Question for Koreans

Taeguk is our flag. Also theres a place called Daegu. My dad's from there.

 

What was the context of the article you read, Txtriathlete?

 

Well, I'm not an expert so I hope I don't say the wrong thing but I always thought that the circle in the center of the Korean flag is called Taeguk and means the origin of all things in the universe. The circle is supposed to represent the eternal duality in nature ( good vs evil, etc. ) much like the Korean equivalent of yin-yang. The flag itself is called taeguk-ki (i have no idea what the ki means)

 

Ki means flag, LOL. By the way, the yin-yang symbol is Daoist in origin. Some Koreans do not like it on the Korean flag, because it is not of Korean origin, and feel that does not signify anything unique to Korea.

 

haha, thx for the info. My Korean sucks! Good thing my wife is a Korean national, and now I'm gonna raise my son to be my own little interpreter!

 

The oldest taeguk, aka yinyang was found in KOrea engraved on a stone.

SOme people also claim that the taeguk was a battleflag used by a King who was called the "red devil". The king's name was Chiwoo:

Chi wu: http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Chi-You
http://www.kimsoft.com/2004/go-chosun.htm <-- I'm totally guessing but I swear this site is a front for NK spy activity.

 

Well.. Taeguk Warriors in Korean would be Taeguk Junsa-dul.
Taeguk refers to the part of the flag that are the "sticks" that represent Heaven, Earth, Fire and Water.
The "pepsi" thing is the Yin Yang (called Um Yang in Korean).
Taeguk-gi is the full name of the South Korean flag. Taeguk referring to the "stick" patterns and gi meaning "flag."

 

Except that most of them are completely made up or even downright false.
Actually when I decided to write this piece, I confused "13th redneck" guy(whom I don't know very well) with "soju gorae"(who is a certified idiot that I came to know regrettably) and prepared an appropriate flogging for him.

Well I will save it for next time.... maybe to an iranian.

Anyway taegeuk is the circular symbol signifying yin and yang. It is Taoist in origin even though it may ultimately have a deeper root in east asian cosmology(I think Mongols have similar symbols as well).

Broken sticks around are called kwae. There are 2^3=8(you figure it out) kwaes and the original flag sported the full 8 kwae system. Modern Korean flag dropped 4 and is using only the other 4(so it is called 4 kwae).

 

Hey, even a broken clock is correct twice a day... Wargarmer is absolutely right, except for the insults.

 

And I am sure you are still stupid enough to read it incorrectly.

 

Hmmm I'm pretty sure that the "stick" patterns are the Taeguk.
If I'm wrong I deserve to be shot through the foot.
I know the rest of the information is surely right though.
Can someone confirm for me that I am right or smash me back to where I belong?

 

Okay I just looked it up.
Here's a good English site:
http://flagspot.net/flags/kr.html#symb

I was wrong about which the "Taeguk" is in that it's the whole set of the Um Yang and the Kwae (the stick thing). So for that my apologies. But the rest of my information is right.

 

Yeah, Wargamer's right in this one. And those 'gwae's also have their own names - "Gun( 건 )", "Gon( 곤 )", "Garm( 감 )", "Yi( 이 )", if my memory serves me correctly.

The actual Um-Yang's actually a bit different to the Chinese Taoist symbol, I think. It might be a variation, but their symbol is in black and white, with a little circle in each of the semi-circles. And of course ours is just red and black without any circles.

 

Sounds about right.
The last time I read about it was when I was like 8 years old so my memory is a bit faded.

 

I hope you're wearing steel toed shoes.

 

There goes my foot.