Chu Cuoi Cung Trang: A Dive into Vietnamese Folk Tales

Vietnamese Folk Tales and the Mid-Autumn Festival in Vietnam

What is the Mid-Autumn Festival?

One of the most beloved celebrations is the Mid-Autumn Festival (tết Trung thu), held on the 15th day of the 8th lunar month. The festival is a time for families to show their love for children and for the community to gather together in the cool night air. In these gatherings, children enjoy lion dances (múa lân), parade with lanterns, share mooncakes and seasonal fruits under the year’s brightest full moon, and listen to folk tales told by a grandmother in the moonlit yard.

The lantern and mooncake making take place around the village weeks ahead. Therefore, it is also called  “children’s festival” because of the joys, excitement, imagination, loving care, the family and communal bonding it brings to the young ones.

The origin behind the festival:

As a water-rice agriculture country, Vietnam celebrates festivals all year round, mostly in harmony with the water-rice crops. A water-rice crop requires highly intensive family and communal labor in a rush to fit with seasonal weather and natural conditions at the beginning and the end of the crop. 

The fruitful harvest of every crop is always a big concern for every household. The mid-autumn full moon time is the right slack-season time of the Summer-Autumn rice crop. The dedication to the early-stage work of the crop is done, giving them a hope for a fruitful harvest to come. The adults then can relax and enjoy the leisure before rushing for the harvest work. 

Additionally, the seasonal moon and pleasant weather bring a sense of calm that soothes every adult’s heart. After days of tending the rice fields, they can gently turn their attention to caring for children, bonding with the community, and savoring moments of ease.

What are the special features of the Mid-Autumn Festival in Vietnam?

Beyond the lanterns and sweet treats, the festival is deeply connected to Vietnamese folk tales. For centuries, legends have been told during the Mid-Autumn Festival to entertain and teach children about cultural values. Among them, the most famous is the legend of Chu Cuoi Cung Trang, known in English as “Mr. Cuoi and the Tree on the Moon”.

According to the legend, when you look at the full moon during the Mid-Autumn Festival, you can see the image of a man sitting under a banyan tree. That man is Cuoi, a figure who has become an inseparable symbol of the festival and a reminder of the richness of Vietnamese folk tales.

The Legend of Chu Cuoi Cung Trang — English Version

Once upon a time, there was a woodcutter named Cuoi. One day, while chopping wood in the forest, he stumbled upon a tiger’s den where 4 tiger cubs were seen. In a moment of surprise and fear, Cuoi struck each cub using his axe with the intention of eliminating any potential dangers. 

Shortly thereafter, the mother tiger got back to the den. Seeing her cubs dead, she roared with grief. Hiding behind a tree nearby, Cuoi watched as the tiger mother picked leaves from a tree, chewed them, and carefully fed the paste to each cub. To Cuoi’s astonishment, the cubs revived.

Tempted by what he witnessed, Cuoi dug up that magical tree and carried it home to plant it in his garden. On the way home, he encountered a dying old man lying on the roadside. Cuoi picked up a few leaves from the mysterious tree, which he was carrying, to place them in the old man’s mouth. Miraculously, the man came back to life. Gratefully, the old man told Cuoi:

“This tree is not an ordinary plant. It can cure the gravest wounds and even revive the dead. But remember, never water it with dirty water. If you do, the tree will uproot itself and fly to the sky.”

Cuoi got more confident and was so happy to plant the tree in his garden. He strictly followed the old man’s instructions in his daily care of the tree. Words of the tree’s miraculous powers soon spread far and wide. Sick, wounded, and injured people from villages came to him for the remedies. With compassion, he could save them all. 

One day, a wealthy man whose daughter had drowned begged Cuoi to save her. Cuoi used the magical leaves to revive her. Grateful, the man married his daughter to Cuoi. The drowning accident caused the wife’s dementia. He daily instructed her about watering the precious tree with clean water.

One day, Cuoi went to the forest for a new season of wood gathering. At home, his wife, forgetting the instructions, relieved herself at the precious tree. The ground immediately trembled, and winds whirled. The tree uprooted itself and began to rise into the sky right at the moment Cuoi got home.

Seeing the tree floating upward, he dropped his bundle of wood, ran to catch it, and grabbed its roots with his axe. But the rise was too strong. It pulled Cuoi up. The tree, with Cuoi clinging to its roots, ascended until they reached the moon. 

From then on, people believe that on nights of tranquil and full moon, you can see the shape of a banyan tree and a man sitting beneath it — that is Mr. Cuoi, still under the tree on the moon, forever part of the heavens, regretfully looking down to the Earth.

The Legend of Chu Cuoi Cung Trang — Vietnamese Version

Ngày xửa ngày xưa, có một người tiều phu tên là Cuội. Một hôm, khi vào rừng đốn củi, anh bắt gặp hang cọp có bốn con cọp con. Sợ gặp nguy hiểm, Cuội liền vung rìu chém chúng.

Cọp mẹ trở về, nhìn thấy đàn con nằm im, đau lòng gầm rú vang vọng cả rừng xanh. Nấp sau gốc cây, Cuội nhìn thấy cọp mẹ hái lá một cây lạ, nhai rồi mớm cho từng con. Lạ thay, chỉ chốc lát sau, đàn cọp con hồi sinh.

Cuội đào cây ấy mang về nhà để trồng trong vườn. Trên đường đi, anh gặp một ông lão hấp hối nằm bên vệ đường. Cuội nhắc một vài lá cây nhét vào miệng ông. Kỳ diệu thay, ông lão tỉnh lại. Biết ơn, ông lão dặn dò:

“Đây là cây thần, có thể chữa vết thương nặng và cải tử hoàn sinh. Nhưng cháu hãy nhớ kỹ, tuyệt đối không tưới cây bằng nước bẩn. Nếu vi phạm, cây sẽ nhổ rễ bay lên trời.”

Từ đó, Cuội chăm sóc cây theo đúng lời dặn. Tiếng lành đồn xa, người bệnh tật, ốm đau tìm đến, và Cuội đều cứu giúp. Một lần, con gái phú ông chết đuối được Cuội cứu sống. Biết ơn, phú ông gả con gái cho Cuội. Nhưng sau tai nạn, người vợ trở nên đãng trí. Cuội thường dặn nàng rằng chỉ tưới cây bằng nước sạch.

Một hôm, Cuội vào rừng đốn củi. Ở nhà, vợ Cuội quên lời dặn, đi vệ sinh ngay dưới gốc cây, để nước bẩn thấm xuống rễ. Đất rung chuyển, gió nổi ào ào, cây bật gốc bay lên trời đúng lúc Cuội vừa về tới.

Cuội vội vàng quăng bó củi, chạy đến níu bằng rìu, bám vào rễ cây. Nhưng sức hút quá mạnh, cây kéo Cuội bay thẳng lên cung trăng. Từ đó, người ta tin rằng mỗi đêm trăng rằm, nhìn lên mặt trăng sẽ thấy bóng cây đa và một người ngồi bên gốc — đó chính là chú Cuội, mãi mãi gắn liền với cung trăng, trầm ngâm nhìn xuống trần gian.

*Explore more about the animated version and learn Vietnamese: click here

Cultural Meaning and Beliefs about Chu Cuoi Cung Trang

The legend of Chu Cuoi Cung Trang is a popular Vietnamese folk tale that continues to live in the Vietnamese mentality. Beyond being a bedtime story, it carries symbolic meaning and reflects the way Vietnamese culture blends imagination with real-life traditions.

1. A Symbol of the Mid-Autumn Festival in Vietnam
   During the Mid-autumn festival in Vietnam, the families gather in the moon-lit yard, enjoy the sweets, and grandparents or parents tell their children the legend of Chu Cuoi Cung Trang. The shadows on the moon are believed to be the image of Chu Cuoi sitting under his magical banyan tree. For centuries, the legend has been an inseparable part of the festival.
   
2. Life Lessons in Vietnamese Folk Tales
   Like many other Vietnamese folk tales, the legend conveys the values of kindness, gratitude, and mindfulness, as Cuoi used the magical tree to save lives and was mindful about how to take care of a treasure with purity. It figuratively affirms that purity in heart, in action, can create or preserve a magic or a miracle for your prosperity.  At the same time, it warns about carelessness and absent-mindedness  — they can cause an accident or any possible unrecoverable or irrecoverable loss, which can lead to your everlasting regret or grief. These lessons make the story timeless for both children and adults.
3. Myth Meets Reality
   While science explains the moon’s craters and shadows, folklore gives a more poetic version — the image of Chu Cuoi and his tree. This blending of myth and reality shows how Vietnamese folk stories enrich everyday life with imagination and wonder.

Conclusion

The legend of Chu Cuoi Cung Trang is more than just a bedtime tale — it is a cultural symbol deeply tied to the Mid-Autumn Festival in Vietnam. Every year, children are reminded that the figure they see on the moon is not just a shadow, but the guardian of a magical tree and a story that has been passed down for centuries. 

Like many Vietnamese folk tales, the legend of Chu Cuoi reflects values of kindness, giving, responsibility, gratitude, and mindfulness. It also stimulates and revives the imagination of every child. It connects people across generations, and it is one of the reasons why the Mid-Autumn Festival remains such a meaningful tradition in Vietnamese life.

If you want to explore more about Vietnamese culture and folk stories, learning Vietnamese can open the door to a whole new world. It will allow you to enjoy legends like Chu Cuoi Cung Trang in their original form, discover countless other Vietnamese folk tales, and understand the values hidden within them. Through the language, you don’t just read stories — you connect with traditions, festivals, and the way people in Vietnam view life, the universe, and themselves.

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