Yu Kil-chun

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This is a Korean name; the family name is Yu.

Yu Kil-chun
Hangul 유길준 Hanja 兪吉濬 Revised Romanization Yu Gil-jun McCune-Reischauer Yu Kil-chun[1]
Pen name
Hangul 구당 Hanja 矩堂 Revised Romanization Gudang
Courtesy name
Hangul 성무 Hanja 聖武 Revised Romanization Seongmu

Yu Kil-chun (1856–1914) was a Korean reformist and politician of Korea's late Joseon Dynasty.

Born in Seoul, he went to Meiji Japan in 1881 to study at Keio University and returned the following year. He also traveled to the United States, where he studied mathematics at Governor Dummer Academy in 1884^[1], as well as to several European countries, after which he was accused of supporting the Gaehwadang (開化黨, ‘party for enlightenment’[2]). In detention, he wrote a book on his foreign learnings (서유견문, 西遊見聞) using the Korean mixed script to write in Korean as opposed to Literary Chinese, which was written using Chinese characters exclusively and would have been normal to use at that time.

Yu worked for Kim Hongjip's government that intended to modernise Korea. When Kim was killed and his cabinet disbanded, Yu fled the country and took exile in Japan to return in 1907 when Sunjeong pardoned him.

When Korea was under Japanese rule, Yu declined the danshaku title he was awarded by the Government of Japan as part of a new Korean peerage system Japan designed after its own British-modeled Kazoku system.

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