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> Vietnam
History Museum
Situated at # 1 Trang
Tien Street, behind Hanoi's Municipal Theater,
this museum was originally part of the Vien Dong
Bac Co School that was founded in 1932 by the
French. At that time, the museum exhibited a
collection of ancient artifacts collected from all
over southeast Asia.
In 1958, four years after the French lost control
of Indochina, France gave the building to Vietnam
and it became the national History Museum. Both
floors of the museum house thousands of artifacts
displayed in order of age, from ancient to
contemporary. In the Stone Age section, you'll
find tools and instruments for hunting and
fighting made of polished stone, evidence of
pre-historic ancestors living in present-day
Vietnam. Included are stone axes chipped three to
four hundred thousand years ago that were
unearthed at Do Mountain in Thanh Hoa province,
proof that the country is a cradle of
civilization.
The Bronze Age section of the museum is famous for
its bronze drums, the most notable of which is
Ngoc Lu's majestic and beautiful drum which has
been studied by scholars from all over the world
for its implications on sculpture, its use and the
manufacturing technology of its time. Also on
exhibit are bronze axes, javelins, daggers, spears
and other bronze weapons used for close range and
distance fighting, weapons from the period of the
Hung kings, during which Vietnam was first founded
and Co Loa's 2nd century BC thin and thorny bronze
arrows which so frightened northern invaders that
they gained a reputation for being magical.
For the past 2,000 years, Vietnam's history has
been a continuous struggle against foreign
invaders. The museum's many photographs of
pagodas, temples, fortresses, gravesites, famous
figures and generals and many important documents,
well known sayings and artifacts convey the
indomitable will of the people.
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