The Qiang People

Most Qiang live in the Maowen Qiang Autonomous Prefecture ten hours away from Chengdu in western Sichuan Province. The Qiang area is home to the Giant Panda and the fabled Yeti, or "Big Foot." These people are excellent masons and skilled architects who build castles, suspension bridges, dams and sinking wells. Their homes are block made from different size stones and built like fortresses.

Formerly a nomadic people, now most Qiang farm and engage in animal husbandry. Previously, they practiced slash and burn farming. Their diet consists of millet, barley, potatoes, winter wheat and buckwheat and wine is used as a beverage. They also smoke orchid leaves. Women embroider, and all sing and dance to the accompaniment of gongs, tambourines, sonas and bamboos. They have no written script. They are a monogamous people with wives usually being older than their husbands. Cousins often marry and frequently bridegrooms will live with their wife's family. According to government sources, life for them has much improved following Liberation.

The Qiang are animists worshiping the "Heavenly God." The "God of White Stone" is their guardian god. They place a white quartz stone on the roofs, windows and corners of their homes as well as on the edges of their fields to protects them. These stones are worshipped whenever they go on a hunting trip. Three myths exist regarding the source of this worship of the white stone.

Some have postulated that the Qiang are related to the Jewish people.