Hai Luu Stone Village, Vinh Phuc: Preserving National Identity

10:48:21 AM | 12/11/2014

For a long time, the people living in the northern Vietnam have been well-acquainted with stone items but had very little knowledge of the place where those tools come into being. It is the area around Thet Mountain of Hai Luu Commune, Song Lo District, where the Dong Tram area has a vast field of iridescent rocks, a key material used for decoration in construction; the Dong Tro area is full of bluestone and graystone with a range of ivory hues and of physical and chemical conditions perfect to be crafted by the golden hands of stone craftsmen, who for many generations have been continuously creating countless products of high quality, able to exist through time to become antiques and objects of archaeological study.
 
Most Hai Luu people living at the foot of Thet Mountain take carving and cutting stone as a side job. Every year, after the two crop seasons, the people, bringing rice balls, ropes and tools, set off to do this job. In the morning, they climb across the ridge to select chunks of rock, then work to hone those rough stones into useful items. When the sun sets, together they would carry those stone products home. But when the weather is favourable, they set up tents to stay and work overnight and then all families’ members would be mobilized to bring down new products. After that come the long days on boats, sailing down the Lo River, the Red River or on bumpy car trips, rolling through mountainous regions to sell those stone products.
 
It is the joy of labour of the Hai Luu stone craftsmen. With hammer, chisel, jumper iron, white wooden maul, a homemade compass and a simple rope, the people from Hai Luu for many generations have been providing stone products for many places in the country, including large items such as stone statues of elephants, horses, Buddha, lotus, stelae, incense burners’ tops for temples and pagodas, stone bridges, etc. An interesting fact of chiseled stone work in Hai Luu is that even though also using hard steel chisels, thanks to the application of wooden mallets, the sound coming from working is a very low sound, instead of the deafening sound as often heard in other carving and chiselling work. It is also a unique characteristic of the people of Hai Luu.
 
Income from the job is not much and the life of a stone craftsman is not easy, but the stone villagers all appreciate this traditional craft. The more Hai Luu craftsmen love their job, the more they appreciate their hometown mountain giving them material to practice their trade. “As much as rocks in the mountain”, it’s often said, but none of the people in Hai Luu waste rocks, whether big or small, after mining, the workers would calculate carefully to produce an appropriate product.
 
The material in stone furniture reflects the strength of this area's cultural tradition. The workers in Hai Luu are working hard to introducing tens of thousands of stone items every year for people throughout the region, making use of the spare time between harvest seasons, at the same time preserving a traditional craft.
 
Today, the stone era has become the past, but in Vietnamese villages, we still can encounter stone utensils. The Hai Luu people still devote themselves to stonework and continue to keep the trade living through next generations, enriching the culture of the ancient Hai Luu villages and the attraction of Vinh Phuc’s tourist destinations.
 
Thanh Nga