Nashi

The Nakhi, or Naxi, are a Tibeto-Burman people of the Hengduan Mountains centered on Lijiang, whom Chinese records long called the Mosuo. Their ancestors are thought to have migrated south from the northwest. They developed the Dongba religion, rooted in Tibetan Bon, whose priests alone used the pictographic Dongba symbols.

The Lijiang chiefs submitted to the Mongols in 1253, and after 1382 the Ming invested their leader as Mu De, founding the Mu tusi line. Under Mu Zeng Lijiang became the strongest chiefdom of the southwest, patronizing Confucian letters and Tibetan Buddhism; he received the traveler Xu Xiake in 1639.

His successor Mu Yi, who had sworn loyalty to the Qing, refused Wu Sangui's demands, was imprisoned at Kunming, and was released after Wu's revolt was crushed. In 1723 the Yongzheng Emperor abolished the chiefdom and replaced it with centrally appointed magistrates.