The Gaoshan people of Taiwan originated from the ancient Yue people on the mainland, according to He Youji, an expert on Yue culture.
Gaoshan is a general name for the 240,000 aboriginal people who live in the mountains and on the islands of Taiwan. There are no records of their origin, but the 62-year-old He has come to the conclusion, after years of research, that the Gaoshan people have great similarity with the Yue people in terms of habits, customs, legends, remains and relics of ancestors. About 4,000 years ago, a group of the Yue people, who lived in the Shaoxing area of the mainland, crossed the sea by boats and settled on Taiwan. They were the first residents of the island.
The Yue people cut their hair short and tattooed their bodies. The former was suited to the humid and hot climate, and the latter was an effective means of avoiding incest in the group marriages of the early days. Today's Gaoshan people keep the same customs of cutting the hair short and tattooing the body.
The Yue people worshipped the Bird God, and regarded birds as totems. They engraved birds as divine symbols on utensils. The Gaoshan people also worship birds, and have a legend that the Bird God brought them fire. Bird-shaped decorations can be seen on the ridges of Gaoshan houses.
Divining with birds is popular in Taiwan even today. Birds that are said to be able to foretell the fortune and misfortune are similar to the sparrows of the Shaoxing area. He has received support from many scholars. Prof. Shi, president of the Chinese History Society, and Taiwan historian Huang Dashou also claim in their co-work, History of Taiwan's Early Inhabitants, that Taiwan's ethnic groups like the Bunong originated from one group of the Yue people.
Prof. Chen Qiaoyi of Zhejiang University agrees with them in his book on the culture of the ancient states of Wu and Yue in the Shaoxing area. He thinks Taiwan was a place of easy access for the ancient Yue people.
"My textual research demonstrates that the early inhabitants of Taiwan came from the southeast coastal areas of the mainland. So Taiwan is linked by flesh-and-blood ties with the mainland,'' said He Youji.
