Asadal

Asadal, () was the capital city of the kingdom of Gojoseon (), the first Korean kingdom and notably founded by the legendary king Dangun. It is thought that Asadal was located in Manchuria, in the northeastern Hwanghae Province in North Korea, or in the Pyongyang Province (, with no relation to the modern-day capital of North Korea).

Etymology

The etymology of "Asadal" is uncertain. One hypothesis is that the word is a compound composed of two elements, ''asa'' + ''dal''; this hypothesis is primarily motivated by an assumption of equivalence between the Chinese phonetic transcription ''Asīdá'' and the word ''Joseon'' (, ''Cháoxiǎn'' or ''Cháoxiān'', in Chinese), another name for Korea. However, the etymology of ''Joseon'' is ultimately unknown, with opinions differing as to whether the word was created as a phonetic transcription or as a semantic calque (presumably of a foreign word). Furthermore, the reading of the Mandarin Chinese character (''cháo'') in ''Cháoxian'' (Joseon) is identical to the reading when used to mean "dynasty," not with the reading when used to mean "morning" (which would instead be ''zhāo'').

However, the character , which is used in modern Chinese languages mainly to represent the phonemes or in word-final and preconsonantal positions when transcribing foreign words, has always had a sibilant () rather than an affricate like the Korean (), and there are plenty of other characters better suited to transcribing the Korean sound. The second part, ''dal'', might be the result of reading Chinese characters in the Korean way; if so, the original Chinese pronunciation at the time ''Asadal'' was recorded in historical texts could have been ''Asada'', with the final syllable (''-da'') as a transcription of the Middle Korean word (''stáh''), Early Modern Korean (''sta''), Modern Korean (''tta'') or (''ttang''), meaning "land." In this case, ''Asadal'' would mean "Morning Land." If, however, the final syllable was used much like the Goryeo city-name suffix ''-dal'' (used for mountains or cities founded on plateaus/mountains), then ''Asadal'' would mean "Morning Mountain."

It also draws possible connections to the Japanese word " Asa (あさ)" meaning "morning (朝)". The modern Korean word for morning "Achim" () is thought to have evolved from Middle Korean "Achom (아ᄎᆞᆷ〮)." Using Japanese ''Asa'' as a cognate, alongside the aforementioned theories, it can be deduced that "Asadal" most likely meant "Morning Land" or "Morning Mountain". In fact, up until the Yamato Kingdom changed its name from "Wakoku (倭国)" to "Nihon (日本)", Ancient Korean kingdoms such as Baekje had used the same characters "日本", literally meaning "Land where the sun rises" (no relations to Japan) when it colloquially addressed itself, seeming to have carried over the meaning of "Morning Land" from ''Asadal''.

History

The first Korean historical work that mention Asadal is the '' Samguk yusa'', which cites the Chinese '' Book of Wei''. The ''Samguk yusa'' also cites the lost historical records of ''Go-gi'' () to the effect that Dangun's capital was located in Pyongyang. But recent studies show that there were more than one city named Pyongyang (which literally means "flat soil" in Chinese), situated in the north deep in Manchuria - possibly bordering in between China and Russia. The modern Pyongyang, capital of North Korea, is actually the southern counterpart. At that time it was common for an emperor to manage two capitals and rule in two palaces. Therefore, it could be that the "true" Asadal is located in Manchuria.

See also

* Wanggeom-seong, a capital of later Gojoseon

Other sources

* Lee, Peter H & Wm. Theodore De Bary. ''Sources of Korean Tradition'', page 5-6. Columbia University Press, 1997.

References

External links

Naver Encyclopedia
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Gojoseon
Former capitals of Korea
Dangun
Places in Korean mythology