Tran Binh Trong

In Hanoi, in Ho Chi Minh City and in many other places across the country, there are streets named Trần Bình Trọng. People read that name every day, yet the story behind it begins with a plank from a boat. It was the time of the first war against the Mongols. Emperor Trần Thái Tông had pulled his army back to hold the Thiên Mạc River. A general named Lê Tần raised that plank in a flash and held it up in front of the emperor. A plain piece of wood kept an emperor safe. More than twenty years later, in that same river country of Thiên Mạc, the general's son would stand his ground to shield two other emperors. That son was Trần Bình Trọng.

The family of Lê Tần descended from Emperor Lê Đại Hành of an earlier age. For saving the emperor, Lê Tần was granted the royal surname, the family name of the ruling house. So people also called him Lê Phụ Trần. From then on, his children and grandchildren all carried the surname Trần. The general did other great things as well. In 1259 he made a long journey as an envoy to the Mongol court. Later he became Grand General of the Navy. He was also given the task of teaching Prince Khâm, who would one day become Emperor Trần Nhân Tông.

Around that same year, 1259, a boy named Trần Bình Trọng was born. He came into the world just as the first war had ended, and the country entered years of peace. When he grew up, he became a young general of the Trần dynasty, which ruled Vietnam from 1225 to 1400. The retired emperor Trần Thái Tông even gave him his own daughter, Princess Thụy Bảo, in marriage. The young man of the Lê line was now family to the royal house.

But the peaceful years did not last forever. In the first month of 1285, the Mongol armies came a second time. They now fought for the Yuan, the Mongol dynasty then ruling China. Their commander was Thoát Hoan, who held the title Trấn Nam vương, a son of Emperor Kublai Khan. The army was enormous and advanced along three routes into Đại Việt, an old name for Vietnam. In the south, another force under Toa Đô was also striking north. At that moment the invaders were very strong, their two forces closing like the arms of a pincer from both ends.

The Trần court chose a wise way to fight. Instead of risking the whole army in one battle, it pulled back for a time to save its strength, and fought only small surprise battles. A safe retreat needed someone to stay behind and block the pursuers. Choosing that man fell to Prince Hưng Đạo and the two emperors. Prince Hưng Đạo was Trần Quốc Tuấn. The emperors were Trần Thánh Tông and Trần Nhân Tông. Together they chose Trần Bình Trọng.

The place he was given to hold was Đà Mạc, also called Thiên Mạc. It was the same river country where Emperor Trần Thái Tông had once withdrawn, after the day when the young general's father raised the boat plank to shield the emperor. The task sounded simple, yet it was immensely hard. He had to stop the Mongol army and hold it back as long as possible, so that the leaders of the resistance could get far away. His force was small, made up of soldiers of the Thánh Dực army. The other side was many times larger.

Trần Bình Trọng understood this well. He did not hope to win a great battle. He only needed to hold firm a little longer, and then a little longer again. At Đà Mạc his troops were surrounded on every side. He was badly wounded, yet he did not fall back. In the end, he was captured. But the hours he had held that ground were enough. Behind him, the two emperors and Prince Hưng Đạo had quietly withdrawn to safety, so well hidden that the Mongol army could find no trace of them.

His captors knew he was a gifted general, so they tried every way to win him over. He refused to eat. When they asked him about the affairs of his country, he stayed silent and gave no answer. They threatened him, and then made him many promises. At last they asked whether he would like to be a king in the North. That meant being made a minor king, living in wealth in a foreign land.

Trần Bình Trọng answered firmly: "I would rather be a ghost of the Southern land than stoop to be a king in the North."

The word ghost here carries nothing frightening. People of old used it for the spirit of someone who has died. Some old books record the line with ma, another word for ghost. His meaning was simple. Even if he had to stay behind forever, he wanted to belong to his homeland, rather than sit on a throne in a place that was not home. That short sentence was written into the great history of the country. Đại Việt Sử Ký Toàn Thư is the oldest complete official history of Vietnam that survives. The Vietnamese have passed the words from one person to the next for centuries.

Trần Bình Trọng never came home. He was only about 26 when he passed away. He was so young, yet his name has stayed with the land and its rivers. In sorrow, the Trần court granted him the posthumous title Bảo Nghĩa vương. That title became so familiar that many later histories simply use it in place of his real name.

The historians of later ages still remembered him. The scholar Phan Huy Chú placed him among the people of steadfast loyalty, those who kept their integrity to the very end. The scholar Phan Kế Bính also wrote verses in his praise, including these lines: "Firm and unbending in his loyal heart. His great name shines for a thousand autumns." His family line went on, and its most famous descendant was the general Trần Khát Chân.

His name is not only on streets. It was also given to many schools, where children go to class every day, and to many cultural and historical sites.

Behind the name Trần Bình Trọng is the boat plank a father once raised to shield an emperor. Behind it, too, is the 26-year-old son who stayed to hold the river country of Thiên Mạc, and so became a shield for a whole country himself. Today the name rests quietly in the sun on the blue signs at street corners, watching the crowds go by each day.