Dong Son drum

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A bronze drum, unearthed in 1964 from Luobowan, Guangxi, China. Located in the China National Museum

Dong Son drums (also called Heger Type I drums) are bronze drums fabricated by the Dong Son culture, in the Red River Valley of northern Vietnam. The drums were produced from about 600 BC until the third century AD, and are one of the culture's finest examples of metalworking.

The drums, cast in bronze using the lost wax method, are up to a meter in height and weigh up to 100 kg. They may be based on a form originally from Yunnan. Dong Son drums were apparently both musical instruments and cult objects. They are decorated with geometric patterns, scenes of daily life and war, animals and birds, and boats. The latter alludes to the importance of trade to the culture in which they were made, and the drums themselves became objects of trade and heirlooms. More than 200 have been found, across an area from eastern Indonesia to southern China.

[edit] See also

• Moko drum

[edit] Reference

• Mary Somers Heidhues. Southeast Asia: A Concise History. London: Thames and Hudson, 2000. Pp. 19-20.

[edit] External link

• The Present Echoes of the Ancient Bronze Drum by Han Xiaorong (University of Hawaii)
• Page at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

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