東國正韻은 正當하게 評價되어야 한다

Abstract

This paper contends that Donggukjeongun was a pronunciationdictionary of Sino-Korean characters in Middle Korean by KingSejong. King Sejong realized that many Sino-Korean words had a incorrectpronunciation, so he tried to establish standard pronunciations of them aftercollecting and assessing all the pronunciations and phonological characteristicsof Sino-Korean characters. He tried to underscore the autonomy of the pronunciationsas Donggukjeongun is a unique Korean way of rending Chinese characters. Donggukjeongun is difficult to identify as 운서 (韻書, rhyme dictionary, i.e., booksclassifying Chinese characters depending on the phonological properties) becauseit contains little exegesis. Further it does not follow the organization of 운도 (韻圖,rhyme table, i.e., chart showing the place of articulation and aperture along withillustrations). Therefore, Donggukjeongun is identified as a pronunciation dictionary.