Korean

한글

Syllabic blocks · 24 letters

The letters do exist, but stack by syllable into a square block: 부 is b + u. You learn twenty-four letters, then how they assemble, and everything becomes readable. Korean.

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What pays off on the road

• Squares of strokes and circles: Korean, and in practice South Korea — recognising the texture is enough.
• 시 city, 군 county, 도 province at the end of a name; street plates end in 로 or 길.
• Reading a name: twenty-four letters is short — the eight simple vowels first, a third of the signs of our names.

How it works

Twenty-four letters, packed into squares

부산 is not two signs to remember: it is ㅂ ㅜ ㅅ ㅏ ㄴ, five letters stacked into two squares. Korean is an alphabet, merely written differently — each syllable sits in a block of the same size.

A block always reads in the same order: the consonant top left, the vowel to its right or below, and the closing consonant at the bottom if there is one. Nothing else is possible, which is why you can read from the first day.

A syllable starting with a vowel still needs its consonant slot filled: that is the job of ㅇ, which is silent there. 아 is "a", 안 is "an".

One letter, two readings

This is the script's only real difficulty, and it fits in one line: a consonant does not read the same when it opens a block and when it closes one. ㄱ is "g" then "k", ㅂ is "b" then "p", ㅅ is "s" then "t".

ㄹ is the one you meet daily: "r" at the head, "l" at the end. It is the same letter in 한국 "hanguk" and in 서울 "seoul".

Six of the eight finals taught here behave this way; only ㄴ and ㅁ read the same at both ends of a block. Knowing them is what separates a correct transliteration from a word that does not exist — 북 reads "buk", never "bug".

The shapes tell the sounds

The alphabet was designed in 1443 to be learnt in a morning, and it shows. The consonants picture the mouth that says them: ㄱ is the tongue raised to the palate, ㄴ the tongue behind the teeth, ㅁ the lips closed into a square.

One added stroke adds a breath: ㄱ becomes ㅋ, ㄷ becomes ㅌ, ㅂ becomes ㅍ. A doubled letter is said with a tightened throat: ㄱ becomes ㄲ. Three families to understand instead of nineteen consonants to recite.

Vowels are built the same way, on a vertical or horizontal stroke: one mark added to the right gives ㅏ, two give ㅑ — and the second stroke always means a "y" comes first.

What the transliteration does not render

Two consonants meeting across a block boundary sometimes affect each other: 전라 reads "jeolla", not "jeonra", and 강릉 reads "gangneung". We do not render these assimilations.

Measured over the hundred and thirty-six cities in our packs, this happens a handful of times. The rest comes out right, which is why Korean place names have their quiz where Thai and the scripts of India do not.

Cheat sheet

The basic consonants

Ten consonants, each shaped like the mouth that says it. The ones that change reading at the end of a block say so.

The aspirated ones: one more stroke

Each is the basic consonant with a stroke added, and the stroke means a breath. Four letters that ask nothing of the memory once the rule is seen.

The tense ones: the letter doubled

The same consonant written twice, said with a tightened throat and no breath. An outsider does not hear the difference from the plain ones, and does not need to in order to read.

The plain vowels

Eight vowels built on a vertical or horizontal stroke. Two of them, ㅐ and ㅔ, are no longer told apart in speech.

The ones that add a y

A second stroke on the plain vowel, and a "y" goes in front. The rule holds without exception.

The ones that add a w

Two vowels written side by side read as one. They fill the same slot in the block as a plain vowel.

At the foot of the block: the other reading

The same letters, closing a block. Seven of them change sound — the only thing in this script to be learnt by heart, and it fits in eight lines.

The words on signs

Countries

South Korea

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