Standing in the middle of Cổ Trai village, visitors see two buildings from two different eras close to one another. One is a three-bay ironwood ancestral hall, small, old and low-roofed, bearing the exact look of a family shrine in a coastal village. The other is a spacious memorial complex with ceremonial gates, a stone bridge and a grand main sanctuary. Both honor the same lineage, yet one reflects how descendants tend to family rites while the other shows how later generations commemorate a royal dynasty.
This heritage complex comprises five sites, and it should be stated right away that three of those five sites are Buddhist pagodas, namely Trà Phương Pagoda, Nhân Trai Pagoda and the Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda complex. The remaining two sites are the Mạc clan ancestral hall and the memorial complex for the Mạc kings. Because the cluster combines two distinct layers of worship, conflating them leads to misunderstanding both.
ITwo layers of worship on the same land
The first layer is clan ancestor veneration. This is the practice of the ancestral hall and the memorial complex, where the figures worshipped are members of the Mạc lineage, the ceremonies follow ancestral death-anniversary rites, and the caretakers are clan descendants alongside local authorities.
The second layer is Buddhist worship. This is the practice of the three pagodas, where the main hall enshrines Buddha statues according to Mahayana Buddhist tradition, and members of the Mạc royal house appear not as the principal deities worshipped on the main altar, but as benefactors (người hưng công) who contributed funds and labor to build and restore the pagodas.
The distinction between being worshipped as a principal deity and being remembered as a benefactor is the key to reading this entire complex.
In a northern Vietnamese Mahayana pagoda, the central altar is the Three Jewels altar (ban Tam Bảo), and no secular person, however exalted in rank, is placed upon it. When someone renders great service to a pagoda, the pagoda carves a portrait statue or a stone stele and places it on a separate altar in the rear hall, a custom known as the posterior altar (ban hậu) or commemorative endowment (gửi hậu). That is how a pagoda expresses gratitude, allowing the benefactor to receive a share of the pagoda's incense after death while remaining distinct from the ranks of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas.
Therefore, when records state that Trà Phương Pagoda preserves statues and steles donated by members of the Mạc royal family, it does not mean the pagoda is a shrine to the Mạc dynasty. It means the Mạc royal family endowed the pagoda, and the pagoda has preserved the traces of that endowment according to Buddhist custom. The places that directly worship the Mạc kings are the ancestral hall and the memorial complex, the other two sites in the cluster.
Below is the specific role of each site according to the heritage dossier.
The Mạc Clan Ancestral Hall (Từ đường họ Mạc) in Cổ Trai worships the ancestors of the lineage, built in 1905 facing west with three bays of ironwood in the Nguyễn dynasty style, its original floor area covering only about 30 square meters inside grounds now spanning roughly 14,000 square meters, and ranked as a national historical heritage site in 2002. The Memorial Complex for the Mạc Kings (Khu tưởng niệm các vua nhà Mạc) was begun in 2009 on the former foundation of Tường Quang Palace to worship the monarchs of the dynasty, and was ranked as a city-level heritage site in 2016. Trà Phương Pagoda has the Sino-Vietnamese name Thiên Phúc Tự and is popularly called Bà Đanh Pagoda, an ancient temple extensively restored under the Mạc dynasty and ranked as a national heritage site in 2007. Nhân Trai Pagoda has the Sino-Vietnamese name Phúc Linh Tự (also called Nhân Thọ Cung), with a đinh-shaped Three Jewels hall on grounds of about 9,944 square meters, ranked as a city-level heritage site in 2003. The Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda (Đền chùa Hòa Liễu) consists of a temple dedicated to Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn and an adjacent pagoda named Thiên Phúc Tự, where she purchased 25 mẫu, 8 sào and 2 thước of rice fields to endow the Three Jewels, preserving a 1561 stone stele, her statue and an ancient stone pillar, ranked as a national heritage site in 1993.
The most common misunderstanding is to assume that all five sites are shrines to the Mạc kings, an impression easily created by the collective name of the complex. In reality, three of the five sites are active Buddhist pagodas with monastics, study schedules and Buddhist liturgical calendars independent of the clan's ancestral death anniversaries.
Another misunderstanding concerns Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn at Hòa Liễu. She is worshipped in the temple section rather than on the main Buddha altar of the pagoda, and the villagers venerate her for endowing the pagoda and establishing charitable land regulations for the village rather than merely for her court title. In other words, what the village remembers is what she did for the community, not the rank she held at court.
IIFrom the second capital to the heritage complex
What makes this area distinctive is the story of a clan that ascended the throne and established a second capital right in its ancestral homeland. Dương Kinh was founded in 1527 and served as a second capital alongside the old imperial city of Thăng Long. When a coastal fishing and farming village became a royal capital, its pagodas and shrines were expanded and embellished accordingly, and the 16th-century works across this complex are the surviving traces of that building program.
- 1527Founding of Dương KinhThe second capital of the Mạc dynasty was established on the land of Cổ Trai and the surrounding area, the ancestral home of the royal clan.
- 16th centuryMajor royal endowmentsPagodas across the region were restored and expanded through the patronage of the royal family, with Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn recorded as the chief benefactor at many sites.
- 1561Stone stele at Hòa LiễuA stone stele erected during the reign of Mạc Phúc Nguyên in the Quang Bảo era still stands at Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda, serving as one of the most securely dated artifacts in the complex.
- After the fall of the dynastyDescendants change surnames to surviveAccording to branch family genealogies, descendants changed their surnames and dispersed across many provinces. Reclaiming the original surname and resuming public ancestral rites took place gradually over later centuries.
- 1905Building of the Mạc Clan Ancestral HallThe three-bay ironwood ancestral hall in Cổ Trai was erected facing west in the Nguyễn dynasty style, marking the open resumption of clan ancestor worship in the ancestral homeland.
- 1993 to 2016Individual heritage rankingsBefore being grouped into a special national complex, each site was ranked individually, namely Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda (national, 1993), the Mạc Clan Ancestral Hall (national, 2002), Nhân Trai Pagoda (city-level, 2003), Trà Phương Pagoda (national, 2007) and the Memorial Complex for the Mạc Kings (city-level, 2016).
- 2001 to 2003Restoration of the Minh Thề festivalVietnam News Agency records state that the ancient oath-taking festival at Hòa Liễu was officially revived in 2001 and 2002 (some sources state 2003) after a long interruption. The festival was inscribed on the National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2017 and received its certificate in early 2018.
- 2025Special national heritage siteThe entire five-site cluster was ranked as a special national heritage site under Decision 152/QĐ-TTg on January 17, 2025.
Regarding the founding dates of the three pagodas, sources differ, and this should be noted directly. The heritage dossier of the cultural heritage authority dates Trà Phương Pagoda to the Mạc period, whereas many general accounts state that the pagoda was first built under the Lý dynasty and underwent major restoration in the 16th century. Nhân Trai Pagoda is likewise described in some sources as a Lý dynasty foundation. The two accounts do not necessarily contradict each other, as one records the date of the surviving architectural and sculptural layer while the other records local tradition regarding the original founding. The library notes both without forcing a single date.
Regarding Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn, historical records note that she was the principal consort of Emperor Mạc Thái Tổ and a native of Trà Phương village itself. Her role as the named benefactor of numerous pagodas across the region is attested on stone steles, making this one of the notable cases where epigraphic evidence allows historians to reconstruct the religious patronage of royal women in 16th-century Vietnam.
IIIFive sites across one region
The five sites lie scattered across the old Dương Kinh area a few kilometers apart, each with its own scale and chronological layer. Because they do not share a single enclosure, a visit requires traveling in several stages.
Located in Cổ Trai village. The original hall built in 1905 faces west and consists of three bays with four ironwood roof trusses in a single-ridge (chữ nhất) plan of the Nguyễn period, covering about 30 square meters. Inside are preserved ceramics, porcelain, wooden ritual objects and steles related to the worship of the Mạc kings.
Also in Cổ Trai, begun in 2009 on a 10.5-mẫu plot that was once the foundation of Tường Quang Palace under the Mạc dynasty. Its structures include an outer ceremonial gate, a stone bridge, a pond, an inner ceremonial gate, a stele house, side galleries and a 586-square-meter công-shaped main sanctuary supported by 100 ironwood columns, housing a great bronze bell cast on August 15, 2010 weighing over 1,500 kilograms.
Sino-Vietnamese name Thiên Phúc Tự, popularly called Bà Đanh Pagoda. The pagoda preserves two national treasures recognized in late 2020, a stone statue of Emperor Mạc Thái Tổ and a green stone relief carved around 1552 depicting Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn meditating on a lotus seat within a bodhi-leaf frame.
Sino-Vietnamese name Phúc Linh Tự, also called Nhân Thọ Cung, located in Nhân Trai hamlet on grounds of about 9,944 square meters with a đinh-shaped Three Jewels hall. The main Buddha hall was rebuilt beginning in 2019.
Comprises a temple dedicated to Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn standing beside a pagoda named Thiên Phúc Tự. Notable artifacts include a stone stele erected in 1561, a statue of the Grand Empress Dowager and an ancient stone pillar called a thạch trụ. This is also the venue of the Minh Thề oath-taking custom.
Any discussion of this complex must highlight Mạc period stone sculpture, which gives the region its distinctive artistic value. The statue and relief at Trà Phương Pagoda portray real historical figures seated in devotion or meditation, with gentle, approachable facial expressions and finely carved yet unpretentious robes. Compared with religious statues from other eras, Mạc period portraits are often noted by art historians as earthy and warm, showing less stylized courtly stiffness and more lifelike human presence. Because stone endures, after four and a half centuries their lines remain crisp, whereas wooden structures from the same period have almost entirely vanished.
The memorial complex also preserves a great polearm called the Định Nam Sabre (Định Nam đao), measuring 2.55 meters in length and weighing 25.6 kilograms, with a 95-centimeter blade and a 160-centimeter hollow iron shaft. Kept for generations by the Phạm branch of Mạc descent in Xuân Trường (Nam Định), the sabre was brought back to be enshrined at the memorial complex on September 22, 2010 and was recognized as a national treasure in 2020.
IVThe lie of the land and orientation
This section presents the library's reading through the lens of traditional feng shui, not content copied from stele inscriptions or the heritage dossier. The library states this clearly so that readers can distinguish between historical documentation and interpretive reading. For an area once chosen as a royal capital, this aspect deserves close attention, as people in former times selected capital sites with no less care than burial grounds.
The first point to note is that this site was not chosen by searching for a geomantic node (huyệt) in the usual sense. Dương Kinh was placed here because it was the ancestral village of the ruling clan, much as the Trần dynasty built its secondary palace Complex at Tức Mặc. Reading the lie of the land here means reading how a coastal fishing and farming village was elevated into a royal capital, rather than reading a terrain selected from scratch by court geomancers.
Second, and this is the most distinctive feature of the area, Dương Kinh was a capital facing out toward the sea. Major capitals in Vietnamese history mostly lay deep inland, backed by mountains and bordered by rivers, taking mountains as their rear pillow (hậu chẩm). Here, the river mouths and the sea lie in front while flat plains stretch behind. In traditional site reading, that reverses the usual pattern, as the bright hall (minh đường) is no longer a patch of fields or a lake, but the open sea itself, the widest bright hall imaginable yet one without an outer rim to hold it in. Classical manuals favor a broad bright hall sheltered by a front screen hill (án sơn), whereas here the expanse is wide open without a screen hill, gaining open airflow and maritime access while making it harder for qi to gather and stay.
Third is the role of the sanctuaries within that terrain. In a flat landscape lacking natural gathering points, builders created points of focus through architecture. The three pagodas and two clan sanctuaries scattered across this plain each occupy a raised mound or a favorable plot of land, acting as anchors across an otherwise flat and open expanse. Read in traditional terms, this is using human effort to supplement earth force, and the royal family's endowment of multiple pagodas in the same district served both religious devotion and the anchoring of the capital's landscape.
Fourth is orientation. In Cổ Trai, the memorial complex opens its main axis toward the south and southeast looking toward the coastal estuaries, using its broad front courtyard and pond as a gathering space on festival days, whereas the old three-bay ancestral hall built in 1905 faces west toward the old village lanes. The pagodas follow Buddhist layout principles, turning their main halls toward open ground so worshippers have ample room to approach, while the path from the triple gate across the courtyard into the Three Jewels hall narrows step by step to gather qi.
Finally, a word on interpretation. Later generations have often read the land of Dương Kinh through the eventual fall of the dynasty that built it, spinning tales of auspicious or inauspicious ground. The library does not follow that approach. In traditional geomancy, a piece of land reflects only the living conditions of those who dwell upon it, while the rise and fall of a ruling house depends on far too many historical causes beyond geography. What is worth reading here is a rare historical choice, placing a secondary capital facing the open sea at a time when most contemporaries still turned their backs to the coast.
VThe Minh Thề oath custom and annual observances
The ritual calendar of this complex divides along its two layers of worship. The clan layer centers on the ancestral death anniversary and the spring calligraphy ceremony. The pagoda layer follows the general Mahayana Buddhist calendar together with each village's own festival. Most famous of all is the Minh Thề festival at Hòa Liễu, an oath-taking custom preserved more completely here than anywhere else in the country.
| Lunar date | Location | Details |
|---|---|---|
| 14th of the 1st month | Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda | The Minh Thề oath rite. In the morning, before the altar, the chief officiant, village elders and residents read an oath pledging impartiality, vowing not to turn public property into private gain, not to abuse power to oppress others, and not to cover up wrongdoing. |
| 14th to 16th of the 1st month | Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda | The village festival, in which the oath rite is the centerpiece. Records note that this custom was originally held on the 24th day of the twelfth lunar month before being moved to the middle of the first lunar month. |
| During the Minh Thề rite | Oath platform in the temple courtyard | The chief officiant plunges a knife into a circle drawn in the courtyard called the oath platform (đài thề), then mixes rooster blood into wine for participants to drink together as a seal upon their spoken pledge. |
| 15th of the 1st and 7th months | Three pagodas in the complex | The First Full Moon (Thượng nguyên) and Ullambana (Vu Lan) observances according to the general Mahayana Buddhist calendar. |
| 6th of the 1st month and 22nd of the 8th month | Ancestral hall and memorial complex | On the 6th day of the first lunar month the spring calligraphy festival is held at the memorial complex (since 2012), while the 22nd day of the eighth lunar month is the main death anniversary of Emperor Thái Tổ Mạc Đăng Dung, when descendants from branch lineages across the country gather to offer incense. |
The Minh Thề festival deserves special mention. According to historical records, this custom originated in the mid-16th century, linked to Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn spending her own funds to purchase 25 mẫu, 8 sào and 2 thước of rice fields for the Three Jewels and joining villagers in establishing communal charity fields to support worship and aid the poor. Where communal property exists, there must be a way to safeguard it, and the method devised in former times was to require those entrusted with public affairs to swear a solemn oath before the deities once every year.
What sets this custom apart from other village oaths is its content. Most oaths in village communal houses pledge loyalty to village customs and the tutelary deity, whereas the oath at Hòa Liễu addresses the handling of public funds directly, centered on the principle of not taking communal property for private gain. Interrupted for many decades, the custom was revived in 2001 and 2002 (some sources state 2003), inscribed on the National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2017, and awarded its certificate in early 2018.
VILocation And How To Get There
- Address
- Từ đường họ Mạc và khu tưởng niệm ở làng Cổ Trai, chùa Trà Phương và chùa Nhân Trai cùng thuộc xã Kiến Hưng, đền chùa Hòa Liễu thuộc xã Kiến Thụy, thành phố Hải Phòng
- Getting there
- The Mạc Clan Ancestral Hall and the Memorial Complex lie in Cổ Trai village, Trà Phương Pagoda and Nhân Trai Pagoda both belong to Kiến Hưng commune, and Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda belongs to Kiến Thụy commune, Hải Phòng city. Because the sites lie a few kilometers apart across the old Dương Kinh area, visitors should plan to travel between them in stages.
- Coordinates
- 20.7225, 106.6777
All five sites in the complex are active places of worship, so visitors should observe local etiquette by dressing modestly, removing hats when entering inner halls, walking quietly and speaking softly in rear sanctuaries and Buddha halls, and placing donations in merit boxes. Because three of the sites are Buddhist pagodas, visitors should follow pagoda custom, clasping hands in salutation when passing the Three Jewels altar and asking beforehand if wishing to light incense at side altars. Ancient stone statues and steles are easily worn down by human hands, so please do not touch or rub them. The day of the Minh Thề rite at Hòa Liễu draws the largest crowds, and because the oath takes place in the courtyard, visitors should stand outside the oath circle and avoid stepping into the ceremonial area.
Nearby places in the library
VIIContribute To This Page
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?Quick Questions
What does the Mạc Dynasty Complex in Dương Kinh include
It comprises five sites, namely the Mạc Clan Ancestral Hall in Cổ Trai, the Memorial Complex for the Mạc Kings, Trà Phương Pagoda, Nhân Trai Pagoda and the Hòa Liễu Temple and Pagoda complex. Three of the five sites are Buddhist pagodas, while the other two are places of clan ancestor worship.
Do the pagodas in the complex worship the Mạc kings as main deities
No. The main halls of the pagodas enshrine Buddha statues according to Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Members of the Mạc royal family were benefactors who endowed the pagodas, and the pagodas honor their generosity by placing portrait statues or steles on separate posterior altars (ban hậu), a position distinct from the principal deities.
What is the Minh Thề festival at Hòa Liễu
It is an annual village oath-taking custom held on the 14th day of the first lunar month, in which the chief officiant and villagers read an oath pledging integrity and vowing not to take public property for private gain. The officiant plunges a knife into a circle called the oath platform and mixes rooster blood into wine for participants to drink together. The custom was revived around 2001 to 2003 and recognized as national intangible cultural heritage in 2017.
What is notable at Trà Phương Pagoda
With the Sino-Vietnamese name Thiên Phúc Tự and the popular name Bà Đanh Pagoda, it preserves two national treasures recognized in late 2020, a stone statue of Emperor Mạc Thái Tổ and a green stone relief carved around 1552 depicting Grand Empress Dowager Vũ Thị Ngọc Toàn meditating on a lotus seat within a bodhi-leaf frame.
What was Dương Kinh
It was the second capital of the Mạc dynasty, founded in 1527 right in the royal clan's ancestral coastal homeland. It represents one of the rare cases in Vietnamese history where a royal capital was positioned facing out toward the sea rather than deep inland backed by mountains.