Person
Ly Phat Tu
By the Complete Annals, a general of Ly Nam De's clan who defeated Trieu Viet Vuong in 571 and reigned for 32 years, called by the history the Later Ly Nam De; by the Sui shu, merely a chieftain in Giao Chau who rose in 602 and was put down by Luu Phuong.
At a glance
- Also known as
- The history calls him Hau Ly Nam De, the Later Ly Nam De1
- Dates
- By the Complete Annals he reigned 32 years, from the year Tan Mao 571 to the year Nham Tuat 602; in the Sui shu he appears only around the rising of 60223
- Role
- By the Complete Annals, a king, with his capital first at O Dien and later at Phong Chau; by the Sui shu, merely a chieftain in Giao Chau — a local leader the court had the right to summon to its presence13
- Family
- By the Complete Annals, a general of Ly Nam De's clan; went into Cuu Chan with Ly Thien Bao, and was raised up in his place when Thien Bao died without a son in 555; his son was Nha Lang, who asked for the hand of Cao Nuong, daughter of Trieu Viet Vuong, and came to live as a son-in-law45
- End
- Put down by Luu Phuong in 602: the biography of Luu Phuong in the Sui shu says he took fright and surrendered, and was sent to the capital; the biography of Lenh Ho Hy, in that same Sui shu, says he was captured. The Tongjian and the Complete Annals follow surrendered; the Complete Annals add that he went back north and died, and that the people built him a temple at the Tieu Nha estuary. No Chinese history we have opened records that he died6372
- Earliest record
- The Viet su luoc, an earlier Vietnamese history, has no annal of the Later Ly Nam De; it mentions him only in its section on those who governed the land, under the name of Luu Phuong, and writes his surname as Nguyen to avoid the character Ly8
Life
The old chronicles say
Vietnamese and Chinese histories keep two very different files on the same man. By the Complete Annals, Ly Phat Tu reigned for thirty-two years, with his capital first at O Dien and later at Phong Chau; the history calls him the Later Ly Nam De. In the Sui shu, the official history of the dynasty that put him down, Ly Phat Tu appears around a single event, the rising of 602, and there he is no emperor but a chieftain — a local leader the court had the right to summon to its presence. The Chinese histories we have opened know nothing of Dao Lang Vuong, Trieu Viet Vuong or Nha Lang, and the sources give no ground for choosing between the two files.13
The Complete Annals tell it this way: when Ly Bi took refuge in the Khuat Lao grotto, Phat Tu, a general of the same clan, and Ly Thien Bao led thirty thousand people into Cuu Chan; Thien Bao founded the kingdom of Da Nang and died in 555 with no son to succeed him, and they all raised Phat Tu up in his place. In 557 he fought Trieu Viet Vuong, and five times they met in battle with neither side winning; his army was the smaller, and he suspected the king had some magic, so he asked for peace, was given the west of the country, and moved to the citadel of O Dien. His son Nha Lang asked for the hand of Cao Nuong, daughter of Trieu Viet Vuong, and came to live as a son-in-law; in 570, when his wife secretly showed him the helmet with the dragon claw, Nha Lang quietly worked out a way to swap the claw, then went home and planned with his father to fall on the king by surprise and take the country. The compiler’s note says that the old histories do not record Trieu Viet Vuong or Dao Lang Vuong, and that these were filled in from unofficial histories and other books.49510
Directly beneath his name at the head of the annal of the Later Ly Nam De, the Complete Annals set a judgement in small characters: he used deceit to swallow a country, and at the first wind of the enemy he surrendered — from first to last, nothing he did was righteous. Ngo Si Lien sets two measures side by side: by the art of the hegemon, the Later Nam De's attack on Trieu Viet Vuong was a winning plan; by the way of the true king, it falls below dogs and pigs. And he weighs gain against loss: he did win the country, but Nha Lang died first, and he himself in the end could not escape being taken prisoner.111
By the biography of Lenh Ho Hy in the Sui shu, before 602 he was a chieftain in Giao Chau whom the governor-general of Que Chau, on imperial order, summoned to court. The biography of Luu Phuong records: in the middle of the Renshou era, Ly Phat Tu, a man of the Li people in Giao Chau, rose in revolt and seized the old citadel of Viet Vuong; Luu Phuong, closing in on him, sent a man ahead to win him over by setting out what he stood to lose and gain, and Phat Tu took fright and surrendered, and was sent to the capital. Yet the biography of Lenh Ho Hy, in that same Sui shu, says he was captured. The Tongjian and the Complete Annals follow surrendered; the Complete Annals also write that he went back north and died, and that the people built a temple to him at the Tieu Nha estuary, facing the temple of Trieu Viet Vuong.3672
How later ages remembered
The Viet su luoc, an earlier Vietnamese history, has no Dao Lang Vuong, no Nha Lang, and no annal of the Later Ly Nam De; it mentions him in its section on those who governed the land, under the name of Luu Phuong, as a chief of the province who rebelled and then took fright and asked to surrender, and it writes his surname as Nguyen, to avoid the character Ly. Four hundred years after the Complete Annals, the Cuong muc retold the story and set a critical note directly beneath it: the tale of the dragon claw and Nha Lang, set beside the story of An Duong Vuong of Thuc and Trong Thuy of the Trieu, is as if cast from a single mould — absurd and not to be believed, and not worth refuting. And yet within the Complete Annals itself, the people had already built him a temple at the Tieu Nha estuary, facing the temple of Trieu Viet Vuong.8122
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