Thang Long Imperial Citadel

In 1010, an emperor stood on his boat and looked toward the shore. Before him lay the citadel of Đại La. It had long been the seat of officials from the north, during more than 300 years of Chinese rule. That emperor was Lý Thái Tổ, and he had decided to move his capital from Hoa Lư to this place. Legend says that as the royal boat lay moored below the citadel, a golden dragon appeared above it. The emperor took it as a good omen. He renamed the citadel Thăng Long, the city now called Hanoi. The name means Rising Dragon.

With that decision, this ground became the center of power of Đại Việt, an old name for Vietnam. It kept that role for nearly 800 years. Those were not 800 unbroken years. There were breaks, and there were dynasties that lost the city and took it back. But on the whole, this stayed the seat of power, the place where the country's biggest decisions were made. That lasted until the early 19th century, when the capital moved to Hue under the Nguyễn dynasty, Vietnam's last royal dynasty.

Today the Imperial Citadel of Thăng Long lies in the Ba Đình area of central Hanoi. It stretches from Hoàng Diệu Street on the west to Nguyễn Tri Phương Street on the east. The core of the heritage zone covers more than 18 hectares. UNESCO inscribed the site as World Cultural Heritage on July 31, 2010. The listing came just as Hanoi was preparing to celebrate 1,000 years of Thăng Long.

To earn that place, the site was judged on three criteria. The first is that it shows a meeting of two cultural currents, one from the north and one from the south. Chinese influence came down from the north, and Champa influence came up from the south. Together they shaped the distinct identity of the Việt people in the Red River Delta. The second is that the site is evidence of a long cultural tradition, almost unbroken from the 7th century to the present day. The third is that it is directly linked to many important historical and cultural events, which together trace how an independent nation took shape and grew.

Visitors who come in from Hoàng Diệu Street meet Đoan Môn first. This is the south gate of the Forbidden City, the innermost of the three rings of walls that Lý Thái Tổ laid out. The gate as it looks today, with its five arched passages, is the result of many rounds of repair, from the Lê era to the Nguyễn era. But beneath Đoan Môn, in the excavation pits just behind it, researchers have found brick-paved paths and building foundations from many ages. Some come from the Lý and the Trần dynasties. Others come from the Lê. They all lie one on top of another, like the pages of a history book buried deep in the earth.

Farther north lies the most important area of all, the foundation of Kính Thiên Hall. This was the heart of power for the emperors of the Lê dynasty. Emperor Lê Thái Tổ had the hall built in 1428. He had just freed the country by defeating the armies of the Ming, the dynasty then ruling China. For centuries after that, the Lê emperors held court in this very hall. Here they issued their edicts and received envoys from many lands.

The hall itself is gone. The French tore it down in 1886 to build an artillery headquarters. What remains today is the raised foundation, along with a pair of 15th-century stone dragons on the steps. Each dragon is more than 5 meters long, carved from a single block of stone. Dragons from the early years of the Lê dynasty have five claws, a symbol of the emperor's absolute power. Specialists regard the pair as a masterpiece of 15th-century Vietnamese stone carving. The two dragons have been recognized as a National Treasure.

Behind the hall's foundation stand House D67 and the D67 bunker. They are the newest structures on the whole site, built in 1967. But that does not make them any less important. In House D67, the Politburo, the Central Military Commission and the High Command met and made the biggest decisions of the war with the United States. Many key meetings were held here from September 1968 until April 30, 1975. Among them were the meetings on the plan for the General Offensive and Uprising of spring 1975, which reached its peak in the Hồ Chí Minh Campaign. Beneath the floor lies the D67 bunker. It was built solidly to withstand bombs, and it has thick steel doors. The space is narrow, but it holds a whole chapter of history.

Still farther north is Hậu Lâu, the Rear Tower. People also know it by a folk name, Lầu Công chúa, the Princess Tower. The present building dates from the Nguyễn era. At the end of the walk is Cửa Bắc, the North Gate. It is the only gate of the Nguyễn-era citadel of Hanoi that still stands. The French tore down all the others in the late 19th century to build Western-style streets. The North Gate itself was built in 1805, under Emperor Gia Long, the founder of the Nguyễn dynasty.

On the outer face of the gate wall are two round dents. They are the marks of two cannon shells fired by French warships from the Red River on April 25, 1882. The shelling came in the second attack on the Hanoi citadel. After the citadel fell, Governor Hoàng Diệu took his own life out of loyalty. Inside the watchtower on top of Cửa Bắc is an altar to two officials who defended the citadel. One is Nguyễn Tri Phương, the imperial commissioner, who gave his life during the first French attack on the citadel, in 1873. The other is Governor Hoàng Diệu.

Across the street lies the archaeological site at 18 Hoàng Diệu. It covers more than 4 hectares, and excavation began there in December 2002. Archaeologists have found cultural layers stacked over nearly 1,300 years. The oldest dates from the late 7th century, when the Tang ruled the region as the Protectorate of Annam. Above it lie the Đinh and the Former Lê. Then come the Lý and the Trần. The Lê follow, and finally the Nguyễn. Among the finds is pottery imported from China, Japan and West Asia. It is physical proof that Thăng Long was not only a political capital but also a center of international trade.

These stacked layers are the main reason UNESCO inscribed the site in 2010. The honor was not for one beautiful building, or for a single historical event. It was for a whole continuous flow of history, buried deep in the ground and found piece by piece. Together, those pieces are evidence of nearly 13 centuries of a civilization.

The Imperial Citadel of Thăng Long is not a relic of the past. It is a place where history is still being dug up, layer by layer, roof tile by roof tile, shard by shard. Anyone who sets foot here is standing, quite literally, on 1,000 years of history.