under the administration of the Empire were usually referred to as either “people” (ren 人) or “subjects” (min 民). There was absolutely no classification or distinction for "Vietnamese" and it is implausible to identify people accurate as such or implying modern ethnicity to the ancient. It is highly likely that these intermingled multilinguistic communities might have evolved into the present-day without modern ethnic consciousness until ethnic classification efforts carried out by the colonial government and successive governments of the Republic of Vietnam, Democratic Republic of Vietnam, and Socialist Republic of Vietnam, while retaining their intangible ethnic identity such as culture. There was no persisting "ethnic Vietnamese" identity during this period. Official Vietnamese history textbooks usually assume that the people of Northern Vietnam during Chinese rules were Việt/Yue. The Yue were broad groups of non-Chinese peoples of the south which included many different ethnolinguistic groups who shared some certain customs. After the disappearance of the Baiyue and the Lac Viet from Chinese records around the first century AD, new indigenous tribal groups might have emerged in the region under the name of Li-Lao. The Li-Lao people were also known for their great drum casting tradition. However, the culture produced Heger Type II drums, while the previous Dong Son culture of the Lac Viet produced Heger Type I drums. The Li Lao culture flourished from approximately 200 to 750 AD in present-day Southern China and Northern Vietnam. These Li tribes were recorded in Chinese sources as Lǐ (俚) "bandits" inhabiting the coastal areas between the Pearl River and Red River. Li political structures were distributed in numerous autonomous settlements/chiefdoms (dong 洞) located in riverine valleys. The Book of Sui notes that Li noblemen who possess bronze drum in each dong were called dulao (都老), which Churchman argues bears some resemblance and cultural connection to the previous local ruling class of the Red River Delta. The Li tribes were described as ferocious raiding bandits who refused to accept imperial authority, leading to Jiaozhou, the heartland of the Red River Delta, whence the Chinese deemed a lone, isolated borderlands with difficult, limited administration. Because the Li-Lao people managed to keep themselves away from Chinese sphere of cultural influence, the landscape of Northern Vietnam during Han-Tang period experienced a perfect equilibrium between Sinification and localization. From the sixth to the seventh century, Chinese dynasties attempted to militarily subdue the Li dong, gradually causing the Li