Far East Kingdoms

Soi Nhu Culture (Palaeolithic) (Vietnam)
c.16,000 - 5000 BC

Palaeolithic Cultures Early Africa (Intro) Early Americas (Intro) Early Asia (Intro) Early China (Intro) Early Europe (Intro) Early Near East (Intro) Early Oceania (Intro)

Human history in Asia as a whole provides one of the earliest stories outside of the Near East and Africa. However, human history in South-East Asia is relatively obscure. Anatomically modern humans in the form of Homo sapiens reached the region around 60,000 BC, quickly expanding into Oceania and East Asia soon afterwards (see the Hominid Chronology feature link for more).

The Soi Nhu was the second-earliest South-East Asian culture to emerge which was specific to the Vietnam region. It is focussed on the Ha Long Bay area of the Gulf of Tonkin, an area which includes over two thousand islands and islets which emerge from the gulf's emerald waters or from coastal stretches of freshwater swamp forest. The bay encompasses approximately fifteen hundred square kilometres in North Vietnam, with a coastline of about one hundred and twenty kilometres, near the border with China, and one hundred and seventy kilometres to the east of Hanoi.

The bay is also famous worldwide for network of thousands of monolithic limestone islands which jut up from its waters. These tiny islands are dotted with beaches and grottoes which have been created through millennia of wind and wave action, with their sparsely-forested slopes ringing with birdsong. These waters help to sustain a community of fishermen, many of whom live on floating junks. These close-knit communities work within a local cultural history which dates back to the Soi Nhu.

The earliest Vietnam-specific culture in Palaeolithic South-East Asia was the Son Vi, which also reached much farther afield. That was well-established by the time the Soi Nhu appeared in its small coastal pocket of influence. The Son Vi was succeeded by the equally dominant Hoabinhian culture, and a series of others down to the appearance of the Da But around 5000 BC.

Numerous stone artefacts have provided evidence for the presence of the Hoabinhian in this area, but the local Soi Nhu has also produced some evidence of its own. Archaeological sites include those at Bai Tu Long and Ha Long (with the latter also being the type site for local late Neolithic culture).

Archaeological finds are constantly being made, and archaeological cultures are frequently being updated with new information. Get in touch here if this page also requires updating.

(Information by Peter Kessler, with additional information from Vietnam: A New History, Christopher Goscha, from Early Mainland Southeast Asia, C Higham (River Books Co, 2014), from Southeast Asia: A Historical Encyclopaedia, from Angkor Wat to East Timor, Keat Gin Ooi (ABC-Clio, 2004), from The Macmillan Dictionary of Archaeology, Ruth D Whitehouse (Macmillan, 1983), and from External Links: Bradshaw Foundation, and Vietnam (Countrystudies), and Vietnam pre-historic era (Inside Travel), and Ha Long Bay (Tonkin Cruises), and Cultural & Historical Value of Ha Long (Paradise Vietnam).)

c.16,000 BC

The Palaeolithic in South-East Asia witnesses the emergence of the highly-localised Soi Nhu culture around the Gulf of Tonkin in northern Vietnam. It joins the already-established and much wider-ranging Son Vi culture.

Palaeolithic folk of the Soi Nhu enjoyed a coastal life which offered fishing and fruits as the main means of nutrition, along with a network of thousands of monolithic limestone islands which jut up from the local waters, dotted with beaches and grottoes

It is focussed on the Ha Long Bay area of the gulf, an area which includes over two thousand islands and islets in the gulf's emerald waters. The Thien Long and Me Cung sites reveal remains from mounds of mountain shellfish (Cyclophorus), spring shellfish (Melania), and some freshwater molluscs, along with some rudimentary hand tools.

c.8000 BC

Shell middens and cord-impressed or comb-marked pottery characterise Quynh Van sites. Many vessels have pointed rather than rounded bases. The culture appears and flourishes in what is now northern Vietnam, with minor intrusions into south-western China and eastern Laos.

Material culture from the Ru Diep site in north-central Vietnam (Ha Tinh province) reveals a mixture of both pre-Neolithic (Quynh Van culture) and Neolithic elements, in a shell mound context