Hangul Choseong Kapyeounpieup

It marked a light bilabial sound made with both lips. This archaic jamo—an old Hangul letter—represented a voiced fricative, where air rubs between the lips. Korean also calls it yeorin bieup (“soft bieup”). Hunminjeongeum, a guide to the Korean alphabet written in the 15th century, describes brief lip contact with voicing in the throat. Examples from the 15th century include 사ᄫᅵ (“shrimp”) and 드ᄫᅴ (“gourd”).

It wrote a sound, not an independent idea. In old Korean words and inflected forms, it marked a consonant distinction that later changed.

Where did its sound go?

It shifted toward a vowel-like glide before another vowel. In old syllables, ᄫᅡ became 와 and ᄫᅥ became 워; the consonant faded while its lip-rounding effect remained.

An older spelling of Seoul, first recorded in the 15th century, passed through 셔욿 and 셔울 before becoming 서울. The consonant disappeared, but its rounding remained in the vowel sequence. The related archaic letters ㅱ, ㆄ, and ㅹ were formed by the same linked-letter method. ㅸ is a compatibility form of this letter; ᄫ is the choseong used as a syllable onset.

How do I type ᄫ?

Use Old Hangul mode or a character picker. As of 2026-09-06, Microsoft's Korean keyboard input method has a separate mode for obsolete jamo, and the National Institute of Korean Language offers an Old Hangul picker.

Treat ᄫ as a starting consonant and combine it with a vowel jamo, a Korean letter component, such as ᅡ to form ᄫᅡ. If it appears as a box or blank, the text may be intact but your font may lack the character shape. As of 2026-09-06, the Institute's guidance recommends an Old Hangul font.