Language: Tay language belongs to the Tay-Thai language group
(Tai-Kadai language family)
History: The Tay have been present in Vietnam for millennia,
perhaps as early as 500BC.
Production activities: The Tay are farmers who have a long tradition or wet rice cultivation. They have a long history of intensive cultivation and irrigation methods like digging canals, laying water pipes, etc. They also maintain the custom of harvesting the rice and thrashing the grains out on wooden racks, which they call loong, while still in the fields, then carrying the threshed rice home in baskets. In addition to cultivating wet fields,the Tay also plant rice on terraced fields along with the other crops and fruit trees. Cattle and poultry raising are well-developed, but a free range style of animal husbandry is still popular. Household crafts are worthy of note. The most famous Tay craft is weaving brocaded designs of beautiful and original patterns which are highly prized. The local market is also an important economic activity.
Diet: In the past, in several places, the Tay ate mainly sticky
rice, and almost every family used stew and steam pots for cooking. On festival
occasions, they make many kinds of cakes, such as square rice cakes (banh
chung), round rice cake (banh day), black rice sesame cake (banh gai),
lime-water dumpling, fried rice cake, marble dumplings made of rice white rice
flour with rock sugar fillings, patty make of mashed rice, etc. There are
special cakes made from flour with an ant egg filling, and com, a young rice
confection made from smoked sticky rice, roasted, and pounced.
Clothing: Tay traditional dress is made from homegrown cotton that
is indigo dyed. There is usually not much embroidery or other decorations.
Women wear skirts or trousers, with short shirts inside and long one worn on
the outside. The Ngan group wears shorter shirts, the Phen group wears brown
shirts, the Thu Lao group wears conical-shaped scarves on their heads, the Pa
Di group wears hats that look like house roofs, and the Tho group tend to dress
like the Thai in Mai Chau (Hoa Binh province).
Lifestyle: The Tay have settled in valleys in the Northeastern part of the country: Quang Ninh, Bac Giang, Lang Son, Cao Bang, Bac Can, Thai Nguyen, Ha Giang, Tuyen Quang, Lao Cai, Yen Bai. Their villages are characteristically large and crowded, and there are villages with hundreds of houses.
The Tay traditional house is
built on stilts with a frame of rafters and 4, 5, 6, or 7 rows of columns. A house
has from 2 to 4 roofs made from tiles, straw, or palm leaves. Wood or bamboo is
used to make the walls.
Transportation: The Tay use
shoulder poles and baskets to carry small, tidy bundles, or carry them over the
shoulder in cloth bags. Larger bulkier items are carried by buffalo or with the
help of other people. Rafts and floats may also be used to transport items by
water.
Social organization: The Tay’s Quang regime is a form of social
organization which resembles a feudal system that is aristocratic and
hereditary. Within its rule region, the Quang owns all lands, forests, rivers,
etc. Hence, it has the right to control everyone who lives on that land and to
exploit these people through forced labor, imposing duties on commodities, and
enforcing the payment of tributes and offerings. The Quang regime appeared very
early and persisted until the end of the 19th century or the beginning of the
20th century.
Marriage: Young Tay men and women are free to love and to date each
other. However, the decision to become husband and wife depends on their
parents and whether their fates match each other’s suitably. That’s why in the
marriage proceedings, the groom’s family asks for the bride’s fortune to be
read and then brings it home to compare it to the fortune of their son. After
the wedding, the wife stays with her parents until she is pregnant. It is only
before giving birth that the wife goes to her husband’s family to live.
Birth: While pregnant, and after giving birth, the mother and even
the father have to avoid many different things in order for both mother and
child to be healthy, for the child to grow up quickly, strongly, and to avoid
evil spirits.
Three days after an infant is
born, purification is performed while establishing the altar to honor the midwife.
One month after the birth, there is a celebration and naming party for the
infant.
Funerals: Tay funerals are lavishly and elaborately organized with
many rituals in order to fulfill filial duty and to bring the spirit of the
deceased to the world of the afterlife. Three years after burial, there is a
ritual to end the mourning period and to bring the spirit to the ancestral
altar. There is an annual day for worshiping.
New House: When building a new house, the owner has to choose a new
house, the owner has to choose the land and the direction for the house,
examine the age of the man who will head up the construction of the house, and
select a good day for building. On the day they move to a new house, the head
of a family must start a fire and keep it burning all night.
Beliefs: The Tay mainly worship ancestors. They also worship the
House God, Kitchen God, and the Midwife.
Festivals: there are many Festivals and holidays which bear
different meanings in a year. The Lunar New Year that starts a new year and the
mid0July Festivals are the most lavishly organized. A spirit-calling festival
for cows and water buffaloes happens on the 6th of June (according to the lunar
calendar). Ceremonies held after seeding and for the new rice festival held
before harvest are characteristic among farmers who practice wet rice
cultivation.
Calendar: The Tay follow the lunar calendar.
Education: The Tay’s alphabet is pictographic, similar to the
Viet’s alphabet at the beginning of the 20th century. It is used to write poems,
stories, songs, prayers, etc. The Tay-Nung alphabet builds on the Latin
alphabet and was invented in 1960. it remained in use until the mid 1980s and
was used in elementary schools where there Tay and Nung people lived.
Artistic activities: The Tay have many folk song melodies such as
luon, phong slu, phuoi pac, puoi ruoi, ven eng…Luon includes different tunes of luon coi, luon
sluong, luon the, luon nang oi, which are alternating verses popular in many
regions. The Tay sing luon at long tong Festivals, weddings, new house parties,
or when there are guests in the village. Besides, festival dancing, in some
local groups, there are also puppet performances using unique wooden puppets.
Entertainment: On the occasions of long tong festival, people in
many places play con throwing, badminton, tug-of-war, dragon dancing, chess,
etc. Children play spinning top and other games such as khang and chat or o an
quan.
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