A pair of bangles with animal motif

Dong Son period, ca 300 BCE-300 CE

Cast bronze 

Diam.7.5cm

Private Belgian collection acquired in Thailand in the 1980'ies

The Dong Son culture was named after a village in the north of Vietnam on the banks of the Ma river where a huge number of bronze and other objects were discovered in 1924. It emerged at the start of the 1st millennium BC and marked the height of the bronze civilization in this region. Centred on the Red River Valley of Vietnam, the Dong Son were sophisticated agriculturalists, raising rice and buffalos.   

The bronze age culture originated in Vietnam and developed in the other countries of Southeast Asia.

The large numbers of bronze objects and the complexity of the large well known drums could only be made in an ordered semiurban culture.