The Yi people have many branches and are widely distributed, and they live in different geographical environments. Therefore, funeral customs and even rituals vary from Yi area to area and from branch to branch. From the funeral forms to the funeral procedures, there are obvious local differences and branch characteristics.
Looking only at funeral forms, the Yi people have cremation, coffin burial, tree burial, pottery burial, rock burial, water burial and sky burial.
1. cremation. The funeral method of burning the body with fire. It has been spread in the Yi area for a long time. Jiajing's "Guizhou Tongzhi" records that the local Yi people "burned them in the wild and scattered their bones"; "Yuejioting Zhi·Yi Customs Zhi" also records: "Funerals do not use coffins, but use fire It is also recorded in "Xichang County Chronicles of the Yi Tribe" that after the Yi people cremated the corpse, they "collected the bones and placed them in an urn. They ordered several faithful old men to carry urns with loads and hoes and bury them in a deep cave. It is not known to others to prevent enemies from stealing it. "When it is cremated in the Yi area of ??Yunnan Province, the corpse must be curled up, with the man lying on his back and the woman lying on her side. A firewood tower is set up and set on fire. Then a pit was dug, the remaining ashes were packed in jars, wrapped in thatch, and buried in the pit. Some people build a pile of stones behind the grave. The ancestral cemeteries of some Yi families in Xuanwei County are cremation tombs. Some people put the ashes in jars and sent them to caves after cremation. Both of these burial methods are composite secondary burials, that is, cremation followed by burial, or cremation followed by rock burial. The traditional cremation method is preserved and followed relatively completely and original in Liangshan and Xiaoliangshan.
2. Burial. After the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the Yi people in Yunnan, Guizhou and Guangxi gradually replaced traditional cremation with coffin burials. The burial customs are similar to those of the local Han people. After the death of the Sani Yi people in Yunnan, they usually stay there for two days. The wizard chants sutras to convey the soul, and the villagers and relatives of the woman come to "play with lions", "make monkeys", and "play with gongs and drums", etc. On the day of the funeral, all the men and women in the village go to the funeral. The men are in front of the coffin and the women are behind the coffin. They line up to the cemetery. Everyone brings their own wine and food, and the bereaved family prepares meals. After a woman dies, she must invite relatives from her natal family to pay her last respects. During the funeral, her mother's uncle must return the wine to the deceased, indicating the severance of the previous marriage relationship. The funeral cannot be held without someone from her natal family attending the funeral. After the death of the Axi Yi people, the corpse needs to be laid to rest for three days before the funeral. The whole village prepares their own food rations and gathers in the public house to eat and drink for three days as a sign of sacrifice.
3. Water burial, sky burial, rock burial. It is a special burial ceremony of the Yi people in Liangshan in ancient times. Water burial involves throwing the body into a river and washing it away. Sky burial involves carrying the corpse to a nearby hilltop to be torn apart by birds and beasts. Rock burial involves throwing the body from a hanging rock. These special burial methods were decided by Bimo after careful calculation based on the deceased's zodiac sign, life palace, and date of death, and have now been abolished.
4． Pottery burial. Also known as "direct burial" and "sky burial". That is, after a person dies, a six-foot-high jar is used to place the deceased upright, bury him in the soil, and build a grave. The Yi people of the Sani branch of Lunan, Yunnan, have practiced this burial method in history. The locals believe that it was passed down from their ancestors. People walk standing up and die standing up, with the sky above their heads and the earth under their feet. This is how they live and how they die.
5. Tree burial. Tree burial is an ancient burial custom of the Yi people. There is a legend about "tree burial" circulating in the Yi area of ??Yunnan: "In the Han Dynasty, when Zhuge Liang was alive, the concubine of General Meng Huo, the ancestor of the Yi people, died. Meng Huo asked his subordinates to wrap the body in silk satin and bury it in On the green pine tree, people sang and danced around the tree to mourn this beautiful concubine." Local people also said that after the tree burial, the bones fell from the tree and were difficult to deal with, so they packed the bones wrapped in silk satin in buckets or put them in the tree hole. Some said they put them in the spiritual chamber, which is called "Ghost Bucket".
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