Kim Quy is the golden turtle god of Vietnamese mythology, regarded as a divine messenger and protector who recurs across the nation’s founding and liberation legends.
The most famous is the legend of the Restored Sword. After Emperor Lê Lợi (r. 1428–1435) used the magical sword "Heaven’s Will" to defeat the Ming, Kim Quy rose from the lake to reclaim it for the Dragon King; the lake was thereafter called Hoàn Kiếm, the "Lake of the Returned Sword." In an earlier legend it gave a golden claw to An Dương Vương to make a magical crossbow.