Vietnam

A

Chinese Influence

In 221 bc the Qin dynasty in China completed its conquest of neighbouring states and became the first to rule over a united China. The Qin empire, however, did not long survive the death of its dynamic founder, Shi Huangdi, and the impact of its collapse was soon felt in Vietnam. In the wreckage of the empire, the Chinese commander in the south built his own kingdom of Nam Viet (South Viet; Chinese, Nan Yue); the young state of Au Lac was included.

In 111 bc Chinese armies under Emperor Wudi conquered Nam Viet and absorbed it into the growing Han dynasty empire. The Chinese conquest had fateful consequences for the future course of Vietnamese history. After briefly ruling through local chieftains, Chinese rulers attempted to integrate Vietnam politically and culturally into the Han empire. Chinese administrators were imported to replace the local landed nobility. Political institutions patterned after the Chinese model were imposed, and Confucianism became the official ideology. The Chinese language was introduced as the medium of official and literary expression, and Chinese ideographs were adopted as the written form for the Vietnamese spoken language. Chinese art, architecture, and music exercised a powerful impact on their Vietnamese counterparts.

Vietnamese resistance to rule by the Chinese was fierce but sporadic. The most famous early revolt took place in ad 39, when two widows of local aristocrats, the Trung sisters, led an uprising against foreign rule. The revolt was briefly successful, and the older sister, Trung Trac, established herself as ruler of an independent state. Chinese armies returned to the attack, however, and in ad 43 Vietnam was reconquered.

B

Independence

The Trung sisters’ revolt was only the first in a series of intermittent uprisings that took place during a thousand years of Chinese rule in Vietnam. Finally, in 939, Vietnamese forces under Ngo Quyen took advantage of chaotic conditions in China to defeat local occupation troops and set up an independent state. Ngo Quyen’s death a few years later ushered in a period of civil strife, but in the early 11th century the first of the great Vietnamese dynasties was founded. Under the astute leadership of several dynamic rulers, the Ly dynasty ruled Vietnam for more than 200 years, from 1010 to 1225. Although the rise of the Ly reflected the emergence of a lively sense of Vietnamese nationhood, Ly rulers retained many of the political and social institutions that had been introduced during the period of Chinese rule. Confucianism continued to provide the foundation for the political institutions of the state. The Chinese civil service examination system was retained as the means of selecting government officials, and although at first only members of the nobility were permitted to compete in the examinations, eventually the right was extended to include most males. The educational system also continued to reflect the Chinese model. Young Vietnamese preparing for the examinations were schooled in the Confucian classics and grew up conversant with the great figures and ideas that had shaped Chinese history.

Vietnamese society, however, was more than just a pale reflection of China. Beneath the veneer of Chinese fashion and thought, popular mostly among the upper classes, native forms of expression continued to flourish. Young Vietnamese learned to appreciate the great heroes of the Vietnamese past, many of whom had built their reputation on resistance to the Chinese conquest. At the village level, social mores reflected native forms more than patterns imported from China. Although to the superficial eye Vietnam looked like a “smaller dragon”, under the tutelage of the great empire to the north, it continued to have a separate culture with vibrant traditions of its own.

C

Economy Under the Ly Dynasty

Like most of its neighbours, Vietnam was primarily an agricultural state, its survival based above all on the cultivation of wet rice. Much of the land was divided among powerful families, who often owned thousands of serfs or domestic slaves. A class of landholding farmers also existed, however, and powerful monarchs frequently attempted to protect this class by limiting the power of landowners and dividing up their large estates.

The Vietnamese economy was not based solely on agriculture. Commerce and manufacturing thrived, and local crafts appeared in regional markets throughout the area. Vietnam never developed into a predominantly commercial nation, however, or became a major participant in regional trade patterns.

D

Territorial Expansion

Under the rule of the Ly dynasty and its successor, the Tran (1225-1400), Vietnam became a dynamic force in South East Asia. China’s rulers, however, had not abandoned their historic objective of controlling the Red River delta, and when the Mongol empire came to power in China in the 13th century as the Yuan dynasty, the armies of Kublai Khan attacked Vietnam in an effort to reincorporate it into the Chinese empire. The Vietnamese resisted with vigour, and after several bitter battles they defeated the invaders and drove them back across the border.

While the Vietnamese maintained their vigilance toward the north, an area of equal and growing concern lay to the south. For centuries, the Vietnamese state had been restricted to its heartland in the Red River valley and adjacent hills. Tension between Vietnam and the kingdom of Champa, a seafaring state along the central coast, appeared shortly after the restoration of Vietnamese independence. On several occasions, Cham armies broke through Vietnamese defences and occupied the capital near Hanoi. More frequently, Vietnamese troops were victorious, and they gradually drove Champa to the south. Finally, in the 15th century, Vietnamese forces captured the Cham capital south of present-day Đa Nãng and virtually destroyed the kingdom.

For the next several generations, Vietnam continued its historic “march to the south”, wiping up the remnants of the Cham Kingdom and gradually approaching the marshy flatlands of the Mekong delta. There it confronted a new foe, the Khmer kingdom in the area of modern Cambodia, which had once been the most powerful state in the region. By the late 16th century, however, it had declined, and it offered little resistance to Vietnamese encroachment. By the end of the 17th century, Vietnam had occupied the lower Mekong delta and began to advance to the west, threatening to transform the disintegrating Khmer state into a mere protectorate.

E

Le Dynasty

The Vietnamese advance to the south coincided with new challenges in the north. In 1407 Vietnam was again conquered by Chinese troops. For two decades, the Ming dynasty attempted to reintegrate Vietnam into the empire, but in 1428, resistance forces under the rebel leader Le Loi dealt the Chinese a decisive defeat and restored Vietnamese independence. Le Loi mounted the throne as the first emperor of the Le dynasty. The new ruling house retained its vigour for more than a hundred years, but in the 16th century it began to decline. Power at court was wielded by two rival aristocratic clans, the Trinh and the Nguyen. When the former became dominant, the Nguyen were granted a fiefdom in the south around 1620 centred on Huê, dividing Vietnam into two separate zones. Rivalry was sharpened by the machinations of European powers newly arrived in South East Asia in pursuit of wealth and Christian converts. Portuguese mariners had first landed in 1516, and by the 17th century a full trading port had been established. At the end of the century, however, the Vietnamese turned against European intrusion and maintained a seclusion policy similar to those operating in China and Japan. Trinh and Nguyen governed in rivalry from Hanoi and Huê, with the Le rulers maintained as Trinh puppets.

By the late 18th century, the Le dynasty was near collapse. Vast rice lands were controlled by grasping feudal lords. Angry peasants—led by the Tay Son brothers—revolted in 1777, massacring the Nyugens. After toppling the Trinh and fending off an invasion from Manchu dynasty China, the ablest of the brothers briefly restored Vietnam to united rule in 1789. He died shortly after ascending the throne; a few years later Nguyen Anh, the sole surviving heir to the Nguyen house in the south, defeated the Tay Son armies with French help. As Emperor Gia Long, he established the Nguyen dynasty in 1802.