LE QUI LY (Ho Qui Ly) and the HO DYNASTY (1400 - 1407) Le Qui Ly was born in 1400
to the Ho family with the name Ho Qui Ly. He took up the Le's last name when Le
Huan adopted him. Le Qui Ly was cousin to the Queen, Le Thi, and served as minister
during the Tran Dynasty. Taking advantage of his proximity to the King, Le Qui
Ly shrewdly maneuvered his way to power. When King Tran Due Tong passed away in
1377, Le Qui Ly seized control and founded the Ho Dynasty, after his ancestral
name, Ho. He ruled Viet territory for a year before sharing the throne with his
son, Ho Han Thuong. During their reign, the Hos reorganized and reinforced the
army. They revised taxes, placed restrictions on land ownerships, and opened ports
to trading, taxing those as well. They also established a new fiscal system which
replaced coins with bank notes and introduced the extension of royal appointments
to their servants. Convinced that administrators needed to be well versed, the
Hos modified the competitive examination system to demand more practical knowledge
of peasant life, mathematics, history, Confucian classics and literature. They
also took measures to reform the legal system and establish medical services.
In the mean time, well aware that Ho had usurped the throne, the Chinese Ming
Emperor sent 5,000 soldiers into the country to uproot the new king and reclaim
Viet territory. With the pretext of helping the movement faithful to the Tran
Dynasty, the Ming army assisted the rebels in bringing down the Ho Dynasty. In
1407, they succeeded and the Ming gained control of Viet territory. In the short
period of occupation that followed, the Chinese strived to obliterate Vietnamese
national identity. Vietnamese literature and artistic and historical works were
either burned or taken to China, and were replaced by Chinese classics. Chinese
dress and hair style were imposed on Vietnamese women, local religious rites and
costumes were replaced or banished, and private fortunes were confiscated and
transported to China.