Can you explain the meaning of 신(申) as it appears in 신문고?
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申 in 신문고(申聞鼓)
申 here carries its verbal sense: to state, report, or plead before a superior — the gloss dictionaries give as 신달하다(申達하다), "to lay a matter before someone above one." The same 申 appears in 신고(申告), 신청(申請), and 신달(申達).
The compound is therefore read as a statement of function, not an object:
| Element | Reading | Sense in context |
|---|---|---|
| 申 | 신 | to report, state a grievance to a superior |
| 聞 | 문 | to be heard; used causatively, "cause to be heard" |
| 鼓 | 고 | drum |
申聞 thus means "reporting so that it is heard" — 아뢰어 들리게 함 — and 신문고 is "the drum through which a grievance is reported to the throne and heard." The king was to hear the drum himself; the drum was hung at a gate tower of the palace, and its use was restricted by the 《속대전》 to the four categories of complaint (사건사) and to cases of extreme injustice
Historical note: the drum was installed in 1401 (태종 1) under the name 등문고(登聞鼓), modelled on the Song institution intended to carry 下情 upward, and was renamed 신문고 in the same year
Two cautions:
- The 申 of 신문고 is unrelated to the 新 of 신문(新聞, "newspaper"); the modern 국민신문고 inherits only the name's association with petitioning, not the Joseon institution's procedure.
- 申 also denotes the ninth Earthly Branch (申時, the monkey of the twelve zodiac animals) and "to repeat, extend" (거듭 신); neither sense operates in this compound.
References (3 total)