Where did the Qiang people in the ancient west come from? What race did the earliest Qiang people belong to?

Qiang is an ancient Chinese character, which appeared in Oracle Bone Inscriptions as early as Shang Dynasty. Shuo and Bu interpret the word "Qiang" as "the shepherd of Xirong". From people, from sheep. "Visible, qiang people since ancient times is a western nationalities herding sheep. In the present situation of the development of the Chinese nation, the position of the Qiang people is equivalent to the giant panda in the animal kingdom and the ginkgo tree in the plant kingdom. It is the only living fossil of an ancient nation and has attracted much attention in the study of culturology, anthropology, ethnology and linguistics. According to relevant records, the ancient Qiang people lived in northwest China (now Gansu, Ningxia, Qinghai and Shaanxi). Five or six thousand years ago, some Western Qiang people merged with the Central Plains nationality represented by the Yellow Emperor tribe in the Yellow River valley, forming the Huaxia nationality, the predecessor of our Han nationality. It is said that Emperor Yan and Dayu are both Qiang people or descendants of Qiang people, and Dayu's hometown is Beichuan County, which suffered the most in this earthquake. Several other western Qiang ethnic groups have developed into southwest ethnic groups such as Tibetan, Yi and Naxi. During the Northern Song Dynasty, the Tangut Qiang, a branch of the Qiang people in Hehuang area, established the Xixia Dynasty, the most powerful Qiang regime in China history. This dynasty existed for 100 years and was conquered by Mongols. The Tangut Qiang people who established this dynasty were scattered, and some of them were integrated into the Han nationality and some were Tubo, becoming the ancestors of Tibetans now distributed in Ningxia, Gansu and Qinghai.

In history, Qiang people have formed two gathering places: one is Hehuang area and the other is the upper reaches of Minjiang River. This gathering place in Hehuang area was dissolved with the collapse of Xixia Dynasty, and only the gathering place of Qiang people in the upper reaches of Minjiang River survived thousands of years of historical dust. The Qiang people distributed outside this area, either divided by other ethnic groups or assimilated by other ethnic groups, have disappeared in the historical time and space, while the Qiang people in the upper reaches of the Minjiang River have always adhered to their own cultural traditions and preserved this ancient civilization. Here, we need to distinguish two concepts, namely "Qiang nationality in the sense of historical origin" and "Qiang nationality in the sense of modern ethnology". Many scholars' concept of "Qiang" basically means the latter. As one of the ethnic groups in the modern sense, the Qiang nationality lives in the Wolong Nature Reserve in Wenchuan in the west, in the east of Beichuan County, in the south of Xuankou District in Wenchuan County and in the south of Songpan County in the north, including Maoxian County, Wenchuan County, Beichuan County, Lixian County, Songpan County and Pingwu County in the southwest. As far as geological structure is concerned, the area where Qiang people live is located in the zone where neotectonic movement in China is the strongest, and the geological structure is complex and broken, belonging to Longmenshan seismic belt in Sichuan-Yunnan seismic belt. There have been many geological disasters such as earthquakes and mudslides in this area in history, but it is the first time that such a rare geological disaster as the "5. 12" Wenchuan earthquake occurred.

At present, the disaster relief work has come to an end, and the subsequent post-disaster reconstruction work has gradually put the protection and restoration of cultural relics in the disaster area on the agenda. Because the earthquake mainly occurred in the Qiang nationality concentrated areas, the cultural heritage of the Qiang nationality was particularly damaged. According to the statistics of Mianyang Museum, Beichuan was buried in this earthquake with 2 national second-class cultural relics, 3-class cultural relics 12 1 piece, more than 280 general cultural relics and more than 400 Qiang folk cultural relics. /kloc-more than 0/20 pieces of cultural relics were sent to Mianyang Museum for collection after being identified last year, and survived. In order to protect the Qiang culture, Mianyang allocated 654.38+10,000 yuan for the collection of Qiang cultural heritage last year, and advocated the Qiang people to donate their collections enthusiastically. But no one expected that this collection action led to the collective destruction of Qiang cultural relics. In addition to these precious cultural relics, the unique architecture and many precious historical sites of the Qiang nationality have also been damaged to varying degrees. The ancient stone wall of Yongpingbao in Beichuan collapsed in many places, and the gate was cracked and deformed. Maoxian Yingpanshan Neolithic cultural site, Xerox village site, Cook plank road, Qingpu Menhe dam site, sarcophagus burial, shadowless tower, etc. It was destroyed.

Since the Qiang people have no written language, their language and culture are passed down by their elders. The elders who know the Qiang language and the "Duangong" who are familiar with the Qiang history and culture are very important for the description and inheritance of the Qiang culture. The earthquake killed a large number of Qiang people who were familiar with their language, history and culture, which had a great impact on the inheritance of Qiang culture.

To this end, the experts put forward some suggestions to save this ancient nation:

First, in the next five to 10 years, a more favorable birth policy will be implemented for the Qiang people, and appropriate subsidies will be given to the newly born Qiang population.

Second, in principle, the Qiang population does not emigrate or adopt from other places, and tries to resettle locally.

Thirdly, the restoration and reconstruction of some ancient Qiang villages in post-disaster reconstruction can be considered comprehensively with tourism.

Fourth, strengthen Qiang language education, actively promote Qiang phonetic symbols, and set up Qiang language classes in Qiang schools.

There is a poem in the Tang Dynasty: "Why should Qiangdi complain about the willow? The spring breeze is just like Yumenguan". Whether the Qiang flute, a unique national musical instrument of the Qiang nationality, can be played and how long it can be played, not only experts and scholars pay attention to this issue, but also tourists and ordinary people are deeply looking forward to its solution. I believe that with the joint efforts of the government and cultural relics protection workers, Qiangdi can be played for a long time, because there are people deep in the white clouds.