Traditional Vietnamese Funeral Customs and Their Meaning
Explore the main rites of a traditional Vietnamese funeral, from encoffining and mourning attire to burial and the 49-day rites, and their cultural meaning.
Hầu hết công cụ không cần tài khoản. Hồ sơ để lưu và đọc tiếp.
Chọn ngôn ngữ
Trang này chưa có đủ ba bản ngôn ngữ.
The family ritual manuals do not call it a three-day ceremony; they call it tế ngu. Gia lễ giản yếu by Dương Bá Trạc records that on the third day after burial the ngu rite is performed; Việt Nam phong tục by Phan Kế Bính records that the ngu sacrifice is performed three times after burial, and during those three days the children visit the grave each afternoon. A funeral lasting three days is a different matter: a Đại Đoàn Kết report on Cấn Hữu commune (formerly Quốc Oai district, now part of Hà Nội) around 1966 describes an elderly person's funeral held over three days, which is a local case.
From the article “What rituals make up a Northern Vietnamese funeral, from wrapping the body to announcing the mourning?”
Explore the main rites of a traditional Vietnamese funeral, from encoffining and mourning attire to burial and the 49-day rites, and their cultural meaning.
Northern Vietnam worship includes ancestor veneration, Thành hoàng, Mother Goddess and folk rites, reflecting uống nước nhớ nguồn and the wish for peace.
Vietnamese ancestral worship trays reflect regional character: the North favors formality, the Central region is lavish, and the South is simple yet refined.
Hanoi death anniversaries, weddings and funerals run on unspoken rules of hierarchy, invitations and conduct, rooted in the elegant Trang An character.
Explore the deep cultural significance of traditional Vietnamese funerals, common burial forms, and trends of change in modern society.
Funeral rites in northern Vietnam, from shrouding and encoffining to thành phục, the burial and the ngu rites that follow, as old ritual books record.
Explore the origins, four-panel construction, variations, and cultural significance of Ao Tu Than, the iconic traditional dress of Northern Vietnamese women.
A Northern Vietnamese gio tray usually features boiled chicken, sticky rice, bamboo shoot soup, spring rolls, and a bowl of rice with a boiled egg.
Northern and Southern Vietnamese family altars differ in structure, arrangement, generations honored and five-fruit tray choices.
Phong tục in English is custom, tập quán is usage, and truyền thống is tradition. See how the three differ, plus a vocabulary table of Vietnamese customs.
What to do when a family member dies: the order of a traditional Vietnamese funeral, from shrouding and mourning dress to burial and the later rites.
Tet feast trays in Northern, Central, and Southern Vietnam differ in ingredients and meaning, from banh chung in the North to banh tet in the South.
Mid-Autumn Festival customs differ across Northern, Central, and Southern Vietnam, from northern rituals to lively Central festivals and Southern gift-giving.
Tet customs in Northern, Central, and Southern Vietnam share roots but differ in dishes and rituals, from banh chung to bitter melon soup.
The Rain Praying Festival in Hung Yen honours the Four Dharma Goddesses with palanquin processions and the Danh Trang game, a wet-rice farming ritual.
Northern and Central Vietnam stress ancestral offerings and the pest-killing ritual on Doan Ngo, while the South keeps things simpler.
Dai Bai village in Bac Ninh is the cradle of bronze casting in Northern Vietnam, with about 1000 years of history and refined engraving art.
Red River Delta culture centres on village life, communal houses, pagodas, village gates and worship. A close look at Duong Lam, Phu Luu and Phuc Xa.
Four traditional Vietnamese house types compared: the northern three-bay house, Hue rường house, Central Highlands rông house and Northwest stilt house.
Village communal houses differ across the Northern Delta, the South, and the Mekong Delta waterways in architecture, deities, and festivals.
Vietnamese life-cycle rituals mark birth, coming of age, marriage, death and remembrance, with ceremonies shared by many ethnic groups.
Northern Vietnamese Tet worship runs from seeing off the Kitchen Gods on the 23rd of the 12th lunar month to welcoming ancestors and the vang ma burning rite.
Tuổi mụ is the Vietnamese lunar way of counting age: current year minus birth year, plus one, and folk calculations use this number.
Funeral customs across Northern, Central and Southern Vietnam differ in coffin size, burial timing and reburial, with Hue royal culture shaping Central rites.
Fertility worship in Vietnam, or tín ngưỡng phồn thực, hopes for flourishing life and harvests. It appears in Linga–Yoni symbols and the Trò Trám festival.
Vietnamese folk belief includes ancestor worship, deity worship, Mother Goddess religion, agricultural beliefs, and rituals of many ethnic groups.
Folk belief holds that a funeral brings cold air affecting the living, so the sick stay away. Eastern medicine links this to yin-yang imbalance.
The Vietnamese ao dai evolved from the 17th century xiem canh sen garment through reforms under Lord Nguyen Phuc Khoat and King Minh Mang.
Trùng tang, the hour of coffining and avoided burial days are folk beliefs from Bắc Kỳ; anthropology reads them as easing unease when someone dies.
An overview of Vietnamese traditional cuisine by region: Tet dishes, ancestral trays, festivals, vegetarian food and local specialties, with cultural context.
Vietnamese Women's Day on October 20 marks the 1930 founding of the Vietnam Anti-Imperialist Women's Union, a date that honors Vietnamese women each year.
Cá Ông worship reveres whales as guardian spirits in Vietnamese fishing communities, with roots in the Cham sea god Po Riyak.
Each dish at a Vietnamese wedding feast carries symbolic meaning, from red sticky rice to boiled chicken, pork rolls and braised pork.
Discover the origins, history, and deep cultural significance of Ao Ba Ba, the traditional garment symbolizing Southern Vietnam.
Explore the detailed sequence of 6 traditional Vietnamese wedding ceremonies: Chạm Ngõ, Ăn Hỏi, Xin Dâu, Đón Dâu, wedding banquet, and Lại Mặt.
Khan Dong and Ao The were formal wear for Vietnamese men, reflecting elegance and propriety, now revived for Tet, weddings and ceremonies.
Thành Hoàng is the guardian deity believed to protect each Vietnamese village, worshipped at the communal đình. Its origins, deity types and royal decrees.
The longevity celebration honours grandparents and parents at ages 60, 70, 80, 90 or 100, showing filial piety and respect for old age in Vietnamese culture.
Vietnam's 2016 Law on Belief and Religion separates protected belief from banned superstition, with fines and criminal penalties.
Comparing the kut rite of Korean mudang with Vietnamese hau dong: practitioners, clients, music, dress, and how both adapted to the market economy.
Heonik Kwon's ethnography shows how offerings to wandering souls in Quang Nam and Quang Ngai help communities live with wartime memory.
When to burn the mourning scarf in Vietnamese custom: the 49-day, 100-day and death anniversaries, plus the rites of removing mourning.
The Nguyen Trung Truc Memorial Festival in Kien Giang runs each year from the 26th to 28th of the 8th lunar month, honoring the hero who died in 1868.
The Kinh (Viet) are 86.83% of Vietnam's population and speak Vietnamese of the Viet Muong group. Their villages and ancestor worship are covered here.
Vietnam Culture Day falls on November 24 each year, approved by the 16th National Assembly on April 24, 2026, with fully paid leave for workers.
Most tools need no account. A profile lets you save and pick up later.
Choose language
This page is not yet available in all three languages.