Korean Numerals - Substitution For Disambiguation

Substitution For Disambiguation

In commerce or financial sector, some hanja for each Sino-Korean numbers are replaced by alternative ones to prevent ambiguity or retouching.

English Hangul Hanja/Chinese (regular use) Hanja/Chinese (commercial or financial use)
one
two
three
four
five
six 육 (N: 륙)
seven
eight
nine
ten
hundred
thousand

For verbally communicating number sequences such as phone numbers, especially over the phone, native Korean numbers for 1 and 2 are sometimes substituted for the Sino-Korean numbers. For example, o-o-o hana-dul-hana-dul (오오오 하나둘하나둘) instead of o-o-o il-i-il-i (오오오 일이일이) for '555-1212,' because of the potential confusion between the two similar-sounding Sino-Korean numbers.

For the same reason, military transmissions are known to use 하나 둘 삼 넷 오 여섯 칠 팔 아홉 공, with mixed native/Sino-Korean numerals.

Read more about this topic:  Korean Numerals

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