This guideline documents an English Wikipedia naming convention. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though occasional exceptions may apply. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page.

Shortcuts WP:NCKO WP:NC-KO WP:NCKOREAN

In naming Korea-related topics and article titles, please follow these conventions. For infoboxes, templates, romanizations, and other style issues, see also Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Korea-related articles).

Personal, organization, and company names should generally be romanized according to their common usage in English sources. If there is no established English spelling, then Revised Romanization should be used for South Korean names and McCune–Reischauer for North Korean and pre-1945 Korean names.

Generally, Korean templates should be used to show the native script and both romanizations. Please be sure to create redirects from both romanizations and any other likely romanizations and common misspellings.

Name order

Unless the subject is known to prefer otherwise, family name should be written first.

Family name

For many family names, such as Kim, Lee, and Park, there is a single clear common spelling. In cases where the subject has no known personal preference and there is no established English name for the subject, family names are romanized according to the surname's common spelling, which may not necessarily be the Revised Romanization or McCune–Reischauer romanization.

Given name

Koreans variously spell two-syllable given names as a joined word or separated by a hyphen or a space, with the second syllable occasionally capitalized. If there is no personal preference and no established English spelling, hyphenate the syllables, with only the first syllable capitalized (e.g., Hong Gil-dong).

Royalty

The article titles for monarchs should use the format Name (the Great) of Kingdom. For example: Queen Seondeok of Silla; Sejong the Great; Gojong of Korea.

See List of Korean monarchs formatted as above, together with Wikipedia [[]] links to the articles for the individual monarchs.

Appropriate infobox templates should be used.

Articles about places should use the appropriate infobox templates.

Generally, place names are romanized according to the official romanization system of the country the place is a part of. Thus, North Korean place names use McCune-Reischauer Romanization (except that ŏ, ŭ, and the apostrophe (') are not used in article titles, although they may be used in article bodies), while South Korean place names use the Revised Romanization of Korean.

Administrative divisions

Provinces

Translate the terms for administrative divisions "-do". For example, North Gyeongsang Province, not Gyeongsangbuk-do.

Cities

For cities, use the romanization of the city name, without the "-si" (e.g., Seoul, Busan). If disambiguation is needed, "City" may be added.

Counties

For counties, use the romanization of the county name with "County" as the translation for "-gun" or "-kun". If disambiguation is needed, the upper level administrative division's name may be added as the generic class (e.g., Unsan County, South Pyongan).

Districts

There are two kind of districts, autonomous districts (자치구) and non-autonomous districts (일반구). For autonomous districts, use the romanization of the district name with "District" translated the "-gu". Non-autonomous districts are named "X-gu". For North Korean locales, use the romanization of the district name with the "-guyok". For North Korean locales -ku, -chigu, use the romanization of the county name, without the "-ku, -chigu".

Towns, neighbourhoods and villages

For clarity, non-autonomous divisions' articles should be titled with the full name. Towns are named "X-eup" (although "-eup" can be omitted), Townships "X-myeon", Neighbourhoods "X-dong" and villages "X-ri".

Geography

Mountains

Articles about specific mountains should be titled with the mountain's full unhyphenated Korean name including san or bong should be used, as in Seoraksan. If disambiguation is needed, "mountain" can be added -- see Wikipedia:Disambiguation.

This convention applies to mountains without an accepted English name. If a different name has been established in common English usage, it should be used, per Wikipedia:Use common names.

Rivers

Articles about rivers should be named with the river's short Korean name (without gang or kang) followed by the word River. Thus the article on the Nakdong (Nakdonggang) is at Nakdong River.

If disambiguation with a non-Korean river is needed, "(Korea)" can be added -- see Wikipedia:Disambiguation. An example of this would be Han River (Korea).

Islands

For islands, the full unhyphenated Korean name including do or seom should be used, as in Baengnyeongdo. If disambiguation is needed, "island" can be added -- see Wikipedia:Disambiguation.

This convention applies to islands without an accepted English name. If a different name has been established in common English usage, it should be used, per Wikipedia:Use common names.

Sea of Japan

For all articles use: [[Sea of Japan]] which is the common name for the sea among English-language sources.

Buildings and structures

Temples

For Buddhist temples, the full unhyphenated Korean name including sa should be used, as in Bulguksa. If disambiguation is needed, "Temple" can be added -- see Wikipedia:Disambiguation.

This convention applies to temples without an accepted English name. If a different name has been established in common English usage, it should be used, per Wikipedia:Use common names.

This convention may be applied mutatis mutandis to Confucian and other shrines which lack common or official English names, such as the Jongmyo.

• (in Korean) Englishname.net - Seoul City Government Web site giving official romanizations of the names of cities and towns, railway lines and stations, company names, and so on.
• (in English and Korean) Korean Romanization Converter
• Culture Ministry sets guideline for Romanizing Korean names