User:PhanAnh123

Subpages:
 * The contrast between ‹d-› and ‹dĕ-›/‹d-› in Northern Middle Vietnamese, as recorded in de Rhodes (1651)
 * A voyage to Cochinchina, on the attestation of an extinct possible pidgin or aberrant dialect
 * Random thoughts and notes

Middle Vietnamese and modern standard written Vietnamese
The modern Vietnamese written standard is a mixed bag of dialects, influenced by the dictionary published by Taberd (1838), probably based chiefly on the dialects of South Central-Southern Vietnam, with subsequent contributions of all kinds of dialects. Meanwhile, the dialects used in de Rhodes (1651) are evidently chiefly of Northern origin, although it is not rare for occasional Central and Southern forms to appear. Therefore, although a written Vietnamese word might be listed as derived from Middle Vietnamese, with the form as recorded by de Rhodes listed, there might not be any continuation between the two, as it might very well be a word of Central or Southern origin. For a case in point, modern written is likely of North Central origin, while  (‹ſóu᷄›  in de Rhodes (1651)) is the Northern form.

Modern written usage of items such as, , etc., might be contributed the influence of Taberd (1838) and the subsequent dictionaries influenced by it, with the Northern forms with ⟨gi-⟩ being wiped out to a large extent. There are a few cases of multiple forms coexist in the written standard, with differences in meaning: Northern and Central-Southern. On the other hand, as seen below, Sino-Vietnamese morphemes are absolutely dominated by the Northern forms.

Some forms, such as and, might also originate from a particular region (Northeast for tháng, North Central for khoai), but have become so widely adopted by the more mainstream dialects, that the original form in the mainstream dialects are now untraceable. See the case of Southern : it was widely used 100 years ago, but now pretty much eradicated by ; da vanished in the Northern dialects even earlier, before the bulk of literature written in the Latin script started to build up.

More superficial items like and, both are now widespread, also show features that can be contributed a certain dialect zone(s) instead of general, common Vietnamese.

Still, while a "written standard" might exist in one form or another, Northern and Southern Vietnamese are relatively free to intentionally display dialectal features in writting, at least on the Internet, with speakers of Central dialects drawing the short end of the stick.

Regional Sino-Vietnamese readings
While the dialectal Sino-Vietnamese forms exclusive to Central dialects definitely exist (or sadly, existed), as the Central dialects were rarely written down in the Latin script during the colonial period, it's hard to extract the actual Central forms with absolute certainty unlike the Northern and Southern dialects that were both extensively down in their dialectal glory. Obviously, the Nôm and Chinese texts without contemporary annotations in Latin script are not very useful to determine the readings, since things are spelled with Sinitic characters, although needless to say, would be read as  by a Northern writer and as  by a Southern writer.

By the way, the claims about variants due to "taboo avoidance" should be taken with a grain of salt: before the colonial period, the vast majority of Vietnamese literature by Vietnamese native speakers was written in Sinitic and Sinitic-derived characters, with a few exceptions. This means that to spin one of the two forms as being due to "taboo avoidance", one form must be taken as the base, and there is little to no basis to that aside from whatever form is more common after the colonial period, in nowadays Vietnamese. By the time works written in the Latin script started to build up, most of the variants are already quite established in both dialect zones. All of the forms below should be seen as equal, with neither derived from the other, unless there are very obvious reasons to think otherwise (e.g. and  are obviously more innovative than  and, since the later two are likely phonetically more similar to the likely donative Sinitic forms).

Keep in mind that even back then, when there was less dialect-leveling, distribution was not even and it is common for a text filled with Northern features to have some Southern forms popping up (and vice versa). I am not sure how aware writers were during the early days of the colonial period about the regional Sino-Vietnamese readings, although I think they would know at least that Sino-Vietnamese was not monolithic, which is how it's often treated these days although it was absolutely not.

Incomplete list:


 * Northern Sino-Vietnamese:


 * Southern Sino-Vietnamese:

Words from Wikipedia and other sources
Although Vietnamese Wikipedia articles often list "synonyms", care ought be taken when create entries for those "synoyms" here on Wiktionary, because as weird as it is, many people apparently can't tell Chinese and Vietnamese apart. These "non-words" (they're not Vietnamese words with actual usage, but terms consisting of Sinitic morphemes read using Sino-Vietnamese) that have no business to even be listed on Vietnamese Wikipedia, are unfornunately quite common.