Flag of South Korea

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Flag of South Korea

Korean Name
Revised Romanization	Taegeukgi
McCune-Reischauer	T'aegŭkki
Hangul	태극기
Hanja	太極旗

The national flag, civil and state ensign of South Korea is white with a red (top) and blue Yin Yang symbol in the center; there is a different black trigram from the ancient I Ching (Book of Changes) in each corner of the white field. In Korean, the flag is called the Taegeukgi. The flag was designed in 1882 during the reign of King Gojong by Bak Yeong-hyo, the Korean ambassador to Japan. Gojong proclaimed the Taegeukgi to be the official flag of Korea on 6 March 1883.

The four trigrams are:

||| Force (☰; geon (건; 乾) in Korean) = heaven (天);
|:| Radiance (☲; ri (리; 離)) = fire (火), sun, and yang;
:|: Gorge (☵; gam (감; 坎)) = water (水), moon, and yin;
::: Field (☷; gon (곤; 坤)) = earth (地).

In Chinese philosophy, the eight trigrams are related to the Five Elements of fire, water, earth, wood, and metal. An analogy could also be drawn with the four western classical elements.