Salar customs and habits
Salar people are one of the ethnic minorities who believe in Islam in China. They mainly live in the Yellow River Valley of Xunhua Salar Autonomous County and Hualong Hui Autonomous County, Qinghai Province, as well as the Dahe hometown of Jishishan Bao 'an Dongxiang Salar Autonomous County, Gansu Province. Secondly, it is also distributed in Sibaozi, Dahejia, Liuji Township, Shiyuan, Liugou, Chuimatan, Zhalang, Xiaoguan, Zhongzuiling and other towns in Jishishan County, Linxia Prefecture. After the failed anti-Qing Dynasty during the Qianlong, Tongzhi, and Guangxu periods of the Qing Dynasty, the Salar people in the county moved in from Jiezi, Yaman, Xigou, Baizhuang, Qingshui, Mengda, Caotanba, Tasapo and other places in Xunhua Salar Autonomous County, Qinghai due to escape and marriage. Some Salar people are scattered in Xining City and Huangnan, Haibei, Haixi and other prefectures in Qinghai Province, and in Xiahe County of Gansu Province, Urumqi City, Yining County of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and other places.
The Salar people got their name because they called themselves "Sarar", or "Sarar" for short. Some people believe that the Salar people are descendants of Salar, the Uguus tribe of the ancient Western Turks. Legend has it that Sarur is the grandson of Ugushan and the eldest son of Tahehan. "Sarur" means "one who wields swords and hammers and spears everywhere." He originally lived in China during the Tang Dynasty and later moved westward to Central Asia. In the Yuan Dynasty, he returned to China through Samarkand and eastward, and settled near Xining.
According to Sala legend, his ancestor Galamang had a conflict with the king, so he led his troops, led a mountain of white camels, left Samarkand with water, soil and the Koran, migrated eastward, and reached Xunhua, where he could see that the water was good, the pastures were vast, and the forests were lush, so he settled down. Later, it absorbed local Tibetan, Hui, Han and other ethnic elements and gradually formed a single ethnic group, which has a history of about 700 years.
Islam is the national belief of the Salar people, so religion has a profound influence on its historical development and politics, economy, culture and other aspects.
The Salar language belongs to the Ugusi branch of the Altaic Turkic language family. The language is relatively consistent within the language without dialect differences. The basic order of sentence elements is: subject-object-predicate, attribute and adverbial are both in front of the head word. In addition to a considerable number of words that are homologous to the languages of relatives of the same language family, many loanwords have been absorbed from the Sino-Tibetan languages. All vowels have unvoiced phenomena, and stops and fricatives are unvoiced. There are two sets of aspirated and unaspirated. There is no difference in numbers between nouns. The personal form when verbs and nouns are used as predicates has disappeared, and there are very few words with more than two additional elements. Among the Turkic languages, Salar is deeply influenced by Chinese. Salar used to use the Arabic alphabet of the Chagatai style, but now uses the Latin alphabet. Many Salar people can speak Chinese and Tibetan. Chinese is generally used.
Historically, the Salar people used the Salar language based on Arabic letters, which the people called "Turk language". By the 18th century, this "Turk text" was not only used for religious annotation of scriptures, translation of classics, and teaching of scripture, but also became a practical text for social communication, writing contracts, chronicle biographies, and writing books. To this day, the Salar people still retain handwritten copies of some documents on history, religion, literature, etc. written in this language).
Salars live in a concentrated area, regardless of size and size. The building form is a wood-mud structure flat-topped building, and the house is surrounded by earth walls to form a "village enclosure". Arabic "Kufi" calligraphy is posted on the walls of the house, which looks elegant, solemn and clean. On the top of the four corners of the courtyard wall, white stones are placed, which is the same as local Tibetan customs. Most Salar men make a living by logging trees in the mountains and rowing rafts in the rivers. In addition, beekeeping is the favorite sideline production of the Salars, and gardening is also their specialty.
Salar ancestors migrated from Samarkand in Central Asia to Xunhua, Qinghai 700 years ago. According to historical records, their ancestors lived a nomadic life at that time. After the migration, although its human and ecological environment have changed, the habits of animal husbandry have not changed. Many Salar families raise one to twenty sheep and one or two oxen. Most of them are still kept in captivity in nearby mountains. These cattle and sheep meet the needs of fertilizer for agriculture on the one hand, and also meet the needs of meat on the other. The Salar meat delicacies are simple and natural, representing the personality and style of the Salar people.
Salar people are hospitable and pay attention to etiquette. They meet each other and say hello to each other with "Salam"("Salam", which means "peace" and "tranquility" in Arabic). When visiting, the host makes tea, and the guest must hold the tea bowl in his hand. When eating steamed buns, break them into pieces and eat them. Don't wolf them down. The Salar people respect their "uncles" very much and believe that "iron comes out of the house, and people come out of the house."
Cattle and sheep heads and hooves are a kind of meat generally loved by the Salar people. After slaughtering the cattle and sheep, cut off the horns, use a red-hot shovel to burn all the hair on the heads of the cattle and sheep, and then wash it with alkaline water. Use a knife to cut from the corner of the cow and sheep's head along the tooth bones to the roots behind the ears, chop it in half, place it in a frying pan, bring it to a boil, add wheat and cook together. The seasonings are only used as local pepper and green salt. Serve when boiled until the skin falls off. At breakfast, the housewife fished the meat onto the table, took it off piece by piece, and divided each part into each person's bowl. Cattle and sheep hoof meat must have one serving per person, and the eyes are usually eaten by the elderly. It is said that the elderly are dizzy and can be worth the effect of "supplementing what you eat". After eating the meat, each person also drinks a bowl of wheat kernels with soup.
In addition, on the day when cattle and sheep were slaughtered, the Salars also washed the intestines, tripe, etc. of the cattle and sheep with alkaline water, then chopped the liver, liver, etc. of the cattle and sheep into minced meat or meat paste, mixed with flour, chopped green onion, etc., and carefully stuffed it into the large intestine of the cattle and sheep, seal it with a thin thread. In addition, mix the bean flour and white flour well into a batter. The two people work together, pour it into the small intestine, seal it, and put it into the pan together with the large intestine. At the same time, add a few pieces of breast meat to cook together. In about 10 minutes, the large and small intestine will be ready. To prevent the sausage skin from boiling, the heat should be moderate. After cooking, relatives and friends were invited, and the housewife fished out and put them on a plate and served them to the kang table in the guest room. Each person prepared a knife, and the guests cut it off and eat it section by section. Each person's small bowl contained a seasoning sauce made of mashed garlic, hot sauce and vinegar. Whether it is the delicious mutton head meat of cattle or the sweet intestines of cattle and sheep, the enthusiastic owner will distribute several bowls to neighbors to taste.
According to Islamic teachings, the Salar people strictly prohibit drinking alcohol, and generally no wine is prepared at Salar banquets. I don't have the habit of drinking alcohol. In addition to green tea, milk tea and Kaiwan tea, wheat tea and fruit leaf tea are also often drunk as daily drinks. When making wheat tea, the wheat grains are stir-fried and half-charred, mashed, added salt and other ingredients, and boiled in an earthenware jar. The taste is similar to coffee, sweet and delicious; fruit leaf tea is made from fruit tree leaves that are dried and fried until half-charred. It has a unique flavor when drinking.
The Salar marriage form is monogamy. Implement extra-family marriage. Marriage between the close relatives "Agnai" and the distant relatives "Kongmusan" is prohibited, but it is not very strict. Marriage is concluded entirely at the orders of parents, and the wedding is presided over by the imam. There is the custom of "squeezing the door", that is, the bride is forced into the house surrounded by her family, while the groom's house closes the door and asks for gifts;"Opposing" means performing a "camel opera";"Crying for marriage" means that the bride walks out of the house crying and singing;"Needlework" means that the bride must show her needlework when she arrives at the groom's house. The veil on the bride's head is lifted by the bride's sister-in-law or aunt with a pair of new chopsticks after entering the bridal chamber. The bride's sister-in-law will bring water to launder money. The bride's dowry will be displayed on the second day of the wedding, and the man will also present the woman with sheepbacks, clothing, cash, etc. At the same time, a banquet was held for the woman's relatives and friends.
The location of theis because the Salars believe in Islam. His funeral was carried out quickly and frugally and buried in the earth. Generally, there was a cemetery in "Kongmusan". During funeral rituals, people in the whole village will eat wheat kernel rice. On the third day after the burial of the deceased, a special cauldron was set up in the home of the deceased. Women from the neighbors brought spring water and filled the cauldron. The young men from the "Kong Musan"(clan or family) went up the mountain to gather firewood and prepare for the fire. Three or five women washed the wheat, put it bit by bit into a large stone mortar in the village, and pounded it, blew off the wheat skin, poured it into a large pot, put a small amount of broad beans or peas, and started heating. After more than ten hours, it can be boiled until it is done; then, pour the stir-fried diced pork, chopped green onion, etc. into the large pot and stir well.
The mourner also slaughtered a sheep, cooked the mutton, and cut it into meat portions about the size of three fingers. After everything was ready, at around three o'clock in the afternoon, more than a dozen children were sent to a higher place in the village to call for the whole village to eat wheat kernels. When the villagers heard the call, they brought their own bowls and chopsticks to eat the wheat kernel rice. After eating, each person was given a piece of meat and took a bowl of wheat kernel rice home. After the men and children finished eating, the women ate it. Since then, funeral plants are cooked once a week, those with good family conditions are cooked 5-7 times, and those with general conditions are cooked 2-3 times. The raw materials for cooking wheat kernel rice (wheat, sheep, etc.) are generally provided by the relatives of the deceased owner.
Special attention should be paid to the fact that when Sala worship, pedestrians are prohibited from walking in front of them; washing clothes near wells and ponds; coughing and blowing noses when talking opposite to others are prohibited.