| Abstract: |
The Sa Huynh Metal Age culture is named after an urn burial site close to the sea in Quang Ngai province, first investigated early in this century. Major Sa Huynh culture sites occur in the coastal regions of central Vietnam. Assemblages of this culture known to date have come mostly from jar burial sites. From 1989 to 1995 archaeologists of Hanoi National University have made excavations at four urn burial sites in the town of Hoi An (Quang Nam-Da Nang province). The following traits are specific for the Sa Huynh culture at Hoi An: 1. the Sa Huynh sites are located mainly in the sandy dunes which are about 5 km long and are surrounded by an ancient stream (a branch of the Thu Bon river) from the west to the east. All Sa Huynh sites have been found under Cham sites
2. materials gathered here show strong relationships between the Sa Huynh culture and the Han, Dong Son, Indian, and other cultures
3. artefacts from Hau Xa and other cemeteries dated to the first century A.D. allow us to fill in the gap between the final stage of the Sa Huynh culture and the early Cham culture, at least in one area where the important Cham sites of Mi Son and Tra Kieu are located
4. Hoi An was one of the places of exchange between western and northern regions before the Christian era. Southeast Asia already took part in a trade network linking the Mediterranean and Han China. Hoi An, as a pre-port town or embryonic port town, formed the foundation for the establishment of the first kingdom in coastal central Vietnam.
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