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A 60m-long sediment core from the lower Red River delta in northern Vietnam contains three depositional sequences consisting mostly of regressive shallow-marine sediments bounded by unconformities. The youngest unit represents the modern Red River delta. The second unit, a facies succession comparable to the overlying deltaic succession, formed during an earlier sea-level highstand, as indicated by the marine isotope stage (MIS) 3 age obtained by radiocarbon dating. The third, undated unit might reflect earlier high sea levels of the middle to late Pleistocene. The MIS-3 ages, derived from shoreline-related sedimentary facies, are supported by records from adjacent mega-deltas and shelf sites with paleoshoreline facies. Proximal sites from the central Indochina craton show high sea levels during late MIS 3, whereas distal sites from the open continental shelf indicate much lower sea levels at the same …