Brief Introduction of Shui Ethnic Group

The Suis is one of the minority nationalities in China. It has a population of 345993 and they inhabit mainly in Sadu Sui Autonomous County, Libo, Duyun, Dushan counties in the Southern Guizhou Bouyei and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, and Kaili, Liping, Rongjiang and Congjiang counties in the Southeastern Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture. A few scatter over the west of Guangxi Zhang Autonomous Region.

The inhabiting place of the Suis is to the south of the Miaoling mountain range at the upper reaches of the Duliujiang River and the Dragon River, where forest is dense, mountains and water are like pictures. The area is suitable for developing forestry and is a land of fish, rice, flower and fruit in the Guizhou Plateau. In Suis’ folk songs, their hometown is described “as beautiful as peacock’s tail”.

The Suis are engaged in farming and they mainly plant paddy. “Nine-footpath wine” is traditional good wine of the Suis.

The forefathers of the Suis were a branch of the “ancient Baiyue”. In the Tang and Song Dynasties they and the minority nationalities of the Zhuang and Dong branch were called “Liao” all together. In the Northern Song Dynasty, a “Zhou (an administrative division in former times) Appeasing the Suis” was set up in the Sui region. The Suis were often called “Shuimiaojia” or “Shiujia”. The name of Sui was fixed after the new China was founded.

The Sui language belongs to the Sui language branch in the Chuang-Tong family in Sino-Tibetan Family. Ancestors of the Suis created their own character called “Sui character”. The form of it is like that of inscriptions on bones or tortoise shells and inscriptions on ancient bronze objects, but it only has over 400 characters and they were mostly used in witchcraft activities. The Suis have their own calendar, which is consistent to the lunar calendar. But the eighth month in the lunar calendar is the end of a year for it, and the ninth month of the lunar calendar is the beginning of a new year.

In Chinese modern history, the Suis composed a brilliant chapter. In December.1855, Pan Xinjian led the Sui people to rise up, and put forward very resounding slogan: “We won’t deliver tax grain and pay tax, and we’ll overthrow the Qing Dynasty and enjoy peace.” They insisted fighting for as long as 16 years, and coordinated the revolution of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. In 1909, Wuchaojun led the Suis, Bouyeis and Mioas to rise up and advance the slogan of “wiping out foreign invaders and promoting Hans”. They fight against invaders, imperialism, and feudalism, and exerted important influence all over the country. During the New Democratic Revolution, an outstanding son of the Suis—-Deng Enming was the only minority nationality in the representatives of the First People’s Congress of the Communist Party of China. During the War of Resistance against Japan and the Liberation War, the Sui people took part in fight actively which was led by local underground organizations of the Communist Party of China.