Tru Son pot village

(Baonghean) - No one in the commune remembers when the clay pot making profession began here. They only heard from the elders that hundreds of years ago, people made clay pots and brought them all over the South and North to sell, to earn a living. Through many ups and downs, the craft village sometimes prospered and sometimes declined, society developed more and more, clay pots were still ordered by private traders at home, but the number of households practicing the profession became increasingly rare...

Products of Tru Son pot village (Do Luong district) include pots, pans, woks, rice pots, wine pots... People say that cooking with clay pots makes the food delicious, has a rich flavor, and can be kept longer. Braised fish and meat in clay pots are delicious! But clay pots break easily... Talking about the atmosphere of making clay pots in the commune in the past, Mr. Nguyen Huu Tao, Secretary of the Party Cell of Hamlet 12, said: "When I was born, I saw that every house in the village made clay pots to sell, and in every house's yard there was a pot furnace. The village market was full of clay pots, and traders and people from other places flocked to buy them. It was a hard job, but the clay pot makers were mainly women. At the age of 9 or 10, girls in this commune already knew how to knead clay and mold pots; only when they got married in another commune would they give up the job. Women from other communes and villages who came here as brides also had to learn how to mold clay pots."

Not many families in Tru Son are interested in the profession of making clay pots anymore.

Although the commune is famous for its clay pot making, the source of clay for making pots is not available in Tru Son. Clay for making pots must be clay, flexible, without sand or rocks, and usually has to be dug 2-3m deep from the ground. In the past, whenever the weather was sunny, at 3-4am, men in the commune lined up to carry dozens of kilometers to Yen Thanh and Nghi Loc districts to get clay to make pots. They left home at dawn but it was not until 5-6pm that the men could bring the clay back to the village. Later, transportation became more convenient, Tru Son people "went to the ground" by bicycle, motorbike, and even used tire oxen to carry the clay. Now, men in the commune are also reluctant to go far to get clay and leave the "earth going" job to a few households that specialize in the service. The fuel used to burn clay pots must be a combustible material that creates a light, evenly distributed heat, usually straw, later replaced by pine needles. Every year, households making clay pots often have to go to the forest 5-6 times to find enough fuel to meet their needs.

Making a clay pot requires many steps. The pot maker must cut, stab, and knead the clay until smooth, removing impurities. This job is usually done by men, but the next steps such as rolling the clay, shaping the pot, trimming, beautifying, drying in the sun, and burning it in the furnace cannot be done without the skillful hands of women. The craftsman must be meticulous, careful, persistent, and hard-working. However, the stage of burning the pot is considered the most difficult because if the temperature is too high, the pot will crack, and all efforts will be in vain. The furnace is an open furnace, without a roof, so if it rains and the furnace is still burning, only "heaven can save". Usually, after about 10 days, each family will produce a batch of pots. The task of selling the clay pots is assigned to men. They carry or carry the pots all the way to the North and the South to sell. Some trips lasted a few days, but others took weeks, carrying the hopes and expectations of wives, children, and families in the poor countryside. Many shipments could not be sold, and had to be carried home in misery.

No one has given the title of artisan to the women, sisters, grandmothers, and mothers who make Tru Son clay pots, but over hundreds of years, their hands have created countless products to serve the needs of life. Those hands turn inanimate clay bars into useful products, which men carry everywhere to earn small coins, saving up to support their families.

The whole commune currently has only 3 hamlets maintaining the profession of making clay pots. Hamlet 12 has 102 households and 410 people, but now there are only 5 households with about 10 workers participating in the profession. The largest is Hamlet 13 with 9 households and nearly 20 workers participating in the profession. In total, the whole commune has less than 20 households making clay pots. Mr. Nguyen Huu Tao sadly said: "I'm afraid that the clay pot profession will be lost. This is not only a profession to earn a living but also a beauty of this poor countryside, it is attached to people's lives like skin and flesh, now it is very painful to tear it away...". Then, as if explaining the risk of losing the profession, Mr. Tao continued: “This profession is hard, the income is very low. Working hard every day, you only earn about 50 thousand VND/worker. Young people now go to work as factory workers, export labor, and at home there are old grandparents and children, not strong enough to follow the profession...”.

In the past, families mainly made clay pots, but now they mainly make medicinal pots, small pots with difficult techniques and more eye-catching designs to serve the cooking of dishes in restaurants and hotels. Recently, households in Tru Son have been making a tool called a gold-washing tool (?). It is not known whether they use it to wash gold or not, but traders come to their homes to deposit money, and no matter how much they make, they will run out, and the money they earn is much more. However, those who still follow the profession in this commune do not want to "sow" hardship on their children anymore. The craft village is gradually fading away. Many people think of restoring the craft village and "earning" the title of craft village for Tru Son, but it seems very difficult. "For a long time, we really wanted to establish a craft village cooperative, specializing in supplying raw materials, checking the design, quality and output of the products, but it is really extremely difficult. Now, few people are interested in this profession anymore!" - The Party Secretary of Hamlet 12 said...

Article and photos:Vo Dung