ABSTRACT
All human societies create architecture, and such constructions can embody and reflect politics, power, identity, and many other dimensions of societies. The human capacity for social cooperation has resulted not only in social organizations of exceedingly large scale, but also in corresponding forms of modified landscapes and architecture. Co Loa is by far the largest of all contemporaneous sites of the Red River Valley region and one of the earliest forms of city for Southeast Asia. Radiometric and stratigraphic data indicate that most of the rampart was constructed without interruption, within an approximate range of 300 – 100 cal bce. Pungnap-toseong’s rampart construction could reflect a varied political strategy utilizing both differentiation and integration. The marshaling of labor was not simply for the production of artificial landscapes and the practical benefits they furnished – such projects were also designed to symbolize power, control people, and to promote feelings of common identity.
