Throughout the

history of Vietnam Vietnam, with its coastal strip, rugged mountainous interior, and two major deltas, became home to numerous cultures throughout history. Its strategic geographical position in Southeast Asia also made it a crossroads of trade and a focal point ...

, many names were used in reference to

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

History

Throughout the

, official and unofficial names have been used in reference to the territory of

was called Văn Lang during the

Hồng Bàng dynasty The Hồng Bàng period (), also called the Hồng Bàng dynasty,Pelley, p. 151 was a legendary ancient period in Vietnamese historiography, spanning from the beginning of the rule of Kinh Dương Vương over the kingdom of Văn Lang (initia ...

Âu Lạc Âu Lạc (chữ Hán: 甌貉 (Peripheral Records/Volume 1:6a): "王既併文郎國，改國號曰甌貉國。""The King then annexed the Văn Lang nation, changed the nation's name to Âu Lạc nation."/甌駱; (Volume 113): "且南方卑濕� ...

under Thục dynasty,

Nam Việt Nanyue ( zh, c=南越 or 南粵, p=Nányuè, cy=, j=Naam4 Jyut6, l=Southern Yue, , ), was an ancient kingdom founded in 204 BC by the Chinese general Zhao Tuo, whose family (known in Vietnamese as the Triệu dynasty) continued to rule until ...

during the Triệu dynasty, Vạn Xuân during the

Early Lý dynasty The Early Lý dynasty (; chữ Nôm: ), also known in historiography as the Former Lý dynasty or Anterior Lý dynasty, officially Vạn Xuân (chữ Hán: ; "Myriad Spring"), was a dynasty of Vietnam that existed from AD 544 to 602. ...

, Đại Cồ Việt during the

Đinh dynasty Dinh (丁) is a Vietnamese surname. In Vietnam, the surname is spelled Đinh or Đình, but the latter is very rare in Vietnamese. Notable people * Andy Dinh, Team SoloMid owner, player * Dan Dinh, ''League of Legends '' player, brother of Andy ...

and

Early Lê dynasty Early may refer to: Places in the United States * Early, Iowa, a city * Early, Texas, a city * Early Branch, a stream in Missouri * Early County, Georgia * Fort Early, Georgia, an early 19th century fort Music * Early B, stage name of Jamaican d ...

. Starting in 1054,

was called Đại Việt (Great Việt). During the

Hồ dynasty The Hồ dynasty (Vietnamese: , chữ Nôm: 茹胡; Vietnamese: ''triều'' ''Hồ'', chữ Hán: wikt:朝, 朝wikt:胡, 胡), officially Đại Ngu (; chữ Hán: 大虞), was a short-lived List of Vietnamese dynasties, Vietnamese dynasty cons ...

, Vietnam was called Đại Ngu. Việt Nam ( in

Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overseas Vietnamese, Vietnamese people living outside Vietna ...

) is a variation of

(Southern

Việt The Vietnamese people (, ) or the Kinh people (), also known as the Viet people or the Viets, are a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to modern-day northern Vietnam and southern China who speak Vietnamese, the most widely spoken Austroa ...

), a name that can be traced back to the

Triệu dynasty The Triệu dynasty or Zhao dynasty (; ; 茹趙) ruled the kingdom of Nanyue, which consisted of parts of southern China as well as northern Vietnam. Its capital was Panyu, in modern Guangzhou. The founder of the dynasty, Zhao Tuo (Triệu Đ� ...

(2nd century BC, also known as Nanyue Kingdom). The word ''Việt'' originated as a shortened form of Bách Việt, a word used to refer to a people who lived in what is now southern China in ancient times. The name ''Việt Nam'', with the syllables in the modern order, first appears in the 16th century in a poem attributed to

Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm (chữ Hán: 阮秉謙; 1491–1585) was a Vietnamese administrator, confucianist, poet, prophet and later a saint of the Cao Dai religion and of the new religious movement known as School of Teaching Goodness. Biog ...

. ''Vietnam'' was mentioned in Josiah Conder's 1834 ''Dictionary of Geography, Ancient and Modern'' as the other name to refer to Annam. ''Annam'', which originated as a Chinese name in the seventh century, was the common name of the country during the colonial period. Nationalist writer

Phan Bội Châu Phan Bội Châu (; 26 December 1867 – 29 October 1940), born Phan Văn San, courtesy name Hải Thụ (later changed to Sào Nam), was a pioneer of 20th century Vietnamese nationalism. In 1904, he formed a revolutionary organization called ...

revived the name "Vietnam" in the early 20th century. When rival communist and anti-communist governments were set up in 1945, both immediately adopted this as the country's official name. In English, the two syllables are usually combined into one word, ''Vietnam''. However, ''Viet Nam'' was once common usage and is still used by the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

and by the Vietnamese government.

Origin of ''Vietnam''

The term "" (Yue) () in

Early 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 S ...

was first written using the

logograph In a written language, a logogram (from Ancient Greek 'word', and 'that which is drawn or written'), also logograph or lexigraph, is a written character that represents a semantic component of a language, such as a word or morpheme. Chines ...

"戉" for an axe (a homophone), in

oracle bone Oracle bones are pieces of ox scapula and turtle plastron which were used in pyromancya form of divinationduring the Late Shang period () in ancient China. '' Scapulimancy'' is the specific term if ox scapulae were used for the divination, ''p ...

and bronze inscriptions of the late

Shang dynasty The Shang dynasty (), also known as the Yin dynasty (), was a Chinese royal dynasty that ruled in the Yellow River valley during the second millennium BC, traditionally succeeding the Xia dynasty and followed by the Western Zhou d ...

( BC), and later as "越". At that time it referred to a people or chieftain to the northwest of the Shang.Theobald, Ulrich (2018
"Shang Dynasty - Political History"
in ''ChinaKnowledge.de - An Encyclopaedia on Chinese History, Literature and Art''. quote: "Enemies of the Shang state were called fang 方 "regions", like the Tufang 土方, which roamed the northern region of Shanxi, the Guifang 鬼方 and Gongfang 𢀛方 in the northwest, the Qiangfang 羌方, Suifang 繐方, Yuefang 戉方, Xuanfang 亘方 and Zhoufang 周方 in the west, as well as the Yifang 夷方 and Renfang 人方 in the southeast." In the early 8th century BC, a tribe on the middle

Yangtze The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ) is the longest river in Eurasia and the third-longest in the world. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains of the Tibetan Plateau and flows including Dam Qu River the longest source of the Yangtze, i ...

were called the

Yangyue The Yangyue () were a tribe of the Yue people, one of the ancient peoples that inhabited in what is now modern South China. According to Chinese historical and classical texts, the earliest description about the Yangyue appeared during the Warrin ...

, a term later used for peoples further south. Between the 7th and 4th centuries BC Yue/Việt referred to the

State of Yue Yue (), also known as Yuyue ( or ), was a state in ancient China which existed during the first millennium BC the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods of China's Zhou dynasty in the modern provinces of Zhejiang, Shanghai and Jiangsu ...

in the lower Yangtze basin and its people. From the 3rd century BC the term was used for the non-Chinese populations of south and southwest China and northern Vietnam, with particular states or groups called

Minyue Minyue (; Pinyin: ''Mǐnyuè, Mínyuè'') was an ancient kingdom in what is now the Fujian province in southern China. It was a contemporary of the Han dynasty, and was later annexed by the Han empire as the Southward expansion of the Han dynas ...

, Ouyue (Vietnamese:

Âu Việt The Âu Việt or Ouyue () were an ancient conglomeration of Baiyue tribes living in what is today the mountainous regions of northernmost Vietnam, western Guangdong, and northern Guangxi, China, since at least the third century BCE. They were b ...

), Luoyue (Vietnamese:

Lạc Việt The Lạc Việt or Luoyue ( or ; ← Middle Chinese: *''lɑk̚-ɦʉɐt̚'' ← Old Chinese *''râk-wat'') were an ancient conglomeration of peoples inhabiting northern Vietnam, particularly the ancient Red River Delta, from approximately 700 B ...

), etc., collectively called the

Baiyue The Baiyue, Hundred Yue, or simply Yue, were various ethnic groups who inhabited the regions of southern China and northern Vietnam during the 1st millennium BC and 1st millennium AD. They were known for their short hair, body tattoos, fine swo ...

(Bách Việt, ; ). The term Baiyue/Bách Việt first appeared in the book ''

Lüshi Chunqiu The ''Lüshi Chunqiu'' (), also known in English as ''Master Lü's Spring and Autumn Annals'', is an encyclopedic Chinese classic text compiled around 239BC under the patronage of late pre-imperial Qin Chancellor Lü Buwei. In the evaluati ...

'' compiled around 239 BC. According to Ye Wenxian (1990), apud Wan (2013), the ethnonym of the Yuefang in northwestern China is not associated with that of the Baiyue in southeastern China. In 207 BC, former

Qin dynasty The Qin dynasty ( ) was the first Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China. It is named for its progenitor state of Qin, a fief of the confederal Zhou dynasty (256 BC). Beginning in 230 BC, the Qin under King Ying Zheng enga ...

general

Zhao Tuo Zhao Tuo (), rendered as Triệu Đà in Vietnamese language, Vietnamese, was a Qin dynasty Chinese general and first emperor of Nanyue. He participated in the conquest of the Baiyue peoples of Guangdong, Guangxi and Northern Vietnam. After ...

/Triệu Đà founded the kingdom of

Nanyue Nanyue ( zh, c=南越 or 南粵, p=Nányuè, cy=, j=Naam4 Jyut6, l=Southern Yue, , ), was an ancient kingdom founded in 204 BC by the Chinese general Zhao Tuo, whose family (known in Vietnamese as the Triệu dynasty) continued to rule until ...

/Nam Việt () with its capital at Panyu (modern

Guangzhou Guangzhou, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Canton or Kwangchow, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Guangdong Provinces of China, province in South China, southern China. Located on the Pearl River about nor ...

). This kingdom was "southern" in the sense that it was located south of other Baiyue kingdoms such as

and Ouyue, located in modern

Fujian Fujian is a provinces of China, province in East China, southeastern China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its capital is Fuzhou and its largest prefe ...

and

Zhejiang ) , translit_lang1_type2 = , translit_lang1_info2 = ( Hangzhounese) ( Ningbonese) (Wenzhounese) , image_skyline = 玉甑峰全貌 - panoramio.jpg , image_caption = View of the Yandang Mountains , image_map = Zhejiang i ...

. Several later Vietnamese dynasties followed this nomenclature even after these more northern peoples were absorbed into China. In 968, the Vietnamese leader

Đinh Bộ Lĩnh Đinh Bộ Lĩnh (924–979; ), real name allegedly Đinh Hoàn ( 丁桓), was the founding emperor of the short-lived Đinh dynasty of Vietnam, after declaring its independence from the Chinese Southern Han dynasty. He was a significant figur ...

established the independent kingdom of Đại Cồ Việt (大瞿越) (possibly meaning "Great

Gautama Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha (),* * * was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist legends, he was ...

's Viet", as Gautama's

Chữ Hán ( , ) are the Chinese characters that were used to write Literary Chinese in Vietnam, Literary Chinese (; ) and Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary in Vietnamese language, Vietnamese. They were officially used in Vietnam after the Red River Delta region ...

transcription 瞿曇 is pronounced ''Cồ Đàm'' in Sino-Vietnamese); however, 瞿's homophone ''cồ'', 𡚝 in

Chữ Nôm Chữ Nôm (, ) is a logographic writing system formerly used to write the Vietnamese language. It uses Chinese characters to represent Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary and some native Vietnamese words, with other words represented by new characters ...

script, (means "great") over the former Jinghai state. In 1054, Emperor

Lý Thánh Tông Lý Thánh Tông (19th March 1023 - 1st February 1072), personal name Lý Nhật Tôn , temple name Thánh Tông, was the third emperor of the Lý dynasty and the 8th ruler of the Vietnamese dynasty Đại Việt. In his reign, Lý Thánh Tô ...

shortened the country's name to

Đại Việt Đại Việt (, ; literally Great Việt), was a Vietnamese monarchy in eastern Mainland Southeast Asia from the 10th century AD to the early 19th century, centered around the region of present-day Hanoi. Its early name, Đại Cồ Việt,(ch ...

("Great Viet"). However, the names Giao Chỉ and An Nam were still the widely known names that foreigners used to refer the state of Đại Việt during medieval and early modern periods,. For examples, ''Caugigu'' (

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

); ''Kafjih-Guh'' (

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

: كوة ك); ''Koci'' ( Malay); ''Cauchy'' (Portuguese); ''Cochinchina'' (English); ''Annam'' (Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish and French). In 1787, US politician

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (, 1743July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the United States Declaration of Indepe ...

referred to Vietnam as ''Cochinchina'' for the purpose of trading for rice. "Sấm Trạng Trình" (The Prophecies of Principal Graduate Trình), which are attributed to Vietnamese official and poet Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm (1491–1585), reversed the traditional order of the syllables and put the name in its modern form "Việt Nam" as in "Vietnam's founding ancestor lays its basis" or "Vietnam's founding ancestor builds it up". At this time, the country was divided between the

Trịnh lords Trịnh is a Vietnamese family name In many societies, a surname, family name, or last name is the mostly hereditary portion of one's personal name that indicates one's family. It is typically combined with a given name to form the full na ...

Đông Kinh Hanoi ( ; ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Vietnam, second-most populous city of Vietnam. The name "Hanoi" translates to "inside the river" (Hanoi is bordered by the Red River (Asia), Red and Black River (Asia), Black Riv ...

and the

Nguyễn lords The Nguyễn lords (, 主阮; 1558–1777, 1780–1802), also known as the Nguyễn clan (; ), were Nguyễn dynasty's forerunner and a feudal noble clan ruling southern Đại Việt in the Revival Lê dynasty. The Nguyễn lords were membe ...

of Thừa Thiên. By combining several existing names, Nam Việt, Annam (Pacified South),

(Great Việt), and "Nam quốc" (southern nation), the oracles' author created a new name that referred to an aspirational unified state. The word "Nam" no longer implies Southern Việt, but rather that Vietnam is "the South" in contrast to China, "the North". This sentiment had already been in the poem "

Nam quốc sơn hà ''Nam quốc sơn hà'' (, ) is a famous 10th- to 11th-century Vietnamese patriotic poem. Dubbed "Vietnam's first Declaration of Independence", it asserts the sovereignty of Vietnam's rulers over its lands. The poem was first dictated to be read ...

" (1077)'s first line: 南國山河南帝居 "The Southern country's mountains and rivers the Southern Emperor inhabits". Researcher Nguyễn Phúc Giác Hải found the word 越南 "Việt Nam" on 12 steles carved in the 16th and 17th centuries, including one at Bảo Lâm Pagoda, Haiphong (1558).Thành Lân,
Ai đặt quốc hiệu Việt Nam đầu tiên?
", ''Báo Đại đoàn kết'', March 14, 2003. Lord

Nguyễn Phúc Chu Nguyễn Phúc Chu ( vi-hantu, , 1675 – 1 June 1725) was one of the Nguyễn lords who ruled southern Vietnam (Đàng Trong) from 1691 to 1725.Anh Thư Hà, Hồng Đức Trần ''A Brief Chronology of Vietnam's History'' 2000 Page 163 "Nguy� ...

(1675–1725), when describing Hải Vân Pass (then called ''Ải Lĩnh'', lit. "Mountain-Pass's Saddle-Point"), apparently used "Việt Nam" as a national name in his poem's first line , which was translated as "This mountain's pass is the most dangerous in Vietnam". Việt Nam was used as an official national name by Emperor

Gia Long Gia Long (Chữ Hán, Chữ hán: 嘉隆) ( (''Hanoi, North''), (''Ho Chi Minh City, South''); 8 February 1762 – 3 February 1820), born Nguyễn Phúc Ánh (阮福暎) or Nguyễn Ánh (阮暎), was the founding emperor of the Nguyễn dynas ...

in 1804–1813. The Vietnamese asked permission from the Qing dynasty to change the name of their country. Originally, Gia Long had wanted the name Nam Việt and asked for his country to be recognized as such, but the

Jiaqing Emperor The Jiaqing Emperor (13 November 1760 – 2 September 1820), also known by his temple name Emperor Renzong of Qing, personal name Yongyan, was the sixth emperor of the Qing dynasty and the fifth Qing emperor to rule over China proper. He was ...

refused since the ancient state of the same name had ruled territory that was part of the

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

. The

refused Gia Long's request to change his country's name to Nam Việt, and changed the name instead to Việt Nam in 1804. Gia Long's

Đại Nam thực lục ''Đại Nam thực lục'' ( vi-hantu, 大南寔錄, lit. "Veritable Records of the Great South", "Annals of Đại Nam", "Chronicle of Greater Vietnam") was the official history of Nguyễn dynasty, Vietnam. It contained the royal records of t ...

contains the diplomatic correspondence over the naming. In his account about the meeting with Vietnamese officials in Hue on January 17, 1832, Edmund Roberts, American embassy in Vietnam, wrote : "Trung Quốc" 中國, (literally "Middle Country" or "Central Country"), was also used as a name for Vietnam by Gia Long in 1805.

Minh Mang {{Orphan, date=December 2021 Minh ( Chữ Nôm: 明) is a popular unisex given name of Vietnamese origin, written using the Chinese character (明) meaning "bright", and is also popular among other East Asian names. The Chinese name Ming has the ...

used the name "Trung Quốc" 中國 to call Vietnam. Vietnamese Nguyen Emperor

Minh Mạng Minh Mạng (), also known as Minh Mệnh (, vi-hantu, 明命, lit. "the bright favour of Heaven"; 25 May 1791 – 20 January 1841; born Nguyễn Phúc Đảm, also known as Nguyễn Phúc Kiểu), was the second emperor of the Nguyễ ...

sinicized ethnic minorities such as Cambodians, claimed the legacy of Confucianism and China's Han dynasty for Vietnam, and used the term Han people 漢人 to refer to the Vietnamese. Minh Mang declared that "We must hope that their barbarian habits will be subconsciously dissipated, and that they will daily become more infected by Han ino-Vietnamesecustoms." This policies were directed at the Khmer and hill tribes. The Nguyen lord Nguyen Phuc Chu had referred to Vietnamese as "Han people" in 1712 when differentiating between Vietnamese and Chams; meanwhile, ethnic Chinese were referred to as Thanh nhân 清人 or Đường nhân 唐人. The use of "Vietnam" was revived in modern times by nationalists including

, whose book '' Việt Nam vong quốc sử'' (History of the Loss of Vietnam) was published in 1906. Chau also founded the

Việt Nam Quang Phục Hội The Việt Nam Quang Phục Hội (Hán-Nôm: 越南光復會; , ''Restoration League of Vietnam'' or ''Restoration Society of Vietnam''Marr 1970 or VNQPH, was a nationalist republican militant revolutionary Political organization, organization ...

(Vietnam Restoration League) in 1912. However, the general public continued to use Annam and the name "Vietnam" remained virtually unknown until the

Yên Bái mutiny The Yên Bái mutiny () or officially Yên Báy general uprising () was an uprising of Vietnamese soldiers in the Troupes coloniales, French colonial army on 10 February 1930. This took place in collaboration with civilian supporters who were mem ...

of 1930, organized by the

Việt Nam Quốc Dân Đảng The Việt Nam Quốc Dân Đảng (; chữ Hán: ; ), abbreviated VNQDĐ or Việt Quốc, was a nationalist and democratic socialist political party that sought independence from French colonial rule in Vietnam during the early 20th century ...

(Vietnamese Nationalist Party). By the early 1940s, the use of "Việt Nam" was widespread. It appeared in the name of

Ho Chi Minh (born ; 19 May 1890 – 2 September 1969), colloquially known as Uncle Ho () among other aliases and sobriquets, was a Vietnamese revolutionary and politician who served as the founder and first President of Vietnam, president of the ...

's Việt Nam Độc lập Đồng minh Hội (

Viet Minh The Việt Minh (, ) is the common and abbreviated name of the League for Independence of Vietnam ( or , ; ), which was a Communist Party of Vietnam, communist-led national independence coalition formed at Pác Bó by Hồ Chí Minh on 19 May 1 ...

), founded 1941, and was even used by the governor of

French Indochina French Indochina (previously spelled as French Indo-China), officially known as the Indochinese Union and after 1941 as the Indochinese Federation, was a group of French dependent territories in Southeast Asia from 1887 to 1954. It was initial ...

in 1942. The name "Vietnam" has been official since 1945. It was adopted in June by

Bảo Đại Bảo Đại (, vi-hantu, , , 22 October 191331 July 1997), born Nguyễn Phúc (Phước) Vĩnh Thụy (), was the 13th and final emperor of the Nguyễn dynasty, the last ruling dynasty of Vietnam. From 1926 to 1945, he was ''de jure'' em ...

's imperial government in Huế, and in September by Ho's rival communist government in Hanoi.

Other names

Official names pre-1945 Official names since 1945: "Việt Nam" * Đế quốc Việt Nam (帝國越南, Empire of Vietnam) : 11 March – 25 August 1945. * Việt Nam Dân chủ Cộng hòa (越南民主共和, Democratic Republic of Vietnam) : 2 September 1945 – 18 February 1947, 10 October 1954 – 2 July 1976. * Quốc gia Việt Nam (國家越南, State of Vietnam) : 27 May 1948 – 26 October 1955. * Việt Nam Cộng hòa (越南共和, Republic of Vietnam) : 26 October 1955 – 30 April 1975. * Cộng hòa Xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam (共和社會主義越南, Socialist Republic of Vietnam) : 2 July 1976 to now. Non-official names * Việt Thường (越常, 越嘗, 越裳國, 越裳氏): Initially, the name of a people and/or nation to the south of

Jiaozhi Jiaozhi (standard Chinese, pinyin: ''Jiāozhǐ''), or , was a historical region ruled by various Chinese dynasties, corresponding to present-day northern Vietnam. The kingdom of Nanyue (204–111 BC) set up the Jiaozhi Commandery (; , ch� ...

Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư The ''Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư'' ( vi-hantu, 大越史記全書; ; ''Complete Annals of Đại Việt'') is the official national chronicle of the Đại Việt, that was originally compiled by the royal historian Ngô Sĩ Liên under ...

claimed that this was

's endonym when first presenting gifts to

King Cheng of Zhou King Cheng of Zhou (; 1055–1021 BC), personal name Ji Song, was the second king of the Chinese Zhou dynasty. The dates of his reign are 1042–1021 BCE or 1042/35–1006 BCE. Ji Dan, Duke of Zhou served as regent during his minority. His pare ...

* Lĩnh Ngoại (嶺外) : lit. "Beyond the Ranges" (i.e.

Nanling Mountains The Nanling (), also known as the Wuling (), is a major mountain range in Southern China that separates the Pearl River Basin from the Yangtze Valley and serves as the dividing line between south and central subtropical zones. The main rang ...

). Used interchangeably with Lĩnh Nam (嶺南;

pinyin Hanyu Pinyin, or simply pinyin, officially the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, is the most common romanization system for Standard Chinese. ''Hanyu'' () literally means 'Han Chinese, Han language'—that is, the Chinese language—while ''pinyin' ...

: Lǐngnán; lit. "South of the Ranges"). Included

Guangdong ) means "wide" or "vast", and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. The name "''Guang''" ultimately came from Guangxin ( zh, labels=no, first=t, t= , s=广信), an outpost established in Han dynasty ...

Guangxi Guangxi,; officially the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People's Republic of China, located in South China and bordering Vietnam (Hà Giang Province, Hà Giang, Cao Bằn ...

Hainan Hainan is an island provinces of China, province and the southernmost province of China. It consists of the eponymous Hainan Island and various smaller islands in the South China Sea under the province's administration. The name literally mean ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

, and

Macau Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by p ...

, as well as modern northern

. * Giao Chỉ quận (交趾郡): Chinese name for Đại Cồ Việt &

* An Nam quốc (安南國): Chinese name for

. The basis for various foreign exonyms for Vietnam. * Nam Việt quốc (南越國) : Proposed by

Nguyễn Nguyễn (阮) (sometimes abbreviated as Ng̃) is the most common surname of the Vietnamese people. Outside of Vietnam, the surname is commonly rendered without diacritics as ''Nguyen''. By some estimates 30 to 39 percent of Vietnamese peopl ...

emperor

but rejected by

Qing The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

Emperor Jiaqing. * Đại Nam đế quốc (大南帝國) (1839 – 1945) : Diplomatic name. * Empire d'Annam : French exonoym. * Union indochinoise (1887–1945), Fédération indochinoise (1947–1953) or Liên bang Đông Dương (東洋聯邦). * Đại Hùng đế quốc (大雄帝國, 30 August 1917 – 11 January 1918) : Only during the

Thái Nguyên uprising Cài () is a Chinese-language surname that derives from the name of the ancient Cai state. In 2019 it was the 38th most common surname in China, but the 9th most common in Taiwan (as of 2018), where it is usually romanized as "Tsai" (based on ...

. * Việt Nam dân quốc (越南民國, 1929? – 1930) : Only during the

. File:Đế-quốc Việt-Nam tuyên-bố độc-lập, 1945.jpg, ''Telegram Dailynews'' has reported the "

Empire of Vietnam The Empire of Vietnam (; Literary Chinese and Japanese language, Contemporary Japanese: ; Japanese language, Modern Japanese: ) was a short-lived Japanese puppet state, puppet state of Empire of Japan, Imperial Japan between March 11 and Abdicat ...

declared independence", 11 March 1945. File:Tem in dưới thời Đế quốc Việt Nam.jpeg, Stamps of the

. File:Cảnh chuẩn bị bầu cử Quốc hội khóa I tại ngõ Phất Lộc năm 1946.jpg, Preparing of the National Assembly elections, Phất Lộc lane,

Hanoi Hanoi ( ; ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Vietnam, second-most populous city of Vietnam. The name "Hanoi" translates to "inside the river" (Hanoi is bordered by the Red River (Asia), Red and Black River (Asia), Black Riv ...

1946. File:20 Đồng - South Vietnam (1960) FAO 01.jpg, Coin of the

Republic of Vietnam South Vietnam, officially the Republic of Vietnam (RVN; , VNCH), was a country in Southeast Asia that existed from 1955 to 1975. It first garnered international recognition in 1949 as the State of Vietnam within the French Union, with it ...

in 1960. , Stamps of the

in 1961. File:COA Vietnamese Embassy Prague 5542.JPG,

ese

Embassy A diplomatic mission or foreign mission is a group of people from a Sovereign state, state or organization present in another state to represent the sending state or organization officially in the receiving or host state. In practice, the phrase ...

Prague Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...

on 25 April 2012.

Notes

Other spellings

In English, the spellings ''Vietnam'', ''Viet-Nam'', ''Viet Nam'' and ''Việt Nam'' have all been used. Josiah Conder in his 1824 descriptive gazetteer ''The Modern Traveller: Birmah, Siam, and Anam'' (Burma, Siam, and Annam) spells ''Viet-nam'' with a hyphen placed between Viet and Nam. The 1954 edition of '' Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary'' gave both the unspaced and hyphenated forms; in response to a letter from a reader, the editors indicated that the spaced form Viet Nam was also acceptable, though they stated that because Anglophones did not know the meaning of the two words making up the name Vietnam, "it is not surprising" that there was a tendency to drop the space. In 1966, the U.S. government was known to use all three renderings, with the

State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs o ...

preferring the hyphenated version. By 1981, the hyphenated form was regarded as "dated", according to Scottish writer

Gilbert Adair Gilbert Adair (29 December 19448 December 2011) was a Scottish novelist, poet, film critic, and journalist.Stuart Jeffries and Ronald BerganObituary: Gilbert Adair ''The Guardian'', 9 December 2011. He was critically most famous for the "fien ...

, and he titled his book about depictions of the country in film using the unhyphenated and unspaced form "Vietnam". Currently "Vietnam" is most commonly used as the official name in English, leading to the adjective ''Vietnamese'' (instead of ''Viet'', ''Vietic'' or ''Viet Namese'') and 3-letter code VIE in

IOC The International Olympic Committee (IOC; , CIO) is the international, non-governmental, sports governing body of the modern Olympic Games. Founded in 1894 by Pierre de Coubertin and Demetrios Vikelas, it is based in L ...

and

FIFA The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (), more commonly known by its acronym FIFA ( ), is the international self-regulatory governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal. It was founded on 21 May 1904 to o ...

(instead of VNM). In all other languages mainly written in

Latin script The Latin script, also known as the Roman script, is a writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae in Magna Graecia. The Gree ...

, the name of Vietnam is also commonly written without a space. The spelling that separated by a space as "Viet Nam" is formally recognized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), the United Nations (UN) and the

Vietnamese Government The Government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (; less formally the Vietnamese Government or the Government of Vietnam, ) is the cabinet and the central executive arm of the state administration of Vietnam. The members of the Governmen ...

itself as the official, standardized and "accurate" country name, resulting in the systematic prioritization in the usage of this spelling by the Vietnamese state-powered agencies and official documents such as the nationwide-issued citizen identity cards and the

passports A passport is an official travel document issued by a government that certifies a person's identity and nationality for international travel. A passport allows its bearer to enter and temporarily reside in a foreign country, access local aid ...

. Both Japanese and Korean formerly referred to Vietnam by their respective

Sino-Xenic pronunciations Sino-Xenic vocabularies are large-scale and systematic borrowings of the Chinese lexicon into the Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese languages, none of which are genetically related to Chinese. The resulting Sino-Japanese, Sino-Korean and Sino- ...

of the Chinese characters for its names, but later switched to using direct phonetic transcriptions. In Japanese, following the independence of Vietnam, the names and were largely replaced by the phonetic transcription , written in katakana script; however, the old form is still seen in compound words (e.g. , "a visit to Vietnam").

Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs The is an executive department of the Government of Japan, and is responsible for the country's foreign policy and international relations. The ministry was established by the second term of the third article of the National Government Organiz ...

sometimes used an alternative spelling . Similarly, in the Korean language, in line with the trend towards decreasing usage of

hanja Hanja (; ), alternatively spelled Hancha, are Chinese characters used to write the Korean language. After characters were introduced to Korea to write Literary Chinese, they were adapted to write Korean as early as the Gojoseon period. () ...

, the Sino-Korean-derived name ''Wollam'' (, the Korean reading of ) has been replaced by ''Beteunam'' () in South Korea and ''Wennam'' () in North Korea.

History

Origin of ''Vietnam''

Other names

Notes

Other spellings

See also

References

Books

Cites