Earliest known history of Vietnam for young 2nd generation Mitchongs

Legendary kingdoms

According to the most authoritative legends, the history of the Vietnamese people begins with King De Minh, a descendant of a divine Chinese ruler who was also the legendary father of Chinese agriculture. De Minh and an immortal fairy of the mountains produced Kinh Duong, ruler of the Land of Red Demons, who married the daughter of the Dragon Lord of the Sea. Their son, Lac Long Quan ("Dragon Lord of Lac"), is regarded as the first authentic Vietnamese king. To make peace with the Chinese, Lac Long Quan married Au Co, a Chinese immortal, who bore him 100 eggs, from which sprang 100 sons. Later, the king and queen separated; Au Co moved with 50 of her sons into the mountains, and Lac Long Quan kept the other 50 sons and continued to rule over the lowlands. Lac Long Quan's eldest son succeeded him as the first of the Hung (or Hong Bang) kings (vuong), and he is regarded as the real founder of the Vietnamese nation and of the first Vietnamese dynasty.

This legend and other related legends, most of which received their literary form only after AD 1200, describe in mythical terms the fusion, conflicts, and separation of peoples from the north and south and of peoples from the mountains and the coastal lowlands. The legends show the immortals as mountain dwellers, while the people along the coast are represented by the dragon lords--a division found in many legends throughout Southeast Asia. The retreat of Au Co and 50 of her sons into the mountains may well be a mythical record of a separation among the proto-Vietnamese in the Red River delta: those who left the lowlands could be the ancestors of the Muong, who still live in the hills surrounding the delta and who are the only ethnic minority of Vietnam closely related in language and customs to the Vietnamese.

According to legend, the Hung dynasty had 18 kings, each of whom ruled for about 150 years. Their country, called Van Lang ("Land of the Tattooed Men"), is said to have included not only the Red River delta but also much of southern China. The last of the Hung kings was overthrown in 258 or 257 BC by a neighboring warlord, Thuc Phan, who invaded and conquered Van Lang, united it with his kingdom, and called the new state Au Lac, which he then ruled under the name An Duong. Au Lac existed only until 207 BC, when it was incorporated by a former Chinese general, Trieu Da (Chao T'o in Chinese), into the kingdom of Nam Viet (Nan Yüeh in Chinese).

Nam Viet

This kingdom covered much of southern China and was ruled by Trieu Da from his capital near the present site of Canton. Its population consisted chiefly of the Viet who had earlier been driven by the Chinese from their kingdoms south of the Yangtze River. Trieu Da, after throwing off Chinese sovereignty and killing all officials loyal to the Chinese emperor, adopted the customs of the Viet and made himself the ruler of a vast non-Chinese empire. After it had incorporated Au Lac, Nam Viet included not only the Red River delta but also the coastal lands as far south as modern-day Da Nang. The end of Au Lac in 207 BC marks the end of legendary history and the beginning of Vietnamese history, as recorded in Chinese historical annals.

After almost 100 years of diplomatic and military duels between the Han Chinese empire and Trieu Da and his successors, Nam Viet was conquered (111 BC) by the Chinese under the Han emperor Wu-ti. Thus, the territories occupied by the ancestors of the Vietnamese fell under Chinese rule. Nam Viet became the Chinese province Giao Chi (later Giao Chau), which was divided into nine military districts. The three southernmost of these covered the northern half of what is now Vietnam.

Early society

When China extended its rule over Vietnam, the people of the Red River delta were in transition from the Bronze to the Iron Age, although some stone implements were also still in use. These ancestors of the Vietnamese were already experienced at cultivating rice. They had learned how to irrigate their rice fields by using the tides that backed up the rivers. Plows and water buffalo were still unknown (the land was prepared for cultivation with polished stone hoes), but the proto-Vietnamese are thought to have been able to produce two rice crops annually. They supplemented their diet by fishing and hunting. Their weapons were mainly bows and arrows; the bronze heads of their arrows often were dipped in poison to facilitate killing such larger animals as elephants, whose tusks were traded for iron from China.

The social organization of the early Vietnamese, before Chinese rule, was hierarchical, forming a kind of feudal society that until the mid-20th century existed among the Tai and Muong minority populations of northern Vietnam. Power was held by tribal chiefs at the head of one or several communities. These chiefs were civil, religious, and military leaders, and their power was hereditary; they were large landowners who kept the mass of the people in virtual serfdom. At the head of this aristocracy stood the king, probably the most powerful of the tribal chiefs.

Religion was characterized by the kind of animistic beliefs in supernatural beings and spirits that are common among preliterate agricultural and hunting peoples. Some of the spirits were those of dangerous animals, while others were of deceased important persons who needed to be propitiated. A great religious festival, almost a carnival, was held at the beginning of spring and was marked by abandon and promiscuity.

In all these respects, the inhabitants of the Red River delta, prior to their subjugation by the Chinese, showed numerous affinities with most of the people of mainland and island Southeast Asia. It was not until several centuries after the imposition of Chinese rule that the Vietnamese developed more distinct ethnic characteristics.

(part of article found on the net)