Mu-Tze

Mu-Tze
Total population
About 55 million
Regions with significant populations
Tukarali Aldegar Kalistan	41 million 10 million 4 million
Languages
Panmuan, Lao-Tze, Shi-Tze, Tze-Tze Aldegarian
Religions
Gao-Showan Religions, Luthoranism, Yazdism
Related ethnic groups
Gao-Showa, Tukarese, Indralans, Kunihito, Đinh

The Mu-Tze are a Jelbo-Tukaric group of peoples who live in the mountainous areas of Tukarali, Kalistan, and Aldegar. The Mu-Tze are actually formed of two closely related tribes, the Mu and Tze. The people most closely related to the Mu-Tze, from a linguistic and genetic point of view, is the Tukarese people. Due to long influence by the Gao-Showa people since antiquity, the Mu-Tze are counted as part of the Gao-Showa metaethnicity, in spite of their linguistic differences.

History

Throughout most of their history, the Mu-Tze have lived in pastoral nomadic tribes in the mountains. In 218, the Mu-Tze tribes were unified by a strong khan named Bat-Erdene, who then proceeded to conquer most of the continent of Seleya. The Mu-Tze Khanate lasted until 719, leaving a significant influence on most Seleyan nations.

The advent of modernization in Tukarali during the Malagar era has done much to urbanize and westernize the Mu-Tze, although many of them retain their traditions and pastoral lifestyle. Also, in spite of the efforts of several Tukarese governments to eliminate pre-modern identities, by, among others, banning clan names and the introduction of Western-style family names, imposing mandatory education and military service, and creating a literary version for the Panmuan languages, many Mu-Tze still identify with their tribes and clans. A consequence of this has been the fact that the politics of modern Tukarali has been dominated by Tukarese and by Hulstrian Gao-Showan immigrants, but the younger generations have begun to take more interest in national political life.

In Aldegar the Mu-Tze occupied an important role in the central government. The last Aldegarian dynasty before the First Republic, the Shahnazid Dynasty, was founded by Shahnaz Mirza Abbas, a Yazdean general of modest Mu-Tze origins. Currently, the Mu-Tze form around 10% of the population of Aldegar, and are frequently involved in politics.

Language

The Mu-Tze speak several closely related Jelbo-Tukaric languages called the Panmuanic languages, which include standard Panmuan (Panmuol Khele), the literary dialect of the Mu-Tze. Similarly to several other Gao-Showan languages, Panmuan has a pitch accent. Typically for its language group, Panmuan has developed vowel harmony and a complex syllabic structure that allows clusters of up to three consonants. It is a typical agglutinative language that relies on suffix chains in the verbal and nominal domains. While there is a basic word order, subject–object–predicate, ordering among noun phrases is relatively free, unlike the case with the other Jelbo-Tukaric languages, so grammatical roles are indicated by a system of about eight grammatical cases. There are five voices. Verbs are marked for voice, aspect, tense, and epistemic modality/evidentiality. In sentence linking, a special role is played by converbs.

Religion

Traditionally the Mu-Tze have practiced various tribal shamanic religions. During the Middle Ages they entered in contact with the Gao-Showan Religions, and they subsequently integrated elements of their old religious traditions into the new systems of belief. Later the Mu-Tze were exposed to Hosianism, especially since the modern era, and around 10% of the Mu-Tze are now Luthoran. The Mu-Tze in Aldegar largely adhere to Yazdism.