Abstract
In the fishermen villages of Southern and Central Vietnam, there exists a rather surprising institution : the so-called 'whale cult', a series of ceremonies aimed at honouring the spirit of a dead whale found on the shore. This ancient cult, dating back to at least the 18th century, presents many original characteristics : the fact that the person who found the corpse is considered as the 'son' of the whale which in turn is refered to as his 'mother' or 'father', the incorporation of the cult to an official state rite, the syncretism it implies in relation to Buddhism, and its distribution, limited to the villages of the South and the Center of the country. We will attempt here to give a brief account of the cult and put it in an ethnologic and comparative perspective.
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