I like to find out the meanings of the areas, places and suburbs (or dongs [동 | 洞] as the Korean equivalent of suburbs are called) that I live in. Often there’s an interesting cultural or historical reference attached to the name of the place you’re living in or visiting.
Such as my childhood suburb of West Pymble - did you know Mel Gibson lived there in his youth? I didn’t know this nor meet him, must have been before my time! – was named after Robert Pymble, an influential early settler in the Sydney region. Whereas, the local council of Ku-ring-gai was named after the Kuringgai people who were the original inhabitants of the Central coastal region of New South Wales on which Sydney now sits. In my youth, I went to high school in Turramurra, which was the local Kuringgai peoples’ name for ‘big hill’ – my high school had a great view of downtown Sydney 18 kilometres away, overlooking extensive bushland of the Lane Cover River valley.
One thing I like about Korea is that seemingly every locality name has some cultural and/or historical reference to it with the majority of words being of Sino-Korean origin, ie. being derived from Chinese characters, such as Suncheon (순천 | 順天) which roughly translates as ‘orderly heaven’ – I’m still trying figure out just what exactly that means four years on! Whilst, many are also indigenous Korean words such as Seoul (서울) which means ‘capital’ in ‘Pure’ Korean.
Last year, I searched out some place names of relevance to me – having either lived, worked or traveled there extensively in the last few years – and came with the results below.
My favourites are Yeonhyang-dong which comes out ‘lotus fragrence’ village, Haeryong-myeon which comes out as ‘sea dragon’ township and Jorye-dong which comes out as ‘reflective courtesy’ whatever the hell that means! Though, sometimes place names may be the amalgamate of the first letters of two localities merged together at point in history, resulting in somewhat odd literal meanings, as Jorye-dong may be an example of. The dong (or suburb) I currently live in is Dongoe-dong which literally means ‘east outside’ village, which no doubt is a reference to its location just outside the old city walls of Suncheon.
Jeollanam-do & Jeollabuk-do place names
全羅南道와 全羅北道의 地名
전라남도와 전라북도 지명
Suncheon-si 순천시 [順天市] orderly.heaven.city ‘Orderly heaven’
Jangcheon-dong 장천동 [長泉洞] long.spring.village ‘Long spring’
Yeonhyang-dong 연향동 [蓮香洞] lotus.fragrance.village ‘Lotus fragrance’
Jeojeon-dong 저전동 [楮田洞] mulberry.field.village ‘Mulberry fields’
Jogok-dong 조곡동 [稠谷洞] dense.ravine.village ‘Dense ravine’
Jungang-dong 중앙동 [中央洞] middle.centre.village ‘Central’
Dongoe-dong 동외동 [東外洞] east.outside.village ‘Eastside’
Haeryong-myeon 해룡면 [海龍面] sea.dragon.township ‘Sea dragon’
Jorye-dong 조례동 [照禮洞] reflective.courtesy.village ‘Reflective courtesy’
Wangjo-dong 왕조동 [旺照洞] prosperous.reflective.village ‘Reflective prosperity’
Wangji-dong 왕지동 [旺之洞] prosperous.this.village ‘Prosperous village’
Geumdang-jigu 금당지구 [金塘地區] golden.pond.area ‘Golden pond’
Sangsa-myeon 상사면 [上沙面] above.sand.township ‘By the sand’
Buddhist temples
Seonamsa 선암사 [仙巖寺] transcendent.cliff.temple ‘Zen precipice’
Songgwangsa 송광사 [松廣寺] pine.wide ‘Expanse of pines’
Gwangju gwangyeok-si 광주광역시 [光州廣域市] bright.province.wide.district.city ‘City of light’ metropolitan city
Hwajeong-dong 화정동 [花亭洞] flower.pavilion.village ‘Flower pavilion’
Yang-dong 양동 [良洞] gentle.village ‘Gentle village’
Jeonju-si 전주시 [全州市] whole.province.city ‘Whole province’
Hyoja-dong 효자동 [孝子洞] obedient.child.village ‘Obedient child’
Seosin-dong 서신동 [西新洞] west.new.village ‘New west’
Deokjin-dong 덕진동 [德津洞] virtue.ford.village ‘Virtuous ford’
Pyeonghwa-dong 평화동 [平和洞] peaceful.harmony.village ‘Harmonious peace’
Gwangyang-si 광양시 [光陽市] bright.sun.city ‘Sunshine’
Jungma-dong 중마동 [中馬洞] centre.horse.village ‘Central horse’
If you’re interested yourself in finding out more about place names in Korea, there’s a few sites that can help. The Naver encyclopedia is helpful in finding out the Chinese characters of local place names if you are unaware of them, you just type the place name in Hangeul and a page should come up with information on the locality, though you do need some Korean knowledge for that site. Another good site is the Galbijim Wiki site which has quite extensive information on all matter of things Korean and has the advantage of being in English. And, a good site to find out the etymology of place names in Chinese characters is the Wiktionary site, where you just enter the character whose meaning you are unaware of and it will come up with its meaning, spelling and pronunciation in Korean, Japanese, Chinese and even Vietnamese. Or, you can’t be arsed finding out yourself but are keen to know the meaning of your locality, send us a message and I’ll look her up for you!
Posted by elcanguro76 
