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Vietnamese people (người Việt)
Kinh people (người Kinh)
Aodai-nonla.jpg
Kinh girls in traditional áo dài dress and non la hat
Total population
c. 86 million
Regions with significant populations
 Vietnam     81,328,696 (2015)[1]
 United States2,067,527 (2016)[2]
 Cambodia750,000–800,000[3][4]
 France350,000[5]
 Australia294,798[6]
 Canada240,514[7]
 Taiwan200,000 (2014)[8]
 Japan199,990 (2016)[9]
 South Korea155,553 (2017)[10]
 Germany150,000[11]
 Laos100,000
 Malaysia70,000[12]
 United Kingdom28,000
(Vietnam-born, 2014 est.)[13]
"At least 55,000"
(total, 2007 est.)[14]
 Czech Republic58,080 (2016)[15]
 Poland50,000[16]
 Russia36,225[17]
 China36,205[a][18]
 Philippines27,600
 Sweden24,465 (2016)[19][20]
 Norway21,721 (2014)[21]
 Netherlands20,603 (2014)[22]
 Thailand17,662 (2010)[23][24]
 Denmark14,669 (2014)[25]
  Switzerland14,496
 Qatar8,000 (2008)[26]
 Macau7,199 (2011)[27]
 Belgium7,151 (2001)[25]
 New Zealand4,875 (2006)[28]
 Finland4,645[29]
 Ukraine3,850 (2001)[30]
 Hungary3,019 (2011)[31]
 Slovakia3,000[32]
 Italy3,000
 Bulgaria2,600[16]
 Brazil1,000
Languages
Vietnamese
Religion
Predominantly Vietnamese folk religion syncretized with Mahayana Buddhism. Minorities of Christians (mostly Roman Catholics) and other groups.[33]
Related ethnic groups
Other Vietic groups
(Gin, Muong, Chứt, Thổ peoples)

The Vietnamese people or the Kinh people (Vietnamese: người Việt or người Kinh), are an ethnic group originating from present-day northern Vietnam. They are the majority ethnic group of Vietnam, comprising 86% of the population at the 1999 census, and are officially known as Kinh to distinguish them from other ethnic groups in Vietnam. The earliest recorded name for the ancient Vietnamese people appears as Lạc.

Although geographically and linguistically labeled as Southeast Asians, long periods of Chinese domination and influence have placed the Vietnamese culturally closer to East Asians, or more specifically their immediate northern neighbours, the Southern Chinese and other peoples within South China. The word Việt is shortened from Bách Việt, a name used in ancient times. Nam means "south".

Origins

Written history knows the ancient Vietnamese people first simply as the Lạc or Lạc Việt, and the country of Vietnam as Văn Lang. Archaeological evidence of the Đông Sơn culture (also known as Lac Society) is the result of society from the Bronze Age.

In a 2013 book, professor emeritus of history at UCLA, Damodar R. SarDesai said that Vietnamese people were thought for a long time to have come from Tibet, but SarDesai said that more modern hypotheses indicate that Vietnamese people are a mixture of many peoples, peoples who are Mongoloid and non-Mongoloid. SarDesai said that Vietnamese are a mix of the Mongoloid Yueh (Viet) people, and the Austro-Indonesian people who lived in Guangdong and Guangxi. SarDesai said that, in around the 3rd century BCE, the Viet people moved into the Red River Delta. SarDesai said that, because the Mongoloid Thai people invaded Tonkin in the 8th century CE, the Viet people came across the Mongoloid Thai people. SarDesai said that the Vietnamese language has in it both monotonic Indonesian and "variotonic Mongoloid elements." SarDesai said that the mixed origins of Vietnamese people explains the reason that Vietnamese people have in common a variety of animistic beliefs, which are common to all peoples who are Austro-Indonesian.[34][35]

Anthropometry

Stephen Pheasant (1986), who taught anatomy, biomechanics and ergonomics at the Royal Free Hospital and the University College, London, said that Far Eastern people have proportionately shorter lower limbs than European and black African people. Pheasant said that the proportionately short lower limbs of Far Eastern people is a difference that is most characterized in Japanese people, less characterized in Korean and Chinese people, and least characterized in Vietnamese and Thai people.[36][37]

Craniometry

Ann Kumar (1998) said that Michael Pietrusewsky (1992) said that, in a craniometric study, Borneo, Vietnam, Sulu, Java, and Sulawesi are closer to Japan, in that order, than Mongolian and Chinese populations are close to Japan. In the craniometric study, Michael Pietrusewsky (1992) said that, even though Japanese people cluster with Mongolians, Chinese and Southeast Asians in a larger Asian cluster, Japanese people are more closely aligned with several mainland and island Southeast Asian samples than with Mongolians and Chinese.[38][39]

Hirofumi Matsumura et al. (2001) said that Japanese people, Vietnamese people and other modern Southeast Asians are regarded to be a mix of migrants from Northeast Asia and indigenous Southeast Asians who are closely related to Australo-Melanesians.[40]

Bradley J. Adams, a forensic anthropologist in the Office of Chief Medical Examiner of the City of New York, said that Vietnamese people could be classified as Mongoloid.[41][42]

A 2009 book about forensic anthropology said that Vietnamese skulls are more gracile and less sexually dimorphic than the skulls of Native Americans.[43]

Hirofumi Matsumura et al. (2011) said that the earliest anatomically modern humans in Northern Vietnam are called Sonvians or Hoabinhians. The oldest anatomically modern human culture in Northern Vietnam is the Son Vi Culture which starts at 30,000 BP. Later, the Hoabinhian Culture starts at 18,000 BP. The Hoabinhians samples in the study were consistently classified craniometrically as having close Australo-Melanesian affinity. Hoabinhians may have common ancestry with Aboriginal Australians and Melanesians. Coinciding with the terminal Hoabinhian, the Bac Son Culture is a phase from c. 9000 to 7000 years BP. Hoabinhians and Bac Son specimens tend to show "dolichocephalic calvaria, large zygomatic bones, a remarkably prominent glabella and superciliary arches, a concave nasal root and a low and wide face with prominent prognathism." Examples of extensive population change in Northern Vietnam, which are probably associated with large scale admixture with Northeast Asians, are particularly evident from the Neolithic and early Metal Period. The study defined the term "Neolithic" as it is used in the study to mean the "pre-metal communities that show clear evidence for agricultural subsistence economies..." Man Bac, a Neolithic site which is dated to 3900–3500 years BP, may show a population in transition where there occurs the first appearance of people with genetic inheritance from the northern periphery of Vietnam, which is present-day South China, along with the indigenous people whose ancestry traces back to the Hoabinhians. In contrast to the Hoabinhians and Bac Son specimens, most the specimens from the Metal Period have "relatively narrow faces, low glabella, supercillary arches and nasal roots and round orbits." Matsumura and Hudson (2005) said that a broad comparison of dental traits indicated that modern Vietnamese and other modern Southeast Asians derive from a northern source, supporting the immigration hypothesis, instead of regional continuity hypothesis, as the model for the origins of modern Southeast Asians.[44]

Genetics

Vietnamese show a close genetic relationship with other East Asians with the exception of seven unique markers.[which?][45] The reference population for Vietnamese (Kinh) used in the Geno 2.0 Next Generation is 83% Southeast Asia & Oceania, 12% Eastern Asia and 3% Southern Asia.[46]

Jin Han-jun et al. (1999) said that the mtDNA 9‐bp deletion frequencies in the intergenic COII/tRNALys region for Vietnamese (23.2%) and Indonesians (25.0%), which are the two populations constituting Southeast Asians in the study, are relatively high frequencies when compared to the 9-bp deletion frequencies for Mongolians (5.1%), Chinese (14.2%), Japanese (14.3%) and Koreans (15.5%), which are the four populations constituting Northeast Asians in the study. The study said that these 9-bp deletion frequencies are consistent with earlier surveys which showed that 9-bp deletion frequencies increase going from Japan to mainland Asia to the Malay Peninsula, which is supported by the following studies: Horai et al. (1987); Hertzberg et al. (1989); Stoneking & Wilson (1989); Horai (1991); Ballinger et al. (1992); Hanihara et al. (1992); and Chen et al. (1995). The Cavalli-Sforza's chord genetic distance (4D), from Cavalli-Sforza & Bodmer (1971), which is based on the allele frequencies of the intergenic COII/tRNALys region, between Vietnamese and other East Asian populations in the study, from least to greatest, are as follows: Vietnamese to Indonesian (0.0004), Vietnamese to Chinese (0.0135), Vietnamese to Japanese (0.0153), Vietnamese to Korean (0.0265) and Vietnamese to Mongolian (0.0750).[47]

Kim Wook et al. (2000) said that, genetically, Vietnamese people more probably clustered with Northeast Asians of which the study analyzed DNA samples of Chinese, Japanese, Koreans and Mongolians rather than with Southeast Asians of which the study analyzed DNA samples of Indonesians, Filipinos, Thais and Vietnamese. The study said that Vietnamese people were the only population in the study's phylogenetic analysis that did not reflect a sizable genetic difference between Northeast Asian and Southeast Asian populations. The study said that the likely reason for Vietnamese people more probably clustering with Northeast Asians was genetic drift and distinct founder populations. The study said that the alternative reason for Vietnamese people more probably clustering with Northeast Asians is a recent range expansion from South China. The study mentioned that the majority of its Vietnamese DNA samples were from Hanoi which is the closest region to South China.[48]

Schurr & Wallace (2002) said that Vietnamese people display genetic similarities with peoples from Malaysia. The study said that the aboriginal groups from Malaysia, the Orang Asli, are somewhat genetically intermediate between Malaysians and Vietnamese. The study said that mtDNA haplogroup F is present at its highest frequency in Vietnamese and a high frequency of this haplogroup is also present in the Orang Asli, a people with whom Vietnamese have a linguistic connection (Austroasiatic languages).[49]

Jung Jongsun et al. (2010) said that genetic structure analysis found significant admixture in "Vietnamese (or Cambodian) with unknown Southern original settlers." The study said that it used Cambodians and Vietnamese to represent "Southern people," and the study used Cambodia (Khmer) and Vietnam (Kinh) as its populations for "South Asia." The study said that Chinese people are located between Korean and Vietnamese people in the study's genome map. The study also said that Vietnamese people are located between Chinese and Cambodian people in the study's genome map.[50]

He Jun-dong et al. (2012) did a principal component analysis using the NRY haplogroup distribution frequencies of 45 populations, and the second principal component showed a close affinity between Kinh and Vietnamese who were most likely Kinh with populations from mainland southern China because of the high frequency of NRY haplogroup O-M88. The study said that Kinh often have NRY haplogroup O-M7 which is the characteristic Chinese haplogroup. Out of the study's sample of seventy-six Kinh NRY haplogroups, twenty-three haplogroups (30.26%) were O-M88 and eight haplogroups (10.53%) were O-M7. The study said that, in northern Vietnam, it is suggested that there has been considerable Chinese assimilation through immigration into the Kinh people.[51]

A 2015 study revealed that Vietnamese (Kinh) test subjects showed more genetic variants in common with Chinese compared to Japanese.[52]

Sara Pischedda et al. (2017) said that modern Vietnamese have a major part of their origins from South China and a minor part of their origins from a Thai and Indonesian composite. The study said that admixture analysis indicates that Vietnamese Kinh have a major part which is most common in Chinese and two minor parts which have the highest prevalence in the Bidayuh of Malaysia and the Proto-Malay. The study said that multidimensional scaling analysis indicates that Vietnamese Kinh have a closeness to Malaysians, Thai and Chinese, and the study said that Malaysians and Thai are the samples which could be admixed with Chinese in the Vietnamese gene pool. The study said that Vietnamese mtDNA genetic variation matches well with the pattern seen in Southeast Asia, and the study said that most Vietnamese people had mtDNA haplotypes that clustered in clades M7 (20%) and R9’F (27%) which are clades that also dominate maternal lineages in Southeast Asia more generally.[53]

Y-chromosome DNA

Kayser et al. (2006) found four members of O-M95, four members of O-M122(xM134), one member of C-M217, and one member of O-M119 in a sample of ten individuals from Vietnam.[54]

He Jun-dong et al. (2012) found that the NRY haplogroup profile for a sample of 76 Kinh in Hanoi, Vietnam was as follows: twenty-three (30.26%) belonged to O-M88, nine (11.84%) belonged to O-M95*(xM88), nine (11.84%) belonged to C-M217, eight (10.53%) belonged to O-M7, seven (9.21%) belonged to O-M134, seven (9.21%) belonged to O-P200*(xM121, M164, P201, 002611), five (6.58%) belonged to O-P203, two (2.63%) belonged to N-M231, two (2.63%) belonged to O-002611, two (2.63%) belonged to O-P201*(xM7, M134), one (1.32%) belonged to K-P131*(xN-M231, O-P191, Q-P36, R-M207), and one (1.32%) belonged to R-M17.[51]

Having analyzed the Y-DNA of another sample of 24 males from Hanoi, Vietnam, Trejaut et al. (2014) found that six (25.0%) belonged to O-M88, three (12.5%) belonged to O-M7, three (12.5%) belonged to O-M134(xM133), two (8.3%) belonged to O-M95(xM88), two (8.3%) belonged to C-M217, two (8.3%) belonged to N-LLY22g(xM128, M178), one (4.2%) belonged to O-PK4(xM95), one (4.2%) belonged to O-JST002611, one (4.2%) belonged to O-M133, one (4.2%) belonged to O-M159, one (4.2%) belonged to O-M119(xP203, M50), and one (4.2%) belonged to D-M15.[55]

A study published in 2010 reported the following data obtained through analysis of the Y-DNA of a sample from Vietnam (more precisely, Austro-Asiatic speakers from Southern Vietnam according to He Jun-dong et al.): 20.0% (14/70) O-M111, 15.7% (11/70) O-M134, 14.3% (10/70) O-JST002611, 7.1% (5/70) O-M95(xM111), 7.1% (5/70) Q-P36(xM346), 5.7% (4/70) O-M7, 5.7% (4/70) O-P203, 4.3% (3/70) C-M217, 2.9% (2/70) D-M15, 2.9% (2/70) N-LLY22g(xM178, M128), 2.9% (2/70) O-P197*(xJST002611, P201), 2.9% (2/70) O-47z, 1.4% (1/70) J2-M172, 1.4% (1/70) J-M304(xM172), 1.4% (1/70) O-P201(xM7, M134), 1.4% (1/70) O-P31(xM176, M95), 1.4% (1/70) O-M176(x47z), 1.4% (1/70) R-M17.[56]

The individuals who comprise the KHV (Kinh in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam) sample of the 1000 Genomes Project have been found to belong to the following Y-DNA haplogroups: 26.1% (12/46) O-M88/M111, 13.0% (6/46) O-M7, 8.7% (4/46) O-JST002611, 8.7% (4/46) O-F444 (= O-M134(xM117)), 8.7% (4/46) O-M133, 6.5% (3/46) O-M95(xM88/M111), 4.3% (2/46) O-P203.1, 4.3% (2/46) O-F2159 (= O-KL2(xJST002611)), 4.3% (2/46) Q-Y529, 2.2% (1/46) O-CTS9996 (= O-K18(xM95)), 2.2% (1/46) O-CTS1754 (= O-M122(xM324)), 2.2% (1/46) O-F4124 (= O-N6 or O-P164(xM134)), 2.2% (1/46) C-F845, 2.2% (1/46) F-Y27277(xM427, M428), 2.2% (1/46) N1b2a-M1811, 2.2% (1/46) N1a2a-M128.[57][58]

Mitochondrial DNA

Schurr & Wallace (2002) displayed the mtDNA haplogroup profile for a sample of 28 Vietnamese as follows: 17.9% belonged to B/B*, 32.1% belonged to F, 32.1% belonged to M and 17.9% belonged to other haplogroups.[49]

He Jun-dong et al. (2012) found that the mtDNA haplogroup profile for a sample of 139 Kinh was as follows: twenty-four (17.27%) belonged to B4, nineteen (13.67%) belonged to B5, one (0.72%) belonged to B6, four (2.88%) belonged to D, twenty-nine (20.86%) belonged to F, one (0.72%) belonged to G, seven (5.04%) belonged to M*, twenty-one (15.11%) belonged to M7, twelve (8.63%) belonged to M8, four (2.88%) belonged to M9a'b, one (0.72%) belonged to M10, two (1.44%) belonged to M12, one (0.72%) belonged to N*, two (1.44%) belonged to N9a, ten (7.19%) belonged to R9 and one (0.72%) belonged to W4.[51]

Sara Pischedda et al. (2017) found that the mtDNA haplogroup profile for a sample of 399 Kinh was as follows: 1% belonged to A, 23% belonged to B, 2% belonged to C, 4% belonged to D, 35% belonged to M (xD,C), 8% belonged to N(xB,R9'F,A) and 27% belonged to R9'F.[53]

Genetic contribution to Koreans

Bhak Jong-hwa, a professor in the biomedical engineering department at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), said that the ancient Vietnamese, which was a population that flourished with rapid agricultural development after 8,000 BC, slowly travelled north to ancient civilizations in the Korean Peninsula and the Russian Far East. Bhak said that Korean people were formed from the admixture of agricultural Southern Mongoloids from Vietnam who went through China, hunter-gatherer Northern Mongoloids in the Korean Peninsula and another group of Southern Mongoloids. Bhak said, "We believe the number of ancient dwellers who migrated north from Vietnam far exceeds the number of those occupying the peninsula," making Koreans inherit more of their DNA from southerners.[59][60]

In later history, there was intermarriage between the aristocracies of Korea and Vietnam, especially with that involving an heir of the Lý Dynasty, Lý Long Tường, who was exiled to Goryeo and who was to become the progenitor of the Hwasan Lee clan that would take root on the Korean peninsula.

Legend and early history

According to legend, the first Vietnamese descended from the dragon lord Lạc Long Quân and the female heavenly angel Âu Cơ. They married and had one hundred eggs, from which hatched one hundred children. Their eldest son ruled as the Hùng king.

First Vietnamese

Historians believe that the earliest Vietnamese people gradually moved from the Indonesian archipelago through the Malay Peninsula and Thailand until they settled on the edges of the Red River in the Tonkin Delta.[citation needed] Archaeologists follow a path of stone tools from the Late Pleistocene across Java, Malaysia, Thailand and north to Burma. These stone tools are thought to be the first human tools used in Southeast Asia. Archaeologists believe that at this time the Himalayas, a chain of mountains in northern Burma and China, created an icy barrier which isolated the people of Southeast Asia. During the Last Glacial Maximum (25,000-18,000 BCE), ocean levels dropped significantly. This resulted in the exposure of the shallow areas surrounding the coasts and islands of Southeast Asia - today known as the Sunda Shelf.

It is generally thought[citation needed] that the exposed Sunda Shelf looked like a giant salt plain, and that perhaps people ventured out across this area to settle on other coasts or islands. Later, when the glaciers melted, the Sunda Shelf again disappeared under water. Because it is a relatively shallow body of water, it has always provided a safe area for traders and travelers in small boats to pass safely without the threat of high or choppy seas. In this way, the geography of the area has had a lot to do with the way in which cultures developed. As the map indicates, outside the Sunda Shelf are deep ocean basins which were not often crossed until heavier and wider Chinese vessels (massive vessels from the Song dynasty (960-1279), which dwarfed later European man-of-war sailing ships) could traverse these deep and sometimes dangerous seas.

As the glaciers melted and the seas near these coasts rose, traders and other travelers who wanted to migrate to other areas, or perhaps to proselytize religion, used boats as transport. For the next 4,000 years, until 8000 BCE, people also moved across the mainland of Southeast Asia towards the Tonkin Delta, some stopping and settling along the way. Eventually, the descendants of these migratory peoples entered the Neolithic Age (from around 8000-800 BCE), when humans started to use simple stone tools. Remains of these people and the Hoabinhian culture have been found in the Hòa Bình Caves along the Red River and in the Tonkin Delta. In the Middle Neolithic Period (2500–2000 BCE), more people appeared in the area of present-day Vietnam and settled at another location called Bắc Sơn, in a central area of the Tonkin Delta. These people were probably somewhat taller and lighter-skinned than the Hoabinhian negritos; they excelled in the art of basket weaving as well as in the manufacturing and use of polished double-edged stone tools.

Earlier Vietnamese groups