Who were the first settlers in Sai Gon?

Traditionally, Viet Nam was divided into three regions: North (Bac Ky), Center (Trung Ky), and South (Nam Ky). The French called the regions, respectively: Tonkin, Annam, and Cochinchina. According to scholar Ben Kiernam, the name "Cochin" comes from a Portuguese pronunciation of "Giao-chi," a Chinese name for Viet Nam. The French added "china" to distinguish the location from the city of Cochin in India. The fertile land in the South awaited human development. Fish, shrimp, crabs, and crocodiles filled its rivers and streams. The climate was pleasant, and the rain and wind patterns were so moderate that the area seldom experienced typhoons, floods, or droughts. Such heavenly blessings attracted peasants from the far harsher climate of the North and Center to the South.



Before the French invaded, the South had only two urban areas: Sai Gon and Cho Lon (Big Market). The rest of what is now southern Viet Nam was a vast stretch of wild countryside divided into six provinces bordered by Cambodia, the Gulf of Siam (Thailand), and the sea. This area contained the extremely fertile Mekong (Cuu Long) Delta. Compared with the North and Center, the Mekong Delta's easy climate and fertile soil made a stable supply of food and even the possibility of wealth seem within easy reach. The people living in the six provinces came from three main groups: Soldiers and convicts: The Nguyen Court sent soldiers to ensure security, defend the frontiers, and set up colonies. The Court also sent convicts to expand farming land around their military posts. When a colony grew large enough, those involved in reclamation received part of the land and the public retained ownership of the remaining reclaimed land.



A handful of the rich and powerful: Representatives of the Nguyen Court implemented the Court's land policy by recruiting poor peasants mostly from the Center to help claim the land in the South. Poor peasants from the North and Center: These peasants were adventurous pioneers armed with hammers, ploughs, fishing nets, and the energy to conquer new land. They arrived during the seventeenth century after escaping the long and bloody territorial wars between two feudal families, the Trinh and Nguyen. The rich and powerful expanded their holdings to become big landowners, while the others became tenants and servants. Usually, the relationship between a landlord and tenants favors the landlord. However, the landlords needed the peasants to work new farm land more than the tenants needed the employment. Landlords didn't dare set high rents or behave too harshly; as a result, rents in the six provinces were much lower than those in the North and Center. Further, southern peasants who did not want to kow-tow to a landlord could support themselves by fishing and by reclaiming land to raise a garden. With work, they soon became middle-level farmers owning several hectares of land and perhaps even from three to seven water buffaloes.



During that time, families in the North and Center concentrated their houses in clusters amidst surrounding rice fields, while those in the southern delta spread out along waterways. Each southern household had a large area within a bamboo hedge. Many of these new southerners had come from regions in the Center, where contempt for feudal authority and Confucianism was common. Their relationships with the mandarins and even among the villagers themselves were not close. As a result, at times the government had trouble maintaining order in the six provinces. Outlaws and rebels roamed the vast forests, crisscrossing rivers and streams and coming as close to Sai Gon as the town of Gia Dinh.