Perhaps when many people answered this question, they focused on the Yao family in the late Qin Dynasty, which was founded in the Sixteen Kingdoms period. However, unlike them, I focused on the ancient Qiang people in the Han Dynasty. The establishment of the post-Qin Dynasty was indeed the greatest success of the ancient Qiang people in the Central Plains. Compared with the ancient Qiang people in Han dynasty, the ancient Qiang people who established the post-Qin dynasty are only a small part. The ancient Qiang people had the greatest influence in the Han Dynasty, and the ancient Qiang people in the Qin Dynasty after the Sixteen Kingdoms period could only be regarded as a dead lamp.

Before answering the question formally, it should be clear that the ancient Qiang people are completely different from the modern Qiang people. The modern Qiang people are only a tiny and distant branch among the descendants of the ancient Qiang people. The glorious history of the ancient Qiang people can be seen everywhere in history books, which has nothing to do with the modern Qiang people. Secondly, it needs to be clear that the concept of Qiang people is a reduced concept. The scope of Qiang people in Han Dynasty was larger than that in Tang Dynasty, which was much larger than that of contemporary Qiang people.

Let's not talk about the Yan Huang Xia Shang Dynasty. It is too long, illusory and difficult to verify. Just know that many ancient Qiang people are one of the main sources of Chinese ancestors. They joined (actively) or (passively) in various forms in different stages of the pre-Qin dynasty, and developed into a unified Chinese nation with other ancestors in the Qin and Han dynasties, and then became the Han nationality.

First, the ancient Qiang people in Qin and Han Dynasties

During and after the Warring States Period, there were mainly three ethnic minorities, Qiang, Rong and Hu, around the northwest Qinghai-Tibet Plateau:

(1) Rong is one of the important ancestors of the Chinese nation, mainly distributed in the Loess Plateau and its surrounding areas, Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia region, where dogs, Yiqu and Dali are Rong. During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, Rong was conquered by Qin, Jin, Yan, Zhao and other countries and joined the Huaxia nationality. In the Qin and Han Dynasties, Rong no longer existed alone. Many official histories regard Rong as a branch of the ancient Qiang people, but Rong has nothing to do with the Qiang people in Qin and Han Dynasties.

(2) The Hu people were mainly Yue and Wusun in Hexi Corridor at first, and then Huns. They are basically the same species, yellow and white, distributed in Rongxi. During the Han and Wei Dynasties, due to the Xiongnu, Da Yue and Wusun moved westward. Da Yue went all the way to Afghanistan, Wusun went to the Ili River, and some Ren Yue stayed in the Hexi Corridor to integrate with the Qiang people. They are called Xiaoyue, distributed in Qilian Mountain and Huangshui River Basin, and later called a cluster lake and a green water lake respectively. Culturally, Hexi Corridor was occupied by Xiongnu and later seized by Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. The oasis in Hexi Corridor became the territory of Han nationality, connecting the western regions and isolating Qiang and Hu.

(3) It is an ancient Qiang people isolated at the southern foot of Qilian Mountain in Hexi Corridor. During this period, the ancient Qiang people had a large population and many tribes, and went their own way. They are mainly distributed in the marginal areas of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, Qinghai, Gannan, Ganzi, Aba and other places, with the Qiang people's strength in Hequ area of Qinghai (called Jizhi here) and Huangshui River Basin as the most prominent. Qiang people migrated and spread widely. There are Geqiang people in the southeast of the Taklimakan Desert in the Western Regions, and Faqiang and Tangmao people in the depths of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

The ancient Qiang people in Qin and Han dynasties had many tribes, but they were not a unified nation. According to the records of the later Han Dynasty, there are as many as 150 Qiang tribes. Although heroes come forth in large numbers, the Qiang people also have a family similar to the Mongolian gold family more than a thousand years later. This is the direct descendant of Wu Yijian, an ancient leader in Qiang legend. Wuyi is an ancient Qiang language, meaning slave, and construction is its name. This fellow was originally a slave of Qin in the Spring and Autumn Period, and later fled to Qinghai. Because of his many legendary experiences, he was regarded as a hero and the oldest by the ancient Qiang people.

The descendants of Yi Jian are the golden family of the ancient Qiang people. There is a descendant named Yan, who is very good at research. Therefore, Wu Yijian's direct descendant tribe is called Yan Zi. Later, there was a descendant of Emperor Yan named Shao Dangzi, who was also fierce. Lao Yao's family, the Qiang people in the Qin Dynasty after the establishment of the Sixteen Kingdoms period, is the descendants of the Qiang people. However, although he came from a well-known family, his strength as a young Qiang before the Eastern Han Dynasty was not outstanding, and he was even weak for a time, mainly because other tribes such as Xianling Qiang and Beiling Qiang were stronger. Party-burning guns were revived in the Eastern Han Dynasty.

Before Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty fought back against the Huns, the ancient Qiang people with many tribes were subject to the Huns who occupied the Hexi Corridor. Later, in the Battle of Hexi, Huo Qubing conquered the Hexi Corridor. In addition to Yangguan and Yumenguan, there were Wuwei, Zhangye, Jiuquan and Dunhuang in the Han Dynasty. In order to ensure the safety of the four counties and two customs, before11year (six years), Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty sent Li Xi and Xu Ziwei to conquer the Qiang people and incorporated Xining and other places into the central government. From then on, a captain protecting Qiang is the direct leader of the ancient Qiang people. He led an army composed of regular troops, abortion mercenaries and surrendered Qiang mercenaries to take over the Qiang people in Liangzhou.

During the Western Han Dynasty, the Qiang people were generally simple, and the oppression and exploitation of the ancient Qiang people by the Han people in Hexi was not very severe, and the Qiang people could tolerate it most of the time. During the reign of Xuan Di, the Emperor Gaozu of Han Dynasty, the No.10Qiang crossed the Huangshui River eastward and fought against the officers and men of Han Dynasty, causing chaos among the Qiang people. It was suppressed by Han emperors Xuan Di, Zhao Chongguo and Xin Wuxian, thus quelling the rebellion. However, the problem of Qiang people has not been fundamentally solved. During Wang Mang's usurpation of the Han Dynasty, due to the war in the Central Plains, Qiang people got rid of the shackles of the Han Dynasty and regained their independence. The problem of Qiang people finally broke out in the Eastern Han Dynasty, which brought lasting and heavy disasters to both Han people and Qiang people.

At the beginning of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Emperor Guangwu of Han Dynasty adopted Ban Biao's suggestion and re-established a captain to protect the Qiang people and manage their affairs. The first captain was Han Niu. But at this time, the Qiang people did not want to accept the slavery of the Han Dynasty again, and rose up and resisted. ? Gold family? The burning Qiang people have come back to life and become powerful. Generations of chiefs, such as Dianliang, Dianwu, Miwu and Tommy, just like Xiao Qiang, can't be killed. 1 century, in the era of Emperor Guangwu of Han Dynasty, Emperor Hanming, Zhang Han, Emperor Hanhe, the Han Dynasty spent 60 or 70 years continuing to fight the Qiang people headed by Shaodang Qiang, and finally conquered Shaodang Qiang and the ancient Qiang people. A large number of surrendered minority party Qiang and other departments were moved to Shaanxi-Gansu area, regarded as strong in the east, while strong in the west remained in Qinghai. Qiang people's weapons were confiscated, and the situation in the west was once stable.

But in the middle of the Eastern Han Dynasty, due to the oppression of the Eastern Han government, especially many Qiang people became cannon fodder for the Eastern Han government's foreign operations, and the Qiang people rebelled. This was at the beginning of the second century, in the early days of Emperor Han 'an. Dongqiangren, represented by Shaodang Qiang, had no weapons, picked up sticks and bamboo poles to resist and fled to the Gobi Desert in the north of Hexi Corridor. Xiqiang, with excellent weapons and numerous cavalry, took the opportunity to kill him. The first one was Zero Qiang. Dian Ling and Primate, the leaders of the first two generations of Qiang people, took the lead, while Lang Mo of Qiang people and Du Jigong of Han people took the lead. This wave of Qiang people's troubles was aggressive, and the troops in the Eastern Han Dynasty lost in a row. Qiang people once went deep into Shaanxi, Shanxi, Henan and Hebei, burning and looting, and many counties and counties were abandoned.

Finally, at the suggestion of Seo Woo, an outstanding strategist, the Eastern Han Dynasty conquered and changed the battle plan, which was mainly infantry, and switched to cavalry. Ren Shang, Deng Zun and others put down the Qiang people's unrest in one fell swoop, and in the process, they called the southern Xiongnu mercenaries, and finally defeated the Qiang people, and the 100 th Qiang was hit hard. At the beginning of Yongchun, the Qiang rebellion lasted for fourteen years, costing the Eastern Han government 24 billion yuan. After the war, it took Ma Xian, a captain of the Eastern Han government, more than ten years to quell the burning Qiang in Hexi Corridor.

However, this situation has only been stable for 20 years. In the early 1940s, during the Yonghe period of Emperor Shun of Han Dynasty, the Qiang people rebelled again. This wave of rebellion is smaller than the last Adriá n Pollo, mainly affecting Shaanxi and Gansu. Under the command of Zhao Chong and Zhang Gong, the rebellion was finally put down by the Han Dynasty seven years later. Yonghe Qiang squandered more than 8 billion yuan of the Eastern Han government.

However, ten years later, in the late 1950s, during the Yan period of Emperor Huan of Han Dynasty, the Qiang people rebelled again. This time, Dong Qiang and Xi Qiang rebelled together, especially the tribes such as Shaodang, Shaohe, Dangjian and Lejie, which were particularly troublesome. However, to the despair of the Qiang people, their opponents are very strong this time. They are three people from Gansu, so-called? Liangzhou Sanming? They are Huang from Anding (whose word is Ming), Zhang Huan from Dunhuang (whose word is Ran Ming) and Duan Qi from Wuwei (whose word is Ming). Huang and Zhang Qian advocated paying equal attention to kindness and prestige, which played a great role in the early stage and defeated and recruited many Qiang people, while Duan Qi advocated slaughter and solved the problem once and for all, which played a key role in the later stage and became a nightmare for the ancient Qiang people.

Duan Qirui had a good relationship with the eunuchs in power, so his proposal was fully supported by the Han government. So Duan Qirui raised his butcher's knife at the ancient Qiang people. Tuan Chi first destroyed the Western Qiang, cutting its 23,000, and then destroyed the Eastern Qiang, cutting its 38,000. In this process, Duan Qi took the lead and pursued deeply. Wherever he met the Qiang people, he killed them mercilessly. As a result, the Qiang rebellion, which lasted for more than ten years, was finally put down, and it only cost 4.4 billion yuan. Since then, the ancient Qiang people have become less important.

At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Qiang people made another trouble, but it was not only the Qiang people who made trouble. Both the Abortion people and the Han people participated. Abortion Gong Bei Apollo was promoted as the leader, with Han Han Sui and Bian Zhang as the main force, while Qiang people played little role. Wen led the army to the Western Expedition, and Dong Zhuo and Sun Jian were all in the team. After several fierce battles, both sides suffered heavy losses and finally called a truce. Rebels soon infighting, Han Sui seized all power, became one of the main warlords in the late Han Dynasty, and separated Liangzhou from Marten, after which the ancient Qiang people remained silent. These separatists were finally annihilated by Cao Cao. Later, Xia invaded Shaanxi and Gansu, and the Qiang people were cut again. During the period of Cao Pi's Cao Rui in the Three Kingdoms, the Qiang people in Hexi Corridor, under the guidance of the Han nationality, made trouble several times again and were settled by Zhang Qian and Su Ze.

The Ancient Qiang People in the Period of the Second and Sixteen Kingdoms

At the end of the Han Dynasty, a group of people who moved to the Central Plains were burned as Qiang? Gold family? , survived in Dingxi area, gradually sinicized, surnamed Yao, claiming to be Dashunhou. The reason why the surname is Yao is estimated to be related to the similar pronunciation when burning words. In the era of chaos in China, this group of Qiang people also pulled up a team. Yao, the leader, claimed to be the captain of Qiang, and led his team around, fighting from south to north, pulling to Henan for a while and returning to Shaanxi for a while. In the fourth century, they sometimes attached to the post-Zhao of Jie nationality, sometimes surrendered to the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and sometimes attached to the pre-Qin wings of the Di nationality; They were beaten a lot. When Huan Wen first made the Northern Expedition, it was the old Yao family of the Qiang people who were cut down. And Tijen gave him a good beating. Yao Xiang, the leader of the second generation, was killed, and his brother Yao Chang surrendered to the former Qin Dynasty.

After the Battle of Feishui in 383, Yao Chang took the opportunity to stand on his own feet as king, established the post-Qin Dynasty, forced Fu Jian to perish, fought the barbarians and seized Guanzhong. His son, Yao Xing, finally destroyed the remnants of the former Qin Dynasty, monopolized Guanzhong, and once seized Liangzhou, becoming the patriarch of the Western Qin Dynasty, the Southern Liang Dynasty and the Northern Liang Dynasty, competing with the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the Later Yan Dynasty and the Northern Wei Dynasty. Due to the bumpy fate and development process of the minority Qiang, its population is actually very small, which can not be compared with the once powerful southern Xiongnu, Jiezu, Xianbei, Di and other ethnic groups. Therefore, the late Qin adopted a very realistic policy, that is, sinicization.

The military power in the late Qin Dynasty was firmly in the hands of the old Yao family, but the regime was completely sinicized and there was no trace of the Qiang people. Many nobles from Shaanxi, Gansu, Han and Han ruled together with them, and Confucianism prevailed in Hexi. The Northern Wei Dynasty was also a highly sinicized regime, but we can still see the sinicization process such as Emperor Xiaowen's reform. Later, the degree of the Qin dynasty was deeper, and people were highly localized, so it was only then that they saw how it was localized.

However, at the beginning of the 5th century, the Yao Xing regime gradually lost its vitality, losing ground in the battlefields of Gansu, northern Shaanxi and Shanxi, and was severely divided by Nanliang, Western Qin, Daxia and Northern Wei. Finally, shortly after Yao Xing's death, the government of the Eastern Jin Dynasty made a Western Expedition, and Emperor Wu of song took a huge team to swallow Wanli and destroy the later Qin Dynasty. Yao Xing's son Yao Hong was taken to Nanjing to ask for punishment. After the demise of the Qin Dynasty, what was the lineage of the ancient Qiang people? Gold family? (A Qiang's burning) also completely disappeared.

Third, descendants of other ancient Qiang people.

The Central Plains failed, and in the hometown around the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the ancient Qiang people were not the mainstream. In Qinghai, during the Wei and Jin Dynasties, some people from the Murong Department of Xianbei in the east came to Qinghai from the distant Liaohe River basin and Wan Li, and merged with the local Qiang people, forming a new ethnic group called Tuguhun, which withdrew from the category of Qiang people. Later, Tuguhun was defeated by Northern Wei, Sui, Tang and Tubo, and finally merged into Han and Tibetan respectively. In southern Gansu and northwestern Sichuan, another indigenous people, the Di nationality, gradually rose and became the local mainstream. In Hexi Corridor, Han people, Xianbei people and Lushui Hu people all have good strength, but Qiang people have no sense of existence. However, in northern Shaanxi, many Qiang people poured into it, mixed with Xiongnu, Lushuihu and other tribes, and became a part of miscellaneous Hu in northern Shaanxi, which was eventually razed to the ground by the Northern Wei Dynasty.

The successful direction of the ancient Qiang people was the south. They went deep into Minshan Mountain and Hengduan Mountain in large numbers, and developed independently between the exterior and interior mountains and rivers. As early as the Han Dynasty, there were a large number of ancient Qiang people in Hengduan mountain area, living together with the southwest Yi people, accounting for a large proportion. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Deng and Dang Changqiang were very successful, and they were able to make ends meet between the Southern and Northern Dynasties, courting, getting rich and being beaten on both sides. During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, these Qiang people developed into different tribes, and there were many tribes, collectively known as Xishan Eight Countries, which swayed between the Tang Dynasty and Tubo, and the Tang Dynasty was presided over by Jiannan Xichuan or Tubo. Later, Tibetan culture had a great influence on these Qiang tribes, and they gradually became Tibetans. However, unlike the traditional Tibetans in the Yarlung Zangbo River valley, these new Tibetans in Hengduan Mountain area have their own characteristics. They are Kangba Tibetans, Jiarong Tibetans and so on.

In addition to these, there are a number of ethnic groups born out of the ancient Qiang people in Minshan and Hengduan mountains, and their influence is more prominent. Tubo historical materials call them Ren Yao or Muya people, while Central Plains historical materials call them Tangut people. During the Tang Dynasty, the Dangxiang Qiang tribe was violently attacked by Tubo. In order to escape, they chose to go north to the Tang Dynasty. They went to the Tang Dynasty several times and were placed in the Wuding River valley in Ningxia and northern Shaanxi. They still live a nomadic life with many tribes and guard the border for the Tang Dynasty. At the end of the Tang Dynasty, Tuoba Sigong, a Tangut born in Tuoba Department, took part in pacifying the Huang Chao Rebellion. Because of his outstanding military exploits, he was given the surname Li by the Tang Dynasty, and was appointed as our envoy, ruling Xia, Yin, Sui, Yi and other States in the Wuding River Basin, and began to separate one side.

In the Song Dynasty, three generations of Tuoba descendants, Li, Li Deming and Yuan Hao, rose up to break up the Tangut tribes in Wuding River valley and Helan Mountain area in Ningxia, withstood the pressure of the Song Dynasty, established Xixia, and created a brilliant civilization, which confronted the Song, Liao and Jin Dynasties for more than 200 years until it was destroyed by Mongolia at the beginning of the third century. In the six world wars in Xia Meng, the Tangut Qiang suffered heavy losses, most of which were integrated into the Han nationality and some into the Mongolian nationality.

In addition to the ancient Qiang people who went south to Hengduan mountain area, some ancient Qiang people went deep into the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau very early. During the Han Dynasty, Fa Qiang and Tang Qiangmao lived in the depths of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. People in the Han dynasty knew about their existence, but they never came into contact with them. Later, the Qiang people continued to enter, and in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, many big tribes were formed, including Supi, Mi Duo and Prynne. They are distributed in Naqu, Yushu and other places. They were sworn enemies of Tubo in the 6th and 7th centuries, but they were eventually annexed by Tubo. These ancient Qiang people integrated into the Tibetans. As for Tubo, it is said that it is also a descendant of the ancient Qiang people.

In addition to the above-mentioned mobility, in different periods of ancient times, many ancient Qiang people went south to Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau and even Myanmar at different times, and merged with various local southwest nationalities, forming many ethnic minorities. For example, Yi, Bai, Hani, Lahu, Naxi, Lisu, Jingpo and many other Tibetan and Burmese ethnic minorities all have the elements of the ancient Qiang people in the south.

In addition to the above, there are still some descendants of the ancient Qiang people in Hengduan Mountain area who have not integrated into the Tibetans and kept their own names and customs. They are still called Qiang people, that is, modern Qiang people, with about 300 thousand people.