Designed by French architect Delaval and established in 1927 under the auspices of the Société des études Indochinoises as the Musée Blanchard de la Brosse, this museum became the Sài Gòn National Museum in 1956. In 1975, after some renovation, it was expanded to become the Hồ Chí Minh City Historical Museum. Through its various exhibits of of cultural and ethnological artefacts the museum recounts the history of the Vietnamese people from the earliest times up to the 1930s, when the Việt Nam Communist Party was founded. The museum’s exhibits are divided according to the following topics: Prehistory; the Rise of the Hưng Kings; the Fight for Independence (1st-10th centuries); the Lý dynasty (11th-13th centuries); the Trần dynasty (13th-14th centuries); the Lê dynasty (15th-18th centuries); the Tây Sơn dynasty (18th-19th centuries); and the Nguyễn dynasty (19th-middle of the 20th centuries). A second part of the museum displays specific characteristics of the southern area of Việt Nam, such as Óc-Eo culture, the ancient culture of the Mekong Delta, Chăm bronze statuettes and sandstone works from Quảng Nam and Binh Đình Provinces, Bến Nghé Sài Gòn art, the Vietnamese ethnic minorities and ancient pottery of various Asian countries. The museum houses a small water puppet theatre and incorporates an important historical research library: