Iranians in China

Iranian people in China have lived in China throughout various periods in Chinese history.

History

The Parthian Iranians An Shigao and An Xuan introduced Buddhism to China.

The sister of the Sassanian Prince Peroz II was married to the Chinese Emperor, who allowed Sassanian noble refugees fleeing from the Arab conquest to settle in China.^[1]

Iranian girls as dancers were highly regarded in China during this period. During the Sui dynasty, ten young dancing girls were sent from Persia to China. In the Tang dynasty Bars were often attended by Iranian or Sogdian waitresses who performed dances for clients. Dancers were sent as gifts. Whirl dances were often performed by Iranian girls. Some of these iranian, Central asian, and Sogdian girls and blue eyes and blonde hair.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13]} Blue eyed Greek and Persian girls danced in bars and clubs in China during this period.^[14]

During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period (Wudai) (907-960), there are examples of Chinese emperors marrying Persian women.^[15]

From the tenth to twelfth century, Persian women were to be found in Guangzhou (Canton), some of them in the tenth century like Mei Zhu in the harem of the Emperor Liu Chang, and in the twelfth century large numbers of Persian women lived there, noted for wearing mulitiple earrings and "quarrelsome dispositions".^[16][17] Multiple women originating from the Persian Gulf lived in Guangzhou's foreign quarter, they were all called "Persian women" (波斯婦 Po-ssu-fu or Bosifu).^[18]

Some scholars did not differentiate between Persian and Arab, and some say that the Chinese called all women coming from the Persian Gulf "Persian Women".^[19]

The young Chinese Emperor Liu Chang of the Southern Han dynasty had a harem, including one Persian girl he nicknamed Mei Zhu, which means "Beautiful Pearl"(媚珠). During the first year of his reign, he was not over sixteen years old when he had a taste for intercourse with Persian girls.^[20] Liu Chang also had a Persian princess in his harem.^[21]

A village dating back 600 years in Yungju in Jiangsu province, China, has inhabitants descended from Iranians. It has 27,000 people, and It contains Iranian places names like Fars and Parsian.^[22]

Of the Chinese Li family in Quanzhou, Li Nu, the son of Li Lu, visited Hormuz in Persia in 1376, married a Persian or an Arab girl, and brought her back to Quanzhou. Li Nu was the ancestor of the Ming Dynasty reformer Li Chih.^[23][24]

See also

• Tajiks of Xinjiang

References