Sichuanese people

Sichuanese people in a Taoist religious procession. 7th–10th century.

Beginning from the 9th century BC, Shu (on the Chengdu Plain) and Ba (which had its first capital at Enshi City in Hubei and controlled part of the Han Valley) emerged as cultural and administrative centers where two rival kingdoms were established. Although eventually the Qin dynasty destroyed the kingdoms of Shu and Ba, the Qin government accelerated the technological and agricultural advancements of Sichuan making it comparable to that of the Yellow River Valley. The now-extinct Ba-Shu language was derived from Qin-era settlers and represents the earliest documented division from Middle Chinese.

Most of central Sichuan was inhabited by the Dai people who formed the serfs class, accounting for the vast majority of the population. They were later thoroughly sinicized, adopting the local language of speech. Large numbers of foreigner merchant families from Sogdia, Iran and other countries immigrated to Sichuan.

During the Yuan and Ming dynasties, the population of Sichuan, Chongqing had been reduced due to immigration, deportation and flight of refugees fleeing war and plague, new or returning settlers from modern Hunan, Hubei, Guangdong and Jiangxi, replacing the earlier spoken language with different languages they adopted from the former regions to form a new standard language off communication.[3][4][5]

Locations of present-day Sichuanese speakers.

The Sichuanese once spoke their own variety of spoken Chinese called Ba-Shu Chinese, or Old Sichuanese before it became extinct during the Ming dynasty. Now most of them speak Sichuanese Mandarin. The Minjiang dialects are thought by some linguists to be a bona fide descendant of Old Sichuanese due to many characteristics of Ba-Shu Chinese phonology and vocabulary being found in the dialects,[7] but there is no conclusive evidence whether Minjiang dialects are derived from Old Sichuanese or Southwestern Mandarin.

Sichuan is well known for its spicy cuisine and use of Sichuan peppers due to its more arid climate.

DNA research has shown that Sichuanese people are closely genetically related to the Dai people.[8]

Well known Sichuanese people are such as:

• Chen Shou, official and writer
• Huang Jiguang, highly decorated soldier during the Korean War
• Zhao Yiman, resistance fighter
• Liu Yonghao, businessman
• GAI, rapper, singer, and songwriter
• Zhang Yong (restaurateur), Singapore's richest man in 2019
• Wang Jianlin, business magnate, investor, and philanthropist
• Jiang Zhuyun, revolutionary martyr
• Zhang Daqian, artists
• Wang Xiaoya, television host and media personality
• Li Yifeng, actor and singer
• Li Yuchun, singer, songwriter, and actress
• Tan Weiwei, singer and actress
• Tang Chun-i, philosopher and scholar
• Luo Ruiqing, army officer and politician
• Su Shi, writer, poet, painter, calligrapher, pharmacologist, gastronome, and statesman
• Su Xun, writer
• Su Zhe, politician and essayist
• Li Bai, poet
• Zhuo Wenjun, poet
• Yang Xiong, poet, philosopher, and politician
• Zheng Ji, nutritionist and pioneering biochemist
• Deng Xiaoping, revolutionary and politician
• Ba Jin, author and political activist
• Zhu De, general, warlord, politician, and revolutionary
• Zhang Lan, political activist
• Zou Rong, revolutionary martyr
• Guo Moruo, author, poet, historian, archaeologist, and government official
• Zhang Qun, premier of the Republic of China
• Bai Ling, actress
• Xu Youyu, scholar
• Cheung Chung-kiu, business magnate
• Song Yonghua, scholar
• Sanyu (painter)