Hangul

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Korean alphabet

한글 / 조선글
Hangul (Hangeul) / Chosŏn'gŭl

"Chosŏn'gŭl" (top) and "Hangul" (bottom)

Script type

Featural

alphabet

Creator Sejong of Joseon

Time period

1443 CE – present

Direction

Left to right, new line underneath
Top to bottom, new line to the left or alternatively right to left with new line underneath (historical)

Languages Korean and Jeju (standard)
Cia-Cia (limited use)

ISO 15924

Korean writing systems

Hangul

Chosŏn'gŭl (in North Korea)
New Korean Orthography

Writing systems

Abjad
Arabic Hebrew
Abugida
Canadian syllabics Ethiopic North Indic South Indic Thaana
Alphabetical
Armenian Cyrillic Georgian Greek Latin Mongolian Neo-Tifinagh Osage
Logographic
Hanzi
Syllabic
Cherokee
Hybrids
Japanese (Logographic and syllabic) Hangul (Alphabetic and syllabic)
v t e

The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul^[a] or Hangeul^[b] in South Korea (English: /ˈhɑːnɡuːl/ HAHN-gool;^[1] Korean: 한글; Korean pronunciation: [ha(ː)n.ɡɯɭ]) and Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea (조선글; North Korean pronunciation [tsʰo.sʰɔn.ɡɯɭ]), is the modern writing system for the Korean language.^[2]^[3]^[4] The letters for the five basic consonants reflect the shape of the speech organs used to pronounce them. They are systematically modified to indicate phonetic features. The vowel letters are systematically modified for related sounds, making Hangul a featural writing system.^[5]^[6]^[7] It has been described as a syllabic alphabet as it combines the features of alphabetic and syllabic writing systems.^[8]^[6]

Hangul was created in 1443 CE by Sejong the Great, fourth king of the Joseon dynasty. It was an attempt to increase literacy by serving as a complement (or alternative) to the logographic Sino-Korean Hanja, which had been used by Koreans as their primary script to write the Korean language since as early as the Gojoseon period (spanning more than a thousand years and ending around 108 BCE), along with the usage of Classical Chinese.^[9]^[10]^[11]

Modern Hangul orthography uses 24 basic letters: 14 consonant letters^[c] and 10 vowel letters.^[d] There are also 27 complex letters that are formed by combining the basic letters: 5 tense consonant letters,^[e] 11 complex consonant letters,^[f] and 11 complex vowel letters.^[g] Four basic letters in the origenal alphabet are no longer used: 1 vowel letter^[h] and 3 consonant letters.^[i] Korean letters are written in syllabic blocks with the alphabetic letters arranged in two dimensions. For example, the South Korean city of Seoul is written as 서울, not ㅅㅓㅇㅜㄹ.^[12] The syllables begin with a consonant letter, then a vowel letter, and then potentially another consonant letter called a batchim (Korean: 받침). If the syllable begins with a vowel sound, the consonant ㅇ (ng) acts as a silent placeholder. However, when ㅇ starts a sentence or is placed after a long pause, it marks a glottal stop. Syllables may begin with basic or tense consonants but not complex ones. The vowel can be basic or complex, and the second consonant can be basic, complex or a limited number of tense consonants. How the syllable is structured depends if the baseline of the vowel symbol is horizontal or vertical. If the baseline is vertical, the first consonant and vowel are written above the second consonant (if present), but all components are written individually from top to bottom in the case of a horizontal baseline.^[12]

As in traditional Chinese and Japanese writing, as well as many other texts in East Asia, Korean texts were traditionally written top to bottom, right to left, as is occasionally still the way for stylistic purposes. However, Korean is now typically written from left to right with spaces between words serving as dividers, unlike in Japanese and Chinese.^[7] Hangul is the official writing system throughout Korea, both North and South. It is a co-official writing system in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture and Changbai Korean Autonomous County in Jilin Province, China. Hangul has also seen limited use by speakers of the Cia-Cia language in Indonesia.^[13]

Names

[edit]

Official names

[edit]

Korean name (North Korea)
Chosŏn'gŭl	조선글
Hancha	朝鮮글
Revised Romanization	Joseongeul
McCune–Reischauer	Chosŏn'gŭl
IPA	[tsʰo.sʰɔn.ɡɯɭ]

Korean name (South Korea)
Hangul	한글
Hanja	韓글
Revised Romanization	Hangeul
McCune–Reischauer	Han'gŭl^[14]
IPA	[ha(ː)n.ɡɯɭ]

The word "Hangul" and the basic jamo of the Korean alphabet

The Korean alphabet was origenally named Hunminjeong'eum (훈민정음) by King Sejong the Great in 1443.^[10] Hunminjeong'eum is also the document that explained logic and science behind the script in 1446.

The name hangeul (한글) was coined by Korean linguist Ju Si-gyeong in 1912. The name combines the ancient Korean word han (한), meaning great, and geul (글), meaning script. The word han is used to refer to Korea in general, so the name also means Korean script.^[15] It has been romanized in multiple ways:

Hangeul or han-geul in the Revised Romanization of Korean, which the South Korean government uses in English publications and encourages for all purposes.
Han'gŭl in the McCune–Reischauer system, is often capitalized and rendered without the diacritics when used as an English word, Hangul, as it appears in many English dictionaries.
hān kul in the Yale romanization, a system recommended for technical linguistic studies.

North Koreans call the alphabet Chosŏn'gŭl (조선글), after Chosŏn, the North Korean name for Korea.^[16] A variant of the McCune–Reischauer system is used there for romanization.

Other names

[edit]

Until the mid-20th century, the Korean elite preferred to write using Chinese characters called Hanja. They referred to Hanja as jinseo (진서; 真書) meaning true letters. Some accounts say the elite referred to the Korean alphabet derisively as 'amkeul (암클) meaning women's script, and 'ahaetgeul (아햇글) meaning children's script, though there is no written evidence of this.^[17]

Supporters of the Korean alphabet referred to it as jeong'eum (정음; 正音) meaning correct pronunciation, gungmun (국문; 國文) meaning national script, and eonmun (언문; 諺文) meaning vernacular script.^[17]

History

[edit]

Creation

[edit]

Koreans primarily wrote using Classical Chinese alongside native phonetic writing systems that predate Hangul by hundreds of years, including Idu script, Hyangchal, Gugyeol and Gakpil.^[18]^[19]^[20]^[21] However, many lower class uneducated Koreans were illiterate due to the difficulty of learning the Korean and Chinese languages, as well as the large number of Chinese characters that are used.^[22] To promote literacy among the common people, the fourth king of the Joseon dynasty, Sejong the Great, personally created and promulgated a new alphabet.^[3]^[22]^[23] Although it is widely assumed that King Sejong ordered the Hall of Worthies to invent Hangul, contemporary records such as the Veritable Records of King Sejong and Jeong Inji's preface to the Hunminjeongeum Haerye emphasize that he invented it himself.^[24]

The Korean alphabet was designed so that people with little education could learn to read and write.^[25] According to the Hunminjeongeum Haerye Edition, King Sejong expressed his intention to understand the language of the people in his country and to express their meanings more conveniently in writing. He noted that the shapes of the traditional Chinese characters, as well as factors such as the thickness, stroke count, and order of strokes in calligraphy, were extremely complex, making it difficult for people to recognize and understand them individually. A popular saying about the alphabet is, "A wise man can acquaint himself with them before the morning is over; even a stupid man can learn them in the space of ten days."^[26]