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LESSON III
In this lesson, the students will be able to

 Use counters in sentences.

 Translate Romanized numbers into Hangeul.
 Demonstrate how to ask and tell prices.

NUMBERS IN KOREA

To understand why Korea has two number systems, let’s go all the way back to
the beginning for a mini history lesson.

Over the years Korea has developed two systems for numbering things. Korea
and China have a long history, and the first number system we’ll learn was
derived from Chinese characters (though the words themselves are uniquely
Korean).

There are two sets of numbers in Korean: the Native Korean system and the Sino-
Korean system. The native numbers are used for numbers of items (1-99) and
age, while the Sino-Korean system is based on Chinese numbers and are used
for dates, money, addresses, phone numbers, and numbers above 100.

NATIVE KOREAN NUMBERS

The Korean numbers system is a bit more modern than the China System. Like the
country of Korea, it has a much lower population (only 99 to be precise), and it tends to
be more than one layer (many of the numbers are at least two syllables)!

The first number in the Native Korean system is 하나, which is shortened to 한 when
counting in Korean.

This makes it easy to remember as the Korea System, considering that 한국 means
“Korea.” They have the same first syllable!

The Native Korean system has more complex names for numbers, and they can be
trickier to internalize at first.
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It’s best to start with just the numbers 1-4 in the beginning, as these are what you’ll use
most often. Luckily, these four numbers are some of the easiest to learn and have fewer
syllables.

After you are comfortable with these numbers, move on to learn the numbers all the
way to 10!

Though the system goes all the way up to 99, you will rarely ever use numbers greater
than 10 with the Native Korean System.

The exception would be when saying your age or hearing other people’s ages, so it is
suggested you learn the numbers 20, 30, and any other that is necessary for saying your
age.

With the exception of these numbers, you’ll often hear most Koreans just using the
simpler Sino-Korean system when counting large numbers so it really isn’t necessary to
learn the others unless you wish to for personal knowledge or the rare exception.
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SINO-KOREAN NUMBERS

The Sino-Korean number system is also known as the Chinese-based number system.
Sino Korean numbers are used to count years, months, days, minutes, phone numbers
and the Korean money (won).

The existence of Sino-Korean vocabularies makes it seem like knowing Chinese would
be helpful toward learning Korean. That could be true, but the actual use of Sino-
Korean words in Korean actually may lead to confuse Chinese speakers. There are at
least two possible points of confusion.

First, Sino-Korean words can be expressed in Chinese characters, but the pronunciation
is different in Chinese and in Korean. For example, the word for “society” is 社會 in
Mandarin Chinese, which is pronounced “she-hui”. Korean word for “society” is Sino-
Korean that uses the same characters. But when Koreans see 社會, they read it as: “sa-
hwae.” (The Korean only knows Mandarin Chinese, but he is told that Korean
pronunciation of Chinese characters is actually closer to Cantonese Chinese.)

Second, while Sino-Korean words can be expressed in Chinese, the two languages may
differ in their uses of the Chinese characters because the two languages evolved
separately. For example, 酒 in Chinese means “wine”, and 店 means “store”. Put
together, Koreans understand 酒店 (written and pronounced as 주점 in Korean) as
meaning “bar”. But Chinese understand 酒店 (pronounced as “jiu dian” in Mandarin) as
meaning “hotel”.

Sometimes, this divergence between Chinese and Sino-Korean happened because

Koreans came to adopt a Sino-Japanese word and pronounce the word in Korean. For
example, the word for an automobile is 自動車 in Sino-Japanese (“jidousha,” or “self-
moving cart”) and 汽車 in Chinese (“qi-che” or “steam-cart”). Koreans ended up
adopting 自動車, but pronounce the word as 자동차 (“ja-dong-cha”) because that’s
how Koreans pronounced those three Chinese characters.
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With only those numbers, you can create any number from 1 – 10 million. All you need
to do is put them together:

일 = one (1)

십 = ten (10)

십일 = eleven (10 + 1)

이십 = twenty (2 x 10)

이십일 = twenty one (2 x 10 + 1)

이십이 = twenty two (2 x 10 + 2)

백 = one hundred (100)

백일 = one hundred and one (100 + 1)

백이 = one hundred and two (100 + 2)

백구십 = one hundred and ninety (100 + 90)

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구백 = nine hundred (9 x 100)

천 = one thousand (1000)

천구백 = one thousand nine hundred (1000 + 9 x 100)

오천 = five thousand (5 x 1000)

오천육백 = five thousand six hundred (5 x 1000 + 6 x 100)

만 = ten thousand

십만 = one hundred thousand

백만 = one million

천만 = ten million

Counters

Counter is a noun that are associated with a number. An equivalent English example is
“piece”, as in “a piece of paper”. But while English only uses counters for things that
can only counted in a bound form (e.g. piece, cup, slice, etc.,) Korean uses counters to
count pretty much all nouns. Some counters must be associated with a number, while
other counters may stand alone. For example, the counter 그루 (counter for trees) must
be associated with a number, since it has no meaning on its own. But the counter 잔
("cup") can stand alone as a noun meaning "cup", as well as serve as a counter for
something that goes into the cup. (For example, 소주 한 잔, i.e. "a glass of soju".)

The tricky part about counters is that there are different counters for different types of
nouns. For example, majority of objects use 개, like 사과 한 개 (“one apple”). But for long
objects with a handle, the correct counter is 자루, like 칼 세 자루 (“three knives”).
Another tricky one is 마리 versus 명. 마리 is used with animals, like 강아지 네 마리 (“four
puppies”). 명 is used with people, like 의사 두 명 (“two doctors”). You absolutely do NOT
want to use 마리 to describe a person, because it implies that the person is an animal.
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(Also, notice in the examples above that “한, 두, 세, 네” are used as opposed to “하나, 둘,
셋, 넷” because the numbers, as adjectives, modify the counters.)

That much is enough for this part. For the full list of counters, please see the “Advanced
Stuff” section below.

How to Count in Korean

Now we are actually ready to count in Korean. There are four ways to count in Korean.

(a) noun-number

학생 셋이 찾아왔다

Literal translation: Student three came to visit.

Correct translation: Three students came to visit.

(b) noun-number-counter

학생 세 명이 찾아왔다

Literal translation: Student three persons came to visit.

Correct translation: Three students came to visit.

(c) number-noun
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세 학생이 찾아왔다

Literal translation: Three student came to visit

Correct translation: Three students came to visit.

(d) number-counter-의-noun

세 명의 학생이 찾아왔다

Literal translation – There persons of student came to visit.

Correct translation: Three students came to visit.

All four of the above are grammatically correct, although they all convey slightly
different nuances. (b) is the most colloquial and has nearly no restrictions. (d) is the most
literal and used nearly exclusively in written texts. (c) somewhat implies that we know
the three students previously, and only certain types of nouns are used in (c) (For
example, it is fine to say 두 학교 (“two schools”), but ungrammatical to say 세 나무
(“three trees”)). (a) and (c) cannot be used with nouns that cannot be counted, since
neither construction has a counter involved.

Notice the variant uses between 셋 and 세, depending on whether “three” specifically
modifies a noun in the sentence.

When to Use Native and Sino-Korean Numbers

Like almost all language rules, there is no particular rhyme or reason for when the two
systems are used. But there are broad rules about how those two systems work.
(Remember the first rule of language learning – when it doubt, memorize.)

(1) Sino-Korean is used with large numbers. You may notice that the native Korean
words for hundred and above are rarely used. In fact, it is likely that an average Korean
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would not even know the native Korean term for hundred, thousand, etc. In practice,
native Korean tends to be used for numbers less than 30, and Sino-Korean tends to be
used for numbers greater than 30. A big exception to this, however, is when counting
ages, in which case native Korean counting system is used about as frequently as Sino-
Korean.

(2) Only Sino-Korean is used in math formulas. 1 + 3 = 4 is read as 일 더하기 삼은 사, not

하나 더하기 셋은 넷.

(3) Only native Korean number is used when there is no counter. This means that the
constructs (a) and (c) above can only be made with native Korean numbers.

(4) Certain counters only match with native Korean, other counters only match with
Sino-Korean, and still other counters match with both. This is detailed in the Advanced
Stuff below.

These rules are not ironclad, and people often change them arbitrarily in a colloquial
setting. The best way to memorize them is simply to see a lot of different sentences, and
memorize the entire context, not just the rules.

Telling Time in Korean

Finally! We get to the part about how to tell time in Korean. Like most other “things” in
Korean, time is measured by counters – 시 for “hour”, 분 for “minute” and 초 for “second”.

The Korean mentioned earlier that each counter matches up differently, either with
native Korean numbers, Sino-Korean numbers, or both. With these three counters, 시
matches up only with native Korean numbers, while 분 and 초 match up only with Sino-
Korean numbers.
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Also, Korea uses American style time, not European style time. In other words, 1:30 in the
afternoon is not 13:30.

Here are some general time-related words in Korean:

오전 – before noon

오후 – after noon

아침 – morning (after sunrise)

정오 – noon

저녁 – evening

밤 – night

새벽 – dawn (between midnight and sunrise)

Now, let’s tell some time. If a digital clock displays “3:22:08”, how do you read that in
Korean?

Remember which counters to use, and which number system to use – native or Sino.
Recall that hour is native, minute and second Sino. So “3:22:08” reads as: 세 시 이십이 분
팔 초.

What if the clock displays: "11:34 p.m."? "a.m." and "p.m." in Korean are translated into
one of the time-related words above. So "11:34 p.m." reads as either 저녁 열한 시 삼십사
분 or 밤 열한 시 삼십사 분. Be aware that while English-speakers might read "2:13 a.m." as
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"two-thirteen in the morning", Koreans would read it as 새벽 두 시 십삼 분, not 아침 두 시

십삼 분. For Koreans, 아침 does not start until the sun rises.

What if you wanted to talk about duration, not the exact moment? For example, how
would you say "I will visit two hours and thirty-two minutes later"? In that case, only the
"hour" counter changes from 시 to 시간. So the equivalent translation is: "두 시간 삼십이
분 후에 오겠습니다."
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EXERCISE:

A. Practice writing the Korean numbers

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B. Write the Korean numbers of the following Romanized items. Determine if the
item is Sino Korean or Native Korean.

_____________1. 6:10 PM

_____________2. 23 oranges

_____________3. 10 babies

_____________4. January 25, 1997

_____________5. 42 foxes

_____________6. March 12, 2011

_____________7. 5:10 AM

_____________8. 0999 504 2215

_____________9. 4, 347 books

_____________10. 1:10 AM

C. Write in Hangeul the time below in each clock

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REFERENCES:

 www.southkoreagovernment.com
 www.korea.net
 www.korcan50years.com
 www.omniglot.com
 www.90daykorean.com
 www.mannamkoreanfiles.com