Daur people
Chinese: 达斡尔族
Pinyin: Dáwò’ěr Zú
Inner Mongolia and Heilongjiang, especially Morin Dawa Daur Autonomous Banner; a smaller historic community in Tacheng, Xinjiang.
Daur, a Mongolic language. Chinese, Mongolian, and other regional languages are also used.
Agriculture, animal husbandry, fishing, hunting in the past, transport, and household crafts.
Traditional hockey, Lurigele dance, Uqin, Zhaendale folk songs, oral history, embroidery, and foodways.
The theory linking the Daur to the Khitan is influential but should be presented as a scholarly hypothesis, not a settled archaeological fact.
Who Are the Daur People?
The Daur are a northern Chinese ethnic group whose communities developed across river valleys, forest margins, and grasslands. Today, their largest population centers are in the Morin Dawa Daur Autonomous Banner in Inner Mongolia and in neighboring parts of Heilongjiang. Daur communities also live around Ewenki Autonomous Banner and Qiqihar, while descendants of an eighteenth-century westward movement remain in the Tacheng area of Xinjiang.
This distribution matters because there is no single Daur cultural “uniform.” Speech, clothing, food, songs, and festival practice vary by locality and by contact with Mongol, Ewenki, Oroqen, Han, Manchu, Kazakh, and other neighboring peoples. A responsible introduction therefore describes shared traditions while leaving room for regional difference.
The Daur Language and Oral Tradition
Daur belongs to the Mongolic language family. Linguists usually discuss several regional varieties, including speech associated with the Butkha, Qiqihar, Hailar, and Xinjiang communities. Mutual understanding can vary, and long-distance migration has produced different vocabularies and contact influences.
The Daur language did not historically rely on one continuously used, standardized writing system of its own. Manchu script was used by some educated Daur during the Qing period, and Chinese is widely used today. Modern documentation may use adapted scripts or phonetic transcription. The vitality of spoken Daur differs by community and generation, making family conversation, school materials, recordings, and community-led archives important to transmission.
Oral knowledge includes migration accounts, genealogies, legends, riddles, proverbs, songs, and long narrative performance. These genres do more than preserve “old stories”: they record how people understand kinship, land, work, conflict, humor, and moral choice.
History, Migration, and the Khitan Question
Historical accounts place Daur ancestors north of the Heilongjiang River before large movements southward in the seventeenth century. Warfare, Russian expansion, and Qing frontier administration contributed to relocation toward the Nen River basin. Daur communities subsequently became involved in agriculture, frontier defense, transport, and regional exchange. In the eighteenth century, some families were transferred westward, creating the long-established Daur community in Xinjiang.
Hala, Mokon, Villages, and Traditional Homes
Traditional Daur social organization used the terms hala for a broader patrilineal clan grouping and mokon for a more localized branch. These structures shaped kinship memory, mutual responsibility, marriage rules, and ritual relations. Their practical authority changed greatly through modern administration, education, mobility, and civil law, but the terms remain useful when discussing genealogy and community history.
Many older villages were located near cultivable land, rivers, pasture, and woodland. Courtyards and houses reflected climate, available timber, agricultural storage, livestock, and extended-family life. Mud, wood, reeds, and thatch could be combined in warm, practical structures. Contemporary families generally live in modern rural or urban housing, so preserved dwellings and heritage villages are records of earlier building knowledge rather than the universal present.
Clothing, Embroidery, and Personal Ornament
Historical clothing was adapted to cold northern seasons and to farming, riding, and travel. Robes, jackets, trousers, boots, hats, leather, fur, and cloth appeared in different combinations. Festival clothing could use stronger color, patterned edging, embroidery, beadwork, and metal ornament. Everyday dress today is largely contemporary, while heritage clothing is especially visible at festivals, weddings, museums, cultural programs, and staged performances.
Embroidery appears on collars, cuffs, headwear, shoes, bags, pouches, and domestic textiles. Floral, bird, animal, and geometric designs can carry family associations or wishes for beauty and well-being, but motif meanings are not always fixed. Interpretation is strongest when a maker, place, date, and use are known.
Food and Traditional Livelihoods
Daur food reflects a mixed agricultural and northern pastoral environment. Millet, buckwheat, oats, wheat, potatoes, and other crops have been important, alongside dairy products, meat, fish, vegetables, and gathered foods. Preparation and preference vary by region and household. Milk tea, porridge, noodles, dumplings, roasted or boiled meat, and preserved foods may appear in descriptions of traditional foodways, but none should be treated as a daily menu for every Daur family.
Agriculture became especially important in the Nen River region, while animal husbandry, fishing, hunting in earlier periods, forestry, cart transport, and household production contributed to local economies. Modern livelihoods include mechanized agriculture, public service, education, manufacturing, commerce, tourism, digital work, and urban employment.
Why Is Hockey Important in Daur Culture?
Traditional Daur field hockey is one of the best-known cultural sports of northern China. The Daur name is commonly transcribed as beikou ta’rike bei. Older forms used a curved wooden stick and balls made from wood, hair, or other available materials; accounts also describe a fireball game played under controlled conditions. Skills emphasize running, passing, striking, teamwork, and spatial judgment.
The practice is included in China’s national intangible cultural heritage list as “Daur traditional hockey,” project number VI-15, first listed in 2006, with Morin Dawa as its principal declared area. School programs, competitions, community teams, and public demonstrations have helped sustain it. Modern sport equipment and standardized rules coexist with heritage presentation.
Lurigele Dance, Uqin, and Zhaendale Folk Songs
Lurigele: group movement and improvisation
Lurigele is a major Daur dance tradition and a national intangible cultural heritage item. Dancers often form a circle or semicircle, combining singing, calls, rhythmic steps, gestures, and movements inspired by labor, animals, or daily life. Women have been prominent performers, although modern stage versions can involve larger mixed ensembles, arranged music, and choreographed costume.
Uqin narrative art
Uqin is a Daur narrative tradition that combines storytelling, recitation, and singing. Qing-period works were sometimes written in Manchu script, while later performers transmitted stories orally. A four-stringed instrument, often described as huaqangsi, may accompany performance. The repertoire can include historical narratives, heroic stories, family experience, and adapted literature. Today Uqin also appears in recordings, schools, staged programs, and livestreams.
Zhaendale folk songs
Zhaendale songs include lyrical and narrative forms performed solo or antiphonally. Melody, vocal fillers, and improvisation allow singers to shape a song for a particular scene. Love, landscape, work, homesickness, family, and community memory are recurring themes. Classification varies among researchers and performers, so one published list should not be treated as the only valid system.
Festivals, Marriage Customs, and Belief Traditions
Anie, often described as the Daur New Year, is a major seasonal celebration. Family visits, greetings, food, games, song, dance, and sports can be part of present-day observance. Local schedules and programs vary. Black Ash Day involves playful marking with soot or ash in some descriptions; meanings are commonly related to protection and good fortune, but community practice is not identical everywhere.
Older marriage customs were shaped by clan rules, matchmaking, gifts, family negotiation, and multi-stage ceremonies. These should be written in the past tense. Contemporary Daur marriages follow civil law and often combine modern venues and clothing with selected family blessings, songs, foods, or ceremonial dress.
Historical belief traditions included respect for ancestors, natural places, fire, and protective powers, with shamanic practices in some communities. Buddhism and other regional religious influences also occurred. It is inaccurate to assume that every Daur person today follows the same belief system; contemporary religious and secular identities are individual and diverse.
National Heritage and Cultural Preservation Today
| Heritage form | National list information | What it includes |
|---|---|---|
| Daur traditional hockey | VI-15, first national list, 2006 | Stick-and-ball skills, community games, training, competition, and associated knowledge. |
| Daur Lurigele dance | III-28, first national list, 2006 | Group dance, song, calls, rhythmic movement, improvisation, and staged transmission. |
| Daur Uqin | V-41, first national list, 2006; Morin Dawa expansion in 2008 | Narrative singing, oral storytelling, historical repertoire, and instrumental accompaniment. |
| Daur Zhaendale folk songs | II-108, second national list, 2008 | Lyrical and narrative songs, solo and antiphonal performance, regional melodic practice. |
Preservation now takes place through community performers, representative inheritors, cultural centers, schools, museums, competitions, archives, festivals, university research, and digital media. The strongest projects document the names and voices of knowledge holders, support young learners, and keep language and practice connected to community life.
Challenges include language shift, aging performers, loss of informal learning time, separation between stage versions and local practice, and the temptation to package many northern cultures as one visual style. Heritage work is most credible when it labels reconstructions clearly and lets Daur participants decide how their culture is presented.
Cultural Symbols and Craft Inspiration
These three active store pieces are presented through neutral visual ideas—flight and sound, textile geometry, and birds with flowers. They are contemporary Chinese designs, not Daur artifacts, replicas, or claims of ethnic origin.
Swallow and Bell
Embroidery, suspended movement, and a gentle bell connect craft with the broader idea of seasonal return and sound.
$36.99 USD
Explore the symbol
Textile Geometry
Layered borders and embroidered curves show how pattern can organize a practical modern textile object.
$76.99 USD
See the textile language
Bird and Flower
A small embroidered bird among blossoms offers a nature-centered motif without assigning it a fixed ethnic meaning.
$36.99 USD
View the motifFrequently Asked Questions
Where do the Daur people live?
They live mainly in Inner Mongolia and Heilongjiang, especially Morin Dawa Daur Autonomous Banner, with a historic community in the Tacheng area of Xinjiang.
What language do the Daur speak?
They traditionally speak Daur, a Mongolic language with several regional varieties. Chinese and other local languages are also widely used.
Are the Daur descendants of the Khitan?
Some oral traditions and scholarly research support a possible connection, but it remains an important hypothesis rather than a conclusively proven fact.
Why are the Daur associated with hockey?
Traditional stick-and-ball games have a long place in Daur community life. Daur traditional hockey entered China’s first national intangible cultural heritage list in 2006.
What is Lurigele?
Lurigele is a Daur group dance combining singing, calls, rhythmic steps, gestures, and improvisation. Modern stage versions often use arranged choreography and coordinated costume.
What is Uqin?
Uqin is a Daur narrative art involving storytelling, recitation, and singing, sometimes accompanied by a four-stringed instrument.
What is the Daur New Year?
Anie is a major Daur seasonal celebration. Family visits, greetings, shared food, games, songs, dance, and sport may be included, with regional variation.
Do Daur people still wear traditional clothing every day?
Usually not. Contemporary clothing predominates in daily life, while heritage dress is especially visible at festivals, weddings, performances, museums, and cultural events.
What are important Daur handicrafts?
Embroidery, beadwork, leatherwork, woodwork, practical household textiles, and decorative objects are important, though styles and meanings vary by region and maker.
How is Daur culture preserved today?
Through community teaching, schools, cultural centers, museums, language documentation, sport, performance, craft training, archives, festivals, and digital media.
References
- National Ethnic Affairs Commission of the People’s Republic of China. “The Daur Ethnic Group: Overview.” Official overview.
- National Ethnic Affairs Commission. “History and Origins of the Daur.” Official history page.
- National Ethnic Affairs Commission. “Daur Customs and Culture.” Official customs page.
- China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network. “Daur Traditional Hockey,” project VI-15. Project record.
- China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network. “Daur Lurigele Dance,” project III-28. Project record.
- China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network. “Daur Uqin,” project V-41. Project record.
- China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network. “Daur Zhaendale Folk Songs,” project II-108. Project record.
- National Ethnic Affairs Commission. Reporting on contemporary Uqin transmission and livestream performance. Official report.
