View source for Jie people

{{Short description|Historical ethnic group in Chinese history}}
{{for|the Jie/Jiye people in Eastern Equatoria state, South Sudan|Jiye people}}
{{for|the Jie people of northern Uganda|Jie (Uganda)}}{{Infobox ethnic group
| group            = Jie
| native_name      = {{lang|zh|羯}}<br / >{{small|*ki̯at}}
| native_name_lang = zho
| image            = Sixteen Kingdoms 338 AD (2).jpg
| image_caption    = Map of Sixteen Kingdoms in 338 AD, showing the Later Zhao, a state ruled by the Jie.
| population       = assimilated into Han
| regions          = [[Later Zhao]]
| languages        = [[Jie language]]
}}
{{Use American English|date=January 2019}}
The '''Jie''' ({{zh|c=[[wikt:羯|羯]]||p=Jié|w=Chieh{{sup|2}}}}; [[Middle Chinese]]: {{IPA|[ki̯at]}}<ref name="Pulleyblank">{{cite journal|last=Pulleyblank|first=Edwin George|author-link=Edwin G. Pulleyblank|title=The consonantal system of Old Chinese. Part II|journal=Asia Major|volume= 9|year=1963|pages=206–265|url=http://www2.ihp.sinica.edu.tw/file/1114AUnNESH.pdf|access-date=2011-02-06}}</ref>{{rp|246}}) were a historical tribe of [[North China|northern China]] in the fourth century. They were part of the [[Five Barbarians]] during the [[Sixteen Kingdoms]] period. Under [[Shi Le]] and his family, they established the [[Later Zhao|Later Zhao dynasty]] which dominated northern China from 319 to 351. The Jie ceased to play a role in Chinese history after [[Ran Min|Ran Min's]] culling order and the wars that followed the collapse of Later Zhao. Some figures from the [[Northern and Southern dynasties|Northern Dynasties]] were identified as being descended from the Jie.

==Name and origins==
Historical records do not give a clear origin of the Jie. According to the ''[[Book of Wei]]'' (6th century AD), the name Jie was derived from the Jiéshì area (羯室, modern [[Yushe County]] in [[Shanxi]] province), where the Jie resided.<ref>{{cite book |last=Wei |first=Shou |author-link=Wei Shou |title=魏書 |year=554 |trans-title=[[Book of Wei]]}}, Vol. 95.</ref><ref name="Taskin">{{cite book |last=Taskin |first=V. S. |publisher=[[Nauka (publisher)|Nauka]] |year=1990 |isbn=5-02-016543-3 |series=Материалы по истории кочевых народов в Китае III–V вв. [Materials on the history of nomadic peoples in China. 3rd–5th cc. AD] |volume=2 |location=Moscow |language=ru |script-title=ru:Цзе |trans-title=Jie}}</ref>{{rp|6, 149}}

According to the ''[[Book of Jin]]'', the ancestors of [[Shi Le]] were a part of the multi-ethnic [[Xiongnu|Southern Xiongnu]] tribe known as ''Qiāngqú'' (羌渠), although by the 4th-century, Shi Le and his people were classed separate from the Xiongnu as a "miscellaneous ''[[Hu (people)|hu]]''" (雜胡; záhú) group.<ref>{{cite book|last=Fang|first=Xuanling|publisher=[[Commercial Press]]|year=1958|location=Beijing|language=zh|script-title=zh:晉書|trans-title=[[Book of Jin]]|author-link=Fang Xuanling|volume= 104}}</ref>  Some have linked the names Shi (石) and Jie (羯) to a Sogdian statelet known as 石國 ''Shíguó'' (literally, "Stone Country", at [[Tashkent#History as Chach|Chach]] ''Zhěshí'' 赭時, now [[Tashkent]], also meaning "Stone City" in [[Common Turkic]]). 

Other sources link the Jie to the [[Lesser Yuezhi]] (''Xiao Yuezhi'' 小月氏), who remained in China as vassals of the Xiongnu and then the [[Han dynasty]].<ref name="Haw">{{harvnb|Haw|2006|p=201}}</ref>

According to Chen Yong, while Shi Le and his biological family were ethnically Jie, the other recorded "Jie" in history were from a wide array of miscellaneous ''[[Hu (people)|hu]]'' tribes in [[Bingzhou|Bing province]] and [[Hebei]], who only adopted the label during the rise of Shi Le and Later Zhao. Chen asserts that Shi Le, due to the small population of the actual Jie in contrast to the numerous other ''hu'' that made up his power base, undertook ethnic policies to unite the assortment of people under a common "Jie" or "''guoren''" (國人; countryman) identity, which would explain the sudden spike of the Jie population around this time. He also adds that a considerable number of these ''hu'' were from the [[Western Regions]], citing the claim of their high noses and full beards, and that there were instances of the Han Chinese becoming part of the Jie.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Chen |first=Yong |date=2008 |title=《后赵羯胡为流寓河北之并州杂胡说》 |journal=民族研究 |issue=1 |pages=66–75}}</ref>

== Jie language ==
{{Main|Jie language}}There are widely differing accounts of the exact language of the Jie, with two theories uncertainly suggesting that the [[Jie language]] was either [[Turkic languages|Turkic]]<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Shimunek, Andrew |last2=Beckwith, Christopher I. |last3=North Washington, Jonathan |last4=Kontovas, Nicholas |last5=Niyaz, Kurban |date=2015 |title=The Earliest Attested Turkic Language |url=https://doi.org/10.2143/JA.303.1.3085124 |journal=Journal Asiatique |issue=1 |pages=143–151 |doi=10.2143/JA.303.1.3085124 |issn=1783-1504}}</ref><ref>{{Citation |last=Yakup |first=Abdurishid |title=‘Lacuna filling’ in Old Turkic Runiform Inscriptions and Old Uyghur Texts |date=2015-12-31 |work=Interpreting the Turkic Runiform Sources and the Position of the Altai Corpus |pages=206–214 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783112208953-020 |access-date=2024-08-27 |publisher=De Gruyter}}</ref> or [[Yeniseian languages|Yeniseian]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kim |first1=Hyun Jin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fX8YAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA176 |title=The Huns, Rome and the Birth of Europe |date=2013 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-107-06722-6 |page=176 |language=en}}</ref>{{sfn|Shimunek|Beckwith|Washington|Kontovas|2015|p=149}} Some authors believe the Jie were of [[Indo-European]] origin (probably [[Iranian peoples|Iranian]]).{{efn|Medieval Sinologist David A. Graff suggests Central Asian or Iranian origins.{{sfn|Graff|2002|p=74}}}}{{sfn|Lewis|2009|pp=82–83}}

Others claim that the Jie were an ancient [[Yeniseian languages|Yeniseian-speaking]] tribe related to the [[Ket people]], who today live between the [[Ob River|Ob]] and [[Yenisei River|Yenisey]] rivers&mdash;the character 羯 (''jié'') is pronounced ''/kiɛt̚/'' in [[Hokkien]], ''/kʰiːt̚/'' or ''/kiːt̚/'' in [[Cantonese]], ''/ciat̚/'' in [[Hakka Chinese|Hakka]] and ''ketsu'' in [[Japanese language|Japanese]], implying that the ancient pronunciation might have been fairly close to ''Ket (kʰeˀt)''.{{efn|1=[[Western Washington University]] historical linguist [[Edward Vajda]] spent a year in [[Siberia]] studying the Ket people and their language and his findings helped substantiate such conjecture into the origins of the Ket people, where DNA claims show genetic affinities with people of China and Myanmar, suggesting a [[Sino-Tibetan]] origin.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/vajda/ea210/ket.htm |title=East Asian Studies 210 Notes: The Ket |access-date=2009-10-09 |archive-date=2019-04-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190406214043/http://pandora.cii.wwu.edu/vajda/ea210/ket.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> He further [[Dene-Yeniseian languages|proposes a relationship]] of the Ket language to the [[Na-Dene languages]] indigenous to Canada and western United States, and even suggests the tonal system of the Ket language is closer to that of [[Vietnamese people|Vietnamese]] than any of the native Siberian languages.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6050673836854498204 |title=The Ket People |via= Google Video |access-date=2009-10-09 |archive-date=2007-03-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070303083233/http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6050673836854498204 |url-status=dead }}</ref>}} The root {{Zh|c={{linktext|羯}}|labels=no}} may be transliterated as ''Jié''- or ''Tsze<sup>2</sup>''- and an older form, < ''kiat'', may also be reconstructed. This ethnonym might be cognate with the ethnonyms of Yeniseian-speaking peoples, such as the [[Ket people|Ket]] and the [[Kott people|Kott]] (who spoke the extinct [[Kott language]], but their ethnonym is believed to have Buryat origins). Pulleyblank (1962) connected the ethnonym to [[Proto-Yeniseian]] *'''qeˀt'''/'''s''' (*cew-ç) "stone". Vovin et al. (2016) also pointed to *'''keˀt''' (*qid) "person, human being" as another possible source.<ref name=":0">Vovin et al. "Who were the *Kjet" (羯) and what language did they speak?" ''Journal Asiatique'' 304.1 (2016): 125–144 [126–127]</ref> [[Alexander Vovin]] also suggests that the Xiongnu spoke a Yeniseian language, further connecting them with the Jie people.<ref name=":1">Vovin, Alexander. "Did the Xiongnu speak a Yeniseian language?". ''[[Central Asiatic Journal]]'' 44/1 (2000), pp. 87–104.</ref>

Among the Yeniseian languages, Jie is hypothesized to be [[Pumpokol language|Pumpokolic]]. Vovin, [[Edward Vajda|Vajda]], and [[Étienne de la Vaissière|de la Vaissière]] have suggested that Jie shares the same idiosyncrasies with the Pumpokol language, and the two are therefore closely related. This argument is strengthened by the fact that in northern Mongolia, Yeniseian-derived hydronyms have been demonstrated to be exclusively Pumpokolic, while influence from other Yeniseian languages is only found further north.<ref name=":0" /> This therefore lends credence to the theory that the Jie are a Pumpokolic-speaking tribe, and confirms that the Pumpokolic-speaking Yeniseians existed in the core territory of the Xiongnu state.

==History==

=== Sixteen Kingdoms ===
{{Main|Later Zhao}}
Most of what is known about the Jie people comes from the [[Later Zhao|Later Zhao dynasty]], one of the [[Sixteen Kingdoms]] that existed in the first half of the 4th-century. The earliest recorded Jie was [[Shi Le]], a minor chieftain from [[Wuxiang County]] in [[Bingzhou|Bing province]] (roughly modern-day [[Shanxi]]) under the Western Jin dynasty. However, his name was not originally "Shi Le", as it does not appear that the Jie had family names; Instead, his original name was either Bei (㔨) or Fule (匐勒). He became chieftain by succeeding his father Zhouhezhu (周曷朱) and grandfather Yeyiyu (耶奕于) before him. When a famine struck Bing in 303, he and many other Jie and ''hu'' people became displaced. The Jin provincial inspector, looking to fund his military for an [[War of the Eight Princes|ongoing civil war]], had them captured and sold into slavery. The Jie and ''hu'' were scattered around the [[Hebei]] and [[Shandong]] regions, with Shi Le himself becoming a slave.

After attaining his freedom, Shi Le became a bandit and later a rebel leader with his [[Han Chinese]] friend, [[Ji Sang]], who gave Shi Le his name. When their rebellion was defeated in 307, Shi Le joined the [[Xiongnu]]-led [[Han-Zhao|Han-Zhao dynasty]], where he quickly rose through the ranks and became a key commander in their war against the Western Jin. He was also effectively a powerful warlord who controlled the eastern parts of the empire and made the city of [[Xingtai|Xiangguo]] his capital. In 319, Shi Le broke away and established the Later Zhao. He conquered his former state in 329, and while some areas remained independent, the Later Zhao became the hegemonic power of northern China, reaching a stalemate with the [[Jin dynasty (266–420)|Eastern Jin]] and [[Cheng-Han]] dynasties in the south.

During his reign, Shi Le issued a ban on the word "''hu''", replacing it with the word "guoren" (國人; countryman) when referring to the Jie and other miscellaneous ''hu'' tribes. Shi Le's family also had an unusual practice of heavily adopting people into their clan. His brother, [[Shi Hu]], for example was a distant cousin who was adopted by his father during their tribal years. Shi Le continued this practice during his rise to power, adopting the likes of Shi Hui (石会), previously Zhang Beidu (張㔨督) of a different ''hu'' tribe, as well as [[Shi Kan]] and [[Shi Cong (Later Zhao)|Shi Cong]], who were [[Han Chinese]]. The adopted members were turned into powerful princes and military generals. However, after Shi Le died, Shi Hu violently seized power from his biological son, [[Shi Hong]] and ascended the throne in 334. 

Shi Hu shifted the capital to [[Ye (Hebei)|Ye]] and ruled over northern China for roughly 15 years. Records describe him as a brutal tyrant who oppressed the common people through his excessive building projects, concubine collection and military campaigns. By the end of his reign, he was troubled by a succession crisis, and after his death in 349, his family members engaged in an internecine struggle over the throne. During the course of the conflict, Shi Hu's adopted Han Chinese grandson, [[Ran Min|Shi Min]], was promised the role of Crown Prince, but soon took control of the emperor and capital by force after his promise was reneged upon. The Zhao state then split into two parts when [[Shi Zhi]], a son of Shi Hu, formed a faction against Shi Min in the old capital of Xiangguo.

After surviving multiple assassination attempts, Shi Min suspected that he could not trust the Jie and tribespeople in Ye. In 349, he ordered the killing of every Jie and ''hu'' people, identifying them by their high noses and full beards. Shi Min personally led his soldiers to massacre the tribes in Ye while his generals purged their armies of tribesmen. According to some sources, more than 200,000 of them were slain, but a large portion of them were also Han Chinese who were mistaken due to their facial features. Regardless, the culling order appears to have had an adverse effect on the Jie population.<ref>''The Buddhist Conquest of China'', Erik Zürcher, [https://books.google.com/books?id=388UAAAAIAAJ&dq=CHIEH++people&pg=PA111 p. 111]</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Maenchen-Helfen |first=Otto J. |author-link=Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen |date=1973|title=The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture|url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_CrUdgzSICxcC_2 |publisher=[[University of California Press]]|page=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_CrUdgzSICxcC_2/page/n399 372]|isbn=0520015967|access-date=January 16, 2015}}</ref> Later that year, Shi Min massacred the Shi clan in Ye, changed his name to Ran Min and proclaimed himself Emperor of (Ran) Wei. He also reversed the genocide policy to avoid causing more tribesmen to join Shi Zhi's side. 

In 351, the final ruler of Later Zhao, [[Shi Zhi]] and his family were massacred in Xiangguo, bringing the dynasty to an end. The last member of the Shi clan fled to the Eastern Jin in [[Jiankang]], but was executed upon his arrival. The remaining Jie people eventually became subjects of the [[Xianbei]]-led [[Former Yan]], who defeated Ran Min and conquered the [[Hebei]] and [[Shandong]] regions.

=== Later history ===
Hereafter, the Jie people seemingly faded into obscurity. Despite this, there were several figures in later history who may have been of Jie ethnicity. [[Gai Wu]], a rebel during the [[Northern Wei|Northern Wei dynasty]], is described in the [[Book of Qi]] as a Jiehu (羯胡), although the [[Book of Wei]] states that he was a [[Lushuihu]] instead. Both [[Erzhu Rong]] and [[Hou Jing]], two famous warlords of the [[Southern and Northern Dynasties|Northern Dynasties]], were identified as Qihu (契胡) and Jiehu respectively, and modern scholars have suggested that they could have been be related to the Jie.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=y_KCAgAAQBAJ&dq=Jie+people&pg=PT99|title=Medieval Chinese Warfare 300–900|first=David|last=Graff|date=2003|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781134553525|access-date=10 December 2021|via=Google Books}}</ref> The [[Tang dynasty]] rebel, [[An Lushan]] was also called a Jiehu, and according to the unearthed epitaph of [[Shi Chonggui]], the Shi clan of [[Shatuo]] origin that ruled the [[Later Jin (Five Dynasties)|Later Jin (936–947)]] claimed that they were descendants of Shi Le.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Barenghi |first=Maddalena |date=2017 |title=Ancestral Sites and Lineages of the Later Tang (923–936) and the Later Jin (936–947) Dynasties According to the Song Sources |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.13173/jasiahist.51.1.0001 |journal=[[Journal of Asian History]] |volume=51 |issue=1 |page=18 |doi=10.13173/jasiahist.51.1.0001 |jstor=10.13173/jasiahist.51.1.0001 |hdl=10278/3720502 |hdl-access=free }}</ref>

== Religion ==
Both Shi Le and Shi Hu endorsed [[Buddhism]] by granting the [[Kucha|Kuchean]] monk, [[Fotu Cheng]] a privileged position within their government. Buddhism was at first restricted to government officials, but as the religion became increasingly popular among commoners as well, Shi Hu promoted religious freedom, stating that his people have the right to worship the Buddha, who was a "foreigner" like him. Under Later Zhao, Fotu Cheng's teachings spread, and many Buddhist temples were built in northern China.

The Jie practiced [[cremation]], which was notably a custom in the city-state of [[Tashkent|Chach]] in the [[Western Regions]]. Scholars have speculate that the Jie believed in [[Sogdia|Sogdian]] [[Zoroastrianism]], stating that there was a temple or altar in Ye called "''Hutian''" (胡天), which was the Chinese name for the Zoroastrian god, [[Ahura Mazda]]. Due to the veneration of fire in Zoroastrianism, another example they cite is the giant lamp that was built in Shi Hu's palace for his crowning ceremony as Heavenly King.<ref name=":02">{{Cite book |last=Tang |first=Changru |title=《魏晋南北朝史论丛》 |date=2010 |publisher=[[Commercial Press]] |isbn=9787100074513 |location=Beijing |language=zh |chapter=〈魏晋杂胡考 三 羯胡〉}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Wang |first=Qing |date=2002 |title=〈石赵政权与西域文化在中原的传播〉 |journal=[[Western Regions Studies]] |issue=3 |pages=91-98}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Chen |first=Sanping |last2=Mair |first2=Victor H |date=2017 |title=A 'Black Cult' in Early Medieval China: Iranian-Zoroastrian Influence in the Northern Dynasties |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26187347 |journal=Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society |volume=27 |issue=2 |pages=201–224 |issn=1356-1863}}</ref>

==See also==
*[[Ethnic groups in Chinese history]]
*[[Zhongshan (state)]]

== Notes ==
{{Notelist}}

== References ==
=== Citations ===
{{Reflist}}

=== Sources ===
{{refbegin}}
*{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Q3QszQEACAAJ |title=Medieval Chinese Warfare 300–900 |first=David |last=Graff |publisher=Routledge |year=2002 |isbn=9780521877152 }}
* {{cite book |last=Haw |first=Stephen G. |title=Beijing – A Concise History |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=J8J8AgAAQBAJ |access-date=16 December 2014 |year=2006 |publisher=Routledge |isbn = 1134150334 }}
*{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0wRikR7hhFQC&printsec=frontcover&dq=China+between+Empires:+The+Northern+and+Southern+Dynasties&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjkjcza15WPAxWXMjQIHWg3El4Q6AF6BAgGEAM#v=onepage&q=Jie&f=false |title=China between Empires: The Northern and Southern Dynasties |first=Mark Edward |last=Lewis |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=2009 |quote="The court defeated the rebel armies only with the assistance of an allied tribal group of Indo-European (probably Iranian) origin that dominated central Shanxi. These people, known as Jie or Jie Hu.."}}
*{{cite journal |last1=Shimunek |first1=Andrew |last2=Beckwith |first2=Christopher I. |last3=Washington |first3=Jonathan North|last4=Kontovas |first4=Nicholas |last5=Niyaz |first5=Kurban |title=The Earliest Attested Turkic Language: The Chieh (*Kir) Language of the Fourth Century A.D. |journal=Journal Asiatique |year=2015 |volume=303 |issue=1 |pages=143–151 |doi=10.2143/JA.303.1.3085124 |url=https://poj.peeters-leuven.be/content.php?id=3085124&url=article}}
* Wang, Zhonghan. ''"Outlines of Ethnic Groups in China"'', Taiyuan, Shanxi Education Press, 2004, p.&nbsp;133, {{ISBN|7-5440-2660-4}}.
{{refend}}

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20041212143602/http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/twain/1279/royalhouse/jie.htm 羯語記載 The language of Jie ( Kiet ) – earliest Turkic language phrase recorded in Chinese Chronicle](Chinese Traditional Big5 code page) via [[Internet Archive]]
{{16 Kingdoms |state=autocollapse}}
{{Historical Non-Chinese peoples in China}}

[[Category:Ancient peoples of China]]
[[Category:Ethnic groups in Chinese history]]
[[Category:Five Barbarians]]
[[Category:Later Zhao]]
[[Category:Xiongnu]]