Ross King

10.18399/acta.2013.16.1.009

kugyŏl gugyeol glossing Diamond Sūtra Asami Collection

This paper analyzes the kugyŏl 口訣 glosses in the Asami Collection copy of the Ch’ŏllo Kŭmgang kyŏng 川老金剛經 owned by the University of California-Berkeley. Though the text itself was printed in 1387 at the end of Koryŏ, making it the oldest glossed Korean text available in North America, the analysis shows that the vast majority of the glosses were copied over from the 1464 Kŭmgang kyŏng ŏnhae 金剛經諺解 and the 1482 Kŭmgang kyŏng samgahae 金剛經三家解. However, the glosses also include a few archaisms, show interesting hybrid glosses that combine abbreviated Chinese character kugyŏl graphs and Hunmin chŏng’ŭm glosses, and include instances of ‘final sound suffixation’ (marŭm ch’ŏmgi 末音添記)-type glossing and other vernacular script annotations in the lefthand margin that raise interesting questions about the transition from high Koryŏ ‘interpretive’ glossing (釋讀口訣sŏktok kugyŏl) to Chosŏn ‘sequential’ glossing (順讀口訣 sundok kugyŏl) and the role of the new Korean vernacular script as an extension of kugyŏl glossing practice. In other words, it would appear that after the demise of the older ‘interpretive’ glossing at the end of Koryŏthat used both sides of the line in an integrated process, the lefthand side of the line was more or less abandoned for many decades with the advent of the newer ‘sequential’ glossing that used only the righthand side of the line. However, with the invention of the vernacular script in 1446, a new use was found for the lefthand side of the line: vernacular glosses that complemented the newer-style 順讀口訣 sundok kugyŏl glosses on the righthand side of the line and partially reprised the role of the now-defunct ‘interpretive’ glossing in a new,‘two-dimensional’ glossing practice.