Here is a list of the past ethnic groups that have sinicized or assimilated into Chinese culture/society.

http://www.answers.com/topic/list-of-past-...e-ethnic-groups

Judging by this list, I must say d**** that's alot of assimilating and sinicizing that took place over the centuries.

I was expecting more since you made it seem like there are hundreds.

Note that not all the groups listed here are completely or even partially Sinicized.

Miao, for example, is clearly recognized as an official Chinese ethnic group by the PRC government. There are also still plenty of Miao (a.k.a. Hmong in the West) who live outside of China, mostly in SE Asia and the U.S. who are probably much more Americanized than Sinicized, especially those in the U.S.

I've always thought Xiongnus were the ancestors of modern Mongols.

The "Huihe", according to the site, are the ancestors of modern Uighurs, so how are they Sinicized?

Are the Qidan/Khitan the ancestors of modern Manchus?

Menggu is also on the list? Modern Mongols are no more Sinicized.

Heck, the only group listed on this site that I know for sure was Sinicized is probably Manchus. All the others are extremely questionable at best.

I always thought the Manchus were thought to be descended from the Nuzhen (Jurchen) and the latter thought to be descended from the Mohoe (Malgal)....

I've heard some people say that the Qidan (Khitan) are the ancestors of the Xianbei..although I'm not too sure about this...

I'm sure if one were to perform the impossible task of tallying up every ancient tribe that was sinicized, it would be in the hundreds if not thousands. Alot of these groups are simply minorities in China these days.

That's exactly my point.

This website is claiming that these ethnic groups were "assimilated" into Chinese culture and Sinicized but in reality, most, if not all with the exception of Manchus, are distinct non-Han ethnic groups still in existance today and are recognized by the PRC government or have "evolved" into another ethnic group.

IMO, the problem is not the sinicization, but several complex historical facts.
I don't think the information provided by the page you posted is exact and believable much. An example:
羯 (jie2), one of the most bellicose ethnic groups of Hu2 (胡, ancient general designation to the northern ethnic groups), was factually killed out by 冉闵 (Ran3 Min3), who issued the famous "Decree of Killing Hu" (杀胡令) to call on all the Han people raising up to kill Hu, which invaded Zhong1 Yuan2 (中原) and made the trouble time of "Terrible Fragment" (五胡乱华).
And I can't find too many groups presented in that page signed "assimilated" into Han people. So I'm puzzled why you "must say d**** that's ALOT of assimilating and sinicizing...". Of course I don't think sinicization was too terrible to take place. The most sinicized three nations, Korea, Japan and Vietnam, are still there with own development well.

Actually the Jie were only a group of Sogdians, and the Sogdians remained prominent on the Silk Road well into the Tang dynasty.



Xiongnu were Turkic, not Mongol. The Mongols are probably descended from the Mengwu Shiwei, a branch of the Xianbei/Donghu. The Khitan are also a branch of Donghu.

The ancestors of the Manchus are the Jurchen, and the Jurchen were probably descended from the Malgal (Mohe).

Huihe were one of the ancestors of modern Uyghurs, but modern Uyghurs probably have also mixed with other ethnicities over time.

that list is extremely exaggerated and simplified

Sinicization was an extremely long and often painful process which most nomad groups resisted.

for example, The Qidan found it degrading to inter-marry with Han and discouraged it as did the Mongols

another factor is cultural assimilation that does not require intermarriage. the Manchus adopted elements of Han culture but their population is 8 million today meaning that they did not intermarry much, other wise, their population would not be this large

add to that the fact that the population of Northern China never dropped below 50 million before the Mongol invasion. so EVEN IF 5 million nomads (a ridiculously large population by nomad standards, this is an exaggeration by the way) married into the Han population, it would not have a major effect on the native Han population

Simple to say, but can you explain if XiongNu, Xianbei, Tujue, Khitan hasn't been sinificized or mixed into the chinese population, why have they disappeared from history and do not exist today?

As others have mentioned before, those ethnic groups were the direct ancestors or were assimilated into other ethnic groups. Just because they disappeared it doesn't mean they were Sinicized.

you're over simplifying again. Qidan's modern descendants exist in the daghur ethnic group. alot of the Xianbei Sinicized, others fled west. the modern day Xibe ethnic group is thought to be Xianbei descendants. only the southern xiong nu sinicized

the majority of the Qidan fled west and formed west Liao when the NuZhen wiped out Liao so the majority of their population didn't even end up living anywhere near China proper

PLEASE use each nomad case as a seperate case. don't say the Qidan assimilated jsut because the Xianbei Sinicized (to an extent)

these groups were fiercely independent and for the most part hated the settled Chinese way of life.

the NuZhen were without a doubt the most successfully Sinicized and EVEN THEY remained seperate enough to one day become the Manchu ethnic group

genetic testing has shown that these supposed mixing with nomads has barely altered the gene pool of Northern China simply because China's population was so large and nomad populations small.

also, the nomad way of life is fundamentally unstable, one day they could be ruling a large empire, the next day, they vanish.

How do you know? Can you show me the source and proof?

Truely right. That is what I want to say.

I have no idea about Jie's origin, except the steppe between the Black Sea and the Caucasia that the place they were from.
Jie was a mixture from various ethnical groups (胡/Hu) in Xi Yu (西域, west territory), said by Tang Changru (唐长孺), judging by Jie's feature, custom of funeral, religion and family name, etc. (《魏晋杂胡考》,《魏晋南北朝史论丛》, Page 414). And obviously, Jie in Gansu as an ethnical group were influenced much by Xiong Nu on the custom and culture.

The research of Chen Yinke and Wan Shennan suggested that the Jie actually bore cultural and phenotypical similarities to the Nine Zhaowu states of Sogdiana (i.e. the statelets of Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara etc.), including the use of the word 'Jie' to refer to warriors. They were also most likely Zoroastrians, like many of the early Sogdians. However, the conventional view based on the dynastic histories is that the Jie were just a branch of the Xiongnu.

The site claims that the Western Tujue are the ancestors of modern Turks of the Middle East; however, the origins of the Oghuz is still un-clear. Besides, the Eastern Tujue didn't get assimiliated into the Uyghurs, there were Tujue in Mongolia a century even after the migration of the Uyghurs to Gansu and Turfan.

As Yun says, the Xiongnu were Turkic and the ancestors of the Mongols were the Shiwei.

I'm highly skeptical that the Miao are sinicized.

Define sinicize. Does that mean Chinese or more specifically Han influeced or totally lost ethnic identity to become Han identity? Regarding a lot of minotiry groups, especially the southern tribes, if the former, yes, if latter, no.

The same is also true about westernization or Americanization.

Interestingly, the sinicization in the south is more gradual and less brutal than in the north. Are the southern people in general more docile, less culturally-conscious, less barbaric, closer to Han culturewise, or any other reasons?

Chinese characters are the bedrock to sinicization

Westernization is different from Sinicization. Like Pang said above, Sinicization today is mainly based upon Chinese characters and national identity; while Westernization involves ideals, fashions and trends developed since the Western Enlightenment. Tibet and Miao can still being "Sinicized" even as most of China is being Westernized.

Chinese civilization hasn't produced a single influential and original thought for hundreds of years. The last significant thought was from Zhejiang-native Wang Yangming (b. 1472), which was later embraced by Tokugawa and Meiji Japan. He believed that men knew right and wrong innately (and not through rational deduction), and they can determine right with self-cultivation (zen). His ideas however received limited attention in China, where Confucianism traditionally (and the rival orthodox school) viewed the innate (the child) with a general disdain. Japan's key civilizational divergence from the Chinese occured at that time.

These are current ethnicities in china, with information about culture, origin...
http://www.china.org.cn/e-groups/shaoshu/shao-2-miao.htm

We could whit some justifications easily call scandinavians Vikings, since compared to so many others there has not been that much immigration in the last 1200 years compared to so many others (Harsh climate and only average soil at best is not inducive to volunttery immigrations, but they did't capture quite a few slaves ´do) But the reason we do not have that name is becourse our culture as such changed, we didn't raped and plunderd as in olden times, even throu we still made war whit each other (often) we are still the same people, some parts of scandinavia still speaks our old language and it is still fairly easy for the rest of us to learn it.
all cultures changed, China is proud off having been relatively unchanged since the Han dynasty, but there has still been changes and a static society is doomed to destruction never forget that. Avars and Magyars still live today, and the remnants of the Hun's (northern Xioung - Nu) are still to see in the faces of people in carpathia and in the DNA of the modern Hungarians which are directly decentet from Magyar and Avar's-.