corimaith 4 days ago

Kind of amazing too that it was personally created by King Sejong himself. Even today there aren't many people who can do such thing, let alone a monarch whose handd would have been filled by other duties.

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labster 4 days ago

Admittedly most of my impressions are from watching K-dramas but I get the impression that the monarch is somewhat superfluous in bureaucracy-heavy systems like in Joseon and China — and that the government was generally happiest when the kings did nothing. All they have is free time and education.

Plus you should look at Hangul as a political action. Educating the commoners creates a bourgeoisie class that can be the king’s allies against the noble and bureaucratic classes. People who can read laws and write complaints are less subject to the whims of corrupt local officials.

hyeonwho4 4 days ago

There are ... speculations that King Sejong was not fully independent in the creation of Hangeul. He may have delegated parts of the task to courtly scholars. (But all the evidence either way has been lost to history, and so speculation it remains.) There are a few "historical" dramas which make this their premise.

kijin 4 days ago

In many ancient and medieval monarchies, any major project that occurred with the king's approval was attributed to the king personally, regardless of his level of participation. Kings built plenty of castles, but they probably didn't move a single stone with their own hands.

The academic consensus seems to be that Sejong had a lot of personal involvement in the creation of Hangul, though. He was a quintessential nerd, after all, who didn't have much patience with the conservative officials who got in the way of his nerdy projects.