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다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

In the first part of this article I concentrate on defining the notion of kwisin, through the meaning of its characters and by ascertaining how kwisin appears in documentary records; I also deal with synonyms of kwisin. Then, I attempt to give a rough sketch of the true identity of kwisin through a review of how previous Korean scholars have approached the kwisin. In the middle part, I explain that the meaning of 'kwisin' became narrower over time; originally, '鬼神 kwisin' was the integrated meaning of '鬼 kwi' and '神 sin', but 'sin' became a separate concept while 'kwi' became identical with 'kwisin'. Finally, I studied the true identity of kwisin by focusing on the characteristic features of kwisin as they appear in folk belief.