Re: Korean invented chinese language
Posted: Tue Oct 29, 2002 3:38 pm
James Campbell wrote:
> But both these Korean and Japanese speaking peoples soon
> realized that not only was their languages polysyllabic,
> unlike Chinese, but the Chinese characters didn't match their
> language well.
King Sejong 世宗 quite eloquently makes that point of Chinese characters
not fitting the Korean language (so the populace couldn't properly express
themselves) in his preface to the _Hunmin Jongum_ 訓民正音. (Somewhere,
I have this quote jotted down somewhere. But it doesn't matter--Sejong
wrote it in classical Chinese...)
> The Koreans worked hard to create a writing
> that would work for their own language, and it wasn't until
> the 20th century that it got full acceptance
And until then, that writing system was called things like onmun 諺文
'common writing', because it wasn't thought to be prestigious as writing in
Chinese characters.
> but by that
> time so many monosyllabic-based words (including 2-syllable
> words) from Chinese were being used in the language (even
> everybody adopted Chinese names!!!), they also kept the
> Chinese characters, even if not using them at the very
> minimum continuing to educate their children.
The wholesale Korean adoption of Chinese words and names is
pretty interesting--the earliest rulers of Silla 新羅 used to have titles like
"nisagum" 尼師今 or "maripkan" 麻立干, but one day, they suddenly became
monosyllabic "wang" 王. Guess what, "wang" turns out to be the Chinese
word for 'king'. :/
> The Japanese also developed a writing system of their own,
> one adapted from the general shapes of the Chinese
> characters, since they weren't as creative as the Koreans or
> the Chinese. They even thought the Chinese characters were so
> great that they enforced them to fit into the rules of their
> own language, along with all the other scripts they
> developed, and they even enforced them onto their local
> names, even though these names are unrelated to Chinese. In
> fact, many grown Japanese are even confused to the point that
> they tell their western colleagues that these characters are
> indeed of Japanese origin.
And yet, they will still call them "kanji" 漢字, which very obviously means
"Chinese characters"...
> In fact, it was the Chinese that were the creative ones. Not
> only did they invent their writing, but paper, (ink?),
> printing, medicine, (and does anybody have a more expanded
> list of all the thousands of inventions?),
The best would be Joseph Needham, et al.'s multi-volume _Science
and Civilisation in China_ series. If that's too much information (or too
expensive), there's the abridged _The Shorter Science and Civilisation in
China_ series. And if that's still too long or expensive, there's Robert
Temple's 248 page _The Genius of China_ (London: Prion Books Limited,
1986), which may be regarded as an even more abridged version.
Mind you, I do find Temple a bit too Sinocentric at times and dismissive of
Western achievements, while at the same time claiming some mere
designs--that's like crediting Leonardo Da Vinci for the helicopter instead
of Sikorsky. Or a mention of some object in an ancient text is taken to be
proof of invention--that's like crediting sci-fi author Robert Heinlein for
things in his novels that others later worked out and built for real.
> and one I saw
> recently, an object that detects earthquakes and their
> magnitude. Chinese inventions can literally fill volumes of
> books. How do the Koreans and Japanese compare?
I've heard of that earthquake detecting device--a pot that drops balls
into the mouths of frog sculptures, and is supposed to show you from
which direction it is coming from. But supposedly it cannot distinguish
sheared waves from direct ones.
It is somewhat pointless to argue these things, because few are willing
to honestly analyze the successes and shortcomings. e.g., the Chinese
wheelbarrow design may carry more weight, but a pro-Chinese debater
will conveniently not mention to non-Chinese that it is not as stable as a
Western wheelbarrow design (and of course, a non-Chinese doesn't know
that fact, so he doesn't question). We must also be careful of Chinese
writings about things, since it reflects a Chinese viewpoint--we know now
that crossbows weren't a Chinese invention but from some of those
"barbarians in the south", but earlier Chinese and Western authors didn't
know that from Chinese writings on the subject, who attribute it to a
mythicalized Zhuge Liang. (Of course, we are unfortunately very
dependent on Chinese writings on any early topic, because no one else
had writing to document what was going on.)
But I think first concept and invention also matters little if they are
forgotten, or if the invention isn't capitalized upon. Sure, Zheng He had
ships bigger than Columbus, but the Ming government axed the naval
exploration program. The Chinese had paddle-boat technology but forgot
it, and were surprised when the English showed up with their steam
paddle-boat gunboats.
> Let me ask you: is it just me or are the Koreans trying
> really hard to claim to have invented something? Do I feel a
> little bit of jealousy here? Or even copyright infringement,
> false claims?? All the things they're good at manufacturing
> such as cars, ships, electronics, were mostly invented in the
> west already. The only thing I can think of is basically
> their own cuisine and Korea's hangul.
It's still debated whether or not hangul are purely a Korean invention.
The Koreans knew of Chinese writing (why else would they arrange
hangul letters in a square block for each syllable?) and Chinese
phonological models, and supposedly they had also known of other
alphabetic designs like the Tibetan-designed Mongolian Phagspa.
> And then, these aren't
> things that people use much around the world, not like cars
> and electronics. Although, I do hear westerners say "let's
> get some Chinese take-out", I rarely hear "let's go have
> Japanese" or "let's go have Korean" or "let's get sushi" or
> "let's get kimchi".
And I read (from Korean linguists) that "kimchi" too isn't a native Korean
word--it's 沈菜 (formerly "timchoy"), and the native word is "ci". (I don't
know enough Korean to evaluate this conclusion independently.) "sushi"
is a preserved archaic Japanese word, but unnaturally forced to be
written in Chinese characters as 壽司.
Thomas Chan
tc31@cornell.edu
> But both these Korean and Japanese speaking peoples soon
> realized that not only was their languages polysyllabic,
> unlike Chinese, but the Chinese characters didn't match their
> language well.
King Sejong 世宗 quite eloquently makes that point of Chinese characters
not fitting the Korean language (so the populace couldn't properly express
themselves) in his preface to the _Hunmin Jongum_ 訓民正音. (Somewhere,
I have this quote jotted down somewhere. But it doesn't matter--Sejong
wrote it in classical Chinese...)
> The Koreans worked hard to create a writing
> that would work for their own language, and it wasn't until
> the 20th century that it got full acceptance
And until then, that writing system was called things like onmun 諺文
'common writing', because it wasn't thought to be prestigious as writing in
Chinese characters.
> but by that
> time so many monosyllabic-based words (including 2-syllable
> words) from Chinese were being used in the language (even
> everybody adopted Chinese names!!!), they also kept the
> Chinese characters, even if not using them at the very
> minimum continuing to educate their children.
The wholesale Korean adoption of Chinese words and names is
pretty interesting--the earliest rulers of Silla 新羅 used to have titles like
"nisagum" 尼師今 or "maripkan" 麻立干, but one day, they suddenly became
monosyllabic "wang" 王. Guess what, "wang" turns out to be the Chinese
word for 'king'. :/
> The Japanese also developed a writing system of their own,
> one adapted from the general shapes of the Chinese
> characters, since they weren't as creative as the Koreans or
> the Chinese. They even thought the Chinese characters were so
> great that they enforced them to fit into the rules of their
> own language, along with all the other scripts they
> developed, and they even enforced them onto their local
> names, even though these names are unrelated to Chinese. In
> fact, many grown Japanese are even confused to the point that
> they tell their western colleagues that these characters are
> indeed of Japanese origin.
And yet, they will still call them "kanji" 漢字, which very obviously means
"Chinese characters"...
> In fact, it was the Chinese that were the creative ones. Not
> only did they invent their writing, but paper, (ink?),
> printing, medicine, (and does anybody have a more expanded
> list of all the thousands of inventions?),
The best would be Joseph Needham, et al.'s multi-volume _Science
and Civilisation in China_ series. If that's too much information (or too
expensive), there's the abridged _The Shorter Science and Civilisation in
China_ series. And if that's still too long or expensive, there's Robert
Temple's 248 page _The Genius of China_ (London: Prion Books Limited,
1986), which may be regarded as an even more abridged version.
Mind you, I do find Temple a bit too Sinocentric at times and dismissive of
Western achievements, while at the same time claiming some mere
designs--that's like crediting Leonardo Da Vinci for the helicopter instead
of Sikorsky. Or a mention of some object in an ancient text is taken to be
proof of invention--that's like crediting sci-fi author Robert Heinlein for
things in his novels that others later worked out and built for real.
> and one I saw
> recently, an object that detects earthquakes and their
> magnitude. Chinese inventions can literally fill volumes of
> books. How do the Koreans and Japanese compare?
I've heard of that earthquake detecting device--a pot that drops balls
into the mouths of frog sculptures, and is supposed to show you from
which direction it is coming from. But supposedly it cannot distinguish
sheared waves from direct ones.
It is somewhat pointless to argue these things, because few are willing
to honestly analyze the successes and shortcomings. e.g., the Chinese
wheelbarrow design may carry more weight, but a pro-Chinese debater
will conveniently not mention to non-Chinese that it is not as stable as a
Western wheelbarrow design (and of course, a non-Chinese doesn't know
that fact, so he doesn't question). We must also be careful of Chinese
writings about things, since it reflects a Chinese viewpoint--we know now
that crossbows weren't a Chinese invention but from some of those
"barbarians in the south", but earlier Chinese and Western authors didn't
know that from Chinese writings on the subject, who attribute it to a
mythicalized Zhuge Liang. (Of course, we are unfortunately very
dependent on Chinese writings on any early topic, because no one else
had writing to document what was going on.)
But I think first concept and invention also matters little if they are
forgotten, or if the invention isn't capitalized upon. Sure, Zheng He had
ships bigger than Columbus, but the Ming government axed the naval
exploration program. The Chinese had paddle-boat technology but forgot
it, and were surprised when the English showed up with their steam
paddle-boat gunboats.
> Let me ask you: is it just me or are the Koreans trying
> really hard to claim to have invented something? Do I feel a
> little bit of jealousy here? Or even copyright infringement,
> false claims?? All the things they're good at manufacturing
> such as cars, ships, electronics, were mostly invented in the
> west already. The only thing I can think of is basically
> their own cuisine and Korea's hangul.
It's still debated whether or not hangul are purely a Korean invention.
The Koreans knew of Chinese writing (why else would they arrange
hangul letters in a square block for each syllable?) and Chinese
phonological models, and supposedly they had also known of other
alphabetic designs like the Tibetan-designed Mongolian Phagspa.
> And then, these aren't
> things that people use much around the world, not like cars
> and electronics. Although, I do hear westerners say "let's
> get some Chinese take-out", I rarely hear "let's go have
> Japanese" or "let's go have Korean" or "let's get sushi" or
> "let's get kimchi".
And I read (from Korean linguists) that "kimchi" too isn't a native Korean
word--it's 沈菜 (formerly "timchoy"), and the native word is "ci". (I don't
know enough Korean to evaluate this conclusion independently.) "sushi"
is a preserved archaic Japanese word, but unnaturally forced to be
written in Chinese characters as 壽司.
Thomas Chan
tc31@cornell.edu
