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Foundation

According to folklore, prior to Chinese domination of the region, Lạc Kings (Hùng Kings) ruled a series of kingdoms known collectively as the Văn Lang Kingdom in northern and north-central Vietnam. Its government was a hierarchical one, headed by king, who were served by Lạc hầu and Lạc tướng, and the Lạc people.^[11][12] In approximately 257 BCE, Văn Lang were purportedly annexed by the Âu Việt state of Nam Cương.^[13] The Âu Việt inhabited the southern part of the Zuo River, the drainage basin of You River and the upstream areas of the Lô, Gâm, and Cầu Rivers.^[14] The leader of the Âu Việt, Thục Phán, overthrew the last Hùng kings, and unified the two kingdoms establishing the Âu Lạc polity, proclaiming himself King An Dương (An Dương Vương).^[15] Knowledge about this kingdom is a mixture of legend and history, and although King An Duong is the first figure in Vietnamese history documented by reliable historic sources, most of what known about his reign survived in legendary form.^[16]

Construction of Cổ Loa Citadel

As the largest prehistoric moated cities predating the Common Era, constructed between 300 to 100 BCE,^[17] encompassing 600 hectares (1,500 acres),^[18][19] and requiring as many as 2 million cubic meters of material,^[20] Cổ Loa was the first political center of Vietnamese civilization pre-Sinitic era.^[21] The sheer scale of rampart system of Cổ Loa, which was "contemporaneous and connected in an overall and planned design", together with labor expenditures and complex forms of labor organization, displayed the Cổ Loa polity’s ability to produce enough surplus; envision, plan and direct construction; mobilize substantial labor and investment for construction; ensure the continuation of construction efforts; and upkeep or maintain the citadel over time. This signaled a high degree of political centralization and hinted the presence of a powerful, permanent and durable political authority that was "heavily consolidated, institutionalized, and concentrated".^[20][22][23] It was estimated that between 3,171,300 and 5,285,500 person-days were needed to construct such a large-scale project.^[24] The citadel can provide "physical, symbolic, and psychological protection", showing the polity's power and its ability to defend itself, thus deterring any potential threat.^[25]

Historical accounts claim, after purportedly taking power, Kinh An Dương ordered to construct a fortified settlement in Tây Vu known to history as Cổ Loa as his seat of power.^[26] It looked like a snail shell design (its name, Cổ Loa 古螺, means "old snail": according to Đại Việt Sử Ký Toàn Thư, the citadel is shaped like a snail^{[‡ 3]}).^[27][28][29]

The events associated with the construction of this spiral-shaped citadel are remembered in the legend of the golden turtle. According to this legend, when the citadel was being built, all the work done during the day was mysteriously undone during the night by a group of spirits seeking to avenge the son of the previous king.^[27] A thousand-year-old white chicken perched on nearby Mount Tam Đảo led the local spirits. The King burnt incense, prayed, and evoked the gods to help him. In response to his plea, a giant golden turtle suddenly emerged from the water, subdued the white chicken, and protected him until the citadel's completion. When he departed, he gave the King one of his claws and instructed him to use it as a trigger for a crossbow, assuring him he would be invincible with it.^{[‡ 4][27]} King An Dương then commissioned Cao Lỗ (or Cao Thông) to construct a crossbow and christened it "Saintly Crossbow of the Supernaturally Luminous Golden Claw" (靈光金爪神弩; SV: Linh Quang Kim Trảo Thần Nỏ); one shot could kill 300 men.^{[‡ 5][12][27]}

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In 204 BCE, in Panyu (now Guangzhou), Zhao Tuo established the kingdom of Nanyue.^[30] Taylor (1983) believed that when Nanyue and Âu Lạc co-existed, Âu Lạc temporarily acknowledged the suzerainty of Nanyue to show their mutual anti-Han sentiment, and this did not imply that Nanyue exerted any real authority over Âu Lạc. As peaceful relations with the Han were restored, Nanyue's influence over Âu Lạc waned. The army Zhao Tuo had created to oppose the Han was now available to deploy against the Âu Lạc.^[31]

Details of the campaign are not authentically recorded. Zhao Tuo's early setbacks and eventual victory against King An Dương were mentioned in Record of the Outer Territory of Jiao Region (交州外域記) and Records of the Taikang Era of the Jin (晉太康記).^{[note 2][‡ 6]} Records of the Grand Historian mentioned neither King An Duong nor Zhao Tuo's military conquest of Âu Lạc only that after Empress Lü's death (180 BCE), Zhao Tuo used his troops to menace and his wealth to bribe the Minyue, the Western Ou, and the Luo into submission.^{[‡ 7]} However, the campaign inspired a legend whose theme is the transfer of the turtle claw-triggered crossbow from King An Duong to Zhao Tuo. According to the myth, ownership of the crossbow conferred political power: "He who is able to hold this crossbow rules the realm; he who is not able to hold this crossbow will perish."^[32]

Unsuccessful on the battlefield, Zhao Tuo asked for a truce and sent his son Zhong Shi to submit to King An Dương and serve him.^[33][32] There, he and King An Duong’s daughter, Mỵ Châu, fell in love and were married.^[32][34] A vestige of the matrilocal organization required the husband to live in the residence of his wife’s family.^[35] As a result, they resided at An Duong’s court until Zhong Shi discovered the secrets and strategies of King An Dương.^[35] Meanwhile, King An Duong treated Cao Lỗ disrespectfully, and he abandoned him.^[36]

Zhong Shi had Mỵ Châu showed him the sacred crossbow, at which point he secretly changed its trigger, neutralizing its special powers and rendering it useless.^[34] He then asked to return to his father, who thereupon launched a new attack on Âu Lạc and this time defeated King An Dương.^[35] History records that, with his defeat, the King jumped into the ocean to commit suicide. In some versions, he was told by the turtle about his daughter's betrayal and killed his daughter for her treachery before killing himself. However, a legend discloses a golden turtle emerged from the water and guided him into the watery realm.^[32] There is also a tradition that the King fled south to the modern-day Nghệ An Province, building a new citadel and ruled until his death.^[37]

Archaeological findings of Cổ Loa showed that technologies and innovations from the politically tumultuous Warring States may have found their way into the region, suggesting that the magical crossbow may have been a type of "new model army" trained and commanded by Cao Thông, which was "no longer effective" without his instruction.^[38][39]

Zhao Tuo subsequently incorporated the regions into Nanyue but left the indigenous chiefs in control of the population.^[40][41][42] For the first time, the region formed part of a polity headed by a Chinese ruler,^[43] Zhao Tuo posted two legates to supervise the Âu Lạc lords, one in the Red River Delta, named Giao Chỉ, and one in the Mã and Cả River, named Cửu Chân.^[7][44] although it is not yet certain whether the inhabitants concurred with this nomenclature or if they were even aware of it.^[45] The legates seemed chiefly interested in trade; and their influence was limited outside of imperial outposts.^[46][36]

In 111 BCE, the Han dynasty conquered Nanyue and ruled it for the next several hundred years.^[47][48] Local Lạc lords, just as under Nanyue, acknowledged Han dominion to be granted authority, bestowed imperial "seals and ribbons" as symbols of their status in return for what they viewed as "tribute to a suzerain" but which Han officials viewed as taxes.^[44][49]

Indigenous ways of life and ruling class did not experience major Sinitic impact, into the first century CE.^[50][51] It was not until the fourth decade of the first century CE that more direct rule and greater efforts at Sinicization were imposed by the Han dynasty.^[51][52] The Han fully consolidated their control, replacing the loosely tribute system by a full Han administration and ruling the region directly as provinces.^[53][54][55] While "some form of nominal northern hegemony was installed",^[45] there was no evidence that any Chinese-style enterprise controlled the region during the second or first centuries BCE as certain historical accounts are relatively Sinocentric and misleading as to the nature of Proto-Vietnamese society before the "real, later imposition of full Chinese power".^[56][57]

Based on evidence from the historical, ethnohistorical, and archaeological records, Kim (2015) believed that a state-level society existed in the region between 300–100 BCE that was responsible for the construction of the Cổ Loa settlement.^[58] According to him, this polity was a “highly centralized, overarching state-level society with enduring political institutions and structure”.^[59] The size of Cổ Loa Citadel and the requisite manpower to construct it implied "a strong military force and significant centralised, state-like control" and "a high population density".^[22] The number of bronze implements found at the site also suggested the existence of centralized production, social stratification, and material monopolization.^[60] The fact that we can only find roof tiles at Cổ Loa also implied its status as a capital site. Surrounding villages and communities seem to have paid tribute or taxes to the centralized polity.^[61]

Ancient Han Chinese had described the people of Âu Lạc as barbaric in need of civilizing,^[62] comparing their language to animal shrieking, regarding them as lacking morals and modesty, although according to Olivia Milburn, the egalitarian nature of such a society now appears enlightened rather than barbaric.^[63] Chinese chronicles maintain the native people in the Hong River Delta were deficient in knowledge of agriculture, metallurgy, politics,^[64] and their civilization was a by-product of Chinese colonization. They denied in situ cultural evolution or social complexity, attributing any development to Sinicization,^[65][66][67] though they were aware of this "stable, structured, productive, populous, and relatively sophisticated" society they encountered.^[68]

Lạc people "organized themselves along less strict, nonnuclear lines",^[69] with women enjoying high status in society. Such a society is a matrilocal society, a societal system in which a married couple resides with or near the wife's parents. Thus, the female offspring of a mother remain living in (or near) the mother's house, forming large clan-families couples after marriage would often go to live with the wife’s family. Meanwhile, unmarried couples often lived together, contrasting with Chinese society and Confucian notions of the patriarchal family, which provided a model for imperial government.^[70] It has also been said that Proto-Vietnamese society was matrilineal.^[71] The status of Lạc lords transferred through the mother's lineage while women possessed inheritance rights.^[72] In addition, they also practiced levirate,^[73][74] meaning widows had a right to marry a male relative of her late husband, often his brother, to obtain heirs. This practice provided an heir for the mother, protecting widows' interests and reflecting female authority, although some patriarchal societies used it to keep wealth within the male family bloodline.^[72][73]

There was a high population level in the region prior to the arrival of the Han Empire.^[75] It is estimated that the population for Cổ Loa and the environs was thousands of people, and for the greater delta region the population was tens of thousands of people, if not hundreds of thousands.^[76] This is supported by the census of A.D. 2, according to which Giao Chỉ (Red River Delta) contained 746,237 people.^[77] Although some can be attributable to immigration from the north, Han immigration into northern Vietnam was not overwhelming during this time,^[78] and population levels were not affected until after the middle of the second century.^[79]

The main Lac tribes subjected to Au Lac are generally believed to be Austroasiatic speakers.^[80] It was suggested the majority of the lowland population spoke Proto-Viet-Muong belonging to the Mon-Khmer language family.^[81] Another plausible conjecture is that those from the mountainous areas north and west of the Red River Delta spoke an ancient language analogous to modern Khmu.^[81] French linguist Michel Ferlus in 2009 draws his conclusion that they were northern Vietic (Viet–Muong) speakers and believes that the Vietnamese are directly inherited from the Dongsonian (i.e Lac Viet).^[82] Specifically, Ferlus (2009) showed that the inventions of pestle, oar and a pan to cook sticky rice, which is the main characteristic of the Đông Sơn culture, correspond to the creation of new lexicons for these inventions in Northern Vietic (Việt–Mường) and Central Vietic (Cuoi-Toum). The new vocabularies of these inventions were proven to be derivatives from original verbs rather than borrowed lexical items. The current distribution of Northern Vietic also corresponds to the area of Đông Sơn culture. Thus, Ferlus concludes that the Northern Vietic (Việt–Mường) speakers are the "most direct heirs" of the Dongsonians, who have resided in Southern part of Red river delta and North Central Vietnam since the 1st millennium BCE.^[82] On the other hand, the Âu Việt possibly spoke a language related to the Tai-Kadai language family.^[81] Archaeological evidence reveals that during the pre-Dongson period, the Red River Delta was prominently Austroasiatic, such as genetic samples from the Mán Bạc burial site (dated 1,800 BCE) have close proximity to modern Austroasiatic speakers,^[83] and then during the Dongson period, genetic examples yield to a significant proportion of Tai stocks (known as Au, Li-Lao) possibly living along with Vietic speakers.^[84]

The economy was characterized by agriculture with wet rice cultivation, draft animals, metal plowshares, axes and other tools, as well as irrigation complexes.^[68] The cultivation of irrigated rice may have started in the beginning of the second millennium BCE, evidenced by findings from palynological sequences,^[85][68] while metal tools were regularly used before any significant Sino-Vietic interaction.^[68] Chapuis (1995) also suggested the existence of line fishing and some specialization and division of labor.^[86]

Northern Vietnam was also a major node or hub of interregional access and exchange, connected to other area through an extensive extraregional trade network, since well before the first millennium BC, thanks to its strategic location, giving it access to key interaction routes and resources,including proximity to major rivers and the coast^{[note 3]} while enjoying an uneven distribution of copper, tin, and lead ores.^[88][89] Kim (2015) believed these would have been main reasons the Chinese conquered the region, its economic and commercial value, location and access to key waterways, and access to tropical products, allowing them to have unrestricted access to other parts of Southeast Asia.^[90]

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Modern

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• Âu Lạc on Encyclopædia Britannica