한글
hangul.name
a pressed specimen of the Korean script
기역 ㄱ
The first consonant, giyeok, mimics the tongue's rising posture when it strikes the velum. King Sejong, in the 1443 Hunminjeongeum, described it as an image of speech itself — not a sound drawn in the air, but the shape the mouth must hold to make it.
It reads like the angled stem of an unnamed fern, pressed flat in the cool pages of a mountain herbarium.
collected 춘천, 원주, 평창 — spring 1974
니은 ㄴ
When the tongue lifts and rests behind the upper teeth, the mouth takes the shape of ㄴ. A low valley, a quiet pause. It is the sound of the word 나 — "I" — the letter with which a person first names themselves.
Its curve is the valley of a bamboo leaf, folded and dried, lying across the ruled paper of the world.
collected 지리산 — autumn 1976
디귿 ㄷ
A tongue striking firmly. Three edges of a small open box — a vessel facing east, catching morning light. ㄷ holds the sound of landing, of a footfall on worn stone steps.
In the herbarium, it is a fragment of paper-bark, three-sided, still remembering the shape of the tree it peeled from.
collected 강원도 — winter 1975
리을 ㄹ
The letter of flow. The tongue flickers against the ridge behind the teeth and releases — a small river, a folded ribbon, a returning path. ㄹ appears in every word for wandering.
Like a dried climbing vine still marked with the spiral of the trunk it wound around, it remembers motion long after the motion has ended.
collected 덕유산 — spring 1977
미음 ㅁ
ㅁ is the closed mouth — four walls, a small square room. It is the letter of 말 (word) and 마음 (heart-mind). The box that contains the spoken, the unspoken.
A pressed window-frame of lichen, geometric and still, holding a rectangle of pale green stillness.
collected 오대산 — autumn 1974
비읍 ㅂ
Two pillars holding a horizontal rain. ㅂ opens with the softest pop of lips parting — the letter of 비 (rain) and 봄 (spring). A porch, a pause, a threshold.
Two reed-stems flanking a cluster of water-spores. Pressed while still damp.
collected 한강 변 — monsoon 1976
시옷 ㅅ
A tooth; a mountain; a standing person bowing forward. ㅅ is the sibilant whisper — 산 (mountain), 숨 (breath), 사랑 (love). Three of Korea's most quiet, most essential words.
Pine needles crossed in a careful X, pressed just before their green turned silver.
collected 설악산 — autumn 1977
이응 ㅇ
Silent at the beginning, a ring at the end. ㅇ is the throat held open — a circle, a full moon over water, the sound of nothing becoming something.
A ring of moss gathered from a temple stone. It remembers rain for decades.
collected 해인사 — all seasons
지읒 ㅈ
A roof of thatch over two legs. ㅈ is the tongue pressed wide, releasing with a gentle affricate — the letter of 집 (home), 잠 (sleep), 저녁 (dusk).
A maple seed, hanging symmetrical, pressed before it could spiral to the ground.
collected 내장산 — late autumn 1975
치읓 ㅊ
The aspirated sibling of ㅈ — adding a small dot like a seed above the roof. ㅊ gives words a breath of weather: 첫 (first), 차 (tea), 천천히 (slowly, slowly).
A dried camellia stamen above a leaf. The smallest breath on the page.
collected 제주도 — early spring 1978
키읔 ㅋ
The aspirated key — ㄱ with an extra stroke of breath. ㅋ is a tool; it sharpens. 크다 (to be large), 콩 (bean), 키 (height, stature).
A folded piece of birch-bark with a fine horizontal slit. Kept for its cleanness.
collected 태백산 — winter 1976
티읕 ㅌ
Three horizontal layers — the earth, the walking, the sky. ㅌ carries 땅 (earth), 터 (place, site), 틈 (gap, a space between).
A dried sedge frond, its parallel veins still legible under the mounting tape.
collected 낙동강 — summer 1977
피읖 ㅍ
Two pillars under a sky. ㅍ is the aspirated breath of ㅂ — a porch held up by the wind. 풀 (grass), 파도 (wave), 평화 (peace).
Two reed stalks between two horizons. Collected after the first snowmelt.
collected 남한강 — early spring 1975
히읗 ㅎ
The last consonant. The voiceless fricative, the breath itself. ㅎ begins 하늘 (sky), 한 (one, also: a quiet sorrow), 하얀 (white).
A wreath of wild chrysanthemum around the word for "breath." The herbarium ends here, with air.
collected 지리산 — first frost 1977
아 ㅏ
ㅏ — the standing human, arm outstretched to the east where the sun rises. The vowels, unlike consonants, were drawn from philosophy: a vertical stroke is the human; a horizontal stroke is the earth; a single dot is heaven.
A morning-glory vine reaching sideways toward dawn. Pressed before it could close.
east-facing — spring mornings, 1978
야 ㅑ
The doubled ㅏ — two suns, two outstretched arms, a softer greeting. 야 is the syllable for 꽃 야! — "oh, flower!" — an utterance of surprise at something small and alive.
Twin honeysuckle buds, pressed while still humming.
southern slopes — high summer 1976
어 ㅓ
The human facing west — toward evening, toward memory. ㅓ holds 어머니 (mother), 어제 (yesterday), 어둠 (darkness).
A bellflower stem bent by the evening wind, its purple still visible beneath the pressing sheet.
west-facing — autumn dusk 1975
여 ㅕ
Two westward arms. A softer evening. 여 opens 여름 (summer), 여기 (here), 여행 (journey).
A doubled stem of field aster, pressed the week the cicadas quieted.
western meadows — late summer 1977
오 ㅗ
The earth with the sky above. A vertical dot rising from the horizontal line — sun over field. ㅗ is 오다 (to come), 오늘 (today), 오후 (afternoon).
A single cotton-flower rising from a pressed blade of rice-straw.
rice-terraces — harvest 1976
요 ㅛ
Two suns over the field. 요 is a word-ending of polite softening — it appears at the close of almost every sentence spoken with affection.
Twin globe-thistles pressed under a single mounting weight.
high meadow — midsummer 1974
우 ㅜ
The earth with the sky below — a root descending beneath the horizon. ㅜ carries 우리 (we, ours), 우물 (well), 우산 (umbrella).
A pressed root-section, still branching downward beneath the mounting paper.
riverbank sediment — summer 1975
유 ㅠ
Twin roots beneath a shared earth. 유 opens 유월 (June), 유리 (glass), 유행 (trend).
Double-rooted water-iris, pressed with both bulbs still attached.
marsh border — rainy season 1977
으 ㅡ
The earth alone. The flattest line, the horizon without the human, without the sky. ㅡ is the most patient of vowels — 으르렁 (a low growl), 음 (the syllable of thinking).
A horizon, pressed: the single fiber of a reed stem, unjointed, complete.
estuary flats — winter 1978
이 ㅣ
The standing human, upright, alone. The simplest stroke. ㅣ is the syllable 이 — "this one", "this person" — the letter one becomes when naming oneself.
A single stem of reed, pressed vertically. The specimen that is also the act of standing.
no location — a person cannot be collected
and so — arranged on a single spread —
the syllable chart
ᄒᆞᆫ글 — the script that names the breath