Origin
Though much effort has been paid to trace the origin of Vietnamese language, so-far findings remain debatable. It is, however, unquestionable that it does emerge from the aspirations of its people to have something speak for their own cultural identity (in both oral and written ways). After a long time borrowing Chinese characters, in 14th century, Vietnamese people created their own scripts called “chu Nom” to set down their language. In 17th century, with huge joint effort of Western missionaries, notably Alexandre de Rhodes, it was transcribed again into Romanised scripts which later became the national language characters (chu Quoc Ngu).
