CHAPTER VIII.
THE MAHOMMEDANS OF YUNNAN.
Their origin—Derivation of the term “Panthay”—Early history—Increase in numbers—Adoption of children—The Toonganees—Physical characteristics—Outbreak of the revolt—Tali-fu—Progress of revolt—The French expedition—Overtures from Low-quang-fang—Resources of the Panthays—Capture of Yunnan-fu—Prospects of their success—Our position—The governor’s presents—Preparations for return.
The Mahommedans of Yunnan have a tradition of their origin, which is curious, but mythical. The governor and the hadji at Momien stated, in substance, that their forefathers came from Arabia to China one thousand years ago, in the reign of the emperor Tung-huon-tsong, who had sent his chief minister, Khazee, to Tseeyoog(?) to implore help against the rebel Oung-loshan. Three thousand men were accordingly sent, and the rebellion was crushed by their assistance. Their former compatriots refused to receive them back, as having been defiled by a residence among pork-eating infidels, so they settled in China, and became the progenitors of the Chinese Mahommedans. This information was furnished in the form of answer to questions put by me carefully written, and translated into Chinese, and Sladen also procured a Chinese document, giving substantially the same account.[29] It will be seen that the variations of this from the account furnished to General Fytche are important;[30] but as the name of the emperor Tung-huon-tsong differs but slightly from that of Hiun-tsong of the Tung dynasty, against whom Ngan-Loshan[31] rebelled, it seems possible to connect this account with Chinese history. His son Sutsung, A.D. 757, was rescued from his difficulties by the arrival of an embassy from the khalif Abu Jafar al Mansur, the founder of Bagdad, accompanied by auxiliary troops, who were joined by Ouigoors and other forces from the West. It must be added that my informants, while claiming Arab descent, stated clearly that their more immediate ancestors had migrated from Shensi and Kansu to Yunnan about one hundred and fifty years ago. History, however, shows the early growth and rapid increase in China of a large Mahommedan population, whom the Chinese term Hwait-ze; the name Panthay or Pansee being of Burmese origin.
As to the derivation of this term, several theories have been suggested. Major Sladen gives Puthee as a Burmese term for Mahommedans generally. Garnier says that the word Pha-si, which the Burmese have corrupted into Pan-thé, according to Colonel Phayre, is the same as Parsi or Farsi, which in India is applied to the Mahommedans, and that this denomination is very ancient, as Colonel Yule pointed out that in a description of the kingdom of Cambodia, translated by A. Remusat, a religious sect is described, called Pâssi, who were distinguished by wearing white or red turbans, and by refusing to drink intoxicating liquors, or to eat in company with the other sects; but that distinguished Chinese scholar, Sir T. Wade, derives the term Panthay from a Chinese word Pun-tai, signifying the aboriginal or oldest inhabitants of a country; and Garnier mentions that a people called Penti are found on the eastern side of the Tali Lake, and in the plain of Tang-tchouen, to the north of Tali. They are a mixed race, descended from the first colonists sent into Yunnan by the Mongols, after the conquest of the country by the generals of Kublai Khan.
Mr. Cooper tells us that the term Pa-chee, or white flag party, as distinguished from the Hung-chee, or red flag, or imperialists, was also used to designate the rebels in the north of Yunnan, and Garnier frequently applies these terms to the contending parties. The termination -ze in the name Hwait-ze, as in Mant-ze, Thibetans, Miaout-ze, hill tribes, and Khwait-ze, foreigners, seems always to imply political and tribal separation from Chinese proper. These names occur in the curious prophecy of the Four -Ze Wars, quoted by Cooper.[32]
From the account of China compiled in the middle of the ninth century by Abu Zaid, from the reports of Arab traders, it is evident that his countrymen had long resorted to China. Even then the Arab community of Hang-chew-fu (Khanfu) was of great importance: it possessed a separate judge, appointed by the emperor of China, and we are told that the Mahommedan, Christian, Jewish, and Parsee population massacred in A.D. 878 numbered one hundred and twenty thousand. Mahommedanism was little known among the Tartars before the time of Chengis-khan, but his conquests were the means of bringing a considerable population of Uigurs into Shensi and Kansu; and the faith of the Prophet had spread amongst this tribe long before the Tartar conquest of China.
The vigorous trading and political intercourse subsisting between China and their mother country kept alive the religious life and social individuality of these immigrants. This large addition of population to their co-religionists already derived from the contingents of the khalifs, and the Arab traders, accounts for the number of Mahommedans which Marco Polo noted during his residence in China (1271-1295). In his description of the people on the western border of Shensi, where the celebrated mart of Singui was situated, and his account of Singan, and Carajan, a part of Yunnan, he describes the Mahommedans as forming a considerable part of the foreign population.
How strong a position this sect had obtained under the reign of Kublai appears from Marco Polo’s statement that the provincial governments were entrusted to Tartars, Christians, and Mahommedans. The invasion of Burma and the sieges of Singan and Fun-ching were entrusted to Mahommedan generals. The story of Bailo Achmed, the great minister of finance, is the most striking illustration of the Mahommedan influence, although the discovery of his crimes brought the khan’s anger upon the Saracens, and led to their being prohibited the practices as to marriage and slaughter of animals, enjoined by their religion. This check could only have been temporary, and as we find Mahommedans filling high places of trust, both civil and military, it can be fairly conjectured that after the conquest of Yunnan these enterprising soldiers and traders established themselves in the colonies planted in the new province.
In the early part of the fourteenth century, Rashid-ood-deen, Vizier of Persia, mentions Karajang or Yunnan province, and states that the inhabitants were all Mahommedans. Ibn Batuta, who visited China in the middle of the same century, found in every large town Mahommedans, who were mostly rich merchants. In all the provinces there was a town belonging to them, each of which usually possessed a mosque, market, a cell for the poor, and a kadi and sheikh ul Islam, while in some districts they were exceedingly numerous.
The Jesuit fathers, in the seventeenth century, make frequent mention of the Chinese Mahommedans. Le Compte, writing to Cardinal de Bouillon in 1680, says, “that they had been six hundred years in the country undisturbed, because they quietly enjoyed their liberty without seeking to propagate their religion, even by marriages, out of their own kindred, even in places where they were most numerous, and longest settled, as in the provinces north of the Hoang Ho, and in towns along the canal, where they had built mosques, differing altogether from Chinese architecture. They were regarded as foreigners, and frequently insulted by the Chinese.”