The Cyrillization of Korean is the transcribing and transliterating 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 ...

into the

Cyrillic alphabet The Cyrillic script ( ) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking countries in Southeastern Europe, Easte ...

. The main cyrillization system in use is the Kontsevich system (). The Kontsevich system was created by the

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n scholar Lev Kontsevich () in the 1950s based on the earlier transliteration system designed by (). As a consequence of the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

, a Latin-script variant of the Kontsevich system is used in the states of the former

Warsaw Pact The Warsaw Pact (WP), formally the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation and Mutual Assistance (TFCMA), was a Collective security#Collective defense, collective defense treaty signed in Warsaw, Polish People's Republic, Poland, between the Sovi ...

(for example, in Polish and

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus *Czech (surnam ...

), while Serbian and Macedonian follow a Cyrillization system based on

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 ...

romanization owing to the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia being a non-aligned state outside the Soviet bloc.

Features

Cyrillization systems for Korean were developed domestically in both

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 Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders China and Russia to the north at the Yalu River, Yalu (Amnok) an ...

(where it has been proposed to replace the current script in the past) and

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...

; Kontsevich carried out work on the systemization of these rules. In contrast with some systems of

Romanization of Korean The romanization of Korean is the use of the Latin script to transcribe the Korean language. There are multiple romanization systems in common use. The two most prominent systems are McCune–Reischauer (MR) and Revised Romanization (RR). MR ...

, the transcription is based primarily on the pronunciation of a word, rather than on its spelling.

Consonants

Initial

Final

Medial consonant rules

Some letters are transcribed differently in the middle of a word when following certain other letters.

Vowels

Examples

Notes

Korean personal names are written by

family name In many societies, a surname, family name, or last name is the mostly hereditary portion of one's personal name that indicates one's family. It is typically combined with a given name to form the full name of a person, although several give ...

first, followed by a space and then the

given name 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 ...

. As a rule, syllables in given names are not separated.

External links

*
Degrees of Courtesy and Communication Styles in the Korean Language
by K. B. Kurotchenko. *
Entry for Lev Kontsevich on the Institute of Oriental Studies
*
Russian and Latin Transcription of Korean Words
by Lev Kontsevich. {{Cyrillic navbox Korean language Korean Korea–Soviet Union relations Koryo-saram culture Sakhalin Korean culture