| People | Dong · 侗族 Dòngzú |
| Region | Guizhou (Qiandongnan), Hunan and northern Guangxi: Sanjiang, Liping |
| Role | growers |
Tea
Dong oil tea — leaves are fried in oil, pounded in an iron pot with a wooden pestle, steeped, salted and served with puffed rice and peanuts; eaten rather than drunk, and by custom guests do not leave before finishing the fourth bowl. Plus 三江早春茶 and 黎平香茶
Crown growth
An oiled triplet: three small leaves fused into one clump and darkened by oil, slightly flattened by the pestle, with a satin surface — the only growth in the set with its own non-glossy sheen, and an honest one, because a leaf in oil does shine
Headwear
A low flat wrap of 亮布 liàngbù — cloth beaten with a hammer over egg white applied to indigo, hence its blue-violet metallic cast; it sits close to the skull, has a slot for the growth, and on one side stands a single smooth silver comb shaped like a small fin. At 6 mm the silhouette is a tight low band plus a small vertical fin at the side: no headdress of the nine has side fins, and what sets it apart from the Bulang wrap is the absence of side coils and a narrower width
Clothing
A short jacket of the same beaten 亮布 with its metallic cast, a pleated skirt, leg wraps, a basket. In its hands an iron pot and a wooden pestle, and on the belt a pouch of puffed rice
Palette
Indigo with a metallic blue-violet cast — a legitimate fourth level of sheen on fabric because the cloth shines in real life; a red trim of a single thread, and the silver of the comb in fine flakes. No green goes onto the outfit — the wrap is blue-violet
Why this is not a caricature
The Dong and the Zhuang are not distinguished in the silhouette, and rather than invent a difference in headwear that does not exist, one of the two is taken and reinforced with a real trait — the hammered 亮布 cloth and a single everyday comb. The Dong ceremonial silver crowns are excluded entirely. Oil tea is called food, not a “curious drink,” and is presented through the work with the pestle. The comb is single, plain, unengraved — it stays within the limit of one metal point in the front field and belongs to everyday dress, not to a dowry