Sino-Vietnamese reading
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Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary ( vi, từ Hán Việt,
Chữ Hán Chữ Hán (𡨸漢, literally "Chinese characters", ), Chữ Nho (𡨸儒, literally "Confucian characters", ) or Hán tự (漢字, ), is the Vietnamese term for Chinese characters, used to write Văn ngôn (which is a form of Classical Chinese ...
: 詞漢越, literally ' Chinese-Vietnamese words') is a layer of some 3,000 monosyllabic
morphemes A morpheme is the smallest meaningful constituent of a linguistic expression. The field of linguistic study dedicated to morphemes is called morphology. In English, morphemes are often but not necessarily words. Morphemes that stand alone a ...
of the
Vietnamese language Vietnamese ( vi, tiếng Việt, links=no) is an Austroasiatic language originating from Vietnam where it is the national and official language. Vietnamese is spoken natively by over 70 million people, several times as many as the rest of the ...
borrowed from Literary Chinese with consistent pronunciations based on "
Annamese The Vietnamese people ( vi, người Việt, lit=Viet people) or Kinh people ( vi, người Kinh) are a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to modern-day Northern Vietnam and Southern China (Jing Islands, Dongxing, Guangxi). The native lang ...
"
Middle Chinese Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese recorded in the '' Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expanded editions. The ...
. Compounds using these morphemes are used extensively in cultural and technical vocabulary. Together with Sino-Korean and Sino-Japanese vocabularies, Sino-Vietnamese has been used in the reconstruction of the sound categories of Middle Chinese. Samuel Martin grouped the three together as " Sino-xenic". There is also an Old Sino-Vietnamese layer consisting of a few hundred words borrowed individually from Chinese in earlier periods. These words are treated by speakers as native. More recent loans from southern
varieties of Chinese Chinese, also known as Sinitic, is a branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family consisting of hundreds of local varieties, many of which are not mutually intelligible. Variation is particularly strong in the more mountainous southeast of mai ...
, usually names of foodstuffs such as '
Chinese sausage Chinese sausage is a generic term referring to the many different types of sausages originating in China. The southern flavor of Chinese sausage is commonly known by its Cantonese name (or ) (). Varieties There is a choice of fatty or lean s ...
', are not treated as Sino-Vietnamese. Estimates of the proportion of words of Chinese origin in the Vietnamese lexicon vary from one third to half and even to 70%. The proportion tends towards the lower end in speech and towards the higher end in technical writing. In the famous ' dictionary by Vietnamese linguist , about 40% percent of vocabulary are of Chinese origin.


Monosyllabic loanwords

As a result of a thousand years of Chinese control (except for brief rebellions), and a further thousand years of use of Literary Chinese after independence, two main layers of Chinese vocabulary have been borrowed into Vietnamese. These layers were first systematically studied by linguist Wang Li.
Middle Chinese Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese recorded in the '' Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expanded editions. The ...
and Vietnamese (like other languages of the
Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area The Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area is a sprachbund including languages of the Sino-Tibetan, Hmong–Mien (or Miao–Yao), Kra–Dai, Austronesian and Austroasiatic families spoken in an area stretching from Thailand to China. Neighbou ...
) are of
analytic Generally speaking, analytic (from el, ἀναλυτικός, ''analytikos'') refers to the "having the ability to analyze" or "division into elements or principles". Analytic or analytical can also have the following meanings: Chemistry * ...
type, with almost all
morpheme A morpheme is the smallest meaningful Constituent (linguistics), constituent of a linguistic expression. The field of linguistics, linguistic study dedicated to morphemes is called morphology (linguistics), morphology. In English, morphemes are ...
s monosyllabic and lacking
inflection In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and ...
. The phonological structure of their syllables is also similar. The Old Sino-Vietnamese layer was introduced after the Chinese conquest of the kingdom of
Nanyue Nanyue (), was an ancient kingdom ruled by Chinese monarchs of the Zhao family that covered the modern Chinese subdivisions of Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Hong Kong, Macau, southern Fujian and central to northern Vietnam. Nanyue was establis ...
, including the northern part of Vietnam, in 111 BC. The influence of the Chinese language was particularly felt during the
Eastern Han The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warr ...
period (25–190 AD), due to increased Chinese immigration and official efforts to sinicize the territory. This layer consists of roughly 400 words, which have been fully assimilated and are treated by Vietnamese speakers as native words. The much more extensive Sino-Vietnamese proper was introduced with Chinese
rhyme dictionaries A rime dictionary, rhyme dictionary, or rime book () is an ancient type of Chinese dictionary that collates characters by tone and rhyme, instead of by radical. The most important rime dictionary tradition began with the ''Qieyun'' (601), whi ...
such as the ''
Qieyun The ''Qieyun'' () is a Chinese rhyme dictionary, published in 601 during the Sui dynasty. The book was a guide to proper reading of classical texts, using the ''fanqie'' method to indicate the pronunciation of Chinese characters. The ''Qieyun'' ...
'' in the late
Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an Zhou dynasty (690–705), interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dyn ...
(618–907). Vietnamese scholars used a systematic rendering of
Middle Chinese Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese recorded in the '' Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expanded editions. The ...
within the phonology of Vietnamese to derive consistent pronunciations for the entire Chinese lexicon. After driving out the Chinese in 880, the Vietnamese sought to build a state on the Chinese model, including using Literary Chinese for all formal writing, including administration and scholarship, until the early 20th century. Around 3,000 words entered Vietnamese over this period. Some of these were re-introductions of words borrowed at the Old Sino-Vietnamese stage, with different pronunciations due to intervening
sound change A sound change, in historical linguistics, is a change in the pronunciation of a language. A sound change can involve the replacement of one speech sound (or, more generally, one phonetic feature value) by a different one (called phonetic chan ...
s in Vietnamese and Chinese, and often with a shift in meaning. Wang Li followed
Henri Maspero Henri Paul Gaston Maspero (15 December 188317 March 1945) was a French sinologist and professor who contributed to a variety of topics relating to East Asia. Maspero is best known for his pioneering studies of Daoism. He was imprisoned by the Naz ...
in identifying a problematic group of forms with "softened" initials ''g-'', ''gi'', ''d-'' and ''v-'' as Sino-Vietnamese loans that had been affected by changes in colloquial Vietnamese. Most scholars now follow André-Georges Haudricourt in assigning these words to the Old Sino-Vietnamese layer. Sino-Vietnamese shows a number of distinctive developments from Middle Chinese: * Sino-Vietnamese distinguishes Early Middle Chinese palatal and retroflex sibilants, which are identified in all modern Chinese varieties, and had already merged by the Late Middle Chinese period. * Sino-Vietnamese reflects Late Middle Chinese labiodental initials, which were not distinguished from labial stops at the Early Middle Chinese phase. * Middle Chinese grade II finals yield a palatal medial ''-y-'' like northern Chinese varieties but unlike southern ones. For example, Middle Chinese ''kæw'' yields SV , Cantonese ''gaau'' and Beijing .


Modern compounds

Up until the early 20th century, Literary Chinese was the vehicle of administration and scholarship, not only in China, but also in Vietnam, Korea and Japan, similar to
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...
in medieval Europe. Though not a spoken language, this shared written language was read aloud in different places according to local traditions derived from
Middle Chinese Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese recorded in the '' Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expanded editions. The ...
pronunciation: the literary readings in various parts of China and
Sino-Xenic pronunciations Sino-Xenic or Sinoxenic pronunciations are regular systems for reading Chinese characters in Japan, Korea and Vietnam, originating in medieval times and the source of large-scale borrowings of Chinese words into the Japanese, Korean and Vietnames ...
in the other countries. As contact with the West grew, Western works were translated into Literary Chinese and read by the literate. In order to translate words for new concepts (political, religious, scientific, medical and technical terminology) scholars in these countries coined new compounds formed from Chinese morphemes and written with Chinese characters. The local readings of these compounds were readily adopted into the respective local vernaculars of Japan, Korea and Vietnam. For example, the Chinese mathematician Li Shanlan created hundreds of translations of mathematical terms, including ('replace-number-study') for 'algebra', yielding modern Chinese ''dàishùxué'', Vietnamese ''đại số học'', Japanese ''daisūgaku'' and Korean ''daesuhak''. Often, multiple compounds for the same concept were in circulation for some time before a winner emerged, with the final choice sometimes differing between countries. A fairly large amount of Sino-Vietnamese compounds have meanings that differ significantly from their usage in other Sinitic vocabularies. For example: *''bác sĩ'' () is widely used with the meaning 'physician' or 'medical doctor', while in Chinese it refers to a doctoral degree; *''tiến sĩ'' (進士) is used to refer to 'doctoral degree', whilst in Chinese it is used to refer to 'successful candidate in the highest imperial civil service examination'. *''bạc'' 'silver' is the Old Sino-Vietnamese reflex of Old Chinese *''bra:g'' 'white', cognate with later Sino-Vietnamese ''bạch'' 'white', yet in Chinese means 'thin sheet of metal' (variants: , ) and 鉑 (
pinyin Hanyu Pinyin (), often shortened to just pinyin, is the official romanization system for Standard Mandarin Chinese in China, and to some extent, in Singapore and Malaysia. It is often used to teach Mandarin, normally written in Chinese fo ...
: ''bó'') has also acquired the meaning 'platinum', whose Sino-Vietnamese name is ''bạch kim'', literally 'white gold'; *''luyện kim'' () means 'metallurgy' instead of its original meaning, 'alchemy'; *''giáo sư'' () means 'teacher' in Chinese, but is now associated with 'professor' in Vietnamese. *English "club" became ''kurabu'' in Japan, was borrowed to China, then to Vietnam, is read as ''câu lạc bộ'', and abbreviated ''CLB'', which can be an abbreviation for club. *''linh miêu'' () means 'civet' in Chinese but means 'lynx' in Vietnamese. *''ân nghĩa'' ~ ''ơn nghĩa'' () not only retains its original Chinese meaning "feeling of gratitude" but also acquires the extended meaning "favor, kindness"."ân nghĩa"
in ''bab.la'' Some Sino-Vietnamese compounds are entirely invented by the Vietnamese and are not used in Chinese, such as ''linh mục'' 'pastor' from 'soul' and 'shepherd', or ''giả kim thuật'' ( 'art of artificial metal'), which has been applied popularly to refer to 'alchemy'. Another example is ''linh cẩu'' (, 'alert dog') meaning 'hyena'. Others are no longer used in modern Chinese or have other meanings. More examples include trang trại (莊寨, 'farm'), thành phố (城庯, 'city'), hiện diện (現面, 'to be present at'), giải trí (解智, 'to entertain'), ngoạn mục (玩目, 'pleasant to the eyes'), cổ truyền (古傳, 'traditional'), and thoả mãn (妥滿, 'to satisfy').


Proper names

Since Sino-Vietnamese provides a Vietnamese form for almost all Chinese characters, it can be used to derive a Vietnamese form for any Chinese word or name. For example, the name of Chinese leader
Xi Jinping Xi Jinping ( ; ; ; born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has served as the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC), and thus as the paramount leader of China, ...
consists of the Chinese characters . Applying Sino-Vietnamese reading to each character yields the Vietnamese translation of his name, ''Tập Cận Bình''. Some Western names and words, approximated in Chinese or in some cases approximated in Japanese and then borrowed into Chinese, were further approximated in Vietnamese. For example, Portugal is transliterated as Putaoya in Chinese, became ''Bồ Đào Nha'' in Vietnamese. England (Chinese: Ying-ge-lan) became ''Anh Cát Lợi'' (), shortened to ''Anh'' (), while United States became ''Mỹ Lợi Gia'' (), shortened to ''Mỹ'' (). The formal name for the United States in Vietnamese is ''Hoa Kỳ'' (); this is a former Chinese name of the United States and translates literally as " flower flag". Except for the oldest and most deeply ingrained Sino-Vietnamese names, modern Vietnamese instead uses direct phonetic transliterations for foreign names, in order to preserve the original spelling and pronunciation. Today, the written form of such transliterated names are almost always left unaltered; with rising levels of proficiency in English spelling and pronunciation in Vietnam, readers generally no longer need to be instructed on the correct pronunciation for common foreign names. For example, while the Sino-Vietnamese remains in common usage in Vietnamese, the English equivalent
London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
is also commonplace.
Calque In linguistics, a calque () or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal word-for-word or root-for-root translation. When used as a verb, "to calque" means to borrow a word or phrase from another language ...
s have also arisen to replace some Sino-Vietnamese terms. For example, the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in ...
is usually referred to as (literally, "white house") in Vietnam, though (based on ) retains some currency among overseas Vietnamese. However, China-specific names such as ''Trung Quốc'' ( Middle Kingdom, ), as well as Korean names with Chinese roots, continue to be rendered in Sino-Vietnamese rather than the romanization systems used in other languages. Examples include ''Triều Tiên'' (
Joseon Joseon (; ; Middle Korean: 됴ᇢ〯션〮 Dyǒw syéon or 됴ᇢ〯션〯 Dyǒw syěon), officially the Great Joseon (; ), was the last dynastic kingdom of Korea, lasting just over 500 years. It was founded by Yi Seong-gye in July 1392 and re ...
, ) for both
Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic ...
as a whole and
North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...
in particular, ''Hàn Quốc'' ( Hanguk, ) for
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
, ''Bình Nhưỡng'' (
Pyongyang Pyongyang (, , ) is the capital and largest city of North Korea, where it is known as the "Capital of the Revolution". Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River about upstream from its mouth on the Yellow Sea. According to the 2008 populat ...
, ), and ''Bàn Môn Điếm'' (
Panmunjom Panmunjom, also known as Panmunjeom, now located in Paju, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea or Kaesong, North Hwanghae Province, North Korea, was a village just north of the ''de facto'' border between North and South Korea, where the 1953 Korea ...
, ).
Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 of ...
, unlike most Korean place names, has no corresponding
hanja Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom. (, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
; it is therefore phonetically transliterated as ''Xê-un''.


Usage

Sino-Vietnamese words have a status similar to that of
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
-based words in English: they are used more in formal context than in everyday life. Because Chinese and Vietnamese use different order for subject and modifier, compound Sino-Vietnamese words or phrases might appear ungrammatical in Vietnamese sentences. For example, the Sino-Vietnamese phrase ''bạch mã'' ( "white horse") can be expressed in Vietnamese as ''ngựa trắng'' ("horse white"). For this reason, compound words containing native Vietnamese and Sino-Vietnamese words are very rare and are considered improper by some. For example, ''chung cư'' ("apartment building") was originally derived from ''chúng cư'' ("multiple dwelling"), but with the syllable ''chúng'' "multiple" replaced with ''chung'', a "pure" Vietnamese word meaning "shared" or "together". Similarly, the literal translation of "United States", ''Hợp chúng quốc'' () is commonly mistakenly rendered as ''Hợp chủng quốc'', with ''chúng'' ( - many) replaced by ''chủng'' ( - ethnicity, race). Another example is ''tiệt diện'' ("cross-section") being replaced by ''tiết diện''. This phenomenon is known as ''phonetic modulation''. One interesting example is the current motto of Vietnam "Cộng hòa Xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam / Độc lập – Tự do – Hạnh phúc", all the words are Sino-Vietnamese. Writing Sino-Vietnamese words with the
Vietnamese alphabet The Vietnamese alphabet ( vi, chữ Quốc ngữ, lit=script of the National language) is the modern Latin writing script or writing system for Vietnamese. It uses the Latin script based on Romance languages originally developed by Portuguese m ...
causes some confusion about the origins of some terms, due to the large number of homophones in Chinese and Sino-Vietnamese. For example, both (bright) and (dark) are read as ''minh'', thus the word "minh" has two contradictory meanings: ''bright'' and ''dark'' (although the "dark" meaning is now esoteric and is used in only a few compound words). Perhaps for this reason, the Vietnamese name for
Pluto Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the Sun. It is the largest ...
is not ''Minh Vương Tinh'' ( – lit. "underworld king star") as in other East Asian languages, but is ''Diêm Vương Tinh'' () and ''sao Diêm Vương'', named after the
Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
and
Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
deity
Yama Yama (Devanagari: यम) or Yamarāja (यमराज), is a deity of death, dharma, the south direction, and the underworld who predominantly features in Hindu and Buddhist religion, belonging to an early stratum of Rigvedic Hindu deities. ...
. During the
Hồ Dynasty The Hồ dynasty (Vietnamese: , chữ Nôm: 茹胡; Sino-Vietnamese: ''Hồ triều, chữ Hán:'' 胡 朝) was a short-lived Vietnamese dynasty consisting of the reigns of two monarchs, Hồ Quý Ly (胡季犛) in 1400–01 and his second ...
, Vietnam was officially known as ''Đại Ngu'' ( "Great Peace"). However, most modern Vietnamese know ''ngu'' () as "stupid"; consequently, some misinterpret it as "Big Idiot". Conversely, the Han River in
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
is often erroneously translated as ''sông Hàn'' () when it should be ''sông Hán'' () due to the name's similarity with the country name. However, the homograph/homophone problem is not as serious as it appears, because although many Sino-Vietnamese words have multiple meanings when written with the Vietnamese alphabet, usually only one has widespread usage, while the others are relegated to obscurity. Furthermore, Sino-Vietnamese words are usually not used alone, but in compound words, thus the meaning of the compound word is preserved even if individually each has multiple meanings. Today Sino-Vietnamese texts are learnt and used mostly only by Buddhist monks since important texts such as the scriptures to pacify spirits (recited during the ritual for the Seventh Lunar month - Trai Đàn Chẩn Tế) are still recited in Sino-Vietnamese pronunciations. Such as the chant, Nam mô A Di Đà Phật coming from 南無阿彌陀佛.


See also

*
Chữ Nôm Chữ Nôm (, ; ) is a logographic writing system formerly used to write the Vietnamese language. It uses Chinese characters ('' Chữ Hán'') to represent Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary and some native Vietnamese words, with other words represent ...
(historical writing system modelled on
Chinese characters Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanji ...
) *
History of writing in Vietnam History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as wel ...
* Stratum (linguistics)


References


Citations


Sources

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *


Further reading

* *Chiang Chia-lu (江佳璐). (2014). 析論越南漢字音魚虞分韻的歷史層次 iscussion on the Phonological Strata of Sino-Vietnamese as Reflected in the Distinction between Rhymes Yu (魚) and Yu (虞) ''Language and Linguistics, 15''(5), 613-634. *Chiang Chia-lu (江佳璐). (2018). 《安南國譯語》所反映的近代漢語聲調系統 he Tonal System of Early Mandarin Chinese as Reflected in Annanguo Yiyu ''漢學研究, 36''(2), 97-126. *Nguyen Thanh-Tung (阮青松). (2015). ''漢越語和漢語的層次對應關係研究 study of the stratal corresponding relationship between Sino-Vietnamese and Chinese' (Master's thesis). National Chung Hsing University, Taiwan. *Phan, John D. (2010)
Re-Imagining “Annam”: A New Analysis of Sino–Viet–Muong Linguistic Contact
''南方華裔研究雑志 hinese Southern Diaspora Studies 4'', 3-24. * *


External links

*
Đào Duy Anh Đào Duy Anh (25 April 1904 – 1 April 1988) was a Vietnamese historian and lexicographer. He was born in Thanh Oai, Hà Tây, now, Hà Nội. He was one of the writers associated with the Nhân Văn-Giai Phẩm movement. He was the gener ...
(1932), ''Hán Việt Từ Điển'' – a dictionary of Sino-Vietnamese words and expressions (in Vietnamese)
volume 1
(A–M). * Miyake, Marc
Umbrous umbrella
(2014)

(2014); Sino-Vietnamese article

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(2008). {{Chinese loan vocabularies Vietnamese language
Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia ** A citizen of Vietnam. See Demographics of Vietnam. * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overse ...