Korean Idu character 哛

It writes the Korean particle 뿐, meaning “only,” “just,” or “merely.” In Idu, a historical practice of writing Korean sounds and grammar with Chinese characters, the particle appears in formulas such as 哛不喩, meaning “not only” or “besides.” The characters that follow supply the wider construction.

The character combines 叱 and 分: 叱 marks the stronger p sound at the start of 뿐, while 分 contributes the syllable 분. This is a Korean-specific spelling, not a Chinese word assembled from the parts’ usual meanings.

Why was 哛 made?

It let Korean grammar be written with Chinese characters. Idu used Chinese characters, called Hanja in Korean, to record Korean sounds and grammar. Many older records used Literary Chinese, a formal written language shared across premodern East Asia; Korean-specific Idu characters let scribes include Korean forms such as 哛.

A Korean history guide cites 哛 in a family-division document from 1607. This establishes its use by that date, not when the form first appeared.

How should you read 哛 in a document?

In a Korean historical record, read 哛 as the particle 뿐 first. Readers familiar with Idu can recognize its Korean grammatical function; someone unfamiliar with the system may mistake its Chinese-character shape for a Chinese word.

Ordinary Korean writes this particle in Hangul as 뿐. 哛 belongs to an archival Hanja/Idu context.