Trọng Thủy
Trọng Thủy or Zhong Shi (Chinese: 仲始), full name Triệu Trọng Thủy or Zhao Zhongshi (Chinese: 趙仲始), was a prince of Nanyue.
He was a son of the Chinese mandarin Zhao Tuo, was sent as an emissary to the king of Vietnam (then known as Âu Lạc), and was given the hand in marriage of Mỵ Châu, the only daughter of An Dương Vương.[1] But she betrayed her father to her husband's father, leading to the fall of Cổ Loa fortress to Triệu Đà. In legend An Dương Vương fled with his daughter, not knowing she was the traitor, but having ridden to a river a giant golden turtle, told him “The enemy is sitting right behind you!” - and he killed her. Prince Trọng Thủy arrives immediately afterward, and finding the body of his beloved wife and his father-in-law nowhere to be seen, drew his sword and killed himself, in order to be with his wife forever in eternity.
Trọng Thủy and Mỵ Châu in literature
Trọng Thủy and Mỵ Châu are a Romeo and Juliet motif in Vietnam's literature.[2]
References
- The Oxford companion to world mythology - Page 395 David Adams Leeming - 2005 "Another aspect of the Vietnamese cycle tells the quasi-historical story of An Dương Vương, one of the hundred sons of ... But the king is tricked by Trieu Da, who sends his son Trong Thuy as an emissary to Au Lac to find out the source of An ..."
- Two rivers: new Vietnamese writing from America and Viet Nam Kevin Bowen, Frank Stewart, Ba Chung Nguyen - 2002 "I was always thinking of the story of Trong Thuy and My Chau." Our impoverished homeland has many legends. Almost any Vietnamese would know the story of how Trong Thuy's father, king of the Trieu kingdom, had sent him to the court of ..."