Emperor Le Thai To

From the foot of Lam Sơn mountain to the bank of the Red River, across from the citadel of Đông Quan, the road was not measured in miles. It was measured in years. Lê Lợi traveled it in ten. He was born in 1385, a son of that same Lam Sơn country in Thanh Hóa. For generations, his family had served as military chiefs of the region. Later generations called him the hero in plain cloth.

The Ming were the dynasty then ruling China. Since 1407, they had occupied Đại Việt, an old name for Vietnam. The people lived through great hardship. In 1416, Lê Lợi and eighteen close friends swore an oath at Lũng Nhai. It was a rugged, easily defended spot in the Lam Sơn forests. Nineteen people, one promise.

Two years later, on the second day of the first lunar month of Mậu Tuất, the year 1418, the forests were still wet with spring mist. That day, Lê Lợi raised the flag of the uprising at Lam Sơn. He took the title Bình Định Vương and sent a proclamation far and wide, calling all to unite. His early force was tiny, the other side numerous and strong.

The first years were the hardest. Once, the Lam Sơn forces were tightly surrounded. Lê Lai was one of the men who had sworn the oath at Lũng Nhai. He dressed as the commander, with full ceremonial regalia. Then he charged out with 500 soldiers and two war elephants, shouting that he himself was the Lord of Lam Sơn. Lê Lai did not come back. Believing they had caught the leader, the Ming troops pulled back to the citadel of Tây Đô. Lê Lợi and his army slipped out of the trap. Later, Lê Lợi left one instruction. After his death, offerings to Lê Lai were to be made one day before his own death anniversary.

At times they had to make a truce and fall back to Lam Sơn to rebuild. Then, in 1424, Lê Lợi gathered his generals and asked where they should go to carry on the work for the country. It was a very hard question. General Nguyễn Chích stood up. He had traveled in the Nghệ region before. Nghệ An, he said, was rugged and easy to defend, with wide lands and many people. They should hold it as a foothold. Lê Lợi and the generals agreed.

From then on, the road turned south. The Lam Sơn forces made a surprise attack on the outpost of Đa Căng. Then they laid ambushes at the passes of Khả Lưu and Bồ Ải. These lay on the road to the citadel of Trà Lân. Trà Lân was besieged for two months. No relief came. In the end, the commander of the citadel opened the gates and asked to surrender. His name was Cầm Bành. A wide area in the west of Nghệ An was freed. People of the Nghệ region rallied eagerly, and leaders such as Cầm Quý joined. The army freed Diễn Châu and turned back to Thanh Hóa. Then it pushed on as far as Tân Bình and Thuận Hóa.

Lê Lợi had a way of fighting all his own. He held that attacking a citadel was the poorest choice. His army would surround a citadel tightly, then strike the columns that marched to rescue it. This was called besieging the citadel to destroy the relief columns. They used ambushes, the few against the many, the weak against the strong. By 1426, the small band of the early days had become a large army, advancing north in several wings.

From November 5 to November 7 that year, the Ming army suffered a heavy defeat at Tốt Động and Chúc Động. It was led by the general Vương Thông. Late that year, Lê Lợi set up his headquarters at the Bồ Đề landing, on the north bank of the Red River. With him was Nguyễn Trãi, a scholar and statesman of the 15th century. From there they faced the citadel of Đông Quan on the south bank, and besieged it. Even during the siege, Lê Lợi held a special examination, and 32 candidates passed. Across the river stood the walls of the other side. On this side, inside the camp, men sat writing their examination papers with careful strokes.

Late in 1427, Ming relief armies came south to save Đông Quan. They were stopped and broken at Chi Lăng, then at Xương Giang. By then the Ming held only three citadels. One was Đông Quan itself. The other two were Cổ Lộng and Tây Đô. Inside Đông Quan, Vương Thông knew that no one else would come.

On December 10, 1427, south of the citadel of Đông Quan, on the bank of the Red River, two delegations met. Lê Lợi led his own side, and Vương Thông led the Ming side. The Ming general pledged to take all his troops home. Lê Lợi guaranteed that the Ming soldiers would go home alive. Then the Lam Sơn side did something long remembered. They gave the departing army 500 boats, several thousand horses and food for the road. On December 29, the Ming troops began to leave. On January 3, 1428, the last of the troops under Vương Thông set off. Ten years of uprising came to a close with boats leaving the landing, one after another.

The fifteenth day of the fourth lunar month of the year Mậu Thân fell on April 29, 1428. On that day, in the Kính Thiên Hall at the heart of the city, Lê Lợi took the throne as Emperor. He named his reign Thuận Thiên and restored the country's old name, Đại Việt. He made his capital at Đông Đô, that is, Thăng Long, the city now called Hanoi. The citadel he had once besieged was now his capital. In later years he was honored as Lê Thái Tổ. He founded the Later Lê dynasty, one of the longest dynasties in the history of Vietnam. People commonly call its first period the Lê sơ, the early Lê.

In 1429, the court held the Minh Kinh examination. In 1433, the emperor himself set the questions for the policy essay. That same year, after five years on the throne, Lê Thái Tổ died. He was buried at Vĩnh Lăng, in his native Lam Sơn. The ten-year road had run from the foot of the mountain to the bank of the Red River. In the end, it circled back to the foot of that same mountain.

The people of Lam Sơn still keep his wish. The first stick of incense is lit for the friend who put on the commander's robes and charged into the encirclement. Only then comes the incense for the hero in plain cloth, while the morning mist still hangs over the hills and forests of Lam Sơn.