General names
The following is based on analysis of dictionaries and other sources. Comments and corrections are welcome.
Note on Vietnamese naming: With the exception of ducks and chickens, it is common for Vietnamese bird names to be preceded by the word Chim meaning 'bird', although it is normally omitted in Vietnamese bird lists. All bird names, whether they include chim or not, can be preceded by the classifier con, which is used for living creatures.
Members of the Phasianidae in Vietnam include the pheasants, partridges, quails, francolin, tragopans, and peafowl. The Phasianidae are important sources of game and domesticated birds. The world's domestic fowl are descended from the Red Jungle Fowl, a member of this family.
Many Vietnamese members of the Phasianidae are called Gà, which we rather genteelly gloss as 'fowl' but is also the usual term for the domestic chicken (con gà). There are several time-honoured names used for the pheasants. Gà lôi is the name of the Silver Pheasant and similar pheasants. Literally this could be interpreted as 'thunder-fowl/chicken' or 'thunder-fowl/chicken', although the old Chu Nom script evolved a separate character (
) to disambiguate the bird from 'thunder' (雷).
Gà gô is used for the Chinese Francolin. Gà so is used for various partridges, especially the Mountain Bamboo Partridge. Gà tiền ('coin fowl/chicken', possibly referring to the bird's ocelli) is used for the peacock pheasants.
Apart from names using Gà, Vietnamese has several other names for members of the Phasianidae.
The Chinese Francolin is also known as Chim đa đa.
The quails are normally known as Chim cun cút or Chim cút. Some dictionaries also list Chim giải as a word for 'quail'. Naturalists, on the other hand, use Cay.
The Common Pheasant is known as Chim trĩ, from Chinese 雉 .
The Peacock is known as Chim công or Chim cuông, possibly related to Chinese 孔 (as in 孔雀 'peacock').
In naming the Phasianidae, Vietnamese naturalists assign names as follows:
| Vietnamese name | Genera | |
| 1. Those using Gà | Gà gô or Đa đa | Francolin (Francolinus) |
| Gà so (unmarked refers to Bambusicola fytchii) | Hill Partridges (Arborophila) Bamboo Partridges (Bambusicola) |
|
| Gà lôi 'thunder-fowl/chicken' |
Tragopans (Tragopan) Pheasants (Lophura) |
|
| Gà lừng | Vo Quy's Pheasant (Lophura hatinhensis) | |
| Gà rừng 'forest fowl/chicken' |
Red Jungle Fowl (Gallus) | |
| Gà tiền 'coin fowl/chicken' |
Peacock Pheasants (Polyplectron) | |
| 2. Other | Cay | Quails (Coturnix) |
| Trĩ | Common Pheasant (Phasianus) Argus (Rheinhardtia) |
|
| Công or Cuông | Peacock (Pavo) |
The most interesting of these names is Cay, a word not found in normal Vietnamese dictionaries in the meaning 'quail'. It is possibly a borrowing from French 'caille', although it could be related to the adjective cay meaning 'hot and peppery'. Naturalists appear to have adopted Cay for the quails because they assign the common word for 'quail', Cun cút, to the button quails (Turnicidae).
Chữ NômCharacters used for phasianids in the now obsolete Chu Nom characters include:
| Name | Chu Nom Images from the Vietnamese Nôm Preservation Foundation dictionary. (Errors are the sole responsibility of the author of this site) |
| Gà gô |   ;  |
| Đa đa |  ;  (Chinese character) |
| Gà lôi | |
| Gà rừng |  |
| Trĩ |  (Chinese character) |
Species names
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