Thanh Hóa’s Famous Families

                                        by Jim Goodman

villager passing by the walls of the Hồ Citadel

       Thanh Hóa is Vietnam’s fifth largest province, situated between Nghẹ An, the country’s largest, to its south, the plains and rivers of the Red River Delta to its north and bound by the mountains of Laos on its western side.  The provincial capital, also called Thanh Hóa, lies 153 km south of Hanoi on National Highway 1A and 15 km from the beach at Sầm Sơn.  While the scenery in the province is pleasant, it doesn’t boast of anything spectacular and foreign travelers generally pass it by, making it one of the least known places to foreigners in Vietnam.

typical Thanh Hóa landscape

       For the Vietnamese, however, Thanh Hóa is part of the ancient heartland of their culture, where the bronze drum originated and where human habitation began over 6000 years ago.  Unlike the Red River Delta, prehistoric Thanh Hóa’s plains were not swamps that had to be cleared, for only two rivers, the Mã and the Chu, run through them.  Hills are moderate in the eastern half of the province and higher in the west, where the valleys are also home to Thái and Mường minorities.  Thanh Hóa’s Vietnamese have a reputation for cultural conservatism, thrift and fondness for traditional folk music and dance.

flooded rice fields near Vĩnh Lộc

       The province is also important for its role in Vietnam’s history.  It was part of the Hùng Kings’ realm from the 19^th to 3^rd century BCE at the dawn of the Bronze Age.  Under the thousand years of Chinese domination it was part of the administrative unit of Cưu Chan, which included present-day Nghẹ An and Hà Tĩnh.  It suffered and repelled Chăm invasions in the 3^rd and 5^th centuries and after Vietnam regained its independence it later became the birthplace of four famous families—the Hồ, Lê, Trịnh and Nguyễn—that played important roles in the nation’s history.

southern entrance of the citadel's south gate

      The most direct route to Thanh Hóa city from Hanoi is via Highway 1A.  Even with the heavy traffic it takes only three hours or less.  Aside from Sầm Sơn beach, Thanh Hóa province’s main attraction is the Hồ Dynasty Citadel in Vĩnh Lộc district, two hours drive northwest of Thanh Hóa city.  But a better way to reach this historical vestige, and to appreciate the landscape of the province, is by beginning at Xuân Mai, 35 km southwest of Hanoi, one of the starting points of the Hồ Chí Minh Trail during the Vietnam War.

       Largely a footpath through thick jungle back then, Đường Hồ Chí Minh is now a paved road in good condition with very little traffic, rolling through forested hills with gradients at a maximum of 10%.  Skirting around Cúc Phương National Park as it enters Thanh Hóa province, the scenery is especially delightful.  Villages lie far apart from each other, but many restaurants and petrol stations punctuate the route.   

triple arches of the Hồ Citadel south gate

       At the Cẩm Thủy junction, the Trail turns southwest and then south, eventually passing near Lam Kinh, Lê Lợi’s birthplace, where a modest shrine marks the spot.  The other road turns southeast, along the Mã River, to Vĩnh Lộc and the Hồ Citadel, which lies a few kilometers outside the town, in what is now a rural agricultural area.  The gates and portions of the walls are basically all that’s left of the citadel, but that was enough, along with its historical significance, to earn it the award of World Heritage Site.   

citadel wall

       The site is large, nearly square, measuring 870.5 meters north-south by 88ê.5 meters east-west.  The triple-arched south gate, the ceremonial entry point, stands 9.5 meters high and over 15 meters wide.  The other gates have a single arch, the east and west gates rounded.  Local stone provided the construction material, quarried from nearby hills, with their sometimes sheer cliffs often striated, as if to give the masons guidelines where to cut the stone.  Thanh Hóa stone has a national reputation for high quality and in the early 20^th century was used to build the cathedral and subsidiary churches at Phát Diệm in Ninh Bình province.

interlocking stone blocks of the citadel walls

       The stone blocks used in building the Hồ Citadel average 2 meters by 1 meter by .7 meter.  Some are almost perfect cubes, while others are longer.  Usually the masons simply stacked them on top of each other.   But occasionally they cut out sections of the corners to make the blocks fit together more snugly.  Thick earthen mounds backed up the walls and wooden watchtowers stood above the gates and at intervals along the walls.

       The man responsible for the construction of this citadel, Hồ Quý Ly, was a Thanh Hóa native from a nearby village.  Born in 1336, he first entered the service of the Trần Dynasty court in Thăng Long (today’s Hanoi) in 1371, after the Chăm, under a charismatic leader Chế Bồng Nga, had sacked the capital.  The Trần Dynasty, which defeated three massive Mongol invasions the previous century, was now in decline.  The Chăm continued to menace the Vietnamese for nearly two more decades, sacking Thăng Long again in 1378. 

Nguyễn Hoàng departs for Thuận Hoá

the founder of the Lê Dynasty

      In 1388 the Chăm annihilated a Vietnamese counterattack on their capital Vijaya, near today’s Quy Nhơn, and prepared another march on Thăng Long.  Trần Nghệ Tông, the King Father since his retirement in 1372 after two years as King, and still the power behind the throne, appointed Hồ Quý Ly as commander of its forces, but his attempt to deflect the Chăm advance failed.   Thăng Long was spared another sacking only because a Chăm defector revealed to Vietnamese gunners Chế Bồng Nga’s precise location.  After the death of their king the Chăm returned to Vijaya.

Trịnh Lords Palace in Đông Kinh (today's Hanoi)

       Trần Nghệ Tông died in 1394, leaving Hồ Quỹ Ly de facto ruler.  Three years later he ordered the construction of the citadel in Thanh Hốa.  Not merely a fortress, its walls contained a complete city, which was named Tây Đô--the Western Capital.  He forced the Trần Court’s removal to his new capital and renamed Thăng Long Đông Đô---the Eastern Capital.  Then he set about systematically assassinating 370 members of the Trần family and in 1400 deposed the nominal king, usurped the throne and founded the Hồ Dynasty. 

       His blood-soaked usurpation condemns him in the opinion of Vietnamese historians, yet he was also a progressive reformer.  He introduced paper currency and the use of nóm, the Vietnamese version of Chinese characters, in official documents, expanded traditional Confucian education to include mathematics and agriculture, and instituted land reform, limiting holdings to ten acres (four hectares).  Following a Trần tradition, he abdicated in favor of his son Hồ Hán Thương in 1402.but continued to manage state affairs behind the scenes.

local farmer outside the eastern gate

       However, two Trần princes escaped to China, where they called on the Ming Dynasty Emperor Yong Le to restore them.  The Chinese dispatched a huge army of 400,000 in 1407, chased the Hồ family all the way to Tây Đô and captured them there.  The Chinese sent their prisoners to serve as common foot soldiers in China and their ultimate fate has not been recorded.  Instead of installing a Trần ruler, the Chinese annexed Vietnam and stayed to loot and exploit the country to the greatest extent possible.

planting rice inside the citadel

       Serious resistance to the Chinese occupation began in Thanh Hóa in 1417.  Organized by Lê Lợi and known as the Lam Sơn Insurrection, after the name of the town hosting the first conclave, it won the support of two other influential Thanh Hóa families—the Trịnh and the Nguyễn.  Using guerilla tactics that were adopted by the Việt Minh centuries later, Lê Lợi’s forces first survived, then expanded, and after ten years captured the capital and expelled the Chinese.  In 1428 Lê Lợi founded the Lê Dynasty to govern the liberated country.

       Unfortunately, Lê Lựi died in 1433 and for nearly three decades palace intrigues, purges of lê Lợi’s lieutenants and periodic fights with the Chăm dominated the Court scene.  In 1460 the last two surviving Lam Sơn generals intervened to install Lê Thánh Tông as Emperor, the one truly successful Lê monarch after the founder Lê Lợi.  He conquered Vijaya and annexed the Chăm state’s territory, promulgated a new law code and reigned over a stable and prosperous Vietnam until 1497.

two hundred year-old house outside the citadel

       His son Lê jiiến Tông governed competently for six years, but upon his death in 1504 the country plunged into protracted political chaos, with five successive teenaged kings, who either died young or were murdered for their embarrassing debauchery.  Finally, in 1527 the security chief Mạc Đăng Dung seized the throne and proclaimed a new dynasty. 

       Supported by the Trịnh and Nguyễn families, the remnants of the Lê royal family fled to Thanh Hóa and then to Laos.  There they waited until several years later, when an anti-Mạc revolt broke out in Thanh Hóa.  Under the leadership of Nguyễn Kim, the Lê loyalists returned to Vietnam to engage the Mac armies and in 1443 captured Tây Đô.  Re-occupying and rebuilding the former Hồ citadel, the loyalists proclaimed it their capital and the residence of Lê Trang Tông, the teenaged descendant of Lê Thánh Tông whom they recognized as their sovereign. 

carved brackets of the old house

       Tây Đô remained the capital of the restored Lê Dynasty until the final ouster of the Mạc family from power in 1592.  In 1545 a Mạc follower assassinated Nguyẽn Kim and command of the Lê forces went to his son-in-law Trịnh Kiểm, who was intensely suspicious of the Nguyễn family.  Nguyễn Kim’s eldest son soon died in mysterious circumstances and his other son Nguyễn Hoàng laid low for years and eventually in 1558 secured appointment as governor of Thuận Hoá, today’s Thừa Thiên and Quảng Trị provinces.

Sầm Sơn boat on the sea

       He did such a good job that in 1570 the Lê Court added Quảng Nam to his jurisdiction.  In 1593 Nguyễn Hoàng returned to the north to help mop up remnant Mạc forces, but fearing the intentions of Trịnh Tùng, in charge since 1570, Nguyễn Hoàng returned to Thuận Hoá and turned it into his personal fief.  When he died at the age of 87 in 1613, Vietnam was essentially split into two realms:  the north rued by the Trịnh Lords and the south ruled by the Nguyễn Lords, both recognizing the same Lê Emperor, who was basically a puppet of the Trịnh Lords.

       Hostilities broke out between the two sides later that century, but periodic Trịnh invasions all failed and one Nguyễn invasion of the north only got as far as Thanh Hóa before it had to turn back.  The two sides made a truce in 1674, dividing their realms at the Gianh River in Quảng Binh.  Peace between them lasted a century and then the Tây Sơn Revolt destroyed both regimes in the late 18^th century.  Another protracted war ensued until eventually the resurgent Nguyễn defeated the Tây Sơn and in 1802 established the last pre-colonial imperial dynasty.

morning market on Sầm Sơn beach

       Tây Đô was abandoned during the Trịnh-Nguyễn conflict and today no trace of its former palaces or watchtowers exist. Most of the area has been turned into rice fields.  Only a pair of headless stone dragons in the center remains within the walls as evidence of its former splendor. But another kind of relic—a two hundred year-old house—stands in the village outside the eastern gate.  One story, wide, with a tiled roof, it features nicely carved embellishments on its beams, brackets and furniture and has been home to the same family for seven generations.

       No other vestiges of Thanh Hoá’s famous families exist in the province.  From Vĩnh Lộc, it’s two hours drive to Thanh Hoá city, which is almost entirely new, reconstructed after heavy bombing in the Vietnam War.  But Sầm Sơn Beach is a short distance away and very popular with Vietnamese tourists.  It’s also a major fishing center.  From dawn the fishermen go out in small skiffs of woven split bamboo, covered with pitch, with an engine at the rear, a wooden rudder and a triangular cloth sail, usually blue or brown.

hauling a boat up to higher ground

       At most, half a dozen people can fit into these vessels, but usually it’s just two or three.  They return from 9:00-10:00 and park their boats temporarily at the edge of the water.  Customers from the city and its vicinity, and even from as far away as Hanoi, then come to the boat to purchase the morning’s catch of fresh fish, squids, crabs, shrimps and other crustaceans.  When the crowd of buyers has dispersed, usually before noon, the fishermen move the boat to a higher spot on the beach, beyond the tide line, by mounting it on a frame with wheels and rolling it up the slope.

     The province has a few other scenic attractions.  But besides the Hồ Citadel and Lê Lợi’s birthplace, it does not have much tangible evidence of its historic importance.  The main legacy of its famous families does not lie in buildings.  It is the spread of Vietnamese cultural and political institutions across the entire territory of the Vietnam we know today. No other province can make such a boast.

sunset over the Thanh Hóa plain

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 For the full story of Thanh Hóa's families, see my book Delta to Delta:  The Vietnamese Move South

                           https://www.facebook.com/commerce/products/1223204557724843/   

Deifying National Heroes in Vietnam

                                                          by Jim Goodman

Trần Hưng Đạo, Ngọc Sơn Temple

            It’s the 8^th lunar month and time for a run of festivals in Vietnam.  The whole nation observes the Mid-Autumn Festival, or Tết Trung Thu, the Children’s Tết, and over a dozen Red River Delta villages stage their annual festivals honoring their local protective deities.  As several of these villages have chosen the famous 13^th century general Trần Hưng Đạo for this role, the month thus becomes a time to celebrate the nation’s tremendous victories over three separate massive Mongol invasions, in 1257, 1285 and 1288.

            Trần Hưng Đạo was born in 1228, less than three years after the foundation of the Trần Dynasty.  As a boy he was witness to the machinations of the regime’s godfather Trần Thủ Độ when the latter forced his father Trần Liễu to divorce his pregnant wife so that she could marry the childless king, Trần Liễu’s brother, and provide the new Dynasty an heir.  Trần Liễu protested by raising a revolt against Trần Thủ Độ, but his brother intervened and compensated him with a fief in the northeast.  Before he died Trần Liẽu enjoined his son to take revenge on Trần Thủ Độ. 

            But by this time the Mongol threat was imminent and Trần Hưng Đạo decided to rate national interests higher than filial piety and did not carry out his father’s dying wish.  Instead, he served as Trần Thủ Độ’s leading commander in the 1257 campaign.  Employing a strategy of “empty houses and gardens,” evacuating all people, food and animals before the Mongol advance, the Vietnamese forced the enemy to have to forage immediately, while their guerrillas picked them off easily.  It took the Vietnamese 18 days to expel the invaders. 

Trần Hưng Đạo in the Mongol Wars, woodblock print

            By the time of the second Mongol War in 1285, Trần Thủ Độ had died and Trần Hưng Đạo was now Generalissimo of the Vietnamese armed forces.  The Mongol forces numbered around 400,000, nearly half of them attacking the Chăm state of Vijaya to the south.  The Chăm abandoned their capital and waged guerrilla warfare from the nearby hills.  Soon enough the Mongols, suddenly also susceptible to tropical diseases, gave up and marched north, only to fall into trap after trap until they had no more army left.  As for the Mongols who had marched into Vietnam, the Vietnamese employed the same strategy as in the first war and by the end of the campaign the Mongols scurried back to China with less than 20% of their forces.

            Outraged by the defeat, Kubilai Khan order another in 1288, dispatching a half million troops, half by land and half by sea.  The Mongols defeated the Vietnamese navy, occupied the capital Thăng Long and waited for their supply ships to bring them their provisions.  But Trần Khánh Dư, loser in the first encounter, rebuilt the navy in time to attack and sink all the supply ships.  Faced with the same quandary as in the first two wars, the Mongols decided to evacuate and go home.  Trần Hưng Đạo’s generals harried and decimated the land forces, such that only handfuls managed to cross the border

Trần Khánh Dư hears his royal orders 

           As for the Mongols on board their 400 ships, as they proceeded down the Red River to the Gulf of Tonkin, Trần Hưng Đạo laid a trap for them that he took straight out of the nation’s history.  Like two 10^th century kings foiling Chinese naval invasions, he had sharpened stakes placed in the river bed that would be below the water’s surface at high tide.  When the Mongol armada arrived his side’s smaller boats engaged the enemy not to defeat them, but to slow them down so that when the tide receded they found most of their fleet impaled on the stakes.  That made them easy targets for the Vietnamese. Those ships that swerved away from the part of the river with the embedded stakes found themselves assaulted by rafts full of kindling, which the swimmers rammed into the Mongol boats and set them alight.  The entire fleet was destroyed and there were few, if any, survivors.

            As the man who led the nation to these great triumphs, a man who valued patriotism above family loyalty, who strove to unite not only rival factions in the Trần clan but the whole country in a noble cause, it is easy to see why Trần Hưng Đạo is a paramount Vietnamese hero.  Major streets across the cities of Vietnam have been named after him.  Statues of him stand in various places, even as far south as the riverfront in Hồ Chí Minh City.  In addition, though, many temples are dedicated to Trần Hưng Đạo and it is this phenomenon that gives a very different significance to the meaning of a national hero in Vietnam compared to, for example, my own country.

            We have our national heroes like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, with a national holiday that honors them.  We built monuments to them, and to Thomas Jefferson, too.  These are on the itinerary of every visitor to the capital, whether citizens from around the country or tourists from abroad.  But the holiday doesn’t involve much more than a day off from work or school.  No publicly performed dramas of events from the men’s lives.  No processions in period costumes.  And those who visit Lincoln Memorial do not light candles, burn incense, kowtow or bring food offerings for the spirit of Lincoln to bless.

devotees with offerings toTrần Hưng Đạo, Kiêp Bạc Temple

            These are precisely the characteristics of the festivals honoring Trần Hưng Đạo and other Vietnamese heroes.  The events are not national holidays but local village affairs.  The heroes are not just role models of exemplary behavior.  They are deities, part of the ancient tradition of the thành hoàng, the tutelary deity or guardian spirit of the village, conscripted on its behalf because, having been so successful fighting temporal enemies while on earth, he will be equally formidable fighting spirit enemies in the afterlife. Unsurprisingly, in view of his character and accomplishments, Trần Hưng Đạo became thành hoàng for more villages than any other national hero.

            The cult began right after his death in 1300, with the erection of a temple to him in his home village of Kiếp Bạc, Hải Dương province.   The temple has been rebuilt several times but nowadays hosts a six-day festival, beginning full moon day, in honor of Trần Hưng Đạo.  Devotees bring trays of food on their heads for him to bless, spirit-mediums dance before the altar and merchants set up booths outside offering drinks, snacks, toys, games of skill and chance and sundry other items.  The festival program varies each year, but at times will include battle re-enactments, boat races or even a visiting water-puppet troupe, besides the endless rituals within the temple.

            Besides Trần Hưng Đạo, northern villages honor other heroes of the Mongol Wars, including the Quan Lạn Island festival for Trần Khánh Dư [see my earlier article The Island That Remembers], featuring a drama narrating events of the times.  But Vietnamese national heroes are not always men, nor are they always victors.  Just as dear to Vietnamese hearts are the Trưng Sisters, who launched the first rebellion against Chinese rule way back in the year 40 C.E.   

Lâ Chân, Nghè Temple, Hải Phòng

the Trưng Sisters at the Dồng Nhên show

            The revolt began when the local Chinese Governor murdered Trưng Trắc’s husband.  With her younger sister Trưng Nhi and the support of native lords, she raised the banner of revolt and evicted the Chinese garrison.  Proclaiming independence, she established her capital at Mê Linh, northwest of Hanoi, and announced an immediate two-year tax exemption for the population.  The Chinese sent down a large expedition the following year, but the Trưng Sisters managed to keep their regime alive another two years before final defeat, upon which they drowned themselves.

rites honoring Lê Chân, Nghè Temple, Hải Phòng

           Besides the Trưng Sisters’ temples in Mê Linh and elsewhere, especially Hanoi’s Đồng Nhân Temple in Hải Bà Trưng district, other places honor her female generals, such as Lê Chân, legendary founder of Hải Phòng.  The city’s Nghè Temple worships her at a festival 8^th day 2^nd moon, an event that sometimes includes a procession of flags and men in ancient warrior costumes.  The biggest related event, though, is the celebration at Đồng Nhân from the 6^th day of the 2^nd lunar month. 

            Like other hero-honoring festivals, it will have streams of people bearing offerings to be blessed, usually balanced on their heads, rituals within the temple, a palanquin procession, quan họ singers on a boat in the pond, dragon dances, entertainment in the courtyard--one year bird-fighting matches, another year a cooking contest.  Like the Quan Lạn festival for Trần Khánh Dư, Đồng Nhân Temple will host a drama about the Trưng Sisters, in particular how they launched the insurrection, for the festival marks that particular day and not, like Kiếp Bạc’s, the day of the heroes’ deaths.

The Trưng Sisters review the troops.

            Dressed in resplendent gowns and robes, wearing feathered headdresses and brandishing swords, actresses playing the sisters enter the courtyard and stand on a platform in front of the temple.  There they make proclamations and speeches for a while and then review the troops.  Several performances follow as different contingents dance with their weapons, including female warriors wielding longbows.  A bit of comic relief interrupts the set in a skit depicting three terrified Chinese soldiers fretting about their safety in the wake of the insurrection.  The scene ends with one soldier shaking so much from fright that his companions have to carry him away.  After some more martial displays the show concludes with a double dragon dance, celebrating the initial success of the uprising. 

frightened Chinese soldiers in the Đồng Nhân show

           Though the Trưng Sisters’ revolt ultimately failed, another Hanoi festival marks a victory over the Chinese that was every bit as dramatic as the expulsion of the Mongols.  It occurred at the end of the Lê Dynasty period in 1789.  In the years previous an army of rebels led by three brothers from Tây Sơn village in Bình Định province in south central Vietnam had overthrown the Nguyễn Lords ruling in the southern half of Vietnam and had marched north, expelled the ruling Trịnh family from Hanoi and reinstated the Lê King.  But by late 1786 the Trịnh family had squirmed back into power in the court of the youthful, inexperienced Lê sovereign.  To deal with this de facto usurpation, the Lê King had called on the Chinese to restore his authority.  

performers take a break at Đống Đa

bringing offerings to Quang Trung

            The Qing Emperor in Beijing obliged by dispatching an army of a few hundred thousand to oust the Trịnh supporters and occupy the capital.  Nguyễn Huệ, the Tây Sơn general who had recently restored the Lê to power, decided that by bringing in the Chinese army the Lê King had forfeited his legitimacy.  He proclaimed himself Emperor Quang Trung and assembled forces to march north.  It was early 1787 and the Lunar New Year was approaching.  Quang Trung ordered his troops to celebrate the New Year early this time and then, with the official holidays just beginning, led his army on a quick march to Hanoi.

Quang Trung and his soldiers, Đống Đa festival

            Those who know of 1968 are inclined to think of this campaign as the First Tệt Offensive.  Quang Trung had sent a messenger ahead to the Chinese commander, demanding his withdrawal.  But the Chinese commander executed the messenger and refused to reply.  Over-confident, complacent and pretty well inebriated since the start of the holidays, the Qing troops were in no condition to fight.  Quang Trung’s army launched their surprise attack on the 5^th day of Tết.  After routing the defenders south of the capital, the Tây Sơn army swarmed into Hanoi, surrounded the main Chinese force at Đống Đa, southwest of Hanoi’s Citadel and completely annihilated them.  Very few survivors managed to flee all the way back to China.

            The Vietnamese mark this victory with a grand festival at Đống Đa, beside the hill where the accumulated bones of the slain enemy were buried.  Besides a procession, the usual presentation of offerings to Quang Trung and two rounds of human chess, the day features a stage show re-enacting scenes from the famous campaign.  While not of such a sterling character as Trần Hưng Đạo, and not a thành hoàng of any particular village, Quang Trung is likewise a spiritual protector of the nation and, by extension, the well-being of those who live in it.  And in the light of periodic tensions with their northern neighbor, nowadays the Vietnamese regard their deified national heroes as more relevant than ever.

Quang Trung at the victory dance, Đống Đa festival

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