golden age of archaeology; field research ceased altogether by the early 1970s. Archaeological work in Laos also faltered after this time. Vietnam, however, quickly established institutes of archaeology in the north (in Ha Noi) and in the south (in Ho Chi Minh City) and pursued a vigorous program of archaeological research, with a strengthened focus on prehistoric archaeology.

Prehistoric Archaeology in Indochina: 1901–1970

Intellectual influences on prehistoric archaeology derived from the natural sciences, with a strong emphasis on geology and paleontology. The earliest prehistoric archaeological research was undertaken in the late nineteenth century at sites such as Samrong Sen. It was only with the establishment of the Geological Service of Indochina that technical experts (Henri Mansuy, Madeleine Colani, Etienne Patte, Max de Pirey, J. Fromaget, Edmond Saurin) began to grapple with the region’s prehistory. The first and most important of these scholars was Mansuy, who helped establish the Geological Service in 1899. His archaeological work at Samrong Sen and Long Prao comprised a small part of his impressive corpus of field research on Pleistocene and Holocene sites in Cambodia, Upper Laos, and northern Vietnam.

In the next three decades prehistoric archaeologists visited and excavated sites throughout Indochina whose occupational period ran from the Paleolithic (Pleistocene) to the Iron Age. The early to middle Holocene was one of the first periods to receive systematic archaeological attention. In the 1920s Madeleine Colani’s reconnaissance of caves and rock shelters in northern Vietnam identified a Mesolithic-like tool tradition of early-Holocene age. Named after Hoa Binh Province (in Vietnam) where these sites were originally found, Hoabinhian sites were found in Upper Laos and northern Vietnam. From 1966 to 1968 Roland and Cecile Mourer excavated the Hoabinhian of Laang Spean in northwestern Cambodia in what represents the most systematic prehistoric archaeological work in Cambodia yet published. Vietnamese research on the Hoabinhian since 1960 is too voluminous to report here.

Work by Henri Mansuy in the caves of northern Vietnam, particularly in the mountain range of Bac Son, recovered stone tools and human remains from a late-Hoabinhian/early-Neolithic cultural manifestation that is now called the Bacsonian tradition. The general paucity of “Neolithic” research in Cambodia remains problematic. Bernard-Philippe Groslier’s excavations in 1959 at four monuments in the Angkor region uncovered “Neolithic” adzes but did not investigate this time period. During the 1950s and 1960s both Louis Malleret and Groslier worked in eastern Cambodia (in Kompong Cham Province) at circular earthwork sites; work in the 1990s at these sites has produced dates that begin—but do not terminate—in the Neolithic period (i.e., ca. 4000 b.p.).

The next breakthrough in Indochina’s prehistoric archaeology focused first on the Iron Age and then on the Bronze Age. In 1909 M. Vinet published the first report of earthenware jar burials in the region of Sa Huynh. Fifteen years later Henri Parmentier published results of archaeological work that included illustrations of jar burials containing cremations, beads, and iron tools recovered from the site of Sa Huynh (in Quang Ngai Province, central Vietnam). In 1934, using results of excavations in the region, Madeleine Colani proposed the term Sa Huynh culture for one manifestation of Indochina’s Iron Age.

Ancient bronze drums from Southeast Asia were the subject of comparative study by Franz Heger in 1902. In 1924 tax collector L. Pajot reported bronze artifacts that a fisherman found in a riverbank along the Ma River in northern Vietnam. Subsequent EFEO excavations recovered several graves, remains of pile houses, and bronze artifacts, which Victor Goloubew published in 1929. Olov Janse’s excavations at Dong Son from 1934 to 1939 recovered bronze drums in stratigraphic context. In 1935 Madeleine Colani reported the recovery of molds for casting bronze tools as part of the megalith culture from Upper Laos, now known as the Plain of Jars.

In Cambodia systematic excavations of Bronze Age sites were restricted to Mansuy’s work (published in 1902 and 1921) at Samrong Sen and to