Mother Goddess worship (Đạo Mẫu) and the hầu đồng ritual, as official bodies describe them

The short answer

Đạo Mẫu is the worship of the Mother Goddesses of Three Realms: heaven, water, and mountains and forests. UNESCO inscribed it in 2016, under the title "Practices related to the Viet beliefs in the Mother Goddesses of Three Realms", and describes people turning to the goddesses for spiritual needs, everyday wishes, health and success. UNESCO describes daily worship and ceremonies, rituals like the spirit possession ritual, and festivals such as Phủ Dầy, held at temples dedicated to the Mother Goddesses. UNESCO describes a practice of believers, mediums and temple guardians, and the official sources XTOUR read set no rules for a visitor who attends.[1]

The goddesses

UNESCO's listing names Liễu Hạnh as the Mother of the World: "a nymph who descended to earth, lived as a human and became a Buddhist nun". The Mother Goddesses also include "other spirits considered legendary heroes".[1] UNESCO's decision describes the practice as combining Taoism, Buddhism and other religious dimensions, shared by several ethnic groups in Vietnam, and transmitted since the 16th century among temple guardians, priests and lay believers.[2] It also credits the worship with contributing to "the appreciation of women and their roles in society".[1]

Who carries the practice

UNESCO lists the bearers as members of the public, temple guardians, ritual priests, spirit mediums, their assistants and musicians, who pass knowledge on by word of mouth to newcomers and family members.[1] The decision notes that the nomination was prepared with temple guardians, singers and spirit mediums, and that the practice was entered on Vietnam's National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2013.[2]

Hầu đồng and chầu văn

XTOUR's reading is that the ritual UNESCO calls the spirit possession ritual is hầu đồng. In a 2010 Viet Nam News interview republished on the culture ministry's English portal, Professor Ngô Đức Thịnh describes hầu đồng as a ritual of Đạo Mẫu in which people believe the gods enter the bodies of mediums to give instructions, drive out evil spirits, cure illness and bless believers. It is accompanied by chầu văn singing, with the moon-shaped lute (đàn nguyệt), drums and castanets, and by dances with swords, flowers and fans.[4]

The same sources are frank about strain on the practice. In the 2010 interview Professor Thịnh says that each act of a ritual now needs an elaborate costume, that spending on offerings and gifts for a performance has grown large, and that fake mediums may exploit the ritual for profit.[4] A 2015 news article on the same portal quotes him saying many costumes have changed so much that audiences cannot tell which deities they belong to, and records that hầu đồng was banned in wartime, that some people regard it as superstition, and that scholars want it preserved authentically.[5] UNESCO's decision names "the over-commercialization of rituals" among the threats its safeguarding measures address.[2] These are disagreements within Vietnam about the practice, not settled questions, and XTOUR reports them as such.

The Phủ Giầy (Phủ Dầy) festival

UNESCO names Phủ Dầy as an example of the festivals at temples to the Mother Goddesses.[1] A 2008 article on the culture ministry's English portal, credited to vdc.com.vn and using the spelling Phu Giay, dates the festival to the 1st to 10th days of the third lunar month, with the 3rd marking the anniversary of Liễu Hạnh's death, and quotes the saying that pairs the "Father's Festival in August" with the "Mother's Festival in March". It describes processions on the 5th and 6th days carrying the Mother from the Vân Cát and Tiên Hương temples to the Dần and Gôi pagodas, with lacquered palanquins and a long cloth held overhead called "The Bridge" for spirits to cross, as well as stick play and a human chess game.[3]

The 2008 page names the place as Kim Thái commune, Vụ Bản district.[3] XTOUR has not confirmed the province from an official source and gives neither the province nor a current administrative unit for the temples; the province mergers article explains why names from before 2025 are not translated here.

What a visitor should take from this

XTOUR's reading of these sources is that a hầu đồng ceremony is a religious act by believers and mediums, held at their temples on their calendar, and that the sources describe it from the practitioners' side. None of them tells a visitor whether they may attend, photograph, or what to wear or give. XTOUR does not supply those rules, because no official source it read states them.

What XTOUR does not know

• Etiquette, dress or photography rules at any Mother Goddess temple or ritual.
• The Gregorian dates of the Phủ Giầy festival in any year.
• The current province and commune of the Phủ Giầy temples.
• Which temples in any XTOUR destination hold regular rituals.

For the other Vietnamese practices UNESCO lists, see what UNESCO lists for Vietnam; the heritage words article explains the Vietnamese names for temples and shrines.