The Study On The Development History Of Vietnamese Characters

The development history of Vietnamese character is one of the important questionsof the study on Vietnam. From ancient time to the present, there appeared threecharacters in Vietnam history: Chinese character, Nom character and Quoc Ngucharacter. In addition, during the period of French colonial rule, French was used insome specific fields temporarily. When the past scholars studied Vietnamesecharacters, they almost focused on Nom character or Quoc Ngu character, but seldommade comprehensive study and analysis on the development process of Vietnamesecharacters. It caused that the academic circle could not draw a general understandingtowards many important questions about the development process of Vietnamesecharacters. In fact, Chinese character, Nom character and Quoc Ngu character arethree stages in the development history of Vietnamese character, whose developmentand evolvement not only displayed distinguished features, but also embodied closerelations each other and interior rules of development history of Vietnamese character.Studying the development history of the Vietnamese character via introducing factorsas national ideology and culture, national consciousness, national identification andcross-cultural exchange as well as combining with multi-disciplines, such aslinguistics, archaeology and history will help to grasp and understand thedevelopment history of Vietnamese character more accurately.Vietnam didn't have its own character in prehistoric era. The Red River Delta isthe cradle of Ancient Vietnamese culture. From archaeological materials thatVietnam announces, The Red River Delta appeared rich carved and drawncharacterizations, which reflected the local people's situation of production, life,religious belief and other aspects. But they do not have the nature and essentials ofthe characters.The dissemination and use of Chinese character in Vietnam had been lasted overtwo thousand years, which profoundly affected the Vietnamese local culture. FromQin Dynasty, Chinese character began to spread in Vietnam, becoming the firstformal text in Vietnam national history. From Qin Dynasty to the end of Tang Dynasty Vietnam went into the prefecture and county age as a part of the ChineseEmpire. In a thousand years, the dissemination and use of Chinese character inVietnam was basically the same with states and counties in China's mainland. Duringthis period, feudal officials, asylum celebrities, monks, migrants, garrison soldiersand other personnel from the Central Plains of China had contributed to thedissemination and development of Chinese character in Vietnam. From the mid-tenthcentury to the late nineteenth century, Vietnam was an independent feudal nation.During this period, Chinese character continued to be respected by the Vietnamesefeudal dynasties. In addition, they promoted cultural and educational undertakingsactively. The dissemination and use of Chinese character was further expanded asConfucianism and imperial examination became prevalent in Vietnam. Vietnamgradually became a French colony after the late nineteenth century. In order tostrengthen colonial rule and assimilated the aboriginal Vietnamese, Frenchcolonialists restricted and abolished Chinese character and imperial examinationsystem progressively by the colonial policy. Against this background, Chinesecharacter was gradually declined in Vietnam. In1945, Vietnam gained nationalindependence after the victory in the "August Revolution" and announced that Quocngu character to be the official language. Since then Chinese character lost itsposition as the official language which had been lasting about one thousand years inVietnam.Nom character is the result of Sino-Vietnam language and culture exchange. Itscharacter-creation rule included pictophonetic characters, associative compounds andphonetic loan characters of the six categories of Chinese characters. The birth anddevelopment of Nom character closely related to the relationship history betweenChina and Vietnam. The prefecture and county age of Vietnam was the embryonicstage of Nom character. In the late tenth century, Vietnam established an independentfeudal state. The independence required to establish and develop an accordinglynational cultural system objectively. Under the circumstances, Nom character gotrapid development; it matured in the thirteenth century. For a long time, Chinesecharacter co-existed with Nom character and performed their respective duties.Chinese character?which was regarded as Saint character or Confucian character, was the official text in Vietnamese feudal ruling class, while Nom character, which wasseen as informal text was used by citizens. Nom character was not only made gloriousachievements in Vietnamese folk poetry creation, but also an important carrier ofVietnam country regulations, religion and dictionaries. Due to many subjective andobjective reasons, Nom character was regarded as a fail attempt that Vietnameseculture tried to break away from Chinese culture carried by Chinese character.Quoc ngu character is an alphabetic writing which was created by Westernmissionaries to record Vietnamese language by Latin letters in late sixteenth centuryor early seventeenth century. It was used to spread western religions. DictionarivmAnamiticvm Lusitanvm, et Latinvm, which was compiled by French missionaryAlexander de Rbodes, was published in1651. This dictionary marked that Quoc ngucharacter entered a new stage of systematization and standardization. After themid-nineteenth century, French gradually established colonial dominance in Vietnam.In order to achieve the ultimate purpose of long-term occupation of Vietnam andassimilate indigenous Vietnamese, French colonist abolished Chinese character andpromoted the use of Quoc ngu character. Vietnam National patriots and communistsmade use of the great advantage of Quoc ngu character which was easy to study andunderstand, to preach national culture, national spirit, national independence,revolutionary thought to fight against France. Quoc ngu character is the appropriateweapon for Vietnam to defeat French colonist and won national independence andliberation. Quoc ngu character replaced Chinese character and became the officialtext of Vietnam was an active choice of Vietnam. It reflected the law of developmenthistory of Vietnamese character and lined with the general characteristic of Vietnamnational thought and culture.