Sino-Korean

This article is about the set of Korean words that had its roots in the Chinese language. For the Korean use of Chinese characters, please see Hanja.

Sino-Korean or Hanja-eo refers to the set of words in the Korean language vocabulary that originated from or were influenced by the Chinese language. The Sino-Korean lexicon consists of both words coined in the Korean language using Chinese characters and words that were borrowed directly from the Chinese language. Sino-Korean words are one of the three main types of vocabulary in Korean. The other two are native Korean words and foreign words imported from other languages, mostly from English^[1]. Although Sino-Korean words today make up about 60% of the Korean vocabulary^[1], many Sino-Korean words have been replaced in North Korea with native Korean words. However, there are still a large number of such words in widespread usage in the North. A list of differences:

Sino-Korean vocabulary

Much like Japanese, a great deal of Sino-Korean vocabulary was directly borrowed from Chinese. However, a small number of Sino-Korean words were coined by the Koreans themselves. Furthermore, many academic and scientific terms were borrowed from Japanese. The Japanese translated numerous Western words (mainly English and German) into Sino-Japanese terms by coining or reusing words. Under the Japanese annexation, this vocabulary was borrowed into Korean by systematically reading the characters with Korean pronunciations.

Although the meaning of most hanja-eo is the same as that of their Chinese cognates, there are cases where the Korean meaning is different from the Chinese. This is due to various causes, including divergence of Korean meanings from Chinese, Korean coinage of new words, or borrowing from Japanese. The table below contains some words that are different between Chinese and Korean, although speakers of either language might be able to guess at the meanings from the written form:

Some Sino-Korean words derive from Japanese Kunyomi words, i.e., native Japanese words written in Chinese characters. When borrowed into Korean, the characters are given Sino-Korean pronunciations. (Note that in Japanese, these words are not considered to belong to the Sino-Japanese part of the vocabulary as they are native Japanese words.)

See also

Korean mixed script test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator

• List of Korea-related topics
• Thousand Character Classic
• Hanja
• Korean with mixed script of Hangul and Hanja

References