Cheon (Korean surname)

Cheon, also spelled Chun or Chon, is an uncommon Korean surname. It is written with either of two hanja:


 * Ilcheon Cheon meaning "thousand". This is the more common character, used as a surname by 103,811 people in 32,229 households in South Korea, according to the 2000 census.
 * Haneul Cheon, meaning "heaven". The 2000 census found 8,416 people in 2,668 households who used this character to write their surname.

In a study by the National Institute of Korean Language based on 2007 application data for South Korean passports, it was found that 50% of people with this family name spelled it in Latin letters as Cheon in their passports, while 42% spelled it Chun, and 3.5% spelled it Chon. Rarer alternative spellings (the remaining 4.5%) included Choun and the Yale romanization Chen.

People with this surname include:

Entertainment

 * Chun Bo-geun (born 2002), South Korean actor
 * Chun Ho-jin (born 1960), South Korean actor
 * Chun Jung-myung (born 1980), South Korean actor
 * Chun Myung-hoon (born 1978), South Korean singer, rapper, actor
 * Chun Soo-yeon (stage name Song Ji-hyo, born 1981), South Korean actress
 * Chun Woo-hee (born 1987), South Korean actress

Sportspeople

 * Cheon Eun-bi (born 1992), South Korean field hockey player who competed at the 2012 and 2016 Summer Olympics
 * Cheon Eun-suk (born 1969), South Korean basketball player
 * Cheon Hui-ju (born 1975), South Korean speed skater
 * Cheon In-sik (born 1968), South Korean sprint canoer
 * Cheon Ju-hyeon (born 1977), South Korean speed skater
 * Cheon Min-ho (born 1987), South Korean sport shooter
 * Cheon Seong-tae (born 1943), South Korean rower
 * Cheon Seul-ki (born 1989), South Korean field hockey player who competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics

Writers

 * Cheon Myeong-kwan (born 1964), South Korean novelist
 * Cheon Sang-byeong (1930–1993), South Korean poet
 * Cheon Un-yeong (born 1971), South Korean writer of short stories
 * Cheon Yang-hee (born 1942), South Korean poet

Other

 * Cheon Ho-sun (born 1962), South Korean politician
 * Cheon Jinwoo (born 1962), South Korean professor of nanomedicine
 * Cheon Jun-ho (born 1971), South Korean politician
 * Cheon Jung Hee (born 1969), South Korean mathematician
 * Mina Cheon (born 1973), South Korean-born American artist
 * Taksu Cheon (born 1958), Japanese physicist