Names of Seoul

Seoul, the capital of South Korea, has been called by a number of formal and informal names over time.

It was called Wiryeseong or Hanseong  in the Baekje period (18 BC – 660 AD), Bukhansangun  in the Goguryeo period (37 BC – 668 AD), Hanyang in the Northern and Southern States period (698–926), Namgyeong  in the Goryeo period (918–1392), Hanyangbu  under Mongol rule (1270–1356), and Hanseong  or Hanyang  in the Joseon period (1392–1897).

During the Joseon era, it started to be called Seoul by the public. In the middle of Joseon era, Hanseong and Hanyang were almost replaced by Seoul and remained only formal names. During the period of Japanese colonial rule, Seoul was referred to by the Japanese exonym Keijō (京城), or the Korean reading of that name Gyeongseong. After World War II and Korea's liberation, the city officially adopted its current name.

Etymology of "Seoul"
Seoul is a rendering of the Korean word, pronounced [səˈul]. An etymological hypothesis is that the origin of the native word 서울 derives from the native name Seorabeol, which originally referred to Gyeongju, the capital of Silla, which was then called Geumseong.

Gyeongseong
"Gyeongseong" is a Sino-Korean word for "capital city". Gyeong means "capital" and seong  means "walled city". It was in occasional use to refer to Seoul throughout the Joseon dynasty, having earlier referred to the capitals of Goryeo and Silla. The term came into much wider use during the period of Japanese rule because it is also the Korean form of Keijō (京城), the former Japanese name, which was used for Seoul during the colonial rule.

Seoul was called "Hanseong" (漢城) or "Hanyang" (漢陽) during the Joseon dynasty but the city's main railway station, Seoul Station, opened with the name "Gyeongseong Station" (京城驛) in 1900, which it retained until 1905. It was then called Gyeongseong Station again from 1923 to 1947, when it assumed its current name.

Gyeong is still used to refer to Seoul in the names of various railway lines and freeways, including:


 * Gyeongbu Line and Gyeongbu Expressway between Seoul and Busan;
 * Gyeongin Line and Gyeongin Expressway between Seoul and Incheon;
 * Gyeongui Line between Seoul and Dorasan (the ui comes from Sinuiju, the line's original terminus in North Korea on the Chinese border);
 * Gyeongwon Line between Seoul and Baengmagoji (originally the line went to Wonsan in what is now North Korea); and
 * Gyeongchun Line between Seoul and Chuncheon in Gangwon Province.

Korean Hanja and Chinese Hanzi confusion
Unlike most other place names in Korea, "Seoul" has no corresponding Hanja (Chinese characters used to write the Korean language). This has caused problems in translating between Chinese and Korean, as Chinese terms for Korean places often are a direct reading of the Hanja names. Until recently, some Chinese sources used the older name "Hanseong" to refer to Seoul, as that term does have corresponding Hanja.

However, this led to some confusion. For example, the name of Seoul National University would be rendered as "Hanseong University", but there already is a university that goes by that exact reading in Chinese: Hansung University.

Beginning in 2005, the Seoul City Government under Lee Myung-bak designated a new Chinese term for Seoul:. The name was chosen by a select committee out of two names, the other being.

The chosen name is a close transliteration of Seoul in Mandarin Chinese; (shǒu) can also mean "first" or "capital". For some time after the name change, Chinese-language news media have used both names interchangeably during their publications or broadcasts (首爾 [漢城] in print, 首爾, 以前的漢城 [literally: Shouer, formerly Hancheng] in television and radio).

The change was intended for Chinese speakers only, and has no effect on the Korean language name. The new name would be written and pronounced in Korean. Some linguists criticize the selection of the new name, claim that its pronunciation in Korean bears no resemblance to the native name at all, and state that its intended representation of the Korean pronunciation is effective in Mandarin but is lost in other regional dialects, such as in Cantonese, in which the name is pronounced "sau2 yi5", or in Shanghainese, in which the new name (首爾) is pronounced "sew2 el3." Those critics have said that the names "西蔚" or "徐蔚" (the latter being the ancient name of Seoul) would have been much more effective in representing the city's Korean name.

Other
On a 1751 map of China and Korea prepared in France, Seoul was marked as "King-Ki-Tao, Capitale de la Corée", using an approximation of the Chinese pronunciation of Gyeonggi Province (京畿道). The use of "King-Ki-Tao" to refer to Seoul was repeated again on the 1851 Tallis/Rapkin map of both Japan and Korea.