The Numismatic Chronicle 171 Offprint - Royal Numismatic Society

400
FRANÇOIS THIERRY
The form of the messages is that of the chengyu 成語, the four-character phrase,
sometimes doubled to make an eight-character expression, as an integral part of
education as conceived by the Confucians, both Chinese and Vietnamese. The
chengyu is a functional unit of language composed of four characters in a set phrase,
giving an immediate reference to a particular text that an educated Vietnamese would
have learnt by heart as part of his schooling, from primary school to preparation
for the civil service examinations. These four-character expressions were usually
taken directly from the classics, or composed by a process of abbreviation keeping
only the important semantic characters, to make them easy to remember. What
distinguished the civilized state, be it Chinese or Vietnamese, from the ‘barbarians’,
be they Mongol or French, was that it was managed and administered by educated
offi cials who, as a general rule, owed their promotion not to arbitrariness nor to their
birth (Ch. yin 廕, viet. ấm ‘[hereditary] protection’), but to their success in the civil
service examinations (Ch. keju 科擧, Viet. khoa cử); 235 and all the examinations,
from the local examinations to those held at the palace, relied on a knowledge of
these texts. The fi rst composition (kinh nghĩa 經義) required the explanation of a
passage drawn from the Five Canons and the Four Books; the candidates had to
demonstrate a perfect knowledge of the texts and show their erudition and ability to
quote also the commentaries by Zhu Xi 朱熹 (1131–1200), the great Neo-Confucian
philosopher of the Southern Song. 236
The overwhelming use of Confucian quotations and phrases, which is somewhat
repetitive in this coinage, was not for intellectual convenience. It was not an easy
option, but rather the mark of the clear political will of the second ruler of the Nguyễn
dynasty and his two successors.
In Vietnam, during the fi rst great national dynasty, the Lý dynasty (1010–1225),
the dominant ideology was predominately infl uenced by Buddhism and monks
played a very important role in the intellectual sphere. Under the Trần (1225–1400),
a system of public schools was organised, and a civil service examination system
was introduced in order to recruit offi cials. Thereafter Confucianism tended to
replace Buddhism, and the authorities arranged to have the Four Books and Five
Canons printed, so that they could be used as a basis for education. But it was during
the Lê dynasty (1428–1789), and in particular during the reign of Lê Thánh Tông
(1460–97), that Confucianism became the state ideology. It was during this dynasty
that for the fi rst time in Vietnam the examination system was set up at regional
(hương thí 鄉試), metropolitan (hội thí 會試) and palace (điện thí 殿試) levels,
held regularly every three years. 237 In this intellectual and ideological movement,
it was the Zhu Xi school of Neo-Confucianism that was dominant. A movement of
235 Members of the imperial family, and some sons of high offi cials owing to the merits of their
ancestors (ấm sinh 廕生), could be appointed to posts and administrative roles without taking the
examinations, but these titles were not conferred by law, and were subject to success in a different type
of examination (Laborde, pp. 397–8, 400–1; Poisson, Mandarins et subalternes, p. 31).
236 Tsuboi, pp. 180–9; Poisson, Mandarins et subalternes, pp. 24–30.
237 Eligibility for the national level examinations depended on success in the previous two
examinations: the annual examinations (khảo khóa 考課) and the provincial level examinations (hạch
thí 覈試) (Poisson, Mandarins et subalternes, pp. 24–6).