Vietnam Language: History, Origin of Vietnamese Alphabet

Vietnamese Language: History and Origin

Vietnam Language is the official and national language of Vietnam and is spoken by a large majority of the Vietnamese People. It is also one of the few languages in Asia that uses the Latin alphabet instead of symbols. This makes it a lot easier to interpret street signs and even learn to speak in Vietnamese.

Vietnamese belongs to the Northern (Viet–Muong) clusters of the Vietic branch, spoken by the Vietic peoples, originating from Northern Vietnam. The language Inscription was carved on stone steles at Temple of Literature, in combined Chữ Hán (Chinese characters used in the Vietnamese traditional writing system) and an archaic form of the Chữ Nôm (writing system for vernacular Vietnamese language using Chinese characters).

The List of the Vietnamese Alphabet

Vietnam Language had shared more characteristics common to other languages in South East Asia and with the Austroasiatic family, such as an inflectional morphology and a richer set of consonant clusters, which have subsequently disappeared from the language under Chinese influence. Vietnamese is heavily influenced by its location in the Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area, with the result that it has acquired or converged toward characteristics such as isolating morphology and phonemically distinctive tones, through processes of tonogenesis.

Vietnamese Alphabet Founded from 1651

These characteristics have become part of many of the genetically unrelated languages of Southeast Asia; for example, Tsat (a member of the Malayo-Polynesian group within Austronesian), and Vietnamese each developed tones as a phonemic feature. The ancestor of the Vietnamese language is usually believed to have been originally based in the area of the Red River Delta in what is now northern Vietnam.

Vietnamese Alphabet and Tone in Writing System

Distinctive tonal variations emerged during the subsequent expansion of the Vietnamese language and people from the Red River Plain into what is now central and southern Vietnam through conquest of the Ancient Nation of Champa and the Khmer people of the Mekong Delta in the vicinity of present-day Ho Chi Minh City, also known as Saigon.

Vietnamese Alphabet and Tone in Writing System

Northern Vietnam was primarily influenced by Chinese, which came to predominate politically in the 2nd century BC whilst central and southern lands were occupied by Chamic and Khmer empires. After the emergence of the Ngô dynasty at the beginning of the 10th century, the ruling class adopted Classical Chinese as the formal medium of government, scholarship and literature. With the dominance of Chinese came radical importation of Chinese vocabulary and grammatical influence. The resulting Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary makes up about a third of the Vietnamese lexicon in all realms, and may account for as much as 60% of the vocabulary used in formal texts.

Vietnamese Language with French Influence

After France invaded Vietnam in the late 19th century, French gradually replaced Chinese as the official language in education and government. Vietnamese adopted many French terms, such as đầm (‘dame’, from madame), ga (‘train station’, from gare), sơ mi (‘shirt’, from chemise), and búp bê (‘doll’, from poupée) as well as the Latin alphabet, resulting in a language that was Austroasiatic but with major Sino-influences and some minor French influences from the French colonial era.

See More Useful Articles when You Travel to Vietnam:

• English to Vietnamese: The Best Software and Translation App
• Customs Information – Viet Nam Entrance and Exit Procedures
• Travel to Vietnam: Visa on Arrival, Online-Extension and E-visa
• Travel Safety in Vietnam: All You Need to Know Before You Go
• Vietnam Facts & Figures – All You Need to Know Before You Go
• Frequently Questions of Foreign Tourists Traveling in Vietnam