Hyun (Korean name)


Hyun, also spelled Hyeon or Hyon, Hyoun, is a Korean surname, a single-syllable Korean given name, and an element in many two-syllable Korean given names. As given name meaning differs based on the hanja used to write it. There are 45 hanja with the reading "hyun" on the South Korean government's official list of hanja which may be used in given names.

As a surname

Overview

The family name Hyun is written with only one hanja meaning "dark" or "mysterious". The 2000 South Korean Census found 81,807 people and 25,547 households with this family name. In a study by the National Institute of the Korean Language based on 2007 application data for South Korean passports, it was found that 80.5% of people with this surname spelled it in Latin letters as Hyun in their passports. Another 14.9% spelled it as Hyeon, and 2.2% as Hyoun. Rarer alternative spellings included Heon and Hyean.

Clans

The surviving bon-gwan as of 2000 included:
  1. Yeonju, North Pyongan Province: 59,096 people and 18,686 households. Yeonju is an old name of Nyongbyon County, and is located in territory which became part of North Korea after the division of Korea. The clan members claim descent from Hyeon Dam-yun, who held the position of munha sirang pyeongjangsa in the Secretariat-Chancellery under Myeongjong of Goryeo.
  2. Seongju, North Gyeongsang Province: 4,938 people and 1,438 households. They are a branch of the Yeonju clan, claiming descent from Hyeon Dam-yun via Hyeon Gyu, who held the position of gunsu for Gobu County, Jeolla Province under Sejong of Joseon.
  3. Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province: 3,534 people and 1,099 households. They claim descent from Hyeon Myeong, an official under Injo of Joseon.
  4. Yeongju, North Gyeongsang Province: 1,724 people and 531 households.
  5. Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province: 1,261 people and 376 households. They are a branch of the Yeonju clan, claiming descent from Hyeon Dam-yun via his son Hyeon Deok-yu, who was also an official under Myeongjong of Goryeo.
  6. Other bon-gwan: 12,343 people and 3,387 households.
  7. Unknown bon-gwan: 172 people and 30 households.

People

Notable people with the surname Hyun include:

As a given name

As name element

Many names containing this syllable have been popular for newborn children in South Korea, for newborn girls in the 1950s through the 1990s, and for newborn boys from the 1980s up through the 2010s:
;Newborn boys
;Newborn girls
Other given names containing this element include:
;First syllable
;Second syllable

People

People with the single-syllable given name Hyun include:

Entertainers

Footballers

Other

Fictional characters