Garot

Garot or galjungi is a variety of hanbok, Korean traditional clothing, which has been worn by locals of Jeju Island in Korea as a working clothes and everyday dress. Although there is no historical record on its origin, it is known that Jeju farmers and fishermen have worn it for a long time. According to a research on Jeju traditional tools, about 700 years ago Jeju people used fishing lines which were dyed by unripe persimmons., because it was much stronger than undyed one. They might have come up with the idea that persimmon dying could make cotton stronger, so they might have started to dye it. Gal (갈) comes from gam (감) which means persimmon in Korean, and ot (옷) means clothes in Korean. Therefore, garot refers to clothes dyed by persimmons, especially unripe persimmons.