Maza

Audio recordings: Andrew Hsiu. (2017). Maza audio word list. Zenodo. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1123369

Word list in Mondzish lexical database (2017)

The Maza (ma³³zɑ⁵³) live in the single village of Mengmei 孟梅 (qha³³le⁵³), located on a rocky hilltop overlooking the administrative village center of Puyang 普阳 in Muyang Township, Funing County, Yunnan, China. Liang Min, et. al (2007:1) report that Qabiao speakers living in Dongdu Village 董渡村, Donggan Township 董干镇 further to the southwest had originally migrated in the 1600’s and 1700’s from locations called Pumei 普梅 (Qabiao name: gə³³mei³³) and Puyang 普阳 (Qabiao name: gə³³wan⁵⁵). The Red Gelao of La Pao, Hà Giang province, Vietnam refer to the Qabiao as o⁵⁵mei³³, which in Red Gelao refers to the Lolo as well (Hsiu 2014 field notes). Interestingly, the Qabiao of China are officially classified as ethnic Yi, possibly due to certain cultural similarities to Mangish (Mondzish) speakers.

Maza has a Qabiao substratum that suggests a gradual assimilation of resident Qabiao speakers by Mondzish speakers.

The Maza are also locally known as the White Flowery Lolo, or "Baihua Luo" 白花倮.

References

Hsiu, Andrew. 2014. "Mondzish: a new subgroup of Lolo-Burmese". In Proceedings of the 14th International Symposium on Chinese Languages and Linguistics (IsCLL-14). Taipei: Institute of Linguistics, Academia Sinica.