Posted 02/21/2018 03:40 am
Right? I figured this note would spark your interest :)
The spelling of Korea is a long lasting debate, as I'm sure you know. To be honest I don't buy the C before J hypothesis. The sound of Korea comes from Goryeo and terrible western pronunciation. "Coree" is how you spell Korea in France and it makes sense to spell it like that in other European languages. Who had the first and more successful success with East Asia countries? The Europeans. I seriously think the issue is this simple. As for the K, it makes more sense in other western languages to use the K instead. So whoever told Japan how to spell in English, told them to spell it that way.
Also, I will kindly disagree with your last point. There is a lot more Korean in that note than you think! :) Just like Japanese, Korean also has its own Chinese characters (very similar to Japanese Kanji) called Hanja. Back then, they didn't use the Korean alphabet (Hangeul) like they do today. So if there was a character that could be used by Hanja, then it would be.
So, technically everything but the back of the note and the three vertical lines left of the Hanja/Kanji denomination on the front of the note (where you can distinctly see Japanese characters like "no" and "de"), can be considered Korean. Outside of the obvious "5 Won" written in Hangeul, if you look carefully you can see Old Korean mixed in with Hanja under the center of the bill. The first four characters of that bit say "Guang Mu 9th Year", which you know well. :)
![Most-Expensive-Korean-Banknotes-Sold-In-2017-[eng-CC]](uploaded/lembafc/20180221_Untitled.jpg)
The spelling of Korea is a long lasting debate, as I'm sure you know. To be honest I don't buy the C before J hypothesis. The sound of Korea comes from Goryeo and terrible western pronunciation. "Coree" is how you spell Korea in France and it makes sense to spell it like that in other European languages. Who had the first and more successful success with East Asia countries? The Europeans. I seriously think the issue is this simple. As for the K, it makes more sense in other western languages to use the K instead. So whoever told Japan how to spell in English, told them to spell it that way.
Also, I will kindly disagree with your last point. There is a lot more Korean in that note than you think! :) Just like Japanese, Korean also has its own Chinese characters (very similar to Japanese Kanji) called Hanja. Back then, they didn't use the Korean alphabet (Hangeul) like they do today. So if there was a character that could be used by Hanja, then it would be.
So, technically everything but the back of the note and the three vertical lines left of the Hanja/Kanji denomination on the front of the note (where you can distinctly see Japanese characters like "no" and "de"), can be considered Korean. Outside of the obvious "5 Won" written in Hangeul, if you look carefully you can see Old Korean mixed in with Hanja under the center of the bill. The first four characters of that bit say "Guang Mu 9th Year", which you know well. :)
