Vietnam’s oldest museum – home of Cham cultural treasures

via Vietnam Net, 31 January 2022: A feature on the Museum of Cham Sculpture, an excellent museum you should definitely visit if ever in Da Nang.

The Museum of Cham Sculpture is considered a unique place showcasing the quintessence of Cham people’s art of sculpture, which is a precious heritage of Da Nang city as well as Vietnam as a whole.

In the late 19th century, a French envoy named Charles Lemire discovered a relatively large number of antiquities of Cham people during his archaeological surveys and then brought them to the area which is now the central city of Da Nang to display.

After that, the French School of the Far East conducted more excavations on a larger scale and found many more items, leading to a need for a museum to exhibit these antiquities.

In 1902, Henri Parmentier, a famous archaeologist from the French School of the Far East, proposed a design plan for a Cham museum in Da Nang. Basing on this, the construction of the Museum of Cham Sculpture started in 1915 and completed in 1919.

Source: Vietnam’s oldest museum – home of Cham cultural treasures