Minorities of the Sino-Vietnamese Borderland with Special Reference to Thai Tribes This overview presents comprehensive ethno-graphic introductions to the tribes found in northern Vietnam and China’s Yunnan Province. A brief sketch of historical migration patterns and ethnic affiliations with tribes in Yunnan is provided and a systematic overview given of many tribes of each of four main groups, the Thai, Man (Yao), Meo, and Lolo. Maurice Abadie, a French officer in the Muong Khuong-Pha Long region of the Sino-Vietnamese border (northwest of Lao Kay) just before the First World War, furnishes first-hand information. He discusses each tribe’s origins and settlement, physical characteristics, family life and ancestral cults, livelihood and farming methods, customs related to marriage, childbirth, and death, and trade and crafts, with special reference to textiles. The study includes detailed descriptions of every group, supported by 120 unique photos. Abadie also discusses the growing Chinese and Vietnamese influence that would unmistakably modernize these tri! bes that today mostly preserve only their special costumes as the inalienable characteristic of their original identity. (Bangkok 2001; First English translation of 1923)