Hoi An Ancient Town
Hoi An Ancient town is located in Viet Nam’s central Quang Nam
Province, on the north bank near the mouth of the Thu Bon River. The
inscribed property comprises 30 ha and it has a buffer zone of 280 ha.
It is an exceptionally well-preserved example of a small-scale trading
port active the 15th to 19th centuries which traded widely, both with
the countries of Southeast and East Asia and with the rest of the world.
Its decline in the later 19th century ensured that it has retained its
traditional urban tissue to a remarkable degree.
The town reflects a fusion of indigenous and foreign cultures
(principally Chinese and Japanese with later European influences) that
combined to produce this unique survival.
The town comprises a well-preserved complex of 1,107 timber frame
buildings, with brick or wooden walls, which include architectural
monuments, commercial and domestic vernacular structures, notably an
open market and a ferry quay, and religious buildings such as pagodas
and family cult houses. The houses are tiled and the wooden components
are carved with traditional motifs. They are arranged side-by-side in
tight, unbroken rows along narrow pedestrian streets.
There is also the
fine wooden Japanese bridge, with a pagoda on it, dating from the 18th
century. The original street plan, which developed as the town became a
port, remains. It comprises a grid of streets with one axis parallel to
the river and the other axis of streets and alleys set at right angles
to it. Typically, the buildings front the streets for convenient
customer access while the backs of the buildings open to the river
allowing easy loading and off-loading of goods from boats.
The surviving wooden structures and street plan are original and
intact and together present a traditional townscape of the 17th and 18th
centuries, the survival of which is unique in the region. The town
continues to this day to be occupied and function as a trading port and
centre of commerce.
The living heritage reflecting the diverse
communities of the indigenous inhabitants of the town, as well as
foreigners, has also been preserved and continues to be passed on.
Hoi An Ancient Town remains an exceptionally well-preserved example of a Far
Eastern port.
