So I was wondering where the names for countries in Korean language comes from...
In many names you can find 국 ..like in 국가, 국토 (country) as in 한국 , 대한민국 the Han probably refers to the early Han-dynasty.. I don't know however what the meaning of 민 maybe it refers to the Ming-Dynasty that followed the Mongol/Yuan Empire?
Anyway you can find similar combination in other countries names 미국, 중국.. of course other countries are just a translation of the English.. Besides wanting to know where some other names came from ..in the case of the word for German 독일 I haven't had any reasonable idea yet. Maybe some of you know?
Sophisticatedly the name, Korea came from 고려(Korea empire) which has existed a thousand years ago.
Korea empire was a very dynamic seaborne trading country. Korean(고려인), they used to trade with most Asian countries. In addition, they went to even Europe. Many people called them Corean at that time. We replace the C to K later then.
But we don't actually think we are Korean(고려인). We think we are Han-guk-in(한국인). Even our Ancestor Korean thought they are Han people, too. Now you see, yes, Korea is only the international name officially nowadays.
I am so impressed that you know Han dynasty. It was not a simple dynasty actually. It was more like a huge united nation about 10 thousand years ago.
Many people don't know about it because history class in school handles from the AD century. Even, the same thing in University.
so, now I am very curious. how did you know the relationship between Han empire and Korea? Is it your personal interest? or Are you a historian? I would like to know.
1) First of all, the name of Korea has nothing to do with Han or Ming Dynasty of China. "Han" means Korea itself and "Min" means public.
2) As far as I know, the name of foreign countries is based on where it came from. For example, if the countries' name is origined from what chinese people called, Koreans also normally call it as the same subject to a little modification. I know that the name of Germany is from Japan, so Koreans simply translated it into Korean.
