The Gaoshan region is located in the mountainous areas of central Taiwan, the eastern longitudinal valley plains and the island of Orchid Island, with an altitude of 5,000 to 2,000 meters, with a tropical and subtropical climate and a large area covered by forests, which is known as the "Treasure Trove of Forests".
The Alpine language belongs to the Indonesian group of the South Island language family. There is a big difference in the Alpine language in each region. At present, there are at least 1 5 languages, which can be roughly divided into "Atayal", "Cao", "Paiwan" three major language groups. There is no common ethnic script. The Alpine Diaspora on the mainland use Chinese as their common language.
The Neolithic artifacts unearthed in Taiwan are closely related to those in the motherland, especially in Fujian, and the Taiwanese should have migrated there from the motherland.
The traditional customs inherited by the Gaoshan people from generation to generation have many qualities of the ancient culture of South China, such as nesting, light house, oars, mortar and pestle, wooden drums, raw seafood, betel nut, chewing rice to make wine, drinking from bamboo tubes, trickery, squatting, feathered crowns, floral dresses, beads and shells, headgear, tube skirts, tattooing with severed hair, chiseling and piercing of teeth, piercing of the ears, qin xiao and teasing, building of a house for maturity, cliff burials, burials, songs and dances, swinging, wood carvings, head-hunting, rituals, witchcraft, and the use of the "new stone age". The people of the region are also known for their head-hunting, rituals, witchcraft, sun, snake and bird worship, ancestor worship, flood myths, sun-shooting myths, and the hyphenated name system, to name a few. Among them, nesting, oars, broken hair and tattoos, chiseling teeth, piercing ears, raw seafood, cliff burials, snake worship, etc. are typical cultural traits of the ancient Yue people, confirming that the Alpine and the ancient Yue people; habits **** customs, originating from a single lineage.
The Gaoshan people used to be in the stage of primitive social development for a long time. According to history, during the Three Kingdoms period, the ancestors of the Gaoshan people were divided into a number of tribes, and the tribal members were called "Yilin", and the public **** affairs were managed by the tribal members **** the same. They used stone axe, stone adze, stone ring, with antlers for spears, with lapis lazuli for arrowheads, to collect, hunting is the main, animal husbandry is not yet developed. Prevailing male married female marriage system, about still in the matrilineal clan society stage. To the 7th century, there has been farming, animal husbandry, production tools are still mainly stone tools, a small amount of iron. Tribal chiefs, no taxes, public **** affairs are still managed by tribal members, some people commit crimes, by tribal members according to customary law **** with the decision to sanction, light war responsibility, heavy death. No text, do not know the calendar, worship the god of the mountains, the god of the sea. The assembly held more songs and dances. There were carvings and paintings. Throughout the Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties, Taiwan and the mainland have increasing contact. According to the Ming Dynasty Chen Di "East Fan Zhi" and other books, when the alpine tribe of agriculture, animal husbandry and hunting, although more than before, there is further development, and there have been some of the specialties of the mainland coastal residents to trade, the Han to agate, porcelain, cloth, salt, copper, hairpin ring and so on the easy alpine tribe of the deer, buckskin, antlers and so on, but the tribes are still "old and dead and other barbarians to exchange But the tribes still "do not communicate with other barbarians", still living a primitive life.
After the 17th century, due to a large number of Han Chinese migrated to Taiwan, as well as Zheng's regime to take a series of measures conducive to the development of alpine economic and cultural, accelerated the social and economic development of the alpine tribe. Some of the Kaoshan people living in the southwestern plains developed into a feudal society. Beginning in the 16th century, the Gaoshan people in Taiwan were subjected to many foreign invasions; in 1563, Japanese invaders invaded the area around Jijiang (Keelung) in the north, killing and looting people, and the local Gaoshan people were forced to move to the mountainous areas. Later on, there were Dutch colonizers, Spanish colonizers, and American and Japanese invaders invading Taiwan, and the Gaoshan people gave resolute resistance and carried out heroic and unyielding struggles, showing the patriotism of defending their homeland to the death.
Before the mass immigration of the Han Chinese in the 17th century, the Alpine people in Taiwan were in the stage of primitive society. Those who lived in the mountains hunted for a living. The ethnic groups living in the plains were engaged in farming, fishing, hunting and gathering, mainly planting taro, yams, dry rice and cereals. They did not know the tools of plowing, harrowing, hoeing and axing, and their production tools and farming techniques were extremely primitive.
During the Qing Dynasty, with the large-scale immigration and development, Taiwan's alpine people generally introduced the advanced production technology of the Han Chinese. Residing in the plains and coastal alpine production and life has changed significantly, began to plant rice, wheat, millet, jasmine, sesame, beans, etc., while nesting in caves and deep forests of the alpine tribe is still mainly hunting, and also collect, planting. Hunting is called "out of the grass", to catch deer, and hunting wild boar, bison, bears, leopards, rabbits, pheasants and so on. Hunting tools are mainly bows, arrows, spears, knives, cannons, etc., hunting methods are generally burned hunting, trap hunting, hunting, etc., the hunting scene is very spectacular. In recent times, hunting has become a sideline business for the Takayama people. In the customs of the Amis and the Peinan, group hunting is an activity that must be carried out before and after the religious ceremonies of major rituals. The Yami and Coastal Amis of Lanyu and the Shao of Sun Moon Lake also engage in fishing. Fishing is usually done with spikes, harpoons, bows, nets, fish traps, fish cages, bamboo covers, rafts, and fishing boats. Methods such as shooting fish, netting, fishing, building weirs, poisoning fish, drying fish, curtain fish, and luring fish are used. The Yami people have a peak season for hunting and catching flying fish from March to June every year. They form flotillas in patrilineal descent groups and net fish at night. Although the Peinan, Paiwan and Rukai people live near the sea, they do not engage in fishing and still use agriculture and hunting as their basic form of production. Until 1949, part of the Alpine Bunun and the Atayal still retained strong remnants of primitive communes, and the Pingpu, Paiwan, Atayal, Rukai, and Amis had moved beyond the slavery society into the feudal society stage. The Pingpu and Paiwan people have also developed tenancy relations and polarization between the rich and the poor.
Since 1949, under the control of the Kuomintang (KMT), Taiwan Province of China's capitalist commodity economy has reached a relatively advanced stage, and Taiwan's economy has been called one of the "Four Little Dragons of Asia". Under the influence and impetus of the developed commodity economy, the farming-cum-fishing-hunting economy of the Gaoshan people has undergone tremendous changes. Modern industry and agriculture grew up in the areas where the Alpine people lived, and the living standards of the Alpine people, especially those living on the coasts and plains, were greatly improved. However, the level of productivity and the degree of economic development varies greatly from place to place. The economic development of the mountainous Takayama people is still slow and their standard of living is relatively low.
The folklore of the Alpine people consists of songs, myths, legends, and stories, which are colorful, ancient, and simple. The songs reflect various production activities such as farming, fishing, hunting and gathering, and there are also war songs that record tribal battles, fight against foreign invasion and defend the territory. There are also customary songs, which are like pearls, and songs on current affairs, which are powerful in attacking the ills of the time. The songs are fresh in tone and beautiful in music. The myths of the Gaoshan people are rich in connotation, and in the process of inheritance, they have formed a mythological system centered on the origin of human ancestors, the flood and the marriage of compatriots, and the conquest of the sun, etc. The myths reflect the beliefs of the Gaoshan compatriots. They reflect the beliefs, aspirations, values and artistic cultivation of the compatriots of the Gaoshan people. In addition, there are many legends and stories based on customs, prominent figures, "little black people", plants and animals.
The Gaoshan are a people rich in artistic genius. They are famous for their singing, dancing, music, carving and other national arts. History shows that whether it is labor, love, wedding banquets, festivals, etc., there are songs and dances performed by the Alpine people, with their hands together, footsteps stepping on the song, shaking their heads and closing their eyes, and they are extremely charming. The hair-swinging dance of the Yami, the short spirit festival dance of the Saixia, and the harvest dance of the Amis are all of high artistic standard. Historically, the Gaoshan people had a marriage custom of building a house for marriage and playing the qin and xiao, so they often played pleasant melodies on the harmonica and nose flute. In addition, there are wind instruments such as nose flute and nose whistle, percussion instruments such as wooden drum, xylophone, pestle and mortar, and stringed instruments such as bowed zither, which make the music pleasant to the ear.
The art of wood carving has the unique style of the primitive art of the Pacific region, among which the wood carving of the Paiwan people is the most prominent. Whether it is a home, weapons and household utensils are carved, knife rough, simple shape. Decorated with squatting human figures as the theme, as well as totemic features of the human head, snakes, deer and geometric patterns of the combination, the pursuit of strong color contrast and exaggerated realism, hiding the soul in the natural, the spirit of the simple and beautiful. The wood carving jewelry of the Paiwan people is a favorite collection at home and abroad. In addition, Yamei people's fishing boat also has a unique carving, its artistic realm for the world to praise.
The Gaoshan people in ancient times took nudity as their beauty. They only used cloth to cover their shadows and furs around their waists. But after contact with the Han culture, gradually formed men wear long shirts and women wear skirts, pay attention to the beauty of the dress. Clothing in addition to animal skin, bark, mostly with self-woven linen and colorful decorations. Men's clothing types, common in the north, sleeveless carcass, cloak, corset, belt; common in the middle of the buckskin undershirt, chest pocket, waist pocket, corset, black cloth skirt; common in the south of the lapel long-sleeved blouse, waist skirt, pants, black turban and so on. The types of women's clothing include short dresses and long skirts and long dresses and short garments. The Yami dress is simple, with men covering their lower body with a dungaree and wearing an undershirt on top; women usually wear an undershirt on top and a tube skirt underneath, and are wrapped in a square cloth in winter.
The diet of the Alpine people is based on cereals and roots and tubers, with corn, rice, potatoes, and taro as the usual food, accompanied by miscellaneous grains, wild vegetables, and game. Mountain to corn, dry rice as the main food, plains to rice as the main food. Pingpu people also specialize in fragrant rice, like to eat "hundred grass paste" (deer intestines in the grass pulp accompanied by salt that is). In the past, the diet was squatting and raw food, and now the diet, cooking and enjoyment are very sophisticated. The Gaoshan people are addicted to tobacco and alcohol, and chew betel nut.
The Gaoshan people used to live in a cave by the mountain and the water, or they used to make bamboo huts and wooden huts. Now the type of housing has a wooden house, bamboo house, thatched roof, slate stone house, grass roof underground houses, etc., but pay close attention to the combination of modeling and practical. Most of them are rectangular or quadrangular, with doors and no windows.
The Alpine people also have the custom of decorating their bodies with face tattoos, tattoos, chiseled teeth, nails, pierced ears, hair removal, and girded bellies, etc. The body decorations are generally done for the purpose of adulthood, aesthetics, marriages, honoring, and respecting the people.
The marriage of the Alpine people is monogamous, and consanguineous marriage is prohibited. Most men and women are free to love and unite, such as the Atayal whistling to show love, some Amis women go to the man's home to give things to show their love for each other. Funeral form, the Atayal, Bunun, Cao people more house burial, burying the body under the bed of the deceased. Paiwan people, Yamei people line field burial, Amis people will be buried in the house before and after the open space, the evil dead, all buried on the spot.
The Gaoshan people have many taboos: women are pregnant, it is forbidden to use the knife and axe, can not eat apes, bobcats, pangolins and jatropha fruits, etc., avoid giving birth to twins; taboo to see snakes, bobcats, rats, and cross the dead and their burial places; taboo to see the animal cross-tailed; forbidden farting, sneezing, adultery with the same family; taboo on eating the head of the animal; taboo on the man to contact the woman's special weaving, linen, hoeing, and hogs; prohibit the female contact with the man's special weapons, hunting equipment, will be the same race, and the woman's special weapon, hunting equipment, will be the same race. Specialized weapons, hunting equipment, clubs and so on.
The important festivals of the Alpine people include: the Sowing Festival (Atayal, late March, the day of the end of the spring sowing), the Peace Festival (Bunun, April 4), the "Ali" Ancestor's Festival (Pingpu, Sept. 16), the Bountiful Years' Festival (Cao, Rukai, Amis, etc., Aug. 15), the Jukan Festival (Paiwan, Oct. 25), the Monkey Festival and the Monkey Festival (Paiwan, Oct. 25), and the Monkey Festival. (Paiwan, October 25), the Monkey Festival and the Great Hunting Festival (Peinan, November), the Short Spirit Festival (Saisiyat, October 11-18), and the Flying Fish Festival of the Yami, to name but a few. The traditional festivals of the Alpine people are usually combined with rituals. The complexity of the festivals is so great that the Taiwan authorities advocate simplifying them and adjusting and merging them, and the above list is the main festivals that are popular now. During the festivals, in addition to songs and dances and gatherings and feasts, sports competitions, cultural exhibitions and amusement activities are also added.
The Alpine people also retain the beliefs and rituals of primitive religions. They worship elves, and the gods they believe in vary from place to place, including the God of Heaven, the God of the Creation of the Universe, the God of Nature, the God of Justice, and other elves and monsters. The rituals include agricultural festivals (including cultivation festivals, sowing festivals, weeding festivals, mowing festivals, new grain in the barn festivals, etc., with the main one being the corn festival), hunting festivals, fishing festivals, and ancestral spirit festivals, etc. Witchcraft was prevalent. Witchcraft was prevalent, including divination methods such as bird divination, dream divination, water divination, bamboo divination, ladybird divination, rice divination, etc., and there were many forms of witch books. Due to the influence of Han Chinese immigrants and Dutch and Spanish colonizers, the religious beliefs of the Gaoshan people are complicated. The Han Chinese brought Buddhism, and the Western invaders brought Christianity and Catholicism. These several religions have taken root among the Gaoshan masses, and now the religious life of the Gaoshan people is characterized by the intertwining of primitive religious beliefs, Buddhism and Western religions.
The Kaoshan people are the collective name for the ethnic minorities in Taiwan Province, which includes more than ten ethnic groups such as the Bunun, Rukai, Paiwan, Peinan, Shao, Taiya, Yamei, Tsao, Amis, and Saisiat.
The name "Gaoshan" was the general name given to the ethnic groups in Taiwan Province after China's victory in the War of Resistance against Japan in 1945.
Historically, especially before the Ming Dynasty, there was no such name as the Gaoshan. The origin of the Gaoshan ethnic group is multi-source, but it mainly comes from a branch of the Ancient Yue people from the southeastern coast of mainland China. Since the Han Chinese inhabitants migrated to Taiwan, the aboriginal ethnic groups have divided into two parts: one part settled in the plains and integrated with the Han Chinese, known as the Pingpu people, including 21 communities of the Siraya, 13 communities of the Hunganya, 9 communities of the Babusa, 4 communities of the Bazehae, 4 communities of the Bapu La, 6 communities of the Dawkas, 28 communities of the Ketagalan, and 34 communities of the Kavalan. The other part is still settled in the mountainous areas, less influenced by the Han Chinese, and still retains the language, customs and habits of its original inhabitants, and what is now called the Gaoshan generally refers to this part of the ethnic minority. on March 14, 1954, the Taiwan authorities stipulated that the Gaoshan include the nine ethnic groups of the Atayal, Saisiyal, Bunun, Tsao (renamed the Tsou in November 1998), Rukai, Paiwan, Penan, Yamei, and Amei (one said 10 ethnic groups). One says there are 10 ethnic groups, and the Thao are also counted as an ethnic group). Most of these ethnic groups are located in the Central Mountain Range and the southeastern islands, with a few scattered in Fujian, Shanghai, Beijing, Wuhan, and other places. The total population is about 400,000, with 2,909 in the mainland diaspora (1990 fourth census).
The Gaoshan have their own language, which belongs to the Indonesian group of the South Island language family. Languages vary greatly within the Alpine ethnic group, with more than a dozen branches such as Amis, Atayal, Paiwanese, and Bunun. They do not have their own script. The Alpine compatriots living in Taiwan have their own unique culture and art, and their oral literature is rich in myths, legends and folk songs.
Most of the Alpine people are engaged in agriculture, and a few fish and hunt. There are handicrafts such as carving and weaving.
For a long time the Gaoshan and Han peoples ****together resisted the aggression of foreign invaders and ****together developed Taiwan. During the 50 years of the Japanese imperialist occupation of Taiwan, the resistance was particularly fierce, with the Mushi Society Uprising of 1930 being the largest, and the predominantly Han Chinese participating in the February 28th Uprising in 1947.
Taboos Women are forbidden to use knives and axes when they are pregnant, and they are forbidden to eat ape meat, bobcat meat, pangolin meat, and fruit; men are not allowed to touch the looms used by women.
Daily Food Customs The Alpine people eat mainly cereals and potatoes. With the exception of the Yami and Bunun, several other ethnic groups use rice as their daily staple food, supplemented by potatoes and mixed grains. The Yami living on Orchid Island eat taro, millet and fish as their staple food, while the Bunun eat millet, corn and yams (locally known as groundnuts) as their staple food. In terms of staple food preparation methods, most of the alpine people prefer to boil rice or steam glutinous rice and cornmeal into cakes and mochi. When making staple food, Bunun people break millet rice in the pot into paste for consumption, and Paiwan people like to use banana leaf rolls to stick millet, mixed with peanuts and meat, steamed as a festive delicacy, which can also be brought when going out for hunting. But as a hunting point to bring small, filling generally do not add salt and other savory seasonings. When the Atayal people go hunting in the mountains, they like to use bananas as the filling wrapped in glutinous rice, then wrapped in banana leaves, steamed and taken away. The Paiwan people like to mix groundnuts, wooden beans, taro stems, etc., and cook them as rice. Yamei people like to mix rice or porridge with taro and sweet potato and cook them together as the main food. Outside labor or travel, but also often to dry taro or boiled sweet potatoes and glutinous rice products similar to dumplings for dry food. Paiwan and other ethnic hunting, do not bring pots, only with matches, the first stone base up, with dry firewood burning hot, and then in the stone under the taro, groundnut, etc., take the sand and soil cover on the stone, cooked and eaten. Alpine vegetables from a wide range of sources, most rely on planting, a small number rely on collection. The common ones are pumpkin, leek, radish, cabbage, potato, beans, chili, ginger and all kinds of mountain shoots and wild vegetables. Yami people consume mustard first when the growing leaves to beat down, with salt kneaded, put two or three days before eating, left in the ground mustard roots continue to grow. The Takayama people generally love to eat ginger, some directly use ginger dipped in salt as a dish; some use salt with chili peppers to pickle. The source of meat is mainly by rearing pigs, cows, and chickens; in many areas fishing and hunting are also a supplement to daily meat consumption, especially among the Gaoshan people who live in the mountains and forests, where captured prey is almost the main source of daily meat. There are many wild animals in the mountains and forests, such as wild boars, deer and monkeys, whose meat can be used in dishes. Paiwan people do not eat dogs, snakes, cats, etc., eating fish is also a very unique method, usually in the fish, take a stone plate on the spot to burn hot, put the fish on the stone plate baked into eight mature, sprinkle salt can be eaten. Paiwanese children are not allowed to eat eel, and even the heads of other fish are not allowed to eat, which is considered unlucky. Amis people in making meat dishes, like to cut the meat into pieces, inserted bamboo sticks, after cooking in a large pot, the whole family around the pot, each person with a small basket of rattan rice, *** with a spoon to scoop the vegetables, one hand to grab the rice, one hand to take the meat to eat. During the rice-planting season, they like to catch small frogs in the paddy fields, bring them back to their homes, wash them with water and cook them. Some of the Amis, Taiya and other ethnic groups also eat raw fish. They also like to hit the hunt to kill a good skin, add salt and half-cooked millet with pickling, for a few months to eat. Preservation of food is often pickled, dried in the sun and roasted in several ways, to pickle one or two years of pork and fish for the top dishes. In the past, the Alpine people generally did not drink boiled water and did not have the habit of drinking tea. The Atayal people like to use ginger or chili bubble of cold water as a drink. It is said that this drink has the function of curing abdominal pain. In the past, when hunting in the mountains, there is the habit of drinking animal blood. Both men and women are addicted to alcohol and usually drink home-made rice wine such as corn wine, rice wine and potato wine.
Festivals, ceremonies, rituals and food customs The Gaoshan people are bold and hospitable. They like to hold feasts, songs and dances on festivals and happy days. Every festival, we have to kill pigs, slaughter cows, and set up wine feasts. At the end of the year, the Bunun people use a kind of plant leaves to eat "Xino", wrapped with glutinous rice and steamed, for the people of the same clan to enjoy, in order to express the celebration. The most representative food for the Gaoshan people's festivals are cakes and mochi made from various kinds of glutinous rice. They are not only used as snacks during festivals, but also as offerings for rituals. Glutinous rice is also made into rice for guests. The Alpine tribes have many festivals, such as Ancestral Spirit Festival, Cereal God Festival, Mountain God Festival, Hunting God Festival, Marriage Festival, Harvest Festival, etc., and the Paiwan's Five-Year Festival is the most solemn. In addition to the banquet and offerings, there are also various cultural and sports activities. Weddings and banquets are very sumptuous and spectacular, especially the preparation of a large amount of wine, when the participants have to drink a lot, and there is a custom of not leaving without getting drunk. On the day of "Harvest Festival", clansmen bring their own jar of wine to the venue, surrounded by bonfires, dancing, eating and drinking to celebrate the harvest of a year's labor, which is held once a year. Paiwan people in the celebration of the day commonly used a wooden, beautifully carved even cup, two people holding shoulders **** drink, to show that the intimate, such as guests to, must kill chickens to be treated. Bunun people in the feast guests first left the chicken legs, to be guests to leave with the road to eat, meaning that ate chicken thighs, walking more energy. Rukai people good to bake taro for the stove, baked taro outside the crispy soft, easy to carry, and often brought to the guests on the road to eat. Paiwan people wedding, the millet ground into powder, add water to stir the paste, wrapped in fish and shrimp (shrimp exposed tail), pinched into an egg-sized ball, placed in a pot of boiling water, cooked and then fished out to eat.
Typical Foods The Gaoshan people, each of the ten ethnic groups has its own unique foods, among which the typical foods are: cured meat, the method of storing meat for the Atayal and Amis people of the Gaoshan ethnic group, of which the Atayal cured monkey meat and the Amis cured venison and wild boar are unique; smacking wine, a kind of rice wine brewed in the local method of the Paiwan people and Bunun people of the Gaoshan ethnic group.
Introduction of the Alpine Ethnic Groups The Alpine Ethnic Group is the collective name for the ethnic minorities in Taiwan Province of China, which includes more than ten ethnic groups, including the Bunun, the Rukai, the Paiwan, the Peinan, the Shao, the Atayal, the Yamei, the Tsao, the Amis, and the Saisiat.
The Bunun
The Bunun (Bunun means "people" in the Alpine language) are one of the ethnic groups of the Alpine people. The population is more than 30,000, living in 60 villages. The original settlement was in the high mountains north of Yushan and west of the Central Mountain Range, and later migrated toward Taitung and Kaohsiung. Nowadays, they mainly live in Renai and Xinyi Townships in Nantou County, Sanmin, Taoyuan, and Maolin Townships in Kaohsiung County, Haiduan, Yanping Townships, and Guanshan Townships in Taitung County, and Wanrong, Zhuoxi Townships, and Yuli Townships in Hualien County. There are three subgroups under the total ethnic group: the Northern Bununs are located in the western foothills of the Central Mountain Range; the Central Bununs are located in Kaohsiung County; and the Southern Bununs are scattered in the area of Hualien in Taitung County. Weaving, basket weaving, tanning and pottery making techniques are relatively developed. The social life is patriarchal clan system. After marriage, wives follow their husbands and sons follow their fathers, and women have a certain status in the family.
The Rukai
The Rukai are one of the ethnic groups of the Takayama. With a population of more than 6,300, they live in 20 villages distributed in the mountains south of the Alishan and New Alpine Mountains and north of the Dawu Mountains, including the upper reaches of the Gaoping River in the watersheds of the Turbid Water Creek, the Ailiao Creek, and the Danan Creek on the east side of the Central Mountain Range, and belonging to the townships of Sandi and Wutai in Pingtung County, Moulin in Kaohsiung County, and Peinan in Taitung County, with Wutai County being the most centralized. The Rukai people have the same living habits as the Paiwan people; they live in slate houses and are famous for their pottery pots, material beads, carvings, and tattoos. Classes have emerged in social life. Only one pair of spouses is allowed to exist among members of each generation, power is inherited by the eldest male, and side and straight limb burials are used after death. The language and culture are greatly influenced by the Bunun.
The Paiwan People
The Paiwan people are one of the ethnic groups of the Gaoshan. They have a population of about 55,000 and live in 160 villages. Originally, they lived in the foothills of the mountains, but later moved to the mountains. Its distribution area, from the north of Dawu Mountain, south of Hengchun, west of Ailiao, Fangliao line, east of Cannabis in the south of the triangle area, respectively, scattered in Pingtung County, three land, Majia, Taiwu, Laiyi, Chunri, lions, Mudan, and Taitung County's Jinfeng, Daren, Cannabis in the townships, such as Dawu. The Paiwan people are divided into two subgroups, the Paiwan and the Tarotaro. The former resides in the central part of the tribe's distribution area and has a strong ethnic identity, and is divided into two subgroups, the Dongben, with the Central Mountain Range as the boundary; the latter resides along the east coast, and is also divided into two subgroups, the East Coast and the Bari Raleo. The community is divided into commoners, nobles and other classes. The eldest of the children inherited power. Crafts are more developed.
The Peinan
The Peinan are one of the ethnic groups of the Alpine Nation. They have a population of about 7,000 and live in eight villages. Legend has it that the tribe originated in Banatu, near Taitung, and were once the masters of the Taitung Plain. It is mainly distributed in the coastal area south of the Peinan River and north of the Chiben River, and resides in the townships of Peinan, Jinfeng, and Daren in Taitung County. In the past, they used to be classified as a clan with the Rukai and Paiwan, but were recognized as a separate ethnic group in 1954. Clan rights are inherited by the eldest daughter, and family life favors the mother's side.
The Shao People
The Shao are one of the ethnic groups of the Gaoshan people, living in the area around Sun Moon Lake in Nantou County. Some consider it to be part of the Cao people, others classify it as a member of the Bunun people, and still others classify it as a lineage of the Pingpu people, but its language, customs, and habits are uniquely distinctive, and thus it is viewed as a separate ethnic group.
Tayas
Tayas are one of the ethnic groups of the Gaoshan. With a population of more than 64,000, accounting for 23.5% of the total population of the Takayas, they are the second largest ethnic group among the Takayas. They live in 120 villages. Originally living in the plains of western Taiwan, they gradually moved to the mountainous areas due to environmental pressures, mainly in the northern half of Taiwan, such as Wulai Township of Taipei County, Fuxing Township of Taoyuan County, Jianshi Township and Wufeng Township of Hsinchu County, Tai'an Township of Miaoli County, Heping Township of Taichung County, Ren'ai Township and Xinyi Township of Nantou County, Xiulin Township of Hualien County, and Datong Township and Nan'ao Township of Yilan County. This ethnic group is divided into two subgroups, the Atayal and the Sedek. The Atayal subgroup is subdivided into the Xizumabao group, the Da (Shan + Ke) (Shan + Kan) group, the Dahu group, and the Xikailik group; the Sedek subgroup is also subdivided into two groups, the East and the West. This group has the custom of whale face and tattoo. Men are good at hunting, women are good at weaving, and they live from their husbands.
The Yami
The Yami are one of the ethnic groups of the Takayama. They have a population of 2,500 and live in six villages. Distributed in the coastal area of Lanyu Island in Taitung County, they are the only fishing and hunting ethnic group among the Gaoshan. The language is almost identical to that of the Bataan inhabitants in the northern Philippines. Agriculture is based on the cultivation of water yams, and the crafts are more famous for pottery, shipbuilding and silver making. Social life is dominated by the nuclear family. The group is peace-loving and has no habits such as head-hunting. Their grandest festival is the Flying Fish Festival.
The Cao (renamed the Tsou in November 1998)
The Cao are one of the ethnic groups of the Takayama. With a population of over 3,000, they live in 12 villages. Originally distributed in the area from Da Xi to Da An Xi in Taoyuan, they settled in Wufeng Township in Hsinchu County, Nanzhuang and Shihtan Township in Miaoli County. The group is divided into two sub-groups, the North Saixia and the South Saixia, and within the group, the line follows the father's line, the wife follows the husband's line, and they often cohabit with each other for generations, with no one pair of spouses in the same generation as the limit. Every two years, a human dwarf festival is held.
The Amis
The Amis (Amis means "north" and is the name given by the people of the southern part of Amis to the people of the northern part of the country) are one of the ethnic groups of the Takayama. The Amis have the largest population of about 120,000 among the Alpine people. Originally located in the vicinity of Xiuguluan Creek and Hengchun, at the north and south ends of the longitudinal valley plain in eastern Taiwan, they later moved to the eastern part of Hualien County and the northeastern part of Taitung County along the eastern longitudinal valley and coastline, including 11 townships in Taitung County and 12 townships in Hualien County. Based on language, customs and regional differences, they are roughly divided into four parts: the northern, central and southern Amis and the coastal Amis.
The Saisiyas
The Saisiyas are one of the ethnic groups of the Gaoshan. They have the smallest population among the Alpine ethnic groups, with about 1,075 people. Their ancestors moved down from the Daba Jian Mountains to the flatlands around Dahu and Miaoli, and then gradually migrated to the mountainous areas around Alishan and Wufeng Mountains, southwest of the Atayal habitat, which are divided into Wufeng Township and other areas in Hsinchu County.
Recency
At present, the aborigines in Taiwan are generally referred to as residents outside of the Han Chinese lineage, and the "Gaoshan" is only one of them (as opposed to the Pingpu, who have been more y Sinicized), and follows the research of anthropologists during the Japanese colonial period, and is divided into dozens of groups, with the language belonging to the South Island language group of Taiwan, and the total population of each of these groups is about 44,000, and there are another 4,400 in the Chinese mainland. The total population of each ethnic group in Taiwan is about 44 people, and another 4,400 people live in mainland China. However, it is worth noting that not all of the Alpine tribes live in the mountains. For example, the Amis, who live in the Huadong Valley in eastern Taiwan, and the Dawu (Yami), who live in Orchid Island, do not live in the mountains, and so this term is relatively generalized. In recent years, based on the position of respect and more correct categorization, the term "aborigines" or the original names of the ethnic groups have been used to replace the division of the two major ethnic groups (Gaoshan and Pingpu), but some people also believe that the term "prehistoric people" is more appropriate.