Ly Dynasty in Vietnam
The Ly dynasty is one of the foundational royal houses of Vietnam. Its founder, Ly Cong Uan, took the throne in 1009 and in 1010 moved the capital to the site of modern Hanoi, a city later called Thang Long. The summary often given for this event, that it ended a thousand years of Chinese rule, compresses a longer story. Vietnamese independence had been won decades earlier, and the Ly era is better understood as the moment when that independence became a stable, lasting state.
Chinese imperial control over the Red River region began with the Han conquest in 111 BC and lasted, with interruptions, for about a thousand years. There were notable revolts, including the one led by the Trung sisters in the first century AD. Local autonomy grew as Tang authority weakened in the early tenth century, and in 938 Ngo Quyen defeated a Southern Han fleet on the Bach Dang River, a victory traditionally seen as the end of Chinese rule. Short-lived dynasties followed. The Dinh and Early Le rulers held power and repelled a Song Chinese attack around 981, but their capital at Hoa Lu was fragile, and succession disputes weakened them.
Ly Cong Uan was a palace commander who had reportedly been raised by Buddhist monks. After the last Early Le ruler died in 1009, court officials backed him as emperor, and he is known by his posthumous title Ly Thai To. In 1010 he relocated the court from the narrow, mountain-ringed Hoa Lu to the open Red River plain at Dai La. According to tradition he saw a dragon rising there and named the new capital Thang Long, meaning "Soaring Dragon." The move put the court in a richer, more central position for farming, trade, and administration.
The Ly rulers built institutions that outlasted them. They patronized Buddhism heavily and also adopted Chinese-style bureaucratic models. The Temple of Literature was founded in 1070, and a national school followed in 1076. The state took the name Dai Viet in the 1050s. It also defended its sovereignty. General Ly Thuong Kiet fought a successful campaign against the Song in the 1070s, and a poem asserting the southern kingdom's rightful independence is traditionally attributed to him, though its authorship is debated.
The dynasty lasted until 1225, when palace intrigue and the rise of the powerful Tran family led to the transfer of the throne by marriage. Thang Long remained the principal political center of Vietnam for much of the next eight centuries, and Hanoi is the national capital today. Vietnamese tradition regards the Ly period as the point at which an independent Vietnamese monarchy took lasting root.