Maritime Consciousness Of Ancient Vietnam

Vietnam lies in the east of the Indochina Peninsula with super natural conditions and rich resource and faces the broad ocean on the east, whose geography is characterized by closed and open environment. It is generally believed in academic circles that ancient Vietnam has little relations to the sea and maritime consciousness. In fact, during the historical and civilized evolvement of Vietnam, it contacted and got to know the sea, and had various relations to the sea. The maritime civilization in Vietnam depended on the rice civilization on the land.The maritime consciousness of ancient Vietnam was represented in literatures, writings, myths, tales and beliefs in the sea gods, which were the cultural and religious medium of such consciousness. The literatures of ancient Vietnam came into being at a relatively late history period, some of which referred to or specialized in the sea in official or private writings, some of which is still unknown to the outside. Some myths and tales relating to the sea recorded by Viet Dien U Linh Tap (Compilation of Spirits of the Departed Spirits in the Realm of Viet) and Linh Nam Chich Quai (Wonders Plucked from the Dust of Linh-nam) revealed the origins of ancient Vietnamese, resistance against "invasion", daily lives and production, worthy of further and deep examination. As the sea gods or goddesses with various origins and from influences of various cultures, the Dragon King in South Directional Sea, the Po Nagar (Thien Y A Na), the Four Sacred Ladies in South Directional Sea, the Lady Thai Duong and the Ca Ong (the whale) became the most important objects on the sea for government and common people to worship and offered sacrifice to them in ancient Vietnam, especially in the early Nguyen period. Myths and tales about the sea and beliefs in the sea gods/goddesses reflected from the cultural and religious aspects ancient Vietnamese knowledge and thoughts of the sea.The origin and development of maritime consciousness of ancient Vietnam was based on such activities as maritime explorations and voyages, which provided the producing of consciousness with social context and behavior foundation and promoted the growth of its maritime consciousness. In turn, the emergence and growth of maritime consciousness influenced its maritime activities. The tradition of maritime development in ancient Vietnam resulted from such activities as "treating the sea by the river", the building of saltproof banks, the production and circulation of sea salt, cultivation of the land being seized from the sea, and limited foreign trade through harbors and seaports to increase revenue and meet consumer needs. The coastal voyages around harbors and estuaries have long existed, reflected by the compass course ballads popular in the folk, and represented by maritime transport of rise from the north and the south to the capital in the middle area during 19^th century. With the advance of shipbuilding technique and the development of maritime awareness, the Nguyen lord (Chua Nguyen)and its government officials made frequent voyages by sailing boats to "Ha Chau" and sometimes to "Tieu Tay Duong" for "official business", sailing to the far insular countries in -Southeast Asia and the east of the Indian Ocean between the end of 18^th century and the early 19^th century, during which Vietnam made contact with more scope of the sea and got wider horizon of the sea and the world, and its ancient sailing activities culminated in this period.Monarchs, scholar-bureaucrats and common people developed multilevel and various maritime notions, and had various ideas of the sea in the ancient Vietnam during contacting the sea. Various maritime notions were reflected in historical records of estuaries, seaports, islands, shoals and compass courses, sea shapes, scales of tide, beliefs in the sea gods, maritime directions, fortunes, disasters and defense and so on, during which some notions had much influence on the ancient civilization of Vietnam such as the mysterious concept of regarding the sea as a monster, fortune ideas of "mountain gold and sea silver" and the pride from "excelling in the navy". Maritime consciousness of ancient Vietnam generally showed more direct perception than abstract reasoning, more records of coastal activities than ones of activities on the open sea, and more enumerations of natural phenomenon than argumentation and analysis with deep thoughts. Concepts with reasoning and analysis of the sea were hardly found out. The maritime notions of Nguyen Trai in the 15^th century, of Le Quy Don in the 18^th century and especially of Minh Menh emperor in the early 19^th century contained much content and had much influence, with a relatively high status in the maritime history of ancient Vietnam. Le Quy Don paid attention to the sea and made much record of the coastland, inshore islands, islets, shoals and coastal voyages in the middle and southern Vietnam in his writing of "Phu Bien Tap Luc" (A Miscellany of Pacifying Frontier Areas). The government of modern Vietnam and many scholars regarded Le Quy Don's record as one of "the important authorities" for Vietnamese sovereignty over the Xisha and Nansha Islands of China. In fact, according to Le Quy Don, "Bai cat vang" (the strip of yellow sand) and "Dao Dai Truong sa" (the large Changsha island) were the islands, islets and shoals only in the inshore area in the middle of Vietnam without relation to the Xisha and Nansha Islands of China.The maritime consciousness and the tradition of maritime activities of ancient Vietnam remain and upgrade in the modern time. During the 1970s and 1980s, the appetite of modern Vietnam for the sea extended viciously at a time. This resulted in ownership disputes between China and Vietnam over the islands in the South China Sea provoked by Vietnam, and leaded to Vietnam's crazy plunder of the resources such as the oil and gas in the South China Sea. At present, with the advance of its renovation and opening policy and its economic achievement, Vietnam has further made its overall maritime strategies and put them in practice, and its dream of becoming "a great maritime power" is steadily coming true.