Exhibitions in My Son Sanctuary’s Museum

The Permanent Exhibition

This exhibition is in the room to the left side of the My Son Sanctuary Museum. After entering, visitors will see a large map showing all temples and groups of temples in My Son Sanctuary. Their names are made of Latin letters and numbers followed by.

On the right hand side, there are columns at the entrance of My Son’s temples. They are carved at different times in the history (in the reign of different kings), and have different decorative styles.

Not far away, visitors can see a couple of sacred worshipping objects – Linga and Linga, made of stone and placed in the middle of a wooden house with a leaf roof. This is how the first temples at My Son Sanctuary look like. In the 4th century, Champa king constructed a temple here to worship Shiva god, and then it’s burnt by fire. After that, other kings used brick and stone to build towers, instead of flammable materials.

The star in this room is the Sculpture of Mukhalinga, the Linga with a god/king head. It’s made of sandstone, protected by a box because it’s inscribed to be a national treasure of Vietnam (in 2015). This sculpture is 126,5 cm long, including 3 sections of the same height. The lowest section is squared, representing Brahma god or the Creator in Hinduism. The middle section is octagonal, representing Vishnu god or the Saver in Hinduism. The top is cylindrical, and has a head of the god/king.

The Mukhalinga of My Son was found by mistake, 10m away from the Temple E4, after a heavy rain on 11st February 2012. It might be carved in the 8th century, and was an unknown piece of the My Son E1 Pedestal which has been preserved in the Museum of Cham Sculpture at Da Nang (another Vietnam’s national treasure). For historians, this artifact is the only one in My Son Sanctuary, and the most intact one in the country.

Next to the Mukhalinga, there is a pyramidal sandstone sculpture, used to place and decorate the top of Temple A1, the tallest tower ever at My Son Sanctuary (28 kilometers). It’s carved in the 10th century. Today, we can not see a full Temple A1 because it’s destroyed by bombings in the Vietnam war in the 1970s.  

On the nearby wall, rock carvings at My Son Sanctuary reveal the traditional costume, hairing style, official written language, trading history and relationship with neighbouring countries in the region, and more. Many things are influenced by Indian culture and Hinduism.

The Thematic Exhibition

This exhibition is in the room to the right side of the My Son Sanctuary Museum. It informs visitors of results about building techniques, holy animals, decorative motifs, cultural connections between My Son and other places, and Unesco world heritage sites in the region.

Temples and towers are constructed by unbaked red-clay bricks, and glued together by an adhesive that was not fully understood today. In this exhibition of My Son Sanctuary Museum, historians used physical and chemical methods to analyze the compositions of the adhesive as well as building techniques. The analysis indicated that Cham people might use resin tree’s milk. By the way, researchers also found a high concentration of the tree in forests that surround old temples.

It’s interesting to know about mythical animals used to decorate temples at My Son Sanctuary. There are gajasimha (lion body elephant head animal), lion, goat, elephant, snake naga,…

In history, My Son Sanctuary was in Amaravati, one of 5 municipalities of Champa kingdom (‘Thu Bon River basin’). The capital city Simhapura was not far away, and the holy land might be the hiding place for Cham kings if wars happen. It’s interesting that these places, and the trading port Champapura/Hoi An, are on the same axis. Meaning that from sea to mountain, the order will be port city – capital city – holy land. Since this ‘rule’ was discovered by Tran Quoc Vuong historian, missing places in three places were easier found in other municipalities of the kingdom.

In Duy Xuyen and Dai Loc districts (where My Son is located), local Vietnamese people worship Thu Bon goddess. In the legend, after helping them to live in the land, she flies up in the sky and disappears in My Son. For that reason, a festival is held to honour her on 12nd day of the second lunar month annually. Around Quang Nam province, the worship of goddesses is also popular, and a remaining heritage from Cham people’s culture after they moved.

The exhibition also introduces other Unesco world heritage sites in Vietnam, and Southeast Asia region, such as Angkor complex of Cambodia, Borobudur complex of Indonesia, Preah Vihear temple of Cambodia, Wat Phou complex of Laos, Pagan city of Myanmar. All have an influence from Indian and Hindu cultures.