The Sa Huỳnh culture was a culture in modern-day central and southern
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making ...
that flourished between 1000 BC and 200 AD. Archaeological sites from the culture have been discovered from the
Mekong Delta
The Mekong Delta ( vi, Đồng bằng Sông Cửu Long, lit=Nine Dragon River Delta or simply vi, Đồng Bằng Sông Mê Kông, lit=Mekong River Delta, label=none), also known as the Western Region ( vi, Miền Tây, links=no) or South-weste ...
to Quang Binh province in central Vietnam. The Sa Huynh people were most likely the predecessors of the
Cham people
The Cham (Cham: ''Čaṃ'') or Champa people (Cham: , ''Urang Campa''; vi, Người Chăm or ; km, ជនជាតិចាម, ) are an Austronesian ethnic group. From the 2nd century to 1832 the Cham populated Champa, a contiguous territor ...
, an
Austronesian-speaking people and the founders of the kingdom of
Champa
Champa ( Cham: ꨌꩌꨛꨩ; km, ចាម្ប៉ា; vi, Chiêm Thành or ) were a collection of independent Cham polities that extended across the coast of what is contemporary central and southern Vietnam from approximately the 2nd ...
.
[Higham, C., 2014, Early Mainland Southeast Asia, Bangkok: River Books Co., Ltd., ]
Description
The site at Sa Huỳnh was discovered in 1909. Sa Huỳnh sites were rich in locally worked iron artefacts, typified by axes, swords, spearheads, knives and
sickle
A sickle, bagging hook, reaping-hook or grasshook is a single-handed agricultural tool designed with variously curved blades and typically used for harvesting, or reaping, grain crops or cutting Succulent plant, succulent forage chiefly for feed ...
s. In contrast,
bronze
Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids suc ...
artifacts were dominant in the
Đông Sơn culture sites found in northern Vietnam and elsewhere in mainland Southeast Asia.
The Sa Huỳnh culture
cremated
Cremation is a method of final disposition of a dead body through burning.
Cremation may serve as a funeral or post-funeral rite and as an alternative to burial. In some countries, including India and Nepal, cremation on an open-air pyre ...
adults and buried them in jars covered with lids, a practice unique to the culture. Ritually broken offerings usually accompanied the jar burials. The culture is also typified by its unique ear
ornaments
An ornament is something used for decoration.
Ornament may also refer to:
Decoration
* Ornament (art), any purely decorative element in architecture and the decorative arts
*Biological ornament, a characteristic of animals that appear to serve o ...
featuring
two-headed animals, believed by some to depict
saola
The saola (''Pseudoryx nghetinhensis''), also called spindlehorn, Asian unicorn, or infrequently, Vu Quang bovid, is one of the world's rarest large mammals, a forest-dwelling bovine native to the Annamite Range in Vietnam and Laos. It was descr ...
. The ornaments were commonly made from
jade
Jade is a mineral used as jewellery or for ornaments. It is typically green, although may be yellow or white. Jade can refer to either of two different silicate minerals: nephrite (a silicate of calcium and magnesium in the amphibole group ...
(
nephrite), but also made from
glass
Glass is a non- crystalline, often transparent, amorphous solid that has widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in, for example, window panes, tableware, and optics. Glass is most often formed by rapid cooling (quenchin ...
.
Bead
A bead is a small, decorative object that is formed in a variety of shapes and sizes of a material such as stone, bone, shell, glass, plastic, wood, or pearl and with a small hole for threading or stringing. Beads range in size from under ...
ornaments were also commonly found in Sa Huynh burials, most commonly made from glass.
Trade network
The Sa Huỳnh culture showed evidence of an extensive trade network that existed between 500 BC to AD 1500, known as the Sa Huynh-Kalanay Interaction Sphere (named after the Sa Huỳnh culture and the
Kalanay Cave of
Masbate
Masbate, officially the Province of Masbate ( Masbateño: ''Probinsya san Masbate''; tl, Lalawigan ng Masbate), is an island province in the Philippines located near the midsection of the nation's archipelago. Its provincial capital is Masbate C ...
,
Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
). It was mainly between Sa Huỳnh and the Philippines, but also extended into archaeological sites in
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...
,
Southern Thailand
Southern Thailand, Southern Siam or Tambralinga is a southernmost cultural region of Thailand, separated from Central Thailand region by the Kra Isthmus.
Geography
Southern Thailand is on the Malay Peninsula, with an area of around , bounde ...
, and northeastern
Borneo
Borneo (; id, Kalimantan) is the third-largest island in the world and the largest in Asia. At the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, in relation to major Indonesian islands, it is located north of Java, west of Sulawesi, and e ...
. It is characterized by shared red-slipped pottery traditions, as well as double-headed and penannular ornaments known as ''
lingling-o
''Lingling-o'' or ''ling-ling-o'', is a type of penannular or double-headed pendant or amulet that has been associated with various late Neolithic to late Iron Age Austronesian cultures. Most ''lingling-o'' were made in jade workshops in the Ph ...
'' made from materials like green
jade
Jade is a mineral used as jewellery or for ornaments. It is typically green, although may be yellow or white. Jade can refer to either of two different silicate minerals: nephrite (a silicate of calcium and magnesium in the amphibole group ...
(sourced from
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...
), green
mica
Micas ( ) are a group of silicate minerals whose outstanding physical characteristic is that individual mica crystals can easily be split into extremely thin elastic plates. This characteristic is described as perfect basal cleavage. Mica is ...
(from
Mindoro
Mindoro is the seventh largest and eighth-most populous island in the Philippines. With a total land area of 10,571 km2 ( 4,082 sq.mi ) and has a population of 1,408,454 as of 2020 census. It is located off the southwestern coast of Luz ...
), black
nephrite (from
Hà Tĩnh) and clay (from Vietnam and the
Northern Philippines).
Sa Huynh also produced beads made from glass,
carnelian
Carnelian (also spelled cornelian) is a brownish-red mineral commonly used as a semi-precious gemstone. Similar to carnelian is sard, which is generally harder and darker (the difference is not rigidly defined, and the two names are often used ...
,
agate
Agate () is a common rock formation, consisting of chalcedony and quartz as its primary components, with a wide variety of colors. Agates are primarily formed within volcanic and metamorphic rocks. The ornamental use of agate was common in Anci ...
,
olivine
The mineral olivine () is a magnesium iron silicate with the chemical formula . It is a type of nesosilicate or orthosilicate. The primary component of the Earth's upper mantle, it is a common mineral in Earth's subsurface, but weathers qui ...
,
zircon
Zircon () is a mineral belonging to the group of nesosilicates and is a source of the metal zirconium. Its chemical name is zirconium(IV) silicate, and its corresponding chemical formula is Zr SiO4. An empirical formula showing some of t ...
,
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...
and
garnet
Garnets () are a group of silicate minerals that have been used since the Bronze Age as gemstones and abrasives.
All species of garnets possess similar physical properties and crystal forms, but differ in chemical composition. The different ...
; most of whom use materials that are also
import
An import is the receiving country in an export from the sending country. Importation and exportation are the defining financial transactions of international trade.
In international trade, the importation and exportation of goods are limited ...
ed.
Han dynasty
The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Emperor Gaozu of Han, Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by th ...
-style
bronze mirror
Bronze mirrors preceded the glass mirrors of today. This type of mirror, sometimes termed a copper mirror, has been found by archaeologists among elite assemblages from various cultures, from Etruscan Italy to Japan. Typically they are round an ...
s were also found in Sa Huynh sites.
Timeline of Iron age
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id:era value:rgb(1,0.85,0.5) #
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id:filler value:gray(0.8) # background bar
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Period = from:-1300 till:500
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal
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PlotData =
align:center textcolor:black fontsize:8 mark:(line,black) width:15 shift:(0,-5)
bar:Vietnam color:era
from: -771 till: -221 shift:(0,5) text: Sa Huỳnh culture
from: -221 till: 500 shift:(0,4) text: Óc Eo culture
bar:Vietnam color:filler
from: -221 till: 500 shift:(0,-7) text:Imperial Vietnam
The Empire of Vietnam (; Literary Chinese and Contemporary Japanese: ; Modern Japanese: ja, ベトナム帝国, Betonamu Teikoku, label=none) was a short-lived puppet state of Imperial Japan governing the former French protectorates of Annam ...
bar: Philippines color:era
from: -500 till: -108 text: Ifugao society
bar:Philippines color:filler
from: -108 till: -18 shift:(0,5) text: Ancient Barangay
from: -18 till: 500 text: Archaic epoch
bar: Indonesia color:era
from: -500 till: -108 text: Prehistory of Indonesia
bar:Indonesia color:filler
from: -108 till: -18 shift:(0,4) text: Buni culture
from: -18 till: 500 text: Early Kingdoms
:::''Dates are approximate, consult particular article for details''
::: Prehistoric (or
Proto-historic) Iron Age Historic Iron Age
Artifacts
File:Bronze weapon Sa Huynh Culture.JPG, Bronze dagger
File:Pottery vase Sa Huynh Culture.JPG, Pottery vase
File:Pottery fruit tray Sa Huynh Culture 2.JPG, Pottery fruit tray
File:Pottery burial jar Sa Huynh Cultue.JPG, Pottery burial jar
File:Three node pendant (Jade), Artefacts of Phu Hoa site(Dong Nai province).JPG, Jade penannular lingling-o
''Lingling-o'' or ''ling-ling-o'', is a type of penannular or double-headed pendant or amulet that has been associated with various late Neolithic to late Iron Age Austronesian cultures. Most ''lingling-o'' were made in jade workshops in the Ph ...
File:Bicephalous pendant (Jade), Artefacts of Phu Hoa site(Dong Nai province) 01.jpg, Jade double-headed lingling-o
''Lingling-o'' or ''ling-ling-o'', is a type of penannular or double-headed pendant or amulet that has been associated with various late Neolithic to late Iron Age Austronesian cultures. Most ''lingling-o'' were made in jade workshops in the Ph ...
See also
*
Austronesian peoples
The Austronesian peoples, sometimes referred to as Austronesian-speaking peoples, are a large group of peoples in Taiwan, Maritime Southeast Asia, Micronesia, coastal New Guinea, Island Melanesia, Polynesia, and Madagascar that speak Au ...
*
Plain of Jars
*
Cát Tiên sanctuary
*
Óc Eo
*
Champa
Champa ( Cham: ꨌꩌꨛꨩ; km, ចាម្ប៉ា; vi, Chiêm Thành or ) were a collection of independent Cham polities that extended across the coast of what is contemporary central and southern Vietnam from approximately the 2nd ...
*
Buni culture
*
Tabon Caves
Notes
References
*
Higham, Charles, ''The Bronze Age of Southeast Asia'',
* Higham, Charles, ''Early Cultures of Mainland Southeast Asia'',
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sa Huynh Culture
Ancient Vietnam
Archaeological cultures of Southeast Asia
Archaeological cultures in Vietnam
Iron Age cultures of Asia
1st millennium BC in Vietnam
Archaeology of the Philippines