"Bà Nà" meaning in Vietnamese

See Bà Nà in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Proper name

IPA: [ʔɓaː˨˩ naː˨˩] [Hà-Nội], [ʔɓaː˦˩ naː˦˩] [Huế], [ʔɓaː˨˩ naː˨˩] (note: Saigon)
Etymology: Uncertain. The French used to name the mountain as Banane because of a lot of banana trees in this mountain. Over time, Vietnamese people started to pronounce Banane to Bà Nà. The writer Nguyên Ngọc suggested that the name is derived from a Katu phrase, meaning "my mountain" (some of the documents translate as "my house"). However, Katu-Vietnamese dictionaries define "mountain" as kakoong, "my" as ớng aku ("of" as ớng, "I" as aku). Both of these words are not pronounced the same as "Bà Nà". The third proposed etymology is that the name is from the name of the goddess Thiên Y A Na or Lady Po Nagar. "Bà Nà" is a variant of "Po Nagar", but it is unknown why the element -gar would be dropped. Nowadays, people call the goddess as Bà Chúa Ngọc, some people call her Bà Na. It is unlikely that the tone from Na to Nà in the name could be confused. Another etymology said to be a compound of Bà (“spirit”) + Nà. The element nà is attested in Đại Nam quấc âm tự vị with the meaning "mountain gorge" (vực núi) (> đất nà (“land on mountain slope”)). However, the spirits usually use the pronoun Ông (e.g. Ông Hổ, Cá Ông, etc.), not Bà. Etymology templates: {{unc|vi}} Uncertain, {{com|vi|bà|alt1=Bà|alt2=Nà|t1=spirit}} Bà (“spirit”) + Nà Head templates: {{head|vi|proper noun|head=|tr=}} Bà Nà, {{vi-proper noun}} Bà Nà
  1. name of a mountain that is the part of Annamite Range
    Sense id: en-Bà_Nà-vi-name-MGl~af7J
  2. a commune of Da Nang, Vietnam Categories (place): Municipalities of Vietnam, Places in Da Nang, Places in Vietnam
    Sense id: en-Bà_Nà-vi-name-lEQi13x- Categories (other): Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Vietnamese entries with incorrect language header Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 4 96 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 3 97 Disambiguation of Vietnamese entries with incorrect language header: 12 88
{
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      },
      "expansion": "Uncertain",
      "name": "unc"
    },
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      "args": {
        "1": "vi",
        "2": "bà",
        "alt1": "Bà",
        "alt2": "Nà",
        "t1": "spirit"
      },
      "expansion": "Bà (“spirit”) + Nà",
      "name": "com"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Uncertain.\nThe French used to name the mountain as Banane because of a lot of banana trees in this mountain. Over time, Vietnamese people started to pronounce Banane to Bà Nà.\nThe writer Nguyên Ngọc suggested that the name is derived from a Katu phrase, meaning \"my mountain\" (some of the documents translate as \"my house\"). However, Katu-Vietnamese dictionaries define \"mountain\" as kakoong, \"my\" as ớng aku (\"of\" as ớng, \"I\" as aku). Both of these words are not pronounced the same as \"Bà Nà\".\nThe third proposed etymology is that the name is from the name of the goddess Thiên Y A Na or Lady Po Nagar. \"Bà Nà\" is a variant of \"Po Nagar\", but it is unknown why the element -gar would be dropped. Nowadays, people call the goddess as Bà Chúa Ngọc, some people call her Bà Na. It is unlikely that the tone from Na to Nà in the name could be confused.\nAnother etymology said to be a compound of Bà (“spirit”) + Nà. The element nà is attested in Đại Nam quấc âm tự vị with the meaning \"mountain gorge\" (vực núi) (> đất nà (“land on mountain slope”)). However, the spirits usually use the pronoun Ông (e.g. Ông Hổ, Cá Ông, etc.), not Bà.",
  "head_templates": [
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      "args": {
        "1": "vi",
        "2": "proper noun",
        "head": "",
        "tr": ""
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      "expansion": "Bà Nà",
      "name": "head"
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    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "Bà Nà",
      "name": "vi-proper noun"
    }
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  "senses": [
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        "name of a mountain that is the part of Annamite Range"
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      "id": "en-Bà_Nà-vi-name-MGl~af7J",
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          "kind": "place",
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          "name": "Places in Da Nang",
          "orig": "vi:Places in Da Nang",
          "parents": [
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        {
          "kind": "place",
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          "parents": [],
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          "kind": "other",
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          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
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      "glosses": [
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      "ipa": "[ʔɓaː˨˩ naː˨˩]",
      "tags": [
        "Hà-Nội"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ipa": "[ʔɓaː˦˩ naː˦˩]",
      "tags": [
        "Huế"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ipa": "[ʔɓaː˨˩ naː˨˩]",
      "note": "Saigon"
    }
  ],
  "wikipedia": [
    "Lady Po Nagar",
    "Thiên Y A Na"
  ],
  "word": "Bà Nà"
}
{
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    "Vietnamese entries with incorrect language header",
    "Vietnamese lemmas",
    "Vietnamese proper nouns",
    "Vietnamese terms with IPA pronunciation",
    "Vietnamese terms with unknown etymologies"
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      "name": "unc"
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        "2": "bà",
        "alt1": "Bà",
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        "t1": "spirit"
      },
      "expansion": "Bà (“spirit”) + Nà",
      "name": "com"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Uncertain.\nThe French used to name the mountain as Banane because of a lot of banana trees in this mountain. Over time, Vietnamese people started to pronounce Banane to Bà Nà.\nThe writer Nguyên Ngọc suggested that the name is derived from a Katu phrase, meaning \"my mountain\" (some of the documents translate as \"my house\"). However, Katu-Vietnamese dictionaries define \"mountain\" as kakoong, \"my\" as ớng aku (\"of\" as ớng, \"I\" as aku). Both of these words are not pronounced the same as \"Bà Nà\".\nThe third proposed etymology is that the name is from the name of the goddess Thiên Y A Na or Lady Po Nagar. \"Bà Nà\" is a variant of \"Po Nagar\", but it is unknown why the element -gar would be dropped. Nowadays, people call the goddess as Bà Chúa Ngọc, some people call her Bà Na. It is unlikely that the tone from Na to Nà in the name could be confused.\nAnother etymology said to be a compound of Bà (“spirit”) + Nà. The element nà is attested in Đại Nam quấc âm tự vị with the meaning \"mountain gorge\" (vực núi) (> đất nà (“land on mountain slope”)). However, the spirits usually use the pronoun Ông (e.g. Ông Hổ, Cá Ông, etc.), not Bà.",
  "head_templates": [
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        "2": "proper noun",
        "head": "",
        "tr": ""
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      "expansion": "Bà Nà",
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      "args": {},
      "expansion": "Bà Nà",
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  ],
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        "name of a mountain that is the part of Annamite Range"
      ],
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      "categories": [
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    {
      "ipa": "[ʔɓaː˨˩ naː˨˩]",
      "tags": [
        "Hà-Nội"
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    {
      "ipa": "[ʔɓaː˦˩ naː˦˩]",
      "tags": [
        "Huế"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ipa": "[ʔɓaː˨˩ naː˨˩]",
      "note": "Saigon"
    }
  ],
  "wikipedia": [
    "Lady Po Nagar",
    "Thiên Y A Na"
  ],
  "word": "Bà Nà"
}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable Vietnamese dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-11-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-10-21 using wiktextract (4c3c609 and 24bdde4). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.