가야의 지명소 ‘감(甘)-’의 의미와 분포

Abstract

The Garak(駕洛) culture was founded on a turtle totem. This paper aims to study the distribution and the meaning of ‘Gam(甘)-’, which means a turtle(龜). Conclusions are as follows : (1) In the vicinity of Nakdong river system, ‘Gam(甘)-’ was generally understood as a water god. This fact indicates that ‘Gam(甘)-’ represented a turtle, which is supported by distribution and corres pondences. (2) According to documents, the morpheme ‘Gam(甘)-’ was transcribed as ‘Ham(咸)-’. The grapheme of the two morphemes had been usually shared in ancient times. (3) The place name of ‘Gam(甘)-’ morpheme system were probably bor rowed from the sound and meaning of chinese letter, because we did not have an orthographic system at that time. (4) In terms of the geographical linguistics, the ‘Gam(甘)-’ morpheme system is concentrated in the vicinity of the Gimhae district including Busan.