Nguyễn

Nguyễn (; sometimes abbreviated as Ng̃) is the most common surname among Vietnamese people. Outside of Vietnam, the surname is commonly rendered without diacritics as Nguyen. By some estimates 30 to 39 percent of Vietnamese people bear this surname.

==Origin and usage== is the transcription of the Sino-Vietnamese pronunciation of the character 阮, which originally was used to write a name of a state in Gansu or ruan, an ancient Chinese instrument. The same Chinese character is often romanized as in Mandarin and as in Cantonese. thumb The first recorded mention of a person surnamed Nguyễn is a description dating AD 317, of a journey to Jiaozhou undertaken by Eastern Jin dynasty officer Nguyễn Phu and his family. Many events in Vietnamese history have contributed to the name's prominence. In 1232, after usurping the Lý dynasty, Trần Thủ Độ forced the descendants of the Lý to change their surname to Nguyễn. When Hồ Quý Ly overturned the Trần dynasty, he killed many of their descendants so when the Hồ dynasty collapsed in 1407, many of his descendants changed their surname to Nguyễn in fear of retribution. In 1592, on the collapse of the Mạc dynasty, their descendants changed their surname to Nguyễn. In late 16th century, the Tư Mã clan from Thanh Hóa changed to Nguyễn and settled in Cochinchina. When the Nguyễn dynasty (the descendants of the Nguyễn Lords) took power in 1802, some of the descendants of the Trịnh Lords fearing retribution changed their surname to Nguyễn, while others fled north into China.thumb|A Vietnamese stele from 1699 during the Lê dynasty, recording the names of those to inherit the duty of ancestral worship and clan rituals. A majority of the people listed have the surname Nguyễn.