Records of the Won Court | ONE | Wongul and Won-Eo

[Metamancy 1759]

 

一 | 원글과 원어

[1. Wongul and Won-Eo]

 

OOC:
 

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Hello! This is a fun little project I came up with to act as not only one of the books that my new group brought over from the Ai-Zho mainland, but also as a guide for anyone trying to learn to read Hangul! This entire post is grounded in truth, and I have simply switched out some terms to match LOTC terminology. Other than that, everything on this post is real and true about how to read Hangul/Wongul! The Records of the Won Court will be an ongoing project regarding Korean and Won culture, and this is only the beginning. I hope you enjoy!

 

FUN FACT: Did you know that Hangul characters were originally made to resemble the inner shape of the mouth and tongue as it makes each respective sound?

 

INTRODUCTION

 

Won-Eo is an ancient language as old as the people of Won have existed, and it is the tongue of the Salamdeul, the chosen people of Chonwon. Many people find the difference between Wongul and Won-Eo baffling; in truth, it is simply that Wongul is the written language while Won-Eo is the spoken tongue. This tome was written for all the men and women of Won to read and learn how to speak and write their own language. 

 

One must take pride in one’s mother tongue. Wongul is a truly revolutionary script, as it was developed not by time and development, but by the ingenious hands of the Won court officials who dedicated their lives to creating a script that was easy to read and write, such that all the people of Won could do so.

 

This first chapter of the Records of the Won Court shall detail how to read and write Wongul. 

 

CONSONANTS

 

Much like in Common, Won-Eo consists of vowels and consonants. 

 

Below are listed the different consonants of Wongul, and their respective sounds. One must keep in mind, however, that many of these sounds are not comparable to the ones in Common; and thus, some sounds will be represented with two separate Common letters separated by a slash to denote that the sound lies somewhere in between those two Common sounds. If two Common letters are put together without a slash, it denotes that the two letters should be pronounced together to pronounce that Won character. 

 

ㄱ - g/k

ㄲ - gg/kk (ㄱ, but stronger)

ㄴ - n

ㄷ - d

ㄸ - dt (ㄷ, but stronger)

ㄹ - r/l 

ㅁ - m

ㅂ - b/p

ㅃ - bp (ㅂ, but stronger)

ㅅ - s/sh

ㅆ - ss/ssh (ㅅ, but stronger)

ㅇ - open vowel

ㅈ - j

ㅉ - jch (ㅈ, but stronger)

ㅊ - ch

ㅋ - kh

ㅌ - t

ㅍ - p

ㅎ - h

 

VOWELS

 

As Won vowels can be harder to grasp from a Common perspective than consonants, examples of the sound in Common have been attached to each vowel.

 

ㅏ - ah (as in spA)

ㅐ - eh (as in wEnt)

ㅑ - ya (as in YAard) 

ㅒ - yeh (as in YEt)

ㅓ - eo (as in UP)

ㅔ - eh (as in wEb, very similar to the point of little distinction to ㅐ)

ㅕ - yeo (as in YUm)

ㅖ - yeh (as in YEs - again, very similar to ㅒ)

ㅗ - oh (as in gO)

ㅛ - yoh (as in YOlk)

ㅜ - ooh (as in mOOn)

ㅠ - yooh (as in YOU)

ㅡ - eu (as in EUgh)

ㅣ- ee (as in sEE)

 

HOW TO FORM CHARACTERS

 

Having come this far, it is paramount to understand that Won words are not written the same way as Common words. The way to write “hyeon,” intuitively, would be ㅎㅕㄴ; but it is not. Refer to the helpful diagram below:

 

This diagram illustrates how Won characters are formed. The characters are read in the order of 1-4; but oftentimes, steps 2, 3, or 4 are skipped. One and four are where consonants go, and two and three are where vowels go.

One may notice, when reading the list of vowels, that some vowels appear to be "horizontal" and some to be “vertical.” Horizontal examples may include ㅡ, ㅠ or ㅗ, while vertical ones may be ㅣ, ㅒ or ㅓ. Horizontal vowels always go in slot number two, while vertical ones always go in slot number three. All, with the exception of one, consonants remain the same whether they are in slot one or four. 

 

This idea may still be hard to grasp. Below are detailed a few examples of this system in action.

 

As one is able to see, slots two and four are excluded, marked by an “x” each: while slots one and three contain a consonant and vowel within them, respectively. With two and four excluded, the above character would be written like so:

 

마

 

And, by referring back to the list of vowels and consonants, one is able to see that this character is pronounced as “ma,” with the vowel in slot 1 (m) being pronounced first, 2 being skipped, 3 being pronounced as a consonant (ah) and 4 being ignored, as it is regarded last. 

 

Below is another example:

 

This time, three and four are excluded, meaning we are able to ignore both and simply pronounce 1 and 2 in order. This character would be written as:

 

무

 

And would be pronounced as “moo.” 

 

Hopefully, it is becoming clear how the system of Wongul works. This system may take practice, as it can be difficult recognizing which slot each of the vowels and consonants are occupying; but with practice, identifying them becomes second nature.

 

Below are four more examples.

 

This case is slightly different, as only one of the four slots is excluded. Nevertheless, the order of pronunciation remains, from 1 to 2 to 3, which means the character is written as:

 

쾌

 

And is pronounced in the order of ㅋ -> ㅗ -> ㅐ, and is thus spoken as “kweh.”

 

At last, the fourth slot is able to find a use. This is, again, slightly different as one must now deal with two consonants; however, the exact same rules apply. One (ㄱ) is pronounced first, then 2 (ㅗ), then 3 is skipped, and finally, 4 (ㅁ). This character is written as:

 

곰

 

And is pronounced as “gohm.” This character also happens to mean “bear!”

 

 

This case is similar to the last one, with the only factor changed being the 2 slot exchanged for the 3 slot and a different vowel in its place. This is written as:

 

검

 

And is pronounced as “geom.” This character means “blade” – it can be shocking how such a small change drastically alters the meaning. 

 

At last, the ultimate challenge: all four slots used at once. If one has been following, however, this should prove quite easy. This is written as:

 

쉼

 

And is pronounced as “shwim” or “shuim.” 

 

Congratulations – any reader of this chapter of the Records of the Won Court now has an understanding of how to read Wongul. In truth, the hardest part of Wongul is memorizing the characters; for unlike languages such as Common, there are little to no exceptions to this system. 

 

WORDS

 

So far, how to read characters have been covered in this chapter. And yet, how to read words? Words are, always, simply a combination of characters, just like in Common, and one need only read them in order.

 

사람들, which is pronounced Salamdeul (literally the name for the Won-In peoples,) is separated into three characters – sa, lam, and deul. Notably, each character is one syllable, and one will find that this also always holds true, with no exceptions; Wongul characters are always one syllable each.

It is satisfying, to an extent, how little exceptions there are to Wongul.

With that said:

 

THE EXCEPTIONS

 

The exceptions in reading Wongul are so few and far between that they are able to be listed here, in this chapter, all at once. Above, it was mentioned that there is only one consonant whose placement changes its pronunciation; and a perceptive reader may already have guessed it from the list of consonants at the beginning. It is none other than ㅇ, which cannot be read on its own.

 

Above, ㅇ was said to be an “open vowel.” And yet, how is this possible, if it is a consonant? ㅇ is special in the sense that its sound changes based on its relationship to a consonant. For example: 

 

It should come to no surprise, at this point, that this character is written as:

 

위

 

However, its pronunciation can be misleading. If it does not have a sound on its own, then why does it exist?

The answer is simple: A vowel, or two vowels, cannot be on its or their own, ever. The first slot must always be occupied – there are no exceptions to this in the entire language. Therefore, if one is attempting to pronounce a character which does not begin with a consonant – that is where ㅇ is used. It is almost an invisible consonant, when in the first slot as shown above; it is, in every sense, an open vowel sound. 

If one has not surmised already, the above character is pronounced “ooee,” or “oui.” ㅇ (invisible) -> ㅜ (oo) -> ㅣ(ee). 

ㅇ, however, changes its purpose when in the fourth slot.

This character is written as:

 

방

 

It also happens to mean “room.” However, if one were to apply the previous logic and consider the ㅇ to be invisible, one would find that the pronunciation does not change at all - it is “ba,” and stays “ba” whether the ㅇ is there or not.

Which, of course, cannot be the case. When ㅇ is in the fourth slot, it is no longer invisible; it is pronounced as “ng,” which means that the above character is pronounced as “bang.”

 

With this, ninety-nine percent of the Won script is decoded. There lies, however, one last exception, which one will only see incredibly rarely.

 

THE FIFTH SLOT

 

This section was intentionally saved for last, for how rare it is to see the secret, hidden fifth slot. 

 

 

It is not an understatement to say that one could physically count the number of cases in which the fifth slot is used in, perhaps, five to ten minutes. The fifth slot is another consonant slot, and is seldom used at all. However, in the word/phrase 없다, which means “there is not,” it is clear to see that the first character of the word is nothing like the second.

 

As written above, this character is written as:

 

없

 

And is actually used quite commonly in day-to-day language. It is, however, one of remarkably few. 

As usual, one skips the second slot and pronounces, in order: ㅇ (invisible) -> ㅓ (eo) -> ㅂ (b/p) -> ㅅ (s/sh). This may seem a baffling pronunciation, but is pronounced as “eobs.” This is an interesting case as, when alone, this character is pronounced as “eobp,” with the ㅅ being ignored; and when placed before a character that starts with most consonants, it also remains “eobp,” with the ㅅ still ignored. However, one very specific exception: when 없 is placed before a character that has ㅇ in the 1 slot (such as 어, making the entire word 없어), the ㅅ carries over, and it is pronounced the same as 업서 (eopseo), despite being written as 없어. This may seem confusing to many – why not simply write “eopseo” as 업서? – but to native Won-Eo speakers, it is comical to even entertain the idea that the word would be spelled as anything but 없어.

 

It is a difficult concept to wrap one’s head around, and luckily, it is so rare that one virtually need not worry about it at all. The fifth slot, for the most part, does not exist.

 

And, perhaps surprisingly, those are the only exceptions to reading Wongul (원글). Every other word, every last one, follows the rules detailed above.

 

Below are some practice characters, words and phrases in case one may wish to practice reading. Refer back to the list of vowels and consonants for practice, of course. 

 

글

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“Geul”

 

차

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“Cha”

 

누

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“Nu”

 

관

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“Guan”

 

안

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“An”

 

명

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“Myeong”

 

안녕

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“Annyeong” - Hello

 

없습니다

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“Eopseupnida” - I do not have any

 

하늘

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“Haneul” - Sky

 

If any reader has made it this far, congratulations! All that is left is to memorize the different characters, and one may possess a full knowledge of how to read Wongul.

 

May the light of Heaven preserve this script for all eternity. 

 

[Riot 743]

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