Among the 12 Ho Chi Minh Awards and 20 State Awards for Science and Technology this time, the Faculty of History has two awards: one Ho Chi Minh Award for the cluster of works on Vietnamese culture by the late Professor, Meritorious Artist Tran Quoc Vuong, one State Award for the work “Thang Long - Hanoi in the 17th - 18th - 19th centuries” by Associate Professor, Meritorious Artist Nguyen Thua Hy. This is the 5th Ho Chi Minh Award and the 4th State Award that the staff of the Faculty of History has been honored to receive from the State.Associate Professor, Doctor, Meritorious Teacher Nguyen Thua Hy was born in 1937, in the "core space" of "old Hanoi" (Hang Cot Street, Ba Dinh District), his hometown is Ha Dinh village (now Thanh Xuan District), his mother is from La Phu village (old Ha Tay). Graduated from high school at one of the three most prestigious high schools in Hanoi at that time (Nguyen Trai School, along with Chu Van An and Truong Vuong Schools), he became a student of the first course of the History Department, Hanoi University of Science, in the same class with famous names in the history industry later, such as Professor, People's Teacher Phan Dai Doan, Professor, People's Teacher Vu Duong Ninh, Associate Professor, People's Teacher Le Mau Han, Associate Professor, Meritorious Teacher Pham Thi Tam... It is said that in this first course of the History Department, he was one of the best students. But unlike many of his friends, after graduating, he was assigned to teach high school history. After thirty years of teaching and working at the Departments of Education in Ha Nam and then Hanoi, it was not until 1990, when he was 53 years old, that he returned to work as a lecturer at the Department of Ancient and Medieval Vietnamese History, Faculty of History, at the invitation of Professor Phan Huy Le, who was then the Head of the Department. He thought that being a high school teacher meant teaching and not doing research. But he was not "satisfied". With his passion for science, the knowledge he had accumulated - especially from books written in English and French - and his natural ability to absorb, he wrote quietly, not much, but deeply. Then, from the early eighties, he decided to do a PhD (in the country). At that time, PhD students, in general and in history in particular, were rare. He chose Hanoi - the land where he was born and raised, witnessing many changes - as the subject of his research. In early 1984, his thesis “Thang Long - Hanoi in the 17th - 18th - 19th centuries: economic - social structure of a medieval city” was defended, among the first doctoral theses (then called Associate Doctorate) of the History Department. I remember, the day of the thesis defense (at 19 Le Thanh Tong) was very crowded, with many great figures in the history industry present. Later, in 1993, this work was published as a book and immediately attracted the attention of researchers at home and abroad. Up to now, nearly 20 years have passed, it has become a book that cannot be missed, not mentioned, not cited in studies on Thang Long - Hanoi, especially in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. In this work, by exploiting a variety of sources, especially those written in Western languages (English, French), which are carefully processed, methodically and effectively, the work has outlined the appearance of Thang Long - Hanoi through the periods, especially the 17th - 18th - 19th centuries, highlighting the socio-economic structure, economic activities of Thang Long - Hanoi in the 17th - 18th - 19th centuries, the policies of the feudal states of Vietnam on this issue through the case of Thang Long - Hanoi. Sharp analysis of economic structure, social structure, class mechanism and class exchange; The generalizations about the factors of urban development and rise, about the urban-rural relationship, about the dual state-folk relationship in the city, about the form of development and transformation of the city have become important theses, having a wide influence on domestic and foreign researchers, students, graduate students and postgraduates when approaching the history of Vietnamese society in the medieval period.
The work has become a typical study on Thang Long - Hanoi, which is often cited by domestic and foreign researchers when studying Vietnamese history in general and Thang Long - Hanoi history in particular. This work is also a valuable monograph, effectively serving the training work of the Faculty of History - University of Social Sciences and Humanities - VNU (bachelor, master, doctorate in Ancient and Medieval Vietnamese History, Vietnamese Cultural History and other related majors). The work has been translated into English (published by The Gioi Publishing House, 2002), known by many scholars and readers from many countries, contributing to promoting Vietnamese history and culture in general, and Thang Long - Hanoi history and culture in particular to international friends. Recently, the work was supplemented and published in the "Thang Long Thousand Years of Culture Bookcase" on the occasion of the 1000th anniversary of Thang Long - Hanoi, continuing to be highly appreciated by researchers and readers. The work has made an important contribution to promoting the development of Hanoi studies. As an excellent study of Thang Long - Hanoi, the work can be considered an exemplary monograph on the history of Thang Long - Hanoi as a city playing the role of a political - administrative center of the country. Although the work focuses mainly on the period from the 17th to the 19th century, most issues related to the economic - social life of Thang Long - Hanoi are generalized in the entire historical process, creating a relatively comprehensive picture of the economic - social structure of this city. Among hundreds of monographs on Thang Long - Hanoi to date, this work can be considered one of the most excellent studies, marking a great step forward for Hanoi studies. Reading Nguyen Thua Hy, one can clearly see the erudition of knowledge and elegance in literature, especially the works on the history and culture of Thang Long - Hanoi. Perhaps it is the combination and absorption of a thousand-year-old Thang Long culture with a fairly mature Hanoi urban culture in modern times. At the age of 75, his hands and feet are weak, but he is still unusually clear-headed. Just sitting at home, he surfs the web regularly, using both landline and mobile phones, he knows everything about the world, the country, the school, the faculty, the big and small personnel... (and sometimes even knows in advance). And especially, he still writes, from research articles to books. During the thousand years of Thang Long - Hanoi, he edited the book "Thang Long - Hanoi Cultural Documents: Collection of Western Documents" with a thousand pages, which was highly appreciated, and just a few days ago, he published "Traditional Vietnamese Culture - a Perspective", with more than half a thousand pages. He translated and edited famous works of foreign scholars about Vietnam. When meeting him, everyone feels happy and loves life. He works wholeheartedly, seriously, responsibly, and effectively. He almost never cared about the gains and losses of life. That's why he was very "leisurely". And perhaps because he was "leisurely", he was very "deep".
