Hanja
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Hanja (; ), alternatively spelled Hancha, are
Chinese characters Chinese characters are logographs used Written Chinese, to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represe ...
used to write the
Korean language Korean is the first language, native language for about 81 million people, mostly of Koreans, Korean descent. It is the national language of both South Korea and North Korea. In the south, the language is known as () and in the north, it is kn ...
. After characters were introduced to Korea to write
Literary Chinese Classical Chinese is the language in which the classics of Chinese literature were written, from . For millennia thereafter, the written Chinese used in these works was imitated and iterated upon by scholars in a form now called Literary ...
, they were adapted to write Korean as early as the
Gojoseon Gojoseon (; ), contemporary name Joseon (; ), was the first kingdom on the Korea, Korean Peninsula. According to Korean mythology, the kingdom was established by the legendary king Dangun. Gojoseon possessed the most advanced culture in th ...
period. () refers to
Sino-Korean vocabulary Sino-Korean vocabulary or Hanja-eo () refers to Korean words of Chinese origin. Sino-Korean vocabulary includes words borrowed directly from Chinese, as well as new Korean words created from Chinese characters, and words borrowed from Sino-Japan ...
, which can be written with Hanja, and () refers to
Classical Chinese Classical Chinese is the language in which the classics of Chinese literature were written, from . For millennia thereafter, the written Chinese used in these works was imitated and iterated upon by scholars in a form now called Literary ...
writing, although ''Hanja'' is also sometimes used to encompass both concepts. Because Hanja characters have never undergone any major reforms, they more closely resemble
traditional Chinese A tradition is a system of beliefs or behaviors (folk custom) passed down within a group of people or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common examp ...
and traditional Japanese characters, although the stroke orders for certain characters are slightly different. Such examples are 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 a standard set of Chinese character forms used to written Chinese, write Chinese languages. In Taiwan, the set of traditional characters is regulated by the Ministry of Education (Taiwan), Ministry of Educat ...
. By contrast, many of the Chinese characters currently in use in
mainland China "Mainland China", also referred to as "the Chinese mainland", is a Geopolitics, geopolitical term defined as the territory under direct administration of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War. In addit ...
,
Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...
and
Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
have been simplified, and contain fewer strokes than the corresponding Hanja characters. Until the contemporary period, Korean documents, history, literature and records were written primarily in
Literary Chinese Classical Chinese is the language in which the classics of Chinese literature were written, from . For millennia thereafter, the written Chinese used in these works was imitated and iterated upon by scholars in a form now called Literary ...
using Hanja as its primary script. As early as 1446, King
Sejong the Great Sejong (; 15 May 1397 – 8 April 1450), commonly known as Sejong the Great (), was the fourth monarch of the Joseon, Joseon dynasty of Korea. He is regarded as the greatest ruler in Korean history, and is remembered as the inventor of Hangu ...
promulgated
Hangul The Korean alphabet is the modern writing system for the Korean language. In North Korea, the alphabet is known as (), and in South Korea, it is known as (). The letters for the five basic consonants reflect the shape of the speech organs ...
(also known as ChosÅn'gÅ­l in North Korea) through the '' Hunminjeongeum.'' It did not come into widespread official use until the late 19th and early 20th century. Proficiency in Chinese characters is, therefore, necessary to study Korean history.
Etymology Etymology ( ) is the study of the origin and evolution of words—including their constituent units of sound and meaning—across time. In the 21st century a subfield within linguistics, etymology has become a more rigorously scientific study. ...
of Sino-Korean words is reflected in Hanja. 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 a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...
s from other languages in Hangul, a system known as mixed script. By the 21st century, even Sino-Korean words are usually written in the Hangul alphabet, 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'' published by the
National Institute of Korean Language The National Institute of Korean Language (NIKL; ) is a language regulator of the Korean language based in Seoul, South Korea. It was created on January 23, 1991, by Presidential Decree No. 13163 (November 14, 1990). It has previously gone by a ...
(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


Introduction of literary Chinese to Korea

There is traditionally no accepted date for when
literary Chinese Classical Chinese is the language in which the classics of Chinese literature were written, from . For millennia thereafter, the written Chinese used in these works was imitated and iterated upon by scholars in a form now called Literary ...
() written in
Chinese characters Chinese characters are logographs used Written Chinese, to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represe ...
() 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 appearing in Korea is dated to this period. A large number of inscribed
knife money Knife money is the name of large, casting, 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. duri ...
from pre- Lelang sites along the
Yalu River The Yalu River () or Amnok River () is a river on the border between China and North Korea. Together with the Tumen River to its east, and a small portion of Paektu Mountain, the Yalu forms the border between China and North Korea. Its valle ...
have been found. A sword dated to 222 BC with Chinese engraving was unearthed in
Pyongyang Pyongyang () is the Capital city, capital and largest city of North Korea, where it is sometimes labeled as the "Capital of the Revolution" (). Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River about upstream from its mouth on the Yellow Sea. Accordi ...
. From 108 BC to 313 AD, the
Han dynasty The Han dynasty was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC9 AD, 25–220 AD) established by Liu Bang and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–206 BC ...
established the Four Commanderies of Han 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'' () is a historical record of the Three Kingdoms of Korea: Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla. Completed in 1145, it is well-known in Korea as the oldest surviving chronicle of Korean history. The ''Samguk sagi'' is written in Classical ...
'',
Goguryeo Goguryeo (37 BC – 668 AD) (; ; Old Korean: Guryeo) also later known as Goryeo (; ; Middle Korean: 고ᇢ롕〮, ''kwòwlyéy''), was a Korean kingdom which was located on the northern and central parts of the Korea, Korean Peninsula an ...
had ' 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, dated to 414, is the earliest securely dated relic bearing ' inscriptions. ' became commonplace in Goguryeo during the 5th and 6th centuries and according to the '' Book of Zhou'', 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 BCE to 660 CE. It was one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, together with Goguryeo and Silla. While the three kingdoms were in separate existence, Baekje had the h ...
beginning in 375 and Goguryeo annals prior to 600. Japanese chronicles mention Baekje people as teachers of '. According to the '' Book of Liang'', the people of
Silla Silla (; Old Korean: wikt:å¾ç¾…ä¼#Old Korean, å¾ç¾…ä¼, Yale romanization of Korean, Yale: Syerapel, Revised Romanization of Korean, RR: ''Seorabeol''; International Phonetic Alphabet, IPA: ) was a Korean kingdom that existed between ...
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 ' was the adoption of the , copied from the Chinese
imperial examination The imperial examination was a civil service examination system in History of China#Imperial China, Imperial China administered for the purpose of selecting candidates for the Civil service#China, state bureaucracy. The concept of choosing bureau ...
, 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 ' system was maintained by Goryeo until after the unification of Korea at the end of the nineteenth century. The scholarly elite began learning the ''hanja'' by memorizing 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 c ...
'' (), '' Three Character Classic'' () 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 language , Chinese text composed of common Chinese surnames. An unknown author compiled the book ...
'' (). Passage of the ' required the thorough ability to read, interpret and compose passages of works such as the ''
Analects The ''Analects'', also known as the ''Sayings of Confucius'', is an ancient Chinese philosophical text composed of sayings and ideas attributed to Confucius and his contemporaries, traditionally believed to have been compiled by his followers. ...
'' (), ''
Great Learning The ''Great Learning'' or ''Daxue'' was one of the " Four Books" in Confucianism attributed to one of Confucius' disciples, Zengzi. The ''Great Learning'' had come from a chapter in the '' Book of Rites'' which formed one of the Five Classi ...
'' (), ''
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 origina ...
'' (), ''
Mencius Mencius (å­Ÿå­, ''MèngzÇ'', ; ) was a Chinese Confucian philosopher, often described as the Second Sage () to reflect his traditional esteem relative to Confucius himself. He was part of Confucius's fourth generation of disciples, inheriting ...
'' (), ''
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, co ...
'' (), ''
Book of Documents The ''Book of Documents'' ( zh, p=Shūjīng, c=書經, w=Shu King) or the ''Classic of History'', is one of the Five Classics of ancient Chinese literature. It is a collection of rhetorical prose attributed to figures of ancient China, a ...
'' (), '' Classic of Changes'' (), ''
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 242-year period from 722 to 481&nbs ...
'' () 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 '' ...
'' (). Other important works include ''
the Art of War ''The Art of War'' is an ancient Chinese military treatise dating from the late Spring and Autumn period (roughly 5th century BC). The work, which is attributed to the ancient Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu ("Master Sun"), is compos ...
'' (), '' Selections of Refined Literature'' (), etc. 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 BCE to 660 CE. It was one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, together with Goguryeo and Silla. While the three kingdoms were in separate existence, Baekje had the h ...
were renowned in Japan, and were eagerly sought as teachers due to their proficiency in '. Korean scholars also composed all diplomatic records, government records, scientific writings, religious literature and much poetry in ', 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 ''
Samguk sagi ''Samguk sagi'' () is a historical record of the Three Kingdoms of Korea: Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla. Completed in 1145, it is well-known in Korea as the oldest surviving chronicle of Korean history. The ''Samguk sagi'' is written in Classical ...
'', ''
Samguk yusa ''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, d ...
'', '' Geumo Sinhwa'', '' The Cloud Dream of the Nine'', '' Akhak gwebeom'', '' Hong Gildong jeon'' and '' Domundaejak''.


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 found in Korean. Despite the adoption of literary Chinese as the written language, Chinese never replaced Korean as the spoken language, even amongst the scholars who had immersed themselves in its study. The first attempts to make literary Chinese texts more accessible to Korean readers were ' passages written in Korean word order. This would later develop into the ''
gugyeol Gugyeol, or kwukyel, is a system for rendering texts written in Classical Chinese into understandable Korean. It was used chiefly during the Joseon dynasty, when readings of the Chinese classics were of paramount social importance. Thus, i ...
'' () 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, the 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 (), 'to do (and so).' In Chinese, however, the same characters are read in Mandarin as the expression , meaning 'becoming a nun'. This is a typical example of Gugyeol words where the radical '' is read in Korean for its meaning (—'to do'), whereas the suffix '', (meaning 'nun'), is used phonetically. Special symbols were sometimes used to aid in the reordering of words in an approximation of Korean grammar. It was similar to the () 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'' to overcome the difficulties in interpreting Chinese texts. Although it was developed by scholars of the early
Goryeo Goryeo (; ) was a Korean state founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korea, Korean Peninsula until the establishment of Joseon in 1392. Goryeo achieved what has b ...
Kingdom (918–1392), 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 '' , 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 ...
. Instead, it was read as '' which is the Middle Korean pronunciation of the characters' native gloss and is the ancestor to modern '', 'do not' or 'does not.' The various conventions were developed in the Goryeo period but were particularly associated with the '' jung-in'' (), the upper middle class 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 ' was known as '' hyangchal'' (), 'village notes,' and was a form of ' 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'' (late 6th to 9th centuries) and ...
'' () 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 or 'village letters' system, there was free choice in how a particular ''hanja'' was used. For example, to indicate the topic of Princess Seonhwa, a daughter of King Jinpyeong of Silla was recorded as '' in ' and was read as (), ''seonhwa gongju-nim-eun'' where '' is read in Sino-Korean, as it is a Sino-Korean name and the Sino-Korean term for 'princess' was already adopted as a loan word. The ''hanja'' ',' however, was read according to their native pronunciation but was not used for its literal meaning signifying 'the prince steals' but to the native postpositions '' , the honorific marker used after professions and titles, and '' , the topic marker. In mixed script, this would be rendered as ''. Hanja was the sole means of writing Korean until King
Sejong the Great Sejong (; 15 May 1397 – 8 April 1450), commonly known as Sejong the Great (), was the fourth monarch of the Joseon, Joseon dynasty of Korea. He is regarded as the greatest ruler in Korean history, and is remembered as the inventor of Hangu ...
invented and tried to promote
Hangul The Korean alphabet is the modern writing system for the Korean language. In North Korea, the alphabet is known as (), and in South Korea, it is known as (). The letters for the five basic consonants reflect the shape of the speech organs ...
in the 15th century. Even after the invention of Hangul, however, most Korean scholars continued to write in ', although Hangul did see considerable popular use. ' and its ' variant were mostly replaced by mixed-script writing with ''hangul'' although ' was not officially discontinued until 1894 when reforms abolished its usage in administrative records of civil servants. Even with ', most literature and official records were still recorded in literary Chinese until 1910.


Decline of Hanja

The Hangul-Hanja mixed script was a commonly used means of writing, and Hangul effectively replaced Hanja in official and scholarly writing only in the 20th century. HangÅ­l exclusive writing has been used concurrently in Korea after the decline of literary Chinese. The Mixed script could be commonly found in non-fiction writing, newspapers, etc., until the enacting of President
Park Chung Hee Park Chung Hee (; ; November14, 1917October26, 1979) was a South Korean politician and army officer who served as the third president of South Korea from 1962 after he seized power in the May 16 coup of 1961 until Assassination of Park Chung ...
's 5-Year Plan for Hangul Exclusivity () in 1968 banned the use and teaching of Hanja in public schools, as well as forbade its use in the military, to eliminate 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. Another reason for the decline is found in the Hangul typewriter, and the keyboard. The push for better Hangul typewriters mainly began in 1949, but as it was long before the Hanja ban, government institutions did not prefer typewriters altogether as they could not write in Hanja nor Mixed script. Kong Byung Wo's notable ''Sebeolsik'' type first appeared in March 1949, jointly winning second place in the ''Joseon Balmyong Jangryohoe'''s () Hangul type contest, and Kim Dong Hoon's typewriter winning joint 3rd. During the 50s and 60s, alongside the Korean government's support for typewriting, new Hangul typewriters were developed, distributed, and adopted. Hangul type with both horizontal writing and ''moa-sseugi'' (모아쓰기; the style of Hangul where Hangul consonants and vowels mix in together to form a full letter, which is the default style being used today) first appeared in the same period as government policy. With further adoption, during the 1970s, even when Hanja and mixed script were still used widely in society both as a writing system and as a style option, Koreans mostly gave up on mixed script at least in government documents and memorandums; The use of Hanja in type hindered the speed of writing and printing compared to only-Hangul usage, especially after the advent of the ''Sebeolsik layout'' (). 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 Kim Dae-jung (, ; 6 January 192418 August 2009) was a South Korean politician, activist and statesman who served as the eighth president of South Korea from 1998 to 2003. Kim entered politics as a member of the new wing of the Democratic Pa ...
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 () was introduced. In 2005, an older law, the Law Concerning Hangul Exclusivity () 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. Hanja is now very rarely used and is almost only used for abbreviations in newspaper headlines (e.g. for China, for Korea, for the United States, for Japan, etc.), for clarification in text where a word might be confused for another due to homophones (e.g. () vs. ()), or for stylistic use such as the () used on Shin RamyÅn packaging. Since June 1949, Hanja has not officially been used in North Korea, and, in addition, most texts are now commonly written horizontally instead of vertically. Many words borrowed from Chinese have also been replaced in the North with native Korean words, due to the North's policy of
linguistic purism Linguistic purism or linguistic protectionism is a concept with two common meanings: one with respect to foreign languages and the other with respect to the internal variants of a language (dialects). The first meaning is the historical trend ...
. 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 A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged Alphabetical order, alphabetically (or by Semitic root, consonantal root for Semitic languages or radical-and-stroke sorting, radical an ...
. 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 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 changed 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 the 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 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 (; 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 educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...
. 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 led as its first Supreme Leader (North Korean title), supreme leader from North Korea#Founding, its establishm ...
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 () 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 standard set of letter (alphabet), letters written to represent particular sounds in a spoken language. Specifically, letters largely correspond to phonemes as the smallest sound segments that can distinguish one word from a ...
. 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, which is how Chinese distinguishes many words that would otherwise be homophonic. For example, while , , and are all phonetically distinct in Mandarin (pronounced , , and respectively), they are all pronounced () 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 is 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. While the term ''sailor'' ...
lost in the sinking of ROKS Cheonan (PCC-772).


Print media

In South Korea, Hanja is 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 is 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 world map, maps of Earth or of a continent or region of Earth. Advances in astronomy have also resulted in atlases of the celestial sphere or of other planets. Atlases have traditio ...
es. For example, the Hanja ( or , meaning 'spicy') appears prominently on packages of Shin Ramyun 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 led as its first Supreme Leader (North Korean title), supreme leader from North Korea#Founding, its establishm ...
, 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 (), which may have meanings such as: # : spiritual discipline # : prisoner # : 'city of water' (e.g.
Venice Venice ( ; ; , formerly ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 islands that are separated by expanses of open water and by canals; portions of the city are li ...
or
Suzhou Suzhou is a major prefecture-level city in southern Jiangsu province, China. As part of the Yangtze Delta megalopolis, it is a major economic center and focal point of trade and commerce. Founded in 514 BC, Suzhou rapidly grew in size by the ...
) # : paddy rice # : drain, rivers, path of surface water # :
tunnel A tunnel is an underground or undersea passageway. It is dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, or laid under water, and is usually completely enclosed except for the two portals common at each end, though there may be access and ve ...
# : capital (city) # : hand knife Hanja dictionaries for specialist usage – () or () – are organized by radical (the traditional Chinese method of classifying characters).


Personal names

Korean personal names, including all
Korean surnames Korean may refer to: People and culture * Koreans, people from the Korean peninsula or of Korean descent * Korean culture * Korean language **Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Korean **Korean dialects **See also: North–South differences in t ...
and most Korean given names, 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 (, ) followed by a two-character given name (, ). There are a few two-character family names (e.g. , ), 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 A 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 becau ...
). 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 ...
that are simply native Korean words. Popular ones include ()—meaning 'sky'—and ()—meaning 'morning dew'. Nevertheless, on official documents, people's names are still recorded in both Hangul and Hanja.


Toponymy

Due to standardization efforts during
Goryeo Goryeo (; ) was a Korean state founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korea, Korean Peninsula until the establishment of Joseon in 1392. Goryeo achieved what has b ...
and
Joseon Joseon ( ; ; also romanized as ''Chosun''), officially Great Joseon (), was a dynastic kingdom of Korea that existed for 505 years. It was founded by Taejo of Joseon in July 1392 and replaced by the Korean Empire in October 1897. The kingdom w ...
eras, native Korean placenames 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 Seoul Special Metropolitan City, is the capital city, capital and largest city of South Korea. The broader Seoul Metropolitan Area, encompassing Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, emerged as the world's List of cities b ...
, a native Korean word meaning 'capital' with no direct Hanja conversion; the Hanja () 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 () corridor connects Seoul (', ) and
Busan Busan (), officially Busan Metropolitan City, is South Korea's second list of cities in South Korea by population, most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.3 million as of 2024. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economi ...
(, ); * The Gyeongin () corridor connects Seoul and
Incheon Incheon is a city located in northwestern South Korea, bordering Seoul and Gyeonggi Province to the east. Inhabited since the Neolithic, Incheon was home to just 4,700 people when it became an international port in 1883. As of February 2020, ...
(, ); * The former
Jeolla Jeolla Province (, ) was one of the historical Eight Provinces of Korea during the Kingdom of Joseon in southwestern Korea. It consisted of the modern South Korean provinces of North Jeolla, South Jeolla and Gwangju Metropolitan City as wel ...
() Province took its name from the first characters in the city names
Jeonju Jeonju (, , ) is the capital and List of cities in South Korea, largest city of North Jeolla Province, South Korea. It is both urban and rural due to the closeness of Wanju County which almost entirely surrounds Jeonju (Wanju County has many resi ...
() and Naju () (''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 Oriental studies is the academic field that studies Near Eastern and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages, peoples, history and archaeology. In recent years, the subject has often been turned into the newer terms of Middle Eastern studie ...
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 Chinese characters are logographs used to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represent the only one ...
,
Kanji are logographic Chinese characters, adapted from Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script, 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 and are ...
or Hanja.


Art and culture

For the traditional creative arts such as
calligraphy Calligraphy () is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instruments. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as "the art of giving form to signs in an e ...
and
painting Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...
, 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 featured a float decorated with the scenario for welcoming
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 led as its first Supreme Leader (North Korean title), supreme leader from North Korea#Founding, its establishm ...
, which included a banner with Kim Il Sung's name written in 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 (). Most of them are for proper names (place-names and people's names) but some refer to Korean-specific concepts and materials. They include (; ; 'paddy field'), (; , 'wardrobe'), (; , a character only used in given names), (; , a rare surname from Seongju), and (; , an old name referring to Kumgangsan). Further examples include ( ), ( ), ( ), ( ), and ( ). See Korean gukja characters at Wiktionary for more examples. Compared to the parallel development in Japan of , of which there are hundreds, many are rarely used. These were often developed for native Japanese plants and animals.


Yakja

Some Hanja characters have simplified forms () that can be seen in casual use. An example is , which is a
cursive Cursive (also known as joined-up writing) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in functionality and m ...
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. To This may refer to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds used in speaking a given word or all language in a specific dialect—"correct" or "standard" pronunciation—or si ...
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 in Mandarin Chinese and () in Korean, but it is pronounced in
Shanghainese The Shanghainese language, also known as the Shanghai dialect, or Hu language, is a variety of Wu Chinese spoken in the central districts of the city of Shanghai and its surrounding areas. It is classified as part of the Sino-Tibetan langua ...
(a
Wu Chinese , region = Shanghai, Zhejiang, southern Jiangsu, parts of Anhui and Jiangxi provinces; overseas and migrant communities , ethnicity = Wu , speakers = million , date = 2021 , ref = e27 , fa ...
dialect). One difference is the loss of
tone Tone may refer to: Visual arts and color-related * Tone (color theory), a mix of tint and shade, in painting and color theory * Tone (color), the lightness or brightness (as well as darkness) of a color * Toning (coin), color change in coins * ...
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 codas in characters with labial consonant onsets, such as the characters ( ) and ( ); labial codas existed in
Middle Chinese Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese language, Chinese recorded in the ''Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expande ...
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 is the traditional prestige variety of Yue Chinese, a Sinitic language belonging to the Sino-Tibetan language family. It originated in the city of Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton) and its surrounding Pearl River Delta. While th ...
and
Hokkien Hokkien ( , ) is a Varieties of Chinese, variety of the Southern Min group of Chinese language, Chinese languages. Native to and originating from the Minnan region in the southeastern part of Fujian in southeastern China, it is also referred ...
, 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 Chinese characters are logographs used to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represent the only one ...
may differ considerably. For example, ('woman') is in Mandarin Chinese and () in Korean. However, in most modern Korean
dialects A dialect is a variety of language spoken by a particular group of people. This may include dominant and standardized varieties as well as vernacular, unwritten, or non-standardized varieties, such as those used in developing countries or iso ...
(especially South Korean ones), is pronounced as () when used in an initial position, due to a systematic
elision In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run to ...
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, 'quince' from , and 'Paeonia suffruticosa' from . There is some pronunciation correspondence between the onset, rhyme, and coda between
Cantonese Cantonese is the traditional prestige variety of Yue Chinese, a Sinitic language belonging to the Sino-Tibetan language family. It originated in the city of Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton) and its surrounding Pearl River Delta. While th ...
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 of 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 () in which () is the native Korean pronunciation for 'water', while () 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 () for 'person/people', () for 'big/large/great', () for 'small/little', () for 'underneath/below/low', () for 'father', and () for 'Han/Korea'.


See also

*
Chinese characters Chinese characters are logographs used Written Chinese, to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represe ...
*
Chinese influence on Korean culture Chinese influence on Korean culture can be traced back as early as the Goguryeo period; these influences can be demonstrated in the Goguryeo tomb mural paintings. Throughout its history, Korea has been greatly influenced by Chinese culture, borrowi ...
* Chinese-language literature of Korea *
East Asian cultural sphere The Sinosphere, also known as the Chinese cultural sphere, East Asian cultural sphere, or the Sinic world, encompasses multiple countries in East Asia and Southeast Asia that were historically heavily influenced by Chinese culture. The Sinosph ...
*
Kanji are logographic Chinese characters, adapted from Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script, 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 and are ...
– Chinese characters used for writing Japanese (Japanese equivalent of Hanja) *
McCune–Reischauer McCune–Reischauer romanization ( ) is a romanization system for the Korean language. It was first published in 1939 by George M. McCune and Edwin O. Reischauer. According to Reischauer, McCune "persuaded the American Army Map Service to ad ...
* Korean mixed script *
New Korean Orthography The New Korean Orthography was a spelling reform used in North Korea from 1948 to 1954. It added five consonants and one vowel letter to the Hangul alphabet in an attempt to fit the morphophonology of the Korean language. Its use has since be ...
*
Revised Romanization of Korean Revised Romanization of Korean () is the official Romanization of Korean, Korean language romanization system in South Korea. It was developed by the National Institute of Korean Language, National Academy of the Korean Language from 1995 and w ...
*
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 ...


Notes


References


Citations


Sources

* * * * * * {{Portal bar, China, Korea, Language Writing systems using Chinese characters Culture of East Asia East Asia Southeast Asia Korean language Korean writing system Logographic writing systems Writing systems without word boundaries