Ziqi () was a kingdom established by the ''Wuman'' (烏蠻, lit. "black barbarians", ancestors of

Yi people The Yi or Nuosu people,; zh, c=彝族, p=Yízú, l=Yi ethnicity historically known as the Lolo,; vi, Lô Lô; th, โล-โล, Lo-Lo are an ethnic group in China, Vietnam, and Thailand. Numbering nine million people, they are the seve ...

) in southwestern China during the

Song dynasty The Song dynasty (; ; 960–1279) was an imperial dynasty of China that began in 960 and lasted until 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song following his usurpation of the throne of the Later Zhou. The Song conquered the res ...

. The territory of Ziqi included parts of modern-day

Guizhou Guizhou (; Postal romanization, formerly Kweichow) is a landlocked Provinces of China, province in the Southwest China, southwest region of the China, People's Republic of China. Its capital and largest city is Guiyang, in the center of the pr ...

Guangxi Guangxi (; ; alternately romanized as Kwanghsi; ; za, Gvangjsih, italics=yes), officially the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (GZAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China, located in South China and bordering Vietnam ...

and

Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the ...

provinces of China. Ziqi was originally one of 37 tribes of the Wuman people in eastern Yunnan. During the

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an Zhou dynasty (690–705), interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dyn ...

, they were ruled by the Nanzhao Kingdom. The Nanzhao Kingdom collapsed in 937, and Yunnan entered a chaotic transitional period between the Nanzhao and Dali kingdoms. During this time, Wuman tribes split away from Yunnan and moved eastward. Among them, several small kingdoms were established, and Ziqi was the strongest one, gradually defeating others and controlling a large area between Yunnan and the Red River. At this time,

China proper China proper, Inner China, or the Eighteen Provinces is a term used by some Western writers in reference to the "core" regions of the Manchu-led Qing dynasty of China. This term is used to express a distinction between the "core" regions pop ...

was ruled by the Song dynasty. Ziqi then became one of Song's tributary states. People in the Song dynasty called them ''Xi Nan Yi'' (西南夷, "Southwestern Barbarians") along with several other tribes. When

Jurchens Jurchen (Manchu: ''Jušen'', ; zh, 女真, ''Nǚzhēn'', ) is a term used to collectively describe a number of East Asian Tungusic-speaking peoples, descended from the Donghu people. They lived in the northeast of China, later known as Manch ...

attacked the Song from the north, Ziqi became an important source of war horses for the Song. During the reign of Axie (1176 - 1205), Ziqi defeated the

Dali Kingdom The Dali Kingdom, also known as the Dali State (; Bai: Dablit Guaif), was a state situated in modern Yunnan province, China from 937 until 1253. In 1253, it was conquered by the Mongols but members of its former ruling dynasty continued to a ...

Luodian Luodian County () is a county under the administration of Qiannan Buyei and Miao Autonomous Prefecture in the south of Guizhou province, China, bordering Guangxi to the south. The climate in the area is humid subtropical, with strong monsoon inf ...

and Annan (

Lý dynasty The Lý dynasty ( vi, Nhà Lý, , chữ Nôm: 茹李, chữ Hán: 李朝, Hán Việt: ''Lý triều'') was a Vietnamese dynasty that existed from 1009 to 1225. It was established by Lý Công Uẩn when he overthrew the Early Lê dynasty an ...

) in a series of battles and became the strongest power in southwestern China. In 1253, the

Mongol Empire The Mongol Empire of the 13th and 14th centuries was the largest contiguous land empire in history. Originating in present-day Mongolia in East Asia, the Mongol Empire at its height stretched from the Sea of Japan to parts of Eastern Europe, ...

annexed the Dali Kingdom and started to invade Ziqi. The Mongols found many maps of Ziqi in Dali and planned strategies based on those maps. With reinforcements from the Song, Ziqi fought hard and caused remarkable casualties to the Mongols, but it was eventually conquered by Mongols in 1259. The territory of Ziqi suffered a massacre by the Mongols.History of Yuan, Uriyanqadai：''川谷为之一空。''

List of rulers

* Ziqi 自杞 (1100 - 1136) * Awei (1136 - 1158) * Asi 阿巳 (1158 - 1162) * Axie 阿謝 (1176 - 1205) * Amo (1205 - 1240) * Nuoju 郍句 (1240 - 1259)

References

Song dynasty Former countries in Chinese history 1100 establishments 1259 disestablishments History of Guizhou History of Yunnan {{China-hist-stub