3. Counting Time by Battles

In olden times, the frequency of armed feuds made going into battle one of the main elements of life. This was because “the enmity of the Nuosu cannot be forgotten, and the joints of the fir will not rot.” And it was because “only the son who seeks revenge for his grandfather counts as number one; only the son who seeks revenge for his father counts as number two.” Thus wars and pillage took place incessantly and over a long period of time. The eminent late-Ming thinker Gu Yanwu wrote that the Nuosu “think of battle as an everyday occurrence and of pillage as a way of farming” (1831, chap. 68, 25b). And this epitomizes perfectly the whole heroic air of Yi life. Up to the sixth decade of this century,warfare continued to play an important role in Yi life. Their behavior and attitude in battle fully expressed their heroic mettle. Before going out to fight, men ate the best foods and put on their

---

best clothes in order to concentrate their energy and raise their spirits to high pitch. This shows what they thought of the value of human life: if you must die, die splendidly and without regret. The ancient Qiang, who share their origins with the Yi, held that “to die of old age is misfortune; to die in battle is glory.” At the end of the last century, the gun had not yet arrived in Liangshan, and the Yi still wore their exquisite helmets and armor of lacquer with leather padding, their arm greaves and elbow guards; they still had their bows and arrows tucked into their waistbands, swords and spears in their hands, and yak tails flying from their backs. Their whole appearance exuded the very ideal of the saying “Sallying into battle, there is no one who does not want to be brave.” In order to give this impression, they would sometimes hold pledging ceremonies or horse races.

Lowie said, “Primitive man wants, above all, to shine before his fellows; he craves praise and abhors the loss of ‘face.’ . . . He risks life itself if that is the way to gain the honor of a public eulogy” (1929, 156—58). And these hallmarks have been extremely prominent among the Liangshan Yi. A nuoho injured on the battlefield “must clench his jaws shut and not let out so much as a gasp, lest he be ridiculed by the other nuoho. Losing face in view of slaves—for instance falling captive to the enemy—is worse still, and he will by all means rather commit suicide than surrender.” When quho clans fought their enemies, both sides invited their masters, who professed to be the “protectors” of the quho; not to take part would mean being laughed at, being thought timid. In battle, the masters would display valor in order to win over slaves and make themselves look good. Someone in the Buji clan once said, “He is nuoho; I am nuoho; why should I fear him?” This kind of thinking is precisely why Liangshan was the stage of so many wars—armed feuds! And so Qumo Zangyao has said, “Within the 360-odd days of one year, there is no one in all of Luoyi who will not take up arms and do battle” (1933, 55). The idea of “taking up arms and doing battle” had a high aesthetic appeal to Nuosu. A Nuosu saying goes, “Nuoho are most beautiful with the smell of gun smoke all around them; women are most beautiful with the smell of gold and silver on their bodies.” Clearly, courage and wealth were what Liangshan society esteemed. And courage had to be embodied—wealth had to be obtained—through “the smell of gun smoke.” So Liangshan society was one in which “the land does not have feet, but masters are often changed; the enemy does not have wings, but the sky is filled with them in flight”; and “there is no kin who is not enemy; there is no enemy who is not kin.”