Hangul Bat-chim Rules 1: Lenition and Fortis
Grammar
Lesson 13: Bat-chim Rules, Part 1
7 Basic Batchim Rules
1. Lenition
2. Fortis
3. Aspiration
4. Nasalization
5. Flowing
6. Palatization
7. Special rules with ㅎ
1. Lenition: the consonant in the batchim position affects the next
consonant
- ㅇ(이응, iun) is just placeholder and doesn't have any sound. So the
consonant in the batchim position replaces the ㅇ(이응, iun) in the next
word.
For example:
Word Romanization Pronounciation Meaning
한국어 hangugeo 한구거 Korean
금연 gumyeon 그면 Non smoking
2. Fortis: When the consonant in the batchim and next consonant are
the same, it becomes doubled
- While the rule lenition replaces the sound, it keeps the original then
double on the next consonant.
For example:
Word Romanization Pronounciation Meaning
듣다 deutta 듣따 to listen
학교 hakkyo 학꾜 school
- When ㄱ,ㄷ,ㅂ are the consonants either in the batchim position, the
next consonant gets doubled.
For example:
Word Romanization Pronounciation Meaning
먹다 meokda 먹따 to eat
학생 haksaeng 학쌩 student
갑자기 gapjagi 갑짜기 all of sudden
안녕하세요 여러분. Koreanclass101.com 하나하나 한글시리즈의 에이미입니다.
Hi, everybody! I’m Amy and welcome to Hana Hana Hangul on
KoreanClass101.com - The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn
Hangul, the Korean alphabet.
In the last lesson, we introduced the batchim position -- consonants at
the end of syllables in Korean. We already saw some of the tricky ways
consonants change their sound when they’re in that position.
Now we’re going to explain what happens when two consonant sounds
run into each other.
There are seven basic rules, as shown here.
Some scary names, right? But after you see some examples, I think
you’ll understand why they exist, and how to use them without needing
to memorize any linguistic terms!
Remember, all of these rules help the Korean language to be *easier*
to pronounce. They take some getting used to, but they’re worth the
effort to learn.
One important note: all of these rules affect how syllables are read.
For the examples, I will write the way words *sound* in blue. The
characters aren’t actually changed, but just pronounced differently
depending on these rules.
Okay? Here’s the first batchim rule:
This rule involves syllables with a batchim coming before a syllable
with an ㅇ (이응) in the initial position.
Remember how the ㅇ (이응) in the initial position is just a placeholder
and doesn’t have any sound? So when this happens, the consonant in
the bat-chim position *replaces* the ㅇ(이응). Imagine it this way:
Korean syllables *like* to begin with a consonant sound. So if it’s
beginning with an ㅇ (이응) and sees that the previous syllable has a
batchim, it will steal it and use it as its own initial.
Here’s an important word. It’s 한국어 meaning “the Korean language.” If
you pronounce it syllable-by-syllable, it would be han(한)-guk(국)-eo(어).
But because the last syllable starts with an ㅇ(이응), and the syllable
before that has a bat-chim, so the batchim ㄱ(기역) would replace the ㅇ
(이응).
Now two things happen: First, the last syllable now starts with a
consonant sound instead of a vowel sound. From “eo(어)” to “geo(거)”.
The sound that this ㄱ makes changes from a to a sound because it’s
moving from bat-chim to the initial positon. Not han-gu-keo(한구/커), it’s
han-gu-geo(한구거).
There will be some complicated rules today, but eventually they will
become second nature to you. Just keep listening to natural Korean
and it will soon feel *right* to say han-gu-geo(한구거) instead of han-
guk-eo(한구/커).
So with this rule, you really need to keep track of what we learned in
the last lesson: how certain consonants change their sound when
they’re in the batchim instead of the initial position.
For example, we learned last lesson that all of these consonants
sound like ㄷ(드/디읃) when they’re in the batchim position. But if they
get moved to the initial position by this rule, they change back. So 옷은
would not be pronounced od-eun(오든), but 오슨 (o-seun).
Test how much you understand this rule by trying to read this
word...Got it? It’s 낮은곳[나즌곧] not 나든곧.
This rule is pretty simple, and has two parts. First, if a batchim
batchim and the following initial consonant are the same sound, the
initial consonant becomes doubled.
This is easy to see in the following words. 듣다 and 학교. But it can be a
little trickier when the consonants are different, but have the same
sound.
Remember that batchim ㅆ(쓰) is the read the same as ㄷ(드) when it’s
in the batchim, so you need to remember to apply this rule here: 있다.
There’s one more part to this rule.
The emphasized initial consonant not only happens when the
consonants make the same sound, but also if ㄱ(기역), ㄷ(디읃), or ㅂ(비
읍) is in the batchim position. No matter what the following initial is, if
can be doubled, it will be.
먹/따 - 먹다
학/쌩 - 학생
갑/짜/기 - 갑자기
Two rules down, five more to go. In the next lesson, we’ll continue this
discussion of a difficult but very important part of learning Hangul.
See you on the next Hana Hana Hangul! 여러분 다음에 또 만나요.
