秋察

Old Korean

Alternative forms

• 秋察尸
  • Alexander Vovin considers this to be the correct form and 秋察 to be a scribal error omitting 尸. However, 秋察 occurs twice in the corpus (Jemangmae-ga, Cheongjeonbeomnyun-ga) whereas 秋察尸 only occurs once (Won-ga).

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

秋察 (*KOsol(h) or *KOcol(h))

1. autumn
   • c. 750, 月明師 (Wolmyeongsa), “祭亡妹歌 (Jemangmae-ga)”, in 三國遺事 (Samguk Yusa) [Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms]:

     於內秋察早隱風未

     *enu KOsol ILU-n POLOm-oy

     At the early wind of a certain autumn

Reconstruction notes

In Old Korean orthography, native terms with clear Chinese equivalents are usually written with an initial Chinese character (logogram) glossing the meaning of the word, followed by one or more Chinese characters (phonograms) that transcribe the final syllable or coda consonant of the term. In the case of 秋察, the first character shows that this is the native Old Korean word for “autumn, fall”, and the subsequent character(s) show(s) that the final syllable of this word is *-sol/*-col. Because the semantics and the final phoneme(s) match, the word is conventionally reconstructed as *KOsol/*KOcol, the ancestor of Middle Korean ᄀᆞᅀᆞᆶ (Yale: kòzòlh). Note that the reconstruction was not necessarily the actual pronunciation. Rather, it should simply be considered as a method of representing an Old Korean form phonetically by using its Middle Korean reflex.

According to scholarly convention, the elements of the reconstruction which are not directly represented by phonograms are given in capital letters. This allows readers to identify what part of the reconstruction is attested and what part is applied retroactively from the Middle Korean reflex. Reconstructions differ on the nature of the sibilant represented by the phonogram. Given the initial affricate in Middle Chinese 察 (MC tsrheat), *-col may be more likely, although Middle Korean /z/ is usually believed to have arisen from */s/.

Descendants

• Middle Korean: ᄀᆞᅀᆞᆶ (kozolh), ᄀᆞᄋᆞᆶ (koolh)
  • Early Modern Korean: ᄀᆞᄋᆞᆶ (koolh), ᄀᆞᄋᆞᆯ (kool), ᄀᆞ을 (koul), 가을 (kaul)
    • Korean: 가을 (ga'eul)
    • → Jeju: ᄀᆞ을 (gaweul)
• Gyeongsang Korean: 가실 (gasil)
• Jeju: ᄀᆞ슬 (gawseul), ᄀᆞ실 (gawsil)

References

• 박지용 外 (Park Ji-yong et al.) (2012) 향가 해독 자료집 [hyangga haedok jaryojip, A Sourcebook of Hyangga Interpretations], Seoul National University, page 143
• Vovin, Alexander (2017). Old Korean and Proto-Korean *r and *l Revisited (conference presentation). Helsinki, Finland.