No. 214Language4 minviews 73
Published by GK Library Annex
Deowo and jobaa: the same ㅂ final consonant, two different paths
In deopda and chupda the ㅂ turns into u, while jopda and japda keep it. Gupda does both, depending on its meaning
In Korean, 덥다 (deopda, "to be hot") becomes 더워요 (deowoyo, "it's hot"), but 좁다 (jopda, "to be narrow"), which ends in the very same final consonant ㅂ (b), becomes 좁아요 (jobayo), not 좁워요 (jobwoyo). Korean has a mix of words in which a final ㅂ turns into 우 (u) before a vowel and words in which it stays put. Which group a word belongs to isn't decided by its sound alone; it's fixed word by word.
Words that change and words that don't
Article 18 of Korea's official spelling rules (Hangeul Matchumbeop) says that words whose final ㅂ turns into 우 should be written as they change. 덥다 (hot), 춥다 (cold), 맵다 (spicy), 무겁다 (heavy), 쉽다 (easy), 눕다 (to lie down) and 가깝다 (near) belong to this group. So they're written 더워 (deowo), 추워 (chuwo), 매워 (maewo) and 누워 (nuwo).
On the other hand, 잡다 (to catch), 좁다 (narrow), 씹다 (to chew), 입다 (to wear), 뽑다 (to pull out), 접다 (to fold) and 업다 (to carry on one's back) keep their ㅂ. The correct forms are 잡아 (jaba), 좁아 (joba), 씹어 (ssibeo) and 입어 (ibeo). Even the explanation from the National Institute of Korean Language lists the two groups separately, because it's hard to tell them apart by their outward shape. Even when words look alike, such as 춥다 and 좁다, there's no choice but to learn them one by one.
Gupda goes both ways, depending on meaning
The fun part is that the same word 굽다 (gupda) appears in both groups. 굽다 meaning "to grill meat" becomes 구워 (guwo), while 굽다 meaning "for one's back to be bent" becomes 굽어 (gubeo). So both 고기를 구워 먹었다 ("I grilled meat and ate it") and 허리가 굽어 있다 ("one's back is bent") are correct.
곱다 (gopda) is similar. Meaning "for a face or heart to be lovely," it becomes 고와 (gowa), but meaning "for hands to go numb from the cold," it becomes 곱아 (goba). The second sense describes fingers so stiff from the cold that they won't move well. Even when two words look the same, a different meaning can change the way they transform.
The year gakkawa became wrong
People used to write 가까와 (gakkawa, "near"), 고마와 (gomawa, "thankful") and 아름다와 (areumdawa, "beautiful"). This followed a vowel harmony rule that attached 와 (wa) when the vowel of the syllable before ㅂ was ㅏ (a) or ㅗ (o). But more and more people actually said 가까워 (gakkawo), and the Korean spelling rules announced in January 1988 (in force from March 1989) made 워 (wo) the default. Today 와 survives only in one-syllable stems containing ㅗ, such as 돕다 (to help) and 곱다 (lovely), which are written 도와 (dowa) and 고와 (gowa). 뽑다 (to pull out) meets the same conditions, but because its ㅂ doesn't change, it stays 뽑아 (ppoba).
In research on the history of Korean, the words whose final ㅂ turns into 우 are thought to be linked to ㅸ, an old letter that recorded a sound different from ㅂ in earlier Korean. The explanation is that this sound gradually weakened until it was close to "w," leaving behind today's forms like 더워 (deowo).
Whether a final ㅂ turns into 우 is fixed word by word, so deopda becomes deowo and jopda becomes joba, and a word like gupda can even split by meaning.
Notes and references · Korean spelling rules, Art. 18; NIKL notes; Gugeo Saenghwal 1988. Conjugation examples and the two word lists: Article 18 of the Korean spelling rules (announced 1988) and NIKL notes. The gakkawa-to-gakkawo change: Gugeo Saenghwal, summer 1988. The ㅸ origin is a common account in Korean historical linguistics.
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