Truong Vinh Ky
(1837–1898), Vietnamese linguist, collaborator with the early French regime. Truong Vinh Ky (Petrus Jean-Baptiste Vinh Ky) was a Catholic-educated Vietnamese scholar who collaborated with the early French colonial regime in southern Vietnam. Ky was also a brilliant linguist who spoke more than twenty-five Asian and European languages and was a pioneer in early efforts to popularize quoc ngu (the romanized form of Vietnamese). Born in the Mekong Delta region of Ben Tre, Ky was educated by Catholic priests in his home village and later at missionary schools in Cambodia and Penang, Malaysia. In 1858 he returned home to become a village teacher, only to leave again in 1863 to serve as an interpreter for a Vietnamese imperial delegation to France. While there, he met Victor Hugo and Ernest Renan among other European intellectuals and became convinced of the value of European civilization and culture and the potential benefits of French colonial tutelage for his own country.
On his return from Europe, Ky resumed his role as an educator, now serving the French colonial regime. He taught at the College des Interprètes in Saigon, where he trained many early colonial officials and later gave French lessons to a future Nguyen emperor, Dong Khanh (reigned 1886–1888). Truong Vinh Ky was also a prolific researcher and writer, producing more than one hundred books on topics ranging from grammar and linguistics to history and geography. He wrote and published the first work in romanized Vietnamese in 1866, and between 1869 and 1872 he served as editor of the earliest romanized Vietnamese newspaper, Gia Dinh Bao. Ky's Cours D'histoire Annamite (1875) was the first French-language survey of Vietnamese history, and he also produced the first French-Vietnamese dictionary.
Further Reading
Bang Giang. (1993) Suong Mu Tren Tac Pham Truong Vinh Ky (Haze over the Works of Truong Vinh Ky). Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam: Nha Xuat Ban Van Hoc.
Durand, Maurice, and Tran Huan Nguyen. (1985) An Introduction to Vietnamese Literature. Trans. by D. M. Hawke. New York: Columbia University Press.
Osborne, Milton. (1969) The French Presence in Cochinchina and Cambodia: Rule and Response (1859–1905). Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Truong Vinh Ky (1875) Cours D'histoire Annamite. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam: Imprimerie du Gouvernement.
Xuan Thu Khong. (1958) Truong Vinh Ky, 1837–1898. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam: Tan Viet.
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