From the year of the Fire Horse and the land stretching for thousands of miles…

From the center of Hue city, traveling along National Highway 1 for about forty kilometers, upon reaching the beginning of the old Phu Loc town, turning left reveals a resort nestled beside Cau Hai Lagoon, quietly hidden amidst the vast expanse of water and sky. This space evokes a sense of tranquility difficult to describe: a calmness before the vastness of the lagoon, distinct from the immensity of the sea, separated only by a long stretch of sand. A breeze rustles through the low trees. Anyone can feel the serenity that the lagoon bestows.

For me, each time I stop here, the experience takes on a different dimension. It's the feeling of touching a layer of history that has receded more than seven centuries. From any guesthouse, you can gaze down at the shimmering surface of the lagoon, bathed in an ancient, ethereal light. In that mystical light, the image of a Vietnamese princess is reflected on the waves here: Princess Huyền Trân!

On the waves of Cau Hai

Many times I woke up early to photograph the sunrise over Cau Hai Lagoon. The first image I saw was right in the middle of the expansive water surface, connecting the lagoon and the East Sea, with a estuary and a bridge crossing it named Tu Hien - which is also the name of this estuary.

I suddenly remembered Princess Huyền Trân during those months when the "reorganization of the land" was taking place, filled with so much emotional turmoil. Some worried that the place names, which had been merged for generations, would eventually fade into oblivion. But the land is a matter of a thousand years; the changing place names may no longer exist in official documents with their bright red seals, but in people's hearts, what is intimately connected to their beloved homeland will remain vibrant, flowing through their blood. Like that bridge, that estuary now bearing the name Tư Hiền, but seven centuries ago it was called Tư Dung.

Cau Hai Lagoon flows into the sea through Tu Hien estuary, where in the summer of 1306 Princess Huyen Tran bid farewell to Dai Viet to become the wife of King Che Man of Champa. Photo: Le Huy Hoang Hai

Legend has it that, for safety before reaching Champa, Princess Huyền Trân's fleet traveled a long distance through the Tam Giang lagoon and the Cầu Hai lagoon (present-day). The Cầu Hai lagoon, where it opens into the sea, was the mouth of the sea belonging to Champa, and King Chế Mân's fleet was there to welcome the Đại Việt princess. This was also the moment the princess bowed in farewell to her homeland, a scene later described by composer Phạm Duy in the epic poem "On the Main Road" in the chapter "Through Central Vietnam": "Looking out at my father's homeland, the road is long and the river wide; looking back at my mother's homeland, the wind blows strongly over the high mountain pass." After Huyền Trân's departure for the greater good, the mouth of the sea was named Tư Dung. There are many explanations for this name, but ultimately it reflects the longing (Tư) for the beautiful girl (Dung) who sacrificed her personal feelings for the people's peace and the nation's expansion.

The Tư Dung estuary was renamed Tư Hiền in the 19th century, a name that remains to this day. The transformation of the two provinces of Ô and Lý into Thuận and Hóa provinces, and the change from Tư Dung to Tư Hiền… these are just small stories of the changes over a thousand years of history, but the legend of Princess Huyền Trân lives on among the people.

The day Huyền Trân boarded the ship, bidding farewell to Thăng Long, is recorded in volume 8 of the "Khâm định Việt sử thông giám cương mục" (Imperial-commissioned Comprehensive History of Vietnam) by the National History Institute of the Nguyễn Dynasty: “Bính Ngọ, the 14th year (1306). (Yuan Dynasty, the 10th year of Đại Đức). June, summer. Princess Huyền Trân was married to the Champa ruler Chế Mân. Chế Mân offered the lands of Châu Ô and Châu Lý. Previously, the Emperor, while traveling to a certain place, took the opportunity to visit Champa and arranged to marry his daughter to the Champa ruler. Later, Chế Mân sent his ministers, including Chế Bồ Đài, to submit a petition offering gold, silver, rare incense, and other exotic items to request the marriage. The court officials all said it was not advisable to marry her off, except for Văn Túc Vương Đạo Tái, who advocated for the marriage, and Trần Khắc Chung agreed. Chế Mân then requested to offer Châu Ô and Châu Lý as part of the wedding ceremony, at which point the Emperor finally decided to let Princess Huyền Trân marry the Champa king.”

September, autumn. The tide is high. An envoy from Champa arrives in our country. The Champa ruler, Che Man, has died, and his son, Che Da Gia, sent his servant, Bao Loc Ke, to present a white elephant and report the sad news.

October, winter. The king ordered the official Tran Khac Chung to go to Champa to bring Princess Huyen Tran back to Vietnam. According to Champa custom, whenever the king died, his wife had to be cremated to die with him. The king, upon hearing this, sent Tran Khac Chung under the pretext of visiting, saying: "If the princess is cremated, there will be no one to preside over the funeral rites. It would be more convenient for the princess to go to the beach to summon the king's soul to come with her, and then cremate her." The Champa people agreed. Once out at sea, Khac Chung used a small boat to abduct the princess and bring her back.

Just a few lines like that in the old pages of history, yet so much emotion still resonates through the endless days. After the wedding in the summer of 1306, the Vietnamese groups truly became the legitimate owners of this dowry land.

"Leaving home for thousands of miles..."

I have traveled through many ancient villages of Quang Tri (formerly) and Hue, and met with respected elders who all mentioned that the founding milestones of their villages mostly date back to the early 14th century, specifically to 1306 - the year of the Fire Horse. Migrants from Thanh Hoa and Nghe An, and even from the Red River Delta, settled in the O Ly region, establishing villages and living harmoniously with the local inhabitants. They brought with them their language, customs, beliefs, farming practices, and simple faiths, so that today, in many archaeological excavations, we can see the remnants of Champa temples and Vietnamese pagoda pillars side by side!

The two provinces of Ô Lý became Thuận Châu and Hóa Châu, then Quảng Trị and Huế today. From a land of wedding gifts, Ô Lý in ancient times became a strategic region with profound cultural layers. When Ô Lý came under Đại Việt, who could have imagined that a few centuries later, the Thuận Hóa - Phú Xuân region would become the capital of the Nguyễn dynasty, lasting for over 200 years and now a former capital - a world cultural heritage site? Nor could they have imagined that this land would later become the dividing line of the country, the site of some of the fiercest battles of the 20th century.

Choosing a dowry to expand the territory of the kingdom was a major undertaking, but the marriage of Huyen Tran brought to Dai Viet not just a few tens of thousands of square miles of vast land. That marriage contributed to maintaining peace and tranquility in the southern border region of Dai Viet. Looking back at ancient history, the O Ly region, from Ly Thuong Kiet's first southward expansion in 1069 until it became the dowry for Huyen Tran's marriage in 1306, was rarely without conflict for nearly three centuries. It only found peace after Huyen Tran's arrival in Champa – and later, the Thuan and Hoa provinces of Dai Viet.

It's difficult to fully describe the contributions that the land of Huyen Tran's dowry made to the great legacy of Dai Viet, not only the strategic location of Hai Van Pass, the songs that originated after the love affair of O Ly, or the story of peace and harmony for the nation. From this border, the territory of Dai Viet gradually expanded southward. Of course, before that, there was the blood and bones of tens of thousands of Vietnamese people.

Princess Huyền Trân boarded the boat to bid farewell to Thăng Long in the summer of the year Bính Ngọ, 1306.

And this year is the year of the Fire Horse, 2026.

Seven hundred and twenty years, more than seven centuries have passed. The map of the country has been redrawn many times, the land has been rearranged and reshaped by our ancestors, and many place names have been replaced with others… But some things never fade: the image of a Vietnamese woman who silently stepped through her own destiny to pave the way for the nation. Not only was the territory expanded, but a different cultural current was kindled, through sacrifice and the sorrow of her fate, permeating every melody and rhythm of the Thuan Hoa region to give birth to the song of Nam Binh.

Now, night after night on the Perfume River, amidst the memories of the capital, visitors can still hear the echoes of a farewell, a parting, a silent longing for the homeland that has lasted for seven centuries, in the footsteps of those who "went thousands of miles away" for the greater good.

From the two provinces of O and Ly in those days, the Vietnamese people continued their journey of territorial expansion through silent departures and sacrifices, through a reconciliation between land and people, between the past and the future. And this year, 2026, the year of the Horse, cannot fail to remember that year of the Horse, 1306, and cannot fail to listen to the many emotions that still echo in the voice of Huyen Tran!