Iu Mien: The Iu Mien bear a culture that opens before them a path of dignity, achieved ultimately beyond death in a position of honor among the gods and spirits in the celestial kingdom. Through astuteness and industry in the present life, the individual acquires the wherewithal to faultlessly fulfill obligations to the living and the dead and to fittingly honor the gods and spirits so as to merit their esteem and their aid in further advancement. Iu Mien culture emphasizes politeness, reserve and careful negotiation so as to discover common interests that will foster harmonious cooperation. Conflict is avoided, for it only wastes precious time and resources and diverts the individual from the central tasked of earning a living and gaining honor here and hereafter.

The language of the IU Mien linguists calls Yao and classify in the Miao-Yao-Pateng family. This is usually placed in the great Sino-Tibetan super-family. Which also includes such families of languages as Burmese, Chinese, and Tibetan. Iu Mien are often able to speak Yunnanese or the closely relate Mandarin Chinese, And literacy in Chinese has long been highly regarded among them, sons being taught by fathers, and by tutors when available, An archaic form of Chinese is The liturgical language of Iu Mien religion, occupying a place analogous to that of Pali in Buddhism and Latin in Roman Christianity. Chinese characters are also employed in writing Yao. However, the new generation of Iu-Mien in the USA today has adapted new form of writing. The old Chinese characters are still employed, but only for older generation. The USA Iu-Mien (younger generations) use the English characters when writing Mien. For example, ~ "Yie mbuo Iu Mienh yiem Meic- Guov xei yiem longx nyei." It means "We Iu Mien in the USA are doing fine." ~

In Yao, the word mien means “people.” In Chinese and Thai, the Iu Mien is called Yao, and in Laos and Vietnam, they are called Man. Man is an ancient Chinese word, meaning “barbarian,” which was applied to peoples the han Chinese encountered but were unable to assimilate in their expansion to the south over the past few thousand years. In both Chinese and Lao, man may also refer to peoples other than Iu Mien.

Yao, which derived from the 'Iu' in Iu Mien, first appears as a name for the group in an account of the Man “barbarians” living along the Hunan-Guizhou border written about a century before the founding of Chiang Mai. By this time. Iu Mien had probably also spread into Guangdong, Guangxi, and Yunnan, the other provinces of southern China where they are found today, as well as into northern Vietnam.

Attire
Traditional dress of the womenfolk consists of a large turban, trousers, and a long robe girt with a sash, all in dark blue or black, which sets off a bushy boa of bright red yarn sewn about the neck and down the front of the robe. The sides of the robe are slit and the front panels are generally tucked up into the sash, bringing into view the beautiful embroidery covering the trousers.

Needlework is the feminine pastime. A pair of trousers is a project that occupies a woman, between household chores and fieldwork, for the better part of a year. Her skill is also displayed at the ends of the sash and the cloth forming the turban, on her men folk’s clothing, on the caps and clothes she makes for her children, and on many other articles. Silver is the symbol of wealth and status, and at New Year’s, weddings, and special ceremonies, the family trove of bracelets, earrings, neck rings, and necklaces is trucked out to adorn the ladies of the house, and their turbans and robes are draped with gleaming strings of coins, chains, braid, and other ornaments, all made of coins, chains, braid, and other ornaments, all made of silver. On such occasions an apron-like garment lavishly decorated with embroidery and silver is worn either at the waist or around the shoulders like a stole.

Traditional men’s garb includes loose trousers and a double-breasted jacket. On special ritual occasions men don bright turbans and Chinese-style robes, and substantial amounts of money and effort may be invested in obtaining traditional goods from China. Particularly elaborate are the brocaded vestments worn by the ritual experts who preside at such ceremonies.

Village
Iu Mien culture counsels adaptation to the local political situation and prescribes on one form of village organization. In Thailand, Iu Mien choose a headman, of their own or another ethnic group, to represent their village in accord with Thai government regulations.

Iu Mien culture specifies no communal structures, though communities cooperate in making improvements facilitate earning a living. On a mountain, an Iu Mien village may not be below that of another ethnic group, and in a village, no house may obstruct the front door of another or a clear line to the local spirit shrines, which must be above the village.

In the past Iu Mien were highly mobile, While villages might remain in one place, inhabitants came and went as family headed were ever on the lookout for better land and opportunities to increase productivity to bear the costs of marriages and merit making.

Housing/Houshold
The Iu Mien ritual center is the household altar, This faces the front door of the house, which opens away from the mountain and is used only on ritual occasions, such as when spirits are honored, when brides enter the household, or when the bodies of the dead depart. Normally, access is through doors in either gable end of the house, At one end is the main room, where guests are received: on the other is a kitchen area with a rice pounder and two hearths, both indwelt by spirits, The area behind the altar is partitioned into bedroom. The house stands on the ground and has wooden or bamboo plank walls, and a shingled, grass, or thatch roof.

Iu Mien favor large households, The ideal is for each son to bring his bride to his father’s home, While each family is a separate production unit, the ritual entity is the household, which is better able to absorb the expense of ceremonies when several families are contributing their resources.

To enlarge the household work force, Iu Mien adopts children of any ethnic group, making payment to the children’s parents. Adoptees, who make up a fifth of some communities, are ritually integrated into the household head’s lineage.

Ceremonies and Beliefs:
As they themselves tell it, the origins of the Iu Mien involved a hero or god named Bienh Hungh (King Pan) and an epic “crossing of the sea” far in the distant Past. Many versions of what happened exist, some written down over a thousand years ago. In one, the Iu Mien was forced by drought to leave their land and cross the sea in boats. Many perished on the voyage, but a god, whom Bienh Hungh promised would evermore be honored by the survivors, saved the twelve Iu Mien clans some.

In another version, Bienh Hungh is a dragon dog, which volunteers to cross the sea to destroy an enemy of the Chinese emperor. Returning across the sea with the enemy’s head, he declines high state office, asking only to wed a lady of the court. Bienh Hungg and his wife then retire to the mountains and have twelve children. When the heroic dog dies, the emperor orders his children, the founders of the twelve clans, to honor him and grants them licenses to cultivate the mountains in perpetuity.

Lineage
Iu Mien bear a clan name for life but, while well disposed toward fellow clansmen, they are not bound by obligations and restrictions as they are toward members of their lineage, a much narrower grouping of those able to trace a genealogical connection in the male line. The members of a lineage, living and dead, cooperate contractually. The older generation invests in merit-making ceremonies and marriages on behalf of the younger, expecting recompense before or after death. Prosperity and health attend the living that makes offerings to and merit for their forbearers, while illness and misfortune are often attributed to dissatisfied ancestors.

The Celestial Kingdom
The felicity of the lineage spirits depends upon the place they have merited in a heavenly hierarchy governed by a number of great gods. The Iu Mien possesses exact information on the correct protocol for approaching these gods. This is detailed in the liturgical manuals used by Iu Mien major ritual experts, who orchestrate the Iu Mien community in enacting the rites and instruct them in their meaning.

The teaching of this liturgy links scattered individuals as one people and has held this central position probably since 14th century, when Chinese Taoism influenced Iu Mien religious thinking.

In addition to great gods and ancestors, there are lesser spirits, which may affect the living, often by causing illness. Iu Mien shamans and minor ritualizes conduct rites to cure those so disturbed.

Marriage

"DAOISM:" "Where there is impossibility, there is possibility; and where there is possibility, there is impossibility. It is because there is right, that there is wrong; it is because there is wrong, there is right. Thereupon the self is also the other; the other is also the self." --Zhuangzi

Marriage is a momentous undertaking, crucial to augmenting both productivity and the lineage. Compatibility being essential to a stable union, young people is permitted to choose for them. A teenage girl is given her own bedroom and may have her boyfriend over for the night. Any children she may bear enhance her value as a bride, and as a wedding can involve very heavy expenses, more than one child may be born before the necessary wealth is assembled.

In making a match, the most important criterion is the harmony of the birth dates of the couple as determined with Iu Mien astrological handbooks, If the match seems propitious, the families negotiate wedding arrangements, such as numbers of guests, days, and pigs to be involved in feasting and the amount of the bride price and terms of payment. All details are entered in an agreement drafted in duplicate, duly signed and witnessed, retained by each party, and posted at the wedding.

A grand wedding consumes many days and pigs in feasting, first at the home of the bride and then at that of the groom. Escorted by a party of the agreed size, the bride, wearing an elaborate headdress of scarlet and embroidered cloths and long fringe draped form a large triangular frame, is received at the groom’s home with much pomp and feasting. At the auspicious moment, she is introduced through the spirit door, and in the evening begins the central ceremony, in which the couple pay obeisance to each guest. The next morning the couple drink wine mixed by the presiding ritual expert, who then preaches on Iu Mien tradition and the duties of married life.

Story by: Sarayote/Thailand