For basically as long as scholars have been writing in English about premodern Vietnamese history, there has been an effort to argue that Vietnam (or at least part of it) is not “East Asian” or “Sinitic.”
In the 1970s, Alexander Woodside argued in his Vietnam and the Chinese Model that there was a “Chinese model” that the Nguyễn Dynasty tried to impose on a Southeast Asian “Vietnam.”
In the 1980s, Keith Taylor argued in his The Birth of Vietnam that there was a “Vietnamese” cultural core that persisted through 1,000 years of “Chinese” rule in the first millennium AD.
In the 1990s, Taylor, Li Tana and Nola Cooke all argued that Nguyễn Đàng Trong (the southern half of Vietnam in the 17th and 18th centuries) was less Sinitic/Confucian and more Southeast Asian than its northern counterpart under the Lê Dynasty/Trịnh clan, an idea that has continued to be repeated in the 21st century.
I have never agreed with any of these views, and I have never seen evidence in the historical sources that can support these views. To the contrary, whenever I look closely at one of these issues, I always find tons of evidence that counters what scholars have argued.
This, for instance, is the case with an argument that has been made about how the Nguyễn Dynasty honored its ancestors in its capital of Hue.
During the peak of the effort in the 1990s to argue for the distinctness of the southern half of Vietnam, historian Nola Cooke published a book chapter entitled “The Myth of the Restoration: Dang-Trong Influences in the Spiritual Life of the Early Nguyen Dynasty (1802-47).”
The Nguyễn clan ruled over the southern half of Vietnam in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as essentially a separate kingdom, although the Nguyễn never renounced their status as officials of the Lê Dynasty in the north.
That family was then driven from power in the late eighteenth century during the years of the Tây Sơn Rebellion. Then in the early nineteenth-century, this same Nguyễn clan established a dynasty that governed over all of Vietnam, and its ruler elevated himself to the position of emperor.
The Nguyễn then tried to figure out how to talk about 1) their new dynasty and 2) the fact that they kind of had a dynasty for the previous two centuries but they didn’t actually call it that because they never officially declared themselves as emperors. . . At times they use a term meaning “restoration” to imply that they had “restored” themselves to power in the nineteenth century, but officially they had never been in power prior to that point. . . so the expression is ambiguous.
Cooke refers to this ambiguity as “the myth of the restoration.” At the same time, however, she uses this topic to argue that the way we have understood the Nguyễn has also created certain myths. In particular, she argues that there was something non-Sinitic and “southern” at the core of the belief system of the Nguyễn, but that Western scholars have only seen “Chinese” elements in Nguyễn rule.
To quote, Cook states that, “Much evidence points to the political centrality of ‘southerness’ under the Nguyen. But to find it we need elude the suggestive undertow of Chinese images that have captivated western historians since late nineteenth-century French colonial scholars first constructed their powerful discourse of traditional Vietnam as ‘little China.’”
As an example of this, Cooke points to the ancestral temples that were built in Huế and argues that they do not follow “the Neo-Confucian paradigm.” To quote again,
“. . . its royal buildings quit the Sinic model specifically to enshrine the Restoration myth within its walls – unlike in Beijing, the first two kings erected six ancestral temples within the Imperial City, dedicating four to their pre-dynastic ancestors. The New-Confucian paradigm misses this whole dimension of Nguyen convictions. . . (277).”
In mentioning “the Restoration myth” here, Cooke is arguing that in building numerous ancestral shrines (I’m only aware of four, one of which was renamed) the Nguyễn were in fact attempting to honor their non-Sinitic, “southern” system of beliefs, and that therefore, this is something that cannot be understood by scholars who focus on “Chinese images.”
I always feel uncomfortable when I see people confidently employing terms like “the Neo-Confucian paradigm.” If there is something that we can call “the Neo-Confucian paradigm,” then I have no idea what it is.
Neo-Confucianism is a strain of philosophy that emerged during the period of the Song Dynasty, and the way that I like to think of it is that it essentially sought to connect the moral concepts in Confucianism to larger cosmic powers (as discussed in early texts like the Yijing).
So yes, we can talk about certain Neo-Confucian philosophical ideas, but a “Neo-Confucian paradigm” that relates to the construction of ancestral temples? I don’t think anything like that exists.
That said, there are ideas in what we can call the larger “East Asian” tradition that relate to ancestral temples, and it is extremely clear that the Nguyễn were well-aware of these ideas, and that their construction of ancestral temples was carried out with those ideas in mind.
Let’s take a look at how that happened.
In the fourth lunar month of 1804, construction got underway in Huế on three separate shrines for royal ancestors: the Imperial Ancestral Shrine (Thái Miếu 太廟) the Dynastic Creator Shrine (Triệu Tổ Miếu 肇祖廟) and the Royal Father Shrine (Hoàng Khảo Miếu皇考廟) (ĐNTLCB, 1/23/14b).
Prior to this point, the Nguyễn had long maintained a tradition of honoring their ancestors in ancestral shrines, and in doing so they followed in the footsteps of countless earlier East Asian rulers in creatively adapting principles about ancestor worship that were recorded in the ancient Classic of Rites (Liji 禮記).
The Classic of Rites offered a model for worshiping one’s ancestors that differentiated between social ranks. The Son of Heaven (the emperor) was granted the right to worship the most ancestors, a total of seven, beginning with a “great forefather” (thái tổ 太祖) and then alternating between three “chiêu” 昭 and three “mục” 穆.
The meaning of these terms has long been debated, however it is likely that they were meant to place the ancestors in a generational order, so that, for instance, a father would be a chiêu, and would be followed by a son who would be labeled a mục, etc. (Liji 禮記 [Record of Rites], “Wangzhi” 王制 [Royal Regulations]).
In order to keep these numbers consistent, any new ancestor could only be added to a full ancestral shrine by first transferring one of the ancestors (usually the one closest to the great forefather) to a shrine of lesser importance, such as a chamber of rest (tẩm 寢) or a dedicated site (thiêu 祧).
For a detailed discussion of this zhaomu system, as it is now commonly labelled, see Michael Loewe, Problems of Han Administration: Ancestral Rites, Weights and Measures, and the Means of Protest (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 1-96.
Over the centuries this system of ancestor worship was modified and manipulated countless times, perhaps most famously, and controversially, by the Han Dynasty usuper, Wang Mang, who expanded the number of ancestors that an emperor could worship to nine.
Other emperors essentially created imagined ancestries in order to enhance their legitimacy, while still other emperors debated over the propriety of removing ancestors from the shrine in order to make room for others.
The Nguyễn clan contributed their own examples to this tradition both before and after establishing their dynasty.
In 1744, Nguyễn lord Nguyễn Phúc Khoát implemented reforms to start creating an imperial capital in the south, and he ordered that an ancestral shrine (tông miếu 宗廟) be erected. Note that this was not called an “imperial ancestral shrine” (thái miếu 太廟), because at this pint the Nguyễn were still serving the Lê Dynasty, and thus were not “emperors.”
The great forefather in the shrine was Nguyễn Kim, the last member of the Nguyễn clan to serve in the north. In the places of the chiêu and mục were the seven generations of Nguyễn Phúc Khoát’s ancestors who had served before him in the south.
This shrine was built in the area of what is now Huế, and the Nguyễn were forced to abandon that region during the Tây Sơn rebellion. However, after gaining control of Gia Định (Saigon) in 1788, Gia Long built an ancestral shrine there in early 1790.
While that temple followed the practice of alternating between chiêu and mục ancestors, it broke with East Asian precedents by including eleven ancestors in the shrine, rather than nine.
The image above lists the men who were honored in the ancestral shrine in Gia Định (ĐNTLCB, 1/23/14b-15b).
Nguyễn Kim continued to hold the position as great forefather, and was followed by his descendants, starting with Nguyễn Hoàng, the first member of the Nguyễn family to govern in the south.
Further, this ancestral shrine also included two men who never served as Nguyễn lords: Nguyễn Hạo, the son of the seventh Nguyễn lord, Nguyễn Phúc Chú, and Nguyễn Phúc Luân, Gia Long’s father. Nguyễn Phúc Luân was in line to succeed his own father, Nguyễn Phúc Khoát, but was prevented from doing so by a powerful official.
After recapturing Hue in 1802, the original ancestral shrine was recovered. Two years later, however, Gia Long ordered that a new ancestral shrine be constructed, and it is clear from the chronicles that a deliberate effort was made to ensure that this shrine more faithfully follow East Asian precedents.
In particular, the emperor discussed the matter with his officials and decided that since Nguyễn Hoàng was the first member of the family to “create a foundation in the southern wilds” (triệu cơ nam phục 肇基南服), he should be given the place of honor in the ancestral shrine as the “great forefather.” Nguyễn Kim was thus removed.
In addition, Nguyễn Hạo and Gia Long’s father were likewise removed as they had never served as rulers. Finally, the tenth ruler, Nguyễn Phúc Dương, was also removed (ĐNTLCB, 1/23/15a-b. The quote is from 1/23/15b).
No explanation is offered for this decision, however Nguyễn Phúc Dương ruled briefly during the time of the Tây Sơn Rebellion, and for a period of time was captured by the Tây Sơn. These factors may have led Gia Long and his officials to decide that he was not worthy of worship in the ancestral shrine.
In justifying this re-ordering of the ancestral shrine, the Nguyễn chronicles make it clear that the objective was to follow East Asian precedent and to have the number of ancestors honored “accord precisely with the number of nine shrines.”
Further, the chronicles specifically state that the overall shrine was to emulate the Han and Ming practice of having a single hall with separate chambers (ĐNTLCB, 1/23/15b).
Meanwhile, Nguyễn Kim was given the title of “Creating Forefather” (Triệu Tổ 肇祖) and a separate shrine was built to honor him called the Creating Shrine (Triệu Miếu 肇廟) “in order to illuminate where the Great Forefather came from.”
Similarly, a shrine was built for Gia Long’s father called the Royal Father Shrine (Hoàng Khảo Miếu 皇考廟) in order “to illuminate where the imperial enterprise came from.”
Finally, Nguyễn Hạo and Nguyễn Phúc Dương were to be placed in a separate chamber of rest, a common treatment for ancestors who were removed from the ancestral shrine (ĐNTLCB, 1/23/16a-b).
The new Ancestral Shrine, therefore, perfectly fit the model of a shrine that honored nine ancestors, as can be seen in the image below (ĐNTLCB, 1/8b-9a).
That said, at the time it was ordered built, Gia Long had yet to declare himself as “emperor.” He soon did, however, and had his ancestors upgraded from “princes” (vương) to “emperors” (đế), a necessary change so that they could be honored in an “Imperial Ancestral Shrine.”
While Gia Long therefore found a way to establish an orthodox ancestral shine and to still honor additional ancestors with the creation of new subsidiary shrines, he left his successor with a major problem. . . There was no place in this shrine system left for Gia Long himself, as all of the places were filled. . .
Minh Mạng, the second emperor of the Nguyễn Dynasty clearly understood this problem, and he took measures to address it.
He was not excited at the prospect of having to remove someone from the Imperial Ancestral Shrine to make room for his father, so to make a long story short, he ordered the construction of a new shrine, the Founding Imperial Ancestor Shrine (Thế Miếu 世廟).
This shrine followed the same 9-position system as the Imperial Ancestral Shrine. In this case, Gia Long was placed in the honored central position, while the eight other positions were reserved for honoring future Nguyễn emperors, starting with Minh Mạng himself.
In other words, there were now essentially two “imperial ancestor shrines”: one for the Nguyễn who ruled prior to the establishment of the Nguyễn Dynasty, and one for Nguyễn Dynasty emperors. Both of those shrines, however, dutifully followed the standard for such shrines in the East Asian tradition.
Further alongside each of these 9-person shrines was a shrine for the immediate ancestor of those nine individuals. Nguyễn Kim was honored in the Creating Shrine that stood next to the Imperial Ancestor Shrine, and Gia Long’s father was honored in the Royal Father Shrine (which Minh Mạng renamed the Rising Shrine [Hưng Miếu 興廟]) that stood next to the Founding Imperial Ancestor Shrine.
Finally, Minh Mạng was aware that there was not a clear precedent in the classics for the Founding Imperial Ancestor Shrine, but he essentially argued that he could not bring himself to remove an ancestor from the ancestral shrine. Hence, his decision to build a new shrine.
In doing so, Minh Mạng joined a long list of such innovators in East Asian history, such as Ming Dynasty Emperor Jiajing who likewise established a “Thế Tổ Miếu 世祖廟” for his father.
That these men were able to do so was because there was no “Neo-Confucian paradigm” that they had to rigidly follow. Instead, there were concepts in ancient texts, like the Classic of Rites, that dictated how an imperial shrine was supposed to be arranged, and Gia Long and Minh Mạng both carefully and dutifully upheld those concepts.
However, when reality didn’t fit with those concepts (like when they had more ancestors to worship than the number of spaces mentioned in the Classic of Rites), then they got creative. However, what is essential to understand is that their creativity was likewise informed by the ideas in the larger East Asian tradition.
Yes, it was an innovation for Minh Mạng to order the construction of a Thế Miếu 世廟, but the fact that he ordered that this shrine follow the model of an imperial ancestor shrine points to the limits of his creativity.
He was not creating from some “southerness” or from a “non-Sinitic” belief system. He was creating from within the East Asian cultural tradition, as so many others had before him had done as well.
This is all so obvious when one reads the sources, which leads me to wonder, why have Western scholars been so keen on trying to show something “non-Sinitic” in premodern Vietnam at the elite level when the historical sources do not support their claims? What is their stake in all of this?
With a topic like the one here, one finds oneself buried in East Asian concepts and considerations. So why not just recognize that? Why do scholars insist on distorting the historical record to put forth an argument that the sources not only do not support, but provide abundant evidence to refute?
I’ve never been able to figure this out, but as I said at beginning of this post, it has been an enduring element in English-language scholarship on premodern Vietnam.
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A minor technical error happens on the schema depicting Nguyễn ancestors honored in Gia Định. “Nguyễn Hoàng” is duplicated on the spot which is supposed to be that of Hiếu Văn Vương Nguyễn Phúc Nguyên, aka Chúa Sãi enthroned in 1613. Also it’s worthy to keep in mind that the original Thái Miếu was destroyed 1945 by Việt Minh in their “tiêu thổ kháng chiến” strategy. We understand that a lot of details are not mentioned because the current article aims at showing the fallacy of the narrative that Đàng Trong was much less Sinitic than Đàng Ngoài.
Thank you for pointing this out! I have updated the image.
And I did not know about the Thái Miếu in 1945. I’d be curious to find out more about that.