Jiaozhi


Jiaozhi, was the Chinese name for various provinces, commanderies, prefectures, and counties in northern Vietnam from the era of the Hùng kings to the middle of the Third Chinese domination of Vietnam and again during the Fourth Chinese domination.

Name

According to James Chamberlain, 'Jiao' originated as a cognate of Lao. According to Michel Ferlus, the Sino-Vietnamese 'Jiao' in Jiaozhi, together with the ethnonym and autonym of the Lao people, and the ethnonym Gelao, a Kra population scattered from Guizhou to North Vietnam, would have emerged from the Austro-Asiatic *kra:w 'human being'. The etymon *kra:w would have also yielded the ethnonym Keo/ Kæw kɛːwA1, a name given to the Vietnamese by Tai speaking peoples, currently slightly derogatory. In Pupeo, kew is used to name the Tay of North Vietnam.
Some scholars like Joachim Schliesinger and James Chamberlain claim that the Vietnamese language was not originally based in the area of the Red River in what is now northern Vietnam. According to them, the Red River Delta region was originally Tai-speaking, ethnic Li people in particular. They claim that the area become Vietnamese-speaking only between the seventh and ninth centuries AD, or even as late as the tenth century, as a result of immigration from the south, i.e., modern central Vietnam. According to ancient records, Jiaozhi in the Han and Tang eras was heavily populated by Ethnic Li people.
On the other hand, Ferlus showed that the inventions of new terms for pestle, oar and a pan to cook sticky rice took place in Northern Vietic and Central Vietic. The new vocabularies of these inventions were proven to be derivatives from original verbs rather than borrowed lexical items. The current distribution of Northern Vietic also correspond to the area of Dong Son culture. Thus, Ferlus conclude that the Northern Vietic is the direct heirs of the Dongsonian, who have resided in Southern part of Red river delta and North Central Vietnam since the 1st millennium BC.
Furthermore, John Phan argues that “Annamese Middle Chinese” and northern Vietic was spoken in the Red River Valley and Annamese was later absorbed into the coexisting Proto-Viet-Muong, one of whose divergent dialect evolved into Vietnamese language.
The name of the territory was also used to refer to the Lac people and their ancient language. It seems to be a Yue or Viet endonym of uncertain meaning, although it has had various folk etymologies over the years. In his Tongdian, Du You wrote that "The Jiaozhi are the southern people: the big toe points to the outside of the foot, so if the man stands up straight, the two big toes point to each other, so people call them the "jiaozhi"." The Ciyuan disputed this: Various Vietnamese scholars such as Nguyễn Văn Siêu and Đặng Xuân Bảng have since echoed this explanation.
Jiaozhi, pronounced Kuchi in the Malay, became the Cochin-China of the Portuguese traders, who so named it to distinguish it from the city and the Kingdom of Cochin in India, their first headquarters in the Malabar Coast. It was subsequently called "Cochinchina". However by viewpoint of researcher Trần Như Vĩnh Lạc, 交趾 or 交阯 in the transcribing a pronunciation "Viet", as "/ˈɡw:ət/" in the ancient Annamese.

History

Van Lang

The native state of Văn Lang is not well attested, but much later sources name as one of the realm's districts. Its territory purportedly comprised present-day Hanoi and the land on the right bank of the Red River. The Van Lang fell to the Âu under prince Thục Phán around 258 . By researcher Lê Văn Lan, "文郎" was the Chinese script of the "urang" or "orang" in the Proto-Malayo-Polynesian.

Âu Lạc

established his capital at Co Loa in Hanoi's Dong Anh district. The citadel was taken around 208 by the Qin general Zhao Tuo. By Lê Văn Lan.

Nanyue

declared his independent kingdom of Nanyue in 204 and organized his Vietnamese territory as the two commanderies of Jiaozhi and Jiuzhen. Following a native coup that killed the Zhao king and his Chinese mother, the Han launched two invasions in 112 and 111 that razed the Nanyue capital at Panyu.

Han dynasty

The Han received the submission from the Nanyue commanders in Jiaozhi and Jiuzhen, confirming them in their posts and ushering in the "First Northern Domination" of Vietnam. These commanderies were headed by grand administrators who were later overseen by the inspectors of Jiaozhou or , the first of whom was Shi Dai.
Under the Han, the capital of Jiaozhi was first Mê Linh and then Luy Lâu, within Bac Ninh's Thuan Thanh district.
According to the Book of Han’s "Treatise on Geography", Jiaozhi contained 10 counties: Leilou, Anding, Goulou, Miling, Quyang, Beidai, Jixu, Xiyu, Longbian, and Zhugou. Đào Duy Anh stated that Jiaozhi's territory contained all of Tonkin, excluding the regions upstream of the Black River and Ma River. Southwestern Guangxi was also a part of Jiaozhi. The southwest area of present-day Ninh Bình was the border of Jiuzhen. Later, the Han dynasty created another commandery named Rinan located south of Jiuzhen from the Ngang Pass to Quảng Nam Province.
One of the Grand Administrators of Jiaozhi was Su Ding. Ma Yuan's bronze column was supposedly erected by Ma Yuan after he had suppressed the uprising of the Trưng Sisters in the early 40s. Ma Yuan followed his conquest with a brutal course of assimilation, destroying the natives' bronze drums in order to build the column at the edge of Chinese territory. Six Chinese characters were carved upon it: "If this bronze column collapses, Jiaozhi will be destroyed" of the Eastern Han, Lý Tiến was the first native of Jiaozhi to be the inspector of Jiaozhou. Lý Tiến then petitioned the Han emperor to allow natives of Jiaozhi to be officers and mandarins in the Han court, but the emperor only accepted the ones who were awarded maocai or xiaolian titles. Another native of Jiaozhi named Lý Cầm petitioned the throne and eventually the natives were allowed to take higher positions in other regions of the Han empire. For example, a Jiaozhi native named Trương Trọng was grand administrator of the Jincheng Commandery.

Three Kingdoms

During the Three Kingdoms period, Jiaozhi was administered from Longbian by Shi Xie on behalf of the Wu. This family controlled several surrounding commanderies, but upon the headman's death Guangzhou was formed as a separate province from northeastern Jiaozhou and Shi Xie's son attempted to usurp his father's appointed replacement. In retaliation, Wu executed the son and all his brothers and demoted the remainder of the family to common status.

Jin dynasty

Jiaozhi underwent attacks from the neighboring kingdom of Linyi starting from 270 and continuing until at least 280. In 280, the governor of Jiaozhi wrote to the emperor of the Western Jin complaining about these attacks aided by allies from the Kingdom of Funan.

Sui dynasty

The Sui divided the commandery into 9 counties: Songping, Longbian, Zhuyuan, Longping, Pingdao, Jiaozhi, Jianing, Xinchang and Anren.

Tang dynasty

The Tang first changed Jiaozhi from a commandery to a prefecture named Jiaozhou. was created in 622 due to the separation of Songzhou.
In 679, this was renamed Annan, fully the "Protectorate General to Pacify the South". This comprised 12 prefectures, one of which continued under the old name Jiaozhou. This prefecture contained 8 counties: Jiaozhi, Songping, Zhuyuna, Pingdao, Wuping, Nanding, and Taiping.

Medieval Jiaozhi

In 938 Ngô Quyền defeated the Southern Han kingdom at the Battle of Bạch Đằng River north of modern Haiphong. He took Cổ Loa as his capital. In 1257, after invading China in 1251, the Mongol Empire invaded Đại Việt but they had to draw back in 1258 because of local resistance. Between 1284 and 1287, the Mongol Empire tried to invade Đại Việt twice but they were defeated both times.

Ming dynasty

had violently taken the Trần throne and changed the country's name to Đại Ngu. When the Ming government found out, they demanded that he reestablish the Trần dynasty, which he agreed to. However, Hồ's forces instead ambushed the Ming convoy escorting the Trần pretender, who was killed during the attack, and started harassing the Ming border.
After this, the Ming dynasty invaded Đại Ngu, destroyed the Hồ dynasty, and began the Fourth Northern domination. The Ming created "Jiaozhi Province". At this time, the Jiaozhi Province area contained all the territory of Vietnam under the Hồ dynasty. The Jiaozhi Province was divided into 15 prefectures and 5 independent prefectures :
Together with the 5 independent prefectures, there were other administrative divisions, which were under the normal prefectures. There were 47 divisions in total.
In 1408, the independent administrative division Taiyuan, Xuanhua was promoted to a prefecture, which increased the number to 17. Afterwards the Yanzhou prefecture was dismissed and its territory became an independent prefecture.
The Ming dynasty crushed Lê Lợi's rebellion at first but indecisively. When Lê had rebuilt his force, the rebel repeatedly defeated Ming's army and tighten their siege of Jiaozhou. Eventually, Ming's emperor accepted the de factor independence of the country. Later, when Lê offered to become a vassal of China, the Ming immediately declared him as ruler of Dai Viet.
Lê dismissed all former administrative structure and divided the nation into 5 đạo. Thus, ever since that time, the name Giao Chỉ and Giao Châu have never been applied to official administrative units.

Trade

Jiaozhi and Rinan in what is now northern Vietnam became the main point of entry to China from countries to the west as far away as the Roman Empire, as recorded in the Book of Later Han:
In the ninth Yanxi year , during the reign of Emperor Huan, the king of Da Qin , Andun, sent envoys from beyond the frontiers through Rinan... During the reign of Emperor He , they sent several envoys carrying tribute and offerings. Later, the Western Regions rebelled, and these relations were interrupted. Then, during the second and the fourth Yanxi years in the reign of Emperor Huan , and frequently since, foreigners have arrived at the frontiers of Rinan to present offerings.

The Book of Liang states:
The merchants of this country frequently visit Funan , Rinan and Jiaozhi ; but few of the inhabitants of these southern frontier states have come to Da Qin. During the 5th year of the Huangwu period of the reign of Sun Quan a merchant of Da Qin, whose name was Qin Lun came to Jiaozhi ; the prefect of Jiaozhi, Wu Miao, sent him to Sun Quan , who asked him for a report on his native country and its people."

The capital of Jiaozhi was proposed by Ferdinand von Richthofen in 1877 to have been the port known to the geographer Ptolemy and the Romans as Kattigara, situated near modern Hanoi. Richthofen's view was widely accepted until archaeology at Óc Eo in the Mekong Delta suggested that site may have been its location. Kattigara seems to have been the main port of call for ships traveling to China from the West in the first few centuries, before being replaced by Guangdong.
In terms of archaeological finds, a Republican-era Roman glassware has been found at a Western Han tomb in Guangzhou along the South China Sea, dated to the early 1st century BC. At Óc Eo, then part of the Kingdom of Funan near Jiaozhi, Roman golden medallions made during the reign of Antoninus Pius and his successor Marcus Aurelius have been found. This may have been the port city of Kattigara described by Ptolemy, laying beyond the Golden Chersonese.

Footnotes