Park (name)

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Park (name)
Hangul 박
Hanja 朴
Revised Romanization Bak
McCune-Reischauer Pak

Park or Pak is one of the more numerous family names of the Korean people in Korea, which its origin is starting from King Park Hyeokgeose, the founder of Silla dynasty on 57 BCE. When written with a Chinese character (Hanja), it uses a character that means "sincere," "simple" and "unadorned." When the case is based on the surname, it means plain. It is usually transliterated as either Pak (as in Pak Se Ri, a golfer) or Park (as in Park Chung Hee, ex-president of Korea and Park Chan Ho, a Major League Baseball pitcher). Nine percent of the Korean population share this surname.

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[edit] History

According to the legend, Park Hyeokgeose was the founder of this Korean surname. He was said to be hatched from an egg and when the egg shell cracked, there were rays of light that came from it. Since the Korean verb for "to shine" or "to be bright" is spelled B-A-R-G in hangeul characters, his last name became Bak. When he turned thirteen, he became the founding king of the ancient Korean kingdom of Silla in 57 BCE.

[edit] Clans

As with most other Korean family names, there are many Park clans, each of which consists of individual Park families. According to the last census in 2000[1], there are 161 Park clans in South Korea consisting in total of 1,215,918 households made up of 3,895,121 individuals.

Even within each clan, people in different families are not related to each other. These distinctions are important, since Korean law used to prohibit intermarriage in the same clan, no matter how remote the relationship; now, however, only those in a relationship of second cousins or closer may not marry.

As with other Korean family names, the Park clans are distinguished by bon-gwan, the place from which they claim to originate. Of these clans, the Miryang (Milseong) clan is the largest at 3,031,478 people (about 77% of all Parks). Other notable clans include the Goryeong clan which produced South Korean leader Park Chung Hee.

[edit] List of people with the name "Park"

[edit] See also

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