Note 1 — Chapter XXXVIII · EDUCATION AND CULTURE.

The Corean syllabary seems to have been first invented by Chul-chong, one of the ministers at the court of the king of Shinra, in the seventh century. This was the Nido; like the kana of the Japanese, purely a collection of syllables and not a true alphabet. The Nido was made by giving to some of the commoner Chinese characters a phonetic value, though the idea of having a vernacular system of writing was most probably suggested by the Sanskrit letters,1 some of which accurately represented Corean sounds. The true alphabet of the Coreans, called Unmun (common language), was invented by a Buddhist priest named Syel-chong, or Sye′-chong, who is regarded as one of the ablest scholars in the literary annals of Corea. The “Grammaire Coréenne” states that this took place under the dynasty of Wang, at Sunto, “toward the end of the eighth or ninth century of the Christian era.” This is a palpable mistake, as the dynasty of Wang was not established at Sunto until the tenth century. Mr. Aston, whose researches are based on the statements of Corean and Japanese writers, believes that the Unmun, or true Corean alphabet, “was invented not earlier than the first half of the fifteenth century.” Yet, in spite of their national system of writing, the influence of the finished philosophy and culture of China, both in form and spirit, has been so great that the hopelessness of producing a copy equal to the original became at once apparent to the Corean mind. Stimulating to the receptive intellect, it has been paralyzing to all originality. The culture of their native tongue has been neglected by Corean scholars. The consequence is, that after so many centuries of national life, Chō-sen possesses no literature worthy of the name. Only in rare cases are native books translated into either Chinese or Japanese.