: the god of the universe is the Jade Emperor, in some local taditions (for example in the Quảng Hoà district of Cao Bằng) also identified as the Yellow Emperor (Hoàng Đế). For their religious ceremonies they used to be able to recite Chinese characters but now along with the characters they use glosses because many of them can't recite anymore due to the fact that Vietnam schools don't teach Chinese characters.
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Wikipedia