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Goryeo was a Korean state founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korean Peninsula until the establishment of Joseon in 1392. Goryeo achieved what has been called a "true national unification" by Korean historians as it not only unified the Later Three Kingdoms but also incorporated much of the ruling class of the northern kingdom of Balhae, who had origins in Goguryeo of the earlier Three Kingdoms of Korea. According to Korean historians, it was during the Goryeo period that the individual identities of Goguryeo, Baekje and Silla were successfully merged into a single entity that became the basis of the modern-day Korean identity. The name "Korea" is derived from the name of Goryeo, also romanized as Koryŏ, which was first used in the early 5th century by Goguryeo; Goryeo was a successor state to Later Goguryeo and Goguryeo.
Japonic or Japanese–Ryukyuan, sometimes also Japanic, is a language family comprising Japanese, spoken in the main islands of Japan, and the Ryukyuan languages, spoken in the Ryukyu Islands. The family is universally accepted by linguists, and significant progress has been made in reconstructing the proto-language, Proto-Japonic. The reconstruction implies a split between all dialects of Japanese and all Ryukyuan varieties, probably before the 7th century. The Hachijō language, spoken on the Izu Islands, is also included, but its position within the family is unclear.
The Peninsular Japonic languages are now-extinct Japonic languages reflected in ancient placenames and glosses from central and southern parts of the Korean Peninsula. Most linguists believe that Japonic arrived in the Japanese archipelago from the Korean peninsula during the first millennium BCE. The placename evidence suggests that Japonic languages were still spoken in parts of the peninsula for several centuries before being replaced by the spread of Korean.
The Goguryeo language, or Koguryoan, was the language of the ancient kingdom of Goguryeo, one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea. Early Chinese histories state that the language was similar to those of Buyeo, Okjeo and Ye. Lee Ki-Moon grouped these four as the Puyŏ languages. The histories also stated that these languages were different from those of the Yilou and Mohe. All of these languages are unattested except for Goguryeo, for which evidence is limited and controversial.
Tamna was a kingdom based on Jeju Island from ancient times until it was absorbed by the Korean Joseon dynasty in 1404, following a long period of being a tributary state or autonomous administrative region of various Korean kingdoms. The Go (Jeju) clan is the family name of the Lord, that ruled West Tamna over 400 years. The Moon (Nampyeong) clan is the family name of the Prince, that ruled East Tamna for 400 years.
The state of Jin was a confederacy of statelets which occupied some portion of the southern Korean peninsula from the 4th to 2nd centuries BCE, bordering the Korean Kingdom of Gojoseon to the north. Its capital was somewhere south of the Han River. It preceded the Samhan confederacies, each of which claimed to be the successor of the Jin state.
Samhan, or Three Han, is the collective name of the Byeonhan, Jinhan, and Mahan confederacies that emerged in the first century BC during the Proto–Three Kingdoms of Korea, or Samhan, period. Located in the central and southern regions of the Korean Peninsula, the Samhan confederacies eventually merged and developed into the Baekje, Gaya, and Silla kingdoms. The name "Samhan" also refers to the Three Kingdoms of Korea.
Very little is known of the language of the Buyeo kingdom. Chapter 30 "Description of the Eastern Barbarians" in the Records of the Three Kingdoms records a survey carried out by the Chinese state of Wei after their defeat of Goguryeo in 244. The report states that the languages of Buyeo and those of its southern neighbours Goguryeo and Ye were similar, and that the language of Okjeo was only slightly different from them. Based on this text, Lee Ki-Moon grouped the four languages as the Puyŏ languages, contemporaneous with the Han languages of the Samhan confederacies in southern Korea.
Mimana, also transliterated as Imna according to the Korean pronunciation, is the name used primarily in the 8th-century Japanese text Nihon Shoki, likely referring to one of the Korean states of the time of the Gaya confederacy. As Atkins notes, "The location, expanse, and Japaneseness of Imna/Mimana remain among the most disputed issues in East Asian historiography." Seth notes that the very existence of Mimana is still disputed.
The Korean–Jurchen border conflicts were a series of conflicts from the 10th century to the 17th century between the Korean states of Goryeo and Joseon and the Jurchen people.
The language of the kingdom of Baekje, one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, is poorly attested, and scholars differ on whether one or two languages were used. However, at least some of the material appears to be variety of Old Korean.
The traditional periodization of Korean distinguishes:
Middle Korean is the period in the history of the Korean language succeeding Old Korean and yielding in 1600 to the Modern period. The boundary between the Old and Middle periods is traditionally identified with the establishment of Goryeo in 918, but some scholars have argued for the time of the Mongol invasions of Korea. Middle Korean is often divided into Early and Late periods corresponding to Goryeo and Joseon respectively. It is difficult to extract linguistic information from texts of the Early period, which are written using adaptations of Chinese characters. The situation was transformed in 1446 by the introduction of the Hangul alphabet, so that Late Middle Korean provides the pivotal data for the history of Korean.
Gaya, also rendered Kaya, Kara or Karak, is the presumed language of the Gaya confederacy in ancient southern Korea. Only one word survives that is directly identified as being from the language of Gaya. Other evidence consists of place names, whose interpretation is uncertain.
Koreanic is a small language family consisting of the Korean and Jeju languages. The latter is often described as a dialect of Korean but is distinct enough to be considered a separate language. Alexander Vovin suggested that the Yukjin dialect of the far northeast should be similarly distinguished. Korean has been richly documented since the introduction of the Hangul alphabet in the 15th century. Earlier renditions of Korean using Chinese characters are much more difficult to interpret.
The Puyŏ or Puyo-Koguryoic languages are four languages of northern Korea and eastern Manchuria mentioned in ancient Chinese sources. The languages of Buyeo, Goguryeo, Dongye and Okjeo were said to be similar to one another but different from the language of the Yilou to the north . Other sources suggest that the ruling class of Baekje may have spoken a Puyŏ language.
The Han languages or Samhan languages were the languages of the Samhan of ancient southern Korea, the confederacies of Mahan, Byeonhan and Jinhan. They are mentioned in surveys of the peninsula in the 3rd century found in Chinese histories, which also contain lists of placenames, but are otherwise unattested. There is no consensus about the relationships between these languages and the languages of later kingdoms.
Chapter 37 of the Samguk sagi contains a list of place names and their meanings, from part of central Korea captured by Silla from the former state of Goguryeo (Koguryŏ). Some of the vocabulary extracted from these names provides the principal evidence that Japonic languages were formerly spoken in central and southern parts of the Korean peninsula. Other words resemble Korean or Tungusic words.
The Bureau of Interpreters or Sayŏgwŏn was an agency of the Joseon government of Korea from 1393 to 1894 responsible for training and supplying official interpreters. Textbooks for foreign languages produced by the bureau aimed to accurately describe contemporary speech and are thus valuable sources on the history of Korean and the various foreign languages.
Mioyama was one of the 12 statelets located in the Byeonhan confederacy during the Proto–Three Kingdoms period of Korea first mentioned in the Records of the Three Kingdoms. Due to its peculiar name, the statelet is used as an example of a possible placename that supports the Peninsular Japonic theory and a possible presence in Korea from ancient Japan.
References
- ↑ Lee & Ramsey (2011), p. 37.
- ↑ Lee & Ramsey (2011), pp. 37–38.
- ↑ Seth, Michael J. A Concise History of Korea: From Antiquity to the Present. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 149. ISBN 9781442235175.
Works cited
- Lee, Ki-Moon; Ramsey, S. Robert (2011). A History of the Korean Language. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-49448-9.