In the 16th century the Zhuang from Guangxi and perhaps from southeast Yunnan began migrating into Vietnam. This movement was accelerated by the cycle of disasters and political events of the seventeenth century which brought larger numbers of Chinese immigrants into the region, such as the fall of the Ming, the rebellion of Wu Sangui, the Qing occupation, and the Muslim revolts in Yunnan.This migration was a peaceful one which occurred family by family. French administrators later identified a number of Nùng clans in the course of their ethnographic surveys. These had incorporated Chinese place names in their clan names and indicated the place of their origin in China, such as the "Nùng Inh" clan from Long Ying in the southwest of Guangxi. Other names also reflected the locations from where they came, indicating that they were primarily from the immediate frontier region of the southwest of Guangxi. The Nùng became increasingly numerous in the region, and were spread out through a long stretch of the Vietnamese northern border from Lạng Sơn to Cao Bằng. The Mạc dynasty, a Vietnamese dynasty ruled over the Vietnamese northeast highlands, profited from the migration in that they were able to draw upon Nùng manpower for their own forces.
