Tai Dam Community

Tai Dam are found in many locations in southern China and Southeast Asia. The largest concentration lives along
the borders separating northwestern Vietnam and northeastern Laos.  Scatterings of Tai Dam are also found in
Yunnan, China; and in Loei [Ban Na Pa Nhaad, บ้านนาป่าหนาด] province in northeastern, Phitsanulok in amphur Bang
Rakum [บางระกำ, Amphur Wangthong [Ban Dong Khoi บ้านดงข่อย], Ban Nong Tasi, บ้านหนองตาสี, Ban Dong Pluang
บ้านดงพลวง], Phichit in Amphur Vichian Barami วิเชียรบารมี [Ban Ton Pradoo บ้านต้นประดู่, Ban Huay Hang บ้านห้วยห้าง,
Ban Nong Lum บ้านหนองหลุม, Ban Sra Boraphet บ้านสระบรเพ็ด, Nakhon Sawan in Amphur Chumsang, Suphanburi in
Amphur …., Kanchanaburi, Phetchaburi provinces in Amphur Khao Yoi[ Ban Nong Prong บ้านหนองปรง, … in central
Thailand, where they are known as Lao Song or Lao Song Dam. 

      Tai Dam, several names are used to identify the various Tai Dam groups; some are based on features of native
costume - the color of the blouse or trousers worn by different groups, for example:   Tai Dam [Black] or Tai Lam
(the sounds /d/ and /l/, /v/ and b/, /y and z/ vary from one location to another); Phu Thai Dam, Song or Lao Song Dam
(lit. "Lao [wearing] black trousers"). Other names include Tai Muan, Tai Tang, Tai Tan.  In Vietnam the Tai groups
are referred to as "Thai," not to be confused with the Thai of Thailand.
     Origin, in proto-Tai geographic terms, a muang [เมือง] is a basin surrounded by mountains, an ideal location for
growing irrigated rice, bounded area that lends itself to a central degree of centralized governance.  According to
tradition, the Tai Dam ancestral home is believed to be around the area of Muang Thaen [เมืองแถน]or Dien Bien Phu
[เดียนเบียนฟู], in Vietnam. ("Thaen" is the traditional name of the chief Tai Dam deities who reside in the
sky.) Nearby are the large Tai Dam centers of Muang Muay [เมืองม่วย] and Muang La [เมืองลา] or Sonla [เซินลา],
Vietnam. One version of the Tai Dam Origin myth provided Tai Dam comes from Muang Muay/Muang La region. 
Muang Muay was one of the original twelve "Chu/Cu" in an older alignment of Muang referred to as "Sipsong Chu
(Chao) Thai" [สิบสองจุไทย] literaly the "Twelve Thai Chiefs." The muang or petty chiefdoms or "cantons" of that era
were governed by a "Chao/ Taaw" [จ้าว/ท้าว] or "Lord," who was hereditary for the most part.  According to the
French scholar Maspero (1950), by the end of the 18th century, Muang Muay was the dominant muang or chiefdom
from which all of the hereditary nobles or /taaw2/ came. The twelve, later sixteen, chiefdoms included White and
Red Tai groups as well as the Black Tai.  The original twelve names have become obscured over time, and the
number of muang was expanded beyond twelve under French rule.

     Dang Nghiem Van (1972:146-147) says the following.  "Towards the beginning of the first millenary B.C., the Thai
[Tai] left their old place of settlement and moved southwest, reaching southern Yunnan and the west of the
Indochinese peninsula.  Towards the same period they came into contact with groups speaking Tibeto-Burmese
dialects coming from Central Asia of Northwest China.  Later on, the same migratory current brought them in
touch with the expanding Han, a vanguard group of whom came down the valley of the Hwang Ho (Yellow River) in
the southwesterly direction. Further south, they began to cohabit with the Mon-Khmer groups who had settled in
the region for a long time. After many historic events, towards the start of our era, a number of Thai [Tai] states
were set up, spreading from the upper reaches of the Irrawaddy, Salaween and Mekong rivers to the border
regions between Yunnan, Upper-Laos and the northwest of Viet Nam."
He goes on to say, "The above sketchy description, used as a working hypothesis, is generally confirmed by many
documents from the official annals of successive Chinese imperial dynasties, from the Tang to the Yuan and Ming
(7th-16th centuries).   Therefore, we may think of the forefathers of the present Thai [Tai] as having settled in
areas spreading from the northwest of the Chinese province of Yunnan to the valleys of the Red and Black rivers,
under different names - Bach Zi, Bai Zi, Bach Y - which even in our days still designate different Thai [Tai] groups in
the northwest and south of Yunnan. Our hypothesis is again confirmed by the genealogical books and written
tradition recently discovered among the Thai [Tai], especially the Black Thai [Tai] of the Northwest Autonomous
Region such as Tay Pu Xac (which may be roughly translated as "The Expeditionary Road of the Thai [Tai]") and
Quam To Muong (Story of the Land, กวามขับ).  According to these documents written in traditional Thai [Tai] script,
the cradle of the Thai [Tai], the Lue and the Lao was situated at the confluence of nine rivers: the Nam Tao (Red
River,แม่น้ำแดง), Nam Te (Black River, แม่น้ำดำ), Nam Ma (Ma River which waters Thanh Hoa province), Nam Khoon
(Mekong แม่โขง), Nam U, Nam Man and three other unidentified rivers of Yunnan.  There small "states" or rather
seigniories commonly called Muong were set up under Thai [Tai] chieftains: Moung Om, Muong Si, Muong La,
Muong Bo Te, Muong Oc, Muong Ac, Muong Tum Hoang, Muong Then...Reserches over the past few years have
identified most of those places with present-day localities of southern Yunnan.  Muong Then or Muong Theng
alone belongs to another region which comprises part of the Lao province of Phong Sa Ly
[พงสาลี] and the northwest of Lai Chau province (in the Northwest Autonomous Region) of which the centre is the
plain of Muong Thanh which was the theatre of the Dien Bien Phu battle."
     Acording to Sumitr Pitiphat [สุมิตร  ปิติพัฒน์] (1908:29), various Tai groups to the west of what was once known
loosely as Annam had a long history of self-government.  Between the 14th and 15th centuries, the Tai Dam came
under the protection of the Lao of Luang Prabang while still functioning independently.  With the establishment of
the Chakri dynasty at Thonburi and throughout the Bangkok period, the Siamese gained power over the Kingdom
of Lan Chang [ล้านช้าง] centered at Vientiane and, indirectly, the Sip Song Chao/Chu Thai region.  However, their
early control did not extend to the Tai Dam, who remained under the "mild suzerainty" of Luang Prabang.  The
Siamese, however, did move Tai Dam captives and resettled them in villages near Bangkok, where they are
known as Lao Song Dam. When Vietnam fell to France, the Sip Song Chao/Chu Thai and the adjacent Hua Phan
Districts [หัวพัน] were ceded by the Thais to Vietnam in 1888.

     In 1999, the Tai Studies Center at Des Moines, Iowa published a two-part volume Kwaam To Nhay (The Great
Tale), and Kwaam Tay Pu Serk (The Odyssey of the Warlords), a 260-page history of the Tai Dam. In the Preface to
this publication, they write:  "The region known as Indochina was colonized by the French during the last half of
the 19th Century: Cambodia in 1863; southern Vietnam (which they named Cochinchina) in 1867; central and
northern Vietnam (named, respectively, Annam,and Tonkin) in 1884; Tai Country (named Sip Song Chau Tai) in
1889; and Laos in 1893.  Sipsong Chau Tai, which means "Twelve Tai Principalities," was colonized and annexed to
Tonkin in 1889. In 1948, the region was reorganized as Sip Hok Chau Tai (Sixteen Tai Principalities), and was
referred to by the French as the "Tai Federation".  As such, it was declared an independent country by the Tai and
the French, and remained so until 1954 when it was absorbed by Vietnam after the defeat of the French at Dien
Bien Phu.  The Vietnamese, in 1955, renamed the region the "Tai-Meo Autonomous Zone" of Vietnam, then again in
1962, the "Northwest Autonomous Zone".  Finally, in 1975, the region lost its identity and became known simply as
the northwest of Vietnam, which now includes the provinces of Son La, Lai Chau. Lao Cai, and Yen Bai."
Reference http://www.seasite.niu.edu/tai/TaiDam/TaiDamOrigin.htm