The Dai people are distributed in China, India, Vietnam, Cambodia and other countries.
The Dai people regard peacocks and elephants as mascots, and their folk stories are rich and colorful. The Dai people like to live by water, love cleanliness, bathe often, and women like to wash their hair, so they are known as the "water nation". In the past, the Dai people generally believed in the Southern Tradition
Theravada Buddhism and primitive religions.
1. Dai Opera The Dai people have traditional Dai opera.
In the past, there was a form in Xishuangbanna that was mainly about dancing and singing opera lyrics. This was the prototype of Dai opera.
The plot is relatively simple, mainly showing the hunter holding a knife fighting against the dragon, phoenix, turtle and crane in disguise.
The development and improvement of Dai opera mainly occurred in the Dehong area.
Therefore, Dai opera is also called "Western Yunnan Dai opera".
It was produced in Zhanxi and Ganya of Yingjiang River in Dehong around the beginning of the 19th century.
2. Dai brocade is mostly made of a single color and is patterned with weft threads. The organization of the pattern is very strict.
When weaving, Dai women first tie the pattern tissue to the "pattern board" (flower book) with thin ropes. They use the movement of hand-held pedals to make the warp threads form upper and lower layers and then start picking the weft. Repeat this cycle to weave.
It turned into a very beautiful Dai brocade.
3. Musical Instruments Dai folk musical instruments include Galasa, Ding, Jiao, Doluo, Elephant Foot Drum, 铓, Pai 铓 and Dai cymbals, etc.
Hulusi, the characteristic musical instrument of the Dai people, is a reed instrument. It can continuously produce intervals of fifths using the circulatory ventilation method. The timbre is beautiful, soft, mellow and graceful.
In the bamboo forest or Dai bamboo house on a moonlit night, it can give people a subtle and hazy beauty, and the vibrato is as elegant and soft as shaking silk.
The famous composer Shi Guangnan composed the music "Phoenix Tail Bamboo under the Moonlight", which made cucurbit music popular all over the country.
4. Flower Street Festival The most solemn festival in Huayao Dai is the "Flower Street Festival" on the 13th day of the first lunar month.
On this day, thousands of young men and women from surrounding villages gathered in Flower Street.
The festival's Flower Street is very lively. Young girls (girls) in costumes line up in long queues, walking through the flower street, competing for beauty, and full of charm; while the young men open their eyes wide and look for the one they like.
5. Marriage The distinctive feature of Dai family and marriage history is hierarchical endogamy.
Strict hierarchical endogamy was practiced among the chieftains, and polygamy was prevalent.
The chieftain also used his power to abuse farmers' wives and daughters at will.
The vast majority of farmers practice a patriarchal monogamous family, with family members consisting of parents and unmarried children.
Social development varies from place to place, so there are also differences in family and marriage patterns.