By Adnan Hameed TWA _____ Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and other officials offered incense in commemoration of the Hung Kings, the legendary founders of Vietnam, at Kinh Thien Palace on Nghia Linh Mountain in Viet Tri city, the northern province of Phu Tho, on April 18 (the 10th day of the third lunar month). The incense offering ceremony was held in the special national historical relic site of Hung Kings Temple. According to VNA, Prime Minister Chinh, other officials of the Party, State, ministries, sectors, central agencies and localities, along with people from nationwide attended the event, expressing deep gratitude to the ancestors who founded the nation, paving the way for the construction and development of a beautiful, prosperous, and civilised Vietnam nowadays. Following that, the delegation offered incense at the Tomb of the Hung Kings and laid wreaths at the bas-relief depicting President Ho Chi Minh talking to soldiers of the Tien Phong (Pioneer) Brigade at the Gieng Temple Intersection. After the historic Dien Bien Phu Victory in May 1954 and the signing of the Geneva Accords in July the same year, Group 308 of the brigade returned to take over the capital of Hanoi from French colonialists. At Gieng Temple on September 19, 1954, President Ho Chi Minh talked to the soldiers on their way to Hanoi, underlining that the Hung Kings founded the nation and Vietnamese people must together protect it. The incense offering ceremony is the most important among the activities of the Hung Kings Temple Festival and the Culture and Tourism Week of the Ancestral Land 2024, held from April 9 to 18 at the historical relic site and other localities in Phu Tho province. Legend has it that Lac Long Quan (son of Kinh Duong Vuong and Than Long Nu) married Au Co (the fairy daughter of De Lai). Au Co gave birth to a pouch filled with one hundred eggs, which hatched into a hundred sons. However, soon thereafter, Lac Long Quan and Au Co separated. Lac Long Quan went to the coast with 50 of the children while Au Co went to the highlands with the rest. Their eldest son was made king, who named the country Van Lang and set up the capital in Phong Chau (now Viet Tri city in Phu Tho province), beginning the 18 reigns of the Hung Kings. The kings chose Nghia Linh Mountain, the highest in the region, to perform rituals devoted to rice and sun deities to pray for bumper crops. To honour their great contributions, a complex of temples dedicated to them was built on Nghia Linh Mountain, and the 10th day of the third lunar month, which falls on April 18 this year, serves as the national commemorative anniversary for the kings. The worship of the Hung Kings, closely related to the Vietnamese people’s tradition of ancestor worship, was recognised as part of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2012.