The Tai and Muong valley lords of the north-west

Who rules

Title

Hereditary valley lords: Tai chao muong and Muong lang, no paramount

Confidence

low

No name can be given for 1200; the chronicles that name early lords are later.

What the realm holds

• Wet-rice basins and their weirs (muong fai), worked by the lord's kin and bonded households
• Timber, cinnamon, wax, honey, ivory and lacquer sent down the Black River on rafts (Chợ Bờ is the rafting head)
• Salt and iron got by exchange; mountain tolls
• The right to call out the muong's men
• Tribute rights over the hill peoples above them

How it was acquired

Not recoverable. The Tai Dam chronicle makes the Tai come down from Mường Lò to Mường Thanh and Mường Lay under a legendary Lang Chuong; it has no firm dates.

Allies and rivals

Dai Viet: tributary in name when Thăng Long is strong; the Ly marry its chiefs' kin to border chiefs in the north-east but we have no named marriage in the north-west. Dali: the Tai of the upper Red and Da touch Dali's Lincang and Honghe march (Dali is the Yunnan researcher's ground). Lao muang: Muang Phuan and the middle Mekong muang lie over the Annamite crest. The Muong of the Ma and the Black River trade with the Ly court through the rafting heads.

The realm that morning

Quiet and self-governing. No campaign against the western chau is dated to the 1190s in anything we could read, and a court that is running down is not able to send one.

Wealth

Rice, timber, cinnamon bark, wax, honey, ivory, lacquer, cattle on the Mộc Châu grass, livestock and bonded labour; salt and iron bought in.

Military

Each muong calls out its own men and stockades its head; hill tracks and rapids are the defence. No numbers.

Threats

• A strong Ly or Dali force (neither is likely)
• Feud between valleys
• The Tai movement down the rivers, whose dates are not known

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. 1257 to 1258The Mongol army of Uriyangkhadai comes down the Red River road from Yunnan past the Quy Hoa and Thanh hills to Thăng Long.Depends on: The Mongols hold Dali (1253). Stopped by: Dali is not taken.
2. after 1250 (the chronicle gives no year)Tai Dam lords of Mường Lay and Mường Thanh enter the Trần court's records.Depends on: The Trần reach west. Stopped by: A Trần retreat.

Places of note

• Muong Thanh (Dien Bien): The great Tai basin of the Nam Rom
• Muong Lo (Nghia Lo): The Black Tai heartland in tradition
• Cho Bo: Rafting head on the Black River

Where the sources disagree

• Board 'The Tai and Muong of the northwest' says the Muong society is documented from the nineteenth century and read backwards: agreed; the four great muong are the later Muong tradition, not a 1200 source.

Evidence: Vietnamese notices of campaigns (not read here), the Tai chronicle and modern ethnography; no inscription or dated text of the valleys themselves.

On the map: The units are modern districts; valleys and watersheds, not districts, were the lords' ground. Edges against the Lao muang and Dali are anchors, not research results. The Nghe An and Ha Tinh hills are left out on purpose: no source we read names a lord there in 1200, so they sit in the province record The Nghe An hills under the hill peoples.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Complete Annals of Dai Viet, Ngo Si Lien, drawing on Le Van Huu's Dai Viet su ky (1272) and Phan Phu Tien; continued by Pham Cong Tru and Le Hi (1479; printed 1697 in the standard Chinh Hoa edition). The main narrative source for Dai Viet in 1200, compiled in 1479 from Le Van Huu's lost history of 1272. Read online
• The Unofficial History of Nanzhao, Yang Shen; revised by Hu Wei (16th century, revised 1775, from Dali and Yunnan traditions and lost local histories). The kingdom of Dali has no surviving text of 1200: its own records were destroyed in the Mongol conquest and after, and the Song shi's Dali entry ends in 1175. Read online