Vietnamese numerals

This article contains Vietnamese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of chữ nôm, chữ Hán and chữ quốc ngữ.

Historically Vietnamese has two sets of numbers: one is etymologically native Vietnamese; the other uses Sino-Vietnamese origin vocabulary. In the modern language the native Vietnamese vocabulary is used for both everyday counting and mathematical purposes. The Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary is used only in fixed expressions or in Sino-Vietnamese words, in a similar way that Latin and Greek numerals are used in modern English (e.g., the bi- prefix in bicycle).

For numbers up to one million, native Viet is often used the most, whilst mixed Sino-Viet origin words and Native Viet words are used for units of one million or above.

Concept[]

For non-official purposes prior to the 20th century, Vietnamese had a writing system known as Hán-Nôm. Sino-Vietnamese numbers were written in Hán tự and native vocabulary was written in Chữ Nôm. Hence, there are two concurrent system in Vietnamese nowadays in the romanized script, one for Native Viet and one for Sino-Viet.

In the modern Vietnamese writing system, numbers are written as Arabic numerals or in the romanized script Chữ quốc ngữ (một, hai, ba), which had a Chữ Nôm character. Less common for numbers under one million are the numbers of Sino-Viet origin (nhất [1], nhị [2], tam [3]), using Chữ Hán (classical Chinese characters). Chữ Hán and Chũ Nôm has all but become obsolete in the Vietnamese language, with the Latin-style of reading, writing, and pronouncing Native Vietnamese and Sino-Vietnamese being wide spread instead, when France occupied Vietnam. Chinese characters can still be seen in traditional temples or traditional literature or in cultural artefacts. The Hán-Nôm Institute resides in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Basic figures[]

The following table is an overview of the basic Vietnamese numeric figures, provided in both Native and Sino-Viet forms. The form that is highlighted in green is the most widely used in all purposes whilst the ones highlighted in blue are seen as archaic but may still be in use. There are slight differences between the Hanoi and Saigon dialects of Vietnamese, readings between each are differentiated below.