A large cast-iron cannon was unearthed on the morning of October 21 at the Thành Điện Hải relic in Đà Nẵng, Tuổi Trẻ reported. The construction crew found it about 1.5 metres underground while digging to move the foundation of an electric pole during a restoration and landscaping project at the site.
According to the report, the gun is about 2.95 metres long. Huỳnh Đình Quốc Thiện, director of the Đà Nẵng Museum, gave a first assessment that it is a large-calibre cast-iron cannon roughly 168 years old, and that it is probably one of the guns used against the joint French and Spanish forces that attacked the city in 1858–1860. He described this as a preliminary judgment based on looking at the piece.
Museum staff were still excavating it carefully at midday to avoid damaging it. The report does not say how the cannon will be conserved, studied or displayed, and the dating has not been confirmed by a formal examination.
Why it matters: Thành Điện Hải is a citadel site tied to the defence of the Hàn River estuary in the mid-19th century. Any firm identification of the gun would add a physical object to a history that residents mostly know from plaques and archives. This brief will be updated if the museum publishes a detailed assessment.
Sources
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