Dong people's customs and habits

"Mid-Autumn Festival" is a social activity. People go from one village to another to play lusheng or sing and sing operas. Off-season bullfighting is one of the collective entertainment activities. At that time, young and old will gather together, with a sea of people, cheers and thunder, gongs and drums, and iron cannons shaking the valley. If guests from other villages pass by this village, they will stop at the edge of the village and answer with a song called "Zhazhai Gate". "Singing and sitting on the moon", also known as "singing and sitting at night", is the general term for young men and women to socialize and fall in love. The Dong nationality area in the north is called "mountain play", where young men and women meet in groups of three and five to sing love songs on the hillside after work. In the southern Dong area, it is called "Walking Village" or "Walking Girl". In the evening, the girls work together in the house, and the boys in Kezhai bring musical instruments to accompany them and talk about their love. When making out, men and women exchange notes (give gifts) and make promises to each other, which is a matter between husband and wife. Dong people in Fulu and other places in Sanjiang County often gather in Guangping on March 3 or February 2 in the summer calendar to punch an iron ring with a special fire bag. When landing, everyone will grab it, and the winner will get a generous reward. This is the so-called "fireworks grab".

The marriage of Dong people is monogamous. Cousins are more popular, and aunts, cousins and people of different generations can't get married. After marriage, women have the custom of "sitting at home" (that is, "staying at home"). Before liberation, the basic social unit of Dong nationality was patriarchal clan system with feudal patriarchal system. Women's status in society and family is lower than that of men, and women are forbidden to touch bronze drums; Men or elders are downstairs and are not allowed to go upstairs. Dong girls can only enjoy the "private houses" accumulated by their parents and themselves and a small amount of "girl fields" and "girl fields" after marriage. Men inherit the family business, and those who have no heirs can adopt adopted sons.

Funerals are generally buried like the Han nationality. In some areas, there is also the custom of stopping burial. After death, people park their coffins in the suburbs, and their families are buried together with the contemporaries of the deceased when they die.

Believing in polytheism and worshiping natural objects, ancient trees, boulders, wells and bridges are all objects of worship. Taking the female surname "Sa Sui" (meaning the mother who founded the village) as the supreme god, every village has established a "Sa Sui Temple". Use chicken, grass, egg, snail, rice and rice to determine good or bad luck. Some places are influenced by the Han nationality and believe in some gods of the Han nationality. Believe in the immortality of the soul. Buddhism has also spread, and there are temples in Antang, but not many people believe it. Christianity and Catholicism were also introduced, but not many believers.

The Dong people's festival is the Spring Festival, where they worship the ox god (the eighth day of April or the sixth day of June in the lunar calendar) and eat Chinese New Year's goods (the seventh month in the lunar calendar). In some areas, people celebrate the Year of Dong in 10 or 1 1 month. Due to the inter-ethnic communication, Dong people also have Tomb-Sweeping Day, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival and Double Ninth Festival.

Among them, the festival of Dong nationality is called Walking Year. Eating club meals (Spring Club Day in February) is the custom of Dong people to eat club meals, but they don't engage in any activities. Collect fresh Artemisia ordosica (Artemisia ordosica and Artemisia annua) in fields, streams and hillsides, go home, wash and chop them, knead them into bitter water, bake them, mix them with auxiliary materials such as wild garlic (shallots), dried glutinous rice, dried bean curd, dried bacon, etc. (some glutinous rice can also be mixed, but the glutinous rice needs to be cooked half-cooked first and then mixed with glutinous rice), and steam or stew them to make them taste different.

Indoor shrines dedicated to ancestors are the most sacred places. Knife, pine, sword, halberd, spear, bow, crossbow and even brown rope are not allowed to be placed on it. Otherwise, out of disrespect for God, you will be punished. During the sacrificial activities in the village, outsiders are forbidden to enter the village. The sign of taboo is to tie four knots with spotted thatch to form a cross and hang it at the gate of the stockade.

Dietary customs

Dong people are distributed in the adjacent areas of Guizhou, Hunan and Guangxi provinces in southern China. Dong ethnic rice, fish farming in paddy fields, fish and food run concurrently. Produce fungus, mushrooms, magnolia slices, watermelons, etc.

In most Dong areas, there are four eclipses, two meals and two teas. Rice is the main body of rice. Pingba eats more japonica rice and mountainous areas eat more glutinous rice. There are many kinds of glutinous rice, including red glutinous rice, black glutinous rice, white glutinous rice, bald glutinous rice and dried glutinous rice, among which Xianghe glutinous rice is the most famous. They make all kinds of rice into white rice, flower rice, rice congee, flower porridge, zongzi, Ciba and so on. When eating, they knead rice into a ball with their hands, which is called "eating rice". Dong people are generally used to cooking all day in the morning and taking them up the mountain to eat. Among them, the "steamed rice" made by Xianghe rice is particularly sweet, and there is a saying that "a steamed rice makes the whole village fragrant". The tea that Dong people drink refers to camellia oleifera, which is a thick soup made of tea, popcorn, fried peanuts, crisp soybeans, glutinous rice, meat, pig water, salt, chopped green onion and tea oil. It can not only quench thirst, but also satisfy hunger. Accompanied by rice and tea, there are vegetables, fresh fish, meat, melons and fruits, game, fungi and drinks, and the food sources are extensive.

Vegetables are mostly made into sour garlic. There are two kinds of sauerkraut: cylinder system and cylinder system. Tanning refers to putting rice washing water into a jar, heating it with fire, fermenting it to make sour soup, and then cooking fish, shrimp and vegetables with sour soup as the most common daily dishes.

Fresh fish include carp, crucian carp, grass carp, eel, loach, shrimp, crab, river snail, clam, etc., and can be made into famous dishes such as roasted carp, grass carp soup, fried crucian carp, sucking river snail, sour shrimp and sour crab. The shrimp paste that people often eat is also made of cans. Braised fish, braised pork chops, steaks and braised chickens and ducks are mainly made in test tubes. There are two kinds of wooden barrels: wooden barrels and bamboo barrels. It is best to cook pickled fish in winter. The longer the curing time, the more mellow the taste. Fish and shrimp are often eaten fresh except for many sour foods.

Meat is mainly pigs, cows, chickens and ducks, with little difference. Melons and fruits include thorn plum, kiwi fruit, black persimmon, wild bayberry, wild pear, rattan pear, full fruit, thorn chestnut, dawangpao, tender bark of Matsumura, tender bark of mulberry and vanilla root.

Among them, the fruit of oak can be made into tofu, the skin of "fragrant tree" can clean white teeth, and the "tea bubble" on tea tree is natural sweet and sour juice. Game includes rats, snakes, tadpoles, quadrupeds, cicadas, locusts, ground bees, Shi Wa, pangolins, baby fish, elk, sika deer, muntjac, and pine cone-eating turpentine chickens and pigs, which can be skillfully used by Dong people. In terms of auricularia auricula ears, there are Tricholoma matsutake and delicious frozen shredded chicken mushrooms, as well as vine roots and kudzu roots that can be used to make Baba and vermicelli. Tess, who grows in paddy fields, is full of bamboo shoots. The drinks are mainly home-brewed rice wine and "bitter wine", as well as tea and juice.

According to a rough estimate, there are no fewer than 500 kinds of common foods for Dong people, including those that fly in the sky, those that swim in the water, those that grow on the ground and those that crawl in the grass. It shows their intelligence and strong survival adaptability. Dong Jia can make all kinds of pickles with ginger. It can be processed into pickled ginger, drum ginger, sugar ginger, striped ginger, spiced ginger, oil ginger, ginger wine and so on and sold all over the country. Dong girls in western Hunan are good at carving fish, birds, flowers and plants in various shapes with grapefruit skin and winter melon skin, and making candied fruit with white sugar stains. When entertaining guests, use small pickles and grand pickles. In the minds of Dong people, glutinous rice is the most fragrant, sweet wine is the most mellow, sauerkraut is the most fragrant, tobacco leaves are the coolest, wine songs are the coolest, and banquets are the most jubilant. Dong people want to make "bronze bars" for banquets, and the process is complex and meticulous, and there are many varieties. For example, those with perilla juice are called red Dongba, those with bayberry leaves are called black Dongba, those with stuffing are called bean paste Dongba, jujube paste Dongba and so on. When making tea, you should add candied flowers carved from grapefruit skin and winter melon skin; At the banquet, five-flavored ginger, fragrant and palatable oil tea, sweet and soft black pearl rice, sour dragon meat prepared by buffalo and world-famous wild grass carp should be prepared, so that the host and guest can get together.

Dong adult men generally like to drink, and most of them drink their own brewed rice wine, which is not high in degree, light and mellow. The most distinctive feature is the special welcoming ceremony when guests enter the village-"blocking wine". When the Dong people entered the stockade, they set up "roadblocks" at the gatehouse to stop the guests and drink songs. You sing and I answer, and the lyrics are humorous. After singing the wine, they swept away the obstacles and welcomed the guests in. After sitting down, it's time to change the wine and "make a drink". Neighbors either come to accompany guests automatically, or invite guests to their own homes, or "get together" to hold a banquet in the Drum Tower, regardless of each other. At the banquet, there are also rules such as "treat guests with the head of a chicken", "treat guests with camellia oleifera", "treat guests with sauerkraut and bitter wine", "eat closed meals" and "drink alcohol".

Dong people's dietary taboos are mainly: don't sit on the threshold and eat, don't watch others eat; There is no fire on the first day of the first month; No outsiders are allowed to enter the village during the sacrifice; During the mourning period, dutiful sons should avoid vegetarianism, but fish and shrimp are not limited.

Dong people worship dragons, and rainbows appear on the horizon, which is called "dragon drinking water". No one can carry water or finger a rainbow. When worshiping fish, identifying with clan or recognizing relatives, first ask the other party if they know the head of Sanyu (the totem symbol of its ancestors). If they can answer, they will be regarded as kin. Every wedding, funeral, wedding and other major events, guests and gifts are inseparable from fish.

Dong adult men generally like to drink, and most of them drink their own brewed rice wine, which is not high in degree, light and mellow.

Constant habit

Dong people's diet is mainly rice, Pingba area is mainly japonica rice, and mountainous areas eat more glutinous rice. Generally like to eat Chili and sour. Self-processed "fermented fish" and "fermented meat" will not go bad after being stored for more than ten years. It is the hospitality habit of Dong people to entertain guests with camellia oleifera. The villages of the Dong nationality are surrounded by mountains and rivers, and the southern region is the most distinctive. There are many ancient trees at the end of the village, and the stream crosses the "wind and rain bridge". There are four fish ponds in the village. According to the surname, the Drum Tower stands among them. Live in a "dry fence" house, live upstairs, raise livestock, and pile up debris downstairs. There are three eclipses in most areas, and four eclipses in some places, that is, two teas and two meals. Second tea refers to the unique camellia oleifera of Dong nationality. Camellia oleifera is a thin soup made of tea, flowers, fried peanuts (or crisp soybeans), glutinous rice, meat or pig water, salt and chopped green onion. (There are spinach and Artemisia in some places), which can quench thirst and satisfy hunger, so it is often called "eating camellia oleifera".

The shrimp paste that people often eat is also made of cans. Braised fish, braised pork chops, steaks and braised chickens and ducks are mainly made in test tubes. There are two kinds of wooden barrels: wooden barrels and bamboo barrels. It is best to cook pickled fish in winter. The longer the curing time, the more mellow the taste. Fish and shrimp are often eaten fresh except for many sour foods. Dong adult men generally like to drink, and most of them drink their own brewed rice wine, which is not high in degree, light and mellow.