Le Minh Khai, a researcher of SE Asian history, found that there was a lot of misinformation on the interwebs relating to the origin of Vietnam’s name, especially in English sources. Khai jumped into a plethora of historical documents to set the record straight.
Khai explains that many of the English texts, such as Alexander Woodside’s Vietnam and the Chinese, rely heavily on the Đại Nam hội điển, which condenses information in the Đại Nam thực lục (Veritable Records of Đại Nam) and must be supplemented with other sources to reveal the full story.
While a bit detailed, Khai does an excellent job of breaking down the series of events which led to the adoption of Việt Nam as the country’s name.
Take a few minutes to read the full article here.
