รับรู้อารยธรรมลุ่มแม่น้ำโขง สืบสาวอารยชนพงศ์เผ่าไท-ไต
Responding to the Vietnamese readers…
เนื่องจากมีผู้อ่านชาวเวียดนามสนใจโพสต์นี้กันมาก และขอให้เขียนย่อเป็นภาษาอังกฤษ โดยแจ้งว่า อ่านพบชื่อและการอ้างงานเขียนของอาจารย์ชลในหนังสือวิชาการของเวียดนามซึ่งกำลังถกเถียงโต้แย้งกันในเรื่องที่มาของ “ความเป็นเวียด vs ความเป็นไท” จึงสนองตอบคำร้องขอพี่น้องในเวียดนามไว้ในที่นี้ด้วยความขอบคุณ
@Lưu LòĐôngtà Kanoa Saipan
The article “Laen taay, Laen mii” is a chapter in my most recent research on the Tai Ethnicity as a whole, entitled “The Tai Epics”, which I aimed at both the content on the Tai, as well as the Tai Poetics.
Therefore, the verse “Laen taay, Laen mii” is also part of an ancient Tai Yai saying, the preceding verse is “Suea taay, Suea thaen”.
Both terms are animals. The term /suea/ means ‘tiger’, who lives with dignity in the big forest, and the term /laen/ means a species of animal whose living is in fertility in both land and water.
“Suea taay, Suea thaen; Laen taay, Laen mii”
in terms of poetical value, this saying is rhyming: /thaen~laen/; and also repetitive:
/suea-suea/, /laen-laen/.
Such poetic style is truly identical to the poetry of all Tai groups in SEA.
In terms of symbolic anthropology, both terms, “suea-laen” signify two clan names, and stands for the totemic clan system of the Tai which strongly believe in anscestral clan spirits.
The meaning of this saying is to glorify the dignity and courage of the Tiger Clan which has been originated among the Tai Mau group in ancient Tai Kingdom of Tai Mau in Yunnan at Ruili, in other word, the Tai Nuea, or Northern Tai groups who have been living and moving across the border, in the country of China (Yunnan), Thailand (Chiangrai), Myanmar (Shan State), and India (Assam). Possibly, according to the motif of the ‘Laen’ in the Dongson bronze drum of Vietnam, the ‘Laen Clan’ would have also been the spiritual clan of some of the Tai groups in Vietnam, particularly the Tai Khao and the Tai Dam.
The appearance of the “Laen motif” on the bronze drum discovered in Vietnam elaborates the long great journey and migration route of the Tai anscestors who had been connected with their ‘Suea’ and ‘Laen’ Clan names together with their belief in totemic clan system.
The saying “Suea taay, Suea thaen; Laen taay, Laen mii”, is an attempt to comfort the younger generations of the Tai that, “even if any ‘Suea’ member died, there would be a new tiger replaced our mission; any ‘Laen’ member died, there would be still more ‘Laen’ survived to follow up our mission as well.
“แลนตาย แลนมี” พี่น้องใกล้ชิดสายด้ำเสือ (7)
ตีพิมพ์ในทางอีศาน ปีที่ 8 ฉบับที่ 86 พฤษภาคม 2565 หน้าที่ 34-41
