Clarifying the Names ‘Mekong’ and ‘Cửu Long’ River

Abstract

Based on an analysis of nineteenth-century documentary sources, this article clarifies the origin of the Vietnamese name Mê Kông and examines the etyma of its constituent elements, me and kong. The study demonstrates that official documents of the Nguyễn dynasty did not record the name Mê Kông, but referred to the river as Khung Giang. Furthermore, neither the Nguyễn court nor Trịnh Hoài Đức assigned the name Cửu Long to the Mekong River in southern Vietnam. Rather, the name Cửu Long was coined by inhabitants of the Mekong Delta to denote the nine distributaries through which the Mekong flows into the Biển Đông. This naming practice was likely inspired by the local usage of Cửu Long for the section of the Lancang River in Yunnan, as mentioned in the Gia Định thành thông chí.