14. The New Whites - Xianbei
Xianbei was a group of tribes, who lived on the Eastern Steppe, roughly described in the present Inner Mongolia reaching out in East and West. Here they had lived "allways", or at least long before rise of written history.
But there are many indications that Xianbei was a non-Mongolian people with white skin and often with blond or reddish hair.
The debate on Xianbei's ethnic origin is a fierce debate with political overtones that have been going on for years. The idea that possible Indo-European peoples have had their root within the borders of modern China is causing a very considerable emotional resistance.
Basicly the statements about Xianbei's respectively Mongolian or tungusic origin are simply repeated many times, as it was a self evident truth, but with few and insignificant real evidence. Since it seems to be politically correct in both East and West, it has gradually won an image of truth.
Supporters of Xianbei's Mongolian origin bring forward to know that the Xianbei's descendants, the Qi-Dans, mobilized their troops in military units called "Ordo". Mongolian has a word with the same significance, "Ordu", for example in "The Golden Horde" and other Genghis Khan's armies. The word is found in Danish and English as "Horde," but they think it comes from Mongolian. Therefore, since Xianbei's descendants used a word, which the Mongols also used, they must have been of Mongolian ethnic origin, the supporters of the theory conclude.
http://www.dandebat.dk/eng-dan14.htm
Интересно.