Taiwanese Negritos

The Austronesian speaking tribes of Taiwan are recognised as the island’s indigenous inhabitants. But what if they were not the first? Oral tradition among the Saisiyat people points to an earlier population resembling the ‘Negritos’ of Southeast Asia, who died out long ago. If true, then this ancient group would be the first human beings to live in Taiwan.

‘Negritos’, or Asiatic Pygmies, is the word ethnographers use for the indigenous peoples of maritime Southeast Asia. Unlike the dominant Malay, Indonesian and Fillipino populations, Negritos are under 150 cm and dark-skinned. They include groups like the Aeta, Semang and Sentinelese, who although diverse in culture and language, share a similar appearance. Negritos descend from the first people to arrive in Southeast Asia and were displaced by more numerous farmers and seafarers 5,000 years ago.

The Saisiyat are an aboriginal group of 6,000 from northwestern Taiwan. Anthropologists believe the Saisiyat to be among the first peoples to settle Taiwan. Among them exist oral accounts of an earlier Negrito population.

Every two years, the Saisiyat celebrate Pas’tai’ai – the ‘Ritual to the Short People’, and the tribe’s largest celebration. Thousands gather to sing, dance and drink rice wine, wearing blades of silver grass to protect them from ill-fortune. Performers wear coloured robes, beads, mirrors and bells which clang as they dance. Other rituals take place in secret and are closed to outsiders. Pas’tai’ai takes place on the tenth lunar month and lasts several nights. The festival was at risk of dying out until its revitalisation in the the 2010s.

Legend has it that the Saisiyat once lived by a tribe of dark-skinned ‘short people’ they called the ‘Ta’ai’. A river separated the two peoples. Relationships were cordial until around a thousand years ago, the Ta’ai took interest in Saisiyat women. According to one version, they made advances on the chieftain’s wife during the harvest festival. In anger, the Saisiyat turned on the Ta’ai and killed all but two. Some versions say they forced a battle; others say they cut down a bridge; some say a tree fell on the Ta’ai.

The two survivors were elders. They warned the Saisiyat that the spirits of their people would curse them unless they kept their culture alive. The elders then taught the Saisiyat the dances and songs of the T’ai, which they recited every two years to this day. Local caves said to house the Ta’ai spirits are forbidden to visitors. The Saisiyat tell of sickness and misfortune befalling those who visit them.

The Ta’ai of legend resemble Philippine Negritos. Dutch colonists of the 1600s claimed accounts of ‘Little People’ were once common, and similar, though less developed, accounts still exist amongst the Tsou tribes of Taiwan.

Aeta people are indigenous to Luzon, Phillippines

Archaeologists have found no trace of an earlier, Negrito presence in Taiwan. A 2019 genetic study, however, noted ‘strong genetic affinity’ between the Saisiyat and Atayal, and Philippine Negritos, but stated this ‘could not support a past Negrito presence in Taiwan’.

Folk tales of pixie and dwarf-life people are common in other Austronesian cultures, particularly the Haiwaiian and Māori traditions. However, the Ta’ai of Saisiyat folklore do resemble real people in the neighbouring Philippines. As hunter-gatherers leave less remains than settled communities, it is entirely possible there was once a small Negrito population living in the mountains of Taiwan. Their memory lives on in a thousand year old ritual still held today.

Sources: BBC, Edelweiss Journal of Biomedical Research and Review, Taiwan Museum Reuters

See Also:

• Taiwan
  • Taiwanese Aborigines
• The Southern Dispersal
• Population Y

Taiwanese Aborigines

Taiwanese aborigines are the original people of Taiwan. They settled the island over 6,000 of years ago. Today, most Taiwanese are of Han Chinese ancestry – the 569,000 aborigines are 2% of the population. They belong to around 20 different tribes.

The Austronesian language family began in Taiwan. In ancient times, settlers from Taiwan took to the sea. Their descendants became the modern inhabitants of Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia and Polynesia. Of the 9 subdivisions in the Austronesian language family, 8 are exclusive to Taiwan. The descendants of those who remained are the modern Taiwanese aborigines.

Taiwanese aborigines did not consider themselves a single people but as members of one tribe or another, such as the Truku or Atayal. Some lived in the island’s western plains, where most Taiwanese cities stand today, others in the wilder, mountainous west.

The plains tribes lived in bamboo villages. They grew millet, fished and hunted deer. When the Dutch colonised Taiwan (Formosa) in the 1600s, mass-scale Han Chinese immigration assimilated the plain tribes. The modern Taiwanese census does not recognise the 200,000 or so plains aborigines as a separate people.

The mountain tribes had little contact with settlers until the 19th century. Headhunting was a common rite of passage. In some tribes, if a man did not take an enemy’s head in his life, he would not pass into the next. Mountain tribes hunted wild game and had facial tattoos. They traded pelts and camphor to Han settlers in exchange for guns and iron.

In response to raids, the Japanese invaded Taiwan’s interior in the 1890s. They considered the aboriginals barbarians to be vanquished, and over the next forty years, cowed the indigenous tribes one by one.

When the Sediq rebelled in 1930, Japanese authorities bombarded them with artillery and killed 600.

Taiwanese aborigines fought as specialist jungle troops for Japan in WW2. One of them, Terumo Nakamura, did not surrender until 1974.

The Kuomintang dictatorship that ruled Taiwan from 1945 – 1987, pushed a vigorous assimilation campaign through interrmarriage and education.

Bunun people, c.1900.

The Yami people live on Orchid Island off the coast of Taiwan. In 1982 their government dumped nuclear waste on the island, which the Yami have protested since.

Aborigines have been a minority since the 1700s. In modern, democratic Taiwan, they face higher mortality, poverty and unemployment than Chinese-Taiwanese. Of their twenty known languages, ten are now extinct, the rest endangered. Those who move to the cities risk losing their culture, those who stay face poverty.

In the 1860s, European missionaries exploited aboriginal animosity for the Han colonial system to win converts. Today, most aborigines are Christian.

In the 21st century, Taiwan has begun to embrace its aboriginal heritage as a means to distinguish it from mainland China. Aboriginal groups have made been slowly reviving their culture through tourism and education.

In 2016, Taiwanese president Tsai-Ing-Wen, herself of aboriginal descent, officially apologised on behalf of the government for historic oppression of the aboriginal community. She declared August 1st Indigenous People’s Day.

Sources: Cultural Survival, Jared Diamond – Guns, Germs and Steel (1997), New York Times, Taipei Times.

See Also:

• Taiwan
• The Ainu
• Ruc People
• Polynesian Migrations
• Taiwanese Negritos