訓民正音의 올바른 字體 = The Correct Graphic Shapes of the Korean Alphabet

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

According to the underlying cosmogonic theory of Yin-Yang and Five Elements, in the
Explanation of the Design of the Korean alphabet, the throat of man is said to correspond to Heaven and Water, while his lips are analogous to Earth and Soil.
It is from the interaction of throat and lips that our speech is produced, just as it is out of the conjugation of Heaven and Earth, or Water and Soil, that the remaining three elements of Wood, Fire and Metal emerge, to which, in turn, the molars(Wood), the linguals(Fire) and the incisors (Metal) are said to correspond.
The process and development in the larger universe, in which the myriad things are created to fulfill their destiny according to the Logos of Heaven and Earth, is thus duplicated in the smaller universe of human body, especially in its vocal tract. For the Five Elements of nature representing the Mineral(Water), Vegetable(Wood), Animal(Fire), Human (Metal) and Soil (which is common to all the rest and supports them) are matched by the microcosmic elements of throat, molar, tongue, incisor and lips of human body, and these speech organs represent five articulatory regions.
As is already known, the consonants of Korean alphabet are modelled after the shapes of articulatory structures, while its vowels 'represent symbolically the Three Germinants of Heaven, Earth and Man in their correlative regions in the vocal tract and the shapes of those regions as they vary from (sound) segment to segment. This rationalization which appears in the annal of Yi dynasty and the In-Ji Chung's preface to the Commentary to the Korean Alphabet of 1446 is Mated that "the graphic shapes are depiction of articulatory configurations." The graphic shapes were then graphically stylized in the fashion of the Chinse Old Seal characters.
To wit, the glottal sound is rendered by circle, the molar, the lingual and the labial sound are represented by a rectangular or a square respectively, while the incisor is portrayed by a triangle. The shape of Heaven is presented by a round dot, that of Earth by a horizontal stroke, and that of Man by vertical stroke. Those basic strokes are imitative of the Old Seal characters.
In this manner, the underlying rationale of design of the Korean alphabet is the metaphysical harmony among the Three Germinants and the Five Elements in terms of their symbolic configurations such as dots, vertical or horizontal strokes, circles, squares and rectangles. This fact proves that the Korean alphabet is neither a simple sign-letter nor an ordinary phonetic symbol. Needless to say, Korean alphabet is the most simple and rationally designed phonetic symbol ever known in the world. But the extent to which it owes its efficiency and simplicity to the underlying philosophical idea has been often overlooked. Rather than being just another particular national writing system, it must be viewed as an application of the pervasive cosmic theory of correspondence to the human speech phenomena. It is ultimately the cosmological principle enunciated in the Book of Change (I Ching) that gives Korean alphabet the character of versatility and universality as a living phonetic system.
Only ignorance regarding this original spirit that that gave rise to such a marvelously rational design of Korean letters could be blamed for the corrupt names given to the alphabet and the unorthodox styles of writing that often parade as calligraphic styles today. Thus, instead of "The Correct Sounds", the alphabet is variously labelled as "Eun-mun" (a vulgar script), "fan ch'ieh", "female script" and "Han-gul". Similarly, with regard to its writing style, a round dot is erroneously reduced to a square one, point is extended to a stroke, or stroke abbridged to a point. Straight lines are often bent; a circle squashed to an oblong; an angle is flattened; a vertical line is tilted to horizontal, etc. Such changes and corruptions may seem inevitable in the course of any history of writing, but in our case, it should be remembered that thd Book of Change admits changes only insofar as they are lawful and modificatory applications of the principle which itself is immutable.
The substance that underlies all the changing phenomena is not to bs tampered with. The orthodox writing forms of the Korean alphabet as dictated by the rationale of the Book of Change should be consistently preserved to avoid confusions that stem from calligraphic adulterations. What is at stake is not merely the presentation of a unique phonetic system in its authentic form, but a cultural heritage in which the spirit of cosmic harmony has been literally and graphically crystalized into a living language.

목차 (Table of Contents)

• 序言
• 一. 正音制字의 構成原理
• 1. 圓方角과 點平直
• 2. 縱橫의 妙合
• 二. 正音 各字의 올바른 字體
• 1. 初聲 十七字
• 2. 中聲 十一字
• 結語