relation between 粤 and 越?

[vinhlong]

Is there any relation between the words 粤 and 越 ?

I used to think it was interesting that Guang Dong was also called Yue Dong and Vietnam was called Yue Nam, but then I found out that the characters were totally different...

But I'm wondering was there maybe a period where the words coincided or were they different from the beginning and is there no relation at all?

[nnt]

See the two posts below, on Bách Việt:

http://www.chinese-forums.com/viewtopic.php?t=980

and Nam Việt:

http://www.chinese-forums.com/viewtopic.php?t=521

[Guest pl]

they are different from the beginning.

粤 is the alias of GuangDong province

越 is the ancient state in period of Warring States which presumably lies in nowadays ZheJiang province the alias of which is 浙.today we ofen use this term literarily refer to the area of ZheJiang province.

[nnt]

粤 is the alias of GuangDong province

True, but it's nowadays usage (as well as nowaday's usage of 越 for Việt Nam). See the two posts mentioned before for their usage in the past.

[Ian_Lee]

Guangdong and North Vietnam had been under the same administrative region for quite a while a long time ago. I read that Hanoi resembles old time Guangzhou. There are 36 streets in Hanoi which specializes in selling artifacts that are almost the same as those you can find in Guangzhou.

Moreover, the Lunar New Year -- Tet -- that Vietnamese celebrate has almost the same kind of custom as Cantonese have.

I think the major difference between Cantonese and Vietnamese are their taste buds. Cantonese depends on fish from rivers and lakes as their main staple and supplement with some vegetable. Moreover, traditionally Cantonese cuisine seldom uses beef since cows are reserved for ploughing. Cantonese gournmets also value original flavor.

But Vietnamese cuisines are way different. Their Pho uses a lot of beef and they like light sour and light hot food. Moreover, it seems that they don't consume as much as seafood as Cantonese do even though Vietnam has a longer coastline.

[ala]

Lots of people get the proverb 吳越同舟 (Wu, Yue in the same boat) confused for referring to the Wu (Shanghainese) speaking and Yue 粤 (Cantonese) speaking population... the so called "rivarly" between the two. Actually 越 doesn't have much to do with Guangdong; 吳 covered the region of modern day Jiangsu province, and 越 covered modern day Zhejiang province immediately south of Jiangsu and Shanghai. Also neither the original 吳 nor 越 spoke a Sinitic language. 吳 and 越 never got along, with 吳 later defeated by 越. In the 5 Dynasties 10 States period around 970 AD, there was also a small state called 吳越 in present day Zhejiang. 越剧 (yueju) is Zhejiang opera (and is also a Shanghai thing), not Cantonese opera. For more information on 越剧 go here: http://www.yueju.net/ Present day Shaoxing, Zhejiang was the capital of the original 越; and present day Suzhou, Jiangsu was the capital of the original 吳.

Guangdong and Vietnam were at one point called 越南, and now 越 refers to Vietnam, and 粤 is used for Guangdong.

[Ian_Lee]

Ala:

Even though Wu was annihilated by Yue, Wu was more popular than Yue in the later generations.

During the Three Kingdom period, Wu was the kingdom that presided over a huge chunk of present day southeastern Chinese territory.

In Japan, the Kanji for Kimono Shop is literally the "Shop of Wu Clothes".

It seems that Yu left scantily any legacy.

[nnt]

1. Việt (Yue4) 粤 was used in Bách Việt 百粤 , the hundred 粤 tribes. In Đại Việt Sử Ký Toàn Thư (大越史記全書 History of Đại Việt ), Lạc Long Quân (貉龍君) married Âu Cơ 嫗姫 and gave birth to one hundred eggs, the ancestors of Bách Việt (Bai3 yue4百粤), one of whom was Lạc Việt 雒粤, the tribe of Hùng Vương (雄王). According to this legend, the original Vietnamese tribes were related to others Bai Yue tribes, some of them still existing in Southern China, Taiwan and Hai Nan.

2.Việt (Yue4) 越 was the Chinese kingdom of Câu Tiễn (Gou1 Jian4 勾踐 ) in modern day Zhejiang as Ala said. Câu Tiễn's story has always been very popular in Vietnam, due to the fact that it's the same character 越 (but no other known relation...).

According to a theory, Gou1 Jian's descendants fled to the south after the absorption of Việt (Yue4) 越 by Sở (Chu3 楚 ), and founded kingdoms in the South... where the Yue4 粤 lived.

Btw, Chu Nguyên Chương (Zhu Yuan2 Zhang1) 朱元璋, the founder of the Ming dynasty, was also at one time king of Ngô (Wu2) 吳(吴)王, and for this reason the word Ngô (Wu2)吳(吴) was also used in Vietnam to designate Chinese people (nothing to do with Ngô Việt đồng chu 吳越同舟 ).

3.Nam Việt (Nan2 Yue4) 南越 the kingdom of Triệu Đà (Zhao4 Tuo2 趙 佗) which included modern Guangdong and Northern Vietnam. In the past, the Triệu 趙 was considered a Vietnamese dynasty in official Vietnamese history books. Nowadays, it's considered a Chinese dynasty by the Vietnamese.

4.南越 Việt Nam ( an inversion of Nam Việt 南越 ) is the name of present day Vietnam since 1802.

[ala]

The confusion however compounds because 百粤 is more popularly written as 百越, and was historically interchangeable. Take an average Chinese and ask him where "越" was, and he will point to somewhere around Guangdong and southern Fujian, instead of Zhejiang.