Vietnam, Kingdom of
State | Defunct
1804 CE to 1839 CE
The Nguyễn dynasty or House of Nguyễn is the final imperial family of Vietnam.
Their ancestral line can be traced back to the beginning of the Common Era.
However, only by the mid-sixteenth century had the most ambitious family branch, the Nguyễn Lords, isen to conquer, control and establish feudal rule over large territory.
Imperial rule lasts for 0one hundred and forty-three years, when Gia Long ascends the throne in 1802, after putting an end to the rise of the Tây Sơn and uniting the country.
Emperor Bảo Đại, the dynasty's last representative, abdicates the throne and transfers sovereign power to the Democratic Republic of Vietnam in 1945.
Nguyễn dynastic rule is obtained by the support of the French, who compromise its authority from the beginning.
Sovereignty is eventually lost to French colonialism as the nation is divided into three administrative entities of French Indochina: Cochinchina becomes a French colony, and Annam and Tonkin become nominally-independent protectorates.
Worlds
The Far East
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Thai influence grows in the following years until challenged by Western powers.
In 1795 the Thai seize the provinces of Battambang and Siem Reap in Cambodia, where throughout the first half of the next century Chakkri kings will resist Vietnamese incursions.
The conflict between the Thai and the Vietnamese is resolved finally by a compromise providing for the establishment of a joint protectorate over Cambodia.
The Thai also press their claim to suzerainty in the Malay state of Kedah in the face of growing British interest in the peninsula.
As a result of the Anglo- Burmese War (1824-26), Britain annexes territory in the region that had been contested by the Thai and the Burmese for centuries.
This move leads to the signing of the Burney Treaty in 1826, an Anglo-Thai agreement that allows British merchants modest trade concessions in the kingdom.
In 1833 the Thai will reach a similar understanding with the United States.
Nguyen Anh adopts the reign name Gia Long in June 1802 to express the unifying of the country—Gia from Gia Dinh (Saigon) and Long from Thang Long (Hanoi).
As a symbol of this unity, Gia Long changes the name of the country from Dai Viet to Nam Viet.
For the Chinese, however, this is too reminiscent of the wayward General Trieu Da.
In conferring investiture on the new government, the Chinese invert the name to Viet Nam, the first use of this name for the country.
Acting as a typical counterrevolutionary government, the Gia Long regime harshly suppresses any forces opposing it or the interests of the bureaucracy and the landowners.
In his drive for control and order, Gia Long adopts the Chinese bureaucratic model to a greater degree than any previous Vietnamese ruler.
The new capital at Hue, two kilometers northeast of Phu Xuan, is patterned after the Chinese model in Beijing, complete with a Forbidden City, an Imperial City, and a Capital City.
Vietnamese bureaucrats are required to wear Chinese-style gowns and even adopt Chinese-style houses and sedan chairs.
Vietnamese women, in turn, are compelled to wear Chinese-style trousers.
Gia Long institutes a law code, which follows very closely the Chinese Qing dynasty (1644-1911) model.
Under the Gia Long code, severe punishment is meted out for any form of resistance to the absolute power of the government.
Buddhism, Taoism, and indigenous religions are forbidden under the Confucianist administration.
Traditional Vietnamese laws and customs, such as the provisions of the Hong Due law code protecting the rights and status of women, are swept away by the new code.
Taxes that had been reduced or abolished under the Tay Son are levied again under the restored Nguyen dynasty.
These include taxes on mining, forestry, fisheries, crafts, and on various domestic products, such as salt, honey, and incense.
Another heavy burden on the peasantry is the increased use of corvée labor to build not only roads, bridges, ports, and irrigation works but also palaces, fortresses, shipyards, and arsenals.
All but the privileged classes are required to work on such projects at least sixty days a year, with no pay but a rice ration.
The great Mandarin Road, used by couriers and scholar-officials as a link between Gia Dinh, Hue, and Thang Long, is started during this period in order to strengthen the control of the central government.
Military service is another burden on the peasantry; in some areas one out of every three men is required to serve in the Vietnamese Imperial Army.
Land reforms instituted under the Tay Son Are soon lost under the restored Nguyen dynasty, and the proportion of communal lands dwindles to less than twenty percent of the total.
Although chu nom is retained as the national script by Gia Long, his son and successor Minh Mang, who gains the throne upon his father's death in 1820, orders a return to the use of Chinese ideographs.
In the early years of Minh Mạng's government, the most serious challenge will come from one of his father's most trusted lieutenants and a national hero in Vietnam, Lê Văn Duyệt, who had led the Nguyễn forces to victory at Qui Nhơn in 1801 against the Tây Sơn Dynasty and had beem made regent in the south by Gia Long with full freedom to rule and deal with foreign powers.
French vessels entering Vietnamese harbors are ordered to be searched with extra care.
All entries are to be watched.
Minh Mạng had continued and intensified his father's isolationist and conservative Confucian policies.
His father had rebuffed a British delegation in 1804 proposing that Vietnam be opened to trade.
The delegation's gifts are not accepted and turned away.
Vietnam is under no threat of colonization, since most of Europe is engaged in the Napoleonic Wars.
Nevertheless, Napoleon had seen Vietnam as a strategically important objective in the colonial power struggle in Asia, as he felt that it would make an ideal base from which to contest the British East India Company's control of the Indian subcontinent.
With the restoration of the monarchy and the final departure of Napoleon in 1815, the military scene in Europe quieted and French interest in Vietnam was revived.
Jean-Baptiste Chaigneau, one of the volunteers of Pigneau de Behaine who had helped Gia Long in his quest for power, had become a mandarin and continued to serve Minh Mạng, upon whose ascension, Chaigneau and his colleagues were treated more distantly.
He eventually left in November 1824.
In 1825, he is appointed as French consul to Vietnam after returning to his homeland to visit his family after more than a quarter of a century in Asia.
Upon his return, Minh Mạng receives him coldly.
The policy of isolationism will soon see Vietnam fall further behind and become more vulnerable as political stability returns to continental Europe, allowing her colonial powers a free hand to once again direct their attention towards further conquests.
Her captain was to pay his respects to Minh Mạng, but was greeted with a symbolic dispatch of troops as though an invasion had been expected.
In 1824 Minh Mạng rejected the offer of an alliance from Burma against Siam, a common enemy of both countries.
In 1824 Henri Baron de Bougainville had been sent by Louis XVIII to Vietnam with the stated mission "of peace and protection of commerce.
Upon arriving in Tourane in 1825, the mission is not allowed ashore.
The royal message is turned away on the pretext that there is nobody able to translate it.
It is assumed that the snub is related to an attempt by Bougainville to smuggle ashore a Catholic missionary from the Missions étrangères de Paris.
Minh Mạng was willing to sign a contract, but only to purchase artillery, firearms, uniforms and books.
White was of the opinion that the deal was not sufficiently advantageous and nothing was implemented.
In 1821, a trade agreement from Louis XVIII was turned away, with Minh Mạng indicating that no special deal would be offered to any country.
That same year, British East India Company agent John Crawfurd made another English attempt at contact, but was only allowed to disembark in the northern ports of Tonkin; he gained no agreements, but concluded relations with France posed no threat to Company trade.
Following the fall of Vientiane by King Taksin's army in 1779, the city had been looted but spared destruction, the Emerald Buddha and several other important Buddha images had been taken to Siam, and the sons and daughter of King Siribunyasan had been taken as hostages, along with several thousand Lao families who were resettled in Saraburi, north of the Siamese capital.
King Siribunyasan had three sons, who were all to succeed him as king of Vientiane—Nanthasen, Inthavong, and Anouvong.
The Siamese and Burmese have been in almost perennial conflict between 1779 and 1826.
Siam seeks trade in weapons from Europe, and relies upon heavy conscription from the Lao, Cambodian, and Malay areas in the south to strengthen their forces.
Prince Anouvong had gained military distinction as a successful military commander and a loyal vassal of Siam during the campaigns against the Burmese near Chiang Mai.
Siam requires corvée labor in addition to military conscription.
Lao laborers have assisted in digging the canals of Bangkok, building a dam at Ang Thong in 1813, and constructing several forts along the Chao Phraya.
Siam had begun the intense cultivation of sugarcane for the European trade in 1810.
Sugar plantations are labor-intensive and require corvée labor from the Chinese, Khmer, Lao and hill tribes in their domain.
Anouvong begins actively making military preparations for rebellion in 1826.
His strategy involves three key points: 1) respond to the immediate crisis caused by the popular discontent over the forced tattooing; 2) remove the ethnic Laos on the Khorat Plateau to the Kingdom of Vientiane, conducting a scorched Earth policy as he does so to slow the inevitable Siamese pursuit; 3) seek a diplomatic victory by gaining support from Vietnam, China, or Britain.
Anouvong may have believed the balance of power in Southeast Asia was turning away from Siam.
The factionalism at the Siamese court, the presence of the British in nearby Burma, the growing influence of Vietnam in the Cambodian provinces, and the regional dissatisfaction in the Lao areas suggest that Siamese power is waning.
In June 1826 the British had arrived to finalize the Burney Treaty between Siam and the British Empire, and the presence of the British fleet may have led Anouvong to believe that an invasion was imminent.
However, his most serious miscalculation is in the disparity of military power between Siam and the Laos.
From at least 1822, Siam has been purchasing large quantities of modern firearms and munitions from Britain, military surplus from the now ended Napoleonic Wars in Europe.
In December 1826, Anouvong's rebellion begins with an army of ten thousand men making its way toward Kalasin, following the path of the Siamese tattooing officials.