Annam (French protectorate)

Annam is also the name of the Father of all Giants, according to the mythology of the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.

Annam, literally meaning "Pacified South", is a region of central Vietnam that fell under Chinese rule in 111 BC as Annan (安南). Known locally as Trung Bộ, meaning "Central Boundary", it was formerly a kingdom the size of Sweden with its capital at Hué. It had been seized by the French by 1884.

The other two Vietnamese regions that were first under the Chinese rule, then the French after the Franco-Chinese War, are Cochin China and Tonkin.

File:AnnamFlag.gif

Flag of Annam Protectorate

Annam comprises a sinuous strip of territory measuring between 750 and 800 miles in length, with an approximate area of 52,000 square miles. It has a rich well-watered soil, which yields tropical products, and is rich in minerals.

The country consists chiefly of a range of plateaus and wooded mountains, running north and south and declining on the coast to a narrow band of plain varying between 12 and 50 miles in breadth. The mountains are cut transversely by short narrow valleys, through which run rivers, most of which are dry in summer and torrential in winter. The Song-Ma and the Song-Ca in the north, and the Song-Ba, Don-Nai and Se-Bang-Khan in the south, are alone of any size. The chief harbour is that afforded by the bay of Tourane at the centre of the coast-line. South of this point the coast curves outwards and is broken by peninsulas and indentations; to the north it is concave and bordered in many places by dunes and lagoons.

Climate

In Annam the rainy season begins during September and lasts for three or four months, corresponding with the northeast monsoon and also with a period of typhoons. During the rains the temperature varies from 59 degrees or even lower to 75 degrees F. June, July and August are the hottest months, the thermometer often reaching 85 degrees or 90 degrees, though the heat of the day is to some degree compensated by the freshness of the nights. The southwest monsoon which brings rain in Cochin-China coincides with the dry season in Annam, the reason probably being that the mountains and lofty plateaus separating the two countries retain the precipitation.

Agriculture and other industries

The cultivation of rice, which is grown mainly in the small deltas along the coast and in some districts gives two crops annually, and fishing, together with fish-salting and the preparation of nuoc-mam, a sauce made from decaying fish, constitute the chief industries of Annam.

Silk spinning and weaving are carried on on antiquated lines, and silkworms are reared in a desultory fashion. Besides rice, the products of the country include tea, tobacco, cotton, cinnamon, precious woods and rubber; coffee, pepper, sugar-canes and jute are cultivated to a minor extent. The exports comprise tea, raw silk and small quantities of cotton, rice and sugar-cane. The imports include rice, iron goods, flour, wine, opium and cotton goods. There are coal-mines at Nong-Son, near Tourane, and gold, silver, lead, iron and other metals occur in the mountains. Trade, which is in the hands of the Chinese, is for the most part carried on by sea, the chief ports being Tourane and Qui-Nhon, which are open to European commerce.

Administration

Annam is ruled in theory by its emperor, assisted by the "comat" or secret council, composed of the heads of the six ministerial departments of the interior, finance, war, ritual, justice and public works, who are nominated by himself. The resident superior, stationed at Hué, is the representative of France and the virtual ruler of the country. He presides over a council (Conseil de Protectorat) composed of the chiefs of the French services in Annam, together with two members of the "comat"; this body deliberates on questions of taxation affecting the budget of Annam and on local public works. A native governor (tong-doc or tuan-phu), assisted by a native staff, administers each of the provinces into which the country is divided, and native officials of lower rank govern the areas into which these provinces are subdivided. The governors take their orders from the imperial government, but they are under the eye of French residents. Native officials are appointed by the court, but the resident superior has power to annul an appointment. The mandarinate or official class is recruited from all ranks of the people by competitive examination. In the province of Tourane, a French tribunal alone exercises jurisdiction, but it administers native law where natives are concerned. Outside this territory the native tribunals survive. The Annamese village is self-governing. It has its council of notables, forming a sort of oligarchy which, through the medium of a mayor and two subordinates, directs the interior affairs of the community--policing, recruiting, the assignment and collection of taxes, &c.--and has judicial power in less important suits and crimes. More serious cases come within the purview of the an-sat, a judicial auxiliary of the governor. An assembly of notables from villages grouped together in a canton chooses a cantonal representative, who is the mouthpiece of the people and the intermediary between the government and its subjects. The direct taxes, which go to the local budget of Annam, consist primarily of a poll-tax levied on all males over eighteen and below sixty years of age, and of a land-tax levied according to the quality and the produce of the holding.

Education is available to every person in the community. The primary school, in which the pupils learn only Chinese writing and the precepts of Confucius, stands at the base of this system. Next above this is the school of the district capital, where a half-yearly examination takes place, by means of which are selected those eligible for the course of higher education given at the capital of the province in a school under the direction of a doc-hoc, or inspector of studies. Finally a great triennial competition decides the elections. The candidate whose work is notified as très bien is admitted to the examinations at Hué, which qualify for the title of doctor and the holding of administrative offices. The education of a mandarin includes local history, cognizance of the administrative rites, customs, laws and prescriptions of the country, the ethics of Confucius, the rules of good breeding, the ceremonial of official and social life, and the practical acquirements necessary to the conduct of public or private business. Annamese learning goes no farther. It includes no scientific idea, no knowledge of the natural sciences, and neglects even the most rudimentary instruction conveyed in a European education. The complications of Chinese writing greatly hamper education. The Annamese mandarin must be acquainted with Chinese, since he writes in Chinese characters. But the character being ideographic, the words which express them are dissimilar in the two languages, and official text is read in Chinese by a Chinese, in Annamese by an Annamese.

The chief towns of Annam are Hué, seat both of the French and native governments, Tourane, Phan-Thiet in the extreme south, Qui-Nhon, and Fai-Fo, a commercial centre to the south of Tourane. A road following the coast from Cochin-China to Tongking, and known as the "Mandarin road", passes through or near the chief towns of the provinces and forms the chief artery of communication in the country apart from the railways (see French Indo-China.

History

The ancient tribe of the Giao-chi, who dwelt on the confines of S. China, and in what is now Tongking and northern Annam, are regarded by the Annamese as their ancestors, and tradition ascribes to their first rulers descent from the Chinese imperial family. These sovereigns were succeeded by another dynasty, under which, at the end of the 3rd century B.C., the Chinese invaded the country, and eventually established there a supremacy destined to last, with little intermission, till the 10th century A.D. In 968 Dinh-Bo-Lanh succeeded in ousting the Chinese and founded an independent dynasty of Dinh. Till this period the greater part of Annam had been occupied by the Chams, a nation of Hindu civilization, which has left many monuments to testify to its greatness, but the encroachment of the Annamese during the next six centuries at last left to it only a small territory in the south of the country. Three lines of sovereigns followed that of Dinh, under the last of which, about 1407, Annam again fell under the Chinese yoke. In 1428 an Annamese general Le-Loi succeeded in freeing the country once more, and founded a dynasty which lasted till the end of the 18th century. During the greater part of this period, however, the titular sovereigns were mere puppets, the reality of power being in the hands of the family of Trinh in Tongking and that of Nguyen in southern Annam, which in 1568 became a separate principality under the name of Cochin-China. Towards the end of the 18th century a rebellion overthrew the Nguyen, but one of its members, Gia-long, by the aid of a French force, in 1801 acquired sway over the whole of Annam, Tongking and Cochin-China. This force was procured for him by Pigneau de Béhaine, bishop of Adran, who saw in the political condition of Annam a means of establishing French influence in Indo-China and counterbalancing the English power in India. Before this, in 1787, Gia-long had concluded a treaty with Louis XVI., whereby in return for a promise of aid he ceded Tourane and Pulo-Condore to the French. That treaty marks the beginning of French influence in Indo-China.

The earliest printed book of Vietnam was published in 1335: the 20-volume An Nam Chí Lược (The Concise Records of Annam, 《安南志略》), written by Lê Tắc (黎崱 li4 ce4).

The name gave rise to the Annamitic Chain (la Chaîne Annamitique), also translated as Cordillera, Ridge, Mountains, a 1100-km with a height of 2958 metres, that divides Vietnam and Laos.

References

See also Legrand de la Liraye, Notes historiques sur la nation annamite (Paris, 1866?); C. Gosselin, L'Empire d'Annam (Paris, 1904); E. Sombsthay, Cours de législation et d' administration annamites (Paris, 1898).