Emperor Le Anh Tong

A man lives quietly in the countryside of Thanh Hóa. His feet are caked with mud and his house is plain. Hardly anyone suspects that the blood of a royal family runs in him. Then one morning people come to his door, escort him away, and place on his shoulders the weight of a whole royal line. He is Emperor Lê Anh Tông, and this is the quiet story of how he began to rebuild his family's inheritance.

What is unusual is the line of descent. Lê Lợi founded the Lê dynasty, one of the great royal lines of Vietnam. Yet this time the throne did not go to the direct descendants of Lê Lợi. It went to a more distant branch. The man's personal name was Lê Duy Bang. He was descended, many generations back, from Lê Trừ, the older brother of Lê Lợi. A branch that seemed to have settled quietly in the countryside was suddenly called home to carry a heavy duty.

The reason lay in the year 1556. Emperor Lê Trung Tông died without a son to follow him. The whole royal line stood before an empty space. The Grand Preceptor Trịnh Kiểm and the high officials went searching everywhere. They hoped to find a descendant of the Lê family who could join the royal thread again. And they found Lê Duy Bang.

Here was a man living an ordinary life, suddenly sought out by great officials who invited him to be made king. He had just turned 25, an age when many people are still building their own lives. Now the whole royal line was his to carry, and it was heavy. They brought him back, and he became Emperor Lê Anh Tông. It was a very quiet welcome, yet it joined a thread that had seemed lost for good.

But being king in those days did not mean sitting in a splendid capital. The old capital of his forebears lay far away in the north. This was Thăng Long, the city now called Hanoi. The emperor and his commanders made their base in the Thanh Hóa region. From there they held the land stretching south. The north, including Thăng Long, was then held by the Mạc dynasty.

Thanh Hóa was no makeshift place of shelter. It was the homeland of the Lê family, where the emperor's ancestors had first risen to build their power. So to withdraw to Thanh Hóa was not to give in. It was more like returning to their own cradle, to gather strength and build again. That old home ground held the young royal line the way a cradle holds a newborn child.

From the cradle of Thanh Hóa, under the command of Trịnh Kiểm, the Lê army patiently moved forward in stages. They were in no hurry and made no noise. Little by little they won back land, from Thanh Hóa out toward the plains beyond. Each step brought them a little closer to the old capital, where the roof of their ancestors was waiting.

Through those long years, one can picture the soldiers lifting their eyes each evening toward the distant north. There lay a capital that even they had never seen. From 1556 to 1570, Emperor Lê Anh Tông and his commanders kept on this way, steady and patient. They turned their whole hearts toward the place where their forebears had reigned, like a traveler far from home who keeps looking back at the old roof.

Emperor Lê Anh Tông reigned for about 16 or 17 years. What he left in that time was not famous battles but a firm foundation. With his commanders he kept the Lê royal line standing on the land of Thanh Hóa. He laid the first bricks of the road back to Thăng Long that came later. His descendants would build on that foundation in their turn.

Thanh Hóa was the cradle of a royal line working hard to stand up again. Year after year a quiet army kept its face turned toward the distant north, where an old capital lay. They had not yet arrived, but their hearts were already set there. The roof of their ancestors still stood, waiting for a day of reunion.