날다 means to fly, and 기다 means to crawl, so 날다 긴다 means to fly and then crawl. If someone or something could fly and also crawl, that thing or person would be rather talented. A bird can fly, but it cannot crawl, and a worm can crawl, but it cannot fly. Even though a flying insect can do both, it normally does neither very well.
Consider the following Korean proverb:
날면 기는 것이 능하지 못하다.
Those who fly are not good at crawling.The proverb suggests a person can excel at one thing but not at everything. However, 날다 긴다 suggests that a person is good at both flying and crawling, which means the person is multi-talented. Therefore, I think 난다긴다하다 was originally 날다 긴다하다 and simply changed to 난다긴다하다 over time.
The above explanation is only my opinion. I have seen Koreans on the Internet try to explain 난다긴다 by saying that it comes from expressions used in the Korean game of yut (윷놀이), but their explanations seem too contrived to convince me.
Anyway, as for the origin of 난다긴다하다, believe what you want, as long as you remember its current meaning.
No comments:
Post a Comment