Etymology of the Korean currencies Etymology of the Korean currencies The won is the currency of both North and South Korea. "Won" is a cognate of the Chinese currency unit, the yuan, and the Japanese currency unit, the yen, meaning "round object". The won is subdivided into 100 jeon (전; 錢; McCune-Reischauer: "chŏn"; Revised Romanization: "jeon"). Yang is a former Korean currency. It is a cognate of the Chinese tael (pronounced "liǎng" in Chinese). The yang was subdivided into 100 fun (pronounced "pun" but spelt with an "f" on the coins). Fun (푼) is a cognate of the Chinese word fen (分 fēn), referring to
Pao (unit) Pao (unit) The pao is an obsolete unit of dry measure (mass) which was used in South Asia. The name may come from the Punjabi ਪਾਓ "páo", which was a traditional charge of one quarter of a seer per every maund of grain that was weighed, converted into a tax by Sawan Mal. Turner also cites a Sindhi word "pāu" () meaning a quarter of a seer. The pao was recorded in the Bengal Presidency in 1850, but was not considered to be an integral part of the local system of weights. It was equal to four chitaks, and hence