Tongking, TONQUIN, or TONKIN, since 1884 a French possession, is the north-east portion of the Indo-Chinese peninsula (see map at BURMA), bordering on China. The name has been used for various areas in this region. The various usages of the word, its physical geography, ethnography, and history are described at ANNAM, of which country it is naturally part. As is there mentioned, the main feature of the country is the Song-coi or Red River (variously spelt Song-koi, Sang-koi, &c.), coming from Yunnan, and traversing the whole of Tonquin lengthwise. The area is 34,700 sq. m.; the pop. was estimated in 1891 at 9,000,000. The capital is Hanoi (q.v.). The chief produce is rice, silk, sugar, pepper, oil, cotton, tobacco, and fruits, with some copper and iron; and companies are now working coal and antimony mines at one or two places on the coast, especially near the chief port of Haiphong. The imports in 1890-98 had an annual value of 30,000,000 francs (one-third only from France), the exports of 14,000,000 francs (only a small fraction to France). The French scheme of tapping the resources of Yunnan by means of the Song-coi has proved impracticable, the navigation of the upper course being very difficult and at times impossible. The unpopularity of the Tongking expedition, and the tediousness of the war it led to, brought about the fall of Jules Ferry (q.v.), nicknamed 'le Tonkinois.'
See C. R. Norman, Tonkin; or, France in the Far East (1884); J. G. Scott, France and Tongking (1885).