[KS] Choson, The land of the morning calm... really?

[Kirk Larsen]

Hello all,

my understanding is that Mark is correct in pointing out that the characters that are now used to depict "Choson" were applied to a non-Chinese name a couple of millennia ago and should not be considered to be any sort of "authentic" depiction of the original meaning of the non-Chinese term.

However, recent Chinese usage makes the "Land of the Morning Calm" designation even more problematic since the character that is pronounced "Cho" in Korean actually has two entirely separate pronunciations and meanings in modern Chinese. When Chinese say and write "Choson" (Chaoxian) for Korea, they use the "chao" pronunciation, which usually signifies "dynasty" or "court" rather than the "zhao" pronunciation which means "morning." I don't have the dictionary resources here at home to check how far back this distinction goes but my guess is that "morning calm" comes from Percival Lowell or some other well meaning but not terribly conversant in Chinese/Korean Westerner. 

Cheers,

Kirk W. Larsen
Korea Foundation Associate Professor of
History and International Affairs
Director, Undergraduate Program in International Affairs
1957 E Street 503H
The George Washington University
Washington DC, 20052
(202) 994-5253

----- Original Message -----
From: Mark Byington <byington at fas.harvard.edu>
Date: Saturday, June 16, 2007 1:21 pm
Subject: Re: [KS] Choson, The land of the morning calm... really?
To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws>


>  
>  Dear Ernesto,
>  
>  If one felt it necessary to translate the characters of the name 
> ChosOn 
>  literally, for their semantic meaning in Chinese, "morning freshness" 
> is 
>  not far from the mark - at least it is one pleasant-sounding 
> possibility 
>  among several. However, this is really little more than word play 
> since 
>  the name, which first appears as early as the fourth century BC, is 
> almost 
>  certainly a non-sinitic name, rendered by Chinese writers using 
> Chinese 
>  characters for their phonetic values to approximate the sounds of a 
>  foreign name (be it a toponym or ethnonym, or something so related). 
> The 
>  original meaning of this name was probably lost two millennia ago. 
> This is 
>  important to bear in mind when attempting to "translate" the name 
> into 
>  English. Of course, during the later ChosOn period, the literati of 
> that 
>  state may have read more into the name, and for that I defer to those 
> who 
>  work on that period.
>  
>  Best Regards,
>  
>  Mark Byington
>  
>  
>  On Fri, 15 Jun 2007, Ernie . wrote:
>  
>  > Dear list members, I just hope this subject has not appear before, 
> but would 
>  > you agree with the translation of Cho-son as “The land of the 
> morning calm?”, 
>  > which have been fully accepted since Lowell wrote his famous book 
> in late 
>  > 1880’s? I lack the knowledge on Chinese language to explain these 
> two 
>  > characters which form the world Cho-son, but what about changing 
> ‘CALM’ for 
>  > ‘RADIANCE’ or ‘FRESHNESS’, or even ‘PURITY’ as I’ve some times read?
>  >
>  > Thanks and regards.
>  >
>  > Ernesto, from Madrid
>  >
>  > _________________________________________________________________
>  > Dale rienda suelta a tu tiempo libre. Mil ideas para exprimir tu 
> ocio con MSN 
>  > Entretenimiento. 
>  > >