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POST 714
10 – TRACKING THE SACRED SEAL
While Thu-Lan, astride the motorcycle, was
chasing the van with Clara’s kidnappers, she realized she had previously seen
the man who had attacked her on the sidewalk. The day before, when she
consulted documents with Clara at the National Library, she noticed that man sitting
at a nearby table, often cast furtive glances at them and he also seemed very
interested in their conversation. They had before them several ancient
documents of different historical periods. These documents were very diverse,
but, with their expertise, they had managed to establish a link between them.
With Clara's sound knowledge of Japanese Kanji they could read and understand
documents written in ancient Vietnamese Han-Viet, which is very close to
Kanji. With the expertise of Thu-Lan in the history of Vietnam, they found
historical facts that had been neglected by historians of the past, but that
allowed a new interpretation of important historical figures such as King
Le-Loi and Le-Lai.
Thu-Lan had noticed the great interest of their
neighbor at the library while they were trying to decrypt a document
describing some facts of the fifteenth century. The document was about a man
named Nguyen-Tham and the Sacred Seal. They exchanged information and
comments:
Thu-Lan: "Regarding the Seal, according to
what is recounted in the book of the history of the Le dynasty, ‘Le Trieu
Ngoc Pha Ky’, of which I have a personal copy, Le-Loi’s Seal had fallen from
the sky into his garden in 1414, the sixth day of the first month of the year
of the Horse. This golden Seal, measuring as described twenty-one by
thirty-one centimetres, bore the inscription ‘Thuan Thien Le Loi’ meaning
that Le-Loi had been appointed by Heaven. In the book, it is mentioned that
the day Le-Loi found the Seal there was the imprint of a giant foot, more
than a meter long, in his garden. In my opinion, this popular version is in
the field of legend."
Clara: "You're right, this document
describes here the presentation of the Seal to Le-Loi in 1414, the year of
the Horse. Nguyen-Tham, one of the dignitaries of the Thuan-Thien Society for
national protection, had the mission to hand in the Seal to Le-Loi. From what
I read, the Seal was much smaller in size. Its base was a square of about
four by four centimetres. A dragon sat on the top of the Seal to a full
height of about eight centimetres. This gold Seal bore the inscription ‘Thuan
Thien Bao Quoc’ which means ‘in accordance with Heaven to protect the
country’. It is written that the nine dignitaries of the Thuan-Thien Society
met to decide whether to support Le-Loi. During this meeting, they solemnly
printed the Seal in the middle of a sheet of paper. It is also written that
the nine dignitaries printed their own personal Seal on this sheet to ratify
their agreement and that this operation had been repeated nine times, in
order to have a copy of the agreement for each of them."
Thu-Lan: "This helps explain why Le Loi,
when he was king in 1431, the year of the Dog, ordered the making of a
twenty-one by thirty-one centimetre gold Seal with the engraved inscription
‘Thuan Thien Le Loi’. He later used this Seal on official acts, as it is
written in the book. It was done to confirm the legend that he had previously
spread on the dimensions of the Seal and the inscription on it. Le-Loi was
very skilful in spreading extraordinary information."
Clara: "What did he do with the Seal of the
Thuan-Thien Society?"
Thu-Lan: "According to the book 'Le Trieu
Ngoc Pha Ky' on page five it is written that he kept the Thuan-Thien Seal in
a golden box, so we can assume that the Seal given by the Thuan-Thien Society
was also kept in a golden box."
Clara: "In this document here, it is also
written that the Thuan-Thien Society did not approve of the dictatorial
methods employed by Le-Loi when he became king. He had several of his combat
comrades imprisoned or killed. The Society then decided that the king no
longer deserved to hold the Sacred Seal and wanted to have it back. Secretly,
a member of the Society, in the inner circle of the royal court, replaced the
Sacred Seal with a replica which did not confer any legitimacy to the
king."
Thu-Lan: "One can understand these
precautions to protect the lives of members of the Thuan-Thien Society. If
the king had discovered the disappearance of the Sacred Seal, he would
immediately have taken steps to suppress the opposition."
The insistence with which their neighbour
watched them and tried to listen to their words started to be a nuisance.
Thu-Lan could not stay in the library any longer. They returned the documents
and agreed to meet the next day.
(to be continued)
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