Vol,113 of the Sejong Annals describes the situation that impelled King Sejong to devise and promulgate han-gul (Great script) in the month of the lunar calendar in his 28th year of the throne (1446) as follows: 「"Hunmin-jongum was this month", the King wrote, "The sounds of our language differ from those of China and are not easily conveyed in Chinese writing. In consequence, though one among our ignorant subjects may wish to express his mind, in many cases he after all is unable to do so. Thinking of these, my people, with compassion, we have newly devised a script of 28 letters, only that it may become possible for anyone to readily learn and it to advantage in his everyday life". 」

As becomes clear in the above preface to the Humnin-jongum text, King Sejong developed the Han-gul alphabet only to create a writing system suitable to record the Korean langage, which itself is highy unique and therefore fundamentally different from the Chinese language in both its structure and phonetics, but also to provide the common people an easy and convenient means of conveying or expressing their thoughts in writing.

The Han-gul alphabet is considered one of most scientific sets of alphabets in use in country and around the world. Each of the five basic consonant symbols are in fact abstract dawings of each speech organ and the other consonants were derived by adding additional strokes to the basic letters. The three basic vowel symbols are actually representations of Heaven, Earth, and Man.