Chapter 1. Background to the Investigation of Gojoseon Script

 📘 Chapter 1. Background to the Investigation of Gojoseon Script

Let me first introduce why I began researching and investigating these scripts.

At school, I was considering what to do for the creative activity period (previously known as CA time), and as I had already been studying writing systems and the possibility of using Korean phonetics to transcribe world languages through the internet, I decided to start a club called “World Jeongeum” (World Proper Sounds).

As someone who particularly enjoyed reading ancient history, I happened to read a book titled The Lost History of Gojoseon around that time. In it, Mr. Seong Sam-je raised a question regarding the national origin of the coin known as Mingdaoqian (明刀錢).

Reading that passage sparked my curiosity—I felt I needed to investigate and try deciphering the scripts myself.

At the time, I did not anticipate that I would come across something as significant as what could be called the discovery of “Pictographic Hangul from the era of Dangun Joseon”—a discovery of potentially monumental importance in human cultural history.

To help understand this investigation process, I imagined myself and the reader in a specific role: as script nationality investigators. My goal was to determine whether Mingdaoqian truly belonged to Gojoseon or, as traditionally believed, to the Yan state of ancient China.

Let’s begin by examining what Mingdaoqian looks like.

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Physical Features of Mingdaoqian

• Length: 13 cm – fits in the palm of a hand

• Width: 1.5 cm

• Material: Bronze – so thin it could tear

• Weight: Approximately 11–12 grams

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The First Clues

Next, I needed to gather actual inscriptions from the coin. Initially, resources were limited, so I began with just two examples featured on page 147 of The Lost History of Gojoseon.

Like most people, I initially assumed the characters were simply numeric indicators, used to denote coin value. I began my first script investigations on February 4, 2008, as recorded on my blog.

Here are the four mysterious characters I started with:

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Early Hypotheses (Investigator's Notes)

I documented my initial impressions of these characters as follows:

1. ①: Resembles the Hangul letter “ㅌ,” but with a horizontal stroke extending to the left; also resembles English letters I and X.

2. ②: A circle—possibly represents the sun; includes arcs that resemble a moon above.

3. ③: Characters like ㅁ, Ɵ, ＋ — possibly early forms of alphabetic symbols.

4. ④: Horizontal and diagonal lines; a large circle; a semi-circle—unsure whether these are connected characters.

My Hypothesis:

• ① and ③: Likely indicate coin value.

• ② and ④: Possibly indicate the issuing country or region.

• Characters such as E, I, X, and Ɵ appear similar to Greek or Latin alphabets.

• There is no historical evidence that the Yan state ever used alphabetic scripts.

Thus, my initial memo already included the sharp prediction:

“These inscriptions are alphabetic characters, and there is no record of Yan having used such scripts.”

But of course, the mystery was not so easily solved. If it had been that simple, Chinese or Korean scholars would have deciphered them already.

As you’ll later see, these characters conceal the key to unlocking a profound linguistic secret. Rather than presenting only the translated results, I believe showing the entire investigative process makes the work more credible and intellectually engaging.

After investigating those two characters, I treated the problem as a scientific or mathematical puzzle and began formulating hypotheses. From here, I advanced step-by-step, one stage at a time.