Hai Ba Trung Temple Traditional Festival: Paying tribute to two national heroines

Taking place from the 18th to the 21st of the third lunar month every year, the traditional festival of Hai Ba Trung Temple, De Tham Ward ( Thai Binh City) is an occasion to commemorate and pay tribute to the merits of the two female national heroes Trung Trac and Trung Nhi and their generals who led the people to rise up to fight off the Eastern Han invaders and gain national independence. This year, the traditional festival includes a water-raising ceremony including a land procession and a water procession to meet the spiritual needs of all classes of people.

Hai Ba Trung Temple relic has been restored and renovated to meet the spiritual needs of all classes of people.

"Debt collection, revenge for family"

Visiting Hai Ba Trung Temple during the traditional festival days, having the opportunity to chat with the temple caretakers here, we learned more about the anecdotes associated with the lives of two female national heroes.

According to historical records, the Trung sisters were twin sisters, daughters of Lac Tuong of Me Linh district, of the Hung King lineage. Trung Trac and Trung Nhi were intelligent and beautiful at an early age. Their parents also taught them military and martial arts. When they grew up, they were both good at martial arts, literature, patriotism, and love for the people. At the age of 19, Trung Trac married Thi Sach, son of Lac Tuong of Chu Dien citadel, who was also talented, always planning great things, and had the will to be self-reliant and self-reliant. At that time, our country was under the domination of the Han Dynasty. With the extremely brutal domination policy and harsh tribute regime of the Han Dynasty, our people had to live in misery and suffering. Facing the loss of their country and their broken homes, Thi Sach and Trung Trac planned to fight against the brutal domination of the feudal government of the North. Knowing that, the Governor To Dinh plotted to harm Thi Sach in order to shake the will of Trung Trac and the fighting spirit of our people. However, To Dinh's brutal actions did not make Trung Trac lose heart, on the contrary, they made her hate the enemy even more and determined to revolt "to collect the debt of the country, to avenge her family". On January 6, Canh Ty year (40 AD), the Trung sisters raised the flag of uprising, calling on heroes from all over the country and the people of the whole country to rise up and fight against the foreign invaders. Before the country, Trung Trac took off her husband's mourning scarf and swore: " One, I wish to wash away the national hatred/Two, I wish to restore the old Hung family's legacy/Three, I wish to avoid injustice to my husband/Four, I wish to keep this justice intact ".

The uprising was successful, and Trung Trac was enthroned by the generals and people, taking the title of Trung Vuong, and established the capital in Me Linh, becoming the first female king of the Vietnamese nation. Upon hearing that Trung Trac had declared herself king, the Eastern Han king was extremely angry and sent Ma Vien to bring 20,000 main troops, 2,000 boats and chariots, not counting the number of boatmen and soldiers who followed, and transported food and supplies, to invade our country. After a year of resisting the enemy, our army fought extremely bravely, but because the forces of both sides were too different, the Trung Sisters fought to their last breath, then threw themselves into the river to commit suicide. To show gratitude and respect for the great contributions of the Trung Sisters, temples and shrines were built in many localities across the country to worship them.

Hai Ba Trung Temple, De Tham ward (Thai Binh city).

Preserving traditional festivals

In Thai Binh, people have built a temple to worship Hai Ba Trung and the six female generals in the sacred land in the heart of the city. Ms. Bui Thi Huong, Chairwoman of the People's Committee of De Tham Ward (Thai Binh City) said: Hai Ba Trung Temple is a temple belonging to the relic complex of Hai Ba Trung Temple - Trung Pagoda.

According to ancient geographical documents, the temple grounds used to be large, the temple gate had a pillar gate, the entrance on both sides had two elephants symbolizing the war elephants of the Two Ladies, from the temple gate there was a small pond, then the 5-room front hall, the 3-room middle hall, the 3-room rear palace, there were 3 guest houses, the landscape was green, the ancient mossy tiled roofs were looming. Through the ups and downs, historical events, wars, and natural devastation, the temple grounds were narrowed, currently the usable area is only 179.5m2. With the awareness and responsibility to preserve the values of historical and cultural heritage, in recent years, the local Party Committee, government and people have regularly paid attention to investing in repairing and embellishing the relics. In 2019, with the approval of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Thai Binh City People's Committee and competent authorities, De Tham Ward People's Committee restored the relic with a total investment of more than 4.5 billion VND from socialized sources.

Every year, the traditional festival of Hai Ba Trung Temple is held to review the glorious history, the heroic tradition of the nation's resilience and indomitability. At the same time, this is also an opportunity for each citizen to respectfully offer incense to express their infinite gratitude and appreciation for the great contributions of Hai Ba Trung, our ancestors, and the heroic martyrs who heroically sacrificed for the independence and freedom of the Fatherland, for the happiness of the people.

At the age of over 80, Mr. Ta Duc Thu (De Tham ward) has been taking care of Hai Ba Trung temple for 21 years. He shared: Not only this year but for many years in the traditional festival, there is a procession with 3 palanquins, including the king's palanquin, the eight-pole palanquin and the hammock palanquin. This year, the procession takes place right after the incense offering ceremony to open the traditional festival on the morning of the 19th day of the third lunar month. The traditional festival is an occasion to welcome a large number of local people and tourists from all over to visit and worship, meeting the spiritual and cultural needs of the people.

With its great cultural and historical values, in 2005, the Provincial People's Committee granted a certificate of provincial-level relic ranking to Hai Ba Trung Temple. Each traditional festival held here will be an opportunity for each person to gain more understanding of the heroic history of the nation, love their homeland and country more, and demonstrate the morality of "When drinking water, remember its source". From there, it contributes to promoting the value of the relic, making the relic an attractive spiritual cultural tourist destination for visitors from inside and outside the province.

Tu Anh

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