VietNamNet Bridge – Fourteen strange stone bars in various shapes and colors have been found in Tuy An district of Phu Yen province. They are believed to be part of a dan da (lithophone) because if using a piece of stone or wood to beat these bars, there will have the sound similar to the sound from the lithophone discovered in Tuy An in 1990.

On June 13, the Department of Culture - Sports and Tourism of Phu Yen sent several experts of the Phu Yen Museum to Tuy An to see the man – Dinh Hai Hung - who discovered the strange stone bars to determine information and the artifacts.

There is no professional conclusion for the 14 stone bars yet. The local authorities have asked Hung to preserve the artifacts.

Mr. Le Van Tien Dung, Head of the Culture - Information Division of Tuy An district, said that experts are examining the stone bars.

Earlier, while digging in Da Den Forest in Tuy An to find medicinal plants, Hung detected 14 stone bars in the depth of about 30 cm. Seeing the stones with different shapes and making sound, he took them home.

The stones are ivory white with black-green core, in the shapes of rectangular, trapezoidal and bow of different sizes. They look much like the lithophone discovered in Tuy An in 1990 but smaller in size.

The largest stone bar is about 38 cm long, 13 cm wide, weighing 4.5 kg while the smallest bar is 18 cm long, 4.5 cm wide and weighing 0.6 kg.

The site where the stone bars were found is about 15 km from the place where the Tuy An lithophone discovered in 1990.

The Tuy An lithophone was discovered by a farmer named Huynh Ngoc Hong in 1990 in the Hon Mot mountain of Tuy An district. It includes eight stone bars. The stone instrument is preserved at the Museum of Phu Yen Province.

The Tuy An lithophone dated back to the first half of the first millennium BC. It is considered the stone instrument with the most complete scales in Vietnam.

In 1994, a farmer named Do Phan found a pair of stone trumpets in Phu Can mountain of Tuy An district. One trumpet weighs 75kg, with bottom size of 40cm, 35cm high, and the blowing hole of 2.5 cm wide. The other weighs 34.5 kg, with bottom size of 29cm, 35cm high, and the blowing hole of 1.8 cm wide.

Phu Yen province and the Ministry of Culture - Sports and Tourism have proposed the government to recognize the Tuy An lithophone and the stone trumpets as national treasures and to ask for the UNESCO’s recognition as memorial heritage of the mankind.

The dan da is a lithophone played by minority ethnic groups in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, in the provinces of Lam Dong, Dak Nong, Dak Lak, Gia Lai, and Kon Tum.

Several stones of different sizes are placed in a row. The player then uses a stick to knock the stones, each of which produces a different tone. The stone music sounds like the rhythm of the streams and bird songs, and therefore goes well with the surrounding landscape. One of the oldest stone musical instruments ever discovered was found in this area, dating back more than 2,000 years ago.

Thanh Van