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/   

Lạng Sơn, Vietnam’s Gateway to China

                                                               by Jim Goodman

the city of Lạng Sơn

       Of northeastern Vietnam’s three border provinces, Lạng Sơn is the most easily accessible and least appreciated.  Just 154 km from Hanoi, on a good level road, the trip to Lạng Sơn city takes just over two hours.   The last hour or so the road flanks picturesque hills, but nowhere in the province do these hills rise to heights like its neighbor provinces Hà Giang and Cao Bằng.  Thus, guidebooks downplay Lạng Sơn, giving it little attention other than as a city on the way to the border crossing into China, which is just 18 km away near Đồng Đăng.  But the city and its environs offer enough attractions to make it worth a stopover or even a separate excursion out of Hanoi when you’re not crossing the border.

         Thanks to cross-border trade, Lạng Sơn has thrived since the normalization of relations between China and Vietnam.   Chinese goods dominate the markets and virtually all of its buildings date from after the 1979 conflict, which resulted in the destruction of nearly every building in the city.  Only the remnant of one of the old Nguyễn Dynasty city gates remains at the south end.  Lying along a bend of the Kỳ Cùng River, most of the commercial and residential quarters lie north of the bend, while administrative buildings are largely south.  The old French quarter used to lie here, but it was destroyed in 1979.   A couple of hills jut up from the flat land of the city while bigger hills dominate the surroundings.

phallic stalagmite in Tam Thanh Cave

altar to Quan Âm and other deities

       The city basically lies on a north-south axis, with its main market, Kỳ Lừa, lying in the northern quarter. In its northwest suburb, behind a fancy entrance gate, is the Tam Thanh cave, the biggest of three in the vicinity, with an elaborate altar to Quan Âm and other deities just inside the mouth.  Several paths from here lead to other small shrines inside niches of the cave walls.  One path leads to an opening with a view of the countryside, another to a pavilion on the slope of the mountain and all of them converge at an underground pool, featuring a very phallic stalagmite jutting up from the dark water.  Another cave, Nhị Thanh, lies just south and is even more impressive, featuring a 600-meter walk along a subterranean stream.  Stalactites force a lot of ducking and dodging along the route, which is also graced by a 20-meter high waterfall.

NàngTô Thị Waiting for Her Husband

      Outside Tam Thanh cave a path leads to the top of Thô Thị Hill, affording a great view of the city and the red roofs of its buildings. The hill gets its name from the interesting rock formation called Nàng Thô Thị Waiting for her Husband, which resembles a woman carrying her baby, standing alone on the ridge.  Lạng Sơn residents venerate this rock by leaving offerings of flowers and incense.  Perhaps they identify with the theme suggested by the rock.  For devotees it symbolizes all the women who have waited for husbands to return from one of the many wars that have plagued the country’s history.

       On another section of the same hill lie the remnants of a 16^th century Mạc Dynasty citadel, one of the few physical vestiges in the country of a little-known period of Vietnamese history.  In 1428, following final success in expelling Chinese forces after a twenty-year occupation of Vietnam, Lê Lợi, a Thanh Hoá landowner who led the insurrection, founded the Lê Dynasty.  Though it was to be the longest running dynasty in the country’s history, not officially ended until 1787, its kings were rarely in control.  Lê Lợi died five years after establishing it.  His successor was just ten years old at his accession and died in mysterious circumstances nine years later.  The next king was barely a year old when crowned and when he reached 17 his brother murdered him and usurped the throne.  He in turn lasted but eight months and then the last of Lê Lợi’s veterans overthrew him and installed Lê Thánh Tông as king.

remains of a Mạc Dynasty citadel above Lạng Sơn

       He proved to be the most successful monarch in the entire Lê Dynasty.  Taking over in 1460 at the age of 18, he led the conquest of the Chăm state of Vijaya, opening the way for Vietnamese migration to south central Vietnam.  A dedicated Confucian, he promulgated a law code that was to survive until the early Nguyễn Dynasty replaced it, held regular examinations aimed at recruiting government officials, promoted literature and commissioned national histories. 

       Unfortunately, kings in those times rarely lived to an advanced age.  Perhaps because he worked himself too hard, Lê Thánh Tông died in 1497 at the age of 57.  His very capable son Lê Hiến Tông ruled but six years and died when just 43.  After his demise the Dynasty basically ran out of good rulers, doomed by the fatal flaw underlying all dynastic successions—that the son is not always the equal of the father.  His own son and successor died after six months and the next four monarchs were depraved, capricious, murderous teenaged tyrants with, thanks to Lê Thánh Tông’s centralization, absolute power.  All of them suffered violent deaths as factions at Court, basically pitting the Red River Delta officials against the Thanh Hoá families that had supported Lê Lợi, worked behind the scenes to promote their favorites.

Thất Khê

      One of these schemers was Mạc Đặng Dung, from a village in Hải Dương, who won appointment to the Royal Guards under one of these young kings and rose steadily in the hierarchy while remaining keenly aware of the scandals at Court and the subsequent deterioration of conditions in the countryside.  In 1527 he decided the country had had enough of Lê Court shenanigans, arrested the current king and founded his own dynasty.  Those Lê family members he could not capture escaped to Laos with their Thanh Hoá supporters, primarily the Trịnh and Nguyễn clans, to plot their return to power.

       The Mạc Dynasty ruled until 1592, when the Lê loyalists captured the capital and the reigning Mạc king.  Though the victors reinstated the Lê king’s legitimacy, they did not yet wipe out the Mạc.  The latter maintained its own claimants to the throne and remained strong in the east and northeast.  It was around this time that the Mạc regime constructed the citadel in Lạng Sơn.  Later in the 17^th century they lost Lạng Sơn and retreated to Cao Bằng, where they survived until 1677.

gate to the Holy Mothers temple in Đồng Đăng

       Lạng Sơn residents are unlikely to know anything about the Mạc period of the city’s history, but are well aware of 20^th century Lạng Sơn history.  The road to Cao Bằng is the famous Highway 4, site of the first significant Việt Minh advances against the French colonialists.   The French had built a fort at Đông Khê, south of Cao Bằng and north of the Lạng Sơn provincial border.  In September 1950 the Việt Minh captured it, prompting a French evacuation from Cao Bằng province.  Shortly afterwards they also captured Thất Khê, inside Lạng Sơn province and used it as a base of operations for expelling the French from this province as well.

Tày ethnic minority

       The first stop north of Lạng Sơn on Highway 4 is the border town of Đồng Đăng, a prosperous-looking place with new buildings in the Franco-Viet style and a large and lavishly decorated temple to the Holy Mothers.  It’s not the actual crossing point, which is eight km northeast at Tôn Thanh, a nondescript place with a big entry gate and the adjacent Friendship Village, basically rows of tents hawking Chinese goods like clothing, utensils, kitchen ware, appliances, cell phones, DVD players, radios, etc.

       Just at the northern edge of Đồng Đăng, though, a sign reading “Border Zone” points to a path between the hills flanking the road that leads to another post, hidden behind the promontories, with big warehouses and Chinese signs.  Vietnamese porters pick up large packages here and carry them down the rocky paths to the road, where motorcycles wait to take the goods into town. 

Nùng in the countryside

        The road north passes by steep limestone hills on its eastern side and the gently flowing Kỳ Cùng River on the western side, featuring a number of water wheels along the banks.  The towns and most of the roadside villages along this and other provincial highways are Vietnamese, but the province is also home to the Dao ethnic minority in the hills and Tày and Nùng in the valleys.  The Dao are rather exclusive, rarely venturing into the cities, even at festival time or market days.  The Tày and the Nùng are both members of the Tai-Kedai linguistic group and in China are considered sub-groups of the Zhuang. 

       Tày and Nùng dialects are similar, as are their lifestyles.  They differ in various domestic and religious customs and especially in appearance.  The Tày women dress in dark colors, mostly black, with little or no embellishments like embroidery or jewelry.  Nùng women wear black trousers, with a thin white strip along the sides, but their jackets are quite colorful, with checked and plaid patterns, side-fastened and long-sleeved, similar in style but no two jackets exactly alike.  The same is true of their headscarves:  tied in the same manner but always with individual cloth patterns.

Nùng in the city

       The jacket material they buy in the market and stitch together back home.  They live in single story houses on the ground of mud-brick walls and tiled roofs.  The interiors are full of split-bamboo storage baskets, spinning wheels, thread winders and a four-shaft loom.  Winter is the weaving season, when women make cloth for their trousers, bags, pillowcases and blankets.

       Nùng villages lie just several kilometers east of Lạng Sơn in Cao Lộc district, in valleys among the rolling hills.  Being so close, the Nùng are frequent visitors to the city, especially on market days, held every fifth day.  They comprise a noticeable percentage of both buyers and sellers, generally hawking crops grown on their farms and purchasing household goods and maybe grain.  And when they’re not shopping they’re window-shopping and exploring the city, not confining themselves to the immediate market areas.

bringing in baskets for sale at market day

      Market day begins early and is not entirely confined to Kỳ Lừa, for the city has two other, smaller venues.  Kỳ Lừa is the most crowded, though, and the first stop for ethnic minorities in attendance.  The activity only begins to subside in late afternoon and the presence of so many Nùng women, often in groups of three to six, makes it a memorable day.  For a traveler, the only occasion more interesting is Lạng Sơn’s annual Kỳ Lừa Festival.

       Beginning the 22^nd day of the first lunar month and running six days, the festival honors Thân Công Tài, the 17^th century Lê military officer who founded Kỳ Lừa market.  The main venues are the Tả Phù Temple behind the market, dedicated to this man, and Kỳ Cùng Temple, sited at the bend in the river that divides the northern and southern sections of the city.  Devotees begin bringing offerings, like trays of glazed roast pig, to these temples the day before the festival starts.

food offering at Kỳ Cùng Temple 

       Besides religious activities, the festival’s highlights are the processions between Tả Phủ and Kỳ Cùng Temples and the costumed dances in the streets and squares along the route.  Elaborately carved red and gold sedan chairs carry the temple deities from one temple to another, borne by both Vietnamese and Nùng men, dressed in ceremonial silk garments.  Preceding them are lines of women holding the sacred guardian weapons that normally stand inside the temples in front of the altars.  Others hoist Buddhist flags.  And at the very front a band of musicians playing drums, gongs, cymbals, lutes and viols leads the line, their volume augmented by an amplifier and speakers mounted on a bike pushed alongside them.

Tày and Nùng performers at Kỳ Lừa market

       On the first day the gods of Tả Phủ go to visit Kỳ Cùng Temple, while on the last day the Kỳ Cùng deities return the call with a procession to Tả Phủ.  Near the temple before the processions begin, and at various places on the route, traditional dance performances entertain the crowds.  Nùng men put on a show with three dancers wearing fierce red demon masks. Tày men follow with lion dances and a Vietnamese troupe performs a dragon dance. 

       Besides the dances, the procession itself is entertainment, with participants dressed in utterly gorgeous clothes.  Proceeding normally in a stately manner, at major intersections the line breaks into a quick-time figure-8 loop and then resumes its ordinary pace.  All along the way shopkeepers have erected candlelit altars with burning incense, laden with offerings to the passing deities.  These are mainly liquor and food items, cooked, raw and packaged.  The gods bless these offerings, as they did the roast pigs, fruits and glutinous rice cakes presented at their altars, and return the offerings to the people.  And when the processions are over and the dance costumes put away the celebrants are then free to indulge in the last act of the festival program—enjoying the blessings of the deities in the form of a big feast and a fine round of drinks.

the annual Kỳ Lừa Festival procession

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The Communal House of a Vietnamese Village

                                                             by Jim Goodman

    From ancient times Vietnamese villages have always been semi-autonomous social units, with their own hierarchies, administrators, history and heritage, rites and customs, clubs, mutual aid groups, and local guardian spirits.   When the Lý Dynasty set up its administration, organized the defense of the state, promulgated laws and the obligations and taxes required of its citizens, it opted to deal with the villages as individual units.  The Court established the amount of taxes and the number of men required for military service or corvée labor and it was up to the villages themselves how they went about meeting those requirements. 
    Villages had a representative called lý trưởng who dealt with Court affairs, the one who received the government communications and orders and was held responsible if they were not implemented.   The village chief (phố lý) was in charge of security and a Council of Notables ran village affairs.   This entailed carrying out state directives, establishing village regulations, budgets, tax shares, law enforcement and the management of village funds and the periodic re-distribution of communal property.

Đình Sồ, west of Hanoi

    The venue for deliberations was the đình, which translates as “communal house,” though the only actual resident here was the village tutelary deity, its guardian spirit, known as thành hoàng.  The đình grew out of conditions in the waning decades of Chinese rule in Vietnam, when villages took advantage of the fading Chinese power structure to set up their own administrations.  The Lý Dynasty formalized the institution by issuing an edict in the 11th century requiring every village to have one. 
    The đình was not the only public building in a village.  It might also have a văn chi, a temple for the Confucian scholars, a võ chi, temple for the martial gods and heroes, a Buddhist or Taoist temple, and in more recent centuries a church.  But the đình was the most important building in the village, serving as the office of village administration, the venue for the tribunals that adjudicated disputes between villagers and the site of the communal feasts.   As it also housed the village thành hoàng, it was the main venue for the great festival and entertainment programs.  Thus it was the most imposing building, for it was the village’s political, social and cultural center, the focal point of its identity.

the đình of Đình Bảng, Bắc Ninh province

     The earliest đìnhs have all succumbed to the ravages of time and war.  The basic architecture probably hasn’t changed much over the centuries, for surviving buildings from the 17th century on show a basic similarity.  They were set a bit apart from the main residential area, preferably beside a pond with some greenery in the vicinity.  Ideally, this should include acacia, palm, frangipani and jackfruit trees.  Geomancers determined the exact spot on which to build.  It was laid out like an inverted T, with the altar for the village deity to the rear of the building.  It featured a heavy, wide, low-hanging, tiled roof with upturned corners, open sides and thick pillars, on a rectangular raised platform of brick or earth, appearing as if it were floating on its base.

terracotta plaque of farming life, Giá village đình wall

    A long wall enclosed the đình and the open yard around it.  Occasionally these walls, as at the đình in Giá village, west of Hanoi, sported decorative terracotta plaques of scenes from everyday life, like plowing with buffaloes or boating on the river.  An ornamental gate marked the entry point, with tall columns topped by sculpted animals.  Gates constructed in the Nguyễn Dynasty, like the one at Lệ Mật, near Hanoi, are more ornate, with several roofed tiers, similar to those of Buddhist temples.
    In the 17th century, despite the demise and fall of the Mạc Dynasty and the restoration of a much weaker Lê Dynasty, the architecture of the đình continued to develop.  Having established the basic shape, the architects now worked on embellishments, especially on the roof and the interior.  They created a molded ridge along the roof sections, often latticed, and added ornamental elements at the apex and at the end of the roof slopes.

carvings beneath the apex of the roof

    These molded ridges generally end, at the upturned corners of the roof, in a stylized dragon or lion.  The tail or mane is often curved into a coil.  Depending upon the artist, this ornamental roof would end with a pair of lions or dragons, or perhaps one on top of the other.  And another one might be mounted halfway up the ridge.  Details like scales and whiskers are usually part of the sculpture as well.
    Artistic adornment was also a feature of the triangle beneath the apex.  Either the head, and maybe the paws, of a mythical animal filled the space in a single, low-relief carved plaque, or a floral design, in open, lattice-work wood or mortar, hung from the top of the triangle, its pattern standing out against the shadowed background.
    Mythical dragons or lions, without the coiled tails, stood flanking the đình’s compound gates, as well as the three-step staircase at the entrance to the building itself.  Sometimes the dragons are independent sculptures, which descend from the top of the staircase.  Sometimes they are carved in low relief on stone plaques at the bottom of the steps.  Because they are likely to be touched, stroked and sat upon by humans, these sculptures were made of hard stone instead of mortar.

mythical animals on the roof corner

    The coiled dragons arched near the upturned corners of the roof enhanced the building’s majestic silhouette.  The guardian lions or dragons at the đình’s entrance added to its imposing appearance. It looked like the important building it was.  Inside the building, đình artisans produced intricately carved altars, furniture, decorative brackets, plaques, column heads and statues, depicting subjects both religious and secular.
    The first visible examples of their work were the altars, incense tables, carved figures and statues, which stand right in the middle of the interior. The altar itself is basically a multi-level table, upon which rest the images of the guardian spirit or the ornate miniature thrones by which they are sometimes represented.  The small incense table in front of it, standing closer to the worshiper, was something to which the đình artisans imparted the best of their skills, featuring panels of dragons, lions, phoenixes, floral vegetation, etc., while on the four corners stood openwork carvings.
    Mounted above the altar was the large, ornamental panel called cửa võng.  These were done in a variety of shapes and styles, no two alike, employing an array of carving and chiseling methods and the most ornate designs.   They could take the shape of a three-sided canopy, as at Đồng Kỵ in Bắc Ninh, or a multi-paneled arrangement of carved elements on the frames and posts of a triple window, as in the cửa võng of Đình Diên Lộc in Gia Lương, Bắc Ninh.  And above this the ceiling itself might be intricately decorated with red lacquered plaques, flanked by low-relief carvings, gilded so that they stand out.

the interior of Đình Văn Phuc, Hanoi

    When a visitor enters the central compartment of a đình the eyes first behold the altar and its paraphernalia.  Tall thin cranes perched on turtles flank the altar and in front of it stand the ceremonial protective weapons—lances, halberds, swords, etc.—and the ornate incense table.  These are the familiar components of temples and evoke a religious atmosphere.  But as the eyes move up to the elaborately crafted cửa võng and the ornamented ceiling, the effect is one of palatial splendor, enriching the setting and the luster of the community rituals performed beneath it.
    Further examination of the interior, though, reveals how the đình artisans further enhanced the interior with the art of woodcarving.  Their favorite motif seems to have been the dragon.  It symbolized power, majesty and prosperity and was part of mythology and folklore.  Its monstrous head, with flaring nostrils, bulging eyes and bared fangs, was inherently eye-catching.  Its long, sinuous body lent itself to myriad styles of depiction.  Dragon heads stuck out from the junctures of the posts with the horizontal crossbeams.   They formed the ends of the roof beams.  Long and winding dragons climbed up columns and sprawled across rafters.

dragons in the đình

    Sometimes carvers filled a large panel, door or plaque with intertwined dragons, with clouds, flames or plants in between, each spaced harmoniously apart.  The work as a whole is an aggregate of curling and swerving lines.  And on close inspection the details emerge.  A dragon is dragging a baby lion by its tail.  Two recumbent dragons face each other, both jaws locked on the same single pearl between them. A dragon’s whiskers turn into swirling flames that terminate in a straight sword.  The mane and whiskers of dragons’ heads turn into bamboo shoots, atop which fairies dance.
    Carvers worked in teams and specialized in individual tasks.  Some were dragon-carvers, while others only did dragon heads.  Others did lions or phoenixes.  Some took care of the arabesques or flaming swords.   Still others carved the clouds or ocean waves or the human figures.   Classical models existed for all the motifs.  But these served as guidelines, not as exacting requirements.
    What makes the wood-carved artworks of the đìnhs particularly special is its deployment of both religious and secular themes.  While the religious imagery had to follow more or less established standards, mostly imported, the secular imagery had no restrictions.  Scenes of village life were part of the đình’s ornamentation and it was in this field that the carvers had the greatest liberty of expression.  Today their extant works of art are a valuable source of insight into the daily life of times long past.

depiction of an elephant vs. a tiger

peasant life depicted in  a đình carved panel

    For those carvers assigned to the secular themes, though, no such classical models existed.  No traditional aesthetic standards instructed them how to depict real animals and real people or what details to include in vignettes of everyday life, or even what those vignettes should portray.  The artists simply made careful, attentive observations of the world around them and then re-created it in wood.  They got the shapes of the animals right, the proportion of limbs and heads on the people correct and covered a huge range of activities.  Far from being crude folk art, the carvings often reach a high level of execution.  Even moods and facial expressions are discernible.  Taken as a whole, the body of secular woodcarvings in the đìnhs is one of the most outstanding legacies of the indigenous imagination.
    The most impressive of these carvings are the long friezes of processions of various people and animals.  Sometimes they are peasants going to market, leading their animals or riding buffalo carts.  Other times they are royal or military parades.  Some of the officers ride horses or elephants, soldiers brandish weapons and trumpeters blow conch shells.  And in the midst of such processions an irreverent detail might slip in, like in the frieze at Đình Đệ Tam Đông in Nam Định, where a mandarin fondles the breast of one of three naked bathing girls.  She covers her lower parts with a lotus leaf, but she and the other girls, and the mandarin as well, are all smiling.

leisure time in old Vietnam

    Another saucy example is of flirting youths, in Đình Hưng Lộc, Nghĩa Hưng, Nam Định.  A smiling boy sits with a scantily clad girl on his lap, she looking quite contented, while a third youth, grinning as well, tickles the boy’s face.  The figures are in full relief and wedged into the open jaws of one of the dragons in a large portrait of an assembly of dragons and fairies.
    One of the most unusual friezes is the vibrant vignette in a rafter in Đình Liên Hiệp, Phúc Thọ, west of Hanoi.  In a crowded scene one man rides a galloping horse through a gathering of peasants.  In front of him a soldier points his rifle at a seated peasant, while another man holds up a pig by its hind legs.  The carving has been given two names—“Officials Plundering Peasants’ Wealth,” which is certainly what it looks like, and the less seditious-sounding “A Hunting Party.”
    Artisans didn’t like to leave smooth, unadorned surfaces on any of the wooden components other than the big pillars.  Besides the long horizontal friezes, they carved scenes from daily life on posts, beams, cabinets and wall plaques.  The portraits could be realistic, like a woman carrying her children in baskets suspended from a pole, an acrobatic performance, two buffaloes locked in head-to-head

boating scene in Đình Tây Đằng

combat, a pair of wrestlers, a game of chess, etc.  Or they could be a little fanciful, like an elephant plowing a field, two men playing badminton while a tiger watches their game, military commanders riding leopards, etc.

    When a villager entered the đình, then, two sets of contrasting imagery caught the eye.  The religious imagery was a reminder of the belief system that ordered life.  The secular imagery was a reminder of the everyday reality in which those concepts operated.  The Vietnamese saw no contradiction in including both kinds of imagery in a single building.  What those images represented was all part of one system anyway—the indigenous way of life.

the compound of Đình Mông Phụ 

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Đình Mông Phụ is one of the stops on the itinerary of my cultural-historical tours of Vietnam.
                                       Go to http://deltatoursvietnam.com for details.