Le (surname)

Le is a romanization of several rare East Asian surnames and a common Vietnamese surname.

It is a fairly common surname in the United States, ranked 975th during the 1990 census and 368th during the 2000 census.^[1] In 2000, it was the eighth-most-common surname among America's Asian and Pacific Islander population,^[2] predominantly from its Vietnamese use.^[3] It was also reported among the top 200 surnames in Ontario, Canada, based on a survey of that province's Registered Persons Database of Canadian health card recipients as of the year 2000.^[4]

Origins of surname

Vietnamese

Lê is a common Vietnamese surname (third most common), written 黎 in Chữ Hán. It is pronounced /le˧˧/ in the Hanoi dialect and /lej˧˧/ in the Saigon dialect. It is usually pronounced /liː/ in English, with it being commonly mistaken for another surname, with similar spelling and pronunciation in English, Lý.

Chinese

Mandarin

Le is the Pinyin romanization of the Chinese surname (written 乐 in Simplified Chinese characters and 樂 in Traditional Chinese characters); it is Lok in Cantonese.

Minnan

Lê or Le is the POJ romanization of the Chinese surname Li (黎, Lí)

People with the surname

Vietnamese

Lê Anterior Lê dynasty The Lê dynasty Lê Công Vinh, football player Lê Hoàn, founding emperor of the Anterior Lê dynasty Dinh Q Lê Lê Duẩn Lê Đức Anh Dowager Empress Gia Từ, originally of the Lê clan of Vĩnh Lộc District Lê Hằng Phấn Lê Huỳnh Đức, football player Lê Khả Phiêu Lê Lâm Quỳnh Như, Vietnamese-American singer known as Như Quỳnh Lê Lợi, founding emperor of the Lê dynasty Nguyên Lê Lê Minh Đảo Lê Nhân Tông Lê Quan Ninh, French percussionist Lê Quang Liêm, chess player Lê Quang Tung, commander of ARVN Special Forces Lê Quý Đôn Lê Văn Duyệt, general of Gia Long and viceroy of southern Vietnam Lê Văn Hưng Lê Văn Khôi, adopted son of Le Van Duyet Lê Văn Thiêm Lê Thái Tông, second emperor of the Lê dynasty Lê Thánh Tông, fifth emperor of the Lê dynasty Lê Tuấn Hùng Lê Long Đĩnh, the last emperor of the Anterior Lê dynasty

Le Annie Le Cung Le (born 1972), Vietnamese-born American martial artist Duy-Loan Le Hoang Le Linda Le, Vietnamese-American cosplayer and model Michelle Le Minh Le Tony Le-Nguyen Thuy Thu Le Tuan Le Danny "Shiphtur" Le, Canadian League of Legends player

Chinese

• Le Jingyi, a former swimmer from China who won the gold medal in the 100 meters freestyle at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, USA

Other

• Nhi Le (born 1995) German journalist, speaker, discussion moderator and author.

See also

• Le (disambiguation)
• Lí (黎)
• Lee (Korean surname)

References

1. US Census Bureau. Op. cit. Public Broadcasting Service. "How Popular Is Your Last Name? Archived 2015-11-27 at the Wayback Machine" Accessed 6 Apr 2012.
2. "Genealogy Data: Frequently Occurring Surnames from Census 2000". 27 Sep 2011. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |url= (help)
3. Lauderdale, Diane S.; et al. (2000). "Asian American ethnic identification by surname" (PDF). Population Research and Policy Review. 19 (3): 283–300. doi:10.1023/A:1026582308352. S2CID 151050659. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-01-02.
4. Shah, B. R.; Chiu, M.; Amin, S.; Ramani, M.; Sadry, S.; Tu, J. V. (2010). "Surname lists to identify South Asian and Chinese ethnicity from secondary data in Ontario, Canada: A validation study". BMC Medical Research Methodology. 10: 42. doi:10.1186/1471-2288-10-42. PMC 2877682. PMID 20470433.