Abstract
Various proposals for the vowel system in Middle Korean (henceforth MK) of the 15th century have been offered, and included in these are various explanations of vowel harmony. Some postulate forced vowel systems to obtain simple vowel harmony rules, and others vowel systems which would require a diacritic feature for vowel harmony. Many of proposed MK vowel systems have been posited on the basis of Altaic patterns.
In this paper, the author proposes a vowel system which in itself is a natural one, and attempts to treat the process of vowel harmony without recourse to any diacritic feature. In setting up this vowel system the author has not been influenced by “altaic” preconceptions, but rather has considered the problem only in relation to Middle Korean.
