Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are
Chinese characters
Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanji ...
() used in the writing of
Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
. Hanja was used as early as the
Gojoseon
Gojoseon () also called Joseon (), was the first kingdom on the Korean Peninsula. According to Korean mythology, the kingdom was established by the legendary founder named Dangun. Gojoseon possessed the most advanced culture in the Korean P ...
period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to
Sino-Korean vocabulary, which can be written with Hanja, and (, ) refers to
Classical Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
writing, although "Hanja" is also sometimes used to encompass both concepts. Because Hanja never underwent any major reforms, they are mostly resemble to ''
kyūjitai
''Kyūjitai'' ( ja, 舊字體 / 旧字体, lit=old character forms) are the traditional forms of kanji, Chinese written characters used in Japanese. Their simplified counterparts are ''shinjitai'' ( ja, 新字体, lit=new character forms, lab ...
'' and
traditional Chinese characters
Traditional Chinese characters are one type of standard Chinese character sets of the contemporary written Chinese. The traditional characters had taken shapes since the clerical change and mostly remained in the same structure they took ...
, although the
stroke orders for some characters are slightly different. For example, the characters and as well as and . Only a small number of Hanja characters were modified or are unique to Korean, with the rest being identical to the
traditional Chinese characters
Traditional Chinese characters are one type of standard Chinese character sets of the contemporary written Chinese. The traditional characters had taken shapes since the clerical change and mostly remained in the same structure they took ...
. By contrast, many of the Chinese characters currently in use in
mainland China
"Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...
,
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
and
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
have been
simplified, and contain fewer strokes than the corresponding Hanja characters. In
Japan, simplified forms of Chinese characters known as ''
shinjitai
are the simplified forms of kanji used in Japan since the promulgation of the Tōyō Kanji List in 1946. Some of the new forms found in ''shinjitai'' are also found in Simplified Chinese characters, but ''shinjitai'' is generally not as extensiv ...
'' were also enacted, but are not as extensive. During the 1970s, Singapore had also briefly enacted its
own simplification campaign, but eventually adopted the standard simplification of mainland China to avoid confusion.
Although a phonetic
Hangul
The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul, . Hangul may also be written as following South Korea's standard Romanization. ( ) in South Korea and Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea, is the modern official writing system for the Korean language. The le ...
, also known as Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea, had been created by
Sejong the Great in 1446 through the promulgation of the
Hunminjeongeum
''Hunminjeong'eum'' () is a document describing an entirely new and native script for the Korean language. The script was initially named after the publication but later came to be known as hangul. Originally containing 28 characters, it was c ...
, it did not come into widespread official use until the late 19th and early 20th century.
Thus, until that time it was necessary to be fluent in reading and writing Hanja to be literate in Korean, as Korean documents, history, literature and records throughout its history until the contemporary period were written primarily in
Literary Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
using Hanja as its primary script. Therefore, a good working knowledge of Chinese characters is still important for anyone who wishes to interpret and study older texts from Korea, or anyone who wishes to read scholarly texts in the humanities. A high proficiency in Hanja is also useful for understanding the
etymology
Etymology ()The New Oxford Dictionary of English (1998) – p. 633 "Etymology /ˌɛtɪˈmɒlədʒi/ the study of the class in words and the way their meanings have changed throughout time". is the study of the history of the Phonological chan ...
of Sino-Korean words as well as to enlarge one's Korean vocabulary.
Hanja were once used to write native Korean words, in a variety of systems collectively known as ''
idu'', but by the 20th century Koreans used hanja only for writing Sino-Korean words, while writing native vocabulary and
loanword
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because t ...
s from other languages in Hangul. By the 21st century, even Sino-Korean words are written in the Hangul alphabet most of the time, with the corresponding Chinese character sometimes written next to it to prevent confusion if there are other characters or words with the same Hangul spelling. According to the ''
Standard Korean Language Dictionary
''Standard Korean Language Dictionary'' () is a dictionary of the Korean language, published by the National Institute of Korean Language.
History
The compilation of Standard Korean Language Dictionary was commenced on 1 January 1992, by The ...
'' published by the
National Institute of Korean Language
The National Institute of Korean Language is a language regulator of the Korean language. It was created on January 23, 1991, by Presidential Decree No. 13163 (November 14, 1990). It is based in Seoul, South Korea
South Korea, official ...
(NIKL), approximately half (50%) of Korean words are Sino-Korean, mostly in academic fields (science, government, and society). Other dictionaries, such as the ''Urimal Keun Sajeon'', claim this number might be as low as roughly 30%.
History
''Hanja: Hanmun''
![Chusa-Silsa_gusijang](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/Chusa-Silsa_gusijang.jpg)
There is no traditionally accepted date for when
literary Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
() written in
Chinese characters
Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanji ...
() entered Korea. Early Chinese dynastic histories, the only sources for very early Korea, do not mention a Korean writing system. During the 3rd century BC, Chinese migrations into the peninsula occurred due to war in northern China and the earliest archaeological evidence of Chinese writing are dated to this period. A large number of inscribed
knife money
Knife money is the name of large, cast, bronze, knife-shaped commodity money produced by various governments and kingdoms in what is now China, approximately 2500 years ago. Knife money circulated in China between 600 and 200 B.C. during the Zh ...
from pre--
Lelang
The Lelang Commandery was a commandery of the Han dynasty established after it had conquered Wiman Joseon in 108 BC and lasted until Goguryeo conquered it in 313. The Lelang Commandery extended the rule of the Four Commanderies of Han as far so ...
sites along the
Yalu River
The Yalu River, known by Koreans as the Amrok River or Amnok River, is a river on the border between North Korea and China. Together with the Tumen River to its east, and a small portion of Paektu Mountain, the Yalu forms the border between ...
have been found. A sword dated to 222 BC with Chinese engraving was unearthed in
Pyongyang
Pyongyang (, , ) is the capital and largest city of North Korea, where it is known as the "Capital of the Revolution". Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River about upstream from its mouth on the Yellow Sea. According to the 2008 populat ...
.
From 108 BC to 313 AD, the
Han dynasty
The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warr ...
established the
Four Commanderies of Han
The Four Commanderies of Han (; ) were Chinese commanderies located in the north of the Korean Peninsula and part of the Liaodong Peninsula from around the end of the second century BC through the early 4th AD, for the longest lasting. The comma ...
in northern Korea and institutionalized the Chinese language.
[Taylor, I. & Taylor, M. M. (2014). '' Writing and Literacy in Chinese, Korean and Japanese: Revised Edition.'' (pp. 172-174.) Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins North America. p]
172
/ref> According to the ''Samguk Sagi
''Samguk Sagi'' (, ''History of the Three Kingdoms'') is a historical record of the Three Kingdoms of Korea: Goguryeo, Baekje and Silla. The ''Samguk Sagi'' is written in Classical Chinese, the written language of the literati of ancient Korea, ...
'', Goguryeo
Goguryeo (37 BC–668 AD) ( ) also called Goryeo (), was a Korean kingdom located in the northern and central parts of the Korean Peninsula and the southern and central parts of Northeast China. At its peak of power, Goguryeo controlled mos ...
() had ''hanmun'' from the beginning of its existence, which starts in 37 BC. It also says that the king of Goguryeo composed a poem in 17 BC. The Gwanggaeto Stele
The Gwanggaeto Stele is a memorial stele for the tomb of Gwanggaeto the Great of Goguryeo, erected in 414 by his son Jangsu. This monument to Gwanggaeto the Great is the largest engraved stele in the world. It stands near the tomb of Gwanggaeto ...
, dated to 414, is the earliest securely dated relic bearing ''hanmun'' inscriptions. ''Hanmun'' became commonplace in Goguryeo during the 5th and 6th centuries and according to the ''Book of Zhou
The ''Book of Zhou'' (''Zhōu Shū'') records the official history of the Xianbei-led Western Wei and Northern Zhou dynasties of China, and ranks among the official Twenty-Four Histories of imperial China. Compiled by the Tang dynasty histori ...
'', the Chinese classics were available in Goguryeo by the end of the 6th century. The ''Samguk Sagi'' mentions written records in Baekje
Baekje or Paekche (, ) was a Korean kingdom located in southwestern Korea from 18 BC to 660 AD. It was one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, together with Goguryeo and Silla.
Baekje was founded by Onjo, the third son of Goguryeo's founder Jum ...
() beginning in 375 and Goguryeo annals prior to 600. Japanese chronicles mention Baekje people as teachers of ''hanmun''. According to the ''Book of Liang
The ''Book of Liang'' (''Liáng Shū''), was compiled under Yao Silian and completed in 635. Yao heavily relied on an original manuscript by his father Yao Cha, which has not independently survived, although Yao Cha's comments are quoted in seve ...
'', the people of Silla
Silla or Shilla (57 BCE – 935 CE) ( , Old Korean: Syera, Old Japanese: Siraki2) was a Korean kingdom located on the southern and central parts of the Korean Peninsula. Silla, along with Baekje and Goguryeo, formed the Three Kingdoms ...
() did not have writing in the first half of the 6th century but this may have been only referring to agreements and contracts, represented by notches on wood. The '' Bei Shi'', covering the period 386-618, says that the writing, armour, and weapons in Silla were the same as those in China. The ''Samguk Sagi'' says that records were kept in Silla starting in 545.
Some western writers claimed that knowledge of Chinese entered Korea with the spread of Buddhism, which occurred around the 4th century. Traditionally Buddhism is believed to have been introduced to Goguryeo in 372, Baekje in 384, and Silla in 527.
Another major factor in the adoption of ''hanmun'' was the adoption of the ''gwageo'' (), copied from the Chinese imperial examination
The imperial examination (; lit. "subject recommendation") refers to a civil-service examination system in Imperial China, administered for the purpose of selecting candidates for the state bureaucracy. The concept of choosing bureaucrats by ...
, open to all freeborn men. Special schools were set up for the well-to-do and the nobility across Korea to train new scholar officials for civil service. Adopted by Silla and Goryeo, the ''gwageo'' system was maintained by Goryeo after the unification of Korea until the end of the nineteenth century. The scholarly élite began learning the ''hanja'' by memorising the ''Thousand Character Classic
The ''Thousand Character Classic'' (), also known as the ''Thousand Character Text'', is a Chinese poem that has been used as a primer for teaching Chinese characters to children from the sixth century onward. It contains exactly one thousand ...
'' (), ''Three Character Classic
The ''Three Character Classic'' (), commonly known as ''San Zi Jing'', also translated as ''Trimetric Classic'', is one of the Chinese classic texts. It was probably written in the 13th century and is mainly attributed to Wang Yinglin (王應麟 ...
'' () and ''Hundred Family Surnames
The ''Hundred Family Surnames'' (), commonly known as ''Bai Jia Xing'', also translated as ''Hundreds of Chinese Surnames'', is a classic Chinese text composed of common Chinese surnames. An unknown author compiled the book during the Song dy ...
'' (). Passage of the ''gwageo'' required the thorough ability to read, interpret and compose passages of works such as the '' Analects'' ((), '' Great Learning'' (), ''Doctrine of the Mean
The ''Doctrine of the Mean'' or ''Zhongyong'' is one of the Four Books of classical Chinese philosophy and a central doctrine of Confucianism. The text is attributed to Zisi (Kong Ji), the only grandson of Confucius (Kong Zi). It was originall ...
'' (), '' Mencius'' (), ''Classic of Poetry
The ''Classic of Poetry'', also ''Shijing'' or ''Shih-ching'', translated variously as the ''Book of Songs'', ''Book of Odes'', or simply known as the ''Odes'' or ''Poetry'' (; ''Shī''), is the oldest existing collection of Chinese poetry, c ...
'' (), '' Book of Documents'' (), ''Classic of Changes
The ''I Ching'' or ''Yi Jing'' (, ), usually translated ''Book of Changes'' or ''Classic of Changes'', is an ancient Chinese divination text that is among the oldest of the Chinese classics. Originally a divination manual in the Western Zhou ...
'' (), ''Spring and Autumn Annals
The ''Spring and Autumn Annals'' () is an ancient Chinese chronicle that has been one of the core Chinese classics since ancient times. The ''Annals'' is the official chronicle of the State of Lu, and covers a 241-year period from 722 to 48 ...
'' () and ''Book of Rites
The ''Book of Rites'', also known as the ''Liji'', is a collection of texts describing the social forms, administration, and ceremonial rites of the Zhou dynasty as they were understood in the Warring States and the early Han periods. The ''Book ...
'' (). Other important works include '' Sūnzǐ's Art of War'' () and '' Selections of Refined Literature'' ().
The Korean scholars were very proficient in literary Chinese. The craftsmen and scholars of Baekje
Baekje or Paekche (, ) was a Korean kingdom located in southwestern Korea from 18 BC to 660 AD. It was one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, together with Goguryeo and Silla.
Baekje was founded by Onjo, the third son of Goguryeo's founder Jum ...
were renowned in Japan, and were eagerly sought as teachers due to their proficiency in ''hanmun''. Korean scholars also composed all diplomatic records, government records, scientific writings, religious literature and much poetry in ''hanmun'', demonstrating that the Korean scholars were not just reading Chinese works but were actively composing their own. Well-known examples of Chinese-language literature in Korea include '' Three Kingdoms History'' (), ''Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms
''Samguk yusa'' () or ''Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms'' is a collection of legends, folktales and historical accounts relating to the Three Kingdoms of Korea (Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla), as well as to other periods and states before, duri ...
'' (), '' New Stories of the Golden Turtle'' (), ''The Cloud Dream of the Nine
''The Cloud Dream of the Nine'' (Hangul: 구운몽, Hanja: 九雲夢) by Kim Man-jung is a 17th-century Korean novel set in the Chinese Tang Dynasty (although there have been some arguments about whether Kim was the original author ). It has been ...
'' (), '' Musical Canon'' (), '' The Story of Hong Gildong'' () and '' Licking One's Lips at the Butcher's Door'' ().
Adaptation of ''hanja'' to Korean
The Chinese language, however, was quite different from the Korean language, consisting of terse, often monosyllabic words with a strictly analytic, SVO structure in stark contrast to the generally polysyllabic, very synthetic, SOV structure, with various grammatical endings that encoded person, levels of politeness and case. Despite the adoption of literary Chinese as the written language, Chinese never replaced Korean as the spoken language, even amongst the scholars that had immersed themselves into its study.
The first attempts to make literary Chinese texts more accessible to Korean readers were ''hanmun'' passages written in Korean word order. This would later develop into the ''gugyeol
Gugyeol, also ''kwukyel'', is a system for rendering texts written in Classical Chinese into understandable Korean. It was chiefly used during the Joseon Dynasty, when readings of the Chinese classics were of paramount social importance. Thus ...
'' () or 'separated phrases,' system. Chinese texts were broken into meaningful blocks, and in the spaces were inserted ''hanja'' used to represent the sound of native Korean grammatical endings. As literary Chinese was very terse, leaving much to be understood from context, insertion of occasional verbs and grammatical markers helped to clarify the meaning. For instance, the ''hanja'' '' was used for its native Korean gloss whereas '' was used for its Sino-Korean pronunciation, and combined into '' and read ''hani'' (), 'to do (and so).' Special symbols were sometimes used to aid in the reordering of words in approximation of Korean grammar. It was similar to the ''kanbun
A is a form of Classical Chinese used in Japan from the Nara period to the mid-20th century. Much of Japanese literature was written in this style and it was the general writing style for official and intellectual works throughout the period. ...
'' () system developed in Japan to render Chinese texts. The system was not a translation of Chinese into Korean, but an attempt to make Korean speakers knowledgeable in ''hanja'' overcome the difficulties in interpreting Chinese texts. Although it was developed by scholars of the early Goryeo
Goryeo (; ) was a Korean kingdom founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korean Peninsula until 1392. Goryeo achieved what has been called a "true national unificat ...
Kingdom (918 - 1392), ''gugyeol'' was of particular importance during the Joseon period, extending into the first decade of the twentieth century, since all civil servants were required to be able to read, translate and interpret Confucian texts and commentaries.[Nam, P. (1994). 'On the Relations between Hyangchal and Kwukyel' in ''The Theoretical Issues in Korean Linguistics''. Kim-Renaud, Y. (ed.) (pp. 419-424.) Stanford, CA: Leland Stanford University Press.]
The first attempt at transcribing Korean in ''hanja'' was the '' idu'' (), or 'official reading,' system that began to appear after 500 AD. In this system, the ''hanja'' were chosen for their equivalent native Korean gloss. For example, the ''hanja'' '' signifies 'no winter' or 'not winter' and has the formal Sino-Korean pronunciation of () ''budong'', similar to Mandarin
Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to:
Language
* Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country
** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China
** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...
''bù dōng''. Instead, it was read as ''andeul'' () which is the Middle Korean pronunciation of the characters' native gloss and is ancestor to modern ''anneunda'' (), 'do not' or 'does not.' The various ''idu'' conventions were developed in the Goryeo period but was particularly associated with the '' jung-in'' (), the upper middle class
The middle class refers to a class of people in the middle of a social hierarchy, often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status. The term has historically been associated with modernity, capitalism and political debate. Com ...
of the early Joseon period.[Hannas, W. C. (1997). ''Asia's Orthographic Dilemma''. O`ahu, HI: University of Hawai`i Press. pp. 55-64.]
A subset of ''idu'' was known as ''hyangchal
''Hyangchal'' (, literally "vernacular letters", "local letters", or "corresponded sound") is an archaic writing system of Korea and was used to transcribe the Korean language in Chinese characters. Using the ''hyangchal'' system, Chinese chara ...
'' (), 'village notes,' and was a form of ''idu'' particularly associated with the ''hyangga
''Hyangga'' () were poems written using Chinese characters in a system known as '' hyangchal'' during the Unified Silla and early Goryeo periods of Korean history. Only a few have survived: 14 in the ''Samguk yusa'' and 11 by the monk Kyunyeo.
...
'' () the old poetry compilations and some new creations preserved in the first half of the Goryeo period when its popularity began to wane. In the ''hyangchal'' or 'village letters' system, there was free choice in how a particular ''hanja'' was used. For example, to indicate the topic of Princess Shenhua, the half-sister of Emperor Jiajing
Jiajing () (28 January 1522 – 8 February 1567) was the era name of the Jiajing Emperor, the 12th emperor of the Ming dynasty of China.
Comparison table
Other eras contemporaneous with Jiajing
* China
** ''Tianyuan'' (天淵, 1546): Ming peri ...
of the Ming Dynasty was recorded as '' in ''hyangchal'' and was read as (), ''seonhwa gongju-nim-eun'' where '' is read in Sino-Korean, as it is a Chinese name and the Sino-Korean term for 'princess' was already adopted as a loan word. The ''hanja'' ',' however, were read according to their native pronunciation but was not used for its literal meaning signifying 'the prince steals' but the native postpositions () ''nim'', the honorific marker used after professions and titles, and ''eun'', the topic marker. In mixed script, this would be rendered as '.' The ''idu'' and its ''hyangchal'' variant were similar to the Japanese '' man'yogana'' () system that would develop much later in Japan. ''Idu'' and its ''hyangchal'' variant were mostly replaced by mixed-script writing with ''hangul'' although ''idu'' was not officially discontinued until 1894 when reforms abolished its usage in administrative records of civil servants. Even with ''idu'', most literature and official records were still recorded in literary Chinese until 1910.
Decline of Hanja
The foremost problem at the centre of this debate is the use of Hanja. Mixed script was a commonly used means of writing, although Hangŭl exclusive writing has been used concurrently, in Korea after the decline of literary Chinese, known as ''hanmun'' (Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
: 한문; Hanja
Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
: 漢文). Mixed script could be commonly found in non-fiction writing, news papers, etc. until the enacting of Park Chung-hee's 5 Year Plan for Hangŭl Exclusivity ''hangŭl jŏnyong ogaenyŏn gyehuik an'' (Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
: 한글전용 5개년 계획안; Hanja
Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
: 한글專用 5個年 計劃案) in 1968 banned the use and teaching of Hanja in public schools, as well as forbade its use in the military, with the goal of completely eliminating Hanja in writing by 1972 through legislative and executive means. However, due to public backlash, in 1972 Park's government allowed for the teaching of Hanja in special classes but maintained a ban on Hanja use in textbooks and other learning materials outside of the classes. This reverse step however, was optional so the availability of Hanja education was dependent on the school one went to. Park's Hanja ban was not formally lifted until 1992 under the government of Kim Young-Sam. In 1999 the government of Kim Dae-Jung actively promoted Hanja by placing it on signs on the road, at bus stops, and in subways. In 1999 Han Mun was reintroduced as a school elective and in 2001 the Hanja Proficiency Test ''hanja nŭngryŏk gŏmjŏng sihŏm'' (Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
: 한자능력검정시험; Hanja
Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
: 漢字能力檢定試驗) was introduced. In 2005 an older law, the Law Concerning Hangul Exclusivity ''hangŭl jŏnyonge gwahak pŏmnyul'' (Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
: 한글전용에 관한 법률; Hanja
Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
: 한글專用에 關한 法律) was repealed as well. In 2013 all elementary schools in Seoul started teaching Hanja. However, the result is that Koreans who were educated in this period having never been formally educated in Hanja are unable to use them and thus the use of Hanja has plummeted in orthography until the modern day. Where Hanja is now very rarely used and is almost only used for abbreviations in newspaper headlines (e.g. 中 for China, 韓 for Korea, 美 for the United States, 日 for Japan, etc.), for clarification in text where a word might be confused for another due to homophones (e.g. 이사장(李 社長) vs. 이사장(理事長)), or for stylistic use such as the 辛 (Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
: 신라면; Hanja
Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom.
(, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, ...
: 辛拉麵) used on Shin Ramyŏn packaging.
A major motivation for the introduction of Chinese character
Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanj ...
s into Korea
Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...
was the spread of Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religions, Indian religion or Indian philosophy#Buddhist philosophy, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha. ...
. The major Chinese text that introduced Hanja to Koreans, however, was not a religious text but the Chinese text ''Cheonjamun'' (; ''Thousand Character Classic'').
Although Koreans had to learn Classical Chinese
Classical Chinese, also known as Literary Chinese (古文 ''gǔwén'' "ancient text", or 文言 ''wényán'' "text speak", meaning
"literary language/speech"; modern vernacular: 文言文 ''wényánwén'' "text speak text", meaning
"literar ...
to be properly literate for the most part, some additional systems were developed which used simplified forms of Chinese characters that phonetic
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. ...
ally transcribe Korean, including hyangchal
''Hyangchal'' (, literally "vernacular letters", "local letters", or "corresponded sound") is an archaic writing system of Korea and was used to transcribe the Korean language in Chinese characters. Using the ''hyangchal'' system, Chinese chara ...
(), gugyeol
Gugyeol, also ''kwukyel'', is a system for rendering texts written in Classical Chinese into understandable Korean. It was chiefly used during the Joseon Dynasty, when readings of the Chinese classics were of paramount social importance. Thus ...
(), and idu ().
One way of adapting Hanja to write Korean in such systems (such as Gugyeol) was to represent native Korean grammatical particles and other words solely according to their pronunciation. For example, Gugyeol uses the characters to transcribe the Korean word "hăni", which in modern Korean means "does, and so". In Chinese, however, the same characters are read in Mandarin as the expression "wéi ní", meaning "becoming a nun". This is a typical example of Gugyeol words where the radical () is read in Korean for its meaning (hă—"to do"), whereas the suffix , ni (meaning "nun"), is used phonetically.
Hanja were the sole means of writing Korean until King Sejong the Great invented and promoted Hangul in the 15th century. Even after the invention of Hangul, however, most Korean scholars continued to write in ''hanmun'', although Hangul did see considerable popular use.
Hangul effectively replaced Hanja in official and scholarly writing only in the 20th century. Since June 1949, Hanja have not officially been used in North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...
, and, in addition, most texts are now most commonly written horizontally instead of vertically. Many words borrowed from Chinese have also been replaced in the North with native Korean words. Nevertheless, a large number of Chinese-borrowed words are still widely used in the North (although written in Hangul), and Hanja still appear in special contexts, such as recent North Korean dictionaries. The replacement has been less total in South Korea where, although usage has declined over time, some Hanja remain in common usage in some contexts.
Character formation
Each Hanja is composed of one of 214 radicals plus in most cases one or more additional elements. The vast majority of Hanja use the additional elements to indicate the sound of the character, but a few Hanja are purely pictographic, and some were formed in other ways.
The historical use of Hanja in Korea has had a change over time. Hanja became prominent in use by the elite class between the 3rd and 4th centuries by the Three Kingdoms. The use came from Chinese that migrated into Korea. With them they brought the writing system Hanja. Thus the hanja being used came from the characters already being used by the Chinese at the time.
Since Hanja was primarily used by the elite and scholars, it was hard for others to learn, thus much character development was limited. Scholars in the 4th century used this to study and write Confucian classics. Character formation is also coined to the Idu form which was a Buddhist writing system for Chinese characters. This practice however was limited due to the opinion of Buddhism whether it was favorable at the time or not.
''Eumhun''
To aid in understanding the meaning of a character, or to describe it orally to distinguish it from other characters with the same pronunciation, character dictionaries and school textbooks refer to each character with a combination of its sound and a word indicating its meaning. This dual meaning-sound reading of a character is called ''eumhun'' (; from "sound" + "meaning," "teaching").
The word or words used to denote the meaning are often—though hardly always—words of native Korean (i.e., non-Chinese) origin, and are sometimes archaic words no longer commonly used.
Education
South
South Korean primary schools ceased the teaching of Hanja in elementary schools in the 1970s, although they are still taught as part of the mandatory curriculum in grade 6. They are taught in separate courses in South Korean high schools, separately from the normal Korean-language curriculum. Formal Hanja education begins in grade 7 (junior high school) and continues until graduation from senior high school in grade 12.
A total of 1,800 Hanja are taught: 900 for junior high, and 900 for senior high (starting in grade 10). Post-secondary Hanja education continues in some liberal-arts universities
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, ...
. The 1972 promulgation of basic Hanja for educational purposes changed on December 31, 2000, to replace 44 Hanja with 44 others.
South Korea's Ministry of Education
An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...
generally encourages all primary schools to offer Hanja classes. Officials said that learning Chinese characters could enhance students' Korean-language proficiency. Initially announced as a mandatory requirement, it is now considered optional.
North
Though North Korea rapidly abandoned the general use of Hanja soon after independence, the number of Hanja taught in primary and secondary schools is actually greater than the 1,800 taught in South Korea. Kim Il-sung
Kim Il-sung (; , ; born Kim Song-ju, ; 15 April 1912 – 8 July 1994) was a North Korean politician and the founder of North Korea, which he ruled from the country's establishment in 1948 until his death in 1994. He held the posts of ...
had earlier called for a gradual elimination of the use of Hanja, but by the 1960s, he had reversed his stance; he was quoted as saying in 1966, "While we should use as few Sinitic terms as possible, students must be exposed to the necessary Chinese characters and taught how to write them."[Hannas 1997: 67]
As a result, a Chinese-character textbook was designed for North Korean schools for use in grades 5–9, teaching 1,500 characters, with another 500 for high school students. College students are exposed to another 1,000, bringing the total to 3,000.
Uses
Because many different Hanja—and thus, many different words written using Hanja—often share the same sounds, two distinct Hanja words (''Hanjaeo'') may be spelled identically in the phonetic
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. ...
Hangul alphabet
An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a syllab ...
. Hanja's language of origin, Chinese, has many homophones, and Hanja words became even more homophonic when they came into Korean, since Korean lacks a tonal system
The tonal system is a base 16 system of notation (predating the widespread use of hexadecimal in computing), arithmetic, and metrology proposed in 1859 by John W. Nystrom.Nystrom, John W.''Project of a New System of Arithmetic, Weight, Measur ...
, which is how Chinese distinguishes many words that would otherwise be homophonic. For example, while , , and are all phonetically distinct in Mandarin (pronounced ''dào'', ''dāo'', and ''dǎo'' respectively), they are all pronounced ''do'' (도) in Korean. For this reason, Hanja are often used to clarify meaning, either on their own without the equivalent Hangul spelling or in parentheses after the Hangul spelling as a kind of gloss. Hanja are often also used as a form of shorthand in newspaper headlines, advertisements, and on signs, for example the banner at the funeral for the sailors
A sailor, seaman, mariner, or seafarer is a person who works aboard a watercraft as part of its crew, and may work in any one of a number of different fields that are related to the operation and maintenance of a ship.
The profession of the s ...
lost in the sinking of ROKS Cheonan (PCC-772)
ROKS ''Cheonan'' (PCC-772) was a of the Republic of Korea Navy (ROKN), commissioned in 1989. On 26 March 2010, she broke in two and sank near the sea border with North Korea, killing 46 sailors. An investigation conducted by an internatio ...
.
Print media
In South Korea, Hanja are used most frequently in ancient literature, legal documents, and scholarly monographs, where they often appear without the equivalent Hangul spelling. Usually, only those words with a specialized or ambiguous meaning are printed in Hanja. In mass-circulation books and magazines, Hanja are generally used rarely, and only to gloss words already spelled in Hangul when the meaning is ambiguous. Hanja are also often used in newspaper headlines as abbreviations or to eliminate ambiguity.
In formal publications, personal names are also usually glossed in Hanja in parentheses next to the Hangul. Aside from academic usage, Hanja are often used for advertising or decorative purposes in South Korea, and appear frequently in athletic events and cultural parades, packaging and labeling, dictionaries and atlas
An atlas is a collection of maps; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a region of Earth.
Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geograp ...
es. For example, the Hanja (''sin'' or ''shin'', meaning spicy) appears prominently on packages of Shin Ramyun
Shin Ramyun is a brand of instant noodle (including cup ramyeon) that has been produced by the South Korean food company Nongshim since 1 October 1986. It is now exported to over 100 countries, and is the best-selling instant noodle brand in S ...
noodles. In contrast, North Korea eliminated the use of Hanja even in academic publications by 1949 on the orders of Kim Il-sung
Kim Il-sung (; , ; born Kim Song-ju, ; 15 April 1912 – 8 July 1994) was a North Korean politician and the founder of North Korea, which he ruled from the country's establishment in 1948 until his death in 1994. He held the posts of ...
, a situation that has since remained unchanged.
Dictionaries
In modern Korean dictionaries, all entry words of Sino-Korean origin are printed in Hangul and listed in Hangul order, with the Hanja given in parentheses immediately following the entry word.
This practice helps to eliminate ambiguity, and it also serves as a sort of shorthand etymology, since the meaning of the Hanja and the fact that the word is composed of Hanja often help to illustrate the word's origin.
As an example of how Hanja can help to clear up ambiguity, many homophones can be distinguished by using hanja. An example is the word (sudo), which may have meanings such as:
# : spiritual discipline
# : prisoner
# : "city of water" (e.g. Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...
or Suzhou)
# : paddy rice
A paddy field is a flooded field of arable land used for growing semiaquatic crops, most notably rice and taro. It originates from the Neolithic rice-farming cultures of the Yangtze River basin in southern China, associated with pre-Aus ...
# : drain, rivers, path of surface water
# : tunnel
A tunnel is an underground passageway, dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, and enclosed except for the entrance and exit, commonly at each end. A pipeline is not a tunnel, though some recent tunnels have used immersed tube cons ...
# : capital (city)
# : hand knife
Hanja dictionaries for specialist usage – ''Jajeon'' () or ''Okpyeon'' () – are organized by radical (the traditional Chinese method of classifying characters).
Personal names
Korean personal names, including all Korean surnames
This is a list of Korean surnames, in Hangul alphabetical order. Note: (S) denotes South Korea. (N) denotes North Korea.
The most common Korean family name (particularly in South Korea) is Kim, followed by Lee and Park. These three family na ...
and most Korean given names
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
, are based on Hanja and are generally written in it, although some exceptions exist. On business cards, the use of Hanja is slowly fading away, with most older people displaying their names exclusively in Hanja while most of the younger generation using both Hangul and Hanja. Korean personal names usually consist of a one-character family name (''seong'', ) followed by a two-character given name (''ireum'', ). There are a few two-character family names (e.g. , Namgung), and the holders of such names—but not only them—tend to have one-syllable given names. Traditionally, the given name in turn consists of one character unique to the individual and one character shared by all people in a family of the same sex and generation (see Generation name
Generation name (variously zibei or banci in Chinese; tự bối, ban thứ or tên thế hệ in Vietnamese; hangnyeolja in Korea) is one of the characters in a traditional Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean given name, and is so called because ea ...
).
During the Japanese administration of Korea (1910–1945), Koreans were forced to adopt Japanese-style names, including polysyllabic readings of the Hanja, but this practice was reversed by post-independence governments in Korea. Since the 1970s, some parents have given their children given names
A given name (also known as a forename or first name) is the part of a personal name quoted in that identifies a person, potentially with a middle name as well, and differentiates that person from the other members of a group (typically a f ...
that are simply native Korean words. Popular ones include ''Haneul''—meaning "sky"—and ''Iseul''—meaning "morning dew". Nevertheless, on official documents, people's names are still recorded in both Hangul and in Hanja.
Toponymy
Due to standardization efforts during Goryeo
Goryeo (; ) was a Korean kingdom founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korean Peninsula until 1392. Goryeo achieved what has been called a "true national unificat ...
and Joseon eras, native Korean placenames
Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of ''toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...
were converted to Hanja, and most names used today are Hanja-based. The most notable exception is the name of the capital, Seoul
Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 of ...
, a native Korean word meaning "capital" with no direct Hanja conversion; the Hanja ''gyeong'' (, "capital") is sometimes used as a back-rendering. For example, disyllabic names of railway lines, freeways, and provinces are often formed by taking one character from each of the two locales' names; thus,
* The Gyeongbu
The name Gyeongbu refers to the Seoul-Busan corridor in South Korea. It is used as the name of the Gyeongbu railway line and Gyeongbu Expressway, both of which connect Seoul—the South Korean capital and largest city—to Busan—t ...
() corridor connects Seoul (''gyeong'', ) and Busan
Busan (), officially known as is South Korea's most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.4 million inhabitants. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economic, cultural and educational center of southeastern South Korea, ...
(''bu'', );
* The Gyeongin
The name Gyeongin refers to the Seoul- Incheon corridor in South Korea, and is used as a name for the Gyeongin railway line, the Gyeongin Expressway, and the Gyeongin Canal (which was completed in 2011 and is now called the Arabaetgil Canal), al ...
() corridor connects Seoul and Incheon (''in'', );
* The former Jeolla
Jeolla Province (, ) was one of the historical Eight Provinces of Korea during the Kingdom of Joseon in today Southwestern Korea. It consisted of the modern South Korean provinces of North Jeolla, South Jeolla and Gwangju Metropolitan City as w ...
() Province took its name from the first characters in the city names Jeonju
Jeonju () is the 16th largest city in South Korea and the capital of North Jeolla Province. It is both urban and rural due to the closeness of Wanju County which almost entirely surrounds Jeonju (Wanju County has many residents who work in Jeonj ...
() and Naju
Naju () is a city in South Jeolla Province, South Korea.
The capital of South Jeolla was located at Naju until it was moved to Gwangju in 1895. The name Jeolla actually originates from the first character of Jeonju () and the first character of Na ...
() ("Naju" is originally "Raju," but the initial "r/l" sound in South Korean is simplified to "n").
Most atlases of Korea today are published in two versions: one in Hangul (sometimes with some English as well), and one in Hanja. Subway and railway station signs give the station's name in Hangul, Hanja, and English, both to assist visitors (including Chinese or Japanese who may rely on the Hanja spellings) and to disambiguate the name.
Academia
Hanja are still required for certain disciplines in academia, such as Oriental Studies and other disciplines studying Chinese, Japanese or historic Korean literature and culture, since the vast majority of primary source text material are written in Hanzi, Kanji
are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese ...
or Hanja.
Art and culture
For the traditional creative arts such as calligraphy and painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...
, a knowledge of Hanja is needed to write and understand the various scripts and inscriptions, as is the same in China and Japan. Many old songs and poems are written and based on Hanja characters.
On 9 September 2003, the celebration for the 55th anniversary of North Korea appeared a float decorated with the situation of North Korean people welcomes Kim Il-Sung
Kim Il-sung (; , ; born Kim Song-ju, ; 15 April 1912 – 8 July 1994) was a North Korean politician and the founder of North Korea, which he ruled from the country's establishment in 1948 until his death in 1994. He held the posts of ...
, which including a banner with Kim Il-Sung's name written with Hanja.
Popular usage
Opinion surveys in South Korea regarding the issue of Hanja use have had mixed responses in the past. Hanja terms are also expressed through Hangul, the standard script in the Korean language. Hanja use within general Korean literature has declined since the 1980s because formal Hanja education in South Korea does not begin until the seventh year of schooling, due to changes in government policy during the time.
In 1956, one study found mixed-script Korean text (in which Sino-Korean nouns are written using Hanja, and other words using Hangul) were read faster than texts written purely in Hangul; however, by 1977, the situation had reversed. In 1988, 65% of one sample of people without a college education "evinced no reading comprehension of any but the most common hanja" when reading mixed-script passages.
Gukja
A small number of characters were invented by the Koreans themselves. These characters are called ''gukja'' (, literally "national characters"). Most of them are for proper names (place-names and people's names) but some refer to Korean-specific concepts and materials. They include (; ''dap''; "paddy field"), (; ''jang'', "wardrobe"), (; ''Dol'', a character only used in given names), (; ''So'', a rare surname from Seongju
Seongju County (''Seongju-gun'') is a county in North Gyeongsang Province, South Korea. This largely agricultural area is located immediately west of the metropolitan city of Daegu. The capital of the county is the town of Seongju.
Lotte Skyhill ...
), and (; ''Gi'', an old name referring to Kumgangsan
Mount Kumgang () or the Kumgang Mountains is a mountain massif, with a peak, in Kangwon-do, North Korea. It is located on the east coast of the country, in Mount Kumgang Tourist Region, formerly part of Kangwŏn Province, and is part of ...
).
Further examples include ( ''bu''), ( ''tal''), ( ''pyeon''), ( ''ppun''), and ( ''myeong''). Se
Korean gukja characters at Wiktionary
for more examples.
Compare to the parallel development in Japan of , of which there are hundreds, many rarely used—these were often developed for native Japanese plants and animals.
Yakja
Some Hanja characters have simplified forms (, ''yakja'') that can be seen in casual use. An example is
, which is a cursive form of (meaning "nothing").
Pronunciation
Each Hanja character is pronounced as a single syllable, corresponding to a single composite character in Hangul. The pronunciation
Pronunciation is the way in which a word or a language is spoken. This may refer to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds used in speaking a given word or language in a specific dialect ("correct pronunciation") or simply the way a particular ...
of Hanja in Korean is by no means identical to the way they are pronounced in modern Chinese, particularly Mandarin
Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to:
Language
* Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country
** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China
** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...
, although some Chinese dialects and Korean share similar pronunciations for some characters. For example, "print" is ''yìnshuā'' in Mandarin Chinese and ''inswae'' () in Korean, but it is pronounced ''insah'' in Shanghainese (a Wu Chinese
The Wu languages (; Wu romanization and IPA: ''wu6 gniu6'' [] ( Shanghainese), ''ng2 gniu6'' [] (Suzhounese), Mandarin pinyin and IPA: ''Wúyǔ'' []) is a major group of Sinitic languages spoken primarily in Shanghai, Zhejiang, Zhejiang Provin ...
dialect).
One difference is the loss of tone from standard Korean while most Chinese dialects retain tone. In other aspects, the pronunciation of Hanja is more conservative than most northern and central Chinese dialects, for example in the retention of labial consonant
Labial consonants are consonants in which one or both lips are the active articulator. The two common labial articulations are bilabials, articulated using both lips, and labiodentals, articulated with the lower lip against the upper teeth, bot ...
codas in characters with labial consonant
Labial consonants are consonants in which one or both lips are the active articulator. The two common labial articulations are bilabials, articulated using both lips, and labiodentals, articulated with the lower lip against the upper teeth, bot ...
onset
Onset may refer to:
*Onset (audio), the beginning of a musical note or sound
*Onset, Massachusetts
Onset is a census-designated place (CDP) in the town of Wareham, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 1,573 at the 2010 census.
Geog ...
s, such as the characters ( ''beop'') and ( ''beom''); labial
The term ''labial'' originates from '' Labium'' (Latin for "lip"), and is the adjective that describes anything of or related to lips, such as lip-like structures. Thus, it may refer to:
* the lips
** In linguistics, a labial consonant
** In zoolog ...
codas existed in Middle Chinese
Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese recorded in the '' Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expanded editions. The ...
but do not survive intact in most northern and central Chinese varieties today, and even in many southern Chinese varieties that still retain labial codas, including Cantonese
Cantonese ( zh, t=廣東話, s=广东话, first=t, cy=Gwóngdūng wá) is a language within the Chinese (Sinitic) branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages originating from the city of Guangzhou (historically known as Canton) and its surrounding ar ...
and Hokkien
The Hokkien () variety of Chinese is a Southern Min language native to and originating from the Minnan region, where it is widely spoken in the south-eastern part of Fujian in southeastern mainland China. It is one of the national languages ...
, labial codas in characters with labial onsets are replaced by their dental counterparts.
Due to divergence in pronunciation since the time of borrowing, sometimes the pronunciation of a Hanja and its corresponding hanzi may differ considerably. For example, ("woman") is ''nǚ'' in Mandarin Chinese and ''nyeo'' () in Korean. However, in most modern Korean dialects
The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena:
One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a ...
(especially South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
n ones), is pronounced as ''yeo'' () when used in an initial position, due to a systematic elision of initial ''n'' when followed by ''y'' or ''i''. Additionally, sometimes a Hanja-derived word will have altered pronunciation of a character to reflect Korean pronunciation shifts, for example, mogwa "quince" from mokgwa , and moran "Paeonia suffruticosa" from mokdan .
There are some pronunciation correspondence between the onset, rhyme, and coda between Cantonese
Cantonese ( zh, t=廣東話, s=广东话, first=t, cy=Gwóngdūng wá) is a language within the Chinese (Sinitic) branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages originating from the city of Guangzhou (historically known as Canton) and its surrounding ar ...
and Korean.[Patrick Chun Kau Chu. (2008)]
Onset, Rhyme and Coda Corresponding Rules of the Sino-Korean Characters between Cantonese and Korean
Paper presented at the 5th Postgraduate Research Forum on Linguistics (PRFL), Hong Kong, China, March 15–16.
When learning how to write Hanja, students are taught to memorize the native Korean pronunciation for the Hanja's meaning and the Sino-Korean pronunciations (the pronunciation based on the Chinese pronunciation of the characters) for each Hanja respectively so that students know what the syllable and meaning is for a particular Hanja. For example, the name for the Hanja is (mul-su) in which (mul) is the native Korean pronunciation for "water", while (su) is the Sino-Korean pronunciation of the character. The naming of Hanja is similar to if "water", "horse" and "gold" were named "water-aqua", "horse-equus", or "gold-aurum" based on a hybridization of both the English and the Latin names. Other examples include (saram-in) for "person/people", (keul-dae) for "big/large/great", (jageul-so) for "small/little", (arae-ha) for "underneath/below/low", (abi-bu) for "father", and (naraireum-han) for "Han/Korea".
See also
* Chinese characters
Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as ''kanji ...
* Chinese influence on Korean culture
* Chinese-language literature of Korea
Hanmunhak or Literary Chinese literature in Korea (Hangul: 한문학 Hanja: 漢文學) is Korean literature written in Literary Chinese, which represents an early phase of Korean literature and influenced the literature written in the Korean lang ...
* East Asian cultural sphere
The East Asian cultural sphere, also known as the Sinosphere, the Sinic world, the Sinitic world, the Chinese cultural sphere, the Chinese character sphere encompasses multiple countries in East Asia and Southeast Asia that were historically ...
* Kanji
are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese ...
– Japanese equivalent of Chinese characters
* McCune–Reischauer
* New Korean Orthography
* Revised Romanization of Korean
* Yale romanization of Korean
The Yale romanization of Korean was developed by Samuel Elmo Martin and his colleagues at Yale University about half a decade after McCune–Reischauer. It is the standard romanization of the Korean language in linguistics.
The Yale system pla ...
References
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
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Chinese characters
East Asian culture
East Asia
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Korean writing system
Logographic writing systems
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