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Histoire Épistémologie Langage
39/1 (2017), p. 155-176
© SHESL/EDP Sciences
DOI : 10.1051/hel/2017390108
Disponible en ligne sur :
www.hel-journal.org
First codiFication oF Vietnamese by 17th-century
missionaries: the description oF tones and the inFluence
oF portuguese on Vietnamese orthography*
Résumé
Nous analysons l’importance de la génération
des missionnaires jésuites pionniers au ser-
vice du patronage portugais dans l’implémen-
tation du quốc ngữ [langue nationale] dans
l’actuel Vietnam et la description linguis-
tique de la tonologie de la langue annamite
ou tonkinoise (anciens noms du vietnamien).
Nous étudions, en particulier, le manuscrit
Manuductio ad Linguam Tunckinensem (ca.
1745 [avant 1623]) de Francisco de Pina,
S.J. (1585 / 1586-1625), et le Dictionarium
Annamiticum Lusitanum et Latinum et le traité
grammatical Annamiticae seu Tunchinensis
Brevis Declaratio (Rome 1651) de Alexandre
de Rhodes, S.J. (1593-1660). Nous afrmons
que Pina fut, en effet, le premier à utiliser le
système de romanisation du Tonkinois, et nous
conrmons qu’il fut aussi le premier à décrire
en détail ses six tons. Rhodes a approfondi le
savoir de Pina, qui est particulièrement expli-
cite dans la description de la tonologie tonki-
noise. Nous démontrons aussi que Rhodes a
utilisé les dictionnaires manuscrits disparus
de Gaspar do Amaral, S.J. (1594-1646) et
António Barbosa, S.J. (1594-1647), qui sont
d’une importance capitale dans l’utili-
sation de l’archigraphème « portugais »
<nh> pour représenter le phonème /ɲ/.
Mots-clés
histoire de la linguistique, linguistique
missionnaire, vietnamien, annamite,
tonkinois, quốc ngữ
Abstract
We analyse the importance of the generation
of Jesuit pioneer missionaries at the service
of the Portuguese Patronage for the imple-
mentation of quốc ngữ [national language]
in present-day Vietnam and the linguistic
description of the tonology of Annamese or
Tonkinese (former names of Vietnamese).
We analyse, in particular, the manuscript
Manuductio ad Linguam Tunckinensem (ca.
1745 [ante 1623]) by Francisco de Pina, S.J.
(1585/1586–1625), and the Dictionarium
Annamiticum Lusitanum et Latinum and the
grammatical treatise Linguae Annamiticae seu
Tunchinensis Brevis Declaratio (Rome 1651)
by Alexandre de Rhodes, S.J. (1593–1660).
We corroborate that Pina was indeed the rst
to use the Romanization system of Tonkinese,
and we establish that he was also the rst
to describe its six tones in detail. Rhodes
expanded Pina’s knowledge, which is particu-
larly explicit in the description of Tonkinese
tonology. We also explain that Rhodes used
lost manuscript dictionaries written by Gaspar
do Amaral, S.J. (1594–1646) and António
Barbosa, S.J. (1594–1647), which is evident
mainly in the use of the “Portuguese” digraph
<nh> to represent the phoneme /ɲ/.
Keywords
history of linguistics, missionary linguistics,
Vietnamese, Annamese, Tonkinese,
Quốc ngữ
Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos Assunção
Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro (Vila Real)
* We’d like to dedicate this paper to Prof. Roland Jacques for his contributions to the histori-
cal studies on the relationships between Vietnam and the missionaries from the Portuguese
Patronage. We’d also like to gratefully acknowledge the help of Dr. Nguyễn Vũ Thu Hà (Khoa
Bồ Đào Nha of Đại học Hà Nội) for her improvements on the description of Vietnamese
tones, and the editorial board and the anonymous referees whose stimulating comments and
recommendations we have tried to implement in the nal version of this paper.
Article published by EDP Sciences and available at http://www.hel-journal.org or https://doi.org/10.1051/hel/2017390108
156 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
IntroduCtIon
We analyze the work of the rst pioneer missionaries of the Portuguese Patronage
in Vietnam in the rst half of the 17th century and their metalinguistic texts. The
paper is structured as follows: rst, we describe the historical background of the
Portuguese discoveries, the constitution of the Portuguese Patronage or the Ius
Patronatus [Right of Patronage] given by various papal bulls and their impor-
tance for the evangelization of South East Asia, particularly Macau, which became
the center of Christianity in China, Japan and nearby territories, although it was
“only” a Vice-Province. Then, we will describe the activities of pioneer mission-
aries at the service of the Portuguese Patronage, mainly the Portuguese Jesuits
Francisco de Pina, S.J. (1585/1586–1625), Gaspar do Amaral, S.J. (1594–1646)
and António Barbosa, S.J. (1594–1647), and the French Jesuit Alexandre de
Rhodes, S.J. (1593–1660). We describe the rst published metalinguistic works
on Vietnamese, i.e., the Dictionarium Annamiticum Lusitanum et Latinum and
the Linguae Annamiticae seu Tunchinensis Brevis Declaratio (Rome 1651) by
Alexandre de Rhodes and their main sources. This chapter is divided into two sec-
tions. In the rst section, we will analyze the implementation of the Romanization
system called currently Quốc ngữ [national language] and Portuguese orthography
in Vietnamese, namely the representation of the phoneme /ɲ/ by the Portuguese
digraph <nh>. In the second section we will explicitly analyze the inuence of
Francisco de Pina in de Rhodes’s description of the six Tonkinese tones, com-
paring Pina’s manuscript Manuductio ad linguam Tunchinensem (ca. 1745 [ante
1623]) and de Rhodes’s Linguae Annamiticae seu Tunchinensis Brevis Declaratio
(Rome 1651).
HIstorICal baCkGround1
The treaties of Tordesillas (June 7, 1494) and Zaragoza (April 22, 1529), signed
by the Portuguese and Spanish kings, regulated the spheres of inuence or parts of
the world of Portuguese and Spanish colonization / evangelization, in the west and
the east, respectively. Both countries divided the world in two, mutatis mutandis,
similar parts, the lands between the meridian 370 leagues west of the Cabo Verde
islands (ca. 46th meridian west) and the antemeridian 297.5 leagues east of the
Moluccas Islands (ca. 142nd meridian east) belonging to Portugal. In addition, for
Catholic countries like Portugal and Spain, the Pope’s authorization to colonize
1 We used some data from an earlier paper concerning mainly the historical context,
the presentation of the rst missionaries of Portuguese patronage in Vietnam and the
description of the rst Vietnamese metalinguistic texts (see Ferna ndes & assunção 2014).
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 157
was indispensable because the main ofcial reason was the conversion of native or
“indel” people to the Catholic religion.
In effect, after 1452, with the papal bull Dum Diversas (June 8, 1452) and,
mainly, the Romanus Pontifex (January 8, 1455), Pope Nicholas V (1397–1455)
gave Portuguese king D. Afonso V (1432–1481) the Ius Patronatus [Right of
Patronage] and complete jurisdiction of overseas lands, discovered and still to be
discovered (See, v.g., Rego 1940, p. 7–8, Jacques 1999: 43-52). These rights (and
obligations) consisted in the exclusive supervision of the administration and mis-
sionary activity in overseas territories, the establishment of dioceses and parishes,
the nomination of bishops and ecclesiastical benets, the funding of the clergy
(secular and regular) and the construction and provision of churches, schools and
convents, etc. (Sena 2014, p. 91–92).
The Portuguese missionaries – or those at the service of the Portuguese
Patronage – did not initially know the native languages. They took translators
with them, interpreters or “linguas” as they were known. Thus, one of their rst
missionary tasks was to learn the native languages and write catechisms, conver-
sational booklets, dictionaries and grammars, in order to communicate with local
inhabitants and to teach the forthcoming missionaries.
This was particularly important after the establishment of the Society of Jesus
(1540) by Pope Paul III (1468–1549), the Council of Trent (1545–1563) and, espe-
cially for Asia, the rst ve Provincial Councils of Goa in India (1567, 1575,
1585, 1592 and 1606), which left deep marks on the religious and social evolution
of the Portuguese empire in Asia (Souza 2008, p. 424). The main objective was
the adequacy of the rules of the Council of Trent or the Counter-Reformation to
Eastern realities. One of the recommendations, for example, of the third Provincial
Council of Goa (1585) was the publication of catechisms in Portuguese and in nat-
ive languages in order to disseminate better the Catholic faith (Faria 2013, p. 227;
see also Fonseca 2006, p. 87).
The arrival of the Portuguese in China, Japan and Vietnam occurred mutatis
mutandis in the middle of the sixteenth century (see, v.g., Jacques 1999). The enorm-
ous diocese of Goa (India), erected by the papal bull Romani ponticis circum-
spectio (January 31, 1533) of Clement VII (1478–1534), covered the jurisdiction
of the whole East, i.e., from the Cape of Good Hope (Cape Town in South Africa)
to China and Japan. In 1558, Pope Paul IV (1476–1559) established the Diocese
of Malacca (Malaysia) by the apostolic constitution Pro Excellent! Praeminentia
(February 4), and, 18 years later, Pope Gregory XIII (1502–1585) established the
diocese of Macau (China) by the bull Super specula militantis Ecclesiae (January
23, 1576), all suffragan to the Archdiocese of Goa (see Fernandes & Assunção
2014).
158 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
Macau became a Portuguese colony in 1557 (see, v.g., Correia 2012), received
a Charter from king D. Filipe I of Portugal (Filipe II of Spain) (1527–1598) in
1586 and was the center of Christianity in China, Japan and nearby territories.
This was the situation at least until about the end of the 17th century with the
establishment by Pope Alexander VIII (1610–1691) of the Diocese of Nanjing
by the apostolic constitution Ponticis Sollicitudo and the reestablishment of the
Diocese of Beijing (China) by the apostolic constitution Romanus Pontifex, Beati
Petri (April 10, 1690) (see Teixeira 1996, p. 15–16). The Portuguese Patronage of
the Orient ended with the integration of Macau into the People’s Republic of China
on December 19, 1999.
The Portuguese arrived in present-day Vietnam in mid-September 1516, in
the region of Chăm Pa (in contemporary central and southern Vietnam) (see, v.g.,
Manguin 1972, p. 1-3; 45-46). The initial contacts had not been planned and resul-
ted from a storm that forced the boats to change course, and the ofcial “discovery”
of “Cochinchina” by the Portuguese occurred seven years later, in 1523. Despite
the fact that the Portuguese never conquered Vietnam, their presence there lasted
for more than three centuries, with many casual relationships (see, v.g., Manguin
1972, p. 1-3; 236), mainly through the evangelization organized by missionar-
ies from the Portuguese Patronage. In the 17th century, the country was divided
mutatis mutandis by the 18th parallel north into two main kingdoms: Tonkin,
namely northern Vietnam, with the capital set in Thăng Long (nowadays Hà Nội),
and Annam / Cochinchina, which corresponds to central and southern Vietnam,
with the capital set in Phú Xuân (Huế). After the secession war, in 1614, the Trịnh
dynasty ruled the Kingdom of Tonkin and the Nguyễn family the Kingdom of
Annam or Cochinchina. Vietnam was called internally Đại Việt, but, externally,
in their relations with China, they used the toponym An Nam, which was called
“Cochin-China” by the Portuguese (see, v.g., Jacques 2004, p. 56-58).
FIrst mIssIonarIes oF PortuGuese PatronaGe In VIetnam
The rst book which describes the rst contacts between the Portuguese and
Vietnam was written by the chronicler and grammarian João de Barros (1496–
1570). It was entitled Terceira decada da Asia: Dos feytos, que os Portugueses z-
eram no Descobrimento & conquista dos mares & terras do Oriente (Lisbon 1563).
Barros states that the Viceroy of India, Afonso de Albuquerque (1453–1515), sent
Fernão Peres de Andrade (1458–1552), a sailor, merchant and diplomat, to explore
the coast of China and to establish the rst contacts with the Chinese. He left
Malaca on 12 August 1516, but he was forced to change course because of a storm
and they arrived in the Kingdom of Chăm Pa, in Cochinchina. Fernão Peres de
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 159
Andrade set foot ashore to look for fresh water and could report on the quality
of life of the inhabitants. After the rst impression, Fernão Peres ordered that the
sailors offer gifts to the local population, trying to soften potential conicts and
establish relationships with the natives. Fernão Peres continued his expedition but
he couldn’t go to China. He stopped at the island of Côn Sơn, on the southern coast
of Vietnam, belonging to the current Côn Đảo archipelago, in Southern Vietnam,
in the South China Sea. Côn Sơn was named “Pullo Condor” by the Portuguese,
from the Malayan language “Pu Lao Kundur”. Côn Sơn or Pullo Condor was not
inhabited at that time but it was well known by sailors because of the quantity of
fresh water, chickens, birds, turtles and many species of sh available (Barros
1563, f. 42r-43v).
Another of the rst Portuguese texts about Vietnam was written by the
Dominican friar Gaspar da Cruz, O.P. (ca. 1520–1570), and it was entitled Tratado
em que se contam muito por extenso as cousas da China (Évora 1570). It is the
rst European book specically about China. Gaspar da Cruz was a missionary in
Malacca and he decided to travel to China to know that famous kingdom better.
In his trip, he landed in the kingdom of Cochinchina to obtain fresh water and
take a break. He describes it as a great kingdom, with a lot of people and rich
citizens. Specically, he says that Cochinchina connes southwards with China,
with approximately a hundred leagues along the seacoast. He also observed that
Cochinchina was subjected to the king of China and that the people looked very
much like Chinese people and dressed in the same way. Unfortunately, he did not
make any linguistic description of Vietnamese, but he mentioned the fact that
the letters of the language of Cochinchina were similar to those of Chinese, even
though it was a very different language. For him, Vietnamese and Chinese people
understood each other only in writing and not orally because China had many dif-
ferent languages, and its inhabitants could not understand each other (Cruz 1569,
f. b iiir; for other details, see Fernandes & Assunção 2014, p. 9-10).
Roland Jacques, O.M.I, presently Emeritus Professor of Saint Paul University
in Ottawa and Vicar Provincial of Vietnam from the Congregation of the
Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, is a French scholar who has stud-
ied in detail the relationships between Vietnam and the missionaries from the
Portuguese Patronage. He discusses, when studying the generation of pioneers of
the rst organized2 mission, the Jesuit missionaries at the service of the Portuguese
Patronage between 1623 and 1678 with particular emphasis on Francisco de Pina,
S.J. (1585/1586–1625), Gaspar do Amaral, S.J. (1594–1646), António Barbosa,
S.J. (1594–1647) and Alexandre de Rhodes, S.J. (1593–1660) (see Jacques 2012,
p. 43–48).
2 For the rst unorganized missions in Vietnam see, v.g., Jacques 1999, p. 126-141.
160 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
Francisco de Pina was born in Guarda, in northern Portugal between 1585
and 1586. He entered the Society of Jesus at 19 and spent several years studying
at the College of Madre de Deus in Macau, where he was a student of Father
João Rodrigues “Tçuzu” (1562–1633) and was able to make use of his language
skills. He arrived in Vietnam at Chăm Pa (Hội An, known as “Faïfo” among the
Portuguese) in 1617 and passed away tragically only eight years later (December
15, 1625) at only 40 years old while trying to rescue passengers in danger in Đà
Nẵng (“Turam” or “Turão” for the Portuguese), a port on the Hàn river on the
south central coast of Vietnam (Jacques 2002, p. 24–27; See also Mourão 2005,
p. 317–319).
Gaspar do Amaral was born in Corvaceira, district of Viseu, in the north of
Portugal in 1594; he was ordained priest of the Society of Jesus in 1622, and, in the
following year, he left for a mission in Japan, having initially remained in Macau
at the College of Madre de Deus. He was sent to Tonkin in 1629 by the Rector
of the College of Macau, Father Pedro Morejón (ca. 1562–1639), because “he
had not heard news of the missionaries” (Ribeiro 2001, p. 68). Gaspar do Amaral
was Rector of the College of Macau and Vice-Provincial of the Jesuit Japanese
Province (1641–1645) (Wernz, Schmitt & Goetstouwers 1950, p. 650). He died in
a shipwreck in front of the island of Hainan in southern China (February 26, 1646)
at approximately 52 years old (Mourão3 2005, p. 310–313, 2012, p. 54–61).
António Barbosa was born in Arrifana do Sousa, Penael, district of Porto,
also in the north of Portugal, in 1594. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1624, and
he traveled to Goa and Macau and collaborated with Gaspar do Amaral for the
Portuguese version of the Annamese dictionary (Zwartjes 2011, p. 291). In 1635,
he taught at the College of Macau, and, between 1636 and 1642, he remained in
Tonkin. In 1644 there was news from his stay in Macau (Mourão 2012, p. 59, foot-
note 16); he felt ill and, therefore, “was sent for a cure to Goa, where he died in
1647 (Jacques 2002, p. 30, footnote 36).
Alexandre de Rhodes was born in 1593 in Avignon, in the south of France,
in a family of Jewish origin. His ancestors came from Calatayud, in Aragon near
Zaragoza, in Spain, “had escaped the Iberian persecutions and, changing their
name from Rueda4, had settled in Avignon” (Maryks 2010, p. 151). Rhodes hid
his Jewish and Spanish origins when he entered the seminary of Saint Andrew’s
3 Isabel Mourão presented her Ph.D in 2011 at the École Pratique des Hautes Études, Section
des Sciences Historiques et Philologiques, in Paris, under the supervision of Dejanirah Silva
Couto, about Amaral’s works, entitled Gaspar do Amaral S.J. (1594-1646): La vie et l’œuvre
d’un jésuite portugais fondateur de la mission jésuite du Tun Kim à la cour des Trinh.
Unfortunately, this work is still unavailable, even in the Library of the French University.
The author told us in a personal email that she intends to publish the book soon.
4 “Rueda, written as Rode in Provençal (…), means a small wheel, which the Jews were
required to wear on their clothes during the Middle Ages.” (Phan 1998, p. 39)
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 161
at the Quirinal in Rome, in 1612, to achieve the novitiate of the Society of Jesus.
However, he considered himself French, as he said explicitly in the book Divers
Voyages: “ma chere patrie” (de Rhodes 1653, f. ẽ ii v., “Epistre à la Reyne”). He
“requested to be admitted into the Roman province rather than that of Lyon because
its members were better placed to obtain the permission of the king of Portugal to
go to the mission in India” (Phan 1998, p. 39). Rhodes received the Ordination in
1618 and, in the same year, left as a missionary for the Far East. He came to Lisbon
by land, where he took the “Santa Teresa”, the ship of the Portuguese Patronage,
and reached Goa the next year. According to Fidel González Fernández (2011), his
missionary activity can be divided into three different periods: 1) between 1619
and 1645 in the Far East at the service of the Portuguese Patronage; 2) between
1645 and 1655 in Europe, mainly in France and Italy, and 3) between 1655 and
1660 in Persia mutatis mutandis current Iran, where he died in 1660, aged 67 years.
Alexandre de Rhodes wanted to follow the route of Saint Francisco Xavier, S.J.
(1506–1552), but, due to the persecutions in Japan after 1614, Rhodes was forced
to stay in Goa for two and a half years and dedicated his time to learning local
languages; he arrived in Malacca in 1622 and in Macau in 1623; there he was
appointed at the College of Madre de Deus, where he started studying Chinese and
Japanese. His rst mission in Cochinchina, in Chiêm Thành (Chăm Pa), began a
year later in 1624. There he met Francisco de Pina, with whom he started learning
the Vietnamese language. However, a year later, Pina drowned in a shipwreck
at Đà Nẵng (González Fernández 2011, p. 283). Rhodes still remained some
years in Tonkin and in the Nghệ An Province on the north central coast, where
he met Gaspar do Amaral. In 1630, during the rst reign (1619–1642) of Lê Thần
Tông (1607–1662), the ruler Trịnh Tráng (1577–1654) considered the Catholic
religion dangerous and started persecuting the Christians (Brockey 2009: 338–
339). Rhodes was expelled from Tonkin, and he had to retreat to Macau until 1640,
where he could still have known father João Rodrigues “Tçuzu”, S.J. (1562–1633)
and reinforced the relations with Gaspar do Amaral, S.J. (1594–1646). Rhodes
returned to Cochinchina, but, during the Trịnh–Nguyễn War (1627–1673)5, he was
condemned to death (by beheading) in Phú Xuân (Huế) in central Vietnam by
the ruler Nguyễn Phúc Tần (1620–1687). He was accused of being a spy for the
king of Tonkin, Lê Thần Tông (1607–1662). However, the death sentence would
be commuted to perpetual exile. Thus, he boarded a Portuguese ship in Hội An,
on the south central coast, on July 3, 1645, never to return to Vietnam (González
Fernández 2011, p. 288).
5 Concerning the history of Vietnam, of Catholicism in Vietnam, of the Trịnh (1545-1787) and
Nguyễn Lords (1558-1777) and their complicated relationships with one another and with
Portuguese missionaries, see, e.g., Manguin 1972, 1984; Taylor & Whitmore 1995; Phan
Khoang 2001; Guillemin 2014; and Fernandes & Assunção 2014.
162 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
It is also important to mention the rst prominent linguist of Japanese, the
Portuguese priest João Rodrigues “Tçuzu”, S.J. (1562–1633)6, notwithstanding he
had never been in Vietnam. His stay in Macau between 1614 and 1633 would
change Vietnamese linguistics, due mainly to the further action of his younger
colleague and disciple Francisco de Pina. To sum up, João Rodrigues wrote a com-
pletely original work, added many linguistic innovations and created a pioneer-
ing metalanguage derived from his knowledge of Japanese society and classical
Japanese literature. He was the rst to describe Japanese in Latin characters, and
his descriptions of Japanese address forms, the use of honorics, hierarchical rela-
tions in Japanese society and social differences between men and women are par-
ticularly relevant (Zwartjes 2011, p. 94–142; see also Rodrigues 1604 [-1608],
1993 [1620]). Father João Rodrigues7 deserves, effectively, as Zwartjes (2011,
p. 141) says, to “be classied among the ve best Jesuit grammarians from the
colonial period”, mainly for his Arte da lingoa de Iapam (Nagasaki 1604–1608).
Roland Jacques (2012: 44) calls him “un génie de la linguistique” and Charles
Ralph Boxer (1904–2000), “the Father of Japanese Language Studies” (Boxer
1950, p. 363). About his main grammar (1604-08), Richard L. Spear says that it
“is by any standards the greatest grammatical study of Japanese made during the
Christian Century” (Spear 1975, p. 2).
tHe FIrst VIetnamese metalInGuIstIC texts PublIsHed8
The rst published metalinguistic works of Vietnamese are the Dictionarium
Annamiticum Lusitanum et Latinum and the Linguae Annamiticae seu Tunchinensis
Brevis Declaratio by Alexandre de Rhodes. They were printed by Propaganda Fide
(Rome 1651) six years after he had left Vietnam. Therefore, he could not have
6 João Rodrigues was born in Sernancelhe in the district of Viseu in the north of Portugal;
he entered the Society of Jesus at the age of fteen and dedicated almost all his life to
evangelization in Japan and China until his death, which occurred in Macau (China). He
was a condant and an interpreter of the Japanese daimyos Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1593–
1598) and Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542–1616), who gave him the nickname “Tçuzu”, meaning
“translator” or “interpreter”. However, when the Japanese started persecuting and expelling
the Christians from Japan in 1614, João Rodrigues, after more than 30 years dedicated to
the Japanese language and culture, started living in several Chinese cities, but Macau was,
effectively, the center of his missionary activity during the last 19 years of his life (Zwartjes
2011, p. 95).
7 Regarding to João Rodrigues’ works, see also, e.g., Boxer 1950 and Maruyama 2004 and
2006.
8 We have adopted the following transcription criteria:a) We have maintained the original
distinction between uppercase and lowercase graphemes.
b) We have separated the words that were improperly joined, and we have combined those
that are separated.
c) We have kept the original punctuation in order not to change the thought or expression of
the authors.
d) We have corrected the very clear errors from the original text, even when there are not in
the errata.
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 163
ended them there and he probably took with him the manuscripts by Gaspar do
Amaral and António Barbosa that he used to compile the dictionary, as we will see.
The Dictionarium has, in whole, 591 pages. The dictionary itself has 450 pages,
divided into 900 columns, which Rhodes called pages or sheets; it follows an
explanatory appendix, an erratum in Annamese, Portuguese and Latin and an
index of words with Latin entries ([440]–[490]). On the other hand, the Linguae
Annamiticae seu Tunchinensis Brevis Declaratio is (a sketch of) a grammatical
treatise of Annamese, collated, in some copies, at the beginning of the dictionary
and in other cases at the end. It has 31 (autonomous) pages, in which Rhodes ana-
lyzes Annamese or Tonkinese grammatical issues, such as the letters and syllables
(2–7), the accents and other diacritics (8–10), nouns (10–14), “honoric” pronouns
(14–20), other pronouns (21–23), verbs (23–26), other indeclinable parts of speech
(26–29) and some syntactical precepts (29–31).
The prologue of the dictionary, “Ad lectorem” [to the reader] (6–7), is very
enlightening concerning Rhodes’s main sources and his explanation of what the
Annamese or Tonkinese language is. These details were particularly important for
the future European missionaries who would be its potential readers. For example,
Rhodes explains that Annamese or Tonkinese was spoken not only in these two
kingdoms, Tonkin and Annam (Cochinchina), but was also used as a common lan-
guage or lingua franca in the neighboring kingdoms of Cao Bằng (nowadays the
northeast of Vietnam), Chăm Pa (in central and southern Vietnam), Cambodia,
Laos and Siam (Thailand) (de Rhodes 1651a, p. [VI]).
Rhodes also mentions that he spent twelve years listening to local people and,
furthermore, he started learning the language with the Portuguese Jesuit Francisco
de Pina, who, according to him, mastered Annamese and the rst among the Jesuits
to know it deeply and preach without any interpreter:
In hoc autem opere praeter ea quae ab ipsis indigenis didici per duodecim ferme
annos quibus in illis regionibus tam Cocincinae quam Tunkini sum commoratus,
e) We have eliminated the Latin pedagogic accents.
f) In Latin, we have substituted the ramist letters <v> and <j> for <u> and <i>, and the long
(medial or descending) <ſ> for the short (terminal or round) <s>. In Portuguese, we have
maintained the grapheme <u> with the value of the consonant <v>.
g) We have put in italics the examples in Portuguese, Vietnamese and Japanese.
h) We have expanded all Latin abbreviations and brevigraphs. We have interpreted the
abbreviation “i.” (in small and capital letters) as the Latin explicative expression “id est”,
even in Portuguese texts. It was a common expression amongst Jesuit Latin grammars,
which is often mistaken for the grapheme <L>. Some authors have wrongly interpreted
this abbreviation for the disjunctive conjunction “vel”. However, this conjunction always
appears without abbreviation.
i) In Portuguese quotations, we have also expanded the abbreviations, such as <ã> (<am>
or <an>), <ẽ> (<em> or <en>), <õ> (<on>), <ũ> (<um> or <un>), <q̃> (<que>) and the
ampersand <&> (<e>). However, we have maintained the indenite articles / pronouns
<hũa>, <algũa(s)> and <nenhũa>, in order to preserve a Portuguese phonetic specicity,
which still remains in some Northern Portuguese villages.
164 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
ab initio magistrum linguae audiens Patrem Franciscum de Pina lusitanum e
nostra minima Societate IESV, qui primus e Nostris linguam illam apprime
calluit, et primus sine interprete concionari eo idiomate caepit (de Rhodes 1651a,
[VI-VII]).
[However, in this work, besides what I have learned from the natives themselves
during the almost twelve years I have lived in those regions in Annam and
also in Tonkin, I have included what I have heard from the beginning of father
Francisco de Pina, a Portuguese from our smallest Society of Jesus, who was
the rst among us to have extensive knowledge of that language and who rst
started preaching in that tongue without an interpreter.]
This encomium is repeated in Divers Voyages, where Rhodes declares Pina’s
great expertise in Annamese:
Nous partimes de Macao au mois de Decembre de cette année 1624. et dix-neuf-
jours, nous arrivâmes tous en la Cochinchine, pleins du desir d’y bien travailler:
Nous y rencontrâmes le Pere Pina qui s’estoit rendu sçavant en la langue du païs
entierement differente de la Chinoise. (de Rhodes 1653, p. 71-72)
In addition, in the prologue of the Dictionary, Rhodes also adds that he used the
works of two other priests from the Society of Jesus, the Portuguese Jesuits Gaspar
do Amaral and António Barbosa. They had composed Annamese-Portuguese
(Gaspar do Amaral) and Portuguese-Annamese dictionaries (António Barbosa),
though the dictionaries were unnished due to their premature death. Rhodes
explains that he developed them and added the Latin version through his own
authorship (de Rhodes 1651a, p. [VII]). Michel Ferlus (1982, p. 85), among others,
had already determined that Rhodes’s dictionary was a compilation of pre-existing
works.
Adoption of the Latin alphabet and Portuguese orthography
In a copy of a letter to the Visitor of the Japanese and Chinese Provinces, possibly
written in 1623, Francisco de Pina says that he had already made a little treatise
using Annamese-Tonkinese orthography and tonality and that he was starting the
redaction of a grammar book. He also says that he was writing in Portuguese char-
acters in order that “we” (Portuguese and / or Jesuits) could read it and know it by
heart:
Eu já tenho feito hum Tratadozinho sobre a orthograa e toadas desta lingua,
vou entrando pela Arte (…) eu escrevilas [em] letra portuguesa, e para os nossos
poderem lelas, aprendendo de cor (Pina ca. 1745b [ca. 1623], f. 414v).
[I have already made a little treatise about the orthography and tonalities of this
language. I began with the grammar… I wrote them in Portuguese script so that
our brothers can read them, learning by heart.]
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 165
In this quotation, Pina used mutatis mutandis reasons analogous to those of
João Rodrigues “Tçuzu” in the Arte da Lingoa de Iapam:
No escreuer esta lingoa em nossa letra seguimos principalmente a ortographia
latina, e a Portuguesa, assi por ter a pronunciação de Iapão semelhança com a
Portuguesa em algũas syllabas como sam, cha, chi, cho, chu, nha, nho, nhu, et
cetera. Como tambem por que Iapão em os Padres e irmãos entre si usam da
lingoa e ortographia Portuguesa. (Rodrigues 1604[-1608], f. 55v)
[Writing this language [Japanese] in our script, we mainly followed Latin
orthography and Portuguese because of the Japanese language’s pronunciation
similarity with Portuguese in some syllables, including cha, chi, cho, chu,
nha, nho, nhu, etc., and also because, in Japan, the priests and brothers use the
Portuguese language and orthography between themselves.]
João Rodrigues, in the Arte Breve, wrote, a few years before Pina’s letter, that
he had mainly followed Latin orthography because all Jesuits knew it. He also said
that he needed to use Portuguese because it had many phonetic similarities with
Japanese and less with Italian and Spanish:
E por que a latina he commum a todas as naçoens, essa seguimos em geral,
e o que falta à latina tomamos, ou do Portugues, que tem muitas syllabas
semelhantes às Iapoas, que algũas terras de Europa nam tem, ou do Italiano, ou
nalmente do Castelhano (Rodrigues 1993 [1620], f. 6r, p. 367).
[And, because Latin is common to all nations, we follow that [language] in
general, and what is missing in Latin, we take from Portuguese, which has many
similar syllables to Japanese. This is not so for the other languages in the lands
of Europe, for example Italian or Spanish.]
It is possible that Pina, in the letter, was referring to the Manuductio ad Linguam
Tunckinensem [Handbook of Tonkinese language], of which a copy from the 18th
century exists in the Biblioteca da Ajuda (Lisbon, Portugal) and a facsimile was
published by Jacques (2002, p. 146-167). Roland Jacques attributes its author-
ship to the Swiss citizen Honufer Bürgin, in Portuguese Onofre Borges (1614–
1664). However, Jacques’s arguments are not totally conclusive. The inuence of
Portuguese phonetics is evident in the whole manuscript, Rhodes couldn’t have
access to a document written approximately 15 years after he had left Vietnam and
Pina’s letter says explicitly that he had made a treatise about Vietnamese tonalities.
In addition, Jacques believes that Pina’s “tratadozinho” [little treatise] inuenced
Bürgin’s Manuductio (see Jacques 2002, p. 31-39). Thus, until the discovery of
new data, we still believe that Rhodes’s main source was indeed Francisco de Pina
and the Manuductio ad Linguam Tunckinensem was written by him.
The Manuductio is, in fact, a grammatical sketch or a little treatise of the
Annamese or Tonkinese language. It has 22 pages, three main chapters (about the
tones (accents), the letters of the alphabet and the nouns) and some complement-
ary notes (dialogues, common phrases, some familiar offensive expressions and
166 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
sentences with a possible obscene meaning). It is a copy written approximately
in 1745 by Brother João Álvares, S.J. (?–post 1762) in Macau at the Madre de
Deus College, which was sent approximately in 1747 to the Japanese Province
Procurature in Lisbon with other copies of important Jesuit documents (Rodrigues
1931–1950, t. 4, p. 162).
In recent years, mainly after Roland Jacques’s research (2002, 2004, 2012), it
seems to be consensual amongst international scholars that Francisco de Pina was
the real creator of the Romanization (Latin-based orthography) of the Vietnamese
language, which is currently called Quốc ngữ, meaning “national language” (see
also Guillemin 2014). Its ofcial introduction in Vietnamese administrative appli-
cations occurred only in 1898 by a Decree of the Governor-General of French
Indochina (and future president of France) Paul Doumer (1857–1932). However,
its application only became denitive in 1909 and, nally, a 1917 imperial edict
abolished the traditional method of teaching in favor of an education based on
quốc ngữ and French (see Jacques 2004, p. 24, footnote 3). After the independence
(September 2, 1945) and the unication (April 30, 1975), quốc ngữ remained the
ofcial script in Vietnam (see Thompson 1987).
In conclusion, despite all the convenience provided to future European mission-
aries, Francisco de Pina was clearly inuenced by Father João Rodrigues “Tçuzu”,
as in the case of Japanese. Gaspar do Amaral, António Barbosa and Alexandre
de Rhodes had developed and improved the method. Recently, for example, Otto
Zwartjes (2011: 291) and Fidel González Fernández (2011, p. 299) recognized that
Rhodes’s writings were based on former Portuguese missionaries’ works.
On the other hand, Thompson noted that there were many Portuguese inu-
ences in Rhodes’s dictionary, but he did not understand why it happened:
What is perhaps most puzzling is that Alexandre de Rhodes, who was responsible
for the basic codication, was a native of Avignon in southern France, yet the
writing system probably shows more oddities relating to Portuguese than to
any other one language. In this connection, it is signicant that de Rhodes’
dictionary included specically Portuguese-besides the expected Latin-rather
than French. (Thompson 1987, p. 55)
His explanation was based only on Portuguese trading and shipping interests in
that region and not in the action of earlier missionaries:
Throughout this early period it was the Portuguese trading and shipping interests
that represented the most considerable European commitments in the area,
and as a result Portuguese was likely enough the most widely used European
language of the time. (Thompson 1987, p. 55)
We cannot assess, unfortunately, the degree of inuence that Gaspar do Amaral
and António Barbosa had on Rhodes because their works have never been printed,
and their manuscripts are still lost. In addition to Rhodes’s telling that he used the
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 167
dictionaries of Amaral and Barbosa, there are some Jesuit annual letters (annuae
litterae) which conrm that they were indeed working on these dictionaries (see,
v.g., Rodrigues 1917, p. 360; 1931–1950, t. 3, vol. 2, p. 157; Boxer 2002, vol.
1, p. 189). Given that Gaspar do Amaral died the year following Rhodes’ expul-
sion from Vietnam, it is possible that he had already copied the Portuguese and
Vietnamese versions, nishing his Latin translation in Europe. However, there are
undoubtedly characteristics of Portuguese authorships.
In addition to the fact that the word “Portuguese” is repeated more than
70 times— “portugueses”, 6 times; “lusitani” “dicunt” or ”vocant”, 29 times; “a”
or “pro” “lusitanis”, 24 times; “lusitana” “lingua”, 5 times; “apud” “lusitanos”,
3 times, etc. — there is a specically Portuguese orthography: the dorso-pala-
tal nasal phoneme represented by the symbol /ɲ/ from the International Phonetic
Alphabet, is written by the Portuguese digraph <nh> and not by the Italian or
French archigrapheme <gn>9. Rhodes says it explicitly but he does not declare
that is a specic Portuguese orthography: “(…). adhibemus etiam simul cum, n,
vt nhà, domus, & facit idem quod apud Italos, gna” (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 4) [we
also add [h] with n, like “nhà”, house, and does the same like the Italian “gna”].
This “Portuguese” orthographic mark is still in use in current Vietnamese, such
as, for instance, “nhà” [house], “quạnh” [be solitary, deserted], “lành-lạnh” [be a
bit cold], “mình” [oneself], “nhẹ” [be light, in weight], “nhè-nhẹ” [be rather light
in weight], “nhỏ” [be small], “nhưng” [but, however] (see, e.g., Michaud, Ferlus,
Nguyễn 2015; Haudricourt 2010; Thompson 1987).
Rhodes learnt several languages, and he certainly spoke Portuguese very well,
the common language amongst the missionaries from the Portuguese patronage,
together with Latin. However, he wrote only in Latin and French (see Rhodes
1653). Thus, Gaspar do Amaral and António Barbosa were exclusively responsible
for the adoption of the digraph <nh> (and not by the Italian or French archigraph-
eme <gn>) for the Vietnamese phoneme /ɲ/.
Description of tonality
Pina’s inuence on Rhodes was not only in the use of the Romanization system
but also in the description of Tonkinese tonality. It should be mentioned, however,
that Pina and Rhodes didn’t distinguish between the Tonkinese language/dialect in
northern Cochinchina and Annamese in southern Cochinchina10. For both authors,
the language was mutatis mutandis the same, although Rhodes’s Dictionarium can
9 For the historical orthography of the archigrapheme <gn> in French, see, v.g., Catach 1995,
p. 1138-1140.
10 For the analysis of historical Vietnamese dialectology and the tone differences in the two
largest Vietnamese cities, Hanoi and Hồ Chí Minh City (Saigon), see, v.g., Maspero 1912
and Michaud, Ferlus & Nguyễn 2015.
168 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
be considered a mixture of various Vietnamese dialects (see, e.g., Maspero 1912).
Michel Ferlus states that Rhodes based his dictionary on the variety spoken in
Central Vietnam: “Le Dictionarium Annamiticum Lusitanum et Latinum du Père
Alexandre de Rhodes (1651), rédigé dans la romanisation qui deviendra le quốc
ngữ (…) semble élaboré à partir d’un parler du centre” (Ferlus 1982, p. 85).
However, Maspero tells that Rhodes’s Dictionarium and Brevis Declaratio “se
rapportent au dialecte tonkinois” (Maspero 1912, p. 9, note 1). In effect, on the
one hand, Francisco de Pina and Alexandre de Rhodes explain that this language
and its tones can be described with the same characters as the European languages,
i.e., in Latin letters. Pinas’s Manuductio says that he should start by explaining the
Latin alphabet, following the tradition, but, for him, the learning of tonality (or the
“accents”, in his terminology) is much more important:
Mos est alias in tradendis, discendisque linguis ab alphabeto seu litteris initium
ducendi, quem utique morem tenuissem, nisi accentuum notitia ad meliorem
litterarum intelligentia hac in lingua praeprimis esset necessaria. (Pina ca.
1745a [ante 1623], f. 313r)
[The custom elsewhere in language teaching and learning is starting with
the alphabet or letters. I would have undoubtedly followed this custom if the
knowledge of accents were not the prime necessity to a better understanding of
the letters in this language.]
Duo tamen praecipue sunt in hoc idiomate notanda, e quibus tanquam
fundamentis tota ratio bene addiscendae huius linguae pendet, ita ut sine illis a
nostratibus haec lingua vix teneri possit; si uti enim homo constat ex corpore et
anima, sic etiam hoc idioma constat ex characteribus quibus a nobis conscribitur,
et ex tonis seu accentibus quibus notatur et pronunciatur: quibus duobus prius
explicatis et positis tanquam fundamentis, de partibus Orationis, et praeceptis in
ipsa oratione seruandis agendum postea. (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 1).
[Instead, principally, two [fundamental aspects] should be noted in this language,
according to the bases of learning this language are based on, as, without them,
this language can hardly be comprehended by us; actually, as man is made
of body and soul, this language also is constituted by the characters that are
described by us and by the tones and accents by which it is pronounced. These
two previously explained fundamentals, the parts of speech, and the precepts
regarding each phrase will be observed later.]
On the other hand, both describe the six Tonkinese11 tones (“de accentibus”)
similarly. Nguyễn and Edmondson, who didn’t know Pina’s work, write that
[…] the rst documented phonetician of Vietnamese, Alexandre de Rhodes
(1651) […] described them in the following impressionistic terms: “acute-
angry” (sắc), “smooth-rising” (hỏi), “level” (ngang), “chesty-raised” (ngã),
11 Nowadays scholars consider that Tonkinese maintains the six tones (see, v.g., Nguyễn &
Edmondson 1998, p. 7-8) and the Annamese has the realization of only ve tones. The hỏi
and ngã tones have been merged in some provinces of Central Vietnam (see, v.g., Nguyẽ̂n
1997, p. 26).
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 169
“chesty-heavy” (nặng), “grave-lowering” (huyền) […]. Three and one half
centuries later these characterizations still remain remarkably apt and insightful.
(Nguyễn & Edmondson 1998, p. 2)
Sometimes Rhodes uses the same words as Pina, and occasionally they add dif-
ferent details. In the introduction, Rhodes compares the tones with Greek accents
(acute, grave and circumex) and also the iota subscript diacritic from ancient
Greek. Pina is more succinct, giving these details in the description of each spe-
cic tone:
Accentus hac in lingua seu tonorum mutationes sunt sex, ex quibus solis
multoties signicationum diuersitas sumi debet; unde patet huiusmodi tonos ex
arte callendi necessitas [esse]. (Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313r)
[In this language there are six accents or tone changes, on which often depend
the diversity of signications. It is, therefore, clear that it is necessary to learn
the correct pronunciation of these tones.]
Diximus accentus esse quasi animam uocabulorum in hoc idiomate, atque ideo
summa diligentia sunt addiscendi. Vtimur ergo triplici accentu linguae Graecae,
acuto, graui, et circunexo, qui quia non sufciunt, addimus iota subscriptum,
et signum interrogationis nostrae; nam toni omnes huius linguae ad sex classes
reducuntur, ita ut omnes prorsus dictiones huius idiomatis ad aliquam ex his sex
classibus seu tonis pertineant, nulla uoce prorsus excepta (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 8);
[We have said that the accents are almost the soul of the words in this language,
and, therefore, the greatest care must be taken with them. Therefore, we use
three accents of the Greek language, acute, grave and circumex, to which,
because they are not sufcient, we add an iota subscript and a question mark;
however, all tones of this language are reduced to six classes, so all the words
of this language pertain to some of these six classes or tones, and no word is, in
fact, an exception.]
Furthermore, both explain each tone separately. Francisco de Pina adds each tone’s
music score, in the key of G, with half (minim) and quarter (crotchet) notes. Pina’s
explanations are clearer than Rhodes’s. Actually, the rst tone is the neutral tone,
without any voice inexion, and both authors begin with the same sentence:
Primus tonus esta aequalis, et sine ulla vocis inexione pronuntiatur, habeturque
tum, quando vox aliqua nullo ex quinque signis ̀, ́, ̃, ʅ, ’, ͅ : hoc ultimum
vocalibus tantum subscribitur ut apud Graecos jota subscritum, ͅ notatur. Sunt
quidem et alia signa, sed quia non ad vocis inexionem, verum ad literarum
certam pronunciationem dignoscendam adiiciuntur […].
(Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313r).
170 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
[The rst tone is equal and is pronounced without any inexion of voice as it is
implied when none of the ve signs are used ̀, ́, ̃, ʅ, ’, ͅ . The latter is written
under words using the Greek iota subscript. There are also other diacritic signs,
which do not affect the inexion of the voice but they are used to distinguish the
different pronunciation of the letters to which they are added…]
Primus igitur tonus est aequalis, qui sine ulla vocis inexione pronunciatur, ut
ba, tres: quod ita verum est, ut etiam si quis aliquem interroget per vocem,
chang, quae est aequalis, ut có chang, est ne; nullo modo debeat inectere
vocem interrogando, quia vox interrogativa, chang, nullo notatur accentu, quod
si inecteretur vocis tonus, tunc esset alia signicatio: voces itaque quae hunc
aequalem habent tonum, nullo notantur accentu; et hoc est sufciens illarum
distinctivum signum, cum omnes aliae suum accentum habeant. (de Rhodes
1651b, p. 8)
[Therefore, the rst tone is equal. It is pronounced without any inexion of
voice. Examples include ba, “three”; this is so true that if anyone asks someone
else something using the word chăng, which is equal, like có chăng, “it is
not”, which in no way should inect the voice in the interrogation because the
interrogative word chăng takes no tone. If the tone of the voice is inected,
it will have another meaning; thus, the words that have this same tone are
distinguished by having no accent, and this is a sufcient distinctive sign to
distinguish them from all the others that have their accents.]
In the description of the other tones, Rhodes’s text is almost the same as Pina’s,
and both always use as an example the word (monosyllable) “ba”, which has dif-
ferent meanings according to each specic tone. On the other hand, they nd a
similarity in Portuguese (Greek, in Rhodes’s perspective) accents (acute, grave
and circumex) in order to explain the second, third and fourth tones:
Secundus est acutus: hic profertur voce acuta et quasi iram demonstrante, ut in
eadem voce Bá: concubina Regis vel Principis viri.
(Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313v).
[The second is acute, which is pronounced with an acute voice and by
demonstrating a sound almost like anger, as in the word Bá: “the King’s
concubine”, or “the Prince’s sons”.]
Secundus tonus est acutus, qui profertur acuendo vocem, et proferendo
dictionem, ac si quis iram demonstraret, ut bá concubina Regis, vel principis
alicuius viri. (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 8);
[The second tone is acute, which is pronounced by highlighting the voice and
pronouncing the word as if someone expressed anger, as in bá, “the King’s
concubine”, or “a Prince’s sons”.]
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 171
Tertius est gravis, et profertur deprimendo vocem; ut iterum in voce Bà: avia
aut Domina usuvenit.
(Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313v).
[The third is grave, and it is pronounced by lowering the voice, as is commonly
used again in the voice for bà, “grandmother” or “lady”.]
Tertius est gravis, et profertur deprimendo vocem, ut bà, avia, vel Domina. (de
Rhodes 1651b, p. 8);
[The third is grave, and it is pronounced by lowering the voice, as in bà,
“grandmother” or “lady”.]
Quartus est circumexus, qui exprimitur inectendo vocem ex imo pectore
prolatam et postea sonore elevatam: ut t in voce βã12: colaphus.
(Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313v).
[The fourth is circumex, which is expressed by inecting the voice pronounced
from the depths of the chest and then elevating the sound loudly, as is done in
the voice vã, “slap”.]
Quartus est circumexus, qui exprimitur inectendo vocem ex imo pectore
prolatam, et postea sonore elevatam, ut βã, colaphus, vel colaphizare. (de
Rhodes 1651b: 8);
[The fourth is circumex, which is expressed by inecting the voice pronounced
from the depths of the chest and then elevating the sound loudly, as in vã, “the
slap” or “to slap”.]
The fth is a lower and descendent tone and is marked by the Greek iota subscript:
Quintus vocatur ponderosus seu onerosus, quia cum quodam pondere, seu onere
ex imo pectore prolata voce exprimitur: ut in voce Bą: res derelicta.
12 Interestingly, they used the Greek letter <β> to represent the voiced labiodental fricative
consonant [v].
172 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
(Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313v).
[The fth is called ponderous or onerous because it is pronounced by emitting
the voice from the depths of the chest and giving a certain force, as in the word
Bą, “derelict thing” (without owner).]
Quintus vocatur ponderosus seu onerosus quia cum quodam pondere seu onere
ex imo pectore prolata voce exprimitur, et notatur cum iota subscripto ut bạ res
derelicta. (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 8)
[The fth is called ponderous or onerous because it is pronounced by emitting
the voice from the depths of the chest and giving a certain force, and it is noted
with an iota subscript, as in bạ, “derelict thing”.]
The last one is a soft tone, but with an interrogative accent, as if someone was
asking something:
Sextus denique dicitur lenis, quia leniter profertur, et per modum interrogantis
v.g. itáne? Ut in voce Bả: sericum quoddam coloris lutei seu crocei.
(Pina ca. 1745a [ante 1623], f. 313v-314r).
[Finally, the sixth is called lenient because it is pronounced softly and per
interrogative mode, e.g., itáne?, as in the word bả, “a yellow or saffron
Tonkinese silk”.]
Sextus denique dicitur lenis, quia cum leni quadam vocis inexione profertur,
sicuti cum interrogare solemus, itane? et similia; et idcirco signo illo
interrogativo pro accentu notatur ut, bả, quoddam sericum apud Tunchinenses
coloris lutei vel crocei. (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 9);
[Finally, the sixth is called lenient because it is pronounced with a gentle
inection of the voice, as when we usually ask, itáne?, and similar questions;
therefore, it is noted by an interrogative accent sign, as in bả, “a yellow or
saffron Tonkinese silk”.]
As we have seen, Francisco de Pina represents each tone on a music score, and this
is not done by Rhodes. However, he compares Annamese tones to the six musical
notes of the diatonic scale C–D–E–F–G–A (“dò”, “rẹ”, “mĩ”, “pha”, “sổ”, “lá”),
although he is not so clear as Pina:
FIrst CodIFICatIon oF VIetnamese by 17tH-Century mIssIonarIes 173
Hos autem sex accentus ad nostrae musicae tonos sic accommodare possumus ut
aliquam cum illa, uideantur habere proportionem per has uoces ut, dò, pedica: re,
radix, in pronunciatione cuiusdam Prouinciae; mĩ, nomen cuiusdam familiae;
fa, uel pha, miscere; sổ, cathalogus; lá, folium; ita ut ex his uocibus etiam in
lingua Tunchinica signicatiuis, per sex tonos linguae Tunchinensis, dò, rẹ, mĩ,
pha, sổ, lá, possimus referre aliquo modo sex tonos nostrae musicae, non tamen
ita exacte, quin magna intersit differentia; quare nullus istos tonos addiscere
poterit, nisi ab aliquo qui linguam bene calleat, illos per se ipsum audierit
saepius, ut illis assuescat: Quinque igitur sunt accentuum notae quia tonus
equalis non indiget nota […]. (de Rhodes 1651b, p. 19)
[Nevertheless, we can, therefore, align these six accents with our musical
tones, as they seem to have some kind of proportion in terms of these sounds.
Examples are dò, “trap”; rễ, “root” in the pronunciation of a certain province;
mĩ, the name of a specic family; fa or pha, “to mix”; sổ, “catalogue”; lá, “leaf”;
thus, as these sounds are also meaningful in the Tonkinese language, using the
six tones of the Tonkinese language, dò, rễ, mĩ, pha, sổ, lá, we can refer, in some
way, to the six tones of our music, although not exactly, which makes a big
difference; because nobody will be able to learn these tones, except someone
who is well versed in the language and heard them more often and has become
familiarized with them; therefore, there are ve music notes because an equal
tone doesn’t need a note…]
ConClusIon
The rst descriptions of Vietnam from a western perspective date back to the six-
teenth century and belong to chronicler and grammarian João de Barros (1496–
1570) in 1563 and the Dominican Gaspar da Cruz (ca. 1520–1570) in 1570.
However, the rst linguistic descriptions were due to the group that Roland Jacques
called the Jesuit Pioneers, especially the Portuguese Jesuits Francisco de Pina, S.J.
(1585 / 1586–1625), Gaspar do Amaral, S.J. (1594–1646) and António Barbosa,
S.J. (1594–1647) and the French Jesuit Alexandre de Rhodes, S.J. (1593–1660).
It is nowadays established that it was Francisco de Pina who rst described the
Annamese or Tonkinese language in Latin characters or using the Romanization
system (called today Quốc ngữ, national language, by Vietnamese people) inu-
enced by the Portuguese João Rodrigues “Tçuzu”, S.J. (1562–1633). Gaspar do
Amaral, António Barbosa and Alexandre de Rhodes developed and improved this
method. Rhodes also used two manuscript dictionaries written by Amaral and
Barbosa and left an identity mark of Portuguese orthography (currently also of
Vietnamese): the digraph <nh> representing the dorso-palatal nasal phoneme /ɲ/.
On the other hand, Francisco de Pina was also an important source for Rhodes’
description of Tonkinese tones. On this particular point, the similarities between
the texts of Rhodes’s Linguae Annamiticae seu Tunchinensis Brevis Declaratio
(Rome 1651) and Pina’s Manuductio ad linguam Tunchinensem (ante 1623) are
quite impressive. They complement each other, but Pina’s text is clearer, because
174 Gonçalo Fernandes & Carlos assunção
he explains each tone with the help of a music score, in the key of G, with half
(minim) and quarter (crotchet) notes. Both explain the six Tonkinese tones using
the same scripts as European languages and they describe them with very similar
words.
To sum up, for Pina and Rhodes, the six Tonkinese tones can be described as
follows: the rst one is a neutral tone, without any voice inexion (the ngang tone);
the second one is an acute-angry tone, pronounced with an acute voice, revealing
a sound almost like anger (the sắc tone); the third one is a grave tone, pronounced
by lowering the voice (the huyền tone); the fourth one is a chesty-raised tone,
inecting the voice pronounced from the depths of the chest and then elevating
the sound loudly (the ngã tone); the fth one is a chesty-heavy tone, pronounced
by emitting the voice from the depths of the chest and giving a certain force (the
nặng tone); and, at last, the sixth one is a question tone, pronounced with a gentle
inection of the voice, like in an interrogative sentence, as if someone was asking
something (the hỏi tone).
Finally, the quotation of Nguyễn and Edmondson (1998, p. 2) must be revised,
adding Pina’s name to Rhodes’s: these characterizations by the rst phoneticians
of Vietnamese, Francisco de Pina and Alexandre de Rhodes, “three and one half
centuries later […] still remain remarkably apt and insightful”.
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