直体

Old Korean

Verb

直体 (*KWOthi-)

1. (hapax) to straighten; to arrange in an orderly manner
   • c. 965, 均如 (Gyunyeo), “廣修供養歌 (Gwangsugong-yangga)”, in 均如傳 (Gyunyeo-jeon) [Works of Gyunyeo]:

     仏前灯乙直体良焉多衣

     PWUL.CYEN.TUNG-ul KWOthi-e-n ta-oy

     at the time that I arrange the lamps before the Buddha

Reconstruction notes

The form is given with the abbreviated character 体, now the simplified form used in Mainland China, in the source text of Gyunyeo-jeon itself.

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 直体, the first character shows that this is the native Old Korean word for “to straighten; to arrange correctly”, and the subsequent character(s) show(s) that the final syllable of this word is *-thi. Because the semantics and the final phoneme(s) match, the word is conventionally reconstructed as *KWOthi-, the ancestor of Middle Korean 고티〮다〮 (Yale: kwòthítá). 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. The logogram implies that the Old Korean meaning (at least in this sole attested example) was "to straighten; to arrange in a proper manner", somewhat different from the sense of "to fix; to correct" which was common by the Middle Korean period and predominant by the Modern period.

Descendants

• Middle Korean: 고티〮다〮 (kwòthítá, “to fix; to arrange in an orderly manner”)
  • Korean: 고치다 (gochida, “to fix”)

References

• 김유범 (Kim Yu-beom) (2010) “均(균)如(여)의 鄕(향)歌(가) <廣(광)修(수)供(공)養(양)歌(가)> 解(해)讀(독) [Interpretations of Gyunyeo's hyangga "Gwangsugong-yangga"]”, in Gugyeol Yeon'gu, volume 25, pages 47–81
• 박지용 外 (Park Ji-yong et al.) (2012) 향가 해독 자료집 [hyangga haedok jaryojip, A Sourcebook of Hyangga Interpretations], Seoul National University, page 233