Every fact below names its source and the month we checked it. Local legends are labelled as legends. Spotted a mistake? Tell us through the contact page.
Po Nagar is a Cham temple tower founded before 781. A stele dated 781 records King Satyavarman restoring the temple after it was damaged.
The stele implies the area had earlier come under temporary foreign dominion, and that foreign vandals had damaged the existing temple. Other steles say raiders, perhaps from Java, arrived in ships, stole the jewelry and broke the linga. The temple stands near Nha Trang, in the medieval principality of Kauthara, and is dedicated to the goddess of the country.
Source: Wikipedia, Po Nagar. Checked October 2026.
A golden statue of the goddess ordered in 918 was stolen in 950 by the Khmer ruler Rajendravarman II. In 965 King Jaya Indravarman I replaced it with a stone one.
A stele dated 918 by the Cham King Indravarman III records the order for a golden statue to the goddess Bhagavati. Later steles show that offerings continued: land, slaves, jewelry and precious metals in 1050, a Shivalinga and a Shrishana Vishnu in 1141, and rich gifts in 1160. The temple kept receiving gifts across several reigns.
Source: Wikipedia, Po Nagar. Checked October 2026.
Alexandre Yersin was born in Aubonne, Switzerland, on 22 September 1863 and died in Nha Trang on 1 March 1943.
Yersin was born in Aubonne, in the canton of Vaud, the youngest of three sons. His father died of a cerebral hemorrhage shortly before he was born, and his mother raised the children alone in Morges. He is remembered as a pioneer in microbiology and immunology, and he co-discovered the diphtheria and tetanus toxins.
Source: Wikipedia, Alexandre Yersin. Checked October 2026.
Yersin was sent to Hong Kong on 5 June 1894 during a plague outbreak and isolated the plague bacillus just 15 days later.
The French government sent him to investigate an outbreak that had already caused 100,000 deaths. He arrived alone on 15 June, carrying a microscope, a sterilizer and culture supplies. At the hospital all the cadavers were reserved for Kitasato, and Lowson offered no support because he saw France as a colonial competitor to Great Britain.
Source: Wikipedia, Alexandre Yersin. Checked October 2026.
Yersin decided to stay in French Indochina and founded the Institut Pasteur in Nha Trang in 1895.
Back in Paris in 1895, he prepared an anti-plague serum with Emile Roux, Albert Calmette and Amedee Borrel, then returned to Indochina and installed a small laboratory at Nha Trang to manufacture it. He studied cattle breeding to produce the serum. In 1905 that laboratory became a branch of the Pasteur Institute.
Source: Wikipedia, Alexandre Yersin. Checked October 2026.
Yersin pioneered rubber growing, set up a quinine tree station at Hon Ba in 1915 and introduced cacao and coffee to Indochina.
Yersin began with rubber trees, obtaining a concession in 1897 for an agricultural station at Suoi Dau. At Hon Ba he acclimatised the quinine tree, which came from the Andes and gave a remedy for malaria. His trees let Indochina meet its quinine needs during the Second World War.
Source: Wikipedia, Alexandre Yersin. Checked October 2026.
The main tower of Po Nagar is about 25 m (82 ft) high, and the shrine holds a 1.2 m (4 ft) stone statue of the goddess Yan Po Nagar.
The Po Nagar complex sits on Cu Lao Mountain on three levels, and the top level has two rows of towers. The goddess sits cross-legged, wearing a skirt, with ten hands holding symbolic items. According to the Vietnamese scholar Ngo Van Doanh, these attributes show she was also identified with the Hindu goddess Durga.
Source: Wikipedia, Po Nagar. Checked October 2026.
The goddess of Po Nagar is Yan Po Nagar. In Vietnamese she is called Thien Y Thanh Mau.
The source says she came to be identified with the Hindu goddesses Bhagavati and Hariti. Above the entrance, a sculpture shows the four-armed goddess Mahishasuramardini holding a hatchet, a lotus and a club while standing on a buffalo, in the Tra Kieu style of Cham art from around the end of the 10th century.
Source: Wikipedia, Po Nagar. Checked October 2026.
Climate, airports and UNESCO status for Nha Trang are on its destination page. More places are on the fun facts index.