Tonkin

name

name ·2 syllables ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A surname transferred from the given name.
  2. 2
    Synonym of Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam. archaic
  3. 3
    A former kingdom in northern Vietnam. historical
  4. 4
    A former protectorate in northern Vietnam, a colony of France. historical
  5. 5
    Ellipsis of the Gulf of Tonkin: a gulf in northern Vietnam. abbreviation, alt-of, ellipsis
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  1. 6
    Ellipsis of Gulf of Tonkin incident, a 1964 event used to increase US involvement in the Vietnamese Civil War. abbreviation, alt-of, ellipsis

Synonyms

All synonyms
hanoitongking

Etymology

Etymology 1

From a medieval diminutive form of the given name Thomas.

Etymology 2

From French Tonkin, from Vietnamese Đông Kinh (“Hanoi; its former kingdom”), from đông (“east, eastern”) + kinh (“capital”), from Middle Chinese 東京 (tuwng kjaeng), q.v.

Related phrases

Gulf of TonkinTonkin pit viper

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.