Ly Bi rises and founds Van Xuan, 541-544

In five hundred and forty-four, according to the Vietnamese histories, Giao Chau had a new sovereign. He proclaimed himself emperor, set a reign title, appointed a hundred officials, built a palace for his court, and named the country Van Xuan, in the hope that the state would last ten thousand generations.¹

Open the four Chinese histories that cover the same years, and the whole framework of years and months is there. But not one of them contains the words Van Xuan.²³⁴⁵

Two sides looked at the same man, over the same four years, and wrote two different stories. This episode tells both, and makes clear which line belongs to whom.

The last episode stopped just before the rising. It broke out in the seventh year of the Datong era of Emperor Wu of Liang, usually converted to five hundred and forty-one.

The Chen shu and the Zizhi tongjian record it in almost the same sentence: Ly Bi joined with the bold men of several provinces, and they rose up together.³⁴

The first target was the governor of Giao Chau, Tieu Tu. The way he left the game is the strangest detail of that whole year. The Liang shu, the official history of the Liang dynasty, records it complete in a single line:

That year, Ly Bi, a native of the land of Giao Chau, attacked the governor Tieu Tu; Tu paid a bribe, and was allowed to return to Viet Chau.²

No month, no battle, no numbers of troops. A governor of the imperial court paid the man attacking him, so that he could leave.

Sima Guang’s Tongjian, from the Song dynasty, records the same thing but changes the destination: Tu bribed Bi, and fled back to Quang Chau.⁴ One says Viet Chau, the other says Quang Chau. The sources are not enough to choose between them.

The Dai Viet su ky toan thu follows the Tongjian, and also says Quang Chau. But one word changes the whole tone of the sentence: Tu learned of it, bribed the emperor, and fled back to Quang Chau.¹ The Complete Annals call Ly Bi the emperor from their very first lines on the year five forty-one, even though he would not proclaim himself emperor for another three years.

The Complete Annals go on: the emperor went out and seized the provincial citadel. Then the Complete Annals themselves add a small note: that is, Long Bien.¹ The Nguyen court’s Kham dinh Viet su thong giam cuong muc adds the month: in winter, in the twelfth month, Ly Bi of Giao Chi raised troops, drove out the Liang governor Tieu Tu, and seized and held Long Bien.⁶

If that really was the twelfth lunar month, the event may already have fallen early in five forty-two by the Western calendar. No one has yet converted the exact date, so the figure five forty-one should be read as the seventh year of Datong, and nothing more.⁶

The next year, the eighth of Datong, the Liang sent troops. Here it has to be said plainly: in the histories compared for this episode, there is no battle in which Ly Bi defeated a Liang army in the two years five forty-two and five forty-three. What the histories record instead is an order to march that led nowhere, and an army that died of disease.²⁴

The Liang shu records that in the third month, the governors of four provinces, Viet, La, An and Ai, were sent together to attack Ly Bi in Giao Chau.² Four governors. Then the Liang shu falls silent. It does not say how far they got, or how they fought.

The ending is in the Tongjian, at the close of that year. The two generals given the task were Ton Quynh and Lu Tu Hung. They asked for a delay, and gave a very specific reason: the miasma of spring is rising; we ask to wait until autumn.⁴ The request was refused, and they had to go anyway.

Then the Tongjian sets down one dry sentence:

Quynh and the others reached Hop Pho; six or seven in ten of their men died, and the army broke up and went home.⁴

Ly Bi is not in that sentence, and there is no battle in it. The army collapsed from sickness at Hop Pho. The Complete Annals copy it almost word for word, both the request to wait for autumn and the figure of six or seven dead in every ten.¹ The real enemy of this army, just as its two generals had said, was the southern spring.

The four governors in the Liang shu and the two generals in the Tongjian do not share a single name. Whether this was one campaign told in two ways, or two separate expeditions, these lines of history do not make clear.²⁴

When an army is lost, someone has to take the blame. And the man who stepped forward to point the finger was Tieu Tu himself.

The Tongjian records: Tu, the Marquis of Vu Lam, reported to the throne that Quynh and Tu Hung were in league with the rebels, and had dawdled without advancing; by edict they were ordered to die at Quang Chau.⁴

The rebels in that sentence are Ly Bi’s side. That is the name given to him in the report, as the Tongjian records it.

The compilers of the Complete Annals copy this sentence and add exactly one word: Tu falsely reported.¹ The Tongjian says only "reported". It is the Vietnamese history that turns the charge into a slander. It is easy to see why they suspected it. The man who had just bribed the other side to save himself was now accusing others of being in league with that same side. But the word "falsely" is the judgment of the Le-dynasty court historians. It is not in Sima Guang’s sentence.

The Chen shu tells the same affair from another angle: the court sent the governor of Cao Chau, Ton Quynh, and the governor of Tan Chau, Lu Tu Hung, to attack with troops; Quynh and the others did not advance in time, and both were put to death at Quang Chau.³

The Chen shu then tells what followed. Lu Tu Hung’s younger brother and his son rose in revolt and attacked Quang Chau. An official named Tran Ba Tien led three thousand picked troops, rolled up their armour, and marched at double speed to the rescue.³ The first book of the Chen shu is this man’s own annals, the man that history honours as Gaozu. And this is the step by which he walks into the story of Giao Chau.

The only victory for Ly Bi’s side that the histories record in these years was not over a Liang army. It was over a neighbouring country to the south.

The Liang shu, in the fourth month of the ninth year of Datong, that is five forty-three: The king of Lam Ap sacked Duc Chau and attacked Ly Bi; Bi’s general Pham Tu in turn defeated the king of Lam Ap at Cuu Duc; the king of Lam Ap fled in defeat.²

What is worth noticing is who records this feat: the Liang dynasty’s own history. For its own troops, the Liang shu has not set down a single result. For Ly Bi’s troops, it gives the name of the general who beat Lam Ap.

The Tongjian shortens the entry and drops the sacking of Duc Chau. The Nan shi records it as the Liang shu does, and adds a few words: beat him and put him to flight.⁴⁵

The Complete Annals change the scene: in the fourth month, the king of Lam Ap raided Nhat Nam; the emperor sent his general Pham Tu, who struck and broke him at Cuu Duc.¹ The sacking of Duc Chau disappears, and a raid on Nhat Nam takes its place; the Cuong muc also records a raid on Nhat Nam.⁶ And as in every other line of this section of the annals, Pham Tu is no longer "Bi’s general" but the emperor’s general.

Early in the tenth year of Datong, that is five forty-four, Ly Bi proclaimed himself emperor. This is where the two sides differ most, so we will go through the books one at a time.

The Liang shu: Ly Bi of Giao Chi usurped a sovereign’s title, and set up a hundred officials.² What that title was, the book does not say. But the word "usurped" already says enough about its attitude: this was something taken without right.

The Nan shi records the same idea, and adds one piece: the reign title Thien Duc.⁵

The Tongjian: Ly Bi proclaimed himself Viet De, set up a hundred officials, and changed the reign title to Thien Duc.⁴ Of the four Chinese histories compared here, this is the only one that names the title, and that title is Viet De.

The Chen shu, the history that tells the fighting in most detail, does not record the taking of a title at all. For the Chen shu, Ly Bi is from the start a native man who joined with the bold men of several provinces and rose up.³

The Vietnamese histories, though, write at far greater length. The Complete Annals: the emperor proclaimed himself Nam Viet De, took the throne, set a reign title, and set up a hundred officials; the year is marked as the year Giap Ty, the first year of Thien Duc.¹ Then come details that none of the Chinese histories compared here contain:

He named the country Van Xuan, in the hope that the state would last ten thousand generations. He built the Van Tho palace as the hall for court assemblies. He made Trieu Tuc grand tutor; Tinh Thieu and Pham Tu were both given posts as military and civil officials.¹

The Viet su luoc, a Vietnamese history compiled earlier than the Complete Annals, packs all of it into one sentence: he proclaimed himself Nam Viet De, set up a hundred officials, changed the reign title to Thien Duc, and named the country Van Xuan.⁷

The Nguyen court’s Cuong muc records the same things, Nam Viet De, Thien Duc, Van Xuan, but changes the name of the palace: he built the Van Xuan palace as the hall for court assemblies.⁶ The Complete Annals say the Van Tho palace, the Cuong muc says the Van Xuan palace. There is no textual ground for choosing between them.

So one man carries three titles. The Liang shu says only "a sovereign’s title", and does not name it. The Tongjian calls it Viet De. The Vietnamese histories, from the Viet su luoc to the Complete Annals and the Cuong muc, all call it Nam Viet De.

Set the names side by side. The Liang shu calls him a native of the land of Giao Chau. The Chen shu calls him a native man. The Tongjian calls him Ly Bi of Giao Chi. The Nan shi calls him a man of Giao Chau.²³⁴⁵ His taking of the throne is described with the word "usurped". His side, in the report the Tongjian records, is "the rebels". And the words Van Xuan appear in none of them.

The closest any Chinese book comes to those two words still has to pass through Vietnamese hands. A note in the Cuong muc quotes the Song-dynasty Thai Binh hoan vu ky: in Long Bien district there is the Van Xuan terrace, built by Ly Bi of Giao Chi in the Datong era of the Liang.⁸ That is a terrace, not the name of a country. And we know that sentence only through the Cuong muc’s quotation. It has not been checked against the original book.

The two sides differ even in how they count time. The Complete Annals count his reign from five forty-one, mark that year as his first, and record that he reigned for seven years. Yet the first year of Thien Duc is five forty-four.¹ Within the same section of the annals, two clocks run side by side: one starts from the day he took up arms, the other from the day he proclaimed himself emperor.

So the two stories do not really quarrel over what happened. Both sides record a man who rose up, a governor who fled, a Liang army that fell apart at Hop Pho, Lam Ap driven back, and a man who proclaimed himself emperor with the reign title Thien Duc. What differs is the frame. The Chinese histories see a native who usurped a title in a distant province. The Vietnamese histories see a sovereign with a name for his country, a palace, a hundred officials, and a reign counted from the day he took command of an army.¹²

The next episode: The Liang strike back, and Ly Nam De dies, 545-548.