A Corean Manual or Phrase Book; with Introductory Grammar by Joes Scorz, BLA., H.B.M.'s Vice-Consul, Second edi-Seoul, 1893. the Introduction Mr. Scott traces the Corean writing from its origin in A.D. 1447, when 28 symbols derived from Sancrit were invented, He shows how the alphabet contains eleven vowels and thirteen sonants, Tt was just after the Yuen dynasty that the Buddhists gave this alphabet to Cures, Previous to this Chinese writing had been used and is. atill used. The influence and language of in Coren date from BE, 1122 and colonisation, 80 far as is known, began with that period now 3,000 years ugi, and Buddhist missionary zeal gave to Corea comparatively full "knowledge of the Chinese language in the fourth century ut our era, Tewas by the fourth King of the present dynasty that the Gurean alphabet was introduced, and he did so, because the court of Hung Wa all the tributary states of China had writing of their own, Mr. Scott is the first to have found this out and made it known, In p. 13, of the Introduction the reader will notice a Chinese table with Corean characters i his tables like those in Kanghi's dictionary which are cupied from dictionaries common in North China for several centuries back, Here I venture to add certain features to the view presented by the author, the theory I would for, The Sun-cut alphabet gave the Buddhists facility in writing down Chinese sounds. They wrote them also when there was in the euuntry qenersily a complete set of initial sounds like what exists in Kiangan and Chébkiany at present, Consequently they had among the initials b, g, and d, x8 well ass, ch, nud di. 'The thirty six initials in the' Kanghi spelling represent. precisely what Chinese speech was formerly in Shensi and Honan, The Corean king in A.D, 1447, wok these us they existed in the dictionny Hwy rw cheng yun, of the bh ce turg, and formed from them a Coren niptxbet based on a cmapeeiwon, na Br.
At points out, of Mongol, Pibetan, Burmese, and Sanserit writing," Phe last was specially used, Down to the 14th century the Chinese were agood deal under the guidance of the Buddi a brought into use no syllabic writing wit heat the sonant letters b, g. cly etc. The Corenn alphabet has algo the m rks for these lette But the sounds b, g, d, have disappeared from North China, while in Qurea, the letters 0, cly g. exist as Mr. Scott teaches us, xs alternates with ky & p. in any word. By x careful search in dic-tinnery the student will find that it is only Corean native words as rule, and scarce! any Chinese words, that are written with the double consonant mark. The conclusion ty be drawn from this fact is that in the Chinese of Chilli province when the transcription was made, the sonant initials were lost being all changed for surds. But in Corean the sonant initials were still strongly enough felt, to keep their plice xa sonants in the new Buddhist alphabet, Tt is then to be regarded xs an indication whenever in a native Corean word the doubled consonant is preferred, that such a word was anciently so pronounced. That Lam right in this conclusion is rendered extremely probable by the fact that Baschpa's Mongol writing, us in the Confacian tenible at Shanghai found by Mr. Wylie, the final letter m is uniformly employed. Final m existed therefore in the Peking pronunciation of the
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.