The Vietic languages are a branch of the

Austroasiatic The Austroasiatic languages ( ) are a large language family spoken throughout Mainland Southeast Asia, South Asia and East Asia. These languages are natively spoken by the majority of the population in Vietnam and Cambodia, and by minority popu ...

language family A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family. The term ''family'' is a metaphor borrowed from biology, with the tree model used in historical linguistics ...

, spoken by the

Vietic peoples Vietic peoples refers to a group of ethnic groups of Southeast Asia. Geographic distribution The Vietic peoples are aboriginal to northern Vietnam, Laos and surrounding areas, mostly in northern Annamite mountains, although they can also be fo ...

in Laos and Vietnam. The branch was once referred to by the terms ''Việt–Mường'', ''Annamese–Muong'', and ''Vietnamuong''; the term ''Vietic'' was proposed by La Vaughn Hayes, who proposed to redefine ''Việt–Mường'' as referring to a sub-branch of Vietic containing only Vietnamese and Mường. Many of the Vietic languages have tonal or

phonation The term phonation has slightly different meanings depending on the subfield of phonetics. Among some phoneticians, ''phonation'' is the process by which the vocal folds produce certain sounds through quasi-periodic vibration. This is the defi ...

al systems intermediate between that of Viet–Muong and other branches of Austroasiatic that have not had significant Chinese or Tai influence.

Origins

The ancestor of the Vietic language is traditionally assumed to have been located in today's North Vietnam. However, the origin of the Vietic languages remains a controversial topic among linguists. Another theory, based on linguistic diversity, locates the most probable homeland of the Vietic languages in modern-day

Bolikhamsai Province Bolikhamsai (, ), formerly gallicized as Borikhamxay, is a province of Laos. Pakxan, Thaphabat, Pakkading, Borikhane, Viengthong, and Khamkeut are its districts and Pakxan is its capital city. The province is the site of the Nam Theun 2 Dam, ...

and Khammouane Province in

Laos Laos, officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic (LPDR), is the only landlocked country in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by Myanmar and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the southeast, and Thailand to the west and ...

as well as parts of Nghệ An Province and

Quảng Bình Province Quảng Bình was formerly a southern coastal Provinces of Vietnam, province in the North Central Coast region, the Central Vietnam, Central of Việt Nam, Vietnam. It borders Hà Tĩnh province, Hà Tĩnh to the north, Quảng Trị province, ...

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

. The time depth of the Vietic branch dates back at least 2,500 years to 2,000 years (Chamberlain 1998); 3,500 years (Peiros 2004); or around 3,000 years (Alves 2020).Chamberlain, J.R. 1998,
The origin of Sek: implications for Tai and Vietnamese history
, in The International Conference on Tai Studies, ed. S. Burusphat, Bangkok, Thailand, pp. 97-128. Institute of Language and Culture for Rural Development, Mahidol University. Even so, archaeogenetics demonstrated that before the Đông Sơn period, the

Red River Delta The Red River Delta or Hong River Delta () is the flat low-lying plain formed by the Red River and its distributaries merging with the Thái Bình River in Northern Vietnam. ''Hồng'' (紅) is a Sino-Vietnamese word for "red" or "crimson". T ...

's inhabitants were predominantly Austroasiatic: genetic data from Phùng Nguyên culture's Mán Bạc burial site (dated 1,800 BC) have close proximity to modern Austroasiatic speakers such as the Mlabri and Lua from Thailand, the Nicobarese from

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

(

Nicobar Islands The Nicobar Islands are an archipelago, archipelagic island chain in the eastern Indian Ocean. They are located in Southeast Asia, northwest of Aceh on Sumatra, and separated from Thailand to the east by the Andaman Sea. Located southeast of t ...

), and the Khmer from

Cambodia Cambodia, officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. It is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the north, and Vietnam to the east, and has a coastline ...

; meanwhile, "mixed genetics" from Đông Sơn culture's Núi Nấp site showed affinity to " Dai from China, Tai-Kadai speakers from Thailand, and Austroasiatic speakers from Vietnam, including the

Kinh The Vietnamese people (, ) or the Kinh people (), also known as the Viet people or the Viets, are a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to modern-day northern Vietnam and southern China who speak Vietnamese, the most widely spoken Austroa ...

"; therefore, " e likely spread of Vietic was southward from the RRD, not northward. Accounting for southern diversity will require alternative explanations."

Vietnamese

The

Vietnamese language Vietnamese () is an Austroasiatic languages, Austroasiatic language Speech, spoken primarily in Vietnam where it is the official language. It belongs to the Vietic languages, Vietic subgroup of the Austroasiatic language family. Vietnamese is s ...

was identified as

in the mid-nineteenth century, and there is now strong evidence for this classification. Modern Vietnamese has lost many

Proto-Austroasiatic Proto-Austroasiatic is the reconstructed ancestor of the Austroasiatic languages. Proto-Mon–Khmer (i.e., all Austroasiatic branches except for Munda) has been reconstructed in Harry L. Shorto's ''Mon–Khmer Comparative Dictionary'', while a ...

phonological and morphological features. Vietnamese also has large stocks of borrowed Chinese vocabulary. However, there continues to be resistance to the idea that Vietnamese could be more closely related to Khmer than to Chinese or Tai languages among Vietnamese nationalists. The vast majority of scholars attribute

typological A typology is a system of classification used to organize things according to similar or dissimilar characteristics. Groups of things within a typology are known as "types". Typologies are distinct from taxonomies in that they primarily address t ...

similarities with Sinitic and Tai to

language contact Language contact occurs when speakers of two or more languages or varieties interact with and influence each other. The study of language contact is called contact linguistics. Language contact can occur at language borders, between adstratum ...

rather than to common inheritance. Chamberlain (1998) argues that the Red River Delta region was originally Tai-speaking and became Vietnamese-speaking only between the seventh and ninth centuries AD as a result of emigration from the south, i.e., modern

Central Vietnam Central Vietnam ( or ), also known as Middle Vietnam or The Middle, formerly known as by the State of Vietnam, by the Republic of Vietnam, or '' Annam'' under French colonial rule, is one of the three geographical regions within Vietnam. Th ...

, where the highly distinctive and conservative North-Central Vietnamese dialects are spoken today. Therefore, the region of origin of Vietnamese (and the earlier Viet–Muong) was well south of the Red River.*Chamberlain, James R. 1998.
The Origin of the Sek: Implications for Tai and Vietnamese History
. ''Journal of the Siam Society'' 86.1 & 86.2: 27-48. On the other hand, Ferlus (2009) showed that the inventions of pestle, oar and a pan to cook sticky rice, which is the main characteristic of the Đông Sơn culture, correspond to the creation of new lexicons for these inventions in Northern Vietic (Việt–Mường) and Central Vietic ( Cuoi-Toum). The new vocabularies of these inventions were proven to be derivatives from original verbs rather than borrowed lexical items. The current distribution of Northern Vietic also corresponds to the area of Dong Son culture. Thus, Ferlus concludes that the Northern Vietic (Viet-Muong) is the direct heir of the Dongsonian, who had resided in the southern part of the Red River Delta and North Central Vietnam from the 1st millennium BC. Furthermore, John Phan (2013, 2016)Phan, John. 2013
Lacquered Words: the Evolution of Vietnamese under Sinitic Influences from the 1st Century BCE to the 17th Century CE
Ph.D. dissertation: Cornell University.Phan, John D. & de Sousa, Hilário. 2016
A preliminary investigation into Proto-Southwestern Middle Chinese
(Paper presented at the International workshop on the history of Colloquial Chinese – written and spoken, Rutgers University, New Brunswick NJ, 11–12 March 2016.) argues that “Annamese Middle Chinese” was spoken in the Red River Valley and was then later absorbed into the coexisting Proto-Viet-Muong, one of whose divergent dialects evolved into the Vietnamese language. Annamese Middle Chinese belonged to a

Middle Chinese Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese language, Chinese recorded in the ''Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expande ...

dialect continuum A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of Variety (linguistics), language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are Mutual intelligibility, mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulat ...

in southwestern China that eventually "diversified into"

Waxiang Chinese Waxiang (; ) is a divergent variety of Chinese, spoken by the Waxiang people, an unrecognized ethnic minority group in the northwestern part of Hunan province, China. Waxiang is a distinct language, and is very different from the surrounding ...

, the Jiudu patois 九都土話 of

Hezhou Hezhou () is a prefecture-level city in the northeast of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, People's Republic of China. Geography and climate Hezhou is located in northeastern Guangxi. It borders Hunan to the north and Guangdong to the east. ...

, Southern

Pinghua Pinghua is a pair of Sinitic languages spoken mainly in parts of Guangxi, with some speakers in Hunan. Pinghua is a trade language in some areas of Guangxi, spoken as a second language by speakers of Zhuang languages. Some speakers are offic ...

, and various

Xiang Chinese Xiang or Hsiang ( Chinese: 湘; Changsha Xiang: , Mandarin: ), also known as Hunanese, is a group of linguistically similar and historically related Sinitic languages, spoken mainly in Hunan province but also in northern Guangxi and parts of n ...

dialects (e.g., Xiangxiang 湘鄉, Luxi 瀘溪, Qidong 祁東, and

Quanzhou Quanzhou is a prefecture-level city, prefecture-level port city on the north bank of the Jin River, beside the Taiwan Strait in southern Fujian, China, People's Republic of China. It is Fujian's largest most populous metropolitan region, wi ...

全州). Phan (2013) lists three major types of Sino-Vietnamese borrowings, which were borrowed during different eras: *Early Sino-Vietnamese (

Han dynasty The Han dynasty was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC9 AD, 25–220 AD) established by Liu Bang and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–206 BC ...

(ca. 1st century CE) and Jin dynasty (ca. 4th century CE) layers) *Late Sino-Vietnamese (

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, c=唐朝), or the Tang Empire, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907, with an Wu Zhou, interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed ...

) *Recent Sino-Vietnamese (

Ming dynasty The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of ...

and post-Ming dynasty)

Distribution

Vietic speakers reside in and around the

Nakai–Nam Theun Nakai-Nam Theun National Park in Nakai District, Khammouane Province, Laos, is one of the last remaining wildernesses in Southeast Asia. Nakai-Nam Theun covers approximately 4,270 km2 of the Annamite Range and the adjacent Nakai Plateau in ...

Conservation Area of Laos and north-central Vietnam (Chamberlain 1998). Many of these speakers are referred to as Mường, Nhà Làng, and Nguồn. Chamberlain (1998) lists current locations in Laos for the following Vietic peoples. An overview based on first-hand fieldwork has been proposed by

Michel Ferlus Michel Ferlus (; 1935 – 10 March 2024) was a French linguistics, linguist who specialized in the historical phonology of languages of Southeast Asia. In addition to phonological systems, he also studied writing systems, in particular the evoluti ...

. * Nguồn: Ban Pak Phanang, Boualapha District, Khammouane; others in Vietnam * Liha, Phong (Cham), and Toum: Khamkeut District; probably originally from the northern Nghe An / Khamkeut border area * Ahoe: originally lived in Na Tane Subdistrict of Nakai District, and Ban Na Va village in Khamkeut District; taken to Hinboun District during the war, and then later resettled in Nakai Tay (39 households) and in Sop Hia (20 households) on the Nakai Plateau. * Thaveung (Ahao and Ahlao dialects): several villages near Lak Xao; probably originally from the Na Heuang area * Cheut: Ban Na Phao and Tha Sang, Boualapha District; others probably also in Pha Song, Vang Nyao, Takaa; originally from Hin Nam No and Vietnam * Atel: Tha Meuang on the Nam Sot (primarily Malang people); originally from the Houay Kanil area * Thémarou: Vang Chang on the Nam Theun; Ban Soek near the Nam Noy * Makang: Na Kadok, Khamkeut District (primarily Saek people); originally from the Upper Sot area *

Malang Malang (; , ), historically known as Tumapel, is an inland List of regencies and cities of Indonesia, city in the Indonesian Provinces of Indonesia, province of East Java. It has a history dating back to the age of the Singhasari, Singhasari K ...

: Tha Meuang on the Nam Sot *"Salang": Ban Xe Neua, Boualapha District *Atop: Na Thone, Khamkeut District (primarily Tai Theng people); originally from the Upper Sot area * Mlengbrou: near the Nam One; later relocated to the Yommalath District side of the Ak Mountain, and now living in Ban Sang, Yommalath District (primarily Yooy people) * Kri: Ban Maka In Vietnam, some Vietic hill-tribe peoples, including the Arem, Rục, Maliêng, and Mày (Cươi), were resettled at Cu Nhái (located either in western

or in the southwest of Hương Khê District in Hà Tĩnh Province). The Sách are also found in Vietnam. The following table lists the lifestyles of various Vietic-speaking ethnic groups. Unlike the neighboring Tai ethnic groups, many Vietic groups are not paddy agriculturalists.

Languages

The discovery that Vietnamese was a Mon–Khmer language, and that its tones were a regular reflection of non-tonal features in the rest of the family, is considered a milestone in the development of

historical linguistics Historical linguistics, also known as diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of how languages change over time. It seeks to understand the nature and causes of linguistic change and to trace the evolution of languages. Historical li ...

. Vietic languages show a typological range from a Chinese or Tai typology to a typical Mon-Khmer Austroasiatic typology, including (a) complex tonal systems, complex phonation systems or blends; (b) C(glide)VC or CCVC syllable templates; monosyllabic or polysyllabic and isolating or agglutinative typology. * Arem: This language lacks the breathy

common to most Vietic languages, but does have

glottalized Glottalization is the complete or partial closure of the glottis during the articulation of another sound. Glottalization of vowels and other sonorants is most often realized as creaky voice (partial closure). Glottalization of obstruent conso ...

final consonants. * Cuôi: Hung in Laos, and Thô in Vietnam * Aheu ( Thavung): This language makes a four-way distinction between clear and breathy phonation combined with glottalized final consonants. This is very similar to the situation in the

Pearic languages The Pearic languages (alternatively called the Chongic languages) are a group of endangered languages of the Eastern Mon–Khmer branch of the Austroasiatic language family, spoken by Pear people (the ''Por'', the ''Samré'', the ''Samray'', t ...

in which, however, the glottalization is in the vowel. * Ruc, Sach,

May May is the fifth month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Its length is 31 days. May is a month of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, and autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. Therefore, May in the Southern Hemisphere is the ...

, and Chưt: A

dialect cluster A dialect is a variety of language spoken by a particular group of people. This may include dominant and standardized varieties as well as vernacular, unwritten, or non-standardized varieties, such as those used in developing countries or iso ...

; the

register Register or registration may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), ...

system is the four-way contrast of Aheu augmented with pitch. * Maleng ( Bo, Pakatan): Tones as in Ruc-Sach. *

Pong ''Pong'' is a 1972 sports video game developed and published by Atari for arcades. It is one of the earliest arcade video games; it was created by Allan Alcorn as a training exercise assigned to him by Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell, but B ...

, Hung, Tum, Khong-Kheng *Việt–Mường: Vietnamese and Mường. These two dialect chains share 75% of their basic vocabulary, and have similar systems of 5–6 contour tones. These are regular reflexes of other Vietic languages: The three low and three high tones correspond to

voiced Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds (usually consonants). Speech sounds can be described as either voiceless (otherwise known as ''unvoiced'') or voiced. The term, however, is used to refe ...

and

voiceless In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, it is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word phonation implies v ...

initial consonants in the ancestral language; these then split depending on the original final consonants: Level tones correspond to

open syllable A syllable is a basic unit of organization within a sequence of Phone (phonetics), speech sounds, such as within a word, typically defined by linguists as a ''nucleus'' (most often a vowel) with optional sounds before or after that nucleus (''ma ...

s or final

nasal consonants In phonetics, a nasal, also called a nasal occlusive or nasal stop in contrast with an oral stop or nasalized consonant, is an occlusive consonant produced with a lowered velum, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. The vast major ...

; high rising and low falling tones correspond to final stops, which have since disappeared; dipping tones to final

fricative A fricative is a consonant produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate in ...

s, which have also disappeared; and glottalized tones to final glottalized consonants, which have deglottalized.

Classification

Sidwell & Alves (2021)

Sidwell & Alves (2021) propose the following classification of the Vietic languages, which was first proposed in Sidwell (2021). Below, the most divergent (basal) branches listed first. Vietic is split into two primary branches, ''Western'' (corresponding to the ''Thavung–Malieng'' branch) and ''Eastern'' (all of the non-Thavung–Malieng languages). *Vietic **''Thavung–Malieng'' (''Western Vietic''): Kri, Maleng, Malieng; Ahao/Ahlao, Thavung **''Eastern Vietic'' ***'' Chut'': Arem; Sach, Ruc,

***''Phong–Liha'' (''Pong–Toum''): Phong, Toum, Liha ***''Cuoi–Tho'': Cuoi, Tho ***''Viet–Muong'': Vietnamese, Muong, Nguon The Thavung-Malieng group retains the most archaic lexicon and phonological features, while the Chut group merges *-r and *-l finals to *-l, along with the other northern languages. Sidwell & Alves (2021) propose that the Vietic languages had dispersed from the

, based on evidence from loanwords from early Sinitic and extensive Tai-Vietic contact possibly dating back to the Dong Son period.

Chamberlain (2018)

Chamberlain (2018:9)Chamberlain, James R. 2018.
A Kri-Mol (Vietic) Bestiary: Prolegomena to the Study of Ethnozoology in the Northern Annamites
'
Kyoto Working Papers on Area Studies
No. 133. Kyoto: Kyoto University. uses the term Kri-Mol to refer to the Vietic languages, and considers there to be two primary splits, namely ''Mol-Toum'' and ''Nrong-Theun''. Chamberlain (2018:12) provides the following phylogenetic classification for the Vietic languages. *Kri-Mol **Mol-Toum ***Việt-Mường **** Vietnamese **** Mường, Nguồn ***Toum-Ruc **** Toum, Phong, Liha **** Ruc, Chứt,

, Sach, Malieng **Nrong-Theun ***Kri-Phoong **** Kri, Phoong **** Mlengbrou *** Ahlao-Atel ****Ahoe-Ahlao *****Ahoe *****Ahlao, Ahao ****Atel-Maleng *****Thémarou *****Atel, Atop, (Makang), Arao, Maleng, Malang, To-e (Pakatan)

Sidwell (2015)

Based on comparative studies by Ferlus (1982, 1992, 1997, 2001) and new studies in Muong languages by Phan (2012), Sidwell (2015) pointed out that Muong is a paraphyletic taxon and subgroups with Vietnamese. Sidwell's (2015) proposed internal classification for the Vietic languages is as follows. *Vietic ** Viet-Muong: Vietnamese, Mường Muốt, Mường Nàbái, Mường Chỏi, etc. ** Pong-Toum: Đan Lai, Hung, Toum, Cuôi, etc. ** Chut *** East: Mãliềng, Maleng, Arem, Kri, Chứt (Mày, Rụt, Sách, Mụ Già), etc. *** West: Thavung, Pakatan, etc.

Chamberlain (2003)

The following classification of the Vietic languages is from Chamberlain (2003:422), as quoted in Sidwell (2009:145). Unlike past classifications, there is a sixth "South" branch that includes Kri, a newly described language. *Vietic **North (Viet–Muong) *** Vietnamese *** Mường (according to Phan (2012), Mường is

paraphyletic Paraphyly is a taxonomic term describing a grouping that consists of the grouping's last common ancestor and some but not all of its descendant lineages. The grouping is said to be paraphyletic ''with respect to'' the excluded subgroups. In co ...

Phan, John D. 2012. "Mường is not a subgroup: Phonological evidence for a paraphyletic taxon in the Viet-Muong sub-family." ''

Mon-Khmer Studies ''Mon-Khmer Studies'' was an academic journal that focused on Mon-Khmer languages. It was established in 1964 and ceased publication in 2016. From 1992 onwards, it was published by Mahidol University and SIL International SIL Global (formerl ...

'' 40:1-18.) *** Nguồn ** Northwest (Cuoi) ** West (Thavưng) ***Ahoe ***Ahao ***Ahlao ** Southeast (Chut) ***Cheut ***Rục ***Sách ***Mày ***Malieng ***( Arem ?) ***(Kata) ** Southwest (Maleng) ***Atel ***Thémarou ***Arao ***Makang ***Malang ***Maleng ***Tơe ** South (Kri) ***Kri ***Phóng ***Mlengbrou

Animal cycle names

(1992, 2013)Michel Ferlus
The sexagesimal cycle, from China to Southeast Asia
23rd Annual Conference of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society, May 2013, Bangkok, Thailand. notes that the 12-year animal cycle (

zodiac The zodiac is a belt-shaped region of the sky that extends approximately 8° north and south celestial latitude of the ecliptic – the apparent path of the Sun across the celestial sphere over the course of the year. Within this zodiac ...

) names in the Khmer calendar, from which Thai animal cycle names are also derived, and were borrowed from a phonologically conservative form of Viet-Muong. Ferlus contends that the animal cycle names were borrowed from a Viet-Muong (Northern Vietic) language rather than from a Southern Vietic language, since the vowel in the Old Khmer name for "

snake Snakes are elongated limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (). Cladistically squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales much like other members of the group. Many species of snakes have s ...

" corresponds to Viet-Muong /a/ rather than to Southern Vietic /i/.

References

External links

La Vaughn Hayes Vietic Digital ArchivesRWAAI
(Repository and Workspace for Austroasiatic Intangible Heritage)
Vietic languages
in the RWAAI Digital Archive {{Austro-Asiatic languages