thơ

• (Hà Nội) IPA^(key): [tʰəː˧˧]
• (Huế) IPA^(key): [tʰəː˧˧]
• (Hồ Chí Minh City) IPA^(key): [tʰəː˧˧]

• Audio (Hà Nội)

  (file)

Likely from Middle Chinese 初 (MC t͡ʃʰɨʌ). Doublet of sơ.

Examples of doublets with ‹s-› and ‹th-› initials are:

• SV readings Sái and Thái from Middle Chinese 蔡 (MC t͡sʰɑiH);
• sỏ and thủ, both meaning "head" and from Middle Chinese 首 (MC ɕɨuX), the former being an early borrowing, the latter a late borrowing;
• sao and Northeastern thao "star", sông and Northeastern thông "river" (as ancestral cluster *C-r typically yielded ‹th-› in Northeastern dialects (e.g. as spoken by Gin people in Guangxi) and ‹s-› elsewhere);
• sẹo and thẹo "scar", sèm and thèm "crave", etc.

thơ • (𦭟, 𡮲)

1. young, tender

Non-Sino-Vietnamese reading of Chinese 詩 (“poem”, SV: thi).

thơ

1. poetry

   Synonym: thơ ca

   thơ Đường ― Tang poetry

(classifier bài) thơ

1. a poem

(classifier bức) thơ

1. (obsolete) Southern Vietnam form of thư (“letter”)