(hist) Chu Viet Nam (Vietnam-Portugal)

[hoang tran le <h9852272@idefix.wu-wien.ac.at>]

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forward lai co bac nao nha ta quan tam doc cung hay hay. 

Cheers, Vu Xuan Quang
---------------------------------

Subject:      Relations between Vietnam and Portugal in the 17th century


Arts and Literary E-Magazine (Va(n Ho.c Nghe^. Thua^.t) 463, 13/8/99

Pham Van Huong

University of Bordeaux 1; 351 Cours Liberation, 33405 Talence, France
Fax: 33 556 848402. E-mail: huong@morgane.lsmc.u-bordeaux.fr

Since the beginning of the 16th century, the relations between most
European countries and the Far East intensify everywhere according to
an unchangeable chronological diagram: the arrival of Christian
missionaries, then of cannons and some merchants.

The relations between Vietnam and Portugal are of a very different
character. In the dawn of the 17th century, the contact between
Portugal, that was called "Lusitania", and Vietnam only lasted about
thirty years, but this brief meeting let some very deep prints.

THE VIETNAMESE WRITING

Well that since nearly two thousand years, Vietnam received a strong
influence of the Han culture coming from the North, especially during
the period spreading from the third century BC to the 9th century of
this era, Vietnamese people always had their own writing: the chu-nom,
an ensemble of idiogrammes reassembling the Chinese characters and
signs permitting to describe Vietnamese sounds and words, words that
don't have root in the Chinese terminology. These merely Vietnamese
words represent nearly fifty percent of the vocabulary, the other half
being the sino-vietnamese terms of Chinese origin. Let's take the
"Sai-gon" word for example. This term comes from the sino-vietnamese
word "Tây-co^'ng" that wants to say western tributary offering, the
land reserved by Vietnam to the emperor of China to shelter the
undesirable individuals of the Chinese court. This term pronounces
itself "Sai-kun" in Cantonese and by Bay-kaun in Cham language. Whereas
the Chinese district of Saigon is called "Cho-lon", a merely Vietnamese
name that wants to say big-market.

In the years 1614-1624, Vietnam received the visit of Francisco de
PINA, a Portuguese missionary of the Jesus' Company. This father learns
languages of the Far East very quickly, in particular the Vietnamese,
the Chinese and the Japanese. He teaches in turn, in Macao and in
Vietnam, the Vietnamese to the other missionaries anxious to establish
their ministry in the last country. F. de PINA will pass the end of his
life in Vietnam and dies in a typhon at the large of Danang.

Among his disciples in Vietnamese language, are Gaspar do Amaral, born
in 1591in Vizieu, Portugal, and Antonii BARBOSA born in 1595, all these
two Jesuit missionaries having finished their theological studies in
Coïmbra and in Evora, Portugal. Joins himself to them, another Jesuit
missionary born in Avignon, France, named Alexander RHODES as it can be
seen on his manuscripted letters, before his engagement to the Far
East. This one named himself with particle of nobility Alexander de
RHODES on his return, before passing the last left of his life in
Lebanon and there to die.

During their stay in Vietnam, do Amaral and Barbosa, with the aid of
local Vietnamese followers, undertook an immense work while using the
Latin alphabet, transcribing phonetically the Vietnamese terms and
share the task to write the first dictionaries. G. do Amaral is in
charge of the Vietnamese-Portuguese-Latin dictionary and A. Barbosa the
Portuguese-Vietnamese-Latin dictionary.

The modern Vietnamese writing was then born and carried the name of chu
quoc ngu, literally "writing of the national language". After more than
fifteen living years and intensive work, these two missionaries leave
Vietnam and go to Macao. From this city, they continue to furrow seas
for works of the Jesuit mission. A typhon (derived from the chinese
taï-phong that wants to say big wind, writen in English) carries them
two away in depths of the China sea, at the large of Macao one day of
February 1646.

These missionaries let in Macao their manuscripts before their wreck.
The Dictionaries of Amaral and Barbosa are known and are used by all,
in particular by Alexander Rhodes. The last lived at the Mission in
Macao after the death of Amaral and Barbosa.

Some years later Alexander Rhodes goes to Rome and publishes in 1654 a
Vietnamese-Portuguese-Latin dictionary under the name of Alexander de
Rhodes. Let's recall that this last is of French origin from Avignon.
He also signs seven other books but none of these books does carry the
mark of the Portuguese language well that it was the language of
travelers of the time.

I put in doubt the knowledge of this individual with regard to the
Vietnamese latin writing, the chu quoc-ngu. Already on the cover of
this dictionary, in the title of the book, the Annam word - probably
one of the rare words of Vietnamese consonance that he wrote - appears
with a mistake, Annnam. And inside this dictionary, the Vietnamese
writing carries the merely Portuguese marks, which are not easily
adopted by someone of another country. The u vowel pronounces itself
"oo", the nh pronounces itself ng in French.... Terms designating days
of the week also have a Portuguese origin; Monday for example
translates itself in Vietnamese as thu hai, the second; Tuesday
translates itself as thu ba, the third. Only in Portuguese, Monday
designates itself by feria segundo and Tuesday by feria tertio and so
on... In all other languages, French, English,... Monday counts itself
as "first" day of the week, Tuesday the "second" day etc... This
reference to the Holy Writings is particular to Portugal, and by way of
consequence, to the Vietnamese writing.

Father Manual Teixera, a Portuguese Jesuit missionary of 84 years just
as I met him in Macao, made me part of his deep conviction that Rhodes
signed a dictionary that he never wrote.

It would be certainly the same conviction that motivated the Catholic
Portuguese Church to refuse to Rhodes a second mission in the Southeast
Asia when Rhodes solicited this organism, after the publication of the
famous dictionary. Let's recall that at that time, the Portuguese
Church was in charge of evangilization missions in the Far East.

If this usurpation is not quite clarified yet, the community of Jesus
clearly demonstrated another plagiarism of Rhodes. The latter signed
and made printed a report on the situation of Japan, report intended to
the princess of Denmark, that has actually been written by another
father Jesuit!

Anyhow, the Portuguese Francisco de Pina, Antonii Barbosa and Gaspar do
Amaral created the modern Vietnamese writing, chu quoc ngu. I would
like to give back them homage and to express my deep recognition.
Bronze and stone statuaries could be edified for their honour!

THE CITY OF HOI-AN.

Since the beginning of the 16th century, some rare meetings took place
between Vietnamese and the Portuguese shipwrecked victims or
adventurers at the service of the Portuguese empire, that took refuge
at the mouth of the Mekong river or on the Vietnamese coast, for the
time of a storm. Among these, Luis Camões, born in 1524, more known as
poet than civil servant of state, landed coasts of south Vietnam in
1557. But it is necessary to wait until the beginning of the 17th
century to meet navigators or merchants anxious to stabilize on earth.
It is in Hoi-an, that these Portuguese settled.

Hoi-an is an inshore township in the Middle Vietnam, at 30 kilometers
south of Danang. Its past importance comes from its high quality
agricultural products, the fishing and the wealths of the neighboring
region basement, as well of the rear earth, that of the continental
plateau of the Vietnam sea.

In addition, this geographical area was home of a resplendent
bouddhico-brahmanic culture since the beginning of our era, as
testified by the splendor of Myson city, at about thirty kilometers
west of Hoi-an, and the statuary of the Buddha handing a flower,
nowadays exhibited at the National museum of History in Hochiminh, and
that of Avalokitesvara bodhisattva lately excavated in front of the
portal of the pagoda of Dongduong, at some kilometers from Myson. These
statuaries, dated of the third century, are undoubtedly among the most
ancient bouddhic statuaries in bronze of all the Far East.

Hoi-an has been therefore chosen by Portugese merchants to establish
their first counters. They not only exercise trade with Vietnameses but
also with merchants coming from other countries, in particular the
Chinese and some Japanese and others in their harbour activities.

It is at Hoi-an that Portugueses found and so much beloved porcelains,
especially those decorated with cobalt. However, the secrets of the
glazing materials and special ovens for high temperatures in the
manufacture of porcelains were so well kept that it is necessary to
wait until the beginning of the 18th century so that some Catholic
missionaries succeed in spying on by certain supporter mediator local
infidels. Their reports toward Europe permitted to manufacture, little
time later, the first porcelains in Coïmbra, Limoges and Meissen.

It is also at Hoi-an where the Portuguese constructed houses in hard
during the period spreading 1600 to 1646. Most these houses of
Portuguese style of the 17th century stay almost intact until our days.

After 1646, for a reason that I don't have even searched for to solve,
all Portuguese, without exception, left Hoi-an and migrated toward
Macao, a nearly island conceded to the Portuguese authorities before
well little time by a weakened China.

Since that time, Hoi-an pursued its destiny without the Portugueses.
The economic activities continue to develop itself and the intensive
exchanges settle with the Japanese and especially with the Chinese
among others, during more than one century. These communities let
several hano-taoïst temples, next to Vietnamese bouddhic pagodas, and
the covered bridge, called Japanese bridge although it doesn't carry
the rosace of cherry flower with five petals common to the Japanese
decorations of the time, a bridge that connects the japanese quarter to
the street bringing to Vietnamese houses built of imputrescible jack
wood. Let's note that a similar covered bridge, but of more elegant
shape, be to Thanh-toan, located at about ten kilometers from Hue.

After two centuries of lethargy following a foreign domination, Hoi-an
wakes up, proud of its historic past, but also of its urbanism and the
black gold that oozes its continental plateau.

Nowadays, several Portugueses come to Hoi-an as tourists, ignoring that
their forefathers stayed here, and some of them, as Amaral and Barbosa,
let here works of inestimable values.

Pham V. Huong in CULTURA 1999, 11, 175.

huong@morgane.lsmc.u-bordeaux.fr