THINH HAO COMMUNAL HOUSE

Thinh Hao Communal House is located at no. 190, Ton Duc Thang street, Hang Bot ward, Dong Da district, Hanoi city. The Communal House is also called as Lang Mieu Communal House (because in the past, it belonged to Lang Mieu village, former Thinh Hao ward, Ha sub-district, Vinh Thuan district, Hoai Duc sub-province, Hanoi province).

The Communal House is the place for worshiping the Tutelary God of the village, who is Cao Son Royal Highest - the God who defended the South of Thang Long capital and Bo Cai Royal Highest Phung Hung – the hero who defeated the enemy to save the country in 8th Century. These gods are worshipped in many residence areas of the Viet people in the Northern river delta.

According to folk legend, the God Cao Son Royal Highest was the son of the Nation Ancestors Lac Long Quan and Au Co; he was one of the fifty children to follow the mother to the mountainous region and later became a general of Son Tinh (i.e. Tan Vien Saint). Because God Cao Son had the merits of supporting Son Tinh to defeat Thuy Tinh and the Au Viet tribe in the battle between Hung King and Thuc King, he was worshipped at the second position in Tan Vien mountain temple (Ba Vi). In Le Dynasty, when the King Le Tuong Duc raised the troops to quell the revolt and restored the fortune of Le Loi, he was supported indirectly by the God’s omen in the dream, and it took him only 10 days to succeed with his mission. To commemorate the God’s merits, in 1509, the King commanded to re-build the temple in a larger and more beautiful scale in Kim Hoa ward, close to Thang Long citadel in that time (now the Kim Lien temple).

Bo Cai Dai Vuong (Royal Highest Parents) Phung Hung, whose official names was Cong Phan, was a village notable of Duong Lam land area and had high prestige to the regional people. In the later half of 8th Century, Gao Zhengping was sent to rule Annam (ancient Vietnam). This guy made every effort in extracting and over-exploiting, which made the people’s lives extremely miserable. In about the Dai Lich period (766-779), Phung Hung, together with his two brothers Phung Hai and Phung Dinh, led a rebellion against the ruling ChineseTang Dynasty. The war last over 20 years. In 791, the troop surrounded the Tong Binh citadel (Hanoi).

The enemy’s general Gao Zhengping took his troop to outside of the citadel to intercept but lost the battle; he then was so worrying to death. Phung Hung entered the citadel, organized the ruling and building long-term independence for the country. However, not long later, he caught an illness and died; the people regretted and titled him as Bo Cai Dai Vuong, considered him as the Father of the people and set up worshiping temples in his hometown and everywhere in the country. Besides being worshipped in temples built by the people, he was titled as the Tutelary God in many villages in the Northern Delta.

Based on remaining materials in the vestige, especially the two Conferring edicts dated to Duy Tan reign (1911) and 9th Year of Khai Dinh reign (1924) and 4 stone steles, Thinh Hao Communal House was built in about beginning of 19th Century. In 1928, it was repaired and restored. After the country gained peace and reunion, the Communal House was used as the head office of the Hang Bot ward Provincial People’s Committee. In 1998, the ward People’s Committee was moved to another place, the Communal House was repaired and used for cultural and religious activities of the local citizen community.

According to memoirs of the elders, the Communal House was originally built in Southeast direction with overall layout of Dinh (丁) character and consisted of Front Hall and Back Palace. In front of the Communal house, there was a 4-pillar entrance gate and in the right side there was a well. However, due to various reasons, current Thinh Hao Communal House could not keep the original scale. Now the Communal house only maintains the original Back Palace consisting of 2 in-line compartments with close brick wall at the sides, concrete roof covered with tiles and floor covered with enameled tiles.

Through historic ups and downs, Thinh Hao Communal House still preserves some relics created in Nguyen Dynasty, such as: 02 Conferring edicts, 04 stone steles, 02 horizontal lacquered boards, 01 pair of parallel sentences, etc. which make contribution to enriching the local heritage treasure. The presence of the Communal House confirmed the very important role of Tutelary God worshiping belief in the contemporary lives in order to build an advanced culture with traditional national character in the path of integration and development.

Thinh Hao Communal House was classified as City’s historical – cultural vestige in 2016.