Before "Chinese" and "Vietnamese" in the Red River Plain: The Han–Tang Period

Abstract

The identification of people as Chinese and Vietnamese in Vietnam, that has caused much suffering in the last half-century, has been projected back into distant pasts where it does not belong. Almost all historians of the Han–Tang period in the Red River Delta use modern ideas of “Chinese” and “Vietnamese” ethnicity to discuss this era, contrasting “Chinese” invaders with indigenous “Vietnamese”. Using textual analysis and historical linguistics, this essay argues that no Han–Tang period texts recognise these ethnic divisions, meaning these terms cannot accurately reflect social divisions of the period. Furthermore, none of the national ethnonyms Vietnamese historians claim as their own (like Việt and Lạc) referred exclusively to Red River Delta people. Where Chinese are concerned, the article explores how the equally problematic term “Chinese” became applicable to northern migrants, and when it became a useful analytical category of ethnicity in early Vietnamese experience.