![]()
1 Cường Ɖể’s ancestry
The imperial Nguyễn dynasty and French colonialism
We are sometimes weak, sometimes strong
But never lacking in heroes!
The country ‘Việt Nam’ or ‘Ɖại Nam’
Vietnam has land frontiers with China, Laos and Cambodia. The Long Mountains (Trừỏng Sỏn) curve along the backbone of Vietnam in the west, separating it from Laos, while the South China Sea adorns its long coastline to the east. Such a vast frontier historically enabled a great amount of cross-border commercial, political and military contact. Today Vietnam occupies a land area of 329,566 square kilometres with 3,290 kilometres of coastline. There are 769 surnames but Nguyễn is the biggest group.1
Vietnam’s early and recorded history was much influenced by the central kingdom. That it was known as Annam, a derivation from the Chinese ‘An nan’ (pacified south) illustrates the level of Chinese influence on it. Close connections exist between Vietnam and China and particularly with China’s two southern provinces, Kwangtung and Kwangsi, dating back to the beginning of Vietnamese settlement in the Red River delta around 207 BC. 2 This occurred when a Ch’in General, Chao T’o, conquered and then incorporated it with the two Chinese provinces under his care to create the independent kingdom Nan Yeuh (Nam Việt in Vietnamese), with its capital based in the area of modern-day Canton. In 111 BC this kingdom was annexed by the Han Empire and governed as a Chinese colony, known as Giao Chi (Giao Châu from AD 203). It remained in China’s orbit until AD 939. During the 1,000 years of Chinese rule, there was a series of Vietnamese uprisings, which were mostly crushed. However, the successful battle at Bạch Ɖằng led by general Ngô Quyền in 938 finally allowed an independent state to emerge, covering the northern central area of modern-day Vietnam.3
From the mid-tenth century onwards, successive Vietnamese kings maintained the Chinese system of administration, statecraft, Confucian traditions and Chinese language, allowing Vietnam4 to become ‘the spearhead of Chinese cultural influence in Southeast Asia’.5 The Chinese attempted to retake Vietnam under the Ming rulership in the mid-fifteenth century, which was strenuously resisted by Lê Lợi (r.1428–33) with the help of Nguyễn Trải, a brilliant strategist and intellectual. Despite this successful resistance, Vietnam entered a tributary relationship with China in recognition of its sovereignty and superiority. This situation remained the norm until 1885, when France gained full control of Vietnam, having coerced China into surrendering sovereignty over its tributary.6
The Vietnamese southern migration (Nam tiến) altered Vietnamese history altogether. This relentless move south was prompted not only by a dream of expansion, but also by the need to completely conquer the once powerful Champa, who were defeated in 1470–1 during the rule of Great King Lê Thánh Tông.7 The Champa occupied the central part of the land and had earlier raided Vietnamese territory, fuelling the urgency of the southern migration. At one stage the Trần entered a marriage of convenience with the Champa kingdom, by giving Princess Huyền Trân to the Champa king in return for two provinces, Thuận Châu and Hoá Châu (1306–7). Then through politics and conquest the territory slowly expanded, incorporating land for development and also for political refuge in the years ahead. It was Nguyễn Hoàng (1525–1613) of the Nguyễn clan who, in 1558, began the southward movement, with an entourage of about 1000 men to avoid possible clashs with the Trịnh. This historic move eventually opened up the southern territory for the Nguyễn or the Nguyễn Phúc.8
From the seventeenth to the eighteenth century the country was politically divided into two parts (then known as Ɖàng Ngoài and Ɖàng Trong) along the River Giang near Ɖồng Hới. This is much the same border that divided Vietnam following the Geneva Agreement in 1954. Two ruling lords dominated the divisions: the Trịnh in the north and the Nguyễn in the south. The elongated character of the country, with a thick mountain range running through the middle, helped to sharpen the Trịnh and Nguyễn division. The period from 1620 to 1674 was dominated by civil war, where neither side could claim victory. This episode was intriguing due to the existence in the north of the Lê dynasty (1428-1789), originally founded by Lê Lợi.9 However, the central control of the late Lê emperors was ineffective and difficult to preserve, due partly to geography and partly to the political environment of the time. Thus the Nguyễn lords steadily extended their stronghold in the south. By 1691 the Cambodian court recognised Vietnamese sovereignty over the areas of Saigon and Biên Hoà. Two years later the Nguyễn were confident enough to adopt the title ‘Master of the State’. In 1744 Nguyễn Phủớc Khoát even took on the title ‘Celestial King’. To further distance himself from the north, he even ‘ordered a dynastic seal to be made, changed people’s costumes, encouraged local dialects, adopting local expressions and indigenous words’.10
Early contact between Vietnam and the West began when the lords on both sides of the country welcomed the support of the foreigners and their weapons in their continuing battle with each other. The Portuguese traded with the north from about 1541. They also became successful in the south, setting up bonded warehouses to attract more merchants in Faifo and building a foundry for the Nguyễn lords. Other Western traders from Holland, Spain and England followed suit. Consequently, the Trịnh lords traded more with the Dutch, who were allowed to establish a commercial centre in 1637 to compete with the Portuguese. Traders often came and went, however the Jesuit missionaries who followed succeeded in setting up a mission. Already in 1615 the Macau-based Council of Bishops of Portuguese Missions in the Far East sent its missionaries to establish a mission in Hội An. The majority of missionaries were Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, but it was the Frenchman Father Alexandre de Rhodes (1591–1660) who left a lasting impact. Upon his arrival in Ɖàng Trong (1624) he conducted some important evangelical work, but his main achievement was the initial creation of a romanised system for the Vietnamese language that was to become the national language (Quốc Ngữ).11 More ominously, he was able to describe the wealth of Vietnam, including the goldmines, silk and spices of the land, in many of his books, whetting the French appetite for further evangelical and mercantile activities in the region. By 1664 the French Society of Foreign Mission and the French East India Company had come into existence, marking the success of French efforts to combine missionary work and trade in Vietnam.
A papal ban at the end of the seventeenth century on missionaries participating in trade moderated French activity in Vietnam. However, this did not stop the direct involvement of the French in Vietnamese politics. French influence increased into the late eighteenth century, particularly under French Jesuit Pierre Pigneau, commonly known as Pigneau de Béhaine after his birthplace or Bishop d’Adran.12 Nguyễn Ánh (Nguyễn Phúc Ánh) was the person who opened the door of opportunity to Bishop d’Adran, allowing the latter to succeed in interfering with the politics of the southern domain. Nguyễn Ánh was born in 1762 to Prince Nguyễn Phúc Côn and Nguyễn thị Hoàng. At the age of thirteen he followed Lord Nguyễn Phúc Thuần to refuge in Quảng Nam when their capital, Phú Xuân (today Huế) fell to the Trịnh lords. From here the Nguyễn moved further south to Gia Ɖịnh to re-establish themselves, during which time the young and bright Nguyễn Ánh proved himself a most able military man. In fact he became the only survivor of the Nguyễn lords in the debris of the Tây Sỏn onslaught which soon swept the south.
Nguyễn Ánh’s encounter with the French
In contrast to the Portuguese and the Dutch who had direct commercial dealings with Vietnam from the sixteenth century, the French, besides their early missionary work, were latecomers to the Far East, a region of vital commercial potential. Their entry was part of the nineteenth-century Western imperialist expansion. The French followed in the footsteps of other Westerners, roaming the South China Sea in search of potential commercial ventures. The Jesuit missionaries followed suit, frequenting various Asian lands. They made many converts, but were thus seen as a threat to these Asian nations, resulting in their expulsion.
In Vietnam, Nguyễn Ánh’s personal encounter with the French, significantly with Bishop d’Adran, was indirectly linked to a successful peasant revolt led by three brothers, known as the Tây Sỏn, in 1777. It brought the collapse of Nguyễn dynasty in Ɖàng Trong (Cochinchina) and the fall of its stronghold, Saigon. Nguyễn Ánh miraculously survived the Tây Sỏn onslaught by escaping to Hà Tiên. Ten years later the Tây Sỏn triumphantly conquered Tonkin, leaving them in a position to rule the entire country. The Tây Sỏn placed various bans on Christianity in order to curb its spread during their rule (1788-1801). The south proved less hostile to Christian religion, as prior to the Tây Sỏn’s onslaught the Nguyễn already lifted a ban against Christianity. Thus some of the foreign evangelical missions survived and their priests made some more converts.
Pigneau de Béhaine, known in Vietnamese as Monseigneur de Béhaine (Bá Ɖa Lộc), was in the right place at the right time. He could run his seminary in Hà Tiên with a dozen students. Later, he was reliant on the benevolence and needs of young Nguyễn Ánh, known then as Nguyễn Vủỏng (Nguyễn King),13 whose resistance against the Tây Sỏn stumbled during the 1780s. Nguyễn Ánh was forced to take refuge first in Siam, and then back and forth between two of the swampiest islets of the Mekong Delta, Phú Quốc and Hà Tiên. Nguyễn Ánh took refuge together with his associates, soldiers and family, including his mother. It was in this dire situation that a relationship with the French missionary was developed.
Nguyễn Ánh encountered the Bishop d’Adran for the first time on Hà Tiên in 1782, when the former briefly hid in a forest near the latter’s seminary. Accounts say that every day the Bishop brought out food and drink for Nguyễn Ánh.14 At some point he helped the latter to get to a little island in the Gulf of Siam. The French bishop met Nguyễn Ánh twice more after 1782 for preliminary discussions involving French assistance: first in the middle of January 1784 when Nguyễn Ánh was at sea and the Bishop was asked to stay at sea too, for half a month and second in December 1784. It is assumed that the Bishop encouraged Nguyễn Ánh to firmly seek French help, as the latter’s predicament at that time situation was indeed precarious.15 In fact he had been taking refuge virtually since the capture of Saigon by the Tây Sỏn (1777), which resulted in the death of three members of the dynastic family. In addition, the misbehaviour of the Siamese whom he had deployed, made him reconsider the wisdom of enlisting their support in his struggle to regain the lost territory. Given his circumstances he needed all the outside help he could get to battle the Tây Sỏn and hence agreed to send the Bishop to France to solicit the help of King Louis XVI. Earlier Nguyễn Ánh thought about calling for assistance from the Dutch in Batavia, the British in India and even the Portuguese, but the Bishop dismissed this suggestion outright. In his desire to know how serious Nguyễn Ánh was in seeking French assistance, the Bishop asked how could he know it. Nguyễn Ánh’s reply was that he could use young Prince Cảnh to accompany the Bishop to France, to carry the letter of credit and the royal seal. This began a new chapter in the Franco-Vietnamese relations, becoming a curse for the Nguyễn dynasty and, in time, for Prince Cường Ɖể also, a direct descendant of Crown Prince Cảnh a hundred years later.
In 1785 Bishop Pigneau de Béhaine embarked for France, accompanied by Prince Cảnh and a small entourage of a dozen others. They made a short stop at Malacca and then Pondicherry (1785), where the Bishop began to perform his task. He and Prince Cảnh did not arrive in France until February 1787. The French government was unable to respond generously to the Bishop’s request due to its deep financial troubles and growing popular unrest. But it was Prince Cảnh who stole the show due to his exotic appearance and circumstance. The Queen’s court adored him, dressing him up and having his portrait painted. One painting of Prince Cảnh taken during his time in Paris became an heirloom for Cường Ɖể years later.
One of Pigneau’s letters to the court regarding assistance to Nguyễn Vủỏng was most revealing, as it confirmed the Bishop’s wider agenda. Besides his desire for a great French empire in Cochinchina, the Bishop planned to anchor the young crown prince with fundamental French values, especially through a Christian education. Pigneau’s letter read in part:
Figure 1.1 Crown Prince Cảnh.
here, once again we met the King of Ɖàng Trong. He told us the reasons of his escape to Siam, in particular explaining the two-faced nature of the Siamese. They used the excuse of helping him to regain the throne to exploit the situation in his name to rob the people. It was at this time the King entrusted me to look after his six-year-old eldest son whom I am taking with me now … Then we, having passed through the gulf of Siam, got to Malaque on 19 December [1784].16
The end of his letter clearly indicated his request for assistance from the French authorities for the education of the young prince under his care:
I wish regardless of the outcome of the situation, to provide a Christian education to the young Prince to replace the earthly crown he just lost and … this new and replaced crown will be much better, long lasting. It is only you, sir, who can assist me to look after him and to avoid the world pollution. If later his father turns to the Dutch for help, so assisting this young Prince now as you can see, is not at all a wasteful exercise.
One should note that in this important letter, Pigneau made no reference to the plea from Nguyễn Ánh that he request French assistance from the King. He also raised the possibility that Nguyễn Ánh may seek help from the Dutch in the future.
Doubt has been raised as to whether Nguyễn Ánh did in fact give the National Seal (Quốc Ấn) to the Bishop as credible proof of his request. It has been argued that the seal in question was another kind of seal, not the National Seal.17 The reasoning behind this argument is that it would have been impossible for Nguyễn Ánh to rally his people to fight against the Tây Sỏn (1785–9) without the National Seal.18
A formal treaty was signed on 28 November 1787 at Versailles between Count de Montmorin, representing King Louis XVI and Bishop d’Adran, representing Nguyễn Ánh, Lord of Nam Kỳ. According to the terms of the treaty, the French would send two frigates and a detachment of 1650 men to aid Nguyễn Ánh. In return, the King would cede to France suzerainty of Tourane (Hội An) and the island of Poulo Condore, incorporating full commercial rights. Maybon has noted an anomaly with regard to the date of the draft agreement, as only a French translation of the treaty was found. Missing are the original document in Chinese and a document approved by the Royal Household Committee recording this important treaty. It has been suggested that the agreement was only drafted in 1787, before the negotiation took place.19 The Bishop and Prince Cảnh decid...
