Under the Ancestors' Eyes: Kinship, Status, and Locality in Premodern Korea 0674504305, 9780674504301

Citation preview

Under the Ancestors’ Eyes

Harvard East Asian Monographs 378

Four generations of an upper-class family are gathered to celebrate the sixtieth birthday of the matriarch, who sits at the center with her husband and the future ritual heir, 1942 (original photograph copied by the author).

Under the Ancestors’ Eyes Kinship, Status, and Locality in Premodern Korea

Martina Deuchler

Published by the Harvard University Asia Center Distributed by Harvard University Press Cambridge (Massachusetts) and London 2015

© 2015 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College Printed in the United States of America The Harvard University Asia Center publishes a monograph series and, in coordination with the Fairbank ­C enter for Chinese Studies, the Korea Institute, the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, and other faculties and institutes, administers research projects designed to further scholarly understanding of China, Japan, Vietnam, Korea, and other Asian countries. The Center also sponsors projects addressing multi­ disciplinary and regional issues in Asia.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Deuchler, Martina, 1935–   Under the ancestors’ eyes : kinship, status, and locality in premodern Korea / Martina Deuchler.     pages cm. – (Harvard East Asian monographs ; 378)   Includes bibliographical references and index.   ISBN 978-0-674-50430-1 (hardcover : alk. paper)  1.  Korea–Social conditions–1392–1910.  2.  Elite (Social s­ ciences)—Korea–History.  3.  Social structure—Korea—History.  4.  Korea—Civilization— Confucian i­ nfluences.  5.  Confucianism and state–Korea–History.  6.  Kinship—Korea—History.  7.  Neo-Confucianism—Korea.  I.  Title.   HN730.5.Z9E425  2015   306.09519–dc23 2014032982 Indexes by the author 8  Printed on acid-free paper Last figure below indicates year of this printing 22  21  20  19  18  17  6  15

To My Lifelong Teachers and Mentors

Con ten ts List of Maps and Figures Preface and Acknowledgments Chronology of Korean Kings Note to the Reader General Introduction: Kinship, Status, and Locality

xiii xiv xvii xix 1

Part I: Foundations Introduction

15

1 Indigenous Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

18

The Indigenous Descent Group of Silla The Formation of the Founding Elite of Early Koryŏ The Examination System as a Centralizing Instrument Eminent Descent Groups of Early Koryŏ The Nature of the Early Koryŏ Aristocracy Elite Descent Groups in Late Koryŏ: Survival in Uncertain Times Inventory of Late Koryŏ Elite 2 Crisis of Identity: New Dynastic Ventures Failed Reform Efforts: Enemies of Change The Kwŏnmun: The Villains of Late Koryŏ The Neo-Confucians: The Ideologues of National Restoration Descent Groups in Early Chosŏn New Bureaucratic Order for Reempowering the Sejok Elite Power Contested: Aristocratic Oligarchy versus Royal Despotism

18 21 23 25 29 32 36 39 39 43 45 51 53 59

viii

Contents

3 The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism The Twofold Approach to Neo-Confucianism Examination Reform and Kingly Education Tohak Idealism Advancing The Rise of the Sarim The Construction of the “Succession of the Way” in Korea

64 64 68 70 72 75

Part II: Rebuilding the Countryside Introduction

79

4 Repossessing the Countryside: The Formation of Localized Elite Descent Groups

84

The Local Settings Early Elite Formation: Indigenous Descent Groups in Andong and Namwŏn Andong’s Indigenous Descent Groups Namwŏn’s Indigenous Descent Groups Migration and Early Pioneer Settlers Early Andong Settlers and Their Descendants Early Namwŏn Settlers Communality for Stabilizing the Local Scene 5 Consolidation of Localized Elites in Mid-Dynasty: The Social Dimensions Localized Elites of Andong The Ŭisŏng Kim of Naeap (Ch’ŏnjŏn) The Andong Kwŏn of Yu’gok The Kwangsan Kim of Och’ŏn The Chinsŏng Yi of Chuch’on and On’gye The Chaeryŏng Yi of Yŏnghae Localized Elites of Namwŏn The Chŏnju Yi of Tundŏk The Sangnyŏng Ch’oe of Tundŏk The Kwangju Yi of Sarib’an The P’ungch’ŏn No of Twinnae (Huch’ŏn) The Sunhŭng An of Ant’ŏ (Naegi) The Ch’angwŏn Chŏng of Tarisil (Wŏlgok) The Changsu Hwang and the Hŭngdŏk Chang of Chup’o Networking with Suitable Affines The Elite and Its Secondary Offspring

84 89 89 94 96 96 100 102 107 107 108 112 113 114 115 116 116 116 118 118 118 119 119 120 126



Contents

6 Consolidation of Localized Elites in Mid-Dynasty: The Economic Dimensions Establishing Economic Foundations The Slaves as the Ubiquitous “Hands and Feet” of the Sajok Elite Local Development through Communal Efforts in Andong Economic Regimes over Time: Husbanding the Patrimony The Naeap Kim The Yu’gok Kwŏn The Och’ŏn Kim The Chinsŏng Yi The Tundŏk Yi The Hwang of Chup’o Land and Slaves in Andong and Namwŏn: A Comparison

ix

132 133 135 141 144 145 147 148 150 152 153 154

Part III: Confucian Learning and Practice Introduction

159

7 The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

163

Early Sarim in Andong Early Confucian Learning in Chŏlla State and Private Education in Andong Sajok Scions as T’oegye’s Disciples Learning and the Dilemma of the Confucian Student The Confucian Recluse The Recluse in Southern Kyŏngsang: Nammyŏng Cho Sik The Establishment of the First Private Academies in Andong Strains over Securing T’oegye’s Intellectual Legacy for Posterity 8 Ritual Practice and the Early Formation of Localized Lineages Customary Mortuary and Ancestral Rites Zhu Xi’s Ritual Concepts as Understood in Korea Early Adherents of the Lineal Principle (chong) Contending with Long-Standing Religious Practices Reformed Rituals as Manifestations of Elite Culture Reformed Worshiping Groups at Ancestral Graves Rediscovery of Ancestral Graves and Rearrangement of Graveyards Identity and Early Genealogical Notations Ritual Innovation and Social Change

163 165 168 170 175 178 180 181 183 187 188 189 190 191 194 197 200 205 207

x

Contents

9 Communal Stratification and Local-Level Leadership Communal Relations in Practice: Ward Fund Associations Inscribing Elite Status: The Local Roster The Local Rosters of Andong Standards for Leadership: The Community Regulations The Local Bureau (Yuhyangso) The Local Bureau vis-à-vis the State Defending Community: The Imjin War Postwar Reconstruction in Andong Postwar Reconstruction: New Rosters and Regulations Moral Rehabilitation: Revised Community Compacts Namwŏn’s War Ordeal The Localized Sajok on the Threshold of the Seventeenth Century

208 209 212 213 216 218 221 223 225 228 230 232 234

Part IV: Divisions and Bondings Introduction

237

10 Center and Periphery: Divorce of Interests

245

The Widening Gap between Center and Periphery The Case of Andong The Case of Namwŏn Political Engagement on the Home Front The Case of Andong The Case of Namwŏn State Penetration of the Local Communities

246 246 249 253 253 256 260

11 The Maturation of the Lineage System: Identity and Locality

266

Consolidation of the Position of the Ritual Heir Life in the Service of the Ancestors Idiosyncratic Ritual Practices Secondary Sons as Challengers of Confucian Principles Safeguarding Patrilineality: The Munjung as Kin Contract The Mature Localized Lineage Organization Localization and the Development of Single-Surname Villages Identity and the History of Descent The Loss and Retrieval of Identity: A Rare Story Markers of Respect: Unifiers of Kin

266 270 275 277 280 287 289 297 299 300



Contents

12 Learning and Politics: Orthodoxy Contested Intellectual Realignments after T’oegye’s Death Sajok Strongholds: Private Academies in Andong The Confucian Way in the Crossfire of Factional Interests Factional Conflicts and Dilemmas Chŏlla Interlude Dissent and Competing Forces within Yŏngnam Andong and the Yi In-jwa Rebellion of 1728 Yŏngnam under King Yŏngjo: Broken Hope of Reconciliation Yŏngnam Namin under Pressure of Factional Infiltration Yŏngnam in the Late Eighteenth Century

xi

304 304 310 313 319 321 323 325 329 332 335

Part V: Survival in a Changing World Introduction

341

13 Transformation within Stability: Sustaining Sajok Status

345

Agrarian Regimes for Sustaining Status The Ethos of Life in the Rural Community Literati “Economics” Ancestral Land and Gravesites as Objects of Conflict Sodalities for Displaying Elite Dominance Memorials to the Ancestors: Shrine Construction and Munjip   Compilation Status Exclusivity: The Genealogical Dimension Stratification and Competition 14 The End of Sajok Supremacy? Challengers from Within and Without Old Forces versus New Forces: Conflict with Factional Motives The Rise of Secondary Sons as a Pressure Group Sŏja Storm of Sajok Bastions National Sŏja Movement The Reemergence of the Hyangni in Andong and Namwŏn “Uncontrollable Inferiors” The End of the Traditional Social Status System Concluding Reflections

346 350 352 354 356 358 363 366 370 370 372 373 377 380 382 388 392 397

xii

Contents

Appendix A: Documentary Research Materials Appendix B: Genealogical Charts of Major Descent Groups   of Andong and Namwŏn Abbreviations Notes Bibliography Glossary-Indexes   Descent Groups   Personal Names Arranged Alphabetically According    to Choronym (Pon’gwan)   General Names and Terms

411 417 438 439 543 581 581 583 589

M a ps a n d Figu r e s Maps Map of Korea in the Chosŏn dynasty

xx

Figures frontispiece: Four generations of an upper-class family are gathered to celebrate the sixtieth birthday of the matriarch 1.1

Kyŏngwŏn Yi marriage chart

27

4.1

Map of Andong County proper

86

4.2

Map of Namwŏn County

88

5.1

Portrait of Kim Chin

109

5.2

Marriages in Andong: Ŭisŏng Kim

122

5.3

Marriages in Andong: Andong Kwŏn

123

5.4

Marriages among Namwŏn descent groups

124

7.1

Preparing a document at Tosan Academy

185

8.1

View from behind Kwŏn Haeng’s tomb

201

11.1

Autumnal service at the domestic shrine

272

11.2

Sacrificial meal

275

11.3

Munjung gathering

283

11.4

Preparation of a munjung document

286

11.5

Kim Sŏng-il’s residence

294

11.6

The Blue Rock Pavilion

296

11.7

Purification hall (chaesil)

302

12.1

T’oegye’s discipleship: A selection

305

12.2

Gathering of local Confucians at Tosan Academy

309

Pr eface a n d Ack now l edgm en ts

M

y thinking about this book started as soon as I had completed The Confucian Transformation of Korea (1992). Whereas in that earlier work I investigated how Confucian norms and values transformed Korea’s indigenous bilateral society in the course of the first half of the Chosŏn (1392–1910), in this new study I change my approach and move from detailing the “rules of kinship” to a consideration of “the social uses of kinship.”1 With this changed perspective and an expanded time frame, I focus on the descent group and its function and transformation across time and space from early Silla to the late nineteenth century. Due to the wealth of primary sources recently made available by eminent descent groups, my main emphasis naturally lies in the development and maturation of the Confucian-inspired lineage system in the course of the Chosŏn dynasty, a subject I discussed earlier only in outline. Building on my previous work, there are unavoidably a few overlaps, but I have tried to keep the number of self-citations to a minimum. Social history is the most exacting of all historical disciplines. Studying Korean society’s basic unit—the descent group—prompted me to pursue the study on multiple levels simultaneously and to weave intellectual, political, economic, and cultural history into the narrative. Though my focus is on the descent group, it was individuals who, as the agents of their respective descent groups, moved history forward over generations. I have therefore endeavored to identify all major actors with brief biographical notes, at the risk of overwhelming the reader with a great number of names. For easy recognition, I have inserted the choronym (pon’gwan) in square brackets before key names to facilitate their location on the genealogical charts for their respective descent groups in appendix B.

This book has passed through various stages of preparation. A first opportunity to outline my new approach came when I was privileged to deliver the Edwin O. Reischauer Lectures at Harvard University in March 1995. In three lectures entitled “Class, Status, and Gender in the Formation of Traditional Korean Society: An East Asian Perspective,” I presented my new research project, concentrating on the role of status and gender in the composition of the Chosŏn dynasty’s elite layer, the yangban; in the middle lecture I talked about Korean slavery. Harvard University Press graciously exempted me



P r e fac e a n d Ac k n ow l e d g m e n t s

xv

from scheduled publication of the lectures with the understanding that one day a fuller version would be presented in monographic form. I hope to fulfill this requirement with the present study. Over the years I was able to test my ideas and insights in numerous lectures in Europe, the United States, and Korea. In the autumn of 2004, I was invited by the Academy of Korean Studies to deliver a set of lectures on Korean society and greatly profited from the feedback I received from my learned Korean colleagues. Over the years I also addressed stimulating audiences at Sungkyunkwan University and Korea University. I had many useful exchanges with colleagues at Seoul National University, especially during my research stay at the Kyujanggak Institute in October of 2007, and during my year-long teaching assignment at Sŏgang University, 2008–9. On several occasions I was invited by the Korea Institute at Harvard University to talk about aspects of my work. I remember with special gratitude my numerous research stays at the Kyujanggak Archives (Seoul National University, hereafter SNU), the National Central Library (Seoul), and the Harvard-Yenching Library over the past forty years; in all three institutions I received invaluable assistance from library staff. I also cherish the memory of many field trips to Andong and Namwŏn, which enabled me to study in situ the social culture and rituals I was trying to describe in my book. In Andong, I had the privilege of being shown around by the late Sŏ Chu-sŏk, who also provided me with some rare local materials. In addition, I had the pleasure of getting to know colleagues at Andong National University as well as at the Korean Studies Advancement Center (Han’guk kukhak chinhŭngwŏn). In Namwŏn, I profited enormously from the guidance and encouragement of the late Song June-ho, who opened his priceless collection of books and documents to me and patiently instructed me in reading difficult sources. I also enjoyed the company of Mr. An T’ae-sŏk and the late Mr. Yang Man-jŏng at the Chŏnbuk hyangt’o munhwa yŏn’guhoe (Chŏnju), who, as representatives of two of Namwŏn’s most eminent descent groups, gave me precious insights in material and spiritual aspects of yangban culture. Without the extensive scholarship of many researchers in Korea and the West it would have been impossible to undertake as sweeping a view of Korean society as this book attempts to present. I thus owe an immense debt to all of these scholars and gratefully acknowledge in particular the constant encouragement, instruction, and material support I received over many years from (in alphabetical order) Peter K. Bol (Harvard University), Ch’oe Chin-ok (Academy of Korean Studies, hereafter AKS), Ch’oe Sŭnghŭi (SNU), Chŏn Kyŏng-mok (AKS), Chŏn Sŏng-ho (AKS), Chŏng Chin-yŏng (Andong National University), Chŏng Ku-bok (AKS), Chŏng Man-jo (Kungmin University), Chŏng Sun-u (AKS), Chŏng Tu-hŭi (Sŏgang University), Myron L. Cohen (Columbia University), John B. Duncan (University of California, Los Angeles), Benjamin A. Elman (University of California, Los Angeles and Princeton), Han Yŏng-u (SNU), Hŏ Hŭng-sik (AKS), Hwang Kyung-moon (University of Southern California), Michael Kalton (University of Washington), Kim Hak-su (AKS), Kim Kŏn-t’ae (Sungkyunkwan University and SNU), Kim Kwang-ŏk (SNU), Kim Mi-yŏng (Korean Studies Advancement Center, Andong), Kim Mun-t’aek (Seoul City Museum), Kim Ŏn-jong (Koryŏ University), Kim Sun Joo (Harvard University), Ko Hye-ryŏng (National Institute of Korean History), Ko Yŏng-jin (Kwangju University), Gari Ledyard (Columbia University), Mun Ok-p’yo

xvi

P r e fac e a n d Ac k n ow l e d g m e n t s

(AKS), Mun Suk-ja (National Institute of Korean History), Paek Sŭng-jong, Pak Pyŏng-ho (SNU and AKS), James L. Watson (Harvard University), Yi Hae-jun (Kongju National University), Yi Ho-ch’ŏl (Kyŏngbuk University, Taegu), Yi Hŭi-jae (Kwangju University), Yi Hun-sang (Tonga University, Pusan), Yi Kwang-gyu (SNU), Yi Sŏng-mu (AKS), Yi Su-gŏn (Yŏngnam University, Kyŏngsan), Yi Su-hwan (Yŏngnam University, Kyŏngsan), Yi Yŏng-ch’un (National Institute of Korean History), Yi Yŏng-hun (SNU), and Yu Yŏng-ik (Yonsei University). I also wish to remember with special gratitude the lively and enlightening discussions I had with a few longtime friends and colleagues who sadly are no longer with us: Edward W. Wagner (Harvard University), William E. Skillend (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London), JaHyun Kim Haboush (Columbia University), James B. Palais (University of Washington), and Fujiya Kawashima (Bowling Green State University). I owe an immense measure of thanks to Hoenik Kwŏn (Cambridge University), Peter Kornicki (Cambridge University), John B. Duncan, Laurel Kendall (American Museum of Natural History), and an anonymous reader for the Asia Center, who commented on the whole or parts of the manuscript. Kim Kwang-ŏk generously allowed me to reproduce two of his photographs, and Valérie Gelézeau (École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris) kindly provided the map of Korea. Sandra L. Mattielli gave editorial assistance, and Sem Vermeersch (SNU) never tired of sending me needed materials. I also wish to thank Stefan Deuchler for his unfailing information technology assistance. Special thanks go to my two editors, Deborah Del Gais (Harvard University Asia Center) and Maura High, for their patient support and professional efficiency. I am naturally responsible for any errors or misinterpretations that might have remained undetected. Last but not least, I should like to give heartfelt thanks to my extended in-law family, above all to Mr. Cho Ik-ho and Mr. Cho Hyŏng-jun (Seoul), who not only provided for my physical comfort during my many longer and shorter stays in Korea, but also facilitated my frequent visits to their country seat in northern Kyŏngsang, where I was able to witness, at a late stage, traditional life as it was once lived by an upper-class family—a way of life that is rapidly disappearing under the pressures of the modern world.

Ch ronol ogy of Kor e a n K i ngs Koryŏ Dynasty (918–1392) T’aejo Hyejong Chŏngjong Kwangjong Kyŏngjong Sŏngjong Mokchong Hyŏnjong Tŏkchong Chŏngjong Munjong Sunjong Sŏnjong Hŏnjong Sukchong Yejong Injong Ŭijong Myŏngjong Sinjong Hŭijong Kangjong Kojong Wŏnjong Ch’ungnyŏl Ch’ungsŏn Ch’ungsuk Ch’unghye Ch’ungmok Ch’ungjŏng

太祖 惠宗 定宗 光宗 景宗 成宗 穆宗 顯宗 德宗 靖宗 文宗 順宗 宣宗 獻宗 肅宗 睿宗 仁宗 毅宗 明宗 神宗 熙宗 康宗 高宗 元宗 忠烈 忠宣 忠肅 忠惠 忠穆 忠定

918–43 943–45 945–49 949–75 975–81 981–97 997–1009 1009–31 1031–34 1034–46 1046–83 1083 1084–94 1094–95 1095–1105 1105–22 1122–46 1146–70 1170–97 1197–1204 1204–11 1211–13 1213–59 1259–74 1274–1308 1308–13 1313–30, 1332–39 1330–32, 1339–44 1344–48 1348–51

xviii

Kongmin U wang Ch’ang wang Kongyang

Chronology of Kor ean Kings

恭愍 禑王 昌王 恭讓

1351–74 1374–88 1388–89 1389–92

Chosŏn Dynasty (1392–1910) T’aejo Chŏngjong T’aejong Sejong Munjong Tanjong Sejo Yejong Sŏngjong Yŏnsan’gun Chungjong Injong Myŏngjong Sŏnjo Kwanghae’gun Injo Hyojong Hyŏnjong Sukchong Kyŏngjong Yŏngjo Chŏngjo Sunjo Hŏnjong Ch’ŏlchong Kojong Taewŏn’gun Sunjong

太祖 定宗 太宗 世宗 文宗 端宗 世祖 睿宗 成宗 燕山君 中宗 仁宗 明宗 宣祖 光海君 仁祖 孝宗 顯宗 肅宗 景宗 英祖 正祖 純祖 憲宗 哲宗 高宗 大院君 純宗

1392–98 1398–1400 1400–1418 1418–50 1450–52 1452–55 1455–68 1468–69 1469–94 1494–1506 1506–44 1544–45 1545–67 1567–1608 1608–23 1623–49 1649–59 1659–74 1674–1720 1720–24 1724–76 1776–1800 1800–1834 1834–49 1849–63 1864–1907 regent 1864–73 1907–10

Note to t h e R e a der

T

he romanization of Korean follows the McCune-Reischauer system, that of Chinese, Pinyin; for Japanese, I have used the Hepburn romanization system. Unless otherwise specified, dates are given according to the traditional lunar calendar (year/month/day). The plus sign before some months signifies an intercalary month. All Korean and Chinese personal names follow the East Asian convention of putting the family name first. A superscript number 1 or 2 after a personal name indicates that in the same descent group there are two persons whose personal names have the same phonetic value, but are written with two different Chinese characters; they are listed under their respective descent group in the glossary-index of Personal Names Arranged Alphabetically According to Choronym (Pon’gwan). For easy recognition, I have inserted the choronym (pon’gwan) in square brackets before a number of personal names to facilitate location of those names on the genealogical charts for their respective descent groups in appendix B and in the glossary-indexes. Appendix B contains concise genealogical charts for a few select descent groups referred to in the text. Individuals appearing on the genealogical charts are listed under their respective descent group in the glossary-index of Personal Names Arranged Alphabetically According to Choronym (Pon’gwan). There is a separate glossary-index for all the other descent groups mentioned in the text. For the komunsŏ (described in appendix A) referred to in the notes, see the listings under Komunsŏ chipsŏng in the bibliography. The individual Sillok referred to in the notes are all collected in the Chosŏn wangjo sillok (Royal Annals of the Chosŏn Dynasty). Sources that have volume and page numbers (typically, the Western sources) use a colon between volume and page number; sources that use traditional Korean divisions such as kwŏn use a period between the kwŏn and the page number, with the letter a designating recto and b verso. The abbreviation “Chin.” denotes a Chinese term.

Map of Korea in the Chosŏn dynasty (courtesy of Valérie Gelézeau).

General Introduction Kinship, Status, and Locality

T

he fact that premodern Korea was ruled by a powerful upper class has long been acknowledged, and in recent decades intensive research has attempted to clarify and define its nature. Such research has resulted in widely divergent interpretations. Most historians have tended to fix their gaze on political and institutional aspects and, by focusing predominantly on the central bureaucracy (and using centrally produced documents), identified the ruling elite in terms of examination success, office hold­ing, or status privileges. Relying on terminology confined to the time it was used, such functional approaches usually apply, however, only to limited periods of the dynastic history. Others have tried to explain elite status on the basis of economic wealth, for example landownership or slaveholding. Comparatively few researchers have probed the social basis of elite power, and when they have it has often been in relation to “class analysis” or conflicts of interests between different social groupings.1 Anthropologists, on the other hand, have produced a number of studies of elite villages, yet they have rarely taken into account the fact that what they observe under present-day conditions are structures and organizations that formed and evolved over centuries; moreover, they commonly neglect to tie village developments to larger issues of state. However indispensable these historical and ethnographic studies are, they profile the ruling elite in restricted structural and functional categories and in too narrowly conceived time or space slots, so that the questions of the elite’s formation and evolution over time and its responses to historical processes and developments across dynastic boundaries are rarely addressed. Was this elite homogenous and continuous, or did it constitute itself anew with every change of dynasty? How did it construct its identity and legitimize its claim to supremacy? How did it draw and maintain boundaries between self and others? What role did the nexus between culture and power play in elite formation? What was its position

2

Gener al Introduction

vis-à-vis the state? These are among the questions this book intends to address by pursuing an as yet little explored course of inquiry—that of kinship. This study takes kinship as the constitutive principle of elite formation and explores the cultural and political environment within which the elite evolved over the course of time—from early Silla (fourth and fifth centuries) to late Chosŏn (eighteenth and nineteenth centuries). It will be argued that the consciousness of a common descent and ancestral prestige bonded kin together and created lasting social structures and networks through which political and economic objectives were pursued. This study thus postulates that the primacy of socially manipulated and legitimized patterns of hierarchy and dominance shaped the nature and operation of the political, economic, and cultural institutions of premodern Korea. It was the persistence with which kinship ideology was articulated and utilized, also across dynastic boundaries, that more than anything else determined the tenor of Korea’s historical experience. Whether called kwijok, yangban, sejok, or sajok, the elite defined themselves in terms of descent groups (chok) that traced birth and descent bilaterally through both male and female links. Priding themselves on ascribed rather than achieved characteristics, the elite used social criteria anchored in the descent group model to claim the top ranks in state and society. Indeed, elite status could neither be claimed nor upheld without attested membership in a historically certified descent group that constituted the backbone of elite society from Silla to late Chosŏn. These descent groups had strong aristocratic traits similar to the British aristocracy: they pursued “fame and fortune, power and prestige, place and office, rank and title, ancestor worship and family pride.”2 They were, however, not immutable. Rather, they survived over long periods of time precisely because they were capable of constantly evolving and developing in response to the exigencies of political, economic, and ideological changes. Two momentous historical events profoundly impacted this native Korean sociopolitical constitution and left indelible imprints on the self-definition of the elite. The first was the adoption of the Chinese-style examination system in 958, which introduced a competitive recruitment system that altered the elite’s perspective on the nexus between ascriptive empowerment and political achievement. The second was the introduction, some 450 years later, of Neo-Confucianism, which, with its propagation of the patrilineal descent principle, revolutionized the structure of the native descent group. Though intimately connected to dynastic change and renovation, each of these two events illuminates differ­ ent ways in which the elite descent groups responded, resisted, or adapted themselves to altered sociopolitical environments. Indeed, the responses to these challenges illustrate the resilience of the descent group as a model of social organization: it preserved what seemed essential to the elite’s very definition—most significantly native bilateral (that is, through both male and female links) ascription of status—but it also absorbed ideological and structural elements of Confucian patrilineality that enabled it to sustain its historic claim to leadership in the changing conditions of late Chosŏn. The Chosŏn (1392–1910) was the only dynasty in East Asia founded on Neo-Confucian premises. Indeed, the contributions of Neo-Confucianism to Korea were manifold: it



K i n s h i p, S tat u s , a n d L o c a l i t y

3

furnished the state ideology at the inception of the dynasty, provided fresh impulses to Korean thought, and, above all, altered the structural principles of the native kin group. As the historic transformation of elite society from indigenous bilaterality to Confucian patrilineality during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition was the subject of a previous publication,3 this book is chiefly devoted to an investigation of the social, economic, political, and ideological background of the genesis and development of the lineage system that, from roughly the mid-sixteenth century onward, provided a persuasive model for “rationalizing” the structure of the descent group. To be sure, political and intellectual developments taking place around the time of the founding of the Chosŏn prepared the ground for structural changes in kin organization, but why did lineages first emerge and mature in the countryside almost two hundred years later? Why indeed did the Confucian patrilineage become an attractive model for elite organization in a rural environment? Answers to these and related questions are closely related to the elite’s posi­ tion with respect to the state and will be discussed within the framework of center and periphery—between oligarchic rule of a select group of eminent descent groups emerg­ing in the capital and gradually politically disenfranchised and numerically larger rural elites. How, then, could the latter sustain their elite status when passing the examinations and holding office at the center were for many no longer a viable prospect and state and society began to drift apart? The genesis of the Korean lineage as the product of a conscious act of cultural assimilation has so far been poorly understood. Equally underrated is its significance as a central social, political, and economic force in the Chosŏn polity. Lineage building, it will be argued, was the localized elite’s most compelling “strategy of distinction,”4 and with it they positioned themselves vis-à-vis the state and maintained their elite status in the localities where they resided. In other words, even without examination success and office holding, the landed elites, it will be suggested, derived their social empowerment and identity from the aggregate power of close-knit agnatic groups of kin whose cohesion was supported by an elaborate ancestral cult. At the same time, scholarly reputation and the construction of wide-ranging intellectual networks to an extent disengaged them from dependence on the state. Indeed, scholarly authority assumed, it will be argued, a status-preserving value similar to that of bureaucratic employment, challenging the state on its own Confucian terms. As they emerged in Chosŏn Korea, lineages were far more than simple aggregates of agnatic kinsmen. Membership in a recognized lineage, sustained by ancestral entitlement, was a social arrogation of power with which the landed elite defended their prerogatives with tenacity with regard to the state—and against any challenge from “below.” The elite’s assertion of hegemonic power with all its economic, cultural, and scholarly privileges rested on a highly developed hierarchical categorization of elite and nonelite— the majority of whom were commoners (yangin, yangmin). Indeed, the frequent allusion to the dichotomy of “noble versus base” (kwi-ch’ŏn) was not merely a rhetorical device. It expressed the strong sense of a hierarchical order that put the elite in opposition to the rest of society—an order that, they believed, was “natural” and thus had to be upheld if

4

Gener al Introduction

state and society were to survive and prosper. The “bounded pairs” kwi-ch’ŏn and its equivalent, chon-bi (“elevated versus low”), were not technical administrative terms; rather, they denoted, to use Charles Tilly’s formulation, the “durable inequality” among these two categories of people and thus set up a system of exclusion and control.5 Utilizing such conceptualization, the early Chosŏn legislators frequently referred to the ancient notions of “rectification of names” (chŏngmyŏng) and “determination of status” (chŏngbun) to espouse the idea that the social order was firmly established only when a “great divide” (taebang) lastingly separated “base” from “noble.”6 How was such a divide realized in practice? By “clarifying” status (pun) in terms of “descent group affiliation” (choksok).7 Thus, what differentiated the nonelite from elite was in the first instance a lack of ancestral empowerment. Only the elite organized kin on the basis of long-lasting “descent groups” (chok), whereas commoners were held to lack a certifiable ancestral background (munji). For them, “descent” meant at best a “line” (kye) or “generational line” (segye) rarely reaching back for more than two generations. Consequently, the radius of a commoner’s recognized kin was limited.8 Clearly, the societal order was thought to be bifurcated by social qualifications, lending substance to the proposition that in traditional Korea social considerations had the greatest power of differentiation. Social status determined the nature and extent of the service obligations (yŏk)— taxation, corvée, and military service—that had to be rendered to the state. Both elite and nonelite were subject to such obligations, albeit to differing degrees according to their assigned occupations (chik) identified by distinct service titles. Indeed, it was through the differential enforcement of these obligations that inequality was lastingly institutionalized, notably making corvée/military service another crucial touchstone of inequality. Constituting by birth and descent the ruling stratum, the yangban (here used as a generic term for the elite) were exempt from corvée and service in the regular army and, at best, manned some royal guard units in the capital. In contrast, the commoners, the large majority of whom were peasants, were subjected to corvée/military service (kug’yŏk) levied on all able-bodied men aged sixteen to sixty. In addition, by tilling the land, they produced the principal tax items, grain and cloth, with which they maintained the state economically, making the commoners into a hereditary “service class.” From the commoners’ lack of social qualifications derived several cultural handicaps that significantly underlined their inequality with respect to the yangban. Not only did they find it difficult to get access to education, wanting proper social credentials, they were in fact (even if not by law) also barred from the examination process.9 Indeed, in early Chosŏn, the king was urged to make the discrimination between “noble” and “base” a policy priority: “From of old, the use of men [yongin] has not exclusively relied on talent; it is essential first to investigate [a candidate’s] descent line [ka’gye] and ancestral background.”10 Such a policy effectively excluded the commoners from political participation. A multitude of legal, ritual, and disciplinary stipulations furthermore under­lined in practice and symbolically the commoner’s degradation by forcing upon him a distinct attire, a truncated ritual program, and deferential patterns of speech and behavior vis-à-vis the elite. Not surprisingly, then, intermarriage between commoner and elite was a social taboo, except for secondary unions.



K i n s h i p, S tat u s , a n d L o c a l i t y

5

Whereas kwi and ch’ŏn signified the great divide bifurcating the social world at large, the bounded pair “good” (yang) versus “base” (ch’ŏn) established a second line of inequality: that between the commoners and the slaves (nobi). Even though the same Chinese character ch’ŏn figures in both, the two pairs were never used synonymously.11 Indeed, yang and ch’ŏn contrasted the “good,” that is, the commoners who had no base blood in their veins, to the “base,” that is, the slaves. This categorical distinction, which rested on “purity” and positioned the slaves at the bottom of society’s hierarchical structure, was, however, a far less secure boundary and at times was willfully manipulated according to the interests of state and elite alike. Korean slavery was unique for at least two reasons.12 Unlike most other slave systems, the Chinese excepted, Korean slaves did not differ ethnically from their masters. Further­ more, they constituted up to 40 percent of a total population of some nine million people around 1500.13 The origin of Korea’s slave system is obscure. Though it was often attributed to a ruling by the legendary Kija, according to which thieves and robbers were to be enslaved,14 it more likely started on a large scale with the enslavement of prisoners of war during Silla’s and, later, Koryŏ’s unification wars.15 By early Chosŏn, it was a widely held view that involuntary labor was a form of punishment, that it was of great antiquity, and that it had served well to define Korea’s status differentiation. Due to their special assignments in the public and private spheres, slaves were exempt from corvée and military service.16 Whereas “public slaves” (kong nobi) worked in government workshops and agencies inside and outside the capital, private slaves (sa nobi) constituted, besides land, the elite’s most valued property and thus were vital attributes of elite status. As an enduring feature of elite history, male and female slaves represented the elite’s proverbial “hands and feet,” ubiquitous in house and field, and consequently figure in the historical record more prominently and in much greater detail than the commoner population. The slave was conceptualized as the elite’s social antipode—as a “kinless” person, to whom the concept of an enduring descent group did not apply.17 The earliest legal evidence dealing with slaves, a law of 1039, reads: “A lowborn follows his mother.”18 Because no further explanation or practical application of this law is recorded in historical documents,19 its interpretation has given rise to considerable controversy. Did it ascribe status or did it make the offspring of a base mother the property of her owner? In view of Koryŏ’s hereditary status distinctions, it must have meant the former. This law should therefore be read: “A base child receives its status from its mother, regardless of the status of the father.” Since paternity could rarely be established, the law took into account the only readily ascertainable genealogical link—the link to the child’s mother. According to this “matrifilial rule,”20 then, a child inherited its baseness from its mother. That the child also became the property of its mother’s owner was a secondary, but no less important consequence.21 It is clear that the early Chosŏn legislators read the law of 1039 in this sense and in fact made it the common understanding of the hereditary reproduction of base status.22 As an “incomplete” person, then, a slave lacked a surname (sŏng) and was usually known merely by a native (not Chinese-derived) personal name that frequently carried a dehumanizing pejorative connotation. Thus deprived of antecedents as well as of col-

6

Gener al Introduction

lateral relatives,23 the slave was easily manipulated and treated as a piece of property that could be inherited, bought and sold, given away as a gift, and pawned. Surprisingly, however, this did not prevent a slave from owning land and slaves, a fact that challenges the commonly held view that a slave was “quintessentially a property-less person.”24 On the contrary, this demonstrates that being a slave and owning landed property were, in Korea, not incompatible in principle, because the definition of slave status was not connected to material ownership. As their service obligations (yŏk) differed, it was vital for the state to uphold the boundary between yang and ch’ŏn and underpin it with legal measures lest the slaves attempt to escape from the stigma of baseness by merging with the commoner population. Intermarriage between commoners and slaves was therefore undesirable and was prohibited from Koryŏ times.25 Yet during the fluid social conditions of late Koryŏ unions between commoners and slaves were frequent, invalidating the intention of the matrifilial rule to stop the upward mobility of the base. On the other hand, a late Koryŏ extended reinterpretation of the matrifilial law, according to which a child was base if either the mother or the father was base,26 encouraged the rich and powerful to forcibly join destitute peasant women to their estate slaves, adding their offspring to the owner’s slave workforce.27 The Chosŏn founders thus faced a formidable challenge when they attempted to find a new balance between commoners and slaves without infringing on the elite’s interest in retaining slaves. After several decades of debate and social engineering to forestall a demographic disparity created by illegal mixed marriages, the Kyŏngguk taejŏn (Great code of administration) of 1486 merely repeated what had become a customary rule of thumb: if one parent is base, the offspring is base.28 By tacitly acknowledging that a total ban on intermarriage between commoners and slaves was unenforceable, this catchall law effectively prevented the possible upwardly mobility of slaves, but it did not guard against the debasement of commoners. It reflected, as a critic in the mid-sixteenth century dryly pointed out, the interests of influential ministers who, as slave owners, put personal advantage above the public good.29 In sum, the kind of inequality between members of the elite and their slaves characteristic of Koryŏ-Chosŏn society (the heyday of private slavery was the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries) gave rise to a host of contradictions and ambivalences. These unquestionably derived from the fact that status was a social construct for the yangban and the slaves alike. From its attested beginnings, the slaves’ baseness (ch’ŏn) was conceived as a social category that was unrelated to a particular type of work.30 Later, some Confucians added a moral explanation: it was their “turbid mind-matter [ki] and dull nature” that made slaves morally inferior beings and therefore suitable to coerced menial labor.31 Though not denied humanness, slaves thus led an ambivalent existence. Physically they sustained elite society, yet were stigmatized as outsiders—an anomaly that rarely figured in the reflections of those who, as slave owners, drew the greatest profit from perpetuating slavery. The elite’s overpowering and persistently advanced claim on social and political hegemony marginalized large segments of society, first of all commoners and slaves. But there were two additional groups that came to chafe under the yangban’s enforcement of the



K i n s h i p, S tat u s , a n d L o c a l i t y

7

societal divide: the secondary sons (sŏja or sŏŏl) and local functionaries (hyangni), whom Kyung Moon Hwang has aptly called “secondary status groups.”32 Their marginalization was a consequence of sociopolitical changes at the beginning of the Chosŏn and created vexing social and cultural problems that troubled the yangban throughout the dynasty. The hyangni, discussed extensively in later chapters, often descended from the same progenitors as their office-holding kinsmen in the capital and, as the principal administrators of local affairs throughout Koryŏ, dominated their native communities and thus belonged to the ruling elite. In early Chosŏn, however, they became the victims of the dynastic founders’ concerted drive to bring the countryside under the authority of the central government. Suspected as prime opponents of the new dynasty, they were subjected to various anti-hyangni policies by which they were deprived of their powerful earlier positions and forced to fulfill their service obligations (hyangyŏk) hereditarily and unsalaried as subadministrative staff in the local bureaus (yuhyangso) and magistracies. Though technically bound to their duties in local administration, the hyangni were not completely excluded from the examination process, however, and the rare lower-degree holders (chinsa or saengwŏn) among them were exempt from hyangni duties.33 Nevertheless, most Chosŏn hyangni suffered a marked status deprivation and were much maligned as “preying on state and society.” As a symbol of such degradation they had to wear special attire, especially a square hat (pangnip) with a brim so wide that “they could no longer see the sun.” Originally apparently a punitive measure, the “black bamboo square hat” (hŭkchuk pangnip) was legally designated a common hyangni outfit in early Chosŏn.34 Another humiliating piece of legislation stipulated that the hyangni were to mourn their parents for merely one hundred days instead of the customary three years,35 segregating them, they complained, from “universal practice from emperor down to commoner.” From the beginning of the Chosŏn, then, the hyangni became legally and ritually isolated from the yangban and humiliated into a generally despised position. It was their humbled pride, however, that seems to have nurtured their determination eventually, toward the end of the dynasty, to regain what they considered their rightful place alongside the yangban. Whereas the hyangni became a “problem” when the early Chosŏn ruling elite endeavored to extend their political domination from the capital into the countryside, the secondary-son problem, in contrast, was an entirely new phenomenon lacking a Koryŏ prehistory. It first emerged with the enforcement of patrilineal kin concepts that were meant to streamline the structure of the elite kin group and, by extension, narrow access to political office. Since under this new scheme only one wife could mother the lineal heir, the various spouses an elite man in late Koryŏ may have had were subjected to a ranking system in 1413. Since elite status continued to be ascribed bilaterally, impeccable ancestral credentials were mandatory for a woman to be chosen as primary wife (ch’ŏ) capable of conferring bona fide elite status upon her offspring; the other wives and their progeny were consequently degraded to secondary status. Henceforth secondary wives were of either commoner or slave background (yangch’ŏp or pich’ŏp) despite the maxim that noble (kwi) and base (ch’ŏn) were not to mix. As a son’s legitimacy within his father’s descent group thus came to hinge on his mother’s social origin,36 an elite descent group was split into “primary” (chŏk) and “secondary” (sŏ) lines of descent—a cleavage

8

Gener al Introduction

that was perpetuated by heredity. This differentiation created for secondary sons the humiliation of “illegitimacy,” which, translated into law and customary practice, tended to exclude them from participation in the domestic and public spheres.37 Secondary sons were discriminated against socially, politically, and ritually. They were barred by law from the lower (saengwŏn-chinsa) and higher (munkwa) civil service examinations,38 and, when exceptionally admitted to the bureaucracy due to a father’s high office holding, restricted in how far they could advance in rank (hanp’um sŏyong). Especially talented sŏja were allowed to compete in the specialist examinations (chapkwa) that the elite tended to avoid and thus came to form one contingent from which the so-called “middle people” (chungin), the capital-bound professionals, arose from around 1600; for others, service in the military was an alternative.39 Whereas in the political sphere occasional compromises were tolerated, such was rarely the case in ritual matters affecting the social reproduction of the descent group. Whether a secondary son was qualified to become the heir of his father’s descent line in cases where there was no son by the primary wife was a controversial, much-discussed question throughout the dynasty’s first century, but it was not satisfactorily solved in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn. Discrepancies in opinion and law therefore gave rise to innumerable disputes, not least because of the economic implications—a secondary son made lineal/ritual heir benefited from an increased inheritance portion. Nevertheless, by the mid-sixteenth century his “impurity” virtually excluded a secondary son from descent group affairs: if a direct lineal heir was without a primary son, he chose either his younger brother’s primary son or at least the primary son of a cousin as his heir. This tendency was clearly reflected in the Taejŏn husongnok of 1543, which no longer mentioned a secondary son as a possible candidate for lineal succession or ritual heirship.40 Though the law thus cemented the secondary sons’ marginalization, was their exclusion from government service not a grave violation of the Confucian dictum of the “use of man” (yongin)? Could a country with a small population, it was argued, afford to reject them on the basis of discriminatory practices? Indeed, the inherent contradiction between what was termed the Chinese method of “using men” and the Korean insistence on social differentiation created an insoluble dilemma. After frequent government debates agonized over the question of whether or not a man’s talents could be invoked to override his social handicap, in the end, the elite’s obsession with drawing durable boundaries to keep secondary sons from political participation led to a redefinition of the law: the Taejŏn chuhae of 1555 interpreted the “sons and grandsons” (chason) in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn to mean that “all descendants” (chaja sonson) of a secondary son were ineligible for sitting the examinations.41 By the mid-sixteenth century, then, the discrimination against secondary sons in the domestic and public realms was complete and became an enduring feature of Korean society, haunting the elite throughout the latter half of Chosŏn. The severity with which the nonelite segments of the population were marginalized in Chosŏn Korea testifies to the fervor with which the elite enforced the hierarchical structure of society—with the apparent assistance of Confucianism. Indeed, the elite chose certain Confucian tenets, most significantly agnatic ritualism and heirship, to accentuate their aristocratic privilege of birth and descent and contract the membership



K i n s h i p, S tat u s , a n d L o c a l i t y

9

of the elite descent group. In this sense, Confucianism, as interpreted in Korea, intensified rather than attenuated social differences. Because of their proximity to the elite, the hyangni and the secondary sons suffered most under this contradiction. If the yangban elite are the primary agents in this study, the secondary sons and the hyangni figure as subtext actors who in the course of time, independently and separately, started to challenge the yangban’s one-sided claim to social and political dominance. Marginalization did not have merely social dimensions, however. It possessed a spatial extension insofar as “center” and “periphery” divided the peninsular territory into two ideationally unequal parts each with its own social, political, and economic qualities. The center was synonymous with the locus of power—the capital (sŏul).42 Whether located in Kyŏngju, Kaesŏng, or Hanyang (Seoul), the capital as the seat of the royal court, the hub of the government apparatus, and the residence of the ruling elite constituted the middle of the country, exercising a seemingly irresistible centripetal attraction. Indeed, Korea was a “monocentered” country, in contrast, for instance, to multicentered China, where Beijing, the capital in late imperial times, never possessed the same political, economic, and cultural weight as Hanyang during the Chosŏn.43 From the “centrality” of the capital derived the notion that everything outside the capital was somehow inferior and subordinate—a hinterland whose only function was to sustain the center. Government assignments in the provinces and counties were therefore never popular, and banishment to far-off and little-developed places in the south or north of the country amounted to an extreme form of punishment. The famous scholar Tasan Chŏng Yag-yong (1762–1836), who suffered exile in faraway Kangjin (southern Chŏlla Province) for eighteen years and thus was thoroughly familiar with the forlorn state of rural Korea, commented around 1800 as follows: “In China, civilization has become so much part of everyday life that even if one lives in a remote part of the country or in an isolated village, there are no obstacles in the way of becoming a sage or a worthy. In our country, however, this is not so. Only short distances outside the gates of Seoul, people live as if in distant antiquity or in a really outlying rural area.”44 Despite the country’s extreme centralism and the ensuing contrast between center and periphery, Korea was an agrarian state with most of its population living in the countryside until recent times. On the basis of its mountainous constitution the peninsula was naturally subdivided into several macroregions. The capital was surrounded first by the “capital circuit” (Kyŏnggi) and secondarily by a metropolitan area that (in Chosŏn times) embraced parts of Ch’ungch’ŏng, Hwanghae, and Kangwŏn Provinces. The southern part of the peninsula is cut in two by high mountain ranges that form a spur going west from the T’aebaek Mountains, the peninsula’s tectonic backbone, which runs along its eastern seaboard from north to south: thus Chŏlla Province, in the southwest, was separated from Kyŏngsang Province, in the southeast. To the north of the capital lay the provinces of Hwanghae and P’yŏngan. Only in the course of the fifteenth century was the latter extended to the Yalu River; in the same period, the extreme northeast became part of Chosŏn’s territory as Hamgyŏng Province, with the Yalu and Tumen Rivers forming the country’s northern border. The eight provinces differed demographically, economically, and culturally, and a historically grown

10

Gener al Introduction

notion subordinated the “uncivilized,” thinly populated north to the more prosperous agrarian south—creating a clear north-south divide. In Chosŏn times, the rural village (ch’on) was the “central place”45 of residence and activities for the large majority of the Korean population, whether elite or nonelite. The location and the structure of these villages differed according to the social status of their inhabitants. For the landed elite, their villages were not merely places of residence; in time, they turned into vital loci of social identification. In contrast to China, where the market towns played a predominant economic and social role, in Korea the administrative centers, the walled county seats of the magistrates and their staff, rarely functioned also as market towns. More common were the rotating five-day markets frequented by the elite’s agents, the slaves. The periodicity of markets in traditional agrarian societies was, as G. William Skinner remarks, a function of the relatively underdeveloped state of transport.46 With the development of lineage culture from the mid-sixteenth century, a dominant feature in the countryside was the elite’s single-surname villages. According to a Japanese survey conducted in the entire country in the 1930s, there were 1,685 elite villages in a total of 14,672 villages. Typically, the majority of these village communities were found in the southern, most fertile half of the peninsula. While they were most numerous in northern Kyŏngsang and southern Chŏlla, they were also scattered across Ch’ungch’ŏng in the central region and as far as Hwanghae and the southern reaches of P’yŏngan in the north. Some of these settlements were said to have historical records reaching back more than five hundred years, but a greater number had apparently been founded within the previous three hundred years.47 In short, these single-surname villages originated during the process of lineage building and covered an area that Edward Wagner used to call the “yangban crescent” stretching across the productive alluvial plains from the southeast to the northwest of the peninsula. For the purpose of analyzing and narrating the history of a select number of descent groups, this study concentrates on Andong (modern-day North Kyŏngsang Province) and Namwŏn (modern-day North Chŏlla Province). These two localities were chosen for comparative study not only because of their contrasting geographic, demographic, and economic conditions, but, above all, because of the rich historical record they have preserved.48 This study is not intended as a local history of these two areas; rather, it situates the fate of their descent groups within the dynamic binary of center and periphery. How did members of the localized elites in Andong and Namwŏn acquire their Confucian learning to become the pioneers who “transformed the countryside” (hyanghwa) consistent with the newly propagated Confucian moral order? Indeed, how did they re-form the structures and ritual practices of their own descent groups? How did they sustain their elite status and react when in the late seventeenth century the state began to extend its power with heightened authority into the countryside? And what was their response when, in the course of the eighteenth century, persistent challenges coming from “subordinate” social groups began to break down fixed hereditary status boundaries? In view of the intensified ambiguity between ascriptive and achieved status in the latter part of the Chosŏn, the preservation of elite status in the deep countryside turned into an ongoing process of identification. Survival over time depended foremost on membership in a



K i n s h i p, S tat u s , a n d L o c a l i t y

11

mature lineage community. Though attributes such as “long-standing” (sejok) or “resident [in one location] over generations” (segŏ), with which successful “localized” descent groups came to be identified with their localities, may suggest their immutability and inflexibility, it was precisely the adaptability and multifunctionality of lineage organization that enabled individual elite descent groups in Andong and Namwŏn to persist in the changing world of late Chosŏn. This book is divided into five parts. The three chapters in part I, “Foundations,” are intended to present a new and expanded view of pre-Confucian Korean society, which is indispensable for an understanding of the social, intellectual, and political developments that were to follow during the Chosŏn dynasty. The first two chapters trace the origin and the early development of the indigenous descent group in Silla and Koryŏ and explore the ramifications that the impact of the Chinese-style examination system had on the nascent political system. The third chapter revisits the introduction of NeoConfucianism during the transition from Koryŏ to early Chosŏn within the wider context of the contemporary social and political situation. The remaining four parts discuss the diversification of the elite during the Chosŏn period. Part II, “Rebuilding the Countryside,” introduces the two main localities under consideration, Andong and Namwŏn, as the sites where select descent groups experienced “localization.” The subject of part III, “Confucian Learning and Practice,” is the early training of localized elites in Con­fucian scholarship and the application of their newly won understanding of Confucian ritualism to their own kin groups. It ends with a description of how the local elites expanded their hegemonic claims of leadership to their localities and how they responded to the Imjin War at the end of the sixteenth century and the Manchu invasions in the 1620s and 30s. Part IV, “Divisions and Bondings,” opens with an exploration of the growing gap between center and periphery in the course of the seventeenth century and its impact on the elite’s thought and behavior. It elucidates the ensuing intellectual splits and factional divisions and discusses the maturation of the lineage system. Part V, “Survival in a Changing World,” finally, examines the strategies that the landed elites devised to counteract the challenges of a shifting socioeconomic environment in the eighteenth century and their responses to the emergence of competing social forces that threatened to transgress social boundaries. Each part is preceded by a brief introduction that outlines specific aspects of contemporary political, economic, and cultural conditions that situate the contents of the individual chapters within the larger framework of national history. The volume concludes with reflections on the implications that the insights drawn from this examination of kinship ideology through time and space and across dynastic boundaries may have for reevaluating the nature and workings of premodern Korean society and, by extension, of Korea’s long history.

Pa rt I

Foundations

g

Introduction

T

he proposition that the descent group was the principle agent of Korean history has an antecedent in a statement that the prominent scholar-official Ryang Sŏng-ji (1415–82) made in the mid-fifteenth century: In the same way as the sun, the moon, and the stars give substance to the formless Heaven, and mountain peaks, the sea, and rivers to the formless Earth, a great country is great because great and hereditary descent groups [taega sejok] give it substance. Because there are great and hereditary descent groups, even traitorous fellows are unable to find an opportunity [to rise], and therefore internal disturbances cannot occur. Great and hereditary descent groups, like foundation stones and protecting walls, support each other and guard [the country]. This is the reason why indignities from outside cannot have an effect.1

Contemplating the political events of the first few decades of the newly founded Chosŏn dynasty, Ryang evoked his country’s traditional social stability across dynastic change and ascribed it to the existence of “great and hereditary descent groups.” In his view, it was these descent groups’ presence inside and outside the capital that prevented frequent dynastic upheavals. In Korea, he continued, there had therefore been only seven dynasties from the time of the nation’s mythic founder Tan’gun to Ryang’s own time—this in contrast to China, which experienced twenty-six such cataclysms from antiquity down to the Great Ming.2 In sum, Ryang ascribed the endurance of Korea’s polity to the existence of these self-perpetuating elite descent groups that, he thought, gave “substance” to the country. What was the nature of these descent groups, which by Ryang Sŏng-ji’s time had evidently become a “historically determined perception”3 of elite society, and to which Ryang thus attributed singular historical agency? Assuming that Ryang had good reason to assign to aristocratic descent groups (sejok) a historic role in securing the country’s stability, did they in fact participate in the dynastic transition? Or did Ryang

16

Fou n dat ions

remember them purely as relics of bygone days? And who were the “traitorous fellows” he referred to? Can Ryang’s evaluation be verified by the historical record? Or did it simply derive from Ryang’s well-known penchant for highlighting Korea’s singularity vis-à-vis China? To answer these questions it is indispensable not only to assess the nature and activities of the pre-Chosŏn descent group but also to pursue such an assessment across dynastic boundaries. Most previous studies of Korean society concentrate on specific time slots and neglect dynastic transitions. But it is precisely the contingencies pertaining to the conditions leading to dynastic change that pose the most difficult but also the most crucial questions as to stability and continuity or change and discontinuity. Did the descent groups survive, or were they replaced by new social elements and organizational patterns at each dynastic change? There were only two transition periods in Korean history—from Silla to Koryŏ in the tenth century and from Koryŏ to Chosŏn in the fourteenth century. These transition periods provide key testing grounds for examining the fate of elite descent groups across dynastic boundaries. The first dynastic transition that led to the foundation of Koryŏ (918–1392) has elicited relatively moderate scholarly interest because it was principally a territorial reunification of three regions that had been formerly united and held together (from 668) under Sillan rule, but which had reverted to separate units because of regional antagonism. Since a number of territorially based descent groups (not all by any means of Sillan origin) started to vie for power at the center, the early decades of Koryŏ witnessed several power struggles. Nevertheless, the vortex of capital politics eventually amalgamated them into a compact central aristocracy variously called kwijok or munbŏl, which upheld strict criteria of birth and descent for the recruitment of new members. The second transition, which prepared the founding of the Chosŏn in 1392, has, in contrast, engendered a long-running, heated scholarly debate because an understanding of the driving forces involved in this dynastic change has been considered vital for an evaluation of whether or not the new dynasty was capable of offering the historic conditions for incipient “modernity” in Korea. During the colonial period (1910–45), Japanese scholars argued that Korea was a country mired in political and economic stagnation brought about by the dominance of an overpowering aristocratic scholar-official class that prevented the country from moving toward modernity. To repudiate this negative appraisal, Korean historians began in the course of the 1960s and 1970s to come up with revisionist interpretations of Korean history. Inspired by various Western concepts of “progress,” some Korean scholars postulated a progressive view of history and insisted that the founding of the Chosŏn in 1392 was the result of “revolutionary acts” (kaehyŏk) initiated by a new group of forward-looking activists. This group, variously called “newly rising scholar-officials” (sinhŭng sadaebu) or “newly upcoming Confucian scholars” (sinjin yusa), supposedly consisted of men of recent origin and modest economic means who, inspired by Neo-Confucian learning, rallied to topple the established leadership class (ku-kwijok) and found a new dynasty. In brief, the dynastic transition from Koryŏ to Chosŏn was interpreted as principally resulting from a socioeconomic struggle between old and new forces that ended with the victory of the latter—a view that brought the history of early Chosŏn close to the revolutionary patterns of Western European regime



Introduction

17

changes, and recently enticed some scholars to locate the Korean “early modern” in the fifteenth century.4 The “newly rising scholar-officials” interpretation is, however, far too simplistic to explain the reasons for and the consequences of dynastic change in 1392 and tends to essentialize the early Neo-Confucians as an isolated group of actors detached from their sociopolitical backgrounds. It is also short-sighted insofar as it neglects to take into account the long-term historical developments before and after 1392. Although research conducted over the past two decades has thrown serious doubts on a “class struggle” explanation of dynastic change, it is regrettably still widely adhered to in Korean and Western historiography. If this book, then, aims to demonstrate that it was the descent-group model that empowered the elite to persist through time and space and across dynastic boundaries, an alternative interpretation of the establishment of the Chosŏn dynasty is called for. The task of the three chapters in part I is therefore to provide, however briefly, the historical details that will illuminate the evolution of the descent group and its status-preserving role in dynastic change. It thus recasts and occasionally modifies some of the ideas first expressed in The Confucian Transformation of Korea. Chapter 1 traces the origin of the descent group model in Silla and its development into the normative organization of elite society during Koryŏ. It also discusses the introduction of the Chinese-style examination system and the elite’s reaction to changing conditions of government service, and finally explores the fate of elite descent groups under Military Rule (1170–1250) and Mongol Overlordship (1250–1350). The second chapter deals with the crisis of identity that elite descent groups experienced during the late Koryŏ and suggests the political, economic, and religious factors that led to the founding of Chosŏn (1392–1910). It also examines the reconstitution of the early Chosŏn elite. The third chapter, finally, details the intellectual and political uses that Neo-Confucianism was put to in the recalibration of state and society during the first two centuries of the new dynasty.

Ch a p ter 1

Indigenous Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

I

t is the task of this chapter to define the structure and organization of the indigenous descent group as it emerged in the early Silla and to relate the gradual stratification of Sillan society to the process of state formation. Although the documentary basis is thin, it is clear that in the early Silla a direct relationship between kinship and power existed, so that the exercise of the latter came “naturally” to be contingent on the configuration of social relationships. Indeed, the hierarchization of Silla’s society seems to be a prime example for how social units formed by descent and proximity to the ancestors regulated access to the positions bestowing power and authority.1 The social paradigm that matured during the Silla period largely survived in Koryŏ and, despite certain incisive institutional innovations, continued to shape its sociopolitical field.

The Indigenous Descent Group of Silla According to the documentary and archaeological record,2 early Silla (ca. fourth century) emerged as a state-like polity from a confederation of a number of territorially well-defined segmentary descent group clusters located in the Kyŏngju plain.3 Before the rulership was consolidated in one descent group, it was apparently shared by a multi­ lineal “dynastic group” constituted by three descent groups, the Pak, the Sŏk, and the Kim—all three likely to have originated from in-migrating sons-in-law from outside. Although later historiography strung their rule out in a line of succession, succession to the rulership was not automatic, as the criteria for selection were often unclear, and moved back and forth among these three kin groups, who closely intermarried. How the Kim managed to “break out” of this tripartite dynastic group and seize power in the course of the second half of the fourth century is not entirely clear, but it is likely that they were able to bolster their hold on solitary rule with their tighter kin organization as



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

19

well as their superior landed wealth and control of larger populations. With these resources as the underpinnings of his supremacy and with the support of the Pak, who provided wives to the royal house, King Naemul (r. 356–402) consolidated the “House of Kim” and succeeded in strengthening his rule and enlarging the confederated territory through conquest of neighboring polities. Further factors, suggested by Hyung Il Pai, may have been regional peer competition and the stimuli that the early Silla received from trade and diplomatic contacts with the northern Chinese colony of Lolang (108 BCE– 313 CE).4 It was Naemul’s descendant, King Pŏphŭng (r. 514–40), who decisively transformed Silla into an independent kingdom. He reinforced the Kim’s arrogation of the “royal line” by introducing the royal shrine system from Tang China, thereby establishing their ancestry as the dynastic ancestry, and shortly thereafter replaced the native form of royal address with the more prestigious Chinese title “king” (wang). His final triumph was the welcoming of Buddhism as a religious prop of royal authority.5 It was, moreover, through the construction of stone-mounded tombs in the Kyŏngju plain, in which the deceased rulers were adorned with gold and silver crowns, girdles, and ornaments, that the early Silla rulers of the fourth and fifth centuries marked their superiority over Kyŏngju society.6 The elevation of one descent group of the original dynastic group above the other two likely did not come without competition and possible strife. As the evidence suggests, the Kim ruler had to defend his claims not only against contenders from within the dynastic group, but also against challengers arising from among those excluded from that group, who demanded for themselves by birth and descent the social and political privileges of elite status. It is quite possible that the kolp’um system (bone rank system, or kolp’umje), which seems to have received definite shape in King Pŏphŭng’s reign, was conceived as an instrument to integrate potential rivals into a hierarchical system that linked status “received”7 by virtue of descent to political participation. Clearly, such classification of Kyŏngju society was a parallel development in the process of state formation. The kolp’um system stratified Silla society according to ascriptive criteria of status into graded status groups (kol). The royal group (which included consort givers) positioned itself at the top of this social hierarchy as “hallowed bone” (sŏnggol ). Next followed the “true bone” aristocrats (chin’gol), that is, branch members of the royal descent groups who could no longer aspire to the throne. Minor aristocrats of “head rank six” (yuktup’um) came next who, not belonging to the royal group, were excluded from intermarrying with royals but likely formed their own endogamous group. Some lesser groups given fifth and fourth head ranks, usually regarded as “commoners,” ranged next, with the slaves forming the bottom of the societal hierarchy. The rationale of this ranking system seems to have been the graded assignment of political office in a nascent bureaucracy. Only the chin’gol aristocrats had access to all seventeen office ranks, whereas the minor aristocrats were barred from holding office in the five top ranks. Each kol was subject to sumptuary laws prescribing dress codes and house construction. A further important corollary to the centralizing force of the kolp’um system was that residence in the royal capital of Kŭmsŏng (Kyŏngju) constituted an essential part of an aristocrat’s identification.8 Even though scholarly opinion diverges as to the extent of an early Silla king’s power,

20

Fou n dat ions

there were two institutions that seem to have considerably limited (rather than, as is sometimes asserted, strengthened) royal decision-making. One was the kalmun-wang system, according to which the prestige and authority of rulership was extended to members of the royal group by granting the honorary title kalmun-wang to the ruler’s father or brothers, to the consorts’ fathers, and to maternal grandfathers, among a few others. Whereas this scheme may have kept the royal group together, it seems above all to have prevented the rise of competing factions within the group by letting potential challengers participate in the royal enterprise. The other institution that was an equally important part of royal rule was the Royal Council (Hwabaek). Its membership was reserved for members of the ruling house and chin’gol aristocrats. At the beginning of his reign, the king apparently selected the council head (sangdaedŭng)—an act usually interpreted as a sign of his supreme position. It was the council, however, that had chosen the king. The council had a deliberative function, and decisions had apparently to be taken by unanimity. That this council was all-powerful on state matters is unmistakably demonstrated by its persistent opposition to King Pŏphŭng’s attempt to introduce Buddhism for shoring up royal prestige with a suprahuman aura. Only the dramatic martyrdom of the first temple’s architect finally broke its resistance.9 The sŏnggol royal line of the Kim came to an end after the reigns of two royal daughters in the mid-seventh century, and the throne passed, after an internal struggle, to King Muryŏl (r. 654–61), a prominent chin’gol with a mother of royal blood. This change, marked by Muryŏl’s assumption of the title “great ancestor” (t’aejong), coincided with the unification of the Korean peninsula under Silla rule in 668 and signified a marked strengthening of the royal house. Not only were Muryŏl’s successors direct lineal descendants, but royal consorts were also no longer chosen from the Pak but from within the royal descent group. Royal power reached its apogee during the eighth century, but with the murder of one of Muryŏl’s descendants in 780 the royal line ended, and the royal prerogatives fell into the hands of feuding chin’gol aristocrats who vied for the throne. As a result of the breakdown of the political order in late Silla (late eighth to ninth centuries), aristocratic descent groups began to leave the royal capital and settle in the countryside, where they built up rural bases. Also taking advantage of slackening central control were the local forces that began to emerge as regional power holders. With the acceleration of such centrifugal tendencies, the kolp’um system started to fall apart, calling for a new system of social identification. From what has been said thus far, two propositions regarding the nature of Silla’s social and political culture may be formulated. The basic units making up Sillan society were descent groups that contemporary sources called chok or ssijok. As illustrated by the dynastic group, the chok seems to have been little differentiated and, above all, genealogical lines were flexible. This is demonstrated by early royal succession: it could first go horizontally from brother to brother before it descended to the next generation; if there was no son, a grandson, daughter, nephew, or even a son-in-law could take his place. Clearly, such a descent group was not fixed on a single descent reckoning. Though the Chinese-derived term chok implies patrilineality, in the Sillan context chok (likely used for the native kyŏre, meaning “kin”) unquestionably denoted a loosely structured bilateral kin group, that is, descent was traced through both male and female links.10



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

21

In the course of their appropriation of Chinese cultural institutions from the sixth century onward, the royal group and the capital aristocrats started to use Chinese onecharacter surnames. When, during the Silla’s declining decades, aristocrats began to leave Kyŏngju to settle in rural areas, they took their surnames, often bestowed by royal favor, with them as a kind of “identification tag” and coupled them, in Chinese fashion, with a territorial designation, usually the name of the administrative district of their new residence. A good example is that of the royal Kim who settled on the eastern seaboard and called themselves the Kangnŭng Kim. Later recorded as “territorial descent groups” (t’osŏng), the combination of surname (sŏng) and “ancestral seat” or choronym (pon’gwan) reconfirmed the social distinctiveness of a particular descent group and highlighted its close identification with a specific locality. The second proposition concerns the nature of royal rule. Although the Silla king was eventually able to free himself from the grip of interfering kin and in-law groups and gain a degree of independent power and authority, he had to contend with a powerful central aristocracy that claimed by birth and descent title to political participation—and occasionally even to the throne. That kinship and power stood, in Georges Balandier’s words, in “dialectical relation”11 was pointedly demonstrated by the kolp’um system, which ranked Sillan society into status groups of which only the top stratum could occupy hereditarily the most powerful positions in state and society. As “co-rulers” and as royal consort givers, they effectively restricted the scope of the king’s ambitions and actions and confined him—by degrees—to the role of primus inter pares. Even after the breakdown of the kolp’um system, its underlying philosophy remained intact: the social, centered on the aristocratic descent-group model, took precedence over the political. It was the crucial interplay between these two forces—the social and the political—that generated the historical momentum that continued to intertwine Koryŏ’s history with the rise and fall of the aristocratic descent groups.

The Formation of the Founding Elite of Early Koryŏ During Silla’s decline, its territory broke up into regional areas controlled by competing local leaders, who often were backed by sizable military forces. One of them was Wang Kŏn (877–943; posthumously known as T’aejo), who in the course of the tenth century suc­ceeded in reestablishing unified rule over the peninsula and founding a new dynasty he called Koryŏ (918–1392). Wang Kŏn was joined in this venture by a heterogeneous group of supporters that included a considerable contingent of Sillan chin’gol and headrank-six aristocrats. More numerous, however, were local military leaders and regional strongmen (hojok) from the peninsula’s middle regions, entrenched in localities far away from any central control.12 Even though they pledged allegiance—while safeguarding their interests—these diverse elements were potential challengers to Wang Kŏn’s fledgling rule. Originating from the Kaesŏng area and lacking a solid power base of his own, Wang Kŏn had therefore to woo them with a variety of incentives to make them permanently side with him. One of his strategies was to create an intricate network of marriage

22

Fou n dat ions

alliances: he married the daughters of his closest allies from throughout the peninsula, many of non-Sillan origin. His first queen, for example, was the daughter of Yu Ch’ŏngung, a strongman of unclear origin from Chŏngju (later P’ungdŏk, Kyŏnggi Province) nicknamed “the Elder.” Yu was so rich and powerful that he had provided Wang Kŏn’s troops with provisions when Wang passed through Chŏngju on one of his campaigns. Wang’s sixth queen was also a Chŏngju Yu, the daughter of one of Yu Ch’ŏn-gung’s kinsmen. With his twenty-nine consorts, who originated from seventeen different descent groups, he had twenty-five sons and nine daughters, a progeny large enough to create an exclusive royal group. Except for the first and ninth daughters, whom he married to the last king of Silla to lay claim to Silla’s heritage, T’aejo kept royal daughters within the group by marrying them to half-brothers—a pattern of close kin marriages that was continued by his descendants.13 A further strategy with which T’aejo rewarded those who allied themselves with him in unifying the country was to bestow “merit subject” (kongsin) status upon them. Originally a late Tang invention, the merit subject system recompensed those who assisted royal rule with special social and material privileges and thus linked their loyalty lastingly to the throne. Merit subject status conferred rare prestige—and often also a surname—on a man and privileged his (agnatic and nonagnatic) descendants without office with unrestricted access to the officialdom. A select number of the king’s most trusted collaborators was further honored with ennoblement (pongjak) and/or with commemorative services (paehyang kongsin) in the Royal Ancestral Shrine—six in T’aejo’s time. Thus vested with extraordinary standing, many of T’aejo’s original merit subjects (Samhan kongsin) launched the fortunes of their descendants in the capital and were in retrospect designated “apical ancestor” (sijo) of their respective descent groups.14 Kim In-yun (n.d.), for example, is said to have supported T’aejo in the unification of the Three Han and, made a merit subject, followed T’aejo to the capital, where he established generations of Kyŏngju Kim in high offices in the central bureaucracy. One of these was Kim Chi-u (1108–51), who apparently owed his government position to his illustrious forebear and acknowledged this fact on his tombstone.15 T’aejo left to his successors a tightly knit yet unstable royal kin group. Power was contested in typically native fashion among a number of brothers and half-brothers, who were backed by the respective descent groups that had provided their mothers. The ensuing power struggles between contenders to the throne therefore also involved regional interests. The ramifications of external influences on royal succession were dramatically pointed up in the first succession struggle of 945—two years after T’aejo’s death. When Hyejong (r. 943–45), who, as eldest son, had succeeded T’aejo on the throne against strong objections to the low status of his maternal kin, was ill and about to die without naming an heir to the throne, one of his fathers-in-law,16 Wang Kyu (?–945), a merit subject and state councilor with a power base in Kwangju (Kyŏnggi Province) (who had also given T’aejo two of his daughters),17 warned him against an alleged plot led by his two halfbrothers, the princes Yo (later King Chŏngjong) and So (later King Kwangjong). With Sillan roots on their mother’s side, the two princes were apparently in accord with high officials of Sillan ancestry who objected to Hyejong. For his part, Hyejong, mustering no viable defense, merely gave, as a conciliatory gesture, his eldest daughter to her uncle



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

23

Prince So in marriage. Powerless to stave off the princely half-brothers’ growing dominance, Wang, fearing for his life, then turned against Hyejong, whom he even attempted to assassinate, and schemed to put his royal grandson (T’aejo’s son by one of his daughters) on the throne. Alarmed at this precarious turn of events, Yo called in military support from his northern backers, killed Wang Kyu and his cronies, and, upon Hyejong’s death, ascended the throne as King Chŏngjong (r. 945–49). As a result of this vendetta, Hyejong’s erstwhile supporters in the southwestern coastal area withered away.18 When, four years later, T’aejo’s third son, Prince So, succeeded his brother as King Kwangjong (r. 949–75), royal rule was still threatened by the multiple interests of those who had taken part in the founding of the dynasty and thus claimed political participation. To free himself of these contesters, Kwangjong first tried to curb their economic and military power by introducing the Slave and Land Act in 956. Shortly later, however, he more or less wiped out the privileged holders of dynastic-founding merit by ruthlessly purging most of his father’s helpmates, so that, as a contemporary witness lamented, only some forty members of the former officialdom survived.19

The Examination System as a Centralizing Instrument Kwangjong’s undoubtedly most incisive and lasting policy, however, was the introduction of the Tang-style examination system (kwagŏ chedo) in 958.20 Assisted by his Chinese advisor Shuang Ji, he chose a recruitment system with which he intended to restrict access to office by making entry to the officialdom conditional on the mastery of texts and lit­ erary skills.21 Clearly, the examination system was not only intended to professionalize the bureaucracy and to advance Confucian scholarship and civil virtues. It profoundly impacted the native sociopolitical system and to a degree altered the self-definition of Koryŏ’s elite descent groups. Did the introduction of this examination system, which was promoted by a king who was criticized for his preference of Chinese advisors and things Chinese, not provoke the resistance of those who had considered political participation a birth right? Curiously, the historical sources, such as the History of Koryŏ (Koryŏsa), are almost completely silent on this point, most likely due to the fact that its Confucian-trained early Chosŏn compilers were eager to suppress evidence of a negative reaction. It is unimaginable, however, that so sweeping an innovation, which threatened earlier privileges, would have been silently accepted. Indeed, a close reading of the memorials that the eminent early Koryŏ scholar Ch’oe Sŭng-no (927–89)22 submitted to King Kwangjong reveals that Ch’oe—and others of Sillan origin—was alarmed at the prospect that the new achievement-oriented system might entice “outsiders from the north and south” to compete for government positions. Yi Ki-baek interpreted these “outsiders” as people of the former Later Paekche and Parhae, that is, people from outside the Silla-Koryŏ power nexus.23 That this interpretation may not be far-fetched is suggested by the enactment of a new law in 1055, according to which only those who could give proof of membership in a recognized descent group (ssijok), that is, who possessed a surname and a choronym, were admitted

24

Fou n dat ions

to the examinations.24 Clearly, belonging to a descent group of known status was regarded as an absolute requirement for public office and effectively excluded unwanted outside competitors. Sometime later—the exact date is unknown—an additional, even more restrictive formula for testing an examination candidate’s social status background was adopted. This was the “four-ancestor” (sajo) formula that identified father, paternal grandfather, paternal great-grandfather and, significantly, the maternal grandfather. Reflecting the deeply rooted bilateral criteria of descent group membership, this formula more or less ruled out the candidacy of an outsider or a social climber.25 Whatever the extent of initial anxieties about its impact, the examination system was there to stay. The rise of an educated officialdom was a necessity for a state that not only tried to strengthen its civil bureaucracy but also increasingly maintained contact with the dynasties ruling in China. Ambitious minor aristocrats, who had earlier returned from China with an examination certificate, but found themselves excluded from top positions in Silla, are said to have even welcomed the innovation as a prospective pathway into higher bureaucratic office. During Kwangjong’s reign, the examinations were held eight times, producing a total of thirty-three successful candidates.26 Among the twelve who can be identified were Ch’oe Sŏm, most likely a head-rank-six aristocrat from Kyŏngju, and Sŏ Hŭi (942–98), the son of a prominent Ich’ŏn (Kyŏnggi Province) hojok and T’aejo merit subject, who later had a brilliant career as an official and diplomat.27 Initially, a majority of examination graduates came from the capital area, but with the expansion of the bureaucratic apparatus, the number of degree holders grew rapidly and diversified with respect to their geographic origin. Most of them tested in Tang-style belles lettres in the literary examination (chesulkwa), and just a few chose the classics examination (myŏnggyŏngkwa). Up until 1170, 130 candidates passed, of whom close to one-third came from descent groups originating in the capital region.28 It was the prestige of holding office in the new capital Kaegyŏng (Kaesŏng) that worked as a powerful unifying force and created an office-holding aristocracy that dominated the top-level positions in the central bureaucracy. By the end of the first millennium, in 995, the officialdom was divided into civil (munban) and military (muban) officials—the “two branches” (yangban) of government.29 Whereas the military initially played a significant role in government at least partly because of their instrumental assignment of holding off the frequent Khitan incursions from the north, in the course of the eleventh century there was a clear shift to civilian rule, and the military were, to their chagrin, variously degraded and discriminated against. By controlling the vital deliberative first- and second-rank offices in the Secretariat/Chancellery and the Security Council, collectively called chaech’u or chaesang, a civilian, capital-bound elite came to exercise supreme power in the nine-rank bureaucracy.30 Kaegyŏng, where the new royal palace and the seat of government came to be located, replaced Kŭmsŏng (Kyŏngju) as the political, cultural, and, of course, social center of the country. Despite an increasingly sharp separation between capital and countryside, another important contingent of examination graduates and subsequent office holders originated from the southern provinces of Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla—the old territories of Silla and Later Paekche.31 These areas were home to a large number of long-standing descent groups descended from local strongmen (hojok) of the Silla-Koryŏ transition period.



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

25

With the institution of a “local administrator system” (hyangnije) in 983, scions of these territorial groups functioned, often hereditarily, as “administrators” (hyangni) of their ancestral localities, which were newly reorganized into counties and districts (kun-hyŏn). The larger the size of an administrative unit and the more numerous its constituent local descent groups (t’osŏng), the greater was the command (ŭpsa) of these hyangni. With the countryside only loosely controlled by the center, the hyangni descent groups, variously interconnected by marital ties, exercised formidable local power and must, at least in early Koryŏ, be counted as belonging to the ruling stratum. Frequently sharing ancestral roots with capital aristocrats, the hyangni significantly retained the statutory right to qualify for the examinations and thus, throughout Koryŏ, continuously contributed a noteworthy share of fresh blood to the bureaucratic elite in the capital.32 The introduction of the examination system thus did not diminish but, on the contrary, enhanced the crucial significance of descent group membership in Koryŏ society and had a profound and lasting sociopolitical and cultural impact. The capital-bound elite, which emerged in the course of the eleventh century, increasingly regarded examination success as a vital means of demonstrating high social status. The examinations furthermore functioned as a major conduit of Confucian learning and Chinese norms and values into Koryŏ life as the offspring of the civil and military officialdom were, in preparation for the exams, educated in the Chinese classics at the Royal University (Kukchagam) or in one of the private schools.33 The examination process thus bred a new type of scholar-official, who distinguished himself through the mastery of a nonnative literate culture. Most consequentially, however, the successful examination graduate acquired an “official identity.”34 The state could not dispense elite status, but by admitting an individual, on the basis of his “four ancestors,” to the examinations and giving him, upon success, a certificate, it validated his elite status, which in turn empowered him to become a servant of the state. Indeed, the examination system thus created an unprecedented correlation between descent and state approbation: the aristocrat by birth now co-ruled by royal fiat. It is nevertheless vital, however, to remember that elite and officialdom never fully coincided and always formed two separate, albeit closely linked, social entities.

Eminent Descent Groups of Early Koryŏ A number of descent groups that came to control the central government in early Koryŏ boasted Sillan aristocratic (chin’gol or head rank six) origin, like the Kyŏngju Kim or the Kyŏngju Ch’oe, but an even larger group originated from local hojok, among them the P’yŏngsan Pak, the P’ap’yŏng Yun, the Haeju Ch’oe, and many others. Yi Su-gŏn counted some 150 descent groups from which the 550 highest officials (rank three and above) rose in early Koryŏ (to 1170).35 How compact an office-holding body was this? Following John Duncan’s statistics, up to 1146, eighty-seven descent groups were represented among the 234 officials who held chaech’u positions in the central government. Of these, twenty-nine (one-third) continuously put men into office, of whom at least two advanced to first- and second-rank positions (chaech’u). Among these twenty-nine there was a small contingent

26

Fou n dat ions

of eminent descent groups of Sillan descent. With ten chae’chu, the Kyŏngju Kim were not only prominently represented in the top stratum of office holders, they also provided consorts to seven kings, from T’aejo to Wŏnjong (r. 1259–74). The Kyŏngju Ch’oe and the Kangnŭng Kim belonged equally to this upper-level group.36 By nearly monopolizing the highest decision-making agencies, they were part of early Koryŏ’s “most powerful” elite.37 Surely the most powerful descent group of early Koryŏ, however, were the Kyŏngwŏn (Inch’ŏn) Yi who placed a total of twenty-seven officials, of whom twelve reached chaech’u rank, into government. Of hojok background in the Inch’ŏn area, the Yi climbed to the pinnacle of power not only through the examination route, but most decisively through their exceptionally close involvement with the royal house, as illustrated in figure 1.1. Taking advantage of the circumstance that his paternal aunt, married to an illustrious Ansan Kim, was the mother of three daughters—who were all given in marriage to King Hyŏnjong (r. 1009–31)—Yi Cha-yŏn (1003–61), a first-class examination graduate of 1024, advanced rapidly through the bureaucracy to reach the high office of chaech’u in 1040. Ten years later, in 1052, he married his three daughters to King Munjong (r. 1046–83), their patrilateral cross-cousin once removed. The eldest of them gave birth to three future kings, Sunjong (r. 1047–83), Sŏnjong (r. 1083–94), and Sukchong (r. 1095–1105). By combining an illustrious government position with an unprecedented grip on the royal house, Yi Cha-yŏn was undoubtedly the most commanding man in the realm. All eight of his sons held government positions; the eldest, Yi Chŏng (1025–77), entered government with a protection appointment (see below) and held various positions before he became a chancellor. One of his daughters became King Sŏnjong’s consort. In the next generation, with the marriage of a daughter of Yi Cha-gyŏm (?–1126), Yi Cha-yŏn’s grandson and Chŏng’s nephew, to King Yejong (r. 1105–22), resulting in the birth of the future King Injong (r. 1122–46), the Kyŏngwŏn Yi extended their influence far into the middle of the twelfth century. By presenting ten royal consorts, who became the mothers of nine kings, and, in addition, intermarrying with other eminent descent groups such as the Kyŏngju Kim, the Haeju Ch’oe, the P’ap’yŏng Yun, and the P’yŏngsan Pak, among others, the Kyŏng­ wŏn Yi accumulated an unprecedented measure of power—power that tempted two of Yi Cha-yŏn’s grandsons to challenge the kingship itself. Yi Cha-ŭi (?–1095), who started his government career with a protection appointment and advanced to the Security Council in 1091, saw his chance come for consolidating his influence when the young and sickly Hŏnjong (r. 1094–95) ascended the throne in 1094. Attempting to counteract competing forces that supported the future King Sukchong, he plotted to replace his cousin’s son with his own nephew. Before he could rally sufficient backing, however, he and his followers were murdered in a palace coup in the summer of 1095.38 This was not the only fateful turn of events, however. Cha-ŭi’s first cousin, Cha-gyŏm, who also entered government on the strength of ancestral privilege, used his position as grandfather of King Injong to shamelessly expand his wealth and power, unsparingly eliminating his political rivals and even forcing two of his daughters to marry their young nephew. In a bid to seize the royal prerogatives for himself by having Injong poisoned by one of his daughters, he overplayed his hand. He was betrayed by his own erstwhile collaborator, and he, his wife, and his sons together with their entourages were sent separately to far-off exile.

Fig. 1.1 Kyŏngwŏn Yi marriage chart (abbreviated).

28

Fou n dat ions

He died an outcast, and his two daughters were expelled from Injong’s harem (p’yebi). With Cha-gyŏm’s disappearance from the political scene, the fortunes of his branch of the Kyŏngwŏn Yi declined rapidly. Indeed, both Yi Cha-ŭi and Yi Cha-gyŏm are remembered by history as prime examples of infamous power-holders (kwŏnmun).39 Yet, in true Koryŏ fashion, other branches of the Kyŏngwŏn Yi survived, and, although their presence in government was greatly diminished, by late Koryŏ they were still recognized as one of the capital’s most outstanding descent groups.40 An impressive example of the metamorphosis of a descent group from localized military strongmen in late Silla into capital-based aristocrats in early Koryŏ is provided by the P’yŏngsan Pak. Claiming chin’gol descent from Silla’s mythical founder, Hyŏkkŏse, Pak Chŏg-o—the Pak’s first traceable ancestor—is recorded to have left Kyŏngju sometime in the course of the eighth century and taken up local (military?) office in Chukchu (Chuksan) in the Kyŏnggi area. One of his sons, Pak Chig-yun (n.d.), then moved on to P’yŏngsan (present-day Hwanghae Province), where he served as a local magistrate (ŭpchang). Chŏg-o’s descendants came to prosper in Chuksan as well as in P’yŏngsan, forming two independent branches. P’yŏngsan was not only fertile; as a Sillan garrison in former Koguryŏ territory it also possessed military significance. Likely benefiting from this favorable environment, the P’yŏngsan Pak established themselves as one of the mightiest local kin groups (hojok) in that area. Chig-yun’s son, Chi-yun (n.d.), joined Wang Kŏn around 900, and his and his two sons’ valor in the final unification battles was rewarded with merit subject status (Samhan kongsin). So imposing was the Pak’s power that Wang Kŏn chose Chi-yun’s daughter and two of his granddaughters as consorts. However, despite the fact that the Pak had supported Princes Yo and So against the forces backing King Hyejong, they suffered gravely, like most of the dynastic founding elite, during King Kwangjong’s purge. They made a decisive comeback with Chi-yun’s sixth-generation descendant, Pak Il-lyang (?–1096). Il-lyang passed the examinations in 1051 and was famous as far as China for his literary talents, and advanced, by holding in rapid succession important offices in the central government, to a top ministerial post (chaesang). With three of his sons passing the examinations and simultaneously holding office, the Pak group’s eminence was once again consolidated. They not only produced (up to 1146) a total of five officials, two of whom held ministerial posts, they also intermarried with the most prestigious aristocrats of the time. Clearly, the P’yŏngsan Pak belonged firmly to the early Koryŏ capital elite—an august social standing that they were, however, apparently unable to maintain until the end of the dynasty.41 Though by far not as powerful as the Kyŏngwŏn Yi in early Koryŏ, the P’ap’yŏng Yun were an impressive descent group as far as longevity was concerned. The first prominent member whose biography is recorded in the dynastic annals appeared at the end of the eleventh century. With an ancestry reportedly reaching back to a merit subject at the beginning of Koryŏ, Yun Kwan (?–1111) was the first to pass the exams in 1073. Though reputedly always carrying the Five Classics around with him, he won fame in the military campaigns against the Jurchen and was later, probably helped by his affinal ties to the Kyŏngwŏn Yi, given prestigious offices in the capital. He rose to chaech’u status in 1108 and, together with several sons in high office and descendants who excelled in the examinations, established the P’ap’yŏng Yun as eminent capital-bound aristocrats.42



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

29

These brief profiles could easily be multiplied by other remarkable descent groups whose achievements left lasting marks on early Koryŏ history, such as the Haeju Ch’oe,43 the Kyŏngju Ch’oe, and the Kangnŭng Kim, among others. They all furnish lively examples of how aristocratic credentials were turned—with or without examination success— into political dividends at the center.

The Nature of the Early Koryŏ Aristocracy Granted that the “most powerful” descent groups formed the compact and exclusive upper stratum of Koryŏ society,44 how did they define themselves and legitimize their eminence? And what were the characteristics by which they were recognized as munbŏl or pŏryŏl—both meaning “occupants of elevated status”—in the historical records? In a society in which political participation was thought to be contingent on social status, the political elite liked to define themselves in terms of the prestige (chongmang) that their kin groups enjoyed in state and society and flaunted it, for instance, on their tombstones—as precious testimony for posterity. The Kyŏngwŏn Yi thus styled themselves “the foremost descent group of East of the Sea” (Haedong kapchok), whereas the Suju Ch’oe used the pompous “great descent group of the Three Han” (Samhan taejok). The P’yŏngsan Pak chose “eminent surname of Silla” (Silla kwisŏng) as their social marker.45 The use of kapchok, taejok, and similar terms epitomized the elite’s obsession with social superiority and inscribing it as a commitment in their descendants’ memory. As extensive genealogical records were difficult to keep because of the tangle of bilateral descent lines, ancestral links could easily get lost. Nevertheless, the elite’s desire to connect their eminence to illustrious ancestry and descent is reflected in the way they represented their (likely, under Chinese influence, often only patrilineal) antecedents on tombstones: descent lines were traced back to a great-great-grandfather or at times even beyond, and ancestral merit subject status, whether verifiable or putative, and relations to the royal house were invariably recorded. On Ch’oe Kye-bang’s (1045–1116) tomb inscription, for example, Sillan pride shines through in the recollection that his mother’s ancestors were of Sillan origin. As mentioned before, the P’yŏngsan Pak contended that they were descendants of the Pak ancestor Hyŏkkŏse, and the P’ap’yŏng Yun self-assuredly recorded Yun Tal (892–972), a dynastic founding merit subject, as their apical ancestor.46 Clearly, extended ancestry that reached beyond the minimal “four-ancestor” (sajo) formula required for admission to the examination process was considered a hallmark of high elite status. Equally notable was the importance of the “ancestral locality” (pon’gwan) for status legitimation. Though the ruling elite became capital-bound, they maintained the area of origin as part of their identification even after it had long ceased to be their place of birth or residence. Indeed, identification with a specific locality seems to have assumed even greater relevance once migration from countryside to capital started. Kyŏngju is, of course, a key example. It imparted a special aura of nobility on the Kyŏngju Kim or the Kyŏngju Ch’oe long after they had settled in Kaesŏng. Descent defined by locality was thus part and parcel of an eminent descent group’s social credentials.

30

Fou n dat ions

With the introduction of a bureaucratic system in early Koryŏ and the concomitant disintegration of the kolp’um order, social status alone no longer guaranteed automatic participation in government, and office holding turned into a crucial element of elite legitimation. But how high had the rank of an office holder to be for him to be counted as a member of the “ruling class” (munbŏl)? The recorded career paths of those twentynine descent groups that monopolized the chaech’u-rank offices over generations suggest that rank five marked a vital dividing line that separated the officialdom into an “upper” and a “lower” half.47 Indeed, for officials of rank five and higher the rules of the game seem to have changed insofar as descent and power reinforced each other in dialectical manner: the ascent to top positions depended less on bureaucratic achievement than on social background, and holders of top positions were empowered to make entry into the bureaucracy heritable through the “protection privilege” (ŭmjik or ŭmsŏ). Introduced in the late tenth century,48 the protection privilege functioned as a kind of institutionalized “aristocratic loophole” that in a sense replicated the Sillan aristocrat’s birthright to political participation. According to this system, which privileged not only the descendants of high-ranking officials (i.e., holders of rank five and above) but also of the royal house and of merit subjects, a son, an agnatic or nonagnatic grandson, a nephew, or even a son-in-law was entitled to claim through a father, a paternal or maternal grandfather, or even a paternal uncle access to the bureaucracy by bypassing the examination routine. For officials, however, this privilege was limited to the generations of sons and grandsons, and the latters’ appointments needed royal approval. Such appointees, though usually starting at low rank, typically advanced rapidly to offices of rank five and higher and thus gained entitlement to pass the privilege on to the next generation. Indeed, such advancement stood in stark contrast to the many degree holders who never received an appointment. Even though the total number of protection recipients is unknown, it must have been considerable—initially, most likely far surpassing the number of examination graduates—since the simple oral test given to appointees, based on the Analects (Lunyu) and the Classic of Filial Piety (Xiaojing), apparently was held four times a year and, irregularly, on special occasions.49 Clearly, the protection privilege, characteristically following a flexible, nonlineal descent reckoning, not only expedited official careers, it also safeguarded a descent group’s political prominence over generations. Nevertheless, an initial protection appointment did not exclude the possibility of later sitting for the regular examinations. Indeed, passing the examinations was highly valued as a means of displaying literary skills and Confucian learning. Ancestral examination success therefore put a heavy obligation on descendants: “In view of all our forefathers’ brilliant accomplishments [in the examinations], how could we, their descendants, go another way?” Not surprisingly, then, it was the most powerful descent groups that were, over generations, also the most prolific producers of examination graduates, and some 40 percent of initial protection appointees are estimated to have later taken the examinations.50 The dignity of the occupants of top-ranking offices was marked by the purple office garbs they wore;51 they were salaried (nokpong) and also the recipients of the largest stipends in the Field and Woodland Rank System (Chŏnsikwa), a remuneration scheme



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

31

instituted in the late tenth century (and revised several times thereafter) with the intention of making officialdom dependent on the state. It is uncertain, however, how the system could have worked without the state’s full control over the countryside. The stipends were prebendal, that is, they had technically to revert to the state after the recipient’s death; only merit subjects were entitled to hand them on to their descendants. Presumably rarely sufficient to support the elegant and expensive life style the Koryŏ upper class was leading in Kaegyŏng, the stipends were naturally always in danger of alienation. Long before the Field and Woodland Rank System started to disintegrate later in the dynasty, descent groups such as the Kyŏngwŏn Yi therefore began to build their own landed estates (nongjang).52 Munbŏl prestige and power was likewise maintained and perpetuated by close marital ties with other munbŏl descent groups and with the royal house. By exchanging daughters among themselves, the elite created an intricate affinal network that was often spun across generations. The Kyŏngwŏn Yi are, again, a good example: they created affinal links with the Ansan Kim, Kyŏngju Kim, Haeju Ch’oe, P’ap’yŏng Yun, Kangnŭng Kim, and the P’yŏngsan Pak, among others—all equally belonging to the top-ranking elite. Together forming a nearly endogamous group, they closely controlled access to the upper rungs of the bureaucracy and also were the principal bride givers to the royal house. Although the royal house kept its daughters within the dynastic group, it could not but take aristocratic women as royal consorts and wives of princes. Forging affinal bonds with the royal house by “presenting a consort” (nappi) was a mark of aristocratic status and, as noted above, provided the bride givers with an opportunity to establish a foothold within the palace and, by influencing the royal persona—a daughter’s offspring—to manipulate royal politics. No other descent group in early Koryŏ was more successful in playing this power game than the Kyŏngwŏn Yi. The broad organization of the Koryŏ chok, embracing matrilateral and patrilateral kin and on occasion also affines (relatives by marriage), created a multilaterally connected body of people that perpetuated its social status and thus retained its political influence. Though depending on individual achievements, it was the collectivity of the descent group that fostered and promoted prosperity and success. The larger the group, the greater its potential to persist at a high level of power over a prolonged period of time. Supreme power was, thus, reached when multiple kinsmen served simultaneously in high office and were able to pass it on to their descendants. Such a feat crucially depended on a descent group’s flexible, yet stable inner organization inspired by a strong ancestral consciousness. Even though often only certain branches or lines of a descent group prospered politically, their achieved status generally enhanced the social prestige of the entire group. For this kind of social disposition coupled with political triumph, a descent group gained recognition as “great” (taejok) or “famous” (myŏngjok) or “long-lasting” (sejok)— highly esteemed appellations with which, Chinese observers noted, the elite sized one another up.53 Indeed, it was its dynamic nature that could expedite a Koryŏ descent group’s rise as well as cushion its fall. Thus, despite their diminished presence among the chaech’u in late Koryŏ, the Kyŏngwŏn Yi nevertheless not only survived but indeed preserved their great social prestige as sejok into early Chosŏn. In sum, then, it is evident that the descent group as known in Silla continued to

32

Fou n dat ions

structure Koryŏ’s elite society, and that the principles underlying the kolp’um system were still largely controlling the values that determined how Koryŏ society functioned: the social retained its determinant influence over the political. To be sure, the bureaucratization of the officialdom and, in particular, the introduction of the examination system professionalized political participation, but they did not diminish the social significance and viability of the descent group because social criteria essentially continued to confer office. This was particularly true for the top positions—the high deliberative offices that made their occupants virtual co-rulers of the king. Indeed, it was these munbŏl descent groups, variously intertwined with the royal house and among themselves, that formed the powerful civil upper stratum of government that directed the affairs of the land in early Koryŏ.

Elite Descent Groups in Late Koryŏ: Survival in Uncertain Times What was the fate of the early Koryŏ munbŏl during the periods of Military Rule (1170– 1270) and Mongol Overlordship (1270–1350)—two periods that, according to conventional historiography, ushered in the decline of the munbŏl amid tumultuous change? Did Military Rule succeed in permanently replacing civilian control of government? And what was the impact of Mongol dominance on Koryŏ’s elite society? Were, in short, the social premises upon which the early Koryŏ munbŏl had based their arrogation of political supremacy declared outmoded and discarded? Military Rule started with an open revolt in 1170. No longer tolerating the discrimination they had suffered since the founding of the dynasty, some frustrated military officials took bloody revenge on civilian officials and purged a great number of elite descent groups that had flourished in early Koryŏ.54 [P’ap’yŏng] Yun Kwan’s grandson, In-ch’ŏm (1110–76), for instance, survived the purges, whereas his eldest son was killed. Like other survivors, his younger sons fled the capital and retired to the countryside, thus safeguarding their descent group from complete destruction.55 In 1196, General Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn (1149–1219) wrested power from the original rebels and established himself and three generations of his descendants as de facto rulers of Korea. Of obscure military background,56 Ch’oe, supported by his private military forces, strategically superimposed his own administrative agencies on the dynastic structure. Thus challenging civilian rule, he nevertheless left the dynastic government intact and needed civilian personnel to run it. He therefore maintained the examinations as a civilian recruitment system: they were held fifty-one times and close to two thousand candidates passed.57 Whereas some of those who had earlier suffered purgation, such as the P’ap’yŏng Yun, eventually managed a comeback in government service, a few leading descent groups, having survived the purges more or less unscathed, were able to use the examinations either to consolidate or even to enhance their elite status. Among them were, for instance, the Yŏhŭng (Hwangnyŏ) Min. Already present in the higher ranks of government in early Koryŏ, it was through Min Yŏng-mo (1115–94) that the Yŏhŭng Min reinforced their munbŏl status. An examination graduate of 1138, Yŏng-mo had a some-



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

33

what rocky career until he rose to a chaech’u post in the early Military period. Many of the descendants of his two sons held, as exam graduates, important government positions and thus maintained their status as one of the most flourishing descent groups of late Koryŏ.58 Another kin group with a similar background were the Hoengsŏng Cho, who, though in office since early Koryŏ, started to prosper with the eminent Cho Yŏng-in (1133–1202). As a passer of the 1160 exams, Yŏng-in gained fame for his scholarship and calligraphy and eventually was promoted to a chancellorship; his descendants continued in high office, although the group seems to have lost momentum toward the end of the dynasty.59 These examples could easily be expanded with the Chŏngan Im, the Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe, and the Namp’yŏng Mun, among others, who moved along comparable career trajectories.60 With the central officialdom nevertheless weakened by the earlier purges, a number of previously undistinguished descent groups, many apparently of hyangni background, used the examinations for social entry into the capital. A good example is the famous poet and writer Yi Kyu-bo (1168–1241) who rose from hyangni origin via the exams (1190) to high civilian office.61 Others such as the Ŏnyang Kim of southern Kyŏngsang had a military background. Kim Ch’wi-ryŏ (?–1234) entered government service through protection of his father, a general. A confidant of Ch’oe U (Ch’ung-hŏn’s son and successor) and a merit subject for his military exploits against the Mongols, Ch’wi-ryŏ was late in life appointed a chancellor. He thus launched his descendants, through protection and exams, into the bureaucratic top ranks and elevated the Ŏnyang Kim to one of the most prosperous descent groups of the time.62 A similar military route empowered the P’yŏnggang Ch’ae to join the Ŏnyang Kim in the upper echelons of late Koryŏ society.63 Under the Ch’oe’s military rulership, then, the civilian sector of government was still functioning and gave examination graduates a chance to reach or retain munbŏl status. With individuals from military backgrounds advancing by means of the examinations into the bureaucracy, however, the earlier strict separation of the two office groups started to blur.64 And how much actual power did this “civilian” government still wield? Though it remained in charge of routine government matters, it seems to have lost its decision-making powers to special supragovernmental agencies Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn established to pursue his own interests. A few high-placed civilian officials nevertheless straddled this dual organization. The above-mentioned Cho Yŏng-in, for instance, belonged to Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn’s brain trust, whereas Kim Ch’wi-ryŏ and Yi Kyu-bo were among the men constituting the inner council of Ch’oe U.65 As Ch’oe’s “retainers,” these men presumably were loyal to Ch’oe rather than to the king. Though a civilian facade was thus maintained, civilian rule was undoubtedly weakened and seriously discredited by the Ch’oe’s predominant reliance on military might to support their regime.66 Typically for a social parvenu, Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn sought to legitimize his rule by establishing marital connections with long-standing munbŏl descent groups. Once firmly in power, he married as his second wife the daughter of Im Po (n.d.), a graduate of the 1197 exams and a scion of the Chŏngan (Changhŭng) Im. Reaching munbŏl status in early Koryŏ, the Im gained distinction in the course of the twelfth century, when Im Ŭi (1041– 1117), his three sons, five grandsons, and four great-grandsons all occupied chaech’u-rank offices. A daughter of Ŭi’s first son, Wŏn-hu, had become King Injong’s (r. 1122–46)

34

Fou n dat ions

consort and the mother of the future kings Ŭijong (r. 1146–70), Myŏngjong (r. 1170–97), and Sinjong (r. 1197–1204). This made Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn’s new wife a niece of Injong’s queen.67 Likely emboldened by this indirect tie to the royal house, Ch’oe took a further, unprecedented step: he claimed one of King Kangjong’s (r. 1211–13)68 daughters as his third wife. This was a blatant breach of tradition that hitherto had confined royal princesses to marrying exclusively within the royal kin group. Aware that he needed to preserve the Wang’s kingship as a legitimating shield (especially with regard to the Jurchen rulers in China), Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn resisted the temptation to seize the throne himself, but by breaching the marriage taboo he degraded the royal house. He further showed his arrogance by forcibly dethroning Kings Myŏngjong and Hŭijong (Kings Sinjong and Kangjong died in office after short reigns) and compelling King Kojong (r. 1213–59) to marry Hŭijong’s daughter, his own second cousin, as his only wife—a measure intended to curtail the influence of munbŏl wife givers. As wives for his sons and grandsons Ch’oe selected royal princesses, and his son U finally had his granddaughter marry Kojong’s son, the crown prince and future King Wŏnjong (r. 1259–74)—a union that brought forth King Ch’ungnyŏl (r. 1274–1308). By thus manipulating the royal court, the Ch’oe deprived it of its dignity, not to mention its authority, and reduced the kings, to the chagrin of many, to mere “figureheads without power.”69 The Ch’oe’s ignominious rule eventually collapsed amidst internal popular unrest and under the heavy human and material losses that the repeated Mongol invasions inflicted upon the country between 1231 and 1259. With the establishment of their overlordship in 1270, the Mongols (ruling China as Yuan from 1271) ushered in an epoch of national humiliation and dependence. Through close intermarriages between the Mongol imperial house and the Koryŏ royal court—King Ch’ungnyŏl’s wife was a daughter of Khubilai Khan—Koryŏ came to be known as the “son-in-law country.”70 The intimate personal unions that thus evolved created special human and material requirements and expedited the rise of hitherto socially indistinct groups, even slaves, to prominence and power. Among the new risers were the P’yŏngyang Cho and the Ch’irwŏn Yun. With his knowledge of the Mongolian language, Cho In-gyu (1237–1308) earned great merit as an interpreter and was made a merit subject by King Ch’ungnyŏl. In 1295, he unprecedentedly advanced to the position of prime minister (susang). Four of his sons entered government service, the oldest via the examinations and the other three by claiming their father’s privilege; and one of Cho’s daughters even became King Ch’ungsŏn’s (r. 1308–13) consort. By the end of Koryŏ, the P’yŏngyang Cho had produced a remarkable number of examination graduates and seventeen officials, among whom eight had chaech’u status.71 Whereas Cho In-gyu was able to create with his fortuitous linguistic skills a platform for his descendants’ rapid advancement through the regular bureaucracy, the Ch’irwŏn Yun, in contrast, epitomized those later labeled “parasites” (p’yehaeng), who were thought to have owed their rise to flattery and servility. It was with his mastery of falconry that Yun Su (n.d.), who had a shallow military background, ingratiated himself to King Ch’ungnyŏl and thus found his way into the upper echelons of government. Thanks to Mongol patronage Su’s grandson, Yun Hwan (1304–86), had, for someone without an examination degree, a most extraordinary, even if rocky career: he served five kings, three times as prime minister. It is likely that the Yun’s reported wealth held in



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

35

their ancestral seat, Ch’irwŏn (Kyŏngsang Province), helped expedite their steep, albeit short-lived ascent to prominence.72 Still another kin group that began with a kinsman’s extraordinary career and emerged to great influence and power at the center were the Andong Kim. A military talent from early youth, Kim Pang-gyŏng (1212–1300) entered government with a protection appointment he owed to his father’s position as a minister in the Ministry of Military Affairs. When the Mongols launched their expeditions against Japan in 1274 and 1281, Pang-gyŏng excelled with his tactical skills as a military leader. Though both those costly ventures were unsuccessful, Kim was highly decorated, with merit subject status and multiple honors bestowed on him by his Mongol masters. He ended his career as a grand chancellor. Among his descendants there were military as well as civilian officials, and by the end of the dynasty these Kim from Andong ranged among the most influential descent groups in Kaesŏng.73 Despite these diverse ways that led to prominence and power at the center, the examination system retained its importance as a ladder into the regular bureaucracy, and the increase at the time in the number of examination graduates and office holders from outside the capital region, especially from Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla Provinces, is noteworthy.74 Nevertheless, holding a traditional office in Kaesŏng surely meant social recognition rather than political influence, as the deliberative and administrative functions of government were shifted to the Policy Council (Top’yŏngŭisasa or Todang) in 1279. Manned by chaech’u-rank officials, this new institution became, at least nominally, the supreme organ of government. Its functionality seems to be in doubt, however, as it was clearly subordinated to forces outside its purview.75 Still, holding a Todang position did convey prestige and influence. It was through this office, for instance, that, after a few generations of lesser fortune, Yun Sŏn-jwa (1265–1343), an exam passer of 1288, was able to restore the P’ap’yŏng Yun’s prosperity. Similarly, the Ŏnyang Kim further strengthened their position when Kim Ch’wi-ryŏ’s grandsons and great-grandsons were among its high office holders and maintained it until the very end of the Mongol period.76 No longer willing, however, to rely on institutions operated by the traditional munbŏl (sejok) elite, and anxious to reestablish royal authority after the humiliation the kingship had to endure under the Ch’oe’s military rule, King Ch’ungnyŏl strove to enhance his independence by centralizing all decision-making in the inner palace. For this purpose, he surrounded himself with hand-picked favorites of usually nonelite or even foreign origin and eunuchs and placed them in charge of extragovernmental agencies he established around him.77 With this policy of personalized dependencies, Ch’ungnyŏl created during his long reign a political culture that, already badly tarnished under the Ch’oe, furthered the rise of nonelite elements who, by receiving for their services unusual political and economic rewards, undermined the tradition-sanctioned understanding of the social as the determinant of the political. An explosive atmosphere was building up in Kaesŏng that foreboded ill for the time after Ch’ungnyŏl. Confronted by individuals who transgressed social boundaries and advanced to the highest levels of public life—the above-mentioned Yun Su apparently was a good example of this sort of person—the bona fide elite began to fear the king’s henchmen as potential challengers and to denounce them as unscrupulous climbers and parasites. Although not

36

Fou n dat ions

easily documented, it is telling that a term, which had earlier been used to censure political waywardness, appeared in contemporary records with increasing frequency and was now applied to these social parvenus: kwŏnse chi ka or kwŏnmun.78 Though kwŏn is commonly translated “powerful,” it also connotes “weighing the circumstances” or “gauging the exigencies” and thus can mean “opportunistic.” If this interpretation is correct, kwŏn­ mun stands for “opportunistic houses” rather than “powerful houses,” even though “power” is, of course, subsumed in the term. Kwŏnmun thus designated those who grabbed power (kwŏnse) with royal blessing outside the examination system, swindled and bribed their way into commanding positions, amassed illegal wealth, and suppressed the common folk—in short, persons who by their unscrupulous acts threatened the traditional sociopolitical and economic order.79 Though conventional historiography has usually paired kwŏnmun with sejok in a composite term ostensibly denoting the “old, long-serving, and corrupt political establishment” of late Koryŏ, recently Pak Yong-un has convincingly shown that these two terms were in contemporary documents never used as a compound and in fact stood for two differently constituted groups of actors: the hereditary elite of long standing (sejok) and the “opportunistic houses” (kwŏnmun).80 This insight has opened the possibility of a fundamental reassessment of the power constellation in late Koryŏ. Even though, as chapter 2 will reveal, the dividing line between sejok and kwŏnmun was by no means absolute, the new terminology nevertheless clearly points to an unprecedented reversal of power relationships in the early 1300s. It in fact suggests that the appearance of social elements who successfully broke through time-honored status barriers was perceived by the elite as an assault on their identity. To be sure, elite privileges had begun to be threatened by the military takeover at the end of the twelfth century. But under the particular sociopolitical circumstances created during the time of foreign domination, the situation grew immeasurably more precarious, and the sejok elites found themselves progressively more isolated and their political legitimacy in jeopardy.

Inventory of Late Koryŏ Elite Had the composition of the “traditional” elites—those who claimed sejok status—not also undergone some changes during this turbulent period? Though no official list of prominent descent groups exists for Koryŏ, the proclamation issued by King Ch’ungsŏn81 upon ascending the throne in 1308 gives at least a partial glimpse of who counted as the elite at that time. Apparently initiated on Khubilai Khan’s personal order, the proclama­ tion stipulated fifteen “ministerial descent groups” (chaesang chi chong) with whom the royal house would henceforth exchange brides and grooms in order to terminate the Koryŏ tradition of keeping royal women within its group. The fifteen potential marriage partners were apparently chosen on the basis of one of three conditions: (1) continued holding of chaech’u-rank offices since the inception of the dynasty; (2) previous and current marital ties to the royal house; and (3) the existence of a merit subject ancestor remembered in the Royal Ancestral Shrine. Among the fifteen designated descent groups there



Descent Groups in Silla and Koryŏ

37

were four whose members had continuously held chaech’u-rank offices in the bureaucracy from the beginning of the dynasty until the early fourteenth century: the Kyŏngju Kim, the P’ap’yŏng Yun, the Yŏhŭng Min, and the Kongam Hŏ. To be sure, there were also the Chŏngan Im, the Kyŏngwŏn Yi, the Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe, the Haeju Ch’oe, the Ch’ŏngju Yi, and the Ansan Kim, all of whom had been first-rate munbŏl in early Koryŏ, but they had apparently lost in the course of time their momentum of putting members into high office. They retained, however, recognition as belonging to the social elite of late Koryŏ because they were affinally related to the royal house (Chŏngan Im, Kyŏngwŏn Yi, Ansan Kim), or had a merit subject ancestor (Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe, Haeju Ch’oe, Ch’ŏngju Yi). Besides these ten descent groups, there were the P’yŏnggang Ch’ae, who rose during the Military period and had a commemorated merit subject ancestor, and the Ŏnyang Kim who fulfilled the first and second criteria. The Hoengsŏng Cho, rising to short-lived prominence in the late twelfth century, had two ancestors honored in the Royal Ancestral Shrine. Finally, the Namyang [Tangsŏng] Hong, who consolidated their power by assisting the rehabilitation of the royal house during the early days of Mongol Overlordship, and the P’yŏng­yang Cho both provided consorts to King Ch’ungsŏn.82 In short, these fifteen selected descent groups had, despite differing backgrounds, distinguished themselves, through the achievements of specific individuals and their lines of descent, as loyal servants to the throne. The list of 1308, then, shows the remarkable continuity of elite society and its capacity to assimilate fresh blood. King Ch’ungsŏn’s list does not, however, give a full picture of contemporary sejok society. There clearly were glaring disparities: the Andong Kim (Kim Pang-gyŏng and his three sons), the Andong Kwŏn (both further discussed in chapter 4), the Kwangsan Kim, the Sŏngju Yi, and the Munhwa Yu, among others, who at the time were prominently represented among the examination graduates and in the highest echelons of gov­ ernment, were left out. Others, such as the Chŏngan Im, the Ch’ŏngju Yi, or the Hoeng­ ch’ŏn Cho, however, were included due to their affinal ties to the royal house, but were not or were only lightly present in government. Although not all of the fifteen nominees were thus bona fide “ministerial descent groups,” they all enjoyed high social prestige and, for Ch’ungsŏn, who clearly strove to distance himself from his father’s poor preferences of people to serve him, what was apparently most important was that they possessed social profiles incontestably untainted by kwŏnmun excesses. Proximity to the royal house, however, did not necessarily secure continued prosperity. Although the Ŏnyang Kim, for instance, had gained eligibility in 1308 through Kim Ch’wi-ryŏ, few of his descendants entered government service as examination graduates, and the group started to decline in the fourteenth century. The same happened to the Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe, who never seem to have had a strong hold on bureaucratic office except for Ch’oe Yu-ch’ŏng (1095–1174), whose descendants were selected as royal partners in 1308 but were no longer prominent by the end of Koryŏ.83 Waning fortunes seem to have befallen especially those who owed their rise to military ability rather than to scholarly culture. Examination taking remained an essential part of the late-Koryŏ sejok’s identity. Indeed, as Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl and others have demonstrated, examination success and sub­ sequent office holding at the center guaranteed at least continued social, if not necessarily

38

Fou n dat ions

political, prominence. The P’ap’yŏng Yun were perhaps the most remarkable example, for they had uninterruptedly produced examination graduates and chaech’u-rank officials since early Koryŏ. But even the descendants of the late starter [P’yŏngyang] Cho In-gyu were able to consolidate their sejok status by continuously holding high-ranking offices over several generations and intermarrying with long-established elite descent groups. Even though careers might have been disrupted by political or military upheavals, longtime survival was clearly correlated with exam success, with reaching office above rank five, and with prestigious marriage arrangements. Whereas some descent groups slowly lost their productive capacity and slipped into social oblivion, others picked up, often only in stages, sufficient momentum to join the sejok capital elite.84 Gaining and retaining sejok recognition was a dynamic process that largely depended on a descent group’s ability to husband its human resources over time. Among the twenty-two descent groups identified by John Duncan as “most powerful” in late Koryŏ, only five qualified, according to his count, for this label in early Koryŏ; the other seventeen had variously moved into sejok ranks after the middle of the twelfth century.85 In sum, then, the criteria for what in late Koryŏ was considered “elite” did not sig­ nificantly differ from those of early Koryŏ. And yet, did this elite still constitute the “ruling elite” so that it is appropriate to call them “most powerful”? How could the Todang have functioned properly with chaech’u of both sejok and kwŏnmun background equally vying for control of it? Neither the Ch’oe nor the Mongols made lasting inroads into the native social structure or customs, and both left the mechanisms through which the traditional elite articulated itself—examination system and bureaucratic structure— largely intact.86 Nevertheless, it was under their patronage that nonelite elements moved irregularly to the heights of power through the extragovernmental channels they had created. From the perspective of the sejok elite, the social demarcation lines were being fate­ fully eroded so that the sociopolitical order lost its tradition-sanctioned self-evidence— exposing the social to the threat of being rendered obsolete by the political.

Ch a p ter 2

Crisis of Identity New Dynastic Ventures

T

he Mongols left Korea a double legacy: a fractured polity and Neo-Confucianism. Ironically, it was Neo-Confucian learning that not only opened for the embattled late Koryŏ elite the vision of restoration but, at the same time, offered the pragmatic precepts to bring it about. The last few decades of Koryŏ witnessed tumultuous conflict between forces demanding reform and forces clinging to the status quo. The transition from Koryŏ to the establishment of the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910) was thus a highly volatile, multifaceted process of unpredictable change from which the sejok elite at last reemerged at the head of a restored civil governance that was to steer the country’s fate for the next five hundred years.

Failed Reform Efforts: Enemies of Change Though some political reforms were tried out, unsuccessfully, by King Ch’ungnyŏl’s successors,1 King Kongmin’s (r. 1351–74)2 accession of the throne in 1351 gave rise to new hopes of national reconstruction. Proclaiming the “restoration of the laws of our ancestors” (pok a chojong chi pŏp), King Kongmin promised to eliminate the vestiges of the Mongols’ overlordship and their hangers-on, to strengthen royal authority, and to restore institutional stability.3 He was encouraged in these efforts by the eminent scholar Yi Chehyŏn (see below), who had already pleaded for political reform earlier, and by the king’s scholarly cousin, Hong Ŏn-bak (1309–63).4 Hong was a colleague of Yi’s and represented the Namyang Hong, who, as royal in-laws, were the most powerful descent group during Kongmin’s reign.5 This initial reform spurt culminated in 1356 in the executions of one of the most notorious profiteers of Mongol tutelage, Ki Ch’ŏl (?–1356), whose elder sister

40

Fou n dat ions

was the second consort of Shundi, the last Yuan emperor (r. 1333–70),6 and some of his colleagues, who were accused of plotting sedition and intending to make Korea a Yuan province. Supporters of the purge were given merit subject status; among them was Hong Ŏn-bak, who was made a first-class merit subject and promoted to high office.7 King Kongmin’s reform plans were, however, soon halted by a number of internal and external exigencies. Not only was he himself the target of several assassination attempts, his growing anti–Yuan China stance provoked the Mongols’ ire. In 1361, moreover, he was even forced to flee to Andong, when Kaegyŏng was devastated by bands of the Red Turbans, part of a sectarian rebel movement, who took advantage of slackening Mongol control, ransacked north China and repeatedly invaded the peninsula from the north.8 At the same time, the coastal areas were pillaged and despoiled by Japanese pirates. With the household registers burned by the Red Turbans, Hong Ŏn-bak assassinated by a high-placed rival in 1363, and even the king in danger, the country was plunged into deepening chaos. This enabled the military to reassert themselves as a power in politics, and the Mongols reacted by demanding King Kongmin’s abdication in favor of his uncle.9 Kongmin survived, however. Yet every time he overcame a crisis, he lavishly rewarded his backers with merit subject status and land grants and thus worsened the plight of the rural population. Military prowess rather than examination success again expedited entry into the bureaucracy, causing not only the overstaffing of the Todang but also the inflationary granting of supernumerary bureaucratic offices (ch’ŏmsŏlchik)10—developments that clearly also exacerbated the problem of the “opportunistic houses” (kwŏnmun). It was at this desperate juncture that Sin Ton (?–1371), an unknown Buddhist monk and reportedly the son of a temple slave, won King Kongmin’s confidence as his religious counselor after the death of his favorite consort in 1365. Although this unusual companionship between king and monk drew harsh criticism from Yi Che-hyŏn, among others, Sin Ton, elevated to the rank of state preceptor (kuksa), soon was in charge of governmental affairs, which he concentrated in the palace. He also purged military leaders and embarked upon a far-reaching reform program—apparently in spite of his inclinations. The reforms aimed at dismantling the large rural estates, reintegrating the holders of supernumerary offices into active military service, and boosting Confucian education. Although Sin Ton is conventionally depicted as the mastermind of these reforms, its actual initiator was, as Min Hyŏn-gu convincingly demonstrated, Im Pak (?–1376), an official who belonged to the forerunner generation of reform-minded Confucian scholars—whom Sin Ton contemptuously titled “thieves of the country.” Though clearly not a Sin Ton intimate, as a reportedly outspoken and resolute personality and a member of the Royal Secretariat, Im nevertheless won King Kongmin’s ear and inspired him with important reform proposals which the king subsequently ordered a reluctant Sin Ton to carry out. Assisting Sin Ton in this daunting task, Im was, among other assignments, appointed superintendent of the National Confucian Academy (Sŏnggyun’gwan), the renamed Royal Academy, which had fallen into disrepair, and he not only pressed for its restoration but also demanded that the Yuan-style examination system be introduced—a momentous demand that was implemented “as normal procedure” two years later, in 1369.11 The revitalized activities of the academy promoted the rise of a younger generation



Crisis of Identity

41

of critical Confucian scholars, who, though without prospects of advancing into the bureaucracy under Sin Ton, prepared the intellectual momentum that eventually expedited dynastic change. Sin Ton, who was decried by the Buddhist establishment as a “false monk” (sasŭng), behaved increasingly like an autocratic ruler and gradually lost even King Kongmin’s trust. After more than six years in power, Sin was accused of plotting the king’s death, was exiled, and finally executed in 1371. With him a large number of his cronies were either put to death or exiled.12 After this bloodletting, Kongmin tried to reassert himself, but he remained an irresolute monarch, far more inclined to a life of leisure and artistic diversions. When he was assassinated in 1374, he left no successor, and the kingship, and with it the dynasty, rapidly approached its end. With the support of the pro-Yuan military leader and high-ranking official Yi In-im (?–1388),13 the young son of one of Sin Ton’s slaves was pushed onto the throne and reigned “irregularly” as King U (r. 1374–88). Both the king and Yi In-im were exiled when the generals Ch’oe Yŏng and Yi Sŏng-gye seized de facto power in 1388,14 and U was for a short time succeeded by his young son, King Ch’ang (r. 1388–89).15 The Koryŏ royal line of the Wang was briefly restored by the victors when King Kongyang (r. 1389–1392) was placed on the throne,16 but it finally came to an end when a new dynasty was proclaimed in the summer of 1392. The reasons for the failure of reform in the immediate post-Mongol era were manifold. Not only was the kingship much weakened, the political culture also had deteriorated to the point that the bureaucratic mechanisms controlling the dispensation of power were paralyzed. Above all, however, it was a social crisis. The sejok elite felt disempowered, but were divided in their attitudes toward the Mongols, in their dynastic loyalties, and consequently also in their ideas of reform. On the other hand, the kwŏnmun remained a powerful and influential group inside and outside the government, profiting from the general social unrest. An analysis of the forces that had a hand in the late Koryŏ crisis reveals a complex web of social interdependencies and rivalries and suggests that most other woes plaguing the dynasty—in particular, economic ills such as unequal land distribution and the consequent decay of the country’s fiscal system—were largely a result of social dislocations. One of the most influential men at King Kongmin’s early court was Yi Che-hyŏn (1287–1367). A scion of the Kyŏngju Yi,17 Che-hyŏn early excelled in Confucian scholarship and passed the examinations at the age of fifteen in 1301. At King Ch’ungsŏn’s behest, he went to Yuan China in 1314, where he maintained close contacts with many famous Chinese scholars.18 Upon his return to Korea six years later, he advanced to high office and repeatedly urged King Ch’ungnyŏl’s successors to initiate institutional reforms to restore the sejok elite’s political power. As a chancellor under Kongmin, he agitated for the restoration of “reverence” (kyŏng) and “sincerity” (sin) as fundamental principles of a king’s moral education.19 Wishing the king would surround himself with proper expositors of the Four Books and the Five Classics, he sternly reproached him for instead favoring as his companions such “parasitical” elements as Pae Chŏn (?–1361), the son of a palace slave who had earlier advanced to high office under King Ch’unghye, and Kang Yun-ch’ung (?–1359), known for his riches and for being a rapist, whom Yi called the

42

Fou n dat ions

worst kind of evildoer. Another royal intimate was the eunuch Kim Sa-haeng (?–1398), an obscure figure who managed to survive several purges to become a minor merit subject of the Chosŏn founder.20 Though not a radical reformer, Yi Che-hyŏn was one of the chief initiators of the purge of Ki Ch’ŏl and his associates—presumably at some personal risk because Yi was variously related to Ki through affinal ties to Kwŏn Pu (1262–1346), the eminent representative of the Andong Kwŏn in the capital.21 One of Kwŏn Pu’s sons, Hu,22 married Ki Ch’ŏl’s daughter, and Ki’s eldest son took the daughter of Yi Che-hyŏn’s second son, Tal-jon (1313–40), as his wife. Tal-jon in turn was married to a daughter of Paek I-jŏng (1247–1323), one of the early transmitters of Neo-Confucianism to Korea and a teacher of Yi Che-hyŏn’s.23 A further victim of 1356 was Kwŏn Pu’s own son, Kyŏm (?–1356), who, as a retainer of King Ch’ungsuk, had close dealings with the Mongols, giving one of his daughters to the crown prince in marriage. Kyŏm obviously became the Kwŏn’s black sheep, and his line soon died out, apparently due to the lack of male heirs.24 The third victim was No Ch’aek (?–1356), who swiftly rose to prominence and high office due to his marriage to a royal princess and, “being greedy by nature,” grossly enriched himself; he also managed to marry one of his daughters to a Mongol prince.25 The execution of these three “traitors” (panyŏk) must have sent more than fleeting ripples through the capital elite. To be sure, it was an act dictated by reason of state, but it also revealed how deeply enmeshed the elite was with the Mongol overlords and the royal house and how tempted to abuse privilege and power. One can only imagine the feelings of a man like Yi Che-hyŏn, who all his life strove with the wisdom of Confucian morality to reinvigorate kingly rule and reinstate a “civilized” elite in a reformed bureaucracy. In 1357, Yi retired to the countryside and did not live long enough to witness the second major round of executions during King Kongmin’s reign. One of King Kongmin’s motives for placing his trust in Sin Ton apparently stemmed from his desire to liberate himself from the tight embrace of the established great descent groups (sesin taejok), who “did not respond to his intentions.” He was equally disgusted with obscure outsiders who tried to move up by intermarrying with the elite, and disappointed with the Confucian scholars who were “weak and irresolute” and formed their own master-disciple cliques. In Sin Ton he apparently hoped to find an “independent individual detached from worldly affairs.”26 As noted above, Sin Ton soon no longer conformed to such a profile and, by “not sitting together with the chaech’u but daring to sit close to the king, alarmed the people.” Whoever had the courage to criticize this “double rulership” (yanggun) risked his life.27 Pitilessly purging his adversaries in the bureaucracy and the military, Sin preferred to surround himself with a group of intimates in the palace, creating what became known as the “palace chaech’u” (nae chaech’u). Most of Sin’s collaborators were, like Sin himself, of murky background and advanced to important positions through military service. Yi Un-mok (?–1371), for instance, won some merit against the Japanese pirates, declared himself an enemy of Ki Ch’ŏl, and was rewarded with second-rank merit subject status upon the latter’s demise. He shared the reputation of braggart with Yi Ch’un-bu (?–1371),28 who flattered Sin Ton into giving him an office. Another, Kim Nan (?–1371), of equally obscure origins, reportedly was in charge of the palace chaech’u.29 All three were executed together with Sin Ton in 1371. Also



Crisis of Identity

43

among the victims were Ki Hyŏn, a collateral kinsman of Ki Ch’ŏl, and his two sons, General Chin Yun-gŏm, a few monks, and kinsmen of Sin Ton. Besides the thirty men put to death, an equal number were beaten and exiled.30 The elimination of Sin Ton and his supporters brought King Kongmin short-lived respite. He had been urged by some high officials to do away with Sin and take governmental matters in his own hands but was increasingly confronted by a fast-changing international situation. Sin had been staunchly pro-Yuan, whereas the king started to recognize the signs of the time and to side with the victorious Ming. The military, prominently represented by General Ch’oe Yŏng, who had been purged by Sin, were, moreover, again pushing for more political participation. Kongmin was not up to these diverse challenges and was evidently much troubled by the fact that he had not produced a male successor. In 1373, he gave the royal name Wang U (1365–89) to a young boy he alleged to be his son by a palace slave (in fact, it was Sin Ton’s son), designated him as his successor, and entrusted his education to his old mother, Queen Dowager Myŏngdŏk. Before long, King Kongmin was murdered by two intimates—as the result of a bizarre palace-intern cabal31—and young U was hastily declared his successor. The queen dowager, who wished a different royal kinsman to succeed, was apparently outmaneuvered by Chancellor Yi In-im who, taking advantage of U’s youth, seized the reins and emerged as the strongman of the moment. Starting a military career in the 1360s, Yi had moved up into the Todang under Sin Ton, and now tried, with the support of such shady figures as Chi Yun,32 to assert his authority. Afraid of being accused by the Ming of regicide, he tried to reopen relations with the retreating Yuan and thus provoked the opposition of Mingfriendly officials. A number of memorialists who demanded the removal of Yi and Chi were purged and sent into exile in 1375. Chi Yun, surrounded by his own clique, soon turned against Yi, whom he wanted to eliminate together with Ch’oe Yŏng. His plans failed, however, and he, his entire family, and his hangers-on were executed in 1377. Yi then found a new collaborator in Im Kyŏn-mi,33 a military man who had started his career in the fight against the Red Turbans. As a member of the palace chaech’u, Im’s influ­ence grew steadily, and he even advocated that the capital be moved south to Hanyang— against Yi In-im’s and Ch’oe Yŏng’s opposition. In the first month of 1388, Im and another of Yi In-im’s intimates, Yŏm Hŭng-bang,34 both of whom opposed a normalization of relations with the Ming, were finally eliminated by King U and Ch’oe Yŏng, the king’s principal supporter—and father-in-law. Im Kyŏn-mi was executed with some fifty of his retainers, and their wives and children were enslaved, while Yi In-im, who had earlier collaborated with Ch’oe Yŏng, was at the time merely sent into exile, where he died shortly afterward.35

The Kwŏnmun: The Villains of Late Koryŏ The post-Kongmin decade thus ended with the demise of individuals who, later labeled “traitorous officials” (kansin), were held responsible for having factionalized power for their own aggrandizement, cultivated nonelite elements as personal retainers, and mis-

44

Fou n dat ions

judged Korea’s precarious position in a changing world. As the power holders, they not only perpetuated the kwŏnmun problem but were themselves part of it. Belonging to descent groups without great ancestral distinction, both Im Kyŏn-mi and Yŏm Hŭngbang (an examination graduate) had made it into the higher officialdom through military prowess and reportedly abused their positions by ganging up with dubious elements, seizing other people’s land, and committing all kinds of abuses. Im is said to have owned landed property all over the country. Chi Yun, in contrast, was the son of a shaman and gained the reputation of a notorious ruffian who enriched himself by, among other things, selling offices. After his death, Yi In-im was made the principal scapegoat, blamed for having caused the political stagnation under King U by tolerating the wanton behavior of Im and Yŏm; he suffered posthumously the greatest disgrace—his corpse was decapitated and his former residence razed to the ground.36 Whereas a number of high-placed individuals gained historical notoriety, the kwŏnmun included others of low status who often remained nameless but, as royal favorites, officials, retainers, or eunuchs, were not slower at profiting from the unstable situation at court and in government. As contemporary reports testify, the problem was not merely a political one; it also had an economic dimension. The kwŏnmun—apparently even including members of the royal house—owned large estates, which they acquired or enlarged by illegally grabbing land upon which they claimed tax-free status. They thus not only gave rise to innumerable ownership disputes, but also caused the decline of the country’s tax base. Worse yet, the accelerated privatization of land jeopardized the allocation of prebendal land and as a result subverted the officials’ remuneration system. The peasantry, furthermore, no longer able to bear the tax burden of several claimants, left their homesteads in growing numbers and either roamed the countryside or sought refuge on the estates of the mighty, enslaving themselves. In short, the kwŏnmun’s selfserving economic behavior was a significant reason why the agrarian economy in the mid-fourteenth century was close to collapse.37 The kwŏnmun problem had even a religious dimension. With their wealth, the kwŏn­ mun invested heavily in the Buddhist establishment. Though the construction of private shrines (wŏndang), which were not dedicated to the royal house, was not tolerated in early Koryŏ, after the Military period their building or restoration proliferated, not only for the builders to earn a good rebirth but also to divert landed assets from the state to the shrines.38 Indeed, in late Koryŏ, memorial temples turned into such objects of prestige that “wherever a boat or a cart can go, pagodas and shrines are facing each other.” By striving after good fortune, a disgusted contemporary critic remarked, those who built them were inflicting harm on the peasantry and regarded the regular officials, who presumably could not compete, contemptuously as “slaves.”39 Among the constructors were, for instance, such infamous eunuchs as Pang Sin-u (?–1343) and Ko Yong-bo (?–1362). Pang, known for the extensive landed property he amassed during his service to King Ch’ungnyŏl and his successors, rebuilt Sŏnhŭngsa in 1330, “exerting extreme efforts to make it grand and imposing.”40 Ko, who was known, and hated, as one of the most cruel and abusive individuals of late Koryŏ, and who was one of Ki Ch’ŏl’s cronies, reconstructed an old Paekche temple, Pogwangsa, and had the renowned scholar Yi Kok write a commemorative inscription (ki). Late in life, perhaps feeling some remorse, Ko retreated



Crisis of Identity

45

as a monk to Haeinsa, where he was murdered in 1362.41 Though it was not unusual for high government officials to build temples to commemorate their ancestors in the vicinity of the capital, when such infamous personalities as Pang and Ko were building them even Buddhism became a part of the kwŏnmun problem.42 In sum, by late Koryŏ, the kwŏnmun represented a heterogeneous group of individuals who, by ignoring or grossly contravening the traditional conventions of sociopolitical behavior, were perceived by the sejok as threatening the core values of the dynasty as well as the social, economic, and cultural stability of the country. To be sure, as detailed in chapter 1, the kwŏnmun first emerged as a problem in the early days of Mongol domination, when King Ch’ungnyŏl used hand-picked underlings of doubtful social origin to assert himself against the sejok-dominated bureaucracy. Yet despite later efforts to cut their influence back, they continued to thrive under King Kongmin, who seems to have wanted to use eunuchs and persons like Sin Ton as a counterweight against the interference of his in-laws and sejok officials. The problem escalated dangerously after Kongmin’s demise, when the kingship was practically taken over by men like Yi In-im, who, in tandem with the military, further cultivated nonelite elements in the highest echelons of power. Clearly, from the sejok’s perspective, the country was rapidly approaching total chaos. Under these adverse circumstances, were the dynasty and, with it, sejok hegemony, restorable?

The Neo-Confucians: The Ideologues of National Restoration The restoration process of late Koryŏ was not a process with a predictable outcome. It oscillated between reestablishing the “laws of the dynastic founders,” as promised in King Kongmin’s throne proclamation, and the Confucians’ more radical call for rehabilitating state and society on the models of Chinese antiquity (pokko). While both these visions aimed to “restore,” they differed in the envisioned scope of restoration. Was dynastic change necessary? And what, in the end, did make the change of dynasties inevitable? Although the role of Neo-Confucian scholars in the transition from Koryŏ to Chosŏn has received extensive scholarly treatment, this section will briefly reexamine it against the background sketched above. The Neo-Confucian scholars have often been portrayed as an isolated group of idealists dreaming of instituting an ideal society in their own lifetime. But were they not also chief players in the power struggle that had to do with preserving status and wealth? In view of what the terms kwŏnmun and sejok likely stood for, it may no longer be justifiable to argue that “the primary objectives of the Neo-Confucian reformers [was] to destroy the hereditary aristocracy and replace it with a meritocracy based on the knowledge of the Confucian Classics.”43 Were the NeoConfucians not rather the vanguard of the sejok—the hereditary aristocracy—urging reform first of all to win back for themselves supremacy in government from those who, in their eyes, ruled without proper social legitimation? Did the eventual change of dynasty, then, not signify a victory of the sejok, spearheaded by a small number of Confucian scholars, over the usurpers of late Koryŏ power—a victory later glorified

46

Fou n dat ions

and legitimized as the successful implementation of the moral imperatives codified in the Confucian canon? Rather than postulating, as most conventional historiography has done, the rise of the Neo-Confucians from an alleged “class of newly rising landowners of small and medium-sized parcels of land” turning against “the aristocratic establishment”—an allegation for which supporting evidence is entirely lacking—it is necessary to reconsider the Neo-Confucians’ part in contending with the deep social crisis besetting late Koryŏ elite society. Did their efforts to cast the moral into a “natural” extension of the social suffice to recapture the controlling power of the social over the political? Or did they need the succor of forces not included in their original vision of mission to help them carry this very vision through to ultimate victory? Though the record is fragmentary, the early Neo-Confucians seem to have considered themselves first of all as victims in a world ruled by individuals who did not share their professional ethos as sadaebu. Returning from Yuan China, where they had been instructed by their Chinese teachers and colleagues in the role of Neo-Confucian thought as a civilizing instrument (see chapter 3),44 they looked at their environment in Kaesŏng with a new consciousness of self and of their mission in state and society. Though not anti-Yuan, they became keenly aware that the general malaise that had befallen their country was a result of the Mongols’ imposition of a supranational system of dependencies and control upon Korea. As examination graduates and office holders in both countries,45 they themselves had become part of this system, but, as newly converted NeoConfucians, they felt compelled to distance themselves from the Mongol-leaning current power holders (kwŏnse), and they did so by applying such ancient terms as “great and common officers” (sa or sadaebu) to their group.46 A veteran of Mongol-sponsored education, Yi Kok (1298–1351) used moral terms: he set the “serious officials” (chungsin) against the “opportunistic officials” (kwŏnsin)—the former (surely Confucian-trained) “loyal and upright,” the latter “crafty and vile.” Serious officials, he maintained, even in adverse times adhered to principle and duty without regard to fate and fortune, whereas the opportunistic officials abused the situation to advance their own interests and consolidate their power by currying favor with the king. Meanwhile the great majority of officialdom, Yi lamented, remained silent though full of resentment.47 Clearly, Yi Kok, who regarded “sincerity” (sŏng) and “respect” (kyŏng) as key virtues in politics, diagnosed the contemporary social crisis as a deficit of moral training and urged his colleagues to speak up and rescue the dynasty.48 A major source of Neo-Confucian dissatisfaction was that the bureaucracy, once the exclusive domain of the sejok, was now at all levels infiltrated by elements who, on the basis of their social origin, would earlier not have been admitted. The examination system had lost its function as social filter and was marred by irregularities, and what is more, it had been rendered dysfunctional by royal favoritism and the abuse of the protection privilege. Worse still, it could be altogether circumvented by short-term service in the military that led directly to high office. And, indeed, the traditional, examination-based bureaucracy, though apparently never threatened with elimination, was as a whole being outmaneuvered by the authority of diverse inner-palace decision-making organs. It is not surprising, then, that engaged scholars such as Yi Che-hyŏn targeted the examination system for urgent renewal. In a first attempt, made as early as 1320, Yi recommended that



Crisis of Identity

47

the requirements for Tang-style poetry and rhyme prose (si-bu) be replaced by policy questions (ch’aengmun). In 1344, apparently emboldened, he pressed for the introduction, on the Yuan model, of the Chinese classics with the Song commentaries as mandatory examination materials. Accordingly, examination candidates were to be tested, in the first round, on the Six Classics and the Four Books, in the second on rhyme prose, and in the last on policy treatises. This radical revamping of the examination canon, which would likely have put the exams intellectually out of reach of most candidates, naturally did not remain uncontested by those (among them even Yi’s colleague Hong Ŏn-bak) who defended poetry and rhyme prose as the principal basis for assessment. It is doubtful, therefore, that Yi’s proposal was ever considered for implementation.49 The Neo-Confucians’ project of revitalizing Confucian learning and making the study of the Chinese classics the centerpiece of the examination system concentrated in the late 1360s on rebuilding the National Confucian Academy—which was financed, it should be noted, with forced contributions of cloth from the “Confucian officials” (yu’gwan) inside and outside the capital. As noted before, it was Im Pak who pushed the project through and then also introduced a new regime by dividing an increased student body into two groups, one studying the Five Classics, the other the Four Books. He resolutely pursued his efforts until they finally climaxed in the first implementation of the Yuan-style three-tiered examination system in 1369.50 Although Im Pak is credited in the annals as the key figure in the above events, he seems to have been foremost an activist, and, with his mission accomplished, he apparently disappeared from the scene. Among those who brought Im’s work to fruition was Yi Saek (1328–96), Yi Kok’s son.51 Following his father to the Yuan capital, the young Saek passed the Mongol exams and first entered office in Kaesŏng with a protection appointment. In 1353, he also excelled in the home examinations administered by Yi Che-hyŏn and Hong Ŏ-bak. For accompanying King Kongmin on his flight to Andong, he was rewarded with first-class merit subject status and a large land allotment with twenty slaves. In 1352, while in mourning for his father, he submitted to King Kongmin a lengthy programmatic memorial in which he mapped out his vision of reform. As a task of great urgency, he concerned himself with education and argued that the reform of the decayed school system “would benefit not only the Confucians.”52 Thus, when appointed to succeed Im as superintendent (taesasŏng) of the National Confucian Academy in 1367, he went to work with a vengeance. He designed new educational rules and won fame as a revered teacher of many Neo-Confucian adepts of the late Koryŏ. He chose as his teaching colleagues such like-minded younger “scholars with classics skills” (kyŏngsul chi sa) as Chŏng Mong-ju (1337–92), Kim Ku-yong (1338–84), Pak Sang-ch’ung (1332–75), and Yi Sung-in (1349–92), among others.53 They formed a small core group of dedicated scholars and lecturers who, as examination graduates, entered office in the late 1350s and early 1360s. None of them had had educational experiences in Yuan China, and their preoccupation with Neo-Confucian thought seems to have commenced exclusively by studying the Four Books with their Song commentaries under the guidance of senior veterans and in small study and discussion circles.54 It is not recorded how Chŏng Mong-ju acquired his enthusiasm for the “teachings of body and mind” (sinsim chi hak), but he graduated with top honors from the examinations in the same year, 1360, like men such

48

Fou n dat ions

as Im Pak and Yi Chon-o (1341–71),55 both of whom were close to Yi Saek. A few candidates were, presumably because of their precocity and/or personal bonds, hand-picked by their mentors: Yun So-jong (1345–93), for example, who had been earlier a student at the National Confucian Academy and who graduated under Yi Saek and Yi In-bok (1308–74)56 in 1365. Yun was the grandson of Yun T’aek,57 a close friend of Yi Saek’s father, Kok. Pak Sang-ch’ung was a classmate of Yi Saek in 1353 and married Saek’s sister,58 and Kim Ku-yong, a fifth-generation descendant of the mighty Kim Pang-gyŏng, was a degree holder of 1355. Yi Sung-in, finally, an exam passer of 1362, was a collateral kinsman of Yi In-im and married the daughter of Hong Ŏn-bak’s son. Also to this group belonged Yi Sung-in’s friend and exam colleague Chŏng To-jŏn (?1337–98), the man who is often called the “architect” of the Chosŏn dynasty.59 These early teachers of Neo-Confucianism, “tirelessly engaged in lecturing and discussing,” were thus a closely knit group of friends, united not only in scholarly orientation but also variously related by marriage. Though some belonged to the long-established sejok elite and others were comparatively recent arrivals at the political center, all of them held government positions as examination graduates and cultivated close teacher-disciple relationships.60 As deeply engaged and critical contemporaries, they constituted a minority group within the bureaucracy and acquired an easily recognizable profile as “the Confucians” (yusaeng), while the silent majority of scholars (hakcha), as Yi Saek once bitterly remarked, were interested more in scrambling for office than in becoming sages.61 Speaking up, however, was not easy and could even be dangerous. Though King Kong­ min evidently sympathized with a few Confucians and is said to have “liked Chŏng To-jŏn very much,” he did not actively back them and even called them “weak and ir­resolute.” Sin Ton, by contrast, not only perceived them as a troublesome clique but also ruthlessly persecuted his critics. Yi Chon-o, who dared to denounce Sin’s autocratic behavior, narrowly escaped a death sentence, thanks to Yi Saek who came to his rescue with the argument that since the inception of the dynasty no censor had ever been killed. “Moreover, what harm could the words of little Confucians do to great persons?”62 Though the Confucians were not directly involved in Sin Ton’s removal, which was initiated and led by the military, they did profit from the new political constellation: both Chŏng Mong-ju and Chŏng To-jŏn advanced to third-rank offices, and Yi Saek was appointed to the Royal Secretariat. This did not, however, put the Confucians on a par with the military.63 Their situation deteriorated again when, after King Kongmin’s demise, Yi In-im seized power and reversed the king’s pro-Ming course in favor of closer relations with the retreating Mongols. The Confucians came out in force to protest this change of policy and the murder of a Ming envoy, and demanded the elimination of Yi and Chi Yun.64 Their interventions backfired: Yi Ch’ŏm, whom King Kongmin had personally examined in 1368, and who now as a censor denounced Yi and Chi, was exiled for ten years.65 Chŏng To-jŏn, Chŏng Mong-ju, Kim Ku-yong, and many others who opposed Yi In-im’s proYuan policy were punished with banishment; Pak Sang-ch’ung died of his torture wounds on the way to exile; and Im Pak, demoted to commoner, was killed before he reached his place of banishment.66 Though some exiles were released a year later, Chŏng To-jŏn spent some ten years in the countryside. The purge of 1375 signified a traumatic



Crisis of Identity

49

setback for the Confucians who, without high-placed sponsors, remained exposed to the arbitrary actions of those who wielded supreme power. In such a generally adverse climate, what chance did the Confucians’ reform proposals have? Was their call for moral governance and the restoration of a regime on the model of the Chinese sage kings, Yao and Shun, not simply illusory? Of course, the Confucians were realists enough to recognize that it was the country’s economic plight that demanded most urgent attention, yet, overwhelmed by massive social and economic ills, their initial reform ideas sounded rather modest. In his memorial of 1352, Yi Saek, for instance, seems to have had the Mencian well field model in mind when he suggested that “correcting the field boundaries” (kyŏnggye chi chŏng) and “equalizing farmland on a well grid” (kyŏngji chi kyun) should be a ruler’s uppermost concerns. In other words, as a means of alleviating the cultivators’ plight Yi postulated the disentanglement of multiple land ownerships so that one field would have but one owner.67 But when Sin Ton, with Im Pak’s assistance, established the Directorate for Reclassification of Farmland and Farming Population (Chŏnmin pyŏnjŏng togam) with the aim of dismantling the large landed estates (nongjang) of the mighty,68 Yi Saek, himself the owner of considerable landed property, was not the only one to be alarmed at such radical measures and vehemently opposed them.69 Indeed, any change to the existing land system was resisted because, with the breakdown of the prebendal Field and Woodland Rank System, privately owned landed property assumed ever-greater significance as a primary source of income—naturally also for the Confucians. Whereas the Confucians thus vacillated between reform and preservation, they were more resolute in their critique of Buddhism and their condemnation of the kwŏnmun’s involvement with the Buddhist establishment. The well-known fulminations of men such as Chŏng Mong-ju and Chŏng To-jŏn against fundamental tenets of the Buddhist faith clearly broke with positions earlier held by Yi Che-hyŏn, who had defensively looked for correspondences between Confucianism and Buddhism. They also went further than Yi Saek’s merely institutional demands, submitted in 1352, for introducing a license system for monks and prohibiting further temple building.70 Yi Saek and Chŏng Mong-ju shared, however, a commitment to renovating their disciples’ ritual behavior by propagating the integration of Confucian-style rituals into their everyday lives. The display of reformed ritualism was an excellent means of demonstrating opposition to the kwŏnmun’s lavish self-aggrandizement with Buddhist trappings. In 1357, Yi Saek requested that a three-year mourning period be introduced and reportedly mourned his mother for such an unusually long time, and Chŏng Mong-ju was the first Neo-Confucian who not only pressed for the establishment of ancestral shrines (sadang) for conducting ancestral services but also observed three-year mourning periods for both his parents.71 Among their colleagues were imitators. Yun T’aek, for instance, demanded in his last will not to be buried with Buddhist rites, and his son, Ku-saeng (1317–81), Yun So-jong’s father, retired from office to the Yun’s rural estate in Kŭmju (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province) to build an ancestral shrine and conduct regular rites for three ancestral generations. This was such uncommon behavior that he earned official praise for his filiality, and a commemorative arch.72 Nevertheless, despite their critical spirit, none of the early Confucians seems to have been quite ready to make a clean break with the Buddhist past. One exception was Ch’oe

50

Fou n dat ions

Hae: calling Buddhism a “heresy” (idan), he withdrew from his official position in the capital and retired to the countryside.73 Others remained ambivalent: while extolling Confucian values as superior to Buddhist “vagueness,” they did keep sociable contacts with monks and were willing to write numerous commemorative pieces (ki) for new or reconstructed temples. Even Yi Saek seems to have found himself caught in this dilemma. Though he denounced the Buddhists’ economic extravagances, he refrained from attacking their beliefs on philosophical grounds—a stand for which he was later criticized.74 At this early stage, then, not all Confucians could either detach themselves completely from their religious background or envisage dynastic change as a necessary precondition for pursuing their mission to success. It was left to the next generation of Confucians to break through the intellectual as well as the political stalemate of the 1380s. With the kingship slipping into the hands of Sin Ton’s “illegitimate” descendants, the political arena was more than ever before laid wide open to personal feuds among a few high-placed contenders for power in the Todang. Yi Saek, who had survived Sin’s regime, opposed Yi In-im but not the “fake rulers” and was, after Yi In-im’s purge in early 1388, appointed chancellor, thus becoming the most powerful man in the Todang. This elevated position of elder statesman did not, however, further the Confucians’ cause. On the contrary, by getting involved so closely with the politics of the day, Yi exposed himself to the charge of siding with elements who opposed any outside assaults upon their vested interests. Outside events did, however, force action upon the government. With the Ming’s threat of annexing territories formerly under direct Mongol control, General Ch’oe Yŏng, supported by King U, decided to launch a punitive campaign into Liaodong Peninsula, a venture vehemently opposed by military veteran Yi Sŏng-gye75 on the ground that Korea was not prepared militarily to stand up against the mighty Ming. Though entrusted against his will with the command of the right wing of the expeditionary army, Yi demonstrated his opposition by his spectacular “turning-around of troops” on the Yalu River island Wihwa (Wihwado hoe’gun) in the summer of 1388. This was a historic turning point in a double sense: Yi marched back to the capital to eliminate his adversaries, foremost among them General Ch’oe, and he met with men who outlined for him the strategies for consolidating his power.76 The man who became Yi Sŏng-gye’s principal advisor was Cho Chun (1346–1405), a person with many facets. When Yi first met him, he was so impressed by Cho’s deportment that he spontaneously treated him like an old acquaintance. Though an examination graduate of 1374, Cho had advanced into the officialdom through various military achievements, but so disillusioned was he with contemporary politics that in 1384 he withdrew from public life, “closed his door and amused himself with the classics and his­ tory.” Together with friends, among them Yun So-jong, he vowed to work for the restoration of the royal house of the Wang, and it was presumably with this ambition in mind that he approached the victorious Yi Sŏng-gye. He had worked out concrete suggestions for tackling the land problem. The crux of his reform proposals was the abolition of private land (sajŏn) and the reestablishment of a rank-based prebendal remuneration scheme for the officialdom.77 In short, Cho’s plans envisaged land grants parceled out by the state only to those who as office holders were performing actual service to the state. It is not



Crisis of Identity

51

surprising that such a radical scheme did not find approval among most members of the Todang. Yi Saek, in particular, argued that “old laws could not suddenly be changed” and, supported by “scions of mighty houses” (kŏsil chaje), strongly opposed Cho’s proposals.78 For Yi Sŏng-gye, who had long been concerned that land alienated from the state was not providing sufficient funds for the military, Cho’s plans and a number of similar reform proposals set out a clear and irreversible path of action.79 This was not a plebiscite on Neo-Confucianism; it was a struggle for returning land resources to state control for redistribution to the bureaucratic elite. To carry this struggle to a successful end, it was even necessary to remove two revered figures of early Neo-Confucianism from the scene: Yi Saek, who stood in the way of reform by clinging to the juvenile King Ch’ang, was sent into exile in 1389, and Chŏng Mong-ju, who could not envisage transferring his loyalty to a new dynasty, was assassinated on the eve of the Chosŏn’s establishment. Both, however, had laid the intellectual foundations of a long, transformatory process that was carried forward into Chosŏn by their disciples in spirit, Cho Chun and Chŏng To-jŏn. Without the assistance they received from Yi Sŏng-gye, however, it is hard to imagine that they could have created, on the premises of the Confucian classics, a new dynastic framework that enabled the sejok elite, transformed into the new “great and common officers” (sadaebu), to repossess their social and political preeminence.

Descent Groups in Early Chosŏn What were the repercussions of the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition on Koryŏ’s elite descent groups? Was there an appreciable change in the composition of the ruling stratum of early Chosŏn? Did some descent groups that had belonged to the upper segment of Koryŏ society disappear while others, unrelated to the old Koryŏ aristocracy, rose and seized power at the center? In other words, was there a major shift in the tradition according to which social criteria defined the degree of political participation? As the events of the Koryŏ period suggest, vicissitudes in their fate were always part of the history of descent groups, and it does not come as a surprise that this was even more the case during dynastic transition. This was recognized at the beginning of the Chosŏn, when the government compiled an inventory of descent groups in all districts of the country (completed in 1432). Introducing a new nomenclature to take recent changes into account, the Geographic Gazetteer Appended to the Annals of King Sejong (Sejong sillok chiriji) recorded, besides “territorial surnames” (t’osŏng), “defunct surnames” (mangsŏng), that is, descent groups that had been recorded in late Koryŏ but no longer existed in the early fifteenth century; “in-migrating surnames” (naesŏng), that is, descent groups that had moved into a district during Koryŏ; and “continued surnames” (soksŏng), that is, descent groups that lacked Koryŏ documentation and were now registered for the first time.80 In addition to providing data on a district’s administrative, demographic, and agricultural circumstances, the Geographic Gazetteer included under the rubric “individuals” (inmul) outstanding “native” personalities who, as representatives of their respective descent groups, were considered as having over time contributed

52

Fou n dat ions

to building up the legitimacy of the new dynasty.81 Whereas the Gazetteer listed only deceased individuals, the later official Geographic Survey of the Eastern Country (Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam) of 1482 also chronicled personalities who were still alive at the time of its compilation and thus in significant respects augments the earlier Gazetteer. The latter, for instance, recorded for P’aju only the early twelfth-century [P’ap’yŏng] Yun Kwan; in contrast, the Geographic Survey included nine Koryŏ Yun and nine early Chosŏn Yun, giving testimony that a strong consciousness of current social prominence guided the selection made by its compilers. The Geographic Survey, moreover, took only officials of senior third rank and above into account—the crème de la crème of the elite.82 In addition to the Gazetteer and the Geographic Survey, there is a third record that helps identify the prime descent groups of the time. This is Sŏng Hyŏn’s (1439–1504) list of what he called “our country’s outstanding kin groups” (a’guk kŏjok). Noting that there were “descent groups [t’osŏng] who prospered in the past but are in decline at present, and others who were humble in the past but are flourishing today,” he enumerated seventyfive surnames with choronyms.83 In sum, these three works provide vital contemporary data for gauging the fortunes of descent groups during the dynastic transition period and in early Chosŏn.84 Surprisingly, there were only a small number of descent groups that had been important in Koryŏ but declined in early Chosŏn. Among them were, for instance, the Ch’ŏr­ wŏn Ch’oe, who fell on hard times after the ignominious downfall of General Ch’oe Yŏng. Not only did they no longer bring forth high officials, apparently due to a lack of sons, but they were also no longer considered an outstanding descent group in early Chosŏn, despite the fact that in 1308 they had been recognized as one of the kin groups marriageable to the royal house.85 The Kongam Hŏ, Hoengsŏng Cho, Ŏnyang Kim, and the P’yŏnggang Ch’ae, who had equally been honored in 1308, also disappeared from the elite, even if not necessarily from the lower officialdom. The same fate befell the descendants of the two “treacherous officials,” Im Kyŏn-mi and Yŏm Hŭng-bang, both of whom had briefly emerged in late Koryŏ from insignificant descent groups in small counties, which were later unable to produce regular officials. In contrast, a number of Yi Ch’unbu’s Yangsŏng Yi descendants entered the new bureaucracy as munkwa graduates and, despite their ancestor’s execution in 1371, retained official recognition of their high social status. Ki Ch’ŏl had suffered a similar disgrace in 1356, yet his descendants, too, continued to be accepted as an “outstanding kin group” in early Chosŏn even though no Haengju Ki passed an examination or any longer held office.86 Whereas small and genealogically shallow descent groups were prone to disappear after a brief period of prominence, large and collaterally well-developed descent groups were able, through different descent lines, to sustain their viability and preserve their reputation as “outstanding kin group.” A good example are the Sŏngju Yi. Though Yi In-im’s name and descent line were tarnished, In-im had five brothers (two of whom were exam passers) in high office with prodigious numbers of descendants. Yi Chik (1362– 1431), the son of his youngest brother, In-min, and a degree holder of 1377, was even made a third-rank founding merit subject of the new dynasty (kaeguk kongsin) and served in the highest offices. Yi Chik’s brothers and cousins—one of whom, Yi Che (?–1398), as Yi Sŏng-gye’s son-in-law, became a first-class merit subject in 1392—were equally politically



Crisis of Identity

53

active in early Chosŏn. Indeed, there was no question about the Sŏngju Yi’s continued high social standing.87 The success of the Sŏngju Yi stands in stark contrast to the waning fortunes of the Ponghwa Chŏng almost as soon as Chŏng To-jŏn disappeared from the political scene. Again, lacking the backing of an extended familial and local background—Ponghwa was a remote small district north of Andong—Chŏng To-jŏn was, despite his brilliance, a socially isolated individual; only two of his great-grandsons passed the munkwa exams, whereupon the descent group seems to have declined into social and political oblivion.88 Did the fifty-two individuals whom Yi Sŏng-gye, posthumously known as King T’aejo (r. 1392–98), awarded with dynastic foundation merit subject status (kaeguk kongsin) as soon as he ascended the throne in the autumn of 1392, introduce new blood into the emerging ruling elite? It was a mixed group, uniting men of military as well as civilian backgrounds. Degree holders predominated in the civilian segment. To it belonged scions of long-established descent groups with examination records, such as Cho Chun, his brother, and his cousin, all of the P’yŏngyang Cho; Kim Sa-hyŏng (1341– 1407), [Andong] Kim Pang-gyŏng’s fourth-generation descendant; and Han Sang-gyŏng (1360–1423) of the Ch’ŏngju Han.89 Whereas all three had descendants who were continuously active during the fifteenth century (and beyond), the brothers Chŏng Ch’ong (1358– 97) and Chŏng T’ak (1363–1423) of the Ch’ŏngju Chŏng, who started to rise during the early years of the Mongol period, were both exam passers, but had few heirs in prominent positions in early Chosŏn, so they were not counted among the “outstanding descent groups.”90 The Ŭiryŏng Nam brothers, Nam Ŭn (1354–98; military degree holder) and Nam Chae (1351–1419; exam passer of 1371), also were relatively late starters, but were, as a kin group, able to put a few of their descendants into middle-level and high offices in the first half of the fifteenth century, and were, undoubtedly due to Ŭn’s and Chae’s honors and Chae’s grandson’s marriage to a daughter of King T’aejong (r. 1400–1418), nevertheless recognized as an “outstanding kin group.”91 The social backgrounds of a few men belonging to the civilian sector can be traced back only to their fathers’ generation, perhaps indicating hyangni background. Typically, social identification is even more difficult in the case of the seventeen military men who were rewarded for having actively assisted Yi Sŏng-gye in his fight for eventual supremacy. On balance, then, civilians headed the merit subject list of 1392 and represented descent groups of varying genealogical depths, but the influx of fresh blood into the ruling class seems to have been limited, as most of the honor recipients were well advanced in age, and unless they were part of a wellconnected kin group or had earlier built up a sizable progeny, their prestige and power often did not last beyond a couple of generations.92

New Bureaucratic Order for Reempowering the Sejok Elite Continuity was their objective when Chŏng To-jŏn and Cho Chun laid out the ideational foundation of a bureaucracy that was to meet the sejok’s aspirations to regain political hegemony. They dismantled the parallel structures built up during late Koryŏ and

54

Fou n dat ions

constructed a centralized polity that was to be administered by civilian and military bureaucrats (yangban). The civilians were unmistakably placed above the military as the highest military posts were concurrently assigned to civilian officials. At the apex of the bureaucratic structure stood the members of a slimmed-down Privy Council, in 1400 transformed into the State Council (Ŭijŏngbu), which was the top organ of government with far-reaching policy competence. Next in prestige came the ministers of the Six Ministries (Yukcho) who were in charge of overall administration. To accommodate increased demands for sharing power and status at the center, a number of independent high-level offices, especially with censorial functions, were soon added, thus broadening the bureaucratic authority.93 Central to this reformed bureaucracy was a revised examination system that recruited, in three stages administered every third year, both the civilian (munkwa) and (from 1402) the military (mukwa) officials, collectively known as the “two branches [of government]” (yangban), for staffing the Chosŏn eighteen-rank officialdom. Real power was lodged in the rank-two and rank-one positions in the State Council and the Six Ministries and a few further offices; the senior third rank (chŏng-sam p’um) was subdivided into “upper officials” (tangsang-gwan) and “lower officials” (tanghagwan), and, reminiscent of the Silla kolp’um system’s office exclusivity, only officials holding specific offices of senior third rank were eligible for promotion to tangsang-rank assignments, with their extraordinary social and material privileges.94 Even though starting an official career with examination success gained greater social prestige than ever before, the “protection privilege” (ŭmsŏ) was preserved as an “aristocratic loophole” for merit subjects and officials of rank two and above; it was even expanded through a new kind of “compensation system” (taegaje) introduced in 1449 that created sinecures (sanjik) for a specific group of ranked men to ease the great competitive pressure on the limited number of actual offices (silchik).95 What was new was that the ruling elite began to define itself by terms suggesting achievement, that is, by examination success and office holding. The term sadaebu, “great and common officers,” borrowed from the Rituals of Zhou (Zhouli), started, as already noted, to appear with some frequency from the late thirteenth century, but by the beginning of Chosŏn it was “professionalized” to designate the office holders and was used more commonly than yangban.96 Sa, originally meaning lower-level official, came to be extended by “descent group” (chok, -jok) to sajok and replaced the centuryold sejok that had emphasized generational longevity (se). Sajok also encompassed an official’s near kin and thus referred to the elite as a social group from which the sadaebu emerged.97 Similarly, yangban, too, eventually acquired this extended meaning. Whereas sadaebu stood primarily for bearers of political office, sajok also implied reputation for Confucian scholarship and civic virtues. That the ruling descent groups began to use such terms as yangban or sajok interchangeably as generic appellations for “elite” is evidence of their heightened awareness that it was the holding of a regular office or a sinecure in the central bureaucracy over generations that had come to generate prestige and power and that transmitted elite status to the younger generation.98 It may thus have been not so much their predilection for Neo-Confucian studies that, as is often alleged, inspired adoption of a new nomenclature, as a shift in the sadaebu’s conscious-



Crisis of Identity

55

ness: the social, while still determining access to power, had functionally become contingent on political achievement. Nevertheless, it was social criteria that continued to shape the new bureaucracy insofar as political participation and advancement in office remained to a significant degree dependent on social origin, tested by an examination system that continued to function as a social filter. Candidates seeking entry into the bureaucracy were, as before, subjected to state scrutiny because the examinations, as was repeatedly stated in early Chosŏn, were not merely intended to test talents; they were equally vital to “differentiate descent group affiliation” (pyŏn choksok).99 Consequently, despite the obvious bureaucratization of elite status taking place in early Chosŏn, it was likely such adherence to nonobjectifiable, selective social benchmarks that even now, at the beginning of a new dynastic order, prevented a legally binding definition of yangban status.100 Instead, from the early sixteenth century the threshold into the examination hall seems to have been raised further: a candidate needed to give proof that he had at least one “officially recognized” (chungso kongji) regular office holder (hyŏn’gwan) among his four ancestors. Lacking such an ancestor, he had to undergo an arduous probing of his social background, and his sponsor had to expect harsh punishment if his certification proved false.101 In other words, the existence of what came to be known as a “distinguished ancestor” (hyŏnjo)—whether official or scholar—turned into an essential additional con­ dition for long-term preservation of elite status. It was this kind of inherently subjective interpretation of “recognition” that, later in the dynasty, when office holding slackened, made yangban or sajok also a situationally determined status designation, no longer necessarily tied to office, but rather to an established lineage in a known locality, for example, a named village. How, then, was the ruling stratum of early Chosŏn constituted? Not unexpectedly, during the first three reigns of the new dynasty (1392–1418) it was the merit subjects who occupied most state councilor positions and thus continued to assist the kings they helped to enthrone.102 Richly endowed with land and slaves, both hereditary in perpetuity, these merit subjects could have handed their privileged access to office on to their sons and grandsons without passing a single examination, but very few actually were able to do so—too great, it seems, was the social pressure of obtaining office via the examinations. [Andong] Kim Sa-hyŏng’s descendants are a good example of how merit subject privilege was translated into lasting bureaucratic attainment and social prominence. Kim’s second son, Sŭng, who became a state councilor without passing the examinations, had three sons: one of them started a line of descendants who, over five consecutive generations, produced an extraordinary number of examination graduates and thus cemented the Kim’s strong standing as one of the most prosperous descent groups of Chosŏn.103 Though merit subject status did not necessarily facilitate examination passing, there was a clear correlation between the latter and high office holding, as it was multiple examination success that empowered a descent group to launch several members into the upper levels of the officialdom. With the highest number (fifty-seven) of munkwa graduates in the fifteenth century, the Andong Kwŏn, for instance, came to rank third among the top office holders. They were outranked only by the royal Chŏnju Yi (with

56

Fou n dat ions

twenty-nine exam passers) and the Yŏhŭng Min (with twenty-four exam passers)—both of whom included, of course, merit subjects.104 As can be expected in times of flux, members of descent groups of unremarkable background who sought social security and recognition through status confirmation by the state swelled the numbers of examination aspirants during the dynastic transition and the early decades of Chosŏn—testifying to the crucial importance examination success had acquired as a means of gaining status validation. In the fifteenth century, then, a total of 411 descent groups produced successful graduates; this was a much larger number than ever before, but 200 of them were represented by one single graduate only. To ascertain their backgrounds is difficult, but it is likely that descent groups that had never before put a member into central government now tried to assert themselves. How hard, however, it was to compete without the backing of previous political engagement at the center is evident from the fact that over 40 percent of the fathers of successful graduates, whose immediate ancestry could be verified, held senior third-rank offices and above, with a marked concentration in the first three reigns. This suggests an early consolidation of power in a select circle of well-established descent groups. Indeed, 72 descent groups (17.5 percent) brought forth slightly over 62 percent of all graduates, with continuous examination success often conspicuously centered in one single descent segment.105 A striking example of how such concentration could propel a kin group into lasting prominence is provided by the Kwangju Yi, whom Sŏng Hyŏn praised as one of the two “most prosperous descent groups [munbŏl] of the present time.”106 The Kwangju Yi had over generations served as regional hyangni of Kwangju (Kyŏnggi Province), before Yi Chip (1314–87) passed the literary examinations (chesulkwa) in 1355 and afterward apparently entered office.107 All of his three sons were examination graduates and officials in the 1380s and 1390s. The descent segment started by Chip’s eldest son, Chi-jik (n.d.), exam passer of 1380 and holder of ministerial posts in early Chosŏn, came to be extraordinarily productive in the early decades of the new dynasty. All three of his sons passed the examinations, but only one held a ministerial post. In turn, the five sons of Chi-jik’s second son gained great fame as the “five-son examination passers” (oja tŭngkwa). Three of them later acquired merit subject status and served as high officials. Overall, there were twenty-six Kwangju Yi exam graduates in the fifteenth century, ranking them sixth on the table of high examination achievers.108 By combining examination success, office holding, and merit subject status, the Kwangju Yi thus rose to join the socially and politically most prominent descent groups of early Chosŏn. Yi Chip’s descendants continued to do well, and one descent line still figured among the highest officialdom in the eighteenth century.109 Examination success was one thing; to translate it into office holding quite another, as the two were not necessarily linked. Nevertheless, the greater the number of examination graduates, ideally spread over a descent group’s several descent lines, the better the chance of obtaining and holding office at a high level. Despite the dense presence of merit subjects in the highest echelons of bureaucratic power in the early decades of the new dynasty—in many cases, as it turned out, merely a temporary phenomenon—it was an amazingly small coterie of descent groups that not only produced the highest number of examination graduates but also controlled the top bureaucratic offices. According to



Crisis of Identity

57

Duncan’s calculations, among a total of 158 descent groups active in the central bureaucracy from 1392 to 1400, 34 held 56 percent of all tangsang-rank offices, an increase of more than 50 percent over late Koryŏ. Among these, 34 were such well-known late Koryŏ descent groups as the P’ap’yŏng Yun, the Munhwa Yu, the Kyŏngju Yi, the Yŏhŭng (Hwang­nyŏ) Min, and the P’yŏngyang Cho, among others. Such concentration of power at the top continued during the first decade of the fifteenth century, and, what is more, it even accelerated in the course of the fifteenth century, though the number of descent groups represented in the bureaucracy at the center broadened slightly, causing fluctuations in highest office holding and thus minor changes in the pecking order. In sum, then, this means, as John Duncan has pointed out, that power was concentrated in a remarkably small circle of descent groups, disproving earlier postulates of a broader and less aristocratic ruling stratum at the beginning of the Chosŏn.110 The exclusive focus on numerically well-established descent groups might, as Duncan has indicated, obscure the rise of a few individuals from less distinguished backgrounds who, as scholars and high officials, were significantly involved in the legislative process during the reigns of King Sejong (r. 1418–50) and King Sejo (r. 1455–68). Among them was, for instance, Hwang Hŭi (1363–1452) of the Changsu Hwang, a descent group of relatively shallow ancestry originating in a mountainous area of eastern Chŏlla Province. Hŭi, born in Kaesŏng, was a degree holder of 1389 and rose under King T’aejo into the higher officialdom, capping his career as chief state councilor under King Sejong. So great was Hŭi’s personal prestige as a scholar and legislator that his descent group was, despite its recent rise and even though there were very few office holders among Hŭi’s immediate descendants, counted among the “outstanding” descent groups of the time.111 Similarly, the Hayang Hŏ were recognized as “outstanding” due to the fame of the leading ritualist Hŏ Cho (1369–1439) and his two brothers, all three exam graduates, and undoubtedly to the circumstance that their mother was a daughter of Yi Chik of the mighty Sŏngju Yi (and one of T’aejo’s merit subjects).112 To this list of minor descent groups that joined the highest elite in early Chosŏn seemingly through the merits of single individuals should be added the Sinch’ang Maeng of Maeng Sa-sŏng (1360–1438), the Chinju Ha of Ha Yun (1347–1416; a merit subject of 1398), and the Namwŏn Ryang of Ryang Sŏng-ji (a merit subject of 1471), among a few others.113 If, however, such “newcomers” could not conform to the same growth patterns as the well-established descent groups, they had little chance to transform singular achievement into long-term social and political currency. As in the earlier example of the Ponghwa Chŏng of Chŏng To-jŏn, the Sinch’ang Maeng and the Chinju Ha, for instance, remained, in terms of munkwa graduates and office holders, relatively insignificant descent groups, in contrast, for example, to the Chinju Kang. The latter, who gained great fame for scholarship, artistry, and statesmanship with Kang Hŭi-maeng (1424–83) and his older brother, Hŭi-an (1418–65)—both members of King Sejong’s famous Hall of Worthies (Chiphyŏnjŏn)—had been building up their social distinction for at least four ancestral generations and, through continuous munkwa success and putting members into high offices, were able to sustain their high standing through generations until the end of the nineteenth century.114 As suggested before, maintenance of status distinction rested equally on strategically

58

Fou n dat ions

cultivated marriage networks. A preliminary survey of marriage connections recorded in the two early genealogies of the Andong Kwŏn of 1476 and the Munhwa Yu of 1565 reveals that a majority of those with name and fame in the first 150 years of the new dynasty were linked by multiple affinal ties. From a total of 3,416 munkwa graduates between 1392 and 1567, roughly 60 percent are listed in both genealogies, that is, were related to each other by marriage. Also noteworthy is the fact that the percentage of examination graduates listed in the two documents rapidly increased over time. Whereas during the first three decades (1392–1418) the percentage stood at 26.3, it rose to over 70 per­cent in the first half of the sixteenth century. The majority of these men resided in the new capital Hansŏng (Seoul) and nearby Kyŏnggi Province, but a considerable number also hailed from Kyŏngsang Province.115 Clearly, not only can the early Chosŏn ruling elite be regarded as an endogamous status group; with the passage of time, the marriage radius seems to have even narrowed in relation to the concentration of examination graduates and office holders in the capital-bound elite descent groups. In sum, then, the data presented above may suffice to confirm that the elite society of late Koryŏ survived the dynastic transition to early Chosŏn largely on the strength of the long-established customary descent group model. The larger the group was in terms of ancestral depth and collateral configuration, the greater its prospect of weathering the storms of untimely reversals. An abundant number of sons and nephews created the branches that collectively secured a group’s continued reproduction over generations, as a time span of at least three generations seems to have been required to advance to the all-powerful tangsang-rank offices. Equally vital were marital connections. It was often through propitious marriage arrangements that a relative newcomer was quickly absorbed into the capital elite. Matrilateral and affinal ties were an additional sensitive gauge for evaluating a group’s social standing within the elite. A further factor was, as Yi Su-gŏn has indicated, a group’s physiographical environment. The richer a locality was in human—that is, in the number of t’osŏng—and economic resources, the greater the possibility of finding powerful marriage partners and creating local synergies, for example, for putting young men through the rigors of examination preparations at home and in the capital, thus expediting their move into the central bureaucracy. Kyŏngsang Province was a particularly fertile ground for such kin group clusters; twenty-six of Sŏng Hyŏn’s seventy-five “outstanding descent groups” hailed from that province. Sŏngju or Andong were just two of the most prosperous of such localities.116 Taken all together, then, it may not be too far-fetched to assert that it was the sustained strength of kinship and its multiple social and political ramifications that, as Ryang Sŏng-ji observed, prevented “traitorous fellows” from dislodging the established sejok elite from power. Indeed, the dynastic transition from late Koryŏ to early Chosŏn was characterized by a remarkable degree of continuity rather than by social disruption, as the social retained its supremacy over the political. Consequently, though initiated by the military, the new dynasty resettled remarkably smoothly into a civilian regime dominated by sejok reempowered as the dynastic sadaebu. Despite the assimilation of some newcomers, by the end of the fifteenth century the descent groups that monopolized the top stratum of government were once again a close-knit elite similar in nature to that of the early Koryŏ.



Crisis of Identity

59

Power Contested: Aristocratic Oligarchy versus Royal Despotism Was it the intention of Yi Sŏng-gye, a military man, merely to assist the sejok to restore their hegemony and rebuild a civilian bureaucracy into the principal locus of power? Or did he hope to establish, with the administrative expertise of civilian scholar-officials, a new dynasty that would enable him to reassert kingly rule after the dismal end of Koryŏ’s royal house? The rhetoric of his “founding edict,” proclaimed in the late summer of 1392, predictably reveals none of Yi’s innermost thoughts, as it was couched in the programmatic terms of a “Confucian” ruler founding a benevolent new regime “for the benefit of the people.”117 But it was barely a few years later that the royal court was shaken by events that revived memories of earlier trials to find a balance of power between ruler and aristocracy. Indeed, with the sadaebu reinstated as the officials of the Chosŏn, the rivalry between kingship and aristocratic officialdom continued, with variations, to dominate the political agenda of the new dynasty. The recalibration of the fields of power that started immediately after T’aejo’s accession reveals the divergent expectations with which the dynastic founders—the military as well as the civilian—had entered the new era. Banking on the military contributions they had made to the establishment of the dynasty, the military leaders, among them many members of the royal house, were intent on using their privately held forces as leverage for winning political influence, and they therefore were not willing to yield to the pressure coming from the civilian officialdom to give up their arms. Within hardly more than a year after coming to power, however, King T’aejo clearly shifted his sympathies from his military associates to his civilian advisors, Cho Chun and Chŏng To-jŏn, among others, whom he entrusted with top-level offices.118 It was Chŏng To-jŏn who drafted the dynasty’s first “constitution,” in which he mapped out a centralized bureaucratic system headed by a prime minister (ch’ongjae), who was to be in control of the decision-making and administrative apparatus at the center, while the king, symbolizing the cosmic link between Heaven and the people, was to fulfill primarily a ceremonial and civilizing function.119 For stabilizing such a political system, Chŏng called for the abolition of all military units controlled by provincial leaders and by T’aejo’s sons and kinsmen and for their absorption into the government troops under a central military command headed by the prime minister—demands with which Chŏng incurred the military leaders’ immediate enmity. Reportedly a brazen personality insensitive to the feelings of his surroundings, Chŏng soon found himself in deepening trouble, not only because he was held responsible for serious diplomatic discord with the Ming, but also because he propagated a military campaign to regain the Liaodong Peninsula—old Koguryŏ territory—for which he needed a unified military force. Intensely hated by the military and the princes, Chŏng was also rumored to support T’aejo’s youngest son, Pang-sŏk, as his father’s successor (thus upsetting the princes’ natural birth order) with the intention to eliminate all the other princes.120 In the end, the troublesome Chŏng, defamed as someone who rose from a modest social background to “create turmoil at court,”121 was, together with Nam Ŭn and some others, indicted of sedition and executed along with Prince Pang-sŏk, Pangsŏk’s elder brother, and their in-laws in the eighth month of 1398. This, the First Princely

60

Fou n dat ions

Coup, is generally assumed to have been masterminded by T’aejo’s fifth son, Pang-wŏn (the later King T’aejong); though Chŏng To-jŏn was the principal victim, the coup also epitomized the power struggle over royal succession fought behind the scenes among T’aejo’s sons by two different mothers. As the slate of merit subjects of 1398 (chŏngsa kongsin) reveals, it was equally a victory of those who still defended what they considered to be their prerogatives with military force: twenty-nine individuals, including three royal princes, six royal in-laws, and nine military leaders, were rewarded, in contrast to only seven civilian officials (among them Cho Chun, who had distanced himself from Chŏng To-jŏn).122 Disheartened by this turn of events, the ailing King T’aejo abdicated, and, after Pang-wŏn declined to succeed him, T’aejo’s second son, later known as King Chŏngjong (r. 1398–1400), ascended the throne. Never feeling secure in his exposed position, Chŏngjong decided to return to the old capital, Kaesŏng, and, anxious that a country awash with weapons in private hands constituted a continuous threat to the throne, summarily abolished the private armies in 1400, likely with the support of Pang-wŏn, the designated crown prince. Opposition was quick to arise, however. Led by Pang-wŏn’s older brother, Pang-gan, a military showdown between the two princely brothers ended with the latter’s capture and exile (where he died of illness). Thus, less than two years after 1398, a Second Princely Coup tipped the balance of power at least partially back in favor of the civilian sector. Indeed, sixteen of the forty-six new merit subjects (chwamyŏng kongsin) in 1401 were civilian officials.123 When Pang-wŏn, later known as T’aejong, was anointed king in late 1400 he proved a resolute ruler and finally broke with the dynastic reliance on military force and definitively advanced the civilian character of government. To strengthen royal authority, however, he immediately ordered a sweeping reorganization of the bureaucracy, downgraded the all-powerful Council of State into an advisory organ staffed with a select group of trusted merit subjects such as Cho Chun, Ha Yun, and Kwŏn Kŭn,124 and put the Six Ministries under direct royal control—measures that showed T’aejong’s autocratic tendencies to curb the power of the bureaucrats. With the military and the civilians brought under control, T’aejong turned to eliminating the danger to dynastic consolidation posed by the royal in-laws who, made merit subjects, commanded considerable political influence at court. In 1382, he had married a daughter of Min Che,125 later Queen Wŏngyŏng, and made Min Che’s sons, Mu-gu and Mu-jil, merit subjects in 1398 and 1401. Unlike their noble father, however, these two brothers, known for their waywardness, soon displayed disloyalty and were accused of intending to usurp power when T’aejong planned to yield the throne to his twelve-yearold crown prince, their nephew, in 1406. The two were also suspected of stirring up trouble in the inner quarters of the palace where their sister, Min-ssi, deeply resented that T’aejong had taken a secondary consort (pin) in 1402 and increasingly surrounded himself with various palace women. Though the extent of the queen’s two brothers’ involvement in their sister’s marital troubles is not clear, the two were before long accused of having sown dissension in the palace and the government at large and, found guilty by T’aejong of sedition, had to end their lives in 1410; their two brothers, who pleaded the condemned men’s innocence, were similarly killed six years later. Reflecting on these events later, the king justified his actions: “Letting in-laws get close to the



Crisis of Identity

61

inner court cannot be a ruler’s long-term strategy. . . . It is better to control an evil before it sprouts.”126 King T’aejong had reason to remember these words a few years later. True to a trusted pattern, King T’aejo had married his second daughter to Sim Chong (n.d.), the son of one of his old comrades-in-arms and a merit subject of 1398. In 1408, Sim Chong’s brother, On (?–1418), in turn became the father-in-law of T’aejo’s young grandson, the later King Sejong (born 1397; r. 1418–50), and rapidly advanced to the lofty position of chief state councilor. Anxious to secure a smooth handover of the throne to his third son, in 1416, T’aejong preventively eliminated Sim Chong, who allegedly entertained contact with exiled Prince Pang-gan, and two years later also had Sim On killed because On had dared to criticize the king for retaining the military command even after his abdication in favor of his son in 1418.127 These bloody events surrounding T’aejong’s precautionary relinquishment of the throne illustrate how fragile royal succession was deemed to remain, and they were, in retrospect, also taken as a bad omen for the violent occurrences rocking the royal house some thirty years later. Nonetheless, under King Sejong’s rule the Chosŏn dynasty experienced a period of unprecedented political calm on the home front, once the king had subdued some of his erstwhile trusted officials as potential troublemakers. Securer in his kingship than his predecessors, Sejong cultivated a new generation of civilian officials in Confucian scholarship and thus advanced the growth of an ideologically more committed civilian sector. But, mindful of the irregular way in which he came to power,128 Sejong tried—officially, because of bad health—to prepare a stable transmission of the throne to his eldest son, the crown prince, by involving him in governmental affairs from 1442. His attempt, however, to retire early five years later was thwarted by the heavy opposition of his highest officials, and Sejong was the first Chosŏn king to die in office, leaving the throne to his sickly son, King Munjong (1414; r. 1450–52). The reassertion of royal power by King T’aejo and his first three successors, then, was in many ways reminiscent of the establishment of the Koryŏ dynasty some four and a half centuries earlier. The dynastic founders depended for the construction of a new dynasty on the active support of various groups of men, each claiming as a reward its own share of power. As a seasoned military commander, Yi Sŏng-gye first surrounded himself with military men, but he was equally dependent on civilian advisors to give him ideological guidance and the new dynasty its organizational blueprint. Seizing the throne illegally and thus likely feeling exposed to antagonistic currents, it was T’aejong who ruth­lessly freed the kingship of its dependencies—doing away with the private armies, chastising scheming in-laws, and “bureaucratizing” the royal court.129 Despite his despotic leanings, T’aejong was the first Confucian ruler who gave his government a fully civilian framework and engaged the scions of the most eminent descent groups of the day, who monopolized the examination system, as his key officials, thus satisfying their ambition to share power at the highest level. No doubt, the early Chosŏn kings succeeded in reviving and restoring royal rule, but from where did they derive the legitimacy that would elevate them above the co-ruling officialdom? Could they claim to have received the Mandate of Heaven as the Wang house’s rightful successors, entitled to sacrifice to Heaven as the ultimate manifestation of their legitimacy? What about their status vis-à-vis the Ming, who viewed the events on the Korean peninsula with suspicion and apprehension?

62

Fou n dat ions

None of the four early Chosŏn kings ascended the throne by regular means. Yi Sŏnggye’s position was particularly vexing. Not only had he usurped power from King U, who had received investiture from the Ming, but the Ming believed that Yi was the son of infamous Yi In-im and had killed the last four Koryŏ kings during his rise to power.130 The Ming therefore denied him recognition as dynastic founder. Whereas King Chŏngjong’s reign was too short for him to obtain formal Ming confirmation, King T’aejong was the first Chosŏn king to be granted investiture and the state seal, from the second Ming emperor in the sixth month of 1401.131 It was from this time onward that Sino-Korean relations settled into a pattern of exchanging regular tributary missions, which continued until 1897.132 But did the suzerain’s formal investiture entitle its tributary to behave like a Son of Heaven and perform the supreme state rite of sacrificing to Heaven? The early Koryŏ kings enjoyed, according to Remko Breuker, the mystique of ruling with the Mandate of Heaven, and King Sŏngjong (r. 981–97) unhesitatingly initiated, on the model of the Tang imperial etiquette, the sacrifice to Heaven at the Round Altar (Wŏn’gu) in 983. He personally plowed the ancestral fields (chŏkchŏn),133 built the Royal Ancestral Shrine (Chongmyo), and constructed the Altar to the Spirits of Soil and Grain (Sajik).134 These grand displays of dynastic legitimacy and royal authority apparently were, as Remko Breuker has pointed out, supported by the Koryŏ elite, who liked to perceive Koryŏ as part of a universe that provided for the coexistence of several Sons of Heaven.135 Nevertheless, this “Son-of-Heaven” image seems foremost to have strengthened the kingship domestically, while in the greater East Asian realm the Koryŏ king was accorded merely the status of a “feudal lord” (chehu); as the head of a tributary state, he had to receive investiture from the dynasties ruling in China, follow their calendar, and reduce the royal ritual program by one degree.136 Even though the Koryŏ king was thus (at least in the first two centuries) surrounded by the aura of a monarch vested with supreme authority, his power was in reality, as recounted above, severely limited by his ministerial advisors and bureaucrats—scions of the dominant descent groups who came to constitute the capital aristocracy and who were also the principal wife givers of the royal house. It was this dual image of kingship, then, the founders of the Chosŏn inherited. In his coronation edict of 1392, King T’aejo declared that Heaven had bestowed the mandate on the Yi house “due to its ancestors’ virtue,” and two years later, in 1394, he rebuilt the Altar of Heaven137 in his new capital. But to what an extent could the Son-of-Heaven concept be tolerated by the king’s ministers? Did it not jeopardize or even limit their exercise of power? To be sure, royal legitimacy, badly eroded by Military Rule (after 1170) and Mongol Overlordship and lost altogether in the final years of the Koryŏ, had to be restored to demonstrate the Yi’s entitlement to inaugurate a new royal dynasty. T’aejo’s ministers therefore agreed to the first performance of the sacrifice to Heaven in the twelfth month of 1394 on the ground that it manifested dynastic sovereignty and independence and, as a remnant of Koryŏ tradition, could not easily be discarded. Not willing to grant the new king more than “kingly” status, however, they insisted that the sacrificial act be carried out not by the king in person, who had on the occasion to observe a strict fast in the palace, but by a proxy—none other than Chŏng To-jŏn.138 T’aejong objected to the use of a proxy and wished to perform the rite himself, but was



Crisis of Identity

63

restrained from doing so by his advisors, who argued that even Confucius’s home state of Lu had not worshiped Heaven. Thereafter, in emergency situations of severe droughts, ministers were occasionally commissioned to pray for rain at the Altar of Heaven. Though Sejong also on occasion prayed for rain at the altar, he eventually followed Confucian advice and abolished the rite of sacrificing to Heaven, even by proxy.139 Consequently, the rite was omitted in King Sejong’s draft of the five state rites (orye) and also no longer figured at the head of the “auspicious and sacrificial rites” (killye) in the later Manual of the Five State Rites (Kukcho oryeŭi) of 1474. The king’s ritual performance at the Altar to the Spirits of Soil and Grain (Sajik) in the spring and autumn therefore became the most important state rite in the Chosŏn. The contest over recalibrating the power relationship between the royal house and the major defenders of elite interests ensconced in the top advisory positions thus ended with the latter’s success in divesting the king of any kind of sacral status and reducing him to temporal ruler. They not only prevented the ruler from deriving legitimacy from a ritual act that would have placed him outside their ideological reach; they also presented for the Chosŏn kingship a historical model in the History of Koryŏ—many of its com­ pilers were also engaged in the redaction of the Kukcho oryeŭi—that showed the Koryŏ king as a feudal subject rather than as an independent ruler sacrificing to Heaven, thereby thwarting further royal appeal to historical precedence.140 In essence, then, the strength of the office-holding elite, once again manifested so clearly in the rivalry over fixing the perimeters of royal authority in the early decades of the dynasty, rendered the kingship vulnerable to ministerial interference—a pattern that persisted throughout Chosŏn history. To be sure, a number of strong and independently acting royal personalities sat on the Chosŏn throne, but the kingship as an institution lacked the support of pervasive ideological or ritual underpinnings—except perhaps for the “loyalty” (ch’ung), an extension of “filiality” (hyo), demanded of all of the king’s subjects—that would have shielded the royal persona from the political manipulations of an oligarchic bureaucracy. Since his own kinsmen were statutorily barred from the examinations for four generations, the king was surrounded by ministers who often were also affinally related to him and thus, as fathers or brothers of queens or as royal sonsin-law, had easy access to the inner court deliberations. Though a few kings were able to turn factional rivalries among their bureaucrats to their own advantage or to eliminate their adversaries by force, the usurpations of the throne, succession struggles, and coups d’état occurring throughout the Chosŏn testify to the basic defenselessness of the kingship, even if such irregular events did not jeopardize the security of the dynasty itself. In sum, it was the social constitution of the state apparatus that gave the dynasty its constancy and longevity, while this very constitution could assist or constrain the king’s course of action—a sociopolitical constellation that is undoubtedly the principal reason why royal despotism never had a chance to arise in Korea.

Ch a p ter 3

The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

H

istoriographically, the establishment of the Chosŏn has been inextricably linked to the adoption of Neo-Confucianism as the new dynasty’s founding ideology. It may therefore be a moot point, whether or not dynastic change would have occurred without the incentive of Neo-Confucian thought. Yet looking back at the violent power struggles taking place during the last decades of Koryŏ, it seems likely that without the active partnership of scholars inspired by a compelling vision of renovating state and society, Yi Sŏng-gye, the military leader, would have established simply another military dictatorship. That this did not happen was singularly due to this alliance between the triumphant general and a few Neo-Confucian activists—a truly historic conjunction of diverse forces and interests that ushered in an entirely new era in Korea’s history. What enticed Yi Sŏng-gye (the future T’aejo) to take advice from a number of powerless scholar-­officials and make an unfamiliar creed the basis of his policy preferences? And what kind of Neo-Confucianism did the scholar-officials think suitable for shifting the military-dominated tradition of late Koryŏ to a civilian-ruled Chosŏn?

The Twofold Approach to Neo-Confucianism In this study, Neo-Confucianism refers to “learning of the Way” (Daoxue; Kor. Tohak) as propagated by the two Song Chinese scholars Cheng Yi (1033–1107) and Zhu Xi (1130–1200), usually called the Cheng-Zhu school. They and their Tang-Song forebears developed Dao learning during an extended process of recovering and rethinking Confucianism, supposedly lost since the time of Mencius (371–289 BCE), into a comprehensive moral philosophy that offered universal guidelines for restoring state and society after centuries of Buddhist “misrule.” Though they did not work out a systematic exposition of their new discourse on “nature and principle” (Chin. xing li xue; Kor. sŏngnihak, an alternative



The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

65

name for Tohak), they did write lengthy commentaries in which they detailed how their readings unlocked the often obscure meaning of classical literature and translated it into an updated and coherent ideology of moral renovation—from individual self-cultivation to renewal of state and society. The core literature that was to guide the Daoxue learner were the texts that Zhu Xi collected into the famed Four Books: the Analects (Lunyu), the Mencius (Mengzi), the Doctrine of the Mean (Zhongyong), and Great Learning (Daxue); the latter two were extracted by Zhu Xi from the Records of Rituals (Liji). Together with the Five (sometimes Six) Classics,1 the Four Books formed what was to be declared as the orthodox Confucian canon in 1241. After the early fourteenth century, this canon provided the materials on which aspiring civil officials were tested.2 In short, it was with the mastery of this classical corpus of knowledge that every learner—whether Chinese or non-Chinese—could participate in the Confucian ecumene. In Korea, some basic Confucian literature, especially the Analects, the Classic of Filial Piety (Xiaojing), and a selection of the Five Classics had been studied since late Silla times,3 and during Koryŏ these works served as mandatory examination materials for the classics examination (myŏnggyŏngkwa). For various reasons, however, the peninsula was cut off from the intellectual developments in Southern Song China,4 and it was only with the rise of the Mongol empire that Korea became part of a vast, multinational network that connected Korean scholars with Neo-Confucianism. In 1289, the Mongols established an Office for the Promotion of Confucian Studies in Korea (Koryŏguk yuhak chegŏsa) with a rank-five head,5 but because of the Mongols’ own initial ambivalence toward the value of Neo-Confucian studies, it is unlikely that this office functioned as a conduit of Daoxue to Korea. Rather, it was through personal encounters with Chinese Zhu Xi scholars in Beijing that a few Korean scholars, who visited the Mongol capital as members of royal retinues, came first to appreciate the appeal of Daoxue. One of the first to do so was the famous scholar An Hyang (1243–1306), who in 1289 accompanied the later King Ch’ungsŏn on one of the prince’s frequent trips to Beijing and returned home with the “new books” of Master Zhu. Though subsequently promoted to high office, An’s foremost concern was the stimulation of Confucian scholarship. Yet, given the unaccommodating social and political environment in Kaesŏng at that time, his teaching efforts were likely confined to a small group of devoted disciples who made Cheng-Zhu Daoxue their exclusive study domain.6 For sustaining and deepening initial enthusiasm, however, continued personal contact with Chinese scholars proved crucial, and King Ch’ungsŏn created an ideal venue for intensified Sino-Korean scholarly exchanges. Renouncing the throne in Kaesŏng to “enjoy himself by studying” with such outstanding literati as Yao Sui (1238–1313), Zhao Mengfu (1254–1322), and Yu Ji (1272–1348), he founded the famous library, the “Hall of the Ten Thousand Scrolls” (Man’gwŏndang).7 It was there that Yi Che-hyŏn and others of his generation came to realize fully the reformatory potential of Neo-Confucianism. Young Yi eagerly absorbed the teachings of Xu Heng (1209–81) conveyed to him by Xu’s disciples present in the hall. As the major proselytizer of Cheng-Zhu Confucianism in Yuan China and the teacher of Khubilai Khan, Xu not only insisted on universal moral education on the basis of Zhu Xi’s Elementary Learning (Xiaoxue) and the Four Books; he also advocated an activist approach to public affairs as outlined in the Great Learning and

66

Fou n dat ions

expounded in detail in the works of Northern Song statecraft thinkers. Following Zhu Xi’s guidelines to education, Xu thus stressed moral, intellectual, and political concerns at the expense of literary styles—a program of study that was eventually implemented in the 1313 examination reform.8 Indeed, the Yuan examination schedule marked, in Benjamin Elman’s words, “the confluence between classical theory and practical affairs”9 and thus opened, for a few Koreans, a completely new vista on how Neo-Confucianism could be used to remedy the ills of the day at home. From 1313, the year the Mongols restored the civil examinations in China, they installed (periodic) “provincial examinations” (hyangsi) in each of the administrative regions of the empire and assigned quotas of graduates who would finally be examined in the metropolitan examinations (hoesi) in the Mongol capital. Under this scheme, Kaesŏng was allowed to send three candidates. Barely two dozen Koreans, among them Ch’oe Hae, Yi Kok, and Yi Saek, are known (or said) to have passed the “special examinations” (Chin. zhike; Kor. chekwa) in Beijing.10 The examination curriculum of the provincial and metropolitan examinations varied according to the ethnic origin of the candidates, and the Koreans were apparently tested in the same way as the Han candidates.11 According to Elman, the metropolitan exams were organized in two sessions: in the first session, questions were drawn from the Four Books (one essay) and Five Classics (five quotations), with answers based on the Cheng-Zhu commentaries; in the second, candidates had to answer a single policy question (Chin. ce; Kor. ch’aek).12 This new regime thus concentrated on testing classical learning and, in addition, in policy questions assessed candidates’ classical and historical knowledge that could be applied to contemporary conditions. As it apparently eliminated poetry and rhyme prose—the principal examination materials in the Koryŏ examinations—it is not surprising that the first three Korean candidates, chosen to take the examinations in 1315, were ill prepared and failed the examinations.13 Inspired by his new understanding of Tohak, the first thing Yi Che-hyŏn attempted after his return home was to call for an examination reform (as discussed in chapter 2) that would replace the traditional belles lettres with policy questions—a demand that, he evidently hoped, would stimulate the rise of statecraft thought in Korea. Although he did not live long enough to see the reform put into practice (in 1369), it is likely that it was Yi’s relentless advocacy of examination reform as the basis of clean government and his tireless educational efforts inside and outside the royal court that prompted Chŏng To-jŏn to credit Yi with having pioneered the introduction of the “learning of ancient prose” (komun chi hak) in Korea.14 Later, Chŏng added, Yi Kok and Yi Sung-in followed Yi’s lead, and Yi Saek, receiving this “family legacy,” went to Beijing to study and, upon his return, further stimulated interest in this new learning among his younger contemporaries—among whom Chŏng counted himself.15 Although Chŏng To-jŏn ascribed the beginnings of komun learning to Yi Che-hyŏn, this does not, of course, exclude the possibility that earlier Koryŏ scholars, among them, for instance, the famous poet and literatus Ch’oe Cha (1188–1260), had already become familiar with such komun luminaries of Northern Song as Han Yu or Ouyang Xiu.16 Choe’s interest, however, seems to have been foremost in the literary and poetic experimentations of these Song scholars and less in the application of their classical and histori-



The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

67

cal learning to contemporary issues. Yi Che-hyŏn, in contrast, was not concerned with writing styles—on the contrary, following Zhu Xi, he considered ornate writing harmful to Dao learning (although he himself was an accomplished writer and poet). He also was not a one-sided statecraft thinker. Rather, for him and his contemporaries Tohak blended two strands: an “idealistic-moral” one (to) and a “pragmatic-practical” one (sil), both equally relevant for accomplishing the remedial tasks with which they saw themselves confronted as teachers and reformers. Yi Che-hyŏn’s literary works contain a few mentions of this dual approach. For his contemporaries, however, it must have been what he did and taught rather than what he wrote that made him such an influential and revered statesman, scholar, and teacher, remembered by Chŏng To-jŏn, perhaps all too partially, as the first komun practitioner.17 Komun as a term does not seem to have gained much currency in Korea. Instead, the equally old term “revive [or return to] antiquity” (Chin. fuge; Kor. pokko) signified for the early Korean Neo-Confucians the idea of “restoration,” for which they sought blueprints in the Chinese classics, in particular in the Rituals of Zhou (Zhouli). This text outlined in encyclopedic detail the structure and functions of a government thought to have promoted the stability and longevity of the dynasties of Chinese antiquity. Yi Chehyŏn often referred to the “Six Classics” as mandatory Tohak reading, thus unmistakably including the Rituals. Indeed, the Rituals of Zhou became, besides the Records of Ritual (Liji) and Ceremonial Rituals (Yili), a key text to which the early Tohak practitioners turned to find practical guidelines for their reform endeavors.18 It therefore stimulated Korean adaptations. Kim Ku-yong, Yi Saek’s colleague at the National Confucian Academy, for instance, “collected the statutes of Korea and divided them into six [categories of ] offices [according to the Zhouli]” and called his work the Six Wings [according to] the Zhouli (Churye yug’ik); Yi Saek contributed the preface.19 It was, however, Chŏng To-jŏn who used the Zhouli to its fullest, when he made it his model for devising the organizational framework of the new Chosŏn government apparatus in his Statutes for the Governance of Chosŏn (Chosŏn kyŏngguk chŏn) of 1394—a foundation text from which all later legislative thinking drew inspiration.20 The fact, moreover, that the Zhouli was a favored handbook that the Ming founder consulted extensively for his wide-ranging reformist policies could not have eluded the Koreans’ notice and must have further convinced them of its practicability in Korea.21 In sum, for the late Koryŏ Tohak adepts and their early Chosŏn followers, who prepared for Yi Sŏng-gye and his immediate successors a concrete program of dynastic restoration, the pragmatic and action-oriented aspects of Tohak seem to have, to an extent, blunted the urgency of its moralistic message. To be sure, the Great Learning (Chin. Daxue; Kor. Taehak)—the spiritual handbook of the reformers—linked “ordering the state” to “self-cultivation,” making the former contingent on the latter. But facing an overwhelming social, political, and economic crisis, the early Chosŏn institution-builders like Chŏng To-jŏn and Cho Chun and their later successors such as Ha Yun, Kwŏn Kŭn, and Pyŏn Kye-ryang,22 among others, seem to have put “ordering the state” above “selfcultivation” and took Tohak as their “position,” to use Peter Bol’s term (in a slightly different sense): they regarded Tohak predominantly as “concrete learning” (sirhak) based on texts, such as the Zhouli and the Liji, that helped them to recreate the “ancient

68

Fou n dat ions

institutions” (koje)—the institutions of the sage-kings Yao and Shun and the founders of the Three Dynasties (Xia, Shang, and Zhou)—in their own time. In this spirit, striving to institute a “civilized governance comparable only to the perfection of Zhou,” they produced a large volume of social, administrative, and economic legislation and encoded it in the Great Code of Administration (Kyŏngguk taejŏn) of 1471 (extant only in the version of 1485).23 Those who pursued this pragmatic course came to outnumber those who took Tohak as their “identity”24—“idealists” who insisted that the recovery of the Way in Korea had to start with self-cultivation, and therefore concentrated on revising ritual practice for personal and communal renovation. Although these two approaches did not, of course, exclude each other—Cho Chun was also a renowned ritualist—in the course of the fifteenth century, they nevertheless began to drift apart and created for the Confucian learner the dilemma of how far the “political man” could embody the ideal of the “moral man.” The dilemma was even deepened by the paradoxical situation that the sadaebu were simultaneously the initiators as well as the principal target group of the Confucian transformation. Doubts, therefore, as to how and to what extent Neo-Confucian values and norms were applicable to the Korean sociopolitical situation spawned adversarial attitudes and conflicts that reverberated far into the sixteenth century.

Examination Reform and Kingly Education Granted that the architects of the Chosŏn Confucian transformation were a relatively small group of learned officials serving in high-ranking posts,25 how did the new Confucian learning reach the average official? It reached them only because the Four Books and the Five Classics with the Cheng-Zhu commentaries were made the mandatory examination curriculum. When the triennial civil service examinations (munkwa) were instituted in 1392,26 the Koryŏ literary licentiate examination, which had predominantly tested various Tang literary styles (sajang) now regarded as unsubstantial and frivolous, was abolished and superseded by a new examination canon that enforced mastery of the canonical literature for all civil service aspirants. This was an epochal change that, when attempted in late Koryŏ, had failed several times. This time, however, it marked an intellectual and cultural commitment that demanded full compliance of all who wanted to take part in the new dynastic venture.27 Nevertheless, the general predilection for traditional belles letters was still so intense that the statecraft proponents had, after fierce opposition, to concede the reinstatement of the literary licentiate examination in 1453. Now, however, it was declassed as one of the two lower-level examinations (sokwa) that did not directly recruit officials. For these preliminary examinations, a candidate had a choice: the classics licentiate (saengwŏn) tested mastery of one of the Four Books and one of the Five Classics; and the literary licentiate (chinsa) assessed proficiency in two literary styles.28 In addition, all candidates were expected to be thoroughly familiar with the Elementary Learning (Sohak; Chin. Xiaoxue)29 and Zhu Xi’s Domestic Rites (Chin. Zhuzi jiali; Kor. Karye).30 Those who passed a lower examination and aimed to sit for the munkwa examinations received their



The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

69

final training in the National Confucian Academy (Sŏnggyun’gwan).31 Reestablished in 1398 as the country’s highest academic institution, the academy was staffed by teaching personnel belonging to the regular bureaucracy.32 With the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo) in its precincts, the academy could, by rallying its students, exercise significant political influence, especially at times when controversies over the definition of Korean Neo-Confucian “orthodoxy” agitated and divided the officialdom. In view of the fact that a munkwa degree became indispensable for validating high social status, it is not surprising that the sons of the capital elite crowded the National Confucian Academy and monopolized the examination process. Instead of pursuing “learning of the Way,” however, they tended, to the alarm of a few concerned officials, to concentrate on statecraft issues.33 With the reintroduction of the literary licentiate in mid-century, moreover, the study of the canonical texts apparently further slackened. Learning thus easily turned into “learning for a government career” (kwanhak), losing sight of the dynastic founders’ idealist vision of creating a morally superior officialdom. By its sheer volume and complexity, then, Cheng-Zhu learning, as an examination prerequisite, did raise the intellectual stakes for entering office. It did not, however, challenge the social criteria for admission to the examination process. This remained, as noted in chapter 2, the exclusive privilege of the sajok. Indeed, for a member of the elite, the acquisition of a “red certificate” (hongp’ae) that certified high social status as well as eligibility for the bureaucracy, continued to be the most coveted goal—and, for a true Confucian, an obligation. To stay aloof from government for reasons of pursuing “pure” Tohak learning does not seem to have been a viable option in the early fifteenth century— except for a few outsiders too isolated to make their voices heard at the center. The sadaebu were not only students of Confucianism; they also believed that it was incumbent on scholar-officials to function as the royal educators. Indeed, the king, as the one who occupied a pivotal position at the helm of the state, had to be encouraged to take the Way of the sage-kings as his model so that he would, by his exemplary behavior, exert a civilizing influence on his subjects. In order to follow such a path, he needed instruction. From the beginning of the Chosŏn, a number of offices were instituted to provide the king with regular tutoring and instruction and in addition to supervise and, if necessary, censure his conduct in both his private and public life. The Confucian lecture system was first introduced in Koryŏ in the early twelfth century,34 but it was from early Chosŏn that the Office of the Royal Lectures (Kyŏngyŏn), reestablished shortly after Yi Sŏng-gye’s accession and staffed with a select number of high officials, turned into an instrument through which the sadaebu subjected the king to a rigorous schedule of indoctrination. In contrast to Ming Taizu, who as an autocrat was his officials’ teacher,35 Yi Sŏng-gye was urged to attend a lecture every day, but the elderly general, pleading old age, preferred to have a single instructor occasionally expound to him the meaning of the Extended Meaning of the Great Learning (Daxue yanyi). None of his immediate successors enthusiastically attended the lectures. T’aejong, who was the first crown prince exposed to the lectures, tried to avoid them when he became king, but in the end was forced to adhere to a regular schedule. It was Sejong who, much inclined to embrace and promote Confucian scholarship, started to hold lectures on a daily basis and professionalized them by creating the Hall of Worthies (Chiphyŏnjŏn), the members of which—

70

Fou n dat ions

young and highly motivated scholars—became his favored lecturers and advisors. The lectures were halted by King Sejo (r. 1455–68), who, adverse to the ideological pressure of his ministers, resisted any imposed doctrinal teaching and abolished the Hall of Worthies as well. They were, however, resumed under his more docile successor, King Sŏngjong (r. 1469–94), and expanded into a central fixture of Confucian governance with which the sadaebu steered and supervised the exercise of monarchical power—quite in contrast to China, where, according to Wm. Theodore de Bary, the tradition of educating the emperor was lost after the Yuan period.36 The core text that served as basic textbook for the instruction of the early kings was the Great Learning in the edition of Zhen Dexiu’s (1178–1235) Extended Meaning of the Great Learning in which Zhen, according to de Bary, addressed the typical concerns of the lectures intended for the education of the ruler: the rectification of the ruler’s mindand-heart, his intentions as ruler, and his practice of rulership.37 Finding this text too massive, in 1472 several high officials, led by Yi Sŏk-hyŏng and Hong Kyŏng-son,38 presented to the young King Sŏngjong an abbreviated version, the Abridged Extended Meaning of the Great Learning (Taehak yŏnŭi chimnyak). This shorter rendition concentrated on the rectification of the king’s mind-and-heart (chŏngsim) and drew its illustrations principally from Koryŏ history. It gave much room to historical examples illustrating the ruler’s learning, actions, and human disposition, and touched upon personal cultivation (susin) only at the end. Yi’s and Hong’s work thus heavily focused on providing the king with models of pragmatic action he was to replicate during his reign.39 The royal lectures put the king under relentless pressure to strive after sagehood, spurred on by zealous high officials who were drawn from the government’s top positions to serve concurrently as lecturers.40 The teaching sessions thus were not only devoted to enhancing the ruler’s comprehension of classical literature, but they were also gatherings resembling an inner cabinet where current policy matters were discussed and decided upon, often in light of classical precedent. In conjunction with the censorial organs, the royal lecture system, then, functioned as the most potent institution through which the sadaebu officialdom could mold, guide, and supervise royal behavior and action.

Tohak Idealism Advancing By the second half of the fifteenth century it had become evident to many observers inside and outside the government that the country was still far from being transformed into a Confucian polity and society. The major obstacle to such conversion was not necessarily the pursuit of learning for “gaining rank and emolument.” Rather, some felt, it was the persistence of the Buddhist past—not only in the daily life of private households but also at the royal court—that effectively hindered the integration of Confucian morality and ritualism into society. Even such an enlightened ruler as King Sejong often defended the continuation of Buddhist practices as it would, he thought, be harmful to suppress them abruptly.41 In contrast, for someone like Ryang Sŏng-ji, it was not Buddhism but political and military instability that endangered the country. With young King Tanjong (r. 1452–



The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

71

55) ascending the throne after the brilliant reign of his grandfather, Sejong, Ryang feared that the experiment of the new dynasty might fail for the king’s lack of learning and failure to surround himself with the “right men.” Ryang thus never tired of repeating what his predecessors had emphasized before: that it was the ruler’s moral stature that would guarantee the stability and success of his rule, and that the ruler therefore needed the scholar-officials not only for his own enlightenment but also for carrying the message of kingly rule beyond the palace walls.42 Believing in strong kingship, Ryang was therefore later even inclined to support King Sejo’s (r. 1455–68) autocratic rule. For those who took Tohak as their “identity,” it was apparent that the occupants of the highest bureaucratic offices were ready to press for the conversion of others, especially the king, but were reluctant to convert themselves, and with their one-sided emphasis on statecraft were neglecting self-cultivation—the first step toward effective rule according to the Great Learning. The resulting spiritual dissonance, the Tohak idealists felt, was responsible for delaying the successful assimilation of Confucian morality in political discourse and in everyday life. Their advocacy of self-cultivation as a prerequisite for the governance of men (sugi ch’iin) became shriller and gained heightened relevance in the crisis atmosphere created when, in 1455, King Sejo usurped the throne from his nephew, Tanjong—an appalling violation of all moral values Confucianism was thought to stand for. The leading figure whom tradition credits with launching, as Tohak practitioner, the discourse on morality in public and private life and shaping it into a highly political issue at court was Kim Chong-jik (1431–92).43 Settling into a government career after gaining a munkwa degree in 1457, Kim apparently drew attention at court by insisting that contemporary moral standards had to be lifted by giving priority to nourishing “filiality and brotherly love”—in his view the “fundamentals of learning”—rather than to statecraft. Because his writings have been lost, Kim’s philosophy cannot be fully assessed and it may in fact have still been quite eclectic. In the postface (pal) he wrote for the second printing of the Zhouli in 1478 (for which he had lent his personal copy) he lauded that work as “the classic [chŏn] of statecraft of one hundred kings.”44 He also seems to have insisted that literary style (sajang) and textual scholarship (kyŏnghak) were inseparable.45 Nevertheless, his influence as a dedicated and effective teacher of an idealistic version of Tohak was substantial and is reflected in the fact that two of his many disciples, Kim Koeng-p’il (1454–1504)46 and Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang (1450–1504),47 gained recognition as their generation’s outstanding exponents of Tohak morality.48 Kim Chong-jik’s political weight grew during the reign of Sejo’s grandson, King Sŏngjong, when from the 1480s his disciples and associates, as degree holders, were moving in increasing numbers into the censorial and historiographical offices—offices of remonstrance regarded by the second half of the fifteenth century as the key institutions of a maturing Confucian state.49 They were confronted by a number of highly placed state­ craft advocates—among them the compilers of the Kyŏngguk taejŏn—who for their support of Sejo’s despotic rule had been rewarded by the king with often multiple merit subject statuses and, by occupying key offices (as councilors of state, chief ministers, etc.), still exerted overriding influence on daily politics.50 Yet in contrast to his grandfather, who expressed his disdain for Confucian learning by abolishing the Royal Lectures, King

72

Fou n dat ions

Sŏngjong was the most thoroughly Confucian-educated ruler to that point, and he was therefore inclined to support a Confucian revival by tolerating the growing power of remonstrance. Thus emboldened, Kim Chong-jik and his disciples, installed in the censorial offices, self-confidently stepped up their demand that Confucian morality be made the sole standard of political action, and ever more aggressively criticized the policy decisions of the higher officialdom, often not even sparing the king himself.51 Kim Chong-jik and his followers were for the first time identified by their detractors as a group, “the party of seniors from Kyŏngsang” (Kyŏngsang sŏnbaedang), in 1484, when Sŏngjong honored elderly Kim Chong-jik by promoting him to first royal secretary (among other positions, Kim was also a royal lecturer).52 The group preserved its identity even after Kim’s death in 1492 and increased its admonitory pressure on Sŏngjong’s illfated successor, Yŏnsan’gun (r. 1494–1506). Enraged at being exposed to constant criticism by his entourage, the new, young king again abolished the Royal Lectures, altered the workings of the censorial offices, and no longer tolerated personal remonstrance. The spark that finally ignited what came to be known as the Literati Purge of 1498 (Muo sahwa) was the discovery in a draft of the Sŏngjong sillok of a passage judged as treasonous criticism of King Sejo. Its author, the former historian Kim Il-son (1464–98),53 had, as a disciple of Kim Chong-jik, quoted from one of the latter’s literary works, thus revealing to their enemies at court the apparent seditious tendencies of the two Kim. Charged with high treason, disloyalty, and “cliquism,” the men associated with Kim Chong-jik became therefore the main purge victims. Of the twenty-eight sentenced, five were executed (among them Kim Il-son), and the others exiled or stripped of office. Kim Chong-jik was posthumously punished by decapitation of his corpse. A second purge, which unfolded in 1504 (Kapcha sahwa), led to the execution of the survivors of 1498 and ushered in Yŏnsan’gun’s own downfall. For his misrule and tyranny, he was deposed and succeeded by his half-brother Chungjong (r. 1506–44) in 1506.54

The Rise of the Sarim King Chungjong, who suffered from the insecurity of having come to the throne by a coup, richly rewarded those who had brought him to power with merit subject privileges. He also rehabilitated the victims of 1498 and 1504 and thus gave the few survivors who carried their legacy into the new century hope for a general renovation. The new leader of this group, which was by now perceived as a “movement” referred to as sarim,55 was Cho Kwang-jo (1482–1519), a young and ambitious official who had been Kim Koeng-p’il’s disciple.56 Under Chungjong’s tutelage, Cho advanced in office to inspector general (junior second rank) within three years of passing the munkwa. This high office provided him with almost unlimited power to promote his reform ideas, the most audacious of which was his plan to hold examinations by recommendation. Repudiating the civil service examinations as an inadequate system for judging the qualifications of government aspirants, he instituted the Recommendation Examination of 1519 for which he handpicked men “whose talents and conduct were useful.” Besides classical scholarship,



The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

73

the selection criteria required a candidate to possess a sarim profile: impeccable comportment and an ability to “divest oneself of conventions.” Although initially enjoying royal support for this venture, Cho was soon accused of extremism—he had obviously gone beyond social conventions—and of fostering a clique. Only a few months after the examination had taken place, the Purge of 1519 (Kimyo sahwa) was unleashed by his adversaries, with even the king turning against him. He was first banished and, despite pleas for lenient punishment, had afterward to take his own life.57 Cho Kwang-jo’s premature death reverberated throughout the rest of Chungjong’s reign, which was to end with a further purge.58 With the king unwilling to rehabilitate Cho, the cause of the sarim remained in suspense. In what, then, did the sarim appeal consist? A sarim made self-cultivation for the governance of men (sugi ch’iin) his “identity” and aligned his spiritual and social life with the guiding principles he found in the Elementary Learning and the Reflections on Things at Hand 59—works that apparently were prohibited for some years after Cho Kwang-jo’s downfall.60 So great was young Kim Koeng-p’il’s dedication to these texts that he became known as the “Elementary Learning boy” (Sohak tongja). Individual self-improvement, unmarred by considerations of self-advancement, was the spiritual requirement expected of a worthy official. He had, in Cho Kwang-jo’s words, to be an individual—a scholar (sa)— who “makes the advancement of the Way his personal responsibility” and, by “knowing nothing besides righteousness and principle” (ŭiri), reaches the superior status of a “worthy” (hyŏnja). Thus, the official had to be a scholar and a moral man. For Cho, scholarly standards and political stability conditioned each other. Only if the former were high and well nurtured was the political climate healthy and reminiscent of the blissful periods when the legendary Yao and Shun ruled the world. It was therefore up to the ruler to create the right milieu for scholars to come forward and serve the state. Cho and his group criticized the low level of scholarship of their contemporaries who, instead of devoting themselves to classical learning, were practicing literary styles with the sole aim of getting into government; they also persistently reminded King Chungjong of his obligation to employ properly trained scholar-officials to create the perfect political order (chich’i) as postulated in the Great Learning. For purists of Cho’s persuasion, an examination system that one-sidedly tested literary skills was neither the right instrument for promoting Confucian studies nor a suitable means of selecting candidates for government service. He contrasted the “true Confucian” (chinyu), who delved into the deeper meanings of the classics and lived accordingly, with the “vulgar Confucian” (sogyu), who merely paid lip service to the Confucian cause, and he demanded that scholars who shied away from the examinations in disgust be detected and recruited by recommendation.61 Cho Kwang-jo was a political activist and idealist moralist in the true Tohak tradition who advanced his position beyond Kim Chong-jik’s by utilizing his privileged position close to King Chungjong to try to realize his vision of an engaged officialdom—yet he failed as a result of his impulsiveness. Kim Chong-jik, in contrast, was eventually criticized by his disappointed prime disciples, Kim Koeng-p’il and Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang, for not availing himself of his nearness to King Sŏngjong to initiate effective reforms.62 Kim Chong-jik was perhaps less of a politician than Cho Kwang-jo, but he gained fame as a pioneer of Confucian rituals.

74

Fou n dat ions

A crucial aspect of sarim identity was the performance of the domestic rites as outlined in Zhu Xi’s Domestic Rituals (Jiali). In particular, the staging of a funeral in the novel Confucian style was a personal statement, even though it easily exposed a sarim to the ridicule of the public, which still adhered to Buddhist practices. But so charismatic was Kim Chong-jik that when he buried his mother according to the Jiali, people reportedly stood in awe of his sincerity and filiality. Indeed, in his comportment and speech Kim is said not to have “deviated from This Way, so that those who saw and heard him were converted and compliant.”63 No biography of an early sarim fails to mention that he buried his parents according to the Jiali—commendable evidence that he had broken with the “deleterious” customs of the Buddhist past and was embracing Confucian ritual practice as his identity.64 Is it meaningful, then, to follow conventional historiography and regard the sarim— Kim Chong-jik and his disciples (and their respective disciples) and, later, Cho Kwang-jo and his circle—as representing a collectivity of officials who, because of allegedly different socioeconomic background and intellectual orientation, turned into natural antagonists of the power holders in the higher-ranking officialdom (the various merit subjects included), conventionally called hun’gup’a?65 Can the Literati Purges therefore be explained by the tension between these two groups? True, the sarim did not belong to the highest officialdom, but it is, as Chŏng Tu-hŭi and others have demonstrated, not justified to argue that Kim’s adherents gained influence solely through the censorial offices, where they were a minority and shared their duties with officials belonging to the highest capital stratum.66 Equally, it may be too simplistic to reduce the cause of the purges, as Edward Wagner has done, to institutional factors—the growing importance of the censorial offices—and generational antagonism between the lower- and higher-rank officialdom. Their personal data also clearly belie the proposition that the sarim were of rural origin: fewer than half originated from Kyŏngsang Province, while the other half was made up of residents of the capital and its environs. Typically, the twenty-eight graduates of Cho Kwang-jo’s Recommendation Examination—the quintessential sarim group— belonged by and large, as Wagner has shown, to the capital bureaucracy. More than half of them (nineteen of twenty-eight) resided in Seoul, and almost all had one or even two munkwa graduates among their immediate antecedents. Finally, remembering that fully 70 percent of all munkwa graduates during the sarim heyday (1490–1565) are recorded as agnate or affine (or both) in the Munhwa Yu genealogy of 1565, it hardly comes as a surprise that seven of the eight primary victims of the Purge of 1519 and twenty-six of the twenty-eight graduates of the Recommendation Examination are listed in that genealogy and thus had, if not residence in, at least effective ties to the capital.67 In short, these statistics seem unequivocal enough to reiterate the observation, already made above, that the ruling elite of early Chosŏn, the sarim included, was socially a remarkably homogenous group. Connected to the common assertion that the sarim were of rural origin is the claim that the sarim philosophy first emerged in the countryside. Kim Chong-jik did grow up in a village in Miryang County (southern Kyŏngsang Province) and received his elementary education from his father.68 But it was only after arriving in the capital, aged nineteen, that he started to immerse himself in Tohak learning at the National Confucian



The Challenge of Neo-Confucianism

75

Academy. Indeed, it was in the capital, in particular in the National Confucian Academy, that both teachers and teaching materials were available for a serious engagement with Tohak. Books were rare outside the capital, despite the fact that Chinese editions of the Four Books and the Five Classics were received as gifts from Ming China and the government funded local printings to ease shortages. Nevertheless, throughout the fifteenth century complaints were frequent that the lack of books was hampering the study of the new thought. Books alone, however, were not enough. Teachers were needed to expound and illuminate their contents. Rather than through the fledgling local school system (hyanggyo), it was often through the active proselytism of governors, local magistrates, exiles, or retirees that local “conversions” happened. When, for instance, Kim Chong-jik served as magistrate of Hamyang (Kyŏngsang Province) from 1471 to 1475, he instructed the young, local Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang, later one of his most prominent disciples—and a victim of the Purge of 1504. Similarly, Cho Kwang-jo, mourning at his father’s graveside, received, albeit only briefly, instruction from Kim Koeng-p’il when the latter lived nearby in exile in P’yŏngan Province after 1498.69 Personal contact with an outstanding teacher was evidently a decisive moment in the maturation of a Tohak student. The sarim movement, then, was prompted by intellectual convictions derived from a purist Tohak understanding—often referred to as “learning of principle” (ihak)— rather than by social antagonism, and it was at court that its adherents eventually effected, despite grave setbacks, a historic shift in the perception of what the role of NeoConfucianism in the renovation of state and society had to be. It was a shift from utilitarian statecraft thought to the recognition that renovation had to start with personal cultivation, and that the postulates of the Daxue had hitherto been inaccurately read in reverse order, ignoring the moral imperative of self-cultivation in favor of rushing into political action. In this sense, the sarim ushered in the second phase of Korea’s Confucianization—an inward turn that in the course of the sixteenth century led to an unprecedented investigation into human nature and its propensity for moral action.

The Construction of the “Succession of the Way” in Korea The shift from statecraft to morality, though slow, came eventually to be supported by a broad consensus and received institutional confirmation. Confident of representing the rightful upholders of “learning of principle,” Cho Kwang-jo and his followers sought to secure their political standing with the prestige of an intellectual genealogy. Entrenched in strategic posts in the censorial offices, in 1517 they demanded official recognition of those they regarded as their immediate intellectual forebears. They renewed their request, first submitted in 1510, that Chŏng Mong-ju be honored with a permanent place in the National Shrine of Confucius in order to establish the “succession of the Way” (Chin. dao tong; Kor. tot’ong) in Korea. Chŏng’s merits for the propagation of Confucian scholar­ ship and rituals and his dedication to education, they claimed, compared well with the achievements of such Chinese Neo-Confucian giants as Zhou Dunyi and the Cheng brothers.70 Encouraged by his top ministers, King Chungjong agreed to give the

76

Fou n dat ions

Confucian cause an official boost, and in the ninth month of 1517 Chŏng Mong-ju became the first Korean Tohak scholar whose spirit tablet was installed in the National Shrine of Confucius.71 The pleas of Cho and his men for the simultaneous canonization of Kim Koeng-p’il and Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang, however, remained unsuccessful. The rather quick rehabilitation of the purge victims of 1498 and 1504 in the first month of King Chungjong’s reign heightened the martyrdom of Kim and Chŏng, and by 1517 both had also acquired the aura of “ancestral teachers” (chongsa). Their enshrinement would therefore, it was memorialized, uplift the depressed spirit of the sarim and revitalize the learning of principle. Though Kim Koeng-p’il’s personal moral rectitude was not in doubt, critics belittled Kim’s contribution to Tohak, unverifiable because his written work was lost. By countering that Heaven had brought forth Kim to continue Chŏng Mong-ju’s heritage, Kim’s admirers exposed themselves to the charge that they had promoted Chŏng for the sole purpose of boosting Kim Koeng-p’il’s candidacy. No consensus could be reached at that time, and the canonization of Kim Koeng-p’il and Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang was postponed for a full century.72 Curiously, Kim Chong-jik completely disappeared from the court discussions. His fame had obviously been eclipsed by the rising stars of his disciples.73 Equally conspicuous is the absence of early Chosŏn statecraft thinkers such as Chŏng To-jŏn, Cho Chun, or Kwŏn Kŭn. In fact, Kwŏn had been the first to try to establish an authoritative “succession of the Way,” and was himself recommended for Munmyo honors shortly after his death. At mid-century, in 1456, Ryang Sŏng-ji asked for the canonization of a slate of men among whom he included, besides a few Koryŏ individuals, Chŏng Mong-ju and Kwŏn Kŭn, but not Chŏng To-jŏn.74 These alternative lines, representing personal preferences rather than the ambition to legitimize a cause, evidently never found general consensus. By the early sixteenth century, then, the profound redirection of Neo-Confucian thought toward the idealist learning of principle was symbolized by the new spirit tablet of Chŏng Mong-ju in the Munmyo. Nevertheless, the political culture of the country had been gravely damaged by the purges. Indeed, their memory was still vivid and dampened the mood of many Confucians inside and outside the capital. The altercations between the pragmatists and the idealists leading up to the purges may perhaps be interpreted as an intellectual maturation process in an evolving political field. At the same time, the conflicts had politicized morality, dangerously turning the judgment of who was moral and who was not into a political issue, thereby raising the stakes of what it meant to serve the state. But where was the moral high ground situated—within or without the government? In a sense, then, the purges gave a foretaste of the partisan politics that created for the later Confucian scholar the quandary of whether to take up office or disengage one­self from service to the state to devote oneself to a life of scholarship—with all the consequences this had for the maintenance of elite status.

Pa rt II

Rebuilding the Countryside

g

Introduction

T

he establishment of the Chosŏn dynasty was not a revolutionary act in the sense that a fundamental turnover of social and political relations of power took place. Rather, it was the reestablishment of sejok power under the military umbrella of Yi Sŏng-gye and his successors. Nevertheless, the change of dynasty did give rise to a farreaching rearrangement of power positions in the capital as well as in the countryside. Whereas at the center statecraft-inspired policies reformed the bureaucratic structure of government and laid the legislative foundation for an extensive transformation of the elite’s social organization, the viability of the new dynasty depended equally critically on the extent to which the state was able to reassert control over rural conditions. Indeed, if in late Koryŏ the alienation of land from state control and its growing privatization were major factors to induce dynastic change, it must have been a preeminent con­ cern of the new dynasty to bring the countryside back under its rule in order to secure its economic foundation. A first step in that direction was taken as early as 1391 when, in an effort to restore the bureaucrats’ remuneration, “private land” was, according to Cho Chun’s reform proposal, abolished and transformed into “public land” (kongjŏn) in order to create the economic basis of the Rank Land Law (Kwajŏnbŏp) promulgated in 1392. Although a nation-wide cadastral survey preceded this and may have led to some land confiscations, the new law was built on the fiction that the state owned the land and could control its allocation. That this was not the case, however, soon became evident. “Rank land” (kwajŏn) was first generously shared out to all ranked officials, whether incumbent or retired, around the new capital in Kyŏnggi Province. Though prebendal (i.e., the land had to revert to the state after the recipient’s death) for the sadaebu (office holders), merit subjects were granted the privilege of handing it on to their descendants. As early as 1417 the landed resources in Kyŏnggi proved insufficient to accommodate the rising number of recipients, in particular the many merit subjects continuously created during the first decades of the Chosŏn, so that the government was forced to provide rank land far

80

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

outside its immediate control, in the three southern provinces of Kyŏngsang, Chŏlla, and Ch’ungch’ŏng.1 Using land to compensate service to the state made the ruling elite into “intermediate exploiters” who competed with the state for extracting revenue from land and people. Worse yet, many grantees were tempted to convert their prebends into private property and live on them, undoubtedly acerbating the problem of multiple ownership of land, which had plagued the late Koryŏ peasantry. As the alienation of land from state control progressed, in 1466 the rank land system was abolished and replaced by the Office Land Law (Chikchŏnbŏp) that allocated land only to active officials. Even this more restrictive law was no longer workable around the middle of the sixteenth century, and officials thereafter received salaries in kind (e.g., rice) instead of land.2 The state’s attempt to impose a new order on the landed regions encountered numerous obstacles. In view of the catastrophic situation in the countryside in late Koryŏ,3 the early Chosŏn government was faced with a shifting rural population and with contenders of differing social backgrounds vying for exploiting local human and landed resources. One alarming aspect of the breakdown of local society was the mobility of the “local administrators” (hyangni). With conditions deteriorating in late Koryŏ, many hyangni, intent on upgrading their status with respect to the capital elite, abandoned their hereditary duties and sought advancement through examination success or, presumably more often, by acquiring military merit in the campaigns in the 1360s against the invading Red Turbans in the north or the marauding Japanese pirates (Wakō) along the coasts. Rewarded with one of the honorary or supernumerary offices created to accommodate an ever growing number of contestants for official recognition, the recipients of such office patents and titles (without office) entered the Chosŏn dynasty with the prestige of salaried “ranked officials” (p’umgwan). Together with a large number of former civil and military officials (chŏnham p’umgwan) and their unemployed sons (hallyang), who had left the capital during the dynastic transition period to seek refuge on their rural estates, they formed a formidable pool of inactive officials resident in the countryside.4 The extent of general internal displacement and migration of people during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition period is well illustrated by the Geographic Gazetteer Appended to the Annals of King Sejong (Sejong sillok chiriji). Roughly 30 percent of the kin groups recorded for the country’s most populated core area5 were found in places other than their former residences, and almost 17 percent had disappeared altogether. Populations in Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla remained relatively stable, but due to the relocation of the capital from Kaesŏng to Hanyang, movements were up to 50 percent higher in the capital region of Kyŏnggi and the two adjacent provinces of Kangwŏn and Hwanghae.6 In an effort to stabilize this precarious situation, the government initiated a wideranging reorganization of local administration. Most important, administrative boundaries were redrawn, first in 1413 and later continued under King Sejong, and a magistrate (suryŏng) was dispatched to each of the newly constituted 330 or so counties (kun or hyŏn).7 In particular, areas that had been administered earlier by hyangni and thus had largely been outside government control were now either abolished or merged with larger units in order to bring them under the jurisdiction of the newly appointed magistrates.



Introduction

81

In this process, many hyangni lost their ancestral bases and were forcibly moved to serve in administrative centers where they no longer had any kinship ties. Perhaps in anticipation of hyangni opposition to its rural policies, in 1411 the government instituted the Law Investigating Wicked Hyangni (Hyangwŏn ch’uhae pŏp), which subjected the hyangni to degrading scrutiny. Soon afterward, in 1420, this law was reinforced by a general prohibition against bringing complaints against the county magistrate (Pumin koso kŭmji pŏp). Intended to bolster his authority against local hostility, these measures in fact placed the magistrate in often difficult situations of judgment—a potential source of conflict that Sejong wanted to prevent by ordering increased gubernatorial supervision of local administration.8 One of the magistrate’s foremost tasks was to oversee the introduction of a fine administrative grid, the “township and village system” (myŏllije).9 This system, directed at the grassroots level of every village, was to provide the basis for enforcing the new Household Registration Law (Hojŏkpŏp) that was to furnish population data upon which taxes, corvée labor, and military service would be assessed. Not surprisingly, such an ambitious foray into every household foundered on the resistance of private interests, an unstable populace, and the fact that natural villages (ch’on) tended to be small and widely scattered. Administrative incompetence was undoubtedly an additional cause of failure. Indeed, as mid-fifteenth-century investigations revealed, in areas where local power contestants were especially numerous as, for instance, in Kyŏngsang Province, census taking turned out to be least effective.10 Clearly, the state was not yet capable of building up a reliable local tax base. In view of its limited administrative control of the countryside, the government had to tolerate or indeed had to rely on a local institution that seems to have undercut rather than advanced its authority. Known from late Koryŏ as “offices of representatives-inresidence in the countryside” (yuhyangso; hereafter “local bureaus”),11 these bureaus, staffed by local power holders (yuhyang p’umgwan), apparently existed in most districts of the country to secure the state’s upper hand in rural communities and survived into early Chosŏn. Because the historical record is extremely thin, scholarly opinion diverges as to their origin and exact nature.12 Some scholars have maintained that these local bureaus represented local elite interests and thus impeded the central government’s efforts at centralization, and see their view justified by the fact that in 1406 the inspector general (taesahŏn) demanded their abolition on the ground that they not only interfered with the magistrates’ rule but also exploited the peasantry.13 Whether or not any action was taken upon this request remains a controversial issue; yet even if a royal order had followed, it was most likely unenforceable.14 For this reason, a second abolition order was issued in 1467,15 but rescinded again in 1488.16 That these local bureaus in fact survived after 1406 is suggested by their having seeming counterparts in the capital, the so-called capital bureaus (kyŏngjaeso), first attested in 1417. These equally obscure offices—little evidence of their activities is extant—seem to have been staffed by central officials who were given supervisory powers over the local bureaus in their “homelands” (hyang)— locations where they possessed landed property and slaves.17 Not only did central officials thus enjoy the privilege of keeping an eye on their private economic interests; they were

82

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

apparently also empowered to appoint the staff members of the local bureaus, to recommend local individuals for office, and to vet the social background of examination candidates. No wonder that high-ranking officials and even members of the royal house reportedly vied with each other for these positions.18 The checkered history of the bureaus in the fifteenth century suggests two things: first, the coexistence of local and capital bureaus hints at the close bonds of kinship and common interests uniting officials in the capital with their kinsmen in the countryside; second, the persistence of these semiofficial bodies in early Chosŏn points to the inherent weakness of central-government representation outside the capital and its continued dependence on self-serving middlemen. Indeed, as will be discussed in chapters 4 and 9, the local bureaus came to assume a vital role in sorting out the diffuse power relations in rural districts: to the detriment of the hyangni, yet to the benefit of old and new elite descent groups who began to establish their own regimes in rural communities. Remarkably, in the course of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, while the central government tried to extend its authority into the countryside, an unprecedented exodus of government officials from the capital to rural areas took place. This had diverse causes. The gradual breakdown of the salary system turned landed property into an ever more essential asset for long-term survival. Besides economic motives, the exodus was spurred by such extraordinary occurrences in the capital as King Sejo’s usurpation of the throne in 1455 or the bloody Literati Purges at the end of the century that disrupted or cruelly ended many a political career and forced disgraced or disgruntled officials to take refuge in the countryside. This mass migration substantially contributed to the dispersal of capital descent groups over the entire country.19 In continuation of the Koryŏ tradition of uxorilocal marriage, many a refugee took up residence in his wife’s rural home and developed the latter’s landed property into a sustainable economic base for his descent line to prosper. Indeed, the localization process of in-migrating sajok descent groups was an enduring feature of the first two centuries of the Chosŏn. Taking advantage of the state’s relatively ineffective presence on the local level, these newcomers built up new socioeconomic orders in open competition for human and landed resources. The initial localization phase was followed by a phase of consolidation. Throughout the sixteenth century the second and third generations of the early settlers’ descendants solidified and expanded early estates, initiated wide-flung networks of peer cooperation, and, at the same time, pursued active government careers. Indeed, they laid the economic and social foundations that empowered them to become learners of NeoConfucianism and to pioneer novel cultural and ritual forms, with which they transformed their kin groups and communities into tightly structured social organizations (discussed in part III). These developments were, however, tragically disrupted by the Japanese invasions, known as the Imjin War, at the end of the sixteenth century (1592 and 1597) and, some thirty years later, by the Manchu invasions of 1627 and 1636. In between came the misrule by Kwanghae’gun (r. 1608–23)—a period perceived as “dark days” by many officials who in dejection retired from office to bide their time in the countryside. Whereas the protracted conflicts with the Japanese caused the country immeasurable human and material loss, the showdown with the rising Manchus forced upon Korea the humiliation



Introduction

83

of acknowledging Manchu suzerainty in 1637. Both these psychological and cultural shocks left indelible imprints on the orientation of many generations of Koreans toward the outside world. Part II is divided into three chapters. Chapter 4 introduces the local settings of Andong and Namwŏn and discusses early elite formation in these two localities. Chapter 5 explores the strategies that the localized sajok employed to win social supremacy by net­ working with other in-migrants in their local communities, and chapter 6 considers the schemes the sajok used to consolidate their economic wealth and hand it down to the next generations.

Ch a p ter 4

Repossessing the Countryside The Formation of Localized Elite Descent Groups

T

hroughout Korean history, Andong in Kyŏngsang Province and Namwŏn in Chŏlla Province were recognized as key areas in the southern half of the Korean peninsula. Not only did they possess special meaning in terms of their geographic and strategic importance, they also enjoyed reputations as socially and culturally sophisticated localities. Both areas therefore provide fertile ground for studying the rise and development of some of Chosŏn Korea’s most illustrious localized descent groups.

The Local Settings Andong is situated in a vast alluvial plain sheltered to the north by the T’aebaek mountain range and crossed in the south by two branches of the Naktong River. At a distance of 580 ri (approximately 290 km) from Seoul it was rather isolated, and in traditional times several days were necessary to reach the capital either on horseback or by boat. Due to its strategic significance, in early Koryŏ Andong was elevated from kun to pu (major county),1 and at the beginning of Chosŏn the central government was represented by a special city magistrate (taedoho pusa),2 who doubled as regional military commander (pyŏngma chŏltosa). He was assisted by a deputy (p’an’gwan), an education officer (kyosu) attached to the local school (hyanggyo), and a military officer (muhak chedok).3 The magistrate and his imposing staff, comprising various subaltern military personnel, clerks, and a large number of underlings and public slaves (kong nobi),4 resided in the walled town of Andong (pusŏng).5 Among a magistrate’s most important “seven assignments” (ch’ilsa) were the compilations of household registers (hojŏk) in a three-year cycle and of cadastral surveys (yangan) in a twenty-year cycle.6



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

85

Both Andong and neighboring Yean County had a contingent of slave artisans, who, settled in special villages where they tilled some land for their livelihood, were assigned to the magistrate’s yamen to manufacture items for daily use and tax goods for Seoul.7 Whereas the eight government artisans in Yean produced paper, the majority of the Andong artisans wove sedge mats with dragon and phoenix patterns—important articles in the catalog of tribute goods presented yearly to Ming China.8 Andong County proper (chuŭp) was subdivided into eastern, southern, western, and northern townships (myŏn) and by 1530 still exercised only nominal jurisdiction (imnae) over eight “subordinate counties” (sokhyŏn) (fig. 4.1).9 In addition, Andong territory included two “special areas” (pu’gok).10 As a result of the piecemeal drawing of administrative boundaries over time, more than half of these dependent areas formed “pockets across boundaries” (wŏlgyŏngji) situated within neighboring counties. This circumstance made it difficult for the Andong magistrate to supervise them and therefore laid them open to scarcely controlled exploitation by energetic newcomers.11 In the mid-fifteenth century, Andong County had a population of 7,647 persons in 1,887 households. The two subordinate counties Imha and P’ungsan, adjacent to Andong proper and situated in a vast plain, were the most populous, whereas those at some distance were only sparsely populated. According to the land survey (yangan) of 1429, 11,283 kyŏl 12 of land were either cultivated or lay fallow; only some two-sevenths were irrigated.13 In early Chosŏn, then, there were undoubtedly large tracts of land in Andong County that were only nominally under government supervision, were little populated, and were not yet fully brought under cultivation—factors that, together with its relative isolation, presented favorable conditions for economic development. “Andong” is here to mean an area larger than the county per se, to include the neighboring Yean County 14 in the northeast and parts of what today are the counties of Ponghwa and Yech’ŏn in the north. The second of the two key areas, Namwŏn, was a seven-and-a-half-day journey south of Seoul (655 ri or about 330 km), and was located in the southeastern corner of presentday North Chŏlla Province. It lies in a narrow, yet well-watered plain surrounded by mountains, separated in the east from Kyŏngsang Province by the massive Chiri Mountain. It had a checkered history. Under Paekche (fourth century to 660) Namwŏn was known as Koryong County, and after the unification wars was briefly controlled by the Tang and designated as one of the “secondary capitals” (sogyŏng) under United Silla (668–935). At the beginning of Koryŏ, it was again made a county and underwent several administrative changes until the beginning of Chosŏn when, in 1413, it became a town (tohobu) administered by a town magistrate (toho pusa).15 Because of its past history as part of Paekche territory, Namwŏn suffered from the widely held prejudice that its people were “violent and rebellious.”16 In Chosŏn times, Namwŏn covered a considerably larger area than today, comprising forty-five subcounties (pang) (fig. 4.2).17 In the mid-fifteenth century, its population stood at 1,300 households (comprising 4,912 persons), in addition to several hundred military personnel, and it had a cultivated area of 12,508 kyŏl that included “a large proportion of rice paddies.”18

Fig. 4.1 Map of Andong County proper from Yŏnggaji, woodblock edition of 1899 (reproduced from the facsimile of the Yŏnggaji appended to Kug’yŏk Yŏnggaji [Andong, 1991]).

Fig. 4.2 Map of Namwŏn County from Yongsŏngji, woodblock edition of 1702 (reproduced from Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang ŭi Chŏnju Yi-ssi wa kŭdŭl ŭi munsŏ, eds. Song June-ho and Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, 17 [Chŏnju: Chŏnbuk taehakkyo pangmulgwan, 1990]).



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

89

Early Elite Formation: Indigenous Descent Groups in Andong and Namwŏn Several sources identify the descent groups that were noteworthy in Andong and Namwŏn at the beginning of the Chosŏn. The Sejong sillok chiriji of 1454, which lists the “indigenous surnames” (t’osŏng) of each administrative district in the land, also records for a select number of historical key areas such as Andong, under a separate rubric, “personalities (inmul) [of local origin]”—individuals who, by holding high office in the capital before and during the dynastic transition, had raised their descent groups to national prominence. A few more Andong personalities are mentioned in the older Geographic Gazetteer of Kyŏngsang Province (Kyŏngsangdo chiriji) of 1447.19 For Namwŏn, no such rubric exists—perhaps indicating a historiographical bias. For identifying the descent groups recognized by their contemporaries as major long-term actors on local terrain, this study relies most heavily on the two local gazetteers of Andong and Namwŏn, the Yŏnggaji (1608) and the Yongsŏngji (1702), described in appendix A. Invaluable for firsthand information as these two gazetteers are, it would be a mistake to trust them entirely as impartial. Compiled two hundred years and three hundred years after the inception of the Chosŏn respectively, they cannot be relied on to deliver perspectives on early history untainted by partisan persuasions. They must therefore be complemented by additional material such as biographical compendia and genealogies assembled by individual descent groups.20 Andong’s Indigenous Descent Groups Of the seven surnames (t’osŏng) native to Andong that are listed in the Sejong sillok chiriji, three possess special historical significance for the region: the Andong Kwŏn, the Andong Kim, and the Andong Chang.21 All three seem to have been well-established and powerful descent groups (hojok) of the Andong area during the Silla-Koryŏ transition. Their respective heads—Kwŏn Haeng (n.d.), Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng (n.d.), and Chang Kil (n.d.)—are credited with having assisted the dynastic founder Wang Kŏn in his campaigns to win back Kyŏngsang from his chief adversary, the ruler of Later Paekche, Kyŏn Hwŏn, during the secessionist period of the Later Three Kingdoms (890–935). As prefect of Koch’ang (an old name of Andong), Kwŏn Haeng reportedly rallied the local populace to fight on Wang Kŏn’s side, and together with Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng and Chang Kil took part in defeating Kyŏn Hwŏn in the decisive battle at “Bottle Mountain” (Pyŏngsan) in 930.22 Out of gratitude, Wang Kŏn made all three merit subjects (kongsin) of the new dynasty 23 and bestowed prestige titles upon them. For “capably and brilliantly adapting himself to the circumstances” (pyŏnggi talgwŏn), Wang furthermore rewarded Kwŏn Haeng, whose descent group had up until then used the royal Sillan surname Kim, with the new surname Kwŏn and granted him Andong, upgraded to “major county” (pu), as fief (sig’ŭp).24 All three men were buried in Andong 25 and have ever since been revered by their respective descendants as apical ancestors (sijo) and commemorated in the Shrine of the Three Grand Preceptors (Samt’aesamyo) in Andong City.26

90

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

To the extent that the Koryŏ government was never able to extend its authority fully into the countryside—it was represented by centrally appointed officials only in a number of key districts (chuch’i)—it had to rely for local administration entirely on territorially bound descent groups such as the Andong Kwŏn. Thus, after the system of “local administrators” (hyangni) was instituted in 983, the Kwŏn began from Haeng’s grandsons’ generation on to serve hereditarily as top-ranking headmen (hojang)27 in the Andong hyangni hierarchy. Even though such headmanships were “peripheral administrative posts” (oeri) lacking the prestige of a bureaucratic office in the capital, the hojang nevertheless wielded, due to their distinguished ancestry, formidable power in their localities. Once the prospect for advancement through the civil service examinations opened to them in the mid-eleventh century,28 men of hyangni background moved by passing the examinations into the central bureaucracy and by intermarriage with the capital elite eventually transmuted into Koryŏ aristocrats. The Kwŏn seem to have seized this opportunity relatively late, as some of them began to show signs of upward mobility only from around the mid-thirteenth century. One of them was Kwŏn Su-p’yŏng (?–1250), who reportedly acquired late in life, by unknown means, the title of an official in the Security Council (Ch’umilwŏn).29 He and his younger brother, Su-hong (n.d.), are the first Kwŏn mentioned after Haeng in the Yŏnggaji 30—undoubtedly because each of them was later revered as apical ancestor of one of the fifteen branches (p’a) into which, according to their genealogy, the Andong Kwŏn segmented in the tenth generation after Haeng. Su-p’yŏng’s branch came to be known by his office title as Ch’umilgong-p’a, whereas Su-hong’s is referred to as Pog’yagong-p’a.31 (See genealogical chart B.1.) Su-p’yŏng’s descendants started to prosper with his grandson Tan (1228–1311), who was the first Andong Kwŏn to take and pass the civil service examinations in 1254 and rise to a senior-second-rank position.32 His only son, Pu (1262–1346), succeeded in the examinations at the early age of eighteen in 1279 and won, as mentioned earlier, national fame not only in a first-rank office as a chancellor but also as one of the earliest practitioners of Neo-Confucianism. He supposedly entreated the king to have the Four Books and their commentaries printed in Korea.33 For his merits, Pu was enfeoffed as Lord of Yŏngga (Andong). All of his five sons and three sons-in-law, among them the famous scholar Yi Che-hyŏn (1287–1367), received enfeoffment, so that they were popularly known as “the house of the nine lords”34—a sure indication that this branch of the Andong Kwŏn had reached the zenith of prestige and power in the capital. None of these Kwŏn members was buried in Andong, since their connection to their ancestral seat apparently had slackened. The descendants of two of Pu’s sons, Ko (1294–1379) and Chun (1280–1352), continued to hold office in the central government in the first years of the Chosŏn dynasty. Most outstanding among them was Ko’s grandson, Kŭn (1352–1409), who excelled as a Confucian scholar and at the same time pursued an illustrious official career. In 1401, King T’aejong made him a merit subject (chwamyŏng kongsin).35 Kŭn’s son Che (1387– 1445), a munkwa graduate of 1414, and Che’s two sons, Nam (1416–65) and Pan (1419–72), munkwa graduates of 1450 and 1459, respectively, all served in high-ranking positions.



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

91

Che, Nam, and their cousin, Ch’ae1 (1399–1438), a munkwa graduate of 1427 and famed for his literary style, started their careers as researchers in King Sejong’s prestigious Hall of Worthies.36 Because Su-p’yŏng’s descendants thus continued to be part of the highest capital elite in early Chosŏn, figuring on Sŏng Hyŏn’s list of outstanding descent groups, they were keen to historicize Su-p’yŏng’s rise to eminence by tracing his origin back to the famous Kwŏn Haeng whose memory was still fresh. Yet, due to the typical lack of proper differentiation of descent lines within a Koryŏ descent group, Su-p’yŏng’s exact ancestry was in doubt when his biography was written in early Chosŏn. According to the Koryŏsa, “Su-p’yŏng’s [ancestral] traces are thin and consequently his genealogy obscure.”37 Indeed, for making Su-p’yŏng a “descendant of [Koryŏ] T’aejo’s merit subject Haeng” the historical record had to be manipulated—a deed of which ambitious Kwŏn Che, who was involved in emending the Koryŏsa, was accused.38 Clearly, by connecting Su-p’yŏng directly to illustrious Haeng and attaching a prestigious office title to his name, his heirs transformed their forebear from a little known hyangni into a titled ancestor ­worthy of one of early Chosŏn’s most prominent kin groups.39 The Yŏnggaji kept recording their names for the immense prestige that the capital Kwŏn conferred upon their kinsmen in native Andong, even though they later retired to a landed estate in Ch’ungju (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province)40 and none of them was buried in Andong.41 Whereas Su-p’yŏng’s descendants thus numerically dominate the Yŏnggaji’s coverage of “personalities” from late Koryŏ to the early Chosŏn, his younger brother’s Andongbased posterity is much less well represented, despite the fact that the descendants of Su-hong’s second and third grandsons started from the mid-fifteenth century to count among the principal actors in Andong’s local history. The recording of Su-hong’s immediate descendants is characteristically spotty. After the entry for his son, Cha-yŏ (n.d.), reportedly a grand general (taejanggun),42 comes one for In (n.d.), Cha-yŏ’s second son’s great-grandson. The entry gives In a prestige title, of a minister in the Ministry of Rites, and notes that he lived west of Andong in Soya village and was buried in the vicinity.43 Funeral epitaphs composed centuries later credit In with munkwa success (in 1374) and office titles and state that during the dynastic transition he preferred to preserve his integrity and retire to Andong 44—a scenario that cannot be verified, but promotes In as the historical personality from whom one of the most successful subsegments, the P’ansŏgong-p’a, within the Pog’yagong branch—that of Kwŏn Pŏl (1478–1548)—was proud to derive its immediate ancestry. Curiously, the Yŏnggaji does not mention Cha-yŏ’s grandson, Han-gong (d. 1349)— Kwŏn Pu’s contemporary. As a munkwa graduate of 1284 and capital official, Han-gong45 and his younger son, Chung-hwa (1322–1408), equally a munkwa graduate (1353) and a senior first-rank official,46 undoubtedly were Su-hong’s most distinguished late Koryŏ descendants. The omission of father and son is perhaps explainable by the circumstance that Han-gong’s descendants, resident first in Kaesŏng and later in Hanyang and environs, might have been considered to have lost their relevance for Andong’s local history. But so would have Pu’s descendants. Were Su-hong’s main-line descendants perhaps omitted in order to boost the standing of In’s heirs? That none of Cha-yŏ’s third son’s

92

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

descendants are recorded until the early fifteenth century strongly suggests that they continued to serve as headmen in the local administration throughout late Koryŏ. Evidently, lack of reliable sources may have hindered exact genealogical reconstructions. More important, however, these reconstructions reflect the fact that not so subtle a selection process was at work when the social worth of different descent group branches was weighed one against the other. The Yŏnggaji also records a select number of Andong Kwŏn belonging to collateral lines who variously distinguished themselves.47 Among them was Kwŏn Chŏn1 (1372– 1441), who deserved an entry due less to his (presumably honorary) high office titles than to the fact that he was the father of King Munjong’s wife, Queen Hyŏndŏk (1418–41). Although Chŏn died long before his grandson, King Tanjong, who was dethroned by the latter’s uncle, King Sejo, in 1455, Chŏn’s tomb was destroyed in the purge that followed.48 In sum, the different trajectories of Su-p’yŏng’s and Su-hong’s descendants strikingly demonstrate that it was the concentration in one descent segment of munkwa success and high office holding in the capital over several consecutive generations that elevated Su-p’yŏng’s heirs above those of Su-hong and connected them, through multiple marriage ties, to the capital elite. In contrast, too few of Su-hong’s descendants were able convincingly to shed their hyangni past. Despite office titles (most probably honorary), most of them remained therefore bound to their native place and typically contracted a few conspicuous cousin marriages.49 That by the mid-fifteenth century the Kwŏn had become a self-confident kin group, well aware of their eminence in the capital as well as in their region of origin, is illustrated by the fact that they were among the first to compile a comprehensive genealogy, the Andong Kwŏn-ssi sŏnghwabo of 1476. It is the oldest extant example of an early Chosŏn dynasty genealogy. It was begun by Kwŏn Che, who arbitrarily connected his ancestor Su-p’yŏng to Haeng, was then expanded by Che’s son, Nam, and finally completed and prefaced by Sŏ Kŏ-jŏng (1420–88), one of Kwŏn Kŭn’s nonagnatic grandsons. Although this work was thus initiated in the capital, it seems to have been printed, with the help of another nonagnate, the then governor of Kyŏngsang, Yun Ho (1424–96),50 in Andong with locally raised funds. The Sŏnghwabo strikingly shows that a genealogical record was, then and later, a social statement unmistakably reflecting its compilers’ idiosyncratic view of their time’s societal constellation. By the mid-fifteenth century, Su-p’yŏng’s and Su-hong’s ancestry was obviously no longer in doubt, as the two are depicted as direct tenth-generation descendants of Haeng, with each of the intervening generations represented by only a single individual. With 5,408 individuals connected to Su-p’yŏng’s line, its contents are obviously rigged in favor of the capital Kwŏn, whereas Su-hong’s posterity is, with merely 3,658 members, likely much condensed.51 The remarkable feature of this early genealogy is that it traces, according to the bilateral tradition of Koryŏ, agnatic as well as nonagnatic links—the reason why nonagnatic descendants were so prominently represented among its sponsors.52 Among the Andong Kim, there are two unrelated kin groups that trace their origins to two different apical ancestors. Those Kim, who made Wang Kŏn’s merit subject Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng their progenitor, served, like the Kwŏn, hereditarily as headmen



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

93

(hojang) and do not seem to have distinguished themselves during Koryŏ and early Chosŏn. This group started, however, to produce noticeable members from the late sixteenth century onward, to become, in the latter half of the Chosŏn, one of the mightiest kin groups in the land. Consequently, the only two alleged members of Sŏn-p’yŏng’s line to be found in the Yŏnggaji are contemporaries of the gazetteer’s compiler: Kim Sijwa (n.d.), who was honored by the state with a commemorative arch for excelling in filial devotion to his widowed mother; and his son, Kim Chŭp (1530–?), reportedly a munkwa graduate of 1570, who, after serving in a magistrature, settled west of Andong City in Sudong village.53 In contrast, the other Andong Kim descent group, whose founding ancestor was supposedly I-ch’ŏng,54 clearly cast off its hyangni background in the course of the thirteenth century and advanced to a leading political position during the last two centuries of Koryŏ and into the early Chosŏn. I-ch’ŏng’s great-grandson, Hyo-in (?–1253)—the first of this line to be mentioned in the Yŏnggaji—passed the civil service examinations in 1208 and rose to the senior third-rank office of a vice minister of the Ministry of Military Affairs.55 His son, Pang-gyŏng (1212–1300), first entered officialdom via a protection appointment, then served, as mentioned in chapter 2, as a military commander under the Mongols, and eventually climbed to the lofty and all-powerful position of grand chancellor. So omnipotent did he become that “he held the entire country in his grip, and his fields and gardens stretched across counties and districts.” He died in Kaesŏng but, according to his last will, was buried in Andong, an exception for that time.56 It was thus to Pang-gyŏng that this descent line owed its eminence during the transition from Koryŏ to Chosŏn. Most of the Kim mentioned after Pang-gyŏng in the Yŏnggaji were descendants of his three sons, all of whom were either examination graduates or protection appointees and holders of high office—among them Pang-gyŏng’s great-grandson Kim Ku-yong (1338–84), who, it will be remembered, joined the ranks of the early Confucian teachers in the capital.57 The Andong Kim thus entered the Chosŏn dynasty as one of the most prestigious descent groups in the capital, chronicled, of course, in Sŏng Hyŏn’s list. Kim Sa-hyŏng (1333–1407), a sixth-generation descendant of Hyo-in and contemporary of Kwŏn Kŭn, supported Yi Sŏng-gye in his quest for power and was made, as noted earlier, a first-class foundation merit subject (kaeguk kongsin) in 1392. For helping King Chŏngjong (r. 1398– 1400) to succeed his father on the throne, he received the same honor again six years later in 1398.58 Equally illustrious was the career of Sa-hyŏng’s fourth cousin, Kim Ton (1385– 1440), who, “having been studious from young years,” passed the munkwa in 1417 and was hand-picked by King Sejong as a researcher in the Hall of Worthies and as a royal lecturer.59 His younger relative, Kim Su-ryŏng (1437–73), a ninth-generation descendant of Pang-gyŏng and a munkwa graduate of 1453, also started his career as a Hall of Worthies scholar and in 1471 became one of King Sŏngjong’s merit subjects. He ended his official career as the minister of revenue and was enfeoffed as Lord of Puch’ang. The Yŏnggaji added in praise: “He enchanted the world with his literary style.”60 Whereas the Andong Kwŏn and the Andong Kim thus acquired and maintained commanding positions in the political world of the second half of Koryŏ and early Chosŏn, the Andong Chang left few traces in Andong. In fact, Chang Kil is the only

94

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

Andong Chang recorded in the Yŏnggaji. At an undetermined point in time, his descendants moved northward and settled in the Ŭiju area (P’yŏngan Province), where they prospered.61 The Chang will consequently not figure in the chapters to follow. Namwŏn’s Indigenous Descent Groups Among the eleven native surnames (t’osŏng)62 with Namwŏn as choronym (pon’gwan), the Namwŏn Ryang are said to have enjoyed the reputation of “foremost descent group” (mangjok) of the region since early Koryŏ times, when Ryang Nŭng-yang, the first historical individual in the Namwŏn Ryang genealogy (whose ancestry is uncertain), was appointed local administrator (hyangni) of Namwŏn.63 Generations after him hereditarily served as local hyangni until Nŭng-yang’s ninth-generation descendant, Chun (ca. first half of thirteenth century), reportedly “elevated his house” by passing the civil service examinations.64 Thus established in the capital, all of his four sons apparently held office and intermarried with the capital aristocracy. Chun’s descent line survived into early Chosŏn and produced with his fifth-generation descendant, Ryang Sŏng-ji (1415– 82), its perhaps most illustrious member. Because his mother was an Andong Kwŏn,65 Sŏng-ji was matrilaterally related to prominent Kwŏn Kŭn. He passed the civil service examination in 1441, excelled as an official and scholar, and left a deep mark on the political and cultural life of early Chosŏn. He was enfeoffed as Lord of Namwŏn, although he never lived in Namwŏn.66 Ryang Sŏng-ji clearly was a one-time star; none of his immediate descendants passed the examinations, and the Namwŏn Ryang did not make it onto Sŏng Hyŏn’s list of foremost capital descent groups. There is less information about the early history of the other indigenous surnames. In fact, the Namwŏn Yun do not, strictly speaking, qualify as “native.” Their apical ancestor, Yun Wi (n.d.), is said to have been appointed a royal inspector for Honam to put down a rebellion in Namwŏn during the reign of King Sinjong (r. 1197–1204) and was, allegedly upon the request of Namwŏn’s population, buried in Namwŏn. Thereafter his descendants chose Namwŏn as their choronym and at least some of them settled and continued to live in Chung-bang, a subcounty southeast of Namwŏn City.67 Yun Wi’s seventh-generation descendant, Yun Hyo-son (1431–1503), the first Namwŏn Yun mentioned in the Yongsŏngji, was born in Chung-bang. His immediate antecedents had held various offices, his father as magistrate of Sunch’ang (Chŏlla Province), during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition. As a munkwa graduate of 1453 and Chiphyŏnjŏn scholar, Hyo-son embarked on a successful career that ended with an appointment as sixth state councilor (senior second rank) in the Council of State.68 The Namwŏn Yang (with character “willow tree”) seem to have acquired Namwŏn as their choronym as late as the middle of Koryŏ.69 Because their ancestry is vague down to the early fourteenth century, the Yang revere Grand Academician (taejehak) I-si (n.d.)70 as their “distinguished ancestor” (hyŏnjo), who established the Yang’s high regional reputation. I-si earned the classics licentiate (saengwŏn) in 1353 and two years later, in 1355, passed the civil service examinations. His successful official career ended with the senior second-rank office of grand academician in the Royal Academy of Letters and Archives (Yemun ch’unch’u’gwan). He reportedly also enjoyed the special patronage of King U



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

95

(r. 1374–88). He was buried near Kaesŏng, but the site of his tomb is no longer known.71 I-si’s son, Su-saeng (?1335–?77), reportedly a brilliant young man, passed both the classics licentiate and munkwa exams in the same year (1376) and was immediately appointed assistant academician in the National Confucian Academy (third rank). He died, however, shortly thereafter, so that his young widow, Yi-ssi (?–?1424), cradling her baby son, moved south to her father-in-law’s rural estate. Versed in geomantic theory, she herself chose a propitious spot where she decided to settle permanently in 1379, becoming the foundress of the Yang’s ancestral Kwimi village (Sunch’ang) and the revered ancestress of a posterity that prospered for the next six hundred years. Yi-ssi thus not only ensured her in-law family’s survival, she also saved the examination certificates (paekp’ae and hongp’ae) and some genealogical records of her father-in-law and of her husband—rare treasures preserved by her descendants until the present day. For her “womanly virtues” (yŏlbu), she was honored with a commemorative arch (chŏngmun) a few decades after her death.72 Because the remaining kin groups native to Namwŏn do not appear later in this study, they are not further considered here. This does not mean, of course, that their existence was of no consequence to the region, but, as will be discussed below, they were to an extent eclipsed by more successful and assertive newcomers. In conclusion, then, neither in Andong nor in Namwŏn were there indigenous descent groups that from the very beginning of Koryŏ advanced to positions of power and prestige in the capital. Rather, those who eventually did succeed had long histories of service as local administrators in their respective areas. The stronger their territorial base, the greater was their chance, as Yi Su-gŏn has shown, to muster the necessary momentum for the move upward into the capital officialdom.73 This proves true for Andong as well as for Namwŏn, but it was not sufficient, it would seem, for surviving the dynastic transition and persisting in early Chosŏn. Additionally, it was crucial, it must be remembered, that the first munkwa success occurred at least one and a half centuries or so prior to the end of Koryŏ, since an extended time period was necessary for a descent line to develop a human reservoir with sufficient generational depth and collateral span to produce multiple examination graduates and office holders who could secure for their line a place of influence and power in the political arena of early Chosŏn. Kwŏn Pu’s posterity is an illustrative example. No such example seems to exist for Namwŏn. Yet, even short of such an accomplishment, single individuals who returned to the countryside as examination graduates and/or as titled officials did enhance their groups’ local standing and, with their status validated at the center, gained recognition as “elite” (sajok)—a distinction that predestined these men and their immediate descendants for leadership roles in their home communities. The rural background of some of the great descent groups of early Chosŏn is celebrated by the early Chosŏn scholar-official Yi Suk-ham (n.d.):74 Those of the descent groups in the countryside [hyangjok] who through generations served as local administrators [i] were loyal and trustworthy, generous and respected and thus accumulated virtue without glamour. As a result, their descendants, reaping secret benefit

96

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

[thereof ], rose and prospered in eminence. Among those who over more than a thousand years have in this way enjoyed abundant and unlimited luck [resulting from virtue] are the Andong Kwŏn . . . and the Namwŏn Ryang: they are the premier representatives of Korea’s long-standing elite.75

That was, of course, Yi’s personal, time-bound view—true from a mid-fifteenth-century perspective. Later, the fate of the Andong Kwŏn and the Namwŏn Ryang greatly diverged, with only the former maintaining a prosperous capital branch until late Chosŏn.

Migration and Early Pioneer Settlers Migration into the provinces was, as mentioned earlier, vigorous at the end of Koryŏ; it became even more dynamic in the first two centuries of the Chosŏn. Indeed, by 1449— only thirty-two years after rank land (kwajŏn) was transferred south—almost half of the land in the three southern provinces was reportedly taken up by estates of government officials (who, however, did not necessarily move there). This was a trend that intensified toward the end of the century.76 Taking permanent possession of rank land was one facet of this land grab. Another, equally effective facet was for a former official to move and settle, according to Koryŏ tradition, as the in-marrying son-in-law on land belonging to his wife’s family and use it as a nucleus for estate building. First in-migrants, who founded separate localized branches of their descent groups, invariably came to their rural settlements with the prestige of former office holders. They were later celebrated as “pioneer ancestral settlers” (iphyangjo) by their descendants, who continued, through generations, to expand their forebears’ early landed estates. Thus sustained economically, they then developed new social and cultural strategies for upholding, under localized conditions, the ancestral claim to elite status at the local as well as at the national level. Early Andong Settlers and Their Descendants Among the earliest in-migrants, noted in the Yŏnggaji as “temporary [i.e., nonnative] sojourners” (u’gŏ), was Nam Hwi-ju (1326–72), who established the Yŏngyang Nam77 in Sŏ’gahyŏn village some twelve ri north of Andong City in late Koryŏ. (See genealogical chart B.13.) Hwi-ju is said to have assisted, as military examination graduate, King Kongmin in subduing his pro-Mongol adversaries, and to have finally advanced to minister of civil personnel and rites. Such a vita cannot be verified,78 however, and it is likely that Hwi-ju in fact was one of those hyangni who in the last decades of Koryŏ bettered their lots by serving in the military. The reason for his settling in Andong is unknown. Because his mother was apparently an Andong Kwŏn, he might have received some landed inheritance in the area. In any case, his relocation to Andong meant that he definitely turned his back on his family’s hyangni past and his place of birth.79 His son, Min-saeng (1348–



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

97

1407), allegedly also a military examination graduate, seems to have held some government posts in the capital, yet, unwilling to support the new dynasty, he retired to Andong. Both Hwi-ju and Min-saeng were buried in the Andong area.80 With Min-saeng’s fourth son, Nam U-ryang (1394–1472), the Nam seem to have received full recognition as local notables, since he is the first to be recorded in the “[local] personalities” section of the Yŏnggaji. Like his forebears and his brothers, U-ryang was a graduate of the military examinations (1419) and reportedly served at one time as magistrate of Hoeryŏng (Hamgyŏng Province). Despite his official duties, he actively expanded the Nam’s basis in Andong by developing an estate in Ch’ŏndong village in the northern township of Andong County, while continuing to live in Sŏ’gahyŏn village.81 Another in-migrant was Yi Cha-su (n.d., late Koryŏ), T’oegye Yi Hwang’s fifthgeneration ancestor. (See genealogical chart B.7.) Cha-su’s father, Yi Sŏk (the apical ancestor of the Chinsŏng Yi), had been a county administrator (hyŏlli) in Chinbo (Chinsŏng County),82 a remote county in northeastern Kyŏngsang Province, when he reportedly passed the lower civil examinations (sama). Although he does not seem to have held an appointed office, it was his son, Cha-su, who in 1330 was a rare graduate of the classics examinations. Cha-su’s official career, however, was sluggish until he excelled militarily in the campaigns against the Red Turbans, whereupon, in 1363, he was made a merit subject and ennobled as Lord of Songan with a royal gift of fifty kyŏl of land and five slaves. With his position in the central government consolidated, he ended his career in a senior third-rank office.83 Whereas Cha-su thus obviously cast off his hyangni past and, upon his return from the capital, relocated to Andong’s P’ungsan Subcounty and was buried in the vicinity, his younger brother, Cha-bang, in contrast, continued to hold his family’s hereditary position of local administrator (hyangni) in his rather isolated native Chinbo. That Cha-bang is said to have lost his saengwŏn certificate during the military disturbances in late Koryŏ and for this reason had to return to Chinbo to resume hyangni duties is likely a later apocryphal embellishment.84 It was at this point in time, then, that the Chinsŏng Yi split into two socially differentiated branches. In the early days of the Chosŏn, Cha-su’s grandson, Chŏng (n.d.)—the first to be recorded as “[local] personality” in the Yŏnggaji—assisted General Ch’oe Yun-dŏk (1376–1445) in the pacification of the northern regions and acquired minor merit subject status in 1455; he later served as a county magistrate. He and his descendants resided in Chuch’on, the village his father, Un-hu (n.d.), had founded in the northern township of Andong City.85 Many of the early settlers in Andong were in-marrying sons-in-law. A good example is Yi Chŭng (1419–80), the founder of the Andong branch of the Kosŏng Yi. (See genealogical chart B.12.) He was the sixth son of Yi Wŏn (1368–1429), who, as a munkwa degree holder of 1385, pursued a distinguished government career under King T’aejong, whose merit subject he had become in 1401, and advanced to the high office of left state councilor under King Sejong. Wŏn thus continued the family tradition of munkwa graduates and high office holders reaching back to the early thirteenth century. Undoubtedly, the Kosŏng Yi belonged, also by marriage—Wŏn’s older sister was Kwŏn Kŭn’s wife—to the established capital aristocracy of late Koryŏ and early Chosŏn, even though they are not recorded on Sŏng Hyŏn’s list.86 Chŭng took the lower examinations (chinsa) in 1453 and

98

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

entered government via a protection appointment, eventually to become the magistrate of Yŏngsan (Kyŏngsang Province). But he quit office in protest against King Sejo’s usurpation of the throne and, married to a daughter of the eminent Yi Hŭi (1404–48),87 he came to live outside the South Gate of Andong and was buried there.88 From among Chŭng’s five sons, only his second, Koeng (1451–1526), is mentioned in the Yŏnggaji. His older brother seems to have moved elsewhere. A munkwa graduate of 1480, Koeng served in several magistracies, but in 1513 retired to Andong, where he had been developing his own landed estate. On the banks of the Naktong River he built a pavilion, which, presumably in allusion to Tao Yuanming’s famous literary piece, he called “Pavilion of Return” (Kwiraejŏng). There he entertained his friends with his poems, for which he had gained fame. He was buried in Andong.89 The Yŏnggaji also records three of Chŭng’s grandsons. As a munkwa graduate of 1488, Yi Chu (?–1504), renowned for his literary style, became a fourth censor, but, identified as one of Kim Chong-jik’s disciples,90 his career was cut short in the Literati Purge of 1498. He was exiled to remote Chindo Island and killed six years later.91 Chu’s younger brother, Yŏ (n.d.), a munkwa graduate of 1508, advanced to first counselor (senior third rank) in the Office of the Special Counselors, but died early.92 Of the three, Yi Ko (?–1551) seems to have been involved most deeply in Andong’s regional affairs. Although he served at one time as the magistrate of Ch’ŏngp’ung (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province), he apparently spent most of his time at home, where he was actively engaged in local administration.93 The history of the Hŭnghae Pae in Andong started sometime in the first half of the fourteenth century with the marriage of the Lord of Hŭnghae, Chŏn (n.d.),94 to a daughter of Son Hong-nyang (1287–1379), the first known representative of the Ilchik Son in Andong.95 Although the Yŏnggaji praises the Hŭnghae Pae as a prominent descent group “with a great and illustrious ancestry known in the world,”96 Chŏn’s marriage apparently connected two parties with relatively shallow social backgrounds. (See genealogical chart B.16.) Of the two of Chŏn’s three sons mentioned in the Yŏnggaji as “temporary sojourners,” Sang-ji (1351–1413), married to a daughter of Kwŏn Hŭi-jŏng, a local Andong Kwŏn,97 seems to have held office during the last days of Koryŏ, but “distressed that he could not die [as well]” when the dynasty came to an end, retired to Andong “preserving his integrity.” In a grove of junipers and bamboo he built a pavilion and from then on passed his days with wine and poetry. Although Sang-ji, thus, refused to acknowledge the new dynasty, all of his four sons were munkwa graduates and held office in the central and local governments of early Chosŏn. For this reason a popular saying apparently contrasted the Pae’s civil vocations (mun) to the [Yŏngyang] Nam’s military pursuits (mu).98 Sang-ji’s brother, Sang-gong (n.d.), also married locally 99 and obtained a ministerial title.100 With his colleague Minister [P’ungsan] Yu Chong-hye (n.d.)101 he apparently formed a mutual fund (kye), and when Yu moved from his place of origin in P’ungsan, where his forebears had for generations served as hyangni,102 to Hahoe at the foot of Flowery Mountain (Hwasan), Sang-gong moved with him. Living in the same village, they shared fields and gardens and became popularly known as the “two ministers of Hahoe.” Sang-gong died at home and was buried locally. By marrying one of [Andong] Kwŏn Hŭi-jŏng’s granddaughters,103 Sang-gong’s son, So (n.d.), a munkwa graduate of



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

99

1408, made another close local marriage and continued to live in Hahoe. He died early, however, and was buried near his father. So’s only son, Kye-jong (n.d.), entered office via a protection appointment, but died without heir. As Sang-gong’s funerary inscription concluded—euphemistically, it would seem—the Pae had brought forth a noted posterity that “made their name famous in the world.”104 Both the Pae and the Yu were intricately related by marriage to other local kin groups—the in-migrating Pae prominently to the local Andong Kwŏn (of Su-hong’s line).105 Among the various in-marrying sons-in-law that the Yŏnggaji deemed worthy of mention was also [Sunch’ŏn] Kim Yu-on (n.d.), a son of the renowned Kim Sŭng-ju (1354–1424).106 Yu-on allegedly passed the munkwa (this cannot be confirmed) and advanced in office to third minister in the Ministry of Rites. Married to a daughter of [Andong] Kwŏn Chip-kyŏng,107 he fled the capital in the upheaval of 1455 and took refuge in Kudam (P’ungsan), some thirty ri west of Andong City. This was the village where his father-in-law, attracted by the place’s natural beauty and fertility, had first settled. Because Chip-kyŏng did not have a son, Yu-on became his heir and thus established the Sunch’ŏn Kim in the Andong area. After a military career in the capital, his great-greatgrandson, Sun-go (1489–1574), later also took up residence in Kudam.108 It would be an error to rely exclusively on the Yŏnggaji for identifying the early membership of Andong’s elite. Its compiler left out the early history of two descent groups that will be prominently represented in the pages to follow: the Ŭisŏng Kim and the Kwangsan Kim. Indeed, centuries later, the Ŭisŏng Kim complained about this omission and attributed it to an unjustifiable bias of the Yŏnggaji’s compilers in favor of the Andong Kwŏn.109 The Ŭisŏng Kim, who had for generations functioned as hyangni in their native Ŭisŏng (Kyŏngsang Province), made their first appearance in the Andong area with Kim Kŏ-du (1338–?), a fifth-generation descendant of Yong-bi (1214–59), who, on the basis of his identified gravesite on Ot’osan in Ŭisŏng County, was (later) designated the descent group’s “intermediate ancestor” (chungsijo).110 (See genealogical chart B.4.) Kŏ-du, whose immediate antecedents had joined the capital bureaucracy, served as minister (chŏnsŏ) of works at the end of Koryŏ, and it was through prestigious kin ties that he seems to have settled in Andong. His mother was a great-granddaughter of the mighty [Andong] Kim Pang-gyŏng, and his wife, a Munhwa Yu, was a nonagnatic granddaughter of Kwŏn Hangong.111 It was Kŏ-du’s grandson, Yŏng-myŏng (1398–1463), a sama graduate of 1429, who laid the foundation of the Ŭisŏng Kim’s future good fortunes in Andong by marrying, in sequence, the daughters of three strong kin groups of the area: the Kwangju Yi, the Kwangsan Kim, and the Andong Kwŏn.112 Two of his four sons, Han-gye (1414–61) and Hanch’ŏl (1430–?),113 passed the civil service examinations, yet their careers in the capital were cut short because of their close connection to the royal house. When King Tanjong, the son of their maternal aunt, was forced off the throne and killed by Sejo in 1455, the (half-) brothers were compelled to retire to their country seats in Andong. Finally, the Kwangsan Kim, indigenous in the Kwangju region (Chŏlla Province), emerged into documented prominence with Kim Yang-gam (n.d.), a military commander and high official in the later eleventh century. (See genealogical chart B.9.) It is from his second son, Kim Ŭi-wŏn (1066–1148), who passed the preliminary civil service

100

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

examination (sŏnggyunsi) in 1082 and later served in the Koryŏ capital, that the presentday Kwangsan Kim trace their actual descent.114 In the course of the thirteenth century, Ŭi-wŏn’s seventh-generation descendant, Yŏn1 (1215–92), made the decisive entry into the higher ranks of the civil bureaucracy, started to intermarry with the capital elite, and thus cemented his kin group’s preeminent place in late-Koryŏ upper-class society— and on Sŏng Hyŏn’s list.115 Yŏn’s grandson, Chin (1292–?), for instance, married an Andong Kwŏn whose maternal grandfather was [Andong] Kim Pang-gyŏng. Despite prestigious marriage connections, however, not all of Chin’s five sons seem to have done equally well during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition, and some left the capital to establish themselves in the countryside. It was the second son of Chin’s fifth son, Mu (n.d.), who continued his father’s line—the first son’s line, lacking an heir, died out—and who, after a brief official career in Seoul, decided to take up uxorilocal residence with his father-inlaw, [Andong] Kim Sŏ-rin (n.d.). Mu’s descendants eventually formed the Yean branch of the Kwangsan Kim.116 The above examples represent merely the principal descent groups that will figure prominently in the chapters to follow. The Yŏnggaji in fact documents that in-migration continued during the sixteenth century, so that by the beginning of the seventeenth some forty-six outside surname groups had moved into and settled in the Andong area. Early Namwŏn Settlers From late Koryŏ to the end of the sixteenth century, when nationwide migration was most active, some twenty in-migrating descent groups, in different waves, put down roots in the Namwŏn area.117 A few examples will suffice to demonstrate that in-migration occurred on a larger scale particularly during the latter part of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. Usually ranked first among what later became known as the four premier descent groups of Namwŏn, the Chŏnju Yi made their first appearance in the area when Yi Tamson (1490–?) took a Sunch’ŏn Kim as his wife and settled in Eastern Village (Tongch’on) in Tundŏk Subcounty (pang). (See genealogical chart B.18.) Tam-son’s father-in-law, Kim Man-bo (n.d.), was the son of the first Sunch’ŏn Kim settler in Tundŏk, who himself had made an uxorilocal marriage when he married a nonagnatic great-granddaughter of [Chinju] Ha Chung-nyong (n.d.). The latter reportedly served as governor of Chŏlla Province at the beginning of the fifteenth century, liked Tundŏk’s natural scenery, and decided to take up residence (pokkŏ) there. Yi Tam-son came to Tundŏk with an impressive social background: he was the great-grandson of Hyoryŏng taegun (1396–1486), King Sejong’s older brother; Tam-son himself carried the princely title of Ch’unsŏng-jŏng.118 Tam-son’s descendants, later known as the Tundŏk Yi, blossomed in the sixteenth century and established themselves among the area’s largest landowners.119 The Yi’s neighbors in Eastern Village in Tundŏk were the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe. (See genealogical chart B.19.) The first Ch’oe, who moved from Seoul to Tundŏk a generation earlier than Yi Tam-son, was Ch’oe Su-ung (1464-92); he had married one of Ha Chungnyong’s great-great-granddaughters.120 He was the grandson of famous Ch’oe Hang (1409–



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

101

74), one of the most illustrious scholar-officials of early Chosŏn. Su-ung’s descendants continued to live in Tundŏk and made, as local leaders, outstanding contributions to the region in the next two hundred years.121 Another Namwŏn subcounty, Chup’o-bang to the southwest of Namwŏn City, gained fame through an in-migrating son-in-law. This was [Changsu] Hwang Kae (1468–1540), a great-grandson of eminent Hwang Hŭi (1363–1452).122 Kae married a daughter of Pang Kwi-hwa,123 a grandson of Pang Ku-sŏng (n.d.)124 who had been the first of the Namyang Pang to take up residence in Chup’o.125 When he foresaw political instability and danger upon Yŏnsan’gun’s (r. 1494–1506) accession of the throne, Kae gave up his military career in the capital and moved south to his wife’s estate. He thus established the Changsu Hwang in Chup’o. Using both his own and his father-in-law’s prestige, Kae expanded the latter’s considerable landed estate so aggressively that he came to be decried in Seoul as one of the three “strongmen” of Namwŏn.126 Their neighbors were descendants of [Hŭngdŏk] Chang Hap (n.d.) who had first moved from Hŭngdŏk (Chŏlla Province) to the Namwŏn area in the mid-fifteenth century and was buried in Tae’gok Subcounty. Hap’s second son, Yun-sin (n.d.), a military examination graduate of 1451 and later magistrate of Kijang (Kyŏngsang Province), married a daughter of Chin Kyŏng-ik, a scion of the indigenous Namwŏn Chin, and thus came to live in Chup’o.127 Descendants of the Changsu Hwang, the Namyang Pang, and the Hŭngdŏk Chang—all three eventually known by their place of residence, the multisurname village Chidang in Chup’o—began to dominate the political and social life of their adopted region in the course of the sixteenth century. In sum, the examples of migration presented above reveal a variety of reasons for moving over shorter or longer distances to Andong or Namwŏn. Whatever their background, however, all in-migrants, whose descendants in time came to be recognized as localized elite members in their respective communities, had one decisive thing in common: their career trajectories necessarily led them through the capital. Whether by ancestral empowerment, examination success, or military merit, a period of duty at the center— the source of all prestige and power—bestowed upon an individual the necessary official acknowledgment of high social status that could launch him later to become the founder of a viable localized branch of his descent group. Whatever the reason for leaving the capital, the motivation to settle in a particular locality was often circumstantial. For a large number of migrants, however, their ultimate destination seems to have been decided by the custom of uxorilocal marriage. Indeed, taking up residence in the wife’s native locality was an attractive solution as long as sons and daughters inherited, in Koryŏ fashion, equal shares of the patrimony.128 Not only did an in-marrying son-in-law add the prestige of office holding to an existing economic base; at times, he could even substitute as heir to a sonless line. In fact, it was not uncommon that the newcomer and his descendants eventually eclipsed the original affinal kin group. Localization in this first phase thus meant the appropriation of a particular locale as

102

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

economic basis for maintaining, through continued examination success and/or marital ties, relations to the center. Moving to the countryside definitely did not dampen a man’s national ambitions, but it nevertheless provided him with a degree of independence from the state. Indeed, for an in-migrant to put down roots in a named village and to be buried in Andong or Namwŏn proved that he had become a native son. In time, his burial site would turn into a vital focal point of kin solidarity and social identification for his descendants.

Communality for Stabilizing the Local Scene The in-migration of representatives of nonnative descent groups into Andong and Namwŏn set in motion a profound rearrangement of these areas’ social constellations. It was the in-migrants, with their prestigious official and educational backgrounds, who started to assert themselves in their adopted localities and eventually displaced the older native leadership. This was a slow process of assimilation and repression. In Andong— the situation in Namwŏn is less documented, but may have been similar—local elements with recent hyangni background were able for a time not only to preserve their traditional standing, but also to team up with in-migrant settlers, typically through intermarriage— an indication that hyangni descendants did not immediately suffer from state-imposed discriminatory practices. The combined strength of old and new interests thus undoubtedly tended to blunt the impact of policies with which the central government attempted to bring the countryside under its control. In Andong, the unusual survival of eight subordinate counties (sokhyŏn) and two “special areas” (pu’gok) into the early sixteenth century and beyond seems sufficient proof that the area was scarcely affected by outside pressures to reform its internal divisions.129 In fact, only four of these subordinate counties were situated in Andong proper, whereas the others were enclaves within the territory of neighboring counties. In these widely separated subordinate units the regime of local hyangni undoubtedly persisted, only lightly supervised by the local magistrate, who resided in Andong City. Members of thirteen subbranches (p’a) of the Andong Kwŏn, for instance, still performed hyangni duties at the beginning of the fifteenth century.130 It is noteworthy that the new settlers did not take up residence within the walled town of Andong, traditional “hyangni territory.” Rather, those who did not marry into already existing villages founded (pokkŏ) their own new settlements, as, for instance, [Yŏngyang] Nam Hwi-ju founded the village of Sŏ’gahyŏn and [Chinsŏng] Yi Un-hu that of Chuch’on.131 Both these villages lay only a relatively short distance from Andong City. Later settlers tended to build their estates in more distant, less populated areas such as Naesŏng (to be discussed in the next chapter). Marking their presence in the new environment, the newcomers aimed at more than mere economic security. Indeed, taking advantage of their official status, they strove to gain influence in local matters. Teaming up with local forces, the Yŏngyang Nam seem to have taken the lead in building a Hall for Communal Archery (Hyangsadang) where,



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

103

in imitation of a rite of Chinese antiquity, they occasionally celebrated communality by performing the wine-drinking rite (hyangŭmjurye) and practicing archery.132 The performance of these ancient rites evidently predated the building of the hall. As early as 1439, in a conversation with King Sejong, a royal lecturer praised Andong’s “flair of Tang China” as worthy of replication in other areas.133 The construction of the hall was commemorated by the Confucian teacher (yuhak kyosu) Kwŏn Si (1386–1450)134 in the following commemorative record (ki), dated 1442: In our community of Andong, the customs uphold diligence and frugality and, striving after fundamentals [pon], economize on consumption [yong]. The ancient traditions of Tang and Wei are still applied to weddings and funerals when we offer wine and food. Yet, there was no secure place for our meetings. Sometimes we met on the southern hill behind Pŏpsang temple, or we gathered west of Kŭmgok ward. On some days either rain or snow spoiled our caps and gowns and hampered our proceedings; or we suffered various hardships through cold or heat. For this reason community elders such as Kwŏn Ch’i, Nam Pu-ryang, and Kwŏn Ch’on discussed the matter with old and young, and everyone put forward slaves, building materials, and tiles, and a site on the hill behind Pŏpsang temple was chosen. Kwŏn Ku-gyŏng, Kim Sang, and Kwŏn Ho were asked to supervise the work. A four-kan building was erected, and a board put up with the name “Hall for Communal Archery.” There, all the various ritual vessels and mats are stored.

In this building, established by joint effort, communal wine-drinking rites were held and archery practiced on the occasion of weddings and funerals, or when officials were sent off or welcomed back. The purpose of these drinking parties was not, as Kwŏn Si emphasized, to get drunk, but rather to create a “culture of pledging sincerity” (kangsin chi sok) and, in the archery displays, by hitting the target, to “behold virtue” (kwandŏk). Though as yet confined to one administrative district, these ceremonies, Kwŏn concluded, were to advance peace and prosperity in the entire country.135 The celebration of the wine-drinking and archery rites was not unique to Andong, however. It is also reported that in Namwŏn “some regional individuals gather each spring in Chestnut Grove and Dragon Pool [an abandoned temple?] to ritually drink wine and practice archery.”136 These rites, encouraged by King Sejong as a means of teaching the rural population civilized behavior,137 were apparently practiced widely enough in early Chosŏn to make the king express concern that possible overdrinking on such occasions might, as historical examples had apparently shown, “lead to the loss of the country and the destruction of morality”138—a concern Kwŏn Si may have alluded to in his commemorative record. What may have been unique to Andong was the fact that a special hall was prepared to make the performance of these rites independent of weather conditions. That this perhaps was a first (at least in the region) is also suggested by the singular circumstance that no other than Sejong’s third son, Grand Prince Anp’yŏng, adorned the hall’s name board with his famous calligraphy.139 Indeed, the hall seems to have been talked about even in Seoul, because a few years after its erection, in 1446, Kwŏn Maeng-gyŏng (n.d.),140 who had taken up a military command post in Pusan, visited his native Andong to see with his own eyes the Hall for Communal Archery, about which he had heard from his countrymen in the capital.

104

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

He exchanged ceremonial wine cups with the community elders and was apparently so impressed by their efforts to recreate the important rites of “the sages and worthies of antiquity” that he donated from government stock twelve bolts of cotton cloth to establish a fund for subsidizing with its interest the yearly performance of the archery and wine-drinking rites.141 Who, then, were these community elders (hyang puro) who earned such fame for building the Hall for Communal Archery? It was a mixed group of recent in-migrants and a few locals, none of whom seems to have had an especially cultured background. Their most likely source of inspiration was Kwŏn Si, the Confucian teacher, who, as a munkwa graduate, was the most educated among them and, apparently with not too distant a hyangni past, surely eager to give his hometown a sophisticated profile. This is the more plausible since most of the other participants were either of military or recent hyangni origin. The person credited with having been a prime mover was [Yŏngyang] Nam Pu-ryang (1372–?), Nam Min-saeng’s eldest son, who, as a passer of the military examinations, pursued a military career.142 He was seconded by several Andong Kwŏn who had not yet or had only recently shed their hyangni past and therefore are difficult to identify as they are underrecorded in or entirely left out of the Sŏnghwabo, the Andong Kwŏn genealogy of 1476. Kwŏn Ch’i, another son of Hŭi-jŏng and a brother-in-law of Pae Sang-ji, reportedly served as a magistrate.143 Together with Kwŏn Ch’on,144 he seems to have been one of the project leaders. Kwŏn Ku-gyŏng, nonagnatically related to Ch’on, and Kwŏn Ho—both surely hyangni—supervised the more practical aspects of the hall construction. Kim Sang, presumably also a hyangni, is not traceable.145 Around the middle of the fifteenth century, then, a small number of men, still with strong hyangni ties and closely intermarried among themselves and with newcomers, put themselves, by practicing exclusive rituals, into the role of propagators of the “political way” (sedo), acquiring the reputation of aiding the young dynasty by cultivating proper human relations at home. Or, was the building of this Hall for Communal Archery merely a foil for articulating local interests and resisting the central government’s penetration of the countryside? Was it then a prototype of the local bureau (yuhyangso) and thus, according to general scholarly opinion, doubled as a kind of subadministrative organ of local self-governance? Maybe, but if the suppression of the hyangni was one of the local bureau’s foremost tasks,146 the Andong Hall, which despite strong hyangni participation gained nationwide acclaim, does not (yet) seem to fit such a template. Rather, as Kim Yong-dŏk has suggested, the wine-drinking and archery rites may have been early forms of the later community compacts (hyangyak)147—to be sure, no less instruments for bringing the rural populace under, however, sajok control. No record after 1446 is extant to further document the activities of the Andong Hall in the latter part of the fifteenth century. Was it dismantled in compliance with King Sejo’s order to abolish all local bureaus in 1467? And was it in reaction to this order that in 1478 some “virtuous elders” gathered in “loyal indignation” (ch’ungbun) around elderly [Kosŏng] Yi Chŭng to start a new circle called Friends’ Home Association (Uhyanggye)? This is very possible because most of the thirteen members harbored resentment against the usurper-king. As a chinsa graduate of the only year in which the examinations were



R epossessing the Cou ntryside

105

held under King Tanjong (1453), Yi Chŭng had given up office in protest in 1455. Among the four Yŏngyang Nam, Ch’i-gong (1419–97)148 and Kyŏng-in (1414–83), both according to family tradition military examination graduates, harbored personal grudges against Sejo: Kyŏng-in reportedly relinquished his office in disgust over the Tanjong affair,149 while Ch’i-gong, apparently elevated to merit subject status in 1453, never received a charter, so that, in his last will, he defiantly stipulated that only his military posts be recorded on his tombstone.150 Ch’i-gong and Ch’i-jŏng (n.d.), who had passed the chinsa in the same year as Yi Chŭng, were Min-saeng’s grandsons, and Kyŏng-sin (n.d.) and Kyŏng-in belonged, as Pu-ryang’s grandsons, to the next generation. Four Hŭnghae Pae joined the group: two grandsons and two great-grandsons of Sang-ji. The two Andong Kwŏn (of Su-hong’s line) who joined were closely related affinally to the Nam as well as to the Pae: Kwŏn Kon (1427–1502) was a cousin of Nam Ch’i-jŏng,151 and Suk-hyŏng, Kon’s nephew, substituted for his dead father Kae (1416–77), who had been a son-in-law of Pae Sang-ji’s eldest son and retired as military officer in protest against Sejo.152 The third Kwŏn, Cha-gyŏm, was a son-in-law of Pae Sang-ji’s fourth son.153 The thirteenth member is an unidentifiable member of the An’gang No.154 Compared to the members of the Hall for Communal Archery, the “friends” were socially a more compact and politically more astute group. The majority held a military office or degree, and there was no longer any evidence of hyangni links. Common to them were their anti-Sejo feelings. Curiously, the famous Sŏ Kŏ-jŏng (affinally related to the Andong Kwŏn), who had been in high office under King Sejo and continued to serve under the latter’s grandson, King Sŏngjong, wrote a long poem commemorating the establishment of the Friends’ Association. Did he try to mollify the group’s oppositional posture by praising Andong as the premier locality where the teachings of Confucius and Mencius were being upheld, and from where a great number of illustrious officials had emerged? Even though he conceded that “some men of ability know when to give up office and return home, while others live in obscurity [and do not seek office under unfavorable circumstances],” he extolled Andong’s civil virtues and compared it to Zhou and Lu, the home states of Confucius and Mencius. Sŏ may have chosen such exaggerated praise also to gloss over the members’ overwhelming military background, perhaps an embarrassing reality for the capital Kwŏn.155 Sometime later, the “sons and grandsons of the Friends’ Association members,” under the leadership of Yi Chŭng’s second son, Koeng, organized a successor club for “preserving the realm so that it would not perish for ten thousand years.” Called Club of the Upright (Chinsolhoe), it counted among its fifteen members, besides Koeng, his younger brother Myŏng (chinsa 1486); Kwŏn Kon’s two sons, Sa-yŏng (military) and Sa-bin (saeng­ wŏn 1472); Kwŏn Kae’s second son Suk-kyun (chinsa 1486); Kwŏn Cha-gyŏm’s two sons; two Yŏngyang Nam, one of them Kyŏng-ji (military);156 Chŏng Wŏn-no (1440–1521);157 and one Andong Kim, one Nŭngsŏng Ku, and three unidentified members.158 Clearly, the members of the two above groups derived from a small segment of inmigrants and drew strength not only by multiple marital ties among themselves but also with native Andong Kwŏn. Compared to the founders of the Hall for Communal Archery, they had further consolidated their local standing by examination success and

106

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

subsequent office holding. It was they and their descendants, joined by an enlarged inmigrant constituency, who emerged as its principal officers when, in the early sixteenth century, the restored Hall for Communal Archery was confirmed as the site of the Andong Local Bureau (further discussed in chapter 9). In sum, toward the end of the fifteenth century the country’s rural areas had undergone a first phase of transformation, and not just in Andong and Namwŏn. In-migrating newcomers gradually weakened or even replaced indigenous descent groups, even though the former may initially have depended on the latter’s economic resources. In Andong, at least, there were as yet no clear signs of social polarization. By joining together agnates and affines, an emerging sajok elite formed alliances that stabilized their socioeconomic standing and satisfied their status-based claim to local leadership. In addition, they were continuously seeking examination degrees and government positions and thus defined their relationship toward the state. It was the descendants of these self-confident early leaders who further expanded and strengthened their descent groups’ rural holdings in the sixteenth century, to be discussed in the next chapter.

Ch a p ter 5

Consolidation of Localized Elites in Mid-Dynasty The Social Dimensions

T

he previous chapter outlined the ancestral origins of indigenous and in-migrating elite descent groups of the Andong and Namwŏn areas and their fate at the national and local levels during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition and the fifteenth century. This chapter will discuss the activities of their descendants, who settled permanently in Andong and Namwŏn and consolidated their communities into the seventeenth century. It starts out by briefly profiling the official lives of the principal actors. The development of their economic bases will be discussed in chapter 6.

Localized Elites of Andong Localization meant settlement in a named village that then turned into a status-supporting locus of identification for its inhabitants (further discussed in chapter 11). Indeed, it became common to talk about the Ŭisŏng Kim of Naeap, the Andong Kwŏn of Yu’gok, the Kwangsan Kim of Och’ŏn, and the Chinsŏng Yi of On’gye. Members of all four descent groups continue to populate the pages of the Yŏnggaji—surely a reliable indication that they had consolidated their eminence on the local scene by the early seventeenth century. In addition, rich documentary evidence is available for tracing in some detail their local activities, with which they underpinned their local standing. As has become clear from the previous chapter, however, they alone did not constitute the entire local sajok elite. Others, like the P’ungsan Yu of Hahoe, the Yŏngyang Nam, the Hŭnghae

108

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

Pae, the Ponghwa Kŭm, the Chaeryŏng Yi of Yŏnghae, and collateral branches of the Andong Kwŏn, to mention only a few, figured equally prominently as leading actors in Andong’s closely knit elite community. The Ŭisŏng Kim of Naeap (Ch’ŏnjŏn) Kim Yŏng-myŏng’s eldest grandson, Man-gŭn (1446–1500), was the first to settle in Ch’ŏnjŏn (in Korean, Naeap), “in front of the river,”1 a village so called because it was (and still is) situated at the confluence of two arms of the Naktong River in Imha Subcounty some twelve kilometers east of Andong City. As the son-in-law of a powerful local magnate, O Kye-dong,2 Man-gŭn inherited through his wife a sizable landed property that became the economic nucleus of the Naeap Kim’s early local activities. Although Man-gŭn obtained a lower examination degree (chinsa) in 1477, he never served in government and became known as “the one who first lived in obscurity” (siŭn pulsa).3 Man-gŭn had three sons.4 It was with the descendants of Man-gŭn’s second son, Ye-bŏm (1479–1570), that the Naeap Kim, as they came to be popularly known, started to flourish. (See chapter 4 and genealogical chart B.4.) Ye-bŏm’s eldest son, Chin (1500–1580),5 is revered as the apical ancestor of the five major cadet branches (p’a) that emerged from Naeap. For him, a lengthy biography exists.6 Said to have been born with a memorable physique, Chin started to study the classics at the age of sixteen under the guidance of a paternal aunt’s husband, [Andong] Kwŏn Kan (n.d.).7 He was apparently equally encouraged in his studies by his father-inlaw, Min Se-gyŏng (n.d.),8 whose younger brother, Se-jŏng (1471–?), was a graduate of the Recommendation Examination of 1519. In 1525, Chin was the first Naeap Kim to earn a saengwŏn degree, and, while studying at the National Confucian Academy in Seoul, he befriended such important future scholars as Kim In-hu (1510–60).9 For unstated reasons,10 Chin gave up preparing for the munkwa examinations, however, and retired to Andong to supervise the education of his sons. He also was an early adept of Confucianstyle rituals and reportedly followed Zhu Xi’s prescriptions closely when he buried his parents (further discussion in chapter 8). In his old age, Chin relocated to his estate in Ch’ŏnggi at the foot of Yongdu Mountain in Yŏnghae County—a mountainous area east of Andong bordering on the East Sea, where “the children of the common folk know nothing of learning when young, and grow up seeking profit in stealing and laziness.” Chin therefore ordered the building of schools. When he felt his end near, he returned to Naeap, where he died in 1580. As one who “nurtured his virtue in obscurity” (ŭndŏkcha), his name, as his biographer noted with regret, did not become widely known in the world. Nevertheless, Chin, by virtue of the achievements of his sons, was later honored posthumously with official titles. A rare portrait of the period (dated ca. 1572, fig. 5.1), which shows him sitting on a tiger skin, attired in a dark blue coat and wearing a Koryŏ-style wide-brimmed hat, was installed in Sabin Sŏwŏn, a private academy built by his descendants and the local Confucian com­ munity in 1685, where he, together with his five sons, is ritually remembered until the present day.11 His lineal descendants are, after Chin’s pen name, known as the Ch’ŏnggye branch (p’a) of the Ŭisŏng Kim.

Fig. 5.1 Late sixteenth-century portrait of Kim Chin at age seventy-two (photograph by the author).

110

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

Kim Chin laid the intellectual as well as the economic basis for the extraordinary success of his descendants: all five of his sons12 were disciples of T’oegye Yi Hwang (see chapter 7), three of them later munkwa graduates and two saengwŏn degree holders. Known as “the five Kim dragons,” they are all recorded in the Yŏnggaji. Each one of them eventually became the apical ancestor of an independent subsegment within the Ch’ŏnggye branch.13 (See genealogical charts B.5 and B.6.) Chin’s eldest son, Kŭg-il (1522–85), called “divine boy” (sindong) for his intellectual gifts, passed the munkwa at the age of twenty-five in 1546; thereafter, he was appointed county magistrate and later advanced to head (senior third rank) of the Royal Provisions Department (Naejasi). He earned high praise for his scholarship and reportedly was deeply interested in educational matters. As the main-line heir, he resided in Naeap. His wife was the daughter of Yi Wi (n.d.), a capital official, from whom he received considerable wealth.14 The second munkwa graduate was Sŏng-il (1538–93), better known under his pen name Hakpong. He first studied with his father, but at the age of nineteen sought T’oegye’s instruction. With his mind set on pure learning, he apparently did not intend to prepare for the examinations, but, encouraged by T’oegye, finally passed the munkwa examinations in 1568 and embarked on an illustrious official career. He occasionally took leave from his duties to look after his old father, widowed since 1546, and to read books with friends in the tranquility of Buddhist monasteries. In 1581, he moved to his wife’s residence in Kŭmgye-ri,15 a village west of Andong City—his descendants consequently came to be known as the Kŭmgye Kim—and, during a lull in his career between 1586 and 1588 he devoted himself entirely to family matters and community service in Andong. In 1588, he returned to court and died in 1593 of illness while defending Chinju against the Japanese onslaught.16 Pog-il (1541–91), Chin’s fifth son and the third munkwa graduate (in 1570), spent most of his life, despite occasional official assignments, in neighboring Yech’ŏn County, where both his wives, a Yech’ŏn Kwŏn and Kwŏn Pŏl’s grand-niece, lived; he eventually settled in Kŭmgok.17 Chin’s second son, Su-il (1528–83), married to a Hanyang Cho, did not go beyond the lower examinations. He settled in Naeap and at one time served as head of the Andong Local Bureau (Yuhyangso). Disliking political life, however, he soon resigned and built a pavilion in Puam, where he entertained elders and friends. “Forgetting the world, he managed his house.” For his exemplary conduct, he was recommended for office, but died in Seoul at the age of fifty-six.18 Like all his brothers, Myŏng-il (1534–70), too, studied with T’oegye and, though sickly, passed the sama examinations together with Sŏng-il and Pog-il in 1564; he died six years later. His wife, an eighth-generation descendant of [Yŏngyang] Nam Min-saeng, survived her deceased husband by thirty-eight years.19 Due to his martial talents Chin’s secondary son, Yŏn-il (n.d.), passed the military examinations (mukwa) and held a minor military post.20 Like their brothers, Chin’s three daughters are remembered for observing exacting moral values. The oldest, the wife of Yu Sŏng,21 who lived in the neighboring village of Musil (Su’gok), excelled in “wifely virtue” (pudŏk). When she lost her husband at age twenty-five, local lore tells, she cut her hair and mourned day and night, arranged the



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

111

funeral according to the ritual prescriptions of the Jiali, and during the three-year mourning period visited the grave twice a month despite its considerable distance from her house. Even thereafter she continued mourning, abstaining from healthy food, until she got so ill that her father admonished her to eat meat. She answered him: “How do I dare not to follow my father’s order? Yet, to eat meat and live on for a while is not as good as to starve for a quick death!” Thereupon, she stopped eating and died. When her story was reported at court, her family was honored with a commemorative arch (chŏngmun) in 1635.22 Her two sons, Pok-ki (1555–1617) and Pong-nip (?–1592), were then raised and educated by their maternal uncle, Kim Sŏng-il.23 (See genealogical chart B.14.) Kim Chin’s second daughter was married to [Chinsŏng] Yi Pong-ch’un (1542–1625),24 and the third to [Munhwa] Yu Nan (n.d.). Both lived in Ilchik Subcounty. Each of Chin’s five sons was later revered as the apical ancestor of a subbranch of the Ch’ŏnggye kin group, named after their respective pen names: Yakpong-p’a, Kwibongp’a, Unam-p’a, Hakpong-p’a, and Namak-p’a. (See genealogical chart B.4.) This segmentation came about not only because of the prestige of the individual founders. By marrying uxorilocally, Myŏng-il, Sŏng-il, and Pog-il moved away from Naeap and thus established their own localized subbranches. From a genealogical point of view, Kŭg-il’s line (Yakpong-p’a) was, as the senior descent line of the Ch’ŏnggye branch and in charge of the principal ancestral shrine (sadang) in Naeap, ritually the most prestigious. Yet, the members of Sŏng-il’s descent line (Hakpong-p’a) could, due to their ancestor’s intellectual and political eminence, claim social superiority; they were later not only numerically the most fertile but also in terms of degree holders the most successful. In contrast, the comparative weakness of Myŏng-il’s and Pog-il’s lines stemmed from their low examination performance—a deficit of achieved distinction that translated into lower social and ritual profiles. They did not maintain separate ancestral shrines.25 Kim Chin’s descendants in the next four generations, spanning the second half of the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries, continued to prosper even though their munkwa success diminished. Kŭg-il did not have a son and adopted Su-il’s second son, Ch’ŏl (1569–1616), a chinsa of 1603, to succeed the main line.26 Su-il’s first son, Yong (1557–1620), is said to have been studious from an early age, passed the munkwa examinations in 1590, and advanced to high office. His wife was one of T’oegye’s granddaughters,27 with whom he had six sons, the eldest of whom, Si-ju (1575–1617), was a munkwa graduate of 1613.28 None of Sŏng-il’s three sons passed an examination or held an appointed office, yet two of his three daughters married munkwa graduates who later occupied high offices.29 (See genealogical charts B.5 and 6.) It was the generation of Ch’ŏl’s eldest son, Si-on (1598–1669), the main-line heir, that suffered the shock of the Ming collapse and the disgrace of Korea’s surrender to the Manchus in 1637. Living withdrawn from worldly affairs, he dedicated himself to learning, winning for himself the reputation of a “true gentleman in obscurity.” In his old age, he retired to the ancestral estate in Ch’ŏnggi, where he built a retreat (chŏngsa).30 Si-on had six sons and four daughters from his first wife, a P’ungsan Kim (1593–1633), whose family had a strong record of government service. With his second wife, a Yŏngyang Nam, he had two more sons and three daughters. Despite his numerous progeny, only one son, Pang-gŏl (1623–95), was a munkwa graduate (1660) and an office holder.31 (See genealogical chart B.5.)

112

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

The Andong Kwŏn of Yu’gok The Andong Kwŏn of Yu’gok (in present-day Ponghwa County) derive their prestige from Kwŏn Pŏl (1478–1548), who was an eleventh-generation descendant of Su-hong and a sixth-generation descendant of In, the ancestor of the P’ansŏgong subsegment within Su-hong’s Pog’yagong-p’a. (See genealogical charts B.2 and 3.) Because his father, Sa-bin (1449–1535), a saengwŏn degree holder of 1472, resided uxorilocally,32 Pŏl was born as the second son in his mother’s home in Togich’on-ri to the north of Andong City.33 His mother’s kinsmen, the P’ap’yŏng Yun, belonged to the long-established capital aristocracy, and Pŏl’s matrilateral cousin34 was chosen as King Chungjong’s second queen in 1507. This close connection to the royal house eventually ruined Pŏl’s career in Seoul and, in fact, his life. After taking the saengwŏn degree in 1496, he passed the munkwa in 1504, yet was stripped of his success because he had used in his answer a Chinese character that had been proscribed by the paranoid Yŏnsan’gun. He retook the examination in 1507 and rapidly advanced, under his maternal family’s patronage, from censorial and ministerial offices to fifth royal secretary (senior third rank) in 1518—an honor he unsuccessfully tried to decline. Within a few months, he was further promoted to first royal secretary and in the early months of 1519 was appointed in swift succession to the leading offices of second minister (junior second rank) in the Ministry of Rites and third minister in the Office of Ministers-without-Portfolio (senior second rank). Worried about the threatening clouds he saw rising on the political horizon, in the summer of the same year, he asked to be assigned to the magistracy of Samch’ŏk (Kangwŏn Province) and thus was not in the capital when the Purge of 1519 erupted. Identified, however, as a collaborator of Cho Kwang-jo, the chief victim of 1519, Pŏl was briefly imprisoned and then dismissed from office and ordered to return home.35 During the thirteen years of political exile, Pŏl moved to Yu’gok (in Korean, Taksil) in Naesŏng Subcounty, north of Andong City, where he developed his landed estate. Later, he also founded a mountain estate (sanjang) in the fertile eastern Ch’unyang Subcounty, which would be further expanded by his two sons.36 In 1533, he was recalled to the capital by special royal favor and eventually advanced to the illustrious position of fifth state councilor (junior first rank). He accompanied the winter solstice mission to China in 1540 and, upon his return, was rewarded with a senior second rank as well as with land and slaves. With the accession of King Myŏngjong (r. 1545–67),37 however, Pŏl’s official career ended abruptly for a second time. He was stripped of rank and office and once again sent home. Two years later, in 1547, suspected of having slandered Myŏngjong’s mother, he was punished with exile, first to Kurye in Chŏlla Province, later to distant T’aech’ŏn, and at last to Sakchu in northern P’yŏngan Province. He died there in 1548 and was later buried a short distance from Yu’gok. Some twenty years later, in 1567, he was fully rehabilitated and granted the honorary position of a second state councilor (senior first rank) and the posthumous title (siho) “loyal and determined” (ch’ungjŏng) the following year.38 Pŏl’s wife, [Hwasun] Ch’oe-ssi (?–1531),39 bore two sons and one daughter. The oldest son, Tong-bo (1518–92), early recognized for his literary talents, received, due to his father’s prestige, a protection appointment as keeper (ch’ambong) of King T’aejong’s tomb



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

113

before he passed the sama examinations in 1543. His rise in office was disrupted by his father’s death in disgrace, and only after the latter’s rehabilitation did he resume an official career that ended as a county magistrate. Tong-bo did not, however, enjoy his official life and withdrew to his estate in Yu’gok, where he passed his days in leisure. With his enormous wealth he organized sumptuous feasts for his friends, celebrating poetry and music. In a scenic spot, he constructed a retreat, Sŏkch’ŏn Chŏngsa. When he grew too old to go around on foot, he was carried there in a sedan chair. To his great regret, he did not have an heir and therefore adopted his younger brother’s second son, Nae (1562–1617), as the main-line heir.40 Kwŏn Pŏl’s second son, Tong-mi (1525–85), a chinsa of 1568, held various minor offices in the central government and was later appointed a county magistrate. Despite his frequent absences from home, he was able to expand his landed estates considerably, as becomes evident from the large property he left to his four sons and one daughter (discussed in chapter 6).41 His eldest son, Ch’ae2 (1557–99), seems to have neither earned a degree nor held any office,42 but continued to husband the family’s wealth. He is said to have exhibited the air of a “worthy” (hyŏnin), always preoccupied with creating harmony among family and kin and assisting the needy.43 Ch’ae’s younger brother, Nae, the adopted heir to Kwŏn Pŏl’s main line, aspired to the examinations from an early age, but despite his reputed learning in the classics and history failed them several times. Disappointed, he retired to his home and led a life of leisure with his friends, among them Yi T’oegye’s grandson, Yi Yŏng-do (1559–1637), his sister’s husband.44 It was in particular from among Nae’s descendants, even though not in the main line, that most of the eighteen munkwa and thirty-nine sama graduates in Kwŏn Pŏl’s posterity emerged. The Kwangsan Kim of Och’ŏn Kim Mu, the first Kwangsan Kim to take up residence in the Andong area as in-marrying son-in-law, had four sons, two of whom had no offspring, and it was thus the descendants of his third son, Sung-ji (n.d.), who eventually established the Kwangsan Kim as a powerful localized elite group. (See genealogical chart B.10.) One of Mu’s sons-in-law was the [Ŭisŏng] Kim Yŏng-myŏng mentioned earlier. Sung-ji’s grandson, Hyo-ro (1454–1534), passed the saengwŏn examination in 1480 and, because his father-in-law had reached the upper limit of advancement in the general officialdom, received a senior ninth-rank office.45 Intimidated by the Purge of 1498, however, he did not pursue an official career and lived most of his life in Och’ŏn, a village (popularly called Oenae) he founded (pokkŏ) in Yean County; he is thus recognized as the ancestor of the Och’ŏn Kim. Because he was made the heir of his sonless great-uncle, Hyo-ji (d. 1480), in 1460, he commanded considerable wealth.46 With Hyo-ro’s elder son, Yŏn2 (1487–1544), the line began to prosper. Yŏn passed the sama examinations in 1510 and, nine years later, in 1519, the munkwa, whereupon he began a distinguished official career. Yŏn befriended such prominent contemporaries as famous scholar-official Yi Ŏn-jŏk (1491–1553) and Kwŏn Pŏl and apparently sympathized with Cho Kwang-jo. In 1537, he was appointed second censor, then served in several magistracies, and in 1542 advanced to the post of governor of Kangwŏn Province (junior

114

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

second rank). Two years later he was transferred to the special magistracy of Kyŏngju, where he died in office. Yŏn was prominently tied by affinal links to the prosperous kin groups of the area, among them the Ŭisŏng Kim.47 Yŏn’s younger brother, Yu (1491–1555), though a saengwŏn of 1525, was reportedly more interested in martial arts. But, failing the military examinations, he renounced the “pursuit of fame in the world” and could afford, due to his adoptive father’s strong economic standing, to spend the rest of his life in leisure.48 Hyo-ro’s son-in-law, [Ponghwa] Kŭm Chae (n.d.),49 moved to his wife’s home, and thus the Kim and the Kŭm came to live side by side in Och’ŏn. (See genealogical chart B.15.) Yŏn’s first son, Pu-p’il (1516–77), a saengwŏn of 1537, did not hold office and lived in “obscurity.” As one of T’oegye’s disciples, he gained respect through his virtuous conduct and his devotion to the “learning of the sages and worthies.” His younger brother, Pu-ŭi (1525–82), passed the sama examinations in 1555 but, like his brother, did not pursue an active government career. Rather, he devoted himself to learning, rituals, and communal affairs. Because Pu-p’il did not have male issue with his wife, [Chinju] Ha-ssi, he adopted Pu-ŭi’s only son, Hae (1555–93), whom he had raised because Hae’s mother had died a few days after his birth. Hae, thus, became the main-line heir and the chief inheritor of considerable wealth. Although he passed the munkwa examinations in 1589, his service in government was brief, and he retired to the countryside to spend his energy on scholarship. In 1592, he was active in organizing local resistance to the Japanese invaders and died of illness one year later. His wife was the daughter of one of T’oegye’s collateral nephews.50 The eldest of his four sons, Kwang-gye (1580–1646), took charge of the ancestral trust and studied with the luminaries of his time. Dismayed with the political turmoil during Kwanghae’gun’s reign (r. 1608–23), he did not seek office. He later raised local troops against the Manchu and bemoaned the surrender of the country to barbarian rulers. Because he did not have a male heir, he adopted one of his second brother’s sons.51 The Chinsŏng Yi of Chuch’on and On’gye Although among Yi Cha-su’s descendants there were a few chinsa examination graduates who held local appointments, none seems to have obtained a position in the capital. Cha-su’s great-grandson, Kye-yang (1424–88), a chinsa of 1453, moved as an in-marrying husband 52 from Chuch’on to Yean County, where he founded (pokkŏ) the village of On’gye and developed a large landed estate. He thus became the founder of the Yean sub­ branch of the Chinsŏng Yi.53 (See genealogical chart B.7.) The On’gye Yi reached the zenith of their power and influence with Kye-yang’s grandson, Yi Hwang (1501–70), better known by his pen name, T’oegye. T’oegye was the youngest son of the marriage between Sik (1441–1502) and his second wife, a Ch’unch’ŏn Pak.54 Because Sik died early, T’oegye was educated by his uncle, Yi U (1469–1517). After succeeding in the chinsa examination in 1523 and the munkwa in 1534, T’oegye commenced an illustrious official career, acting as the confidant and advisor of two kings. He retired from active service in the mid-1550s and devoted the rest of his life to refining his philosophy and establishing a school that counted among its students a large number of the scions of Andong’s localized descent groups. With his teachings, T’oegye



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

115

profoundly shaped the intellectual and the ritual atmosphere of the northern part of Kyŏngsang Province (discussed in chapter 7). With his first wife, the daughter of the mighty Hŏ Ch’an (1481–1535),55 T’oegye had two sons, Chun (1523–83) and Ch’ae (1527– 48). The latter died at the age of twenty-one without issue, however, and T’oegye’s second marriage to an Andong Kwŏn remained childless. It was thus Chun who carried on the family line. He married the local Kŭm Chae’s daughter and had three sons and two daughters, the younger of whom became the wife of [Ŭisŏng] Kim Yong.56 Although active on the local scene, none of T’oegye’s descendants later earned national fame. (See genealogical chart B.8.) The main-line descendants of Kye-yang’s older brother, U-yang (1469–1517), continued to live in Chuch’on (known as the Chuch’on Yi). U-yang was a military exam graduate of 1460 and later a county magistrate, but none of his immediate descendants passed the civil service examinations, holding only minor offices. Instead, they concentrated on developing their estate. The Chuch’on Yi’s most prominent member in the sixteenth century was T’oegye’s younger contemporary and U-yang’s sixth-generation descendant, Yi Chŏng-hoe (1543–1612). His mother was [Ŭisŏng] Kim Chin’s younger sister. Young Chŏng-hoe received T’oegye’s instruction, but he did not pursue the examination path, and after his father’s early death in 1563 he lived with his five sisters and one brother in the same household, sharing the economic activities. Upon his mother’s urging, he was briefly recommended for office, but his government career was cut short by her death in 1578. Later, as a reward for his efforts in securing a correction of the erroneous recording of the royal ancestry in the Statutes of the Great Ming (Da Ming huidian) in China (1589), he received merit subject status (Kwangguk wŏnjong kongsin) in 1590. A year later, he was appointed magistrate of Hoengsŏng (Kangwŏn Province), and during the Imjin War he led a militia corps. Despite his official career, however, Yi Chŏng-hoe devoted his energy to local affairs. He kept a copious diary, Songgan ilgi, in which he recounted his manifold activities from 1577 until his death in 1612—a priceless record that illuminates his role as an outstanding community leader who left a lasting mark on Andong’s history.57 (See genealogical chart B.7.) The Chaeryŏng Yi of Yŏnghae Although Yŏnghae, a county east of Andong, does not lie within the purview of this study, the Chaeryŏng Yi who settled there in the early sixteenth century will play an eminent role throughout and therefore have to be briefly introduced. Originally indigenous (t’osŏng) to Chaeryŏng-gun, Hwanghae Province, the Yi began to move south during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition and advanced with Yi Maeng-hyŏn (1436–87), a munkwa graduate of 1460, into the central bureaucracy. One of his sons, Ae (1480–1561), upon his father’s early death, followed his paternal uncle to his place of office, Yŏnghae, and married the daughter of a locally powerful kin group, the Chinbo Paek-ssi. Ae, thus, was the “in-migrating ancestor” of the Yŏnghae branch of the Chaeryŏng Yi and settled in Illyang-ri, a village popularly known as Nara’gol. Ae’s grandson, Yi Ham (1554–1632), who married a sister of [Chinsŏng] Yi Chŏng-hoe, became the main-line heir upon the early death of his elder brother. It was from his generation that the Yi flourished

116

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

economically as well as intellectually. With his five sons marrying locally, the Yi came to be tied to Andong’s most prominent descent groups. Ham’s grandson, Yi Hyŏn-il (1627– 1704), earned fame as the T’oegye school’s most articulate representative in the seventeenth century.58 (See genealogical chart B.17.)

Localized Elites of Namwŏn The Yongsŏngji endorsed the long-standing local practice (still observed today) that ranks Namwŏn’s prominent kin groups according to their influence and power in their localities. At the top of the list stand, in graded sequence (although the sequence may slightly change according to the beholder), the Chŏnju Yi of Tundŏk, the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe of Tundŏk, the (Kyŏnggi) Kwangju Yi of Sariban, and the P’ungch’ŏn No of Twinnae; the Ch’angwŏn Chŏng of Tarisil and the Sunhŭng An of Ant’ŏ are often added. All six are closely identified with the villages in which they resided.59 The Changsu Hwang of Chup’o are included here because of the rich stock of documents they left to posterity. The Chŏnju Yi of Tundŏk In Tundŏk, Yi Tam-son’s grandson, Yi Tae-yun (1530–96), was the only munkwa graduate (in 1585) of his line in the sixteenth century and ended his official career as a ministerial section chief (senior fifth rank). (See genealogical chart B.18.) His immediate descendants, his son Yŏp (1552–1613) and his grandson Yu-hyŏng (1586–1656), entered the bureaucracy through protection appointments. Yu-hyŏng, later a sama graduate and minor official, was also noted for his filial behavior. So was his adopted son, Mun-ju (1623–57).60 It was with two outstanding personalities that the Tundŏk Yi marked their eminent position in the seventeenth century: Yi Sang-hyŏng and Yi Mun-jae. Reportedly gifted with an outstanding intelligence, Yi Sang-hyŏng (1585–1645), Tam-son’s fifth-generation descendant and Yu-hyŏng’s third cousin, was a sama (1612) and munkwa (1625) graduate and earned fame as an eminent scholar. As a revered elder, he also had a decisive voice in local matters.61 Among his large progeny—six sons and three daughters—only his third son, Mun-jae (1615–89), earned a lower degree, but, not keen on public office, became instead one of the most influential local leaders of the Namwŏn area in the mid-seventeenth century.62 The Sangnyŏng Ch’oe of Tundŏk Among the descendants of Ch’oe Su-ung, the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe’s pioneer settler in Tundŏk, the first to succeed in the examinations (sama in 1528 and munkwa in 1537) was his grandson Ŏn-su (1500–1550), who subsequently advanced to the office of fourth censor in the Office of the Censor General (senior sixth rank).63 (See genealogical chart B.19.) Two of Ŏn-su’s four sons were also munkwa graduates, but the line of his second son remained sonless and consequently died out, and the third son moved out of the Namwŏn region.64 It was thus Ŏn-su’s grandson, Sang-jung (1551–1604),65 who not only graced the



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

117

family name with examination success (sama in 1576 and munkwa in 1589) but also brought forth three sons who counted among the most distinguished leaders in Namwŏn in the first half of the seventeenth century.66 His second son, Yŏn (1576–1651), passed the lower and munkwa examinations in the same year (1603) but started his official career after 1636. Because both the son and grandson of his elder brother, Po (1574–1634),67 died in short succession, leaving the main line without heir, the ancestral trust was transferred to Yŏn. His wife was a Namwŏn Ryang.68 His younger brother, On (1583–1658), a sama graduate of 1609, had no political aspirations, but, recommended for office as a ”recluse,” started the most remarkable career of all the Tundŏk Ch’oe (discussed in chapter 10). His first wife was the daughter of the famous scholar Chang Kyŏng-se (see below). Lacking a male heir, On adopted Yŏn’s second son, Yu-ji (1603–73). His strict adherence to moral values made “people stand in awe, yet they love him”—truly the image of a charismatic leader. At an undetermined point in time he moved to Nobong in nearby Sadong-bang, where some of his descendants came to be known as the Nobong Ch’oe. A great-greatgrandson, however, moved back and settled permanently in Tundŏk.69 One of Sang-jung’s three daughters, married to [P’ungch’ŏn] No Ch’ŏl (n.d.), is remembered in the Yongsŏngji as a “chaste woman” (yŏllyŏ). After her husband’s early death, she brought up her seven children alone, taking charge of the domestic duties in a “man-like fashion.” When young, she used to listen in when her brother On was studying, and “what she heard once, she never forgot until old age. She thoroughly grasped the meaning of the old and new classical and ritual literature, yet never discussed them in front of others. When she grew old, she took up the books again to divert herself in her solitude.” Indeed, she received the respect commonly due to a male teacher, and her con­temporaries admiringly called her “a gentleman among women.”70 Yŏn’s older son, Hwi-ji (1598–1669), began his studies at an early age and passed the sama examinations in 1624—not because he desired to enter government service, his biographer noted, but because he obeyed parental orders. He later was recommended for office for his filiality, talents, and exemplary behavior, but, disillusioned with the world after Korea’s defeat by the Manchus, returned to Namwŏn. As the eldest son, he mourned his parents with great strictness according to the Jiali. Later called to Seoul, he briefly held a low-level appointment, but, answering no further summonses, he devoted himself to domestic affairs. Concerned about scholarship deteriorating to “empty words,” Hwi-ji never tired of instructing others, and with his considerable wealth he supported needy relatives and arranged proper marriages. In old age he formed with a few friends the Club of the Nine Elders (Kurohoe) and built a platform above the nearby brook to enjoy the scenery, sing songs, and compose poetry.71 Of Ch’oe Hwi-ji’s five sons, three must be briefly mentioned here because they dominated Namwŏn affairs in the late seventeenth and early part of the eighteenth centuries. Both Ch’i-ong (1635–83) and his younger brother, Kye-ong (1654–1720), passed the munkwa (in 1660 and 1681 respectively) and pursued official careers.72 It was, however, the fourth son, Si-ong (1646–1730), who, without ever taking a degree, was not only a renowned scholar but also one of Namwŏn’s most commanding leaders. Though enjoying nationwide reputation, he considered himself a “rusticated idler,” not fit to associate himself with officials at court.73

118

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

The Kwangju Yi of Sarib’an It was Yi Tŏg-yŏl’s (1534–99)74 widow, [Ch’ŏngp’ung] Kim-ssi (1567–1637),75 who moved to Chup’o-bang in 1618, where some of her husband’s matrilateral kin, the Namyang Pang, lived, and established the Kwangju Yi in the Namwŏn area. Though Tŏg-yŏl had never lived in Namwŏn, as the scion of a long-standing aristocratic descent group holding power over generations in Seoul,76 his name bestowed enormous prestige on his three sons. Two of them passed the sama exams (in 1610 and 1633), but only Sa-hŏn (n.d.), Tŏg-yŏl’s third son,77 seems to have held a minor office. The Yongsŏngji lists the two others as “recluses.” Sa-hŏn’s descendants continued to live in and around Namwŏn. One of his sons and one grandson passed the munkwa in the seventeenth century. A sixthgeneration descendant finally settled in Sarib’an (Chŏkkwa-bang) at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Because the Sarib’an Yi alone carry on the descent line of Tŏg-yŏl’s father, Chun-gyŏng,78 they revere him rather than Tŏg-yŏl’s adoptive father as their “distinguished ancestor” (hyŏnjo)79—a choice that guaranteed them continuous prestige and high standing in the Namwŏn community. The P’ungch’ŏn No of Twinnae (Huch’ŏn) The P’ungch’ŏn No, residing in Huch’ŏn (in Korean, Twinnae) in Wŏnch’ŏn-bang, won recognition as one of Namwŏn’s foremost kin groups through No Chin (1518–78), who advanced to top ministerial posts during the last two decades of his life. Although he never lived in Namwŏn, his mother was a daughter of [Sunhŭng] An Ki (see below), and it is perhaps through some inheritance that his grandson, Uk (1588–1644), settled the P’ungch’ŏn No in Twinnae at the beginning of the seventeenth century. One of Chin’s great-grandsons, Hyŏng-ha (1620–54), was the first No on Namwŏn’s list of munkwa graduates. His mother was Ch’oe Sang-jung’s daughter, whom the Yongsŏngji mentioned in the rubric “chaste women.” His son, Sik (1653–1715), received a royal citation for his extreme filiality toward his father, who died early. Sik was too young to wear mourning, but later he mourned for him for the rest of his life.80 The Sunhŭng An of Ant’ŏ (Naegi) The Sunhŭng An enjoyed a special reputation as a highly cultured descent group due to their renowned ancestor An Hyang (1243–1306), who was one of the first transmitters of Neo-Confucianism to Korea. The An were already settled in the Namwŏn area when An Ki (1451–97), an eighth-generation descendant of An Hyang,81 was awarded the munkwa degree in 1495 and went on to serve as a librarian (senior sixth rank) in the National Confucian Academy. After his early death in the capital, his wife, [Choyang] Im-ssi, returned with her children to Namwŏn and settled in Ant’ŏ (popularly known as Naegi) in Kŭman-bang. Ki’s youngest son, Ch’ŏ-sun (1492–1534), a precocious early learner, passed the chinsa at twenty and the munkwa two years later, and subsequently entered the Office of the Special Counselors. Listed by the Yongsŏngji as one of the “famous worthies of 1519,” he survived the Purge of 1519, but retired to the countryside. The An



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

119

were closely related by marriage to the Twinnae No. No Chin’s father had married one of An Ki’s daughters, and Chin in turn took one of An Ch’ŏ-sun’s daughters as his wife— making for that time a surprising matrilateral cross-cousin marriage. Ch’ŏ-sun’s only son, Chŏn (1518–71), is listed as a “recluse” (yuil) who “hid his virtue and shunned office.” He won fame with his literary style “the elegance of which the world extolled.” One of Ch’ŏ-sun’s great-grandsons, Yŏng, died a hero’s death in 1592 and was honored with a commemorative arch and posthumous titles.82 The Ch’angwŏn Chŏng of Tarisil (Wŏlgok) The Ch’angwŏn Chŏng made their first appearance in the Namwŏn area with Chŏng Yŏn-bang (n.d.), a supreme general (sangho’gun) in the late Koryŏ, who settled in Chinjŏn-bang (northeast of Namwŏn) as an in-marrying son-in-law.83 Both Yŏn-bang’s son and grandson had military careers, but his great-grandson Han-u (?–1447) received a minor appointment on the strength of his outstanding behavior, filiality, and brother­ liness.84 Among his fourth-generation descendants were a few personalities who exerted lasting influence on Namwŏn’s political and cultural life: Chŏng Hwan (1498–1540)85 and Chŏng Hwang (1512–60). Both were munkwa graduates (in 1528 and 1536, respectively). Hwang advanced in office to first secretary (senior fourth rank) in the Council of State, but, embroiled in factional intrigues around royal succession after King Chungjong’s death in 1545, he was sent into exile, where he spent the last fourteen years of his life. For his integrity as an official and his extensive scholarship, the Tarisil Chŏng made him their “distinguished ancestor” (hyŏnjo).86 The Changsu Hwang and the Hŭngdŏk Chang of Chup’o Hwang Kae (1468–1540) was, as mentioned earlier, the first Changsu Hwang to settle in Chup’o as an in-marrying son-in-law around 1500. Lacking a son, he adopted as his heir the third son, Yun-gong (1517–55), of his first cousin, who resided in the capital. The fact that Kae had to go as far as Seoul to find an adoptive son indicates that Kae did not have any kinsmen closer by. Yun-gong (a first cousin of Hwang Yun-gil)87 married within his adoptive village. He wed the only child of his matrilateral cross-cousin, Pang Ŭng-sŏng,88 that is, he took his wife not only from consanguineous kin but also from a generation below his own—certainly an unusual union at the beginning of the sixteenth century.89 Both his two sons, Chŏk (1541–91)90 and Chin (1550–93), were military men, but only the latter passed the military examinations in 1576 and died a hero’s death in 1593. Chin’s sons, Chŏng-jik (1574–1655) and Chŏng-yŏl (1578–1627), also were military examination graduates. At one time, Chŏng-jik served as assistant magistrate of Andong. Because Chŏng-jik had only two secondary sons, Hwang Chin’s line switched to Chŏng-yŏl’s only primary son, Wi (1605–54). Wi entered the civil bureaucracy as sama (1633) and munkwa (1638) degree holder—the only one of his line to do so in the seventeenth century.91 The Hwang’s neighbors in Ch’upo were descendants of [Hŭngdŏk] Chang Hap, the first Chang settler in Namwŏn. Most prominent was the scholar Chang Kyŏng-se (1547– 1615), the adoptive son of Hap’s sixth-generation descendant, Kŭp (1522–89). A saengwŏn

120

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

of 1585 and a munkwa graduate of 1589, Kyŏng-se had a rather modest official career before he retired to Namwŏn in 1603 to be active on the local scene. He and his offspring closely intermarried with the local elite. His great-grandson, Ŏp (1633–1702), a chinsa of 1662, was so respected in the Namwŏn community that the Yongsŏngji, in disregard of common rules, recorded him even though he was still “alive” (saengjon) at the time of its compilation.92 To sum up, the life stories of the individuals narrated above, though a small sample, illustrate well the principal features by which the first few generations of descendants of early Andong and Namwŏn settlers distinguished themselves and assumed leadership roles in their respective localities. Foremost was achievement at the center, at least through the first half of the seventeenth century. Whereas in Andong examination success and office holding seem to have elevated the scions of descent groups recently established in the area above their local brethren, in Namwŏn it was often the enormous ancestral prestige, acquired at the center, with which many of the in-migrants cemented their superior status vis-à-vis indigenous kin groups—an impression the in-migrantoriented Yongsŏngji liked to confirm. Noteworthy is the pivotal role widowed wives ful­ filled in ensuring the survival of their spouse’s descent line by settling in in-law localities— to them most often entirely alien terrain. Even though status confirmation by the state retained its significance, examination success and office holding nevertheless gradually became sporadic, rarely producing multiple graduates in one generation. At times, adverse political conditions in the capital even discouraged them. Under such circumstances, withdrawing from or forsaking office came to be considered a justifiable way of protecting personal integrity. Although for the duration of office holding, taking up residence at the center was inevitable, it was only temporary; it did not loosen attachment to what had become native place, and retirement therefore invariably meant returning home. But an official career, however brief, nonetheless heightened a man’s leadership potential in his village community. Alternatively, so could prestigious ancestral endowment, as illustrated by a few Namwŏn examples. “Prosperity” for localized sajok, then, came to amount to more than a political office. It equally entailed the judicious husbanding of economic resources—an aspect of life the biographers alluded to, if at all, only in terms of the antonym of economic activity— leisure. “Leisure” supported the pursuit of Confucian scholarship and ritual matters, to be discussed in later chapters. For securing and maintaining social and economic prosperity, the localized sajok needed, first of all, to seek out suitable affines.

Networking with Suitable Affines Many famous localized descent groups typically originated from uxorilocal marriages of their apical ancestors. During the uncertain times of transition from Koryŏ to early Chosŏn, the amount of landed wealth rather than the social background of a prospec-



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

121

tive bride may often have clinched a union, as it was the bridegroom’s ancestral endowment and/or political prestige that lent the marriage public respectability. Yet, even though moving into the wife’s home gave an in-migrating husband initial economic support, it also separated him from his own kinsmen. It was therefore not his brothers or cousins, but his affines who assumed a particularly significant part in his new life circumstances. At first, an occasional wife might still have come from the capital, but it was soon the circumspect tying of marital alliances with other in-migrants of similar standing that proved crucial for creating a peer network that would generate the human and material resources for an original settler’s descendants to develop their own social and economic nuclei. Take the Ŭisŏng Kim as a representative example. Kim Yŏng-myŏng, the first Ŭisŏng Kim settler’s grandson, took, as mentioned earlier, his wives from the Kwangju Yi, who had moved earlier into the Andong area,93 the Kwangsan Kim, and the Andong Kwŏn. He thus laid the foundation of the Ŭisŏng Kim’s local growth. Yŏng-myŏng’s second son, Han-ch’ŏl, linked the Ŭisŏng Kim to the Chinsŏng Yi, who in the fifteenth century resided in several villages in the northern part of P’ungsan Subcounty, by marrying his daughter to T’oegye’s father, Sik (Sik’s first marriage). Kim Chin’s grand­father, Man-gŭn, the first settler of Naeap, married uxorilocally. He and his brother-in-law, [Kwangsan] Kim Hyo-ro, received considerable economic assistance from their wealthy father-inlaw, O Kye-dong. Man-gŭn’s younger brother, Man-sin (n.d.), became the son-in-law of T’oegye’s grandfather, Yi Kye-yang. The ties to the Chinsŏng Yi were again activated in Kim Chin’s own generation when his sister married one of T’oegye’s distant cousins. Chin’s sons and grandsons continued to marry local women. Chin’s grand­son, Yong, married T’oegye’s granddaughter94 and Sŏng-il’s eldest grandson, Si-ch’u (1580–1640), one of T’oegye’s great-granddaughters. The wife of Si-ch’u’s brother, Si-gwŏn (1583–1643), was Kwŏn Pŏl’s great-granddaughter. With passing generations, the marriage radius tended to extend beyond the immediate Andong area to neighboring counties: Yŏngju in the north, Yŏnghae in the east, Ch’ŏngsong in the southeast, Ŭisŏng in the south, and Yech’ŏn in the west.95 Clearly, the affinal network spun by Chin’s antecedents as well as by his descendants, indicated in figure 5.2, closely linked the Naeap Kim to the socially most prestigious and wealthy contemporaries in the area. Close marriages with local partners were also characteristic for the other three Andong descent groups studied, as shown in figure 5.3. The Yu’gok Kwŏn, for instance, were linked to the Chinsŏng Yi by Ch’ae’s sister’s marriage to T’oegye’s grandson, Yŏng-do. There was also a double link between Kwŏn Ŭi (1475–1558), Pŏl’s older brother,96 and the Naeap Kim. Ŭi’s grandson, Uk, married Kim Myŏng-il’s only daughter, and Uk’s sister became Pog-il’s second wife—Pog-il’s main reason for eventually moving to Yech’ŏn, where his descendants continued to live. All four kin groups also entertained multiple affinal ties to other elite kin groups of the region. A recent study of marriage patterns of fifteen generations of direct heirs (chongson) in T’oegye’s descent line of the Chinsŏng Yi has confirmed the narrow circuit within which the major localized kin groups of the Andong area exchanged their daughters and sisters. In fact, of the 135 marital exchanges identified in that study, 100 took place among only thirty out of a total of sixty-five kin groups involved. Multiple marriages

Fig. 5.2 Marriages among in-migrants in Andong: Ŭisŏng Kim.



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

123

Fig. 5.3 Marriages among in-migrants in Andong: Andong Kwŏn.

were thus commonly concluded within the same generation, across generations, and sparingly with a restricted number of outside wife givers.97 A peculiarity of seventeenthcentury Andong was, moreover, as will be further discussed in chapter 7, that locally residing T’oegye disciples preferred to exchange partners among themselves. The marriage radius of the Andong elite, thus, tended to narrow, as the majority of spouses originated from the area and its surrounding counties, only rarely from across provincial boundaries. The same close networking is also discernible in Namwŏn. To be sure, some of the early marriages were, as recounted above, concluded in the capital, and even after taking up residence in Namwŏn partners initially continued to be chosen from among the capital officialdom. Nevertheless, in the course of time, marriage boundaries narrowed to county or even village limits, although such contraction never meant unions with others than one’s peers. The Sangnyŏng Ch’oe, for instance, well illustrate this fact. Ch’oe Sangjung’s wife was the daughter of [Namwŏn] Yun Ch’ung, a sama graduate of 1528, whose father and grandfather were both munkwa graduates. All three of Sang-jung’s sons married daughters who were granddaughters of munkwa graduates. The same is true for Sang-jung’s grandsons, Hwi-ji and Yu-ji. Indeed, a brief look at the marriages concluded by Ch’oe Yŏn’s sons and grandsons, outlined in figure 5.4, provides a striking example of how the selection of affines came to center almost entirely on one village. Yŏn, residing in Tundŏk, made a local marriage with a Namwŏn Ryang. His son Hwi-ji’s second wife was also a Namwŏn Ryang.98 Two generations of Hwi-ji’s offspring intermarried almost exclusively with Tundŏk Yi or Twinnae No. Hwi-ji’s third son, Ch’i-ong, married the daughter of Yi Mun-wŏn (1613– 84), Yi Sang-hyŏng’s second son, while Hwi-ji’s first daughter was wed to Sang-hyŏng’s third son, Mun-jae, Mun-wŏn’s younger brother. Curiously, Mun-jae thus seems to have wed a woman belonging to a generation below him. Ch’i-ong’s brother Kye-ong’s wife

Fig. 5.4 Marriages among Namwŏn descent groups.



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

125

was a main-line Tundŏk Yi, that is, a distant cousin of Mun-wŏn and Mun-jae. Hwi-ji’s second daughter married No Hyŏng-myŏng, a great-grandson of No Chin (who had made a matrilateral cross-cousin marriage). In the next generation, by marrying No Hyŏng-myŏng’s son, Ch’i-ong’s daughter made a long outlawed patrilateral cross-cousin marriage. Hyŏng-myŏng’s brother’s wife was a daughter of his mother’s first cousin. And, finally, the adopted son of Hwi-ji’s first son, Sŏ-ong (1618-36), took the daughter of Hyŏngmyŏng’s brother, Hyŏng-sul, as his wife. Yu-ji’s daughter in turn was married to the off­ spring of No Hyŏng-myŏng’s marriage to Ch’i-ong’s daughter. In short, the evidence points to the fact that in the Namwŏn area, extremely close marital bonds were made far into late Chosŏn.99 Marriage was expected to produce progeny to secure the continuity of the descent line, but a surprising number of couples were sonless. Even where secondary sons (sŏja) existed, not a single example of a secondary son being installed as the lineal heir has been found in the analyzed documents. Early in the dynasty, heirless lines were typically allowed thus to die out, and daughters’ sons at times performed the ritual observances for sonless maternal grandparents. Roughly from the early sixteenth century, adoption of a younger brother’s or a cousin’s son began to become common, with the result that main lines in fact often switched to junior lines. Equally conspicuous is the number of men who had, in sequence, two or three wives. This came about in most cases from the high mortality rate of young women, predominantly in childbirth. As a recent study on reproduction and life expectancy in late Chosŏn has revealed, approximately one-fifth of all young married women in their late teens and early twenties died while giving birth to their first child. Once a woman had safely survived this critical period in her life, female life expectancy was in fact higher than that of men.100 These data have undoubtedly equal relevance for earlier times. Although relations to more than one affinal group may have divided a man’s loyalties, they often also considerably increased, as detailed in the next chapter, the landed property under his control. In short, though the sample is small, it is clear that in Andong as well as in Nam­wŏn seeking affines among other in-migrant kin groups localized in the same geographic area became the preferred mode of choosing a spouse—a phenomenon observed also in other parts of the country.101 Whereas earlier the lure of a landed base was presumably in many cases a major motive for a man to migrate to a distant place, in time, when the prospect of a political career at the center as a status marker diminished, localization could have easily threatened the maintenance of elite status without prestigious marital relations. Kwŏn Yang (1628–97) therefore advised in 1692: “Generally, regardless of whether it is for the marriage partner of a daughter or a son, first investigate the family background [munbŏl], then the family’s [moral] principles [kabŏp].”102 Marriage criteria, thus, clearly shifted from the economic to the social, as a verifiable ancestral background remained the surest touchstone against which sajok status could be vetted. Contracting local marriages thus not only generated closely spun affinal networks among elite sajok, they also deepened the attachment to a locality—often a multisurname village where agnates and affines lived in close proximity. Indeed, it was the mutual conditioning of kinship and community that created the durable bases for the dynamic growth of great localized sajok descent groups in mid-Chosŏn.

126

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

The Elite and Its Secondary Offspring The marriage with a primary wife was not only to perpetuate the physical reproduction of a descent line; it also was to secure the elite’s high social standing as well as its political and economic prosperity—hence the often propagated ideal that “high” and “low” were never to mix. This ideal, however, was clearly thwarted when members of the elite took commoner or base women as secondary wives (yangch’ŏp, pich’ŏp) and begot children (sŏja, ŏlcha, ŏllyŏ). Such unions were not illegal, but, with the sharp differentiation between primary and secondary wives (ch’ŏch’ŏp) fixed by law since 1413, they often created tension and unhappiness in the inner quarters by confronting the primary wife with a potentially disagreeable competitor.103 More critically, however, they raised serious problems as to the social status of the offspring. In view of the bilateral principle upon which elite status rested, the son of a commoner or base mother lacked the maternal share of legitimacy that would make him a full-fledged member of his father’s descent group. Thus, despite his father’s elite status, the son of a commoner mother was a commoner at birth, whereas the one of a slave mother was born base.104 It was in particular the base sons who created for their elite fathers the greatest problems because, having received their fathers’ “flesh and bones,” it was “inconvenient,” as an early regulation of the Slave Review Board in 1397 formulated it, to put them to work as slaves. It consequently decreed—obviously with the capital elite in mind—that the offspring of an elite man’s own slave concubine would, as a “permanent rule,” be given commoner status (yang) at birth.105 This regulation was confirmed in 1405 and even extended retrospectively to the grandfather’s and father’s base offspring. A further proviso, however, stipulated that a base son turned “permanent” commoner would have to join, as a rankless sailor, the Office of Maritime Affairs.106 Permanent attachment to a government office was clearly a crucial limitation on acquiring commoner status. Though relieved from baseness, the candidate had nevertheless to serve in a lowly occupation far removed from the capital, and thus was effectively prevented from joining the capital officialdom, a prospect some officials had evidently feared.107 Sons of slave concubines thus suffered from the handicap that, even though made commoners, they were subject to mean duties (sinyang yŏkch’ŏn), which they had to perform while practically banished to the coasts. Despite his ministers’ continued anxiety that this arrangement might provide “bad and obstinate fellows” with an easy escape route so that they would, hiding their identity, mix with the yangban,108 the system was significantly relaxed in the first month of 1414 by King T’aejong, who granted children of slave concubines of officials of the second rank and above unconditional commoner status at birth and allowed them to advance even to rank-five offices in the bureaucracy.109 Although initially confined to the highest officialdom, three months later, T’aejong conferred commoner status on all base offspring born to “high and low officials” after 1361,110 on condition, however, that they serve in the Office of Maritime Affairs.111 In the following spring, the base sons of all ranked officials were freed from this limitation and given the opportunity to hold limited office (hanp’um sŏyong).112 T’aejong’s ostensible favoritism toward the base offspring of the members of the



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

127

ranked officialdom, among them undoubtedly his closest collaborators, encountered various objections. He was entreated to rescind the limited-office system because sympathetic fathers and elder brothers might be tempted to admit their sons and halfbrothers to their midst at court—a magnanimous gesture that would result in a mix-up of social status. Moreover, released “base fellows” might not have much loyalty toward the state and even plot against the ruler.113 Freedmen, another memorialist begged the king, should be made to intermarry solely among themselves and not with bona fide yangban, and be assigned to “miscellaneous offices” (chapchik)114 so that, fixed in their positions (pun), they would be less likely to overstep their station; in the past, the memorialist noted, those who had revolted against state and society had all come from slave ranks.115 Such deep-seated fears were evidently taken into account in later legislation. Offspring of base concubines of “high and low officials” were, under King Sejong, legally barred from intermarrying with the elite,116 and in a legislative reversal were again obliged to serve (for a limited period of time) in the newly established Auxiliary Army Unit (Poch’unggun)—a semimilitary institution said to have been created “out of pity for the base offspring of the elite.”117 Like the earlier Office of Maritime Affairs, the Auxiliary Army Unit functioned as a social clearinghouse: it gave access to commoner status, but made this change of status conditional on a period of service.118 The debates that culminated in the formulation of the laws embodied in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn of 1471 confirm the ambivalence the elite felt toward its own base offspring. Despite the general fear of the slave’s moral depravity, baseness was curiously graded according to the father’s rank in office: the higher the rank, the easier the son’s upward mobility. But such mobility was nevertheless effectively checked by the mother’s low status. The paternal heritage was not allowed to override the matrifilial rule. Only sons of the highest officials could thus hope ever to get an actual office.119 For all the others, access to the civil bureaucracy was effectively closed off. This was also true, though with less severity, for offspring of commoner secondary wives. And both categories of secondary sons were barred from the civil service examinations (munkwa).120 In sum, mechanisms were put in place by which base sons could gain release from the bondage of slavery, but were, with very few exceptions, excluded from office holding. How far then did the above legislation, which evidently targeted primarily the capital elite, affect the lot of base secondary sons in the countryside? Did sajok fathers, whether holding office or not, ever bother to comply with it? Few apparently did. Many sajok reportedly kept their base offspring at home and even put them to work, which on occasion sparked disputes among close kin. How was it possible to “violate the laws of humanity” by making the base sons of father or grandfather labor like any ordinary slaves? Herein lay the dilemma: on the one hand, the distance between father/master and son/ slave had to be carefully observed; on the other hand, family bonds forbade harsh treatment of slave half-brothers or cousins. Quarrels over finding a modus vivendi seem to have been so common that in 1554 a royal edict concerned itself with the matter. It is inopportune, it ruled, to release such menials hastily from servitude, but it is equally intolerable to end disputes by impounding them as government slaves. Whereas base half-brothers and first cousins (sach’on) are not to be coerced to work, it decided, there is no reason to

128

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

spare cousins of the fifth and sixth degree (that is, a father’s first cousins and his son’s second cousins).121 Clearly, this royal pronouncement, apparently taking particularly rural conditions into account, introduced differential treatment of base offspring according to kin distance and thus may have weakened, if not undercut, earlier legislation. After more than a hundred years of legislative maneuvering, coming to terms with the existence of base offspring could evidently not be regulated merely by legal means. After all, it was a social and emotional issue of great complexity. It involved nothing less than fixing the perimeter within which children of base mothers would be tolerated as “kin”—never, however, as someone who could address his procreator with the kin term “father.” A dividing line separating primary and secondary kin thus ran right through a descent group—a reality of status discrimination few base secondary sons were ever allowed to forget. A base son’s advancement to freedman came thus largely to depend on his father’s discretion. That this had by the eighteenth century, if not much earlier, become the norm is evident from a warning incorporated in the Sok taejŏn of 1746 that a base son not registered with the Auxiliary Army Unit would, when discovered, be impounded as a government slave so that his master would no longer be able to use his labor.122 No documents seem to be available to tell how many base sons ever were registered with the Auxiliary Army Unit. Kim Chang-yong, the base secondary son (ŏlcha) of [Kwangsan] Kim Hoe (n.d.), for instance, does not seem to have been one of them. Worrying about the fate of his five adult children, whom he had brought up with his base wife, in 1514 Chang-yong gifted them to his (primary) nephew, Yŏn, and explained his gift thus: As I had no primary offspring and was getting old, Hwang-ssi, the wife of my great-uncle Kim Hyo-ji, gave me [in 1480]123 Mundŏk, whom I made my secondary wife. With her, I raised five children [names given] for whom I feel great love and compassion. Because it is not possible to free them from base status against the law, I entrust them, together with their present and future offspring, to my nephew Kim Yŏn, who is looking after me in my old age and sickness in a filial way, so that they will be exempt from labor and cared for forever. From the generation of their grandchildren they can be put back to work for Yŏn’s descendants.124

Even though Chang-yong had not become a commoner, he was obviously freed from coercive labor and on familiar terms with Yŏn, the main-line heir, to whom he entrusted his offspring in the hope that Yŏn, too, would spare them hard work. Aware that Yŏn would draw no profit from this transfer, he confirmed that, according to the law,125 his children’s grandchildren could again be used as slaves, thus, in the future, benefiting Yŏn’s descendants. Some years later, in 1531, Yŏn again received a similar assignment. This time it was Kim-ssi, the widow of his younger brother Yu (adopted by his heirless uncle Hyo-wŏn), who presented him with eight slaves. Along with this gift Kim-ssi appealed to Yŏn’s humanity, because the eight slaves were none other than the three adult children (two sons and one daughter) that Hyo-wŏn’s secondary base son (pich’ŏpcha) Pukkan had raised with his commoner wife, and that daughter’s five young offspring. Hyo-wŏn had freed



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

129

them all from labor, and Yu, as Pukkan’s primary half-brother, had respected his adoptive father’s will. Kim-ssi, herself adopted by Hyo-wŏn at age three, shared Yu’s feelings, and therefore, according to Hyo-wŏn’s wish, handed them all on to Yŏn.126 These two examples illustrate well how delicate feelings toward base offspring could be, but also how precariously their fate depended on the good will of their primary kin. Yŏn’s household became a temporary safe haven until, after a couple of generations, the memory of kinship would have sufficiently faded to remove any scruples to use their labor again. This must have been the destiny of a great many base elite offspring, because the process of acquiring commoner status through service in the Auxiliary Army Unit was arduous and protracted, as exemplified in fascinating detail by a rare series of documents preserved by the Chaeryŏng Yi. Yi Chi-hyŏn (1639–1716),127 Yi Ham’s great-great-grandson and main-line heir, was married to Kim Sŏng-il’s great-great-granddaughter, but there was no male offspring from this union.128 Chi-hyŏn had, however, a liaison with a private slave, Ch’uhyang (born in 1659), who belonged to his great-granduncle Si-sŏng. When their son Su-gwi was born in 1680, Si-sŏng gave him as a special gift (pyŏlgŭp) to Chi-hyŏn and specified in a deed of gift: You are close to fifty [in fact, 42] and have no son yet, and now my domestic slave [kabi] Ch’uhyang has unexpectedly delivered a base child. I trust your feelings of love do not differentiate between primary and base, and since it is against the ethos of this house to put Su-gwi among the male slaves, I give him to you forever. Su-gwi and those born after him should, according to the law, be exempt from forced labor [myŏnyŏk]. Hereafter think a little more carefully about the honor of this house.129

One year later, in 1681, Si-sŏng and Chi-hyŏn agreed that Chi-hyŏn would exchange a young male slave for releasing Ch’uhyang from menial work. Eight years later, in 1689, Chi-hyŏn freed Ch’uhyang (who had borne him a second son, Su-hak, two years before), from base status (hŏryang) in a formal statement. In the tenth month of the same year, Chi-hyŏn sent all relevant documents, duly certified, in a petition (soji) to the Slave Office (Changnyewŏn), which in turn confirmed in a memorandum (iban) that, according to the law, Ch’uhyang and her two sons would become commoners and, after notifying the Ministry of War, the two sons would be admitted to the Auxiliary Army Unit. A further memorandum reconfirmed this decision in 1698, presumably when either of the sons started service in the Auxiliary Army Unit. Ch’uhyang’s conversion was first recorded in Yi Chi-hyŏn’s household registration draft (ho’gu tanja) of 1690. There, she was listed as Chi-hyŏn’s secondary wife (ch’ŏp) with the surname Kim and the commoner title sosa. Her transformation was obviously complete and recognized. Her two sons, however, were still recorded as “base secondary sons” (ŏlcha). Su-gwi, then twelve, was referred to as tongmong, likely indicating that he had started elementary schooling. The 1690 register also makes it clear that Chi-hyŏn had in the meantime adopted his younger brother’s only son, In-bae (1664–1746), as his main-line heir, listed with the yangban title “young scholar” (yuhak). The transformational process proceeded into the next century, and by the time of

130

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

the household registration of 1702, Ch’uhyang had acquired Hamch’ang (Kyŏngsang Province) as choronym, and Su-gwi, though still labeled ŏlcha, had changed his name to Man-bae in conformity with his adopted half-brother’s name. His birth year was now given as 1675. His newly acquired title t’ongdŏngnang, which identified him as a nonserving civil official of senior fifth rank, suggests that he had completed his labor assignment in the Auxiliary Army Unit and was now, at the age of twenty-eight, a commoner, albeit still with his former stigma. His brother Su-hak was listed as deceased. Finally, in the last extant register of 1708, Man-bae appeared as the head of an independent household, but continued to be labeled “base secondary son.” With this indelible social stain, his name was not entered in the comprehensive genealogy of the Chaeryŏng Yi.130 Though apparently most often shunning this kind of drawn-out procedure, elite fathers usually did make efforts to secure for their base offspring at least a minimal livelihood. Lowborn secondary children (male and female) were, according to the law, entitled to receive one-tenth of the patrimony (more, if there were neither primary nor commoner secondary half-siblings).131 Their actual shares, however, depended largely on the will of the testator, and it was not uncommon that secondary offspring had to be satisfied with less than their legal dues. Giving part of the patrimony to a secondary offspring was regarded as risky lest it eventually pass into the hands of outsiders. For this reason, the preamble in a document of 1579, for instance, read: “Because the shares that secondary offspring receive from their parents’ side are small, within the year they tend to sell them off; if they sell to nonkin [buyers], they will be prosecuted.”132 That such a warning was often not heeded is suggested by land sale documents that identified the property to be sold by slave secondary sons as having originated from the father’s or the mother’s side, or even “from the ancestors” (chosang chŏllae), or as “obtained as inheritance share” (kŭmdŭk).133 At times, however, shares were comparable to or even exceeded those of primary half-siblings or were increased by special allowances (pyŏlgŭp)—signs of parental indulgence that often led to embittered legal disputes among inheritors.134 The strategies of providing for secondary offspring, thus, varied considerably. In 1535, Aesim, the base daughter of An Kye-jong (whose wife was [Ŭisŏng] Kim Man-gŭn’s daughter), inherited one slave and one sŏm of dry and twenty majigi of wet land. Even though much less than her legal due, this share presumably was sufficient to guarantee her a modest income.135 The Yu’gok Kwŏn observed the law in all three extant inheritance divisions (in 1549, 1592, 1621) and provided the base sons and daughters with roughly one-tenth of the slaves and land.136 In contrast, in a further document dated 1544, in which Kwŏn Pŏl’s wife was one of the heirs, the secondary daughter got considerably more than the secondary son (perhaps of a different mother).137 The principal reason for granting base offspring inheritance shares was to secure their subsistence, but occasionally it was also to help them change their status—a procedure that was open to any slave. In an inheritance division of 1627 (with [Kwangsan] Kim Kwang-gye’s wife as one of the heirs) Oksaeng, a base daughter married to a royal guardsman, received four slaves and some land because, the preamble explained, her “master parents” (pumoju, i.e., her father and his primary wife) had not managed to obtain commoner status for her. Therefore, just before her death, her “mother” declared her “forever good” (yŏngyŏng hŏryang) and had her youngest son (i.e., Oksaeng’s primary half-



Localized Elites: Social Dimensions

131

brother) draw up an official document that was to guard against the eventuality that future generations would not respect Oksaeng’s change of status and force her offspring back to coercive labor.138 Similarly, regretting that his base son still was not relieved from slave labor (myŏnyŏk), in 1722 an Ŭisŏng Kim, wishing to settle his domestic affairs because of old age, gave that son four majigi of land “forever” in the hope that in future he would be able to free himself from his base status (myŏnch’ŏn).139 At times, even a beloved “secondary mother” (sŏmo), who might have served as wet nurse, was rewarded with some land,140 but it could be very costly to attempt to release a sŏmo from base status if she belonged to a different owner. In 1690, a certain Kang Han-ju sold to [Ŭisŏng] Kim Se-jung (Pang-gŏl’s eldest son) seven slaves for one hundred silver yang because he needed money to purchase commoner status for both his father’s secondary wife—his sŏmo—and his secondary half-sister (sŏmae). Kim’s acquisition was certified by the Slave Office a year later.141 Acknowledging her faithful service to and care of their late father, a group of heirs gave a sŏmo who “until today has not returned to her daughter and thus is likely to end her life here,” five slaves and 23 pu of paddy and roughly an equal amount of dry fields. This was “not only to please her heart but also in accordance with [the father’s] last will.” Being only usufructuary, this allotment was, after the sŏmo’s death, to revert to the eldest primary grandson.142 Whereas up to the middle of the seventeenth century the inheritance shares given to base secondary offspring more or less followed the law, they later tended to grow, so that by 1700 they often clearly surpassed legal provisions. Although this phenomenon has not yet been fully explored, it is possible that instead of putting a base son through the Auxiliary Army Unit for gaining commoner status, it was more convenient to provide him with property and the option of buying a status change—an economic transaction that by that time had become a common means for shedding base status.143 Critically related to the preservation of elite status, the stigma of baseness was nowhere more clearly signaled than in the segregation of a base son from his elite father’s kin group. Though likely provided for economically, he was barred from participation in descent group activities—a discrimination that more than anything else highlights the social chasm that separated “base” from “noble.”

Ch a p ter 6

Consolidation of Localized Elites in Mid-Dynasty The Economic Dimensions

T

he sixteenth century witnessed an agrarian expansion in most parts of the country: wasteland was brought under cultivation, dikes and irrigation facilities were constructed, and new agricultural techniques pioneered.1 The institutional factors that expedited such expansion reached back into the previous century. With the gradual breakdown of the Rank Land Law the state could no longer protect the prebendal rights of the rank land recipients by prohibiting transactions in land, and as early as 1424 it had to permit the sale of land in special hardship cases.2 By the end of the century, land had come to be regarded as “private property,” that is, it was bought, sold, exchanged, and indeed acquired by reclamation, effectively without state interference.3 In addition, an unbalanced state service system (kug’yŏk) put such a heavy tax burden on the peasantry that an untold number of small cultivators were forced to sell their land and enter into slave-like dependence on elite households.4 Clearly, the conditions for vigorous growth were favorable for those who had the proper resources to create for themselves and for their descendants durable landed estates. It is illuminating to contrast the Andong settings with those of the Namwŏn area, although it has to be borne in mind that the two areas differed not only topographically and climatically but also in the degree of their agricultural development. Namwŏn was not a high-growth area to the extent that Andong was in the sixteenth century. Whereas in the mid-fifteenth century only 29 percent of Andong’s cultivated area consisted of rice paddies, it was 50 percent in Namwŏn. Moreover, the ratio of population to cultivated land was higher in Andong than in Namwŏn, indicating that pressure on land was



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

133

greater in the Andong area (as is true for the whole of Kyŏngsang Province) than in its southern counterpart. These differing preconditions, then, may signal possibly divergent strategies of exploiting land and labor.

Establishing Economic Foundations In the national survey undertaken in King Sejong’s reign, Kyŏngsang’s cultivated area was less than half that of Chŏlla Province’s and well below the national average. In particular, wet field cultivation was less advanced than in the provinces of Chŏlla or Ch’ung­ ch’ŏng. In Kyŏngsang, according to a report of 1480, “the land is narrow, and the population dense,” and therefore pressure on the land was high. Andong appears to have been one of the least developed regions in Kyŏngsang, presumably due to its geographic isolation and its reputedly less fertile soil. In the mid-fifteenth century, irrigated rice paddies accounted for barely one-fourth of its cultivated area.5 In the course of the sixteenth century, however, Andong turned into a high-growth area through the initiative of inmigrants who, with the necessary know-how and enterprising spirit, pioneered new settlements and started to build extensive landed estates. One of them was [Chinsŏng] Yi Kye-yang, who as an in-marrying husband had first taken up residence in Yean and founded On’gye. In a brief biographical note on his grand­ father, Yi T’oegye wrote: My grandfather married a Yŏngyang Kim who lived in Sŏch’on in Yean County. He first lived in Pura-ch’on in the east of the county. As an education officer, he one day passed through On’gye on his way to Ponghwa and fell in love with the scenic beauty of the spring and rocks. . . . There happened to be a monk who came from On’gye and together they rested, and the conversation turned to the geomantic propitiousness of On’gye. Grandfather happily agreed with [the monk’s] opinion and together they returned to On’gye and surveyed it all around. [The monk] pointed out the foundation place for a house and said: “To live here will certainly produce honorable sons.” Thereupon Grandfather made up his mind to move there. At that time, there was along the brook only a single peasant household, and the cultivable land lay waste. In various places it was possible to plough, and the trees were abundant; the gullies were deep, and the water of the brook clear with plenty of fish. He was able to draw water [from the brook] and irrigate fields and garden. Grandfather was by nature calm and aloof and did not busy himself with personal attainments. He enjoyed cultivating the land and fishing and taught his sons and grandsons to make these their business and to be satisfied with it.6

This sketch clearly points to some of the major elements required for the successful founding of an estate: personal initiative, remoteness of the location, and the area’s suitability for intense farming. Yi Kye-yang’s success was briefly noted on his funerary inscription: “The fields he irrigated comprised several hundred kyŏl.”7 It was on this kind of propitious foundation that On’gye started to emerge in the course of the sixteenth

134

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

century and expanded into a village in which “agnatic and affinal relatives live next door to one another, cultivating adjoining fields.”8 Yu’gok had a similar genesis. Situated in a remote and sparsely populated area of Naesŏng Subcounty (north of Andong City), Yu’gok in the mid-fifteenth century had only eighty-three registered households. Impressed by its favorable geomantic position, Kwŏn Pŏl determined a house site (pokkŏ) and moved there at age forty-three.9 Surrounded by hills and well supplied with water from various watercourses, the estate prospered through intensively irrigated rice fields. Later, Pŏl also developed a mountain estate (sanjang) in the fertile Ch’unyang Subcounty to the east. Kim Chin consolidated the economic wealth of the Naeap Kim. From his father he inherited thirteen slaves (the amount of the landed inheritance is unknown),10 and during his lifetime he vigorously expanded his landed property. He is known to have owned and developed estates in at least four different locations, among them in distant Ch’ŏnggi County (Kangwŏn Province), where he brought new land under cultivation with his slaves, whom he exhorted to reach self-sufficiency in grain production and silkworm raising. Chin also built an estate in Kŭm’gwangp’yŏng (Kangnŭng County) on the eastern seaboard, which he registered in the name of his slave Og’yong. The fact that in 1531 he requested a special certificate of ownership (iban) from the magistrate of Kangnŭng is clear evidence that the maintenance of such faraway land in thinly populated areas was risky and had to be protected against the claims of other settlers.11 Kim Chin also laid out, with his slaves, paddies in front of his residence in Naeap, and dug trenches to irrigate them with the waters of Panbyŏnch’ŏn, an arm of the Naktong River.12 Besides bringing virgin land under cultivation, estates were augmented and consolidated by purchasing land from destitute smallholders—commoners and slaves alike. It was in particular during the sixteenth century that the impoverishment of the peasantry reached a new height as a result of the general breakdown of the tax system. Unable to deliver the taxes on time or pay back high-interest loans, peasants were forced to sell their land and seek protection from large landowners. A fragment of a household register of 1528, which records the household of [Chinsŏng] Yi Hun (1467–1539), Yi Chŏng-hoe’s great-grandfather resident in Chuch’on, and includes five associated households, provides a striking example of how an elite household appropriated the labor of indigent neighbors and fugitives. Yi Hun’s own household (ho) comprised ten family members and forty-one slaves (of whom ten were registered as missing).13 In addition, there was the eleven-member independent household of a Nam Ch’i-hŭi, who, on the basis of his title, most likely was a secondary son married to one of Yi Hun’s secondary daughters. An impoverished widow, who lived with her son and daughter-in-law and possessed two slaves, headed the third nonslave household. Despite the fact that the other three households were also recorded as independent households, the designation of their heads as “new paekchŏng” (sin paekchŏng)14 seems to indicate that they had taken refuge under Yi Hun’s elite umbrella, lived in slave-like dependence, and contributed their labor for their upkeep. In sum, Yi Hun’s household was surrounded by a large number of dependents who effectively augmented his labor force.15 Like many of their contemporaries, Yi Hun’s descendants continued to enlarge their estate by building dikes and opening up “ownerless land” (mujujŏn)—often referred to in



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

135

Yi Chŏng-hoe’s diary.16 They also actively purchased land or consolidated their landed property through exchange. A collection of twenty-four documents dating from 1539 to 1569 demonstrate that three generations of Yi Hun’s descendants—his grandson Yi Hŭi-an, Hŭi-an’s son Chŏng-hoe, and Chŏng-hoe’s son Pyŏk (1568–1609)—acquired a total of close to 200 majigi of land.17 This amounted to an increase of Yi Hun’s original acreage by almost one-half. Most of the sellers were impoverished commoners and slaves who, driven by their dire economic circumstances, were forced to put their land up for sale.18 Whereas rice cultivation increased in the course of the sixteenth century, the majority of land was dry-field land—roughly two-thirds of all cultivated acreage in Andong. Paddies did yield larger crops and saved labor, but were profitable only in areas where secure water supplies minimized the risk of droughts. In contrast, dry-field agriculture was less susceptible to climatic vagaries. On dry and upland fields millet, wheat, beans, hemp, and cotton were grown. Sericulture, moreover, was widely practiced, especially by women.19 Although there are no detailed records extant that would spell out the development of individual landed estates in the Namwŏn area, judging from early sixteenth-century official records, Namwŏn “strongmen” (t’oho)20 reportedly were notorious for forcibly incorporating hapless base people and even government slaves into their workforces. At times, they even extracted certificates of ownership from magistrates powerless to prevent such abuses. One of the “local bullies” singled out by name was the before-mentioned [Changsu] Hwang Kae, who was reported to have intimidated his neighbors to such an extent that they did not dare make accusations against him to inquiring officials. Evidently, estate builders took advantage of the general plight of the commoner population. As a high official deplored in 1528, “Nowadays, those who own land [in the three southern provinces] belong all to the elite [sajok], . . . and since the tax burden on the commoners is so heavy, they gladly become public or private slaves.”21 By the end of the sixteenth century, the cultivated area in Andong had increased by well over one thousand kyŏl,22 whereas in Namwŏn, where in the mid-fifteenth century the cultivated acreage had been considerably higher than in Andong, the increase was more modest.23

The Slaves as the Ubiquitous “Hands and Feet” of the Sajok Elite During the crucial fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, when elite descent groups were establishing their landed estates, the control of large contingents of slaves proved critical to economic success. Indeed, the capacity to organize and direct (sahwan) slaves’ labor and use them as “instruments of production” was a sine qua non of the elite’s existence. As a contemporary witness defined this interdependence: “The sajok sustain their households with slaves and land. Thus, if they get one slave and one mou of land, they can maintain their livelihood; if they lose them, they starve and freeze. So great is their dependence!”24 Although the state staked out minimal legal standards for regulating the lives of public slaves (kong nobi), private slavery was an institution that was remarkably

136

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

removed from state control. Indeed, as a “private” arrangement, the master-slave relationship exhibited many facets. Far from being merely economically indispensable, the private slave (sa nobi) held for the elite great cultural and symbolic significance, making slave ownership even an essential attribute of elite status. Private slaves were roughly differentiated according to their residence in respect to their masters: resident slaves (solgŏ nobi) and nonresident slaves (oegŏ nobi), each with its own economic activities and obligations toward their owners.25 The degree of their exploitation moved along a sliding scale. The closer the slaves lived to their master, the greater was their exposure to forcible extraction of labor and the greater their economic dependence. Even at the farthest end of the scale, the slave remained the master’s property and had to follow the latter’s directives. During their lifetimes, slaves could be moved in either direction along this scale of dependence. The evidence suggests that in the sixteenth century the resident slaves constituted the largest contingent, up to some 85 percent, of total individual slave holdings. In Andong, for instance, only 9 out of the Kwangsan Kim’s 216 slaves lived apart from their master in 1559, and 46 out of [Andong] Kwŏn Tong-mi’s 312 did so in 1595.26 The majority were “[agricultural] labor slaves” (ibyŏk nobi), who, under closely controlled working conditions, tilled the land attached to or lying only a short distance from their master’s residence and lived in or around the latter’s village. Such large slave populations were supervised by “diligent and loyal” head slaves (suno), who, often at least partially literate, organized the labor force, kept harvest accounts, and ran errands for their masters. The labor extracted from slaves or slave-like dependents fluctuated widely, from 2.6 majigi to 15.4 majigi (on average, 6.6 majigi) of land per slave. Owning 317 slaves and 2,312 majigi of land, Kwŏn Pŏl had a slave-land ratio of one slave to over seven majigi, which exceeded the average. Likely for this reason, approximately half of Pŏl’s land was cultivated by tenants (chŏnjak), who were either slaves or commoner peasants. Seeds, fertilizer, tools, and draft animals were usually supplied by the landowner. Kwŏn Pŏl, as the largest owner of land and slaves in the Andong area at the time, had thus an estimated average yearly income of over 730 sŏm of grain.27 Such an income, though larger than those of the other big landowners of the region,28 may not have amounted to the even larger yields reaped by the capital ruling elite, but it demonstrates that Andong’s landowners successfully defied any attempts by the central government to impose limits on landed estates.29 Although nonresident slaves (oegŏ or oebang nobi) were principally a phenomenon of late Chosŏn, from the beginning of the dynasty small numbers of slaves lived at considerable distances from their owners in different counties or even in different provinces. Curiously, the evidence shows that the relationship between these nonresident slaves and their owners’ land was at best tenuous, as the slaves did not necessarily live on the owner’s landed property—a phenomenon that likely resulted from multiple property divisions separating slaves and land. According to inheritance documents of 1494, for instance, [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ae’s 758 slaves were located, besides in Seoul and Kaesŏng, in seventy counties in all provinces. Since no document details the distribution of Yi’s land, the nexus between land and slaves cannot be established,30 but that it may in fact have been rather weak seems to be evident from another Andong document. According to



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

137

[Andong] Kwŏn Tae-un’s inheritance paper of 1678, his slaves were scattered over fortytwo locations in five provinces, yet the greater part of his landed property was concentrated in three places in Kyŏnggi Province, so that some of his slaves must have lived on and presumably cultivated the land that he owned in those places in the province.31 How, then, did such nonresident slaves sustain themselves, and how were they productive for their masters? In the sixteenth century, an apparently common mode of opening up new land for cultivation was a kind of modified sharecropping. Under such an arrangement, called “fixed-rent cultivation” (chakkae), the slave owner assigned to individual (male and female) slaves certain amounts of newly reclaimed land for cultivation and levied the largest part of the harvest as rent. In addition, he provided these tillers, who usually had families, with small amounts of predominantly dry fields for “private tilling” (sa’gyŏng), the yield of which served for their sustenance. Such a scheme, which made chakkae slaves in fact the “first settlers” of recently gained land, seems to have been especially advantageous as long as the ownership rights over such land were not yet securely staked out. As Kim Kŏn-t’ae has pointed out, chakkae was closely related to personal tribute (sin’gong). Both were levied on individuals, and the system worked best when entire families were involved as cultivators. Many inheritance papers document that chakkae deals were extensively in evidence in the Andong area among the Andong Kwŏn, the Kwangsan Kim, and the Chinsŏng Yi, among others. Chakkae slaves often had to render diverse additional services (chabyŏk) to their master, and they were forbidden to sell their “private tilling” land. If they failed to fulfill the terms of their “contract,” they had to expect heavy punishment. Whether such arrangements were based on yearly or long-term agreements is uncertain. Even though this system may have provided a slave with some entrepreneurial freedom, it was an exacting regime—referred to by T’oegye in a letter to his son as “hard labor” (koyŏk)—and therefore increasingly subverted by disgruntled slaves. Thus, once the early stage of agricultural development came to an end in the course of the seventeenth century, chakkae was replaced by sharecropping (pyŏngjak), and many nonresident slaves then turned into tenants.32 Nonresident slaves, thus, generally functioned as independent family units, either farming land as chakkae slaves, tenants (chŏnho), or, rarely, even as owners of their own land (then also liable to pay land tax to the state), which they could pass on to their offspring.33 That they remained, however, property of a master, whose face they perhaps never saw during their entire lifetime, was clearly noted down in their household registers (hojŏk); in their owner’s register they were referred to as “tribute bearers” (sugong) and listed according to their geographic location. The nonresident slaves’ “personal tribute” (sin’gong) consisted of a yearly levy of agricultural produce—cotton, rice, beans, and oil—imposed individually on male and female slaves alike.34 The property aspect of slavery is revealed by the circumstance that slaves could be inherited, bought and sold, given away as gifts, exchanged, and pawned. Though slaves were traded from the beginning of the Chosŏn,35 no sales documents (maemae mun’gi) are extant from the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, perhaps indicating that trading in slaves was slack. Evidently more important than the purchase (maedŭk) of slaves was their acquisition through inheritance divisions. Inheritance papers carefully identified a slave’s origin when new ownership was assigned. A typical entry would therefore

138

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

provide a slave’s mother’s name and age, and the slave’s birth sequence, name, and age. The entries were arranged according to the slaves’ provenance: patrimonial slave (choŏp sangjŏn nobi); “new” slave (sin nobi);36 or purchased slave (maedŭk nobi). Further information pertained to a slave’s residence and the separately recorded runaway slaves. Slave families were seriously disrupted when single slaves were bought or sold, or given away as gifts, but dispersal was most severe through inheritance divisions. Because individuals and not families constituted inheritable entities, and male and female heirs were legally entitled to equal shares (at least up to the mid-seventeenth century, and often beyond), slave units were, in disregard of kin considerations, fragmented in accordance with the number of heirs. How precious a slave in fact was is manifest by the severe and prolonged disputes that arose over incongruities in their distribution among heirs. A case in point is the quarrel involving [Kwangsan] Kim Hyo-ro and Nam Ch’ŏ-gon (the husband of Kim’s great-uncle Hyo-ji’s adopted daughter), which erupted in 1517. Hyo-ro, heir to the sonless Hyo-ji, received in 1480 the first child of Hyo-ji’s slave Hongman (with a commoner woman), while Nam got the second child. Hongman’s third child (a woman, named Kŭmŭmdŏk, who lived in Ŭisŏng) had been left out, but in the meantime Nam apparently made use of her offspring. Now Hyo-ro demanded that Kŭmŭmdŏk and her offspring be divided between himself and Nam. After a judicial review by the Andong magistrate, Kŭmŭmdŏk, her five children, and the offspring of two of the latter, a total of thirteen slaves, were equally distributed between the two parties—separating very young children from their mothers.37 A legally more complex dispute arose in 1583 between [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ham and his affinal cousin, [Andong] Kim Sa-wŏn, a direct descendant of powerful Kim Pang-gyŏng. The first wife of Yi Ham’s father, Kim-ssi, was Sa-wŏn’s paternal aunt. She died childless shortly after marriage. At stake were the slaves (sin nobi) and some landed property that she had been given upon getting married. Yi Ham, the issue of his father’s second wife, had, after his eldest brother’s early death, become the direct lineal heir and thus Kim-ssi’s stepson (ŭija). According to the law,38 a stepson was entitled to receive one-fifth of a childless stepmother’s property, and four-fifths if he also became the ritual heir, but in 1555 Kim-ssi’s father had left a testament by which he willed some of Kim-ssi’s slaves to Sa-wŏn’s father (i.e., Kim-ssi’s brother) for the purpose of conducting ancestral rites for her. This arrangement, apparently undisputed by Yi Ham’s father, was justified with the allegation that Ham never visited after the death of his stepmother—an allegation Yi Ham later disputed. In the second month of 1583, therefore, Ham challenged the validity of that testament, arguing that it had not been personally signed by the testator. Moreover, because a stepson did not differ from a real son (ch’inja), he, Ham, was entitled to receive the slaves whom Sa-wŏn, after his father’s death, had wrongly appropriated. Sa-wŏn, sickly and in mourning for his father, was represented by his younger brother, Sa-hyŏng. The latter protested Ham’s accusation and argued that according to a law of 155439 the original owner’s arrangement was irrevocable, and that it was in bad taste to launch a complaint against someone in mourning. The magistrate’s verdict, issued in the fourth month of 1583, censured the dispute between “members of the elite” (sain) as “unseemly,” in particular as a mourner was involved, but awarded Yi Ham five slaves.40



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

139

This case is illuminating not only for confirming that a childless wife’s property could, at the end of the sixteenth century, still be contested by her natal family. It also throws telling light on how disputes over indispensable slaves could disrupt relationships between close kin—a danger the early dynastic rulers had tried to avert with legislation, against objections that the state should not get involved in “private matters.”41 The victim of such quarrels was usually the slave. Besides purchase and inheritance, by far the most important source of slaves was the natural increase of the slaves themselves. Significantly, the marriage rate of nonresident slaves (roughly 75 percent) was three times higher than that of their resident counterparts and accordingly their reproduction more prolific. Resident slaves got married less often (35 percent of males and 65 percent of females) and consequently produced fewer children—clearly turning them into “kinless” persons.42 An analysis of who the marriage partners of resident slaves were reveals that from the beginning of the dynasty slaveholdings were augmented by making male slaves take commoner women as sexual partners—usually daughters of impoverished peasants—with the intention of making the offspring (and their mother) the property of their owners. As a result of anxiety at court about the shrinking number of tax-paying commoners, such unions were outlawed in 1405 and, when discovered, punished with impounding the offspring.43 In 1454, however, likely in response to pressure from the countryside, not only was this very threat removed from private slave owners; it was even decreed that such offspring henceforth follow their father’s base status.44 The slave owners’ appropriation of the children of mixed unions was thus unmistakably legalized and curiously stood in contrast to the frequent legislative attempts to prevent the intermingling of slave and commoner at the expense of the latter. Earliest testimony of this practice in Andong is contained in an inheritance document of 1418. In that year, when [Kwangsan] Kim Mu’s 80 slaves were divided among his heirs, the ratio of offspring of full slave unions to that of mixed unions (i.e., male slave– commoner woman) stood at 63 to 37 percent. It fell in 1429, when the second division of a total of 225 slaves took place, from 87 to 22 percent—perhaps in reaction to the law of 1405. Interestingly, no female slave–male commoner union was recorded, as it would have been unrewarding to get offspring that, according to a revised law of 1414,45 would acquire commoner status and thus be lost as property.46 A Hahoe inheritance document of 1450 confirms this cautious approach: only 28 percent of all slave unions were between slaves and commoner women.47 A less than 30 percent ratio is also evident from two further Andong records,48 suggesting that this may have been a commonly observed ceiling in the Andong region. Even though the law may have been, to an extent, heeded in the early decades of the dynasty, later in the century, certainly after 1454, it was clearly flouted, and the Kyŏngguk taejŏn could but acknowledge what had become (or continued to be) a common practice: the coupling, motivated by greed on the part of owners, of male slaves to commoner women. There is extensive evidence for this in Andong. When in 1474 Kwŏn I’s (a distant cousin of [Andong] Kwŏn Pŏl) property was divided among his heirs, still only 45 of the 150 slaves, or 30 percent, had commoner mothers.49 Roughly the same percentage had been reached when [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ae shared 758 slaves with his eight siblings in 1494.50

140

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

The incidences of mixed unions increased drastically, however, in the course of the sixteenth century, when large-scale estate building went on in Andong. In 1544, for instance, the ratio tipped, at 58 percent, clearly toward mixed unions.51 It was around 50 percent when [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ŭn-bo’s wife divided slaves with her siblings,52 but when Yi Ŭn-bo himself shared his parents’ wealth with his brothers and sisters in 1572, 45 percent of the slaves had been born of commoner mothers.53 These trends, so marked in Andong, were paralleled in other areas of Kyŏngsang Province. In an Ulsan household register of 1609, the number of mixed marriages (either with a male or a female commoner) reached 70 percent among resident slaves—90 percent of which were with commoner women. It was much lower, only 55 percent, among nonresident slaves, indicating that the latter had a freer choice of marriageable partners.54 Why, then, were unions of male slaves with commoner women so prevalent?55 The reasons seem to have been manifold. From the point of view of the slave owner, mixed unions were an attractive option because they not only excluded property disputes—a pos­ sibility when either the slave husband or the slave wife belonged to a different master— but, in addition to the children, their mother usually also joined the labor pool. Moreover, an owner might have given a faithful slave a spouse as a reward and, in view of the high mortality rate of women in childbirth, preferred to lose an outsider rather than one of his own female slaves. Also, he might not have possessed enough females of marriageable age among his own slaves and could, with an incoming stranger, prevent undesirable bondings among his domestic slaves. On the other hand, such an arrangement could be life-saving for a commoner girl, in an impoverished peasant family an unwelcome extra mouth to feed. Finally, the elastic formula according to which a child was base if either one of his or her parents was base granted a slaveholder unusual flexibility of choice— clearly at the expense of the state. The master-slave relationship was often likened to that between ruler and subject—a formula that, by implying interdependence, sought to attenuate the harsh reality of domination and subordination. “To forget himself and dedicate his loyalty [to his master] is the slave’s part [pun]; to reward services and recompense merit lies within the master’s discretion [kwŏn].”56 Nevertheless, the fact that the owner exercised complete control over a slave’s person, labor, property, and progeny highlighted their extreme inequality and rendered their relationship fraught with tension and animosity. Confronted with this daily challenge to their Confucian conscience of humaneness, some elite owners devised codes for treating their slaves with a combination of strictness and leniency. The management of slaves figured importantly in many “domestic laws” (kahun) of the time. A slave owner himself, Yi T’oegye, for instance, advised his son Chun to handle the slaves with benevolence as well as with authority. He had learned, he recalled, from his grandfather not to make slaves harbor resentment and to treat “ignorant female slaves with a forgiving mind.” Give them some rest, he counseled Chun; it was better to make them submit to discipline on their own accord. Anxious, however, that “uncooperative and headstrong” slaves might ruin the house, he warned his son not to provoke disobedience by showing timidity or indecision. By nature, he thought, slaves were obstinate and lazy and, if not strictly supervised, would miss the proper times for sowing, weeding, and manuring the fields. Beating a lazy slave was, he advised, a good warning to the others;



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

141

neither should illness be tolerated as a pretext for shunning work. Slaves should, moreover, be prevented from frequenting the magistrate’s yamen, spreading rumors, and quarreling with each other.57 Clearly, T’oegye endorsed keeping the slaves under firm, yet forbearing control. The small number of domestic male and female slaves (kanae sahwan nobi) who worked within an elite residential compound, functioned as the proverbial “hands and feet” of their master or mistress. They lived in the servants’ quarters (haengnang) beside the storerooms and stables, close to the main gate, and thus were at their master’s beck and call all the time. The female slaves were responsible for “[preparing] firewood and [carrying] water,” with the kitchen slave perhaps the most indispensable servant. When she was ill or had run away, an elite household experienced great discomfort: the ondol floors would remain unheated for lack of firewood and meals would no longer be prepared.58 Female slaves also busily sewed, wove, and tailored, and those who had given birth were commonly put in charge of the nursing and upbringing of the master’s children as well, creating lasting bonds. In rich households, gifted and nice-looking female slaves were often exempted from ordinary work and trained for entertaining their master and his guests with song, dance, and string music. Neither the master nor the mistress could leave the residential compound without male slave escort. Although outings of elite women were rare, when they did go out, they were usually carried in sedan chairs shouldered by at least four slaves. Even elite men found it impossible to go anywhere without a slave “carrying the whip.” It was, moreover, the fast feet of male slaves (for long distances they apparently used horses or mules) on which the elite inside and outside the capital depended for exchanging with colleagues, friends, and kinsmen the thousands of letters still extant in their collected works. Male and female slaves also escorted bridal corteges or joined the retinue when their master took up office as magistrate or provincial governor or was sent on a mission to China or Japan.59 Occasionally, they followed their master into exile or to a parental graveside for the mourning vigil. Clearly, slaves were not only essential as physical laborers; they equally performed as status-enhancing vassals. In sum, early Chosŏn slavery was a multifaceted phenomenon. Not mere property, the slave was the principal producer of the slaveholder’s wealth and in that capacity acquired preeminent significance during the first two centuries, when in areas like Andong land reclamation was undertaken on a large scale. Estate building without slave labor would have been impossible—a fact that underscores the impression that slavery at that time not only increased substantially but also was harsher than in any previous period.

Local Development through Communal Efforts in Andong To open up and make a remote area habitable, especially when it lay outside Andong’s core area, required the cooperation of a larger group of developers. As the Ward Compact of Naesŏng (Naesŏng tongyak) documents, such a group ideally consisted of agnates and affines. Naesŏng, it will be recalled, was one of Andong’s subordinate counties (sokhyŏn) situated, as a “pocket across boundaries,” some one hundred ri north of Andong City.

142

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

With a population of only 371 males and 660 females in eighty-three households in the mid-fifteenth century,60 Naesŏng possessed all the characteristics of an ideal “frontier” area: it was isolated and far removed from magisterial supervision; it was only lightly populated and had no indigenous hyangni; there were as yet no other sajok settlements; and its land was fertile and suited to irrigation. One of the principal initiators of the Naesŏng project seems to have been [Kyŏngju] Yi Hong-jun (n.d.), whose grandfather, Sŭng-jik (1438–90), had married (as his second wife) the daughter of [Hŭnghae] Pae Sang-ji.61 Hong-jun’s mother was the daughter of Kwŏn Kye-gyŏng, Kwŏn Pŏl’s great-grandfather, and for this reason Hong-jun, a chinsa of 1486, returned to his maternal village, Kŭmgye, when he fled the political turmoil in Seoul around 1500.62 As he wrote on his own tomb epitaph: “All my life long I relied on myself and expended my energy on agriculture to provide for my wife and children. Failing to pass the [munkwa] exam seven times, I ended up roaming sorrowfully brooks and mountains.”63 In his Naesŏng venture, Hong-jun was joined by his close matrilateral kinsman, Kwŏn Pŏl, who during his enforced home stay founded his estate in Yu’gok. Also moving into the area was [Yŏngyang] Nam Myŏng (1479–1540), who had married a daughter of [Hŭnghae] Pae I-sun (who in turn was the son of Yi Hong-jun’s second cousin)64 and established himself in Hwangjŏn-ch’on; he was buried in the neighborhood.65 Despite the fact that the pioneer cultivators of Naesŏng were linked to one another by an intricate marital web, venturing into an isolated area such as Naesŏng seems to have entailed manifold hazards. As Yi Hong-jun described them: The position of Naesŏng County is remote and there are few inhabitants. The hearts of the little people are obstinate; they are so bad as to be close to beasts and birds. How, then, could this be a place of rites and moral principles? Thus, those who have sons and younger brothers do not make them labor on the Odes and the Classic of Documents but let them fish and hunt as their sole occupation. If there is someone who holds a book, he is considered an oddity; if there is someone who is filial and brotherly, he is considered as striving for fame. Some take no care with their parents’ funerals and behave without uprightness; others hate and malign each other, are misers and cheaters, fighting for profit. This has gone on for years!

Evidently, the penetration of distant lands inhabited only by a deprived peasantry gave rise to a land grab at the expense of cultured pursuits and fostered individual dispositions that, by jeopardizing cooperation among kin, threatened the entire enterprise. Yi Hongjun went on to say that, “grieved over such deterioration of mores,” he met with a few elders around 1540 to draw up a ward compact (tongyak) in which they spelled out their expectations: “If in our ward [tong] all people had domestic rules [chŏnghun], would not herein lie a motivation? If another was at fault, I would correct him; if I were at fault, he would restrain me. The absence of wrongdoers would mean that in our ward we encourage and exhort each other.” If reciprocal correctives failed to be effective, schemers and evildoers would, as violators of the compact, be excluded from the community—as a warning for future generations.66



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

143

Eighteen kinsmen—agnates and affines—committed themselves to underwriting this charter. Its membership roster (chwamok) contains the names of Yi Hong-jun and four of his sons-in-law, one of whom was Yi Hŭi-dong, a third cousin of T’oegye.67 Also listed are Nam Myŏng and his third cousin Chung-myŏng,68 and the latter’s second son, Se-ch’im. Pae I-sun was probably dead by that time. His son Pae Hŏn (1482–1524),69 Nam Myŏng’s brother-in-law, is alone on the list. Yi Hong-jun and Pae Hŏn were the only chinsa graduates; a few others were royal tomb keepers (ch’ambong). Two pairs of brothers70 were labeled as “ostracized” (sondo).71 In a short catalogue Yi Hong-jun elucidated the principles of the compact in terms of graded penal sanctions: permanent expulsion from the community (yŏngyŏng sondo) for lack of filiality, dissention among brothers, conflict among neighbors, and nonparticipation in compact affairs; temporary expulsion for disrespecting elders, accepting bribes, not paying the land tax in person, and cheating the head of the granary. Lesser misdemeanors such as selfishness and dishonesty when holding a (compact) office, quarrelsome and disrespectful behavior in public sessions, and negligence in forwarding circulars, among others, could be restituted by offering varying amounts of food and wine. In 1542, Yi added a few further provisions concerning mutual help on the occasion of funerals, weddings, fire, happy events (for instance, examination success), and sickness, and amended the membership roster by belatedly affixing (ch’uip) Kwŏn Pŏl’s name72 and tacking on (huip) the names of sixteen new members, among them sons and sons-in-law of the original members, even of those marked as “ostracized.”73 Clearly, with this compact, Yi Hong-jun attempted to construct a community whose members had to subscribe to rudimentary rules of interpersonal conduct. By drafting a moral code, he made access to the community’s human and material resources contingent on its observance. Those who broke it were expelled and could no longer count on community support—harsh terms dictated by a harsh environment. Twelve years later, in 1554, [Chinsŏng] Yi Mun-gyu (1513–?), Yi Hong-jun’s nonagnatic grandson and T’oegye disciple, transformed the compact into a full-fledged Confucian-style community compact.74 Praising the original compact members’ emphasis on pledging “sincerity” (sin) in the community, Yi explicated the members’ duties in five “instructional rules on [serving] the living” (saenggangjo) and five “instructional rules on [taking care of] the dead” (sa’gangjo). Yi’s version laid greater stress on moral cultivation than on penal sanctions and provided the members with two easily memorizable checklists of dos and don’ts. Correct “compact behavior” (yakhaeng) prescribed: “obey your parents,” “observe mourning carefully,” “keep peace between husband and wife,” “cooperate among brothers,” “be concerned about harmonious relations in your neighborhood,” “clarify primary and secondary [lines of descent],” and “differentiate between elite and nonelite [kwi-ch’ŏn].” “Compact admonitions” (yakkye), on the other hand, warned against such social evils as brawling, useless talk, spreading rumors, harboring ill feelings, seeking bribes, and vying for profit. The 1554 document also included a new membership list recording the names of thirteen sons and grandsons of the original members, among them Yi Mun-gyu, Kwŏn Pŏl’s eldest son, Tong-bo, and Pae Hŏn’s second and third sons. All three sons of Nam Myŏng are on the list. The eldest, Ki-su (1499–?), a chinsa graduate of 1558, founded the

144

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

new village of Kwangp’yŏng, whereas the younger Kwi-su (1503–52), a chinsa graduate of 1534 and married to one of Kwŏn Kŭn’s great-granddaughters, built a pavilion in Hwangjŏn-ch’on, where he instructed young students.75 Until the compact was restored after the Imjin War, this list was extended (huip) five times, eventually containing fiftyseven names. Besides a few holders of minor offices—among them Kwŏn Pŏl’s second son, Tong-mi—the most prestigious new members were the two T’oegye disciples, Chŏng Yu-il and Pae Sam-ik (1534–88), both high officials. Chŏng resided in T’app’yŏng-ch’on. As Yi Hong-jun’s son-in-law, Chŏng Yu-il’s father had been one of the original compact members; Yu-il was thus one of Yi’s nonagnatic grandsons.76 Pae Sam-ik was a grandson of Pae Hŏn.77 In sum, the successive versions of the Naesŏng compact illustrate the evolution of a community of early settlers who established themselves on virgin land and pioneered new settlements. As Pae Hŏn’s funerary inscription states: When spring came, he would sit from early morning outside the main gate of his residence and inspect those about to go out to the fields; latecomers were punished. “No one in that village was idle in agriculture.”78 Indeed, the original members of the compact were pioneer agriculturists rather than degree and office seekers. Yet, the ultimate success of their economic enterprise resulted from their ability to create a viable elite community that, sustained by close kinship ties and disciplined by a moral code, eventually brought forth personalities who distinguished themselves as scholars and officials at the local and national levels. Of the sixteen villages noted by the Yŏnggaji for Naesŏng at the beginning of the seventeenth century, eleven were “inhabited by elite [sajok],” and all of them had irrigation facilities.79

Economic Regimes over Time: Husbanding the Patrimony Far into the seventeenth century, the descent groups under consideration managed to consolidate, expand, and preserve their landed wealth. Though such activities are difficult to quantify, inheritance papers and gift certificates, which document the transmission of “land and slaves” (chŏnmin) from generation to generation, do give a general idea of a descent group’s economic fortunes over time, even though they cannot be taken as complete inventories of a descent group’s property. Most property divisions took place after the death of a father, in which case the widowed mother presided over the division, or after the death of both parents. Equal partition of the patrimony among sons and daughters, anchored in the legal code, remained customary into the seventeenth century, so that substantial wealth was transmitted through mothers and wives. The preambles of a few of these inheritance papers conspicuously reveal, however, that there was space for individual choice and manipulation even under the constraints of “normative reality.”80 Following economic calculations or simply “human feelings,” sizable portions of an estate were often handed on, already during the giver’s lifetime, as gifts to specific recipients and thus clearly bypassed normal inheritance channels.81 Inheritance papers thus occasionally throw, like no other documents, rare light on intimate aspects of intrafamilial solidarities or conflicts.



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

145

Even though the Imjin War disrupted, to differing degrees, the economies of Andong and Namwŏn (further discussed in chapter 9), and inheritance divisions were consequently often delayed, it was not war devastation, it will be argued—for recovery was relatively rapid—but the long-term effects of partible inheritance in addition to land shortage, that eventually forced an alteration of economic strategies in the course of the seventeenth century. With the survival of many main descent lines endangered, anxious fathers, conscious of agnatic succession, started to privilege their sons to the detriment of their daughters. This was a first significant step toward creating allagnatic kin groups, which was ultimately justified with ideological arguments provided by Zhu Xi’s Jiali. Three sets of inheritance documents from Andong and two from Namwŏn will be analyzed here to outline the diverse economic regimes of major descent groups through the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The Naeap Kim Kim Chin arranged for the distribution of his wealth among his direct heirs well before his death in 1580. In 1577, at the age of seventy-eight, he drew up a “promissory writ” (hŏyŏ mun’gi) as a kind of testament. Because his estate in Ch’ŏnggi was located in a different county at a considerable distance from Naeap, Chin feared that, if divided among several heirs, it would be difficult to manage and vulnerable to taxation pressures; he there­ fore willed it to his commoner secondary wife’s three offspring (sŏja). Some 600 majigi of paddy fields and the residence in Naeap, however, the ritual-conscious Chin gave exclusively to his eldest son for financing domestic ancestral rites. In an appended last will (yuŏn), Chin expressed his wish that his heirs not start fighting among each other over his decision to distribute the property differentially according to their economic circumstances.82 No documentary evidence of the partition survived, yet all of Chin’s sons seem to have been well off. Kŭg-il, as the eldest son and main-line heir, stayed in the ancestral home in Naeap and managed the land his father had allocated for ritual purposes. Earlier, for passing the munkwa examination in 1546, he had been given by his grandfather five slaves and 15 majigi of land in two locations. Three times he received land and slaves through his wife: in 1559, the wife’s elderly parents gave the couple one female and one male slave out of gratitude for continued care, and in 1564 Kŭg-il’s wife twice inherited sizable amounts of paddy and dry fields.83 Sŏng-il, who eventually moved to his wife’s house in Kŭmgye-ri, inherited from his father an estate (pyŏltchang) in Sin’gok (Imha Subcounty). In addition, he developed a new estate in Wŏn’gok in the mountainous eastern region of Imha Subcounty, where he lived in the early part of his adult life. Moreover, he owned land in at least three more locations in Imha.84 His biographer noted that he left the “domestic affairs” to his slaves, and that talk about “material gain” never crossed his lips. Instead, he would share his wealth with needy relatives and support a poor sŏja uncle with two female slaves.85 It is not clear how large Pog-il’s inherited share was, but he had received from his father a gift of 60 majigi of land when he, as the last son, succeeded in the munkwa

146

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

examinations (in 1570). He first married into the wealthy Yech’ŏn Kwŏn family resident in the Yech’ŏn area and obtained in 1579 from his in-laws twenty-eight slaves and some 9.3 kyŏl of land in lieu of his wife, who had died early. With an additional extra share (five slaves and some 60 majigi of land) Pog-il was supposed to perform the ancestral services for his children’s mother (he had two sons and two daughters from this marriage). Such a generous special allowance to a son-in-law, who in the meantime had remarried, was evidently so unusual that his mother-in-law, Chŏng-ssi, who presided over the division, made the following statement in the document’s preamble: “It is said that one should be sorry for giving one child more [than to the others], but my son, Mun-hae, in accordance with his mother’s wish, has asked to take this [Pog-il’s extra] share out of his own allowance in order to soothe his mother’s heart.” Chŏng-ssi made it furthermore clear that her dead daughter’s descendants should have perpetual use of the slaves’ future offspring, and warned that if ever Mun-hae’s descendants were to disregard this special arrangement, they would be charged with being “unfilial and in breach of peace” (pulhyo pulhwa). In addition, Chŏng-ssi gifted Pog-il with a house. Undoubtedly through his first mother-in-law’s munificence, Pog-il was able to strengthen his economic base in Yech’ŏn, where his second wife’s family also possessed important holdings—a fact that must have been critical in Pog-il’s decision eventually to take up permanent residence in that area.86 No documents detailing either Myŏng-il’s and Su-il’s economic circumstances or those of Chin’s three daughters are extant. In 1574, Kim Chin allotted to the wife of his nonagnatic grandson, Yu Pok-ki, 100 sŏm of grain and one slave as a gesture of sympathy for Pok-ki, who had lost his parents early, and his “nice-mannered” wife, Chŏng-ssi.87 In sum, then, it is safe to conclude that during the sixteenth century the Naeap Kim combined successful official careers with augmenting their economic standing. Even though all of Kim Chin’s sons seem to have received patrimonial shares, it is noteworthy that sizable portions of land came to them through their wives. The record of the Naeap Kim’s economic fortunes in the seventeenth century is unfortunately fragmentary. Even though the damage suffered in Naeap during the Imjin War was minimal, property divisions had to be postponed until peace was restored. In 1611, Su-il’s son, Yong, added to his own inheritance (of unknown volume) the share of his wife, Yi-ssi (T’oegye’s granddaughter): sixty-four slaves (out of a total of 367) and some 600 majigi of land.88 In 1684, Pang-gŏl, Yong’s great-nephew, received from his wife’s side89 nine slaves and 41 majigi of land.90 Although the divisions of 1611 and 1684 are, of course, not readily comparable, they nevertheless point to a trend that in the course of the seventeenth century became critically evident: the inheritance shares of daughters clearly diminished. Indeed, in 1673, one of Si-on’s sons, Pang-ch’an (n.d.), left a testament in which he deplored that “the land and slaves of our house are few; if they are divided in [equal] portions to daughters, the sons might be forced to disperse.” To avoid such danger, Pang-ch’an directed that daughters, upon marriage, be given only one “bridal” female slave (sinbi) and neither patrimonial land nor slaves. These were henceforth to be divided among male heirs alone.91 Pang-ch’an’s fears were not unfounded. His father, Si-on, the Naeap main-line heir, had eight sons and six daughters with seventeen grand-



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

147

sons and nineteen granddaughters (not including the children of Si-on’s youngest son, Pang-gyŏm, and secondary offspring). Surely, even extensive estates were threatened by division among such large progenies. The Yu’gok Kwŏn Similar trends are observable in the inheritance papers left by the Yu’gok Kwŏn. Nine documents evidence the economic situation of Kwŏn Pŏl and his immediate descendants through the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.92 Pŏl received thirty slaves from his uncle, Sa-su (n.d.), with whom he had lived during his childhood, as a special congratulatory gift when he passed the munkwa examinations in 1507. In 1544, more property came his way through his wife.93 The extent of Pŏl’s wealth at the end of his life is revealed in a “writ on the mutual consent of the siblings” (hwahoe mun’gi) drawn up by his sons and daughters after the mourning period for their father had ended. Dated 1550, this document divided a total of 317 slaves and 2,312 majigi of land between his two sons, one daughter, two secondary sons (ŏlcha), and two secondary daughters (ŏllyŏ). Thirty-six slaves were marked as “obtained by purchase” (maedŭk), and three were a royal gift that Pŏl received after his return from a mission to China. Given that his inheritance share of land may have amounted to some 900 majigi, he must have acquired the rest of his landed property during his lifetime by successfully exploiting virgin land in areas such as Naesŏng and Ch’unyang. By 1550, his landed possessions were spread over seven administrative districts. This extensive wealth was divided equally among his primary offspring. The shares given to his secondary sons and daughters were decidedly smaller, roughly one-eighth of slaves and one-fifth of land.94 The extent of Pŏl’s economic success is obvious when compared to that of his older brother, Ŭi. In 1549, the latter left to his offspring merely ninety-five slaves and some 871 majigi of land.95 In the next generation, the property of Kwŏn Pŏl’s second son, Tong-mi, was divided by his widow among their four sons and one daughter as well as the secondary offspring who received shares “according to the law.” In 1550, Tong-mi had received from his parents eighty-eight slaves and 578 majigi of land, yet some forty years later, in 1592, a total of 341 slaves and 1,486 majigi of land were distributed among his offspring. Clearly, Tongmi, too, was able to augment his property substantially during his lifetime.96 Tong-mi’s second son, Nae, was adopted as the main-line heir by the sonless Tong-bo and thus inherited property from his natural as well as from his adoptive father. The latter allotment is not known, but it is likely to have been at least the full share Tong-bo inherited from Pŏl—that is, 104 slaves and 741 majigi (this included the ritual share). In addition, in 1619 Nae received property through his wife. After his death, when Nae’s second wife presided over the distribution of her husband’s wealth in 1621, a total of 532 slaves and 2,059 majigi of land were apportioned to his three sons, five daughters, and two secondary sons.97 In sum, during the three generations from Pŏl to Nae the property of the main line could not only be maintained but was significantly expanded. Yu’gok must have been one of the wealthiest villages in the area.

148

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

Despite such success, however, Nae foresaw serious problems when even a large patrimony continued to be divided in equal shares between sons and daughters. In his testament (yuŏn) written in 1615, two years prior to his death, he therefore stated: I have received the patrimony [yuŏp] of the previous generations. Land and slaves are more numerous than the family members, yet the daughters of the first and second wives are also very many. If each of them got an equal share, the extent [of the patrimony] would nevertheless not be sufficient. . . . When I come to think about all this, at the time of dividing up my property, I cannot but differentiate between sons and daughters.

Indeed, Nae had no fewer than five daughters. As “a way of dealing [with this problem],” he made, before his death, “special gifts” (pyŏlgŭp) (of unknown amounts) to his three sons.98 After thus privileging his male offspring, in 1621 the daughters received equal shares of the strategically reduced patrimony. The spirit of Nae’s testamentary will later influenced the agreement the children of his eldest son, Sang-ch’ung (n.d.), drew up in 1682. The preamble asserted that, with the consent of the deceased’s sons-in-law, landed property would be handed on exclusively to the three sons. Consequently, the five sons-in-law received merely thirteen slaves each (with the exception of one who was so destitute that he also received some land). Five years later, in 1687, however, this agreement was revised to the effect that even the sonsin-law were to get equal shares of land; as a result, the allocations of the three primary sons were considerably curtailed.99 No reason for this turnabout was given, but the revision was most likely forced by the sons-in-law, who regretted their promise, apparently given during Sang-ch’ung’s lifetime, to renounce their shares of some 70 majigi of land. Though successful in this case, such resistance could not in the long run check the tendency, manifest toward the end of the century, of limiting or even abrogating entirely the daughters’ inheritance rights as an expediency to counteract growing land shortage. The Och’ŏn Kim The earliest inheritance document preserved by the Kwangsan Kim of Och’ŏn is dated 1429. At that time, Kim Mu divided his 225 slaves equally among his four sons and two daughters. Typically, no land was mentioned, since the value of a slave was still higher than that of land. Benefiting from this division was the before-mentioned [Ŭisŏng] Kim Yŏng-myŏng, the second daughter’s husband. The individual shares varied between thirty-five and thirty-seven slaves, according to the slaves’ physical condition. Two slaves were given to the eldest grandson (as lineal heir), and one each to nine agnatic and nonagnatic grandchildren.100 In five documents, spread over the second half of the fifteenth century, Hyo-ro, Mu’s great-grandson, figured as the principal beneficiary. In 1464, he received from his maternal grandfather four slaves because he had grown up in the maternal home. Some fifteen years later, in 1479, Hyo-ro shared with his older brother, one sister, and one secondary son his father’s property and received sixteen slaves (no land was mentioned). One year later, in 1480, Hyo-ro, who had been made main heir of his sonless paternal great-uncle, was given by the latter’s widow fifteen slaves, a tile-



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

149

roofed house, and two kyŏl of land in Och’ŏn and vicinity. This inheritance may have been the chief reason for Hyo-ro to settle in Och’ŏn.101 In addition, a few years later he also purchased some land.102 When his mother distributed the rest of the parental estate in 1492, Hyo-ro again got twenty-six slaves. In sum, Hyo-ro was the recipient of some land (for which the records are not complete) and a total of sixty-one slaves. To these, he added six more when, in 1517, it will be recalled, he successfully launched, through the magistrate of Andong, a complaint against the husband of his great-uncle’s adopted daughter, who, in 1480, had received, against the law,103 the same share of slaves as Hyo-ro.104 By 1550, when it was divided up among his heirs, Hyo-ro’s estate comprised 190 slaves and 472 majigi of land, mostly concentrated in Yean.105 A number of documents detail the economic fortunes of Hyo-ro’s main-line heir, Yŏn2, who, together with his wife, became the recipient of several noteworthy bequests. Because his uncle, Hyo-wŏn, had died childless, the latter’s widow, O-ssi (a daughter of the powerful O Kye-dong), bequeathed in 1508 her property of some three kyŏl of land and seventeen slaves exclusively to her nephew, Yŏn. O-ssi apparently had motherly feelings toward Yŏn, because not only had she raised him, but she had also made him marry a collateral niece of hers in order to avoid being accused by her own relatives of giving her property to “others than grandchildren” (sonoe yŏt’a). The real reason behind O-ssi’s strategy is revealed, however, in the preamble of the bequest: frightened by a deplorable precedent of unfilial behavior suffered by a close relative, who, after distributing her wealth in equal parts to her kinsmen, received neither a decent funeral nor ancestral rites, O-ssi set all her hopes— and wealth—on Yŏn.106 Indeed, a wonderful example of an elite woman’s agency. Two years later, in 1510, Yŏn received a gift of three slaves from his wife’s maternal uncle (once removed) because Yŏn’s wife had been raised in that uncle’s house, and Yŏn successfully passed the lower saengwŏn/chinsa examinations in the same year. Seven years later, Yŏn’s wife received three additional slaves from the same source.107 In 1514, Yŏn was given five more slaves from an heirless uncle (of secondary status),108 and in 1528, Yŏn’s wife again was the beneficiary of a large gift consisting of a tile-roofed house, twenty-four slaves, and a considerable amount of land from her widowed maternal grandmother who had no male issue and was thus particularly attached to her granddaughters.109 For his munkwa success, the wife of a maternal uncle presented Yŏn with one slave in 1529, and two years later he received some additional eight slaves from the wife of a collateral kinsman.110 Yŏn’s mother was equally generous in rewarding her eldest son repeatedly with slaves and land in recognition of his adding prestige to the family by advancing in office (last to the magistracy of Kyŏngju), and his mother-in-law gifted him with land in reward for his filial acts.111 In sum, during his lifetime Yŏn—evidently an exemplar of civic and familial virtue—accumulated considerable assets through inheritance and special gifts. He did not live long enough, however, to receive his share of the parental property. In 1547 and again in 1550, some 472 majigi of land and 190 slaves were divided among his widow (in lieu of her husband), his brother Yu, and two sisters. Why this division took place so many years after Hyo-ro’s death (in 1534) is unclear.112 In turn, after the mourning period for their mother ended in 1559, two sons and three daughters shared Yŏn’s 226 slaves equally, but more than 800 majigi of dry and paddy fields were, without stated reason, handed on exclusively to his two sons, Pu-p’il and

150

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

Pu-ŭi.113 During his lifetime Pu-p’il also got various gifts and his wife’s substantial share of inheritance of close to 300 majigi of land, scattered in various localities.114 Lacking an heir, Pu-p’il adopted his brother’s only son, Hae, and entreated him to be a faithful performer of ancestral services. Hae, by inheriting the wealth of both his fathers, thus consolidated the family property that must have far exceeded 230 slaves and 1,000 majigi of land. Apparently remarkably little affected by the Imjin War, this large patrimony was divided among Hae’s four sons and three daughters in two stages, first in 1601 and again around 1619. After that date no inheritance papers are extant.115 The Chinsŏng Yi The economic record of T’oegye’s line of the Chinsŏng Yi is less well documented. No inheritance paper including T’oegye as an heir exists, but it is likely that his share—one among seven—was rather small. His father, Sik, had to divide Kye-yang’s wealth with his brother and sister, and both of Sik’s wives came from “poor” families. Moreover, Sik’s life was not long enough to enlarge his family’s property substantially. After her husband’s premature death, T’oegye’s mother is said to have made ends meet by devoting herself energetically to silkworm raising. T’oegye’s estimated personal wealth of roughly 150 slaves and some 1,000 majigi of land was thus mostly acquired during his lifetime. From both his wives he received sizeable landed property, in Yŏngch’ŏn and Ŭiryŏng from his first wife, Hŏ-ssi, whose father was known as “very rich,” and in P’ungsan from his second wife, Kwŏn-ssi.116 T’oegye was not the scholar who scorned economic matters. On the contrary, as becomes clear from the numerous letters he wrote to his son, Chun, whom he had put in charge of managing the family property, he believed in a judicious advancement of economic interests. In 1554, for instance, he wrote: As to such things as managing property, people cannot but engage in them. Although I have stayed aloof all my life, could I have avoided it entirely? To concentrate primarily on cultured pursuits and to pay secondarily occasional attention to business matters: this does not ruin a scholar’s reputation and causes no harm. If, however, one totally forgets about scholarship and is completely immersed in business matters, this is the way of peasants and the doings of village rustics.117

Indeed, the extensive correspondence with his son demonstrates that T’oegye, though often absent from home, took an active interest even in the day-to-day management of his land and slaves.118 Under the ever-watchful eye of his father, Chun succeeded in increasing the family’s wealth significantly. The largest part of the landed property, most of which was patrimonial, centered in Yean, with extensive holdings in Ŭiryŏng and Yŏngch’ŏn. Upon his marriage to Kŭm-ssi, Chun also received land in Ponghwa County. Although Chun served briefly as magistrate of Ponghwa, it is unlikely that he enriched himself in office, being constantly admonished by his father to lead a “clean and modest administration.” When Chun’s property was divided equally among his three sons and two daughters (among



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

151

them Kim Yong’s wife) in 1586 and in 1611 the total landed assets amounted to over 3,000 majigi in 377 different locations. In addition, there were 367 slaves, four houses, and a house site. In short, although T’oegye’s wealth was less extensive than that of his local contemporaries, T’oegye’s descendants each inherited a comfortable landed base.119 The economic situation of the Chinsŏng main line was apparently comparatively constrained. Yi Chŏng-hoe is said to have been urged to enter government service because of his family’s “poverty.” “Poverty” is, of course, a relative term, but it is true that by Chŏng-hoe’s generation the property that had belonged to his great-grandfather, Yi Hun, consisting of sixty-two slaves and 344 turak of land, had greatly diminished. Though he had to share his parents’ wealth with one brother, five sisters, and one secondary brother, Chŏng-hoe received sizable property from his wife, an Asan Chang-ssi.120 The economic histories of the four kin groups discussed above show remarkable similarities and, in fact, parallel those of other major descent groups in the Andong area, such as the Hahoe Yu, the Chaeryŏng Yi, or the Kosŏng Yi.121 It was during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries that estates were established and expanded through uxorilocal marriage, inheritance, and land purchase. Rather than by increasing land productivity, growth apparently was attained by bringing new land under cultivation by aggressive land reclamation in areas that were little populated and only superficially under state control. The key to such expansion was the size of slaveholdings—a fact that clearly emerges from early inheritance papers and the innumerable disputes over slave allocations. As slaves thus constituted the most valuable inheritable property, land, at that time still plentiful, was often not even mentioned. With land reclamation reaching a certain saturation point around the middle of the seventeenth century, extensive land cultivation was gradually replaced by more intensive cultivation methods. Noteworthy is the great fragmentation of the estates. Even though perhaps concentrated in one or two subcounties, land was not contiguous, but scattered in relatively small parcels over wide areas. Kwŏn Pŏl’s estate, for instance, was, when it was divided among his heirs in 1550, spread over 190 localities in seven administrative units within Andong County.122 The inheritance Kim Yong obtained from his wife’s side was located in twenty-six different sites. Although centered in three main areas (mostly in P’ungsan), the fields were not adjacent and frequently very small in size.123 Such fragmentation, then, renders problematic earlier estimates of elite wealth based on land registers (yangan) that recorded an individual owner’s cultivated land in one single district only.124 A major reason for the extreme parceling of land was undoubtedly the still prevalent equal division of every piece—whether coming from the father’s or the mother’s side— among all heirs, sons and daughters. This was a custom that dated back to Koryŏ125 and was still religiously adhered to in the sixteenth century. T’oegye, writing to Chun, also emphatically endorsed it: “Only if all siblings are treated equally, does the domestic way not decline. It is indeed very difficult for someone not treated equally to be able to preserve a peaceful mind.”126 Nevertheless, landed estates, however sizable and far-flung, were endangered by large progenies, and it is clear that in the course of time many were broken up by multiple inheritance divisions. Occasionally, a single heir like Kim Hae or a strategic marital arrangement may have led to short-term consolidation, but fragmentation could not be halted as long as equal inheritance benefited sons and daughters alike.

152

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

Two sets of inheritance and gift documents are currently available for Namwŏn: one from the Chŏnju Yi of Tundŏk, the other from the Changsu Hwang of Chup’o. Because of the severe destruction the area suffered during the Imjin War, the small number of extant records date predominantly from the seventeenth century—a reason why ritual concerns emerge more as an issue than in the Andong papers. The Tundŏk Yi The earliest document evidencing the Yi’s property is an inheritance paper dated 1577 when Yi Hon’s (1513–76)127 two sons and one daughter shared their father’s wealth. Hon’s adoptive father, Tam-son, had received from his own father only a small piece of land in Kŭmch’ŏn (Kyŏnggi Province),128 so that the bulk of the property, which was distributed among Hon’s heirs, must have come from Tam-son’s in-laws, the Sunch’ŏn Kim, and/or from Hon’s wife’s side, the P’ungsan Sim of neighboring Malch’ŏn Subcounty. Despite slight differences, Hon’s offspring—male and female—received equal portions of the roughly seventeen kyŏl of land, situated in Tundŏk and Malch’ŏn, and eighty-eight slaves. Each of the two sons also received a tiled house. The land in Kyŏnggi Province, as well as four slaves living in two other far-off places, had been given by Hon to his eldest son Tae-yun (1530–96), on the occasion of the latter’s wedding in 1551.129 Some one hundred years lie between Hon’s property division and the next documented partition that took place in 1679. At that time, Yi Mun-wŏn, a great-great-grandson of Hon and Sang-hyŏng’s second son, divided his property, some 300 majigi of land and forty-eight slaves, among his five children. That he did so well before his death may be connected to the fact that he did not have a primary heir and thus made, exceptionally, the only son by his commoner secondary wife, Sŏng-no, his ritual heir. He set roughly one-sixth of his total land and eight slaves aside for ritual purposes and, in addition, gifted Sŏng-no with some extra land. Nevertheless, Mun-wŏn gave his only primary daughter, the wife of [Sangnyŏng] Ch’oe Ch’i-ong, the largest share—120 majigi of land and thirty-one slaves. His oldest secondary son (by a slave mother) received a share equal to that of his commoner half-brother Sŏng-no, and even his two commoner secondary daughters each got some 25 majigi of land and two slaves for maintaining their livelihood.130 Interestingly, instead of adopting an heir, Mun-wŏn evidently preferred to hand on his property to his secondary offspring—an arrangement that would never have been a solution in Andong (further discussed in chapter 11). The next inheritance paper, dated 1688, originated in Tam-son’s main line. It documents the late division of Yi Mun-ju’s (1623–57) property over which his widow, Sin-ssi, presided.131 Lamenting in the preamble that disaster had struck her family with the consecutive deaths of Mun-ju’s natal and adoptive fathers and with Mun-ju’s own premature demise, Sin-ssi deplored that much patrimonial land had to be sold for defraying the funeral costs so that at the time of the partition less than 12 kyŏl remained. After setting aside ritual land in accordance with her husband’s will, she was to allocate smaller portions of the remainder to her two daughters than to her three sons because the daughters were, due to poverty, no longer sharing in rotating the ancestral rites. “Although this amounts to a want in feeling and propriety, the circumstances dictate this.” A contestant



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

153

of this rule, she warned, would be censored for extreme lack of filiality. Consequently, with 5.2 kyŏl earmarked for ancestral and grave rituals, only 6.5 kyŏl of land were left to be divided up. Each of the two daughters had to content herself with roughly half of a brother’s share. Out of a total of sixty-five slaves, thirty-four were reserved for ritual purposes, seven given to each of the three sons, and five to each of the daughters.132 Clearly, in Namwŏn, too, continuous partition had led to a critical diminution of the patrimony and consequently to a gradual disinheriting of daughters. A number of inheritance instruments dating from the eighteenth century demonstrate intensive concern with ritual matters and will be discussed in chapter 11. The Hwang of Chup’o [Changsu] Hwang Yun-gong’s property was divided among his two sons, Chŏk and Chin, in 1582, when the mourning period for their mother, who had died in 1580, ended. According to family lore, the Hwang had always been rather “poor” and therefore relied heavily on maternal and affinal wealth. Indeed, in 1582 only some 166 majigi of land and 116 slaves could be divided among the two brothers. Chin, however, who grew up in the house of his childless maternal step-grandmother, So-ssi (i.e., Pang Ŭng-sŏng’s second wife), had earlier twice received small gifts of land and slaves from her out of gratitude for his filiality. After roughly one-fourth of the land, eight slaves, and the only tile-roofed house were set aside for ritual services, the property was equally apportioned to the two heirs.133 When it was again divided in 1623 between Chin’s two sons, Chŏng-jik and Chŏng-yŏl, with Chin’s widow presiding, half of the greatly reduced land, 29 majigi, and five slaves were allocated specifically to the eldest son in his capacity as ritual heir (sŭngjungwi). The rest, 26 majigi and thirty slaves, were split equally. Included were those slaves given to the two sons when they had married—years before. Because some far-off land scattered in Hamgyŏng and Kyŏnggi Provinces and a number of runaway slaves could no longer be accounted for, their division had to be postponed until verification was possible. Evidently, despite the fact that Chin’s descendants had been granted tax exemption (pokho) in 1594 owing to Chin’s heroic death, the economic fortunes of the family did not seem to have significantly improved.134 On the contrary, the Hwang’s resources apparently declined still further in the next generation. Hwang Wi, Chŏng-yŏl’s only son, received merely 19.5 majigi of land and two slaves from his reputedly very rich father-in-law, [Namwŏn] Yang Si-ik (n.d.),135 in 1643. Si-ik’s primary progeny consisted of two sons and seven daughters (the third one was Wi’s wife). Thus, after 35 majigi of land and three slaves were set aside for ritual purposes, Si-ik’s eldest son inherited no more than four slaves and 21.8 majigi of land. In his last will, moreover, Si-ik allotted his only secondary son 14.5 majigi of land—an uncommonly large bequest, which needed separate mention, because his two secondary daughters received only insignificant amounts of land. In addition, small lots were reserved for grave services.136 Clearly, extensive properties, when distributed among a large progeny, yielded diminishing shares. Some twenty years later, in 1663, Hwang Wi’s widow oversaw the division of her late husband’s property. Curiously, the division document was neither signed by the property

154

R ebuilding the Cou ntryside

owner nor did it apportion a share to the only daughter. That this had nothing to do with discriminating against a female inheritor but in fact reflected domestic trouble is revealed in a brief Sillok entry. Wi’s eldest son, Suk-ku (1625–81), a royal tomb keeper (ch’ambong),137 reportedly had over a trivial matter opened a feud with his younger sister, which had more than once led even to bodily harm. He then forced his mother to disinherit her only daughter. This act violating “human relationships” cost him dearly. Considering him not fit to stand among “those in caps and gowns,” the censors, who conveyed this case to the king in 1671, requested Suk-ku’s dismissal from office—a request promptly granted by the king. Anyway, the 87 majigi of land to be divided up were so small that no land but merely two slaves could be set aside for Hwang Wi’s ancestral services, while the youngest son had to content himself with eleven slaves. Each of the four male heirs was entreated in the preamble to give up one slave to bolster the ancestral trust. Whether or not they later made amends to their sister is not recorded, but it seems highly unlikely.138

Land and Slaves in Andong and Namwŏn: A Comparison In conclusion, the data presented in this chapter illustrate how land and slave ownership and management differed among the various descent groups as well as between Andong and Namwŏn. It appears that in Andong, landed estates were generally larger, at least in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and consequently demanded a more numerous slave labor force—an indication of extensive rather than intensive land use. The size of slaveholdings, therefore, was the key to expansion, and slaves constituted the most valuable inheritable property as long as land was still plentiful. Tenancy apparently was negligible. In contrast, no Namwŏn inheritance document lists more than at most a few dozen slaves and, in comparison to Andong, much smaller amounts of cultivated land. To be sure, agriculture in Andong seems to have remained more labor-intensive than in Namwŏn where the ratio of labor-saving and more productive wet rice cultivation increased from approximately 50 percent in the mid-fifteenth century to over 70 per­ cent in the eighteenth. In Andong, on the contrary, it stagnated at roughly 29 percent throughout the dynasty.139 Noteworthy, moreover, is the lesser geographical land fragmentation in the Namwŏn area, with only occasional property (most often obtained through marriage) situated outside the Chŏlla region. After the Imjin War, the recorded acreage, as opposed to actual acreage, never regained prewar levels. As pressure on land increased with growing populations, in both areas more intensive farming was the answer to a rising food demand. Yet as reclamation of new land came to an end and land fragmentation jeopardized rational land and labor administration, the economic existence of many sajok clearly started to weaken. Not surprisingly, concern about growing poverty, in particular of main lines, began to be expressed in the preambles of inheritance documents. For preventing a descent group’s steady economic decline and securing its long-term survival, the reduction or even abolition of daughters’ shares began to be propagated as defensive strategy. Disinheriting a daughter was obviously a difficult decision because it not only made her entirely depen-



Localized Elites: Economic Dimensions

155

dent on her husband’s wealth, it also may have impaired her natal family’s reputation. A middle-way solution—increasingly resorted to in the seventeenth century—was for parents to reduce the inheritable patrimony by making special gifts (pyŏlgŭp) to sons (preferably first sons). Such transmissions of wealth outside the regular inheritance channel, certified in separate documents to forestall disputes, evidently subverted the traditional (and legal) principle of equal inheritance of the patrimony, even if that ideal continued to be generally upheld when property acquired during the parents’ lifetime was divided.140 Despite the fact that in the course of time the size of the sajok’s landed wealth critically decreased, according to land surveys conducted in the early years of the eighteenth century,141 the sajok in both areas continued to own the largest tracts. Nevertheless, even within the same descent group the amount of land held by individual members often varied considerably so that some plots could have been hardly sufficient for survival. Such discrepancy was naturally most pronounced between primary and secondary offspring, although increasingly evident also among the eldest son (as ritual heir) and his younger brothers—indicating changing intrafamilial relationships due to the appearance of patrilineages (to be further discussed in chapter 8). Taken together, the evidence discussed in this chapter illustrates the critical value of land in the life trajectories of the “localized” sajok in Andong as well as in Namwŏn. By building landed estates, they secured their own and their descendants’ livelihood. At the same time, landed property enabled them to prepare for official careers and to pursue scholarship. As will be argued in later chapters, landed property was vital for stimulating the rise of Confucian learning and ritualism. Indeed, it was the eventual fragmentation and shortage of land threatening the sajok’s very existence that encouraged them to develop new ritual forms for organizing kin in a way that would keep land together. There is thus a strong economic component that acted as a catalyst of the late-Chosŏn lineage system.

Pa rt III

Confucian Learning and Practice

g

Introduction

B

y the mid-sixteenth century, sizable localized elite communities had emerged in Andong and Namwŏn, which, on the basis of communal cooperation and marital networks, had been able to generate considerable amounts of wealth and instate a degree of local stability. With these vital assets in the background, a few sajok members turned to Confucian learning and pioneered the performance of new domestic rituals as strategies for cementing their dominant positions in their respective localities. Yŏngnam [Kyŏngsang] was traditionally regarded as an area exceptionally rich in cultural heritage and scholarly excellence, features that Ha Yŏn1 extolled in his preface to the Kyŏngsangdo chiriji: “As a province, Kyŏngsang had more productive soil and is richer in human resources than any other province. . . . As the ancient site of Silla, it is the foundation of the nation.”2 Indeed, from late Koryŏ a disproportionate number of civil service examination passers hailed from Kyŏngsang Province. Quite a number of them, like Ha Yŏn himself, were disciples of Chŏng Mong-ju, a native of Kyŏngsang, who, as one of the most influential teachers of Tohak learning at the National Confucian Academy, was later praised as the “ancestor of the Eastern [Korean] school of principle [ihak].” Chŏng’s students, inspired by their teacher’s sense of mission for renovating state and society, carried Neo-Confucian knowledge into their communities and thus laid the intellectual foundation for the emergence of Tohak thought in the countryside. One of Chŏng Mong-ju’s disciples was Cho Yong (?–1424),3 a native of Chinbo, who, like his teacher, opposed the founding of the Chosŏn and was exiled to Yech’ŏn. There, he began to instruct the sons of his friend [Hŭnghae] Pae Sang-ji, another opponent of the new dynasty. Among Cho’s disciples was also Yun Sang (1373–1455),4 a local man, who later, after a highly acclaimed teaching career in the capital, retired to Yech’ŏn and con­ tinued educating local students. Thus, in spite of Andong’s geographic isolation, a num­ ber of Andong men acquired the fundamentals of Confucian learning and turned

160

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Andong into an area praised even in the capital for treasuring the “teachings of Confucius and Mencius.” Not surprisingly, a few enthusiastic Andong Tohak students were among the victims of the Literati Purges at the turn of the sixteenth century.5 A receptive ground was thus prepared when T’oegye Yi Hwang (1501–70) started teaching a local discipleship in the 1550s. Yi, a native of Andong (Yean), was nationally famous as a high official, royal educator, and outstanding expositor of Tohak learning when he settled near On’gye and built Tosan Sŏdang, his first local school. His students were the sons of the localized sajok who vied for the prestige to become T’oegye’s disciples, though what T’oegye taught would not necessarily prepare them for official careers. Rather, T’oegye educated men of “civility” (mun), whose learning empowered them to “convert through instruction” (kyohwa). It was they who not only “learned for themselves” but also turned into active teachers, initiated, in an essentially Buddhist environment, new Confucian-style ritual forms to organize their kin, and transformed their communities with community compacts (hyangyak). Profit was not one-sidedly on the sajok’s side, however. T’oegye depended on the existence of a committed discipleship during his lifetime and even more so after his death. A T’oegye “school” (hakp’a) is unlikely to have emerged if it had not been for the intellectual dedication and economic support of some of his prime disciples, who subsidized his teaching activities and, after his death, gathered and preserved his intellectual heritage for posterity. T’oegye’s reputation was unrivaled during his lifetime, but he did have, if not a direct challenger, a sort of counterpart in the southern half of Kyŏngsang. This was Nam­myŏng Cho Sik (1501–72). Never aspiring to public office, Nammyŏng was a maverick philosopher who gathered around himself a considerable number of local students of the Hapch’ŏn and Chinju region (southern Kyŏngsang). Even a number of T’oegye’s disciples are known also to have studied under him. The initial alignment between T’oegye’s and Nammyŏng’s discipleships soon broke apart after 1575, however, for intellectual as well as political reasons, when conflict at the center split the officialdom into feuding factions—a subject discussed in the introduction to part IV. The ensuing division between the two came to be perceived even in geographical terms, which took the Naktong River as a dividing line: the “upper” or “left-side” half (seen from the capital) of Kyŏngsang Province was viewed as T’oegye territory, the “lower” or “right-side” half as Nammyŏng territory. Though the knowledge of what exactly separated these two philosophers intellectually later wore rather thin, outside observers adhered to the stereotype that the people inhabiting these two areas differed noticeably in their mentalities—those in “upper” Kyŏngsang supposedly more civilized and sedate than those in the “lower” part. The transmission of Confucian learning to Chŏlla may initially have been less vigorous than in Kyŏngsang, but with the support of one of Cho Kwang-jo’s closest collaborators, Kim An-guk (1478–1543)6—both Cho and Kim were disciples of Kim Koeng-p’il—Tohak gained a solid scholarly foundation in that province. As a dedicated educator rather than a political activist, Kim, while in self-imposed exile in his native Chŏlla after 1519, taught the classics to such local learners as Kim In-hu (1510–60) and



Introduction

161

Yu Hŭi-ch’un (1513–77). Kim In-hu afterward pursued a minor government career before retiring from office in the wake of the 1545 purge to devote himself to sŏngnihak studies and to teaching in his native Changsŏng. As Kim An-guk’s most talented disciple, he was later honored for his scholarship and literary accomplishments and, as the only Chŏlla native, enshrined in the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo) in Seoul.7 From his youth, Yu Hŭi-ch’un was well connected to early Chŏlla sarim: his father was a disciple of Kim Koeng-p’il and a son-in-law of Ch’oe Pu;8 Yu also was affinally related to Kim In-hu. As a polymath, Yu was, in addition to classical scholarship, exceptionally versed in history, philology, and rituals and also acquired a high reputation as an inspiring teacher.9 So great was their intellectual authority that Kim In-hu and Yu Hŭi-ch’un came to be counted, together with the eminent Chŏlla scholar-official, Ki Tae-sŭng (1525–72), among the “Five Worthies of Honam.”10 Ki won singular fame through the celebrated debate he initiated in 1559 with T’oegye on the “Four Beginnings and Seven Feelings.” This debate opened the complex argument on the relation of human nature to the two Neo-Confucian key concepts of “principle” (i) and “mind-matter” (ki).11 Continued a few years later by Yulgok Yi I (1536–84) and U’gye Sŏng Hon (1535–98), it sparked the philosophically based controversies that split the late Chosŏn officialdom into competing factions. In Chŏlla, then, no one scholar unified the scholarly discourse to the extent that T’oegye did in northern Kyŏngsang and Cho Sik in southern Kyŏngsang. Indeed, Confucian learning fed on diverse and often conflicting sources, yet eventually subscribed predominantly to Yulgok’s philosophical position.12 What did the sajok learners do with their Confucian knowledge? Making Tohak learning part of their identity and understanding it as a moral mission bestowed upon them, they began to be active on several levels. They set out to transform their kin groups and their village communities along the societal models expounded in Zhu Xi’s works. Living in an environment imbued with Buddhist traditions, they had to combat Buddhist mortuary and ancestral rites when they strove to renovate their kin groups’ ritual life. It was, it will be argued, the transformation of the ancestral cult that promoted the eventual emergence of Confucian-style patrilines in Korea. On the community level, the sajok tackled tasks that the state (represented by the magistrate) was apparently unwilling or unable to fulfill and thus delegated to the educated local elites: the spread of Confucian norms and values among elite and nonelite in the countryside. The usefulness of Zhu Xi’s community compact (hyangyak) for assisting the “way of ruling” (ch’ido) was early recognized at the royal court, yet no measures were ever taken to enforce a government-sponsored format of a community compact.13 It was therefore left to the voluntarism of the local elites to use this instrument for “civilizing” their rural constituencies. Confucian learning gradually tended toward individual self-cultivation and thus was often no longer linked to studying for the state examinations so that exam success became sporadic. Scholarly competence and reputation, however, turned into assets that, independent of state recognition, bolstered the localized elites’ social status. As

162

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

learned men, the literati (sa) consolidated their social and political control over the environment in which they lived and, as local power holders, defended their standing vis-à-vis the state. Part III contains three chapters. Chapter 7 discusses the rise of Tohak learning in Andong and Namwŏn and traces T’oegye’s teaching activities and the growth of his local discipleship in Andong. It includes a brief review of Nammyŏng’s school. Chapter 8 explores the introduction of Confucian-style ritual practices against the background of Buddhist and shamanic traditions and describes the first phase of lineage building. Finally, chapter 9 examines the manner by which major Andong descent groups organized themselves into a well-functioning corporate community, which, at the end of the sixteenth century, emerged from the devastation of the Imjin War (1592–97) strengthened and poised for further growth. All three chapters draw heavily on materials from Andong. Namwŏn suffered almost complete destruction in 1597, rendering its history fragmentary for the first two centuries of Chosŏn.

Ch a p ter 7

The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

B

y the second half of the fifteenth century few sajok individuals outside the capital identified with Tohak learning, yet a number of natives of Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla joined the circle of Tohak adepts around Kim Chong-jik in the 1480s and, three decades later, the one around Cho Kwang-jo. Many of them were later remembered in the Yŏnggaji and Yongsŏngji as victims of the Literati Purges at the turn of the century. Tohak learning started to blossom exceptionally in Andong from the mid-sixteenth century, when Yi T’oegye took up teaching in his home district.

Early Sarim in Andong The first Andong man to join Kim Chong-jik’s “seniors of Kyŏngsang” presumably was a grandson of [Kosŏng] Yi Chŭng, Yi Chu (?–1504). A munkwa graduate of 1488, he had by 1495 advanced to the lower echelons of the Censorate and was active in supporting sarim causes. For opposing the performance of Buddhist rites for the late King Sŏngjong, he was, along with other Kim Chong-jik followers, punished with exile to remote Chindo Island (Chŏlla Province). Back in Seoul, he antagonized Yŏnsan’gun with his request of installing a special assembly room for the censors in the royal palace and was beheaded in the 1504 purge.1 The Yŏnggaji mentions two further purge victims of 1504: [Andong] Kwŏn Min-su (1466–?) was banished and his younger brother, Kwŏn Tal-su (?–1504), beheaded. Neither, however, seems ever to have lived in Andong or been directly involved in sarim issues;2 it is therefore not clear why they are recorded in the Yŏnggaji. Earlier, to avoid the Purge of 1498, the Kim Chong-jik partisan [Kwangsan] Kim Yong-sŏk (1453–?) fled the capital and took refuge in Kudam (P’ungsan Subcounty), the village of his wife.3 Though the traumatic events in the capital must have frightened and discouraged sarim adherents, they were again captivated by Cho Kwang-jo’s charismatic leadership.

164

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

One of Cho’s Andong admirers was Kwŏn Pŏl (munkwa 1507), listed with his younger brother Chang (chinsa 1513; munkwa 1519)4 on all three rosters of sarim victims of 1519.5 While serving in various capacities in the censorial offices, Kwŏn Pŏl actively seconded many of the political demands put forward by the Cho group, among them the rehabilitation of the 1498 victims, in particular of Kim Chong-jik.6 Pŏl also befriended the two eminent sarim scholars and educators Kim An-guk and his brother Kim Chŏng-guk,7 and, like Kim An-guk, abhorred radical action. Thus, when in the early months of 1519 Pŏl, high-placed as the second minister of the Ministry of Rites, found himself in serious disagreement with sarim colleagues and sensed that a political storm was imminent, he asked for an assignment outside the capital. Though he thus avoided the full impact of the purge that started at the end of that year, his name was nevertheless inextricably linked to the Cho Kwang-jo party and, as a result, he was stripped of rank and office and sent back home to spend the next thirteen years in virtual exile. After his comeback in 1533, he continued to advance in office and joined Kim An-guk and other survivors in pressing for the rehabilitation of the 1519 victims. Kwŏn’s eventual downfall in 1545 had nothing to do with reformist concerns: it resulted from ministerial infighting surrounding the selection of Chungjong’s successor.8 Kwŏn Pŏl’s sarim credentials were likely enhanced by the fact that he was married to a fifth-generation nonagnatic granddaughter of Chŏng Mong-ju, the person the sarim venerated as their distant progenitor, and to whom Pŏl paid his respects by visiting Chŏng’s native village in the spring of 1515. Pŏl was an avid reader of the Extended Meaning of the Great Learning (Daxue yanyi), the Reflections on Things at Hand, and the Complete Literary Works of Zhu Xi (Zhuzi daquan), copies of which he had received from the king himself. He is reported to have always carried the Reflections in his sleeve so that when a mislaid copy was found in the royal gardens, the king did not need to guess its rightful owner. Kwŏn Pŏl also was one of the collators of the Complete Literary Works of Zhuzi when it was first printed in Korea in 1543. Despite his enormous wealth, Pŏl shunned extravagance and preferred to liken himself to a “humble scholar” (hansa). Significantly, his biography (haengjang) was later written by none other than Yi T’oegye—a posthumous confirmation of his sarim status.9 Two distant kinsmen of Kwŏn Pŏl were in office at the same time, Kwŏn Chu1 (1457– 1505) and his son, Chŏn2 (1490–1521). Chu was killed for reasons unrelated to sarim issues in the wake of the Purge of 1504,10 but Chŏn was a declared partisan and intimate of Cho Kwang-jo and a graduate of the Recommendation Examination of 1519. Because Chŏn championed such sarim causes as the canonization of Chŏng Mong-ju and Kim Koengp’il, he became embroiled in a court affair and was executed in the 1521 aftermath of the 1519 purge.11 One could be a sarim sympathizer without approving of Cho Kwang-jo’s activist political program. [Chinsŏng] Yi U (1469–1517), the younger brother of T’oegye’s father, for instance, counted among his friends such sarim luminaries as Kim An-guk, and his misfortune in government had nothing to do with sarim causes. As a munkwa graduate of 1498, he advanced to royal secretary in Yŏnsan’gun’s last year, yet switched his loyalty and joined Chungjong’s Restoration Army—a switch for which he was rewarded fourthclass merit status. A few years later, in 1514, however, he was accused of opportunism and



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

165

stripped of this honor. Apparently rehabilitated a year later, he was appointed magistrate of Andong. His friend and compatriot from Yean, with whom he shared the munkwa roster of 1498, was Yi Hyŏn-bo (1467–1555).12 Though a reluctant sarim supporter, Yi was briefly exiled in 1504 for critical remarks he made as a junior censor, but he was back in office two years later. Because he kept his distance from Cho Kwang-jo’s activism, he survived the 1519 calamity. As educators, both Yi U and Yi Hyŏn-bo played a vital role in stimulating sarim learning in the Andong area. The events in Seoul around the turn of the sixteenth century cast deep shadows of gloom and uncertainty far into the countryside. What the Yi, the Kwŏn, and other Andong men had suffered in the capital surely threw doubts on seeking a career in government service. But was the pursuit of sarim learning necessarily linked to an official career? Could it not, on the contrary, be detached from worldly affairs and serve as a means of establishing oneself as a learner seeking superior status by moral self-improvement? It was with such an alternative view that T’oegye, when he started teaching in Andong, appealed to the younger generation of localized sajok who had grown up with sufficient wealth to invest in education.

Early Confucian Learning in Chŏlla The early propagation of sarim learning in Chŏlla seems to have followed a pattern similar to that in Andong. It was predominantly munkwa graduates and former office holders who transmitted sarim learning to their native place, even though fewer Chŏlla men passed the munkwa examinations and were in office in Seoul in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.13 Unfortunately, the sources for profiling the early Chŏlla learners are limited and often yield not more than a few bare biographical facts. In contrast to Kyŏngsang, Chŏlla was generally perceived as an area inimical to Confucian culture. When Kim Chong-jik was about to take up his assignment as governor of that province in the summer of 1487, he remarked to the king during the farewell audience that Chŏlla was as yet little touched by the “teachings of nature and principle” because its people were practicing “wanton rituals” (ŭmsa).14 This might have been the prejudice of a Kyŏngsang man, but Ch’oe Pu (1454–1504), a native of Naju (Chŏlla), shared this view. An early disciple of Kim Chong-jik and Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang, Ch’oe, a munkwa graduate of 1482, is reported to have informally toured the southern part of the province intent on “straightening out the [local] discourse and changing its crude customs.” Because Kim Chong-jik’s works were discovered in his house in 1498, Ch’oe was punished first with exile and, like so many others, killed in 150415—likely the first purge victim from Chŏlla. A few Chŏlla men are known to have had direct contact with the early sarim leaders. Though a resident of Hamyang (a county in Kyŏngsang adjacent to Chŏlla), [P’ungch’ŏn] No U-myŏng (1471–1523) is said to have repeatedly sought instruction from Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang when Chŏng was the magistrate of adjacent Anŭm County in the early 1490s. A chinsa graduate, No acquired a reputation for disciplined behavior and charismatic

166

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

leadership and was later appointed royal tomb keeper (ch’ambong) on the recommendation of Kim An-guk (when Kim served as the governor of Kyŏngsang in 1517). Apparently fulfilling the exacting sarim criteria, No was proposed, perhaps through family connections (see below), as a candidate for Cho Kwang-jo’s Recommendation Examination of 1519, but was not among the twenty-eight graduates.16 Dedicated to the education of his young son Chin, U-myŏng reportedly hand-copied some of Zhu Xi’s writings for him. Chin was the one who raised the reputation of the P’ungch’ŏn No in Namwŏn. A munkwa graduate of 1546, he advanced to the highest offices inside and outside the capital and entertained close friendship ties to such Chŏlla luminaries as Kim In-hu, Ki Tae-sŭng, and No Su-sin.17 Later revered as one of the “Five Worthies of Honam,” he apparently adhered to Zhu Xi’s ritual prescriptions so strictly that he fell ill after rigorous mourning periods for his parents. As the educator of men who would later assume leadership roles in their Chŏlla communities, Chin won posthumous recognition as the “ancestor” (chong) of the Chŏlla sarim.18 Practically nothing is known about [Namyang] Pang Kwi-on (1465–?), the only Chŏlla graduate of the Recommendation Examination of 1519. A grandson of the Pang ancestor of Chup’o-bang, Kwi-on was a chinsa of 1495 and served as a royal tomb keeper. It was likely his character and comportment that recommended him, at age fifty-four the oldest examination candidate, to Cho Kwang-jo in 1519.19 Two Namwŏn men are recorded in the Yongsŏngji as “famous worthies of 1519” (kimyo myŏnghyŏn): [Sunhŭng] An Ch’ŏ-sun (1492–1534) and Hong Sun-bok (1492–1520). An Ch’ŏ-sun earned a munkwa degree in 1514 and through his position in the Office of the Special Counselors closely associated himself with Cho Kwang-jo. It may have been An who introduced his brother-in-law, No U-myŏng, to Cho. In 1518, to be nearer his old mother, he took up an assignment as magistrate of Kurye (Chŏlla) and thus was not in the capital when the Purge of 1519 was under way. Yet, listed as he was on all three rosters of Cho Kwang-jo partisans, he was stripped of rank and office, and, like Kwŏn Pŏl, sent into prolonged exile. Only in 1533 was he rehabilitated and appointed to a teaching position in the National Confucian Academy. He died in the capital a year later. True to his sarim commitment, An entertained a life-long interest in the Reflections on Things at Hand and, because copies were rare in the countryside, undertook its printing while in Kurye. Distressed to find there that the biannual rites for Confucius were performed in an ordinary home, he hastened to build a proper shrine—a feat that reputedly won him the admiration of the local populace.20 Compared to the learned An Ch’ŏ-su, Hong Sun-bok, the other “famous worthy of 1519,” was an activist rather than a scholar. Reportedly as hotheaded as his teacher Kim Sik,21 he joined a group of National Confucian Academy students that rushed into the royal compound to protest the accusations levied against Cho Kwang-jo and his followers. For his rashness, he was punished with exile in 1519 and executed the following year. He was later honored with a place of worship in Nobong Sŏwŏn in Namwŏn.22 Even though listed as Cho Kwang-jo’s disciples, the [Ch’angwŏn] Chŏng brothers, Hwan (1498–1540) and Hwang (1512–60), of Tarisil were too young to have been close to Cho, but might have had contact with him when, before his death, Cho lived briefly in exile in neighboring Nŭngju. Reportedly spending a “deprived” youth without books for



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

167

their education, they nevertheless later not only passed the munkwa (in 1528 and 1536, respectively) but also advanced to high government positions. Hwang, in particular, won later in life general praise for his scholarly insights (chadŭk). At times compared to the Song dynasty Cheng brothers, the two Chŏng are credited with having carried Cho’s spirit beyond 1519 and are listed in the Yongsŏngji as “famous worthies” (myŏnghyŏn).23 Though the early dissemination of sarim thought in Chŏlla may thus have been a rather haphazard process depending on personal contacts and individual initiative, Chŏlla’s intellectual scene turned out to be far more lively and creative than its early reputation as an area averse to Confucian learning might have suggested.24 Despite the loss of a great number of young scholars in 1519—their “martyrdom” eventually turned into immensely valuable assets for their descendants25—Neo-Confucian scholarship continued to thrive with Kim In-hu and Yu Hŭi-ch’un, who were major proselytizers of a morality-oriented interpretation of the Confucian canon, laying great stress on ritual practice. Among Yu Hŭi-ch’un’s Namwŏn disciples were Chŏng Yŏm (1524–1609) of Tarisil and Ch’oe Sang-jung of Tundŏk. A distant cousin of the brothers Hwan and Hwang, Chŏng Yŏm, is said to have regularly gathered with other youths in a Buddhist temple to receive instruction from Yu, then the magistrate of Mujang County, on the Reflections on Things at Hand and Elementary Learning and training in literary styles. Soon known as a scholar who set his mind on “learning for himself” (wigi chi hak), he was also praised by T’oegye as a “genuine Confucian” (chinyu). With like-minded comrades, he established a private academy to commemorate Cho Kwang-jo. One of his confidants was his matrilateral kinsman Yi Tae-wi (1540–1609), who apparently shared Yŏm’s passion for the basic moral principles as expounded by the Cheng brothers and Zhu Xi; Yi was recommended for office due to his “virtuous conduct” (tŏkhaeng).26 Exacting observance of Confucian domestic rites is a persistent theme in many Namwŏn biographies, revealing that adherence to the ritual prescriptions of Zhu Xi’s Jiali was an extraordinary distinction of a Confucian learner in sixteenth-century Nam­ wŏn. [Hŭngdŏk] Chang Kŭp of Chup’o-bang, for instance, reportedly expended great efforts on straightening out “irregular rites” and himself buried his parents according to the Jiali so that “those neighbors, who loved rites, took him as a model.” Though Kŭp failed the examinations several times and never took up the offices for which he was recommended, he was respected as a “great scholar.” As his pen name he chose Yulgye, most likely in admiration for the ritual works of Yulgok Yi I and Sa’gye Kim Chang-saeng (1548–1631), Yulgok’s eminent student and ritual expert. Indeed, Kŭp’s adopted son, the scholar Chang Kyŏng-se (1547–1615), is said to have perused the “Yul[gok]-[Sa]gye mourning classic” (Yul-gye sanggyŏng) in the funeral arrangements for his father.27 In sum, then, the early Confucian learners in Namwŏn, as in most other places in Chŏlla, seem to have made mastering the Jiali’s ritual protocol as much a part of their Confucian identity as their devotion to “nature and principle learning” in a strict ChengZhu interpretation. With Yulgok and Sa’gye emerging as the dominant expositors of Tohak in the capital in the late sixteenth century, the majority of Chŏlla scholars adopted them as their authorities in scholarly and ritual matters but seem to have tended to prefer classics scholarship to pure “nature and principle learning” (sŏngnihak).

168

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

State and Private Education in Andong From the beginning of the Chosŏn, government-run local schools (hyanggyo) were established in every district for bringing “civilization” to all corners of the land. In Andong, the school was located north of the city wall and staffed by an education officer (kyosu) dispatched from Seoul.28 A smaller replica of the National Confucian Academy in Seoul, the school’s main building was the Hall of Great Achievement (Taesŏngjŏn) in which the spirit tablets of Confucius, his four principal disciples, a number of Song Confucians, and three Korean Confucians were enshrined. In front of this shrine stood the lecture hall, Myŏngnyundang, a slightly larger building in which the teaching took place. It faced a courtyard that was flanked by the eastern and western dormitories. An imposing front gate led into the school compound. By the early decades of the sixteenth century already in serious decline, the school experienced a short-term revival through the interest of sympathetic Andong magistrates such as Yi U and Yi Hyŏn-bo—both, as noted earlier, sarim scholars. In 1517, Kim An-guk, then governor of Kyŏngsang Province, visited the school and left a commemorative poem in which he encouraged the study of the Elementary Learning as a means of “extirpating old habits.”29 Nevertheless, by the middle of the century, the school seems to have again been so dilapidated that it needed major reconstruction. Moreover, a royal instruction ordered the addition of two side wings (yangmu) to the Hall of Great Achievement to house the tablets of the Chinese and Korean worthies separately. This work was carried out between 1565 and 1567 by the then Andong magistrate Yun Pok,30 with locally recruited corvée labor directed by Kwŏn Sim-haeng, one of Kwŏn Pŏl’s nephews, and a kinsman.31 New “school regulations” (hangnyŏng)32 also were introduced to control the day-by-day operation and the curriculum. Despite these improvements, “not a single student, eager to learn, arrives with his book satchel so that the instructor has no one to instruct,” Yun Pok lamented in a commemorative record (chungsu’gi)33—a lament that suggests that Andong’s elite youth preferred to get their education elsewhere. Consequently, as time moved on, the local school in Andong, as elsewhere, largely lost its ideational function as a “civilizatory” instrument and turned into a branch institution of the National Shrine of Confucius, where local literati rallied to commemorate, with the local magistrate as chief officiant, the Confucian sages and worthies twice a year, in spring and autumn.34 In Andong, elementary Confucian education was transmitted through “domestic instruction” (kajŏng kyuhun) by dedicated fathers. [Ŭisŏng] Kim Chin, for instance, even renounced examination ambitions in favor of personally supervising the early education of his five sons, his nephews, and children of the neighborhood. He built a private school, Puam Sŏdang, across the river from his residence and introduced stringent “rules for learning.” With growing student numbers, “the sound of string music and poetic recitations was heard in the whole area.” All of his sons later continued their studies under T’oegye.35 T’oegye himself was instructed by his learned uncle Yi U, who first exposed his nephew to Tohak learning. After receiving the Analects (Lunyu) from him at age twelve, T’oegye later recalled: “My uncle urged me on in my studies most severely and never was



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

169

insincere in his words or expressions. Once I recited by heart the Analects and its commentaries from the first chapter to the last without missing a single word, and still he had no praising words. That I never relented in my studies is indeed the merit of his instruction and supervision.”36 T’oegye thus early acquired the discipline and scholarly rigor he would later demand from his own students. Even without an acknowledged teacher, Tohak learning seems to have captured the minds of young students. Likely following a family tradition, [Kwangsan] Kim Ŏn-gi (1520–88), a grandson of Kim Chong-jik’s disciple Kim Yong-sŏk, is said to have pursued “This Way” alone in a mountain retreat. But he also formed a study group, the Club of Like-Minded of Kaya (Kaya tongjigye), with his distant cousins Kim Pu-p’il, Pu-ryun (1532–98), and Pu-in, and younger contemporaries such as Yu Sŏng-nyong, Ku Pongnyŏng, and Kwŏn Ho-mun—all later known as enthusiastic T’oegye disciples (and discussed below). They would meet in a mountain temple on the first day of every month to “discuss the Way and investigate [Song] learning.” Kim Ŏn-gi’s reputation as an expositor of the new learning must have spread quickly. Students began to flock around him so that Kim built Kaya Sŏdang in 1561. Eventually some 188 names were listed as his disciples. Though not aspiring to government service, he passed the classics examination (saengwŏn) at age forty-eight in 1567. He is also recorded as one of T’oegye’s disciples, but his relationship to T’oegye does not clearly emerge from his biography; he apparently encouraged some of his own disciples, among them Nam Ch’i-ri and Chŏng Sa-sŏng, to study with T’oegye.37 T’oegye emerged, of course, as the supreme teacher of the Andong sajok youth, and his understanding of sarim learning molded the intellectual orientation of generations of Andong literati. T’oegye, who acknowledged no Korean scholar as his intellectual mentor or teacher, revered Zhu Xi as the one who had given Neo-Confucian thought its final and unalterable form, and he therefore believed that there was no need for additions or amendments to Zhu Xi’s version of “This Way.” At the heart of Zhu Xi’s teachings, T’oegye stated, was “right learning” coupled with “moral nature” (tŏksŏng)—indeed, the basic elements of Confucianism itself. Consequently, he chose Zhu Xi’s Elementary Learning as the core text of his teaching curriculum, a work he considered the “substance and function” (ch’e-yong) of the initial learning process and which therefore had to be mastered as the “root and basis” of the Great Learning.38 The Analects and Mencius came next, followed by Selection of Master Zhu’s Letters (Chujasŏ chŏryo), an anthology T’oegye compiled not only for the instruction of his disciples but primarily for his own enlightenment.39 The Five Classics with Zhu Xi’s commentaries concluded the study list.40 In addition, T’oegye highly valued the Reflections on Things at Hand and the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart (Chin. Xinjing; Kor. Simgyŏng).41 The “Heart Classic” was a collection of key passages excerpted from the classics and the works of Song philosophers that were to guide the moral formation of the Confucian adept in his quest for sagehood. T’oegye revered it as much as the Four Books and treasured it as his lifelong intellectual ­companion—a veneration he handed on to his disciples. As books were not easily available in the deep countryside, standard educational material was often copied by hand.42 Though the Elementary Learning and Zhu Xi’s collected works were printed on the initiative of the sarim scholar Kim An-guk, few copies

170

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

reached far-off village schools. T’oegye’s father, Sik, therefore considered himself fortunate to receive from the mother of his first wife a large number of books—a gift “that broadened his scholarship” and undoubtedly also benefited his son.43

Sajok Scions as T’oegye’s Disciples Why did the sons of the localized sajok seek T’oegye’s instruction? Initially, most likely because of its prestige value. T’oegye returned to Andong as one of the most celebrated philosophers, who, as a high official and teacher in the capital, had gained unprecedented intellectual and moral authority. To be accepted as one of his local disciples must thus have been regarded as a special privilege—later unfailingly stated in biographies. It was a youngish, activist group of sajok who began their studies at Tosan Sŏdang, the retreat T’oegye had built close to his residence in On’gye in 1560.44 Likely arriving with some preliminary understanding, they must have been aware that what they were going to learn from T’oegye would not necessarily groom them for the civil service examinations. Yet, economically secure, they sought “true learning” that would educate them to become morally superior individuals prepared to take on leadership roles in their families and localities. As will become clear in chapter 8, what they wanted above all was practical instruction in how to assert themselves as Confucians in a Buddhist environment. The inner circle of T’oegye’s local discipleship included kinsmen of the Naeap Kim, the Yu’gok Kwŏn, the Och’ŏn Kim, the Hahoe Yu, the Hŭnghae Pae, the Yŏngyang Nam, and indeed his own Chinsŏng Yi.45 The Andong sajok thus offered T’oegye a unique local platform, and the close teacher-disciple bond that developed between T’oegye and his first-generation disciples was to gain historical significance as it continued to be rejuvenated by devoted disciples “in heart” (sasuk) from generation to generation. T’oegye’s most outstanding disciple emerging from Naeap was Kim Sŏng-il. With his brother Pog-il, he initially entered Paegun-dong Sŏwŏn, Korea’s first private academy (sŏwŏn) built in nearby P’unggi in 1542.46 Disappointed that the students there studied only with the examinations in mind, ignorant of the “learning for oneself ” (wigi chi hak), Sŏng-il turned to T’oegye and eventually became not only one of the master’s foremost disciples but also, as a high official, played a vital role in national politics. He made the exploration of Zhu Xi’s works his lifelong pursuit, over which he would “forget sleep and food.”47 Later, he would admonish his own sons that learning started with the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart: “If one only makes the examinations one’s concern, one’s original mind [ponsim] will soon find itself in a mire of material desires. Is this not to be feared?”48 His older brother, Kŭg-il, the lineal heir, also earned high praise for his devotion to “This Way” (samun) and his dedication to transmitting it to the younger generation.49 Kim Pog-il’s experience with building his own private school shows the obstacles a Confucian had to overcome in a Buddhist milieu. Although not identified as one of T’oegye’s students, Pog-il was an untiring student of the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart, Zhu Xi’s letters, and the Reflections on Things at Hand. In a note (ki) commemorating the completion of his Kŭmgok Sŏdang in Kŭmgok (Yech’ŏn), he recounted with apparent



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

171

bitterness the difficulties he had encountered when he sought material support for his project from “fathers and elders.” Lamenting over the poor state of education in Yech’ŏn, he noted: Buddhist and Taoist fellows go around in the mountains, and people do not wonder about this. We Confucians [oyu], however, have only one or two training places, and people harbor suspicions and doubts! Some suggested that the Archery Hall might be transformed into a private academy for the whole district, there being no need for a separate building. The hall, however, located in the midst of the town bustling with traffic, is the meeting ground of local functionaries and commoners. . . . Would this have been a place suitable for young scholars’ activities?

Kŭmgok, situated in a secluded natural setting, by contrast was an ideal place, if only he could raise the necessary funds. “The Buddhists are successful in getting money from the people by deceit. If we had been unsuccessful in our bid, wouldn’t the monks have laughed, putting us to shame?”50 Clearly, the propagation of “This Way” was a frustrating enterprise in an environment as yet little touched by Confucian culture. With their enormous wealth the Och’ŏn Kim became the master’s principal material supporters. Though none of them distinguished himself nationally, they were famed for their frugal lifestyle, ritual correctness, and community leadership. Praised by T’oegye for his erudition and dedication to self-cultivation, Kim Pu-ŭi (sama graduate of 1555) lived the life of a rusticated scholar, reputedly loving books so much that he even sold land to acquire them. At T’oegye’s request, he completed the construction of the armillary globe that the master used to gauge the celestial spheres.51 With his brother and cousins, Pu-ŭi observed the one-year mourning “in heart” after T’oegye’s death.52 Said to have been inspired by the story, recounted in the Great Compendium on Human Nature and Principle, of how Cheng Hao, aged sixteen, set his mind on “seeking the Way,” Pu-ŭi’s cousin, Pu-ryun, at the same age, packed his books and departed for Tosan where he let no “outside matters” disturb his mind. A sama graduate of 1555, he spent his life as a recluse (yuil), but was in 1585 appointed, upon recommendation, to the magistracy of Tongbok (southern Chŏlla). There he rebuilt the dilapidated local school and “with his own funds purchased some eight hundred books and had them stored in a book vault.” Warning against “riotous and outlandish customs,” he “visited the school twice a month to pay homage to Confucius and to test the pupils, encouraging the diligent and punishing the lazy.”53 Together with their two patrilateral crosscousins, Kŭm Ŭng-hyŏp (1526–89) and Kŭm Ŭng-hun (1540–1616),54 both T’oegye disciples, the Kim brothers earned for their village a high reputation for scholarship and practiced sarim spirit. Exclaimed the eminent scholar and ritualist, Chŏng Ku, in admiration: “In the whole village of Och’ŏn there is no one who is not a gentleman—posterity will remember their names!” Indeed, the village is known to this day as “the gentlemen’s village” (kunja-ri).55 Kwŏn Pŏl’s son Tong-mi is listed as a T’oegye disciple, perhaps due less to the extent of his scholarship than to the circumstance that his only daughter was married to the master’s grandson, Yi Yŏng-do.56 Well-known as a tireless T’oegye student, however, was

172

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

his distant kinsman, Kwŏn Tae-gi (1523–87). Living in I’gye-ch’on (in the northern township of Andong proper), Tae-gi sought T’oegye’s instruction at an early age and also studied the classics at the National Confucian Academy in Seoul. Despite sama success in 1552, he abandoned the idea of taking the higher examinations and returned to Andong, where he promoted “filiality, brotherliness, loyalty, and faithfulness.” With fellow students Cho Mok, Ku Pong-nyŏng, and Kŭm Nan-su (see below) he founded the Club of the Like-Minded of Injae57 (Injae tongjigye) to study the classics and history in a secluded place four times a year.58 One of the “many accomplished literati [sa] of the time” to emerge from Tae-gi’s private school, I’gye Sŏdang, was his son, Kwŏn U (1552– 90). Briefly instructed by T’oegye, U concentrated on “learning for oneself.” As a sama graduate (1573), he was recommended as preceptor of the crown prince—an extraordinary honor for a rusticated young scholar. So pleased was King Sŏnjo with U’s explanations of some difficult passages in the classics that he gave him ten “old poems” copied with the royal brush. Lamenting U’s early death, a contemporary eulogist exclaimed: “Indeed, a teacher of our party [odang] for one hundred generations!”59 Collaterally related to Kwŏn Pŏl was Kwŏn Ho-mun (1532–87),60 who, as a nonagnatic grandson of T’oegye’s eldest half-brother, enjoyed T’oegye’s tutoring from an early age. The master praised him for his “innate disposition and posture of a Confucian.” To please his mother, Ho-mun sat the chinsa examination in 1561, but after her death relinquished the examination path and retired permanently to Andong, where he settled in his native village, Soya-ch’on,61 at the foot of Ch’ŏngsŏng Mountain above the Naktong River. There he built Ch’ŏngsŏng Sŏdang, one of his three private schools, and gained the reputation of “educator of one hundred generations.”62 Another of T’oegye’s students who won national fame was [P’ungsan] Yu Sŏng-nyong (1542–1607) of Hahoe. A munkwa graduate of 1566, he excelled as a military leader and prime minister during the Imjin War; he also left a copious oeuvre that reflects his deep involvement with the intellectual discourse of his time. As a devout follower of T’oegye— he shared his master’s aversion to Wang Yangming—he was an effective proselytizer of a humanistic ideal that extended a man’s moral responsibility beyond his own kin to his wider social environment. Despite his official duties in the capital, Yu frequently returned to Andong, where he remained involved in local affairs. He founded several private schools, among them P’ungak Sŏdang, and in 1573 built for himself Wŏnji Chŏngsa, a retreat above the Naktong River where he used to study and write at leisure. Toward the end of his life he confessed—in great modesty, to be sure—that one of his three greatest regrets was that he had failed to direct his will to “learning the Way”!63 Among his large discipleship— some 118 names are recorded64—was the eminent scholar and ritualist Chŏng Kyŏng-se (1563–1633);65 another was Kwŏn Ki, the compiler of the Yŏnggaji. No less dedicated to learning was Yu Sŏng-nyong’s older brother, Yu Un-nyong (1539–1601). At age six he started to read and at fifteen reputedly already fully comprehended the Elementary Learning, the Four Books, the classics, and the histories. Soon after his marriage at sixteen,66 he began his lifelong relationship with T’oegye, often accompanying the master on his outings into the mountains. As the eldest son, he showed an absorbing interest in ritual questions, and it may have been his ritual preoccupations that kept him from taking the examinations. Through recommendation, he eventually was



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

173

appointed to a variety of posts inside and outside the capital. Yet throughout his life, he was fascinated by “ancient rituals” and sought to enact even those parts of Zhu Xi’s Jiali others found difficult to perform. Un-nyong was thus a ritual practitioner rather than a scholar, resembling, according to contemporary testimony, his teacher in his calm and authoritative comportment.67 From a scholarly point of view, Cho Mok (pen name Wŏlch’ŏn; 1524–1606)68 was undoubtedly T’oegye’s most erudite disciple and also his oldest. Born in Wŏlch’ŏn, a village close to T’oegye’s On’gye, he was reputed to have mastered the Four Books and the classics by the time he sought T’oegye’s instruction at fifteen. When T’oegye was absent on official duty, he studied in local schools, and they exchanged letters. Not keen on preparing for the examinations, but allegedly urged by his family’s “poverty,” he passed the lower examinations in 1552 and entered the National Confucian Academy. Before long, however, he relinquished the idea of a government career and returned to Tosan. Sustained by the provisions that T’oegye sent him, he absorbed himself in the Heart Classic and “at night, under a bright light, burning incense, he read the Reflections on Things at Hand and all books on principle and human nature.” No one, T’oegye once declared, surpassed Mok in seriousness and diligence. He excerpted Zhu’s works in Excerpts of Zhu Xi’s Writings (Chusŏ ch’o) and expended his greatest exegetical efforts on the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart. He also collected the master’s answers to his detailed, often stubbornly repeated queries in Questions on the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart (Simgyŏng p’umjil). Clearly, Cho Mok was the one disciple with whom T’oegye entertained the longest and most personal association. He is the only one who later was coenshrined (paehyang) in Tosan Academy.69 From age forty-three, Cho Mok was repeatedly recommended for government offices inside and outside the capital, the last to that of second minister in the Ministry of Works at the age of eighty-one, but he declined most such assignments.70 An unwilling official, Cho Mok excelled as an educator. Teaching in his own Wŏlch’ŏn Sŏdang as well as later at Tosan Sŏwŏn and Yŏktong Sŏwŏn, he won great recognition with his lectures on the Heart Classic. His closest colleagues were Kim Sŏng-il, Yu Sŏng-nyong, and the eminent scholar and ritualist Chŏng Ku. One of Mok’s most prominent local disciples was [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ham. A colorful member of T’oegye’s discipleship was Kŭm Nan-su (1530–1604). First educated by Kim Chin and thus engaged in a lifelong friendship with Kim Kŭg-il and Su-il, he was introduced to T’oegye by Cho Mok, whose younger sister he married. Wandering from one Buddhist retreat to another while studying the Confucian classics, he apparently shunned the examinations and even defied T’oegye’s admonition: “Living in this world and having an old father, how can you not strive for the exams?” Continuing his studies in Buddhist temples, he concentrated on the Classic of Mind-and-Heart and in 1554 built his own retreat. At T’oegye’s request, he hand-copied the master’s selection of Zhu Xi’s letters, the Chujasŏ chŏryo, and catalogued T’oegye’s books, which were kept in Tosan Sŏdang and in T’oegye’s residence, a total of some 1,700 titles.71 Even after finally passing the classics examination in 1561, he pursued his private studies and built a second retreat, Suyŏn Chŏngsa, where he followed “his inclination of learning for himself.” Through letters, poems, and occasional visits in Tosan he kept in constant contact with

174

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

T’oegye. When the master died in 1570, Kŭm mourned him for a full year and became one of the trustees of his philosophical legacy.72 Unlike the young Kŭm Nan-su, Chŏng Yu-il (1533–76) and [Hŭnghae] Pae Sam-ik were high officials as well as activists in their home communities—both were, it will be remembered, members of the Ward Compact of Naesŏng of 1554. Said to have been a precocious child, Chŏng Yu-il was first instructed by Kwŏn Pŏl and later sought the “learning of sincerity and self-discipline” under T’oegye’s guidance. Because he was poor, he hand-copied the Five Classics and the philosophers and, as constant mental reminders, put sayings of early Confucians upon all four walls of his room. When in office in the capital, he continued to receive T’oegye’s instruction by correspondence.73 Pae Sam-ik passed the exams (in 1558 and 1564) and, despite his official responsibilities in the capital, kept close contact with Andong.74 Intimate study friends of Chŏng Yu-il were Ku Pongnyŏng (1526–86) and Chŏng T’ak (1526–1605), who originated from the same village, Chinae-dong (in the eastern township of Andong proper), and, as examination graduates, served in high government positions. When factional differences started to cloud the atmosphere at court, Ku retired to Andong and with fellow scholars “discoursed on classical literature, practiced quiet sitting, and burnt incense.”75 Chŏng T’ak learned from T’oegye “the essentials of the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart and added [to this] his own merit as a practitioner.” After passing the munkwa with first-class honors in 1558, he embarked upon a brilliant government career.76 A younger kinsman of Chŏng T’ak, Chŏng Sa-sŏng (1545–1607) was first instructed by Kim Ŏn-gi and Ku Pong-nyŏng but was deemed immature when he wished to enter Tosan at age seventeen. His father built for him a small study retreat near Tosan T’oegye named “Retreat of the Young and Ignorant.” During his eight-year stay there Sa-sŏng diligently collected in a small booklet the answers he received from T’oegye to his many questions. A chinsa graduate in 1568, he gave up preparations for the higher examination when his father died, and returned home. In 1587, as a recluse, he was recommended for office as a royal tomb keeper (ch’ambong).77 Chŏng Sa-sŏng’s affinal kinsman, Nam Ch’i-ri (1543–80), a great-grandson of Nam Kyŏng-i, was the only Yŏngyang Nam among T’oegye’s disciples. His talents were said to have been so outstanding that, when he died young, his contemporaries compared him to Confucius’s disciple Yan Yuan (who also had died young).78 Finally, T’oegye’s own kinsmen constituted the largest student body, with twentynine recorded members, among them T’oegye’s son Chun and his numerous nephews, grandsons, and grandnephews.79 Two of his grandsons, An-do80—often compared to Confucius’s grandson, Zisi—and Yŏng-do,81 eventually were revered as heads of their own scholarly lineages. Also notable was Yi Chŏng-hoe, whom T’oegye instructed together with Yŏng-do. Recommended for office by Chŏng T’ak and Ku Pong-nyŏng, Chŏng-hoe served briefly as a magistrate, but spent most of his life in Chuch’on, where, as an outstanding organizer and community leader, he expended his administrative talents on local affairs.82 In sum, the profiles of T’oegye’s disciples, though differing in individual detail, show great similarity: all were young men, stereotypically said to have been precocious learners, who eagerly sought T’oegye’s instruction and guidance, which they received orally



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

175

as well as through countless letters.83 Most of them hailed from Andong, Yean, and neighboring counties,84 and represented a socially homogeneous elite group that was interrelated by multiple marriage ties and enduring bonds of friendship. Sharing deep reverence for T’oegye, they made “learning of the Way” their lifelong intellectual commitment, regardless of whether they later pursued an official career or spent their life as rusticated scholars. Indeed, finding a common identity as “our party” (odang), it was this sense of “fellowship”85 that instilled in them the self-confidence that with what they learned from T’oegye they would be able to improve their own selves and educate their kinsmen, direct their communities, or give loyal service to the state. Whether in or out of government or avoiding public office altogether, these men never lost their sense of mission—to continue their master’s dedication to propagating “true learning.” Indeed, the large number of private schools (sŏdang) and study retreats (chŏngsa)—no fewer than twenty-three are recorded in the Yŏnggaji86—testify to the seriousness with which they devoted themselves to perpetuating T’oegye’s intellectual legacy.

Learning and the Dilemma of the Confucian Student What were the topics T’oegye’s students were keen to learn? Judging from the “Record of Pronouncements and Deeds” (Ŏnhaengnok),87 a collection of memos in which they recorded their master’s answers to their queries, they seem to have shown very little interest in T’oegye’s prime area of investigation, namely the definition of the interrelationship between the two Neo-Confucian key concepts of “principle” (i) and “mind-matter” (ki). This subject was touched upon merely eighteen times (out of a total of 663 exchanges).88 Five of them are attributed to Kim Sŏng-il, but Kim’s collected works (munjip) contain no reference to this subject. A rare exception is Kŭm Nan-su’s “On Reading Hwadam’s Work” (Tok Hwadam-jip pyŏn)—a short critical exposition, written after T’oegye’s death, in which Kŭm refuted, in the master’s spirit, Sŏ Kyŏng-dŏk’s emphasis on mind-matter at the expense of principle.89 Not surprisingly, then, T’oegye’s celebrated debate with Ki Tae-sŭng on the “Four Beginnings and Seven Feelings,” held between 1559 and 1566,90 found practically no resonance at that time. Though conducted by correspondence, this debate took place when T’oegye was in residence in Tosan—at the height of his teaching career. The young age of most of his disciples perhaps explains this lack of interest: in 1559, Kim Sŏng-il was twenty-one, Yu Sŏng-nyong merely seventeen. In contrast, the many references to the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart scattered in biographies and treatises seem to suggest that it was this work, belonging to the essential T’oegye curriculum, that exerted an overwhelming influence on the students’ perception of what learning was about: a spiritual rather than an intellectual quest for obtaining the Mencian “purity and transparency” (hoyŏn) of one’s mind-matter (ki). Central to this quest was “restoring and nurturing self ” (suyang)—a restorative process that hinged on “reverence (or seriousness)” (kyŏng). In tune with the Heart Classic, kyŏng acquired in T’oegye’s vocabulary an almost metaphysical meaning of heightened sensitivity of the mind toward the all-embracing principle of the universe. First formulated by Cheng Yi,

176

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

such reverent mindfulness as a means by which the nobleman (kunja) could set himself in harmony with the universe was a key concept in the Heart Classic, where it assumed an ascetic connotation.91 It required concentration on self at the exclusion of external things and desires. “Self-cultivation through reverential mindfulness” (sugi i’gyŏng) and learning as the medium to facilitate it were a nobleman’s prime preoccupations. As T’oegye once poetically formulated: The learning of a nobleman is nothing else than learning for himself. What is called “for himself” is what Chang Kyŏng-bu meant with “having it without one’s own doing” [i.e., without effort].92 [Such a nobleman] can be compared to an orchid in a forest deep in the mountains. The whole day it brings forth a wonderful fragrance without being aware of this being its fragrance. This exactly tallies with the meaning of a nobleman’s [learning] for himself. He simply has it in himself.93

T’oegye rephrased here a dictum central to Zhu Xi’s view of learning: true learning develops what one possesses innately. It is an inner process of realizing the self, which does not need anything external such as literary skills.94 Quiet sitting and “gathering in one’s mind” were the proper methods for fostering the mental conditions for “true learning” (chŏnghak) that ideally culminated in what T’oegye valued so highly: “acquiring [the truth] for oneself” (chadŭk). This course did not necessarily imply originality. Rather, it suggested the internalization of shared ideas and ideals as expressed in the classics. Learning, as Chŏng Yu-il put it, was thus an existential endeavor through which what is taught is absorbed in “one’s heart.” It had nothing to do with flowery compositions that would only please “mouth and ears.”95 In this sense, learning was first of all an inward-directed procedure, but it had also an outward manifestation: ritual. Rituals manifested in practice what the classics expressed in words; they were the words’ “practical application” (silch’ŏn). Though T’oegye was not a ritualist per se, his disciples showed an intense interest in ritual questions. In fact, this topic dominated the discourse between master and students. Kim Sŏng-il alone addressed twenty-five queries to T’oegye—the largest number among the issues on which he is recorded to have sought advice. Most of his questions concerned burial rites and ancestor worship. It was in these areas of ritual practice, then, that he and other T’oegye students pioneered ritual innovations that conformed to the Confucian ritual template, which will be discussed in detail in the following chapter. Did immersion in the Learning of the Way signify the sum and substance of a learner’s mission in life? Or did Confucian learning oblige him to enter public service? In view of the inauspicious political developments in the capital in the mid-sixteenth century, would an official career not compromise the seeking of sagehood? T’oegye advised his disciples to weigh learning against office holding in response to timely circumstances, yet whether to take up an appointment or to stay at home was a purely personal decision that no one could make for someone else. What counted, he counseled, was solely “to keep one­ self clean and exercise righteousness.”96 Despite that he himself had successfully combined an official career with his own intellectual formation, his advice to his disciples seemed



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

177

often somewhat ambiguous. When Kŭm Nan-su, for instance, did not show any sign of ending his wanderings from one hermitage to another in pursuit of learning, he received an admonishing letter from T’oegye: “All those who are laboring on the exams are ignorant of This Learning. You, however, are setting your mind on This Learning, without any concern for the exams. Your will is admirable! [Yet,] living in the present world and having an old parent, how can you not strive for the exams? The two can be pursued together.”97 A few years later, in 1560, T’oegye lamented, however, that in his time the scholars’ learning did not originate from the ancients’ “learning for oneself” (wigi chi hak), but was merely a “scramble for the exams.” He added: “Although today’s scholars cannot completely abandon exam practice, when they look at learning for oneself of sages and worthies and the method of rectifying one’s mind and cultivating self, [they have to realize that] the sequence of inside and outside, fundamental and marginal, light and heavy, slow and fast is indeed as dissimilar as heaven and earth.”98 When he once looked back at his own life as an official, he regretted that he had spent so much time on preparing for the civil service examinations to the detriment of his own spiritual cultivation, and confessed that he had done so at the urgings of his widowed mother because of the family’s economic difficulties. Revealing his remorse, T’oegye wrote: If I had, when young, decided to stay until the end of my life in the mountains and forests, building a grass hut in a quiet place, put more energy in reading books and cultivating my mind, I could have added the achievements of another three decades. And my illness would have been without fail cured and my learning greatly improved so that I would have rejoiced at all things under Heaven. How could I have not been aware of this but set my eyes on the civil service examinations and office holding, simply taking care of my physical needs!99

T’oegye was therefore pleased to hear Kwŏn Ho-mun declare that he had “bent his will” and taken the lower exams only to please his mother. “Now [after her death] even if I took a first [in the higher examinations], who would consider this an honor? What, then, is the use of the examinations?” T’oegye responded: “Since it is impossible to force anyone to take the exams, it is better [for him] to decide in good time on the inclination which gives him pleasure. Among several inclinations it is necessary to choose one and pursue it with vigor.”100 For T’oegye, then, there was nothing inherently wrong with taking the examinations; for some, they may even have been an economic necessity. Yet, at the same time he stressed that learning for “learning’s sake” (wihak), that is, examination learning, was “a pursuit of secondary importance” and did not constitute “Confucian learning.” T’oegye’s definition of what legitimated a “Confucian practitioner” (yuga) as “Confucian” therefore excluded two things: laboring on literary styles (munye) and preparing for the examinations.101 Clearly, by separating so absolutely what he considered primary from what was secondary in a Confucian student’s education, T’oegye wished to direct his disciples toward the Confucian’s prime task: striving after “true learning” (chŏnghak). At the same time, however, he created for them the dilemma of choice.

178

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

The Confucian Recluse A meaningful alternative to holding office, then, was the life of a “scholar in retirement” (ch’ŏsa) or “recluse” (yuil)—one who by intent did not study for advancing in the world, but instead withdrew from worldly concerns to absorb himself in pure scholarship.102 Choosing such an option implied fostering a mental attitude that remained unimpressed by life’s vagaries, as expressed by the often quoted passage from Mencius: “A gentleman never abandons righteousness in adversity, nor does he depart from the Way in success.”103 The refusal to compromise one’s personal integrity and to forgo official emolument at times may even have resulted in material hardship. The “humble scholar” (hansa) thus was not merely an ideal type. “Humbleness” had to be borne as an attribute of voluntary retreat from active participation in public life.104 T’oegye’s ascetic tendencies are obvious in the life stories of a number of Andong recluses. [Ŭisŏng] Kim Si-on, Kŭg-il’s grandson, for instance, is reported to have shunned “worldly Confucians” (seyu) and concentrated on “attaining [the truth] through his own efforts” (chadŭk). He built a simple straw hut where he passed his days in contemplation, quiet sitting, and reading books. When his sons and students came for instruction, he suggested to them that the essence of “moral principle” (ŭi) lay solely in chadŭk. The following quote shows the degree to which he had absorbed T’oegye’s idealism: “As to the learning of a scholar, it consists only in nourishing and caring [hamyang] [one’s mind]. If one does not expend one’s energy on this, though one’s natural disposition be good, one ends up with a coarse mind-matter [ki].” For Si-on, learning was clearly a slow internal process that contrasted with the hasty and unreflective appropriation of the classical literature by “worldly scholars.” “Too many words,” he contended, “hurt the Way.” He became known as a “true gentleman who lived in hiding [chinŭn kunja].”105 Equally well known for his conscious disengagement from the world was Chang Hŭng-hyo (1564–1633). Born in Kŭmgye, he received early instruction from Kim Sŏng-il and, after Kim’s death, from Yu Sŏng-nyong. Later, Chŏng Ku was his principal mentor. At an early age he abandoned the thought of taking the examinations and “made searching for the Way his personal commitment.” He lived a rigorously austere life and once wrote the character “reverence” (kyŏng) on the wall of his study as a kind of contemplative device (which he also took as part of his pen name, Kyŏngdang). His favored books were the Elementary Learning and the Reflections on Things at Hand. “He read and pondered [his readings], and when he did not get [their meaning], he would not go to bed all night. When a thought came to him, he would, even in the middle of night, light a candle to write it down. He thus made a booklet, which he always carried with him.” His seclusion was such that even his neighbors rarely saw his face. He did, however, have a number of students to whom he would explain texts “word by word and sentence by sentence.” The essence of reading books, he admonished them, was to internalize [ch’e] their contents. “If this does not happen, how would it be different from not reading books?” Late in life he was recommended for office, but before the royal warrant arrived in Andong he died.106 The decision to “hide one’s virtue and not serve” (ŭndŏk pulsa) and live in seclusion—



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

179

at times for a few years only, at times for one’s entire life—was foremost a moral one: to place self-cultivation and scholarship above seeking fame in the world. The prestige of such a decision bestowed upon the recluse a special aura of personal integrity and incorruptibility—qualities for which he was often remembered in a separate rubric of the local gazetteer. It was these qualities that on occasion were brought to the attention of the government, when it searched for talents among “mountains and fields.” Although “his fame did not go beyond the community,” [Kwangsan] Kim Pu-p’il, for instance, was one of the recluses recommended for office in a search in 1573, yet he declined to answer the royal summons.107 Confucian learning fostered in its practitioner a particular kind of mental and bodily disposition that marked him as a member of the elite. Of Chŏng Yu-il, for instance, it was said: “[As a person] he was outwardly calm and inwardly upright; in daily life, he was solemn as if indecisive, yet when he dissected principle and discussed matters, he could definitely not be deprived [of his opinion]. He liked what was good and abhorred what was bad. When he heard of someone’s wrong deeds, even if all others avoided [scold­ing him], he would take that person severely to task without mercy.”108 Such a sober frame of mind was reflected in the discipline of daily life—a topos that features prominently in many biographies. The day began at cockcrow with washing and dressing. After a visit to the ancestral shrine, the day would be spent in the solitude of the study until deep into the night. Even during illness, books were never neglected. Mental fortitude manifested itself most acutely when death was near. When [Ŭisŏng] Kim Hakpae (1628–73) knew that he was too ill ever to get up again, he sent word to his closest friends. Then he called in the future lineal heir (his older brother’s son) and admonished him to adopt “cautious and diligent” (kŭn-gŭn) as his personal motto. Growing weaker, he instructed his male and female family members about “the way of preserving the kin [a male task] and ordering the house [a female task]” and warned them not to call in a shamaness (mudang). He then screened himself from the women, had his sons prop him up, and passed away peacefully.109 Life away from political responsibilities was lived in close contact with nature. The natural setting figured as an important source of inspiration for mental restoration. T’oegye is known to have taken intense pleasure from his outings into the mountains. As he once wrote to Cho Mok: “Roaming in the mountains is what I enjoy most.”110 On moonlit nights he would take a student up to Heavenly Source Terrace (Ch’ŏnyŏndae) and make him recite poems.111 His love of nature found expression in dozens of poems and landscape descriptions. Many pen names derived from natural phenomena. Study retreats and pavilions were built in especially noteworthy natural surroundings, and commemorative inscriptions invariably included detailed readings of their topographical features. Poems or single characters were frequently inscribed on rare stones and cliffs, highlighting the organic relationship between nature and culture. To be sure, the repudiation of a place in the political world challenged a man’s elite credentials. By giving up privileges granted on the basis of birth and descent, he was forgoing state affirmation of elite status. Yet concentration on self-cultivation (sugi) as the core of true scholarship identified its practitioner as a “worthy” (hyŏn), a seeker of sagehood—a pursuit that gained a value of its own and confirmed him as a member of

180

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

elite society. Worthiness carried authority and inspired spontaneous awe. “People respectfully submitted themselves to him,” was said of Kim Su-il. As the representative of such an intellectual culture, the literatus (sa) was naturally legitimized to “transform” (hwa) and guide those in his charge—from family and kin to the community at large.

The Recluse in Southern Kyŏngsang: Nammyŏng Cho Sik At the same time as T’oegye was instructing Andong’s sajok elite, the reputation of Cho Sik (Nammyŏng, 1501–72) as an unconventional pursuer of Confucian learning attracted a growing number of disciples in the southern half of Kyŏngsang Province. Born in Hapch’ŏn (South Kyŏngsang)112 in the same year as T’oegye, 1501, Cho grew up to become, in the judgment of contemporaries, the former’s seemingly exact opposite. Like T’oegye largely self-taught, Nammyŏng, however, never aspired to an official career—the calami­ tous events of 1519 may also have had a deterrent effect—and in fact prided himself on living as a recluse (ch’ŏsa) in the deep countryside. Though summoned a number of times to Seoul to take up office, he obstinately refused such advances and instead immersed himself in scholarship, again like T’oegye, especially in the Classic of the Mindand-Heart. He practiced quiet sitting and self-cultivation and through nurturing “reverence” (kyŏng) sought to attain “righteousness” (ŭi) that in turn was to generate “loyalty” (ch’ung)—a sequence of mental steps that would, following another of his major texts, the Great Learning, culminate in the ordering of the world. Indeed, for Nammyŏng kyŏng and ŭi had to find fulfillment in “practical action” (silch’ŏn). Convinced that after Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi the classics no longer needed any further commentaries and elaborations, he apparently was deeply troubled by his fellow Confucians’ exclusive laboring on Cheng-Zhu learning. By understanding “investigating the principle [of all things]” (kung-ni) merely as theorizing about the universe, heaven, and human nature, he opined, they were increasingly distancing themselves from the actual problems of their time. He therefore disparaged the Four-Seven debates between T’oegye and Ki Tae-sŭng as “stealing reputation and deceiving the world” (tomyŏng kise). Words not matched by action, he critiqued, lacked relevance. Championing intellectual freedom, he reportedly also perused Daoist literature and the works of Wang Yangming and Lu Jiuyuan. T’oegye once asked for a meeting, but Nammyŏng let him wait for a negative answer for ten years. Thus they never met and merely exchanged a few letters.113 Obviously puzzled by the two scholars’ quite diverse approaches to Confucian learning, contemporaries tried to gauge their difference. Chŏng Ku, for instance, rated T’oegye’s scholarship as easy to access, whereas he found it difficult to get Nammyŏng’s points. Similarly, Ki Tae-sŭng thought that compared to T’oegye’s close adherence to Cheng-Zhu, Nammyŏng’s scholarship suffered from a lack of rules and organization because of his erratic character, which at times was like a “sheer precipice of eight thousand feet” and at others obstinate and feeble.114 Nammyŏng’s peculiar personality also struck Kŭm Nan-su when he visited Nammyŏng with some friends in 1561: “We were sitting in the Thunder-Dragon Pavilion, each with a cup of wine in his hands. Nammyŏng



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

181

began to sing first and encouraged us to sing while sitting, not conventional songs, but made-up ones. His song texts were daring, as if no one was nearby—exactly as I had been told [about him] before.”115 It was, besides his acknowledged erudition, Nammyŏng’s unconventional character—he had also a penchant for martial arts—that likely appealed to young learners who flocked in numbers to his retreats. They hailed principally from the larger Chinju area, but a few of his students and sympathizers also originated from northern Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla. Indeed, a few counted themselves equally among T’oegye’s students, most notably Chŏng Ku, Chŏng T’ak, and Kim U-ong (1540–1603).116 Said to have been spurred on by their master’s unfailing loyalty to the throne and his constant drive for action, his followers earned great praise for their bravery as militia leaders in the defense of southern Kyŏngsang during the Imjin War.117 Compared to T’oegye’s oeuvre, Nammyŏng’s remained small and principally consists of the Miscellaneous Learning Notes (Hakki yup’yŏn), a great number of poems, and some letters. They were first collected and published by his major disciple, Chŏng In-hong (1536–1623), in 1604.118 After the defeat in 1623 of the Pugin (“Northerners”), the political party of Nammyŏng disciples led by Chŏng (more in chapter 12), Nammyŏng’s national fame faded, and only a small and scholarly insignificant hard core of local devotees continued to uphold his legacy in several private academies in the Chinju area.119

The Establishment of the First Private Academies in Andong Deploring the fact that the state educational system, in decline in the mid-sixteenth cen­tury, was incapable of training true Confucian learners, T’oegye thought it necessary to establish, on the Song model, “private academies” (sŏwŏn) as educational institutions that would improve the sa’s learning culture and form them into committed Tohak practitioners. In T’oegye’s view, a sŏwŏn, built in a rural setting, promised not only to be superior for cultivating “true learning,” it would also aid the kingly rule. In addition, a sŏwŏn was ideally to include on its premises a shrine (samyo) for commemorating a Tohak luminary who could serve as an inspirational model for the students. Although the sŏwŏn was not intended to prepare its students (wŏnyu) for the civil service examinations, T’oegye nevertheless thought, perhaps following Zhu Xi, that the state or at least the local magistrates should assume patronage and be involved in its managerial, if not instructional, aspects.120 T’oegye tested these ideas when he served as the magistrate of P’unggi from late 1548 to the fall of 1549. He grieved over the lax state of affairs in Paegun-dong Sŏwŏn and applied for state support through the governor of Kyŏngsang Province. Despite the adverse political climate in Seoul at the time, a royal charter (saaek) was granted early in 1550. Paegun-dong Academy thus became the first chartered academy in Korea. In addition to a name plaque adorned with the academy’s new name, Sosu Sŏwŏn, in his own calligraphy, King Myŏngjong presented it with a set of the Four Books and the classics and the Great Compendium of Human Nature and Principle. As a chartered academy, it was to enjoy official protection and economic privileges.121

182

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

After he had settled in Tosan in the fall of 1556, T’oegye expressed in a letter to Cho Mok 122 his regret that Yean still lacked a private academy that would commemorate the scholarly legacy of the early worthy, U T’ak (1263–1342). Though not a native of Yean, U T’ak retired to Yean, where he died in 1342.123 Planning to set the matter of an academy right, in the spring of 1558, T’oegye, accompanied by Kŭm Nan-su and Cho Mok, visited Odam, a propitious spot a short distance from U T’ak’s former residence, and decided to build Yŏktong Sŏwŏn there.124 A large undertaking such as the construction of a private academy depended, of course, on the material support of the local elite; it required, in addition, the recruitment of a large labor force. Because the local male population was at that time drafted for building a new magistracy, T’oegye’s project had to be postponed until 1566, when the magistracy was completed. As Cho Mok recorded in his “Record on Yŏktong Sŏwŏn” (Yŏktong sŏwŏn kisil),125 the newly appointed magistrate pledged nine thousand tiles left over from the magistracy, but the largest contribution, a total of some 170 sŏm of rice, was collected from 160 local households—with the wealthy Kim Pu-p’il of neighboring Och’ŏn as the most generous donor. The construction, begun in the second month of 1567, was supervised by local leaders such as Kim Pu-p’il, Kŭm Po,126 Kŭm Nan-su, and Cho Mok, while the magistrate recruited the necessary labor, in particular a number of monk artisans from nearby temples. Even the magistrate of Andong sent ten sŏm of rice and ten large timbers—a clear indication of the prestige of the project. By the early summer, the main hall, Myŏnggyodang, two dormitory wings, and the Shrine for the Veneration of the Worthy (Sanghyŏnsa) were completed. For the day-today running of the new academy, the magistrate allocated, in addition to grain and cloth, some two kyŏl of temple land and staffed it with a number of support personnel. It was, however, members of the local elite and T’oegye disciples—Kim Pu-p’il, his brother Pu-ŭi, their cousins Pu-ryun and Kŭm Ŭng-hyŏp, Kŭm Po, and T’oegye’s nephew Wan,127 among others—who subsidized the school most generously with land and slaves.128 In the following year, T’oegye named the various academy buildings129 and suggested that the academy regulations (wŏn’gyu) he had earlier written for Isan Sŏwŏn (in Yŏngju) be adopted.130 He also gave the academy its name, Yŏktong, in commemoration of the fact that U T’ak had been the first Korean to “comprehend and teach” the Yijing, thus earning for himself the attribute of “progenitor of This Culture” (samun chi chong). In the seventh month of 1570, the academy was formally inaugurated with a seven-day lecture series, during which the aged T’oegye explicated the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart. One month later, U T’ak’s spirit tablet was ritually installed in Sanghyŏnsa.131 At T’oegye’s urging, Kim Pu-ŭi was elected the first academic director (sanjang) of the academy.132 The building of a private academy was an intellectual as well as a social prestige project, especially when it was initiated by a scholar of T’oegye’s reputation. With the construction of Yŏktong Sŏwŏn, T’oegye hoped, paraphrasing Confucius, that it would attract “gentlemanly Confucians” (kunja-yu)—scholars dedicated to “learning for oneself” (wigi). Besides Yŏktong Sŏwŏn, T’oegye was intimately involved in the building and management of a host of other private academies (most of them in Yŏngnam) and composed commemorative pieces for them. In time, he himself was honored as the enshrined worthy in some of them.133



The Sajok Elites as Confucian Learners

183

Later, after T’oegye’s death, Yŏktong Sŏwŏn, though granted a royal charter in 1684, lost much of its luster to Tosan Sŏwŏn, which emerged as the premier educational institution in the Andong-Yean area.

Strains over Securing T’oegye’s Intellectual Legacy for Posterity With T’oegye’s death in 1570,134 the fellowship among his disciples began to show serious fractures. The reason was not only personal animosities and the latent competition between the sajok of the Yean and Andong areas. Rather, fundamental differences in their understanding of what sŏngnihak had to mean in real life led to an increasingly acrimonious relationship between Cho Mok and Yu Sŏng-nyong. Cho Mok, the recluse, insisted on adhering to the unalterable purity of Zhuxiism; in contrast, Yu Sŏng-nyong, the statesman, favored a more flexible approach and thought that sŏngnihak had validity only if applicable to the solution of contemporary issues.135 Cho, the older of the two and T’oegye’s foremost disciple, rallied around him the sajok of Yean, centered on Tosan Sŏwŏn, whereas Yu Sŏng-nyong, backed by Kim Sŏng-il, became the respected leader of the Andong sajok. This was an unfortunate split that in the course of time would even deepen. Soon after T’oegye’s funeral—he had wanted simplicity and advised against a state funeral—his descendants and disciples faced the task of securing and preparing his written and oral legacy for posterity.136 In the spring of 1571, Kŭm Nan-su, who had directed the funeral arrangements, summoned fellow scholars to Yŏktong Sŏwŏn to discuss the procedure of compiling T’oegye’s collected works (munjip). Ignoring T’oegye’s son, Chun, and his closest kinsmen, Cho Mok seized the lead, and Yu Sŏng-nyong, Kim Sŏng-il, and a number of Yean scholars were willing to assist him. Against Cho Mok’s opposition, however, Yu and Kim solicited state support for the printing in Seoul, and a royal order assigned the task to the Printing Office137—an extraordinary honor for T’oegye. Political wrangles, however, led to a retraction of this order a few years later. The editorial work turned out to be a complicated and long-drawn-out process. When a first draft version was completed in 1586, Cho, who pleaded for completeness, clashed with Yu Sŏng-nyong, who wished to exclude two politically sensitive letters and was about to complete his own revised version. The turmoil around the Prison Affair of 1589 halted work and the increasingly bitter factional divisions at the center (discussed in the introduction to part IV) further acerbated the strained relationship between Cho and Yu. Then, taking advantage of Yu’s dismissal from his position of prime minister in 1598 and his consequent political isolation, Cho Mok, supported locally, went ahead with arranging for the printing of his version of the munjip in Tosan Sŏwŏn. Cho offered Yu, who sharply criticized Cho’s highhanded action, the task of writing the preface. Though he declined, Yu in the end agreed to compile T’oegye’s chronological biography (yŏnbo); Cho Mok edited the “Record of Pronouncements and Deeds” (Ŏnhaengnok). In 1600, the T’oegye sŏnsaeng munjip was finally printed at Tosan.138 In the meantime, steps were taken to obtain for T’oegye the honors due to a high

184

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

official and revered scholar. None other than Ki Tae-sŭng composed the tomb inscription (myogalmun) for which T’oegye, who wanted to keep it simple, had written a draft (chajemyŏng).139 Kŭm Nan-su petitioned the court for a posthumous honorary name (siho), a vital part of seeking ultimate state recognition for a scholar-official’s life and work. In 1576, King Sŏnjo granted the name Munsun, “culture/learning” (mun) honoring T’oegye’s extensive learning and “pure” (sun) his uprightness and integrity.140 Parallel to the collection of T’oegye’s written work, in the spring of 1574, plans were being drawn up for expanding T’oegye’s former private school (sŏdang) at Tosan into a full-fledged academy (sŏwŏn). This project initially aroused some anxiety about the economic viability of two academies in a marginal county like Yean. Yet, “could T’oegye’s soul in Heaven be at rest if the Tosan [project] would fail?” Kim Sŏng-il asked in a letter to Cho Mok.141 Despite concerns, work progressed rapidly, and a year later T’oegye’s spirit tablet was ritually installed (pongan) in the Shrine of Exalted Virtue (Sangdŏksa). In the same year, Tosan Sŏwŏn received a royal warrant (saaek). The major supporters of the academy were the same local T’oegye disciples who had earlier financed Yŏktong Sŏwŏn: Kim Pu-p’il, Kim Pu-ŭi, Kim Pu-ryun, Kŭm Po, and Yi Wan, among others. Each of them donated substantial amounts of land and thus contributed to the academy’s strong economic standing throughout the rest of the dynasty.142 Equally important, the Och’ŏn Kim also assumed its academic leadership. As T’oegye had wished that “seasoned teachers and veteran scholars” (nosa sug’yu) be made the principal instructors in the academies,143 Kim Pu-ŭi, then well into his fifties, became the first academic director (sanjang) at Tosan. The headship of the academy (wŏnjang) was customarily entrusted to T’oegye’s descendants (fig. 7.1).144 Despite the superregional importance Tosan Sŏwŏn was to attain, T’oegye’s Andong disciples perceived it as an institution that was dominated by Cho Mok and his associates and thus did not adequately represent them. Driven by the same measure of antagonism and competition that also marred the process of editing T’oegye’s collected works, in 1575 Ku Pong-nyŏng, Kwŏn Ho-mun, Yu Sŏng-nyong, Chŏng Sa-sŏng, Kim Sŏng-il, and Kim’s brothers decided to construct their own academy, Yŏgang Sŏwŏn. As its site, they selected the abandoned Paegnyŏn Temple at the foot of Orobong, east of Andong City, where T’oegye had earlier built one of his study retreats. Buddhist resistance to the project was broken “when the monks heard that Kim Sŏng-il, accompanied by Kim Ŏn-gi, was about to arrive at the site, and vanished in haste.” After some consultations with the authorities of Tosan, a year later, in 1576, they installed a spirit tablet for T’oegye in the main sanctuary, the Shrine for Revering the Way (Chondosa), and adopted T’oegye’s academy regulations of Isan Sŏwŏn. The academy was destroyed by the great flood catastrophe that hit the Andong area in 1605, but was reconstructed a year later and renamed Ho’gye Sŏwŏn when it received a royal charter in 1676.145 In sum, the Andong-Yean sajok accepted Tohak learning under T’oegye’s guidance as their enduring intellectual orientation and made it part of Andong’s culture. Though receptive ground had been prepared since the mid-fifteenth century, one hundred years later, a fortuitous constellation emerged when T’oegye’s retirement from office to devote ­himself full-time to education coincided with the maturation of a good number of young men who, belonging to the second and third generations of localized sajok, were

Fig. 7.1 Preparing a document prior to a ritual performance at Tosan Academy (photograph by the author).

186

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

e­ conomically independent enough to absorb themselves in Confucian studies. T’oegye could thus rely on a group of disciples who keenly submitted to his instruction and supported his vision of creating a community of seekers of true learning. On the other hand, his disciples enjoyed the prestige and moral authority such discipleship accorded them on the local as well as on the national stage. T’oegye’s socially most conspicuous legacy must surely be his separation of scholar from official. By making the spiritual quest for sagehood a legitimate alternative to a career as official, he bestowed a social value on such a quest, which validated elite status to the same extent as office holding did. Without denigrating the scholar-official—not everyone cared to spend his life as a recluse—T’oegye, like Zhu Xi before him,146 shifted sa meaning “political” man to sa meaning “cultured” man, thus legitimizing the pursuit of “true learning” as a vocation befitting a member of the sajok elite. Against the background of contemporary society’s fixation on examination success and office holding as status-maintaining preoccupations, T’oegye converted his disciples into sa, “literati” (sŏnbi in pure Korean), who as independent agents claimed multiple leadership roles on the basis of moral superiority acquired by learning. Reaping the benefit of their Confucian identity (yu), they thus came to culturally transform their communities. The intimate interaction between authoritative teacher and dedicated young men stimulated the growth of a specific culture of learning and spiritual practice that did not abate even after T’oegye’s death. Nevertheless, the fellowship that had kept his discipleship together slowly disintegrated as each of the principal disciples claimed true heirship and, by establishing their own schools or academies, founded competing lines of transmitting T’oegye’s intellectual legacy. Indeed, the private academies, each with its own constituency of local literati, not only grew into formidable intellectual bastions, but, by subsuming the political under the moral, they also turned into loci of local power that gave “literati opinion” (kongnon) a voice vis-à-vis the state. In sum, then, T’oegye’s scholarly heritage, living on in a number of strains, not only stirred rivalry among the Andong sajok elite but also positioned them precariously in the factional discourse that held the seventeenth century in its grip (to be further discussed in chapter 12). It is the sa’s preoccupation with inculcating Confucian ritualism in local soil that is the theme of the following chapter.

Ch a p ter 8

Ritual Practice and the Early Formation of Localized Lineages

T

he sa who embraced Tohak learning eventually made Confucian ritualism an essential part of their cultural identity. They directed their attention in particular to mortuary and ancestral rites, two rites that as highly emotional rites of passage were deeply infiltrated by Buddhist and shamanic beliefs and practices. When they attempted to replace them with the Confucian ritual program as outlined in Zhu Xi’s Jiali, however, not only were they confronted with concerted resistance; they also came to realize that the social paradigm underpinning the Jiali’s liturgies did not at all match that of contemporary Korean society. The renovation of customary ritual practices, therefore, demanded much more than the abandonment of ingrained religious habits. More dramatically, the adoption of the Jiali’s agnatic template necessitated a fundamental restructuring of the traditional Korean worshiping group; to achieve this, the web of nonagnatic and affinal threads woven into socioreligious life had to be disentangled and clear patrilineal descent lines established. This was an extraordinarily intricate and sensitive undertaking with far-reaching consequences for the definition of descent group—but one that was eventually expedited by the economic exigencies discussed in chapter 6. From the inception of the Chosŏn dynasty the government propagated Zhu Xi’s Jiali as the authoritative ritual handbook and incorporated many of Zhu’s basic assumptions— above all linearity and agnation—as legal norms in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn. Yet, there is little evidence that the office holders in the capital observed the new rules, and it was even rarer that they were taken seriously in the countryside. Indeed, as late as 1555, the Ministry of Rites complained that even office holders (sadaebu), when at home in the country, would neglect the construction of Confucian-style ancestral shrines (sadang), would store the ancestral spirit tablets in dirty places, and worse, goaded by “abstruse [Buddhist] theories” (sasŏl), would disregard the Confucian ritual calendar. The “obliteration of [proper] rites,” the ministry indignantly concluded, started with the sadaebu, and warned that it

188

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

was their responsibility to pursue the “acculturation of [Confucian] rites and customs” (hwasŏng yesok) as intensively in the countryside as in the capital—on pain of punishment.1 The state thus set on the sadaebu to act as reformers in and outside the capital, although it lacked the power to enforce compliance in the countryside. Even in an area like Andong, where ritual awareness and knowledge were perhaps more advanced than in other regions of the country, indigenous social and religious traditions stood in diametric opposition to the swift acceptance of Confucian rites demanded by the Ministry of Rites. It was T’oegye and his disciples who acted as ritual pioneers and teachers and gradually transformed Andong into an area famed for its exemplary adherence to Confucian precepts.

Customary Mortuary and Ancestral Rites Records on popular religious beliefs and practices in early Chosŏn are rare, yet it is apparent that mortuary and ancestral customs prevalent in Koryŏ survived far into the sixteenth century.2 Not only did Buddhist monks assist as ritual experts in funeral procedures, some evidence suggests that shamans were called in when death was imminent. Cremation (hwajang) was apparently practiced mainly by the capital elite3 as a means of expediting the entrance of the deceased’s soul into the Western region. Though outlawed in 1395,4 cremation persisted in early Chosŏn so that the prohibition was repeated, threatening punishment, in 1469.5 In rural areas, earth burials (t’ojang) were likely to be more common.6 In both cases, the popular belief that the descendants had the duty “to preserve the corporeal and sentient remains” (an ch’e-baek) of deceased parents and forebears7 as a kind of relic seems to have heightened the importance of the tomb as a devotional site. Vigils by chief mourners at parental gravesites (yŏmyo)8 for the duration of the mourning period, moreover, were propagated in late Koryŏ and early Chosŏn as acts of singular filial piety by such officially sanctioned exhortatory works as the Record of Filial Acts (Hyohaengnok)9 and the Illustrated Guide to the Three Relationships (Samgang haengsilto).10 Regular rites at the gravesites of the recently dead—of parents in particular—thus seem to have occupied a conspicuous place in anyone’s ritual calendar. Worship at graves on the four customary holidays (sokchŏl)11 apparently was so widespread, and had been since early Koryŏ,12 that the Confucians in mid-Chosŏn recognized it as a “national practice” (kuksok).13 It was not necessarily its popularity but the way the rites were conducted that drew scorn from ritual experts. “Male and female [descendants] take turns in providing the sacrifices, presenting [the sacrificial offerings] in a makeshift manner whereby they often neglect cleanliness. The further the generation [of the dead] is removed, the more likely it is that the sacrifices are neglected.”14 Clearly, grave rites were performed by small, ad hoc formed groups of male and female descendants who rotated sacrificial duties. These performances, however, neither conformed to Confucian ritual standards of cleanliness nor did they last beyond a couple of generations.



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

189

To rotate (yunhaeng) grave rites may have originated from the desire of agnates and nonagnates to remember those from whom they had received inheritance shares. Since both sons and daughters were equal inheritors, they were similarly indebted to their forebears.15 A practical reason for sharing responsibilities, however, must also have been the circumstance that ancestral tombs could be widely scattered according to the extent of a descent group’s movements along the path of history. The greater the dispersal of a group, the rarer was the formation of graveyards comprising the graves of several generations of antecedents. Individual, often isolated, graves were therefore cared for by descendants living closest by, but, as a complaint read: “Because sons and grandsons did not for long reside below an ancestral grave, regular rites tended to become infrequent and with the passing of generations came to an end altogether so that after a few generations descendants living in faraway places did not know its location any longer, let alone care for its upkeep.”16 The memory of ancestral gravesites thus easily faded, and graves no longer tended disappeared altogether. Furthermore, due to the custom of uxorilocal residence, agnatic and nonagnatic kin occasionally were buried on one and the same hillside. Depending on who of the kinsmen continued to live in the vicinity, the identity of some of the buried would soon be forgotten and their graves would vanish.17 In short, the different locations of ancestral burial sites did not allow for common action of a larger group of kin and made the maintenance of individual graves contingent on the ritual inclinations of agnatic or nonagnatic descendants residing in the neighborhood. Living in such a shifting religious environment, no Confucian inspired by Zhu Xi’s Jiali could evade the formidable challenge to renovate his own ritual practices and those of his kinsmen by introducing canonical conformity. It was not just Zhu’s warning not to perform Buddhist services. A close reading of Zhu’s text made it clear that putting its precepts into practice demanded very much more than merely combating indigenous “irregularities.”

Zhu Xi’s Ritual Concepts as Understood in Korea The programs of funeral and ancestral rites as outlined in the Jiali hinged on the performers’ organization into clearly defined agnatic descent lines—the main or superordinate line (taejong) traced from an apical ancestor (sijo) and was perpetuated by the eldest son, and minor or subordinate lines (sojong) founded by younger sons. In each successive generation, the eldest son by the primary wife succeeded to the headship of the main line, whereas his younger brothers each established his own new subordinate (or collateral) line. In other words, the main-line heir (chongson) enjoyed ritual priority on the basis of his birth, overriding considerations of seniority; as the primogeniture heir he was destined to be the ritual chief officiant. Each member of an agnatic descent group thus belonged, in varying genealogical positions, to a superordinate line that constituted the spine of the total descent structure and therefore had to be continued ad infinitum.18 For ritual purposes, the basic worshiping group was limited to kinsmen—in Korea, women

190

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

were excluded—who were obliged to wear mourning for one another. Called “within the [same] hall” (tangnae), this group of agnates spanned vertically four ascending ancestral generations (i.e., up to great-great-grandfather) and consequently included horizontally third cousins.19 Tangnae (or chib’an in pure Korean) thus delineated the most intimate category of agnatic kinsmen and also came to define normative kin behavior that reached, beyond mourning, into every realm of a kin group’s life.20 The principal duty of this group of closely related agnates was the ancestral cult. Its center was the domestic shrine (sadang or kamyo), which “every man of virtue” had to build to the east of his main residence.21 It housed the spirit tablets (sinju or sinwi) of three (or, according to Zhu Xi, four) generations of the group’s lineal antecedents and their wives. The main-line heir functioned as sole officiant at the four seasonal offerings (sije),22 with his close agnates in attendance, yet without active roles. This ritual group will hereafter be referred to as “ritual lineage” or “domestic-shrine lineage.” Neo-Confucian ritualists, T’oegye included, recognized that the ancestral cult centered on the domestic-shrine lineage represented a religious domain ideally suited for implanting the core principle of Confucian society—the principle of agnation (chongpŏp)—in the social matrix of elite society. At a time, however, when grave rites still involved diverse kin, the ritual innovators’ efforts to shift the principal sacrifices from the graves to the domestic shrine met with determined resistance. Lineage build­ ing therefore turned out to be an extraordinarily complex and protracted process of persuasion—and coercion.

Early Adherents of the Lineal Principle (chong) By the early 1500s, a small minority of educated elite leaders—some of them degree holders and/or high officials—began to peruse the Jiali in their ritual performances. Developing a sense of patriline, they recognized the pivotal role of the eldest son and bolstered his standing as ritual heir with special economic allowances. Emergent lineal conscious­ ness is evident in inheritance papers where a new “rubric for ancestor worship” (pongsajo) made a gradual appearance. This rubric allocated portions of the inheritable patrimony exclusively to the oldest son for fulfilling his ritual duties; according to the Jiali, it was to be 5 percent of a deceased’s landed estate. Before it became standard, however, this rubric evolved through various intermediate stages. [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ae (1480–1561), for instance, used his inheritance share in 1494 to build a purification hall (discussed below) near ancestral graves in Illyang, yet made no provisions for shrine rites.23 Later, in 1543, by then ailing and anxious about ritual continuation, Ae explicitly gave (pyŏlgŭp) his eldest son, Ŭn-bo (1520–80), sixty majigi of land and four slaves for the stated purpose of taking care of his “ritual charge” (sŭngjung). That Ae had first asked the local magistrate for advice and then made him one of the witnesses of this transaction—a safeguard against later disputes—testifies to the unprecedented nature of Ae’s gift.24 This gift was reconfirmed under a separate heading, when Ŭn-bo shared the parental wealth with his siblings in 1572.25 Clearly, Yi Ae had during his lifetime come to



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

191

appreciate the critical role of his eldest son for defining his descent line and provided him with the necessary economic means to fulfil the concomitant ritual duties. How fragile the ideological as well as the economic position of the ritual heir still was in the sixteenth century is also evident from [Ŭisŏng] Kim Chin’s testamentary arrangements. Well aware that ancestral rites put extraordinary economic pressures on an eldest son, Kim Chin willed, it will be remembered, that a part of his estate in Ch’ŏnggi be added to the indivisible sacrificial land (chejŏn) under the control of the ritual heir lest the main line, if impoverished, be taken over by a better-off junior line. “The prosperity or decline of a family emanates from the performance of ancestral rites [chesa]. How could we not care for these rites and still expect good fortune?” Para­ phrasing Zhu Xi, Kim Chin then advised his heirs that, under difficult circumstances, even one chicken and a single bowl of rice would suffice. What counted was not to let the proper days go by without ritual attention.26 Kim Chin, himself an eldest son, demonstrated his commitment to reformed rituals when he buried his parents according to Zhu Xi’s manual and vehemently combated the “actions of shamans” (mudang). So strict was their ban from his household that “great and small mudang trembled at the mere mention of Chin’s name and did not dare enter his village.” He also ordered the destruction of a nearby “spirit shrine” (sindang) dedicated to a spirit27 with which mudang used “to trick the people,” whereupon “local mores improved appreciably.”28 Long before members of the Och’ŏn Kim and the Yu’gok Kwŏn became T’oegye disciples, they began gradually to increase their eldest sons’ inheritance share. [Kwangsan] Kim Hoe, who feared for the perpetuation of the main line, willed in 1479 that two slaves be assigned to the main-line heir for services in the domestic shrine.29 Later, in 1547, allocations for ancestral rites seem to have been incorporated into the eldest son’s share, and, in 1550, six slaves were earmarked exclusively for ritual duties; finally, in 1559, the administration of land attached to ancestral graves (myojŏn) was explicitly entrusted to the ritual heir.30 Around the same time, the Yu’gok Kwŏn, too, made extra allowances for ancestral rites. In 1550, Tong-bo, Kwŏn Pŏl’s eldest son, received as the ritual heir an additional share of 170 majigi of land and eighteen slaves—the rough equivalent of 7.5 per­cent of the total inheritable land and 6 percent of the slaves.31 The above examples provide telling evidence of the rising concern of a few sajok with strengthening the main descent line with regard to collateral lines by enhancing the material position of the main-line heir. It was, however, precisely the economic implications of privileging the eldest son over his younger brothers that turned out to be a major hindrance to popularizing domestic shrine rituals.

Contending with Long-Standing Religious Practices Even though Zhu Xi’s Jiali was considered to set absolute standards for a ritually pure life, long-standing local practices forced even T’oegye to concede to some substantial compromises. His many letters to kinsmen and disciples provide unique insights in how

192

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

often he felt dejected and frustrated when his instructions were met with resolute opposition, and he had to give in to ritual arrangements he disapproved of. The conundrum started with conflicting views over where the deceased’s soul would find its principal last resting place—whether in the grave or in the domestic shrine. It was clear to T’oegye that his contemporaries, who were in his view ignorant of the meaning of ritual and guided by “feelings,” preferred the grave over the shrine, which explained their “neglect of the shrine in favor of the field [grave]” (holmyo-sungya). Such preference amounted to favoring the paek spirit (believed to stay with the body in the grave) over the hon soul (believed to leave the body to settle in the spirit tablet)—a preference that endangered the ancient rite of “returning to wail” (pan’gok).32 According to that rite, endorsed by Zhu Xi, the spirit tablet (sinju), which was inscribed at the gravesite with the name of the deceased and thus received his hon soul, was after the burial to be quickly taken back to the deceased’s former residence so that the hon soul would be at ease and settle down. On the day after the “cessation of wailing” (cholgok), the new spirit tablet was then briefly to be “associated” (puje) with the ancestral tablets in the sadang before it was installed in the main hall for daily ritual attention during the mourning period. At the end of that period, it was to be permanently placed in the domestic shrine as an indication that the deceased had turned into an ancestor.33 This ritual sequence was clearly jeopardized by the chief mourner’s staying at the gravesite in a makeshift hut (yŏmak) for the duration of the mourning period. Though apparently fairly popular in the sixteenth century, this custom not only lacked an authoritative scriptural basis, T’oegye deplored, it also caused the hon soul to float around in wild mountainous terrain near the grave, where it could not be properly cared for until it was at the end of mourning enshrined (puje) in the ancestral shrine.34 Nevertheless, T’oegye had to admit that a son’s devotional endurance at a parental gravesite was generally praised as a powerful expression of filiality. His own kinsman, Yi Chŏng-hoe, had, upon his mother’s death, a temporary structure erected at her gravesite where he observed (with some interruptions)35 the mourning period. Only after celebrating, in the company of his kinsmen, the “second sacrifice for good fortune” (taesang)36 did he perform the rite of “calling her spirit back” (panhon) to the ancestral shrine. Two months later he ended mourning with the prescribed “peace sacrifice” (tamje).37 Commonly regarded as a comparable expression of filial dedication, grave rites (myoje) performed on the four customary holidays also persisted with great tenacity. Though Zhu Xi had wanted to compress them to once a year (in the third month),38 T’oegye grudgingly approved their performance four times a year on a rotational schedule that gave all kin—male and female—their turn. Similar to the rites on death anniversaries (kije), it was preferable, he opined, that even younger kinsmen were involved, because if the ritual heir alone were put in charge, his brothers and cousins would lose all interest in ancestral rituals.39 What bothered him greatly, however, was the fact that “each time when the descendants have to pay respect [to the ancestors] and sweep their graves, they prepare food at home and carry it fresh in vessels and present it [to the ancestors]. Because their homes are close by, this is convenient. Nevertheless, there are faults in these rites and difficulties in their performance.” In view of such unsatisfactory ritual realities, in 1550



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

193

T’oegye consented unenthusiastically to his kinsmen’s plan to facilitate ritual procedures by building a purification hall, the Hall of the Wooded Valley (Su’gogam), north of On’gye beneath Dragonhead Mountain (Yongdusan), where his father and paternal uncle were buried.40 Purification halls (chaesa or chaesil), erected at royal tomb sites during Koryŏ, started from the late fourteenth century to be built at the gravesites of high-standing individuals.41 There is no mention of such halls in Zhu Xi’s Jiali, though they were apparently popular as Buddhist institutions in Southern Song China.42 Often converted Buddhist shrines or retreats, these secularized memorial halls proliferated in sixteenthcentury Korea and became markers of descent group prestige.43 Though they did not house ancestral tablets and were intended to support the ritual activities at major grave­ sites, these halls clearly retained the character of “privatized temples”44 and thus enjoyed great popularity. The above-mentioned Yi Ae, it will be recalled, built a purification hall before he made provisions for shrine rites.45 Aware that the construction of purification halls on formerly sacred ground was frequently motivated by Buddhist ideas of seeking good fortune, T’oegye warned that a chaesil designated a gravesite and was not to be confused with a Buddhist shrine.46 The purification hall on Dragonhead Mountain was not, however, the first such grave structure the Chinsŏng Yi were building. Already in 1480, the three sons of Yi Chŏng—among them T’oegye’s grandfather, Kye-yang—had constructed, with the assistance of Buddhist monks and his son-in-law Kwŏn Tae-gi, a hall for their father on Kach’ang Mountain.47 T’oegye himself supervised the completion of Su’gogam in 1555 and regretted that it was placed in the care of a Buddhist monk.48 Purification halls, however, competed with domestic ancestral shrines. That T’oegye in the end supported the building of a chaesil on Dragonhead Mountain resulted from his awareness that the contemporary predilection for what he called “minor rites” (sorye) at the graves could not quickly be suppressed in favor of the “major rites” (taerye) in the domestic shrine “without stifling the people’s feelings.”49 Nevertheless, he tirelessly defended the inviolability of the “agnatic principle” that could be fully articulated only by the domestic shrine rites. Indeed, he had occasion to worry about this principle being jeopardized in his own kin group. As the youngest son ritually marginalized, T’oegye witnessed how the domestic shrine of the Yi’s main line in On’gye had become leaderless and fallen into disrepair because the ritual heir, the son of his oldest half-brother Cham, had died without a male heir, and in 1542 Cham’s widow, “ignorant of propriety as women are,” had given the land belonging to the main-line residence to her two sons-in-law. A switch of the descent line to the eldest son of T’oegye’s second half-brother, his nephew Wan, was thus inevitable. Wan, however, had married uxorilocally and was, despite his uncle’s repeated urgings, unwilling to return to On’gye. Instead, Wan promised to send his son Chong-do (1535–1602) to take up the ancestral responsibilities. Yet, because by 1564 Chong-do, too, “is selfishly thinking only about wife and child and not heeding the wish of his kinsmen,” T’oegye, in anger, threatened to have him expelled from the kin group. He relented, however, since Chong-do was preparing for the examinations.50

194

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Four years later, when Chong-do expressed his intention to move back to On’gye early the following year, T’oegye noted with satisfaction that the thirty-year-old conflict had at last come to an end. Worried, however, that Chong-do’s precarious economic circumstances would not allow him to fulfil his duties properly, he approved, against op­position from some kinsmen, the cutting of timber in the ancestral graveyard for repairing the dilapidated residence (chongga); he also supported Chong-do’s bid for buy­ ing an additional piece of land near the graveyard, a deal safeguarded by a contract (munyak). “Would your preoccupation with keeping cows and horses and supervising slaves in disregard of the importance of rites and regulations,” T’oegye chided his unenthusiastic kinsmen, “agree with the sadaebu’s superior intent of handing on their ancestral heritage?”51

Reformed Rituals as Manifestations of Elite Culture Mindful of the significance of reformed rituals as a highly visible aspect of elite culture, early Confucian learners found the Jiali wanting in detail in particular for performing funeral and ancestral rites—not only in Andong. Indeed, ritual questions dominated much of the intellectual discourse of the time.52 Among the queries his disciples put to T’oegye the largest number concerned, as noted earlier, the proper conduct of ancestral rites, with Kim Sŏng-il as the principal interrogator.53 T’oegye did not compile a ritual hand­book, but his views on mourning and sacrificial rites are known through Answers to Questions on Mourning and Ancestral Rites (T’oegye sangjerye tammun), a small compendium that his disciple Cho Chin (1535–?)54 excerpted from T’oegye’s correspondence. Because this was not a systematic work, his disciples supplemented it with their own manuals to assure ritual constancy and compliance in their descent groups. In 1580, when in mourning for his father, Kim Sŏng-il followed his Evidence for the Mourning Rite (Sangnye kojŭng), a text he had likely prepared in advance so that “even all the women [in his household] were familiar with it.”55 Earlier, when his mother died in 1546, Cho Mok carefully consulted the Jiali for all funeral and mourning prepara­ tions and collected his reflections in a small booklet, Karye ŭiŭi (Doubtful Points in the Jiali).56 Both Hahoe Yu brothers compiled their own ritual manuals. In his Various Rites for Ancestral Services (Ch’uwŏn chabŭi), Yu Un-nyong detailed the layout of ritual vessels and elucidated procedural points.57 To aid his descendants, Yu Sŏng-nyong laid down geomantic rules for determining the correct topographical features for siting a grave and burying the dead in his Record of Minding the End (Sinjongnok) (dated 1602) and gathered documentary information in his Evidence for the Mourning Rite (Sangnye kojŭng).58 By providing the mourner with simple guidelines through the various stages of Confucian-style funeral and burial, these men not only intended to create “family traditions”; in an environment still imbued with Buddhist lore, they needed to boost the mourner’s self-confidence against “those who, when first witnessing [these Confucian rites], found them odd and ridiculed them.” It took some time until friends and neighbors began to imitate them and thus spread them throughout communities.59 That the



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

195

mastery of Confucian rituals, however, remained the domain of a small minority is attested by a statement Kim Sŏng-il made to his Japanese interlocutors in the early 1590s. Though he boastingly claimed that “our country’s mortuary rites [sangnye] adhere exclusively to Master Zhu’s Jiali,” he had to admit that he was talking only about “the knowledgeable of the sadaebu, among whom there is not a single believer [of Buddhism]”; only the “dunces in the villages,” he wryly added, “[still] fervently put all their faith in it [Buddhism].”60 Despite the proliferation of ritual handbooks, the early practitioners of Confucian ritualism faced a variety of practical problems. How many ancestral generations, for instance, should be ritually acknowledged in the domestic shrine? Was it necessary to follow the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, which took the official rank of the prospective performer into account and graded the worship accordingly up to three ancestral generations for the highest officialdom,61 or was it more appropriate to observe Cheng Yi’s predilection for venerating four generations, which was incorporated by Zhu Xi in his Jiali? T’oegye left the decision to the ritual heirs, although he strongly felt that in this case adherence to the dynastic law was preferable to the rules in the Jiali.62 It seems, however, that most of his disciples, Kim Sŏng-il among them, took Zhu as their model. A related, more controversial issue proved to be the holding of ancestral rites in perpetuity (pulch’ŏnwi pongsa) for ancestors with merit subject status, as stipulated in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn.63 It was surely a special distinction to boast among one’s ancestors an individual so honored. The Chuch’on Yi, for instance, intended to enhance their reputation by remembering in this fashion Yi Chŏng, their ancestor who had been awarded minor merit subject status by King Sejo in 1455. They built a purification hall near Chŏng’s grave on Kach’ang Mountain, but their plans for initiating perpetual rites for him were delayed by the deaths of Yi Chŏng-hoe’s grandfather and father in the early 1560s. As the new ritual heir of the main line, Chŏng-hoe, mindful of his dying father’s last wish, seems to have pressed for quick action—against T’oegye’s opposition. T’oegye opposed perpetual worship because the Jiali contained no reference to such a rite, and insisted that the spirit tablet of Chŏng, who was Chŏng-hoe’s seventh-generation ancestor, be, according to common procedure, removed from the domestic shrine and buried at his gravesite. Supported by his closest kinsmen, however, Chŏng-hoe had already started building a separate shrine (completed in 1565), and T’oegye had to concede that the Chuch’on Yi in the end venerated, in addition to the four ancestral generations, one extra ancestor in perpetuity.64 Even without perpetual rites, the Confucian ritual calendar was exceedingly demanding and put heavy responsibilities on any kin group. It included, besides the quarterly shrine rites (sije), ritual observances on ancestral death anniversaries (kije), as well as the grave rites. Compliance was thus often lax and necessitated a measure of coercion. This is apparent from the warnings to his kinsmen Kim Sŏng-il incorporated in his Rules for the Worship of Ancestors (Pongsŏn chegyu), written in 1587. At the time of the seasonal shrine rites, he wrote, “[male] descendants from near and far should, without awaiting an invitation from the ritual heir, congregate prior to the rites in order to purify [chae] themselves.” Ritual purification, Kim urged, was vital for communion with the ancestral spirits. Unexcused absences were to be recorded in a ledger

196

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

so that proper punishment could be meted out once a year. Each participant (the poor excluded) had to support the ritual heir with seasonal goods, and shrine rituals were under no circumstances to be rotated with economically weaker younger siblings, lest they be conducted with disposable paper spirit tablets in private residences (as in parental anniversary rites) instead of in the domestic shrine. In contrast, Kim stipulated further, the grave rites on the customary holidays should be rotated and staggered, since it was impossible for all kinsmen to congregate at the graves of four generations of ancestors on the same day. As the value of the exacting Confucian ritual schedule apparently was not self-evident to all of his kinsmen, Kim strove to engage even “those who pretend to be poor or are otherwise negligent” in the ritual process, under threat of punishment.65 The different schedules for shrine (sije) and grave (myoje) rituals also presented difficulties, as the former were to be performed according to the Jiali on the four seasonal holidays, whereas the latter were commonly celebrated on the four customary holidays. Even though Kim Sŏng-il attempted to keep the two schedules apart, it is evident that his efforts were in vain, not only because of the still greater popularity of the grave rituals, but likely also because of the heavy economic and logistical burden the observance of two different sets of rituals entailed. Whereas Zhu Xi had recommended that the rites at graves be performed only once a year,66 ritualists like Yulgok Yi I did not completely disapprove of holding grave rituals on the four customary holidays, but he feared that such frequency might downgrade the much more important shrine rituals. He therefore advocated that in order to establish a clear gradation between these two types of rituals, full gravesite rites be held only at Hansik and Ch’usŏk, and shorter versions at the two other festivals.67 Such a reduced schedule for grave rites, however, did understandably not gain immediate popularity. When the Chin­ sŏng Yi, for instance, decided in 1660 finally to reduce the grave rituals to twice a year, in the spring and in the autumn, it apparently was mainly for practical reasons: at New Year’s, when it is cold, “the offerings freeze and change color,” and at Tano, when it is hot, “they dry up and lose their taste.” The celebrations on these two dates were therefore left to discretion.68 How gradual the switch from traditional grave rites to Confucian shrine rites was is well illustrated in Yi Chŏng-hoe’s diary. Even a ritual-conscious man like Chŏng-hoe, who forcefully pleaded for introducing perpetual shrine rites for Chŏng, performed grave rites on the customary holidays more often than the shrine rites. Except when he was absent on official duty, he regularly sacrificed at least at the tombs of his parents and grandparents. On Ch’usŏk of 1603, for instance, he noted in his diary that “the weather looked as if it was going to rain; because of illness I could regrettably not attend the grave rites.” On the following day: “I went to the domestic shrine to sacrifice; a senior kinsman assisted me.” On the New Year’s Day of 1608, he performed for the first time shrine rituals prior to visiting the graves, and on Tano and Ch’usŏk of that year he officiated at the domestic shrine rather than at the graves. During the final years of his life, Chŏng-hoe usually conducted shrine rituals on the customary holidays and tended the graves afterward.69 Clearly, it was impractical to observe the grave and shrine rites on two different



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

197

schedules. As Yi Chŏng-hoe’s changing practice illustrates, the observance of the shrine rites was gradually given ritual priority and shifted from the seasonal to the customary holidays (most notably New Year and Ch’usŏk), followed by visits to the graves—a practice commonly adhered to until this day.

Reformed Worshiping Groups at Ancestral Graves With the ritual cycle so demanding, why would some ritual leaders feel the need for setting up still another kind of agnatic worshiping group focused on the grave of a specific ancestor? Would such a gathering of agnates not compete with the domestic-shrine lineage? Even though references are scarce and rarely explicit, it seems that, paradoxically, persistent resistance to the exclusive role of the primogeniture heir at the domestic shrine rituals prompted a search for a less restrictive, yet still Confucian type of agnatic worshiping group. The principal objection against the shrine rituals lay in the fact that they elevated the ritual heir over his younger brothers and cousins and degraded them to passive onlookers. Such degradation not only bruised the indigenous sense of fraternal equality, it also had economic consequences. As the inheritance papers of the midsixteenth century clearly demonstrate, younger sons stood to lose land and slaves in favor of the ritual heir. This caused resentment that was expressed by lukewarm interest and reluctant cooperation in Confucian-style rituals. In short, the unreceptive mood of his kinsmen seems to have convinced someone like Kim Sŏng-il that he could fulfill what he felt his “moral duty” (ŭiri)—namely to promote the standing of the main line—only by ritually involving all members of his patriline.70 If the shrine rituals were exclusive, the Jiali also contained, apparently by way of an afterthought, a brief stipulation that suggested the recruitment of a more broadly defined group of agnates for worship at the graves of remote ancestors. This stipulation, entitled “Sacrifices to Early Ancestors [sŏnjo],”71 reads: “Only the descent line [chong] of a first ancestor [sijo] or a great-great-grandfather [kojo] may perform this sacrifice. The descent line of a first ancestor sacrifices to all those from the first ancestor on down. The descent line of a great-great-grandfather sacrifices to the early ancestors on down.”72 Even though no direct reference to this provision can be located in the writings of Andong scholars, it may not be too far-fetched to assume that rite-conscious Kim Sŏng-il, in his search for alternative formulas for motivating his kinsmen to communal ritual action, discovered this passage and recognized its vital implications: all agnatic descendants of either a “first ancestor” or a great-great-grandfather—and not merely the main-line heir—were called upon to participate at these rites, while female and nonagnatic descendants were clearly excluded. In essence, then, such a worshiping group closely followed the outline of the four-generation descent line model, yet by giving all male agnates participatory rights, it broadened its constituency. The evidence is fragmentary, but a few extant documents suggest that from around the mid-sixteenth century some outstanding leaders indeed took the above Jiali passage

198

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

as a model for organizing their kinsmen into extended worshiping groups. In 1581, Kim Sŏng-il, then in mourning for his father, called together his closest male agnates for expressing “sincerity toward the ancestors.” Two weighty issues seem to have been on his mind. First, the Kim’s main line73 was for economic (and possibly social) reasons in such a desolate state that the seasonal sacrifices in the domestic shrine were not performed. The second, no less disturbing circumstance was that the shrine rituals for Man-gŭn, their revered settler-ancestor, were about to come to an end (with the death of the mainline heir), and, according to ritual usage, his spirit tablet had to be removed from the domestic shrine and buried at his tomb site in Imha Subcounty. This, then, was the point in the localized descent group’s history when all of Man-gŭn’s descendants were called to action. They decided to earmark the income from some grave land to support the ritual activities of the main line (chongga) and to provide it with essential ritual utensils. For Man-gŭn, they set aside grave land (myojŏn) to finance the rotating yearly rites in perpetuity “according to ritual prescription.” These decisions were laid down in a resolution (munjung wanŭi) that was written by Kim Sŏng-il and signed by all present in genealogical sequence—two survivors of Man-gŭn’s grandson-generation (In-bŏm’s fourth son Paek and Chin’s younger brother Su) and eleven members of the next generation including Chin’s four living sons and seven first and second cousins, among them Paek’s three sons. Chin’s secondary son, Yŏn-il, was left out, as was his secondary cousin, Hong-il. One of the three copies of the resolution was to be preserved in the main house; the other two were given to Paek and Sŏng-il.74 Similar intentions were expressed in a resolution (chokchung ibŭi) that Yu Un-nyong initiated in Hahoe. He obligated his agnatic kinsmen (tongjong chi in) to be in attendance at the yearly grave rites of five patrilineal antecedents. Since their graves were scattered in different locations, the kinsmen living closest to each tomb had in turn to take charge of notifying their juniors and preparing the sacrificial food. After the services at the designated graves, which had to take place on the twentieth day of the eighth month each year, all kinsmen were to proceed to the domestic shrine at Hahoe to consume the leftover sacrificial food in a convivial atmosphere. Participation in these activities does not seem to have been voluntary, because those who neglected their assignments had to expect punishment. Although Yu addressed explicitly his agnates in this resolution, he nevertheless also welcomed nonagnates who “mindful of propriety and filiality sincerely wish to pay their respects.”75 The “resolutions” that Kim Sŏng-il and Yu Un-nyong introduced point to the genesis of a new type of agnatic organization. Both men—Yu as ritual heir of the Hahoe Yu, Kim as the most prominent among the Naeap Kim—enjoyed the necessary prestige and authority to rally their kinsmen and commit them to common action. In the 1581 resolution the group of agnates was called munjung; Yu wrote chokjung. Still another term was munjok. The origin of the most frequently used term munjung is not clear,76 but from the mid-sixteenth century it evidently designated an exclusively agnatic group of kinsmen, though retaining some of the inclusiveness of the indigenous descent group (chok). In its most narrow sense, this group encompassed, as in the two examples above, agnatic kinsmen who wore mourning for each other, that is, equaled the domestic-shrine group (tangnae). But by focusing on one or several specific ancestor(s) above the fourth ances-



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

199

tral generation, munjung expanded to embrace all respective descendants—lineal as well as collateral—and recognized them as stake-holding members. The munjung enlisted by Kim Sŏng-il was evidently an endowed group that used its corporately held property not only to finance the grave rites of the segment’s apical ancestor, Man-gŭn, but, when necessary, also to assist the main line. Indeed, the munjung came to act as a kind of guarantor of the main line’s economic health. In 1587, for instance, when the main-line heir’s residence (chongga) in Naeap burnt to the ground, the same Kim kinsmen were again mobilized. With their contributions of rice and cloth, the house was rebuilt in the former style, but with an enlarged wooden-floored hall (taech’ŏng) for ceremonial purposes.77 Despite the declared exclusion of nonagnates from munjung, at times it seems to have been nevertheless desirable to include them for a special project. This was the case in 1620, when a tomb stele was to be engraved and erected in front of Kim Chin’s grave. The supervisors of the project were munjung elders belonging to the next generation of Kim kinsmen: Su-il’s, Sŏng-il’s, and Myŏng-il’s eldest sons, and one Munhwa Yu (an affine?). Among the actual overseers who took turns in directing the works were agnatic and nonagnatic grandsons and great-grandsons and, surprisingly, Kim Chin’s secondary son Yŏn-il—a total of twenty-nine persons. The description and schedule of the work were laid down in a dated resolution (wanŭi) signed by all involved.78 In sum, then, in contrast to the ritual lineage, which grouped agnatic kinsmen in front of the domestic shrine according to fixed genealogical relationships, munjung had clearly “associational”79 characteristics: it involved and benefited to an equal degree all agnatic male descendants of a focal ancestor. The benefit of a common estate may have been, at least initially, symbolic rather than economic. Yet, the demonstrative celebration of reformed rites at the tomb of an outstanding forebear or the manifest support of a main descent line—without which a munjung would not have a raison d’être—was not only an act of extraordinary filiality; it also capitalized on ancestral prestige in the interest of the entire group. Munjung thus clearly fulfilled needs the domestic-shrine lineage did not. The latter emphasized vertical kin relationships dictated by the Confucian concept of lineal descent, whereas munjung satisfied horizontal aspects of kinship reminiscent of the native tradition of fraternal equality.80 Despite their interrelationship, analytically they must be regarded as two different entities. Ritual lineage could exist without munjung, but munjung did not make sense without ritual lineage. Both depended for their respective genesis and function on localized groups of agnates—such as the Naeap Kim or the Hahoe Yu—whose determined leaders banked on ancestral distinction to rally their kinsmen for “repaying their roots and tracing the origin” (pobon ch’uwŏn)—a maxim that, engraved on wooden plaques, adorned many a purification hall that came to function as a munjung’s main gathering site. The rise of munjung was not a phenomenon confined to Yŏngnam. Although there are no munjung-related documents found among the papers preserved by the Tundŏk Yi before the nineteenth century, circumstantial evidence points to the existence of munjung in the Namwŏn area from at least the late seventeenth century. Their relatively late appearance may be explainable by the area’s different settlement history and by the fact that there were in Chŏlla no kin groups unified by the same intellectual and ritual dynamism as in T’oegye’s Andong.

200

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Rediscovery of Ancestral Graves and Rearrangement of Graveyards The culture of remembrance was an inherent part of ancestor worship. As a mnemonic practice, ancestor worship ritualized the memory of common descent either at the gravesite of a focal ancestor or in the domestic shrine. When documentary evidence for the reconstruction of lineal ancestry was lacking, an ancestral grave could serve as a potent mnemonic site, and it must have been this insight that motivated the search for the gravesites of key ancestors. Early graves, however, when no longer kept up, tended to slowly disappear, so that, as Kim Chin put it, descendants would pass them by, unaware that what “sheep and cows trampled” were their ancestors’ graves. Even the tomb site of the Andong Kwŏn’s illustrious first ancestor (sijo), Haeng, had vanished by early Chosŏn and was located again only in the latter part of the fifteenth century: Ch’ŏndŭng Mountain is some twenty ri west of Andong and originates from the T’aebaek mountain range that extends over several counties. . . . The Koryŏ founding father [t’aesa], Kwŏn Haeng, was buried on this mountain, but with six to seven hundred years going by, and his descendants proliferating, no one else was buried there thereafter, and thus the mountain was abandoned and the tomb area deteriorated. In the sŏnghwa period [late fifteenth century], an eighteenth-generation descendant of Haeng, the magistrate of P’yŏngch’ang County (Kangwŏn), Ong,81 came from Ch’ungju to marry the daughter of Minister Pae So82 and took up residence in Hahoe village in P’ungsan Subcounty. One day he perused the Yŏji sŭngnam83 and learned the site of his apical ancestor’s tomb, yet there was no marker. For a long time, thus, he failed to locate it. With a geomancer he climbed the [Ch’ŏndŭng] mountain and discovered the tomb tablets,84 whereupon he heaped dirt over the grave into a mound with the intention to erect a stone marker. But before he could do so, he died. On the deathbed, he gave orders to be buried a few feet below his ancestor.85

Kwŏn Ong thus reactivated the memory of his descent group’s apical ancestor and, by being buried in the close vicinity, reoriented his descendants’ consciousness toward their patrimonial roots. Both his sons later returned to P’yŏngch’ang, but his son-in-law, [P’ungsan] Yu So (1424–?), was, following customary practice, buried near his father-inlaw on Ch’ŏndŭng Mountain. From the mid-sixteenth century the agnatic and non­ agnatic kinsmen living in the vicinity started to perform grave rituals at Ch’ŏndŭng Mountain on the customary holiday of Hansik and marked the burial ground with inscribed stelae (fig. 8.1).86 The Naeap Kim decided in 1577 to identify the ancestral tomb of Yong-bi on Ot’osan in the southern part of Ŭisŏng County with a tombstone. In a commemorative piece, Kim Chin wrote: “Funerary inscriptions are not for beauty. They are simply to indicate the temporal distance from the ancestors. From of old, there was no filial son or kindhearted grandson who was unconcerned about this.” Without stone markers the graves would eventually be obliterated, and strangers, ignorant of their existence, would bury their dead nearby.87 Through the custom of uxorilocal marriage in early Chosŏn, the tomb of an inmarrying son-in-law often came to be located in his wife’s ancestral graveyard “where



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

201

Fig. 8.1 View from behind Kwŏn Haeng’s tomb, overlooking the tombs of his descendants (photograph by the author).

[later] his agnatic and nonagnatic descendants were successively buried,” giving rise to complex burial configurations. On Songhyŏn Mountain (in Kunwi County south of Andong), for instance, the dead of four different descent groups, among them the P’ungsan Yu, were buried. The first to occupy the site was the infamous late Koryŏ general Ch’oe Yŏng, followed by his nonagnatic granddaughter, Sa’gong-ssi.88 Next was the latter’s son, [Namyang] Hong Cha-hyŏng, who, because he lacked a male heir, adopted his son-in-law, [Yŏnan] Yi Hyŏng-nye (Yi, as Sa’gong-ssi’s nonagnatic grandson, married Hong’s daughter, i.e., his matrilateral cross-cousin). Yi was buried on Songhyŏn Mountain in 1507. Yi’s daughter and her husband, Yu Kong-jak (Yu Un-nyong’s grandfather) followed in 1518 and 1559, respectively. Thereafter the Yi and Yu continued to bury their dead there and considered the grave mountain their joint preserve. Even though the graves were apparently arranged in generational order—more recent generations interred below their elders or on a different ridge—descent lines obviously blurred so that the identification of individual grave mounds was difficult. Concerned that “the dead are daily further removed, and the living daily forget [a little more],” Yu Un-nyong compiled there­ fore as an aide-mémoire for his descendants the “Record of Songhyŏn Grave Mountain” (Songhyŏn myosan ki),89 in which he sketched a topographical map of the burial sites.

202

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

This record was likely also meant to stake out the mountain as the Yu’s and the Yi’s exclusive domain.90 With the eventual concentration of agnatically related kin in one specific locality, graveyards were gradually closed to nonagnatic kin. Un-nyong himself was initially, as a nonagnate, interred on the Andong Kwŏn’s Ch’ŏndŭng Mountain (where his father, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather had also been buried),91 but, as the Hahoe Yu’s main-line heir, was later moved to Hwasan, a mountain a convenient distance from Hahoe.92 The fact that agnatic and nonagnatic graves were often mixed gave at times rise to prolonged disputes among descendants over land and thus delayed the recovery of important ancestral tomb sites. [Chinsŏng] Yi Cha-su’s son, Un-hu, the first settler of Chuch’on, was buried on Ka’gu Mountain in the eastern part of Andong County, while his wife, an Andong Kwŏn, was interred at a different site north of Andong. The responsibilities for tending the respective graves were divided between the agnatic and non­ agnatic descendants living closest to the burial grounds. This arrangement put the husband of Un-hu’s granddaughter, Chŏng Po-mun,93 in charge of the rites on Ka’gu Mountain. In the course of time, as the Chŏng started to neglect the rites for their nonagnatic ancestor, the exact place of Un-hu’s grave was no longer remembered. It was T’oegye who ordered a Chuch’on kinsman to make investigations, but this was in vain because the Chŏng, who continued to bury their dead on Ka’gu Mountain, feared that the Yi might claim land rights and therefore were not inclined to cooperate. Even though Un-hu’s grave could thus not be located, in 1565 T’oegye and Chŏng-hoe initiated memorial rites for their common ancestor in the purification hall on Kach’ang Mountain. The Chŏng and the Yi finally reached a compromise in the early 1630s when the vestiges of an “ancient tomb” (koch’ong), believed to be Un-hu’s, were found, and in 1643 some fifty Yi kinsmen, called together from different local munjung, celebrated the “forming of the grave mound” (pongsik). With the erection of a stone marker in 1670, the Yi took at last full control of Yi Un-hu’s rediscovered tomb.94 Around the same time, the Chinsŏng Yi also sought to recover the tomb of their apical ancestor (sijo), Sŏk. Sŏk had been buried on Ki’gok Mountain in the southern part of native Chinbo Subcounty, but when Un-hu (Sŏk’s grandson) moved to the Andong area, his descendants scattered and the memory of Sŏk’s tomb site eventually was lost. Nevertheless, local legend had it that three tumuli on Ki’gok Mountain were the tombs of Sŏk and his two wives. Although this could not be verified, T’oegye reportedly established a small altar at the entrance of the nearest village and performed rites “from afar”—most likely an apocryphal story.95 Much later, in 1645, Yi Si-rip (n.d.), a collateral kinsman who lived in Yech’ŏn, intended to bury his mother in that very area and in the process of digging the grave discovered the tomb tablets (chisŏk) of one of Sŏk’s greatgrandsons. The four inscribed characters “eating [the offerings] on the side” (pu sŏnjo sik) seemed to give proof of the identity of those buried in the three tumuli nearby. Yet, Yi Si-rip did not inform his kinsmen about this discovery, hid the tomb tablets, and buried his mother in the emptied grave. Sometime later he himself was buried there. Only in 1678, when some villagers by chance unearthed the hidden tomb tablets, did Si-rip’s evil deed come to light, and his mother’s grave was moved to another site. Finally, in the spring of



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

203

1679, Yi Ch’an-han (1610-80),96 supported by 207 kinsmen, solicited the assistance of the governor of Kyŏngsang Province for reconstructing Sŏk’s tomb site—a major undertaking that was successfully completed later that year.97 A corollary to securing the burial sites of ancestral key figures was the consolidation of graveyards in conformity with the new patrilineal model of kinship. The setting aside of grave land (myojŏn) and the building of a purification hall (chaesil) at a prominent tomb site were often the first steps in laying out a graveyard. Existing cemeteries were consolidated by reburying near lineal antecedents in the vicinity of their settled descendants and closing them to nonagnates. According to Kwŏn Yang’s Domestic Rules of Andong (Yŏngga kahun), for instance, all agnatic descendants enjoyed the right to bury their dead in the ancestral graveyard (sŏnsan), on the condition that their geomantic arrangements did not disturb the forebears’ tombs. Nonagnatic descendants and secondary offspring, however, were expressly banned.98 Clearly, the formation of consolidated graveyards was an additional means for implanting “linearity” into the minds of descendants. The adoption of agnatic principles in burial practices profoundly influenced the location of a married woman’s last resting place. During Koryŏ and often even in early Chosŏn, a wife, regarded as a member of her natal family, tended to be buried close to her own kin, separate from her husband. Following their gradual loss of inheritance rights and their consequent integration into their in-law families, wives eventually were interred in their husbands’ ancestral cemeteries. From around the early seventeenth century, a married couple was thus typically buried either in the same tomb or side by side under separate burial mounds—the wife usually on the husband’s left-hand side (pujwa) according to the dictum that “since in sacrificial rites [che] west is superior, the same is true in burial.”99 Zhu Xi had omitted reference to joint burial (hapchang), but since this mode was referred to in diverse classical works and endorsed by Cheng Yi, it was added in later editions of the Jiali used in Korea.100 When there had been two primary wives, it was normally the first one (wŏnbae) who was joined with the husband, whereas the second one was buried separately. In a few cases, however, a second wife (kyebae), who had borne male offspring, enjoyed her husband’s partnership in death.101 The preservation of the graves of near and distant lineal ancestors thus assumed for their descendants vital significance as genealogical markers and orientation points for regular ritual action. This is also suggested by the solid construction that came to be characteristic for Chosŏn graves. According to Confucian thinking, the grave had to preserve the deceased’s mind-matter (ki), believed to circulate between the dead and the living. Only if the dead person was at peace, would the descendants prosper. This crucial association had to be reflected in the way the deceased was buried, that is, in the grave construction.102 Stone burial chambers (sŏksil), much in evidence for the entombment of high government officials during Koryŏ, were prohibited in 1406 on the grounds that they were uncanonical and Zhu Xi had recommended lining the grave with lime instead.103 The lining of the grave with a mixture of lime, fine sand, and yellow earth, as described in the Jiali and for the sadaebu legislated in the State Manual of the Five Rites (Kukcho

204

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

oryeŭi),104 was in early Chosŏn apparently still so uncommon that T’oegye felt obliged to give a detailed explanation of the procedure.105 From the sixteenth century the sajok commonly dressed the corpse, for fear it might decompose too fast, in multiple layers of clothes, wrapped it in a thick shroud, and placed it in a lacquered coffin which in turn was enveloped in cloth. This inner coffin was then placed into a wooden outer coffin and lowered into a grave that was on all sides fortified with a solid layer of a lime mix to prevent the penetration of moisture. Because the preparation of such a mix—4.15 cubic meters were used for an average grave in 1566106—involved a considerable amount of manpower and material resources, burials were extremely costly and timeconsuming.107 When his mother died in the early summer of 1578, Yi Chŏng-hoe started the construction of her tomb from the day her burial date was fixed. This work was executed by dozens of soldiers and various artisans and lasted two months. On the day she was interred beside her husband, forty-five soldiers were engaged, and on the fol­ lowing days Chŏng-hoe hired some fifty people for heaping the burial mound and terracing the burial site.108 Indeed, burials were so protracted and expensive that mourners were at times forced to sell land to defray the costs.109 Sajok burials therefore usually demanded the cooperation of the entire local community and often even the assistance of the local authorities. With the permanency of consolidated graveyards, corporately owned grave land and adjoining purification halls turned into important lineage assets that had to be protected and maintained. Earlier, Buddhist monks guarded purification halls, but they were eventually replaced by slave tomb keepers (myojik or sanjik) who cultivated, with their families, the grave land. Though often recorded in inheritance documents, they and their offspring did not form part of the inheritable property because their duties became hereditary. The P’ungsan Yu of Hahoe, for instance, stated in a writ drawn up for the maintenance of the grave mountain at Kŭmgye: “Because it is the tomb slaves’ first duty to guard [the grave mountain], [their] names cannot be entered in inheritance documents. If, with the passing of generations, they produce much offspring, all have to be assigned to grave duties.”110 The Chaeryŏng Yi patriarch, Yi Ham, on the other hand, advised his heirs in his testament that if the already designated guard of the tombs in Ilchi Subcounty, Yŏnsu, aged twenty-three, would have many sons, one of them was to continue his father’s duties, whereas the others were to be distributed among the heirs. If Yŏnsu died without heirs, another slave would have to succeed him.111 Yi Ham’s instruction was reiterated a few years later when, in 1634, his estate was divided up.112 By 1646, as Yŏnsu had become old without producing sons, two younger slaves were selected to succeed him, and the heirs were again admonished to jointly preserve the purification hall and the nearby grave land lest they fall in disrepair.113 It became customary for descendants to appeal to the local magistrate to exempt the keepers of their illustrious ancestors’ tombs from corvée duties. In 1607, Chŏng Ku, then magistrate of Andong, granted such a privilege to three tomb sites of Chinsŏng Yi ancestors, and sometime later T’oegye’s grave also came to enjoy such protection.114 That this kind of privilege had later to be reconfirmed frequently is evident by the great number of extant “official writs” (wanmun) with which Andong magistrates guaranteed the continued corvée-free status of Kwŏn Pŏl’s tomb keepers.115



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

205

Identity and Early Genealogical Notations Confucian enunciation of linearity and pedigree as well as vivid consciousness of the power and prestige ancient ancestry imparted on a kin group heightened interest in reconstructing ancestral genealogies—an enterprise that, by calling for the cooperation of all kinsmen, was to deepen their sense of unity and commonality. That one’s identity derived from one’s ancestors was an often repeated dictum. The scholar Chang Hyŏn-gwang,116 for instance, put it as follows: Even though the corporeal bodies [sin] of my ancestors successively perished in the distant past of one hundred, one thousand, or [even] ten thousand generations, the spiritual lifeline [kimaek] transmitted from my ancestors is still alive in this my very body. This body is my ancestors’ body. By respecting this body, I respect my ancestors. . . . As descendant to repay filial respect to my ancestors, is there anything more important?117

Such intimate identification with one’s ancestors called for the tracing of ancestral lines in order to situate one’s own place within the generational continuum. For most sajok, the reconstruction of ancestral genealogies was, because of the scarcity of written documentation, an arduous and laborious undertaking. For the Chinsŏng Yi, for instance, this was no different. T’oegye, who early lost his parents and his uncle, Yi U, and thus likely did not profit from orally transmitted family lore, may initially have known no more than the names of the five lineal ancestors back to Sŏk, whom the Yi had made their apical ancestor (sijo). When he served as magistrate of P’unggi in 1549, however, he received from a distant kinsman settled there a bundle of ancestral documents and a certificate (dated 1363) that proved that his sixth-generation ancestor, Cha-su, had been rewarded with merit subject status (kongsin) and enfeoffment as Lord of Songan for his military exploits against the Red Turbans in the final years of Koryŏ. Encouraged by these findings, T’oegye ordered Chŏng-hoe to search for further documents in the main-line residence in Chuch’on, but the result was disappointing. Nevertheless, it became clear that it had been the Japanese raids along the east coast that caused Sŏk to flee sea-bordering Chinsŏng and relocate inland to Andong, and that Un-hu, Chuch’on’s first settler through whom the Chunch’on Yi were tracing their descent, was Cha-su’s second son—evidence that clarified the early history of the Chinsŏng Yi’s settlement in the Andong area.118 After T’oegye’s death in 1570, his son Chun continued to work on compiling a genealogy. With the assistance of his sons and kinsmen, among them Chŏng-hoe, he completed during his tenure as magistrate of Ŭisŏng the first genealogy of the Chinsŏng Yi, the Chinsŏng Yi-ssi chokpo, in 1583, the year he died. This apparently hand-written draft, com­ prising several thousand names, was likely burned during the Imjin War (and thus is no longer extant), but only a few years later, Chŏng-hoe and Yŏng-do (Chun’s third son) had a new version ready to print at Tosan Sŏwŏn. This first woodblock print of the threevolume Chinsŏng Yi-ssi chokpo of 1600 could take advantage of the human and material resources left over after T’oegye’s literary works (munjip) had been printed earlier that year. According to the preface written by O Un,119 the close-by Yi kinsmen—all Yi

206

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Chŏng’s descendants—contributed information as well as “rice and cloth to defray the production costs.”120 (See genealogical chart B.7.) A genealogy was a chronological representation of a descent group’s past, but often a very selective one. Indeed, the compilers of the Yi genealogy purposely started with Yi Sŏk, who had reportedly entered the central officialdom and whom the Yi had therefore chosen as their apical ancestor (whose local tomb site was vaguely known but not yet rediscovered at that time). They thus suppressed the hyangni past of Sŏk’s father and grandfather that no longer fit the illustrious image they wanted to transmit of their descent group to future generations. For this purpose they also omitted the descendants of Sŏk’s second son, Cha-bang, whose fate was not clear. The compilers excluded, moreover, from the compilation committee, if not from the genealogy, the descendants of Chŏng’s second son, Hŭngyang, a lowly military title holder, who had moved away to the southwestern part of Andong.121 Clearly, it was the respective descendants of U-yang (the main line) in Chuch’on and of Kye-yang (T’oegye’s line) in On’gye who, by 1600 economically strong and ritually well organized, were able to jointly initiate the genealogy and see it to completion. What they produced was typically a bilaterally arranged document. Of the slightly over three thousand recorded persons belonging to twelve generations, only a small percentage (ca. 16%) was Chinsŏng Yi; the majority of the rest were the nonagnatic descendants of Chŏng’s six daughters.122 By listing daughters and their offspring through all twelve generations, the genealogy followed the characteristic format of earlier, bilaterally organized genealogies such as the Andong Kwŏn genealogy of 1476 or the Munhwa Yu genealogy of 1565. This bilateral slant was completely obliterated in the next edition printed in 1748, when the listings no longer went beyond one generation of a daughter’s sons and daughters. The Chinsŏng Yi-ssi chokpo was an attempt to gather in one genealogical record Sŏk’s male and female descendants, “who during the past two hundred and twenty odd years had dispersed and grown distant from each other so that they were not only no longer aware of their common origin but also, when they met, looked at each other like strangers.”123 Even though Yi Chŏng-hoe must have been pleased about the successful completion of this work, he nevertheless seems to have worried that the inclusion of so many nonagnates would blur the direct male descent line and thus prevent ritual action focused on the lineal antecedents. In 1612, “as chongson [ritual heir] with his end in sight,” he therefore felt the need to remind his male descendants of the inviolability of the “agnatic principle” (chongpŏp). Their obligation to uphold this principle, he wrote, “should never be lightly changed by selfish intentions lest the regrettable situation arises that the chongson gets so impoverished as to no longer be able to continue the ancestral rites.” Indeed, “our house” (amun), Yi impressed on the younger generation, had become prosperous because it remembered its origin by strictly observing the rites, and, in addition, had brought forth T’oegye. Committing them to such an illustrious past, Yi compiled for his male kinsmen the Genealogical Chronicle of the Chinsŏng Yi (Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok). Intended as a “mirror for posterity,” this chronicle contained short biographical sketches of the apical ancestor Sŏk down through eight generations of lineal ancestors to Chŏng-hoe’s father and younger brother, Chŏngbaek (who had died in 1600). That Chŏng-hoe envisioned this short work as a kind of testamentary writ is clear from the “resolution” (chokchung wanŭi) he attached to it. In it he exhorted his kinsmen in and around Chuch’on to jointly preserve the grave land allocated



R i t ua l Pr ac t ice a n d L o c a l i z e d L i n e age s

207

to the ancestral tombs, to regularly perform the rites, and to assist each other on the occasion of weddings and funerals, always mindful of their genealogical roots, which he had elucidated for them.124 By emphasizing agnation, Chŏng-hoe aimed to position his kinsmen as a well-organized body of agnates in direct communion with their lineal forebears—threatening the one who did not go along with exclusion from the kin group.

Ritual Innovation and Social Change This chapter has outlined the initial stage of the agnatic transformation of Chosŏn Korea’s elite society at the turn from the late sixteenth to the seventeenth century. Several factors created the momentum for this historic shift to patrilineality. Fundamental were the localization of sajok elite kin groups and the settlement of sizable numbers of agnates in the same village or at least in the same neighborhood. With the socioeconomic platform of their “localization” secure, sajok members began to invest their surplus wealth in education and the performance of Confucian-style rituals, thus distancing themselves from the Buddhist past. The practice of reformed rituals on the model of the Jiali, led by ritual pioneers, relocated the principal worshiping site from grave to domestic shrine and crucially re­grouped the worshipers into discrete groups of agnates focused on a clearly defined set of lineal ancestors. Indeed, it was the ancestral cult that caused a profound reorganization of the structure of the traditional descent group: bilaterality was replaced by the principle of agnation. The Jiali’s preference for the primogeniture heir and the consequent inequality between brothers, however, gave rise to resistance and led to the creation of an extended body of agnates, mitigating fraternal conflict. This emergence of the munjung was a historic compromise. The interlocking of the domestic-shrine lineage with the munjung gave the Korean lineage system its unique character: it harmonized multiple social, economic, and, not least, spiritual interests in the celebration of common ancestry and descent. The gradual shift to agnation is aptly reflected in the changing idiom of kinship. Terms such as “our party” (adang), “our house/family” (amun or a’ga), or “kin of the same surname” (sŏngjok) started to appear in the documents with surprising frequency to delimit groups of agnates who emphasized their distinctiveness as belonging to the same patriline in contrast to their nonagnatic and affinal kinsmen. Clearly, the elastic term chok, which in Koryŏ and early Chosŏn had embraced bilateral kin, was now being redefined in the narrower meaning of agnatic kin—kin with the same surname as in sŏngjok. Though the early genealogies were still bilaterally constructed, this new terminology unmistakably points to the changing contours of the descent group. By 1600, the Confucian principle of agnation was not yet uniformly in operation, but, inculcated through ritual practice, it provided the impetus for the growth of the patrilineal lineage system that in the following century came to maturation and underpinned the life and prestige of the localized sajok elite of late Chosŏn (further discussed in chapter 11).

Ch a p ter 9

Communal Stratification and Local-Level Leadership

A

lthough around 1600 domestic-shrine lineages and munjung began to emerge that “gathered the agnates” of distinct descent groups on the basis of common descent, village communities were still predominantly multisurname settlements in which agnates and affines were residing in close proximity. It was such mixed village communities that constituted the socioeconomic arena where the sajok spent their everyday life and in the first instance exercised leadership. Indeed, in an insecure rural environment where the magistrate’s authority was but lightly felt, it was up to the elite to organize agnates and affines—what Pierre Bourdieu called “practical kin”—into “privileged networks of practical relationships.”1 Such practical relationships were articulated in “ward fund associations” (tonggye) administered by “ward regulations” (tonggyu).2 A “ward” (tong) could be coterminous with a particular village, but often was larger than a natural or administrative village and covered a variable area over which a particular sajok kin group claimed control,3 that is, where its major economic assets were located. Tong was thus the territorial basis of a kin-based community that the “mutual fund” transformed into what David Faure called a “corporate community.”4 A fund (kye), defined as “togetherness” (hap, tong) or “cooperation” (hyŏp),5 supported a self-help association and promoted economic cooperation and solidarity among its members. By financing Confucian-style weddings and funerals, it also translated economic capital into cultural capital—highlighting the sajok’s position of distinction. Ward associations thus structured the sociocultural field of localized kin groups within bounded areas. The sajok did not, however, limit their claim on local power to their individual village communities. They understood themselves as the “local grand officers” (hyang taebu) in charge of local affairs beyond the village level, with hyang referring to an area usually covering a county. The grand officers of a hyang organized themselves in an elective body, the “local roster” (hyangan), that vetted an aspirant’s eligibility in terms of



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

209

ancestral origin and prestige, office holding, land ownership, and ritual competency. Only those so registered—not all sajok managed to obtain membership—were qualified to serve in the subadministrative “local bureau” (yuhyangso), briefly introduced in part II. Roster membership thus meant acknowledgment of a sajok’s legitimacy to stand among his local peers and secured for him special privileges with respect to the magistrate and, by extension, to the state. It furthermore guaranteed him assistance when outside danger approached. It was the members of such collectivities who joined forces to defend their communities successfully against the Japanese onslaught at the end of the sixteenth century.

Communal Relations in Practice: Ward Fund Associations A well-documented example of an early mutual fund is the Ward Regulations of On’gye (On’gye tonggyu),6 which T’oegye initiated in his village of On’gye when he spent some time at home in the late 1540s. At that time, On’gye was a typical multisurname village community where, according to the fund’s membership list (tongwŏn), the Chinsŏng Yi—all descendants of On’gye founder Yi Kye-yang—dominated, with forty-one members; these included one of T’oegye’s brothers, his only son, several of his nephews, grandsons, and grandnephews. The remaining eight surnames belonged to in-marrying sons-in-law or nonagnatic descendants.7 Thus addressing the Chinsŏng Yi, living “together with nonagnatic as well as affinal relatives, door to door, cultivating adjoining fields,” the Resolution on the Kin Mutual Fund in On’gye-dong (On’gye-dong chung ch’in’gye ibŭi), dated 1554,8 stipulated the terms of the fund. Its stated purpose was to nurture kin coherence and solidarity by “instituting the rites for the lucky and unlucky occasions of weddings and funerals.” Twice a year, in the spring and autumn, the membership was to assemble “to pledge sincerity” (kangsin), thus celebrating the fundamentals of kinship. The resolution also itemized the amounts of rice, beans, chickens, paper, straw mats, and labor each fund member had to contribute to funerals and weddings— the costly rites by which the elite displayed its cultural superiority. From 1606, a reserve fund provided for these expenditures. The two officers (yusa) who administered the fund and, with a few exceptions, changed every year, were recruited from among T’oegye’s closest kinsmen and rotated between them.9 Particularly active were T’oegye’s son, Chun, and T’oegye’s numerous nephews, especially Wan and Ping.10 Prominent among the few non-Yi administrators were Kŭm Po, son-in-law of one of T’oegye’s half-brothers and T’oegye disciple, who served five times in the early years of the fund, and O Su-yŏng,11 whose father had taken up residence in On’gye as one of Yi U’s sons-in-law, making the Koch’ang O the largest non-Yi kin group in the village.12 An appended “record of assistance” (pujobu) gives a detailed picture of how the fund was used during the sixty-nine years between 1557 and 1626. It assisted in 140 cases: 73 weddings, 60 funerals, and 1 munkwa13 and 5 saengwŏn/chinsa celebrations; a donation was also made on the occasion of T’oegye’s canonization in the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo) in Seoul in 1610. Some members were multiple recipients. T’oegye’s

210

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

grandnephew and the On’gye Yi’s main-line heir, Yi Chong-do, for instance, received assistance when his son got married in 1576, when he himself passed the chinsa examination in 1579 and subsequently married off his five daughters (in 1580, 1583, 1589, in the spring of 1592, and in 1593), and when he buried his mother in 1595. O Su-yŏng profited from the fund to bury his father in the spring of 1567 and, strangely enough, to marry off one of his daughters in the fall of the same year. Between 1570 and 1580, he gave away five more daughters, and welcomed daughters-in-law in 1583 and 1589. He himself was buried with ward funds in 1606. Clearly, the fund’s assets were used exclusively for high-profile celebrations. The fund association also served to promote collective security within On’gye. In 1560, eleven “ward laws” (tongnyŏng) were added to deal with On’gye’s slaves. At a time when privately owned resident slaves (solgŏ nobi) often accounted for the largest population segment in rural communities, their supervision and control constituted a major security issue, not least because slave owners apparently often tried to cover up their slaves’ crimes to avoid their punishment—an incapacitated slave was a useless worker— and a slave guilty of misconduct sought to dodge detection. The “ward laws” were thus intended to mitigate conflicts between slave owners just as much as putting the slaves under semilegal control. Improprieties committed by slaves against their own or other slave owners were to be punished as heavily as a son’s disobedience against his parents, with a double bastinado of fifty strokes with a light bamboo stick. Fraternal conflicts, sexual misconduct and theft, infliction of bodily harm, disruptive behavior among relatives, plowing of (the elite’s) ancestral gravesites, letting cattle and horses roam freely— such unruly acts drew corporal punishment of differing severity. Though T’oegye, who himself owned some 150 slaves, reportedly expressed concern over controlling them when he retired to the countryside, he did not endorse these “laws” and in a letter to the fund officers warned that the “law of the land” (kukpŏp) forbade private individuals to judge and punish another’s crimes.14 In response to these objections, communal judges were installed to investigate and adjudicate those slave crimes apt to elicit especially angry reactions from elite members. Misdeeds committed by commoners were to be reported to the authorities. The original set of these documents was not destroyed in the Imjin War, but had by the early seventeenth century apparently become almost illegible. For this reason, one of T’oegye’s grandnephews, Yi Yu-do (1565–1626), who served as one of the officers in 1615, copied them with some alterations. After 1626, however, there is no further documentary evidence that the fund continued to function, until it was resurrected by T’oegye’s fifthgeneration descendants as Ward Fund of Kyesang (Kyesang tonggye) at the end of the seventeenth century.15 The Ward Regulations of On’gye served as inspiration and model for a number of later fund associations authored by T’oegye’s disciples. In 1565, Kŭm Nan-su drafted a similar document, the Ward Kin Fund (Tongjung chokkye), in his native Pup’o-dong (Yean), enlisting some thirty kinsmen (ch’inch’ŏk) “living together in one ward [tong], next door to one another, cultivating adjoining fields.” “For the sake of mutual harmony,” agnatic and affinal kin were to offer each other material assistance on lucky and unlucky occasions by contributing per person five sŭng 16 of polished rice and two chickens for



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

211

weddings and five sŭng of rice and beans, two rolls of paper, and the labor of two slaves for funerals.17 Each spring and autumn a meeting (hoe) was to be convened and two officers (yusa) elected to administer the fund. Kŭm added a few graded punitive measures, missing in T’oegye’s blueprint, to lead “whoever violates kin harmony back to wholesome goodness.”18 Self-interest had to be curbed by submitting to a mildly coercive collectivity. Similar ward funds were instituted in Och’ŏn by Kim Pu-p’il, his brother Pu-ŭi, their cousins Pu-in and Pu-ryun, and their patrilateral cross-cousin Kŭm Ŭnghyŏp,19 and in Hahoe by fourteen P’ungsan Yu kinsmen, among them Yu Un-nyong and Yu Sŏng-nyong, in 1584 (and revised four times until 1618).20 Under the leadership of Yi Chŏng-hoe, the Chuch’on Yi concluded a “kin fund” (chokkye) in 1583, likely formalizing earlier common activities within the ward (tong). Chŏng-hoe defined its purpose as follows: [Our] kin fund is being established for promoting every-day kin harmony and mutual assistance on lucky and unlucky occasions. Since the members of our fund are all [agnatic and affinal] kinsmen [choktang] and, in addition, live around the same well, would it be the way of full humanity and harmonious relations among kin, if in daily life they were not to meet cheerfully, and on lucky and unlucky occasions were not to assist one another?

Of the membership of twenty-one, the Chinsŏng Yi naturally constituted a majority with eleven members, but all were either agnatic or nonagnatic descendants of greatgreat-grandfather Ch’ŏl-son (1441–98), the son of the village’s founder U-yang. Each member represented one household scattered over a number of hamlets lying (with one exception) in the same northern township of Andong. The fund was based on a corporately held endowment that, according to the fund’s stipulations, had always to retain a stock of eighty sŏm of grain. It was lent out at interest in the spring and had to be paid back in the autumn. The document ended with the usual penal stipulations.21 The fund gatherings, held twice a year to “pledge sincerity” (kangsin), were apparently exuberant affairs—those recorded in Yi Chŏng-hoe’s diary all ended in the evening with the members blind drunk.22 Nevertheless, the degree with which membership was coerced seems to have increased in the post-Imjin era. Failure to attend the biannual meetings drew, for instance, in 1583 twenty strokes with a light bamboo stick (meted out on a slave) and in 1596, when the fund was renewed with a slightly smaller membership, fifty strokes. Bad and disrespectful behavior could, in the worst case, even lead to expulsion from the fund.23 By committing the membership to communal cooperation, the fund associations transformed a ward into a corporate economic zone. Although the sources are sketchy, when Yi Chŏng-hoe was busy preparing his mother’s funeral in the early summer of 1578, for instance, he gratefully received the help of “eleven slaves from each household of the tong” to weed a paddy field.24 Similar teamwork was invoked in the Ward Compact of Nae­ sŏng (Naesŏng tongyak) that was drawn up in the early 1540s, it will be remembered, to coordinate the economic development of Naesŏng Subcounty (discussed in chapter 5). In sum, then, the alliances formed on a tong basis used kinship ties for economic purposes. In contrast to munjung, with which ward membership undoubtedly overlapped to a

212

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

degree, ward alliances were not focused on common ancestors but on common material welfare. It is likely that the ward funds also sponsored the “ward rituals” (tongje) usually performed in the third lunar month to feast a ward’s various guardian spirits, which Yi Chŏng-hoe occasionally attended.25

Inscribing Elite Status: The Local Roster Residence in a socially and culturally well-integrated village community granted an individual a superior identity that secured for him recognition as an elite (sajok) member within the social context of the region at large. The touchstone of such recognition was what might be called “collective social memory” (kongji)—a concept often referred to in the documents. Shared and replenished by each generation, this intangible mnemonic reservoir stored vital social data of particular relevance within a given locality. It would have been hard indeed for any person to claim elite status against the better evidence of this local memory. A kind of written “social memory” was the so-called local roster (hyangan).26 This apparently unique Korean institution listed the names of acknowledged sajok members residing within a particular area, usually a county.27 As the eminent scholar Chŏng Kyŏng-​ se defined it: Why does a particular area have a roster? It is to differentiate [pyŏn] the “long-standing descent groups” [sejok]. What purpose does such differentiation serve? It is to establish [proper] human relationships within a community by straightening out the people’s mores. [For this] it is sufficient to select worthies [hyŏn]. Why are these necessarily to be sought among the long-standing descent groups? Because it is they whom the people of the community [hyangin] respect and fear and who are capable of keeping the local functionaries [hyangni] and the populace under control. If they were not [belonging to] great houses [i.e., long-standing descent groups], they would not be able to do this.28

It is hardly possible to express the sajok elite’s claim of domination more succinctly and forcibly. Through their moral worthiness elite members had, in Bourdieu’s words, “the power to secure recognition of power.”29 And such power was enhanced by the elite’s ability to organize itself into recognizable groups capable of administering such power. Hyangan membership (hyangwŏn) was highly exclusive. Admission was based on proof of impeccable ancestry on the paternal, maternal, and affinal sides (samch’am).30 Scrutiny was thorough, and if an applicant’s mother or wife had come from an undis­ tinguished background outside the community, even if he himself had held high office, his registration was not automatic. Admission to a local roster was, as Hŏ Kyun (1569– 1618) asserted, more difficult than admission to the civil service examinations.31 Indeed, that “worthiness” (hyŏn) was a social as much as a moral qualification for membership is clear from the admission rules that T’oegye’s disciple Chŏng Sa-sŏng drew up in 1581: secondary sons (sŏja) are excluded from the roster because they do not fulfill the social



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

213

conditions, whereas the sons and grandsons of offenders against the human order are excluded because they do not fulfill the moral conditions. Also disqualified were the local functionaries (hyangni).32 For securing, preserving, and reproducing the prestige of high social status, roster members maintained close marital ties among themselves. In earlier times, Chŏng Sa-sŏng noted disapprovingly, even illustrious sajok, when choosing a marriage partner, often took the number of fields and slaves and the amount of property into consideration, rather than social origin and status. He warned therefore that sajok who, for reasons of “poverty,” intermarried with soldiers and commoners would not to be admitted to the roster.33 The local rosters thus give impressive evidence of the fact that elite bred elite. Marriage among hyangan members, often spun over generations, was consequently a preferred, if not a prescribed, mode of propagating hyangan membership, making the rosters read like catalogues of localized kindred. To prevent tampering, the rosters were jealously guarded in safe places, for instance in local schools, by especially appointed officers and viewed by the membership once a year. As Chŏng Kyŏng-se recalled: When I was young, I followed my father and older brother to go to the Local Bureau [hyangdang]. They removed from a vault in the wall the local roster, which was stored there, and beheld it respectfully as if they had entered the sea and were viewing a dragon! The names of famous personalities and great officials, not superior in wealth, yet from the beginning of the dynasty [illustrious], were recorded therein in a random manner.34

Many rosters got lost during the Imjin War, and it was in the course of the seventeenth century that efforts were made to reconstruct them and to give them renewed relevance as memoranda of elite dominance.35

The Local Rosters of Andong In Andong, the Hall for Communal Archery and the Friends’ Home Association, discussed in chapter 4, are commonly thought to have been early organizations through which exclusive groups of men strove to demonstrate their identity as representatives of leading descent groups by enacting ritualized communal celebrations. Their membership charts may thus be regarded as prototypal local rosters. In the sixteenth century, the compilation of local rosters was continued with greater self-confidence, as the passage from Chŏng Kyŏng-se quoted above illustrates. The first full-fledged local roster in Andong was the Hyangan of the Kajŏng Period (Kajŏng hyangan) of 1530.36 Initiated by chinsa graduate (1528) [Kwangsan] Kim Chu (1493–?), it listed 330 members (hyangwŏn) with thirty-four different surnames (of which at least nine are not recorded in the Yŏnggaji), who resided in all parts of Andong County and its subordinate areas. A great many of these men were descendants of the individuals who had been active in the two earlier organizations mentioned above. The largest

214

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

surname group was that of the Andong Kwŏn, represented, for instance, by Kwŏn Sa-bin, whose father and cousin had participated in the Friends’ Home Association, and who himself had joined its successor, the Club of the Upright. Also listed were the main-line heir of the Chinsŏng Yi of Chuch’on, Hun (1467–1538), and his two sons, Yŏn and Han. Yi Ko (?–1551),37 a grandson of Yi Chŭng, the founder of the Friends’ Home Association, was on the roster, as was Kim Chin’s father, Kim Ye-bŏm, the first Naeap Kim to join the roster. Yu Kong-jak (1481–1559), Yu Sŏng-nyong’s grandfather, and his younger brother Kong-sŏk represented the P’ungsan Yu of Hahoe. Also present were Chŏng Kyo (1470– ?),38 whose father, Wŏn-no, had joined the Club of the Upright, and Kyo’s son, I-hŭng. In addition, almost the entire membership of the Naesŏng Compact was included. More than half of the roster members had military titles (belonging to elite military units in the capital) or were simply called “students” (haksaeng), here presumably a tag for aspiring examination candidates. Most of those with civil titles were retired officials, and the number of lower examination graduates was very small. There was thus a great deal of continuity: the elite members who had already played a distinguished role at the end of the fifteenth century continued, in person or through their descendants, to maintain their recognized social standing in 1530. Such constancy is also vividly illustrated by the continued presence of hyangni (local functionaries) on the roster. On the basis of a nineteenth-century work, the Records of Hyangni Descendants of Andong (Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok),39 fifteen hyangni names can be identified. Their inclusion was extraordinary because a contemporary “resolution” (wanŭi), regulating admission to the roster, stipulated that if an individual, even one belonging to a well-known family or great kin group (that is, sajok), had a “deficiency” either on the father’s, the mother’s, or the wife’s side,40 he would not be admitted. From this severe rule were expressly exempted the great-grandsons, sons-in-law, and nonagnatic grandsons of those hyangni who descended, like their sajok kinsmen, from the “three found­ing fathers” venerated in the Shrine of the Three Grand Preceptors (Samt’aesamyo). This select group of fifteen men, among them nine Andong Kwŏn, included six hyangni sons-in-law and nonagnatic grandsons; the rest were presumably all hyangni greatgrandsons. With one exception, all of them typically resided in Andong City proper.41 This small but nevertheless significant contingent of hyangni on the 1530 roster was soon exposed to increasing hostility from elite critics. Chŏng Sa-sŏng, in his abovementioned regulations for admission to the roster, demanded that hyangni, before being admitted to the roster, intermarry with elite roster members for four to five generations. When he regretted that in earlier times even illustrious sajok families were, for economic reasons, creating marital links with unworthy elements, he undoubtedly had the hyangni in mind.42 As the head of the Andong Local Bureau in 1535, Yi Ko attempted to “cleanse” the membership of the 1530 roster, reportedly by forcing the top-ranking hyangni to start their own separate register (tan’an).43 Moreover, voices were raised against continued hyangni participation in the ritual procedures at the Shrine of the Three Grand Preceptors.44 These were unmistakable signs that the long-standing tolerance of hyangni influence in Andong was rapidly waning. Half a century later, a revised local roster, called Local Register of 1589 (Mallyŏk kich’uk hyangnok), was drawn up.45 It contained 289 names (listed according to seniority), rep-



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

215

resenting over 40 surnames, among which the Andong Kwŏn, the (Ŭisŏng, Andong, Sunch’ŏn, Kwangsan) Kim, the (Chinsŏng, Yean) Yi, and the Yŏngyang Nam accounted for more than 60 percent of the membership. This roster impressively documents the final consolidation of Andong’s elite leadership in the second half of the sixteenth century. A comparison to the 1530 roster brings into relief the mechanisms that facilitated such consolidation. Most conspicuous was the greater number of prominent high officials (hyŏn’gwan)46 on the roster—an indication that the Andong sajok were retaining a voice in national affairs as well. There were Chŏng T’ak, Kim Sŏng-il, and Yu Sŏng-nyong in ministerial posts, and Kim Pog-il and Yu Un-nyong among the six county magistrates. Equally wellknown, albeit lower in actual official rank, were Yi Chŏng-hoe, Chŏng Sa-sŏng, and Kwŏn Ki (the author of the Yŏnggaji). Seventeen members were chinsa/saengwŏn degreeholders, and forty were military title holders. Kwŏn Pŏl’s eldest son, Tong-bo, and grandsons Ch’ae2 and Nae were among the seventy Andong Kwŏn on the list. The great majority of the members were simply designated “student” (haksaeng), such as Kim Yong and his cousin Kim Chip (1558–?; Sŏng-il’s eldest son). Compared to 1530, then, degree and office holding at the national level had greatly increased, and the men who were prominent in Seoul naturally also dominated the affairs at home. A striking outcome of such domination was the complete absence of hyangni from the Roster of 1589. The Yŏngyang Nam, who had been recognized as belonging to the sajok elite since the construction of the Hall for Communal Archery, were clearly no hyangni, but in 1530 two Nam, Nam Kyŏng-ji (who by that time was dead) and his son, Chong, were identified as having hyangni connections. In particular, Chong was labeled as a “hyangni nonagnatic grandson,”47 a circumstance that made Kyŏng-ji a hyangni son-in-law. Chong therefore was judged as having serious “deficiencies” and was excluded from the 1589 roster. A similar fate awaited some of the nine Andong Kwŏn who in 1530 had been listed with hyangni ties, for example Kwŏn Se-yŏng. Belonging to a less distinguished Kwŏn descent line, neither he nor any of his descendants was recorded in 1589 or on a later roster. In contrast, a great-great-grandson of famous Kwŏn Kŭn, Ch’ik,48 who was noted in 1530 as hyangni related, was no longer alive in 1589, but the name of his son got nevertheless onto the roster.49 Undoubtedly, this was an exceptional case profiting from ancestral fame. It did not obscure the fact that by the end of the sixteenth century a hyangni link normally disqualified a man as a candidate for roster membership. How difficult it was to get accepted as a member in 1589, even clearly without hyangni stigma, is told in the perhaps apocryphal story about Chŏng T’ak’s registration. Chŏng, who lived in Chinae village in the eastern part of Andong proper, was initially denied admission allegedly because of his impoverished family background, despite the fact that in the meantime he had become a high official. When he was appointed minister of personnel, he returned to Andong on leave and lavishly feasted the community elders for three days. Only after this extravagant display of his resources, did they finally consent to his admission.50 In conclusion, the two rosters provide remarkable numerical evidence of the progressive stabilization of a select number of sajok descent groups as the power holders in Andong. Whereas in 1530 the four surname groups of the Kwŏn (Andong), Kim (Ŭisŏng,

216

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Andong), Yi (Chinsŏng, Kosŏng), and Nam (Yŏngyang) constituted roughly 57 percent of the total membership (330), this percentage grew in a slightly reduced membership (289) to almost 63 percent in 1589.51 The only losers were the Yŏngyang Nam, whose hyangni members were humiliated by exclusion. In contrast, the P’ungsan Yu and the Hŭnghae Pae more than doubled their presence. Even though some roster members of 1530 might have moved away and thus were no longer counted in 1589, the reduced total in that year is more likely indicative of an ongoing consolidation of local power in the hands of a small, but growing segment of sajok who had been systematically strengthening their social influence by close intermarriage, networking with affines, and adding scholarly and ritual expertise to their credentials.

Standards for Leadership: The Community Regulations The members of a local roster committed themselves to observing a strict code of conduct, the “community regulations” (hyanggyu).52 A kind of moral constitution, the rules spelled out the behavioral standards that the hyangan members pledged to adhere to as part of their accumulation of cultural capital. Indeed, to the extent that the rules for admission to roster membership tested social credentials, the community regulations defined the moral terms of such membership: aspiration to leadership demanded exemplary conduct within family and community and toward the state. In 1556, T’oegye outlined his vision of leadership qualifications in the preface of his Community Rules (Hyangnip yakcho), generally known as the Yean Community Compact (Yean hyangyak): Of old, it has been the task of the local officers [hyang taebu] to lead with virtuous conduct and moral principles and to restrain the undisciplined with punishment. Only after the scholar [sa] has cultivated himself at home and distinguished himself in his community, can he rise as an official in the state. How so? Filiality, brotherly love, loyalty, and trustworthiness are the foundation of the human way, and the home and the community are the sites where they are practiced. . . . If filiality, brotherly love, loyalty, and trustworthiness are not practiced, the deterioration of rites and etiquette and the destruction of shame and modesty get daily worse, and this means a return to the state of barbarians and animals. This would indeed be a great disaster for kingly rule. The responsibility to restrain and to correct lies with the local bureau [hyangso]. It is heavy indeed!53

Clearly, for conceiving the sajok’s role as local leaders, T’oegye took recourse to the ideal of local administration that was believed to have been put into practice during the rule of the “early kings” (sŏnwang), as outlined in the Rituals of Zhou (Zhouli).54 This classic assigned to the hyang taebu a twofold mission: “to instruct the ten thousand people” (kyo manmin) with the “three meritorious acts” (sammul),55 and “to control the ten thousand people” (kyu manmin) with the “eight punishments” (p’alhyŏng).56 Even though T’oegye propagated education and rituals as superior forms of the civilizing process, it is noteworthy that, likely following the Zhouli, he chose to append to his Yean Compact a list of thirty-three offenses punishable according to their severity on a graded scale from



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

217

“heaviest” (kŭkpŏl) to “light” (habŏl), leaving the nature of punishment undefined. With these penal provisions, he must have consciously departed from the more exhortatory Song-Chinese prototype, the Lü Family Community Compact (Lüshi xiangyue), which Zhu Xi had popularized.57 This departure may reflect T’oegye’s rather pessimistic view of human nature: man has to be coerced into becoming truly human and if exhortations fail, punitive measures must follow. He defended himself to possible critics by arguing that such measures were not intended for the “blessed scholars” (kilsa) of Andong (his own disciples?), who fulfilled the moral dicta in family and community; they were, rather, targeted at “evil people” (p’yemin), who by violating righteousness and damaging the rites threatened to destroy community and state. Nevertheless, a few of its penal stipulations, when publicized in the Yean Hall for Communal Archery, apparently alarmed some landowners, and T’oegye’s compact met with such a flurry of opposition that, as Kŭm Nan-su later reminisced, T’oegye was forced to take it down and store it away.58 Though not put into practice during T’oegye’s lifetime, the legalistic format of his Yean Compact59 evidently became thirty years later the principal model for Andong’s so-called Old Community Regulations (Hyanggyu kujo) of 1588. Presumably conceived in conjunction with the Roster of 1589, the Old Community Regulations60 were drafted by T’oegye’s disciple Kang Yun (1514–99).61 Kang, serving at that time as the head (chwasu) of the Local Bureau (to be discussed below), apparently was encouraged to do so by the then Andong magistrate, Kim U-ong, who, during his brief tenure in Andong, instituted his own community compact.62 The regulations forego mention of education and instead lay out twenty-three misdemeanors on a graded scale of punitive measures. Disobedience against parents, grandparents, and paternal uncles (and their wives), conflicts among brothers, and defilement of the local scholarly reputation by dishonest conduct were to be punished most heavily by long-term exclusion from “comradely intercourse”; an unrepentant person was to be reported to the magistrate for punishment. This was the only instance of magisterial involvement. Middle-grade punishment was prescribed for such diverse offenses as slighting the primary wife, disharmony among kin, irreverence toward the community elders, spreading rumors against the magistrate, and negligence of bureau officials (p’umgwan) leading to harming the local mores. An unrepentant person was threatened with ostracism (sondo).63 Drawing light punishment were those who missed the proper time for weddings and funerals,64 were without reason absent from communal gatherings, or ignored community directives. The individual, moreover, who regularly sent a substitute to community gatherings had to expect lifelong exclusion from the local roster. Kang Yun submitted these regulations to the Capital Agency (Kyŏngjaeso) in Seoul for approval.65 It is not difficult to read between the lines. Both T’oegye’s Yean Compact and the Old Regulations reveal in unmistakable terms that all was not (yet) well in sajok families and neighborhoods. Indeed, as long as conflicts and insubordination harmed Confucian intrafamilial rules of filiality and brotherly harmony, and selfish (sa) and lawless acts such as the confiscation of a debtor’s property or the registration in the hyangan of an unworthy person for self-seeking reasons endangered community cooperation, the consolidation of a cultivated environment based on Confucian norms and values was in jeopardy, and the sajok’s claim to authority and leadership undermined.

218

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

The Local Bureau (Yuhyangso) Pressure to reestablish the local bureaus grew during King Sŏngjong’s reign in the 1480s, when some Confucian adepts around Kim Chong-jik argued that the bureaus, rather than competing with the magistrates, would assist them in “straightening out the unfilial and unbrotherly” and promoting familial peace. Indeed, those who pleaded for the bureaus’ urgent reconstruction mentioned the “lewd rituals” (ŭmsa) prevalent in Chŏlla Province, in particular those practiced by local magnates and hyangni in Namwŏn. Sensing that local interests were now simply cloaked in ideological terms, opponents countered that if the magistrates were “wise” (hyŏn), the bureaus would not be necessary. Even though apparently reluctant, King Sŏngjong at last accepted the proponents’ view of the bureaus’ supposedly salutary effect and granted their restoration in the fifth month of 1488.66 That this time the state was intent on actualizing its authority over these semiofficial institutions is clear from the strict guidelines that were enacted. The Rules Concerning the Restoration of the Yuhyangso (Yuhyangso poksŏl maryŏn chŏlmok) of 1488 laid down the responsibilities of the local bureaus: the number of bureau officials (p’umgwan) was to be restricted (five in counties of pu size, four in counties of kun size, and three in hyŏn) and they were to be selected by their respective capital bureau; their major task was to improve local mores by restraining the “wicked clerks” (angni) and to mete out punishment for abuses of influence and power.67 The rules gained legal authority a few years later by incorporation in the Taejŏn songnok of 1492.68 These rules, then, suggest that the central government continued to rely, albeit under certain restrictions, on the existence of regional assemblies at the subadministrative level that were to function as intermediaries between the magistrates and the populace. No longer constituted entirely on local initiative, these assemblies were to be staffed by executive officers the government could trust—“high officials or reasonable [read ‘loyal’] individuals resident in the countryside,” who were to be selected by the respective capital bureaus (kyŏngjaeso). To an extent, then, the state used these informal channels to influence the leadership structure in village communities. On the other hand, as will become evident later, the local bureaus retained much of their original role as loci where intracommunity interests were articulated and executed—not necessarily to the benefit of the state. From the beginning of the dynasty, Andong’s leaders directed local affairs through the Hall for Communal Archery that seems to have doubled as the county’s local bureau (yuhyangso) (discussed in chapter 4). Although nothing is known about the bureau’s activities in the late fifteenth century, the hall was rebuilt and enlarged in 1531, apparently following the compilation of the 1530 roster. Often hailed as the “legacy of the hyang taebu of antiquity,”69 the new hall, situated some two ri west of the city walls, was a five-pillar building, on the eastern side of which a level platform was erected. When the biannual communal gatherings (hyanghoe) and the various archery and winedrinking ceremonies were held, mats were laid out so that the hall and the platform provided one contiguous venue. The southern side of the platform was joined by eastern and western stairs used by host and guests to ascend after exchanging ceremonial bows.



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

219

The hall was adorned with a name plaque with Prince Anp’yŏng’s calligraphy. Several smaller buildings surrounded the hall, among them a shrine housing the tablets for the spirits of land and grain (sajik).70 The Andong Local Bureau’s top personnel (p’umgwan) consisted of a head (chwasu) and three deputy heads (pyŏlgam), often collectively called “controllers of [government] principles” (chipkang).71 They were assisted by a number of hyangni and slaves.72 As evident from the Old Regulations,73 the appointments of the head and his deputies had by the 1580s become an exclusive affair. Only sajok who fulfilled “local expectations” (hyangmang) and whose names were registered in the local roster were eligible. Indeed, Andong became known for selecting its bureau heads with such scrutiny that only “someone virtuous and with the [proper] family background to whom the whole community would readily submit” was considered suitable. Not uncommonly therefore even high officials, after retirement, would take up these posts.74 Appointments were subject to ratification (or perhaps were even initiated?) by the Andong Capital Bureau—the Local Bureau’s administrative counterpart in the capital responsible for Andong County. The prestige of the chipkang was so great that someone who denied them due respect faced expulsion from the community. Nevertheless, the heads were not to act arbitrarily to further their own interests (sa), but were advised to keep the common good in mind at all times. Tampering with the local roster or colluding with capital hyangni to commit misdeeds resulted in ostracism. The same punishment awaited the one who, through negligence in office, defiled the local mores. These rules were later largely taken over by the Ten New Regulations drawn up in the wake of the Imjin War in 1605 (discussed below). It is not clear how long the tenure of bureau heads was in the sixteenth century, nor are name lists extant. Curiously, biographical materials only rarely record such service. In Andong, prominent men like Yi Ko, Kim Su-il, Yi Chŏng-hoe, and Kwŏn Haeng-ga, however, are known to have served as chwasu. Yi Ko is said to have “constrained and improved the bureau’s personnel.”75 In 1594, Yi Chŏng-hoe was unanimously elected head to combat growing lawlessness after the Imjin War.76 Both Yi Chŏng-hoe and Kwŏn Haeng-ga were later also closely involved in initiating and drafting the Ten New Regulations in 1605. Kim Sŏng-il, however, reportedly declined the headship: There is a common saying that in olden days a high official, after retiring from office, would become the bureau head in his old age. Some time ago, when Hakpong Kim Sŏng-il returned home as a first secretary [senior fourth rank in the Council of State], the local assembly [hyanghoe] proposed him as bureau head. He, however, declined on the ground of illness and did not serve. Unexpectedly, a royal summons came, appointing him a second inspector [in the Inspector General’s Office, junior third rank]. He was pleased and said: “Today I have for the first time got to know the taste of serving as an official!”77

Kim Sŏng-il’s refusal of the headship was likely not intended as a snub at holding office in the Local Bureau. Rather, he must have felt that, at forty-nine, he was still too young to end his career in this traditional way.78 Earlier, in his youth, Kim Sŏng-il is said to have once suggested to T’oegye that “local men [hyangin] who set their minds on learning may find it shameful to follow behind p’umgwan [in a ceremonial setting],” whereupon

220

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

T’oegye retorted: “The Local Bureau is the site where fathers, elder brothers, and kinsmen are [active]. Why would it be shameful to follow behind them?”79 Indeed, serving as an officer in the Local Bureau was always regarded as a mark of prestige and power, and consequently the honor seems to have been shared quite evenly among the scions of the foremost descent groups living throughout the Andong area. The local bureaus’ principal assignment was “to rectify the local mores” (chŏng p’ungsok). This was a multifarious assignment. It included the arrangement of the biannual meetings of the roster members (hyanghoe) in the spring and autumn, which were conducted in the style of community compacts (hyangyak).80 If a major issue arose in the community in-between, the bureau head assembled the “elders” to discuss and decide upon the matter. Collegial consensus was also to be the basis of the periodic revisions of the local roster (hyangan). Indeed, communal consultation (hyangŭi) and unanimity of decision were key concepts written into the community regulations—often to be shattered, however, by conflicts over roster admission. Discord became especially frequent in later centuries (discussed in chapter 10), when, with increasing numbers of potential candidates, access to the rosters turned into highly contentious affairs. “Rectifying the local mores” also entailed advancing the moral quality of the community by “enriching human relationships” (huiryun)—fostering harmony within family and neighborhood and preventing all kinds of misdemeanors on pain of punishment. How seriously one single act of moral transgression could damage the reputation of a whole area was exemplified in 1576 when a “rebellious son” killed his own mother in Andong. As collective punishment for this heinous crime, Andong lost its status as a special city and was degraded to a mere county (hyŏn), and both the magistrate and his deputy were dismissed. Five years later, a few local officials, among them Yi Chŏng-hoe, pleaded in a passionate memorial for royal pardon and restitution of Andong’s former status. Recalling Andong’s military contributions to state security and its strategic position and adducing historical precedents, the memorialists argued that after suffering the humiliation for five years the pardon could not come too soon. “If, because of the wrongdoing of one individual the entire population is branded disloyal and dishonest, and the door of reconciliation is not opened, the people’s progress toward good, finding no fulfillment, will slacken.” Finally, in the spring of 1581, with the assistance of Yu Un-nyong, royal pardon was granted and Andong restored to its former status.81 Besides this heavy charge of safeguarding a community’s moral reputation, the officers of the local bureaus, assisted by a large number of subaltern functionaries,82 had a host of other, more routine administrative duties to fulfill. They had, for example, to keep a population register for drafting able-bodied men for military duties.83 They also wielded apparently far-reaching penal authority over sajok evildoers—those who abused their powers in pursuit of selfish interests or disturbed local peace by spreading false rumors and tricking others into crime. In brief, the local bureaus were closely tied to the day-today running of a county. In Andong, the Local Bureau also continued to manage a fund (po) that had been established in the late fifteenth century.84 Its use is not attested, but it most likely defrayed the costs of the officers’ ceremonial duties. And there were many of those. An important one was the arrangement of the biannual community meetings, which climaxed in wine



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

221

drinking and eating. In addition, the officers had to feast incoming and outgoing magistrates and host banquets for visiting dignitaries—usually lively events with female entertainers (kwan’gi) and musicians.85

The Local Bureau vis-à-vis the State With the responsibilities of the local bureaus obviously to a degree overlapping with those of the magistrate, what could have been the state’s interest in tolerating or even promoting the existence of an organization that seemed to contravene its centralizing efforts? Why did the state continue to depend on a subadministrative institution that had earlier been suspended several times because it was judged to harm the state’s intentions in the countryside? What, then, did the local bureaus do that the magistrate was thought not to be able to do? These questions are difficult to answer because there is only circumstantial evidence of local bureaus’ activities beyond what they were supposed to do according to the various written regulations. Although conventional historiography often interprets the local bureau as an instrument through which the rural elites exercised “local autonomy” (chach’i) vis-à-vis the state,86 the bureau was clearly subordinate to the local magistrate. Its officers were to assist the magistrate, who most often was a stranger to his assigned area, as his “eyes and ears.”87 Yet, in view of their apparently often coinciding responsibilities and interests, the potential for conflict was so obvious that the early legal codes expressly prohibited local bureau personnel (p’umgwan) from denouncing a magistrate or a governor.88 A number of regulations, moreover, were clearly intended to prevent confrontations by restraining the bureau’s subaltern officials from frequenting the magistrate’s office in private matters, and by warning sajok members not to harm the magistrate by spreading false rumors or using undue personal influence. The local magistrate thus enjoyed, at least in legal terms, inviolable authority, and it did not pay to forget this fact. When in 1579, for instance, the son of Kwŏn Ŭi (Kwŏn Pŏl’s elder brother) denounced a rapacious magistrate, he was in retaliation branded as “local bully” (t’oho)89—a label that defamed him as an enemy of state and community. Nevertheless, though many of the bureau regulations counseled self-restraint, some sajok, utilizing their local knowledge in pursuit of their own interests, reportedly did not shy away from undercutting the magistrate’s standing by “relishing the display of their power so that clerks and populace, fearing abuse, treated them better than the magistrate.” Even in Yŏngnam, where “the correctness of the elite’s mores and the purity of their customs” had been famous, an official report complained, “local rascals and bullies, claiming to be sarim, insult the magistrate so that he has no other choice but to treat them with contempt.”90 As the relationship between the magistrate and the local elite evidently was often a contentious one, why, then, did the state as late as the sixteenth century still support the local bureau? It would seem that the reason was no other than the state’s realization that without the sajok’s active assistance it would not be able to bring uncooperative social

222

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

elements, in particular the hyangni, under its control. In other words, it was the structural weakness of local administration that forced the state to delegate to the local bureaus, under the euphemism of “rectifying the local mores” (chŏng p’ungsok), the vital task of subduing the hyangni and integrating them into the new dynasty’s hierarchical order. This interpretation seems to be substantiated by the fact that one of the major arguments advanced at court in 1488 in favor of reestablishing the local bureaus in the provinces was that the “rectification of local mores” would be one of their “major services” to the state. Dissenters, on the other hand, feared the potential for conflict with the magistrate.91 Though the evidence is thin, it is not difficult to imagine that the “rectification of local mores” placed into the hands of the local bureau officers a welcome instrument for pursuing a suppressive course against the “wicked hyangni” (wŏnak hyangni) and thereby advancing their own standing and interests. Nevertheless, bureau officers did not have punitive authority. Cases needing adjudication had to be reported to the respective capital bureaus in Seoul.92 To what extent this anti-hyangni policy was generally successful cannot be easily documented. In Andong, it did lead to a restructuring of local society—whether for the benefit of the state or that of the sajok elite is a moot question. Hyangni who by the early sixteenth century still belonged to the local leadership—some of them the sajok’s own kinsmen—came under close scrutiny in the 1580s. Apparently as the result of consul­ tations between the magistrate and bureau officers,93 the hyangni were, as shown above, eliminated from the Local Roster of 1589 and forced to start their own separate register (tan’an). The Regulations of 1588 and 1605, moreover, singled them out as potential wrongdoers to be kept under “coercive surveillance” (ch’i), lest they avail themselves of their local knowledge and connections to jeopardize the magistrate’s administration, or use their writing skills to falsify documents, or, most reprehensible, force commoner women and government slaves into concubinage—offenses that harmed the local economy as well as local mores.94 Though effectively marginalized and squeezed socially and economically (they were unsalaried), hyangni of all ranks95 remained, most often hereditarily, active in a gray zone of local government at the expense of elite and peasantry alike.96 Finally, it is noteworthy how little the elite’s relationship to the commoner population figures in the pre-Imjin regulations. Although there is only circumstantial evidence, this relationship seems to have been tenuous—at best paternalistic, at worst exploitative. The Old Regulations, for instance, warned against illegal seizure of commoner land— apparently a typical abuse. For building their retreats and pavilions, the elite relied heavily on the special skills of commoner and slave craftsmen.97 Indeed, government artisans in Yean reportedly were so ruthlessly exploited that many of them fled into the mountains. This prompted the head of the Yean Local Bureau to appeal to T’oegye in 1567 to draw up “prohibitory rules” (kŭmdan kyuyak) against the elite’s abuses in order to induce the fugitives to return home.98 The mistreatment of commoners and government slaves by the sajok was only one facet of their tribulations; another was the heavy tax and labor burden put upon them by the state. Indeed, the commoners’ plight had reached such an alarming state by the end of the sixteenth century that both Yu Sŏng-nyong and Kim Sŏng-il felt compelled to make representations to the government.99 In sum, then, the state seems to have hoped to coopt the localized sajok for restruc-



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

223

turing the countryside through the local bureaus. The activities of the local bureaus, however, remain unfortunately so little documented that an overall assessment of their role is well-nigh impossible. Evidently, the relationship between magistrate and elite hinged on the degree to which private and public interests could be balanced off against each other. On the other hand, the local bureaus seem to have provided the sajok elite with an unofficial platform to negotiate their local-level rivalries. They undoubtedly also functioned as command centers for organizing common action against the enemy from abroad at the end of the century.

Defending Community: The Imjin War The Imjin War (1592–97) broke over the Korean peninsula unexpectedly and with great ferocity. Indeed, it turned out to be the most destructive event in Chosŏn history. Not only had the central government neglected the country’s defenses during the peaceful first two centuries of the Chosŏn, but as soon as the Japanese invaders approached Seoul, only three weeks after they had launched their invasion in late May of 1592, King Sŏnjo (r. 1567–1608) and the royal court abandoned the capital and fled north, “decentering”100 the country and leaving a shocked population behind. With the regular army unprepared and ineffectual to counter the enemy, which was well equipped with muskets and advanced siege equipment, it was largely left to regional leaders to defend their communities. That the country survived this disaster was due not only to Admiral Yi Sun-sin’s (1545–98) superb naval stratagems and the massive military intervention of Ming China, started in the first days of 1593, but also in large measure to the regional responses to the Japanese onslaught by well-connected sajok, who organized voluntary “righteous army units” (ŭibyŏng) of various composition all over the country.101 News of the Japanese landing in Pusan reached Andong within a couple of days.102 The magistrate and his staff immediately fled the area and panic broke out among the people,103 but because Andong did not lie along one of the invasion routes the Japanese armies followed on their northward march, it was initially little affected by the invaders. Only after the Japanese had established an army camp near Sangju, on the upper reach of the Naktong River, did the area to the east of the river come within the range of military action. In Yean, Magistrate Sin Chi-je104 started right away to organize a defense troop, assisted by representatives of the prominent descent groups of the county. Kim Hae, the Kwangsan Kim main-line heir,105 assumed the overall command as “grand general” (taejang), and several of his cousins, among them Kim Ki106 and Kim P’yŏng,107 filled subsidiary posts. Also conspicuous among the leaders were the brothers Kŭm Ŭng-hun and Ŭng-hyŏp, and their nonagnatic nephew, Yi Yŏng-do (T’oegye’s grandson). Some forty community elders, among them Cho Mok and Kim Pu-ryun (Hae’s uncle once removed), committed themselves to providing military provisions, and Yi Sung-nyang108 directed an urgent rallying appeal (kyŏngmun) to “the sajok and populace of all districts” (yŏrŭp samin). Deploring the cowardice of those magistrates who fled and allowed “the Royal Ancestral Shrine and the Altar to the Spirits of Soil and Grain [in Seoul] to turn into the

224

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

invaders’ lair, and the common people to become the meat and fish boiling in their caldrons,” Yi entreated all likeminded men to stand up to the challenge and unite in defense of their villages in a demonstration of loyalty and filiality.109 By the summer of 1592, the Yean defense force (Yean ŭibyŏng) comprised 55 cavalrymen and some 350 foot soldiers.110 Clearly, those who stood to lose the most used their tight affinal network and ample economic resources to quickly rally around the local magistrate. In Andong, some defense preparations got under way only when Japanese troops were approaching Yonggung on the county’s western border. Attempting to block their advance toward Andong City, [Hŭnghae] Pae Yong-gil111 joined his privately raised militia force with Magistrate Sin Chi-je’s troops, but the enemy, also moving in from the south, reached Andong City by the end of the sixth month and burned and looted the town. A major casualty was the Shrine of the Three Grand Preceptors. From Andong, the Japanese briefly headed toward Yean, but after a fierce battle with local forces, again strengthened by Pae’s militia, they were driven back to the western part of P’ungsan, where they camped in Kudam. There they were harassed by village youth who, as the Yŏnggaji reports, inflicted heavy casualties upon them. In revenge, the survivors burned the entire village.112 From the middle of the eighth month, the Japanese started to withdraw westward. The overall military defense of Kyŏngsang Province began to be belatedly coordinated when Kim Sŏng-il arrived in southern Kyŏngsang as the government-appointed “mobilizer” (ch’oyusa) in the early summer and sent out a “call to arms” (ch’oyumun) to the province’s “elite [sa] and people [min].” It reached Andong in the first days of the eighth month. In this emotional missive, Kim evoked the elevated status Yŏngnam had enjoyed since Silla times thanks to its ethical sophistication. “In our time, T’oegye and Nammyŏng, both emerging in one generation, have promoted and elucidated the Learning of the Way and made it their mission to refine the people’s hearts and support human order.” In view of this awesome past and now confronted with a national disaster, Kim urged, only a concerted effort of everyone—officials and common populace—would save the country from the foreign aggressors. “Only thinking of our own lives, how could we face our forefathers in the netherworld?” Standing up in rightful indignation, whether fighting “with hoe or rake, with a short or a long knife, turning them into strong armor and frightening weapons, what would there be to be feared, even if the enemy came with long spears and big swords?” It was the united exertion sustained by a superior moral tradition, Kim asserted, that would in the end lead to well-rewarded victory.113 In response to Kim Sŏng-il’s arousing appeal, Pae Yong-gil sent out an urgent missive (t’ongmun) to all Andong districts, and within a few days community representatives met to discuss the organization of a militia force. Pae Yong-gil and Kim Yong, who had just returned to Andong on sick leave from government duties,114 assumed the charge of recruiters, and a few days later the Andong militia force (Andong ŭibyŏng) with over one hundred men was formed. Yi Chŏng-baek,115 Chŏng-hoe’s younger brother, was appointed grand general, while Pae Yong-gil was to assist him as deputy general. Kim Yun-sa116 was one of the coordinators and Kwŏn T’ae-il,117 Kwŏn Ki, Yu Pok-ki,118 and Kim Tŭg-yŏn119 assumed subsidiary functions. As before in Yean, it was well-placed elite members, most of them in their forties, who rose to defend their localities with forces drafted from among their own slaves and reinforced with commoner peasants and regu-



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

225

lar soldiers, who had fled their units. Those unable to commit themselves to active duty contributed grain. Yi Ham, at the time in mourning for his mother, handed out relief goods to the starving populace as well as to troops passing by, while Kwŏn Ch’ae fed the destitute seeking shelter in his residence in Yu’gok.120 On the fifteenth of the eighth month, representatives of Andong met with delegates of neighboring Ŭisŏng and Ŭihŭng in a grand gathering, during which they decided to consolidate several units into a regional militia force (Andong yŏrŭp hyangbyŏng). This enlarged force, commanded by Kim Hae, with Yi Chŏng-baek and Pae Yong-gil as his deputies, was to combat the Japanese in small formations.121 As Andong itself was no longer under immediate threat, in early 1593 the Andong combined militia branched out in guerilla-type actions as far west as Indong and Taegu, usually making surprise attacks on small Japanese detachments, cutting off enemy heads and capturing their horses and weapons. It was during such limited operations that the Japanese reportedly suffered heavy losses. In the summer of 1593, Kim Hae, pursuing retreating Japanese troops, died of illness in Kyŏngju.122 The Japanese launched their second invasion in August of 1597, after protracted peace negotiations had broken down.123 Andong, being spared combat at that time, was designated as the headquarters of the Eastern Expeditionary Corps of the Ming army, and the government appealed to the elites to submit (napsok) foodstuffs to feed the Chinese soldiers. Again, the sajok complied with extraordinarily large “donations.” Yi Chin,124 resident in Yean, for instance, contributed in the course of 1597 over twenty sŏm of “righteous grain” (ŭigok) amounting to more than 39 percent of his income that year. For this generous “contribution” to the war effort, Yi apparently received the title “supervisor of military provisions” (kunjagam).125 Two Andong men won national fame for their valor and sacrifice during the war— Kim Sŏng-il and Yu Sŏng-nyong. In his desperate attempt to keep the Japanese invaders from penetrating Chŏlla Province, Kim Sŏng-il died of illness during the defense of Chinju in the early summer of 1593.126 Yu Sŏng-nyong, who immediately after the outbreak of hostilities was put in charge of overall military affairs, accompanied King Sŏnjo on his flight north, but shortly later was dismissed as chief state councilor for allegedly having “ruined the country” by insisting on peace with the Japanese. Reinstated, he con­ tinued to hold high concurrent civil and military assignments to become one of the heroes of Korean resistance. When in 1598 factional infighting again forced him out of office, he returned to Hahoe and, using the notes he had taken during the war years, authored the famous The Book of Corrections (Chingbirok), a detailed chronological account of his war experiences from 1592 to 1598.

Postwar Reconstruction in Andong When peace was restored, the localized sajok utilized their socioeconomic interconnectedness once more to expedite the rehabilitation of the Andong area. Reconstruction work thus started with remarkable speed. The war damage inflicted on the Andong region is,

226

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

of course, not quantifiable, but since the area experienced only a rather brief Japanese incursion at the beginning of the first invasion, devastation was less widespread than in other areas of the country more exposed to repeated war action. Neither Naeap nor Yu’gok seems to have been gravely affected. To be sure, lamentations abounded that slaves had either run away or starved to death and that wide stretches of formerly cultivated land lay devastated. Nevertheless, in Och’ŏn, for instance, agricultural output was normalized within one year,127 despite the fact that the Och’ŏn Kim had lost at least half of their slaves.128 When Yi Chŏng-hoe returned to Chuch’on (from his magistracy in Hoesŏng) in the first month of 1594, he found that only the great hall of his residence and some slave quarters were still standing, and attributed the fact that no one had been hurt to his ancestors’ “accumulated goodness and unostentatious virtue.”129 Although there was a severe famine in 1593, bumper crops were harvested in 1594 and again in 1595, when no major military action took place.130 Nevertheless, labor shortages hampered rehabilitation everywhere, as slaves had absconded (tomang nobi) in large numbers during the war chaos. Yet, at the same time, desperate slave owners tried to get rid of some of their slaves and thus created a buyer’s market. [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ham, for instance, is well known for having augmented his labor force by buying slaves at low prices. Indeed, at the time of his death in 1632, his slaves numbered 142 (compared to the 14 he had inherited in 1592). Land, too, he acquired cheaply—some 103 majigi of dry land and 24 majigi of paddy land. Most of the sellers were impoverished peasants, but some sajok were also among them. With his purchases, Yi Ham was able not only to bolster the dwindling resources of his family but also to concentrate his landed property around his residence.131 Whereas Yi Ham carefully sought legal confirmation of his acquisitions, “rescuing” (kuhyul) migrants from starvation seems to have been an alternative source of much needed labor. With large numbers of homeless roaming around, replenishing depleted slave stocks by enslaving children was apparently not uncommon in Andong.132 The Naeap Kim, for instance, “saved” some starving youngsters who happened to wander through the village and incorporated them into their weakened slaveholdings—to have them demanded back some fifty years later by someone who claimed to be their owner.133 In addition, escaped slaves were hunted down with great persistence and on a large scale. [Kwangsan] Kim Hae’s eldest son, Kwang-gye, for example, inherited three extra slaves in 1619 as a reward for his success in recapturing a number of escaped house slaves.134 It may thus not be far-fetched to speak of a second enslavement wave that accelerated the rehabilitation of rural estates. The postwar situation afforded enterprising personalities opportunities even to enlarge and improve their property. Among them was Yi Chŏng-hoe, who personally oversaw major improvements to his estate throughout the first decade of the seventeenth century. He used his slaves or corvée laborers to bring undeveloped land under cultivation, build irrigation facilities for turning dry fields into more profitable paddies, install fish traps in several places, and plant cotton fields.135 Indeed, agricultural knowledge was now essential even for a sajok gentleman. When Yu Chin (1582–1635), Yu Sŏng-nyong’s third son, moved to Sangju in 1617 where he intended to develop a new estate, he collected whatever he could learn about agriculture in a small handbook, reminiscing that when



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

227

in his youth he had wanted to study crop growing his father rebuked him that this was not a gentleman’s occupation.136 If agriculture could, with the necessary labor force, be brought back relatively easily to full production, skilled artisans were needed to reconstruct the many buildings that had gone up in flames. Indeed, the destruction of architectural substance, in particular of ancestral shrines and purification halls, was perhaps the most deeply deplored loss of the war. Competition to secure the assistance of expert craftsmen was therefore so fierce that government artisans were abused even more severely than before the war.137 The powerful Yi Chŏng-hoe, for instance, managed to accomplish several building projects. He converted a ruined temple site near his ancestral graves into a purification hall and also enlarged his residence, besides building a school (sŏdang) and a pavilion.138 Some sajok seem to have survived without being seriously affected by the war. Yi Chin, who, as mentioned above, could afford to make a major grain contribution to the upkeep of the Ming forces in Andong in 1597, apparently suffered no war damage at all to his estate in Yean. According to his diary, he continued to lavishly entertain his friends and colleagues several times a month in that very same year.139 Yi Chŏng-hoe, too, shared his wealth generously. In the fall of 1604, he celebrated the completion of his school building with a feast for which he slaughtered a calf. In 1608, he had three cows killed in sequence for a ward meeting, a village gathering, and for Ch’usŏk celebrations. As the main-line heir, he also served his kinsmen precious meat when they performed the ancestral rituals on the customary holidays.140 This was presumably a rather rare level of conspicuous consumption so shortly after the war. A factor likely to have significantly contributed to the speed with which the local economy in Andong and elsewhere recovered was the circumstance that King Sŏnjo’s death in 1608 was followed by Kwanghae’gun’s “immoral” rule (1608–23). Shunning government service during this period, many young men belonging to the post-Imjin leadership generation lived instead on their estates. During those “dark days,” Kim Ch’ang-jo, a chinsa of 1605, decided in “resentment” to give up further examination aspirations and return home,141 while Kim Yŏng,142 when he realized that with corrupt ministers in charge of government affairs he would not be able to speak up, retired from office. Though the biographies of Kim Hyu and Yi Chŏn, for instance, report that during this period they passed their time by “amusing themselves with the classics and history, music and chess” and heavy drinking—a classical topos of defying the state—they did use their enforced leisure to rebuild their estates with documented success.143 In sum, land and slave ownership in the Andong area quickly recovered prewar levels and in fact reached an all-time high in the first decades of the seventeenth century144—a reality from which the government seems to have reaped little profit. When it tried to carry out a cadastral survey in 1603 (Kyemyo yangan) and to re-register the unsettled and impoverished population in 1606 (Pyŏngo hojŏk), it unsurprisingly received little cooperation. As even in normal times such government ventures were resisted and sabotaged, the two postwar actions failed dismally. The acreage recorded in 1603, apparently based on dubious self-assessment, reached not more than 20 percent nationwide,145 and even later never recouped prewar levels, leaving the state with a chronic deficit.

228

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Postwar Reconstruction: New Rosters and Regulations The Andong sajok were equally swift to reclaim their hold on local power, apparently amidst fierce altercations. Because the Andong Roster of 1589 had been damaged beyond repair during the Imjin War, some bureau officers, under the pretext of rewriting it, had, “in pursuit of selfish motives,” written in names that had not originally been on the ­roster. This caused such an “uproar of opinion” that the rewrite had to be discarded. Consequently, when he served as bureau head during 1603–4, Yi Chŏng-hoe made a renewed attempt to reconstruct the roster, which apparently was completed only in 1608.146 Clearly, roster membership, besides retaining its high prestige value, became vital for securing social identification when examination success began to slacken. Admission was therefore sought more aggressively than ever before. At the same time, Yi Chŏng-hoe also proposed a revision of the Old Regulations, which Andong Local Bureau officials had reportedly often arbitrarily amended, producing an awkward text. Before Yi could accomplish this task, he was succeeded as bureau head by Kwŏn Haeng-ga.147 In his effort to give the regulations a postwar gloss, Kwŏn was guided by two elder statesmen, Yu Sŏng-nyong, his teacher, and Censor Kwŏn Ch’unnan (1539–1617), who “had set his mind on rectifying the local mores.”148 Yu’s influence on the redaction of the new document seems to have been so decisive that he, rather than Kwŏn Haeng-ga, is commonly acknowledged as the architect of the Ten New Regulations (Sinjŏng sipcho).149 Dated 1605,150 the document, though incorporating a few of the Old Regulations as well as the complete text of the Yean Compact, set new standards that were to regulate the practicalities of administrating the postwar community.151 Its ten sections dealt with the selection procedure of bureau officers, the agenda and conduct of the twice-yearly community meetings, the promotion of intrafamilial relationships, the qualifications for local roster membership, the elaboration of “etiquette and customs,” respect for old age (persons above sixty), warnings against public misdemeanors, the control of local hyangni, equalization of service obligations, and the promotion of local education.152 From their contents as well as from their style, the Ten New Regulations were better structured and, as a postwar document, addressed chiefly the management of the public realm in support of government initiatives: the Local Bureau, for instance, was made directly responsible for compiling a new population register and assessing the acreage of cultivated land in order to equalize the tax and corvée burden (kyun yoyŏk) and to rotate special work assignments (chabyŏk) among the various subcounties—urgent measures to retain tenants and peasants on the land. The bureau officers were also to report to the magistrate anyone for punishment found guilty of seizing land by force or evading taxes and corvée labor. In addition, they were to supervise public works and inspect woods and mountains in the spring and fall to curb the illegal cutting of precious wood during the postwar building boom. The bureau, moreover, was ordered to vet the candidates for the civil and military examinations to prevent unworthy elements from infiltrating them.153 In reality, the New Regulations apparently did little to curtail the many abuses inflicted on land and peasantry in the competitive atmosphere of postwar reconstruc-



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

229

tion. This is suggested by an appendix (ch’urok) that the bureau head, Kim Chip, added in the eighth month of 1615, ostensibly out of concern for the “daily worsening of the mores in the entire county.” Among the many outrages perpetrated by “evil elements” Kim singled out the mistreatment of the government mat weavers, who in desperation were all fleeing their homes instead of producing their quotas of tribute items, and the forcible seizure of land and slaves in the northern subcounties. Kim threatened the worst wrongdoers with referral to the local magistrate for punishment “according to the law,” whereas persons responsible for lesser offenses were to be permanently excluded from roster membership and their descendants disgraced by being denied taking their seats according to the age-based seating order in the Archery Hall.154 Clearly, Kim Chip turned the threat of exclusion from roster membership into a disciplinary instrument. And this may not have been an entirely empty threat, because Kim prepared, concurrently with the appendix, the first postwar roster, the “Draft Roster” (Hyangnok ch’oan), dated the twelfth month of 1615. Taking the confused postwar situation into account, Kim Chip took unusual care to verify the social background of all men whose names he entered on the roster: he not only checked the father and fatherin-law of each prospective member but also ascertained whether or not these two had been members of earlier rosters or of rosters kept in neighboring counties. Whereas he admitted the large majority of the 265 members of 1615 in this way, Kim accepted a small number of men solely on their fathers-in-law’s credentials, with the proviso that if those who had lost their primary wives during the war were later to take nonelite spouses—a frequent occurrence for second marriages—their offspring would not be allowed to join the roster.155 By keeping its membership an exclusive sajok domain, the Roster of 1615 exemplifies Andong’s remarkable postwar stability and the continuity of its leadership. It also reveals, once again, the extraordinarily close affinal network with which the Andong sajok were connected with one another. Dominant among them were the Andong Kwŏn, who, as in 1589, constituted the largest group with sixty-three members. Among the thirteen Ŭisŏng Kim were four of Sŏng-il’s grandsons and several of their second cousins; among the Chŏnju Yu five of Pok-ki’s sons; among the Ch’ŏngju Chŏng two of Sa-sŏng’s sons; and among the P’ungsan Yu Sŏng-nyong’s son Chin and grandson Wŏn-ji (1598–1674). If there was change, it was that a younger generation positioned itself as the postwar leaders. Close to 60 percent were aged between thirty and sixty (in 1589, close to 75 percent), whereas almost 30 percent were only in their twenties (in 1589, a mere 4 percent).156 Not surprisingly, the same surname groups continued to dominate the Roster of 1647 (Chŏng­ hae chwamok), which comprised 324 members.157 In sum, then, the postwar rosters demonstrate that the leading sajok had survived the wars without suffering damage to their most precious asset—social preeminence. On the contrary, a few sajok kin groups even enhanced their fame, as fathers or grandfathers were honored with posthumous titles as war heroes. In 1604, King Sŏnjo rewarded both Yu Sŏng-nyong and Chŏng T’ak with the highest honors—merit subject status (hosŏng kongsin), second and third degree respectively, for having accompanied the king on his flight north. Pae Yong-gil, Kim Ki, and Yi Chin158 received minor merit subject status. Pae was later additionally honored with the posthumous title of a royal

230

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

secretary. Kim Sŏng-il was made a “service-in-battle” merit subject (sŏnmu kongsin) in the same year and, in 1676, King Sukchong bestowed on him the posthumous title of minister of personnel. Finally, in 1651, King Hyojong conferred upon Kim Yong the posthumous title of minister of personnel.159 The personalities so remembered by the state became icons of veneration whom their descendants memorialized with regular commemorative services, showcasing the exceptional social distinction the war heroes bequeathed onto their posterities.

Moral Rehabilitation: Revised Community Compacts After the war, the sajok not only rushed to rebuild their estates and restore credibility to their leadership. They also were anxious to mend long-neglected human relationships with their subordinates, well aware that some commoner peasants and slaves had, out of desperation, collaborated with the Japanese enemy or in revenge even turned against their sajok masters.160 Indeed, for reestablishing security and order—and advancing economic reconstruction—the collaboration of all village residents, commoners and slaves included, was required. This pressing realization generated a new type of community compact—one that was no longer solely centered on the elite. The postwar compact thus came typically to integrate “upper and lower members” (sang-ha chi in)—elite and commoner peasants and tenants—in one enlarged network of ethical and economic interdependence. As Kŭm Nan-su expressed it: [The earlier] kin-based community compacts and ward associations were all good and wonderfully intentioned laws, but since the war the human hearts have become daily more confused. [Thus] it is no longer possible to exhort or control [the nonelite] with [the threat of ] light or heavy punishment alone. For this reason, I have established in Pup’o-dong a separate compact to guide them with feelings of humanity. Although commoners and slaves are socially different, both are heavenly endowed with human nature. Could we therefore consider them barbarians and not lead them back to the highest good?161

Prewar coercive mechanisms, Kŭm recognized, were no longer appropriate to deal with traumatized commoners and slaves; they deserved a more compassionate treatment. In 1598, he therefore introduced a revised village compact in Pup’o-dong. The first part of the compact, entitled “Matters to Be Generally Observed by High and Low” (Sang-ha t’onghaengsa), prescribed for elite and nonelite in eight clauses the moral standards to be abided by in family and village and the degree of mutual aid to be rendered at times of crises; it also warned against quarrels over land cultivation, irrigation, and deforestation. In the second part, “Matters for Exhorting and Disciplining Inferiors” (Hain kwŏnjingsa), Kŭm, aiming at renovating the social interaction of his tenants and slaves, cast five simple postulates into a song for easy memorization: a young person meeting an elder must be respectful and show proper obeisance; a strong youngster must carry the load for an elder; everyone should be respectful toward the other and not fight; men and



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

231

women must stay separate and not sneak glances at each other; women who quarrel and use abusive language, and slaves who are rebellious and disobedient, were to be punished on the basis of general village opinion. Compact officers were chosen from among elite and nonelite, and the entire membership—of the nonelite, men and women—was to meet twice a year, each status group in clearly separated quarters. Meritorious members were to be recommended for reward to the authorities, whereas violators of the compact had to expect punishment; the unrepentant were to be isolated from the community.162 This compact clearly went far beyond Kŭm’s earlier kin-centered fund association and broke new ground by addressing elite and nonelite in the same document. By including commoners (and presumably even slaves) in community networking, he must have hoped to control them with moral persuasion rather than with punitive measures. Indeed, in the early summer of the following year, he put up a notice in the Archery Hall of Ponghwa in which he revealed his confidence in the compact’s restorative power. If, he declared, his and T’oegye’s Yean Compact were transmitted to all villages of the land, they would improve the human relationships in the entire country.163 Kim Ki exhibited a similarly confident spirit in his Pugae Community Compact (Pugae hyangyak) of 1602. Greatly alarmed at the general deterioration of law and order in the postwar years, Kim wanted to “renovate the people’s hearts and enrich their customs” by taking the “Four Imperatives” of the Lü-Zhu Compact and T’oegye’s punitive regulations (in the Yean Compact) as his model. Following Kŭm Nan-su’s lead, Kim included the “little people” (somin), presumably his own tenants, but went considerably further in his efforts to stimulate communal interaction—careful, however, not to blur social barriers. Commoners, for instance, were obliged to contribute one man’s labor and five tu of beans to elite funerals. In return, the elite were to send one able-bodied slave and fifteen straw mats to commoner funerals. He also encouraged close cooperation in case of floods, fires, and robberies. Moreover, at compact gatherings, the compact was also to be explicated in the vernacular so that the assembled commoner men and women would be able to grasp its meaning.164 The educative and cooperative terms of Kim Ki’s compact were apparently widely copied throughout the seventeenth century.165 Different in tone, yet equivalent in intent was the compact Kim Yong introduced in Naeap. Paraphrasing Mencian ideas of village mutuality,166 he expressed his belief that as long as the social hierarchy from paterfamilias down to secondary sons and even slaves was intact, the “human way” (indo) would be sustained. He related intrafamilial relationships to functions of the mind-and-heart (sim), and classified mutual assistance in case of floods, fires, robbers, illness, weddings, and funerals as “outside matters” (oesa). If both realms were in harmony, he thought, “emotions and culture” (chŏng-mun) would coexist and reinforce each other. Preferring T’oegye’s “timely” regulations (of the Yean Compact) over the Lü Compact, he adopted them as a village “constitution” and warned that if anyone, in pursuit of selfish desires, were to violate this constitution he would make himself guilty of defying T’oegye.167 Some compact authors seem to have sought greater intravillage cohesion by bringing (semireligious?) “small mutual funds” (so’gye), which commoner (and slave?) villagers (hain) had earlier been operating independently, under their control.168 A rare instance of such an appropriation was the Hahoe Ward Compact (Hahoe tonggye) of 1618. It

232

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

apparently forcefully incorporated a “small fund” into the reconstituted elite-dominated compact, reinforcing paternalistic relations by promising more lenient treatment in return for productive cooperation.169 The above examples document the evolving nature of the community compacts still thought to be the most effective instruments for reordering and disciplining the public realm at the village level. Though their post-Imjin rhetoric had a more humanistic ring, their objective clearly was to retain the “little people” on the land in order to mobilize them for rehabilitation projects. To this effect, they made interaction between “high” and “low” hinge on moral persuasion instead of corporal chastisement—without, of course, softening social boundaries. Rather, by logic of union and separation, to use Bourdieu’s terms, the sajok strove to make de facto differences look more natural and legitimate.170

Namwŏn’s War Ordeal In contrast to Andong, which experienced war action during the first Japanese invasion in 1592–93, but was spared direct military involvement in 1597, Namwŏn, lying outside the Japanese invasion routes, remained unscathed in 1592, but suffered appalling destruction during the second invasion in 1597. In 1592, during the nationwide general mobilization, Chŏlla was naturally called upon to contribute to the war preparations—under very negative circumstances. Only three years before the outbreak of the Imjin War, the province was shaken by the rebellion of Chŏng Yŏ-rip (1546–89), a low-level official in the Office of the Special Counselors. When Chŏng incurred King Sŏnjo’s displeasure, he was so disgruntled that he returned home to Chŏlla to plan revenge. His treasonous plot was, however, soon discovered, and a bloody vendetta, known as the Prison Affair of 1589 (see introduction to part IV and chapter 12), was unleashed against Chŏng and his suspected collaborators: possibly close to one thousand men were executed, banished, or dismissed from office. Chŏng’s alleged sedition branded Chŏlla as a “rebel country,” and the local elites, among them the [Ch’angwŏn] Chŏng of Tarisil (Namwŏn), tried hard to disassociate themselves from the rebels—Chŏng Yŏm won minor merit subject status for assisting the suppression of the rebellion.171 But an uneasy atmosphere of distrust and mutual suspicion persisted between Seoul and the province and made the local sajok hesitant to take on a leading role in preparing defenses against the enemy. Chŏlla’s official response to King Sŏnjo’s urgent call for troops from Honam in the early summer of 1592 also went terribly wrong. Although the governor of Chŏlla Province, Yi Kwang,172 dutifully mobilized the regular provincial troops, he irresponsibly disbanded them as soon as he heard news of the king’s flight from Seoul. Yi’s unexpected action provoked panic among the populace, who feared that Honam would be unprotected against the approaching enemy troops. Though Yi hastily reassembled some forces, they were incompetently led and decisively beaten in a Japanese surprise attack south of Seoul. It then became clear to the local leaders that they had to take charge of defending their “homeland.” Yet many of them, still weary from the disastrous consequences of the Chŏng Yŏ-rip rebellion, were reluctant to organize militia units lest they be



Str atification a n d L e a der ship

233

accused of sedition.173 Nevertheless, reports of Sŏnjo’s flight and the destruction of the Altar to the Spirits of Soil and Grain and the Royal Ancestral Shrine in the capital—central symbols of the dynasty—made emotions run high in Namwŏn. Overwhelmed by this news, a weeping Yi Tae-wi reportedly bowed toward north, holding his examination certificate and office patent in hand, in an apparent demonstration of his unswerving loyalty toward the throne.174 But only after Sŏnjo, alerted to such sensibilities, granted a grand amnesty to all those still suspected of collaboration in 1589175 did the Sunch’ang scholar Yang Sa-hyŏng,176 “righteously indignant” about the regular military’s weakness, rally like-minded men such as [Tundŏk] Ch’oe Sang-jung, [Tundŏk] Yi Tae-yun, and Chŏng Yŏm around him to organize the local defense of the Namwŏn area. Luckily untouched by war action in 1592, Namwŏn came under massive direct attack during the second invasion in the autumn of 1597, when the Japanese troops opened a corridor through Chŏlla in their push north. Although, as the most southwestern garrison camp of the Ming troops, the defenses of Namwŏn had been strengthened by the government as well as by the Ming command since the late spring of that year, when the Japanese approached by the ten thousands in the middle of the eighth month and encircled the town with heavy assault machinery, its walls crumbled. With no Korean relief forces in sight, the town was sacked after a two-day siege, suffering one of the worst blood­ baths of the war. With their route north now open, the Japanese moved on and ransacked the entire area. Though the militias commanded by local leaders inflicted serious casualties on the Japanese, they could not prevent heavy loss of life and the destruction of many villages. As a result, Namwŏn’s historical record went up in flames.177 With war damage so widespread, the recovery of Namwŏn was considerably slower than in Andong. Nonetheless, under determined local leadership community life was reestablished and the agrarian economy reportedly repaired within three to four years.178 Even though the material scars may thus have disappeared relatively quickly, the mental trauma of the war was, for many Chŏlla men, compounded by a lingering feeling of still being suspected of disloyalty toward the king. Though Ch’oe Sang-jung earned high praise for his military and civic activities during and after the war, he died in 1604 reportedly in full official attire, kneeling and bowing toward the north—the posture of a loyal official who wanted to demonstrate that he had never had anything to do with Chŏng Yŏ-rip. “Thus was his loyalty to his ruler!”179 Indeed, proclaiming itself the “land renowned for loyalty and righteousness,” Honam kept the memory of its war heroes alive in numerous publications and shrines. In a mas­sive compilation, the Record of Loyal and Righteous [Subjects] of Honam (Honam chŏrŭirok), the lives of men who had raised militia forces or had died in battle in 1592 were remembered, among them Chŏng Yŏm who, despite his age and frailty, had sent out several regional appeals for military assistance. The work also collected the numerous postwar petitions submitted to the throne by descendants who hoped to obtain rewards and citations for their valiant forebears who had sacrificed their lives for the country.180 One of the best remembered Namwŏn personalities was [Changsu] Hwang Chin, who, as a military examination graduate of 1576, had by early 1593 advanced to the rank of army commander (junior second rank); a few months later, he died a hero’s death in the defense of Chinju. For his sacrifice, Chin and his descendants were variously honored—

234

Con fucia n Lea r n ing a n d Pr actice

Chin with memorial shrines in Chinju and Namwŏn and the posthumous name (siho) Mumin, “valiant and pitied,” in 1673, and his descendants with tax-free status. The Yong­ sŏngji moreover immortalized Chin as one of Namwŏn’s “loyal ministers” (ch’ungsin).181

The Localized Sajok on the Threshold of the Seventeenth Century The Imjin War and the Manchu invasions, which followed in 1627 and 1636, are conventionally seen as the critical external forces that ushered in the Chosŏn’s gradual dynastic decline. Indeed, the central government was slow to remedy its tarnished image of incompetence in leading the country during and after the foreign wars and to recalibrate its position in a world that after the fall of the Ming in 1644 and the rise of the Qing had taken on new and threatening aspects. Yet, whereas the wars led to alien rule in China and to the establishment of a new regime in Japan, the Chosŏn, remarkably, survived both outside challenges and continued to exist for another two hundred odd years. What, then, gave Korea this extraordinary resilience? The answer must, once again, be sought in the strength and internal coherence that the localized elite kin groups—not only in Andong and Namwŏn—exhibited in the face of overwhelming odds. Though the court had attempted to rally nationwide resistance by making it a “national cause,” it was largely the determined self-defense of regional forces that in the end saved the country. It would, of course, be an overstatement to argue that the Imjin War was won by elite-led militia bands. Nonetheless, in contrast to the inertia of the authorities in Seoul and the ineptitude of the military, the localized sajok displayed throughout the wars a remarkable degree of strategic flexibility. Even though community mobilization may not have been equally effective in all parts of the country, and war damage differed from region to region, the sajok in Andong and Namwŏn used their well-organized social and economic networks also to speedily put their areas back to normalcy. Indeed, the localized elites came out of the war ordeal in many respects strengthened and not, as is often assumed, close to collapse. The challenges to their social and political preeminence arose from internal developments that will be discussed in the following chapters.

Pa rt I V

Divisions and Bondings

g

Introduction

T

he argument that the combined impact of the Imjin War and the Manchu invasions forced the Chosŏn to reposition itself within a rapidly changing East Asian world cannot by itself explain the critical changes the country underwent in the course of the seventeenth century. Rather than regarding the wars as signifying a watershed separating early from late Chosŏn, there were prewar conditions that came to a head, it would seem, independently of the war ordeal and largely shaped the developments that made the seventeenth century into a period substantially different from the preceding century. This is not to deny the historical significance of the wars, but it is essential to weave into a general assessment of the time the manifold social, political, economic, and intel­ lectual threads that tie postwar developments to prewar origins—in particular, as far as the localized sajok were concerned. In the first half of the seventeenth century, two concerns seem to have prompted the sajok to reconsider their position with regard to the state: their war experiences and King Injo’s enthronement in 1623. Not only did they feel resentment that during the Imjin War the state had failed them, forcing them to fend off the enemy with their own resources, they also were overcome by a deep feeling of humiliation and dejection when, barely forty years later, Injo had to capitulate to the rising Manchus (ruling China as Qing from 1644), leaving the king disgraced and the country’s fate in suspension. The state’s repeated failures thus seem to have led many localized sajok to turn “local,” concentrating their attention even more on their own communities (hyang). This shift, while not signaling a denial of loyalty (ch’ung) toward the throne or the “nation” (chongsa), did reveal a considerable measure of insecurity and skepticism vis-à-vis the state/government (cho’ga). Thus, whereas the sajok emerged from the war turmoil with enhanced self-confidence in their own strength, their trust in the central government weakened, as succinctly expressed in a much-used postwar formula “to feel affection for the ruler [but] anxiety about the state” (ae-gun u-guk). While affirming loyalty toward the dynasty, this expression seems at the same time to reflect the sajok’s ambivalence and apprehension that the

238

Divisions and Bondings

state was not capable of resolving the challenges that the country was facing at the beginning of the seventeenth century; this encouraged an inward turn. Another equally critical event that forced the sajok to rethink their relationship to the state was King Injo’s restoration (Injo panjŏng) in 1623. This was the first enthronement masterminded and executed by a political faction. Indeed, 1623 signaled a turning point in the country’s political culture: the rise of political factions and the gradual concentration of power in the hands of an oligarchic group of capital-based high officials. This development was nearly unanimously judged by contemporary opinion as potentially detrimental to the prospects for the elite from outside the capital to gain access to bureaucratic office. Though first erupting in the capital, factionalism was not confined to the center; it reached far into the countryside and thus became equally part of the landed elite’s historical experience. Chosŏn-style factionalism 1 was a complex phenomenon because it embraced social, political, intellectual, and ritual issues and thus touched upon all aspects of elite existence—from the chance of holding political office to the choice of a marriage partner. That factional divisions would evolve into an enduring feature of late Chosŏn politics and society derived from the fact that rather than arising over short-term political issues, they were anchored in lasting intellectual positions molded by the two outstanding expositors and practitioners of Tohak, T’oegye Yi Hwang (1501–70) and Yulgok Yi I (1536–84). Using the prestige of direct discipleship, the inheritors of T’oegye’s or Yulgok’s respective scholarly legacy set up two competing “scholarly lineages” (hakp’a) with their teachers as their “ancestral” heads. Thus, what they considered their differences on the plane of NeoConfucian hermeneutics—divergent evaluations of the respective priority of i (principle) and ki (mind-matter)—also separated them, by extension, as parties or factions (pungdang) in the political arena. Perpetuated largely by kin-based memberships, these “scholarly lineages-cum-factions” possessed, in addition, a conspicuous social dimension: factions promoted social exclusiveness, encouraging the rise of the so-called distinguished houses (pŏryŏl). For contextualizing the sajok’s response to these events at the center, an understanding of the major stages of factional conflict in the seventeenth century is essential. As briefly mentioned earlier, a rift in the officialdom, usually dated 1575 (ŭrhae tangnon), resulted from a quarrel between representatives of two royal in-law families over an appointment to the influential position of section chief in the Ministry of Personnel.2 Because the competitors for this position were supported by officials who were either former disciples of T’oegye/Nammyŏng or were rallying around Yulgok (then still alive), the officialdom split into two feuding camps, despite Yulgok’s strenuous efforts to smooth out the differences. The T’oegye/Nammyŏng disciples came to be known as Tongin (“Easterners”), led by Yu Sŏng-nyong, Kim Sŏng-il, and Chŏng In-hong. Yulgok’s partisans such as Sŏng Hon (U’gye, 1535–98) and Chŏng Ch’ŏl (1536–93), among others, were known as Sŏin (“Westerners”). Though most of the original contestants were capital residents, the split eventually also had a geographic dimension, as the former hailed predominantly from



Introduction

239

Kyŏngsang Province, while the latter resided in the capital area and in Kyŏnggi and Ch’ungch’ŏng Provinces.3 The first factional confrontation, the Prison Affair (Kich’uk oksa) of 1589 ensuing from Chŏng Yŏ-rip’s alleged rebellion against the throne,4 was a portent of how personal animosities and political opportunism rather than scholarly differences could lead to factional confrontations. Taking advantage of the event, the Sŏin, led by Chŏng Ch’ŏl, persecuted, on spurious grounds, the Tongin, who in the aftermath further split into Pugin (“Northerners”) and Namin (“Southerners”). Though factional strife died down during the Imjin War, the Pugin, led by Chŏng In-hong (Nammyŏng’s principal disciple), managed to seize central power during the reign of the much maligned Kwang­ hae’gun. They were permanently eliminated from the political scene, however, when Kwanghae’gun was unseated in 1623 in a swift coup d’état orchestrated by a small group of civil and military Sŏin partisans. Chŏng In-hong lost his life, and those of his erstwhile followers who survived the coup transferred their allegiance predominantly into the Namin camp.5 The Sŏin were the real winners of the Injo Restoration in 1623. Remarkably, all fiftythree perpetrators of the coup who were rewarded with merit subject status6 belonged through marital and affinal ties to the social network of one single man, Ku Sa-maeng (1531–1604)—Injo’s maternal grandfather.7 Merit subject status received at this crucial juncture proved instrumental for some of the recipients’ descendants, Ku’s included, to emerge as the late Chosŏn’s military elite, who came to occupy hereditarily the military command posts.8 Yet, within a short time after the coup, dissension arose between the merit subjects, who strove to dominate court politics, and those Sŏin who had not taken part in the restoration. The conflict deepened further over the dilemma of how to deal with the Manchus— peace negotiations or military resistance. Taking advantage of the general anti-Manchu groundswell after 1637, when King Injo was humiliated into submission to the new masters of China, the Sŏin who had not participated in the restoration, and who had fiercely resisted accepting the Manchu peace terms, finally outmaneuvered the merit subjects who had advocated a peaceful accord, and engineered a political comeback. They buttressed their claim on power by avowing the prestige of long-established ancestry. As descendants of men who had held key bureaucratic offices of tangsang rank9 from at least the second half of the sixteenth century, they managed to recapture decisive influence over the central bureaucracy. Representing a compact, capital-based collectivity of some thirty descent groups (within them usually only one particular descent line),10 these Sŏin constituted the majority of what came to be known as the “distinguished houses” (pŏryŏl).11 The emergence of this privileged group, which was closely intertwined with the rivalry among factions, thus made the Injo Restoration a crucial event also in social terms.12 Of the fifty-odd pŏryŏl, sixteen—fourteen Sŏin, one Namin, and one Pugin13—were continuously “prosperous,” that is, produced at least one tangsang-rank official over the course of ten years,14 throughout the second half of the Chosŏn. Naturally, they also came to dominate the munkwa examinations. From Injo’s reign onward, then, the distinguished houses began to control and, from the early eighteenth century, completely

240

Divisions and Bondings

monopolized the central government offices at the tangsang level. Indeed, with the ascendance of this oligarchic group exclusive descent considerations melted, in Yi Ik’s words, “into an aggregate with factional affiliations.” It was again this inextricable nexus between the social and the political, often to the detriment of scholarship, which, perpetuated over generations, created the highly charged competitive atmosphere at the center “even an enlightened ruler would find difficult to diffuse.”15 Far outranking their peers within this distinguished group were the “new” Andong Kim. With a relatively unremarkable ancestry until the sixteenth century, their rise to prominence and power started with Kim Sang-hŏn (1570–1652), his older brother Sangyong (1561–1637), and their cousin Sang-jun (1561–1635). All three were munkwa graduates and tangsang-rank officials—and belonged to those nonmerit Sŏin who opposed peace with the Manchu. In 1635, disgusted with the peace advocates, Sang-hŏn retired to Andong, and Sang-yong committed suicide when the Manchus occupied Kanghwa Island. For his continued hostility, Sang-hŏn suffered six years in Manchu captivity before he was reinstated as left state councilor in 1645. With their high reputation for integrity and moral uprightness, he and his close kinsmen expedited the rise of the new Andong Kim as the most powerful kin group of late Chosŏn: 113 of their descendants subsequently advanced, as prominent Noron (see below), to tangsang-level offices (for example, 89 via munkwa, 13 via protection appointment), 80 alone in the nineteenth century.16 The continued strength of the Sŏin rested largely on the fact that they numerically controlled the “distinguished houses.” This remained true even after 1683, when they fractured over ideological disagreements into two subfactions, the Noron (“Old Doctrine”) led by Song Si-yŏl17 and the Soron (“Young Doctrine”) headed by Yun Chŭng18 and Pak Se-ch’ae.19 The former claimed Yulgok, the latter U’gye Sŏng Hon as their intellectual mentor. Relying on twelve descent groups, including the new Andong Kim, in addition to a sizable number of newcomers, who moved into pŏryŏl ranks in the eighteenth century, the Noron were in command of formidable human resources and thus constituted the prime political force in late Chosŏn. They far outdistanced the Soron, who, with merely five pŏryŏl lines by King Yŏngjo’s reign (1724–76), were often overruled politically.20 The Namin fared the worst. To their disadvantage, their constituency resided predominantly outside the capital and was geographically concentrated in northern Kyŏngsang—the heartland of T’oegye’s discipleship. To be sure, from the early seventeenth century a small Namin group, known as the Kiho Namin,21 also emerged in the capital with such illustrious members as Hŏ Mok (1595–1682), Hŏ Chŏk (1610–80),22 and Yun Hyu (1617–80).23 Its founding spirit was the eminent scholar and ritualist, Chŏng Ku (Han’gang, 1543–1620), who is often regarded as the ancestor of seventeenth-century “ritual learning” (yehak).24 It was Chŏng who disseminated T’oegye learning in the capital, with Hŏ Mok his foremost student. Though born in Seoul, Hŏ Mok came to entertain close intellectual and amicable contacts with many second- and third-generation T’oegye disciples in Andong.25 Besides the Yangch’ŏn Hŏ, the capital-based Andong Kwŏn (Kwŏn Pu’s descendants) maintained, with ten tangsang-rank officials, their distinguished station in the capital in the seventeenth century but suffered relative decline thereafter.26 Although the Namin vied for power with the Sŏin throughout the latter part of the seventeenth century, they were decisively defeated in 1694, and, while not entirely excluded



Introduction

241

from the bureaucracy thereafter, under Noron dominance never regained a political voice of any consequence in the capital.27 The rise of the pŏryŏl had consequences also for the royal house as it was the pŏryŏl who started to exclusively provide royal consorts and married royal offspring. Indeed, from Injo onward, the twenty queens (to the end of the dynasty) originated from fourteen descent groups all of whom belonged to the highest placed Noron pŏryŏl lines. Not surprisingly, the royal fathers-in-law, and often whole clusters of their kinsmen, occupied top offices in the central bureaucracy and, as Noron exponents, kept the kings within the narrow intellectual confines of their factional interests.28 The kings, thus, were in the clutch of “in-law politics.” In addition, the question of royal legitimacy impinged upon kingly authority. Whereas the early kings up to King Myŏngjong had been, if not first, at least second or third primary sons (chŏkcha), King Sŏnjo was the first king whose father was a secondary son (sŏja).29 As the royal line thus switched to a collateral (technically illegitimate) line, Sŏnjo ascended the throne without the usual enthronement ceremonies. Both of Sŏnjo’s successors had legitimacy problems as well: his son Kwanghae’gun was neither a primary nor a first son, and Injo, though a first son, had a father who had been one of Sŏnjo’s secondary sons. The legitimacy problem ultimately sparked the greatest factional upheavals of the century—the rites controversies (yesong) of 1659 and 1674— when the Noron and the Namin argued royal legitimacy in terms of the patrilineal ritual paradigm (chongpŏp). At the center of the debates was the degree of mourning the surviving stepmother (i.e., King Injo’s second primary wife) was obliged to observe, first for King Hyojong, Injo’s successor, and fifteen years later for Hyojong’s wife. This seems a trivial matter, but since Hyojong was a primary but not a first son, it was twisted into hard-fought and bloody factional confrontations. In the eighteenth century, because King Sukchong (r. 1674–1720) had no primary sons, both Kings Kyŏngjong (r. 1720–24) and Yŏngjo (r. 1724–76) ascended the throne as secondary sons and suffered from heavyhanded factional involvement in their rule.30 In view of the fateful combination of pŏryŏl power with factional interests, the kings of late Chosŏn were rarely successful in asserting their authority over their ministers. Sukchong was an exception. As a resolute ruler, he tried to curb the influence of factional politics by manipulating the animosities between the Sŏin and the Namin and thus to a degree encouraged the frequent violent factional turnovers (hwan’guk) during his reign. In contrast, King Yŏngjo, endeavoring to bolster his legitimacy, installed large, colorful Sun, Moon, and Five Peaks screens behind the seat of state in the throne halls of Kyŏngbok and Ch’angdŏk Palaces.31 In addition to thus skillfully appropriating yin and yang and the five phases to enhance his kingship with cosmic dimensions, he renovated the court rituals by ordering the compilation of a supplement to the Manual of the Five State Rites (Kukcho oryeŭi). Politically, he attempted to diffuse factional polarization by introducing his policy of “grand harmony” (t’angp’yŏng).32 Yŏngjo’s legacy was taken up by his grandson, King Chŏngjo (r. 1776–1800), whose reign is commonly praised as a model of enlightened kingship. After this brief assertion of royal authority, however, the kingship suffered rapid decline in the nineteenth century as minors on the throne were willfully manipulated by their powerful and self-seeking in-laws. During the brief period in power (1864–73), when he ruled for his minor son, the future King Kojong (r. 1864–

242

Divisions and Bondings

1907), the Taewŏn’gun (1821–98) reacted to the overbearing “rule of the in-laws” (sedo chŏngch’i) by curtailing yangban power in a bid to restore the prestige of the royal house. Aiming at icons of yangban pride, he ordered the destruction of a great number of private academies and shrines, apparently regardless of factional affiliation, made the elite households liable for the payment of the household tax, and attempted to curb some of the extravagancies of their lifestyle.33 This was a desperate last stand to reinvest the royal house with dignity and independence—an effort that was soon swept away by diverse forces descending on the country from the outside. To the extent that the concentration of the political process in the hands of a few socially and factionally distinct kin groups was an urban phenomenon centering on Seoul, the large majority of sajok living outside the capital were increasingly alienated from political participation. Such alienation had, in a sense, already started at the beginning of the seventeenth century when sajok, outraged over Kwanghae’gun’s tyrannical rule, began to retreat from government service or no longer aspired to office. As the Sŏin victory in 1623 threatened to deepen the sajok disenchantment even further, King Injo, early in his reign, was advised to renovate royal rule by “using the right men” and to bolster his personal legitimacy by reembedding the political in the cultivation of the moral.34 Following this advice, Injo began, under the slogan “Revere and employ [scholars from] mountains and forests [sallim],” to recruit, outside the normal examination channels, reputed Confucian savants to specially created advisory positions in the National Con­fucian Academy and the Crown Prince Tutorial Office (Seja sigangwŏn).35 The incumbents of sallim offices, while chiefly working behind the scenes, exerted—as teachers of academy students and the crown princes and as royal advisors—considerable, often even decisive influence on state matters. With the majority belonging to the Sŏin camp and hailing from Kyŏnggi and Ch’ungch’ŏng Provinces, the Sŏin homeland,36 political neutrality was definitely not a criterion for sallim status. Nevertheless, the sallim scholars surrounded the politics of the distinguished houses with an aura of scholarly legitimacy, and in their heyday—the seventeenth century—their fate was closely linked to the factional ups and downs at the center. Though carrying high prestige and power, sallim appointments were nevertheless too few and too exclusive to rectify the growing imbalance in office holding that the rise of the pŏryŏl created between capital and periphery. Later, under King Yŏngjo’s policy of “grand harmony,” their influence greatly diminished, but sallim positions continued to be filled until the end of the dynasty.37 Ironically, it was sallim scholars who led the most bitterly fought factional battles in the seventeenth century. All four major protagonists of the rites controversies of 1659 and 1674—Song Si-yŏl and Song Chun-gil38 on the Sŏin side, and Yun Hyu and Hŏ Mok on the Namin side—were sallim scholars recruited into government service by King Injo and his successors. Not only did they compete with one another for fixing the “correct” ritual etiquette of the royal house in their bid for repositioning Korea in the post-Ming world, they also strove to establish their respective “school of learning” as the authoritative exponent of Neo-Confucian orthodoxy by canonizing their separate ancestral



Introduction

243

“founders” in the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo). Their contest over the locus of “orthodoxy” split the Confucian discourse and tended to degrade Tohak learning to an instrument for pursuing narrowly focused partisan interests. Despite the adversarial power politics in the capital, the landed sajok, though increasingly disenfranchised, did not drop their focus on the center. On the contrary, by utilizing their local social, scholarly, and economic resources, they resorted to the privilege of Confucian-educated literati to participate in the “public discourse” (kong­ non). Indeed, the submission of opinions, complaints, or protests to the ruler had long been regarded a common “right,” but from the latter part of the sixteenth century, when factional rivalries started to pervert the national discourse, the extent to which scholars from outside the government were allowed to support or challenge government decisions turned into a political issue: how far could “literati opinion” (saron) be tolerated in court debates? Even though the free flow of “public discourse” was generally regarded as the “life-blood of the nation” (kuk chi wŏn’gi), both Yulgok and T’oegye opined that the state had to guide, yet not dominate, such discourse. “If the discourse is situated in the court,” Yulgok wrote, “the country is well ruled; if it is situated in the alleyways, the country is in chaos.” Yet to suppress opinion offered “from below,” he warned, would lead to the ruin of the state.39 T’oegye saw the issue in a somewhat different light. Except when the existence of the nation (chongsa) or the vitality of “Our Way” was at stake, he insisted, the Confucian literati were not to interfere in the political discourse.40 Taking this as a mandate, his Andong heirs self-righteously intervened twice at the center when they perceived (their version of) the Way endangered by partisan politics. Nevertheless, by the eighteenth century, the Andong Namin were so isolated and under pressure from Noron infiltration that King Yŏngjo attempted to use his policy of “grand harmony” to diffuse the faction-driven regional altercations over defining “right learning.” In reaction to the dramatically changing political environment of the seventeenth century, then, the “localized” sajok turned “local” in the sense that “locality” assumed, as the site of belonging, an ever more vital significance in negotiating high social status. With their prospects of office holding dimmed and their status affirmation by the state in jeopardy, the sajok elites resorted to “localist”41 strategies—foremost lineage building— for asserting and perpetuating their elite status. In a purely locality-related sense, it thus seems justified henceforth to speak of “landed” elites. The sajok’s turn to “localism” will be spelled out in the next three chapters. Chapter 10 explores the repercussions that the political events following King Injo’s restoration had for the sajok’s examination and office-holding prospects, and the state’s attempts to extend its authority into the countryside in the latter part of the seventeenth century. Chapter 11 discusses the maturation of lineage organization and the sajok’s elaboration of elite status on the basis of ancestral prestige. And chapter 12, finally, analyzes the emergence of competing scholarly lineages after T’oegye’s death and the landed sajok’s participation in the factional discourse.

244

Divisions and Bondings

Chronological Table of Factional Reversals First rites controversy (kihae yesong): Namin defeated by the Sŏin Second rites controversy (kabin yesong): Namin win argument, defeat Sŏin Great reversal (kyŏngsin taech’ulch’ŏk): Hŏ Chŏk and Yun Hyu die; Sŏin back in power 1683: Sŏin split into Noron and Soron 1689: Literati purge (kisa sahwa): Song Si-yŏl dies; Namin in power 1694: Political turnover (kapsul hwan’guk): Namin lose permanently; Sŏin in power 1721/22: Switch from Noron to Soron (sin-im sahwa): Noron out of power 1725: Noron back in power (ŭlsa ch’ŏbun) 1741: Declaration of King Yŏngjo’s “grand harmony” (sinyu taehun) 1659: 1674: 1680:

Ch a p ter 10

Center and Periphery Divorce of Interests

U

nprecedented schisms at the center made the seventeenth century a century of political dissension and factional confrontations—with profound repercussions for the landed sajok. The repercussions were profound because of the complexity with which the social came to be intertwined with the political and factional. Indeed, the rise of the pŏryŏl at the center was, in the judgment of contemporary observers, above all a social phenomenon with the pŏryŏl emerging as a kind of superstratum within the elite, dichotomizing the yangban socially and spatially into the ruling pŏryŏl at the center and the rest of the elite, regardless of factional sympathies, marginalized at the periphery. Even if this picture is overdrawn, it is clear that status criteria, even among different descent lines within the same kin group, narrowed further, making “obsession with social status” (sangbŏl) an often bemoaned “evil of the time.”1 Those thus marginalized stood in the “cold” (han)—a term that denoted, from the perspective of the pŏryŏl, loss of “official identity,” even if not necessarily material poverty. Han had also a concomitant spatial connotation: all those residing in the countryside— the large majority of the sajok—were dismissively referred to by the pŏryŏl, the capital resi­ dents (kyŏnghwain), as “the people in the villages” (hyanggog’in). Indeed, the capital elite came to use for their landed counterparts such disparaging appellations as “inferior locals” (chich’ŏ pimi) or “low-status fellows” (munji pich’ŏn),2 creating a social declivity between capital and countryside. Social as well as spatial handicaps thus affected the landed sajok’s prospects of office holding. Though never completely excluded from political participation, with examination success becoming sporadic, they were no longer able to build up over generations the political momentum necessary for advancing into the highest decision-making office ranks. Furthermore, separated from the capital by several days of travel, they were disadvantaged in taking the frequently arranged irregular examinations, which usually

246

Divisions and Bondings

were advertised at short notice.3 In addition, irregular exams tended to test literary styles rather than knowledge of the classics—likely catering to the tastes and abilities of the urbanites.4 To be sure, an alternative to the civil service examination would have been to seek advancement through the military examination (mukwa). Due to the low esteem in which this examination and the military in general were held, not many sajok candidates seem to have regarded it as a viable career path.5

The Widening Gap between Center and Periphery How far, then, is a widening gulf between capital and countryside after the Injo Restoration of 1623 discernible among the landed sajok in Andong and Namwŏn in terms of civil examination success, office-holding patterns, and attitudes toward state and personal integrity? The Case of Andong Yi Chung-hwan in his T’aengniji described the impact of the Injo Restoration on Kyŏng­ sang Province, traditionally known as the “storehouse of talent,” as follows: Before Injo, those who held the state affairs in their hands all hailed from this province [i.e., Kyŏngsang], and the four worthies enshrined in the National Shrine of Confucius also originated from this province. Since Injo calmed the realm with the help of the disciples and sons of Yulgok Yi I, U’gye Sŏng Hon, and Paeksa Yi Hang-bok,6 the [scions of the] hereditary houses of the capital [Kyŏngsŏng sega] have been preferentially recruited for office, so that for the past one hundred years not more than two top-rank and four or five second-rank officials have come from Yŏngnam. There are no state councilors [among them], and high-level appointments have not gone beyond third rank, lower-level ones not beyond a magistrature. Nevertheless, to this day the earlier scholars’ fame and goodness have not been obliterated, and rites and modesty as well as culture have been upheld as habits so that there are until today many examination graduates, placing [Kyŏngsang] first among the provinces.7

For Yi Chung-hwan, a Namin, it was clear that the landed elites of Kyŏngsang, a Namin stronghold, had been suffering from political isolation and exclusion from the center since 1623. How true is Yi’s assessment that during the seventeenth century no highranking officials emerged from Kyŏngsang, whereas there were still considerable numbers of examination graduates? Of all provinces not only was Kyŏngsang Province assigned the highest quotas for admission to the lower and higher examinations, but throughout the dynasty it also produced the highest numbers of successful civil examination graduates: slightly over 14 per­ cent of all lower examination graduates (saengwŏn/chinsa) and 13.2 percent of all munkwa graduates.8 In Kyŏngsang, the Andong-Yean area ranked first, with 783 saengwŏn/chinsa and 366 munkwa graduates—in fact, second only to Seoul.9 These figures, however, are undoubtedly inflated by the very high (and often unverifiable) passing numbers in the



Center and Periphery

247

nineteenth century and therefore may be misleading when the earlier examination success of individual descent groups is being measured. In Andong, successful examination graduates emerged from a total of eighty-five kin groups; not surprisingly, the majority originated from those descent groups who also densely populated Andong’s local rosters of 1615 and 1647: the Ŭisŏng Kim, the Andong Kwŏn, the Chinsŏng Yi, the P’ungsan Yu, the Chŏnju Yu, the Kosŏng Yi, and the Hŭnghae Pae.10 Here only three descent groups will be examined in some detail for the period from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries: the Ŭisŏng Kim, the Andong Kwŏn, and the Chin­sŏng Yi. All three were typically “landed,” as the overwhelming majority of their examination graduates were identified as residing in the countryside—92.2 percent of the Ŭisŏng Kim saengwŏn/chinsa, 99.2 of the Chinsŏng Yi, and 66.6 percent of the Andong Kwŏn.11 Of the Ŭisŏng Kim, Kim Chin’s direct descendants (forming what is known as the Ch’ŏnggye lineage centered on Naeap) enjoyed their most prosperous period in terms of examination success in the late sixteenth century, when two of Chin’s sons passed the lower (saengwŏn/chinsa) and three the munkwa examinations. One of Chin’s grandsons, Yong, was a 1590 munkwa graduate—the only one of his generation. Examination achievement was still quite high in the seventeenth century, with seventeen lower and eight higher examination graduates; most of them, however, were concentrated in the second half of the century. In the last decade, there was an unusual cluster of achievers among Yong’s fifth-generation descendants—three munkwa graduates (two of whom were also chinsa degree holders), who were collectively known as the “three literary officials” (sammun’gwan) in recognition of their outstanding scholarly talents.12 Yong’s early government career in low-ranking positions13 was cut short by illness and the Imjin War, and in 1598, disgusted by the Pugin intrigues that forced Yu Sŏng-nyong out of office, he retired to Andong to take care of his old mother. Later, he was appointed one of the compilers of the [revised?] Sŏnjo sillok and advanced to an upper-senior third rank (tangsang) ministerial post. None of the munkwa graduates in the seventeenth century, however, obtained a government post of any import. Yong’s sons and nephews belonged to the generation that had to come to terms with Korea’s losing its sovereignty to the Manchus. While his eldest son, Si-ju, a munkwa graduate of 1613, advanced to assistant section chief (senior sixth rank) in the Ministry of War, Si-ju’s second cousin, Si-gwŏn, the only munkwa graduate (1630) among his kinsmen during Injo’s reign and a minor official, reportedly took active part in preparing the country’s defenses against the Manchus. When he heard of the king’s surrender in 1637, however, he wept at the palace gate and returned home, never to serve in government again.14 At the same time, their cousin, Si-on, facing the dilemma of whether to care for his old mother or to hasten to the king’s rescue, obeyed his mother’s will and stayed home, but allegedly felt such unease about this decision that he could neither sleep nor eat. When news of the king’s surrender arrived, he donned mourning dress to weep with his local friends for the country. Thereafter he gave up examination hopes, closed his door, and concentrated on the study of the classics, getting the reputation of a “true gentleman in hiding” (chinŭn kunja). He gave instructions that only four characters be written on his tombstone: “Retired scholar of sungjŏng” (sungjŏng ch’ŏsa)15—indicating that for him the world had ended with the demise of Ming China.16

248

Divisions and Bondings

A generation later, factional implications came to bear on the career of Kim Si-on’s third son, Pang-gŏl (1623–95). A munkwa graduate of 1660, he had an ordinary early career at rank six, interrupted in 1669 by the death of his father and three years later by that of his stepmother. With the Namin in power after 1674, he was appointed to various posts, in 1677 to the magistracy of Yŏngam (south Chŏlla). Upset about the abuses of local government, he demonstrated his desire for clean government by returning from this assignment reportedly with nothing more than a pot of chrysanthemums. During the 1680s, with the Namin out of power, he bided his time at home, but, called back by King Sukchong in 1689, advanced to fourth minister of the Ministry of War (lower-senior third rank) before the reversal of 1694.17 His demise will be discussed in chapter 12. The ambivalence about holding office in an unstable, faction-ridden world is vividly illustrated by the biography of Kim Pang-gŏl’s kinsman, Hak-pae. He passed the munkwa in 1663—reportedly out of necessity because of his family’s poverty. As a Namin, he was acutely aware of the hazards of an appointment in the Sŏin-controlled government and, upon receiving his first assignment in the Office of Diplomatic Correspondence, sighed: “As a sadaebu one has to be careful about taking or leaving office. In our country the selection of officials [sa] is solely through the exams. Even as a follower of the ancient Confucian worthies one most often walks this [examination] path to succeed in this world. Yet, if one is not on one’s guard against frivolity, greed, and competition, how can one avoid becoming someone despicable to a true gentleman?” Though apparently in need, Hak-pae decided not to go to the capital to take up the post and instead built a solitary hut, the “self-cultivation retreat,” where he explicated the Classic of the Mindand-Heart to his disciples. He briefly entered the bureaucracy in 1668, but a year later retired to mourn Si-on, the Naeap main-line heir and his early mentor. Later, he again held a few lower-level positions at the center and briefly the magistracy of Kosŏng (Kangwŏn Province). Throughout his life, however, Hak-pae considered himself a “humble scholar” (hansa) and, as a devoted T’oegye follower, preferred to “read books for disciplining his mind” (toksŏ ch’isim).18 Kim Hak-pae’s self-definition as “humble scholar” may have stood less for a localist orientation than for a Namin’s defiance of a government dominated by agents with whom his conscience did not allow close association. Taking up office for economic reasons, there­fore, demanded a compromise with one’s principles. His kinsman, Kim Se-ho (1652– 1722), a munkwa graduate of 1690, though renowned for his scholarship and elegant writing style, also did not strive after “fame and advancement” and contented himself with middle-level offices, not “ashamed to stand in front of the rich and mighty in shabby dress.” After the Namin’s final defeat in 1694, he spent his life as a “poor scholar,” held in “high esteem” for his modesty.19 In the course of the eighteenth century, when the political situation in the capital was mostly unfavorable to the Namin, success diminished further with only four lower and three higher degree holders. The most prominent among the latter was Kim Si-on’s great-grandson, Kim Sŏng-t’ak (1684–1747), a munkwa graduate of 1711, whose career will be further discussed in chapter 12.20 The examination and office-holding record of Kwŏn Pŏl’s descendants was even more modest. Whether for factional or other reasons, there were no degree holders in the



Center and Periphery

249

two generations after Pŏl’s two sons. Pŏl’s fifth-generation descendant, Chu2 (1627–77),21 was the only of his generation to win, late in life, a munkwa degree in 1675, but did not advance beyond the position of recorder (senior seventh rank) in the Royal Secretariat. There were three more munkwa graduates, in 1696, 1710, and 1713, respectively—all three sons of Chu’s younger brother, Yu (n.d.). None seems to have held office beyond rank five. In addition to two more munkwa graduates in 1721 and 1757, twenty-six Kwŏn kinsmen gained lower degrees—overwhelmingly, it would seem, as prestige titles. By contributing a mere 7.2 percent of Andong’s munkwa graduates, Kwŏn Pŏl’s descent line thus did not rank high and, above all, does not seem to have profited from favors or assistance from their more powerful, albeit quite distant capital kinsmen (kyŏngp’a), who produced more than three times the number of degree holders and scores of high officials.22 T’oegye’s Chinsŏng Yi descent line was numerically small, and none of T’oegye’s direct descendants in six generations received a higher degree or held more than an occasional magistracy.23 Overall, in contrast to their kinsmen residing in Andong, who produced merely thirty-nine saengwŏn/chinsa graduates, the Chinsŏng Yi in Yean, the group’s stronghold, brought forth fifty-eight, more or less equally distributed across the centuries. From the middle years of King Yŏngjo’s reign (1730s and 40s) to the end of the century, six direct descendants in the seventh and eighth generations passed the munkwa, with Yi Se-t’aek (1716–77) the most well known among them;24 his fate at court will be considered in chapter 12. The above data relate, of course, the examination success of single descent lines only and are statistically unrepresentative; collateral kinsmen residing in and around Andong also contributed degree and office holders and swelled the numbers of successful graduates of their respective descent groups. The narratives do reflect, however, something of the precarious personal situation a rural Namin experienced even after examination success. Their experience in holding office was neither consistent nor, with a few exceptions, outstanding. It might be too facile to solely attribute this—as Yi Chung-hwan did—to adverse factional circumstances after 1623, even though among the roughly fifty munkwa graduates in the seventeenth century, fewer than a handful apparently reached a tangsang-rank office, and then typically only under Namin aegis. The ambivalent mood about engagement in government, which T’oegye had instilled in the Andong literati, may have been another factor, shining through in a number of biographies, that deterred individuals from entering the world of officialdom. Leaving aside that Yi Chung-hwan did not refer to Korea’s submission to the Qing or to the rites controversies as dramatic events that might have disheartened potential office seekers, his pessimistic assessment of the chances a Kyŏngsang degree holder had to be appointed to high office nonetheless seems to ring true for Andong. The Case of Namwŏn Did the landed elites of the Namwŏn area show markedly different examination and career patterns? In contrast to Yŏngnam, Honam (Chŏlla Province) was a predominantly Sŏin area, though with a few prominent Namin partisans. Did this seemingly more favorable factional constellation make a difference? And was it true, as Yi Chung-hwan

250

Divisions and Bondings

opined, that “the people of Namwŏn, while holding song, beauty, wealth, and luxury in high esteem, do not uphold scholarship,” and therefore, compared to Kyŏngsang, produced fewer individuals who excelled in the examinations and held office?25 Compared to Kyŏngsang, Chŏlla had a smaller examination quota, and its overall examination output was consequently more modest: 3,994 saengwŏn/chinsa (or 10.4 percent of all graduates) and some 1,200 munkwa (or 8.2 percent). With a total of 389 saengwŏn/ chinsa and 120 munkwa graduates Namwŏn occupied, by a wide margin, first place in the province. This seems to have resulted less from outstanding performance of a few particular descent groups than from the fact that scholarly achievement, often with only one single graduate, was spread over a considerable number of descent groups.26 Among the four premier descent groups of Namwŏn, the descendants of Ch’oe Suung produced, within eight generations (i.e., to the end of the seventeenth century), seventeen saengwŏn/chinsa, nine munkwa, and three military examination graduates. Their record was particularly strong in the late sixteenth and the first half of the seventeenth centuries. Su-ung’s fifth-generation descendant, Ch’oe Sang-jung, passed the sama in 1576 and the munkwa in 1589, and two of Sang-jung’s three sons enhanced the family prestige further in the early seventeenth century. His second son, Yŏn, passed both the chinsa and munkwa examinations in 1603, but one year later retired from office to mourn his father’s death, and during the “dark days” of Kwanghae’gun’s rule lived in seclusion. After King Injo’s enthronement in 1623, he advanced to second drafter (junior fifth rank) in the Office of Diplomatic Correspondence and, in 1636, as a second royal secretary (uppersenior third rank) accompanied the king on his flight to the royal refuge at Namhan fortress south of Seoul, a loyal act for which he was rewarded with a junior second-rank title and eventually promoted to second magistrate of Seoul. Yet, feeling worn out, he retired to Namwŏn shortly thereafter, never to lose, as his biographer stated, “his sincerity of loving the ruler and being anxious about the country” (ae-gun u-guk chi sŏng). Upon his death, he was honored with the posthumous title of minister in the Ministry of Personnel.27 During Kwanghae’gun’s reign, Yŏn’s younger brother, On, a chinsa graduate of 1609,28 spent his days “fishing, completely oblivious to fame and profit and unaffected by the evils of his time.” Though recommended for office as a “recluse” in 1624, he instead recruited local militia forces to help quell Yi Kwal’s uprising.29 Later, “not enjoying fame,” he served, never for long, in a few low-level offices. His career only took off when, in 1632, he was called to tutor Prince Pongnim (the later King Hyojong) and the latter’s younger brother in the classics, an assignment that led in 1649 to his receiving the extraordinary honor of a sallim position from a grateful Hyojong. At court, he advised the king, who had spent eight years as hostage in the Manchu capital, Shenyang, and was hatching plans for a revenge attack on his former captors, against such a risky undertaking, insisting: “It is not difficult to wreak vengeance on the enemy, but it is difficult to recognize the right men!” This was likely a veiled rebuke of Song Si-yŏl, who, in contrast, strongly encouraged the king in this venture. A year before his death in 1659, On was promoted to sixth royal secretary (lower-senior third rank).30 Both of Ch’oe Yŏn’s two sons, Hwi-ji and Yu-ji, passed the lower examinations, and Yu-ji was also successful in the munkwa (1646). Because both were ritual heirs (Yu-ji of



Center and Periphery

251

On’s line), their official careers were limited. Hwi-ji kept close to home and, though called to Seoul in 1655, he refused to go. Finally, in 1659, he briefly took up the post of assistant section chief in the Ministry of Works (senior sixth rank), but retired thereafter from the official world. As a loyal subject, however, he kept a vigil in the men’s quarters whenever a death occurred in the royal house, and fasted on royal death anniversaries.31 Arguing that as an only son he had to care for his old (adopted) parents, Yu-ji demurred at the order in 1637, after Korea’s capitulation to the Manchus, to escort Injo’s crown prince and his brother as hostages to the Manchurian capital, and thus incurred his superiors’ displeasure. Though recommended for higher office, in 1648 he was instead sent as the post station superintendent (junior sixth rank) to Osu (close to Namwŏn) and in 1651 was appointed magistrate of Kurye. Yet in the same year his (natural) father died, so he went home for the mourning period. Later, he again held various offices in rapid succession, but his failure to go to Shenyang—considered a breach of loyalty toward King Hyojong—tarnished his career, and for a trivial matter he was even briefly exiled; in 1662, he at last reached—against some opposition—a junior third-rank office.32 Toward the end of the century, there were among Ch’oe Su-ung’s eighth-generation descendants three more sama and two more munkwa graduates, but by the eighteenth century the Tundŏk Ch’oe had clearly lost their drive to excel at the national level.33 Examination success and subsequent office holding was surprisingly insignificant among the three other high-ranking kin groups of Namwŏn. Among the Tundŏk Yi, Yi Sang-hyŏng was, as a sama of 1612, the only munkwa graduate (1625) in the seventeenth century. Never with an official career in mind, Sang-hyŏng, a disciple of the renowned Sŏin ritualist Kim Chang-saeng, won a high scholarly reputation and was summoned to explain the Classic of Documents to King Injo. He was subsequently appointed, in rapid succession, to various positions in ministries and the censorial offices, and in 1636, he escorted Injo to the Namhan fortress; a year later he, who had opposed the peace deal with the Manchus, was ordered to attend the young princes on their way to exile in Shenyang. Because of illness, he returned early to Seoul and again received various appointments, none of which he took up. Instead, he returned to Namwŏn to assume a leadership role in local affairs.34 His third son, Mun-jae, was the only lower-degree achiever, but, though recommended for a royal tomb keeper position, his mind was never set on public office. On the day of his appointment, he returned home.35 The examination record was not much better for Namwŏn’s two other renowned descent groups, the [Kwangju] Sariban Yi and the [P’ungch’ŏn] Twinnae No. After Yi Tŏg-yŏl, a munkwa graduate of 1569, had settled in the Namwŏn area, two of his sons earned lower degrees and one of his grandsons, P’il-mu (1628–?), was the only munkwa graduate (1678) in the seventeenth century. Among No Chin’s descendants there were not more than three widely spaced munkwa successes (1648, 1750, and 1773). The same weak showing in terms of examination degrees is also evident for the descendants of famed An Ch’ŏ-sun (munkwa 1514) of the Ant’ŏ An, and of Chang Kyŏng-se (munkwa 1589) of the Chup’o Chang. They certainly could not compete with the Namwŏn Yang of neighboring Kwimi (Sunch’ang), who boasted from 1468 to the late eighteenth century eight munkwa and some thirty sama graduates.36 With the estrangement between center and periphery deepening even for the Chŏlla

252

Divisions and Bondings

Sŏin, the large majority not only found themselves without prospect to advance in the political world; they also seem to increasingly have shunned it. Indeed, the often recorded “he did not enjoy fame” was likely a veiled critique of the pŏryŏl regime rather than an expression of modesty. Instead of an official life, then, “hiding one’s virtue” (ŭndŏk pusa) and living as a “recluse” (yuil or ch’ŏsa) gained social respectability, with recluses proudly noted in local gazetteers as outstanding human assets, increasingly so beginning in the seventeenth century. Whereas the earlier Yŏnggaji did not yet include a rubric “recluses,” the Yongsŏngji lists twenty-three recluses for Namwŏn alone. Among them were Yi Sanghyŏng’s second cousin, Yi Kuk-hyŏng, and the latter’s eldest son, Yi Mun-gyu (1617–88), as well as Yi Tŏg-yŏl’s two sons, Sa-yŏng and Sa-hŏn; the Tundŏk Ch’oe boasted three recluses, including Ch’oe Sang-jung’s nonagnatic grandson, No Hyŏng-mang.37 A few of these recluses did eventually obtain a lower or even a rare munkwa degree, but what earned them their fame as “recluses” was their charismatic embodiment of high moral and scholarly principles—a level of personal integrity and detachment that ruled out gratifying one’s ambitions with worldly success. For them, it was “difficult to enter [government], yet easy to retire” (nanjin yŏkt’oe). Nonetheless, an occasional recommendation to the throne (ch’ŏn’gŏ) that culminated in a low-ranking office (usually that of royal tomb keeper, junior ninth rank), carried unusually high prestige.38 If such an honor did not come forth despite “peerless talents and an impeccable moral record,” a man such as No Hyŏng-mang, a sama graduate who “did not get a chance to unfold his potential,” earned pity from his contemporaries.39 For the descent groups discussed above, whether in Andong or Namwŏn, the thrust for taking the examinations and holding office was greatest in the late sixteenth and the first half of the seventeenth centuries. Later, success at the center became infrequent, evidently independent of factional affiliation, and very few rural munkwa examination graduates succeeded in advancing all the way to a tangsang-rank office. By the midseventeenth century, the extent of their marginalization was already so blatant that a high Sŏin official felt compelled to draw King Hyojong’s attention to the situation: To speak of King Sŏnjo’s early years, Kim U-ong and Yu Sŏng-nyong were Yŏngnam sa, and Pak Sun and Chŏng Ch’ŏl hailed from Honam; the rest I cannot list—as far-off sa [wŏnsa] of rural areas they all served at the time as high officials. Yet, nowadays one does not hear of Honam or Yŏngnam sa occupying high offices. As certainly not all [members of the] famous houses and outstanding kin groups [i.e., pŏryŏl] are worthies, are all those rural fellows without any talents and worthiness to be employed?40

The situation grew even worse toward the end of the century, as the respected Soron official Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng complained in 1696: “As to the recruitment of talents, in our country we only esteem social background, and thus put capital-based persons [kyŏnghwain] first and countrymen [hyangin] second. This indeed goes against the principle of engaging wise men.”41 As these quotes illustrate, it was no secret in the capital that the sajok residing in Yŏngnam or Honam were discriminated against. Though dis-



Center and Periphery

253

crimination in office assignments may have discouraged “countrymen” from studying for the munkwa examinations, the relatively large number of saengwŏn/chinsa degreeholders throughout the latter part of the Chosŏn suggests that taking a lower degree was prized foremost for its high social value: it highlighted both state confirmation of elite status and the potential for political advancement. It was therefore not uncommon that an exam hopeful would keep trying all his life long to get a coveted “white certificate” (paekp’ae).42 Indeed, even failures were at times proudly recorded on tombstones.

Political Engagement on the Home Front In view of the diminishing prospect of getting social status reconfirmed by the state through exams and office holding, it was by virtue of membership in the local rosters (hyangan) that the sajok elites in Andong and Namwŏn articulated their social prerogatives at the home front. As the history of roster revisions in Andong and Namwŏn reveals, the authentication of elite status turned into a highly contentious discourse on identity and hierarchy. The Case of Andong At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Andong Local Bureau still functioned well enough for Chŏng Tasan to remark admiringly: Nowadays only the Andong elite [sadaebu] still has a local bureau. At the end of the last reign [of King Chŏngjo] Director Yi43 was proposed as head, and Royal Secretary Kim Han-dong,44 who had served as governor of Chŏlla, as his deputy. This is an old rule. In former times, it was like this in all eight provinces, yet later [this rule] gradually fell into dis­favor. Even though still kept up only in Andong, it is not the case that it was a special rule in Andong alone.45

For Chŏng Tasan, it was a remarkable fact that in the late eighteenth century the leading positions in Andong’s Local Bureau were still occupied by former government officials, whereas in most other areas of the country the local bureaus had deteriorated into poorly staffed annexes of the magistrates’ yamen. Chŏng, however, seems to have been unaware of the conflicts that even in Andong surrounded the admission to the local roster and the selection of the bureau’s top personnel during the previous 150 years. In postwar Andong, the membership of the local roster remained the reservoir from which the head (chwasu) and his three deputies (pyŏlgam) of the Local Bureau were elected, leaving to the local magistrate only the feeble privilege of endorsing the slate. During the insecure times after 1623, it was therefore the nexus between the qualification for roster membership and access to local power lodged in the bureau that generated prolonged infighting among the major descent groups. After the roster revision of 1647, several further revision attempts failed for close to thirty years because of repeated

254

Divisions and Bondings

altercations over admission criteria. In 1668, a draft revision by the bureau head Yi Sŏl46 caused such serious disagreements that it had to be discarded. A later attempt to revive it by Kim Kyu (1602–84), Sŏng-il’s great-grandson and main-line heir, also collapsed, despite Kim’s great personal authority. Although the details are not known, both Yi and Kim apparently intended to relax the admission standards. In reaction, drafts circulated under the headships of Chŏng Mun-bo47 and Yu Wŏn-gan48 tended again to tighten the standards, with the result that numerous disappointed aspirants protested their exclusion. Finally, when, as an “inevitable” compromise, the “threefold admission criteria” (samch’am)—impeccable social credentials on the father’s, the mother’s, and the wife’s side—were advanced as the sole conditions for acceptance, a new, though not “entirely beautiful” roster registered some 192 members in 1677. Because of the long thirty years since the last roster of 1647, the membership in 1677 had greatly aged, and only whitehaired men, it was regretted, were at the helm of the bureau.49 It was not until 1707 that Kim I-hyŏn (1653–1719), Kim Kyu’s grandson,50 tackled the next revision, which again ran into stiff opposition. In the end, Kim’s version, which apparently reintroduced softened admission criteria, won a quorum, and because a close scrutiny of all those to be newly admitted proved impossible, the roster membership shot up to 713.51 These developments seem to have created great unhappiness in certain quarters. Continued controversies, acerbated by the chaos of the Yi In-jwa rebellion of 1728,52 delayed the next revision until 1733, when the selection of bureau heads had become so precarious that a renewed postponement was considered unacceptable. Moreover, the local magistrate—representing increased Noron interference in local affairs—warned against a further deterioration of the local discourse. At long last, in 1773, after several drafts had been abandoned, “the pressure of the timely circumstances” necessitated the scrapping of the strict admission standards contained in the original community regulations and, on the premise of the previous Kim roster, some 220 individuals were newly enrolled. Remarkably, some of these newcomers were admitted on the basis of a novel category, “people corresponding to admission criteria” (ŭngch’am chi in). That this latter term referred to secondary sons becomes clear from the postscript to this roster: it was the question of whether or not to admit secondary sons that sparked the conflicts that prevented the acceptance of a roster update for more than twenty years after another attempt had failed in 1748.53 With such long intervals between revisions, not only had the previous roster membership dwindled to a few survivors, but by 1773 the desire for a revision had become general. The elders had two roster models in hand, the “P’ungsan version” and the “Kŭmgye version.” The former—referring to the more restrictive Roster of 1677—had created much resentment among those who were denied admission, whereas the latter— Kim I-hyŏn’s Kŭmgye version—espoused a more flexible admission policy. Emboldened by a recent call by King Yŏngjo for “broadening harmony” (kwangt’ang) in public affairs, a majority of the elders in the end cast their votes in favor of the Kŭmgye version. Consequently, 189 “regular” members as well as 46 “new entries” were accepted. The “new entries” were clearly all secondary sons who wanted to atone for the resentment of their forefathers, who had died before being admitted to the roster.54 This outcome was, however, immediately contested so vociferously by the opponents of the Kŭmgye version that



Center and Periphery

255

the roster was, once more, cast aside. One year later, the supporters of the 1773 roster, again citing the royal appeal to grant secondary sons a voice in public matters, apparently were numerically strong enough to silence the opponents. Not for long, however. The 1774 roster with 373 inscribed members turned out to be the last roster in the old format to appear in Andong.55 The controversies over roster membership that kept the Andong elite in turmoil for close to two hundred years and ended in the roster’s collapse, throw a sharp light on the complexities of social identification at the local level. Several facets are readily discernible. First, membership in the local roster continued to function as the touchstone of high social credentials, and it was by and from this membership that the officers of the Local Bureau were elected. Membership thus remained a precondition for access to the levers of local power. Second, as the local power holders reproduced themselves from within the local community, the possibility of the local magistrate’s interference was initially limited, but grew with Noron attempts to infiltrate Namin territory (discussed below). Third, at stake were two roster models, one launched by the P’ungsan Yu of Hahoe—Yu Sŏng-nyong’s descendants—and the other by the Ŭisŏng Kim of Kŭmgye—Kim Sŏng-il’s descen­dants. In the course of the seventeenth century these two descent groups, each with its own constituency, emerged as the principal actors on the local scene and vied for preeminence in the local assembly (hyanghoe)—the Kim bloc with a more lenient admission policy than the tradition-bound Yu bloc. Their rivalry, it will become clear, was not confined to the local assembly. Fourth, the key issue of contention was the question of whether or not secondary sons, who had been explicitly excluded in 1589, should now be granted membership and thus made potential candidates for Local Bureau posts. This conundrum seemed to defy a solution, had it not been for King Yŏngjo’s milestone proclamation of 1772 that opened to secondary sons the door to the higher bureaucracy.56 In Andong, the king’s daring emancipation of secondary sons provoked a showdown. The opponents of secondary-son involvement in local politics won the day, ending the stormy history of roster revisions in 1774. The showdown of 1774 did not, however, signal the end of the Local Bureau. Rather, a select number of descent groups maintained it as a self-contained institution with the incumbent heads and deputies nominating their own successors. Remarkably, the names, residences, and length of tenure of the 250 bureau heads and the 500 deputies, who served during roughly the period from 1766 to 1906, are contained in the Rules and Register Pertaining to the Local Bureau (Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok).57 This impressive document reads like a contemporary who’s-who of those who continued to dominate local affairs in Andong: the Ŭisŏng Kim (Kŭg-il’s descendants in Naeap and Sŏng-il’s descendants in Kŭmgye), the Chŏnju Yu (predominantly settled in Pakkok and Musil in Naeap’s immediate neighborhood), the P’ungsan Yu of Hahoe, and the Kosŏng Yi, in a total of some twenty-five kin groups who rotated the bureau posts between themselves. Among the officers was an occasional chinsa-saengwŏn and even a few munkwa graduates and former government officials, but the large majority were men without degrees, some of whom gained fame through scholarship and personal comportment. The tenures of the head officer and his usually three deputies were remarkably short, rarely lasting for more than three to four months, presumably signifying a jealously guarded balance of power.

256

Divisions and Bondings

Even though, as suggested by the Rules, the bureau fulfilled purely ceremonial assignments, it retained its function as a powerful status-preserving institution. Gaps in the register in the late nineteenth century likely point to continued infighting among the principal rivals, the Ŭisŏng Kim and the Hahoe Yu, that caused the local discourse occasionally to collapse (further discussed in chapters 12 and 13).58 Nevertheless, the bureau, a curious relic of bygone days that drew admiration from outsiders, served over generations as an exclusive sanctuary of sajok pride and successfully prevented lower social groups such as secondary sons or hyangni from infiltrating this privileged instrument of local dominance. The Case of Namwŏn The postwar reconstitution of Namwŏn’s elite appears even more complex than Andong’s, not only because the prewar rosters did not survive the Imjin War but also because of the area’s different settlement history. The indigenous descent groups came to be far outnumbered by the large number of descent groups who, in the course of the first two centuries of the Chosŏn, had moved into the Namwŏn area and established themselves as the area’s local power holders. The ensuing imbalance is clearly reflected in the membership composition of Namwŏn’s ten postwar local rosters: of a total of 1,726 registered members only 9 percent belonged to descent groups native to Namwŏn: 84 Namwŏn Ryang, 36 Namwŏn Yang, 18 Namwŏn Yun, and 16 Namwŏn Chin; the rest belonged to “outsiders.”59 It was this disparity of forces that gave rise to protracted rivalries and eventually led to a fragmentation of Namwŏn’s social scene. The postwar reconstruction of the Namwŏn roster (Namwŏn hyangan)60 followed in quick succession—in 1601, 1602, and 1603. Together they recorded 127 members who, not surprisingly, belonged to descent groups in commanding positions: the Chŏnju Yi, the Namyang Pang, the Ch’angwŏn Chŏng, the Hŭngdŏk Chang, the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe, the Kwangju Yi, the Namwŏn Ryang, and the Sunhŭng An, among a total of thirty-two kin groups. Between 1607 and 1700, six more revisions took place, on each occasion adding further names—53 in 1607, 145 in 1623, 106 in 1639, 219 in 1655, 437 in 1679, and 641 in 1700— resulting in a grand total of 1,726 members. By 1623, the roster already listed 43 or over 75 percent of the total 58 descent groups incorporated until the end of the century,61 demonstrating the great coherence of the Namwŏn elite at the outset of the seventeenth century. Equally noteworthy is the fact, already noted above, that degree and office holders tended to be prominent in the first, rather than in the second, half of the century, so that from roughly the 1650s on, almost 80 percent of all new members were identified merely as “young student” (yuhak),62 presumably meaning that most of them were no longer vying for bureaucratic office. Membership numbers alone, however, were not necessarily indicative of a descent group’s standing within the local hierarchy. With an aggregate membership of 118, the Hŭngdŏk Chang took first place among their peers on the rosters, but the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe, with the surprisingly small number of 28 members—all descending from Ch’oe Su-ung—were only in nineteenth place, but wielded, as has already been shown and will be further demonstrated below, greater influence in the Namwŏn area.63



Center and Periphery

257

The postwar reconstruction of the Namwŏn roster was not an easy process. In a prefatory “resolution” (wanŭi), eminent Yi Sang-hyŏng (of Tundŏk), who had joined the roster in 1623, explained the reason for roster renewal in 1639. After the capital bureaus, which had kept close watch over the selection of bureau personnel, were abolished in 1603, Yi stated, the officials from Namwŏn serving in the capital (Yi among them) scorned getting personally involved in local affairs of their home region, giving “ignorant and shameless [native] fellows” a chance, Yi deplored, “to act rapaciously, making the local roster their personal charter of advancement and turning the local offices [in the Local Bureau] into moneybags for uplifting their own families.” Conflicts arose, and the roster was burnt twice. To prevent such a development, men of initiative in neighboring Kwangju, such as the renowned scholar Ki Tae-sŭng and others, took early control and with a new constitution turned Kwangju “into a prosperous replica of the Three Dynasties” so that even after the heavy war devastation the local social fabric remained intact. Yi, wishing to draft a similar constitution for Namwŏn, recalled that the former official Hŏ Hang64 had died before accomplishing just this. Yi therefore took over and, after consulting widely with local personages, completed a draft with the active support of Ch’oe Yŏn, a senior roster member of 1603 and by 1639 a high official in retirement.65 According to Yi Sang-hyŏng’s account, the early postwar rosters failed because they had been drafted and administered by self-seeking local individuals who neglected to con­ sult capital officials. He, by contrast, on returning home from Shenyang due to illness, in 1639 drafted, together with a few incumbent government officials, a new roster constitution (yaksok chomok). The new constitution was to regulate the selection procedures of the roster officers (p’unghŏn)66 and of the Local Bureau’s top officials (p’umgwan or hyangim),67 the composition of the local assembly (hyanghoe), the admission criteria to the roster, and the arbitration of disputes; it also instituted a host of other measures dealing with the duties of the local bureau officers. Sajok candidates “generally known to everyone” (chungso kongji) were to be directly admitted (chiksŏ) to the roster, whereas others were scrutinized by the roster officers who voted on a candidate’s admission using a point system (kwŏnjŏm). A similar method was used for the selection of the local bureau officials. Yi’s concept clearly shifted all authority to the discretion of the roster officers, the “officers who dominate the local discourse” (churon chi wŏn).68 One year later, in 1640, Yi Sang-hyŏng’s draft was expanded into a twenty-clause constitution (Kyŏngjin choyak), again on the basis of earlier well-tested models,69 and was endorsed by both the local magistrate and the provincial governor. Importantly, with a tightly administered recruitment system, this constitution imposed on the community a structured power hierarchy dominated by the capital-connected sajok elite.70 That the latter thus succeeded in recapturing complete control over local affairs is clear from the slates of the individuals who served as roster officers during the 1640s and later. In 1640, for instance, [Sangnyŏng] Ch’oe Sang-gyŏm (1567–1643)71 was one of the two roster heads (hyanghŏn), assisted by the three deputy heads (puhŏn): [Changsu] Hwang Chŏng-jik, a military examination graduate of 1606 and former Andong magistrate, [Namyang] Pang Wŏn-jin (1577– 1650), a saengwŏn of 1605 and a former post station superintendent (junior sixth rank), and former magistrate Ch’oe On, who sixteen years later—by then a sallim appointee— was made one of the roster heads.72

258

Divisions and Bondings

Serious conflicts, however, soon arose between the leading sajok and “native” roster members; the latter opposed what they regarded as Yi Sang-hyŏng’s high-handed admission rules and, in 1643, submitted an alternative roster version, causing a noisy showdown. Trying to calm the situation, aged Ch’oe Yŏn73 and a few elders submitted their own revisions. Yet because “those who had different opinions still did not want to go along,” an angry Ch’oe deleted his name from the roster, and Yi Sang-hyŏng followed suit. After these dramatic gestures, Ch’oe Sang-gyŏm gathered a few colleagues in the Local Bureau, burned the alternative roster, and, after severely reprimanding its authors for having “disturbed local mores and disgraced the roster,” struck some of them off the register, and “expelled others forever [yŏngson].”74 In the subsequent revision of 1644, the wide-ranging powers of the roster officers as earlier envisaged by Yi Sang-hyŏng were nevertheless considerably cut back, and the ordinary roster membership was given a greater voice in roster affairs. Most important, new candidates were no longer admitted on the loose evidence of “being known to everyone.” Instead, they had to give proof that two or three “homelands” (hyang)—that is, patrilateral, matrilateral, and/or affinal credentials—were connected with Namwŏn. Failing this, even “distinguished” individuals were to be subjected to the point system. This redefinition of admission criteria evidently aimed at preventing persons, in particular former officials, with only vague ties to Namwŏn, from seizing influence through the roster. New rules drawn up in 1645 stipulated even more precisely that only those aspirants whose father and maternal uncle (oesamch’on) were both listed on an earlier roster would be directly enrolled (chiksŏ). Presumably an insurmountable obstacle to roster membership for many, these restrictive rules were, however, likely never fully implemented.75 Although the roster was supposed to be revised and augmented every year, it was only in 1655 that 219 new members were admitted—71 directly, the remaining 148 according to the point system.76 As more and more untitled candidates demanded access to the roster, the admission criteria continued to provoke violent quarrels and delayed revisions. In 1679, 437 new members were enrolled, the majority of whom styled themselves “young scholar,” that is, did not have official titles. Clearly, the profile of the roster members was rapidly changing, widening the gap between the roster administrators and the rest of the membership.77 The Sangnyŏng Ch’oe continued to dominate the roster. Ch’oe Kye-ong, munkwa graduate of 1681, who subsequently held various government posts inside and outside the capital, wielded, as “country gentleman” (hyang sŏnsaeng)—an honorary title given locally to active government officials—considerable local influence, the more so since his older brother Si-ong was one of the roster officers in 1700. It was they who presided over the last enrollment of 620 new members in 1700—after which date the roster, in effect, ceased to function. Nevertheless, the prestige of roster membership remained so high that even after 1700 a number of requests for “belated enrollment” (ch’urok) were submitted. In a bid to amend past errors and omissions, the names of seventeen men were therefore retroactively added to the Roster of 1700 (Kyŏngjinjŏk ch’urog’an) in 1721.78 What were the principal reasons that the Namwŏn roster came to an end in 1700? Despite the fragmentary and often blurred record, it is evident that two irreconcilable blocs formed: the descendants of the titled “outsiders,” who monopolized the leading



Center and Periphery

259

positions of the roster, on the one hand, and the members of local descent groups, who were only slightly or not represented among the roster officers, yet (often hereditarily) provided the Local Bureau’s top administrators and thus wielded considerable power in local affairs, on the other hand. An early warning signal of a rapidly deteriorating relationship was the bureau officers’ demand around 1644 that admission to the roster be limited to “native sons.” A further factor that upset the local power balance was external: the authority to select bureau officers was transferred to the local magistrate (further discussed below), a shift that not only deprived the roster officers of an important instrument of local control, but, in their eyes, also degraded holding office in the Local Bureau. In 1654, moreover, Namwŏn was designated as one of Chŏlla’s three garrison command headquarters,79 with the result that the Local Bureau had also to assume military responsibilities. The sajok regarded such tasks as “hard labor” (koyŏk) and were no longer willing to fill bureau positions, leaving them to local men. When these demanded admission to the roster, however, they were snubbed by the sajok as “profit-seeking fellows” and often lost out through the point system. In 1677, one of the roster officers, Yi Mun-jae, Yi Sang-hyŏng’s son, deplored the growing distortion of the local discourse as the magistrate, ignorant of local conditions, would invariably side with the bureau personnel (p’umgwan), who often, together with local clerks, were fleecing the populace. Thus losing their role as guardians of local mores, Yi regretted, they no longer assisted the local magistrate in accordance with general expectations.80 On the other hand, [Hŭngdŏk] Chang Ŏp diagnosed as the source of the crisis the different, often discriminatory treatment that the bureau officers had to endure when they applied for roster membership.81 With local supremacy threatening to slip out of the sajok’s control, old Ch’oe Si-ong made a last-ditch appeal to the magistrate of Namwŏn in 1712. In a sharply worded letter he criticized the collusion of Local Bureau staff with the hyangni and demanded that the bureau officers again be selected by the “whole community” (and not by the magistrate alone). He also pleaded that some important economic activities such as tax collection be restored to the community compact under elite leadership in order to prevent corruption and stop the further “deterioration of local mores.”82 Ch’oe’s petition, however, came too late and was curiously out of step with the fact that by 1700 the old order had irrevocably collapsed. In sum, the disbandment of the roster resulted from a complex mix of status assertion and maintenance, competition for local supremacy, and, undoubtedly, rivalry over control of economic resources. As the rift between the sajok and the local descent groups deepened, Namwŏn’s upper society came to be divided into sajok and hyangjok, as the bureau’s top officials (p’umgwan) were often contemptuously called. Even though the latter were still locally recognized as yangban, sajok and hyangjok came nonetheless to be viewed as two groupings, each with its own social and political-functional profile. The days were definitely over when, as Yi Sang-hyŏng had described the situation in earlier times,83 even sons of royal secretaries acted as head officers (chwasu) in the Local Bureau, and daughters of head officers became the wives of capital officials. By the beginning of the eighteenth century, some fault lines had opened through Namwŏn’s local society, visibly segregating the hyangjok 84 from the sajok. There was, however, an aftermath to the roster’s termination in 1700. As in Andong,

260

Divisions and Bondings

some sajok roster officers decided to create a separate charter, much reduced in membership, the chigwŏran85—an undertaking that apparently found favor with Ch’oe Si-ong, by then well advanced in age, yet still an indefatigable advocate of elite domination.86 According to a new set of regulations laid down in 1726, the principal qualifications for membership were certified social background, scholarly competence, and impeccable comportment, and the members were to be elected by recommendation of the incumbents. This charter was occasionally amended, but consensus seems to have gradually declined in the second half of the nineteenth century so that the charter was abolished in 1896. Not surprisingly, those kin groups who had predominated in the seventeenth century—the Chŏnju Yi, the Kyŏngju Kim, the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe, and the P’ungch’ŏn No— continued to populate this charter even though in its truncated form it was surely never more than a symbolic reminder of the elite’s past preeminence.87 Similarly, the hyangjok, who continued to occupy the top positions in the Local Bureau, initiated their own independent registers, the chwasuan and the pyŏlgaman.88 These three separate charters highlighted a newly emerging graded status order that was to define political influence and social respectability in late Chosŏn Namwŏn. The gradual segmentation of local society in Namwŏn was by the eighteenth century a phenomenon common to most rural communities. Indeed, Yi Chung-hwan, for instance, wrote: “While p’umgwan and sadaebu [i.e., sajok] are both called yangban, the p’umgwan constitute one stratum [ilch’ŭng] and the sadaebu another.”89 Whereas Yi spoke of “stratum” and seems to have avoided ranking them hierarchically, Chŏng Tasan later drew a subtle line between the two, but when grading (pyŏndŭng) society into “noble” (kwi) and “base” (ch’ŏn), he nevertheless counted the p’umgwan among the noble: “Since the bureau officers [hyangsŭng], even though not officials of the regular bureaucracy, assist through generations the regime of the local magistrate in their respective locales, they are [like] the major officers [taebu] in [the old states of ] Tŭng and Sŏl. The base must show them proper decorum.”90 Both Yi Chung-hwan and Chŏng Tasan thus acknowledged that by the latter half of Chosŏn serious fissures ran through local society, though in different directions: in Andong horizontally, in Namwŏn vertically.

State Penetration of the Local Communities Despite the fact that the landed sajok started the seventeenth century in firm control of their communities and pursued their rehabilitation projects apparently with little official interference or assistance, they were, after 1623, not only increasingly alienated from the center but also, as evidenced by the roster revisions, entered a gradually more contentious phase of community life. At the same time, the central government made concerted efforts to restore its badly tarnished image in the countryside and to get a per­ manent grip on local affairs by introducing several pieces of legislation aimed at extending its administrative authority to the village level. The state’s penetration of rural communities was slow, but it eventually critically encroached upon the landed sajok’s control of land and people.



Center and Periphery

261

After its failed attempts to survey the cultivated acreage and reregister the population in the immediate postwar years, in 1634–35 the government launched new cadastral surveys in the three southern provinces—Kyŏngsang, Chŏlla, and Ch’ungch’ŏng—where the country’s largest and most fertile arable land was situated. This time, it dispatched commissioners to assess the land. These efforts were in the first place aimed at recovering taxable land and rebuilding the agricultural infrastructure such as dikes, waterways, and irrigation facilities. The provincial governors and local magistrates were moreover instructed to win back “the people’s hearts” by introducing community compacts (hyangyak) espousing such core values as “filiality, friendship, respect, and obedience.”91 The 1634 land survey remained the only one in the seventeenth century before the next and last one of the dynasty took place in 1719–20. The state-sponsored rehabilitation of the countryside was, however, soon diverted to a program of strengthening the military. In 1654, driven by his vision of mounting a punitive campaign against the Manchus, King Hyojong promulgated the Rules Governing Garrison Commanders (Yŏngjang samok) to strengthen the regular army units with locally recruited auxiliaries; the local bureaus, moreover, were put in charge of procuring weapons and training soldiers.92 Hyojong’s scheme proved largely unsuccessful, not only because it was not feasible from a military point of view, but also because it was impossible to impose it on a population that had become increasingly unstable through landlessness, natural disasters, and war deprivation. Population registration, it was recognized, had therefore to be given priority.93 Alert to this problem, in 1674 the Namin ideologue Yun Hyu urged the young King Sukchong to reintroduce the Five-Household Control Law (Oga chakt’ongbŏp). Inspired by classical models of “reform” that he found in the Zhouli, Yun lamented that “since our country does not have a settlement law [t’och’akpŏp], people are moving around like birds and beasts”; consequently, census taking and corvée labor recruitment remained ineffective.94 Besides registering and keeping under surveillance a mostly rural population, the new law was also to stimulate agricultural production and facilitate moral rehabilitation. Yun’s proposal, in fact a revival of an earlier model tried out without success at the beginning of the dynasty,95 found bipartisan approval and contained twenty-one articles. Accordingly, five households (ho)96 were to be combined into a “quarter” (t’ong) in a progressively more inclusive organization of small, medium, and large administrative villages (i) each with its own foreman (ijŏng).97 The villages in turn were to be incorporated into small and large “townships” (myŏn)98 administered by a head (toyun) and deputy head (puyun). Because the local magistrates, it was feared, would find it difficult to draft other than low-status individuals for the village and township head posts, the FiveHousehold Control Law tried to coerce “authoritative and influential” personalities (even civil or military protection appointees) into service by threatening those shunning such duties with the drastic punishment of deportation. The new law also appropriated exhortative features of the community compact that urged the villagers, in cells of five households, to cooperate with weddings and funerals, to encourage the good and warn the wicked, and to promote village harmony. To restrict the villagers’ movement, the law, furthermore, envisaged the issuance of identification tags (chip’ae or hop’ae).99 Clearly, the Five-Household Control Law was the most far-reaching policy with

262

Divisions and Bondings

which the state strove to extend and tighten its control over rural villages and households. In 1711, it was supplemented with the Revised Rules for Commoner Service (Yangyŏk pyŏnt’ong chŏlmok) and in 1712 with the Village Quota System (Ijŏngbŏp), both designed to further systematize the collection of taxes and the recruitment of soldiers. As the taxes were henceforth to be levied collectively on administrative villages (and no longer on individuals), each village foreman was made responsible for assessing and collecting the land tax, assigning corvée duties, publicizing the magistrate’s directives, keeping public order, and collecting census data. He further had to investigate crimes and adjudicate in the first instance local disputes, and levy the military tax (as most able-bodied men by then preferred to pay a cloth tax [kunp’o] to serving).100 The administrative village thus turned into the fiscal base of the country’s tax system, and, as subsequent legislation suggests, there were many pitfalls along the route to the capital. Most serious, however, was the problem of recruiting the personnel for administering the system at the bottom. As the government endeavored to strengthen the magistrate’s powers vis-à-vis the landed sajok, it is surprising that it did not also abolish the local bureaus when it closed down the capital bureaus in 1603 on account of their reportedly undue interference in local matters. Instead, it turned the local bureaus into annexes of the magistracy (Chakch’ŏng) and devolved the sajok’s authority to appoint the local bureau personnel into the magistrate’s hands. Thus deprived of their power to steer local affairs, the sajok, who feared their degradation to local functionaries more than punishment, began to evade assignments in the local bureaus. The magistrates were consequently often forced to entrust the field to men of doubtful social origin and motives, lowranking hyangni, secondary sons, and even slaves—a development that undoubtedly also led to the controversies ending many local rosters. The fact, furthermore, that a magistrate rarely stayed at one assignment for the full statutory term of office101 rendered him unduly dependent on his local aides. The Andong magistrate Yi Pong-ik was a blatant example: he lost his post because he reportedly had not a clue about “administrative matters” (kwansa) and handed most documents down to his underlings (hari).102 The local bureaus were eventually moved within the precincts of the magistracies, and by the mid-eighteenth century the bureau staff apparently became salaried personnel.103 The growing complexity of rural administration, as well as poorly defined managerial responsibilities, readily led to irregularities and conflicts, so that by the end of the seventeenth century most local bureaus had already degenerated into what a disenchanted memorialist called “one of the three greatest evils” of the time—leaving the administration of the countryside in the hands of “hyangni and overbearing local bureau heads [ho’gang p’umgwan].” 104 In the early nineteenth century, Chŏng Tasan described the local scene as follows: As for the last one hundred years salaried offices [in the bureaucracy] have not reached far-off regions, the descendants of the former sadaebu have become destitute and, with their properties dwindling, are no longer able to keep up their appearance. [Therefore] local folks [t’ojok] are grasping for power and scheme all sorts of harm in order to retaliate for generation-



Center and Periphery

263

old humiliation. Thus, when a new magistrate arrives, he misjudges their empty accusations of so-and-so in such-and-such a district—originally of eminent descent [taejok]—as “local bullies” [mudan] and, listening only to such treacherous talk, frequently bears down on them. Is this not wrong? As a way of distinguishing [pyŏltŭng] [the social strata] those t’ojok must be refrained from insulting and harming the aristocrats [kwijok].105

Chŏng Tasan’s analysis summarizes well the twofold sociopolitical transformation that was changing the countryside into an arena of conflicting interests during the last two hundred years of the dynasty. On the one hand, the concentration of power in the capital deprived more and more members of the landed sajok of office holding in the central bureaucracy, pushing many of them to social degradation and economic destitution. On the other hand, with increased administrative tasks, the magistrate was under great pressure to deliver, yet, as the landed sajok withdrew from the local bureaus and were, when deemed uncooperative, decried as “local bullies” (mudan or t’oho),106 he had no alternative but to rely on incompetent staff. Clearly, this was the picture of a tensionprone local scene. How did these changes affect the sajok in Andong and Namwŏn? To the extent that the unit of five households was made the basic socioeconomic entity for all administrative functions (population registration, taxation, corvée, military tax), rural space in both areas underwent quite drastic reorganization. As the county system (kun-hyŏnje) of early Chosŏn had divided the provinces loosely into administrative segments too large and too diverse to reach down to each and every village and hamlet, let alone to all house­holds, the “system of townships and administrative villages” (myŏllije) legislated in the Five-Household Control Law was therefore designed to standardize local divisions and to lay a fine administrative grid over the countryside. Though never uniformly applied throughout the country, the myŏllije did restructure the countryside to an unprecedented degree. The impact that this legislation had on Andong can be gauged by comparing the local divisions in the Yŏnggaji to data in the Comprehensive Population Register (Ho’gu ch’ongsu) of 1789. Andong County, which at the beginning of the sixteenth century comprised eight subordinate counties (sokhyŏn) and two special areas (pu’gok), was by 1789 rezoned into twenty-five townships (myŏn) with a total of 236 administrative villages (i). Andong County proper was subdivided into nine townships with the walled city at the center and eight surrounding myŏn named according to the four directions.107 Imha and P’ungsan Subcounties were newly organized into five and four myŏn, respectively. Kaedan, one of the two special areas (pu’gok), was abolished, and Soch’ŏn transformed into a township, as were the remaining four hyŏn. Most natural villages (ch’on) were absorbed into administrative villages, as, for instance, Imha-hyŏn’s original fifty-seven ch’on re­grouped into forty-one ri. Only in the two outlying former subordinate counties, Kiran and Ilchi, now made townships, had the number of villages actually increased—undoubtedly as the result of vigorous land reclamation and population increases. Strong sajok settlements such as Naeap and Hahoe seem to have successfully resisted government-imposed change and emerged intact as administrative villages, safeguarding their landed property as well as their control over commoner (tenant) hamlets.108

264

Divisions and Bondings

The introduction of the new local administrative system also effected changes in Namwŏn. Among the eight administrative villages listed in 1789 under Tundŏk-pang, for instance, Tongch’on, the longtime seat of the Tundŏk Yi, is strangely missing, and even the larger Tundŏk-ri, historically covering the three hamlets of Tongch’on, Pangch’uk, and Ubŏn, does not appear. It is difficult to account for these apparent omissions,109 but they may well be connected with sajok insistence on keeping local preferences in that densely populated area. Tundŏk moreover provides a remarkable example for the inconsistent application of the Five-Household Control Law. The law intended to register adjacent households irrespective of the household head’s social or economic status, yet three consecutive late nineteenth-century household registers of Tundŏk indicate that registration was quite arbitrary. Not only did the numbers assigned to quarters and households differ from registration to registration, with some households even disappearing between censuses, the numbering also did not follow a fixed path from house to house, but zigzagged without a recognizable pattern through or even among hamlets.110 Such inconsistencies are observable also in other localities and were not specific to the nineteenth century.111 Since they could hardly have resulted from changes of residence, it is more likely that they reflect sajok resistance to and manipulation of the system. The ogat’ong system was undoubtedly more successfully applied in urban spaces than in rural areas, where villages and hamlets were widely scattered, and the social and economic interests of the landed sajok tended to recognize different boundaries. Nevertheless, the ogat’ong system was the institutional basis upon which the household registers were compiled. Every third year, a household had to submit a draft document (ho’gu tanja) in which each household head (hoju) had to give his name, title or service obligation, age, choronym (pon’gwan), and his “four ancestors” (sajo); if he had a wife, he had to list the same information about her and her ancestors, in addition to the names, ages, and titles or occupations of their dependents (sons and daughters) and of other household members; the slaves were recorded, by personal name and age, separately at the end of the main document. These drafts were then checked and collected according to residence unit and submitted to the local magistrate, who had to compile the register of his county. In short, the household register defined the household’s obligations to the state.112 But it was also an instrument with which the state kept a check on the landed sajok. Not only was registration made mandatory for them to claim exemption from corvée and military service; more significantly, the Sok taejŏn contained a new law according to which examination aspirants “from outside [the capital]” (oebang) were admitted to the examination hall only if so registered (and who thus could be properly identified as to social background). Nonetheless, despite the warning of harsh punishment, underreporting, evasion, and falsifications were common (and drastically increased in the nineteenth century)—a fact that seems to diminish the value of the hojŏk as reliable documentary evidence for demographic and economic research.113 In the latter half of the dynasty, then, the countryside was increasingly contested between the magistrate (suryŏng), who, as the state’s representative, resided with his staff in the walled county seat and was consequently also called the “master of the ramparts” (sŏngju); the various lower-level social elements struggling for power and social



Center and Periphery

265

recognition through the local bureaus; and the sajok elites who, frequently disparaged as “local bullies,” ensconced themselves in their villages, keeping their distance from the county seat. In conclusion, this chapter has thrown light on the diverse new challenges the landed sajok came to face in the course of the seventeenth century. Indeed, for the landed sajok elite, the century turned into a period of crucial transformations. On the one hand, they suffered from growing alienation from the center; on the other, they came under pressure from the state’s advancing controls into the countryside. As degree and office holding in the central bureaucracy declined as the principal means of obtaining state approbation of high social status, membership in a local roster gained ever-greater significance as a critical substitute for securing, even without examination success, recognition of social preeminence. It was, however, precisely this overtaxing of the roster’s function as a sociopolitical instrument that precipitated its eventual collapse, not only in Andong and Namwŏn. Indeed, with each roster revision the criteria of access shifted and turned the definition of yangban status into a matter of contention, destabilizing the local status hierarchy. To a degree, the state’s extension of its authority to the local level precipitated this development as it discouraged the landed sajok, who feared their degradation to hyangni status, from participating in this new order. Instead, in defense of their social prerogatives, they responded with lineage building and transforming their villages into unique landmarks of sajok identity, discussed in the following chapter.

Ch a p t er 1 1

The Maturation of the Lineage System Identity and Locality

W

ith elite status under pressure—on the one side, from growing alienation from the center, on the other side, from an ever-encroaching yet inefficient state—the “yangban in the countryside” (hyangban) turned increasingly to “localist strategies” with which they tried to buttress their social standing and preserve their local dominance. Their most effective long-term strategy was the elaboration and consolidation of the lineage system, which reached its mature configuration in the course of the seventeenth century. Lineage building did not merely entail the ritual structuring of patrilineal kin and the build-up of corporate wealth. With the unifying power of the ancestral cult a sajok lineage came to underpin its collective identity and to create kin networks, first on the local, later on a supraregional level, with which it bolstered its position among its local competitors as well as with regard to the state.

Consolidation of the Position of the Ritual Heir It was in the course of the sixteenth century, as discussed in chapter 8, that a few ritual pioneers started, based on the canonical prescriptions of Zhu Xi’s Jiali, to privilege their eldest sons with extra inheritance shares to enable them to fulfill their duties as mainline heirs (chongson). This has been interpreted as an indication of an emerging lineage consciousness and an increasingly nuanced reading of the canonical rules of kin organization that finally led to the formation of the full-fledged patrilineage. Documentary evidence for tracing the consolidation process in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries of what is here called “domestic-shrine lineage” remains fragmentary, but it is clear that the Neo-Confucian emphasis on the senior line of descent as the central



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

267

element of lineage ideology gained ever-greater acceptance and was, as earlier argued, also expedited by economic considerations. Because partible inheritance of land not only threatened the economic standing of individual heirs but also undermined kin cohesion, the consolidation of land in corporately held lineage trusts, sanctioned by the prestige of the ancestral cult, became a necessity for sustaining sajok status and prestige. Motivation for lineage building thus derived from a subtle interplay of ritual-ideological and economic reflections. The extent to which land was set aside for ritual purposes according to Zhu Xi’s prescription of one-fifth of the inheritable wealth, as recorded in the “ritual-allowance rubric” (pongsajo) in inheritance documents, may again serve to gauge the development of the domestic-shrine lineage. Indeed, since the regular performance of ancestral rites is unthinkable without a steady source of income, it was the husbanding of land that in the end determined the degree to which a kin group was able to commit itself to a Confucian-style ritual program. Even though there was no uniformity in the speed or in the extent to which land was earmarked as “ancestral,” ancestral trusts seem to have grown, paradoxically, in proportion to the threat that partible inheritance was perceived as posing to decreasing landed resources. In a document recording the inheritance shares of T’oegye’s grandchildren, dated 1611, roughly one-fourth of the land and one-eighth of slaves of the ritual heir’s regular allotment were set aside for ancestral rituals. This was a small allotment in view of the fact that the ritual heir also had to take care of T’oegye’s perpetual shrine and grave rites.1 In another document detailing an inheritance division in 1627, a ritual allowance equal to the “legal” one-fifth was considered too small and was doubled. In addition, some extra grave land (myojŏn) and slaves were reserved for financing grave rites for the parents and two generations of lineal antecedents. These resources, it was stated, were to be handed on by the ritual heir from generation to generation without ever being divided or sold.2 Such an injunction apparently was needed because land whose ritual purpose became unclear with the passage of time tended to become the object of conflicting interests. On the other hand, in 1671 a sibling group of the Yean Yi decided to continue rotating the death anniversary rites (kije) for their parents. In addition, obviously still favoring grave rites, they earmarked some of their inherited land as parental grave land and jointly financed the erection of grave stelae and the building of a chaesil at an earlier graveyard (myosan).3 Whereas the above documents seem to point to purely ritual considerations that led to the strengthening of the ritual heir’s economic position, ultimately it was the economic reality of the time that hastened the decisive transformation of the patrimony into a corporate trust headed by the ritual heir. Growing alarm over dwindling economic resources called for a reduction in the number of property-holding family members, and ritual terms served well to rationalize this process. As already noted in chapter 8, anxious fathers, among them [Andong] Kwŏn Nae, started to question the justification of giving an equal share to a married daughter who, with the gradual discontinuation of uxorilocal marriage, left home and thus, it was argued, tended to lose interest in the ritual affairs of her natal family. Similar reasoning is also evident in the preamble to a Chaeryŏng Yi division document of 1688 in which Yi Hae’s (1618–61)4 widow declared that because her only daughter, living in a different administrative district, found it difficult to take part in rotating

268

Divisions and Bondings

ancestral rites, she was to be given her full share of slaves, but less land. In fact, she received seven slaves as did each of her five brothers, but only a little more than one-half of a brother’s landed allotment. The daughter, the document further stated, though giving up her part in her father’s death anniversary rite, would continue to attend the graveside rituals in the spring and autumn.5 Clearly, with their ritual roles scaled down or disappear­ ing altogether, married daughters were forfeiting their claims on patrimonial wealth. In the eighteenth century, the assets reserved for ancestral rites rapidly increased. As a document of 1719, signed by [Ŭisŏng] Kim Pog-il’s great-great-grandson Sin-gi (1651–?), illustrates, they began to surpass half of the total inheritable property—well in excess of what the patriarch had orally willed. For preserving the ritual land intact, the preamble warned, the land thus far used for the rites of the nonagnatic grandparents and great-grandparents would not, after the rites’ suspension, be redistributed among the heirs. The parental land (the slaves had all run away) was, however, divided equally among sons and daughters.6 Similarly, in a document he wrote at age eighty to his adopted heir in 1735, a sixth-generation descendant of Kim Su-il carefully detailed the amounts of land to be set aside for the parental and grandparental rites and the rites of his dead son; the total amounted to roughly one-fifth more than the share allotted to his adopted son. In view of critically diminished resources, the old father advised ritual simplicity, although the sweeping of the ancestral graves in the spring and autumn was not to be abandoned.7 In 1745, when the widow of a sixth-generation descendant of Kim Sŏng-il presided over an inheritance division among her six sons and three daughters, the ritual specifications almost equaled one-half of the total inheritable estate, leaving the individual male heirs with shares of hardly more than one kyŏl of land. The three daughters got only fractions of their male siblings’ portions, and land acquired during the patriarch’s lifetime was entirely allotted to the main-line heir (chongga).8 The instructions An P’il-ch’ang (1673–1732) gave in 1732 to his oldest son, Chŏng-sŏ (1705–65; married to an Ŭisŏng Kim), in a sense represent the culmination of the long process of concentrating ritual assets in inviolable funds entrusted to eldest sons. Because land was insufficient to sustain the ancestral rites for several generations of antecedents, the father wrote, he had added land “from far and nearby” to improve the economic standing of the main line. He continued: “The wealth transmitted by the ancestors I exclusively give to you [i.e., eldest son] in recognition of the fundamental idea of ‘enriching the main descent line.’ Do not rotate the rites any longer with impoverished minor lines, and, as the main house [chongga], take charge of the rites from generation to generation.” The slaves were to be handled in the same way. The father left it to the ritual heir’s discretion to provide for the subsistence of the other sons who did not get shares. If later a ritual heir were to sell these ancestral assets, the descendants would have to report him to the authorities as “unfilial.” The daughters, the father finally stated, were to be given the equivalent of 15 majigi of land in money so that they could buy land in their respective places of residence. He then listed special arrangements for the rites of ancestors as far back as nine generations. The scribe (chipp’il) of the document was the head of the munjung.9 With the consolidation of the eldest son of the main line as his descent group’s chief officiant, rotating ancestral rites faded out of fashion. It was therefore quite unique that



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

269

in 1744 the Kosŏng Yi reintroduced, albeit for a limited period of time, rotating rites for the parents. This was done to satisfy the will (yuŏn) of a great-grandmother—evidence that a will, even against opposition, still had the power to challenge what had become ritual norm. Nevertheless, even under this exceptional circumstance, a corporately managed ritual trust was to be set aside from parental wealth, and the ritual heir was to act as the first officiant; daughters were explicitly excluded from the rotational cycle.10 The emergence of corporate trusts controlled by the ritual heir was, of course, not unique to Andong. It also occurred in Namwŏn. There, special gifts (pyŏlgŭp) handed to the main-line heir during the parents’ lifetime, rather than explicit stipulations in the preamble of inheritance papers, seem to have been the preferred way of enhancing his economic standing. Among the eight special gift documents left by the Tundŏk Yi, five addressed exclusively the eldest son as ritual heir, testifying to the Tundŏk Yi’s keen descent consciousness. Thus, when Yŏp made a gift to his eldest son Yu-hyŏng in 1609, he introduced the deed of gift as follows: To recompense one’s roots by serving the ancestors is the greatest of the human responsibilities. As a human being, could one not put one’s entire heart in this? . . . However, even if the mental attitude is correct, yet the resources are insufficient, even a filial son or a compassionate grandson might not be able fully to realize his sincerity. Would this not leave the heart troubled? [Therefore] the land and slaves, which have come down to the descendants, as well as the ancestral provisions I hand on to you as the eldest son. That they should never be moved [to someone else] has already been willed by Father. . . . The ritual heir should always keep to these instructions and do his best to fulfill sincerity and filiality without ever getting tired.

Yŏp let Yu-hyŏng’s second cousin, Sang-hyŏng, write this document so that he, too, would become acquainted with its contents. If later someone among the collateral descendants were to dispute this arrangement, this document would serve as a testamentary deed for the authorities. The document then specified the exact apportionments of the gift: six slaves and fifteen majigi of land for the rites of Tam-son and Hon (Yŏp’s grandfather and great-grandfather, respectively); four slaves and forty-four majigi for Yŏp’s parents; and three slaves and fifteen majigi for Yŏp’s first wife.11 As will be discussed below, some of these provisions did get sidetracked to collaterals in the eighteenth century—an unfortunate occurrence that led to prolonged conflict within the kin group. In 1655, Yi Yu-hyŏng twice turned some land he had confiscated from absconded ancestral duty slaves into exclusive ancestral land that he passed on to his lineal son and grandson.12 Finally, by the mid-eighteenth century, ancestral land had, despite all safeguards, diminished to the extent that Yi Chong-hwan (n.d.), Yŏp’s seventh-generation descendant, exclaimed in the preamble of a deed of gift to his eldest son in 1764: The land that has been transmitted from the ancestors to the ritual heir’s house has through time and changes in land arrangements greatly diminished so that I fear no longer to be able to preserve the main line. For this reason, I procured some extra land and joined it to the existing sacrificial land. I give it in writing to you as the eldest son. According to the will of our ancestors it should be transmitted exclusively to the eldest son and never be diverted.13

270

Divisions and Bondings

By the time Chong-hwan partitioned his property among his two sons and four daughters in 1769, he had converted the largest part of the land into ancestral land so that only insignificant amounts were left to be divided. Most of the slaves that he handed on, he had bought.14 Like the Tundŏk Yi, in 1623 the Changsu Hwang allotted an extra share to the eldest son, and in 1663, when Hwang Wi’s property was divided, the preamble stated that while the eldest son alone was responsible for the shrine rites, all sons were to take turns in the grave rituals.15 Although the Tundŏk Ch’oe did not leave any inheritance papers, biographical writings give ample testimony that ancestral affairs also loomed large in their lives. Because the line of Sang-jung’s eldest son, Po, came to an end with the deaths of Po’s only son and grandson, it was Sang-jung’s second son, Yŏn, who, according to customary practice, took over the ancestral charge (hyŏngmang chegŭp).16 An adoption for Po was apparently not even discussed. Yŏn rebuilt the homestead (chongga) and the ancestral shrine, which had fallen into disrepair, and continued the rituals “according to the ritual prescriptions.” Yŏn’s son, Hwi-ji, reportedly took his ritual responsibilities equally seriously and would supervise the ritual preparations personally. He also reserved sacrificial land even for distant ancestors and admonished his descendants not to neglect those rites.17 In sum, the documents preserved by Andong and Namwŏn sajok descent groups illustrate the process of privileging the eldest son as the patrimony’s sole heir: it started with granting him an extra share and ended with placing him in single-handed control of lineage assets. On the one hand, then, it was the critical land shortage that helped expedite the rise of the eldest son to the position of his patrilineage’s primogeniture heirship; on the other hand, it was the lineage paradigm as elucidated in Zhu Xi’s Jiali that furnished the ideological justification for concentrating the ancestral wealth exclusively (or nearly so) on the successor to the main line (chongson) to the disadvantage of his younger brothers. The chongson was, on the basis of his genealogical status, put in charge of the ancestral cult—independent of his personal qualifications or his material condition. Without economic support, however, he would soon have been unable to fulfill his ritual obligations, as numerous examples testify. Although the ritual assets did not become the ritual heir’s private property—he was forbidden to sell or mortgage them18—and were administered as a lineage trust, they obviously endowed him with major benefits such as the patriline’s main residence (chongga) to which the domestic shrine was attached. As the documents analyzed above also point out, however, the traditional sense that common descent made all sons and daughters equal inheritors persisted, so that token shares, not taken out of the patrimony, but out of wealth acquired during the parents’ lifetime, often continued to be distributed equally to younger sons and daughters far into the eighteenth century.

Life in the Service of the Ancestors By professing, in the formulation of one ritualist, that “the ancestral spirit is my spirit,”19 the ritual heir (chongson) impersonated the vital link between the patrilineal ancestors and their agnatic descendants—a distinction that endowed him with unusual symbolic



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

271

as well as practical power and authority over his kinsmen. Being chongson was a status inherited by the first-born son of the main descent line that not only exacted high standards of personal conduct, but also bound the incumbent for life to the place where the tablets (sinju or wip’ae) representing the ancestral spirits were installed—the ancestral shrine (sadang or kamyo). The shrine was a separate building erected at a short distance usually east of the living quarters and enclosed by a wall, which kept unauthorized visitors out. The ritual heir stood in regular intercommunication with the ancestors by honor­ ing them with rites held on the first and fifteenth days of each month and by announcing to them important matters such as the birth of a lineal heir, a marriage, or the death of a kinsman. He would take leave from his ancestors when he had to be absent from home, and report back upon his return. Indeed, the shrine was so central in a chongson’s life that in case of a disaster—floods or fire—it was the ancestral tablets he would rescue before anything else (fig. 11.1). As the chief officiant at the seasonal services (sije) in the domestic shrine, at the graveside rituals (myoje), and at the rites celebrated on the death anniversary of each lineal ancestor and his spouse (kije or kiilche) (customarily including the third, and often even the fourth, ascending generation), the ritual heir had to observe strict abstinence for at least two days prior to each ritual, bathe, and put on a clean set of clothes. As Kim Sŏng-il put it: “Fasting is the means by which communication with the [ancestral] spirit is facilitated. The degree of [the officiant’s] sincerity determines the ancestor’s enjoyment [of the ritual food].”20 Ritual performance was thus an intimate expression of filiality, and the efficacy of the rites depended on an officiant’s degree of moral formation. A chongson who took his tasks seriously spent a great deal of his time in personal rapport with his ancestors. In overall charge of the sacrificial calendar of his descent line, he sought ritual guidance in various, usually abbreviated, ritual manuals based on Zhu Xi’s Jiali, such as Yi Yulgok’s Kyŏngmong yogyŏl or Kim Sŏng-il’s Pongsŏn chegyu. Indeed, a chongson’s leadership and, by extension, his lineage’s moral standards were judged by the outside world by the punctiliousness with which he directed the ancestral rites. Negligence caused “the ancestral shrine to lose its protection”21—and the patrilineage its good reputation. The preparation of the ritual food was another charge that demanded the highest degree of purity. It was entrusted to the chongson’s wife (chongbu), who usually eschewed the assistance of slaves. If slaves were used at all, they first had to bathe and cover their mouths during work. To avoid any kind of contamination—by dogs, cats, or pregnant women about to give birth—sacrificial food was often prepared and stored in a “spirit kitchen” (sinju) located just outside the living quarters, and presented on special vessels (chegi). Before the rite, such food was not to be served even to an unexpected guest.22 Although ritually conscious husbands advised frugality, the women reportedly prided themselves in creating extravagant assortments of dishes and even incurred debts to compete with neighbors. On the death anniversaries of parents and parents-in-law some women would present what came to be popularly known as “extra offerings” (kagong) consisting of wine and foods that during the parents’ lifetime had been served on their birthdays. Offered after the third libation, such irregular “shows of sincerity” were heavily criticized by ritualists, but apparently persisted even beyond the three-year mourning

Fig. 11.1 Autumnal service at the domestic shrine, with the ritual heir leading his nearest kinsmen, 1974 (photograph by the author).



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

273

periods. If illness or mourning contaminated the household, the rites had to be either canceled or moved to another venue.23 How crowded the calendar of a ritual heir was is demonstrated in the Diary of Kyeam (Kyeam illok) of Kim Yŏng,24 the ritual heir of a small collateral Kwangsan Kim line that had established its own domestic shrine (kamyo). In the year 160425 his ritual activities are recorded as follows: 1st month:   1st New Year rites for parents; earlier he had paid respect to the spirit tablets of his maternal grandparents 15th performed the mid-monthly rite (chŏllye) in the domestic shrine 16th took part in death anniversary (kije) rite of his grandmother in the chaesil; visited the graves 30th because of the seasonal rite (sije) in the main shrine (chomyo) on the following day, he observed abstinence (t’akch’ŏng) 2nd month:   1st attended the seasonal rite and afterward performed the first-ofmonth rite at home; cleansed himself again and partook in ritual meal (ŭmbok) in the main house (chongga)   7th at daybreak performed death anniversary rite of his mother; later ­v isited her grave   8th attended death anniversary rite of his great-great-grandfather   9th because of next day’s rite, he observed strict purification (ch’ijae) and inspected the ritual items in the evening 10th performed seasonal rite [in the domestic shrine] 15th performed the mid-monthly rite in the domestic shrine 16th attended seasonal rite in the main house 27th performed death anniversary rite of his maternal grandmother 3rd month:   1st performed first-of-the-month rite in the domestic shrine   7th inspected ritual items and went to chaesil to perform the Hansik rite; swept the ancestral graves (sŏnyŏng)   8th swept the grave of the fifth-generation ancestor; fire had ravaged it and disturbed the ancestral spirit; felt very alarmed 15th performed the mid-monthly rite in domestic shrine [4th month: no ritual performances] 5th month:   1st performed the first-of-the-month rite   2nd went to Panggŭm 26 to pay respect to the grandparental graves   5th (Tano) in Panggŭm swept the graves and attended the joint rites (myoje); attended common meal in the chaesil   6th because of the seasonal rite in the main house on the next day, he observed abstinence   7th attended the rite and partook in the ritual meal 28th attended the death anniversary rite for the great-great-grandmother 6th month:   1st performed the first-of-the-month rite 15th performed the mid-monthly rite in domestic shrine 7th month:   7th presented noodles and ttŏk in the domestic shrine during the day 8th month: 15th went to Panggŭm to sweep the parental graves 9th month:   1st performed first-of-the-month rite   9th offered libation in the domestic shrine

274

Divisions and Bondings



11th observed strict abstinence 12th observed strict abstinence; at night inspected ritual items (chemul) 13th at daybreak he performed his father’s death anniversary rite; all his cousins and a sŏja uncle attended; in the afternoon visited the grave 14th kept strict abstinence because of next day’s rite; inspected ritual items at night 15th at daybreak he performed the rite for deceased fathers (irye)27 in the domestic shrine and during the day performed the rite of clearing away the leftovers (chullye) Int. 9th month: 1st performed the first-of-the-month rite28 10th month: 1st at daybreak he performed the maternal grandfather’s death anniversary rite, and during the day performed the first-of-the-month rite in domestic shrine 15th performed mid-month rite in the shrine 25th attended death anniversary rite for [one of ] father’s elder brothers 11th month: 1st performed winter solstice rite in the domestic shrine 9th kept strict abstinence because of upcoming rite 11th at daybreak performed seasonal rite in the domestic shrine; because the main house celebrated the seasonal rite on the same day, it was impossible to go there and eat leftover sacrificial food 15th performed mid-month rite in the domestic shrine 12th month: 5th observed abstinence because of next day’s rite 6th attended death anniversary rite for great-grandfather in Irhyu-dang 29th performed customary end-of-year rite (chŏlche) for his deceased father 30th in the morning, performed customary end-of-the-year rite for his maternal grandparents (oe’ga)29

Clearly, the ancestors—and not (yet) only the patrilineal ones—determined a ritual heir’s annual calendar, even though Kim Yŏng’s ritual obligations were relatively light in comparison to those that a ritual heir of a large and prestigious main line had to fulfill (fig. 11.2).30 Ritual performances were solemn occasions of interaction with the ancestors during which loud talking and music were banned. Nevertheless, if the ancestor was as distant as a great-great-grandfather, his descendants easily reverted back to “happy” (kil) activities. As Kim Yŏng noted on the eighth day of the second month, 1604: “After eating the sacrificial meal [ŭmbok] [after the rite for the great-great-grandfather], we kinsmen got out of our mourning garb, and each of us, with a wine cup in hand, composed little poems. It was deep in the night when we finally dispersed.”31 Since regular ritual performances were thought to emanate from an enduring feeling of filiality toward one’s forebears, they were suspended only under extraordinary circumstances. On the first day of the second month of 1637, for instance, Kim Yŏng noted that “due to the troubles of the time [i.e., the Manchu invasions], the rites were stopped.” A few days later: “Today is my mother’s anniversary rite, but we had to suspend the rite. My heart is extremely dis-



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

275

Fig.11.2 The ritual participants eat the sacrificial meal (ŭmbok) after the proceedings at the domestic shrine, 1974 (photograph by the author).

turbed!”32 But it was his own bad health that from mid-life onward prevented Kim Yŏng from conducting the rites himself. On the first day of the ninth month of 1624, he recorded: “I ordered my son to perform the rites in the domestic shrine because I was ill.” And a few days later: “At daybreak my wife and Yo-rip33 performed the anniversary rite for Father. I could not attend because of illness. I’m extremely agitated, and my distress is extreme.”34 With ritual affairs primarily a male obligation, it must indeed have been an extremely painful decision to put them into the hands of a woman and an inexperienced young son.

Idiosyncratic Ritual Practices In the course of the seventeenth century, while the lineal principle promoting the eldest son as the sole ritual leader of his patrilineage was rapidly taking root, some descent groups continued to adhere to “private customs” (sasok)—idiosyncratic ritual enactments often justified as “local customs” (hyangsok). Critics deplored such ritual inadequacy that, in their view, grew out of ignorance of the ritual literature.35 No other “local custom” seems to have been as persistent, yet highly controversial, as the entrusting of nonagnatic descendants with ancestral responsibilities in the patriline—

276

Divisions and Bondings

surely a remnant of earlier bilateral preferences. When direct male descendants were lacking, nonagnatic grandsons (oeson)36 were often put in charge of the rites for their maternal grandparents or even great-grandparents (oeson pongsa). Since grandsons mourned their maternal grandparents for five months, proponents opined, they were well suited to perform rites for them, even though the grandparental line was not to be appropriated by the worshiper.37 Furthermore, as property was handed down from the father’s as well as the mother’s side to both sons and daughters, all descendants—whether agnatic or nonagnatic—stood in the ancestors’ debt and thus, it was argued, had to acknowledge and repay ancestral benevolence. Consequently, ritual land was at times expressly earmarked for this purpose. The above-mentioned Kim Yŏng, too, took care of the anniversary rites for his maternal grandparents and, in a document of 1682, recording the distribution of property among Kwŏn Pŏl’s fourth-generation descendants, fifteen majigi of paddy land were allocated for the maternal grandparents’ rites.38 Though the performance of rites for maternal grandparents by nonagnatic grandsons was regarded as a “national custom” (kuksok) far into the seventeenth century, ritual experts differed as to its propriety. The famous ritualist Pak Se-ch’ae—a Soron—argued that Yi Yulgok had reluctantly condoned the practice because “associated offerings” (panbu) to heirless relatives in the ancestral shrine as detailed in the Jiali had not become part of the ritual program in Korea.39 A Namin scholar, in contrast, insisted that “an agnatic kinsman, however distant, nevertheless has the same blood, whereas a non­agnate, however close, has a different surname [isŏng]”—a fact that irrefutably disqualified the latter as a ritual performer for his maternal grandparents.40 The adoption of an even distant agnate was therefore judged a better solution and eventually widely practiced. Whereas nonagnatic participants at graveside rituals to ancestors of considerable genealogical distance were generally tolerated, their conducting domestic shrine rites was naturally condemned as a grave violation of Confucian prescriptions. If younger sons were undesirable performers of such rituals, the involvement of a daughter’s offspring was even less tolerable. Their partaking, at times even rewarded with land grants, was therefore gradually curtailed on the grounds that descendants with a different surname would no longer feel the same loyalty and commitment to their matrilateral forebears. In a Naeap Kim document of 1671, the generation of great-grandsons was made the cutoff line for nonagnatic participation (presumably also for benefiting from ancestral property),41 and in his 1673 testamentary will Kim Pang-ch’an completely banned nonagnatic descendants from shrine rituals.42 Because the patrilineal system of descent embraced women only indirectly, it is not surprising that unorthodox measures were occasionally taken by natal families to ritually care for married daughters who died young and childless and thus were usually not ritually remembered by their in-laws. In order to prevent her youngest daughter, who had died without offspring, from becoming a wandering “lonely ghost,” in 1634 [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ham’s widow gave to her daughter’s husband eight slaves. This unusually large allotment was to fulfill the express wish of the dead patriarch who during his lifetime had worried that proper rites might be discontinued by the husband, who had remarried in the meantime and thus had technically separated himself from his first set of affines (ŭijŏl).43 The daughter’s grave was to be tended by her own kin. Some twelve years later,



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

277

however, when, after the completion of the mourning period for Yi Ham’s widow, the remaining slaves and the land, omitted in 1634, were distributed among the siblings, the former son-in-law was no longer mentioned.44 A natal family at times even felt obliged to provide a son-in-law with resources for performing rites for his wife—their daughter— who had died with offspring, as illustrated by Kim Pog-il’s case, mentioned earlier. How long such assets were used for their stated purpose must have entirely depended on the ritual fervor of those entrusted with such unusual mandates. An unmarried daughter who died prematurely was sometimes allowed to “eat on the side” (pusik) at rites for the grandparents. Quite exceptional, however, must have been the death anniversary rite a mother performed for her deceased daughter in her own living quarters—an apparently fairly elaborate affair for which preparations had started the previous day, and at which the father offered a libation.45 Secondary wives (sŏmo) were as a rule mourned by their own sons for one year.46 It was therefore undoubtedly quite unusual to make a gift of land and slaves to a secondary wife’s eldest daughter for ritual offerings to her mother. Such an arrangement was willed in 1621, when Kwŏn Nae’s wealth was distributed among his heirs. In the same document, moreover, a secondary grandson was entrusted with nine slaves and thirty majigi of paddy land for performing rites for yet another secondary wife whose son had died.47 Both allocations were recorded in the preamble—presumably to ensure the primary heirs’ ready compliance with the patriarch’s capricious last will, who only a few years earlier had warned of an impending land shortage. As these individual examples testify, ritual decisions were rarely purely rational matters. Activating a complex mix of “feeling” and “reason” (chŏng-ni), they could not be regulated simply by adhering to legal or ritual prescriptions, nor did they necessarily follow economic logic. Responses to particular family circumstances therefore elicited a wide spectrum of idiosyncratic ritual strategies that were to satisfy short-term emotions without, however, seriously challenging the ongoing implantation of the patrilineal principle.

Secondary Sons as Challengers of Confucian Principles Since the perpetuation of a lineage entailed social, ritual, and economic considerations, the question whether or not a secondary son (sŏja) was qualified to substitute for a lacking primary son as heir to his father and the patrilineage emerged as a controversial issue.48 Secondary sons were usually born late in a father’s life, either after the birth of primary offspring or when such had not come forth. By the time of his father’s death, a secondary-son heir would therefore usually be young and likely in danger of being deprived of his heirship by stronger collateral kinsmen, causing the main descent line to be sidelined. Even though the law allowed discretionary judgment on a secondary son’s qualifications in matters of succession, with the development of lineages the weighing of the risks of installing a sŏja as heir no longer lay in a father’s competence alone; it became a munjung concern, and was often decided on the basis of factional preferences. Indeed,

278

Divisions and Bondings

as Zhu Xi had nothing to say about secondary sons, prominent ritualists developed guidelines that were taken up by their respective followers as prescriptive rules. For T’oegye, who so strongly insisted on a clear differentiation of descent lines, it was clear that if an eldest son did not have a primary son, a son of his next younger brother would ideally have to be adopted as the main line’s successor and ritual heir. This view, reinforced by Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s example, who, having only a secondary son, had made his cousin’s son his heir, largely shaped the Namin position on succession matters: a secondary son was unacceptable as lineal-ritual heir to a main descent line. This was an imperative the Andong sajok seem to have taken to heart. In contrast, the Sŏin’s conception of a secondary son’s role was clearly influenced by the way their ideological mentor had handled his own succession problem. Yulgok Yi I, having no primary issue, chose the eldest of his two secondary sons as his lineal-ritual heir (sŭngjungja).49 This option was endorsed by Yi’s famous disciple and leading Sŏin ritualist, Kim Chang-saeng, who opined that a secondary son—even one of low birth if turned commoner—could become his father’s ritual heir and perform the rites for four generations of ancestors.50 Kim’s son Chip,51 who married Yi I’s secondary daughter and made the elder of his two secondary sons his heir, leaned on his father’s judgment when he argued that a secondary son’s exclusion from ancestral rites was not prescribed in “ancient rites” (korye) but was purely a customary bias. Despite such sympathetic feelings shared by father and son, Kim Chang-saeng’s main line nevertheless eventually switched to his third son, Pan.52 Thus, even though the early Sŏin ritualists—Song Si-yŏl included—knowingly deviated from the “lineal principle” (chongpŏp), they justified their more generous treatment of secondary sons by referring to the statute on ritual heirship (pongsa) codified in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, which mentioned the secondary son as heir of last resort.53 How far these divergent views on a secondary son’s jural and ritual suitability framed the behavior of their followers in the countryside is nearly impossible to trace. Unlike the establishment of an heir (iphu), which became legal only with the endorsement of the Ministry of Rites, elevating a secondary son to ritual heirship (sŭngjŏk) remained a discretionary act that needed no official approval.54 The evidence is extremely limited, but a few cases may illustrate how Andong and Namwŏn sajok solved their succession problems, taking recourse to diverse—at times unashamedly economic—reasoning. Andong patriarchs apparently never contemplated the possibility of making a secondary son their successor. On the contrary, as early as 1479 [Kwangsan] Kim Hoe, ­worried about the perpetuation of the main line, willed that in the absence of a primary son, no secondary son of either commoner or base background be allowed to become the ritual heir lest “noble [kwi] be dragged down to base [ch’ŏn].” In the care of a secondary son, he predicted, the rites would soon come to an end, dooming the line. He therefore ordered that the rites be transmitted exclusively to primary descendants (ponjong).55 Kim Chin expressed a similar sentiment when he warned against secondary sons insulting the primary offspring.56 Though these views reflected strong aversion to “impurity” of descent, the law nevertheless allowed for individual solutions, and Kim Chin’s younger brother, Chŏng (1508–78), availed himself of this opportunity. “He had no [primary] son . . . and finally



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

279

got a son [Hong-il] from his [commoner] secondary wife so that his blood line did not come to an end.”57 In 1578, Chŏng, suffering from old age, gifted Hong-il with some land and slaves for his livelihood and provided him with extra provisions eventually to conduct ancestral services for his parents. Because he had been blessed with a son when he was over fifty, Chŏng wrote, he granted Hong-il an additional amount of land and one slave “out of greatest anxiety.” Was he anxious that his young son might not be able to successfully defend his heirship in the face of stronger kinsmen? Or was he, who reportedly cared greatly about ritual matters, worried that with Hong-il his descent line might eventually come to an end? Whatever the case, in a postscript Chŏng told Hong-il that he had already willed some of his property to his nephews (i.e., Chin’s sons) and, for supporting the perpetuation of the main-line ancestral rites, had handed a substantial portion of his wealth to the main-line ritual heir, Kŭg-il (Chin’s eldest son)—a fact acknowledged on the latter’s tombstone.58 Chŏng, as a younger son with only secondary issue, was indeed in a weak position to adopt a “proper” son; in contrast, adopting his younger brother Su-il’s second son as his heir was for the sonless Kŭg-il a strategic decision affecting the survival of the entire kin group for which even state approval was secured. A similar, slightly later case was that of Pak Min, the base secondary brother of [Chaeryŏng] Yi Si-ch’ŏng’s wife, Pak-ssi.59 In 1629, when Min shared the parental wealth with his two primary half-sisters—the older one was Pak-ssi—and one base sister, he received five patrimonial slaves with the express proviso “to conduct the ancestral rites like a primary son according to the law.” Whereas the eight slaves of his personal share came exclusively from his father’s side, two of the five ritual slaves (pongsa nobi) had belonged to his primary stepmother (chŏngmo)—an allocation that endorsed his ritual responsibilities to both parents.60 That this solution was tolerable in Namin country was presumably due to the fact that Min, though labeled “base secondary son” in the inheritance document, carried a civilian junior ninth-rank title, indicating that he was actually a “converted” commoner. Nevertheless, the great majority of sajok in Andong remedied the lack of a primary heir in the main line (chongp’a) with adopting a suitable substitute, with munjung as well as state approval. A few rare documents preserved among the Tundŏk papers illustrate how Yi Sanghyŏng’s second son, Mun-wŏn (1613–84), solved his succession problem. Mun-wŏn had only one daughter (later Ch’oe Ch’i-ong’s wife) from his primary wife, a Puan Kim, but two sons and three daughters from his commoner secondary wife. Following the “ritual codes” (yejŏn), he designated his second son, Sŏng-no,61 as his heir. In view of the latter’s impending heavy ritual responsibilities—he had to take turns in the (still) rotating rites in the main house and eventually service the rites for Mun-wŏn and his primary wife— Mun-wŏn gifted (pyŏlgŭp) him in 1678, well before his death, with twenty-three majigi of land and two slaves (and their offspring). He added that in case Sŏng-no had no son, an adoptee should be chosen from among his (Munwŏn’s) base grandsons; if this were impracticable, the munjung should make the choice so that “the rituals will be perpetuated for one hundred generations.” That Mun-wŏn was anxious about this arrangement becomes clear from the preamble to the inheritance division he made one year later. By that time, his daughter had died, and in her stead [Sangnyŏng] Ch’oe Ch’i-ong became the primary heir of land and slaves. Did he fear interference from that side? Perhaps,

280

Divisions and Bondings

because Mun-wŏn, after reaffirming the legality of his choice of Sŏng-no as heir, nevertheless pondered the possibility of choosing a nonagnate to perform one day the rites for him and his wife (oeson pongsa). Or would it be feasible, he mused, to let the ancestral rites rotate with nonagnatic descendants and expect that the rites be continued for four generations (i.e., until Mun-wŏn’s shrine rituals would come to an end)? Since worship of maternal grandparents by a daughter’s son, however, had recently been disapproved of as violating both sentiment and ritual directions, this would, Mun-wŏn decided, be even more improbable in his case because there was no nonagnatic grandson (Ch’oe Ch’i-ong had only three daughters), and daughters would anyway be excluded as ritual performers.62 Thus, likely referring to Song Si-yŏl’s censure of nonagnatic worship as a breach of agnation,63 Mun-wŏn saw his arrangement justified and, “because my fields are not very productive,” willed to each of his two secondary sons an extra share of ten majigi of land to assist their livelihood. As the ritual heir, Sŏng-no seems to have done well economically; he became a frequent buyer of land in the early eighteenth century.64 At times, however, the preference of a secondary son as heir over an adopted son seems to have been motivated, in violation of ritual prescriptions, by purely economic considerations, in particular when land was getting scarce. Even though a sŏja heir or his descendants risked being challenged later by primary collaterals or an adopted son with the odious charge of “having usurped the primary line” (t’alchong),65 a secondary son was, after all, “blood-related” (hyŏlsok) and thus presumably a better steward of his father’s wealth than an adoptee with split loyalties. Again, the documentary evidence for such a conjecture is thin, but Yi Mun-wŏn’s testamentary arrangements may give a clue in this direction. Clearly, a youthful sŏja heir controlling considerable property was, without the protection of the law, in danger of being deprived of his heirship. That this danger was real seems to be reflected in the numerical rise of petitions that sought to obtain state sanction for installing a secondary son as heir.66 Nevertheless, such manipulations of secondary-son heirships seem to have been rare and apparently confined primarily to Chŏlla. Generally, secondary sons were not deemed fit to guarantee their fathers’ descent group’s physical and sociocultural reproduction, and thus were forced to form their own, often short-lived, “left” (chwajok) or “secondary” (sŏjok) descent lines excluded from the ancestral cult of the primary descent group.

Safeguarding Patrilineality: The Munjung as Kin Contract The shift to primogeniture was a momentous event in the history of Korean descent groups. It might never have materialized, however, if it had not been for the concomitant development of the more broadly conceived munjung that blunted the ensuing social and economic inequality between brothers by making all male agnates coparceners (joint heirs) of the ancestral heritage. As argued in chapter 8, the shrine-focused ritual lineage, which as a group worshiped three or four generations of lineal ancestors (tangnae), was always numerically limited; in contrast, the grave-focused munjung 67 tended to enlist



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

281

larger numbers of a descent group’s agnatic members, even if locally dispersed. The size and the economic power of a munjung could, as will become evident, enhance a descent group’s prestige far beyond its original mission of instituting grave rites for eminent ancestors beyond the third or fourth ascending generations, that is, those who no longer enjoyed shrine rites, but were important for the history of the descent group. Indeed, it was the munjung as a corporate body that came to give a descent group its public stature in the outside world. Despite its overriding significance, the historical documentation on munjung—an unofficial and uncanonical institution—is fragmentary and thus renders the tracing of its development in time and space difficult. Munjung formation was not automatic or universal. Whether or not a descent group could indeed take full advantage of a specific ancestor’s prestige depended to a large degree on the economic strength of his descendants. Unlike the domestic-shrine lineage, which was financed by patrimonial wealth, munjung formation required “new” resources, that is, it hinged on the ability of its initiator(s) to raise the necessary capital from kinsmen. Such fund raising initially started often with organizing a “kin funding association” (chokkye) to which all adult kinsmen were invited (or, at times, coerced?) to contribute. When such a fund reached a certain volume, it was then invested in land and slaves to serve as the munjung’s inalienable corporate wealth. Evidence on the amount of such corporately held munjung land is patchy (and often kept a secret), but it seems to have been most plentiful in the second half of the eighteenth century and then sharply declined in the course of the nineteenth century.68 Only capped agnates (i.e., married adults) within the proper range of kinship could hold a stake in such a corporation; secondary sons and daughters were typically excluded. A member who migrated out did not lose his original stake as long as he maintained active partnership.69 Munjung, when at first focused on near ancestors, embraced small, intimately related memberships, but as their focus shifted to more remote ancestors, their membership expanded proportionally to the generational distance of the ancestor they made their common object of veneration, swelling the numbers of signers of munjung resolutions (wanŭi). Linked by genealogical ties beyond the mourning grades (third cousins) and living dispersed in neighboring localities, these kinsmen, who likely were organized in their own localized munjung, thus came to join what might be termed a “higher-order” munjung, often called chongjung or even taemunjung. The Chinsŏng Yi furnish illustrative examples. As described in chapter 8, in the late sixteenth century the Yi began to search for the tomb of their in-migrating ancestor, Un-hu, and a few decades later for that of their apical ancestor, Sŏk. The driving force in the final stage of the search for Un-hu’s tomb was Yi Kyŏng-jun (1574–1654), chinsa grad­ uate of 1612 and main-line great-grandson of Han (1499–?),70 who had settled in Ilchik Subcounty and thus had started what became known as the Ilchik branch (p’a) of the Chinsŏng Yi. After consulting with his nearest kinsmen, Kyŏng-jun sent out a circular to his kinsmen in Chuch’on, where Yi Chŏng-hoe’s grandson, Chŭng-hyo (1595–1674), was then the main-line heir. A total of some 50 agnatic kinsmen were thus recruited to take part in the final rite of forming Un-hu’s tomb mound in 1643. All of them were either seventh- or eighth-generation descendants of U-yang (Un-hu’s main-line grandson) and

282

Divisions and Bondings

were living in five different village communities located at some distance from Chuch’on. With the inclusion of their Yean brethren—T’oegye’s direct descendants—the number of Yi kinsmen swelled to 207 when, led by Yi Yŏng-ch’ŏl (1607–81), T’oegye’s fifth-generation descendant, and others, they appealed to the governor of Kyŏngsang Province to materially support the reconstruction of the tomb of Sŏk, their apical ancestor.71 Depending on the matter calling for joint action, even quite distant kinsmen residing in separate settlements (who, of course, would no longer attend each other’s domestic shrine rituals) were thus recruited into munjung configurations whose memberships varied in genealogical and numerical span according to the focal ancestor’s ancientness. It was the consciousness of their descent from common patrilineal ancestry that kept them together and made them interact as “kinsmen of the same surname” (sŏngjok) or “our surname relatives” (asŏngch’in)—terms expressing the new idea of an expanded patriline.72 Here, then, the term “kin” (chok) had clearly acquired at last the exclusive agnatic meaning of “same surname” (tongsŏng). Only a well-organized and cohesive munjung could utilize its ancestral entitlement to its full advantage and stage its most impressive public manifestation: the joint grave ritual (myoje) for its target ancestor. Initially apparently performed twice a year in the spring and in the autumn, grave rituals were later often reduced to a date in the ninth or tenth lunar month. The largest and most grandiose of such ritual displays, calling up the entire agnatic membership, took place at the tomb site of a descent group’s apical ancestor (sijo). Perhaps due to the great expense and logistical problems, it was originally held only every third year, but (at least in the Kyŏngsang area) from about the late seventeenth century once, or even twice, a year in the spring and autumn (sihyangje) (fig. 11.3).73 Usually it was the chongson of the main line who offered the first libation, followed by the most senior member of the descent group and/or the head of the munjung.74 Typically, the food offered was, except for the rice, uncooked—marking the ancestral distance. Subsequent to the offerings, the kinsmen celebrated their collegiality by “consuming [ancestral] benevolence” (ŭmbok) at a banquet in the chaesil. Both rite and meal were financed with the income of munjung-owned grave land (wit’o). Attendance at these rites is said to have been mandatory in Hahoe, where an absentee was harshly punished for “lack of filiality”: during the next several regular munjung meetings he had to kneel in the courtyard in front of the main hall (taech’ŏng) of the chongson’s residence, hatless and disgraced with a paper slip stuck to his back showing his name written backward.75 Despite the munjung’s important ritual function, it did not stand in competition to the domestic-shrine lineage. On the contrary, it was deeply involved in safeguarding the main line’s interests by assisting it in times of crisis. This is vividly illustrated, for instance, by a case involving [Andong] Kwŏn Pŏl’s descendants in 1661. The oldest son of Kwŏn Pŏl’s great-great-grandson, Mok, had a stroke and was paralyzed so that, unable to marry a primary wife, he had taken a low-class concubine. As a sick and not properly married man, he was considered unfit to continue the ancestral charge of the main line. Worried about this “day and night,” Mok consulted the elders, and the munjung decided to make Mok’s second son, Tu-in (1643–1719),76 the main-line heir. This decision was duly announced in the ancestral shrine, and a document was drawn up to prevent future disputes. Twelve kinsmen, led by Mok’s father’s second cousin as munjung head and



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

283

Fig.11.3 Gathering of the munjung to celebrate the biannual grand sacrifice (sihyangje) at the tomb of their apical ancestor, Kim Chin (photograph by Kim Kwang-ŏk).

including eight of Mok’s brothers and cousins (up to third degree), signed it in generational order, but Mok himself did not sign.77 Similarly, in 1665, Chaeryŏng Yi kinsmen were called together because of the “deplorable fate of the house [mun].” The ritual heir, Ŭn-bo’s (1520–80) eldest son, Kwangok, had died young without male offspring, and consequently the main line had shifted to Ŭn-bo’s second son, Ham. Ham’s eldest son, Si-ch’ŏng (1580–1616), also had died in 1616 and Si-ch’ŏng’s son and grandson died in short succession in the late 1650s and early 60s, so that by 1665 the weight of the ancestral trust lay on Ham’s young great-greatgrandson, Chi-hyŏn (1639–1717). This precarious survival of the main line filled “all descendants with great anxiety,” most likely also because of the threat to the considerable amount of ancestral land. Now the munjung convened to secure this land against misappropriations by later generations, to reassign it according to the changed genealogical circumstances, to nominate slave guardians for each ancestral grave, and to fix a revised ritual calendar, which included rites for the heirless Kwang-ok. The resolution (munjung ibŭi) was signed, in generational order, by Ham’s two surviving sons, a grandson of Ham’s dead second son, and, at the end, by the new ritual heir, Chi-hyŏn.78 Whereas in Kwŏn Mok’s and Yi Ham’s cases the main lines were continued by second (primary) sons and only minor readjustments in the assignment of sacrificial land

284

Divisions and Bondings

were thus necessary, the switching of the main line to a more distant collateral line was a much graver matter. It not only entailed ritual issues, but had knotty economic implications as well. This was exemplified in 1642 when a munjung had to arbitrate a dispute that arose around sacrificial land between the widow (ch’ongbu) of a ritual heir, who had died without a son, and the heir’s father’s first cousin (i.e., the ritual heir’s paternal uncle once removed). The latter insisted that, because he, as the heir of a second son, had to continue the ancestral rites, the ritual land should be transferred to him as the new chongson. To support his case, he recalled the law of 1554 that had greatly reduced the discretionary rights of the ch’ongbu in the search for a jural heir.79 He furthermore adduced T’oegye’s dislike of a widow’s involvement in ancestral matters. The munjung at last sided with the uncle and stipulated that of the thirty-five majigi of sacrificial paddy land nine had to be given to the widow for her livelihood and twenty-two to the newly designated ritual heir. The remaining four were to be converted into grave land.80 Though the above examples evidence that in the mid-seventeenth century “horizontal succession,” that is, the switching of a primary descent line to a collateral line, was still tolerated in violation of the lineal principle, toward the end of the century the continuation of a main-descent line lacking a direct lineal heir came to be more commonly secured by adopting an heir (iphu) from among collateral kinsmen of the proper generation.81 Customarily, it was the munjung who had in the first instance to approve such a procedure. In 1729, a Naeap Kim, Min-haeng (1673–1737), Kim Ch’ŏl’s sixth-generation main-line heir, who did not have sons, appealed to the Ministry of Rites to adopt as his heir the second son of his distant cousin, Tŏk-ha, Yong’s sixth-generation grandson. Besides the testimony of the young candidate’s widowed mother, it was not before the munjung head (munjang) confirmed both families’ consent that the adoption was officially approved in Seoul.82 In addition to ritual and semijudicial functions, in the eighteenth century some munjung began to pursue purely secular activities. In the Andong area, the munjung as corporate landowner facilitated economic transactions for its members. In 1718, when the harvest was bad, an Ŭisŏng Kim kinsman could not pay the yearly interest totaling 98 yang 83 on a large amount of grain and money he had borrowed from the munjung. He therefore was forced to sell to the munjung thirteen majigi of land to cancel his debts. In the same year, another kinsman had to do the same to extricate himself from a similar predicament. In 1746, the ritual heir exchanged some land with the munjung.84 The munjung’s economic role also emerges from Andong Kwŏn documents. In 1758, the munjung received some “inherited paddies” (chŏllaedap) as a loan repayment, and a few years later, in 1769, the munjung bought back the Yaongjŏng, a pavilion erected by Kwŏn Pŏl’s older brother Ŭi, which the impoverished main-line heir had sold, together with surrounding land, to a collateral kinsman. The munjung justified the large expense of one hundred yang by stating that “to preserve [the pavilion] collectively by all kinsmen is a hundred times better than to have it preserved by one individual alone.”85 It was also a munjung decision to reroute an irrigation watercourse that ran through Yu’gok and in wet seasons not only muddied the grounds around three low-lying houses but also cut off their geomantic lifeline.86 Irritated about “recent fashion trends invading the inner quarters” in violation of the ancestral tradition of frugality, some one hundred Kwŏn kinsmen, while assembled for an ancestral rite in 1784, signed a resolution (munjung



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

285

wanŭi) that they vested with the authority of “domestic law” (kabŏp). It not only commanded a simpler hairstyle for the women—no more than four “switches” (tari) of false hair—and the substitution of patternless silks for patterned fabrics at weddings, it also admonished the men to be frugal in their attire: “Keep fancy things away from your body in fulfillment of the ancestors’ will!” The ninety-eight underwriters of this resolution belonged to four generations and were led by Ŭng-do (n.d.), the fifth-generation ritual heir of above mentioned Tu-in, and the munjung head, an elder of Tu-in’s son’s generation.87 Munjung were landowners and also possessed buildings such as storehouses, graveside chaesil, pavilions, and (as will be discussed in chapter 12) memorial halls (sau). In time, the munjung traded in land and lent grain or money to its members, but there seems to be no evidence that a munjung was ever involved in outside commercial or any other nonagrarian activities. With land getting scarce in late Chosŏn, munjung land often turned into a safety net for impoverished munjung members, who were allowed to earn their livelihood by tilling corporately held land as tenant cultivators. Such arrangements were, of course, not unproblematic because these tenants were at the same time shareholders. Written agreements, therefore, usually laid down firm rules, threatening a defaulting tenant with serious consequences.88 Munjung assets, variously exposed to private interests, could easily disappear and ultimately lead to a munjung’s dissolution. Often growing into a multigenerational organization of agnates and holding con­ siderable amounts of corporate property, a munjung was administered by a munjung head (munjang), a senior elected on the basis of the high esteem he enjoyed among his kinsmen. He was assisted by officers (yusa), who rotated every year. When extraordinary ritual issues or matters of special import such as the compilation of a genealogy or the printing of an ancestor’s collected works had to be deliberated, members were called together by a circular (t’ongmun)89 to “lineage meetings” (munhoe or chonghoe). Decisions had to be unanimous90 or at least supported by a majority and endorsed by the ritual heir. They were enshrined in written documents (wanŭi) that explained the issue at stake and spelled out procedural guidelines (chŏlmok) (fig. 11.4). Such contract-like documents were then (legally) binding for the signers as well as for their descendants, and often they were carved on wooden plaques and hung up in the chaesil as visual reminders. Violators were, depending on the gravity of their offense, reported to the authorities and, as a final resort, expelled from the munjung.91 Some munjung devised “lineage rules” (mun’gyu) to guide, with the imprint of ancestral authority, the behavior and expectations of the members toward the munjung. Being an informal organization of agnates, the munjung received no formal state recognition and thus only rarely appears in government records. This surely must be inter­ preted as an indication that the lineage sought state confirmation only in extraordinary circumstances and, conversely, that the state did not involve itself in lineage affairs. The only mention of the munjang (or munjung) in an official context is in the Taejŏn t’ong­ p’yŏn of 1785 in connection with adoption matters: the munjung head was, in place of parents and overriding a widow’s will, entitled to petition the Ministry of Rites for legitimizing the adoption of a main-line heir92—a step presumably taken only when the mainline succession was threatened by munjung-internal conflicts of opinion. Documentary information on the history of munjung—their formation, stability,

286

Divisions and Bondings

Fig. 11.4 The munjung prepares a collective document (wanŭi) (photograph by Kim Kwang-ŏk).

or possible dissolution—is extremely hard to come by. Recent fieldwork, however, indicates that munjung organizations initiated in the course of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries by the Naeap Kim, the Hahoe Yu, and the Andong Kwŏn, as narrated above, survived more or less uninterruptedly into the late twentieth century. In the 1970s, the Naeap Kim, for instance, were still maintaining corporate grave land, named after the location of the respective grave(s), for five major ancestors: their apical ancestor Yong-bi on Ot’osan, the in-migrating ancestor Kŏ-du, Kŏ-du’s grandson Yŏng-myŏng and greatgrand­son Han-gye, and Han-gye’s son Man-gŭn, the first settler of Naeap. Whereas inde­ pendent grave lands were attached to the often widely scattered tombs of early ancestors, the same pieces of land frequently served several later tombs concentrated in ancestral graveyards. In the case of Kim Su-il, for instance, who was buried just below Chin’s tomb, the income of shared land financed the graveside rituals for father and son. The same was true for conjugal tomb sites, since wives were commonly buried close to or in the tombs of their husbands, or for any other combination of burial sites. Not only did the amounts of land thus set aside differ greatly, but the number of “endowed” tombs also varied according to the power and prestige of the munjung to which they belonged.93 Land thus set aside, though likely to have fluctuated over time, still enables Yong-bi’s descendants to perform a sihyangje for their apical ancestor in the second and tenth lunar months on Ot’osan, and graveside rituals once a year in the autumn for eight generations of Yongbi’s descendants down to Chin, for whom there are two rites each year.94



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

287

Similarly, the Andong Kwŏn have been celebrating a sihyangje for their founding ancestor, Haeng, twice a year—on Hansik and the tenth lunar month—ever since his tomb was rediscovered in the late fifteenth century.95 Even though none of the tombs is now extant, in the early 1960s the “grand kin council” (chokhoeso)96 of the Hahoe Yu was managing an endowment of five majigi of dry land and fifteen majigi of paddy land for six sites marked with offering altars (tanso). These sites belonged to their apical ancestor Chŏl, to the seventh-generation ancestor, and to the ancestral couples of the eighth and ninth generations. In addition, Yu Sŏng-nyong’s descendants maintained six gravesites with combined landed property amounting to forty-three majigi of paddy and thirty-five majigi of dry land, with roughly one-third of both attached to Yu Sŏng-nyong’s grave.97 The above examples demonstrate the powerful ritual and economic hold the ancestors have had over their descendants until recent times. Even though figures are hard to find, spending on rituals is estimated to have amounted to up to 70 percent of a lineage’s expenditures.98 Although economically unproductive, the funds spent over the centuries on these costly ritual performances in honor of key ancestors were what Bourdieu called “demonstrative expenditures”99—the transformation of economic capital into symbolic capital so vital for projecting a descent group’s image as a coherent and ritually conscious social unit toward the outside world.

The Mature Localized Lineage Organization The mature “lineage system” as it emerged in late Chosŏn was the most conspicuous product of Korea’s Confucianization. Whereas the ritual lineage (chong, chongjok, chongp’a) carried the aura of the ritually pure “official” version of a Confucian-style patrilineage, the “associational” or “contractual” munjung lacked a widely acknowledged scriptural basis and thus, not surprisingly, was not mentioned in Korean ritual handbooks. Yet, it was the munjung that acted as the ritual line’s protective umbrella and thus safeguarded the latter’s permanence. In essence, then, two principles of kinship— primogeniture and fraternal solidarity—conjoined in a way that offered a descent group, in a localized setting, a high degree of cohesion and continuance. Naturally, the two principles at times stood in competition, giving rise to internal tension and even conflict. Under such circumstances, the ritual heir (chongson), as the primogeniture successor, wielded near absolute authority. Yet, a munjung’s often stronger economic standing provided a munjung head, frequently the chongson’s senior, with crucial leverage in decision making. It was the dynamic interplay of the two principles these two men represented that endowed the late Chosŏn-period descent group with enormous resilience to withstand internal and external pressures. When internal segmentation (punp’a) occurred, it was the patrilineage that split along genealogical lines, often simply for classificatory purposes.100 Even if a new segment (p’a) developed its own corporate base with its own ancestral shrine, this did not signify a total break-away, because segments and subsegments continued to define themselves in relation to the senior line of descent (chongp’a) from which they separated. In

288

Divisions and Bondings

other words, a new segment remained always oriented toward the senior main line whose genealogical and ritual superiority was never disputed—union seems generally to have carried a higher value than splitting. Though the different p’a may have started to compile their own genealogies (p’abo), these were often again united in a “higher-order genealogy” (taedongbo) that acknowledged the chongp’a, however far removed, as the principal axis of the entire descent structure. Segmentation seems to have rarely resulted from differential property ownership among brothers. Rather, it was a man’s prestige as a prominent public or scholarly figure that induced his descendants to establish a new segment with him as their “branch ancestor” (p’ajo), naming their segment with his office title or pen name (ho). Segmentation was a sign of strength and prestige, was usually irregular, and always retrospective. Although the members of a new branch may have migrated to a new locality and built their own independently endowed ancestral shrine, they always remained conscious of the main line from which they had branched off. Indeed, it was through the munjung network that they stayed in contact with their genealogically superior kinsmen by regularly sending representatives to the munjung-led autumnal grave rituals to common ancestors. To take the Naeap Kim as an example, each of Kim Chin’s five sons became the ancestor of a separate segment named after their respective pen names: Yakpong-p’a (Kŭg-il), Kwibong-p’a (Su-il), Unam-p’a (Myŏng-il), Hakpong-p’a (Sŏng-il), and Namakp’a (Pog-il).101 Despite this segmentation, they remained under the unifying shield of the Ch’ŏnggye “main line” (taejong) with their father, Chin, as its apical ancestor.102 The five branches, each localized in its own village (the Yakpong-p’a and the Kwibong-p’a both in Naeap), differed in size and prestige, with Hakpong’s segment, resident in Kŭmgye, being the most prestigious (in terms of the number of degree and office holders) and the largest numerically. A further major segmentation took place among the sons of Kŭg-il’s grandson, Si-on (1598–1669). Si-on had eight sons, six of whom came to head subsegments within the Yakpong-p’a (the two other sons had been adopted out). Among these six sublineages, the one known as Chich’on-p’a became the most prosperous, due to the munkwa success (1660) and high political career of its focal ancestor, Si-on’s fourth son, Pang-gŏl. The same prestige factors prompted the branching-off of the segment known as Chesan-p’a, headed by Si-on’s great-grandson, Sŏng-t’ak. The segmentation process in Yakpong’s sublineage (as well as in all the other sublineages)103 thus was most conspicuous in the second half of the sixteenth, and again in the latter part of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries—riding on the Namin’s political fortunes. Hence there is a striking correlation between degree/office holding and segmentation, with factional ups and downs determining the rhythm of the Ch’ŏnggye lineage’s internal segmentation. Clearly, for a sublineage to be viable and long-lasting, not only a sufficiently large posterity but equally a favorable political and economic environment proved essential. Committed to common ancestry, competition between subsegments seems to have been covert rather than open. By the early seventeenth century, the Hahoe Yu, for example, had formed two branches residing side by side in the same village—the senior Kyŏmam-p’a with Yu Un-nyong as its focal ancestor, and the junior Sŏae-p’a with Yu Sŏng-nyong as its focal ancestor. Though Un-nyong’s line constituted the main line with Yangjindang as the main-line residence (chongt’aek), it was Sŏng-nyong’s official and



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

289

scholarly career that gave his line, residing in Ch’unghyodang, a special aura of prestige and prosperity. Indeed, even though it was this latter line that brought forth more exam graduates/office holders and that was more affluent than the former, thus representing the Hahoe Yu more prominently in the outside world, in ritual matters Kyŏmam’s descendants wielded undisputed superiority.104 Besides segmentation, a descent group was, as detailed earlier, prone to dispersal as members moved to different locations. The reasons for such movements were manifold. During the first two centuries of the dynasty, men were frequently enticed to leave their immediate kin upon concluding an uxorilocal marriage or taking possession of an inheritance share. Similarly, a political exile or a war refugee may have found himself forcibly separated from his kin and eventually established himself and his descendants in a far-off place, thus losing active ties to his original group. Such dispersal of a kin group evidently contributed to the complexity of keeping track of its members and preserving consciousness of common descent. With the numerical and geographical expansion and diversification of the lineage structure, genealogical identification of individual members became more complex as more distant kinsmen may have literally lost sight of each other. But because a lineage hinged on the exact classification of its members, a generational naming system came into use. Each generation was assigned a “generation-specific character” (hangnyŏl)—a graphic element often based on the five phases (ohaeng)105 that had to appear in the personal names (hwi) of all agnates belonging to the same generation.106 This system also facilitated the generational arrangement of the lineage genealogy (chokpo) (discussed below). In sum, the sajok kin groups of late Chosŏn were organized in highly structured multifunctional lineage systems. Whereas the ritual lineage was naturally centered on the domestic shrine, with the tendency of kinsmen to disperse and settle in different locations, often as independent social units with their own shrines, it was the munjung that provided the operational framework for collective activities involving larger numbers of kinsmen. Indeed, it was through the munjung network that kinsmen were called up to participate in such collective activities as the compilation of a genealogy or the building of a chaesil. Though lacking formal legal status, these lineage systems were exclusive—sharply differentiating between kin and nonkin, insider and outsider (oein or t’ain)—and self-regulating entities exercising semijudicial authority over their members— and often beyond, so that the local magistrates are said to have hesitated to interfere in their internal affairs. Indeed, generating their own dynamics, the late Chosŏn lineages served as formidable vehicles of status reproduction and affirmation.

Localization and the Development of Single-Surname Villages An outcome of the extended process of lineage formation was the development of singlesurname villages. It started with the consolidation of an elite line in a particular locality with which its descendants came to closely identify themselves, claiming it as their “native place” (kohyang). As David Faure has suggested, there is an intricate interrelationship

290

Divisions and Bondings

between territorial bonding and lineage formation.107 Such a link between territory and kinship seems nowhere more evident than in the gradual emergence of single-surname villages in the course of the seventeenth century. Membership in a powerful localized lineage, often in lieu of office holding, came to guarantee the maintenance of high social status. A Japanese survey in the 1930s identified close to two thousand such vil­ lages, the majority of which were typically located in the southern half of the country— 183 in the Andong area and 92 in the northern part of Chŏlla Province.108 Both the Yŏnggaji and the Yongsŏngji attribute the rise and prosperity of a village first of all to its natural environment: the more auspicious the setting, the more conspicuous the achievements of its “local personages” (inmul). Writing about northern Kyŏngsang in his famed T’aengniji, Yi Chung-hwan, too, called attention to the close correlation between the geomantic circumstances of the Andong area and the appearance of human talents: toward the north, Andong was sheltered by the bifurcation of the T’aebaek and Sobaek mountain ranges and, toward the south, it was encircled by the Naktong River. “Mountains in the rear and water in front” (paesan imsu) not only represented the favored constellation of a whole landscape, it also signified the geomantically most propitious setting for a village. “To settle along a brook” (kyegŏ) thus linked the aesthetics of calm scenery with the profitability of irrigation and cultivation. In short, this was the physiographic description of a “blessed area” (pokchi) like Yean and Andong, where villages such as Chuch’on, Naeap, Hahoe, and Yu’gok emerged to national fame.109 Rare geomantic properties (myŏnggi) were, for instance, said to have facilitated the unusual multiple examination success of three Chidang (Chup’o Subcounty) residents: Kim Hyŏn110 and his matrilateral kinsman, Pang Tu-wŏn,111 both of whom achieved firstclass honors in the civil and military examinations of 1627 respectively, as did Hwang Wi eleven years later in the munkwa exams of 1638. According to popular lore recorded in the Yongsŏngji, it was the special features of “Dragon Head Hill” (Yongdubong) in Chidang’s vicinity that expedited the three men’s triumph in the “dragon [civil] and tiger [military] examinations.”112 In the eyes of Korean observers, then, it was favorable natural surroundings, the “territorial spirit” (chihon), that stimulated the founding of a village and advanced the cultural achievements of its inhabitants. Single-surname villages, however, did not come about “naturally.” Rather, they evolved into exclusive settlements through a process of social, economic, and cultural “construction” that extended over generations. As pointed out earlier, a few settlements, like On’gye or Yu’gok, were established by deliberate choice (pokkŏ) and were from the start inhabited principally by a single kin group. In the sixteenth century, however, the predominant settlement pattern was still the multisurname village, where, as a result of the persistent custom of uxorilocal marriage, agnates and affines were living side by side, forming by means of ward fund associations (tonggye) close-knit social and economic communities, as described in chapter 9. Nevertheless, in the course of time, it was not uncommon that the descendants of an in-marrying sonin-law, who prospered through education, office holding, effective social organization, and/or economic activities, would gradually dislodge their affinal relatives and establish themselves as the dominant kin group in the village.



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

291

Such a metamorphosis apparently took place in the village of Kail. A middle-level government official, [Andong] Kwŏn Hang (1403–61),113 a munkwa graduate of 1441, married the daughter of [P’ungsan] Yu So and moved to Kail, a village that So’s grandfather had founded near Hahoe. Though Hang spent most of his life as an official away from home, using his wife’s wealth and inheriting 13 slaves from his mother’s side,114 he nevertheless managed to build up a solid economic basis for his heirs, who inherited 142 slaves, land, and several houses in 1474.115 Hang was buried close to Kail. It was through Hang’s grandson Chu—a purge victim of 1504—that the line also acquired a sarim reputation.116 Although some of Hang’s descendants later moved out of Kail as sons-in-law or nonagnatic grandsons, those who remained began, from Hang’s great-grandson’s generation in the late sixteenth century, to dominate the village to such an extent that Kail came to be so closely identified with the Kwŏn that the Yŏngaji recorded Hang as its first resident. Within four generations, thus, Hang’s descendants had won recognition as the Kail Kwŏn.117 The history of Naeap (Ch’ŏnjŏn) similarly illustrates the point. Kim Man-gŭn first settled in Naeap in the early sixteenth century as the son-in-law of a powerful local magnate. Benefiting from the latter’s extended landed property in the western part of Imha Subcounty, Man-gŭn’s sons and grandsons were consequently born and active there. It was Man-gŭn’s grandson, Kim Chin, and the latter’s descendants who, as narrated before, continued to live in and around Naeap and transformed the village, through cultural and economic success, into one of the richest and best-organized single-surname villages of the area.118 Hahoe Village in P’ungsan Subcounty, too, started out as a multisurname settlement. According to the Yŏnggaji, Hahoe’s first settlers were two high officials (chŏnsŏ), [Hŭng­ hae] Pae Sang-gong and [P’ungsan] Yu Chong-hye, who moved into the Hahoe area during the transition from Koryŏ to Chosŏn. The geomantically most auspicious sites, however, had already been taken up by two earlier settlers, the [Kimhae] Hŏ, who built a village on the southern slope of Hwasan Mountain, and the [Kwangju] An, who did the same on its northern slope. This forced Pae and Yu to settle some distance away from the protective Hwasan Mountain, in a flat area encircled by a loop of the Naktong River— giving their village its name, “River Bend Village.”119 Despite this less propitious location, it was Yu Chong-hye’s only son, Hong (1373–1458), a military officer, who energetically started to develop the village and its surroundings. Of him it is said: “He lived there [in Hahoe] and devoted his energies to sowing and reaping. . . . In his later years his property had become abundant and he built an additional estate in (nearby) Taehyŏn. Just outside, there was a pavilion in a grove on the edge of the large [P’ungsan] plain from where he had a free gaze over more than a thousand ri. In spring, summer, and autumn he often went to the pavilion to take a look at farming.”120 Benefiting from economic prosperity and official achievement, it was the line of Hong’s eldest son So that proliferated, so that Yu Chong-hye’s sixth-generation descendant, Chung-yŏng (1515–73)121—father of Un-nyong and Sŏng-nyong—still lived in Hahoe toward the end of the sixteenth century.122 Through multiple intermarriages between the Pae, the Yu, and other local kin groups, most prominently the Andong Kwŏn and the Kwangju An, by the beginning of the seventeenth century Hahoe was still a mixed village, but the Pae had in the meantime

292

Divisions and Bondings

been absorbed by the An. It was from the generation of Un-nyong and Sŏng-nyong, both residing in Hahoe, that the P’ungsan Yu began to assume control of the village.123 The gradual shift from multisurname to single-surname villages is impressively documented by the ward rosters (tongan) that apparently came into use around 1600 and were later regularly amended. As simple lists of names arranged according to seniority, they recorded the male population of a tong, which was either a single village or, perhaps more often, an area covering a cluster of hamlets. The purpose of these rosters was clearly, in Faure’s meaning, to demarcate rights to settlement and exploitation of common resources within the tong.124 The names of the nonelite, most often secondary sons,125 were listed a notch lower than those of the sajok members. The ward was thus socially as well as territorially divided into “high and low” (sang-ha)—the elite inhabiting the main settlement, residing in tiled mansions, and their secondary sons confined to live in strawthatched houses in the “lower hamlets” (hach’on) at its periphery. “Tong regulations” (tonggyu) often added moral conditions: someone committing a criminal act was, upon the membership’s unanimous consent, to be reported to the local authorities; if a sŏja insulted a “superior,” his name was to be scrapped from the roster, and neither elite nor nonelite was, on pain of punishment, further to entertain relations with him, depriving him of residence, livelihood, and village protection.126 These ward rosters thus impressively demonstrate how earlier multisurname communities contracted into lineagedominated village settlements. In Hahoe, the Yu brothers apparently started a ward roster as early as 1584, but the Roster of 1621 still listed only fourteen P’ungsan Yu among its thirty-four members; the rest were likely all affines. By 1778, however, with merely four out of the eighty-one members belonging to other surnames, Hahoe had clearly turned into a single-surname village of the P’ungsan Yu.127 Thus, in roughly one and a half centuries the Hahoe tongan constituency gradually narrowed to an (almost) exclusive agnatic membership, emphasizing common patrilineal descent within a clearly bonded locality. Eight village rosters (here called “ward fund associations,” tonggye) originating from T’oegye’s hamlet of Kyesang and dating between 1677 and 1808 further illustrate the process of a patrilineally contracting village population. In 1677, only eleven of the eighteen residents were Yi kinsmen. The other three surnames belonged to in-marrying sons-in-law or to nonagnatic grandsons who moved in to take up inherited property. Interestingly, five of these seven sons-in-law joined in-law families who lacked male heirs. From 1730, however, no new surname holders appeared in the village—a clear sign that uxorilocal marriages were no longer contracted and daughters married outside the village. By 1762, 90 percent of the village population consisted of Yi kinsmen, and in the early nineteenth century the Yi were in complete control of their community.128 In Namwŏn County, one of the most notable elite settlements was Tundŏk (Tundŏkpang), which enjoyed a geomantically favored location with Changsŏng Mountain behind it and a well-watered plain in front. Its three hamlets—Tongch’on, Pangch’uk, and Ubŏn— were (and still are) bounded on the east by the Osu River (Osuch’ŏn), which, flowing roughly from north to south, is joined almost in front of Tongch’on by the Ulch’ŏn, a small river coming from the east. A short distance from this confluence, the Osu River makes



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

293

a sharp western bend and captures the waters of another slender stream, the Sŏdoch’ŏn, which runs almost parallel to the Ulch’ŏn. Collectively, the three watercourses are called the “three rivulets” (samgye)—giving Tundŏk the alternative name “Village of The Three Rivulets.” By the early seventeenth century, Tundŏk’s inhabitants belonged to seven different surnames, though the Tundŏk Yi represented the dominant group—the reason why in later (colonial) times Tundŏk was designated as a Tundŏk Yi single-surname village.129 Numerically also prominent were the Sang­nyŏng Ch’oe, the descendants of Ch’oe Su-ung. Su-ung’s great-grandson, Chŏk (1535–96), presumably escaping the narrow living space between mountain and river, moved across the river and founded a new hamlet, while at a later point in time (presumably toward the end of the seventeenth century) the descendants of Ch’oe On settled to the south of Tundŏk in Nobong (Sadong-bang) and thereafter became known as the Nobong Ch’oe. Much fewer in numbers were the Chinju Ha, the Hŭngsŏng Chang, and the Namwŏn Ryang, who lived in closely knit, yet separate clusters in Tundŏk and its immediate surroundings.130 “Single-surname villages” thus did not necessarily denote settlements in which only one descent group resided, but it was usually one numerically strong and well-organized lineage group that gradually came to dominate the village community. As demonstrated above, this process, which accelerated in the course of the seventeenth and climaxed in the eighteenth century, initiated a crucial shift from communities of affines to communities of agnates. The emergence of single-surname villages thus signified the culmination of the sajok’s localization, turning the village into a vital site of sajok identification (fig. 11.5). Villages with strong single-surname dominance such as Hahoe, Naeap, Kŭmgye, or Tundŏk became nuclei from which “satellite” villages were founded. Younger brothers, cousins, and grandsons moved out, initially often upon concluding uxorilocal marriages, and established their own bases—frequently also founding their own subbranches (p’a). At the end of the sixteenth century, for instance, only two of Yu Hong’s five sons remained in Hahoe, and in the course of time more Yu left Hahoe so that, according to their kin roster (chog’an) of 1680, 109 Yu kinsmen (of whom ten were secondary sons) were living in nine different villages besides Hahoe, some as far away as Kunwi, Yŏngch’ŏn, and Yean. As a collectivity, they thus were all part of a far-flung higher-order lineage.131 From among Kim Chin’s five sons, the main-line heir Kŭg-il and Su-il’s eldest son, Yong, continued to reside in Naeap, while Myŏng-il moved further east in Imha Subcounty and developed Sindang, a village noted for “irrigation facilities, suitable soil for the five grains, and even roads.” Sŏng-il built his estate in Kŭmgye-ri, and Pog-il relocated to his wife’s residence in northern Yech’ŏn. Chin’s eldest daughter, married to Yu Sŏng, settled in Musil (Su’gok), a short distance from Naeap. Similarly, the Tundŏk Yi spread out and founded new hamlets like Sin’gi (“New Base,” Saet’ŏ), Tun’gi, Kujang, and Un’gyo so that in late Chosŏn Tundŏk Subcounty was firmly in the hands of the Tundŏk Yi. Typically, as briefly mentioned above, the sajok’s primary and secondary offspring were spatially segregated. Secondary sons lived either in “lower hamlets” on the periphery of elite settlements or were forced to move out to separate sites—at times with the help of a father who would during his lifetime provide the means to buy land and slaves in a new locality.132 Such geographically displaced secondary sons then often intermarried with

Fig. 11.5 Kim Sŏng-il’s residence at Kŭmgye (photograph by the author).



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

295

commoners and consequently blended into the commoner population.133 Naeap is said to have had two “side villages” (pangch’on), Un’gok and U’gok—apparently originally secondary-son settlements.134 The secondary sons of the Tundŏk Yi, too, lived in two different villages. Yi Sang-hyŏng resided late in life with his secondary wife, Yun-ssi, in Ungyo, where the descendants of Yun-ssi’s son, Mun-jung, continued to live. Equally, the two secondary sons of Yi Mun-wŏn, Sŏng-no and Sŏng-il, and their descendants inhabited the separate village of Tun’gi.135 By far the most famous “secondary” village, however, is the single-surname Oksan-ri, Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s estate north of Kyŏngju, where his secondary son and the latter’s descendants have resided to the present day. Yi’s adopted primary son and his descendants continued to live in Yi’s original settlement, Yangdong.136 The localization of elite patrilineages in exclusive villages naturally led to changed marriage patterns: single-surname villages were strictly exogamous. It then became the fate of the in-marrying wife—and no longer of her husband—to start life as an “outsider” (oein) in her in-law family. As Kwŏn Nae-hyŏn has demonstrated for the Tansŏng area (South Kyŏngsang Province), famous single-surname villages preferentially exchanged spouses among a small, more or less constant number of sajok descent groups who lived within a restricted marriage radius that rarely crossed provincial boundaries.137 Multiple marital ties spun over generations among a limited number of kin groups, also typical for Andong and Namwŏn, enmeshed single-surname villages in durable affinal networks vital for reproducing high social status in late Chosŏn. The predominance of one sajok descent group in a particular locality did not, of course, depend on numbers alone. It also rested on its economic power. By the beginning of the eighteenth century, the Tundŏk Yi, for instance, had become the largest landowners by controlling 34 percent of the landed resources in the subcounty.138 In Andong, a certain concentration of land ownership in and around sajok villages had started in the late sixteenth century and accelerated in the course of the next century. Land inherited in distant locales became too burdensome for cultivation and was therefore sold and replaced with land closer to the principal estates.139 The consolidation of landed property and its development with advanced agricultural methods using the labor of slaves as well as of commoner tenants were, in the absence of trade, the chief economic activities with which single descent groups maintained controlling power over their villages. Natural beauty and propitiousness of its setting—a conspicuous combination of mountains and water (sansu)—heightened the attractiveness of a village. Architectural monuments such as pavilions built in scenic spots as icons of culture and leisure enhanced its aesthetic merits. Four of the six pavilions mentioned in the Yŏnggaji were erected by Naeap Kim—among them the White Clouds Pavilion (Paegunjŏng) across the river from Naeap is perhaps the best known. In Yu’gok, the Blue Rock Pavilion (Ch’ŏngamjŏng), standing on a massive boulder in the middle of a pond like a small island surrounded on all four sides by whirling water, was praised in the T’aengniji as “the essence of seclusion” (fig. 11.6).With its exquisiteness it enchanted its beholders and “made them forget to return home.”140 Equally legendary was the Dragon Head Pavilion (Yongdujŏng) in Chidang as a site for poetry contests.141 Such architectural structures stood out as landmarks of the elite’s distinct cultural appropriation of their surroundings and, above all, of their demonstrative detachment from worldly affairs.

296

Divisions and Bondings

Fig. 11.6 The Blue Rock Pavilion at Yu’gok (photograph by the author).

Common to all of these villages was their remoteness from administrative control. All of them lay outside the boundaries of a county seat. Hahoe’s distance from the walled city of Andong, for instance, measures twenty-four kilometers; Yu’gok’s distance is at least twice as much. Kim Si-on, living in Naeap, reportedly never set foot in Andong City for the last thirty years of his life. Putting a safe distance between town and village not only minimized outside interference in village affairs, it also marked such a village as a quasiindependent socioeconomic and cultural entity able to weather outside pressures. In a postface he wrote to the T’aengniji around 1800, Chŏng Tasan summed up the reasons for the sajok’s survival in Kyŏngsang: In our country, Yŏngnam is outstanding as to the beauty of rural estates. Therefore, although the sadaebu have been in difficulties for many centuries, their high social standing and their wealth have not declined. According to their custom, each family [ka] maintains one estate per ancestor, and thus descent groups [chok] live there and do not disperse. This is the reason why their maintenance [of status] has been firm, and their roots have not been pulled up.142



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

297

What lastingly joined agnatic kin to locality were their ancestral graves. The burial site of an in-migrating ancestor on a nearby hillside often turned, as discussed in chapter 8, into the ritual focus of his permanently settled descendants. With the development of full-fledged patrilineages, ancestral graves were relocated and consolidated, and husbands and wives came to be buried in collective ancestral graveyards. The ancestral cult with its elaborate liturgical activities thus provided the ritual basis that ensured the longevity of the single-surname village. In sum, a single-surname village was an aggregate of distinct social, ritual, and economic elements that created the specific characteristics of a locality in time and space. Time was measured in generations. An uninterrupted succession of male heirs, rooted in one place, created what was admiringly called a “locality inhabited through generations” (segŏji). Such places, built upon a temporal continuum, were loci of identity and prestige for their inhabitants—localities inextricably linked to their surname. Indeed, the village name came to stand for a secondary identification (besides the choronym, pon’gwan), and was often recorded in genealogies: the [Ŭisŏng] Kim of Naeap (Ch’ŏnjŏn), the [Andong] Kwŏn of Taksil (Yu’gok), the [P’ungsan] Yu of Hahoe, or the [Chŏnju] Yi of Tundŏk.143 The single-surname village, then, was clearly not simply a place of residence. It legitimated its inhabitants as members not only of a distinct community of kin, but also of a specific social class. It was from such membership that an individual derived confirmation of his elite status that reserved for him a privileged position in the world around him.

Identity and the History of Descent A concomitant of lineage formation was the documentation of descent from a common patrilineal ancestor in a written genealogy. In an increasingly competitive political and economic environment, the tracing of the ancestral past evolved into a determinant of an elite lineage’s identity and self-representation. At first confined to a limited number of lineal antecedents remembered by their tomb sites, as discussed in chapter 8, genealogies later pushed their ancestral claims back to putative ancestors of great antiquity, while at the same time embracing an ever-growing number of dispersed lineage segments. The com­ pilation of a genealogy was thus a purposeful reconstruction of the past and, at the same time, reflected a descent group’s perspective on its contemporary membership. The creation of a collective memory in the form of genealogical records was a stimulus as well as an elaboration of lineage organization, as impressively illustrated by the prefaces to the consecutive editions of the genealogy of the Ŭisŏng Kim, the Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi sebo. According to the preface of 1553, written by Hwang Chul-lyang,144 it was a nonagnate, Yi Suk, who first collected data on agnatic and nonagnatic (nae-oe) descendants of the Ŭisŏng Kim in a booklet. But before these records could be carved into woodblocks, they were scattered during the Imjin War. When, in the first decades of the seventeenth century, some Kim agnates tackled a reconstruction, they strove to provide their common ancestor, Yong-bi, whose historicity was established through his tomb on Ot’osan, with an illustrious ancestry. They boldly made him a direct descendant of Alchi, the legendary

298

Divisions and Bondings

first Kim from whom the Silla Kim kings were thought to originate. Such an ascription, however, was quickly dismissed as pure guesswork, and in the third edition (1650 and 1656), Yong-bi was transformed into a fifth-generation descendant of Sŏk,145 the fourth son of Silla’s last King Kyŏngsun (r. 927–35),146 from whose enfeoffment with Ŭisŏng the Kim supposedly had obtained their ancestral seat. This reconstruction was, of course, also riddled with problems, especially since there were no reliable documents after Sŏk down to Yong-bi. If Ŭisŏng had indeed become the Kim’s pon’gwan through Sŏk, then, as Kim I-hyŏn, the author of the 1720 preface to a revised version of this genealogy, remarked, it was unreasonable to venerate Yong-bi as apical ancestor (sijo), as Kim Chin had done when he established a commemorative stone marker at the latter’s tomb. Moreover, if Yong-bi were considered as apical ancestor, he added, it would make no sense to record the descendants of his younger brothers in the same genealogy. Thus, in order to make Yong-bi and his two younger brothers into plausible fifth-generation descendants of Sŏk, the generations between Sŏk and Yong-bi had to be reconstructed with three men of doubtful origin—an arrangement by which Yong-bi could reasonably be regarded as the “intermediate ancestor” (chungjo) by his descendants in Andong.147 The identification of Sŏk rather than of Yong-bi as the progenitor of the Ŭisŏng Kim was likely propagated by a group of Kim kinsmen that included descendants of Yong-bi’s first and third son and of Yong-bi’s younger brother Yong-p’il—a group that would have been split if Yong-bi had been appropriated by the Kim in Andong as their apical ancestor. By organizing a “kin funding association” (chokkye) in 1670, they therefore aimed to unite the Ŭisŏng Kim who, though all sharing descent from Sŏk (according to the 1650/56 genealogy), had scattered “like clouds” and were residing in the capital as well as in the countryside of Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla. The two leaders, Kim Wang and Kim Sŏng-gu148 (I-hyŏn’s distant kinsmen), regretted that because of the Kim’s dispersal an earlier kye had ceased, and vowed that their revived kye would be permanent and “unite the dispersed kinsmen in one single edifice of relatives [ch’in] in the spirit of honoring their forebears and upholding the [patrilineal] descent principle [chong].” In short, the new kye was to celebrate the Kim’s “we-ness” (ajok).149 Among the twenty-two kinsmen present were civil, military, and lower degree holders, eight of whom resided in the capital (kyŏngp’a), the rest predominately in Andong—Kim Kŭg-il’s, Su-il’s and Myŏng-il’s descendants—and in Yech’ŏn, Pog-il’s descendants (hyangp’a). By setting their signatures under the contract, they manifestly endorsed the reconstruction of the missing generations between Sŏk and Yong-bi necessary to create a genealogical charter that would embrace “all” Ŭisŏng Kim. The reasoned decision to make Sŏk the apical ancestor of the Ŭisŏng Kim highlights the fact that the choice of a sijo was in many cases a rather late phenomenon. A genealogy was, after all, a cultural invention motivated by the ambition not only to establish an unbroken patrilineal descent line back to an ancestor of prestigious origin but also to include as many acknowledged kinsmen as possible. Nevertheless, an indeterminable number of potential kinsmen were undoubtedly excluded by such a procedure from the final document.150 Even though the 1720 version of the genealogy was so far the most complete one, many doubts and uncertainties remained unresolved even after the fully eight years of



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

299

research that had gone into its compilation. The wide dispersal of the Ŭisŏng Kim—the Naeap Kim were after all only one among many localized subdivisions—made a comprehensive inventory of all segments and branches an almost impossible task. Nevertheless, the 1802 revision added roughly another third of information to the one of 1720, but even the “new genealogy” (sinbo) of 1901, intended to be all-inclusive, was declared an incomplete representation of the Ŭisŏng Kim.151 Despite the great efforts to incorporate all dispersed kinsmen in one and the same genealogy, the editors could hope to get information only from those kinsmen who were well organized in their respective localities. That locality as a marker of superior social organization had indeed become a crucial means of identification, as discussed earlier, finds support in the fact that the final version of the Kim genealogy of 1901 identified each kin branch by its place of residence (kŏjuji). The majority were naturally clustered in Kyŏng­ sang Province, but there also were several branches in Chŏlla and Hwanghae Provinces and one even as far north as P’yŏngan Province. The Ŭisŏng Kim genealogy thus ultimately depicted well-established localized segments that were united by a supralocal network of kin identity and solidarity. The desire for comprehensiveness was, of course, not unique to the Ŭisŏng Kim. Similar tendencies are discernible in many other genealogies as well. In 1907, the Andong Kwŏn, for instance, produced an all-inclusive “higher-order” genealogy (taedongbo) that collected the branch genealogies (p’abo) of their fifteen branches (p’a) in one large multi­ volume compilation.152 Genealogical records as they evolved over time and combined ancestral depth with unprecedented comprehensiveness in the eighteenth century not only legitimated an individual’s elite status. By making status maintenance a collective enterprise, they also show how lineage membership in late Chosŏn came to be underpinned by a far-flung kin network that promoted cohesion and facilitated cooperation far beyond village borders.

The Loss and Retrieval of Identity: A Rare Story How the claim of high social status and its privileges depended on verifiable genealogical records is revealed by a chain of events that stirred great emotions at the time of their unraveling. In the spring of 1592, when news of the Japanese invasion reached Andong, Kim Yong, readying his family to seek refuge in the mountains of Ch’ŏngsong, prepared a brief genealogical sketch of his forebears and sewed it into the collar of his youngest son’s jacket, thinking that if the boy got lost, he would be able to identify himself. Indeed, Si-gwa (1588–1653), then only five years old, got separated from his family when Japanese soldiers attacked them at night. The Japanese burnt everything in sight, even Si-gwa’s clothes, so that the sewed-in document got partly scorched. After wandering around some time as a beggar, Si-gwa received shelter and was eventually adopted by a Kimhae Kim peasant couple who had lost their own children during the Imjin turmoil. Si-gwa’s adoption was briefly referred to in a document dated 1642, in which an aged adoptive uncle, a monk, gave Si-gwa some land to enable him to continue ancestral rites for his

300

Divisions and Bondings

adoptive parents. Ignorant of Si-gwa’s true background, his descendants lived as simple peasants until his seventh-generation descendant, Kim Sun-ch’ŏn, who resided in Mun’gyŏng (in northwestern Kyŏngsang), discovered a dusty little box hidden away on the house’s crossbeam that a shaman identified as the cause of Kim’s wife’s death by illness. Because Sun-ch’ŏn was illiterate, he took the charred contents of the box to a literatus who happened to be related to the Ŭisŏng Kim. Astonished by what he could decipher, the scholar sent Sun-ch’ŏn to Naeap, where he was received by Kim Yong’s eighth-generation main-line heir, Kim Hyŏn-un (1748–1816). This was in the autumn of 1805. Hyŏn-un and his kinsmen recognized Yong’s handwriting on the fragment, and with the evidence of the 1642 document it became clear to all that Sun-ch’ŏn was indeed a descendant of long-lost Si-gwa. Together with eight of his kinsmen, Sun-ch’ŏn then sent an appeal to the magistrate of Mun’gyŏng in which he recounted his remarkable story and petitioned to have his ancestral seat restored to Ŭisŏng (pokkwan). Because the magistrate felt unauthorized to rule on such an unusual request, the matter was submitted to the governor of Kyŏngsang Province who, upon inspecting the documentation, handed down his approval, exclaiming: “Is this not an utterly miraculous and strange affair?” For Si-gwa’s descendants, the most critical stage of their rehabilitation, however, was their reentry into the Ŭisŏng Kim’s genealogy. Only after the entire munjung had unanimously given their consent, was this rare homecoming after more than two hundred years announced, with great emotions, in the ancestral shrine in the second month of 1806. Finally, early in 1830, the Ministry of Rites authorized the “return to the ancestral seat and restitution of lineage membership” (hwan’gwan pokchong) and in the official writ repeated what everyone thought at the time: without the assistance granted by the ancestors from the netherworld, it would never have come about that people, who had lived for ten generations as lowly toilers, could one morning enter the ranks of one of the country’s most illustrious descent groups. Acknowledging this singular turn of fate, the ministry returned to the new Ŭisŏng Kim the sajok privilege of corvée labor and military service exemption.153 More than anything else, the above narrative elucidates the “fateful” power the correlation between ancestry and identity had for defining and asserting elite status. Detached from his kin, a man became a social nobody—someone who lost his elite credentials and his place in the written genealogical record. As a charter of descent, the genealogy thus served, paraphrasing the Liji, to honor the ancestors, while ancestral honor in turn endowed the descendants with a distinct identity: a sajok man identified himself to outsiders by the number of generations he descended from so-and-so “distinguished ancestor”—an identification that evoked spontaneous respect and deference.

Markers of Respect: Unifiers of Kin The permutation of genealogical consciousness and ancestral veneration gave rise to an intense cult of key ancestors who by their achievements in life as office holders or scholars—and thus had often become the heads of subbranches (p’ajo)—had attained



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

301

memorable places in recent local or national history. One of the most prestigious ways to historicize the fame of such a “distinguished ancestor” (hyŏnjo) was to institute for him perpetual rites (pulch’ŏnwi pongsa), as briefly mentioned in chapter 8. Originally bestowed by the king on merit subjects as a token of royal gratitude for loyal assistance, from the seventeenth century onward perpetual rites were “granted” at times by the local Confucian community (yurim)—often for quite parochial reasons. It relieved the descendants of a mental predicament: instead of removing the tablet of a revered ancestor, due to generational change, from the domestic shrine and burying it at his grave­ site, they could with official sanction install it, together with that of his wife, in a separately constructed “extra shrine” (pyŏlmyo)154 and continue to ritually remember him indefinitely. Among the Ŭisŏng Kim, Sŏng-il, who had died during the defense of Chinju in 1593, posthumously received merit subject status and second-rank titles and thus the honor of perpetual rites in 1604.155 In 1679—under Namin aegis—he was additionally given the posthumous honorary title (siho) Munch’ung, “cultured and loyal.”156 As the perpetual rites put an extra economic burden on the ritual heir, three generations of Sŏng-il’s descendants decided, in a munjung resolution (munjung wanŭi) of 1692, to allocate some extra land to strengthen the ritual heir’s standing and ensure the continuation of the rites.157 In 1729, it was again a munjung resolution that expedited long-standing plans to build a separate shrine (pyŏlmyo) for Sŏng-il’s spirit tablet and secure the rites with the income from grave land.158 In addition, the Naeap Kim conducted (and still conduct) locally sanctioned perpetual rites for Chin, their focal ancestor (who also received posthumous titles on the strength of Sŏng-il’s merits). Typically, the two major branch ancestors, Pang-gŏl and Sŏng-t’ak, were honored in the same way.159 Both Hahoe Yu brothers, Un-nyong and Sŏng-nyong, received the royal grant of posthumous honorary titles and the distinction of perpetual rites. Because their father, Chung-yŏng, also enjoyed such honors through the merits of his two sons, a separate shrine was built to house Un-nyong’s tablet, whereas the tablets of Chung-yŏng and Sŏngnyong were each installed in a fifth niche within the domestic shrines of the main line and of that of Sŏng-nyong’s line respectively.160 For honoring Kwŏn Pŏl, in 1588 the Yu’gok Kwŏn built Samgye Sŏwŏn in Sahyŏn­ ch’on, a short distance from Yu’gok;161 it received a royal charter in 1660. The academy had also become the ceremonial venue of the Naesŏng compact that was, after its revival in 1611, dominated by the Kwŏn (and the Hŭnghae Pae) to such an extent that its biannual gatherings took place one day after the performance of the sacrificial rites for Pŏl in the spring and autumn.162 Though the Yu’gok Kwŏn had long been planning to build a separate shrine for Kwŏn Pŏl, these plans were repeatedly thwarted by the predicament of the main line in the 1650s (discussed above). In 1715, Kwŏn Tu-in, made main-line heir in 1661, at last addressed the issue in a circular to his kinsmen. Since “recently many sadaebu have a pyŏlmyo,” Tu-in and his closest kinsmen apparently felt under pressure to go ahead with the construction, although, Tu-in noted, there was no solid basis for them to act, according either to ritual handbooks or to state law (kukchŏn).163 Nevertheless, since it was to their famous ancestor that the Kwŏn inside and outside the capital owed their longstanding prosperity and excellent reputation, Tu-in, supported by forty-one kinsmen,

302

Divisions and Bondings

Fig. 11.7 The purification hall (chaesil) of the Andong Kwŏn in Nŭngdong (photograph by the author).

was seeking the consent and cooperation of two related munjung to commence perpetual rites for Pŏl in a separate shrine.164 The institutionalization of extended ancestral rites for an ancestor with special significance for his descent group bestowed upon his descendants incalculable prestige and anchored their status and power enduringly in local terrain. The On’gye Yi owed their continued prominence to the ancestral entitlement they received from T’oegye, the Kŭmgye Kim theirs from Sŏng-il, and the Hahoe Yu theirs from the brothers Un-nyong and Sŏng-nyong. In this sense, the ancestral rites for a notable kinsman among near lineal ancestors sanctified the localization of his descendants—an identification of ancestor and locality without which no sajok of the latter part of Chosŏn would be able to sustain his claim to elite status.165 The veneration of “distinguished ancestors,” as it flourished in late Chosŏn, was thus a broadly based and often competitive corporate enterprise supported by a network of munjung. Besides constructing pyŏlmyo, ambitious sajok expended great fi nancial resources on marking the entry to a prominent tomb site with an elaborately carved “spirit-way stele” (sindobi),166 or identifying a tomb with an artfully inscribed tombstone, stone lanterns, and life-size statues of attendants.167 Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, moreover, purification halls (chaesil) near important ancestral gravesites were expanded or newly built to accommodate growing numbers of kinsmen attending grave rituals of key ancestors. The energetic Kwŏn Tu-in, who was also a driving force behind the revision of the Andong Kwŏn



Th e M at u r ation of th e Li n e age System

303

genealogy of 1701, recorded the various stages of the construction of the purification hall built adjacent to Kwŏn Haeng’s tomb in Nŭng-dong. In 1653, a “distant kinsman” (wŏnson), Kwŏn U,168 appointed governor of Kyŏngsang Province, paid reverence to Haeng’s grave and proposed to his local kinsmen to erect a purification hall in an empty field to the right of the tomb site. The actual work, undoubtedly facilitated by U’s material support, was supervised by two local men (one of them a grandson of Kwŏn Ho-mun). The complex came to comprise a large wooden-floor hall, flanked by side rooms, a purification chamber, and storage space. Despite the general admiration the completed work elicited, at each year’s grand rite (hoejŏn) for Haeng when large numbers of kinsmen assembled, the facilities proved too small, so that in 1683–84 they were considerably enlarged. In particular, a spacious assembly hall (nugak) that could accommodate the entire lineage assembly (chonghoe) was added. Around the same time, another kinsman, Si-gyŏng,169 aided, as governor of Kyŏngsang Province, the marking of Haeng’s tomb with a stone offering table and stone statues. It was through these works, Tu-in declared, that Haeng’s descendants not only remembered their apical ancestor’s great merits for the country, but also celebrated the virtues and achievements of generations of officials and scholars who had come forth from him (fig. 11.7). “By facilitating [through these buildings] continuous offerings from generation to generation at a tomb we had lost and later rediscovered, do we not with greater sincerity recompense the merits our ancestor achieved with the help of Heaven?”170 Kim Chin’s descendants were no less active in expanding their main site of veneration. In 1747, they solicited money from among their kinsmen to construct a purification hall at Yong-bi’s tomb on Ot’osan and to reestablish a recently discovered old spirit way marker (sindobi) leading to the site. For supporting the hall, additional land was purchased in the early 1780s. The upkeep of a chaesil at such a remote location proved costly, and more financial support was later repeatedly requested from kinsmen living all over the country.171 Similarly, the Chinsŏng Yi, who had built a chaesil for Chŏng on Kach’ang Mountain as early as 1480, significantly enlarged it in 1715. With the shrine for Cha-su nearby and the construction of a lecture hall and kitchen facilities in the late 1770s, the site turned into a major precinct consecrated to the worship of Chinsŏng Yi ancestors.172 Indeed, the unifying force of ancestral veneration bonded “near kinsmen” (chongin) and “distant kinsmen” (wŏnson) beyond village boundaries into large socioreligious communities. By holding elaborate communal rituals, compiling genealogies, building pyŏlmyo and chaesil, sajok lineages created enduring structures through which they found and expressed their identity. Utilizing these same structures, they advanced their intellectual and political interests, to be discussed in the following chapter.

Ch a p t er 1 2

Learning and Politics Orthodoxy Contested

E

ven though the Yŏngnam Confucians experienced growing alienation from political participation at the center after 1623, they did not resign to a life of parochial scholarship. Rather, they used their scholarly authority as political leverage to assert their influence on the national scene. No other area of the Korean peninsula came to be as closely identified with a distinct school of thought as Yŏngnam. Indeed, T’oegye’s scholarly inheritors, backed by their master’s overwhelming intellectual power, emerged as forceful contenders of Confucian orthodoxy. They gave T’oegye’s legacy the firm contours of a “school” and underpinned it with a network of private academies committed to cultivating T’oegye’s thought and defending it against factional assaults from the center. As keen observers of events in Seoul, they occasionally brought their distinctive scholarly capital to bear on the national discourse. Though acknowledging that famous scholars had originated from Yŏngnam, the central government, after 1694 in the grip of the Sŏin, tended to view the area as a potential hotbed of rebellious Namin literati and tried, whenever it saw a chance, to either suppress them or infiltrate their regional strongholds. It was not before the mid-eighteenth century, when King Yŏngjo attempted to diffuse factional antagonism, that Yŏngnam scholars were again, selectively, called to service in the government.

Intellectual Realignments after T’oegye’s Death During his lifetime, T’oegye had attracted learners from all major descent groups of the Andong area, but soon after his death it became clear that the title to his intellectual estate would be contested by his four major disciples, Cho Mok, Kim Sŏng-il, Yu



Learning and Politics

305

Fig. 12.1 T’oegye’s discipleship: A selection.

Sŏng-nyong, and Chŏng Ku, each of whom emerged at the head of a separate “scholarly lineage” (hakp’a). Both Kim Sŏng-il and Yu Sŏng-nyong had descendants who commanded high social and scholarly authority as well as considerable economic resources— qualifications that predestined them to perpetuate their respective scholarly lineage by familial succession into the nineteenth century (fig. 12.1). Although Cho Mok was certainly T’oegye’s most learned disciple, his legacy was tarnished by the infighting he provoked between Andong and Yean scholars. Differences between him and Yu Sŏng-nyong arose, as mentioned earlier, not only over the compilation of T’oegye’s collected works. In 1598, Cho Mok, supported by Kŭm Nan-su, sided with Yu’s political adversaries led by Chŏng In-hong (Cho Sik’s major disciple), who accused Yu of having, as chief state councilor, sold out the country by advocating peace with the Japanese. This accusation led to Yu’s being stripped of rank and office (he was rehabilitated in 1600), and hastened the split of the Tongin into two branches: the “moderate” Namin (“Southerners”) and the “brusque” Pugin (“Northerners”). It was under Pugin aegis that Cho Mok, who died in 1606, was coenshrined (paehyang) in Tosan Sŏwŏn in 1614—a feat intended to boost Cho Mok’s standing with regard to Yu Sŏng-nyong as well as to win the Yean Confucians to the Pugin side. With the political downfall of the Pugin in 1623, however, the sons of Cho Mok and Kŭm Nan-su were exiled, and a few Pugin partisans in Yean were subjected to “local punishment” (hyangbŏl)—they were expelled from the area and their residences burned to the ground (hwega ch’urhyang).1 After this radical purge, no local heirs to Cho Mok emerged. On the contrary, Yean scholars, among them T’oegye’s own descendants and the Och’ŏn Kim, prominently represented by Kim Yŏng, switched their allegiance to the Namin and shared the management of Tosan Sŏwŏn as the most outstanding T’oegye memorial in Yŏngnam.

306

Divisions and Bondings

Major figures in the genealogy of Kim Sŏng-il’s scholarly lineage, known as Hakpong hakp’a, were his first-generation disciples Chang Hŭng-hyo and Kim Yong. The latter, Sŏng-il’s nephew, was married to T’oegye’s granddaughter and propagated his uncle’s intellectual line through his nephew, Kim Si-on. The branch that derived from Chang Hŭng-hyo, in his youth a student of both Kim Sŏng-il and Yu Sŏng-nyong, rose to greater prominence. Chang, “forsaking fame in the world,” led a secluded life in pursuit of the Way. It was through his daughter’s son, Yi Hyŏn-il (Karam, 1627–1704),2 and the latter’s large discipleship3 that T’oegye’s intellectual heritage acquired the distinct contours of a Korean “school of principle.” Though not a thinker of exceptional originality, Yi defended T’oegye’s philosophy eloquently against contemporary detractors and, by critiquing Yulgok’s views on the “Four Beginnings and the Seven Feelings,” he formulated the arguments with which he attempted to invalidate Yulgok’s polemics against T’oegye. He strongly advocated T’oegye’s doctrine of the duality of principle and mindmatter (i-gi), in which principle could be both active and inactive. Indeed, he developed an intellectual agenda to which all later T’oegye scholars would take recourse.4 Yi Hyŏn-il’s disciples contributed decisively to buttressing the T’oegye school with a textual foundation. Hyŏn-il’s own son, Yi Chae (Miram, 1657–1730), reissued an amended version of various lecture notes explaining difficult passages in T’oegye’s selection of Zhu Xi’s letters (Chusŏ kangnok kanbo).5 In addition, Chae’s friend and fellow student, Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng,6 compiled a Comprehensive Record of T’oegye’s Pronouncements and Deeds (T’oedo sŏnsaeng ŏnhaeng t’ongnok). Possibly taking recourse to earlier models,7 Kwŏn collected recollections of the master’s life, daily routine, and answers to student queries contained in testimonies left by T’oegye’s principal disciples, and classified them in four sections: learning and instruction (hangmun), conduct (haengsil), public service (ch’ulch’ŏ), and discourses (ŭinon). He also included Yu Sŏng-nyong’s chronological biography of T’oegye. The work, with a postface by Yi Chae, was printed in Andong’s local school in 1732.8 Kwŏn thus created a kind of textbook intended as authoritative reading for future students. Indeed, the Namin-friendly high Soron official Cho Hyŏn-myŏng9 admiringly called it the Lunyu of Korea. Kwŏn was, moreover, the first to gather data on the individuals who had studied with T’oegye at Tosan in a comprehensive register (Kyemun chejarok).10 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng’s energetic initiative to formalize a T’oegye school was apparently not appreciated by T’oegye’s own descendants in Yean. Some who derived their descent and scholarly tradition from T’oegye’s grandson, An-do, decided to counter Kwŏn’s works with their own versions. Yi Su-yŏn11 thus edited a rival Record of T’oegye’s Pronouncements and Deeds (T’oegye sŏnsaeng ŏnhaengnok), which in substance did not differ much from Kwŏn’s version; it was printed in Tosan Sŏwŏn in 1733. In the same spirit, Yi collected a Supplementary Collection of Master T’oegye (T’oegye sŏnsaeng sokchip) and also amended Kwŏn’s Tosan register. These competing productions were in Andong apparently construed as an attempt by the Yean scholars to sharpen their profile as T’oegye’s legitimate successors. Thus, seeking to restore harmony within “our party” (odang), Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng dispatched an emotional communication on behalf of “the Andong Confucian scholars [sarim]” to “the scholar friends in Yean” in which he tried to smooth over past conflicts between Yu Sŏng-nyong and Cho Mok by representing them as friends, and thus to close ranks among T’oegye’s heirs.12



Learning and Politics

307

Yi Hyŏn-il and his students thus were instrumental in defining and organizing T’oegye’s heritage and bequeathing an integrated corpus of learning to future generations of T’oegye students. Hyŏn-il’s disciple Kim Sŏng-t’ak strongly promoted Hakpong’s scholarly lineage at court in the eighteenth century (see below). Another indefatigable student and espouser of Zhu Xi’s and T’oegye’s lines of thought was Yi Chae’s foremost student and nonagnatic grandson, Yi Sang-jŏng (Taesan, 1710–81).13 Sang-jŏng taught numerous disciples and wrote dozens of biographies of his contemporaries and was even praised on his epitaph as the Tosan main-line heir.14 Finally, with Sang-jŏng’s nonagnatic great-grandson, Yu Ch’i-myŏng (1777–1861),15 “ ‘This Way’ naturally found its [last] abode.” The attendance of more than nine hundred sarim mourners at Ch’i-myŏng’s funeral was in his biographer’s eyes a clear indication that he had been the “Confucian patriarch of his generation.”16 A similar combination of close kinship ties and intellectual bonds created what eventually came to be recognized as Yu Sŏng-nyong’s “scholarly lineage” (Sŏae hakp’a).17 Foremost among Yu’s first-generation disciples was his third son, Chin, a chinsa graduate of 1610 and married to one of Kwŏn Pŏl’s great-granddaughters.18 Chin received his first instruction from No Kyŏng-im (1569–1620),19 who had married his cousin,20 and his educational progress was closely supervised by his father, who warned his son not to abandon his studies even during the difficult war years of the 1590s. After Sŏae’s death in 1607, Chin studied the Heart Classic with Chang Hŭng-hyo. As Sŏae’s only surviving son, he was anxious to secure his father’s collected works (munjip) and had them printed in Haeinsa with the support of his elder mentors, Yi Chŏn (1558–1648) and Chŏng Kyŏng-se, both of whom had been Sŏae’s disciples and close colleagues.21 “Whoever saw Chin recognized him as a true gentleman of the Way.”22 Chin also left an incomplete compilation on mourning rituals. Among Chin’s intimate friends were the many gifted sons of T’oegye disciple Kim Tae-hyŏn (1553–1602),23 all of whom are listed as Sŏae’s students, and a few linked to the Hahoe Yu by marriage. In the next generation, Chin’s nephew, Yu Wŏn-ji, Sŏae’s main-line heir and married to a great-granddaughter of Kim Sŏng-il, emerged as one of his grandfather’s line’s most outstanding leaders. He entered government service through a protection appointment and, during his unusually long tenure as magistrate of Hwanggan (present-day North Ch’ungch’ŏng) between 1638 and 1643, directed the area’s rehabilitation after the Manchu devastation. Out of office until 1655, he devoted himself to scholarship at home. When his modest government career was cut short by his connection to the Yŏngnam protest memorial in 1666 (discussed below), he spent the last eight years of his life as a retired scholar. Self-confident as the direct descendant of a merit subject (with perpetual emolument), Wŏn-ji did not need the prestige of high office to maintain a vast network of contacts to his local peers. His correspondence and extensive writing of “poems of sorrow” (mansi), prefaces and postfaces to collected works, and biographies and tomb epitaphs testify not only to his participation in the contemporary discourse on rites (he was equally reputed as a ritualist) and philosophical issues but also to his involvement in local affairs. Throughout his life he labored on the Classic of Changes, and in a short tract on principle and mind-matter (I’gisŏl), dated 1670, he critically weighed Yulgok’s philosophical premises against T’oegye’s teachings and defended his grandfather against Cho Mok’s insinuations. In short, Yu Wŏn-ji prominently represented his family’s distinct tradition of combining scholarship and statecraft.24

308

Divisions and Bondings

This tradition was inherited by Yu Se-myŏng (1636–90) and Yu Hu-jang (1650–1706). Se-myŏng, a great-grandson of Yu Un-nyong and a chinsa (1660) and munkwa (1675) graduate, studied under Wŏn-ji and followed his mentor’s strict observance of rites and his predilection for principle. He was equally famed for his literary style. In the late 1680s, under the Namin’s aegis, he held several middle-level appointments in the central government and as the third censor (senior fifth rank) submitted a memorial in which he lectured King Sukchong on the virtues of rulership in 1689. A year later he died in the capital.25 Yu Hu-jang, Wŏn-ji’s grandson, was—due to his erudition and reputation as a “genuine Con­fucian of the South”—awarded a royal tomb keeper appointment in 1689, and four years later a low-ranking (chaŭi, junior seventh rank) sallim position. Regretting that Hu-jang had burned his scholarly writings, his nineteenth-century biographer unhesitatingly counted him as the last important representative of “our family’s mind-and-heart learning.”26 These brief notes on a number of principal personalities instrumental in engendering and perpetuating over time the Hakpong and Sŏae scholarly lineages may suffice to demonstrate that their commitment to T’oegye’s legacy was largely carried on as family projects. Whereas the Hakpong partisans may have represented the idealistic wing of the T’oegye school, the Sŏae heirs tended to stand for a more pragmatic, statecraft-oriented position. Exercising strong leadership through “moral conduct and scholarly excellence”— and occasionally by degree and office holding—T’oegye’s heirs passed the “Confucian enterprise” (yuŏp) on from father or uncle to son or nephew over generations into the nineteenth century. Indeed, developed along kinship lines, scholarly lines attained a high degree of cohesion and longevity. Even though later biographers were keen to construct single-line genealogies, in reality discipleships in each generation were large and often crossed lines, in particular in the early seventeenth century, when Hakpong’s and Sŏae’s heirs, also connected by multiple marital ties, strove to cooperate in the face of political and ideological adversity. Early leaders such as Kim Yong, Yu Chin, and Yu Wŏn-ji were individuals who, reaching maturity in the post-Imjin era, were not only ardent students of T’oegye’s philosophy; they also engaged themselves in the postwar reconstruction of Andong’s local economy. Economically independent, they built schools and shrines and pursued their studies and instruction at leisure. It was they who created the economic and intellectual infrastructure within which the “T’oegye school” could grow and flourish. Some of their successors commanded their contemporaries’ respect as “recluses” (yuil) at home, whereas a few others, especially in the eighteenth century, advanced to high office in the capital where they acted as apologists of T’oegye’s legacy. By adhering to T’oegye’s version of “learning of nature and principle” as an act of self-identification and enthusiastically embracing the Classic of the Mind-and Heart as their spiritual handbook, they understood allegiance to “our party” not merely as an intellectual statement; they equally understood it as a political position—as the vanguard of the Yŏngnam Namin. Whereas their core area was in and around Andong, the Yŏngnam Namin entertained a vast network of disciples, local scholars, and teachers scattered over the entire Kyŏngsang Province and, more sparsely, beyond. Collectively often referred to as “Confucian forest” (yurim or sarim), they would, when called up to show partisan color, loyally rally around their leaders to carry Namin concerns to the capital (fig. 12.2).

Fig. 12.2 Gathering of local Confucians at Tosan Academy in 2001 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Yi T’oegye’s birth (photograph by the author).

310

Divisions and Bondings

Sajok Strongholds: Private Academies in Andong The competitive development of scholarly lineages—and the fact that for many literati their social identity came to be rooted in “pure learning” and instruction—provided the impetus for building private academies (sŏwŏn). An additional reason was the marked intellectual and social decline of the state-sponsored local schools (hyanggyo). Though T’oegye, when he asked for state support for Paegun-dong Sŏwŏn, had the Song Chinese model of state-subsidized private academies in mind, a characteristic of the Korean academy movement seems to be that a large number of academies did remain “private” in the sense that they upheld family traditions of learning and commemorated familyconnected personalities. They thus neither sought nor received state recognition or aid. Nevertheless, a royal charter (saaek) granting a name plaque, tax exemption of its land, and books amounted to a special state endorsement of the worthiness of the enshrinee 27— a privilege that toward the second half of the seventeenth century came largely to depend on factional connections. Indeed, the academies turned before long into strategic nodes supporting local power struggles for ideological and political supremacy. A private academy was ideally an institution of higher learning set in a secluded spot among mountains and rivers where “This Way” could be pursued in quiet, far removed from town or village life. Seclusion was accentuated by a high wall that surrounded the academy. The compound was laid out according to an architecturally distinct pattern: a tower (ru) as the entrance gate or close to the entrance, a main lecture hall flanked by the eastern and western halls (tong-sŏjae), which served as study and living quarters, a library and a storage space for printing blocks, a kitchen, and various storehouses.28 The buildings were simple and unpretentious, yet an abundance of trees, shrubs, and flowers, and an occasional pond made the student feel close to nature and observe its seasonal transformations. An academy usually was governed by an academic director (sanjang), often an eminent scholar-official, who was assisted by teaching and service personnel.29 Admission criteria varied, but a lower degree (chinsa or saengwŏn) was usually required. Student (wŏnsaeng) numbers rarely exceeded ten per year. Life was austere and followed a strict schedule of lectures, disputations, and exams.30 Even though a private academy was foremost an educational institution, its cultural reputation hinged almost entirely on the scholarly stature of the personality—often, but not necessarily, a founding figure— enshrined within its precinct. Indeed, the closely guarded shrine to the rear of an academy was its religious center, where the enshrinee received ritual attention twice a year, in the spring and the autumn (ch’un-ch’u hyangsa).31 These solemn acts, in turn, conferred intellectual as well as social prestige on the ritual performers—his descendants and disciples. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Andong elites supported three private academies, Tosan Sŏwŏn, Yŏgang Sŏwŏn, and Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn, in addition to over twenty studios (chŏngsa) and study halls (sŏdang).32 As a site of T’oegye learning as well as the major shrine dedicated to the late master, Tosan Sŏwŏn ranked as the undisputed premier educational institution in northern Kyŏngsang, enjoying national recognition. Scholars of every persuasion made pilgrimages to it to pay homage to the great thinker. It thus remained relatively free of factional pressures.



Learning and Politics

311

Tosan Sŏwŏn was administered and staffed by T’oegye’s descendants and the nearby Och’ŏn Kim—Kim Yŏng was one of the lecturers in the 1610s—and economically sustained by the income from landed property, slave tribute (sin’gong), interest on loans, and tenant fees. Although the academy’s economic power, which peaked around the middle of the seventeenth century, was considerable, as a major center of learning, its expenditures were manifold. It subsidized the daily needs of a permanent student body, financed elaborate ritual observances, and supported smaller academies and schools. In the late 1590s and the 1630s, moreover, it contributed grain to the country’s war efforts. One of its costliest ventures, however, was the printing of books, for which it commanded wellknown expertise. The printing of T’oegye’s collected works (munjip) between 1599 and 1601 alone consumed the staggering sum of over 890 sŏm of rice and 1,900 bolts of cloth— an expense that had to be subsidized by private contributions of local supporters.33 Whereas Tosan Sŏwŏn functioned as the intellectual center of the Yean literati, Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn emerged as its major counterpart in western Andong. Like many other sŏwŏn, Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn developed out of a small study hall, P’ungak Sŏdang, originally built by Kwŏn Kyŏng-jŏn34 in 1563 and later taken over by Yu Sŏng-nyong. In 1605, Yu relocated it to a secluded area at the eastern foot of Hwasan Mountain with a view of the Naktong River. After Yu’s death, his disciples attached the “Revering Virtue Shrine” (Chondŏksa), in which Yu’s spirit tablet was installed in the spring of 1614. Chŏng Kyŏng-se, then magistrate of Kangnŭng, read the eulogy in front of an audience of some 180 literati.35 Presumably to demonstrate that this solemn ceremony was endorsed by the entire scholarly community and thus was not a private affair, Yu Chin delayed paying his respects for two days.36 Chin’s own spirit tablet was coenshrined there early in 1662.37 Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn’s main sponsors were Sŏae’s descendants and disciples, the scions of the major descent groups of the P’ungsan area such as the P’ungsan Yu, the Sunhŭng An, and the P’ungsan Kim. The administration of the academy lay, with few exceptions, in the hands of former academy students, the large majority of whom were of local origin, and, after 1623, only a few of them were lower-degree graduates. The student body, too, was overwhelmingly local, and from among the 467 students registered in the academy (wŏnsaeng) in the first half of the seventeenth century only ten held lower-level degrees; the rest were titled “young scholar” (yuhak). Secondary sons (sŏja), even if examination graduates, were expressly excluded from admission.38 Like Tosan Sŏwŏn, Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn was economically supported by landed property and slave labor.39 Sŏwŏn were scholarly institutions, yet from the beginning they were equally sites where power struggles between local descent groups–cum–scholarly lineages were played out. As mentioned earlier, in 1576, T’oegye’s Andong disciples, foremost among them Kim Sŏng-il and Yu Sŏng-nyong, built Yŏgang Sŏwŏn east of Andong City as a rival institution to Tosan Sŏwŏn in Yean, and when Cho Mok was coenshrined in Tosan Sŏwŏn under Pugin authority in 1614, the Andong sarim regarded this partisan act as a provocation and, as a countermeasure, supported the proposal of the Sŏae disciple Kwŏn Kang40 to coenshrine Yu Sŏng-nyong and Kim Sŏng-il in Yŏgang Sŏwŏn in 1620. Kim Sŏng-il was originally worshiped in Imch’ŏn Hyangsa, built in 1607 and elevated to academy status in 1618. But after his spirit tablet was transferred, together with books and slaves, to Yŏgang Sŏwŏn, Imch’ŏn Sŏwŏn was dismantled, so that no separate worshiping place for

312

Divisions and Bondings

Kim remained.41 With its spiritual importance thus upgraded, Yŏgang Sŏwŏn was renamed Ho’gye Sŏwŏn when it received, at Yu Wŏn-ji’s request and with Namin support, a royal charter in 1676.42 The joint veneration in Yŏgang Sŏwŏn of two scholar-officials, however, who not only represented the power of two of the most prominent local elite groups, but also were revered as the ancestors of two competing scholarly lineages, immediately gave rise to heated controversies. When the tablets of Yu Sŏng-nyong and Kim Sŏng-il were transferred to Yŏgang Sŏwŏn in 1620, their positioning with respect to T’oegye’s tablet in the center of the shrine emerged as an intractable issue. Should the two be placed together along the eastern wall (that is, to T’oegye’s left), or should one be put along the eastern wall and the other along the western wall? According to the first scenario, what would their positional sequence be along a north-south axis? According to the second, who would be placed in the east and who in the west? The opinion of Chŏng Kyŏng-se was solicited, and he advised that the tablets be arranged in the same way as in the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo), that is, one to the east, the other to the west; and that not age (which anyway was similar) but official rank determine which of the two should be honored with the more prestigious place along the east wall. As former chief state councilor, Yu Sŏng-nyong clearly had an advantage over Kim Sŏng-il, whose highest office had been that of provincial governor. Consequently, Yu’s tablet was installed in the east, that of Kim Sŏng-il in the west.43 Only a few years later, Sŏae partisans, taking advantage of the royal conferral of a posthumous title on Sŏae in 1629, again installed a spirit tablet for him in Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn and justified enshrining the same person twice in one and the same district on the basis of a historical precedent set by Zhu Xi.44 To Kim Sŏng-il’s descendants this clearly looked like a further upstaging of Yu Sŏng-nyong over Kim Sŏng-il, for whom no separate academy existed anymore, and heightened their unhappiness over their ancestor’s inferior place in Yŏgang Sŏwŏn. The ensuing contestations between the Ŭisŏng Kim and the P’ungsan Yu, at the core of which lay their rivalry over whether Hakpong or Sŏae was to be regarded as T’oegye’s genuine successor, festered on into the early nineteenth century (further discussed in chapter 13). The emergence of private academies with their “cult of worthies” supported by large and powerful followings in the Andong area was viewed with growing apprehension by the Sŏin-controlled government in Seoul. The Sŏin suspected in particular that Tosan Sŏwŏn, the primary landmark of Namin power in Yŏngnam, was a potential breeding ground of local sarim activism. This is vividly illustrated by an incident that occurred in the early summer months of 1626. At first, a vague report reached the capital that a “local strongman” (t’oho mudan) of Ŭisŏng County, who disobeyed orders and resisted the payment of taxes, had died of beatings during interrogation by the provincial governor, whereupon a group of the dead man’s kinsmen had surrounded the local yamen, threatened the magistrate, and abducted a bailiff. It turned out that the dead man was none other than the elderly Tosan Sŏwŏn headmaster (wŏnjang) Yi Yu-do, a grandson of T’oegye’s elder brother.45 He had reportedly used impolite language during interrogation, whereupon the insulted governor had applied force. Yi Yu-do’s two sons filed a complaint, and a kinsman sent out a circular (t’ongmun) from Tosan Sŏwŏn to all provincial



Learning and Politics

313

counties to rally the local literati in protest against Yi’s arbitrary killing. The drafter of the circular was arrested but later pardoned upon the intercession of Chŏng Kyŏng-se (then the inspector general). Both the governor and the magistrate, however, lost their posts. What clearly most disturbed the high court officials was the swiftness with which a circular sent out from a private academy could whip up sarim aggression against the local government officials. To calm the situation, the Andong-friendly Chŏng On46 was appointed new governor of Kyŏngsang Province.47 Similarly suspect to the Sŏin was Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn because they held Yu Sŏng-nyong responsible for the multiple factional splits that eventually pitted the Namin against the Sŏin. Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn suffered therefore from the odium of being deemed an adversary institution—a circumstance that delayed the award of a royal charter until 1863.48 Whereas in the early days of sŏwŏn construction entire local Confucian communities were involved and academy membership remained fluid, it was toward the second half of the seventeenth century that the academies started to mutate into exclusive representations of personal or factional prestige and power, depreciating scholarly achievement (further discussed in chapter 13). Indeed, their number proliferated—not only in Yŏngnam. Yet Yŏngnam acquired special fame for the extensive construction of academies and shrines: 54 (one-third of a total of 158 academies and shrines) were built from Injo to Hyŏnjong (1623–74); 118 were added during Sukchong’s reign alone.49 As a headmaster of the National Confucian Academy critically opined in 1681: “Nowadays, the proliferation of sŏwŏn is nowhere greater than in Yŏngnam, where they amass land and gather idle fellows. Their authority and power even exceed that of the magistrate. [Students] flock around and engage in idle talk and even come up with superficial and highflown discourses. Those who cannot do so simply engage in drinking and eating.”50 These scathing words articulate well the uneasiness with which the Sŏin came to regard Yŏngnam’s academies—as institutions breeding power-hungry idlers or Confucian dissidents, rather than as citadels of higher learning. Indeed, as will be described below, with their far-flung networks of communication the academies turned into convenient staging areas for disenfranchised Confucian literati to launch their protest missions to the capital.

The Confucian Way in the Crossfire of Factional Interests With factional and ideological points of view hardening, the claim on Confucian orthodoxy turned into a touchstone of scholarly, and by extension political, legitimacy. More precisely, the Sŏin and the Namin came to engage in fierce competition over intellectual hegemony. Which party’s philosophical position was to set the terms of what “right learning” was to be? Was T’oegye or Yulgok Zhu Xi’s true successor in Korea? These were questions whose answers ultimately hinged on the establishment of an authoritative line of transmitters of This Way (tot’ong), legitimized by the enshrinement of key individuals in the National Shrine of Confucius. By 1600, only four Koreans, among them An Hyang and Chŏng Mong-ju, both

314

Divisions and Bondings

revered as early disseminators of sŏngnihak in Korea, had been thus canonized. In 1610, taking the reconstruction of the war-torn Munmyo as a propitious occasion, the Five Worthies51—all of them early sarim pioneers—were solemnly enshrined in an act that would revitalize the sarim spirit and intellectually stimulate national reconstruction after the disastrous Imjin War. Their canonization received bipartisan support because it satisfied demands that had been put forward by the entire Confucian community since the late 1570s.52 This grand endorsement, however, remained unique. With the rise of factional cleavages, any later attempt to elevate a Korean scholar to Munmyo honors came to be perceived as a one-sided factional claim to intellectual supremacy and therefore elicited fierce reactions from those who felt betrayed by such an act. Unexpectedly, the historic event of 1610 was challenged in early 1611, when Chŏng In-hong, the ideologue of the then-rising Taebuk (Great Northerners), submitted an offensively written memorial in which he demanded the removal of T’oegye’s and Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s tablets from the Munmyo, presumably with the intention of installing the tablet of his mentor, Nammyŏng Cho Sik, in their place. This daring assault by a splinter Pugin group on a unanimously taken action was greeted with a general outcry, in which the Pugin’s determined enemies in Andong took active part. Led by Yu Sŏng-nyong’s disciple Kim Pong-jo (1572–1630),53 a large group of dissenters from Andong, Sangju, Kyŏngju, and a number of other places in Kyŏngsang sent five protest memorials to Seoul.54 This concerted Confucian protest defeated Chŏng In-hong’s malicious advance, but a bitterly resentful Chŏng took quick revenge: he implicated a few prominent Andong Namin in a trumped-up charge of conspiracy against the Taebuk leadership. Yu Sŏng-nyong’s son Chin was arrested, taken in shackles to the capital, and released only after several months of confinement. Chŏng Kyŏng-se, Chin’s mentor, was stripped of office after one month in prison. These were ominous forebodings of the purge of 1613 with which the Taebuk consolidated their supremacy in government against their own party rivals.55 Shortly after defeating the Taebuk and seizing power in 1623, the Sŏin persistently demanded the enshrinement of their two intellectual “ancestors,” Yulgok Yi I and U’gye Sŏng Hon, in the Munmyo. Though rejected by King Injo as “too rash,” they renewed their offensive in 1635 and caused ugly confrontations between supporters and opponents (mostly from Yŏngnam) among the students of the National Confucian Academy. Again, their demands were blocked by royal interdiction.56 The issue lost its urgency in the crisis of the country’s defeat by the Manchus in 1636, when general attention was diverted to national survival, but it surfaced again with renewed passion shortly after Hyojong had ascended the throne in 1649. Several hundred Confucian Academy students repeated their call for Yulgok and U’gye’s canonization and did not relent even when their several memorials were turned down by the king on the grounds that “an enshrinement is an eminently big and weighty affair.”57 As soon as the alarming news reached Andong that the doors of the Munmyo might be opened to Yulgok and U’gye, a Namin counteroffensive was started under the leadership of Yu Chik (1602–62), a grandson of Yu Pok-ki and a chinsa of 1630.58 Though well known for his classical scholarship, Chik may not have been the actual author of the “Memorial Opposing the Canonization of U’gye and Yulgok” (U-Yul sŭngmu pandaeso),59 but it was with his scholarly and personal authority that he was able to mobilize 950



Learning and Politics

315

“Confucians in support of the memorial” (soyu) from all parts of Yŏngnam. Close to half of them hailed from Andong, among them a large contingent of students of Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn. Others came from Sangju, Kyŏngju, and even from faraway Chinju. Ninety-three were lower-degree holders. With the majority in their twenties and thirties it was a youngish group—like Chik, scions of established kin groups. Before a memorial was ready to be submitted in Seoul, various preparatory steps had to be taken. A written circular (t’ongmun) called together potential participants for an inaugural meeting (sohoe) during which the “memorial head” (sosu) and a number of officers (soim) were chosen and the drafters of the memorial text designated. After the memorial was composed and the necessary funds collected, a select group of escorts (pusowŏn) accompanied the leader on the cumbersome trip to the capital.60 Carrying the memorial in a wrapped red lacquer box, Yu Chik and his entourage of 150 departed on the eighth day of the second month of 1650 and traveled through Yech’ŏn, Mun’gyŏng, across Choryŏng Mountain, Ch’ungju, Yongin, and Yangjae. En route, depending on the sympathy of the local magistrates, they were either accommodated in postal stations or official guest houses, or split up to spend the nights with kinsmen or relatives. After their arrival in Seoul on the twenty-first, Yu and his supporters submitted the memorial via the Royal Secretariat to King Hyojong on the next day.61 The memorial that Yu Chik and his followers presented to the king was no less passionate in tone than the appeal the Confucian Academy students had handed in barely three months earlier. It exposed in detail the philosophical disagreements between T’oegye and Yulgok. The latter, the memorialists insisted, had betrayed Confucianism with his Buddhist leanings, while Sŏng Hon, an inferior scholar, had failed to accompany King Sŏnjo on his flight north during the Imjin crisis. By attacking T’oegye’s scholarship, which was identical with that of Zhu Xi, Yulgok had in fact refuted Zhu Xi himself and thus could not possibly be considered a genuine transmitter of Cheng-Zhu learning. The king, therefore, was advised to ponder deeply the correctness of moral principles and to reject firmly the false request of the Academy memorialists.62 Unexpectedly, a detractor from Yu Chik’s own home base appeared in the capital to challenge Yu. With some forty followers in tow, Sin Sŏk-hyŏng (1605–?), a chinsa of 1633 from Sangju, handed in a memorial in defense of Yulgok’s “theories.” Sin accused Yu Chik of fabricating a rift between T’oegye and Yulgok and distorting Yulgok’s and U’gye’s philosophical views.63 Caught in this crossfire, King Hyojong, who had other more pressing matters on his mind—a Chinese envoy had just arrived in the capital—was perplexed. “From my point of view [these two memorials] differ as little as male and female birds!” Angry that the issue of canonization deepened factional rifts, he simply refused to act, despite his ministers’ protestations. Pressure also mounted from the academy students. They struck Chik off the Confucian register (yujŏk) for having “insulted the worthies” (muhyŏn) and subjected him to “public censure” (puhwang)—the severest punishment the Confucian establishment could mete out.64 Although some sympathetic officials tried to come to Chik’s rescue by arguing that his memorial was nothing more than the impropriety of a “country ignoramus unaware of the signs of the time” and not an assault on the worthies, Chik and his followers, unable to bear the strain and humiliation, unceremoniously

316

Divisions and Bondings

returned home. Chik “closed his door and no longer thought about the world’s affairs.” Later that year students from Left Kyŏngsang (T’oegye territory east of the Naktong River) showed their solidarity by boycotting the provincial examination. Chik died twelve years later as a result of the strict mourning regime he observed following his mother’s death.65 Yu Chik’s protest memorial was soon forgotten over the rites controversy that broke loose after Hyojong’s death in 1659 and resulted in the Namin’s temporary loss of influence. Riding high on their victory, high-ranking Sŏin resumed their plea for Yulgok’s and U’gye’s enshrinement in 1663—a plea that was immediately assailed by the Namin official Hong U-wŏn (1605–87),66 then a sixth counselor in the Office of the Special Counselors and a sympathetic advocate of the Andong Namin literati. By combining his refutation with a petition for the rehabilitation of Hŏ Mok and others, who had been victimized in 1659, Hong stepped into a political minefield. He came under severe attack and was stripped of office. Weary of the matter like his predecessor, King Hyŏnjong thereafter turned a deaf ear to the ongoing acrimonious exchanges between advocates and challengers, and the matter remained unresolved during his reign.67 In the meantime, the issues of royal legitimacy and the Yulgok-U’gye canonization had in the exasperated minds of the Namin become inextricably linked. Indeed, the one could no longer be separated from the other. The Sŏin victory in 1659, based on their advocacy of merely a one-year mourning period to be observed by King Hyojong’s stepmother, jeopardized in the Namin’s eyes the very legitimacy of the late king’s authority— they had demanded three years of mourning—and equally threatened, by upholding Song Si-yŏl’s “false rites” (orye), the survival of “Our Way.” Though convinced that only Song’s intimidating tactics against his adversaries had led to the Sŏin’s triumph, the Andong Confucians at first remained cautious, but in 1665 they resolved to “rectify” that fateful ritual error. Yu Se-ch’ŏl (1627–81), the adopted heir to Yu Un-nyong’s main line, was chosen as their leader.68 A man of high moral standards and a ritual expert, Yu Se-ch’ŏl, a sama graduate of 1654, had apparently been pondering a refutation of Song Si-yŏl’s ritual decision for some time. In the last month of 1665, supported by like-minded friends, he sent a circular to all private academies and townships in the area calling for a preparatory memorial meeting in Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn on the seventh day of the follow­ ing month. A subsequent “provincial meeting” (tohoe) scheduled to convene in Ŭisŏng was thwarted by the harassment of the local magistrate (a Sŏin), and the meeting as well as the “memorial headquarters” (soch’ŏng) had to be relocated to the local school in Yech’ŏn. Continued Sŏin pressure—Song Si-yŏl’s malevolent schemes reached far into the countryside—made some participants fearful of what might await them in the capital and made them want Song’s name deleted from the memorial text. Others tried to withdraw from the venture altogether. Demanding courage and discipline, Yu Se-ch’ŏl threatened recalcitrants with local punishment. The memorial was then solemnly read to some four hundred attendees and encased, together with the sponsors’ signatures, in a red box. The mission, escorted by one hundred members, departed from Yech’ŏn on the eighth day of the third month of 1666 and arrived in the capital nine days later. En route the memorial apparently underwent several revisions on the advice of sympathetic scholars.69 The reception of the group in Seoul was, expectedly, far from welcoming. Even before the memorialists left Yech’ŏn, the magistrate of Ŭisŏng had sent posthaste a



Learning and Politics

317

defamatory report to the government. By holding what they called a “memorial meeting” (sohoe), he insinuated, the memorialists “blocked the road in front of the yamen and impeded the coming and going of official personnel,” behaving in a most unruly and ungentlemanly fashion deserving stern punishment. Forewarned, the left state councilor Hong Myŏng-ha and the minister of personnel Kim Su-hang—both leading Sŏin—asked for an audience to discuss the matter on the twenty-second day of the month.70 Hong as well as Kim opined that the Andong memorial simply repeated Yun Hyu’s arguments of 1659—he had demanded a three-year mourning period—and since in the meantime eight years had passed, its sole aim was to slander Song Si-yŏl. King Hyŏnjong, who had not yet seen the memorial, tended to agree with this assessment, yet Kim Man-gi71 interjected that the memorial had nevertheless been signed by more than one thousand Confucians (yusaeng). In view of their behavior in Ŭisŏng, however, it was clear to Kim that they were troublemakers unworthy of being called “sons of literati” (saja). Hong Myŏng-ha then demanded harsh punishment. Not willing “to act rashly,” the king instructed his ministers to find a way out, since a memorial with such an unprecedentedly large number of signers could not be easily dismissed. Entitled “Memorial Discussing Rites” (Ŭiryeso), the document, most likely of composite authorship, contained in sixteen points a systematic refutation of Song Si-yŏl’s ritual ruling of 1659 and in detail spelled out that there was a fundamental difference between state rites and domestic rites—a difference that Song, when he argued on the basis of domestic usage, had willfully disregarded. As supporting evidence, a voluminous appendix, “Documentation on Mourning Rites” (Sangbok kojŭng) in twenty-nine paragraphs, was attached to the memorial. By lamenting the shame of Hyojong’s humiliation caused by “the destruction of proper royal succession,” the lengthy memorial not only resurrected painful memories of the controversies over the legitimacy of Hyŏnjong’s father, it also undermined Song Si-yŏl’s scholarly credibility by demonstrating that his ritual program of 1659 had “contravened the classics as well as violated the rites.”72 Unwilling or reluctant to take a decisive stand, the king, who by the twenty-third of the month had apparently still not seen the original memorial text, ordered Kim Suhang’s older brother, First Royal Secretary Kim Su-hŭng, to read it and report. Su-hŭng demurred, however, and countered that since this matter had long been settled, it was lamentable that such a memorial had again been presented. On the same day, then, Hyŏnjong issued an official reply: The text and the meaning of the memorial go back and forth and are highly inconsistent. Saying east, it means west; saying west, it means east. How could the perversion of sa culture reach this point? It is indeed despicable! Moreover, if what is called in the memorial “Zhu Xi’s theories” is scrutinized, a lot of the discussion runs counter to Zhu Xi’s meaning. This is utterly disturbing! Don’t annoy us any longer. Go home and pursue your studies!

The warning tone of this edict unleashed a barrage of abuse against Yu Se-ch’ŏl. Because his real intention, top officials claimed, had been nothing less than to initiate another purge, they called for severe punishment. The king, averse to punitive action, again summoned his ministers before him to find a solution. It was clear that punishing

318

Divisions and Bondings

the chief memorialist was not a sufficiently effective measure to prevent similar events in the future and on the contrary might later be construed as an attempt “to keep the people’s mouths shut.” As the ritual decision of 1659, for which he hardly felt responsible (at that time he was eighteen years old), could not now be reversed, Hyŏnjong acquitted himself of a final judgment by instructing his ministers: “If from now on someone, on the pretext of discussing rites, is raising a noisy row, deal with him according to the law and don’t give in!” This command was publicized within and without the government. Despite the king’s obvious desire to put an end to this affair—he was about to depart for the Onyang hot springs—attacks on Yu Se-ch’ŏl continued. Like Chik earlier, he was struck off the Confucian register and subjected to “public censure,” but calls for more severe punishment kept pouring in from yusaeng of Sŏin-dominated provinces such as Chŏlla, Ch’ungch’ŏng,73 and the northern provinces even after the Office of the Inspector General had tried, in vain, to stop the vendetta by prohibiting all further submissions demanding Yu’s punishment. Even Song Si-yŏl sent in a letter in which he ridiculed Yu’s arguments and, a few days later, appeared before the king in person to justify the 1659 decision “which he had taken in full consultation with other ministers.” Yet, in view of the unprecedented clamor for the punishment of some one thousand Confucian students and the great publicity the Yŏngnam memorial had stirred up, Song professed guilt—a gesture that elicited consoling words from the king.74 Years later, Yu Se-ch’ŏl received belated satisfaction (as well as rehabilitation and a modest government career) when his memorial of 1666 was consulted as key evidence for determining the degree of mourning Queen Dowager Cho (Injo’s second consort) had to observe for her stepdaughter-in-law, King Hyŏnjong’s mother, who died in the second month of 1674. Indeed, it was Yu’s document with its extensive scholarly appendix that seems to have initiated Hyŏnjong to the subtleties of ritual politics and critically influenced him to reevaluate and finally reverse the 1659 decision; he now accepted the Namin argument that the dead queen, as the wife of a first son (changja), had to be mourned for one year.75 With this policy victory, the Namin ousted the Sŏin, who under Song Si-yŏl’s leadership had proposed a mere nine-month mourning period, and commenced an almost unchallenged dominance in government for the next six years. During this time, the victorious Namin could effectively ignore the long unresolved ritual question of Yulgok’s and U’gye’s canonization. Yet, after the Sŏin regained central control through the “Great Reversal” (kyŏngsin taech’ulch’ŏk) of 1680, calls for Yulgok’s and U’gye’s enshrinement resumed. Although he tried to persevere in his predecessors’ cautious attitude, young King Sukchong came under mounting pressure not only from his highest ministers; the two worthies were precipitately enshrined in some local schools. After silencing persistent opposition from Yŏngnam by either excluding the protesters from the examinations or sending them into exile, in 1682 the king finally consented to the installment of Yulgok’s and U’gye’s spirit tablets in the National Shrine of Confucius as well as in the shrines of the local schools—ceremonies many Namin scholars preferred to shun. Their presence in the Munmyo did not last for long, however. With the renewed turnabout of power seven years later, the Namin unceremoniously threw the tablets out again, and they were permanently reenshrined only after the Namin’s ultimate defeat by the Sŏin in 1694.76



Learning and Politics

319

Factional Conflicts and Dilemmas The memorials that Yu Chik and Yu Se-ch’ŏl submitted to the court are illustrative examples of the extent to which “country” literati, however marginalized from central power, considered themselves part of the political discourse of their day—a subject frequently overlooked in general studies of factionalism. Although memorial missions, often involving hundreds of local literati, could be suppressed as unwelcome interventions “from below,” they could never be completely ignored and at times even succeeded in swaying the outcome of factional disputes at the center. The staging of a mission to Seoul, though locally organized, largely depended for its realization on the behind-the-scenes assistance from high-placed collaborators and sympathizers in the capital willing to provide intelligence and logistical support. The Andong Namin literati, however, had few friends in the capital. When Yu Chik arrived there in 1650, there was no Namin in high office. On the contrary, Cho Kyŏng,77 a great friend of Andong,78 had been the most senior Namin official, but was sent into exile just before Chik’s arrival; the capital Andong Kwŏn apparently did not volunteer assistance. By the time Yu Se-ch’ŏl presented his memorial sixteen years later, the political atmosphere in the capital had deteriorated further in the wake of the 1659 rites controversy. Hŏ Mok, who had entertained close intellectual and amicable contacts to Andong, lived in disgrace in the countryside. Others like Hong U-wŏn, though out of office at the time, and O Chŏng-il,79 then in ministerial position, presumably learned beforehand of Yu’s intentions and tried directly or indirectly to aid his cause. As the right state councilor, Hŏ Chŏk was the highest-placed Namin at the center, but apparently kept a certain distance from his country brethren. Pleading ignorance of ritual matters and expressing unease about the memorial’s wording, he nevertheless begged his Sŏin colleagues to be lenient toward Yu,80 and advised the latter not to submit the memorial for a second time.81 For the Sŏin, in contrast, it was obvious that Yu Se-ch’ŏl’s memorial was an insider product directed against them. Song Si-yŏl insisted that none other than Yun Hyu, his ritual rival, could have been the actual author of the memorial. No evidence for this allegation exists, and it is more likely that Kim Su-hong,82 though a Sŏin, yet opposed to Song’s extreme views, was not merely privy to, but actively supportive of Yu Se-ch’ŏl’s project.83 For reasons of personal incompatibility and policy conflicts, the Namin administration, which came to power in 1674 with the substantial scholarly contribution of the Yŏngnam literati, did not last long. Indeed, although their relationship had been cool even earlier, after 1674 the two Namin constituencies in the capital and in the countryside increasingly drifted apart. This is eloquently illustrated by O Chŏng-ch’ang’s84 failed intervention on behalf of Yŏngnam scholars. When O, supported by some middle-level Namin officials, suggested the staging of special examinations in Yŏngnam “to soothe the hearts of the region and invigorate the spirits of many literati,” his memorial was so strongly censored by his seniors, among them Hŏ Chŏk, as highly inappropriate that the memorialists chose to hastily leave their offices. Yun Hyu, then the inspector general, ascribed the strains within the Namin camp to ill-founded expectations that the “Yŏngnam people” (Yŏngnamin), who had been “incited to submit their memorial [in

320

Divisions and Bondings

1666],” harbored after 1674. Regarding themselves as the big winners, Yun opined, they were in fact outmaneuvered by the capital Namin, who quickly seized all the high offices. Treated as before, as people to be ashamed of, they thus lost all hope, and O’s proposal of local examinations, intended to cheer them up, was in fact so completely outside established rules, Yun judged, that it aroused suspicion and even heightened the misgivings that the Namin capital leaders entertained toward their Yŏngnam brethren.85 Yu Se-ch’ŏl, who in 1675 had received a minor appointment in Seoul, witnessed the growing estrangement between capital Namin and Yŏngnam Namin and was equally horrified at the in-fighting among the Namin ministers, who split over the issue of whether or not Song Si-yŏl deserved the death penalty.86 Fearful of an impending crisis, Yu requested an outside post, and when the Namin lost power in 1680, he retired to Andong. In his judgment, the Namin defeat resulted from mixed-up policy priorities. Yu deplored the fact that high-placed Namin mindlessly concentrated on “making the country rich and the military strong” instead of nourishing young King Sukchong’s kingly virtue and thus boosting their moral authority vis-à-vis the throne.87 For Yu, then, it was their moral disorientation that led to the Namin’s defeat. In this atmosphere of contention and mistrust at the center, only a small number of Yŏngnam Namin held office during the two short periods during which the Namin dominated the government in the first two decades of Sukchong’s reign. One of them was [Ŭisŏng] Kim Pang-gŏl, who, after 1674, was appointed to censorial posts. Due to his outstanding literary talents, he was wooed by both Hŏ Chŏk and Yun Hyu, yet reportedly was “ashamed to side with the powerful and mighty.” Back in office as a sixth counselor (senior sixth rank) in the Office of the Special Counselors in 1689, Kim used his position to reopen an angry debate on the “wrong rites [of 1659]” and, insisting on the “rectification of royal rule” (chŏng wangbŏp), joined those who demanded Song Si-yŏl’s death. Deeply remorseful, however, that in the same year he did not succeed in deterring King Sukchong from wrongfully expelling his second wife, Queen Min,88 he resigned from his post (then in the Office of the Inspector General), and returned to Andong. Recalled, he briefly served as head­ master of the National Confucian Academy and as censor general. As one of the Namin in high office (then the fourth minister of the Ministry of War), he was purged in 1694 and exiled to Tongbok, a remote place in southern Chŏlla, where he died shortly after.89 Besides Kim Pang-gŏl and a few other representatives of Andong’s mighty lineages (among them Yu Se-ch’ŏl’s younger brother, Se-myŏng),90 the most prominent one was undoubtedly Yi Hyŏn-il. As the principal exponent of the T’oegye school of his time, Hyŏn-il was recommended for a sallim post by Hŏ Mok, but before he could take it up the Namin were ousted. In early 1689, he was again honored with a special sallim position (saŏp) in the National Confucian Academy and thereafter rapidly advanced to ever more important concurrent positions in the regular bureaucracy—an unusual career that climaxed with the tangsang-rank office of minister of personnel (senior second rank). As a confidant of King Sukchong, he was eagerly courted by his capital colleagues, who hoped to advance through him their own interests. Hyŏn-il, seeking on the contrary to counterbalance their influence, planned to draw able scholars through sallim appointments into the government as teachers and advisors. Though Yi’s plans found Sukchong’s



Learning and Politics

321

approval, they were thwarted by hostile reactions within his own faction. Despairing of the increasingly adversarial climate in the capital, Yi chose to return to Andong just before the final defeat of the Namin in 1694. Found guilty by the Noron victors of having earlier come out in favor of the expulsion of Sukchong’s second queen—an act they had opposed—he was stripped of his office patent and sent into exile. Released in 1704, he died in the same year.91 Another Andong man ousted in 1694 was Kim Se-ho, a fourth inspector in the Office of the Inspector General. Accused of having been involved in a protest action against Yulgok’s and U’gye’s canonization, Kim retired to a life as a “marginalized scholar” (hansa), no longer thinking about “honor and advancement”—an attitude for which the local people held him in high esteem.92 The year 1694, then, signified the final bloodletting of the Namin, effectively banning the voices of T’oegye advocates from government. The Namin’s downfall was decisive—a traumatic experience that came to be deeply engraved in the local memory of the Yŏngnam Confucians. Denigrated as “inexperienced and parochial” country squires not fit for sharing power in Seoul,93 the numerically much larger Yŏngnam Namin constituency was marginalized by the capital Namin, so that without common agency between center and periphery the Namin were unable to prevent the Sŏin’s rise to supreme power.94 As a result, in the eighteenth century, the survival of the Namin (after 1694 a relatively small and diverse group) came to depend precariously on the goodwill of an occasional sympathizer in power.

Chŏlla Interlude The factional conflicts and confrontations at the center also deeply affected Chŏlla Province, where, in contrast to northern Yŏngnam, the Namin lived as a minority surrounded by Sŏin communities. It will be remembered that the province experienced the first factional persecution in the wake of Chŏng Yŏ-rip’s Prison Affair of 1589—an event that kept Chŏlla in turmoil throughout the seventeenth century. Trumping it up as a rebellion against the throne, the Sŏin, then led by Chŏng Ch’ŏl, moved in force against the Namin, in particular against the scholar Chŏng Kae-ch’ŏng95 and his discipleship in Chŏlla. Why Kae-ch’ŏng came to be suspected to have made common cause with Chŏng Yŏ-rip is unknown, but, arrested as fellow conspirator—his lowly origin may have been an additional reason for Chŏng Ch’ŏl’s personal aversion toward him—he was exiled to the north, where he died in 1590. Famous for his extensive scholarship, Chŏng Kae-ch’ŏng had attracted a large number of students from among prominent local descent groups, hundreds of whom were victimized in the aftermath of the rebellion. It was the sons and grandsons of these victims, connected to each other by multiple marital ties, who, from 1606 onward regularly demanded Chŏng’s rehabilitation whenever the Namin were in power at the center; in addition, in 1616 they honored Chŏng Kae-ch’ŏng by establishing a private academy for him in Muan. Under Sŏin pressure, the academy was destroyed in 1657, but in the first month of 1677 some 422 Chŏlla Namin literati, led by [Namwŏn]

322

Divisions and Bondings

Yang Mong-gŏ, took advantage of the Namin’s return to power to demand that Chŏng Ch’ŏl be posthumously stripped of rank and office in revenge for his cruel persecution of the Namin in 1589. King Sukchong rejected the memorial as a matter settled long ago and advised the memorialists to go home and study.96 Persuaded, however, by Hŏ Mok (then the left state councilor), the king gave orders to rebuild Chŏng’s academy and granted it a royal charter naming it Chasan Sŏwŏn in 1678, when Yun Hyu was its first head (wŏnjang). Shortly later, in 1680, some Chŏlla Sŏin yusaeng from Kwangju urged the punishment of the 1677 memorialists, and Chasan Sŏwŏn was razed for the second time. With the Namin’s return to government in 1689, the academy was rebuilt, and the king bestowed a posthumous office title on Chŏng Kae-ch’ŏng. The academy apparently survived the crisis of 1694, but was destroyed once more in 1702, and its assets impounded by the victorious local Sŏin.97 Chasan Sŏwŏn was not the only target of local strife. Following the same rhythm of factional turnovers, in 1657 Sŏin partisans—perhaps celebrating victory over Chasan Sŏwŏn—erected two shrines for the famous local sŏngnihak scholar, An Pang-jun,98 Tosan Sau in Nŭngju and Tae’gye Sŏwŏn in Posŏng, An’s natal place. Both shrines were destroyed by Namin locals—supported from the center by Yi Hyŏn-il—in 1692, but Tae’gye Sŏwŏn was rebuilt and granted a royal charter in 1704.99 As the factional tit for tat reached a bloody climax in 1694, even Sŏin officials started to reprimand King Sukchong for having overplayed his factional cards. Among his critics was [Sangnyŏng] Ch’oe Kye-ong, then the fifth tutor in the Crown Prince Tutorial Office. Likely with the aftermath of the 1589 affair in mind—though Noron, the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe were variously related to the victims—Ch’oe, reputed for his sharp tongue, likened the “evil of favoring one party [over the other]” to “grubs chewing away at the heart.” Earlier kings, he reminded Sukchong, had attempted to eliminate factional politics, but during the last twenty years the court had been turned upside down several times, each time with greater perniciousness, comparable to “a sick patient at one time exposed to treatment with cold, at another with heat.” With his officials utterly disgusted, Ch’oe warned, the king would do well finally to come to his senses. That Ch’oe dared use such abrasive language to his king is likely because he felt protected by his mentor, the eminent Soron scholar Pak Se-ch’ae, who had recommended him for office.100 While Ch’oe Kye-ong repeated his lamentations over the worsening factional situation a few more times in the capital, his older brother, Si-ong, observed with alarm the growing harm that factional strife was causing in the Chŏlla countryside. Calling the original break-up between Tongin and Sŏin the root of the country’s decline, he considered the Sŏin split into Noron-Soron in the early 1680s as the even greater evil. Indeed, with factional conflicts between Sŏin and Namin in rural areas leading to beatings and expulsions, even kinsmen, he bemoaned, turned against one another and neighborhoods changed into battlegrounds. Not without an obvious measure of self-praise, however, Ch’oe noted that the situation in Namwŏn was still under control as people continued to attend each other’s weddings and funerals. If, he added, the whole country could be led in this way, the political situation would not have so grievously deteriorated.101 Though Ch’oe Si-ong himself sided, as a disciple of Yun Chŭng, with the Soron, he seems to have had neither quarrels with his brothers, who were all Noron, nor with the Tundŏk Yi (with



Learning and Politics

323

whom the Ch’oe were variously connected by marriage), who had, following Yi Sanghyŏng, prominently allied themselves with the Sŏin. The Chŏlla example is illustrative of how far factional interests and antagonisms in the countryside were stirred and manipulated from the center. Indeed, Chŏng Kaech’ŏng seems to have been a circumstantial victim—apparently made an easy scapegoat by the Sŏin to go against the minority Namin. That his and his followers’ martyrdom did not remain a single event derived from the high degree to which scholarly, and by extension, factional issues were personalized and pursued, along kinship lines, with tenacity over generations—a dynamism that ran its course, at least temporarily, with the expulsion of the Namin from central power in 1694.

Dissent and Competing Forces within Yŏngnam After 1694, the Yŏngnam Namin suffered from a deepening sense of isolation—not only geographically. They witnessed with anxiety how the “public discourse” had deteriorated into “factional discourse” (tangnon) with dire consequences for many of their country colleagues. Nevertheless, though practically cut off from capital intelligence and fearful of “official authority” (kwanwi), Yŏngnam literati did not cease to send memorials to the capital. Yet, such expressions of literati opinion (saron) found fewer local supporters and were far more sporadic than before.102 Indeed, a period of introspection set in, and the powerlessness and hopelessness of their situation led some Yŏngnam Namin to rethink and even compromise their factional loyalties. It was not only the factional upheavals in the capital and their expansion into the countryside that had a deeply troubling effect on the literati in Yŏngnam. In the course of the seventeenth century the various intellectual strands that were growing out of T’oegye’s legacy increasingly diversified and entered into competition with one another. Influential scholar-teacher personalities gathered their own discipleships around them and created through the tradition of student-teacher loyalties and marital ties intellectual nodes of their own. All, of course, took T’oegye’s legacy as their primary point of intellectual orientation, but despite such fidelity tended to assert their own scholarly authority. In this way, several quite distinct “scholarly zones” within Yŏngnam came into existence. Whereas Andong, with Yi Hyŏn-il as Kim Sŏng-il’s recognized successor, remained the center of the moralistic branch of T’oegye’s philosophy, Sangju, to the west of Andong across the Naktong River, won in the course of the seventeenth century almost equal fame for the number of its outstanding scholar-teachers, many of whom had been Yu Sŏng-nyong’s disciples. Among them was Yu’s own son Chin, who had moved to Sangju, Yi Chŏn, and the latter’s younger brother, Yi Chun1.103 Most famous, however, was Sangju’s native son Chŏng Kyŏng-se, who not only had a brilliant government career but also was a renowned scholar and ritualist. Indeed, Chŏng, though well versed in T’oegye thought, also embraced the “learning of the Way” of early sarim thinkers and, in addition, connected to Yulgok’s intellectual position, entertaining close relations to the Sŏin. His son-in-law was none other than the well-known Sŏin scholar-

324

Divisions and Bondings

official, Song Chun-gil (who, in 1657, was one of the principal instigators of the destruction of Chasan Academy in Chŏlla). With his wide-ranging scholarly expertise, Chŏng Kyŏng-se attracted disciples of varied intellectual leanings, among them the Sin brothers, Sŏk-pŏn and Sŏk-hyŏng, both vocal Sŏin partisans.104 It was Sin Sŏk-hyŏng who attacked Yu Chik in 1650 and likened T’oegye to Zhou Dunyi and Cheng Yi, and, rather provocatively, Yi I and Sŏng Hon to Zhu Xi and Zhang Zai. Sin was to regret his intervention: Yu Chik and his followers later punished him by chasing him from his home—inciting calls at court for disciplinary action against such “wicked customs” (p’yesŭp) prevalent in Yŏngnam.105 Sin’s debacle demonstrates the tensions differing factional allegiances introduced into local communities, foretelling the conflicts the Sŏin stirred up when they attempted to advance their influence into Yŏngnam Namin territory in the early eighteenth century. The Sŏin victory in 1694 dealt the Namin a severe psychological blow and engendered in some minds personal disaffection and anxiety about their increased isolation. Indeed, there seem to have been a few who tried to overcome their frustration by switching their allegiance to the faction in power in the capital. Even though presumably small in numbers, such renegades were nevertheless conspicuous enough for a new term for them to appear sporadically in early eighteenth-century documents: “newly rising Sŏin” (sinch’ul Sŏin). For “propagating Sŏin [or Noron] arguments” and seeking to infiltrate local schools and academies, they were immediately accused by the Namin of betraying the T’oegye heritage and thus perpetrating the grave crime of opportunistically switching scholarly lines.106 Though rarely identified by name, the perhaps (in Korean historiography) bestknown among these allegedly disenchanted country Namin was An Yŏn-sŏk (1662–1730). A member of the Sunhŭng An, who had resided for generations in Ka’gu village, a short distance from Andong City,107 Yŏn-sŏk’s biography is known only in fragments as collected works do not seem to exist, and thus the circumstances of his reputed defection to the Noron remain speculative. He grew up in a cultured Namin milieu—his great-greatgrandfather was a T’oegye disciple—and passed, as a chinsa of 1683, the munkwa exams with top honors in 1705, and earned a reputation for his erudition and calligraphic style.108 Reportedly a determined Yi Hyŏn-il partisan, he circulated a protest note against Kim Chang-saeng’s canonization in 1717, and in the first years of King Kyŏngjong’s short reign served as headmaster (wŏnjang) of Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn and Tosan Sŏwŏn.109 Considering his strong Namin background, then, it is surprising that in 1722 An should, late in life, have come out in defense of the Noron-backed future King Yŏngjo, whose life was threatened by the Soron.110 For his loyalty to Yŏngjo, he was rewarded with the magistracy of Yangsan (South Kyŏngsang). An’s unexpected support of Noron interests came later to be interpreted by his detractors as evidence of his “Noron conversion.” Who were these later detractors? The key figure whose testimony branded An Yŏn-sŏk as a turncoat was none other than the high Soron official Pak Mun-su.111 In fact, it was Pak who, in 1727, after the Soron had again wrested power from the Noron, was sent as a secret inspector to appraise the magistrates in Kyŏngsang Province, and who accused An of greed and violence in office.



Learning and Politics

325

Upon this devastating verdict, An was dismissed and exiled to Chinju. It would seem that An became a victim of the Noron-Soron power struggle that raged during King Yŏngjo’s early reign. But was An’s “conversion” merely a factional fabrication? A hint as to An’s motives for allying himself with the Noron may be found in the only written work An seems to have left, a brief history of factionalism entitled Sources of Factional Disputes (Tangnon wŏllyu).112 After Kyŏngjong’s accession, An recorded, the party (tang) of Sŏin Kim Il-gyŏng, which instigated the Noron purge of 1721–22, seized the top positions in government, and banded together with a “depraved Namin family” (Namin p’yejok), “harboring rebellious thoughts.” Though he did not name the “depraved Namin family,” An had unmistakably the capital Andong Kwŏn in mind, specifically the son and grandson of Kwŏn Tae-un, who cooperated with the Soron to negotiate a brief comeback in government during Kyŏngjong’s reign.113 It is thus possible that during the ruinous sequence of plots and counterplots in the early 1720s An felt compelled to side with the Noron in the hope of punishing the wayward Kwŏn. This desperate act, denounced by his detractors as a condemnable change of party allegiance, may in fact rather point to the degree of the general powerlessness Namin experienced in the countryside as well as in the capital: An sought Noron patronage, while the Kwŏn tried to take advantage of Soron power. Whatever An’s motives, his apparent “Noron defection” was possibly exaggerated to further undermine the credibility of the Andong Namin. Nevertheless, An’s epitaph was written by the eminent Noron scholar and high official Yi Chae,114 and the label of “renegade” stuck to An’s name—with serious repercussions for his descendants far beyond An’s death in 1730.

Andong and the Yi In-jwa Rebellion of 1728 The credibility and loyalty of the Yŏngnam Namin were further put to the test by the Yi In-jwa Rebellion in the fourth year (musin) of King Yŏngjo’s reign (therefore also called the Musin Rebellion). The rebellion started off from a combination of perilous circumstances: the bitter power struggle between Noron and Soron during the first years of King Yŏngjo’s reign sent out divisive signals beyond the capital far into the countryside, and anonymous posters (kwaesŏ) began to appear with ominous antiroyal messages in Chŏnju and Namwŏn in late 1727 and, shortly after, in the capital itself. In addition, rumors about impending incursions of Pyŏnsan bandits115 terrorized the Seoul population, and some yangban apparently were packing up to leave the capital. Before the government, fearing a popular uprising, could deliberate countermeasures, news reached Seoul that a rebel army led by Yi In-jwa,116 ostensibly aiming to restore a “legitimate ruler” to the throne,117 had sacked Ch’ŏngju, the army headquarters of Ch’ungch’ŏng Province, on the fifteenth of the third month of 1728 and was marching toward the capital. Five days later, one of Yi’s fellow conspirators, Chŏng Hŭi-ryang,118 was reported to have taken Anŭm and Kŏch’ang in southern Kyŏngsang. Hastily dispatched government troops engaged the rebels in battle near Chuksan (Kyŏnggi) on the twenty-fourth, and

326

Divisions and Bondings

the retreating Yi In-jwa was captured by villagers and sent to Seoul, where he was personally interrogated by King Yŏngjo. Two days later, he was decapitated, whereas Chŏng Hŭi-ryang managed to escape.119 In the aftermath, the government hunted down genuine and suspected collaborators in the southern provinces and persecuted in particular landed elites in Chŏlla120—among them descendants of 1589 victims—and Kyŏngsang. Even though the rebels had found few partisans in the area, the Andong sajok suffered gravely in consequence of the rebellion. In preparation for the rebellion, Yi In-jwa had dispatched his younger brother, Yi Ung-jwa, to Yech’ŏn and Andong with the charge of recruiting rebel soldiers from among disgruntled Namin. His hope of possible support from Andong was apparently based on the large followings that previous collective ventures such as Yu Se-ch’ŏl’s protest memorial had drawn.121 His expectations, however, were far too optimistic. Accompanied by a few mounted and heavily armed horsemen, Yi Ung-jwa first appeared at the gate of the prominent Namin scholar Kwŏn Ku in Kail on the twelfth day of the third month.122 Kwŏn, who had heard rumors about the Pyŏnsan bandits and popular unrest in the capital, was greatly alarmed when Ung-jwa attempted to intimidate him into collaboration by asserting that a large rebel army had already reached Yech’ŏn. Doubting this, Kwŏn proclaimed his unswerving loyalty to the throne and finally, with stubborn resistance and pleading old age, got rid of the disagreeable intruder. Yi Ung-jwa then hastened on to try to win over Yu Mong-sŏ in Hahoe, Kwŏn Tŏk-su in Soya, and Kim Min-haeng in Kŭmgye.123 Clearly, Yi knew well who the leaders of Andong society were. Yet, since all of them rebuffed him, he despairingly cried: “With these Andong bastards I get nowhere!” and, “to unify Andong,” set about decapitating the Noron magistrate of Andong, Yi Chŏng-so124—an attempt that stirred such a popular outcry that he left the area in great anger.125 Informed by a monk about the fall of Ch’ŏngju into rebel hands, Kwŏn Ku intended to meet his friends and kinsmen in Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn to discuss the raising of “righteous troops” (ŭibyŏng). Yet, as Andong was suspected as one of the principal staging grounds of the rebellion, the former Andong magistrate Pak Sa-su (a Noron) arrived there in his new capacity of pacifier of Yŏngnam (Yŏngnam anmusa) on the twenty-seventh, accompanied by Cho Tŏng-nin (a Soron) as special militia recruiter of Left Kyŏngsang (Kyŏngsangdo hososa). Kwŏn and his colleagues therefore first hastened to Andong City to greet the envoys. The city bristled with heavily armed soldiers, and Kwŏn, before he was admitted to make his obeisance, was shackled and led before Pak for interrogation. Because of an identity mix-up—a Kwŏn Ku was listed in a captured enemy document— Kwŏn inadvertently became a prime suspect. Accompanied by his eldest son, Kwŏn was escorted in shackles to Seoul for further investigation. As the road to the capital was tightly guarded, progress was slow, and Kwŏn and his escorts arrived there only on the fifth day of the fourth month. Thrown into a cramped make-shift jail, he had to wait several days before he was questioned in the specially established tribunal (kukch’ŏng). After he signed a protocol in which his “acquaintance” with Yi In-jwa was recorded, he was transferred to the prison of the State Tribunal where he again spent some anxious days, witnessing torture and death among his fellow prisoners. On the eleventh day, finally, King Yŏngjo personally cross-examined him (ch’in’guk).



Learning and Politics

327

King: Kwŏn: King: Kwŏn:

Did you know [Yi] In-jwa? I saw him once. How did you meet him? It was in 1725 when I went to Chŏngsan Sŏwŏn in Yech’ŏn, where I met with eight or nine sarim. The last to come was a young man; it was In-jwa.126 King: Did you get his name? Kwŏn: Since he was my junior, there was no way for me to get his name. How could he have asked the name of a senior first? Therefore there was no introduction. King: But how did you know that it was In-jwa? Kwŏn: After he had gone, I asked the one sitting next to me. King: Did you talk to In-jwa? Kwŏn: Upon learning that he wished to study fortune telling, I asked him why, in view of his apparent talents, he wanted to learn such a trivial profession. These, I think, were my only words. King: Was there no other talk besides? Kwŏn: How could there have been no further talking while we were sitting together? Yet, drinking in leisure we had nothing special in mind. After so many years, how can I recall it all? King: Do you have a grudge against In-jwa? Kwŏn: No. In view of Yŏngnam’s reputation for loyalty and allegiance [to the throne], not a single rebel has arisen from there for five hundred years from Han times through Koryŏ and during the last three hundred years of the present dynasty! K ing interrupts: Is Chŏng Hŭi-ryang not a Yŏngnam man? Kwŏn: I meant the old territory of Silla. Although it is the same Yŏngnam, the customs of the right and left [halves of Kyŏngsang] province are a bit different. A place like Anŭm [Chŏng’s native place] is in the lower [half of Kyŏngsang]; it borders on Honam [Chŏlla] and its customs are similar to those of Honam [i.e., are rude and unpredictable]. King interrupts: Thus, are the people from there no good? Kwŏn: I was only referring to the localities. How can the quality of people completely depend on those? And Kwŏn adds: Andong is the key area of Yŏngnam, and many Confucian worthies have emerged from there.

Kwŏn then praised the virtues and high morals of his native place. Upon the king’s prodding to recommend local men of talent, Kwŏn submitted the names of Yi Hyŏn-il’s son, Chae, Kwŏn Ho-mun’s great-grandson, Kwŏn Tŏk-su, and Kim Sŏng-t’ak. But smarting from the shame he was experiencing, Kwŏn continued to defend himself. How could he, an old man, have made common cause with rebels? After the king apparently jokingly added that there were rebels even among white heads, Kwŏn was released and his shackles removed.127 Even after receiving a full royal pardon, Kwŏn’s ordeal was not over. Set free, he had no place to stay in the capital and had to accept shelter in the house of a compatriot. He also learned that his two younger sons and his slaves had been imprisoned in Tanyang. Before he could get ready for the return trip, he thus needed to obtain an official writ (kwanmun) for his sons’ release from the Border Defense Council (Pibyŏnsa)—a procedure that proved impossible without the assistance of a top-level official. Lacking influ-

328

Divisions and Bondings

ential sponsors, he humbly approached with a petition the minister of punishment, Sŏ Myŏng-gyun,128 a Noron, when the latter emerged from his residence. But Sŏ was busy, and the issue of the writ was delayed, and Kwŏn was informed that the roads out of the capital were still impassable. Hoping that his sons would have heard of his release, he stayed on, and on the nineteenth became a timid witness to the victory ceremony near the South Gate, during which the king received the ears of the slain rebels.129 Finally, a day later, Kwŏn started on his return trip and first went to Ch’ungju, to where his sons had been transferred. In each village he passed through, curious onlookers gathered to behold the recipient of a royal pardon. Surprised at such attention, Kwŏn was told by an old woman: “On this road we have seen many who went up [to the capital], but today it’s the first time that we see someone coming back alive. Is this not worth our curiosity?” Security in Ch’ungju was still so tight that his sons had not received their father’s letters and thus were unaware of his pardon. After their release, Kwŏn and his sons headed home to a great welcome by family and neighbors.130 While Kwŏn Ku was under investigation in the capital, Cho Tŏng-nin had called together some one hundred members of the Andong elite—former government officials and literati—to organize a local militia corps. With Yu Sŭng-hyŏn131 in command as “militia grand general” (ŭibyŏng taejang), assisted by Kwŏn Man,132 a sizable fighting force was soon assembled and food supplies collected. Kwŏn, a descendant of Kwŏn Pŏl, reportedly contributed “hundreds of bags of ancestral grain [chonggok].” But before recruits and provisions reached the government troops, the rebellion had collapsed, and Pak Sa-su returned to the capital to report directly to the king.133 Pak Sa-su’s report contributed nothing to placate King Yŏngjo’s distrust of Andong. Pak admitted that at first he had been misled by his stereotypical understanding of the nature of people in the “upper” and “lower” part of Kyŏngsang—the upper simple and natural, the lower wild and depraved—and thus did not suspect “the gentlemen of Andong” of collaboration, all the more since “they are able to differentiate between submission and revolt.” Only after he had seen captured rebel documents did he realize that the people in Andong must have known about the impending rebellion. Yet, though the rebels clearly had wanted to start the rebellion in the “upper province,” the Andong scholars, Pak asserted, were too timid and cowardly to join them, which is why the rebels had to go south to find collaborators. As to Kwŏn Ku, though a famous scholar, Pak thought, he had lied about his contacts with Yi In-jwa because his story differed from what Pak had heard from other Andong people. But since he now could not interrogate him further—Kwŏn had been released two weeks earlier—there was, he complained, no way to get at the truth. Pak’s report left the king “genuinely worried about the Yŏngnam matter.” Because of the name mix-up, all ministers, the king stated, had wished to release Kwŏn Ku. “Since he did not seem to have been one of the conspirators, I, too, let him go,” despite the fact that the censor general, Song In-myŏng, a Soron,134 had wanted to keep him in custody a bit longer. “I now regret that I did not follow Song’s advice.” Now, the king added, it is inopportune to arrest him again or seize Yu Mong-sŏ and Kwŏn Tŏk-su, who, though not belonging to the original rebels, had made themselves guilty by not reporting their likely insider knowledge to the authorities—something that must have happened not



Learning and Politics

329

only in Yŏngnam, but in all three southern provinces. “If we arrested them all for interrogation, this would, I fear, stir up great unrest!” For completing the pacification, Pak suggested, it would be necessary to arrest at least those suspected of complicity, such as Yu Mong-sŏ and Kwŏn Tŏk-su. Yu Mong-sŏ, Pak explained, was a descendant of Un-nyong, Sŏng-nyong’s elder brother. “Whereas Sŏng-nyong’s descendants are all lawabiding and self-restrained, those of Un-nyong are not at all like this! And Kwŏn Tŏk-su acts as a real strongman in his village. When I was Andong magistrate, I tried to restrain him with the law, but to no avail!” Kwŏn, Pak added spitefully, “likes to talk partisan talk!” Therefore it would be best, Pak beseeched the king, to send another high official to Andong to clear things up, and await that mission’s outcome before recommending any of these men for office.135 Despite the fact that so many questions remained unanswered, the king did not allow the investigation to be reopened. Instead, he sent a conciliatory edict to the governor of Kyŏngsang, Pak Mun-su. Pak conveyed it personally to Andong, where he convened the literati in the local school. Seated in the lecture hall, Pak summoned Yu Mong-sŏ, Kwŏn Tŏk-su, and Kim Min-haeng before him and solemnly read the edict, whereupon Yu and his comrades reportedly burst into tears of gratitude. Some three hundred Andong literati then sent a letter to Seoul praising the royal virtue.136 The Yi In-jwa Rebellion of 1728 would perhaps have passed as one more tragic episode in the vicious cycle of factional violence, had it not fed on the critical issue of King Yŏngjo’s legitimacy as Kyŏngjong’s rightful heir. Shaken in his self-confidence, the king interpreted the rebellion as a direct assault on his royal mandate and construed the participation of a number of Namin malcontents as a Yŏngnam revolt against the throne. Equally disturbing for him was the fact that, for the first time in Chosŏn history, the rebels had emerged from among the “sadaebu whose loyalty has [traditionally] sustained the state.”137 Nevertheless, the unprecedented degree of mutual slaying strengthened Yŏngjo’s resolve to devote ever more energy to his vision of neutralizing factional strife through a policy of “grand harmony” (t’angp’yŏng).138 For Andong, the Yi In-jwa affair ended, at least for the moment, on a mediatory note as none of the Andong descent groups experienced the vindictive slaughtering of entire families as happened elsewhere. Nevertheless, Noron pressure on Andong increased greatly. Not only did they demand that Yu Mong-sŏ, Kwŏn Tŏk-su, Kim Min-haeng, and Kwŏn Noe139—the “four villains” of 1728—be stripped of their membership on the Andong Local Roster; they also interfered directly in local affairs as Noron magistrates, unprecedentedly, laid claim to roster membership.140

Yŏngnam under King Yŏngjo: Broken Hope of Reconciliation After 1728, the Yŏngnam area continued to suffer from its image of having been the breeding ground of a rebellion and was put under close surveillance by either Noron or Soron officials appointed provincial governors and local magistrates.141 True, Yu Mong-sŏ, Kwŏn Ku, Kwŏn Tŏk-su, and their colleagues had obtained royal pardons,

330

Divisions and Bondings

yet they could not rid themselves entirely of the odium of having had contacts with the rebels and therefore were apparently shunned even by locals. In view of the unsettled and anxious situation in Andong, Pak Mun-su, the postrebellion governor of Kyŏngsang Province, urged King Yŏngjo to come to a decision on the fate of the last suspects. “If you suspect them, kill them; if you do not suspect them, release them from suspicion of complicity!” The king promised to take this advice to heart.142 Pak’s successor as governor, his fellow Soron Cho Hyŏn-myŏng,143 equally pleaded for the area’s speedy rehabilitation. Well aware of the particular sensibilities of northern Yŏngnam, in early 1733 Cho entreated the king: Excluded from official life since 1694 and still distressed about 1728, the descendants of even reputed worthies have become peasants and say: “If we are of different opinion, we are branded as rebels; if we pass the munkwa examination, the government rejects us. Do we have an alternative to making a living by farming?” For them, crossing the Choryŏng Pass [on the way to Seoul] in white garb [i.e., not as official] is considered shameful.144

Both Pak and Cho, seriously worried about the political consequences of the ongoing factional malaise separating the periphery from the center, kept reminding the king that with the road into government narrowing by the day, a future revolt was not inconceivable. If partisan politics continued, one day people like Yi In-jwa and Chŏng Hŭi-ryang might arise again and plot revolt.145 Despite Yŏngjo’s resolve to recall Yŏngnam Namin into government service and thus steer a course of reconciliation away from bloody factional exchanges, the human situation in Andong as seen from the center seemed so complex that a swift realization of the royal resolve looked problematic. The king and his ministers puzzled over the “renegade Namin” in Yŏngnam and were particularly divided on how to evaluate men such as An Yŏn-sŏk and Na Hak-ch’ŏn.146 Pak Mun-su denounced An Yŏn-sŏk as a greedy official and a turncoat—as a man who, together with his younger brother No-sŏk, belonged to Andong’s “strongmen elite” (sain ho’gang).147 Na Hak-ch’ŏn, as a royal secretary once given a tiger skin by a grateful Yŏngjo,148 was equally difficult to fathom. As a Yŏngnam man, the king mused, Na had long represented the Namin position, yet after 1721–22 reversed his “old opinions” and came up with “novel views.” But did he not submit to the rebels, as a Namin memorial had insinuated? Indeed, changing one’s position to seek quick profit was condemnable, high Noron official Kim Hŭng-gyŏng149 interjected. Yet, was it not possible to make a decisive change after evaluating the right and wrong of a cause? Though uncomfortable with such “reversals of argument” (nonŭi chi pyŏn), the king admitted that because Na had criticized the purge of 1721–22 as wrong, he had earlier praised him.150 Clearly, An Yŏn-sŏk and Na Hak-ch’ŏn, both dead by the time of this discussion, had left a worrying legacy. In addition, how an individual had positioned himself in 1721–22—for or against Yŏngjo—turned into a vital test of his loyalist or rebel (ch’ung-yŏk) inclinations. Who among the Yŏngnam scholars, then, was employable? For appeasing Yŏngnam, Cho Hyŏn-myŏng recommended for office Kim Sŏng-t’ak, one of Yi Hyŏn-il’s disciples, because “a man of his reputation should be called to court to be consulted on the mean-



Learning and Politics

331

ing of the classics and the way of ruling.” Kim had reportedly also strongly assisted the raising of local militia forces in 1728.151 The tardiness with which Kim Sŏng-t’ak was called to the capital, however, epitomized the intensity with which those in power in Seoul tried to block the rehabilitation of the Yŏngnam Namin. Yŏngjo, in conversation with some confidants, observed with displeasure that court officials continued to threaten one another with sinister schemes, and, a royal secretary remarked, were unwilling to welcome Yŏngnam people when they came to the capital. Instead of a scholar like Kim Sŏng-t’ak, “turncoats” such as An Yŏn-sŏk and Na Hak-ch’ŏn had been the first to be given office—raising adversary tempers in Yŏngnam. If the king wanted to win the hearts of the Yŏngnam literati, he would be well advised to do so with “rites and righteousness” (ŭirye).152 King Yŏngjo took these warnings to heart and increasingly leaned toward the Soron position of impartiality. By early 1734, Kim Sŏng-t’ak had still not been cleared for office. Finally, at the end of the year, appointed a junior sixth-rank assistant to the Office of Animal Husbandry (Sach’uksŏ)153—a post he apparently did not accede—he was called before King Yŏngjo and questioned about T’oegye’s legacy. Recalling “what he had heard from his elders,” Kim praised the eight steps of the Daxue as “the ruler’s learning.” Asked about the essentials of governing, he replied with the Mencian demand for lowering punishment and fines and lightening taxes and corvée. He further urged the king to take seriously the three principles of “stabilizing human relationships, rectifying the terms, and loving the people.” After placing second in the Augmented Examinations in 1735, Kim was promoted to a fifth-rank office.154 Yŏngjo’s determination to draw more Yŏngnam scholars into government service was soon gravely challenged, however. In the spring of 1736, factional animosity again sprang into the open as some four thousand Namin, led by saengwŏn Yi In-ji of Sangju,155 submitted a memorial in which they voiced, in “obscure words,” strong opposition to the canonization of the “two Song” (Song Si-yŏl and Song Chun-gil). With this memorial, they reacted to other Yŏngnam yusaeng of Noron persuasion who had earlier demanded the enshrinement of the two Song in the National Shrine of Confucius. Alerted that Yi’s submission was reminiscent of similar acts in 1674 and 1689 (when the Namin seized power), King Yŏngjo, after personally reading the memorial, rejected it outright and ordered far-off exile for Yi In-ji. He obviously feared for his reconciliation policy and thus was pleased to receive Kim Sŏng-t’ak’s backing. In his capacity of fourth censor, Kim criticized sharply the “evil of factional disputes among sarim” (sarim tangnon), which cast the canonization of the two Song again into an issue of personal victory or failure. In response, some Noron officials resurrected the specter of 1728 as a sure measure of how far Yŏngnam’s morals had deteriorated, and intimated that the king, instead of treating the Yŏngnam people indulgently, should castigate them. They also shot a broadside attack at Kim Sŏng-t’ak, whose words they found “obscure and crafty.”156 Indeed, memories could conveniently be shaped into lethal weapons. In the fall of the same year, chinsa Sin Hŏn of Yonggung157 not only seconded the canonization of the two Song, but also condemned Yi In-ji for slandering earlier worthies. Kim Sŏng-t’ak, Sin insinuated, in fact endorsed Yi’s intents and was, he further reminded the king, a disciple of Yi Hyŏn-il—the very one who in 1689 had been a principal advocate of Song

332

Divisions and Bondings

Si-yŏl’s death. The king, weary of these verbal recriminations, told Sin to go home and study, and promoted Kim Sŏng-t’ak in office. Yet, in the late spring of 1737, when, in reaction to Sin Hŏn’s defamation of his teacher, Kim requested Yi Hyŏn-il’s rehabilitation, he had definitely gone too far. He caused an instant uproar inside and outside the capital, and the subsequent consultation the king had with his top-ranking ministers revealed how precarious Kim’s position in government really was. The left state councilor, Kim Chae-ro,158 a prominent Noron, was amazed at the arrogance of Kim’s language. Yi Hyŏn-il, he stated, was originally known as a bookish man, but in reality was a charlatan who misled people like Kim. Surprisingly, he had saved his head in 1689 and was merely exiled. How in the world did Kim dare bring up 1689 again? Although Kim was reputed for his scholarship, Kim Chae-ro further asserted, he was not at all a learned recluse, and the king should not have treated him with so much indulgence. The king also had sent a wrong signal to Yŏngnam, Kim Chae-ro added, with blame in his voice, by favoring after 1728 Yi Hyŏn-il’s son, Chae, with an appointment to office on the mere recommendation of his scholarship. Feigning ignorance of the events of 1689 (he had not yet been born) and regretting that he had earlier granted Kim Sŏng-t’ak an audience, Yŏngjo, encouraged by Minister Kim, decided to deal harshly with Kim. In a tense interrogation, Kim Sŏng-t’ak proclaimed his profuse gratitude for past royal favors and maintained that he had studied with Yi Hyŏn-il after the latter had been released from exile, and therefore had no clear knowledge about the events of 1689. Moreover, Kim added, Yi had never been indicted for sedition. The king’s ministers took a different view. If Kim was not punished, Kim Chae-ro insisted, the people of Yŏngnam might misunderstand the king’s conciliatory gesture of 1728, and “an even greater evil might arise in the future.” He therefore also supported the call by Pak Sa-su and others for Yi Chae’s posthumous stripping of office— against a petition that Yi Chae, who had died several years earlier, not be dishonored in connection with the Kim Sŏng-t’ak affair. The king’s final verdict, to exile Kim Sŏng-t’ak to a remote island, elicited a Soron plea for leniency, but the angry king even dismissed veteran Cho Hyŏn-myŏng from office for appealing that Kim be not treated like a rebel. Kim was permitted to return to the mainland a year later, but he died in exile in southeastern Chŏlla in 1747.159

Yŏngnam Namin under Pressure of Factional Infiltration King Yŏngjo’s desire to extend his policy of “grand harmony” to Yŏngnam was jeopardized not merely by the obstruction of his Noron ministers, but equally harmful, the king came to realize, was his own narrow focus on a few Yŏngnam individuals thought to be eligible for office. He thus agreed with the suggestion of the left state councilor, Kim Chae-ro, that the court not treat Yŏngnam differently from the other provinces. “Should we ignore all Yŏngnam people because of one Kim Sŏng-t’ak?” the king asked rhetorically. Yet, the “customs” in Yŏngnam, the minister of war, Min Ŭng-su,160 interjected, had considerably changed in recent years. In earlier times everyone was Namin, but lately



Learning and Politics

333

there were some among the Namin who distanced themselves from the events of 1689 (when the Namin insisted on Song Si-yŏl’s death), while others sympathized with the rebels of 1728. Indeed, a few years earlier when serving as the governor of Kyŏngsang, Min had already intimated to the king that factional conflict among the sajok there had reached serious dimensions.161 The memorials of Yi In-ji of Sangju and Sin Hŏn of Yonggung surely provided additional proof of rifts among the Namin and the rise of Noron sympathizers in northern Kyŏngsang. Was it this ambivalent factional situation that the Noron diagnosed in Yŏngnam and that enticed them in the late spring of 1738 to assist in the building of a shrine honoring Kim Sang-hŏn, the patriarch of the capital Noron Andong Kim, in close proximity to the Altar to the Spirits of Soil and Grain (Sajiktan) in the very heart of Andong? One of the shrine builders was none other than the son of An Yŏn-sŏk, T’aek-chun.162 An’s accomplices were his own uncle, An U-sŏk (1676–1748), the out-of-town chinsa Sin Sa-guk (a kinsman of Sin Hŏn), a Kang Wŏn-il, and a few obscure individuals said “to wish to become yangban”—a possible hint that some Noron hangers-on, perhaps of secondaryson status, were hoping for social advancement.163 This motley group apparently was emboldened and likely aided with materiel and labor by the then governor of Kyŏngsang Province, the diehard Noron Yu Ch’ŏk-ki,164 and the Andong magistrate Ŏ Yu-ryong,165 both of whom were eager to infiltrate the Namin stronghold. The shrine did not stand for long, however. Soon after its completion, it was torn down by an angry populace in a frenzied vendetta led by a Kim Sŏng-il descendant, Mong-nyŏm, the head of the Local Bureau, and his kinsman Kim Kyŏng-hŏn, the head of the local school.166 They and a few other local leaders were immediately accused of disobeying official orders, insulting officials, maltreating corvée soldiers (drafted for the construction), and protecting an unruly mob. News of this incident soon reached Seoul, where it again unleashed a prolonged and bitter verbal battle between Noron and Soron ministers. Basically, the points of view at court of how to deal with this newest crisis remained set in old clichés. The minister of works, Pak Sa-su, extolled the virtues of Kim Sang-hŏn, who as a “great elder of the entire nation” well deserved to have a shrine in his native place, but thus far had been commemorated only by a stele. Pak Mun-su, he asserted, had prevented plans for the building of a shrine by citing the prohibition against multiple shrines for the same person. If, Pak Sa-su concluded, the Andong conspirators of 1728 had been severely punished according to the law, the recent outrage would not have happened.167 Pak’s assessment of the Andong sajok’s moral depravity was seconded by Kim Chae-ro, who maintained that the local Namin destroyed the shrine out of fear of losing their local supremacy (hyanggwŏn). If unhappy about the shrine, they should have expressed their dissatisfaction in a memorial and not just demolished it. If, moreover, Yi In-ji had been properly dealt with at the time, it would not have come to this kind of violence. Like Pak Sa-su, he demanded severe punishment for the culprits. Naturally choosing a softer approach, Pak Mun-su pleaded for a royal edict to prohibit the reconstruction of Kim’s shrine and argued that the building of a private academy was part of the “sarim discourse” and therefore a local affair. An T’aek-chun had been arrogant in wanting to change Andong’s factional landscape, but had failed because of the determined opposition of the local sarim. Clearly, Pak stated, it was not a matter in which the

334

Divisions and Bondings

court could or should intervene. In the end, the king followed the balanced solution proposed by Song In-myŏng, one of the most fervent Soron supporters of his “grand harmony” policy: the local officials who had authorized the shrine construction and had failed to keep the rioting populace under control were to be dismissed from office; those literati who had led the wanton demolition of the shrine were to be punished. The king, moreover, did not rescind his earlier edict forbidding the reconstruction of the shrine.168 Evidently fearing that the court did not fully grasp the Andong sajok’s commitment to the Namin tradition and their resistance to outside interference, Yu Ch’ŏk-ki’s successor in the gubernatorial office, Yun Yang-nae,169 reported in the summer of 1738: Even if the state tried to deprive Andong of its local power [hyanggwŏn], it would not succeed. Those who call themselves Sŏin are unable to set foot into the local school, and the ill feelings against them run high. If they want to set up their own place, the Namin are not willing to contribute funds. But even if such a venture materialized, literati with knowledge, like the descendants of Yu Sŏng-nyong, would certainly not join them.170

Yun’s warning that the Andong elite would not easily succumb to Noron pressure was not heeded in Seoul. The Noron persisted in their argument that the shrine for Kim Sang-hŏn in Andong could not be regarded as a “duplicate”—the construction of multiple shrines for the same individual had been prohibited since 1714—because there was to date no shrine in Andong dedicated exclusively to him. Was it conceivable that precisely in Andong there would be no shrine for Kim? The reconstruction of his shrine, furthermore, was necessary to dash the Yŏngnam Confucians’ presumption that their area was a pure Namin area. Against this argument, Pak Mun-su pointed to the abuses of the private academies and in particular objected to the construction of multiple shrines for the same worthy— Kim Sang-hŏn, in fact, was already worshiped in nine different places outside Andong. A reconstruction of Kim’s shrine would, Pak feared, further stoke animosities in Andong. “Even if you tore off their skin and broke all their bones,” would the descendants of famous sadaebu ever “bow their heads and listen to the commands” of someone like An T’aek-chun? For Pak, a shrine reconstruction was inconceivable. Equally unacceptable to him was the fact that the shrine destroyers were to be punished more heavily than the shrine builders. Incessantly attacked by the Noron, Pak found himself increasingly isolated and at last resigned from his post as minister of war. Despairing about which course it was best to pursue and anxious to be impartial, Yŏngjo finally dismissed not only those Noron officials who had most fiercely assailed Pak, but even some moderate Soron ministers. Thus neither side won outright, nor did the king give in to demands for rebuilding the shrine. Yet the suspicion lingered on that the sole purpose of the Noron’s shrine project in Andong had been to score political points by victimizing the Yŏngnam Namin.171 The Kim Sang-hŏn shrine affair in Andong undoubtedly strengthened King Yŏngjo’s determination to destroy all the private academies and shrines built in the eight provinces since 1714, when their construction had already been prohibited by King Sukchong. In 1741, then, Yŏngjo repeated that demolition order, and consequently some 170 shrines



Learning and Politics

335

and academies were dismantled, with the exception of those the king was willing to spare, among them Tosan Sŏwŏn.172 Years later, after Yŏngjo’s death, a small shrine for Kim Sang-hŏn, Sŏ’gansa, was finally erected at some distance north of Andong City in 1786 and given a royal charter one year later.173

Yŏngnam in the Late Eighteenth Century Though he made genuine efforts to extend his policy of “grand harmony” to northern Yŏngnam by calling single Andong Namin scholars to court and showing clemency toward the shrine builders, it is clear that King Yŏngjo saw the “Yŏngnam problem” in predominantly political terms. But would the Yŏngnam sajok, a royal lecturer reminded him, ever delight merely in rank and emolument? Indeed, as Cho Hyŏn-myŏng pointed out, Yŏngnam had brought forth many Confucian worthies and great families, and, anyway, their customs differed in strictness from other areas, as T’oegye’s legacy (yuhwa) was still very much alive. “[Even] children and servants call him ‘Old Master’ and everybody treasures his words.” Therefore, as a concerned official reported after an investigation tour, these people were distressed that the king sponsored the ancestral rites only for Yi Yulgok, but not for T’oegye. Evidently touched, Yŏngjo confessed that this neglect was the result of his own one-sided familiarity with Yulgok’s Essentials of Sage Learning (Sŏnghak chibyo). Indeed, surrounded by Noron advisors and lecturers, Yŏngjo had never held a T’oegye classic in his hands. To make amends, he promised to send a high official to pre­ sent offerings at Tosan Sŏwŏn as well as in T’oegye’s ancestral home. He ordered, moreover, that the Record of T’oegye’s Pronouncements and Deeds (T’oegye sŏnsaeng ŏnhaengnok)— likely Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng’s version—be printed locally and submitted to the throne.174 In the last years of his reign, becoming newly aware of T’oegye’s scholarly eminence, Yŏngjo called a few of T’oegye’s direct descendants, who were munkwa graduates, into government service. The probably most noteworthy among them was Yi Se-t’aek (1716– 77), munkwa graduate of 1753, who in 1755 submitted to the king T’oegye’s tract on sage learning entitled Sources of Learning of the Way of Sages and Worthies (Sŏnghyŏn tohak yŏnwŏn)—a gesture for which he was given a sable cap. Some years later, in 1762, Yi was, on recommendation, promoted to third royal secretary (senior third rank), then to censor general, and in 1772 to inspector general (junior second rank).175 Clearly, Se-t’aek owed this rapid advancement to Yŏngjo’s will to remedy his own ignorance by honoring a descendant of an outstanding scholar of whom he had for so long been oblivious. Andong’s late appreciation by a benevolent Yŏngjo came to an abrupt end shortly after the king’s death, however. In the tense atmosphere that prevailed at court after the tragic death of his son, Prince Sado,176 in 1762, no one had dared mention the prince’s name. This taboo was unexpectedly broken by a memorial handed in by Yi Ŭng-wŏn, an Andong yusaeng, only a few months after King Chŏngjo’s (r. 1776–1800) accession. Not only did Yi Ŭng-wŏn plead for Sado’s rehabilitation, he also submitted a diary that Sado’s tutor and confidant, Kwŏn Chŏng-ch’im,177 had written during the final stage of the prince’s ordeal, together with some letters. Kwŏn, who had tried to save Sado by

336

Divisions and Bondings

protesting his innocence, narrowly escaped Yŏngjo’s killing frenzy and, dismissed from office, retired to Andong, where, mourning the prince, he is said to have starved himself to death. When the diary was later circulated by Kwŏn’s younger brother, Chŏng-hŭm,178 it engendered, far beyond Andong, a ground swell of mournful sympathy for the dead prince, and moved Yi To-hyŏn (n.d.), a kinsman of Kwŏn’s, to send his son, Ŭng-wŏn, to the capital to present it to the throne. Yi’s audacious intervention on Sado’s behalf gave rise to a storm of disgust at court, then still tightly controlled by those Noron who had supported Yŏngjo’s death verdict over his hapless son as an act of “moral principle.”179 The consequences for the memorialist as well as for Andong were accordingly disastrous: accused of insurrection, both father and son were immediately sentenced to death, and, as a collective punishment, Andong was, for the second time in its history, demoted to a mere county (hyŏn).180 This drastic chastisement effectively stifled any voice “from below” for some time. Indeed, King Chŏngjo, too, was only gradually able to free himself from the clutch of the Noron hardliners around him and replace them with moderate ministers. He sought to draw the eminent Namin scholar Yi Sang-jŏng into government service,181 and after the latter’s death it was his disciple, Kim Koeng,182 who persistently pleaded for state recognition of the T’oegye school. At last, in early 1788, Chŏngjo signaled a decisive shift of royal policy toward Yŏngnam by personally appointing his longtime mentor, Ch’ae Che-gong (Pŏn’am, 1720–99),183 as the right state councilor. Ch’ae, an outstanding scholar in the Kiho Namin tradition, had already served Yŏngjo with distinction and had supported the king’s reconciliation policy. Only a few days after he had called Ch’ae to his side, on the first day of the third month, Chŏngjo sent a “royal declaration” (yunŭm) to all provinces: since 1788 was the sixtieth anniversary of the rebellion of 1728, the names of all those who had loyally aided or sacrificed their life for the suppression of the rebellion were to be submitted to the throne for reward. On the next day, the king received their sons and grandsons in audience.184 Since the governor of Kyŏngsang Province neglected to respond to the royal call, “grieving” Confucians in Andong compiled their own Roster of the Resistance Leaders of 1728 (Musin ch’angŭirok) and sent it with a memorial to Seoul. It was apparently only through Ch’ae Che-gong’s mediation that the king came to see this record and to understand the long-lasting predicament of the Yŏngnam literati.185 Encouraged by Ch’ae Che-gong, Chŏngjo showed himself ready to rehabilitate Yŏngnam and honor it as an exceptional “storehouse of literati.” Indeed, by dispatching in the early spring of 1792 a royal emissary to conduct memorial rites at the shrine of Silla’s founder in Kyŏngju, at Oksan Sŏwŏn (the Academy of Yi Ŏn-jŏk), as well as at Tosan Sŏwŏn, Chŏngjo sought not only to reembrace Yŏngnam as a key area of Chosŏn civilization; remarkably, in the instructions he issued on that occasion, he also set his hope on Yŏngnam’s “conservatism.” He wrote: “Recently there has been an infiltration of false learning [i.e., Catholicism]. Only the literati [sa] of Yŏngnam hold on to the learning of the former worthies—steadfastly and unfalteringly; lately, this has greatly increased my sympathy [for them]!”186 Chŏngjo, himself an eminent scholar, counted on the power of Confucian learning to stand up to subversive influences he detected to have started penetrating the country from abroad. To demonstrate his trust that Yŏngnam would function as a Confucian bulwark in



Learning and Politics

337

a changing world, in the third month of 1792, Chŏngjo arranged for a special examination (pyŏlsi) at Tosan Sŏwŏn. This was the first and only time in Chosŏn history that a higher examination was held in Yŏngnam.187 “Close to ten thousand yusaeng, clad in ceremonial cap and gown” crowded the examination grounds, read the examination questions nailed to a tree, and filled over three thousand answering booklets. For the onlookers, this was an “historic” demonstration of Confucian virtues. The king personally graded the papers and chose the graduates, among them Kim Hŭi-rak, one of Yi Sang-jŏng’s disciples.188 For commemorating this unique event, Ch’ae Che-gong composed an inscription (Tosan sisadan pimyŏng) for a stele that was erected at the examination site.189 Barely a month after the special examination, the Yŏngnam Confucian community, uplifted by royal sympathy, submitted to Chŏngjo the famous “Memorial of the Ten Thousand” (Maninso) of 1792. Supported by an unprecedentedly large segment of Yŏngnam’s elite society,190 it boldly called for nothing less than Prince Sado’s full rehabilitation and the punishment of the Noron hardliners who had for thirty years stifled any mention of the prince. Praising the king’s compassion for Yŏngnam, the memorialists swore loyalty to the throne and pledged to make the vindication of Sado’s suffering their moral duty, even at the risk of their lives. Indeed, the memorialists, led by Yi U (1741–1810), Yi Sang-jŏng’s nephew, and without doubt assisted behind the scenes by Ch’ae Che-gong, repeated their resolve two more times, each time with even larger numbers of undersigned. Though greatly touched, Chŏngjo was not able to act on impulse—too great still were the forces around him that prevented a speedy coming to terms with the events of 1762.191 Nevertheless, this time, the memorialists escaped punishment and, on royal order, were even offered provisions for their return trip home—an offer they refused to accept as “a matter of honor.”192 Convinced that a primary cause of the Yŏngnam scholars’ plight was their long-term exclusion from high (that is, tangsang-level) government positions, Ch’ae Che-gong used all his personal influence to recommend to the king promising scholars for office. Among them was Yu Kyu (1730–1806), Yu Sŏng-nyong’s seventh-generation descendant and a leader of the “Memorial of the Ten Thousand.” Kyu had given up examination hopes after failing the preliminaries and returned to Hahoe to devote himself to the “learning transmitted in the family” (kajŏn chi hak), becoming an important exponent of Yu Sŏngnyong’s scholarly lineage. The king was interested in enlisting Yu Kyu, who was reportedly convinced that Confucian classical scholarship was the best weapon against the penetration of Christianity, and appointed him lieutenant in the State Tribunal (junior fifth rank). Shortly later he quizzed him on his scholarship: “You are known as a classics scholar. Do you study all the classics or do you specialize in one or two?” Kyu replied, “Though I have been reading the classics since my youth, I have no real grasp of any of them.” Despite this modest reply, Kyu held several middle-level posts before he was appointed magistrate of Kyŏngsan in 1794. A few months before Chŏngjo’s death in 1800, Yu was singularly honored, thanks to his illustrious forebear, by being promoted to the tangsang-rank position of first secretary of the Royal House Administration.193 That Yŏngnam experienced a late rehabilitation at the center was, to a large extent, due to Ch’ae Che-gong’s skillful propagation of T’oegye’s scholarly heirs. He was an

338

Divisions and Bondings

untiring writer of their biographies and epitaphs and celebrated Yi Sang-jŏng as the Tosan main-line heir. He undoubtedly also pushed for Kim Sŏng-t’ak’s exoneration in 1795. Despite his sympathy for the Yŏngnam Namin, however, he one-sidedly traced the transmission of “Our Way” through the capital Namin. On Yi Ik’s epitaph he wrote: “T’oegye is the Confucius of the East. He handed on the Way to Han’gang [Chŏng Ku], Han’gang handed it on to Miso [Hŏ Mok]. As the Gentleman [i.e., Yi Ik] studied in heart [sasuk] from Miso, he took his learning from Miso and thereby connected to T’oegye’s lead. Only if later learners recognize this primary line of transmission of the Way as the correct one, will they avoid going astray in their pursuit.”194 Though he connected T’oegye’s intellectual genealogy to the capital Namin, Ch’ae paid singular tribute to the Kyŏngsang Namin in the Survey of Yŏngnam Personalities (Yŏngnam inmul ko), a massive compilation of biographical data on some 655 Yŏngnam scholars and officials from the beginning of the dynasty to the late eighteenth century. Working on royal orders issued in the early winter of 1798, Ch’ae’s son, Hong-wŏn (1762–?),195 and Kim Hŭi-rak were among the twenty compilers.196 With close to one half of the recorded personalities hailing from T’oegye’s heartland, the Survey stands as a tribute to the scholars who had upheld T’oegye’s legacy through troubled times.

Pa rt V

Survival in a Changing World

g

Introduction

C

onventional wisdom has it that during the eighteenth century the hierarchical structure of Chosŏn society was gradually breaking down so that the sajok were losing their leadership role to newly emerging social elements. In other words, the criteria of birth and descent upon which the sajok founded their claim to social and political distinction supposedly were being replaced by a different value system derived principally from economic changes that in turn promoted the upward mobility of hitherto underprivileged segments of society. It is certainly an irrefutable fact that the socioeconomic environment for the landed sajok was shifting in the course of the eighteenth century, with the result that competition within sajok society and generally between elite and nonelite sharpened and caused local power to fragment. The factors that promoted such developments were not merely economic, however. More fundamentally, it was a complex interplay of social, political, factional, and economic realities that started to call into question the justifiability of the hitherto unassailable link between social status and political participation. In the assessment of contemporary observers, it was the social inequality created by the power of family background (munbŏl) resting on ancestral entitlement that now increasingly led to unrest and instability. Did the hegemonic grip on daily politics by a small minority not violate the Confucian emphasis on achievement and impartial employment of men of talent? Was it tolerable that hereditary rather than moral qualifications were the selection criteria for government officials? Even though not even the most radical critics of the social system called for the obliteration of “noble” and “base,” the mere fact that the value of social origin in public life came to be questioned inside and outside government points to a truly striking change in attitudes toward the link between the social and the political. Did this shift loosen social boundaries and promote the “upward mobility” of some disenchanted social elements such as secondary sons, hyangni, and, perhaps, even a number of “rich” commoners? It is the aim of the last two chapters to explore, on the one hand, the strategies the landed sajok in Andong and Namwŏn utilized to defend their

342

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

“local power” (hyanggwŏn), and to describe, on the other hand, the forays of restless nonelite groups into sajok domains. Losing their “official” identity in proportion to their marginalization from the center, many landed sajok no longer possessed a “distinguished official” (hyŏn’gwan) among their four ancestors, a circumstance that increasingly threatened them with being drafted for commoner duties.1 How, then, did they cope with their “landed” existence? Occasionally, a sense of resignation is evident in biographical materials. Earlier, repeated lack of success in the examinations and consequent failure to hold office were recorded as regretful personal inadequacy in satisfying parental expectations. But in the eighteenth century such misfortune was often glossed over as “he gave up the intention to serve in office” (chŏrŭi sajin).2 Thus, in view of the fact that aspiring to earn an office certificate became a rather rare option, the sajok in the countryside concentrated all their efforts on preserving, in Bourdieu’s words, “[their] right to the profits of [continued] recognition”3 by cultivating such social and cultural activities as lineage organization, ancestral rites, genealogical compilations, and scholarship. Not all localized sajok were equally able to generate the economic and symbolic capital necessary for upholding a profile of superior status strong enough to stand against the political and economic pressures of the time. With competition over social and economic resources intensifying, survival in the countryside of late Chosŏn without belonging to a well-organized and well-endowed lineage group grew ever more precarious. As earlier in the capital, rivalry among elite lineages sparked a kind of “pŏryŏl-ization” also in the countryside, that is, by the eighteenth century, only a small, select number of lineages possessed the indispensable assets for retaining the “profits of recognition”—a development that led to a fracturing of the landed sajok population. Even though the sajok population expanded numerically, the number of lineages at the top of local society in Andong and Namwŏn remained remarkably constant, suggesting a concentration of influence and power in the hands of a stable leadership group. On the other hand, this implies a downgrading of all those kin groups who were weakly or only intermittently recorded on the local rosters. In essence, then, the pursuit of statussupporting strategies not only generated antagonism within descent groups and conflicts with peers, it also sharpened status gradations within local sajok society. In addition, pressure from the center led to occasional confrontations with the local authorities, earning some influential sajok the unflattering epithet of “rural strongmen and ruffians” (hyanggok saho mudan). In short, continued prosperity in the countryside in the latter part of the Chosŏn depended, more than ever before, on the degree to which a kin group was able effectively to harness its human and economic capital. The landed sajok’s survival was critically affected by the serious economic and demographic changes taking place in their immediate environment. Whereas at the beginning of the dynasty land was plentiful and labor scarce, by mid-dynasty this ratio started to reverse. Even though improved agricultural technology increased productivity, by the eighteenth century the population of some fifteen million people had reached a level beyond which it could hardly be fed. Land, moreover, became limited so that keeping large slave labor forces proved unprofitable. On the other hand, slaves, trying to take advantage of new economic opportunities, escaped in ever larger numbers. Deprived of



Introduction

343

their major producers, the sajok were forced to reorganize production schemes and replace slaves with tenants or hired laborers. Agricultural output was, moreover, often hampered by natural calamities such as droughts, floods, and disease, which occurred with great regularity throughout the second half of Chosŏn, causing large-scale population movements.4 The vagaries of agricultural output did not have an impact on the landed sajok alone. Faced with an ever-shrinking tax base, the government, though abhorring status mobility, paradoxically started to sell titles and offices to fill its chronically depleted coffers. First introduced in 1593 as a temporary relief measure at the height of the Imjin War, such “sales,” at the beginning, targeted individuals with especially acute status aspirations— secondary sons (sŏja) and local functionaries (hyangni).5 Despite frequent demands for abolishing this scheme after the war, it eventually became an established institution for grain collecting, and from the late seventeenth century it was also open to commoners and slaves alike. In return for offering fixed amounts of rice (napsok), later converted to money, the contributors were rewarded with titles and at times even low-ranking, albeit nonserving, government offices (yŏngjik). At least initially, participating commoners were not automatically freed from corvée-military duties, but it was precisely the prospect of social advancement, which meant release from this “commoner curse,” that prompted payments of such one-time taxes. This was also true for contributing slaves, who were rewarded with commoner status (songnyang). Although such irregularly acquired titles and offices were terminologically carefully distinguished from regular government posts and the newly won privileges confined (at least in theory) to the generation of the purchaser, it is clear that an initial beneficiary might have felt tempted to omit the designation of “purchased” (napsok) from his title in the household register to blend himself and his entire family, past and present, into the official world.6 Because of such omissions and occasional falsifications in official documents, it is difficult or even impossible to assess the numerical share of new title holders within the total recorded population. Even though the scheme was surely limited to a rather small number of economically well-off candidates, it is evident that such commodi­ tization of titles and offices led to a blurring of status-group demarcations as those who expended considerable wealth hoped for more than a mere certificate. Indeed, even though these “economically mobile” elements could not penetrate sajok society, they nevertheless strove to emulate some of the sajok’s cultural characteristics—better education, performance of enhanced rituals, mannerisms—and may in a few instances have indeed become indistinguishable from their models. Among the keenest aspirants for social advancement and recognition were the secondary sons and the hyangni. For them, the Imjin War presented a unique opportunity to demonstrate loyalty to the throne through military exploits or by grain contributions and thereby win the state’s attention to their degradation. A number of them did indeed appear on the various postwar royal merit subject lists. It was, however, only in the latter half of Chosŏn that the secondary sons managed, through local agitation and public protests, to turn their position at the margin of sajok society into an issue of factional debate at the center and win enlarged roles in the political, if not in the social realm. Likewise, the hyangni elite—those hyangni who occupied the key posts in the local

344

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

administration and often were closely related by blood to the sajok—began to use their local power to improve their position with respect to the sajok. Though not aiming to merge into sajok society, they were keen to receive recognition as culturally sophisticated players alongside the sajok. The sajok came, moreover, under mounting pressure from the nonelite, notably commoners. Due to the lack of documentation, the life of commoners is unfortunately poorly understood, but by the eighteenth century (if not earlier) commoners began to rebel against established status boundaries. With economic activities such as producing for a growing urban population, a number of commoners (and slaves) bettered their livelihood and, with enhanced self-esteem, began to irritate the elite with a loss of decorum. Their use of inappropriate language and behavior, it will be suggested, was a kind of social protest—a breakdown of what E. P. Thomson called the “paternalism-deference equilibrium.”7 Such status transgressions were socially motivated and likely encouraged by the weakening of some sections of sajok society. They pointed to an ominous loosening, if not to a breakdown, of hitherto fixed hereditary status boundaries. In sum, in late Chosŏn the landed elites operated in a local context that was increasingly plagued by various contrary forces. Not only were they confronted with an everencroaching state and factional subversion from the center; they also found themselves in competition with each other as well as with social elements who, with adversary factional backing, tried to infiltrate sajok institutions. They had, moreover, to deal with shrinking economic resources. Indeed, the local scene was in flux and often in conflict, as the newly appearing term “local warfare” (hyangjŏn) clearly implies. Under these circumstances, the landed sajok mobilized all their material and symbolic means to defend and sustain the dominant position they had been building up since the early days of the dynasty. Part V comprises two chapters. Chapter 13 outlines the various strategies with which the sajok of Andong and Namwŏn strove to secure their social, political, intellectual, and economic prerogatives in an ever more competitive environment. Chapter 14 explores the emergence of secondary sons and hyangni as the sajok’s major challengers who attempted to break through the sajok-imposed social barriers. It also assesses the extent to which even commoners and slaves were drawn into the dynamics of this merciless upward spiral of aspiration and competition. It concludes with a brief considera­ tion of the dramatic dismantling of the social status system at the end of the nineteenth century.

Ch a p ter 13

Transformation within Stability Sustaining Sajok Status

E

ven though the landed sajok had entered the seventeenth century in a strong position, the political, ideological, and economic realities were rapidly changing around them, as described in the earlier chapters. By the eighteenth century, center and periphery had drifted so far apart that the landed sajok’s pretension to be part of the ruling elite began to be seriously jeopardized. Indeed, as the nexus began to fray between office holding at the center and upholding elite status in the countryside, the sajok’s efforts to maintain superior status turned into an unrelenting process of articulating and defending identity by using ancestral entitlement as sociopolitical leverage. Because the management of landed wealth gained even more importance as a crucial facilitator of this process, it must be briefly discussed first. Living predominantly, even if not exclusively, in villages where one descent group dominated and land tended to become concentrated through inheritance, strategic buying and selling, and the creation of corporate trusts, some sajok continued to prosper. The rural estates and slave holdings of the Andong Kwŏn or the Tundŏk Yi, for instance, reached their largest expansion in the course of the seventeenth century; thereafter, however, they gradually declined. For assessing this development, neither inheritance papers nor land registers (yangan) are entirely satisfactory sources. According to inheritance documents, the decreasing volume of individual shares seems to indicate a slow downward trend in the amount of partible land shared out. But, it must be remembered, before an inheritance division took place, considerable parts of the property had often been already given away as gifts or absorbed in special lineage funds, leaving little or nothing to be divided up. If, on the other hand, the assessment relies on land registers, which were compiled for tax purposes without concern for proprietorship,1 the picture is likely blurred by irregularities such as registering land under someone else’s (usually a slave’s) name (taerok), underreporting, or even “hiding.” It is furthermore rarely clear

346

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

what proportion of land belonged to a lineage or a munjung, or under whose name sacrificial or grave land was registered. Despite land consolidation around single-surname villages, landed property often remained scattered over several counties so that the land register of one single county or subcounty does not reflect the entire landed property of an individual owner or a kin group. It is therefore difficult to arrive at a reasonable appraisal of the landed assets in the hands of the Andong and Namwŏn sajok in the eighteenth century.

Agrarian Regimes for Sustaining Status In the late seventeenth century, land and the number of slaves apparently could still be effectively augmented. As for the slaves, the general formula according to which children were automatically base if one parent was base remained the rule of thumb into the second half of the Chosŏn dynasty. With labor in short supply after the war years, it was eagerly adhered to by private slave owners intent on increasing their labor force by coupling their male slaves to commoner women. By the middle of the seventeenth century the unchecked application of this rule had led to such a dangerously low level of commoners liable to the military tax that the alarmed government decided to reaffirm the matrifilial rule by instating the Law on Following the [Commoner] Mother’s Corvée (Chong[yang]moyŏkpŏp) in the first month of 1669.2 According to this law, the children parented by male slave and female commoner were to become commoners at birth, but the effect of this law seems to have been small, as many commoner women, upon getting married to a slave, were simply forced into slavery themselves. In the volatile political situation at the time, moreover, the law turned into a political issue and was rescinded by the Namin in 1675,3 to be reinstated and reversed several times during the subsequent years, creating a confused situation with some family members counting as commoners, others as slaves, each with his/her specific duties and responsibilities.4 Clearly, this was a situation that could easily be exploited by landowners who needed an enlarged labor force. The volume of property handed down among [Andong] Kwŏn Ŭi’s descendants residing in Chŏ’gok (Yech’ŏn), for example, shows a clear increase of land and slaves.5 Kwŏn Ŭi’s fifth-generation descendant, Yun (1615–92),6 inherited, around 1660, some 46 slaves and 170 majigi of land. After his death, when his property was divided by his widow in 1695, it had increased to 129 slaves and 450.5 majigi of land. The share of Yun’s eldest son, Su-wŏn (1654–1729), thus amounted to 49 slaves and 160 majigi of land.7 By 1732, however, the property Su-wŏn bequeathed to his four sons and two daughters totaled a mere 35 slaves and 57 majigi of land, so that his eldest son, Wan (1672–1757), inherited only 7 slaves and 14 majigi of land 8—barely enough to live on. On the basis of the Land Register of 1720 (kyŏngja yangan),9 however, the 1732 figures do not seem to reflect Su-wŏn’s total estate. There, Wan’s landed property is recorded as some 136 majigi. By 1720, Su-wŏn was still alive, but apparently no longer in charge of economic matters, as suggested by the diminutive piece of dry land to his credit. Wan’s three younger brothers also are registered with only small, certainly subsubsistence plots. It is likely, there-



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

347

fore, that a large part of the total of roughly six kyŏl (or 270 majigi) of land registered in 1720 in fact was kept together as a corporate lineage trust under the eldest son’s control.10 Even though individual shares declined, the Chŏ’gok Kwŏn as a group were still comfortably well-off. Concentration of land in the main line is also manifest among Kwŏn Pŏl’s main-line heirs in Yu’gok. Indeed, this tendency is not confined to the Andong area. In Tundŏk, too, partible land had by the early eighteenth century significantly decreased.11 The land registers of 1720 of Yech’ŏn and Tundŏk thus provide the contours of sajokcontrolled land in the early eighteenth century.12 Whereas in Yech’ŏn13 the average sajok holding amounted to no more than just under one half of one kyŏl, in Tundŏk the average was slightly over one kyŏl. Averages show that the sajok owned and cultivated considerably more land than either commoners or slaves, but they do blur the true picture as to individual holdings. In both areas, the spectrum of land held by individual sajok was extremely wide: in Yech’ŏn as well as in Tundŏk it ranged from over five kyŏl to less than 25 pu.14 To be sure, the number of those in the top category with more than five kyŏl to their name was extremely small: in Yech’ŏn (Chego’gok) merely two, in Tundŏk ten. Slightly over 23 percent of individuals in Yech’ŏn held more than one kyŏl (equivalent to 45.3 percent of the total cultivated land); in Tundŏk, it was 25.4 percent. In both areas, sajok cultivating less than one kyŏl thus constituted the majority. In short, an extreme polarization of land ownership is apparent among the elites in Yech’ŏn and Tundŏk, but in both areas the sajok clearly still owned most of the land (in Tundŏk up to 80 percent), whether held privately or in lineage trusts.15 Besides polarization, land fragmentation is evident in the small neighboring county of Yonggung west of Andong for which the land registers of 1634 and 1720 are extant. Whereas the very large landholdings (of more than ten kyŏl) remained practically unchanged, those of between five and ten kyŏl drastically decreased. During the same period marginal landholdings of less than one kyŏl increased—suggesting considerable land fragmentation. In the same area, 8.6 percent of the landowners owned some 40 percent of the total land in 1634, but these figures had decreased to 5.6 and 30 percent, respectively, by 1720.16 Polarization combined with fragmentation was not confined to Kyŏngsang Province; it was in evidence in many areas of the country. An interesting example of the extent to which land ownership varied within the same kin group comes from Tundŏk. According to the 1720 yangan, the average landed property of the Tundŏk Yi amounted to less than three kyŏl. However, Yi I-si17 with far over nine kyŏl of land was one of the richest Yi kinsmen. In contrast, one of I-si’s second cousins, Yi I-gi,18 owned less than half a kyŏl, which may have prompted him to resort to illegal methods to enlarge it. In 1730, obviously taking advantage of his family’s dominant position, Yi I-gi mobilized monk soldiers and subsidiary military households to bring some wasteland under cultivation. For this wrongdoing he was branded a “local bully” (t’oho) and punished by decapitation—a punishment that later was regarded as excessive for a member of the elite (sa).19 Needless to say, the secondary lines (sŏp’a) owned only fractions of what their primary brethren did.20 Such marked disparity of land ownership within the same descent group, likely giving rise to intrafamilial frictions, could easily have led to the dispersal of kinsmen. It was, however, precisely the corporately held lineage trusts that transferred land from private

348

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

economic calculations to communal property and so prevented the dissolution of kin ties in the eighteenth century. Indeed, with individual shares diminishing, the prospect of access to and benefit from corporate lineage land motivated active kin-group membership. Corporate property thus epitomized a critical material resource that not only attenuated potential conflict between rich and poor lineage members but at the same time substantiated the ideological dictum of lineage cohesion and solidarity. The same land registers also give evidence of a variety of land cultivation patterns. Besides the owner-cultivator who worked his land directly with whatever labor force was under his control, a combination of owner-cultivation and tenancy (sharecropping) seems to have become the typical pattern of late-Chosŏn land management. With cultivated parcels tending to become smaller, maintaining a sizable slave labor force proved unprofitable. From the seventeenth century, furthermore, nonresident slaves in particular were absconding from their masters in large numbers, a trend that accelerated in the eighteenth century, as evidenced in Kwangsan Kim documents: in 1702, 160 (out of a total of 237 slaves) were nonresident, decreasing to 125 (out of 127) in 1777, and to 119 (out of 122) in 1828; after that date, there were no longer any nonresident slaves.21 And those still counted for as nonresident slaves no longer submitted their full tributes (sin’gong). Between 1745 and 1770, for instance, only around 20 out of the 40 nonresident slaves belonging to the descendants of Kim Sŏng-il continued to send in tribute payments (now predominantly in money).22 Thus, agricultural slaves had increasingly to be replaced by commoner or slave tenants (chŏn’gaek) who paid rent, altering the relationship between sajok owner and slave from personal subordination to contractual dependence.23 While slaves thus became less evident in the elite’s fields, in the 1720 yangan, sajok– slave tenant relationships are much in evidence, with individual plots registered in the slave-cultivator’s name (taerok). Poor lineage members were often discouraged from becoming tenants on lineage land, presumably to avoid intralineage disputes. Nonkin tenants could anyway be more easily exploited. Tenancy allowed even a “poor scholar” (hansa), who possessed little or no land but a few slaves, to manage a sufficient income by having his slaves work the fields of others.24 Tenancy was widespread in Andong as well as in Namwŏn,25 and reached in Chŏlla Province by the early nineteenth century, in Chŏng Tasan’s estimate, some 70 percent of all cultivators.26 Whereas the elite needed land and labor, the state was always bent on increasing its tax base. By aiming to lighten the commoner population’s physical tax burden, however, the government, paradoxically, seems to have driven many commoner peasants off the land. The gradual introduction of the Uniform Land Tax Law (Taedongbŏp) in the course of the seventeenth century27 presumably largely had this effect. Assessed on households, it converted the onerous and arbitrary tribute taxes (kongbŏp)28 into a land surtax by levying uniformly twelve tu of rice per kyŏl of cultivated land. By increasing the land tax with a surtax, this new law, which presupposed land ownership, shifted the tax burden largely to land at a time when land became increasingly scarce, and many peasants could hardly hold onto their plots. The conversion of military service into a cloth tax by the Revised Rules for Commoner Service (Yangyŏk pyŏnt’ongnon)29 in 1711 is likely to have had a similarly devastating effect, so that it was later halved by the Equalized Tax Law (Kyunyŏkpŏp) of 1750. When the government contemplated extending this



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

349

tax even to sajok households, opposition was stiff. Many yangban were poor, especially in the countryside, the argument went, because they could pursue neither trade nor artisanship without being regarded as commoners (sangnom), yet had to uphold yangban decorum by performing proper weddings and funerals. How could they not be poor?30 Decried as a violation of the yangban’s social status privileges, the imposition of this tax had to be dropped—forcing the government to make up for the shortfall with a number of surtaxes.31 Even though the introduction of the Uniform Land Tax Law was praised for rationalizing the entire tax system and stimulating the development of markets, the tax pressure on the commoner population nevertheless increased to such an extent that small peasant households, unable to shoulder the tax load, abandoned their land and sought shelter in elite households by selling their labor.32 Their slave-like dependence on large households protected such “lean-on households” (hyŏpho) from taxation and corvée. Whereas large landowner-cultivators thus profited from this development for replenishing depleted slave stocks, it clearly diminished the state’s revenues.33 It furthermore becomes clear on the basis of household registers that while the number of agricultural slaves, especially nonresident ones, rapidly decreased in the course of the late eighteenth century, domestic slaves, though likewise declining, did not disappear. On the contrary, the number of persons seeking protection in sajok households—usually individually and no longer in family groups—seems often to have made up for the losses of fugitive slaves.34 According to Andong data, it was commonly the lineal heir (chongson), rather than his younger brothers, who owned a large contingent of such slave-like dependents (solha).35 Sajok-cultivated land was presumably more productive than tenant-farmed land since the sajok were able to intensively farm larger tracts of land. It was they (rather than the state) who could mobilize the labor and finance to build and maintain dikes and irrigation canals, introduce new crops and farming techniques such as double cropping, and conserve soil fertility by rotating crops and applying sufficient fertilizer.36 Tenancy, by contrast, was highly competitive and often did not last for more than a couple of years. Only in Honam did tenancy seem to have been remarkably stable. There, as Chŏng Tasan remarked, a landowner would entrust his best land to a tenant “who was healthy and thrifty, had a wife and children, and some slaves at his disposal.” In short, “someone who brought him profit.”37 Whatever the cultivation regime, the sajok produced chiefly for their own consumption and/or lived off the rent they collected from their slaves or tenants. Producing for and selling in the market smacked of profiteering—“being rich” (pu) projected the negative image of relying on “commercial activities” (sang). The only morally legitimate transactions were those of buying and selling land and slaves—usually conducted between two individuals, assisted by witnesses—and of loaning grain or money at interest. Products not available domestically such as salt, fish, and seaweed were procured by slave agents or from traveling traders. Although in the eighteenth century Andong had a regular five-day market, it remained insignificant and did not deal in luxury items such as paper, writing brushes, and fancy textiles; these were acquired through exchanges with relatives and local officials. In sum, the production and acquisition of goods for daily life centered on a limited geographic area and often only on the village.38

350

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

The Ethos of Life in the Rural Community Living in the countryside (kŏhyang) required the sajok to observe etiquette and propriety. “Don’t behave in a rustic and unworthy manner,” [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ham had admonished his descendants. “Preserve public-mindedness (kongsim) in all your dealings.”39 However far removed from the capital, life in the village was not to give rise to selfishness and lawlessness. T’oegye, too, had once warningly written to his son: “The sons and younger brothers of the elite must be watchful and cautious and respect the law. To use government grain in an arbitrary manner, would this be the way of a scion of a Confucian house who reads books and knows propriety?”40 The same message was encapsulated in [Ŭisŏng] Kim Pog-il’s maxim: “We observe the rites at home and propriety in our rural environment.”41 And [Sangnyŏng] Ch’oe Si-ong put it like this: “The literati [sa] who live in the countryside should not frequent the magistrate’s yamen unless for official business, a courtesy call, or any other unavoidable matter. Even if related [to the magistrate], one should not visit often. Unreasonable requests should not be made at all.”42 Such admonitory advice was included in collections entitled “Miscellaneous Etiquette for Living in the Countryside” (Kŏhyang chabŭi). Compiled by elite leaders such as Ch’oe Si-ong, they featured sayings offering cautionary counsel from Confucius and Mencius and their later Chinese and Korean interpreters: behave with propriety, don’t meddle in local politics, pay the taxes in good time, and avoid conflict with the local magistrate.43 Indeed, such memoranda commended the landed elites as custodians of ethical norms with which they were supposed to negotiate their stance vis-à-vis the local authorities. Part of “public-mindedness” was the sajok’s continued responsibility for implementing community compacts, which were thought, even at court, to be effective instruments for upholding local order and economic stability.44 When the Confucian scholar [Andong] Kwŏn Ku, for instance, temporarily moved to a scenic but impoverished village, he first tried to establish a granary (sach’ang) in the belief that the reason why people were unable to be good and at times even slipped into committing punishable crimes was not because of their deprived nature, but because their preoccupation with hunger and cold made them lose their sense for what was right. Although the granary could in the end not be realized, Kwŏn drew up a compact in the vernacular that reportedly induced the villagers to amend their “stubborn and ignorant ways.”45 In Namwŏn, it was the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe among the local gentlemen who most energetically propagated community compacts. After Ch’oe Yu-ji had devised a compact by combining the “theories of the Song worthies with insights of Korean Confucians,” the customs in Honam reportedly began to flourish.46 His indefatigable nephew, Ch’oe Si-ong, recalled in a letter to the Namwŏn magistrate in 1691: People of old revered the community compact, yet with the generations passing by and the customs getting lax, only a few are now enacted. In recent times, although the compact rules in each village in the countryside differ more or less from the compacts of old, this is better than if they did not exist at all. I was born and grew up in Tundŏk and listened to what the elders discussed [concerning the Tundŏk compact]. Then I moved beyond the mountains and for some ten years practiced [a compact] in Soa-bang as well as in Chungbang-bang 47 [so that]



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

351

the people got to know a sense of shame for bad deeds and of diligence in public service. [The compact] was indeed of considerable assistance. Since I moved to Paegam-bang, eight years have already passed. The people’s customs here lacked [any kind of ] sophistication, and they were completely ignorant of the four social patterns [etiquette, righteousness, modesty, and shame]. This was so because the place is isolated, and few elite families are living here. Some time ago I appealed to Magistrate Yi to design some simple compact rules, and after several years they have indeed had some visible effect: those who used to precede the hearse with music, or in mourning got married, or while wearing a mourning cap sang and danced have of late acquired a sense of shame, and their other shocking customs and lazy practices will with certainty be completely reformed within less than one hundred years!48

Ch’oe Si-ong, however, was not satisfied only with raising moral standards. In 1712, as mentioned before, he demanded from the local magistrate that the elite compact leaders be given supervisory power again over the community’s two basic economic operations: grain loans and assignment of tax and corvée. These the people hated the most because they were apt to be manipulated by selfish yamen underlings. If, Ch’oe reasoned, “one intends to revive [the original compact], yet discards these two items, it would be like giving up eating upon choking, or wanting to walk with the feet cut off.”49 For Ch’oe, then, it was obvious that to function well a compact needed, in addition to its ethical dimensions, authority over the community’s major economic transactions. The elite’s leadership, Ch’oe Si-ong insisted, had to be total—moral as well as economic. This was a postulate, however, that was no longer realistic in view of the state’s tightening of its fiscal authority at the village level. Trying to enforce a more efficient tax regime, the state in fact, as mentioned in chapter 10, changed the nature of most compacts. With taxes and corvée levied on administrative villages, the earlier ward fund associations (tonggye) or ward compacts (tongyak) were transformed from moral charters into a kind of fiscal contract. With these instruments, all village inhabitants, elite as well as commoners, were to defray their taxes and other state-imposed levies, to finance local schools, communal building works such as dikes and roads, and village rites (tongje), and to assist the needy. Often the income from a commonly owned piece of land was used for these responsibilities. Fund-related matters were discussed in the ward assembly (tonghoe), which ritually united elite and nonelite twice a year in a communal hall (tongsa) or a large pavilion. The seating order replicated social divisions: the elite leaders sat in the north facing south, and the nonelite members in the south facing north.50 Extreme punishments such as the “destruction of a culprit’s house and his permanent expulsion from the area” (hwega ch’urhyang) were no longer tolerated.51 An example of such a new type of compact is the writ that Kim Si-t’aek 52 drew up for his single-surname Chirye village (east of Naeap) in 1796. Kim committed to the moral exhortations and penal sanctions contained in the document the twenty Kim and five Yi resident in his own village (principal list, chwamok), as well as the Kim’s close to one hundred commoner (and slave?) tenants living in a dozen adjacent hamlets and villages, whose names were recorded on a “lower list” (ha-chwamok).53 Indeed, such late Chosŏn compacts created horizontal networks of interaction intended to stabilize, with moral dicta, the state’s fiscal basis at the grass roots. Though conflicts over funds and related matters at times caused wards to split (pundong), each starting

352

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

its own compact,54 the sajok strove to keep control over their wards in competition with the local magistrate—at the risk of being accused of “going against the law” or exploit­ ing the “little people.”55

Literati “Economics” How did a late-Chosŏn literatus deal with the mundane circumstances of life? True to the Confucian ethos of frugality and thriftiness, proverbial for Yŏngnam,56 mention of economic activities in biographies was generally avoided. Content with simplicity, [Ŭisŏng] Kim Pang-gŏl, for instance, is said never in his life to have concerned himself with domestic production or household management.57 True, Kim was away on official duty a good deal of the time, yet he nevertheless did find occasion to petition the Andong magistrate for securing a piece of wasteland.58 A century later, Kim Yong-bo (1722–87) complained that his sons and grandsons “were making laziness their habit” and would rather roam fields and gardens than apply themselves to scholarship.59 Playing off “poverty” against a life of leisure is a recurrent theme in many biographies. According to the biographer of [Ŭisŏng] Kim Ch’ang-sŏk (1652–1720), for example, young Ch’ang-sŏk’s family was so poor that at night he did not have enough oil to study, so he used a few pine branches as a candle. Nevertheless, Kim passed the munkwa examinations in 1690 and had a brief official career before he retired to the countryside in 1694 (when the Namin lost power), determined never again to take up office. From Naeap he moved to his more scenic country estate, where he built a pavilion on a cliff. Renowned for his literary and artistic talents, he passed his days with poetry, painting, and calligraphy. On his bookshelf stocked with the classics, the philosophers, and works of history, he also kept a lute and in a cage raised a pair of wild cranes. “Whenever the moon was bright and the breeze refreshing, he would, leaning against the cage, recite the ‘Ode to the Red Cliff,’ 60 accompanied by a guest on the flute, and the two cranes, stretching their necks and spreading their wings, would dance in front of them.” Later, Kim was appointed provincial inspector of Kangwŏn Province, a post he gladly accepted because he had long been wishing to see the Diamond Mountains. In his advanced years, he spent his time with his favored cousins along the river or in his pavilion with wine and poetry until deep into the night. Indeed, Kim Ch’ang-sŏk led a refined life, “such as his contemporaries vied and longed for; those who knew him, however, [were aware] that he was despairing of the world.”61 Kim Ch’ang-sŏk’s older kinsman, Kim T’ae-jung (1649–1711),62 is reported to have been so little interested in domestic affairs that the family resources dwindled to the point that his wife and children would suffer hunger and cold even in a plentiful year or a mild winter. Oblivious to their misery, he only took satisfaction in reading books. Yet, at one time in his life, he is quoted as saying: “As agriculture is the mainstay of the people’s livelihood, the sages took it very seriously. Ancestral rites and the entertainment of guests are financed by it. How dare I not put my energy into it?” The account continues:



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

353

[Thereafter], in his time off from reading books, he put on his coat and hat and made his rounds in the fields. Thus, after a few years when his house had become a little more affluent, he said: “This is enough!” Whereupon he once more concentrated his mind on the classics and never again looked after domestic matters. His house therefore remained poor, but the people respected him even more as a worthy [hyŏn].

After visiting T’ae-jung, a high official from Seoul who had expected little from a “countryman” (hyangin), had to admit in praise: “Mr. Kim is indeed an extraordinary person! Only after coming down to the countryside have I seen such a man.”63 Although leisure and aloofness from worldly concerns were the attributes of a gentlemanly way of life, a sajok had, as Kim T’ae-jung pointed out, two responsibilities incumbent on his elite status: the domestic rites and the entertainment of guests. Indeed, the performance of Confucian rituals was a hallmark of high social standing, regardless of their cost. Because of their periodicity, death anniversary rituals (for parents, for instance) weighed heavily in budgetary terms, but funerals were the costliest among the “four domestic rites” (sarye), and a few successive deaths in the family could necessitate the rapid sale of land to the point that “what was left was no longer big enough to stand upon.”64 Substantial, one-time expenditures were incurred also with weddings, sixtiethbirthday festivities, and degree celebrations.65 Beyond the economic pressures of domestic ritual observances, a web of multiple obligations compelled a sajok household to give material assistance to relatives and occasionally even to nonelite neighbors. Most exacting were contributions in kind and labor to funerals; next came those to weddings. Smaller, but also more frequent were donations to the sick and ailing. To be sure, such aid rested on an unwritten law of reciprocity, yet the higher the status of the giver, the greater the expectation of his generosity.66 “Entertainment of guests” was the other “customary rite” that a sajok household was obliged to observe. It ranged from offering a guest refreshments and a pipe of tobacco to paying his return journey. Considering that communication relied entirely on physical travel, exchanges of visits and the sending out and receiving messengers with gifts and letters were the only means that tied the sajok household to the world beyond the village. The importance of such interaction for sharing information and precious articles thus far surpassed economic considerations. Whether a relative, a friend, or a simple slave, a guest could always be certain of a bountiful reception. Even if austerity reigned in daily life, no sajok could sustain his reputation without using a vital part of his resources on customary hospitality. Though wealth itself was never a critical criterion for the definition of elite status, a sajok who could no longer afford to display the proper ritual status markers—above all the regular services to his ancestors, funerals, and weddings—inevitably was faced with the potential of status loss. In earlier days, a way out of economic difficulties was to enter the bureaucracy via examination success, but, because in the eighteenth century this was no longer a viable alternative for most literati, poverty threatened a sa’s very existence— materially as well as socially. The renowned Namin scholar Yi Ik commented upon the sa’s existential dilemma thus: “Poverty is the constant lot of the literatus [sa]. Sa means someone without office. Why is he poor? Because he owns neither property nor land. The

354

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

poor sa is not a peasant; he cannot bear the hardships of tilling the land in the hot summer, all the more so since the profit off the land is not matched [by the potential loss of status]. Yet, if he did plough the fields of someone else, his livelihood would be secure and not particularly poor.” Yi Ik then detailed three kinds of well-to-do literati: those who owned a patrimonial estate that could be handed on to the descendants; those who held an office; and those who had no scruples to exploit others. Yet, “the patrimony, if there are sons and daughters, is being divided up, and there are wedding and funeral expenses. [Consequently, the estate] diminishes and does not increase. Those who seek profit [with trade?] do not only go into the wrong direction; they also are no longer able to read books, since their minds cannot be used in two ways. If they pursue the one, they have to leave the other.”67 Yi Ik, who toward the end of his life allegedly suffered impoverishment himself, pictured the predicament that many sa, regardless of factional allegiance, were facing in late Chosŏn. By spurning manual work or trade as income-producing occupations, numerous sajok slipped into poverty and, without the safety net of a protective lineage or the support of a lineage-managed “charitable fund” (ŭigye),68 they increasingly encountered the threat of losing their elite credentials, thereby exposing themselves to the scorn and ridicule of their better-off contemporaries, whether elite or nonelite, and to the exactions of an extortionate state—often making it necessary to move elsewhere.

Ancestral Land and Gravesites as Objects of Conflict With the maintenance of elite status threatened by economic destitution, the transfer of large amounts of landed property from regular economic circulation to inviolable trusts administered by lineages often gave rise to bitterly fought conflicts over ownership and exploitation. In particular, feuds over ancestral graves, which were frequently endowed with considerable amounts of land, increased from the late seventeenth century onward, when land in general became scarce and cultivation moved even into mountainous areas. Originally, mountains and woods seem to have been freely accessible,69 yet with growing consolidation of graveyards with attached service land, they were declared exclusive lineage domains and thus off limits (kŭmsan) for anyone except kinsmen.70 Furthermore, timber grown around graves “to screen them from daylight” had long been protected from random cutting “because personal profit was not to be sought by violating trees planted by earlier generations.”71 Such trees, however, turned into valuable, highly marketable assets. Because ownership “rights” over land and trees were poorly defined,72 their ambiguity could lead to prolonged contestations. Indeed, by the beginning of the eighteenth century, the number of conflicts over gravesites (sansong)73 increased to such an extent that in 1719 King Sukchong issued a set of penal provisions (sansong samok) to stem the tide of litigations. Some of these provisions were later incorporated into the mid-dynasty Sok taejŏn.74 Harmony among kinsmen thus undoubtedly reigned only if corporately held assets were protected from arbitrary exploitation and were beneficial to all rightful coowners.



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

355

A “resolution” (wanŭi) underwritten by seven Chinsŏng Yi kinsmen in 1740, for instance, complained that after the hunger years of 1720–21, when the bark of the pines in two graveyards was stripped for food, only a few trees had survived. As kinsmen had lately been wantonly cutting trees for building houses, the rest of the long-preserved woods was endangered. The resolution therefore forbade kinsmen, under threat of punishment, to cut trees except for funerals, and if the ritual heir, for whatever reason, had to fell trees, he had first to seek the munjung’s express approval.75 Among the Tundŏk Yi papers, 74 out of 124 petitions (soji) to the local magistrate relate to discord among kinsmen over ancestral grave land. In 1753, for instance, Yi Chong-hwan, the Tundŏk main descent-line heir (chongson), complained that a collateral kinsman of considerable genealogical distance not only had used the ancestral graveyard to secretly bury two of his dead, but together with another kinsman had felled and sold some three hundred trees. Although when threatened with denunciation to the authorities the culprit repented, he later changed his mind, compelling Chong-hwan to bring his complaint before the Namwŏn magistrate. A year later, the magistrate charged the wrongdoer with a fine of fifty yang and ordered him to write a full confession.76 A few years later, in 1757, Yi Chong-hwan faced an immeasurably more complicated situation, which not only threatened the inviolability of ancestral land but also critically challenged his authority and standing. The root of the problem lay in the fact that his sixth-generation ancestor, Yu-hyŏng, had handed over some land to an elder kinsman to finance continued shrine rites for the latter’s great-great-grandfather Hon. It was customary that if a collateral descendant, for whom the ancestor in question was within the four generations worshiped in the domestic shrine, was still alive, some of the sacrificial land was transferred to him (ch’ech’ŏndap) for financing continued rites to that ancestor. In 1705, both Chong-hwan’s father and grandfather died, followed two years later also by his great-grandfather, so that Chong-hwan was the only surviving lineal heir. Because at that time he was too young to fulfill his duties as chongson, his great-grand uncle, Yun-hwa, assumed the ancestral responsibilities. Yun-hwa was persuaded by some kinsmen to release seven of the fifteen majigi, which in 1609 had been set aside for Tam-son’s and Hon’s shrine rituals, for Hon’s graveside rites. It turned out, however, that the kinsmen used the income from only four majigi for the stated purpose and wasted the rest with eating and drinking. When Chong-hwan, after coming of age, started to cultivate those three majigi himself, his kinsmen protested. Led by a man who, according to the Tundŏk land survey of 1720,77 was landless, they complained to the Namwŏn magistrate. Chonghwan consequently also petitioned the magistrate with the argument that this land belonged to the ritual heir and was inalienable. As the magistrate showed little inclination to get involved in this case, it dragged on and its exact outcome is not known, but Chonghwan must have won in the end because in 1805 his grandson petitioned for the return of the remaining four majigi. Again, he met resistance, and the issue seems never to have been conclusively settled.78 As a further dispute a few years later demonstrates, the transfer of ancestral land to a collateral kinsman always ran the risk of permanent alienation.79 Chong-hwan’s case vividly illustrates that a ritual heir’s standing within his lineage, even though nominally unassailable, was susceptible to pressures from his own kinsmen when the administration of the lineage’s landed resources came to be contested.

356

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

Lest they were invaded by elite or nonelite competitors, gravesites had therefore to be protected. Indeed, without a tomb keeper (myojik) who cultivated and protected the land attached to a graveyard, land and trees were exposed to random plowing and cutting by nearby villagers or, worse yet, unauthorized individuals, seeking to take advantage of a lucky gravesite, clandestinely buried their dead there. Such “shameless” usurpations of gravesites by “rich commoner fellows” were condemned as serious infringements of the status (myŏngbun) of “old families and long-established kin groups” (koga sejok).80 As numerous exchanges with the local authorities testify, the elites in Andong and Nam­ wŏn had to safeguard their ancestors’ resting places by repeatedly requesting corvée-free status for their tomb keepers.81 It seems to have been a symptom of the competitiveness sweeping through the countryside that the belief according to which bad luck derived from the unpropitiousness of an ancestral burial site put further pressure on burial grounds. Goaded by geomantic theories, even many sajok families apparently moved their graves (ch’ŏnjang or ch’ŏnmyo) or, as a censorial report complained, incurred great expense in their efforts to find the “luckiest spot” for their dead. If unsuccessful, a burial would be postponed for months. The reckless even invaded the peasants’ fields and destroyed human dwellings. Although the censors demanded strict measures to halt such abuses, in view of the fact that “even the intelligentsia was not able to extricate itself from these popular [geomantic] customs,” new legislation made only clandestine burials in other people’s burial grounds a punishable offense.82 A late nineteenth-century law granting officials special leave from office for moving a grave attests to the persistence of this practice until the end of the dynasty.83

Sodalities for Displaying Elite Dominance To the extent that the social and economic standing of the elite was often in jeopardy in the ever more contentious late Chosŏn countryside, forming sodalities with kinsmen beyond lineage and munjung tended to prove vital for continually enjoying elite entitlements. The closest allies and preferred comrades were traditionally the affines, and it was with them, with whom they shared common values and practices, that landed sajok tied expedient bonds. Typically, it was by founding mutual assistance funds (kye) that sodalities gained formal structure and continuity, often lasting for generations. Whereas the Ŭisŏng Kim in Andong seem to have intended their Hwangsan Fund Association (Hwangsan’gye) to celebrate their genteel style of life, the famous Ward Compact of the Three Rivulets (Samgye tonggye), which networked the elite inhabitants of Tundŏk and their descendants, apparently started by taking inspiration from the well-known Songera Lü Family Community Compact. Both these associations, though differing in scope and ideational background, are impressive examples of how indispensable elite interaction across agnatic lines remained to sustain identity and to defend elite prerogatives vis-à-vis the local community and the state in late Chosŏn. In the late summer of 1687, a few Ŭisŏng Kim elders started to gather at the peaceful Sŏnch’al Temple on Yak Mountain.84 This was a famous spot in the vicinity of the scenic



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

357

Toyŏn waterfall, where Kim Chin had built his Pavilion of the Roaming Immortals (Sŏnyujŏng). The twelve elderly gentlemen who came to enjoy this extraordinary scenery on Yi Myŏng-o’s (n.d.)85 initiative were all agnatic or nonagnatic descendants of Kim Chin. The only Nam present was presumably included because of the Yŏngyang Nam’s affinal ties to both the Kim and the [Chŏnju] Yu. Fearing that such outings would be unsustainable without formal rules and income, the group decided two months later to found the “Hwangsan Fund Association,” after relocating the meeting place to Hwangsan Temple at the foot of Ki Mountain,86 from which the fund derived its name. The man who took an active part in formalizing the fund association in 1704 was the beforementioned Kim Ch’ang-sŏk. One half of the fund membership consisted of Kim kinsmen, among them Si-on’s four sons (including Pang-gŏl) living in Naeap; the other half comprising descendants of Kim Chin’s eldest daughter (married to [Chŏnju] Yu Sŏng), the Yu residing in Musil.87 The men so united were thus not only close kinsmen; they also lived within walking distance of each other. Each senior member was attended by a “page boy” (sija), most often an eldest son; both Kim Ch’ang-sŏk and Kim T’ae-jung served as junior members. This arrangement was thought to guarantee the fund’s continuity from generation to generation. In a commemorative record written in 1704, Yi Po88 praised the remoteness and beauty of Hwangsansa and alluded to gatherings of “elderly gentlemen” in the remote Chinese past that had served as inspiration. Half a century later, in 1759, the association was reconstituted with an enlarged membership of 136 to celebrate generational continuity and kin solidarity between the Ŭisŏng Kim and the Chŏnju Yu. In the postface of the revised membership record, the scholar and poet Kim Myŏng-sŏk (1675–1762), a seventh-generation descendant of Chin and a grandson of one of the founding members, exalted the beauty of the environment in which Kim Chin’s descendants had been living in harmony for more than ten generations, practicing loyalty and filiality. Whether rich or poor, all joined in what “gentlemen make their avocation: rites and amusements.”89 Besides creating occasions for common amusement, these get-togethers reveal that for the Hwangsan association members kinship reached well beyond the patriline to embrace, in customary understanding, affines as collaborators— and that not only for amusement. The original twenty-eight compact members of the Ward Compact of the Three Rivulets, started in 1623, represented the seven principal surname groups that had been living in Tundŏk-pang, closely interrelated by marital ties for generations: the Chŏnju Tundŏk Yi, the Sangnyŏng Tundŏk Ch’oe, the Ch’ŏngju Han, the Sunch’ŏn T’apkol Kim, the Chinju Ha, the Hŭngdŏk Chang, and the Namwŏn Ryang. Compact membership was restricted to the descendants of these descent groups but not tied to residence in Tundŏk. Even those who eventually left Tundŏk and moved, for whatever reasons, to other villages—for instance, some Sangnyŏng Ch’oe who relocated to Nobong—did not lose their stakes. The compact was, however, closed to outsiders who moved to Tundŏk, even if their elite status was validated by examination success and office holding, in addition to land ownership; critically, they were also spurned as marriage partners. Despite such strict exclusivity, a few secondary sons were allowed to join the compact, albeit on a discriminatory basis in order “to underscore social distinction”; talented exam aspirants among them were, however, relieved from demeaning duties. In a separate

358

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

“minor compact” (ha’gye), commoner villagers living in four separate hamlets were included in the compact—mainly, it seems, for their indispensable physical assistance at elite funerals.90 What was the purpose of this compact centered on Tundŏk, that was confined to a select membership of agnates and affines, but did not require them to reside there? Its founders in 1623 seem to have intended to reenact the “Four Imperatives” of the Lü Family Community Compact.91 Inspired by Lü’s exhortations for mutual moral correction and economic assistance, they laid down meticulous procedural rules for weddings and funerals and the biannual compact meetings in the spring and autumn. Variously revised in the following decades, these rules were augmented by a number of later resolutions, mixing exhortatory and admonitory terms. Member contributions furthermore established a grain fund to defray the costs of weddings and funerals, but there was no word about collecting taxes for the state. From the beginning, when the majority of the kye members were retired officials or lower-degree holders, the Tundŏk Yi—among them Yi Sang-hyŏng—were active as compact officers, and by the mid-seventeenth century they started to control the compact together with the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe. From around that time, most members titled themselves simply “young scholars”—an indication, it seems, that many of them no longer aspired to degree or office holding. Though landownership was not a criterion for membership, as both poor Yi I-gi and his wealthy cousin Yi I-si belonged to the kye in 1724, the compact members held on average twice as much land as other Tundŏk residents.92 By the mid-eighteenth century, the compact seems to have been endangered by the laxity and negligence of its members, who reportedly no longer took interest in one another’s affairs, fell behind with paying their dues (now in money), shunned compact meetings, and generally were remiss in their duties. The Resolution of 1724, redacted by Ch’oe Si-ong, even went so far as to threaten nonpayers with expulsion, which meant being deprived of compact assistance and losing the use of equipment, most importantly, of the funeral bier. Had the moralistic nature of the compact become obsolete? Or did individualistic kin group interests undermine community harmony? Whatever the reasons for its temporary difficulties, by 1817 the Ward Compact of the Three Rivulets counted 647 members. Surely, this large membership represented a formidable collectivity, reflecting the fact that, in a rapidly changing socioeconomic environment, sharing the prestige and power of Tundŏk ancestry sustained local dominance and safeguarded against the harassments of the magistrate’s greedy servants.93

Memorials to the Ancestors: Shrine Construction and Munjip Compilation For upholding the self-image of the sajok elite, no other feature was as assiduously pursued in late Chosŏn as the ritual commemoration of a “distinguished ancestor” (hyŏnjo). Indeed, the cult of the “worthy ancestor” turned, as briefly mentioned before, into an indispensable mark of high social status. Unlike an apical ancestor (sijo), who, however



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

359

illustrious, was an individual of an often nebulous distant past, a “worthy ancestor” was an ancestor of the recent past whose achievements as an official, a scholar, or as a “virtuous” man had made him nationally or locally famous and who thus, with his prestige value, became for his direct descendants and/or disciples a focal object of veneration. The site of worship was either a shrine attached to a private academy or a free-standing memorial hall (sau).94 Some of these shrines were built on the initiative of a local Confucian community. Of others, a munjung was the sole sponsor.95 With high social status more and more under threat, from the early seventeenth century a veritable building boom of sŏwŏn and shrines got under way, perverting, as the eminent Namin scholar Chang Hyŏn-gwang deplored, the academies as institutions of pure learning into private sites of identity construction and factional contests.96 Chang’s concern was seconded by the governor of Kyŏngsang Province, Im Tam, who in mid-century warned of the deleterious consequences the steep increase in shrines was having on Confucian “practices and mores” by “privatizing” the “duty of venerating worthies and upholding virtue.”97 Despite such disapproval, shrine construction proliferated and reached an all-time high, characteristically, during the factionally turbulent period under King Sukchong and decreased only slightly during King Yŏngjo’s reign. Not surprisingly, the areas with the greatest concentrations of such buildings were Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla Provinces.98 In Kyŏngsang, the Andong area boasted, besides a large number of sŏwŏn, a great many private shrines—the Kyonamji mentions seventeen,99 but there may have been many more that remained unrecorded. As the commentator Sin Ch’i-gŭn100 put it to Yŏngjo, “If the descendants are numerous, they worship even the undeserving; if they are weak they cannot afford to worship even the deserving. This is all due to factional issues!”101 In Andong it was the socially well-organized and economically strong local lineages that competed with one another to enshrine their “distinguished ancestors.” An instructive and well-documented example of the genesis and development of a private shrine is Sabin Sŏwŏn, the shrine that the Naeap Kim built for Kim Chin and his five sons.102 In 1666, Kim Chin’s great-grandson and main-line heir, the elderly Kim Si-on, assisted by two of his nephews (one agnatic, one nonagnatic), called together a number of kinsmen and friends in Sŏn’yu Pavilion103 to discuss the construction of a shrine to the east of the pavilion for installing Chin’s portrait. Even though their stated purpose was “to honor [Chin’s] poetic intentions,” the kinsmen must also have been concerned that the domestic shrine rites for Chin would (with Si-on’s death) come to an end. Because Si-on and one of his nephews died not long thereafter, the building project was taken up again only in 1675. In that year, twenty-two of Chin’s agnatic and nonagnatic descendants, led by Si-on’s sons and spanning three generations of kinsmen residing in three communities, reactivated Si-on’s original plan104 and in a munjung resolution decided to build a shrine beneath Kim Chin’s grave on Kyŏngch’ul Mountain. In addition to local support, a circular (t’ongmun) was sent out to thirty-seven destinations as far away as Sangju, Yŏngch’ŏn, Ŭisŏng, and Kyŏngju to solicit cooperation and contributions of rice and cloth. Indeed, the entire kin network was mobilized to advance the venture. By the time the construction started later in the same year, more than fifty sŏm of rice and over one hundred bales of cloth had been collected—apparently still not sufficient to finance the project that in the meantime had grown far beyond a mere portrait shrine. In the

360

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

following year, therefore, a second circular was sent out not only to Chin’s descendants but to the “whole community” (irhyang), propagating the shrine as a “collective” sarim monument. With additional material contributions furnished by kinsmen holding magisterial posts in neighboring counties, the shrine for Chin’s portrait, a lecture hall, and some subsidiary buildings were completed in the winter of 1680. In the autumn of 1681, some twenty-seven kinsmen again gathered to consider, on the basis of a Song Chinese precedent, the coenshrinement (paehyang) of Kim Chin’s five sons whose “virtuous conduct and scholarship stand as a model for future generations.” The execution of this plan was delayed by national mourning for King Hyŏnjong’s queen in 1683 and the death of a project officer the next year. In the third month of 1685, then, more than one hundred kinsmen and local Confucians, led by Kim Pang-gŏl, per­ formed the enshrinement ceremony in the spirit of “glorifying the worthies and upholding virtue” (kyŏnghyŏn sangdŏk). The shrine was then named Shrine for Upholding Virtue (Kyŏngdŏksa). The shrine soon proved too small to accommodate the kinsmen and elder sarim gathered after the autumnal rites, and in 1709 it was decided to relocate it to a new site on the bank of Sasu River (a side branch of Naktong River), for which over the next few months dozens of corvée laborers and monk artisans from nearby villages and temples were recruited on a daily basis. Work was only interrupted by the New Year’s festivities and during the coldest days, when the ground was unworkable. Under the supervision of Kim kinsmen, the old shrine and the adjacent buildings were dismantled one by one and reerected at the new location. In the tenth month of 1710, the new complex was inaugurated and renamed Sabin Sŏwŏn with a headmaster (sanjang) elected on local sarim recommendation.105 Sabin Sŏwŏn honoring Kim Chin and his five sons did not exist long as a private sanctuary of Confucian culture, however. In the summer of 1717, a royal order “suddenly” called, “to the great consternation of the [local] sarim,” for the destruction of the academy. The instigator of this unexpected order was the secret inspector (ŏsa) of Left Kyŏng­ sang Province, Yi Myŏng-ŏn, a Noron,106 whose report to the throne107 had led to the dismissal of the Andong magistrate for “bad administration.” On the surface, the latter had been punished for failing to restrain the Ŭisŏng Kim from unlawfully building a private shrine at such enormous human and material costs. In reality, it surely was a Noron attack against one of the most prominent Namin descent groups in Andong. The destruction order triggered feverish activities among the Kim kinsmen. In a bid to get it reversed, in the twelfth month they sent out an urgent call for a meeting in the local school, but because heavy snowfall prevented many sarim from attending, only some twenty literati gathered to discuss the situation and appoint officers for drafting a petition (so) to the government. Moreover, a circular announced the bad news to all the private academies and local schools in the region. The petition highlighted Kim Chin’s eminent scholarly acquaintances and boasted that the renowned Chŏng Kyŏng-se had written his tomb epitaph. It also recalled that all of Chin’s five sons had been T’oegye disciples and further insisted that the coenshrinement of father and sons was based on Chinese precedence. The general tenor of the petition toned down the institution’s significance as a private academy and emphasized instead its importance as a place of



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

361

veneration of local worthies. After collecting contributions of rice, paper, and money, the petition delegation, led by Kim Myŏng-sŏk and the main-line heir Kim Min-haeng, started on its way to Seoul at the end of the month. Hectic and frustrating activities, interrupted only by the New Year festivities, filled the two months they sojourned in the capital. Hastening from office to office to get their petition endorsed by high government officials, the two Kim, like Andong men before them, were humiliated as “these country Confucians” and forced to amend the petition’s wording a number of times. Their fiercest adversary seems to have been the royal secretary Cho To-bin, a Noron hardliner,108 who snubbed them on several occasions. The apparently unclear division of authority between the Council of State and the Pibyŏnsa added to the confusion. Their provisions running low, the Kim’s stay in the capital threatened to turn into a nightmare, when, at last, on the seventh day of the second month 1718, they received a formal endorsement of their petition on the grounds that the name board of the academy had already been removed, turning the academy into a private shrine. Without delay, the two Kim left for Andong and five days later notified the Local Bureau and the local magistrate of the favorable outcome of their mission.109 As the principal site of ancestral veneration for the Naeap Kim, Sabin Sŏwŏn stood as a monument to sajok power. Invoking ancestral distinction, its builders were in control of a well-organized higher-order munjung and could also muster the support of the local Confucian community. In addition, they were able to recruit local labor and know-how. With Sabin Sŏwŏn, the Naeap Kim demonstrated that their long-standing local prominence was not fading, even under adversary interference from the center. The qualifications, which supported the Naeap Kim’s claim to local supremacy, worked equally well for a number of other distinct kin groups in the area. This is suggested by the large number of further “privatized” sŏwŏn that were built in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: Samgye Sŏwŏn dedicated to Kwŏn Pŏl, Pun’gang Sŏwŏn to Yi Hyŏn-bo,110 Ch’ŏngsŏng Sŏwŏn to Kwŏn Ho-mun,111 and Toyŏn Sŏwŏn to Kim Si-on,112 among many others. The great majority of the enshrinees were either first settlers of their descent groups in Andong or early teachers of Tohak.113 Even though some of these shrines were occasionally destroyed on government orders, most were later reconstructed, giving eloquent testimony of the enduring authority and economic strength of the enshrinees’ descendants over the centuries. The cult of distinguished ancestors was pursued with equal zeal in Chŏlla, where sŏwŏn and sau construction flourished particularly during Sukchong’s reign, so that by the mid-eighteenth century over a dozen sŏwŏn were counted in the Namwŏn area alone.114 Indeed, the compilers of the Yongsŏngji (1702) took an individual’s veneration in either a sŏwŏn or a sau as a criterion for listing him in the gazetteer’s rubric of “famous worthies” (myŏnghyŏn).115 The earliest seems to have been Ch’angju Sŏwŏn, built in 1579 and dedicated to No Chin. It burned down in 1597, but was rebuilt three years later and given a royal charter.116 Nobong Sŏwŏn, erected on an elevation behind Nobong village, apparently developed out of a shrine (sa) dedicated to Ch’oe Sang-jung. In 1649, it mutated into an academy in which five worthies (ohyŏn) received ritual attention: besides Ch’oe Sangjung, it included Hong Sun-bok 117 and O Chŏng-gil,118 Sang-jung’s third son, On, and On’s nephew, Hwi-ji. Due to Sang-jung’s powerful late seventeenth-century descendants,

362

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

the academy received a royal charter in 1697.119 Contemporaneous with Nobong Sŏwŏn was Yŏngch’ŏn Sŏwŏn in Chisa-bang, which was dedicated in 1624 to the four worthies An Ch’ŏ-sun, Chŏng Hwan, Chŏng Hwang, and Yi Tae-wi and chartered in 1686.120 It may have been characteristic of Chŏlla shrines that they often housed a group of worthies who were not kinsmen but who had earned special merits for their native place as scholars or moral paragons. Yet, due to Chŏlla’s multifactional landscape, it was not unusual that factional animosities later led to the breakup of such earlier arrangements in favor of building separate shrines for each worthy according to the factional allegiance of their descendants.121 Indeed, from the perspective of Seoul, the transformation of sŏwŏn from sites of higher learning into shrines for the veneration of particular individuals was motivated not by the desire “to honor a worthy or to respect a teacher” (mohyŏn-chonsa), but solely by the descendants’ ambition to enhance their local standing.122 Such criticism was repeatedly voiced as the construction of new shrines and academies as landmarks of sajok domination continued unabatedly throughout the eighteenth century.123 With their tax-free status 124 and local influence, these institutions even came to challenge the state’s authority over land and people. As Pak Mun-su reported in 1738, “rich yangban and idlers” solicited the help of governors and magistrates for their building projects with huge bribes, and some better-off commoner peasants, fearing the extortionist military tax, were flocking to them by the hundreds—reducing the local magistrates to helpless bystanders.125 Pak Mun-su’s and many similar reports from the provinces must have persuaded King Yŏngjo to order the above-mentioned destruction of a large number of shrines in 1741. The impact of this order seems, however, to have been slight, as most of them were rebuilt shortly thereafter and many more were added in the course of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.126 Subsidiary to shrine construction as a status-supporting strategy was the printing of the literary works (munjip) of revered ancestors. Not surprisingly, the principal shrine builders were also the most assiduous compilers and printers of their ancestors’ scholarly bequests. A recent survey identifies twenty-three descent groups—the core group of the Andong elite—who sponsored, often supported by the Confucian community, the printing of the 154 extant munjip. The heyday of munjip printing was the last two centuries of the dynasty. Of the 146 munjip “authors” 106 (or 73 percent) were T’oegye disciples, 58 were munkwa passers, and 43 combined these two qualifications. The Ŭisŏng Kim (with 27 works), the Andong Kwŏn (28), the Chŏnju Yu (15), and the P’ungsan Yu (9) head the list. To the extent that editing and printing an ancestor’s manuscripts (yu’go) counted as a special act of veneration, it was vital also to enlist a well-positioned personality for contributing a preface or postface, thus embedding the munjip in a larger intellectual and literary context. The before-mentioned eminent T’oegye apologist in King Chŏngjo’s reign, Kim Koeng, was the most devoted writer among Andong scholars of such laudatory materials.127 The production of a munjip usually took place in a private academy or, occasionally, in a Buddhist monastery, and was an exceedingly costly venture because it demanded specialized skills for the carving of the woodblocks (mokp’an) and the printing process. Yu Sŏng-nyong’s Sŏae-jip was printed at Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn in 1646, Kim Sŏng-il’s Hakpong-



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

363

jip at Ho’gye Sŏwŏn in the same year, and Kwŏn Pŏl’s Ch’ungjae il’go at Samgye Sŏwŏn in 1671. Sabin Sŏwŏn was the site of numerous munjip printings, among them the collected works (Yŏnbang se’go) of Kim Chin and his five sons in 1785. During the three-year printing process of Kim Sŏng-t’ak’s Chesan-jip (1801), detailed in a munjung resolution signed by sixteen Naeap Kim munjung members in 1799, all teaching in the academy was suspended.128 The Andong and Namwŏn sajok, though far removed from the center, were thus never idle. On the contrary, for sustaining their high social profile locally and nationally, they mobilized all their human, intellectual, and material resources. By celebrating their ancestors, they also celebrated themselves and, in addition, defended their status against outside pressures and interference. A further dimension of their self-identification as well-organized kin groups in stressful times was the compilation and printing of genealogical records.

Status Exclusivity: The Genealogical Dimension Genealogies (chokpo) were “historical” records documenting descent from a prominent ancestor, as discussed in chapter 11. Yet, when status had to be protected, they assumed equal importance for ensuring that future generations would continue to enjoy elite privileges, most importantly, exemption from the military tax. With both its historical and future-oriented aspects increasingly vital for preserving descent group identity, a genealogy demonstrated a descent group’s corporate rootedness and likewise defined its bona fide lineage membership. The compilation of a genealogy became therefore a sine qua non for any respectable descent group, and, not surprisingly, “genealogical scholarship” (pohak) reached its apogee in the course of the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.129 Distressed that an illustrious kin group such as the Namwŏn Yun did not yet have a printed genealogy, in the autumn of 1685 capital and rural kinsmen met together to discuss a production plan. Yun Tŏk-chun,130 a capital official, was put in charge of collecting the necessary information, but when, due to the pressure of public and private affairs, he was unable to complete the assignment, it was transferred to his second cousin, I-yŏl (n.d.),131 an elderly Namwŏn resident who had “completed his life’s tasks.” Soliciting records from kinsmen, I-yŏl amended an apparently earlier hand-written draft genealogy and painstakingly searched through other kin group’s genealogies to verify and add still missing information. As magistrate of Andong in 1704–6, Tŏk-chun used the privileges of his post to provide the printing blocks and the paper for producing a first printed edition in 1706. This edition, however, was soon found deficient as “many kinsmen resident in the countryside, who had not received notice, had been left out.” A revision was started in the early 1790s under the direction of eminent scholar-official Yun Haeng-im.132 To make sure that new entries would not raise doubts in the minds of future users, their kin relationships were substantiated by consulting munkwa rosters, household registers, or well-preserved written materials in the possession of family members. This verification

364

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

process apparently took several years, so that a new and revised edition of the Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo was printed only in 1805.133 With sajok status beleaguered, there seems to have been a real rush of disconnected kinsmen to rejoin their group. Kinsmen who had dispersed or whose recent ancestors might have been socially and economically too weak and disorganized to maintain active lineage membership and consequently had failed to provide data for inclusion in an early edition of their descent group’s genealogy, now tried to reconnect by submitting proof of descent. This is suggested by the appearance in many later genealogies of “research sections” (kojŭngnok). Accordingly, a hapless “newcomer” whose identity could not be conclusively proven, even after prolonged investigation, was admitted at best as a “separate line” (pyŏlp’a) or relegated to an appendix (purok). Whereas the compilers of the Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo accommodated new entries directly into the main corpus of the chokpo, the compilers of the Andong Kim-ssi sebo, for instance, took a more cautious approach. Initiated in the early eighteenth century by Kim Ch’ang-hŭp (1653–1722),134 this genealogy traced the descent line of the “new” Andong Kim,135 who, from the late sixteenth century onward, had started to prosper with Kim Sang-hŏn and his cousins, and by the early eighteenth century had risen to become one of the most powerful capital Noron kin groups. Not surprisingly, a great number of Kim, whose immediate ancestors had not been recorded earlier, now emerged to claim Andong descent and thus a coveted place under the protective umbrella of an eminent descent group. If a suppliant, for instance, claimed as his ancestor a man earlier recorded without offspring (muhu), the compilers of the 1719 edition decided: “We do not dare add someone not listed in an earlier record; we put him [therefore] at the end as ‘separate line’ [pyŏlp’a].” Since the edition of 1719 and the subsequent revisions of 1790 and 1833 focused in the first instance on the capital Andong Kim, some Kim residing in Andong found it difficult to gather sufficient proof to be accepted by their Seoul kinsmen. If irrefutable sources of identification such as tombstone inscriptions or household records covering several generations were lacking, they were admitted as a “separate line” or a “separate record” (pyŏlbo)—a compromise that naturally retained a measure of doubt. An illustrative example of a weak and dispersed descent line trying to get into the 1833 edition of the Andong Kim genealogy is the case of a Kim Pyŏng-nyun (n.d.), resident in Andong. With his claim of being a descendant of a man who allegedly had been a grandson of “Magistrate Yŏng-jŏn”136 and a “son of chinsa Tŭng,”137 Pyŏng-nyun triggered a lengthy investigation. Because the descendants of these two men later had not only dropped out of genealogical records but, surprisingly, even lost knowledge of their choronym (pon’gwan), Pyŏng-nyun stated, he had happened to discover his proper descent line (pon’gye) only recently (in 1805?) through an ancestral household register. Wishing to rejoin the Kim chokpo, he had therefore gathered, with the help of a kinsman, necessary proof of descent in the hope to restore his pon’gwan and to be entered into the new genealogy. Pyŏng-nyun’s testimony, however, left the chokpo compilers unconvinced, and his line was “for the time being” accepted only as a separate line “in expectation of [clarification] in the future.” But even many more intercessions and the gathering of additional documentary evidence—examination certificates, letters, and oral testimony—could not fully dispel all doubts about the legitimacy of Pyŏng-nyun’s



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

365

claim. His descent line therefore remained a “separate line” in the 1833 edition, yet no longer with the hurtful “for the time being.”138 Similarly, the last few volumes in both editions of the Andong Kwŏn-ssi sebo of 1734 and 1794 contain “separate records” (pyŏlbo), explaining that “branch lines not yet connected to the descent group” would be relegated, in expectation of further investigations, to “newly added separate records” (sinjŭng pyŏlbo). The 1794 edition included twentyseven such “new branches,” typically starting with a man’s name supplemented by details about his wife.139 Clearly, in the course of the eighteenth century pressure to accommodate dispersed potential kinsmen increased and swelled the genealogical records of prestigious descent groups with dubious materials.140 Though in prefatory matters of a genealogy the descent lines of brothers and cousins were often designated as segments (p’a), this was frequently merely a classificatory device for editorial purposes and not necessarily an indication that these lines existed as independent branches.141 Nevertheless, geographically dispersed large and prosperous branches often did compile and print their own genealogical records (p’abo). This did not mean that they lost their sense of belonging to a greater social entity sustained by the bond of common ancestry (tongjong). As suggested earlier, social values such as “together­ ness” and “union” were more highly valued than separateness, a fact that was expressed in the publication of “higher-order genealogies” (taedongbo)—voluminous compilations appearing in numbers toward the end of the dynasty. In contrast to the early Chosŏn chokpo, the late Chosŏn chokpo was laid out according to strictly patrilineal principles and thus had to reduce the recording of a daughter’s sons—an inevitable, yet obviously painful elimination of nonagnates. The “general editorial rules” of the 1790 edition of the Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo explained this decision thus: In the old chokpo [of 1706] [the recording of ] nonagnates [oeson] stopped with the third generation, each generation written in a separate line. Now, however, a continuation [of this practice] gets more and more cumbersome; not only do the volumes get too bulky, it is also necessary to mark the difference between agnates and nonagnates. Therefore [a daughter’s] sons and daughters are now written as notes under the name of the son-in-law.142 If there is a worthy [among them], however, information about him should be recorded even as long as five or six generations.

Less than a century later, however, only a daughter’s sons, and no longer those sons’ offspring, were listed in the genealogy.143 Clearly, in drawing boundaries between agnates and nonagnates by eliminating the latter from many late Chosŏn chokpo, the agnatic “main body” (ponjong) emerged with greater clarity. Nevertheless, such a depiction of kin, however patrilineally correct and editorially reasonable, must have left many compilers with considerable unease because it obviously contravened the bilateral assertion of elite status for which information on matrilateral kin was indispensable. In response to this dilemma, a number of specialized records began to appear in the eighteenth century. The “Genealogy of matrilateral ancestral lines” (sŏnse oega chokpo), for instance, focused on matrilateral kin (oega) and listed, in common chokpo style, the patrilineal antecedents (with spouses) of

366

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

the wives of all male ancestors from their respective apical ancestors down. This type of record, which combined information drawn from a great number of different genealogies, could never be as lucidly arranged as a patrilineal chokpo. A graphically more satisfying, yet generationally limited rendition of both patrilateral and matrilateral antecedents was therefore provided in the same graph, the “Diagram of the eight ancestral pairs” (p’algojo to). A statement made in 1791 explained its purpose: “That today’s descendants are vague about their origin is because they easily forget their maternal ante­ cedents. How can the maternal lines over several generations be made clear? This is what the ‘diagram of the eight ancestral pairs’ can do. Above the great-great-grandparents one more generation is added for detailing their [respective] origins.”144 Such a diagram, usually centered on a male individual, depicted four generations of ascending ancestral couples, starting with the parental couple and ending with the eight couples of the greatgreat-grandparents’ generation.145 It thus traced a man’s ancestry both through patrilateral as well as matrilateral lines, highlighting the bilateral constitution of elite status that never lost its critical social value through time. The exclusivity of the patrilineal chokpo generated, besides the two specimens mentioned above, still another remarkable kind of document: the “Record of cucumber vines and arrowroots” (kwa’galbo), which detailed a kin group’s affinal ties. Through the multiple marriages that localized kin groups tended to make with their closest peers, often across several generations, affinal relationships became as entangled as the vines of cucumbers and arrowroots. The kwa’galbo therefore was to unravel the complexity of affinal connections and, in doing so, it underscored the relevance affines continued to have as social, political, and economic partners in late Chosŏn.146 In sum, then, for an elite descent group the compilation of genealogical records was a crucial means for representing the group’s collective self and drawing boundaries with respect to others. Indeed, to the extent that it confirmed membership in a documented collectivity, a genealogy ensured, by authenticating his descent status, an individual’s survival not only within sajok society but also vis-à-vis the state—foremost by exempting him from registration on the military roster.147 Though patrilineality was firmly implanted in late Chosŏn society, the appearance of specialized records outlining matrilateral and affinal relationships, even if perhaps not all that common, reveals that such relationships retained vital significance for the definition of sajok status.

Stratification and Competition Under the political and economic circumstances described earlier, only those landed sajok who had organized themselves in endowed lineages and possessed widespread kin networks could survive or even thrive in late Chosŏn. Indeed, the cultivation of an elaborate lineage culture was the landed sajok’s surest strategy for sustaining the prerogatives of high status in the changing world of the eighteenth century. As suggested earlier, a kind of “pŏryŏl-ization” took place also in the countryside, insofar as only a select group of sajok seems to have been able to muster the necessary human, scholarly, and material



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

367

energies for preserving and manifesting their social and cultural supremacy. In contrast, those who, for one or the other reason, were unsuccessful in husbanding their kin group potential were increasingly faced with an uncertain future—at times even sliding into the unfortunate category of “fallen yangban” (mollak yangban), a category that might have easily subjected them to the state’s degrading military taxation regime. How, then, could some sajok descent groups uphold elite status generation after generation even without having it reconfirmed through examination success and/or office holding by the state? The major criterion for continued prominence in Yŏngnam, Yi Ik once remarked, was not office holding but “uninterrupted pursuit of scholarship, performance of the proper rites, and avoidance of [social] blemishes [i.e., “wrong” marriages].” If these conditions—characteristically, he did not mention landed property— were fulfilled, he asserted, the sons and grandsons of “outstanding kin groups” (mangjok) were still recognized as elite even if they did not hold office for ten generations. For a poor literatus, he added, there was therefore no better place to live than Yŏngnam. Nevertheless, longevity was only secure with the existence of a “distinguished ancestor”— a cultural distinction Yi called a “remnant of Silla’s kolp’um system.”148 Though Yi Ik formulated his observations with Yŏngnam in mind, they were manifestly also valid for Honam. According to Yi Ik’s checklist, it was precisely those kin groups in Andong and Namwŏn who managed to protect their social credentials by cultural rather than political means that successfully retained their local supremacy with surprising continuity, though the pecking order of prestige might undergo occasional changes. As shown in chapter 10, in Andong fewer than twenty lineages were strongly represented on the late Chosŏn local rosters (as compared to thirty-six in 1530); their members predominantly held Local Bureau posts, and continued to have sporadic examination success (despite the faction-imposed restrictions)—in other words, constituted the local ruling stratum. From the eighteenth to the early twentieth centuries, ten of them—among them the Andong Kwŏn and Kim, the Ŭisŏng and Kwangsan Kim, and the P’ungsan and Chŏnju Yu—monopolized close to 80 percent of the bureau posts and brought forth the largest number of examination passers.149 Typically, all of them were in control of extended lineage organizations. A similar case can be made for Namwŏn, where, however, a certain polarization between the native descent groups and the in-migrating “outsiders” was already evident from the early seventeenth century. Those who maintained their social prestige and local standing into the eighteenth century—the Chŏnju Yi, the Sangnyŏng Ch’oe, and the Kyŏngju Kim, among others—were, as in Andong, the principal cultural producers, deriv­ ing their social empowerment from a distinguished worthy in the immediate past. In sum, then, it was a limited number of landed sajok kin groups—quantitative data are, of course, hard to obtain—who kept up their preeminence continuously over an extended period of time. In contrast, those who lacked a generally recognized ancestor, who no longer pursued serious scholarship, and had neither landed property nor recourse to an economic safety net, did indeed land in trouble: slipping into poverty also threw doubt on their status. Sajok status, as Yi Chung-hwan pointed out, thus fractured into different status gradations (myŏngmok), the lowest of which may have been hardly distinguishable from that of a commoner.150 To avoid such a fate, a sajok, however destitute,

368

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

would, as many contemporary reports relate, shun artisanship or trade—lowly occupations that would degrade him to commoner—and try hard to keep up the outward trappings of sajok status by performing weddings and funerals in proper fashion.151 Poverty was undoubtedly a serious challenge to social status, with the most critical consequence that an impoverished sajok no longer qualified as a desirable marriage partner, dooming the respectability of his line. Clearly, a select number of outstanding sajok descent groups could perpetuate their hegemonic control in Andong and Namwŏn, but harmony did not necessarily prevail between them. Even though closely interconnected by marital ties, associational bonds, common intellectual heritage, and academy networks, rivalry between them was severe, as expressed by their rush to outdo one another with building shrines and printing genealogies and munjip. The high degree of competitiveness with which renowned sajok defended their ancestral prestige is also strikingly illustrated by two conspicuous conflicts that broke out between the neighborly Och’ŏn Kim and Chuch’on Yi and, shortly after, between the P’ungsan Yu and the Ŭisŏng Kim. In 1702, the Kim and the Yi built Hyanghyŏnsa (Shrine of the Local Worthies), a shrine in which they venerated their two local founding ancestors, Yi Kye-yang (T’oegye’s grandfather), the founder of On’gye, and Kim Hyo-ro, the founder of Och’ŏn. The Kim later moved Hyo-ro’s tablet to Nakch’ŏnsa, a separate shrine that they erected in 1762 to honor their ancestors, who had all been T’oegye disciples, among them the eminent Kim Pu-p’il. Sometime later Yi Kye-yang’s spirit tablet, too, was moved to Nakch’ŏnsa. This arrangement functioned well until the early nineteenth century, when the Kim made great efforts to secure for Pu-p’il, who had never held a public office, honorific office titles and, above all, a coveted posthumous name (siho). Their request was honored in 1825, when King Sunjo granted Pu-p’il the siho Munsun, “learned and pure.” The fact that Munsun was, inadvertently it seems, identical with T’oegye’s siho, upset the Yi greatly, who decried it as an insult against T’oegye and a slighting of the Yi. In anger, they sent missives to Seoul in an attempt to have Kim’s posthumous name rescinded and also set about to build a new separate shrine for Kye-yang’s tablet. Protesting this, the Kim deplored that after hundreds of years of common worship the descendants of the two worthies suddenly found themselves embroiled in conflict. Apparently unwilling “to listen to reason and intent on breaking off the connection to Nakch’ŏnsa,” a group of Yi kinsmen, led by Yi Hyo-sun152 and with a troupe of some one hundred followers in tow, moved against the shrine in the dark of night, but were held at bay by vigilant Kim. The following day, while the Kim ate breakfast, the Yi returned with several hundred armed men, broke into the shrine precinct, and when the Kim tried to stop them, started a bloody brawl. Tearing down a wall, they finally wrenched the shrine door open and snatched Kye-yang’s spirit tablet. Shaken by this regrettable affair, which deeply shocked the local Confucian community, the Kim sent repeated appeals for help, underwritten by dozens of Kim kinsmen, to the local magistrate, who, however, did not want to get involved.153 From that time on, the Kim and the Yi venerated their ancestors separately. Whereas the repercussions of the Kim-Yi embroilment seem to have been confined to Yean, the contemporaneous conflict between the P’ungsan Yu and the Ŭisŏng Kim, remembered as the “dispute between Pyŏng[san] and Ho[gye]” (Pyŏng-ho sibi), assumed



Tr a nsfor m ation w ithi n Sta bilit y

369

national dimensions. As outlined in chapter 12, when the Yu and the Kim enshrined Yu Sŏng-nyong and Kim Sŏng-il in Yŏgang Sŏwŏn (after 1676 Ho’gye Sŏwŏn) in 1620, the two parties—Pyŏngp’a and Hop’a—clashed over how to place the spirit tablets—a dispute that ended with Yu Sŏng-nyong’s being granted the more prestigious position. Eventually, Kim Sŏng-il’s descendants took offense at their ancestor’s inferior place and questioned the propriety of the ritual sequence. Exacerbated by personal and factional animosities over the guardianship of T’oegye’s legacy, the conflict began to split Andong’s Confucian community into two feuding camps, and it came at last to a head in 1805. In the winter of that year, Yŏngnam Confucians (yurim) from Andong and the TaeguIndong area planned to request the canonization of Yu Sŏng-nyong, Kim Sŏng-il, Chŏng Ku, and Chang Hyŏn-gwang in the National Shrine of Confucius in Seoul. During the preparations of the memorial, Yu’s partisans insisted that the four spirit tablets would have to be arranged in the same way as in Ho’gye Sŏwŏn, that is, with Yu’s tablet taking precedence over Kim’s tablet. Kim’s followers, in contrast, argued that the tablets should be installed in the sequence of age, which would have placed Kim before Yu. Seconding the age sequence, the Taegu-Indong Confucians opined that with the simultaneous enshrinement of four scholars the date of birth alone should count. When the memorial in this sense was handed in, the Yu partisans submitted a separate memorial demanding that the age order be abandoned. Perplexed at the disunion of the two parties, King Sunjo refused to grant the enshrinement. This fiasco, however, was not the end. When, a year later, the Taegu-Indong Confucians announced that they intended to submit a memorial of their own, the Andong Confucians were greatly offended and immediately drafted a repudiation. A Yu partisan, however, claiming that its wording was twisted against the Yu’s interests, viciously tore it up, whereupon the Kim gave the suspected despoiler a good beating. A further memorial did consequently not materialize. With the rift between the two parties evidently unbridgeable, the Yu partisans decided to withdraw from Ho’gye Sŏwŏn and concentrate their forces in the remote Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn. Though leaving the centrally located academy to the Kim partisans, they nevertheless obstructed the enshrinement of the spirit tablet of Yi Sang-jŏng—the eminent eighteenth-century scholar in Hakpong’s scholarly lineage—in its main shrine. When a government-led attempt to reconcile the feuding parties failed, an angry Taewŏn’gun included Ho’gye Sŏwŏn among the academies he ordered to be destroyed in 1871.154 The abiding conflict between the P’ungsan Yu and the Ŭisŏng Kim not only epitomized the collapse of the local discourse, it also had fateful consequences for the Namin cause. As a widely publicized power play between two of Yŏngnam’s most outstanding descent groups, it prevented four eminent scholars from receiving the nation’s highest honors. More critically, it also thwarted their chance to redress the overwhelming Sŏin presence in the Munmyo. The Namin were losers of their own making.

Ch a p t er 1 4

The End of Sajok Supremacy?

T

he fact that a number of landed sajok were able to maintain their hegemonic control of their communities until the end of the dynasty can hardly be interpreted as a sign of general stability in the countryside. Lineage organization with all its social, political, economic, and cultural aspects was clearly a formidable bulwark against outside pressure, whether coming from the state or from local forces, but even the mightiest sajok descent groups began to feel the stiff winds of change. Did not such newly appearing dichotomous terms as “Confucians” versus “locals” (yu-hyang) signify the breaking open of social rifts at the local level? Who were the “new fellows” (sinbae) or “new locals” (sinhyang) who emerged apparently to challenge the sajok’s social and political preeminence? To be sure, manifold grievances increasingly destabilized the existing social system, but one of the main reasons generally perceived as the origin of growing unrest in the countryside was the bitter conflicts between the long-established landed elites (koga sejok) and their secondary sons. In addition, a number of hyangni mingled with the challengers, and even commoners and slaves started to show signs of insubordination and recalcitrance. Did those who had been marginalized for centuries finally demand the dismantling of the social system? Indeed, did their assault upon social realities, encouraged by signals from the center, forebode the end of the sajok’s supremacy?

Challengers from Within and Without As detailed in earlier chapters, the impact on Andong of the Namin’s defeat in 1694 was severe and long-lasting, and ushered in a prolonged period of isolation that seems to have dejected sajok spirits at the same time as it stirred increased competition among them. It was not only the Namin’s political defeat that had a disheartening effect and discouraged many from studying for the examinations and seeking office in Seoul. It was equally



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

371

the denigration of the T’oegye school at the national level that drove the Andong yurim into intellectual isolation. Weakened on all fronts, Andong became an easy target of Noron repression. By appointing their partisans as governors of Kyŏngsang Province or magistrates of Andong, the Noron were able to place the entire province at a disadvantage1 and to harass specific local adversaries. Regarded in Seoul as the major disciples of Yi Hyŏn-il (who had advocated Song Si-yŏl’s death in 1689), the Ŭisŏng Kim, for instance, came to feel Noron vengeance more than once. In 1717, it will be remembered, they were ordered to dismantle their newly built academy, and, suspected of collaboration with Yi In-jwa, suffered humiliation in the aftermath of the 1728 rebellion. In retaliation, the Ŭisŏng Kim were among the leading opponents of the Kim Sang-hŏn shrine in 1738, and a year earlier Kim Sŏng-t’ak had stoked Noron’s ire by audaciously calling for Yi Hyŏn-il’s rehabilitation. As if these skirmishes were not enough, in 1756, the then Noron magistrate of Andong, Chŏng Sil2—a descendant of Chŏng Ch’ŏl—aimed directly at the Kim’s ancestral home in Naeap. He ordered the felling of a number of pine trees in the grove that had been planted by the Naeap founder Kim Man-gŭn to protect the village geomantically, on a sandbank in the Panbyŏn River (a branch of Naktong River). These were trees that the Naeap residents had guarded closely in the belief that they had safeguarded the village’s prosperity over the centuries. “Without these pine trees, there will be no Naeap!” Caught by surprise and not prepared physically to resist the magistrate’s order, the Kim greatly resented that “these century-old treasures of earlier generations turned in one morning into a tax levy,” and decided to make the protection of the grove in the future the task of the entire munjung. According to a few rules appended to a resolution, two “devoted” Naeap men were appointed “[tree] protection” officers (yusa), assisted by one delegate from each of the six other nearby Kim villages. Should further requests for timber come from the magistracy, the Naeap representatives were to quickly inform their various counterparts to organize resistance. The resolution was signed by the nine appointed officers and ninety-one kinsmen.3 Though the humiliations and harassments coming from the Noron power holders were indeed painful, equally if not more painful and distressing was the realization that individuals emerged from among the sajok’s own ranks who utilized the “factional discourse” (tangnon) to further their own interests. To be sure, factional defections started to happen in reaction to the shock of 1694—An Yŏn-sŏk was a prime example. And later, in the aftermath of 1728, when Andong was weakened as suspected rebel country, some of An’s closest kinsmen, riding the anti-Yŏngnam wave, dared erect a shrine for Kim Sang-hŏn in 1738. Where, concerned observers asked anxiously, will such obsession with building academies lead in the future?4 With some members of the Sunhŭng An consistently identified as the principal sajok deserters to the Noron side, it is intriguing to probe into their standing in Andong society. As detailed in chapter 12, a number of Sunhŭng An had settled in the Andong area at least four or five generations prior to An Yŏn-sŏk’s generation and were variously linked by marriage to prominent Andong sajok.5 An Yŏn-sŏk’s antecedents who settled in Ka’gu might have been less affluent and less well connected than the other An branch that had moved to P’ungsan and had since the mid-sixteenth century resided in Chidong.6

372

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

The An were weakly represented on the Andong Local Roster and brought forth only a modest number of examination graduates.7 Nevertheless, in 1748 An T’aek-chun’s younger brother, Pok-chun, munkwa graduate of 1728,8 and two of his cousins seem to have controlled the local roster as both head and deputy heads of the Local Bureau.9 Had they advanced to these elevated positions with the help of Noron magistrate Kim Sŏng-no,10 who, without precedent, had demanded a place on the roster? Although this cannot be substantiated, the roster revision of 1748 reportedly did break down because of irreconcilable differences between the Noron-backed An and their accomplices and the rest of the Namin roster membership—differences that were perceived as a sure symptom of the general confusion engulfing Andong society to the point that common ground for “factional reconciliation” (t’angp’yŏng) could no longer be found.11 Not all An seem to have supported the Noron position, however. An Sang-ch’im, a collateral kinsman, regretting the split in the literati discourse after 1728, is said to have changed his name to live in anonymity in a different village. His factional steadfastness was later attested in his funerary writ (chemun) composed by the Namin scholar Kim To-haeng, and by the fact that both his son and grandson, as Namin, served as deputy heads of the Local Bureau.12 Even though a few more next-generation Sunhŭng An held bureau posts before the roster finally broke down in 1774, no An seems to have made it onto the successor roster that was, it will be remembered, dominated by the Ŭisŏng Kim and the P’ungsan Yu. Nevertheless, the Ka’gu An did not let themselves be pushed into oblivion. On the contrary, An Kyŏng-wŏn, a nephew of An Pok-chun, finally succeeded in securing a rallying site for the local Noron partisans by building for Kim Sang-hŏn a shrine (sa), named Sŏ’gan Sŏwŏn upon receiving a royal charter in 1786.13 The Noron were there to stay.

Old Forces versus New Forces: Conflict with Factional Motives Noron infiltration of the local discourse likely emboldened a number of “newly rising Sŏin” (sinch’ul Sŏin) to stand up against Namin-based elite hegemony. Who were these elements, also called “new locals” (sinhyang) or even “fellows who strove to become yangban” (yogwi yangban), said to have enthusiastically taken part in the troubles around the shrine building for Kim Sang-hŏn in 1738? Although these individuals were rarely identified by name, the term chung-sŏ, widely used to classify them socially, points to chungin and sŏŏl, that is, to local hyangni and secondary sons.14 Both were, of course, not new to the local scene, but in the course of the eighteenth century they began to claim elite privileges—most importantly, education—from which they had been explicitly excluded for centuries. Indeed, some of these people pushed into the local schools apparently realizing that without education they would not be able to get rid of their social and political powerlessness. Not necessarily aiming to compete in the examinations, a few are said to have set their minds on studying “moral principles” (ŭiri), the young Yi Mongjong, for instance, a chungin in his twenties, who, from age fifteen, disciplined himself



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

373

with the Elementary Learning and the Analects regardless of whether he was freezing or starving.15 Though not all “new locals” may have been equally dedicated students—local schools also became for a number of commoners havens for dodging the military tax and corvée—at least some seem to have aspired to acquire the sophisticated image of the Confucian moral man, thus rising up to the sajok’s hegemonic use of yu, “Confucian,” as the epitome of “cultured elite.” What did “new” mean in contrast to “Confucian” in the Andong context? Apparently the propagation of “new” views that was intended as a deliberate assault on T’oegye’s teachings. This is illustrated well by the alarm that some ambitious “new fellows” (sinbae) from neighboring Noron-leaning Sangju caused among the Andong literati with their “false theories” (sasŏl)—undoubtedly circulating Yi Yulgok’s scholarly tenets. The baffled T’oegye disciples deplored the fact that these fellows not only misled the people but, worse yet, also cut themselves off from “right learning” (samun). T’oegye, they countered, had explicated the “Four-Seven debate” once and for all “as brightly as sun and moon.” All later learners had to do was to follow his explanations in order to avoid violating the Way. With this world in turmoil, they lamented, the “Confucian craft” (yusul) was so weakened that even a few ignorant individuals could come up with “weird views” to insult T’oegye—an outrage for which only the heaviest punishment was adequate.16 This rare testimony reveals the degree to which the scholarly discourse even in Yŏngnam had started to fracture along partisan lines. Indeed, since Sŏin works were banned from Yŏngnam sŏwŏn, the Andong literati must have been as unfamiliar with Yulgok’s thought as King Yŏngjo was ignorant of T’oegye’s teachings. Some of these “newly rising fellows” thus manipulated sectarian antagonisms in an attempt to break out of their social isolation. Assuming that many of them were secondary sons, it is necessary to further explore the changing sociopolitical environment that encouraged them to emerge as groups to claim a place alongside, if rarely within, the life of the sajok elite.

The Rise of Secondary Sons as a Pressure Group The increase of secondary sons’ activities at the periphery using factional motives in their fight against traditional discrimination likely was a reflection of the debates led at the center on how to deal with the anomaly of the secondary sons’ status with regard to elite society. If the Confucian preference of talent over birth made a secondary son employable in the public domain, should this not give him also an enhanced standing in the domestic sphere? But how could this dilemma be solved without going against the axiom according to which political participation was an extension of social standing? In a way, then, a solution to the secondary-son quandary—if such could be found—necessarily touched the very core values of sajok society. The deliberations held at court throughout the seventeenth century hinged on factional positions and primarily revolved around the political role of the secondary sons (sŏja). In contrast to the Namin who, following T’oegye, insisted on maintaining a strict separation of “noble” and “base” by excluding secondary sons from ritual as well as

374

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

political participation, the Sŏin, guided by Yi Yulgok’s inclination to grant secondary sons ritual heirship (as discussed in chapter 11), were advocating their admission to political office. Indeed, in 1583 Yulgok (then the minister of war) had been the first to suggest that secondary sons should, upon making a contribution in kind (napsok), be admitted to the examinations.17 Though Yulgok’s suggestion was shouted down by outraged censors, at least one sŏja profited from it. This was Yi Chun2 (1540–1622), grandson of the famous Yi Ŏn-jŏk and main heir of Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s secondary line (sŏp’a) residing in Oksan. According to the still extant certificate (ch’ŏpchi), dated 1583, Chun submitted 80 sŏm of rice to gain for himself and his descendants admission to the exams (hŏt’ong). He subsequently served as magistrate of Kyŏngsan and in various military capacities.18 Shortly after, the Imjin War opened to secondary sons the prospect of political advancement, as the desperate government reactivated Yulgok’s proposal and solicited grain contributions (napsok) or service in the military (kun’gong). Indeed, according to rules published in 1593, a sŏja was entitled to gain access to the examinations (hŏt’ong) or even acquire a low-level office upon submitting either certain amounts of rice or one enemy head.19 How many secondary sons could in fact avail themselves of these opportunities is uncertain. Even those who distinguished themselves in militia actions (ŭibyŏng) apparently were rarely adequately rewarded. And as soon as the war was over, the opposition against admitting secondary sons to government posts regained strength with royal backing. The rules in question were abolished and those few who had secured a government post were stripped of office.20 Nevertheless, the question of whether or not secondary sons should be granted even modest political engagement was again taken up in the early years of Injo’s reign by several Sŏin ministers who, couching their affirmative views in terms of the country’s urgent postwar reconstruction, encouraged the reluctant king to draw up new rules for assigning government posts in accordance with talent. Even though these rules, proclaimed at the end of 1625, allowed even third-generation lowborn secondary sons to enter low-level government service,21 they seem to have been largely ineffective, not least because they were opposed by Namin ministers who insisted on the strict maintenance of the hierarchical social order. In the early 1660s, new regulations for “soliciting grain” (mo’gok pyŏltan) again put upon secondary sons of both commoner or base origin the burden of having to purchase admission to the examinations (nammi pugŏ)—a humiliation against which 998 secondary sons from southern Kyŏngsang protested in 1695. Reiterating the past history of sŏja discrimination, their leader angrily asked: Is it necessary to block the secondary sons’ road to office in order to prevent the social order from collapsing? This desperate plea found, unprecedentedly, bipartisan support, and at last, in the early autumn of 1696, King Sukchong abrogated the intolerant legislation and further granted a change of terminology: secondary sons, when admitted to the examinations, were no longer to use the discriminatory terms “admitted to the examinations” (hŏt’ong) or even “secondary son”; instead, they could call themselves “engaged in Confucian studies” (ŏbyu) when sitting for the civil, and “engaged in military pursuits” (ŏmmu) when taking the military examinations. From the grandson generation on, they were simply to identify themselves as “student” (yuhak). These important alterations were later codified in the Sok taejŏn of 1746.22



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

375

Though the Sŏin—foremost among them Song Si-yŏl and Pak Se-ch’ae—had early on encouraged Sukchong’s liberalization of the secondary sons’ role in the public sphere with the Mencian slogan “to employ men of virtue without regard to origin” (iphyŏn mubang),23 the Namin’s concurrence was apparently a remarkable change of mind, later castigated by the Sŏin as an opportunistic move to flatter the chief state councilor, Hŏ Chŏk, who tried to get his beloved secondary son into high office. Nevertheless, as early as 1675 (when the Namin were in power) high Namin ministers Hong U-wŏn, Yun Hyu, and Yi Mu,24 in a discussion with King Sukchong, argued that secondary sons, being the issue of yangban, could not really be treated like lowborns, and that their being barred from office was not part of the original dynastic constitution. In a lengthy memorial, an aged Yi Mu took the issue a critical step further. There was no precedent for discriminating against secondary sons in ancient times, he pointed out, and the differentiation between noble and lowborn was superficial because both were the king’s subjects. By isolating the secondary sons for the popularly held reason that their maternal side (oega) was not proper amounted to breaking off the bond between ruler and subject. After criticizing the continued insistence on the immutability of social status (sinbun) even after major policy adjustments had earlier been made under Sŏnjo and Injo, Yi climaxed his argument with an unprecedentedly bold pronouncement: What of old was called the differentiation between “primary descent line” and “secondary descent line” (chŏk-sŏ) should apply exclusively to the domestic-ritual sphere (saga-chongjok), while status terms such as “noble” and “lowborn” had relevance only for the public-bureaucratic sphere (konggagwanwi). Since public and private (kong-sa) clearly differ, how then is it possible to confuse the two and bring domestic criteria to bear upon the public realm? If this were done, Yi claimed, the authority over the officialdom would no longer rest with the king, but would be manipulated by the powerful among his ministers (as in fact it was). The qualification for employment in government, he concluded, should therefore be exclusively determined by a candidate’s worthiness (hyŏn).25 Yi Mu’s momentous memorial, which, according to Yi Ik, was “so clear and trenchant that it made people shed tears,”26 indeed opened a new dimension to the secondary-son debate. By the beginning of the eighteenth century, the employability of secondary sons in the public realm had assumed such persuasiveness as to silence remaining opponents. At least indirectly aiding this trend were the voices of such dissimilar reformist thinkers as Yu Hyŏng-wŏn (1622–73)27 and Yu Su-wŏn (1694–1755).28 For Yu Hyŏng-wŏn, all human beings were basically equal and consequently social distinctions on the premise of birth and heredity were meaningless. Though he championed the employment of secondary sons in public office, he nonetheless did not speak out in favor of abolishing the hierarchical structure of society altogether. On the contrary, he warned against blurring primary and secondary lines in descent group affairs. Surely the most outspoken promoter of the secondary sons’ cause was Yu Su-wŏn, who argued that it was the unreasonable Korean emphasis on family background (munbŏl) as a prerequisite for office holding that prevented the utilization of gifted secondary sons in government—a deplorable violation against Heaven’s endowment of secondary sons with unusual talents. Yu was the only thinker who also addressed the secondary sons’ plight in the domestic sphere. Although status distinctions had their justification even there, was it nonetheless not utterly against

376

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

human relationships endowed by Heaven that a secondary son did not dare call his father “father”? With his demand to adjust human relationships, Yu went clearly beyond Yi Mu’s earlier attempt to detach the public from the private, though he did not spell out what the practical implications of such a vision could be.29 Reformist arguments in favor of using men of talents were not lost on King Yŏngjo, himself a secondary son—a circumstance that undoubtedly heightened his sensitivity to the secondary-son issue. Throughout his long reign, he showed himself willing to listen to reformist voices—in 1741, he received Yu Su-wŏn in audience 30—and thus steered a course that would eventually remove the last obstacles on the secondary sons’ way into the higher officialdom. The more relaxed attitude toward secondary sons at court likely stirred increased activities of secondary sons, who, reiterating the history of their predicament, entreated the king to permit them full government employment “in order to placate the souls of all those who had been barred and had carried a grudge all their life long.” Confronted with a huge secondary-son demonstration in 1725, Yŏngjo, though sympathetic, was nevertheless not willing to make hasty decisions,31 and the ensuing debates among his principal ministers epitomized the gulf of opinion that still divided the officialdom. Whereas some conservatives—mostly Noron—strove to reserve the prerogatives of political power to the yangban elite, a few more enlightened officials—mostly Soron— promoted the Confucian dictum of using men according to their abilities. After further sŏja interventions took on an ever more strident tone,32 in 1772, the aging Yŏngjo finally issued a milestone decree: the civil and military officials of secondary-son status were henceforth allowed to advance to “prestigious offices” (ch’ŏngjik). To celebrate this historic pronouncement, which opened to secondary sons middle-level bureaucratic offices, the king appointed three secondary sons to prestigious censorial offices on the same day.33 A day later, Yŏngjo reportedly went even further by declaring that sŏja should from now on call their fathers and elder (primary) half-brothers “father and brother” in the same way as “Heaven is called Heaven, and ruler ruler.” Shortly afterward the king allegedly crowned this pronouncement by announcing that his policy of “grand harmony” (t’angp’yŏng) would no longer tolerate the distinction between primary and secondary descent lines, and that any discriminatory action would be liable to punishment. Although these last two royal orders are likely apocryphal,34 the king expressed his sympathy to the secondary sons’ aspirations in one of his last decrees in 1774. Attempting to bring his authority to bear even on lineage succession matters, how could secondary sons, he asked, be given access to the higher officialdom, while they continued to be denied a function in descent group affairs? Yŏngjo then ordered that a secondary son henceforth be made his father’s heir when there was no primary son. He apparently topped this off by repeating his wish that a secondary son also be allowed to call his father “father” instead of “master” and his half-brothers “brothers.”35 Though well-intentioned, the old king’s interventions seem to have had minimal impact (and were also not inscribed in law). To be sure, there were sporadic cases of preferring a secondary son as heir—predominantly for economic reasons—as discussed earlier, statistical evidence shows that adoption of primary sons as heirs, most likely circumventing existing secondary sons, increased markedly in the late seventeenth century to reach some 10 to 15 percent of all descent-line successions a century later.36 In this



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

377

crucial area of descent group legitimacy and reproduction, then, there seems to have been no significant difference between Noron and Namin practice, for no self-respecting sajok lineage was to concede heirship to a secondary son—even to one who had gained recognition in the public sphere. Succession matters clearly remained “private” matters, where not the state but the munjung had the last word.37 How are the policy changes that from the early seventeenth century gradually eased the sŏja’s admission criteria to the examinations and to office holding reflected in the statistics? Not surprisingly, the number of known examination graduates of secondaryson status is very small. During the more than two hundred years from Sŏnjo to Yŏngjo only some 131 passed the lower (sama), and 164 the higher (munkwa) examinations.38 Because some aspirants might have entered the examinations before receiving “permission” (hŏt’ong), whereas others might not have identified themselves with the proper nomenclature—simply using the term “young scholar” (yuhak) and thereby critically blurring status lines—these numbers are likely considerably (though indeterminably) larger. Typically, the great majority of secondary-son examination graduates had fathers in high-ranking offices, resided in the capital or the metropolitan area, and profited from the frequently held irregular examinations. Though successful munka graduates could have been appointed (after 1626) to “reputable” and (after 1772) to “prestigious” government posts, most graduates apparently had to be satisfied with undesirable low-level (senior sixth rank) magisterial posts in the countryside. If appointed to “prestigious” posts during Yŏngjo’s reign, they advanced at best to senior fourth-rank positions in one of the censorial offices.39 Clearly, the fact that the examinations were opened to secondary sons did not also mean free access to the arena of high politics. On the contrary, the restrictive assignment of office continued to be used as a potent means of discrimination, as is evident from a set of rules promulgated under Yŏngjo’s successor, King Chŏngjo, in 1777, which again excluded secondary sons from censorial posts.40

Sŏja Storm of Sajok Bastions The slow thaw of anti-sŏja attitudes and the legislative concessions it eventually effected were by and large confined to the capital. They did not bring about a similar change of heart among the sajok in the countryside, thus making the protesting “newly rising Sŏin” a largely rural phenomenon. This is also suggested by a petition some three thousand secondary sons handed in to Yŏngjo in the last month of 1772. Led by Chŏn Sŏng-ch’ŏn (1719–?; chinsa 1759) of Sangju, the petitioners protested against the double standards that existed between court and countryside. Though even the censorial offices had been opened to secondary sons, they asserted, admission to the local schools, private academies, and local rosters (saman)41 was still denied to them, even to holders of so-called prestigious offices in the capital. Moved, Yŏngjo had the impulse to respond to this outcry with a royal injunction, but was stopped by Ch’ae Che-gong. A close observer of the Yŏngnam scene, Ch’ae argued that the admission to the local rosters in Yŏngnam followed a rationale different from that of other provinces. “Let the court be court, and the

378

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

country clique [hyangdang] country clique!” An intervention by the state, Ch’ae feared, would lead to unnecessary local conflicts. Upon this advice, Yŏngjo desisted from his intention.42 Only a few days later, however, in reaction to a further plea from Kyŏngsang, the king apparently did dispatch his order with the words: “How could I tolerate that in regard to local rosters conservative forces disobey my order?” As a result of this royal intervention, secondary sons in Sangju reportedly gained access to the local roster.43 As recounted before, pressure from the capital on local roster revision mounted also in Andong, and as Ch’ae Che-gong had feared, led to heated controversies over sŏja admission. With the promoters taking recourse to King Yŏngjo’s order, forty-six secondary sons were at last admitted to the roster in 1773, but Andong’s clocks did run differently: the sŏja invasion definitely shattered whatever local “harmony” had been left, and the roster came to an ignoble end in 1774.44 Further royal interventions in local affairs, such as King Chŏngjo’s order in 1777 to appoint capable secondary sons to local bureau posts (hyangim), albeit not to headships,45 additionally encumbered the sajok’s troubled relationship to their sŏja. The gradual upgrading of the secondary sons’ status in the public realm, led by the Noron-dominated government, gave the sŏja a new consciousness of their power and clearly heightened their ambition to penetrate the last precincts of sajok exclusiveness, the local educational institutions. It was in particular the private academies—the icons of sajok identity—where the fiercest conflicts between primary and secondary offspring (chŏk-sŏ) took place. As Chŏn Sŏng-ch’ŏn had complained, the local schools (hyanggyo) and private academies in northern Yŏngnam were, as centers of sajok education and learning, traditionally closed to sŏja students. In the course of the seventeenth century, however, the government turned the local schools into institutions that also had to fulfill a clearing function: only young men registered as students (kyosaeng) were exempt from military duties (kunyŏk); in addition, from 1654, all examination aspirants had to be registered with a local school. These rules, intended to open the schools to nonelites, led in Andong, and apparently also in Sangju, to a split of the school roster (kyoan)46 into two separate lists: one reserved for 90 sajok students (yuan), and one limited to 320 students “outside the quota” (aeg’oe), filled by sŏja and commoners—an arrangement to safeguard the social distinction between the sajok “Confucian students” (yusaeng) and the nonelite student body (kyosaeng); such separation also had a spatial dimension: the yusaeng were housed in the east study hall (tongjae), the kyosaeng in the west study hall (sŏjae). Because in most other local schools in the country the majority of kyo­saeng were commoners, they were shunned by sajok students.47 In contrast, the private academies (sŏwŏn), being “private,” closely controlled the admittance of students (wŏnsaeng), whose numbers were usually restricted to under twenty. The Yŏngnam academies generally banned secondary sons or hyangni (chung-sŏ), even graduates of the lower or higher examinations, from their premises on the pretext that T’oegye had established such a rule.48 Though the truth of this claim cannot be substantiated, it does not come as a surprise that the student body of Tosan Sŏwŏn and Yŏktong Sŏwŏn originated mainly from those sajok kin groups that also dominated the Local Roster of Yean, namely the Chinsŏng Yi, the Kwangsan Kim, the Yŏngch’ŏn Yi, and the Ponghwa Kŭm, among a few others.49 Such blatant discrimination of sŏja



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

379

eventually provoked clashes between “old” and “new” in many academies, but the perhaps most dramatic conflicts arose when sŏja, with Noron backing, demanded entry to such Namin bastions as Oksan Sŏwŏn near Kyŏngju and Tosan Sŏwŏn in Yean. Oksan Sŏwŏn, it will be remembered, enjoyed in the Kyŏngju area the highest prestige because it housed the spirit tablet of Yi Ŏn-jŏk, the eminent scholar who was canonized, together with T’oegye, in 1610. Administered and economically endowed by the Namin-supporting local sajok, Oksan Sŏwŏn excluded secondary sons and hyangni with stringent admission rules. But since Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s secondary son, Chŏn-in,50 had been actively involved in the building of the academy and in clearing Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s name after his death, Chŏn-in’s descendants, who lived close to the academy in Oksan village, began from the late seventeenth century—likely stirred to action by Noron insinuation—to demand that they be admitted to the academy and entitled to serve as academy officers and ritual officiants. Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s main-line descendants residing in neighboring Yangdong, however, rejected this demand, arguing that the academy was closed to non-sajok, attributing this rule to T’oegye. In the face of main-line intransigence, the sŏja descendants, led by Chŏn-in’s seventh-generation direct heir, Yi Hŭi-sŏng (n.d.), then tried to boost the legitimacy of their demand by proclaiming Chŏn-in’s scholarly achievements, which, they insisted, made him the true successor to Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s scholarly line. They consequently attempted to have him coenshrined in Oksan Sŏwŏn and a nearby private academy where Yi Ŏn-jŏk was also venerated, and, in addition, solicited recognition and posthumous honors for him from local and capital authorities. When their plans were foiled by main-line opposition, the sŏja, with the help of secondary sons of the Kyŏngju area and behind-the-scenes Noron backing, then erected a separate shrine, Changsansa, for Chŏn-in in 1780 (it was elevated to academy status in 1797). All these hectic activities did nothing, however, to resolve the original problem of Chŏn-in’s descendants being barred from Oksan Sŏwŏn. The conflict, at bottom a struggle between competing primary and secondary descent lines and additionally inflamed by factional animosities, dragged on into the late nineteenth century. It finally came to an end in 1884, when, in answer to a memorial sent to the king by a sŏja saengwŏn degree holder, an official injunction ordered that the sŏja be instated as full members in Oksan Sŏwŏn.51 The protracted “local conflict” around Oksan Sŏwŏn received wide publicity in the entire Yŏngnam area and sparked a similar feud at the very center of T’oegye learning, Tosan Sŏwŏn, in the mid-1880s. Ironically, the ringleaders were sŏja descendants of T’oegye, Cho Mok, and Yi Hyŏn-bo.52 The starting position was analogous to that at Oksan: for centuries Tosan Sŏwŏn had been administered by T’oegye’s direct main-line heirs, and, according to a closely observed rule, sŏja did not have access to the academy. However, barely two months after the forced settlement at Oksan, a royal writ also arrived in Tosan ordering the immediate admission of secondary sons to the academy. How is it possible to exclude those who fulfill ritual duties at the Royal Ancestral Shrine (Chongmyo) as well as at the National Shrine of Confucius in Seoul, it asked, from the academy of their forebears under the pretext that “old and new” would never cohere for a hundred generations? Would they not harbor resentment at such discriminatory treatment? With these arguments, the writ demanded quick compliance with the royal will. Exhilarated by this royal backing, the three sŏja Yi Kyu-sŏp, Cho Yang-sik, and Yi Man-

380

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

hong immediately pressed the Tosan authorities for full academy membership, which, on the basis of the royal injunction, they insisted, could no longer be denied to them. When the Tosan authorities tried to drag their feet with the argument that the Oksan example did not apply to Tosan, the sŏja threatened a sit-in and shortly thereafter attempted to force their way into the academy premises, clashing with academy slaves in a bloody brawl. Joined by sŏja from the neighborhood, the rioters even threatened to burn down the residence of T’oegye’s main heir. The terrorized academy authorities then appealed to the local magistrate for help, but reluctant to take a stand, the magistrate merely advised a temporary truce. Both sides held meetings to decide further steps, but it was clear that there was little ground for a compromise. On the contrary, T’oegye’s primary heirs, among them Yi Man-do (1842–1910)53 and his kinsman Man-ŭng (n.d.), who controlled Tosan, reconfirmed in a resolution the exclusion of sŏja from the academy and added punitive rules for offenders. The sŏja, on the other hand, threatened to publicize the Yi’s irresponsibility and misjudgment in the entire country. Finally, after months of continued wrangling, the magistrate of Yean intervened—unexpectedly, yet in an evident show of respect for Tosan, on the side of the main-line descendants: he seized some of the ringleaders and gave them a good beating. This did not clear the air, however. When a concerned chinsa graduate of Andong appealed to the central government to declare the Yi’s refusal to admit their sŏja to Tosan as unlawful, the Yi countered by taking recourse to T’oegye’s warning that “sŏja assaulting primary kin” (ŏlban nŭngjŏk) were to be punished to the highest degree; their exclusion, moreover, was based on T’oegye’s testamentary injunction, in force for more than three hundred years. At last, in the autumn of 1885, a renewed court intervention seems to have brought the feud to an end by stating that the admission of sŏja to private academies had become an “irreversible fact.” Whether this was at the time also true for Tosan Sŏwŏn remains undocumented.54 The stormy events at Oksan and Tosan drew unusual attention, and in the Yŏngnam region did not remain isolated examples of sŏja challenging their sajok kinsmen. Cases of sŏja “disturbing local peace and violating social status” (nanhyang pŏmbun) terrified lineage elders and epitomized, in the eyes of contemporary observers, the slow decline of local mores through the unraveling of human relationships.55

National Sŏja Movement The fact that pressure from the capital to improve the sŏja’s social position had in fact very little influence in the provinces—not only in Yŏngnam—is strikingly revealed by the largest secondary-son demonstration in Chosŏn history. In the summer of 1823, some 9,996 sŏja from the heartland of sajok power—from Hwanghae to Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla—rallied to submit a protest memorial to King Sunjo. Their leader was the saengwŏn degree holder [Ŭisŏng] Kim Hŭi-yong,56 a sŏja from Sangju, who introduced the memorial with these dramatic words: “We, the descendants of loyal and wise [ancestors] and the issue of high officials, who experience rejection and humiliation in state and



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

381

family, have been bearing a grudge for the past four hundred years!” Essentially, the memorial reiterated the three key sŏja grievances: discrimination in state employment, rejection in succession matters, and humiliation in family relationships. The reason for such treatment, Kim exclaimed, lay in the principle of heredity that perpetuated the sŏja stigma through generations. Yet, how could “half of the country’s population” be so stigmatized? It was up to royal benevolence to remove this evil from all spheres of life.57 Even though King Sunjo expressed “deep understanding” for the memorialists’ “pitiable situation,” the memorial caused an uproar among the students of the National Confucian Academy, who accused Kim and his followers of arrogance and refuted their memorial point by point. Why did Kim, as a Yŏngnam man, fail to mention that Yi Ŏn-jŏk had continued his descent line with an adoptee (instead of with his sŏja), and that T’oegye had ordered sŏja to be seated behind the hyangni in community assemblies? That such insistence on upholding social status persisted among the Yŏngnam sajok up to this day, they cried, was solely due to their obstinate adherence to the ritual prescriptions of these two gentlemen! Kim’s memorial, they warned, only stirred up local conflict, and to emphasize their indignation the students boycotted their lectures.58 Were the academy students trying to teach a Noron lesson to those they thought were Namin memorialists? Perhaps, but Kim Hŭi-yong’s memorial also prompted extensive deliberations among the king’s highest ministers, as a result of which the so-called Kyemi Regulations (Kyemi chŏlmok) were proclaimed in the autumn of 1823. Surely to the disappointment of the memorialists, these regulations, on the one hand, basically reiterated Chŏngjo’s restrictions on sŏja officials’ office holding in the higher bureaucracy; on the other hand, they empowered provincial governors and magistrates to appoint sŏja to local posts in schools, academies, and local bureaus, but warned that social barriers, where such were still in place, were not to be challenged lest local conflict be incited.59 The Kyemi Regulations thus cemented sŏja discrimination in the central bureaucracy, and Kim Hŭi-yong’s descendants provide a notable example: none of the successful examination graduates among them moved beyond a senior sixth-rank office.60 In contrast, the grandson of Hŭi-yong’s elder primary half-brother Hŭi-sŏng, Kŏn-su (1790– 1854), a munkwa degree holder of 1830, ended his official career as a tangsang-rank royal secretary.61 These data, though of course shallow, do suggest that office holding for sŏja did remain restricted. In addition, they give evidence that a sŏja did not profit from the long-term social and economic prestige of his kin group’s native place. Whereas his two primary half-brothers and their descendants continued to reside in Andong, Hŭi-yong, typically for a sŏja, lived elsewhere—in distant Sangju. His son Tu-myŏng later relocated to Sunhŭng (upon marriage?), where his descendants seem to have settled down and where the tomb of Hŭi-yong’s great-grandson U-yŏng is located. The number and the geographical origin of the demonstrators of 1823 give an idea of the strength and organizational network that the sŏja had developed by the turn of the nineteenth century. Indeed, the sŏja protests had reached the dimensions of a nationwide movement that threatened to destabilize peace and order in the countryside. More and more politically active, the sŏja reinforced their demand for social recognition and parity with the claim that the sŏja constituted “half of the country’s population.” Though the notion that the number of sŏja was rapidly increasing in late Chosŏn seems to be part of

382

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

the conventional wisdom, it cannot easily be substantiated statistically. Since secondaryson status was hereditary, the sŏja obviously reproduced themselves, typically marrying within the group, but recent research seems to suggest that the secondary-son population amounted at best to about one-quarter of the sajok population.62 Whatever the accuracy of statistics, a more persuasive explanation of the sŏja’s heightened profile in late Chosŏn seems to be the fact that they were increasingly able to make common cause by mobilizing thousands of partisans through a national network—thereby projecting for the sajok the disquieting specter of a rapidly swelling body of agitators breaking into their longguarded established order.63

The Reemergence of the Hyangni in Andong and Namwŏn The hyangni emerge from Chosŏn dynasty documents as a faceless mass of undisciplined and greedy, yet indispensable underlings running the day-to-day local administration, over which the magistrate presided, in Tasan’s words, as a mere “guest.” Indeed, from the beginning of the Chosŏn, when the local administration was reorganized, many hyangni suffered the lot of being uprooted from their original administrative districts and transferred to places where they had no longer native roots. Forced to serve in unsalaried subaltern roles in the grey zone between magistracy and the populace, these “transferred” hyangni (kari) were doomed to precarious existences in the lowest hyangni ranks. Decried as “wicked,” they became easy scapegoats for whatever went wrong at the grassroots level. Though reforms were occasionally demanded, low-ranking hyangni remained a socially and economically insecure and problematic fixture of local administration (ŭpsa). In large administrative centers such as Andong and Namwŏn, the three top-ranking hyangni in the magistrate’s yamen, in late Chosŏn collectively known as the “[three] public elder brothers” ([sam]gonghyŏng),64 originated from descent lines of eminent indigenous descent groups that had served as local administrators since early Koryŏ and in early Chosŏn had been able to resist forcible removal. These hyangni of “clerkly stock” (ijok)—in certain respects local counterparts to the capital-based professional “middle people” (chungin)—had thus strong local home bases, and, as recent studies have demonstrated, in late Chosŏn they organized themselves in lineages, were closely interlinked by marital ties spun over generations, kept genealogical records, and owned land and slaves often surpassing the wealth of their sajok kinsmen.65 Though socially clearly superior to the “transferred” hyangni, they nevertheless suffered from discrimination and from the negative image that their occupations acquired in the Chosŏn. The hyangni among the Andong Kwŏn and the Andong Kim descended like their sajok kinsmen from two of the Three Grand Preceptors (Samt’aesa) of early Koryŏ, and, with ancestors who had hereditarily occupied the hojang offices in Andong’s local administration since early Koryŏ, they eventually formed separate descent lines.66 In early Chosŏn, they were still respected members of local society and were, naturally, admitted to the Local Roster of 1530 (as discussed in chapter 9); soon thereafter, however, they were



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

383

forced off the roster by their sajok kinsmen, who, apparently taking recourse to the government’s relentless anti-hyangni campaign, endeavored to consolidate their own positions of dominance. Compelled to start their own separate roster (tan’an) from 1589 onward, they set down their own exclusive terms: if a roster member intermarried with a “transferred” hyangni or a secondary offspring, he was to face expulsion from the roster.67 Proudly drawing a clear social boundary between themselves and ordinary lowranking hyangni, they successfully held on to the privilege of administrating the Shrine of the Three Preceptors (Samt’aesamyo)—a privilege T’oegye had acknowledged in a commemorative piece he wrote when the shrine was restored in the 1540s.68 Upholding their distinct social status, a few Andong Kwŏn and Kim hyangni are said to have excelled in the traditional sajok domains of scholarship, calligraphy, and literary composition. At least two hyangni were among T’oegye’s disciples: Kang Han (n.d.), allegedly a chinsa, and Kwŏn Min-ŭi, a saengwŏn of 1525.69 T’oegye reportedly honored the Confucian learners with hyangni background by seating them in community rituals among the sajok according to age, whereas he placed incumbent hyangni below the sajok, but above the other hyangni and secondary sons (chung-sŏ).”70 Nevertheless, the hyangni were increasingly discriminated against by the sajok who, to justify their negative hyangni picture, compiled the Record of Wrongdoings of Hyangni and Yamen Personnel (Illi che’gwansok ki’gwa). Even though this mid-seventeenth century catalogue contained, with the exception of one deputy hojang, the names and misdeeds of low-level hyangni, it served the Andong sajok elite as evidence for the hyangni’s general moral depravity.71 In the eighteenth century, then, a number of high-placed hyangni of ijok origin, taking pride in their ancestral identity, thought the time had come to step out of the shadow of their sajok brethren, in which they had lived for centuries, and regain the honored station in their localities that their forefathers had earlier enjoyed as “local administrators” (hyang taebu). They were apparently encouraged to do so by various benevolent signals King Yŏngjo sent out in their direction. Thus sensing a turn of attitude at the center, chief officers (hojang) from Andong and Sangju, led by Yi Kyŏng-bŏn (1706–78), a hyangni from Sangju who had twice served as personnel officer (ibang), sent several memorials to the throne, in which they recalled the great contributions they had made as hojang to the country. In their unswerving loyalty to the dynasty, they wrote, they had valiantly defended the country in the Imjin War without, however, receiving proper recognition. In 1774, they therefore asked the king to revise the salary system and grant them remuneration, a measure that would even enhance their loyalty. How could it be that other low-ranking officials received salaries but not they? The 1774 memorial, underwritten by 374 chief officers to whom it had been circulated beforehand, was sent to Seoul with great expectations—never, however, to receive a response.72 Though they had supporters in the government, as potentially competitive “insiders” these hyangni were clearly not allowed to penetrate the salaried, sajok-dominated bureaucracy. As kinds of manifestos with which they intended to undergird their assertion that they did not lag behind their sajok brethren in moral standards and loyalty to the throne, hyangni in Andong and Sangju compiled two collections of texts: the Historical Mirror of the Clerks’ Department (Yŏnjo ku’gam), edited by the Sangju hyangni Yi Chin-hŭng (1731–77), Kyŏng-bŏn’s son, in the mid–1770s, and the Records of Hyangni Descendants of

384

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

Andong (Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok), published in 1824.73 Both these works document the hyangni’s struggle to win back social respectability and profile the lives of those who had been prominently engaged in that cause. Though apologetic in tenor, the two booklets exhibit their authors’ newly found self-confidence to recall past experience in their bid to recapture recognition from those in power. Three of the five compilers of the Records of Hyangni Descendants of Andong 74 were lower degree holders: Kwŏn Sim-do (1766–?), a saengwŏn of 1792, who apparently later entered the National Confucian Academy in Seoul; Kwŏn Yŏng-hŭp (1758–?), a saengwŏn of 1801;75 and Kwŏn Yong-ch’ing (1759–?; Yŏng-hŭp’s uncle), a chinsa of 1789. The two other Kwŏn, Kye-wi (Yŏng-hŭp’s son) and Kyŏng-yong, “pursued Confucian studies” (yuŏp). Clearly, these five men, three of whom shared the same hyangni descent line76 that over generations had brought forth provincial hyangni officials (kamyŏng yŏngni),77 impressively exemplify a culturally (and undoubtedly also economically) active generation of hyangni who distanced themselves from their clerical brothers—and from the sajok—by calling themselves “hyangni grandsons” (hyangson), a title with which they acknowledged their local origin yet put a temporal space between themselves and their clerical past. That the compilers also entertained important connections to the capital elite is evident from the surprisingly large number of illustrious sajok authors they were able to enlist for writing prefaces and postfaces to their work. Remarkably, the majority of the twenty-five writers were munkwa graduates and high officials residing in Seoul or its environs, among them eighteen Noron, three Soron, and five Namin—only four of whom (descendants of T’oegye, Kim Sŏng-il, and Yu Sŏng-nyong) lived in Andong.78 Even though none of the Kwŏn compilers ever held office, they must have capitalized on their prominent ancestry in Andong to associate themselves closely with those in power in the capital and apparently easily straddled factional boundaries. Did the intense interest and support that the Noron manifestly lavished on the Kwŏn suggest that they were seeking to enhance their influence in the Andong region also through the local hyangni? A rare portrait of a late Chosŏn Andong hyangson who distinguished himself in the capital emerges from the biography of Kwŏn Hŭi-hak (1672–1742), written by the prominent Yu Sŏng-nyong descendant, Yu Kyu.79 Originating from a high-standing hyangni branch of the Andong Kwŏn80—his great-grandfather had served as a provincial hyangni in Taegu—Hŭi-hak was born in the western part of Andong County and, as a talented young man, drew the attention of Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng when the latter served as the magistrate of Andong in 1689. Ch’oe called him to his side, and Kwŏn soon became Ch’oe’s indispensable aide. He followed Ch’oe back to the capital, where Kwŏn received a thorough education together with Ch’oe’s only slightly older son, Ch’ang-dae (1669–1720; munkwa graduate of 1694). When Ch’oe was sent to China in 1697 to request the appointment of the crown prince (the later King Kyŏngjong), Kwŏn accompanied him as a military official and recorded the trip in Diary of a Trip to Beijing (Yŏnhaeng illok). A year later, Kwŏn also documented Ch’oe’s mission to the northwest in Diary of a Trip to the West (Sŏhaeng illok).81 In 1700, presumably on Ch’oe’s recommendation, he was promoted to commander of the Kyŏngbok Palace Guard, a duty interrupted by his mother’s death in 1708 and additional military assignments. Treated by Ch’oe like a son, in 1715 Kwŏn



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

385

mourned Ch’oe like a father and, after Ch’ang-dae died five years later, looked after the latter’s two sons and collected and arranged Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng’s extensive literary bequest. His military career climaxed in 1728, when he joined O Myŏng-hang’s82 campaign against rebelling Yi In-jwa and Chŏng Hŭi-ryang around Anŭm in southern Kyŏngsang. He left a meticulous day-by-day record of the military actions in his Diary of the Southern Campaign (Namjŏng illok). According to this document, Kwŏn seems to have had at that time no direct contact with his Andong kinsmen and was presumably anyway powerless to intercede on their behalf. For his services, King Yŏngjo made Kwŏn a third-class merit subject of 1728 and granted him the land and slaves confiscated from rebel Chŏng Hŭiryang in Anŭm.83 As a special royal favor, Kwŏn was also promoted to junior second rank and enfeoffed as Lord of Hwawŏn. After brief magisterial postings, he retired from office and settled in Kudam (P’ungsan) in 1738, where he built a small retreat, Kamgodang, “to read old books.” “Even though I won merits as a military man,” he used to admonish his grandsons, “you should not follow this tradition. Devote yourself to scholarship!” Under the shock of the premature death of both his sons, Kwŏn wrote his testament in 1739, three years before his own death. Respect and good fortune, he wrote, do not depend on the amount of property, but rather on the degree of good judgment. Although poor in his youth, he reminisced, he was for his advancement in life deeply indebted to Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng, who “gave me a chance to glorify my ancestors and to support my family.” Yet, as no success comes without defeat, he lamented the loss of his two sons, and thus was now addressing his grandsons. Land and slaves, he instructed them, had to be divided equally between sons and daughters. The property granted by the king, however, was to be used exclusively for sacrificial purposes. Anxious lest it disappear, he advised the chongson and the munjang to keep it under firm control, store the income from it in a separate storehouse, and defray with it the expenses of ancestral grave services from the grandparental generation down. With a possible surplus, they were to buy more grave land and erect a purification hall. If one among the descendants was “diligently pursuing scholarship,” aiming at taking the examinations, he was to be supported economically. His considerable library, which he had partly bought, partly copied, Kwŏn further willed, was not to be scattered, but kept together in the main-line residence (chongga), reminding his heirs of how frustrated he was in his youth over the lack of books. Last, he did not include in his will his house in Seoul, in the hope that it would serve in the future as the home of a descendant pursuing an official career in the capital.84 This document illustrates well the aspirations of a late Chosŏn hyangni. Though he excelled as a military official, Kwŏn Hŭi-hak was keenly aware that concentration on scholarship was the only means for reducing the cultural, if not the social, distance to the sajok. Without pursuing a scholarly career himself, he had collected books, possibly hoping to facilitate his heirs’ advancement into the civil officialdom. Noteworthy, moreover, is his concern with ancestral rites and the explicit provisions he made to finance them with the income from his merit subject property. With his loyal service to the throne and his cultural sophistication Kwŏn won the high esteem of his contemporaries. Indeed, he was variously honored beyond his death. King Yŏngjo bestowed on him a posthumous senior-second rank and the honorific title of a minister of works and twice, in 1754 and 1771, sent a royal emissary to read a eulogy in front of Kwŏn’s spirit tablet.85

386

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

The high Soron official Cho Hyŏn-myŏng composed the inscription on his spirit way tablet, and Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng’s great-grandson, Hong-gan,86 his tomb epitaph. His literary bequest, with both of his sons dead and his grandsons still young, in acute danger of getting scattered and lost, was rescued by his kinsmen, who thus honored his memory as an outstanding diarist.87 Finally, in the first month of 1805, the same kinsmen got together in Kamgodang to plan the erection of a shrine for installing Hŭi-hak’s portrait, painted on royal order upon his receiving merit-subject status, and for preserving the royal citations. Two years later, Ponggang Portrait Hall (Ponggang Yŏngdang) was, with the material assistance of the entire local community, completed and inaugurated with great pomp as a symbol of hyangni pride.88 Like Kwŏn Hŭi-hak, who owed his career in the capital to his serving as liege man (mun’gaek) of Ch’oe Sŏk-chong, Yi Chin-hŭng of Sangju no longer did clerical duties and eventually held a minor (nonserving) military office. His mentor was the highly placed Noron scholar-official and sallim, Song Myŏng-hŭm,89 whose great-great-grandfather, Song Chun-gil, was venerated in Sangju’s Hŭngam Sŏwŏn. Chin-hŭng continued, after his father’s death, work on the Historical Mirror of the Clerks’ Department, but it was his great-grandson Yi Myŏng-gu (1799–1874) who finally brought the project to an end and published it in 1848. Like his forebears, Myŏng-gu studied in the capital under the distinguished Noron scholar O Hŭi-sang (1763–1833) and later joined the circle of liege men around the mighty Noron official Sin Sŏg-u.90 Thus well connected, Myŏng-gu was able to engage five personalities across the factional spectrum for writing a preface and four postfaces to Historical Mirror,91 among them the two T’oegye descendants and renowned scholars Yi Hwi-jae and Yi Hwi-nyŏng.92 Clearly, men like Kwŏn Hŭi-hak, Yi Chin-hŭng, and Yi Myŏng-gu, among others, broke out of the conventional hyangni milieu and apparently also easily stepped across factional boundaries, which, for the sajok, had become almost sacrosanct. In a sense, they pioneered new roles for a small hyangni segment that was to become variously active in the country’s modernization in the late nineteenth century.93 Locally, some hyangni displayed their recovered pride with elaborate ritual performances to their ancestors, as the following episode vividly illustrates. Each year eight descendants of the powerful Andong hojang Kwŏn Paek-chong94 were delegated to hold the grave rites for Kwŏn and his wife on the full moon of the tenth month. After the sacrificial meal, the site was prepared with cushions and straw mats for the three incumbent top hyangni to make their obeisance, while the magistrate’s musicians enriched the occasion with ritual music. Because [Ŭisŏng] Kim kinsmen held the grave rituals on the same day at the nearby tomb site of their illustrious ancestor Kim Yŏng-myŏng, whose third wife had been Kwŏn Paek-chong’s granddaughter, they witnessed the Kwŏn’s sophisticated display with a certain measure of envy. In 1751, the Kim therefore decided in a resolution (wanŭi) to intensify their dedication to their own early ancestors and ordered Chu-guk (1710–71), Kim Sŏng-il’s eighth-generation chongson, to secure from all kinsmen the necessary finances for extending the rites to the recently recovered grave of their in-migrant ancestor Kŏ-du, Yŏng-myŏng’s grandfather, and his immediate descendants.95 Indeed, the hyangni’s ritual enthusiasm seems to have prompted the Kim to update their own ritual commitment to their distant ancestors.



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

387

Despite such apparent occasional cultural cross-referencing, the status boundaries between sajok and hyangni remained firmly drawn. The sajok’s refusal to acknowledge their hyangni kinsmen as bona fide members of the same genealogical stock—a persistent hyangni complaint—is nowhere as plain as in late-Chosŏn chokpo compilations. In the 1701 edition of their chokpo, the Andong Kwŏn, for instance, relegated the two hyangni branches (p’a) to separate registers (pyŏlbo), and even after sajok and ijok branches were finally united in a joint document in 1794, subtle terminological differences set the two clearly apart.96 Compared to Kyŏngsang Province, where the powerful provincial hyangni posi­ tions were held by representatives of a comparatively small number of counties (fifteen at the end of the sixteenth century) and gradually monopolized by the Andong Kwŏn and the Andong Kim, in Chŏlla Province the incumbents of these vital offices seem to have originated from a wider area (thirty-eight counties in the sixteenth century), even though, with the passing of time, a certain geographic concentration is also discernible. With the Naju, Kimje, and Kobu hyangni consistently in the lead, the number of Namwŏn hyangni in provincial offices in Chŏnju was rather small and increased only slightly in the eighteenth century.97 Nevertheless, as a town (tohobu), Namwŏn had important civil and military functions and consequently strong contingents of civil and military administrative personnel. Regrettably few records are extant to document the activities of Namwŏn’s hyangni. Existing name lists (sŏnsaengan) spanning the period from the late seventeenth to the early twentieth centuries seem to suggest that, with each hyangni rank keeping its own separate register, the Namwŏn hyangni were stratified according to a carefully guarded hierarchy. The oldest such roster is that of the hojang (1663), followed by that of the personnel officer (ibang) (1700). The two merged into the roster Hojangibang sŏnsaengan in 1725,98 apparently in an effort to highlight and safeguard the prestige of the incumbents of these two top-ranking positions. As in Andong, the top hyangni positions in Namwŏn (112 from 1663 to 1902) were over generations nearly monopolized by two indigenous hyangni descent lines of the Namwŏn Ryang99 and the Yŏngch’ŏn Yi,100 followed far behind by the Tongnae Chŏng. Even though they only rarely occupied a provincial office and were not as articulate as their Andong counterparts, the Namwŏn hyangni constituted a formidable local force and entertained their own associations, with which they bolstered their cohesion and profile as a distinct group. The earliest seems to have been the Hall of Nourishing Old Age (Yangnodang), an association founded in 1602 to economically support retired hyangni and military officials (muim) in old age and at the moment of death (yangnosongsa). It also supervised the compilation of the above-mentioned name lists. Most conspicuously, it sponsored local cults and organized and funded the services at Yuaemyo, a shrine erected to celebrate the memory of the exemplary administration of an early Chosŏn local magistrate.101 In short, the Namwŏn hyangni expressed their identity and social coherence in cultural and semireligious activities that accentuated their deeprooted attachment to their locality. It was their local orientation that seems to have validated their status as a powerful political and cultural force within Namwŏn society. In sum, the influence on local and often also on supraregional politics and culture the hyangni exercised far surpassed their insignificant number—under one percent—in the

388

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

late-Chosŏn population.102 Even though hyangni power may not have been everywhere as distinctive and concentrated as in Andong and Namwŏn, similar trends are observable in other major administrative centers.103 With the natural increase in numbers of hyangni, and at the same time no change in the number of top positions, competition for office seems to have forced the hyangni to bundle their social and cultural energies and react with exclusivist measures. Associations such as the Yangnodang in Namwŏn or the Courts of Retirees (Anilbang) in Andong,104 Kyŏngju,105 or Sangju106 not only cared for retired members; in time they also seem to have controlled appointments and dismissals and occasionally even meted out punishment, clearly favoring the concentration of power in a few select descent lines. This seems also to be reflected in residence patterns. As local administrators, the hyangni typically resided in single-surname clusters within the walled county seats. In contrast, those hyangni who in late Chosŏn shed their hyangni past and moved into cultural realms hitherto monopolized by the sajok, often demonstrated their emancipation by relocating to extramural villages (t’oech’on).107 With their strong group identity, the high-ranking hyangni drew a clear line between themselves and the sajok and, by appropriating ideals and practices of elite culture, formed a kind of competitive parallel society. Yet, it was their social as well as their occupational characteristics that continued to segregate them from sajok society until the final days of the dynasty.

“Uncontrollable Inferiors” The gradual emancipation of commoners and slaves from the status discrimination with which the sajok had kept them in check for centuries was still another signal of the slow erosion of societal control mechanisms in late Chosŏn. Though little concrete information is available on how some (presumably small number of) commoners began to prosper and harbor ambitions for social advancement, it is commonly assumed that the volatile economic climate in the latter part of the Chosŏn provided economic incentives for mobility out of social degradation. Indeed, the production of surplus crops stimulated incipient commercialization and the rise of markets,108 and though the strong centralization of the country may have hindered the growth of urban settlements outside Hanyang, Taegu, Chŏnju, and Namwŏn became sizable towns with a growing urban population that no longer engaged in agriculture and therefore depended for their livelihood on goods and foodstuffs brought in from outside.109 Unencumbered by status inhibitions, a number of enterprising commoners started to profit from these circumstances. Relying on a few slaves or on contract labor to work their own and possibly rented land as tenants, they were able to farm on a larger scale and diversify production by raising marketable cash crops such as tobacco, vegetables, and oilseeds110—possibly in the manner of the “village fellow” (ch’onhan) that Kwŏn Sang-il observed in his village, who went back and forth to the capital selling his produce.111 Others worked as artisans, ironmongers, or potters, among a proliferation of specialists who produced for a growing nonagrarian market.112 These “entrepreneurs”



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

389

thus generated a surplus that was not immediately siphoned off in the form of taxes. With the number of “rich people” (pumin) apparently growing, however, the cash-hungry state was never far away. In the hunger year of 1732, for instance, the state established a scheme according to which contributors of relief grain were rewarded with official titles, a scheme that reportedly soon led to abuses by magistrates who fleeced the well-to-do with extortionate levies.113 The government thus contributed greatly to raising expectations for upward mobility by handing out official titles and even low-level offices as rewards for grain contributions (napsok).114 Although napsok titles (for example, t’ongjŏng or kasŏn) clearly differed terminologically from regular government titles, it was, as mentioned before, easy for a new title holder to omit “purchased” (napsok) in the household registers. As a change in the service title of one individual carried little credibility, a napsok title holder tended, to make his new status more plausible, to extend it to his near forebears by “adjusting” their titles and service obligations (chigyŏk). (Titles could also be purchased for ancestors.)115 Because of such irregularities in official documents, it is impossible to assess the number of purchased-title holders. In 1729, however, a disgruntled high official complained that as a consequence of leaving out napsok only some ten households in a neighborhood of several hundred were still serving in the military.116 The drastic reduction of commoner households in two rural counties near Taegu in the late nineteenth century also seems to suggest that a relocation to, and a new beginning in, an urban setting was expected to expedite a favorable turn of personal fortunes.117 That accumulated wealth took on a new value and changed the prosperous commoners’ ambitions in life is illustrated by the following remark by a conservative commentator: The status hierarchy [myŏngmok] of yangban, chungin, commoners, and slaves is like a constitution hewn in stone and steel. Yet, because human hearts are not stable, bad practices gradually emerge. Thus, as soon as descendants of those who for generations have served in the military [i.e., commoners] have some wealth, they dream of changing their descent affiliation and, daringly associating with yangban, falsely call themselves yuhak and turn their back on their own relatives. If they find it difficult to hide their traces, they simply move to another location—in the morning to the east, in the evening to the west.118

A striking example of how migration and the manipulation of titles could produce tangible benefits is, for instance, the metamorphosis of the Taegu Paek of Yonggung County (east of Andong), who changed from undistinguished but apparently economically welloff commoners to local “elite” within fewer than sixty years. From the late eighteenth century, the Paek bought their way up with surplus from land and trade with cotton and twice moved a surprisingly short distance east, each time managing to “adjust” their entries in the household register with the help of conniving local officials. In the end, these Paek had successfully made a status change and shed the commoners’ most loathsome stigma—military service or payment of the equivalent tax (yangyŏk).119 It is, of course, impossible to know how representative the Paek case is, but it does point up three basic steps a commoner had to take, singly or in combination, to alter his

390

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

social identity: grain contributions, change of residence, and falsification of household registers. As the above quotation shows, “young scholar” (yuhak) lost its original meaning and, because not directly related to a bureaucratic office, became the most widely used title in late-Chosŏn household registers, frequently chosen also by sajok who were no longer studying for the examinations. The elasticity of yuhak, thus, seems to have tempted ambitious commoners to adorn their names with it illegally, and some of them under this guise may even have entered the examination hall, without the prospect, however, of ever advancing into the regular bureaucracy.120 It was presumably also at this point that upwardly mobile elements attempted to infiltrate the genealogical records of the elite by “changing father and altering grandfather, thus fraudulently calling themselves descendants of sadaebu”—a misdeed newly made punishable as “criminally subverting the social order” (choebŏm kangsang).121 With the commoditization of titles and the consequent breakdown of the nomenclature, service titles evidently no longer defined with certainty an individual’s social status. Even granted that not all household registers were falsified, it is nevertheless hazardous to gauge on the basis of such documentation the extent of social mobility in the latter part of the Chosŏn. This was done in the past with the implausible result that by the middle of the nineteenth century some 70 percent of the Korean population was thought to have become yangban.122 Rather than relying on titles for judging a man’s social standing in late Chosŏn, it is necessary to determine his kin network and the degree of respect and deference he was accorded within his socioeconomic milieu, taking as the surest touchstone his chances of being accepted as a sajok son-in-law. Commoners who thus operated in social niches between the sajok and the general commoner population evidently offended sajok sensibilities by accentuating their improved economic standing with changed behavior and dress patterns, as expressed in the following complaint of 1786: “Even commoners and slaves are wearing kat and top’o 123 and give themselves the appearance of court officials and aristocrats. Worse yet, commoners in the market places and day laborers call each other yangban. The term yangban designates civil and military officials. How can those who are neither court officials nor yangban usurp this title?”124 Throughout the eighteenth century, alarmed sajok appealed to the authorities to restrain “bad fellows” from doing as they pleased, thereby insulting their social superiors. Calling the upholding of social status (myŏngbun) the most critical issue of the age, some Ŭisŏng Kim fulminated against assaults they had suffered from unscrupulous rich “fellows” (sanghan), who, abusing the weakening of some long-standing descent groups, shamelessly even dug up the latter’s ancestral graves to bury their dead.125 This was an outcry against creeping social change heard not only in Andong. Anxious sajok all over the country protested against commoners transgressing their station and arrogating to themselves an inappropriate lifestyle. The government reacted by introducing heavy punishment for “insulting the yangban” or “overstepping one’s station” (pŏmbun) by, for instance, building oversized grave tumuli or letting wives ride in palanquins.126 It is possible that at this point in time a few commoners also started to imitate aspects of elite ritualism by, for example, venerating their ancestors in “Confucian” style.127 The new phenomenon of commoners’ “arrogant manners and lack of deference”



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

391

toward the sajok, facilitated by improved economics, was at bottom a reaction against the age-old repressive and paternalistic social system—a protest that could no longer be curbed by penal sanctions. Yet, what these commoners were striving toward was not the destruction of the yangban system. On the contrary, with acquiring sajok titles they sought to change their own social realities by appropriating some of the sajok privileges for themselves. In other words, the “uncontrollable” commoners’ social transgressions did not signify a revolutionary assault against status barriers. Rather, social barriers had, especially in the countryside, been gradually eroded by creeping impoverishment of certain elements of sajok society—a circumstance that made it easier to defy and challenge their high-handed arrogation of superiority. Although this was far from an organized leveling of the social and cultural features that had separated elite and nonelite for centuries, it did add an undeterminable number of commoners to the “contrary forces” that began to destabilize late Chosŏn society. To an extent, the same was presumably true for the slaves. By the end of the seventeenth century, slaves rebelled against their masters, ran away in large numbers, and falsified their birthdates claiming commoner status—actions that led to endless litigations between owners and slaves.128 But slavery did not disappear. Rather, it perpetuated itself and even peaked again during the precarious social and economic situation in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Not only was the law of 1669, according to which the commoner mother’s social background was to determine her children’s status, rarely observed by the landed sajok, but many commoners, no longer able to pay their heavy taxes, chose to indenture themselves on the estates of the wealthy. With no other measure available that promised to reverse this ruinous trend, in 1731 the government reaffirmed the law of 1669, even at the risk of encouraging the upward mobility of some slaves in return for a larger tax-paying commoner population.129 Whereas for a male slave taking a commoner woman as wife thus became a possible vehicle for a status change of his children, there were other legal means by which slaves could shed their base status. In 1718, for instance, a government slave could, for the first time, purchase commoner status (songnyang) either by offering grain (napsok myŏnch’ŏn) or by providing a suitable substitute slave (tae’gu) to the former master or government agency. Once properly registered, such a “new” commoner was legally protected from ever being enslaved again (amnyang).130 There were, however, many more illegal ways to shed slave status. The simplest one was to escape to a different, often distant locality and start a new existence by a change of identity with falsified records. Though difficult to quantify, the number of escaped slaves (tomang nobi) must have been substantial—according to an estimate of 1674, onesixth of the total population of one particular district.131 Tracking down the escapees was difficult, and trying to force them to return even dangerous;132 yet their names continued to be recorded in their masters’ household registers for a long time after their flight. The decline of the slave population caused by changing economic realities was accelerated by a number of measures the government took in regard to slave labor in the governmental workshops. From the middle of the seventeenth century, public slaves tended to pay a cloth tax rather than provide labor, or they even became waged employees, and in 1755 the government more or less abolished forced slave labor in government

392

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

shops and levied taxes instead, equalizing the tax burden of slaves and commoners.133 Because policy changes and economic decline, by the end of the century, had rendered the division line between commoners and slaves increasingly fragile and unenforceable, in 1801, the government declared the end of public slavery and symbolically burned most of the government slave registers, allowing some 66,067 slaves to blend into the commoner population.134 This was a momentous event, which for many contemporary observers presaged the ultimate doom of Korean society itself. The edict of 1801 liberated public slaves from their duties, but it did not abrogate slave status as such. Indeed, the government’s grand move had a limited effect on private slavery. As data from household registers demonstrate, the landed sajok remained the largest slave owners in late Chosŏn, even though the number of their slaves declined, falling to roughly two slaves per household in the mid-nineteenth century. This small average resulted from the fact that, paradoxically, the number of households with dependent slaves and the number of runaway slaves increased at the same time, suggesting that now individuals, not families, attached themselves to well-to-do masters. The nonresident slaves of the Kwangsan Kim, for example, had vanished by 1828, but a modest contingent of between nine and nineteen resident slaves continued to work in the household of the lineal heir until the end of the century.135 A similar picture emerges from documents belonging to the Chaeryŏng Yi. Up until the late nineteenth century, the main-line heir characteristically owned more slaves than his brothers; by 1891 their number still hovered around fifteen. In the last available document, dated 1897, one male and one female slave were recorded, no longer as “slaves,” but as “hired” hands (yongnam and yongnyŏ).136 Typically, domestic slavery survived longest, often in small contingents of female slaves. Though slave households had all but disappeared by the nineteenth century, it was through the existence of these unfree domestic “dependents” that slavery lasted, albeit on a drastically reduced scale, until the end of the dynasty.

The End of the Traditional Social Status System The above narrative indicates that the rigid social status system that had kept elite and nonelite apart for centuries started to show serious cracks in the course of the eighteenth century. Indeed, the sajok in the countryside were gradually outmaneuvered by the ruling elite at the center, and although lineage building provided selected landed elite descent groups with rare cohesion and strength vis-à-vis the state, a considerable number of rural sajok became victims of their uncompromising adherence to economic positions that in view of shrinking land resources were rapidly becoming obsolete. In contrast, seizing on newly opening commercial opportunities, some commoners and slaves improved their life circumstances, putting the downsliding sajok to shame. Secondary sons and hyangni, moreover, were slowly emerging from their subordination and claimed, each in their own manner, a greater share in the political and cultural life of the elite. Clearly, diverse forces at different social levels were at work, not only to question but actually to fight the premises upon which they had been kept in bondage for centuries.



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

393

What indeed had held this unequal society together for so long? Could it have been the sheer repression and exploitation with which the sajok kept the mostly illiterate population under control? Or did elements of morality in the sajok-propagated social contracts mediate between the status groups by balancing vertically dispensed authority and horizontally active terms of communality? Or were these values and practices advanced by the ruling elite simply to mask the hardships the pursuit of their interests inflicted upon their inferiors? The rebellions of the nineteenth century do not seem to provide clear-cut answers. Both Anders Karlsson and Sun Joo Kim argue against the widely held view that the rebels of 1812 and 1862 aimed at “dismantling the old order.” Perhaps the Tonghak, the adherents of “Eastern Learning,” were aiming to do this when they started to emerge in the mid-1860s and demanded equal treatment of all human beings. Nevertheless, what these diverse rebel groupings, which recruited members from both elite and nonelite, were principally reacting against were the deteriorating conditions in the countryside caused by state interference, local corruption, sajok oppression, and disastrous droughts and famines—not against an unjust social system per se. They thus did not underpin their struggle, which remained largely regional, with grand visions of or practical suggestions for large-scale social change; rather, what they demanded was a restructuring of local leadership to better their livelihood.137 Although Korean historiography usually depicts the nonelite as the principal actors who set off the dynamics of social change, shaking late Chosŏn society from the bottom up, the historic obliteration of the traditional social status system, however revolutionary its consequences, was not achieved by rebellious elements from below, but was set in motion, paradoxically, from the top—by royal fiat. Indeed, the dismantling of the status system was a gradual process that evolved out of a protracted debate on status and heredity that in the course of the eighteenth century created the ideational and practical preconditions for epochal change a century later. To be sure, the issue of heredity as the central mechanism of status reproduction was chafing Confucian sensibilities from early on. Slavery, in particular, became the fulcrum of considerations on the justifiability of keeping large portions of the population in perpetual bondage for economic exploitation by state and elite. As mentioned before, Yu Hyŏng-wŏn espoused the idea of human equality and, referring to slavery, deplored its perpetuation by heredity, which in his eyes dehumanized slave and master alike. Finding moreover no textual evidence for it in the Chinese classics, Yu opposed it and favored even a return to the matrifilial rule, even if it violated Confucian tenets of patriliny, in the belief that it would lead to the eventual phasing out of slavery.138 Yu’s concerns were shared by Yi Ik who, however, never went so far as to advocate the abolition of slavery; he merely thought that buying and selling of slaves should be prohibited.139 Later, Yu Su-wŏn probed the origin of slavery and became convinced that the legendary Kija had never meant to extend slave status inflicted as a punishment to the next generation. He therefore pleaded for the slaves’ manumission and their replacement with hired labor, a process that by his time was already well under way.140 Even though reformist thought may have, as James Palais has averred, influenced some government leaders’ thinking about status discrimination, it is equally likely that comparisons with China, where, according to envoys’ reports, slavery did not exist

394

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

(which, of course, was not the case), made Korea with its heavy reliance on slavery look backward and inefficient and thus strengthened the position of antislavery ministers at King Yŏngjo’s court. Knowledge that, in China, the Yongzheng emperor (r. 1723–35) had issued an edict in 1727 that removed the stigma of baseness from a number of despised social groups and permitted them to register as commoners,141 seems, for instance, to be reflected in Cho Mun-myŏng’s (then the right state councilor) report to his king during an audience in the fall of 1730: Hereditary slavery does not exist in China, but has existed in our country for a long time so that it has been impossible to abolish it. To let a child born of a slave father and commoner mother follow his father’s corvée makes no sense if, as a result, a great number of [potential] able-bodied commoners are registered as base. During King Hyŏnjong’s reign, Song Si-yŏl’s suggestion to do away with this law was not followed. If it were [now] discarded once and for all, the good commoners the state would obtain would indeed be many, and this would also be sufficient to eliminate pent-up resentments.142

Indeed, the Noron under Song Si-yŏl had long been in favor of relaxing status restrictions— not for humanitarian reasons, but for the practical purpose of increasing the commoner population. Cho Mun-myŏng, a moderate Soron, reportedly greatly concerned about the general plight of the people (min), therefore thought that the reinforcement of the matrifilial law of 1669 would lead to a reconstitution of a healthy commoner population. In this same spirit, he was also an early supporter of Yŏngjo’s policy of “grand harmony.” Though sympathetic to Cho’s arguments, the king apparently feared that such a change would incite private slaves to rebel against their masters. Nevertheless, urged by his ministers, he finally consented, as already noted, that the Law on Following the Mother’s Corvée be enforced from the first day of 1731. In 1755, moreover, Yŏngjo reduced the personal tribute tax of public slaves, abolished the Slave Office (Changnyewŏn) in 1764, and voided the tax on female slaves in 1774. These were bold steps that put King Chŏngjo, Yŏngjo’s successor, under mounting pressure to end public slavery altogether. Though perhaps receptive to the reasoning that since the cloth tribute to the state was now the same for slaves and commoners, it was no longer necessary to keep up the differentiation between the two groups, Chŏngjo was as reluctant as his grandfather before him to follow suit for fear of antagonizing the owners of private slaves. It was therefore only after Chŏngjo’s death that public slavery finally came to an end in early 1801.143 In the edict of 1801, King Sunjo justified this momentous act with a bit of historical revisionism: the Koreans, it was explained, had misunderstood Kija’s regulation concerning the punishment of thieves with enslavement to their victims. This, the king regretted, was an unfortunate error he now meant to correct.144 Sunjo’s proclamation thus expressly decoupled slavery from Kija’s supposed civilizatory legacy to Korea, but it neither touched upon the slave’s baseness as an issue of hereditary status ascription nor did it question, let alone challenge, the private ownership of slaves. Couching his pronouncement in terms of royal benevolence, young Sunjo, guided by the power holders around Regent Kim,145 hardly intended to deconstruct the traditional hierarchy. Rather, those in power seem to have regarded the liberation of tens of thousands of public slaves as a lesser threat



The En d of Sajok Supr em acy?

395

to yangban hegemony than the political advancement of the few thousand secondary sons, whose bureaucratic advancement they continued to restrict with the Kyemi Regulations of 1823. With the nineteenth century moving into its second half, the political climate at court began to change rapidly under the impact of foreign encroachment and with the advent of “enlightened” reformist thought, which, by advocating such new values as the equality and humanity of all mankind, urged the abolition of the exploitative status system.146 Impressed by these diverse influences, King Kojong took a couple of decisive steps in that direction. In 1882, acknowledging that restricted bureaucratic eligibility based on social status did not “amount to heavenly justice,” he opened the higher bureaucracy to secondary sons, hyangni, and a few other “secondary groups.”147 Four years later, in the first month of 1886, he arrived at a further monumental decision: the abolition of hereditary baseness. In a royal edict, Kojong called King Sunjo’s earlier burning of public slave registers an act of “extreme virtue and utmost humaneness”—an act he, Kojong, wished to apply to “private houses” (saga) as well: If there is someone who has the status [myŏng] of slave and works under duress all his life, even extending such involuntary service to generation after generation, without a chance of changing such status, this is a failing of humane government and is, moreover, sufficient to become the reason for disturbing [social] peace. Social status [myŏngbun] naturally has the immutability of law, [yet] service [yŏk] must be assigned only to one single individual and ought not to be extended to [future] generations.

This time, the royal message was clearly directed at private slaveholders and aimed to put an end to the still prevalent abuses of private slavery. To his edict the king therefore appended a set of regulations (chŏlmok) that evidently were to sever the link between status (sinbun) and hereditary service obligation (yŏk) and to limit coercive labor to those who had either enslaved themselves or had inherited their labor duties from their parents; yet, as labor was now invested with a monetary value, the next generation, if still willing to serve, had to be adequately compensated. Whereas heredity thus was eliminated, status was not. On the contrary, status was declared “immutable,” and base status, once acquired for whatever reason, could not easily be shed; it remained within the owner’s discretion to grant such a transformation. Commoners, furthermore, were no longer to be enslaved (amnyang) for reasons of long-standing debts of grain or money.148 It was in the end amid the tumultuous events of 1894–95, which completely upset the balance of power on the Korean peninsula, that the status distinctions, still confirmed as “immutable law” in 1886, were finally declared obsolete by the Japanese-backed Kabo Reform (Kabo kyŏngjang) of 1894. Among some two hundred resolutions that the ad hoc Deliberative Council—with a number of secondary sons among its members— proclaimed between July and October of 1894, Resolution 3 was the most trenchant: it outlawed the differentiation between “noble” and “base” and opened government office to men of talent regardless of social background. With this tersely worded piece of legislation the reformers not only dismantled the elite-centered social system that had structured Korean society for close to two millennia, they also broke the nexus between the

396

S u r v i va l i n a C h a n g i n g W o r l d

social and the political by declaring the examination system obsolescent. In Resolution 6, they addressed the secondary sons: adoption was only permitted when there were neither primary nor secondary sons “in conformity with earlier law.”149 Though this stipulation did not touch the root of the secondary-son issue—it did not prohibit concubinage— it secured secondary sons a firm position in domestic affairs. Slavery and the sale of human beings were outlawed by Resolution 9.150 The Kabo Reform stands out as the truly revolutionary last stage of the successive deconstruction of the traditional social hierarchy and of the tenets and institutional mechanisms that had upheld it over centuries. With one stroke of the brush the reformers demolished the three pillars upon which the elite’s power had rested: the prestige of birth and descent incumbent on ancestry, the concomitant dictate of social inequality, and privileged access to political office. The Kabo Reform signified a pivotal moment in Korea’s social history even though it was structural rather than ideological. The Confucian classics were no longer the basis for recruiting government officials, but the reform neither attacked Confucianism as a system of social and ritual practice nor did it denigrate lineage as an outmoded model of social organization and prestige. By the end of the nineteenth century, then, “noble” and “base” were finally swept away as status categories, and political participation (at least on paper) depended no longer on social origin. The acute consciousness of the power of status and prestige, nurtured by social inequality for centuries, nonetheless persisted—on either side of the former divide—in a society that was thrown open to the uncertainties of unbound social fluidity and change that were awaiting it in the twentieth century.

Concluding Reflections

T

his study has aimed to describe the origin, function, and development of the Korean descent group in an extended historical perspective reaching from early Silla to late Chosŏn. This focus on the descent group at the center of the Korean kinship system throws light on the determining strength of the social in all aspects of Korean life through time and space. Indeed, the descent principle created a hierarchy of status groups dominated by an elite that drew its legitimacy to control the political and economic order from social prerogatives. By elevating the social over the political, the elite thus derived its superior status not from its political function but principally from its attested ancestry. For this reason, in Korea, the descent-based elite never needed legal definition of its status, unlike the more function-based elite of China. The social constitution of an elite who claimed political participation as a birthright had crucial implications for the formation and makeup of the political realm. With the political conceptualized as a complement of the social, the “state” could be no more than an extension of society. Formulated more boldly, the state was conceived as being situated within society—a notion that was later reinforced by the Confucian postulate that state and society constitute an entity governed by moral principles of interdependence. This had special significance for the nature of rulership: it weakened the king’s authority and power and encumbered the relationship between throne and aristocracy throughout dynastic times. Although the descent group model underwent various modifications through time, this study shows that the elite descent groups survived with remarkable resilience, even across dynastic boundaries. As collectivities of kin bound together by common ancestry, these descent groups were endowed with cohesiveness as well as with a high degree of flexibility. If historical reality is understood as being socially and culturally constituted, it was indeed these elite descent groups that shaped Korea’s historical experience. It may thus be helpful briefly to recapitulate the major stages of their evolution through time. Emerging in early Silla, the indigenous descent groups were, it has here been argued, graded by the kolp’um system, which assigned the extent of an individual’s political participation on the basis of bilaterally reckoned birth and descent. This scheme, which created an unequal system with an omnipotent small elite dominating the larger population of commoners and slaves, underwent its first major modification with the introduction

398

Concluding Reflections

of the Chinese-style examination system in early Koryŏ. The examinations “bureaucratized” the capital elite in Kaegyŏng, the “powerful descent groups” (sejok), who enjoyed a period of great prosperity—socially, politically, and culturally—during the dynasty’s first two centuries. Like the Tang-Chinese aristocracy, the members of this elite derived their legitimacy to rule, as before, from ancestral empowerment rather than from demonstrated administrative competence. Their counterparts in the countryside were the territorially bound rural administrators, from whom most of the capital elite had originally branched off. The increasing difference in their respective social and political prestige created a divide between center and periphery that put rural areas gradually at a distinct disadvantage vis-à-vis the state. With the country plunged into general unrest by the rise of the military at the end of the twelfth century, and shortly later by its incorporation into the Mongol Empire, social elements arose outside the traditionally sanctioned criteria of social and political legitimacy, who vied for power with Mongol backing. The last century of Koryŏ thus witnessed a prolonged power struggle between the sejok elite and the usurpers of political and economic power, the “traitorous officials” (kwŏnmun). The denouement of this conflict was brought about by a curious conjunction of intellectual and military elements: scholars, who under the aegis of the Mongols had come to appreciate Neo-Confucianism as a potential instrument for renovating state and society, joined military men who feared for the country because of its army’s weakness. It was military raison d’état rather than Neo-Confucian persuasion that finally gave the impetus for dynastic change and put Yi Sŏng-gye, a military man, on the Chosŏn throne. Nevertheless, the new king relied on Neo-Confucian scholars to undergird the new dynasty with a reformed sociopolitical foundation—thus preparing for the sejok’s political comeback. The full historic significance of this dynastic change can be assessed only if the conventional understanding of the transition from Koryŏ to Chosŏn is discarded, which posits a sociopolitical rupture through which “new” elements supposedly replaced the “old guard.” It was not a watershed in the sense that untested social elements emerged and, armed with an equally untested new ideology—Neo-Confucianism—seized power. No “medieval aristocracy” was displaced, as had happened during the changeover from Tang to Song. Nevertheless, the Chosŏn yangban were not simply a replica of the Koryŏ kwijok. Rather, the historical significance of the transition lies in the fact that the founding of the Chosŏn reempowered the “old” elite and made the yangban stewards of a new style of governance inspired and reformed by the Neo-Confucian sociopolitical paradigm. The revised examination system did not create a new meritocratic elite of officials. Even though there were a number of new recruits to the bureaucracy, what is striking is the continuity with which the indigenous kinship ideology persisted: power remained inherent in status and circulated within the same restricted cluster of descent groups over generations, resulting in highly personalized politics that limited royal rule. This underscores the uniquely social character of the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition: it was its organization in flexible and multibranched descent groups that enabled the elite to retain its claim to co-rulership. Amid a recalibration of royal and bureaucratic power during the first century of the new dynasty, differing views about how Neo-Confucianism was to be used to reform



Concluding Reflections

399

state and society split the officialdom and led to repeated bloody purges. Officials fled the conflicts in the capital and settled in the countryside, still insufficiently under state control, where they built up landed estates while maintaining political ties to the center. By 1600, they controlled the countryside. A major test of how far their “localization” in rural constituencies had progressed came during the Imjin War and the subsequent Manchu invasions at the turn of the seventeenth century. Called upon to defend their rural communities, localized elites reacted using their accumulated wealth and social networks to fight the enemy and emerged from the war experience generally as winners—and not as the losers that conventional historiography, intent on constructing the Imjin War as a turning point in the Chosŏn’s sociopolitical history, has tended to make them. It was the Injo Restoration of 1623, which gave rise to an exclusive capital-bound body of descent groups monopolizing the higher levels of the bureaucracy, that started to limit the landed elite’s political participation at the center. Fighting marginalization, the latter responded with vigorous lineage building to defend their elite status. As this study has demonstrated, lineage building proved crucial for safeguarding these descent groups’ primacy in local society as well as for resisting the central government’s repeated attempts to bring the countryside fully under its control. Only those descent groups able to organize themselves in lineages survived with their high social status intact; those lacking the cohesion and support of an elaborate agnatic safety net faced slow social decline. The seventeenth century thus witnessed unprecedented social fracturing in the countryside, as well as between center and periphery, exacerbated by intense factional strife that threatened national cohesion—a critical situation that King Yŏngjo recognized and attempted to ease with his policy of “grand harmony.” In sum, then, it was a dynamic process of social diversification and competition that from mid-Chosŏn onward led to a contraction of elite forces at the center while a much larger number of localized elite descent groups dominated the countryside. Often no longer regularly engaged in national politics, the landed elites nevertheless continued to understand themselves as part of a larger sociopolitical nexus. A determining role in shaping their strategies to maintain their claim to high social status was played by NeoConfucianism. This leads to a brief reconsideration of how kinship, Tohak learning, and political power worked together to transform Chosŏn society. Neo-Confucianism, providing a vision of reordering the world, was from the time of its appropriation in late Koryŏ closely related to power. In early Chosŏn, the “pragmatists” among the scholar-officials embraced Tohak as “practical learning” (sirhak) to guide their efforts to reinstate yangban supremacy in a renovated state and society. The first century of the Chosŏn thus witnessed, as mentioned before, a struggle between throne and officialdom—some early kings rejecting the constraints of the new ideology, while their ministers often applied it to widen their hold on government. Such politicization of Tohak conflicted with the aim of the “idealists” who strove to make moral cultivation the prime task of ruler and elite alike. It is in such a competitive atmosphere that the bloody Literati Purges took place—an intellectual catharsis that in the first half of the sixteenth century shifted the political discourse to the metaphysical dimensions of Tohak

400

Concluding Reflections

and initiated a profound and notably variegated investigation of human nature and of man’s propensity for moral action. Indeed, this launched a second Confucianization— this time with the idealist sarim in charge. It was surely detrimental to this evolving discourse that two authoritative thinkers and teachers, Yi T’oegye and Yi Yulgok, rose in the same century and that, with their different interpretations of Zhu Xi’s key philosophical concepts, eventually split the Way in Korea. Whereas both revered Zhu Xi as the one and only font of “right learning,” they nevertheless thought differently on how to prioritize Zhu’s “principle” and “mind-­ matter.” Though they never intended to divide the scholarly discourse, it was the imbrication of the intellectual domain into the larger sociopolitical domain that came eventually to fracture the Tohak movement—with all its fateful consequences for the further course of Chosŏn history. The split of Tohak not only divided elite society along intellectual lines, giving rise to competing kinship-based factions, it also transformed Tohak into a moralistic instrument of power. Marking the seventeenth century as the century of the bifurcation of the Way, this split initiated a struggle among factions seeking hegemony in state and society by twisting scholarship to fit their interests of the moment. Though Zhu Xi remained the central figure of veneration, the definition of what constituted “right learning” was nevertheless hotly contested. With doctrinal positions increasingly rigidifying, each faction, when in power, attempted to legitimize its ideological claims to political power by having its own version of Tohak officially recognized as “orthodox.” The construction of the Korean “pedigree of the Way” (tot’ong) was therefore primarily a political issue: the worthies installed in the National Shrine of Confucius represented above all the political interests of the faction that had managed to elevate them to the highest scholarly honors. Ironically, the eighteen Korean scholars eventually enshrined in the Munmyo as representing the summa of Korean Confucianism would in real life have bitterly contested each other’s scholarly premises. The factions’ tendentious appropriations of Confucian positions destabilized the politics at the center as their contestations could produce only “winners” and “losers.”1 Couching the power struggle in moral terms, the winners, assuming the posture of moral paragons (kunja), felt legitimized in purging the moral losers, the “petty men” (soin), eliminating them from central power as well as degrading their status. Although ritual questions concerning the mourning behavior of the royal house supplied the initial spark of the “ritual controversies” running between Sŏin and Namin, the issue at the core of these controversies was the defense of status and status legitimacy—both in terms of state and faction—in a rapidly changing East Asian world. As the eventual winners, the Sŏin came to control the central bureaucracy and imposed their version of Tohak as the “state ideology.” The Namin, as the losers, were forced to retreat to Yŏngnam, and Tohak learning in the Namin mode practically disappeared from the national discourse. Indeed, with the political and intellectual ascendency of the Sŏin at the center, scholarship came to be confined to “philosophical zones”: Yŏngnam, the territory of T’oegye’s intellectual heirs; Kiho, Hwanghae, and Ch’ungch’ŏng home to Yulgok’s latter-day discipleship; and Chŏlla, though predominantly Sŏin, having a few Namin pockets. What did this fragmented state of Tohak mean for the further development of



Concluding Reflections

401

Korean thought? Was it not the primary reason that in Korea nothing deserving of being called “state orthodoxy” evolved? To be sure, the examination curriculum consisting of a government-controlled set of classical texts illuminated by Zhu Xi’s commentaries served as the generally accepted intellectual assignment, but “government learning” (kwanhak) did not amount to “true learning” (chŏnghak).2 “True learning” was learning in the sectarian mode of one’s faction. References in a scholar’s biography to his study of either “principle” or “mind-matter” were thus often intended less to highlight his scholarly achievements than to identify his factional affiliation. This is not to mean, of course, that philosophical production stopped. But, due to the ambiguity about where the authority lay to decide and impose doctrinal orthodoxy, scholarship came under the increased scrutiny of the faction in power, so that the pursuit of the Way could no longer be the entirely “private” (sa) affair of an individual scholar. On the contrary, the understanding of what scholarship had to entail turned into an issue of “public” (kong) concern, subjecting “private” pursuit of the Way to general suspicion. Clearly, as a contemporary lamented, scholarship had lost the Mencian thrust of “obtaining the truth through one’s own efforts” (chadŭk), with such efforts even at risk of being condemned as “heterodox” deviations (idan).3 The sites where in late Chosŏn “faction-bound” learning was taught and propagated were the private academies (sŏwŏn). True, the sŏwŏn were originally built on the initiative of individual scholars or elite communities to serve as institutions of higher learning when government schools declined, and sŏwŏn even received royal charters in recognition of their intellectual importance. With the national discourse increasingly polarized and large numbers of the landed elite estranged from central power, however, the sŏwŏn gradually mutated into locales where local literati communities gathered to proclaim and defend their sectarian interests against the state. Private academies were therefore easily suspected of subversive maneuverings and, especially in Namin territory, were often targeted by the central government as antistate institutions. Indeed, the Sŏin—by the eighteenth century in full control of central power—tried to break the social and intellectual power of the sŏwŏn by ordering their demolition and prohibiting further construction. In consideration of such developments, which undoubtedly hampered rather than advanced a free-flowing national discourse, is it reasonable to regard the academies as sites of a nascent “civil society” or “public sphere,” a view that in recent years has gained currency among scholars searching for the roots of Korea’s early modernity?4 Without going into the details of how these terms were originally defined in relation to Western history,5 it seems that those who argue in favor of applying them to premodern Korea underestimate the extent to which the relationship between state and local elite society had changed by the eighteenth century—and with it the nature of the sŏwŏn. Unlike in Song China, where by the thirteenth century a “homogenization of the Way” took place encompassing diverse thinkers under the cult of Zhu Xi at the academies throughout Southern Song,6 a contrary tendency had, as argued above, occurred in Korea, where combined lineage and factional membership turned the academies increasingly into “privatized” icons of elite prestige, no longer serving wider scholarly communities. The competition over social predominance in terms of factional leadership, as exemplified by local strife in Andong, was indeed a remarkable manifestation of Tohak’s localization.

402

Concluding Reflections

The proliferation of sŏwŏn and shrines dedicated to local personalities (no longer necessarily “worthies”) in the eighteenth century thus signaled the fragmentation of the Way along kinship lines rather than the emergence of a depersonalized and extrafamilial “public sector” outside government. One of the central themes of this study is the emergence of the Korean lineage system. To what extent it is justified to call it a product of Neo-Confucianism may be gauged by assessing what expedited lineage building and what hindered it in Chosŏn Korea. The emergence of patrilineages was by no means “natural.” Rather, a number of factors conjoined to make the conversion of loosely organized descent groups into clearly structured, exclusive groups of agnates on the model of Zhu Xi’s Jiali a viable response to the changing sociopolitical circumstances taking place in the course of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. A few localized elite kin groups were typically the first lineage builders. By the seventeenth century if not before, the land grab came to an end, and landed holdings, continually divided by customary equal inheritance, decreased to the point of jeopardizing their long-term prosperity. It was at this stage of existential uncertainty, then, that interest grew in Zhu Xi’s Jiali, which propagated the patrilineal descent principle for group formation. Indeed, Zhu’s paradigm, constructed on the domestic cult of near agnatic ancestors, offered an organizational framework for narrowing kin boundaries to lineal descendants and keeping land together with corporate ancestral trust. Literal adoption of the Jiali’s template, however, conflicted with native customs, most critically with fraternal equality. Fraternal equality stood in the way of instituting the heir of the most senior descent line as the group’s ritually and economically privileged head. Parity of brothers and daughters in inheritance matters—earlier a frequent reason for concluding uxorilocal marriages—presented a further obstacle. Finally, the shifting of worship from grave to shrine impinged on religious sensibilities and ran counter to long-observed practice. All told, the implantation of the vertical principle as demanded by the Jiali in the horizontally constituted native descent group might have failed without a “historic” compromise that reconciled two structural logics in one and the same system: the Confucian patrilineage and the native-based munjung. With its cult centered on the domestic shrine the patrilineage tightened the group’s membership, kept patrimonial land together as corporately owned property, and enhanced the group’s social prestige; on the other hand, the munjung, focused on the grave of a first or otherwise noted ancestor, created an enlarged worshiping group that embraced all agnatic descendants as coparceners of an extended lineage enterprise. The unique permutation of the Jiali’s patrilineage with munjung attests to the strength with which the indigenous sense of collectivity gave the Korean “lineage system” its distinct character. The introduction of patrilineal criteria of group formation defined new collectivities from which affines, nonagnates, women, and secondary sons were unsurprisingly excluded. Despite women’s eventual material disinheritance and ritual degradation, the continued indispensability of the maternal line of descent in transmitting and legitimizing elite status—a remnant of native bilaterality—preserved the high respect that a primary wife received from society and, at the same time, heightened the exclusiveness of



Concluding Reflections

403

the patrilineal descent group by eliminating sons with secondary mothers from lineal heirship. Affines, in particular the wife givers, even though clearly no longer part of the lineage, nevertheless preserved their genealogical importance and thus were ready to oblige the patriline with occasional material and moral support. In sum, the application of the patrilineal paradigm streamlined the indigenous descent group, but native elements remained sufficiently prominent to make the Korean lineage if not functionally then culturally distinctly different from its Confucian model. Lineages made sense to counteract the danger of status loss through marginalization from the center. Indeed, lineage building was an effective instrument with which landed descent groups were able to withstand state interference, a fact that becomes clear when the circumstances of lineage building are put into temporal perspective. When in the course of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the localized elites were staking out their influence in rural communities, the state’s authority over the countryside was still often only nominal, so that the expansion of landed estates and the propagation of Confucian learning happened largely on individual initiative without much state support or obstruction. It was therefore under specific local conditions—one of which was preservation of landed property—that patrilineages began to emerge. Thus, when in the second half of the seventeenth century the state attempted to bring the countryside fully under its administrative control, it encountered well-developed agnatic organizations that were able to thwart any policies running counter to their interests. The local elite successfully rebuffed state advances to involve them in local administration, avoided the magistrate’s yamen, and ensconced themselves in their villages. Powerful lineages thus survived in late Chosŏn without involvement on the part of the state. The lineage thus was rarely a “public” (kong) institution voluntarily cooperating with the state. On the contrary, the latent, and frequently overt, tension between the central bureaucracy and marginalized local elites made lineages into institutions of “private governance”7 with which the landed sajok elite safeguarded their status and interests vis-à-vis the state. Even if headed by examination graduates and office holders, lineages did not, as in China, function as an “extension of state power into local communities.”8 Rather, in competition with the state, lineages defended their particular interests by hold­ ing on to their economic assets and human resources with such law-and-order instruments as community compacts and regulated their internal affairs largely independently. Nevertheless, lineages were subject to taxation and to punishment for criminal or rebellious acts perpetrated by their members, and in especially sensitive cases of intralineage conflict they even appealed, as a last resort, to the authorities for arbitration. As the evidence has shown, the magistrates, however, were generally reluctant to rule on lineage issues, underlining the state’s ambivalent attitude toward the lineage. The lineage was most “political” through affiliation with a faction. Even though not all lineages may have equally strongly participated in factional politics, a lineage’s factional orientation guided the extent and direction of its political participation. The combination of lineage and faction, solidified in time through hereditary membership, thus was, as suggested before, a formidable challenge to the state—a state that itself was dominated by factionally organized power holders. The fact that the Chosŏn state rested on a differentiated, specialized, and permanent bureaucratic apparatus seems often to

404

Concluding Reflections

obscure the determinant influence the complex intertwinement of lineage, faction, and personalized exercise of power had on late Chosŏn politics. In contrast to Ralph Nicholas’s contention that “factions are not corporate groups,”9 it is precisely through their coalescence with lineages that Chosŏn factions acquired “corporateness,” ensuring them enduring presence on the national as well as on the local scene. Lineages emerged above all as social and ritual entities that fused agnatic kinsmen into groups for worshiping their ancestors. Indeed, it was, as repeatedly argued, the practice of ancestor worship that functioned as the dynamo of lineage formation. The ancestral cult was the central “religious” manifestation that bestowed upon the worshipers the prestige of ancestral empowerment. By celebrating their ancestors in grand ritual displays in front of graves, in domestic shrines, and in memorial halls, the lineage members invoked ancestral blessings and put themselves under ancestral protection. A lineage lived literally “under the eyes of its ancestors.” Expulsion from such collectivity meant sure loss of elite status and of its concomitant political and economic privileges. Though Zhu Xi’s Jiali presented a standardized model of Confucian patrilineage, lineages were far from uniform; under the surface of ideological conformity there were many “scattered practices,”10 as exemplified in Andong and Namwŏn. Indeed, in Andong, and likely in Yŏngnam in general, lineage structure seems to have been more fixed and bound to textual faithfulness than in Namwŏn and Chŏlla Province. Purification halls were larger in Kyŏngsang than in Chŏlla. Lineages differed, furthermore, as to the depth of their ancestral background and to the degree of their social, economic, and cultural achievements, criteria that ranked them locally. Competition was consequently a pervasive feature of interlineage dynamics and, as the chapters in part IV attest, in late Chosŏn rural lineage society clearly fragmented along lines of prestige and power. Nevertheless, though following divergent scholarly orientations, the sajok of Andong and Namwŏn subscribed to the larger domain of Confucian culture that made their particularities appear to be differences in degree rather than in kind. The lineage as an organizational model was not confined to Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla. For the other provinces, however, the historical record is rather meager. Fieldwork conducted in the 1930s identified 265 lineage villages in Ch’ungch’ŏng Province and an almost equal number in Kyŏnggi Province—numbers that are considerably lower than those for Kyŏngsang or Chŏlla.11 A recent study seems to suggest that lineage organization in the two central provinces was relatively weak because landed estates in the metropolitan area were managed for the capital elite by local administrators and were thus not generally their residences.12 Typically most elaborate in the southern part of the Korean peninsula, lineage organization was, with the exception of Hwanghae and P’yŏngan Provinces, less developed in the north, where social and cultural growth was relatively late, a situation that worked negatively for elite formation in general and the emergence of strong lineages in particular.13 Put in comparative perspective, lineage building in Korea differed considerably from the way in which lineages came about in China. Under the Ming state’s early activist social policies no lineages emerged. But, with state control weakening in the course of the six-



Concluding Reflections

405

teenth century, lineages began to appear as part of what Peter Bol called the “localist turn.”14 Although scholarly opinion diverges as to the conditions under which the Chinese lineages could come into existence, it seems to be a commonly held view that lineage formation was stimulated by the Ming state’s attempt to bring local society under its control. Whereas David Faure sees the growth of lineages as a result of the state’s efforts to integrate local society into its authority and connects it with China’s commercial revolution from the sixteenth century,15 Michael Szonyi goes so far as to claim that the emergence of lineages had nothing to do with either Neo-Confucianism or elite leadership; rather, he proposes, agnatic kin groups were formed to deal with Ming household registration and taxation,16 a view that is seconded by Zheng Zhenman, who argues that lineages began to develop because of the instability households experienced through constant division.17 Rubie Watson, too, stresses that, since China was not a “descent society,” lineages were not an inevitable outgrowth of a system of descent and, rather, responded to the complex market economy.18 Hilary Beattie, studying local society in southeast China in the Ming and Qing dynasties, also places the initial attempts at formal organization in the sixteenth century and posits that the first steps of lineage building were the compilation of genealogies and the building of ancestral shrines—without direct state involvement. The aim of the lineage, she concludes, was the survival of the group, and points out the remarkable longevity of the lineages she studied.19 Recently, Myron Cohen has added to the above descriptions of Chinese lineages, which were predominantly drawn from research in the south and southeast, a study on different lineage models he found in north and east China. It is striking how northern lineages, in particular, with their ritual focus on the senior descent line traced back to the founding ancestor, show similarities with Korean lineage structure.20 The principal difference between Korean and Chinese lineages, then, seems to lie in the fact that Korean society was a descent-based society, while the Chinese was not. In China, moreover, the state seems to have played an active role insofar as lineages emerged in response to the exertion of state authority. In Korea, in contrast, lineages were formed exactly because of the state’s overall weakness. Surprisingly, the China scholars refer to Zhu Xi at best tangentially, whereas Zhu Xi’s Jiali led the Koreans to go as far as implanting primogeniture, the optimum of a strict lineage structure—a feat the Chinese never tried to accomplish. On the contrary, in Ming and Qing times the ritual prescriptions of the Jiali were generally disregarded, and it was not genealogical standing but economic contribution to the lineage, allowing the creation of an ancestral estate, that guaranteed a Chinese a place in the ancestral hall, making the “worship of ancestors ultimately a matter of individual preference, whether to participate or not.”21 In essence, then, in China, according to Patricia Ebrey, the scholar-officials sought to revise the ritual code to match contemporary society;22 the Koreans, in contrast, tried to change the premises of social organization to conform to Zhu’s ritual prescriptions and made the “correct” performance of rituals a crucial hallmark of elite culture. The fact that the Korean elites defined themselves in social terms, that is, in terms of birth and descent, made elite status inheritable, whereas gentry status in late imperial China was obtained solely by examination success, at least in theory independently of social origin. As Timothy Brook puts it, the Chinese political system “did not condone

406

Concluding Reflections

the begetting of status by status.”23 This did not mean, however, that the examination system was open to all. Although never monopolizing the exams to the degree the elites did in Korea, the Chinese local elites nevertheless perpetuated their high social status through continued degree acquisition. This is an important point, because recent research has shown that in China elite status could be maintained in this way over many generations, even centuries. In Korea, in contrast, the perpetuation of elite status did not primarily depend on examination success or office holding, even though both remained desirable; continuity rested on the social constitution of the elite. Nevertheless, under local conditions, elite status did have to be continuously defended and substantiated by an array of cultural activities, in particular by celebrating ancestry in elaborate ritual manifestations. According to Brook, moreover, a key to dominance of the old gentry families in China lay in their interaction with one another through friendship, marriage, political commitment, and cultural pursuits.24 This rings true for the Korean local elites as well, although competition for influence and recognition seems to have given life in the late Chosŏn countryside a sharper edge than in China due, at least in part, to the ever widening gap between center and periphery. A further point to be considered in this brief appraisal of Korean peculiarities in the light of contemporary China is the remarkable array of social barriers the Korean elite was able to erect and maintain around itself. Whereas in China Confucian social theory placed the gentry at the top of a four-tiered hierarchy above peasants, artisans, and merchants, such hierarchization was of only nominal value in Korea. There, the elite’s arrogation of dominance in state and society by means of birth and descent relegated the nonelite to subordination from which upward mobility was extremely restricted. Indeed, the examination system with its in-built social filtering mechanism practically foreclosed social mobility on the basis of ability. This view contradicts earlier arguments according to which the examination system in Chosŏn Korea, like that in contemporary China, was an important channel of upward mobility for anyone qualified scholastically to sit the examinations.25 In China, the gentry’s fiercest competitors were wealthy merchants. Even though commercial activities, indispensable even in an agrarian economy, were regarded with a large measure of disdain and subjected to all kinds of restraints, wealthy merchants, acting in a complex market economy, constituted a formidable force that did not simply exist alongside the gentry but openly competed with them—through the examination system for positions of power in government26 and with a sophisticated lifestyle for access to gentry culture. Conversely, large portions of gentry income came from trade and financial activities.27 In Korea, even though merchants, traders, and artisans of differing shades did, of course, exist, it was precisely the elite’s grip on the examination process that prevented competitors of nonelite origin, however wealthy or learned, from rising through that system to positions of power. Wealth, moreover, though indispensable, had at no time a socially determining value. What is more, Korean kinship orientation never let elite and officialdom fully coincide—the social always took precedence over the political. It is this very fact that empowered the landed elites of late Chosŏn to maintain their high social status even after they ceased to participate in the political process at the center.



Concluding Reflections

407

The sajok’s competitors, then, did not arise from the nonelite but, in late Chosŏn, from among the hyangni and secondary sons—two anomalous social groupings created by the elite’s social exclusivity. Claiming common ancestral roots with elite descent groups, some hyangni began to vie for general social, if not necessarily political, recognition beside their elite brethren, whereas the secondary sons, asserting their fathers’ elite status, demanded privileged access to the elite’s social as well as political life. With such claims, at times substantiated by success in the civil service examinations, the hyangni and secondary sons came closest to emerging as separate social groups alongside elite society—in positions “beyond birth” that enabled them, in specialized functions, to take active part in Korea’s modern transformation.28 Finally, a word on slavery—a subject that has over the past decades provoked considerable controversies as to its place and meaning in Korea’s social history. No one would deny the importance of slavery in premodern Korea, but opinions have diverged over its extent and definition within traditional society. To be sure, in the Chosŏn, slaves constituted a large portion, estimated at between 30 and 50 percent, of the population, and because slave status was hereditary, it was transmitted from one generation to the next without much prospect of deliverance, rendering it especially restrictive. But does that justify regarding slavery as a defining characteristic of Chosŏn society? In a global perspective, chattel slavery as an institution of involuntary servitude was widely known throughout Asia, Africa, and the West. Indeed, in the Old World, in Greece as well as in Rome, entire populations of conquered areas were taken as prisoners of war and enslaved to serve their new masters. In the late third century BCE, for instance, the free population of Italy of roughly three million grew by two-thirds through slaves brought home from conquests abroad, giving rise to a flourishing trade in humans, both male and female; slaves could, however, attain manumission, and freed slaves even obtained citizenship in Rome.29 There is no need, however, to go so far back in time and space, for chattel slavery was equally prominent in China since earliest times and even beyond 1906, when it was legally abolished.30 Studying slavery in south China in the 1970s, James Watson concluded that slaveholding was typical and widespread where powerful lineages dominated. There, the slaves worked as domestic servants and menial laborers; their status was inherited through the male line, and they never became part of their master’s family. Though granted tenancy rights, the slave was not allowed to possess property. According to Watson, the slave’s importance as producer of economic value is often overemphasized, as only the wealthiest families could afford to keep hereditary servants. The slaves, therefore, served above all as status symbols, living off the surplus and affluence created by their owners’ households in areas of thriving rice cultivation and market town commerce. Although Watson may have observed a kind of slavery suited to the economic circumstances prevalent in south China, there are a number of obvious similarities between Chinese and Korean slavery. In both societies, the marked predilection for societal division and exclusivity prevented slaves from being absorbed into their master’s kin group, condemning them to live as “kinless” persons and lead a debased life on the margins of elite society.

408

Concluding Reflections

Slavery in Korea was undoubtedly most widespread during the first three centuries of the Chosŏn, when the sajok used slave labor to establish their landed estates. As this study has shown, large slave forces, often reaching several hundred men and women, were a sine qua non for bringing new land under permanent cultivation. Slaves thus did have an important economic value, and elite wealth was initially measured in numbers of slaves rather than in acreage of land. Only when land began to be scarce in the seventeenth century did slave labor become unprofitable and started to mutate into tenancy. Domestic slavery, however, persisted, with its economic value at least as high as its symbolic value. A remarkable aspect of Korean slavery was the assiduousness with which the government repeatedly shifted the demographic balance between commoner population and slaves to suit its economic needs. Intermarriage between commoner and slave was prohibited by law, but the very law, which stipulated that slave status was inherited from the mother (“matrifilial law”), was often changed along ideological lines or to increase the number of tax-paying commoners, creating very complex family relationships. Private slave owners, moreover, manipulated the law to augment their workforces. Equally grave were the social implications of unions between elite men and slave women. In China, the acquisition of a secondary wife or concubine, usually by purchase, was unproblematic because women remained “outsiders” who were treated as the “property” of the male-dominated household and always subject to sale. A secondary wife’s son, however, was recognized as legitimate, was fully integrated into his father’s household, and treated, as far as property rights were concerned, in the same way as a primary son.31 In Chosŏn Korea, a secondary wife, whether of commoner or base origin, lacked proper ancestral background and thus was of no import for the patriline; her lowliness, moreover, prevented her sons from joining their father’s descent group and curtailed their inheritance rights. Korean slavery, then, was a multifaceted phenomenon that was never seriously questioned as to its human justifiability because it was critical for the existence of the elite far beyond its economic significance. Indeed, it was a sine qua non of Korea’s premodern social system. In conclusion, then, the indigenous kinship ideology, with its celebration of status hierarchy and status exclusivity, ran like a red thread through Korea’s history from early Silla to the late nineteenth century. By putting the social ahead of the political, this ideology created an elite that ruled on the basis of birth and descent, giving it extraordinary permanence through time and space. As this study has revealed, neither the borrowed examination system nor Neo-Confucianism limited the elite’s arrogation of power by level­ing the hierarchical order; on the contrary, both reinforced elite rule in remarkable ways. Past emphasis on the transformative power of Neo-Confucianism may have obscured the persistent nature of this native kinship ideology. Though Neo-Confucianism, which provided the elite with the contours of a Confucian society, was often blamed for the rigidity of late Chosŏn society, it was not Neo-Confucianism but the enduring native kinship ideology that kept the “elite system” alive. Some Confucian scholars were keenly



Concluding Reflections

409

aware of this fact and launched occasional attacks on the “yangban system.” One of them was the seventeenth-century scholar Yu Hyŏng-wŏn, who proposed to replace the ruling yangban with “moral bureaucrats” selected on the basis of revised universal education; Yu’s ideas, however, found no echo in his time. Was the social status system, which for so long had privileged the yangban elite, then unreformable in the light of an ever more assertive nonelite pushing “upward” in late Chosŏn? Ironically, it was the government that encouraged this trend by selling bureaucratic titles—giving the buyers at least the illusion of social advancement by exempting them from military tax. It was, however, exactly the socially constituted system of “noble” and “base” that prevented the elite from responding flexibly to changing social realities and hindered the nonelite from breaking into yangban ranks—whether with wealth or with bureaucratic titles. Perhaps inevitably abrupt, therefore, was the elite’s demise. Though never legally defined as a “system,” the status system was unceremoniously abolished in 1894, when the dominance of one social group over the rest of society was considered no longer tolerable in a country that tried to position itself in a rapidly moving modern world. With the nexus between the social and the political broken, the traditional status system collapsed. Status consciousness, however, lingered on. The disinherited yangban clung to their status distinctions by updating their genealogies, renovating shrines and gravesites, and displaying ritual propriety. “Status,” moreover, was no longer an unattainable privilege. Striving to overcome a humiliating past and to win social recognition, a large section of society started, for instance, to perform “Confucian” rites as markers of social advancement. The general rush with which “yangban rites” were being pursued alarmed a late nineteenthcentury anonymous ritual expert who, concerned about the vulgarization of the Four Rites by popular practice (soksŭp), compiled a simplified manual to guide the neophytes.32 Indeed, the “social,” though bereft of its normative power, retained its emotional mystique and gave rise to what has been aptly called the “yangbanization” of Korean society.33 Although the “historical” yangban are frequently vilified as having brought ruin to the country, asserting yangban status has even nowadays lost none of its pervasive force for constructing individual and, indeed, regional and national identity.

A ppen di x A

Documentary Research Materials

Primary Sources This work is based to a large extent on sources now known in Korea as “old written materials” (komunsŏ)—a new genre designating private and official documents1 that bear on the history of certain private institutions or of individual descent groups. Recently made available in considerable numbers, these documents have opened fresh perspectives on social history research because they throw light on areas of daily life that official sources such as the Royal Annals (Sillok) do not. They comprise inheritance papers, land and slave registers and sales contracts, census drafts, petitions to the authorities, circular missives (t’ongmun), adoption papers, and correspondence, among others. Unlike official sources, komunsŏ depict a kind of individualized space within which human action occurred. It is an amorphous body of information, the deciphering of which poses considerable problems. The difficulties often start with the poor preservation of the documents. Their reading, moreover, is encumbered by the extensive use of idu (clerk’s renderings).2 Another problem is the dating. The use of cyclical dates3 without reference to a reign period frequently renders their contents meaningless as they cannot be placed into a time frame. Komunsŏ, moreover, do not fit into a systematic body of knowledge. They usually originated from ad hoc situations and relate the consequence rather than the origin of an action and thus rarely provide clues as to motives. Unless put into a larger context, komunsŏ remain anecdotal and do not yield their full potential as distant “informants.” Contextualization, therefore, is one of the greatest challenges in the use of komunsŏ. Another important corpus of information used for this study is the “literary work” (munjip) of outstanding personalities. Thousands of such collectanea are extant from the Chosŏn period, but they have not yet been systematically studied as a source for social history.4 A munjip was typically compiled after a person’s death by his friends, disciples,

412

Appendix A

or kinsmen. It was they who decided what to include or exclude, and who was to edit the contents. At times editorial decisions spurred prolonged conflicts, occasionally drawn out over centuries and leading to the printing of differing editions, casting doubt on their authenticity as the original materials were often no longer extant. The munjip compilers strove to put the deceased into a particular historical or philosophical context that was to reflect the image posterity was supposed to retain of his life and work, further confirmed in the preface or postface a contemporary or later personality of high standing was asked to contribute to a printed version. Because a munjip was thought to function as a “mirror” of an individual’s deeds, [Sangnyŏng] Ch’oe Sang-jung, for instance, destroyed his diary and official writings before his death for fear that his descendants might exaggerate his “modest virtue” (sundŏk).5 Similarly, the official burning of a man’s collected works was a common way of punishment by which those in power could obliterate the memory of an adversary from the pages of history. A munjip, usually titled by the author’s pen name (ho), contains a great variety of material: poetry, memorials and other official writings, letters, prefaces and postfaces, philosophical discourses, obituaries, funerary inscriptions, biographical notes on friends, colleagues, and kinsmen (and, rarely, on kinswomen), and often complete historical or philosophical works. An appendix (purok) frequently includes a “record of conduct” (haengjang) and occasionally also a chronological biography (yŏnbo). These data prove, with certain caution, invaluable for reconstructing a person’s life, his ancestry as well as his immediate posterity, his marital and friendship networks, and the stages of his official life. As a rule couched in conventional patterns of style and wording, this information is at times supplemented by a “record of pronouncements and deeds” (ŏnhaengnok)—random recollections jotted down in brief memos by kinsmen and disciples. It is these “episodic memories”6 that often yield personal details that the more formal biography does not. Equally indispensable for biographical studies are funerary inscriptions, especially those commemorating early Chosŏn personalities for whom no collected works exist. Epitaphs (myoji) written on imperishable materials7 recorded, minimally, the name, ancestral origin, and life dates of the deceased and were buried in, in front of, or beside the grave. A major tomb site was marked by a stele (myobi)—a large, rectangular stone slab—engraved with the name of the deceased on the front and with a eulogy carved on the back. A similar stele was often erected along the pathway leading to the tomb (sindobi). Biographical information on such stelae was at first short and concise, but, with tombs turning into monuments of status distinction, it grew more elaborate and stylized and customarily ended with a few lines in verse (myŏng).8 In addition, brief biographical notes and the location of tomb sites are almost routinely recorded in genealogies (chokpo). A different genre of biographical writing is the diary (ilgi). Unencumbered by conventions of style and etiquette, the diarist feels free to express his innermost thoughts or to look at his social, political, and economic environment with a critical eye. Often written without a particular goal in mind and usually not intended for a wider readership, a diary as autobiographical sketch has many facets, as soliloquy or as dialogue, as self-representation or as self-reflection. Whatever its format, it represents the world—real



Docum en ta ry R e se a rch M ater i a l s

413

or imaginary—the diarist experiences around him. Diaries, therefore, are not necessarily reliable historical records, but they evoke the atmosphere of a diarist’s time and place to a degree other sources rarely do.

The Local Gazetteers of Andong and Namwŏn Unlike the individual-centered munjip, a local gazetteer (ŭpchi) inventoried the geographic, political, social, economic, and cultural properties of a bounded administrative unit such as a province or a county. In contrast to the early government-sponsored Geographic Gazetteer of Kyŏngsang Province (Kyŏngsangdo chiriji) of 14259 or the Geographic Gazetteer Appended to the Annals of King Sejong (Sejong sillok chiriji),10 the earliest local gazetteers were compiled on the private initiative of local magistrates, who saw, in view of the general weakness of state administration, the need of getting a firmer grasp of the economic and human resources of their areas. An outstanding such example is the Gazetteer of Haman (South Kyŏngsang) (Hamjuji), which was edited under the supervision of Chŏng Ku (1543–1620) when he served as magistrate of Haman in 1587. It was later often used as a model for similar works.11 Though conceived in a different spirit, one such later work is the Andong gazetteer, the Yŏnggaji12 of 1608. According to the preface, its initiator was the eminent scholarofficial Yu Sŏng-nyong (1542–1607). As a native of Andong, Yu deplored that many noteworthy historical events had taken place in Andong as the “frontier post” of Kyŏngsang Province but had thus far remained unrecorded; examples were the decisive part that Andong men played in defeating the ruler of Later Paekche during the Koryŏ unification campaigns or King Kongmin’s flight to Andong from the Red Turbans in the midfourteenth century. Moreover, Andong still lacked a local record (chi) of the kind that Chinese literati were known to routinely compile of their native places. The intention of gathering and recording data on Andong was thus not to produce an administrative handbook. Rather, the motivation to compile the Yŏnggaji arose from the ambition to showcase Andong’s unique historical and regional identity. The person recruited by Yu in 1602 as principal compiler was a local scholar, Kwŏn Ki (1546–1624), known for his devotion to local tasks.13 Kwŏn Ki turned out to be an extraordinarily conscientious and imaginative researcher, whose work stands out for its meticulous attention to detail and comprehensiveness. He not only consulted the earlier compendia mentioned above, historical sources, and the Hamjuji, but also designated local assistants who were to conduct “fieldwork” in their respective communities—a pro­ cedure that produced a unique inventory of Andong’s villages and their settlement histories. Kwŏn verified and collated the findings collected over a period of six years and edited the final version. Realizing that there was no map of Andong, he reportedly sat down “in a quiet corner of his open wooden veranda” and outlined mountain ranges and water courses and filled in village names. Where uncertainties arose, he apparently searched for corroboration himself. These efforts resulted in twelve maps, a double-paged one of Andong proper (ponbu) and one for each of Andong’s eight sub-counties (hyŏn)

414

Appendix A

and two “special areas” (pu’gok). The work was interrupted by Yu Sŏng-nyong’s death in 1607, but resumed under Chŏng Ku’s guidance, when the latter was appointed magistrate of Andong in the same year, and was completed in the first month of 1608.14 The general structure of the Yŏnggaji follows the conventional categories common to earlier Chinese gazetteers15 and to the Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam, but with forty-nine headings in eight chapters it is much more detailed and comprehensive than any of its predecessors. For this study, the description of individual villages on twenty-eight pages, the substantial entry entitled “local personages” (inmul) providing biographical data of 140 native and in-migrating individuals, and records of tomb sites (ch’ongmyo) are of special interest. Clearly, Kwŏn Ki intended his Yŏnggaji as a sociocultural geography that would describe Andong as a notable area in terms of its human resources and its environment, both natural and man-made, inscribed with a distinct historical memory and home to a number of outstanding descent groups. Kwŏn Ki’s Yŏnggaji was soon followed by similar works focused on Andong and its environs. Because the Yŏnggaji did not include information on neighboring Yean, Kwŏn Si-jung (1572–1644)16 compiled the Gazetteer of Yean (Sŏnsŏngji) around 1619. Similarly, Yi Chun1 (1560–1635) authored the Gazetteer of Sangju (Sangsanji) in 1617. Both works are invaluable as they supplement and extend the contents of the Yŏnggaji.17 In contrast to Andong, where local scholars started to inventory their native places around 1600, local gazetteers began to appear in Chŏlla almost a century later and under quite different circumstances. The gazetteer of Namwŏn, the Yongsŏngji,18 originated as a by-product of the revision of the Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam ordered by the court in 1699. Because the Namwŏn entry in that work was not only old, brief, and inconsistent, two local scholars were commissioned to redact a separate and more detailed gazetteer, completed in 1702.19 In the preface, the renowned scholar-official Ch’oe Si-ong (1646–1730) extolled Namwŏn’s virtues. Namwŏn, he asserted, occupied a strategically pivotal position between Honam (Chŏlla) and Yŏngnam (Kyŏngsang) and was preeminent in terms of its topographic richness, its wealth of human resources, and the quantity of natural products. Indeed, he pictured Namwŏn as the country’s “right arm” that was sustaining the southern half of the peninsula. Perusing the various chapters, the readers, Ch’oe thought, would be led to sharpen their own moral sensibilities by pondering the pros and cons of past action.20 Following the layout but substantially enlarging the contents of the Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam, the Namwŏn gazetteer emphasizes the county’s educational facilities and its wealth of human talent. Three of the eleven chapters contain biographical data of “local personages” (inmul)—exceptionally, even of some still alive (saengjon) at the time of compilation. Because it would have been difficult, according to the editorial notes (pŏmnye), to list the graduates of the higher and lower examinations and the protection appointees in generational order, “they are grouped according to their subcounties and descent lines [chok], each subcounty marked by a circle.” The gazetteer concludes with four chapters of poetry and literary works.21 In sum, the Yŏnggaji as well as the Yongsŏngji are unique guidebooks to their respective areas. As cultural inventories, they record local history and catalogue natural and institutional features. By linking their localities closely to the individuals who emerged



Docum en ta ry R e se a rch M ater i a l s

415

from them, they furnish above all essential information for identifying the sociopolitical elite—the great descent groups of Andong and Namwŏn. Despite the richness of the written materials detailed above, the historical record of Andong and Namwŏn is unfortunately uneven. Many of Andong’s sources go back as far as the Koryŏ period and are especially plentiful for the first two centuries of the Chosŏn. In contrast, a significant part of Namwŏn’s private and public documents was obliterated during the Imjin War at the end of the sixteenth century so that a detailed study of Namwŏn’s premier descent groups is often possible only after 1600. Notwithstanding this documentary imbalance, a comparative use of the available sources helps to create a framework within which the commonalities and particularities of Korea’s great descent groups residing in Andong and Namwŏn can be critically assessed over time.

A ppen di x B

Genealogical Charts of Major Descent Groups of Andong and Namwŏn Notes to the Genealogical Charts The genealogical charts included here are simplified and show the genealogical position of select personalities only. Within each descent group only relevant branches are shown. The Chinese characters for individual names are provided under their respective descent group heading in the glossary-index for Personal Names Arranged Alphabetically According to Choronym (Pon’gwan). Please note the following: 1. A single line (———) denotes descent; a double line (=====) signifies a relationship by marriage. 2. Square brackets around a personal name denote a secondary son (sŏja). 3. The indication of centuries is approximate. 4. The abbreviations used in these charts are as follows: (A) = adoption D = daughter GD = granddaughter Gen. = generation

Genealogical Charts of Major Descent Groups of Andong and Namwŏn Major Descent Groups of Andong B.1 Andong Kwŏn (1): descendants of Kwŏn Haeng, apical ancestor of the Andong Kwŏn B.2 Andong Kwŏn (2): descendants of Kwŏn In, head of the P’ansŏgong-p’a

418

Appendix B

B.3 B.4 B.5 B.6 B.7 B.8 B.9

Andong Kwŏn (3): descendants of Kwŏn Pŏl (1478–1548) Ŭisŏng Kim (1): descendants of Kim Sŏk, apical ancestor of the Ŭisŏng Kim Ŭisŏng Kim (2): Yakpong-p’a and Hakpong-p’a Ŭisŏng Kim (3): Kwibong-p’a, Unam-p’a, and Namak-p’a Chinsŏng Yi (1): descendants of Yi Sŏk, apical ancestor of the Chinsŏng Yi Chinsŏng Yi (2): descendants of Yi Sik (1441–1502), Yi T’oegye’s father Kwangsan Kim (1): descendants of Kim Hŭng-gwang, apical ancestor of the Kwangsang Kim B.10 Kwangsan Kim (2): descendants of Kim Mu (18th generation) B.11 P’ungsan Yu: descendants of Yu Chŏl, apical ancestor of the P’ungsan Yu B.12 Kosŏng Yi: descendants of Yi Chŭng (1419–80), founder of the Andong branch of the Kosŏng Yi B.13 Yŏngyang Nam: descendants of Nam Hwi-ju (1326–72), founder of the Andong branch of the Yŏngyang Nam B.14 Chŏnju Yu: descendants of Yu Sŏng (1533–60) B.15 Ponghwa Kŭm: descendants of Kŭm Chae (early 16th century) B.16 Hŭnghae Pae: descendants of Pae Chŏn (early 14th century), founder of the Andong branch of the Hŭnghae Pae B.17 Chaeryŏng Yi: descendants of Yi Ae (1480–1561), founder of the Yŏnghae branch of the Chaeryŏng Yi

Major Descent Groups of Namwŏn B.18 Chŏnju [Tundŏk] Yi: descendants of Yi Tam-son (1490–?), first Yi settler in Tundŏk B.19 Sangnyŏng Ch’oe: descendants of Ch’oe Su-ung (1464–92), first Ch’oe settler in Tundŏk

B.1 Andong Kwŏn (1): Descendants of Kwŏn Haeng, apical ancestor of the Andong Kwŏn.

B.2 Andong Kwŏn (2): Descendants of Kwŏn In, head of the P’ansŏgong-p’a.

B.3 Andong Kwŏn (3): Descendants of Kwŏn Pŏl (1478–1548).

B.4 Ŭisŏng Kim (1): Descendants of Kim Sŏk, apical ancestor of the Ŭisŏng Kim.

B.5 Ŭisŏng Kim (2): Yakpong-p’a and Hakpong-p’a.

B.6 Ŭisŏng Kim (3): Kwibong-p’a, Unam-p’a, and Namak-p’a.

B.7 Chinsŏng Yi (1): Descendants of Yi Sŏk, apical ancestor of the Chinsŏng Yi.

B.8 Chinsŏng Yi (2): Descendants of Yi Sik (1441–1502), Yi T’oegye’s father.

B.9 Kwangsan Kim (1): Descendants of Kim Hŭng-gwang, apical ancestor of the Kwangsang Kim.

B.10 Kwangsan Kim (2): Descendants of Kim Mu (18th generation).

B.11 P’ungsan Yu: Descendants of Yu Chŏl, apical ancestor of the P’ungsan Yu.

B.12 Kosŏng Yi: Descendants of Yi Chŭng (1419–80), founder of the Andong branch of the Kosŏng Yi.

B.13 Yŏngyang Nam: Descendants of Nam Hwi-ju (1326–72), founder of the Andong branch of the Yŏngyang Nam.

B.14 Chŏnju Yu: Descendants of Yu Sŏng (1533–60).

B.15 Ponghwa Kŭm: Descendants of Kŭm Chae (early 16th century).

B.16 Hŭnghae Pae: Descendants of Pae Chŏn (early 14th century), founder of the Andong branch of the Hŭnghae Pae.

B.17 Chaeryŏng Yi: Descendants of Yi Ae (1480–1561), founder of the Yŏnghae branch of the Chaeryŏng Yi.

B.18 Chŏnju [Tundŏk] Yi: Descendants of Yi Tam-son (1490–?), first Yi settler in Tundŏk.

B.19 Sangnyŏng Ch’oe: Descendants of Ch’oe Su-ung (1464–92), first Ch’oe settler in Tundŏk.

A BBR EV I ATIONS ADPM

Andong ŭi punmyo

CYCK

[Andong] Chinsŏng Yi-ssi, Chuch’on komunsŏ, referring to Andong Chuch’on Chinsŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn, in Komunsŏ chipsŏng

HMCK

Han’guk munjip ch’onggan

HPYP

Hahoe P’ungsan Yu-ssi p’yŏn, in Komunsŏ chipsŏng

HYMJ

Han’guk yŏktae munjip ch’ongsŏ

KCKM

Kyŏngbuk chibang komunsŏ chipsŏng

KKOK

Kwangsan Kim-ssi Och’ŏn komunsŏ, in Komunsŏ chipsŏng

KNJ

Kyonamji

MHPG

Chŭngbo munhŏn pigo

MTP

Mansŏng taedongbo

STYSN

Sinjŭng Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam

TYSUR

Tongyu saurok

UKKM

Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi komunsŏ, referring to Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi Ch’ŏnsang kakp’a p’yŏn, in Komunsŏ chipsŏng

UKSB

Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi sebo

YGJ

Yŏnggaji (1991)

YSJ

Yongsŏngji

Note s Preface 1 I borrow these terms from Bourdieu, In Other Words, 60.

General Introduction

1 2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9

10 11 12

13 14 15

Major arguments of this debate are summarized in Han’guk sahoe palchŏn saron, passim. Cannadine, Aspects of Aristocracy, 1. Deuchler, The Confucian Transformation of Korea. Bourdieu, Distinction, chap. 5. Tilly, Durable Inequality, 6–8. For examples, Sejong sillok 13.28a (1421); 117.14a–b (1447); Sejong sillok, like all Sillok cited in this volume, is in Chosŏn wangjo sillok. Choksok was an often-used term. For examples, see Sejong sillok 47.8b–9a, 10a (1430). For examples, see ibid., 50.19b (1430); Sejo sillok 46.32b (1468). The household registration law in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn exempted rankless individuals (sŏin) from recording their “four ancestors”— a sure indication that most commoners lacked such information. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 327. The argument that there were no legal barriers barring commoners from taking the examinations has often been advanced and does not need to be repeated here. According to the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, four categories of people were legally barred from the civil service examinations: criminals, the sons of corrupt officials, the sons and grandsons of twice-married or wayward women, and the descendants of secondary sons. Ibid., 207–8. Sejo sillok 43.66b–67a (1467). The petitioner was Ryang Sŏng-ji, the inspector general at that time. For an exhaustive analysis of these terms, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 217–31. For the disputations over these terms between Han Yŏng-u and Yi Sŏng-mu, see Han Yŏng-u, Chosŏn sidae sinbunsa yŏn’gu. Some scholars object to calling the Korean nobi “slaves” and like to differentiate between nobi (male and female slaves), nongno (agricultural slave), and noye (slave-like dependent). All three categories are, however, technically slaves because they were chattel property and their labor was extracted by coercion. For definitions of slavery, see Watson, Asian and African Systems of Slavery. See Yi Yŏng-hun, “Han’guksa e issŏsŏ nobije,” 365. Kija (n.d.) was, according to the Classic of Documents, enfeoffed by the founder of the Zhou dynasty, King Wu (accession in 1122), as the feudal lord of Chosŏn. When he moved to Korea, he reportedly devised a penal code of eight laws—a feat usually regarded as a civilizatory measure. It seems to be a generally confirmed view that slavery started on a large scale with prisoners of war taken during military conflicts or plundering expeditions. See Brockmeyer, Antike Sklaverei, 94.

440

N o t e s t o pa g e s 5 –7

16 At times of national crises such as the Imjin War at the end of the sixteenth century, slaves were recruited into special military units (sog’o’gun), and those who excelled in military exploits were usually manumitted. See Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 226–28. 17 The strictures applied to both male and female slaves. 18 Koryŏsa 85.43a. 19 This law seems to have been enacted in reaction to King Kwangjong’s Slave Review Act of 956 that aimed to break the economic power of the dynastic merit subjects by releasing their slaves. This act was greatly resented because, by giving slaves the opportunity for upward mobility, it not only threatened to blur the dividing line between elite and nonelite; it also deprived slave owners of their slaves. For the opposition of Ch’oe Sŭng-no (927–89), expressed in his memorial of 982, see Ch’oe Sŭng-no sangsŏmun, 157–62. 20 I borrow the term “matrifilial” from Fortes, Kinship and the Social Order, chap. 8, “Filiation Reconsidered.” Unfortunately, in his Confucian Statecraft Palais erroneously termed the law “matrilineal.” The law, however, is neither concerned with the continuation of a “line” nor has it to do with matrilineality. 21 For a summary of the various earlier interpretations, see Yang Yŏng-jo, “Koryŏ sidae ch’ŏnja sumobŏp,” 1–35. Hong Sŭng-gi advocated the view that the law of 1039 assigned property rights. See his Koryŏ sidae nobi yŏn’gu, 20–22. Sudō Yoshiyuki explained it with uxorilocal residence of the husband. See his “Kōrai makki yori Chōsen shoki ni itaru nuhi,” 263–64. Uxorilocal residence, however, was the result, not the cause, of this rule. 22 See, for example, T’aejong sillok 27.1b–2a, 48b (1414). 23 The Kyŏngguk taejŏn chuhae of 1555, 326–27, stated: “To public or private slaves who die without offspring, the law of collaterals [sason] is not applicable.” 24 Orlando Patterson maintained that one of the fundamental features of slavery was that the slave could not, in law, be a proprietor. See Patterson, Slavery and Social Death, 182–83. 25 Koryŏsa 85.41a. The law is undated. 26 This was instated by Koryŏ King Ch’ungnyŏl (r. 1274–1308) to counteract Mongol pressure to give a child of mixed marriage automatically commoner status. Ibid., 31.31a–33a, 85.43b–44a. The Mongol emperor Shizi (Khubilai Khan), Ch’ungnyŏl’s father-in-law, had granted Korea the right to pursue its own customs. Ibid., 108.5b–6a. 27 For an example, see ibid., 39.37b–38a. 28 For a discussion of the legal wrangle over mixed marriages, see Chi Sŭng-jong, Chosŏn ch’ŏn’gi nobi, 10–33. 29 Myŏngjong sillok 14.38b (1553). 30 People such as shamans, butchers, tanners, and wicker workers were base because of their occupations, but they were not slaves. Nevertheless treated as outcasts (paekchŏng), they were confined to special settlements. See Passin, “The Paekchŏng of Korea.” 31 Yi Sik, “Ki Myosin samun sa,” in T’aektang-jip 12.6b–8a. 32 See Hwang, Beyond Birth. 33 The Koryŏ formula of “one-in-three-sons” (samjŏng ilcha) was apparently still honored, according to which one son in a three-son household was allowed to take the miscellaneous exams (chapkwa). The descendants of higher, lower, and miscellaneous examination graduates were then exempt from hyangni duties, but presumably rarely entered office. For early legislature, see Yŏkchu Kyŏngguk taejŏn, vol. 2, Chusŏk-p’yŏn, 203; Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 165; Kyŏngguk taejŏn chuhae, 320–22. 34 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 231. On official duty, the hyangni had to wear a simple cap (pokkŏn), and offduty, a square hat made of black lacquered bamboo. This was legislated by T’aejong in 1416. 35 Chungjong sillok 15.25a–b (1512); Taejŏn songnok 11. The Ministry of Rites argued that if the hyangni were given a three-year mourning period, they would take this as a pretext to shun their duties. If, however, a hyangni sincerely wished to mourn for three years, the magistrate, upon verifying such sincerity, was allowed to grant it. 36 A secondary son with a commoner mother was a commoner at birth, while one with a slave mother was born a slave.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 8 –1 8

441

37 For the details of the legislative process, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 232–36, 267–73. 38 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 208. 39 Secondary sons of officials of second rank and above were, according to their talents, explicitly permitted to take up positions in the “miscellaneous offices” (chapchik): interpreting, medicine, law, astronomy, accounting and mathematics, document preparation, and painting. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 156–58. For the legislative background, see Yi T’ae-jin, “Sŏŏl ch’adae ko”; Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong,” 100–103; Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 134–38. For the chungin, see Hwang, Beyond Birth, 108–19. 40 For the details, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 150–55, 208–10. 41 Kyŏngguk taejŏn chuhae, 258. For a more detailed discussion of these debates, see Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 138–39. 42 Sŏul is the native Korean word for kyŏng, capital. 43 Interestingly, the historically grown notion of “inferiority” of the local is also reflected in the fact that “local history” (chibangsa) was long ignored by historians as being of little relevance to national history. Only in recent years has local history become a topic problematized as to its contents, materials, and methodology. For some discussions, see, for instance, Han’guk chibangsa yŏn’gu ŭi hyŏnhwang kwa kwaje (The present state and task of the study of Korean local history), 2000; Chiyŏksa yŏn’gu ŭi iron kwa silche (Theory and practice of local history), 2001; and Chŏng Tu-hŭi and Shultz, Han’guksa e issŏsŏ chibang kwa chung’ang (The periphery and center in Korean history), 2003. 44 Chŏng Yag-yong, Yubaeji esŏ ponaen p’yŏnji, 138. 45 I borrow this term from Skinner, Marketing and Social Structure, 4. 46 Ibid., 11. For his reconstruction of marketing cycles, see 13–19. 47 Zenshō Eisuke, Chōsen no shūraku, 3: 217–18. 48 The sources used in this study are discussed in appendix A.

Part I Introduction 1 Ryang Sŏng-ji, Nulchae-jip 4.8a (1470); Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 178–80. For the Namwŏn Ryang, see chapter 4. For a recent monographic study of Ryang, see Han Yŏng-u, Yang Sŏng-jio. Please note that in the present book the two surnames that are pronounced Yang but written with different Chinese characters are differentiated as follows: the one meaning “bridge” is written “Ryang”; the other, meaning “willow,” as “Yang.” 2 Ryang Sŏng-ji, Nulchae-jip, sokp’yŏn 1.10a–11a (1467); Sejo sillok 43.29b (1467). Ryang was the inspector general at that time. The meaning of Ryang’s statement has been disputed: see Palais, Confucian Statecraft and Korean Institutions, 36–37, 1024n30. I take it that Ryang did not refer to any hypothetical group of people, but to the elite of his own time—an interpretation supported by other contemporary evidence. 3 Fried, The Evolution of Political Society, 186. 4 For discussions of the scholarship on the “newly rising scholar-officials,” see Chŏng Tu-hŭi, “Chosŏn chŏn’gi chibae seryŏk”; Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 13–26. Min Hyŏn-gu has recently reviewed the historiography of the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition without, however, presenting new interpretative ideas, in “Koryŏ esŏ Chosŏn ŭro ŭi wangjo kyoch’e.”

Chapter 1 1 This formulation is based on Balandier, Political Anthropology, 79–80. 2 Korea’s indigenous social organization has been explored since the 1920s without, however, producing commonly accepted reconstructions. Yi Ki-dong discusses earlier Japanese and Korean scholarship in his Silla kolp’umje sahoe. See also Yi Chong-uk, “Silla sidae ŭi hyŏlchok chiptan.” For a summary of the archaeological record, see Barnes, State Formation in Korea. 3 Because the documentary evidence for Koguryŏ and Paekche is slim and Silla’s social system is commonly regarded as the principal forbear of Koryŏ society, research has primarily concentrated on Silla. Here, too, the emphasis will be on Silla.

442

N o t e s t o pa g e s 19 – 2 4

4 Pai, Constructing “Korean” Origins, 124–25. 5 This summary is based on previous research by Yi Ki-baek, Yi Ki-dong, Ch’oe Chae-sŏk, Yi Chong-uk, among others. The interpretations, however, are mine. 6 Barnes, State Formation in Korea, 218–21. 7 I borrow the term “received” status from Balandier, Political Anthropology, 88. 8 The kolp’um system is discussed by Yi Ki-baek, Han’guksa sillon; Yi Ki-dong, Silla kolp’umje sahoe; Ch’oe Chae-sŏk, Han’guk kajok chedosa; and Yi Chong-uk, Silla kolp’umje. In his studies of Silla social organization, Yi Chong-uk insists on the patrilineal nature of the Sillan descent group, but seems to be quite isolated with this view. 9 For the Royal Council, see Yi Ki-baek, Silla chŏngch’i sahoesa, 66–132. This council was converted in 651 into the highest administrative organ (Chipsabu) of the Silla government. 10 For a detailed discussion of chok, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 38–39. 11 Balandier, Political Anthropology, 77. 12 According to Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 227–28, the majority (ca. 60 percent) of the early Koryŏ descent groups documented in the dynastic annals and on tombstones originated from the former T’aebong area (Hwanghae and southern P’yŏngan Provinces). 13 For T’aejo’s marriage alliances, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 57–59; for an identification of the wife givers, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 130–33, 233–35. 14 For the details on Koryŏ kongsin, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 8–14. For a list of paehyŏng kongsin to the end of Koryŏ, see 11–12. The dynastic founding kongsin apparently numbered over three thousand. For a list of surnames/pon’gwan, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 124–25, 136–37, 235–36, 250. 15 The Kyŏngju Kim, deriving their origin from the mythical Alchi, were closely related to Silla’s royal house and have a bewildering number of branches, each with its own first ancestor (sijo). Kim In-yun cannot be found in the MTP or in the Ssijok wŏllyu. The latter, at 190, lists, however, Chi-u’s father, In-gyu, as a descendant of a shallow military line. For the tomb inscription, see Kim Yong-sŏn, “Koryŏ munbŏl ŭi kusŏng,” 16–17. Kim Chi-u is listed as having entered office on the strength of ancestral prestige in Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 22. 16 Hyejong had four consorts from diverse social backgrounds. 17 According to Kang’s study, Wang Kyu’s background is obscure and likely unrelated to Sillan aristocracy. Originally surnamed Ham, Wang Kyu received the royal surname Wang from Wang Kŏn, and was not from Kwangju, but from nearby Yanggŭn. For the details, see Kang, “The First Succession Struggle of Koryŏ,” 422–23. 18 There are various versions of this plot. See Chŏng Ch’ŏng-ju, Sillamal Koryŏch’o hojok, 179–86; Kang, “The First Succession Struggle of Koryŏ.” 19 Ch’oe Sŭng-no, quoted by Yi Ki-baek, Koryŏ kwijok sahoe, 35. 20 A limited examination system had already been introduced in 788, but in view of the kolp’um system still in place its impact must have been minimal. 21 For a study of Shuang Ji’s role, see Kang, “Institutional Borrowing.” 22 Ch’oe Sŭng-no was a head-rank-six minor aristocrat from Kyŏngju who joined, with his father, Wang Kŏn. Though he never studied in Tang China, Ch’oe was one of his time’s most respected scholars and enjoyed T’aejo’s special favors. He was critical of King Kwangjong’s autocratic rule. 23 For this hint, see Ch’oe Sŭng-no sangsŏmun, ed. Yi Ki-baek et al., 53–57. I follow Prof. Yi’s interpretation, although other views are possible, but less plausible. While acknowledging Ch’oe Sŭngno’s covered criticism of the examination system, Hugh Kang found little effective resistance among the earliest examination graduates. See his “Institutional Borrowing,” 116–17. 24 Koryŏsa 73.3b–4a, 95.2a–b. 25 For the details, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 39–40. The date of the origin of the sajo formula is uncertain, but most likely goes back to the eleventh century. 26 From this number are excluded six passers of apparently professional exams in astronomy and medicine. 27 For a discussion of the candidates under Kwangjong, see O Sŏng, “Koryŏ Kwangjongdae”; Hŏ



28

29 30 31 32

33 34 35 36 37

38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 4 – 2 9

443

Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ kwagŏ, 7–20; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje. The Ich’ŏn Sŏ remained prominent throughout Koryŏ and into early Chosŏn. See STYSN 8.5b. For the most comprehensive analysis of the chesulkwa passers, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 271–72. The examination was given 250 times with a total of 6,330 passers, of whom only 1,445 could be identified by name and only 508 by social background. See ibid., 325–557. There were preliminary examinations in the Royal Confucian Academy (Kukchagam), ibid., 190–91. Besides the literary and classics examinations there were also “technical” examinations (chapkwa) testing for expertise in law, medicine, astronomy, etc. See ibid., 558–624. They are, however, not taken into consideration here. Besides the civil and military officials, there were technical personnel (chabŏp) and palace clerical and attendant posts (namban or naesi). For an overview of the early Koryŏ government structure, see Yi Ki-baek, Koryŏ kwijok sahoe, 96–125. For an overview of the government structure of early Koryŏ, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 20–28. Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 212–17; for the geographic origin of examination graduates, ibid., 310–21. Here and throughout, hyangni refers only to the two highest ranks in the hyangni hierarchy: the headman (hojang) and the deputy headman (puhojang). In 1018, when the local administrative units were fixed, their numbers came to vary according to the size of a unit. Large counties with more than one thousand “able-bodied men” (chŏng), for instance, were administered by eight headmen and four deputies. For details, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 132–41; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 233–39; Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ kwagŏ, 145–64. See also Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 244–45. For details, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 366–74; Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ kwagŏ, 24–36. Bourdieu, In Other Words, 136. According to Yi Su-gŏn, some 60 percent of the 550 officials were of northern origin, and 20 and 18 percent of former Paekche or Sillan origin respectively. Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 138–39, 220–23, 227–29. Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 57; Hwang Ul-lyong, Koryŏ pŏlchok, 103–4. According to Duncan, “most powerful” denotes groups that put in toto four or more officials or two or more chaech’u (first- and second-rank officials) into government. Of a total of 1,140 officials for this period the descent-group affiliation of only 257 men can be identified. See Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 54–58. For the formation of the early Koryŏ elite, see also Hwang Ul-lyong, Koryŏ pŏlchok, 100–116. Hwang counted twenty most prominent descent groups, a total that parallels Duncan’s data. The circumstances surrounding Yi Cha-ŭi’s plot are nebulous. See Kang, “The Development of the Korean Ruling Class,” 267–78. Pak Yong-un, “Koryŏ hugi kwŏnmun ŭi yongnye,” 50, 52–54. For the Kyŏngwŏn Yi, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 75–77; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 397–402; Yi Man-yŏl, “Koryŏ Kyŏngwŏn Yi-ssi kamun,” 2–29; Kang, “The Development of the Korean Ruling Class,” 279–81; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 57, 67. For more details, see Chŏng Ch’ŏng-ju, Sillamal Koryŏch’o hojok yŏn’gu, 37–63; Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 154–59; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 57, 68. The Pak apparently lost influence in the period after 1146. They are not listed in MTP. MTP, 1: 255a; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sahoe wa munbŏl kwijok, 203–10; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 107–9; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 57. For a profile of the Haeju Ch’oe, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sahoe wa munbŏl kwijok kamun, 181–93. For a reconstruction of Koryŏ kinship and descent, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 35–45. Kim Yong-sŏn, “Koryŏ munbŏl,” 4–9; Yi Hye-ok, “Koryŏ sidae ŭi ka,” 32–38. Not surprisingly, the majority of the descent groups that used such high-sounding titles figure as “most powerful” on Duncan’s list.

444

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 9 – 3 4

46 Kim Yong-sŏn, “Koryŏ munbŏl,” 9, 16. 47 The question of where the cutoff line was has been controversially discussed. While Pak Yong-un favors fifth rank, other scholars regard this as too low and see it at rank two and above. See Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 74–79; Kim Yong-sŏn, “Koryŏ munbŏl,” 14. 48 No date can be ascertained for the introduction of the “protection privilege,” yet, according to Pak Yong-un, it likely happened during King Sŏngjong’s reign (982–97). See his Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 3–8. 49 For the operation of the protection privilege, see ibid., 89–123; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 76–78; Kim Yong-sŏn, Koryŏ ŭmsŏjedo; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 60–61. 50 Kim Yong-sŏn, “Koryŏ munbŏl,” 21–23. 51 The official garbs in purple, crimson, red, and green were first introduced in 960 and apparently also served to grade allocations under the Field and Woodland Rank System. See Kang, “The Development of the Korean Ruling Class,” 125–40; Yi Ki-baek, Koryŏ kwijok sahoe, 116. 52 For the details, see Hwang Ul-lyong, Koryŏ pŏlchok, 129–51; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 78–79; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 44–48. 53 Koryŏ chapter of Song-shi (History of Song), quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 97. 54 Ibid., 238–39. 55 Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sahoe wa munbŏl kwijok, 203–10. 56 Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn’s choronym was Ubong (Hwanghae Province). The Ubong Ch’oe rose with Ch’ung-hŏn’s father, a general, and disappeared after two generations of Ch’ung-hŏn’s descendants. Ssijok wŏllyu, 605; MTP, 2: 9b. 57 Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 340–41. The close to two thousand passers during the Military period made up roughly one-third of all examination graduates during Koryŏ. 58 The Yŏhŭng Min (before 1305 called Hwangnyŏ), as immigrants from China, had a relatively shallow ancestry in Korea. Min Yŏng-mo was the fourth-generation descendant of the man recognized as the descent group’s first ancestor. MTP, 2: 142a–49a; Ssijok wŏllyu 471; Han’guk sŏngssi tae’gwan, 788–89; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 57, 73. Yi Su-gŏn states that the Min were hereditary hyangni of Yŏhŭng and emerged as munbŏl with Min Yŏng-mo. See Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 267. 59 MTP, 2: 93a; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 83; Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl, Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng, 65–66. 60 For statistical evidence, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 343–45. 61 Yi Kyu-bo’s pon’gwan was Hwangnyŏ (Yŏju). His seems to have been a rather small branch of the Yŏju Yi-ssi that was later not recorded in the MTP, but in Ssijok wŏllyu 109; STYSN 7.24a–b; Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ kwagŏ, 139–40. Yi Kyu-bo ended his official career as a senior second-rank official. 62 Shultz, Generals and Scholars, 87–88; MTP, 1: 196a–b; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 82; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 73. 63 Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 528; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 73. 64 According to Shultz, throughout the Ch’oe rule roughly two-thirds of the official posts were held by civilian officials. Shultz, Generals and Scholars, 177. 65 Ibid., 80, 87. 66 Shultz projects a more positive assessment of the Ch’oe’s rule when he calls it “enlightened and flexible.” But frequent peasant and slave uprisings were surely signs of tension and malcontent, and the Ch’oe did not take effective measures to alleviate them. 67 Ssijok wŏllyu 517; MTP, 2: 152. The Changhŭng Im obviously reached the zenith of their power with Im Ŭi and his immediate descendants; the Koryŏ Im are not represented in MTP and were no longer important at the beginning of Chosŏn. Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 57, 67. Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn’s first wife apparently was the daughter of a powerful military man. Shultz, Generals and Scholars, 49. 68 King Kangjong (1152–1213) was the eldest son of King Myŏngjong.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 4 – 3 9

445

69 For a genealogical chart of the Koryŏ kings, 1123–1259, see Shultz, Generals and Scholars, 2, 166–71. 70 Under Mongol rule, the kings were no longer honored with a traditional temple name, but had to carry in their title the characters “loyal” (ch’ung) and “king” (wang) as a sign of their subordination to the Mongol emperor. According to Robinson, Empire’s Twilight, 103, the son-in-law-status of the Korean king raised Koryŏ’s position within the Mongol empire. 71 MTP, 2: 82a–b; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 111–12; Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl, Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng, 116; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 73. See also Min Hyŏn-gu, “Cho In-gyu.” 72 MTP, 1: 279a; STYSN 32.45a; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 530. 73 There are two unrelated descent groups among the Andong Kim. Kim Pang-gyŏng’s group is conventionally called the “old” Andong Kim. Their rise started with Pang-gyŏng’s father, Hyo-in (?–1253), who was an exam passer of 1208 and advanced to a ministerial post in the Ministry of Military Affairs. MTP, 1: 164b–65a; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 81; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 73. For more on the Andong Kim, see chapter 4. 74 For the geographic origin of the exam passers, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 317–18; Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 343–44. Kyŏngsang Province produced by far the largest number of exam passers during the Mongol period—twice as many as Chŏlla Province. 75 The Todang emerged from the Military Council (Tobyŏngmasa), which had been in charge of military and defense matters. See Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 97–98, 534; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 161–67. Duncan has shown its low level of activity throughout the Mongol period. 76 For a genealogical chart of the P’ap’yŏng Yun, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sahoe wa munbŏl kwijok, 206; for the Ŏnyang Kim, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 535; Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl, Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng, 153–67. 77 For a list of King Ch’ungnyŏl’s nonelite supporters, see Kim Tang-t’aek, “Ch’ungnyŏlwang ŭi pogwi kwajŏng,” 199; for the extragovernmental agencies, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 166–67. 78 Similar terms are “powerful nobles” (kwŏn’gwi, kwŏn’gwi chi ka), “powerful officials” (kwŏnsin), “powerful strongmen” (kwŏnho), etc. 79 Examples for the use of these terms are provided in Pak Yong-un, “Koryŏ hugi kwŏnmun ŭi yongnye.” 80 Ibid.; Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl made similar observations in his earlier Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng. Note that whereas se in kwŏnse means “power,” se in sejok denotes “generation” or “heredity,” not “strength” or “power.” 81 King Ch’ungsŏn (1275–1325) was King Ch’ungnyŏl’s eldest son; his mother was a daughter of Khubilai Khan. Despite the fact that the Mongols objected to marriages within the royal group, in 1289 young Ch’ungsŏn was married to a Koryŏ princess; he later also wed a Mongol princess in addition to two Korean women. Kim Tang-t’aek, “Ch’ungsŏnwang ŭi pogwi kyosŏ,” 18–19. 82 For the details, see Hwang Ul-lyong, Koryŏ pŏlchok, 100–116; Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl, Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng, 58–89; Kim Tang-t’aek, “Ch’ungsŏnwang ŭi pogwi kyosŏ”; Kim Yong-sŏn, “Koryŏ munbŏl,” 18–20. 83 For statistical evidence, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 344–45; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 73. Their data differ. 84 For tables of examination passers and office holders, see Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl, Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng, 96–97, 125. For diverse career patterns, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 82–86. 85 Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 71–77. 86 Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 83–84.

Chapter 2 1 For the details, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 543–54; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 174–75. 2 King Kongmin’s mother, Myŏngdŏk wanghu, was a daughter of [Namyang] Hong Kyu and consort of King Ch’ungsuk. She also bore King Ch’unghye (r. 1330–32; 1339–44).

446

N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 9 – 4 1

3 For an analysis of King Kongmin’s various reform plans, see Kim Ki-dŏk, “14segi huban kaehyŏk chŏngch’i.” 4 [Namyang] Hong Ŏn-bak, examination graduate of 1330, was the seventh-generation descendant of Hong Kwan and the grandson of Hong Kyu; his paternal aunt was King Kongmin’s mother. He married a daughter of Kwŏn Pu’s son, Chun (1280–1352), and served in high offices. Koryŏsa 111.7b–11a; see also Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 168. 5 Ibid., 73, 168. 6 For Empress Ki, see Robinson, Empire’s Twilight, 118–27. As the mother of the crown prince, Empress Ki had an exceptionally strong position at the Yuan court. 7 The Haengju Ki emerged as a strong descent group with a few military men during the Military period and under the Mongols. Koryŏsa 131.14a–21b (Ki Ch’ŏl’s biography); Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 271; Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (sang), 52. 8 For a detailed description of the Red Turban Wars, see Robinson, Empire’s Twilight, chap. 4. 9 This uncle was a son of King Ch’ungsŏn by a palace woman. For the details, see Robinson, Empire’s Twilight, chap. 7. 10 Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (sang), 62–71. 1 1 Koryŏsa 73.11b; 111.41b–45b (Im’s biography). Im Pak remains a somewhat obscure figure because his reform proposals were not recorded in the Koryŏsa—perhaps, as Min Hyŏn-gu suggests, because they contained ideas similar to those of later reformers such as Cho Chun and Chŏng To-jŏn and were therefore suppressed to enhance Cho’s and Chŏng’s profiles as reformers. Originating from the small county of Kiran (Andong), the Im apparently were in-migrants without the support of a strong descent group, and neither Im’s father nor his grandfather was an official. He passed the examinations in 1360 and eventually advanced to a senior third-rank office, but seems to have remained an outsider throughout his career. Much maligned, he was eventually exiled and killed. For additional details, see Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (ha), 78–81; for the renovation of the education system, see Kim Ki-dŏk, “14segi huban kaehyŏk chŏngch’i,” 459–63. 12 The classic study on Sin Ton remains Min Hyŏn-gu’s “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn.” I am indebted to Prof. Min’s research. 13 Koryŏsa 126.1a–19b (biography); MTP, 1: 128b–30a. For Yi In-im and his kin group, see Ko Hyeryŏng, “Yi In-im chŏngkwŏn.” In-im was a grandson of Yi Cho-nyŏn (1269–1343), who, as an exam graduate of 1285 and eventually high official, was absorbed into the capital elite and thus raised his kin group from hyangni of Sŏngju to power at the center. In-im entered office via a protection appointment. 14 MTP, 2: 9a. Ch’oe Yŏng (1316–88) was the fifth-generation descendant of Ch’oe Yu-ch’ŏng (1095– 1174), an examination graduate of 1112 and a high official. Although the Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe, whose apical ancestor was a merit subject of Koryŏ T’aejo, did not belong to the most powerful elite in early Koryŏ, they did bring forth a great number of examination graduates and officials and were chosen in 1308 as one of the descent groups marriageable by the royal house. Yŏng won respect, honors, and wealth by military successes against the Japanese pirates and Red Turbans. One of his daughters became the consort of King U. For his biography, see Koryŏsa 113.23a–55a; he is not listed in MTP. For biographical information on Yi Sŏng-gye, see the summary in note 75 below. 15 To mark the nondynastic origin of Kings U and Ch’ang, the Koryŏsa did not put their biographies among the royal biographies (sega) but appended them to Sin Ton’s biography. 16 Because the direct royal Wang line had come to an end with King Kongmin’s death, Kongyang (1345–94) was an eighth-generation descendant of King Sinjong (r. 1197–1204). 17 Though they had a founding ancestor who was one of Wang Kŏn’s merit subjects (Samhan kongsin), the Kyŏngju Yi were not one of the most prosperous descent groups of early Koryŏ. Yi Che-hyŏn’s father, Yi Chin (1244–1321), was the first to pass the exams in 1279 and embark on an official career that ended with a junior second-rank office. MTP, 1: 65b; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 435. 18 On Yi Che-hyŏn’s sojourn in the Yuan capital, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 16–20. See also chapter 3. 19 For Yi Che-hyŏn’s reform attempts, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 173–75; a brief



20

21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

32

33 34

35 36 37 38 39

N o t e s t o pa g e s 4 2 – 4 4

447

account of Yi Che-hyŏn’s thought is in Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 136–37; Min Hyŏn-gu discusses Yi’s political activities during King Kongmin’s reign in Koryŏ chŏngch’i saron, 276–91. The biographies of Pae Chŏn and Kang Yun-ch’ung are under the rubric “parasites” (p’aehaeng): Koryŏsa 124.13b–14a, 9b–13b. Kang reportedly raped two elite women, for which he was beaten, but he escaped the full force of the law through high-placed protectors. For Kim Sa-haeng’s biography, see ibid., 122.27a–b. Yi Che-hyŏn’s first wife was a daughter of Kwŏn Pu, who passed the exams in the same 1279 cohort as Yi’s father and eventually acted as one of Yi’s scholarly mentors. Kwŏn Hu (1296–1349; original first name Chae) became a favorite of King Ch’ungsŏn, who adopted him and even granted him the royal surname Wang. For the kin connections between the Andong Kwŏn, the Kyŏngju Yi, and the Haengju Ki, see MTP, 1: 65b; 2: 54a; Ssijok wŏllyu 34, 753; Koryŏsa 131.16b, 18a. One of Yi Che-hyŏn’s daughters was one of King Kongmin’s consorts. Koryŏsa 131.23a–b, 32a–b; Ssijok wŏllyu 461; Kyŏm’s name is left out of MTP, 2: 54a. Koryŏsa 131.21b–23a; Ssijok wŏllyu 521–22; MTP, 2: 226. The Kyoha No-ssi did not belong to the highest elite stratum, but had been active in government since the beginning of Koryŏ. Ch’aek’s mother was a daughter of Cho In-gyu, and his eldest son, Che, also married into the royal house. Koryŏsa 132.3a–b (Sin Ton’s biography); Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 177. Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (ha), 60–61. Koryŏsa 125.36a–38b (biography); for the Yangsŏng Yi, see MTP, 1: 46b–47a; STYSN 10.27a–29a. For a list of men serving under Sin Ton, see Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (sang), 77. There were only two examination graduates among them. For a list of the victims, see ibid. (ha), 109. King Kongmin was likely either homosexual or impotent. In 1372, he established a Boys’ Corps (Chaejewi), which he staffed with “young and nice-looking” boys; among them was Hong Yun (?–1374), Hong Ŏn-bak’s grandson. Worried about his sonlessness, the king incited the youths to have intercourse with his consorts Hye-bi and Ik-pi. When Hye-bi (Yi Che-hyŏn’s daughter) refused and became a nun, he forced Ik-pi on Hong Yun with the intention of declaring a resulting son his own. When the news that Ik-pi had become pregnant was transmitted to the king by the eunuch Ch’oe Man-saeng, Kongmin showed great relief but intended to kill Hong and Ch’oe to stop the secret from leaking out. Fearing for their lives, Hong Yun and his comrades took advantage of the king’s being very drunk that night and killed him. Both Ch’oe Man-saeng and Hong Yun were executed the next day on the orders of Yi In-im. Koryŏsa 89.30b–31a; Koryŏsa chŏryo 29.17b–18a, 20a–21a, 28b–29a. Chi Yun (?–1377) is recorded as having belonged to a small descent group, the Ch’ungju Chi, who were in-migrants from China. He is not, however, listed among the Chi in Ssijok wŏllyu 791, or MTP, 2: 245a. Yun reportedly was the son of a shaman and started his notorious career in the military under King Kongmin. He has a lengthy biography among the “treacherous ministers” (kansin) in Koryŏsa 125.41a–48b. Im Kyŏn-mi originated from a small county, P’yŏngt’aek (then Ch’ungch’ŏng Province), and rose in the battles against the Red Turbans. The P’yŏngt’aek Im are not listed in MTP. For Im’s biography, see Koryŏsa 126.19b–27a (kansin). Yŏm Hŭng-bang (?–1388) was a first-class examination graduate of 1357, but apparently started his advance to influence and power during the campaigns against the Red Turbans; in 1362, he received merit subject status. The Sŏwŏn [Pongsŏng] Yŏm are not listed in MTP, but in Ssijok wŏllyu 787. For Yŏm’s biography, see Koryŏsa 126.27a–29a (kansin). Ko Hye-ryŏng, “Yi In-im chŏngkwŏn”; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 172. Ko Hye-ryŏng, “Yi In-im chŏngkwŏn,” 53. For the details, see Yi Kyŏng-sik, Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oji, 7–96. See also several articles in Sipsa segi Koryŏ ŭi chŏngch’i wa sahoe. Vermeersch, The Power of the Buddhas, 305–12. Ch’oe Hae, Cholgo ch’ŏnbaek, as quoted in Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 261.

448

N o t e s t o pag e s 4 4 – 4 8

40 Koryŏsa 122.19b–21b. 41 Ibid., 122.23a–24b; Yi Kok, “Chunghŭng Tae-hwaŏm Po’gwang-sa ki,” in Kajŏng-jip, 3: 4a–5b. 42 See also the two recent articles by Ahn Juhn-Young, “The Way of Ours” and “The Merit of Not Making Merit.” They contain some interesting thoughts, although I do not agree with the general thrust of the author’s argument. 43 Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 34. 44 For a list of some sixteen early Neo-Confucian scholars, see Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 78, 81. With only one exception, they all were examination graduates, often in Yuan China as well as in Korea. For an account of their education and thought, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 14–27, and chap. 2. 45 For tables of Korean graduates of the Yuan examinations, see Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 100–110. 46 Pak Yong-un has traced the use of sa and sadaebu from Koguryŏ through Koryŏ in Koryŏ sahoe wa munbŏl, 71–173. Although these terms thus were old, they started to appear with some frequency in the documents from the late thirteenth century. Kim Tang-t’aek therefore concluded, in “Ch’ungnyŏlwang ŭi pogwi kwajŏng,” that the regular officialdom began to use them to distinguish themselves from the many lowborn men who surrounded King Ch’ungnyŏl. It seems, however, that the term was used more narrowly by the early Neo-Confucians. See also Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 86–89. 47 Yi Kok, Kajŏng-jip, kwŏn 7, as quoted by Pak Yong-un, “Koryŏ hugi kwŏnmun ŭi yongnye,” 53. 48 For a portrait of Yi Kok, see Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, chap. 3. The Hansan Yi were of hyangni ancestry of Hansan (Ch’ungch’ŏng), and Yi Kok was the first to pass the examinations in 1320, a feat he repeated in Yuan China. He held office in both countries. 49 Koryŏsa 73.11a–b. 50 Ibid., 74.32b–33a; Koryŏsa chŏryo 28.26a; Duncan, Origin of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 258. 51 Yi Saek’s wife was the granddaughter of Kwŏn Han-gong, examination passer of 1284, who was as a top official one of the most powerful representatives of the Andong Kwŏn in Kaesŏng. Koryŏsa 125.28a–31a. 52 Ibid., 115.1a–9a (“memorial submitted during mourning” [pokchung sangsŏ]). 53 Koryŏsa chŏryo 28.26a; Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (ha), 81. 54 For more on the introduction and nature of Neo-Confucian thought, see chapter 3. 55 Yi Chon-o belonged to the Kyŏngju Yi and was a collateral kinsman of Yi Che-hyŏn. Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 128. 56 Yi In-bok was Yi In-im’s elder brother and a disciple of Yi Che-hyŏn. He passed the Yuan examinations in 1342. 57 Yun T’aek’s (1289–1370) kin group was the Musong [Mujang] (Chŏlla Province) Yun, whose apical ancestor, Yang-bi, reportedly was a refugee from China in the late eleventh century and became a hyangni of Musong. MTP, 1: 281a–b; Koryŏsa 106.31b–32b. T’aek received his education from his paternal aunt’s husband, the famous scholar Yun Sŏn-jwa (1265–1343), a scion of the powerful P’ap’yŏng Yun. Sŏn-jwa had passed the examinations with top honors in 1288 under the aegis of An Hyang (1243–1306), who, one year later, went to the Yuan capital, from where he was one of the first to transmit Song Neo-Confucianism to Korea. T’aek passed the examinations in 1320, supervised by Yi Che-hyŏn, together with Yi Kok and such other early Neo-Confucian luminaries as Paek Mun-bo (?–1374) and An Po (1302–57); the latter was also a Yuan examination graduate (1345). For information on examination graduates and their presiding examiners, I rely on Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje. See also Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 14–20. 58 Pak Sang-ch’ung’s pon’gwan was Pannam, a small subcounty of Naju (Chŏlla Province). His greatgrandfather, the son of a Pannam hyangni, seems to have been the first examination graduate during King Wŏn’s reign (1259–74). Pak’s younger brother, Sang-jin, was a graduate of 1365. Ssijok wŏllyu, 163; MTP, 1: 204a; STYSN 35.10a; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 433, 474. 59 Chŏng To-jŏn was the scion of a small kin group serving as hyangni in Ponghwa (Kyŏngsang Province). MTP, 1: 252b; STYSN 25.24b–25a. His father successfully took the exams in 1330 and



60 61 62 63 64 65

66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75

76

77

78 79 80

N o t e s t o pa g e s 4 8 – 5 1

449

subsequently advanced to a high senior third-rank office. To-jŏn’s younger brother, To-bok, also was an exam graduate in 1385. For a family tree, see Han Yŏng-un, Chŏng To-jŏn sasang yŏn’gu, 19. Chŏng’s personal background is controversial because his mother is said to have been the daughter of a slave and herself a secondary wife; the mother of his wife is also said to have been a secondary wife. Since wives were not strictly distinguished in Koryŏ, this is not verifiable. Maema Kyōsaku disputes To-jŏn’s secondary-son background. See his “Shogetsuko,” 11. Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (ha), 82–90. Koryŏsa 115.6b–7a. Ibid., 112.17b–21b; Koryŏsa chŏryo 28.15a–18a. Koryŏsa chŏryo 29.12b; Min Hyŏn-gu, “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn” (ha), 110. Ko Hye-ryŏng, “Yi In-im chŏngkwŏn,” 21–25. Yi Ch’ŏm (1345–1405) belonged to the small descent group of the Sinp’yŏng Yi (Sinp’yŏng was a subcounty of Hongju, Ch’ungch’ŏng Province). Yi was famous for his programmatic “nine regulations” (ku’gyu), which he submitted to King Kongmin. He was released from exile in 1388 and held offices in early Chosŏn. MTP, 1: 145b; STYSN 19.6b; Koryŏsa 73.45a, 117.29b–46a. Koryŏsa chŏryo 30.6b–7a. Koryŏsa 115.1a–3a (“memorial submitted during mourning”). Ibid., 111.44b; Koryŏsa chŏryo 28.19b. Hong Sŭng-gi has analyzed Yi Saek’s landed property and found that it was spread over at least ten different places and was cultivated by slaves. See his Koryŏ sidae nobi, 162–73. Koryŏsa 115.7b–8a. Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 143–44; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 134, 180–81. Koryŏsa 121.21b–22a. Ch’oe Hae (1287–1340), a Kyŏngju Ch’oe and a descendant of the late Silla scholar, Ch’oe Ch’i-wŏn (857–?), was one of Yi Che-hyŏn’s protégés. For a portrait, see Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 241–62; for his views on Buddhism, 258–62. See his biography in Koryŏsa, 115; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 103, 180–81. Yi Sŏng-gye (1335–1408), pon’gwan Chŏnju, originated in the northeast, where the descendants of Sŏng-gye’s seventh-generation ancestor, Yi Ŭi-bang (?–1174), had fled after Ŭi-bang, one of the leaders of the 1170 military revolt, was killed by his colleagues. Over the generations, the Yi built up their bases in the Hamhŭng area (Hamgyŏng Province). From the early 1370s, Sŏng-gye was engaged as a military leader against the Red Turbans in the north and the Japanese marauders along the coasts. For helping to retake Kaesŏng from the Red Turbans, he was rewarded with merit subject status. But until 1383, he had no foothold at the center and was therefore politically without influence. He was always concerned about the weakness of the military because of a shortage of provisions. For a genealogical table of Yi’s ancestors, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 334–45. The best study on the economic problems besetting the last few decades of Koryŏ and Yi Sŏnggye’s takeover of power remains Yi Sang-baek, Yijo kŏnguk. Yi stated that the fundamental reason for Koryŏ’s demise was the breakdown of its land system, and that Yi Sŏng-gye’s foremost concern was to recover a solid economic basis for the military. For the territorial conflicts in the north between the Ming and Koyrŏ, see Clark, “Sino-Korean Tributary Relations,” 274–75. Cho Chun was the great-grandson of Cho In-gyu and an exam graduate of 1374. He started his career in the fight against the Japanese pirates. When he submitted his reform memorials he was the chief censor. For his biography, see Koryŏsa 118.1a–34a; for Cho Chun’s reform memorials, 78.20b–30b. Ibid., 118.3b–4a. The various land reform proposals are discussed in Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 206–9; Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 292–99. T’osŏng denotes a local descent group that identified itself with a Chinese-style surname and an ancestral seat or choronym (pon’gwan). Although this identification process, according to Yi Su-gŏn, began on a large scale during the transition from United Silla to early Koryŏ, the term

450

81 82 83

84 85 86 87 88

89 90 91 92

93 94

95

N o t e s t o pa g e s 5 2 – 5 4

t’osŏng apparently was first used in late Koryŏ/early Chosŏn, especially by the compilers of the Sejong sillok chiriji. This inventory lists some 500 pon’gwan and close to 4,000 t’osŏng (exclusive of subcategories such as “defunct surnames” [mangsŏng]) for the entire country. See Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, chap. 3. Much of this material is reproduced, often with slight modifications, in Yi’s Han’guk ŭi sŏngssi, esp. chap. 4. The Geographic Gazetteer comprises kwŏn 148–55 of the Sejong sillok. For an analysis, see Yi T’aejin, “15segi huban’gi ŭi kwa myŏngjok ŭisik,” 232–34. The Gazetteer lists eighty individuals, three from Silla, sixty-three from Koryŏ, and fourteen from early Chosŏn. The Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam, begun in 1432 and completed in 1481, was later augmented and published in 1530 as Sinjŭng Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam. Among its compilers were representatives of the most powerful descent groups active in early Chosŏn. Sŏng Hyŏn, Yongjae ch’onghwa, 10.272–73. [Ch’angnyŏng] Sŏng Hyŏn was one of the most important officials in the second half of the fifteenth century. A munkwa graduate of 1462, he held many high culture-related offices and was the compiler of a collection of Koryŏ song texts and of Miscellanea of Yongchae, in which he collected information on political, social, institutional, and cultural aspects of early Chosŏn. For a chart comparing the entries of the three documents, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 6. Yi Su-gŏn’s counts do not always coincide with those by Yi T’ae-jin, “15segi huban’gi ŭi kwa myŏngjok ŭisik.” The Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe are not listed by Sŏng Hyŏn in Yongjae ch’onghwa, and there are no Chosŏndynasty Ch’oe in STYSN. These data are based on Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, MTP, STYSN, and Sŏng Hyŏn’s Yongjae ch’onghwa. MTP, 1: 128b–30a; STYSN 28.17a–31a (mentions ten Koryŏ Yi); Sejong sillok chiriji 150.22b (mentions three Koryŏ Yi); Sŏng Hyŏn, Yongjae ch’onghwa; Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 308–9. MTP, 1: 252b; STYSN 25.22a–25b. Chŏng To-jŏn was not born in Ponghwa, but in Tanyang (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province), his mother’s home. He had four sons, two of whom died with him in 1398; the other two held various offices under T’aejong and Sejong. For a brief biography, see Han Yŏng-u, Chŏng To-jŏn, 20–32. The apical ancestor of the Ch’ŏngju Han was a merit subject of Koryŏ T’aejo, but they ascended into the power elite only in late Koryŏ. MTP, 2: 93a–b; STYSN 15.13a–15a; Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 285–85; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 73. For the Ch’ŏngju Chŏng, see MTP, 1: 248a–b; STYSN 15.13b–14a; Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 286. The more successful descent group of Ch’ŏngju were the Han. For the Ŭiryŏng Nam, see MTP, 2: 152b–58b; STYSN 31.27a–31a; Sŏng Hyŏn, Yongjae ch’onghwa. The fifty-two merit subjects of 1392 were divided into three ranks. Those discussed above were among the seventeen men rewarded with first rank. All are profiled by Han Yŏng-u, Chosŏn chŏn’gi sahoe, 117–80. See also Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae seryŏk, 7–23. For a brief critique of these two works, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 99–100. For a description of the early Chosŏn government apparatus, see Wagner, The Literati Purges, 12–17; Chŏng Tu-hŭi, ”Chosŏn kŏn’guk ch’o’gi t’ongch’i ch’eje.” For the grade structure and the distribution of officials by branch and grade, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 102–3. There was another dividing line between ranks six and seven: “officials attending court” (ch’amsang kwan) and “officials not attending court” (ch’am-ha kwan). Each month there were four court audiences for civil and military officials to pay respect to the king. The first assignments of all officials, whether munkwa graduate or not, was at rank six. For details, see Pak Hong-gap, “Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa kŭpcheja.” The “compensation system” (taegaje) allowed an official who was not eligible to advance beyond lower senior rank three to bestow upon a son, son-in-law, younger brother, or nephew any additional rank he received whenever all officials enjoyed a “rank rise” (kaja or pyŏlga) on the occasion of a national celebration. Such compensation ranks could be received several times, but were limited in 1623 to senior fifth rank. The system was not in effect during Koryŏ or in China, nor



96

97 98 99 100

101 102 103 104

105

106 107

108

109 110

N o t e s t o pa g e s 5 4 – 5 7

451

was it ever codified as law in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn; however, it operated in Korea during Chosŏn until 1890 and created a large number of ranked men without actual office. Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn ch’o’gi yangban yŏn’gu, 85–95; Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Chosŏn hugi sahoe sinbunsa, 13–58. Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn ch’o’gi yangban, 16. It should be noted that the term yangban, which began to appear in late Koryŏ, cannot be found in the Chosŏn’s basic law code, Kyŏngguk taejŏn. There, the terms taeso wŏn’in or taeso inwŏn, “high and low officials,” are used to designate the bureaucratic hierarchy. The terms saryu and sarim are often used synonymously with sajok. See Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn ch’o’gi yangban, 4–17; Ko Hye-ryŏng has also discussed these terms at length in Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 7–45, especially the table on 35–38. Duncan expressed similar thoughts in Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 88–89. T’aejong sillok 33.17a–b (1417). At times, the government did stipulate the parameters of what it considered sajok for special purposes. These demarcations, however, were situational and temporary, did not encompass all sajok, and thus did not amount to a once-and-for-all definition of “elite.” Kim Sŏng-u’s assertion that the emergence of sajok as a discernible social group dates from the beginning of the sixteenth century, when the government stipulated specific groups in its deportation policy (chŏn’ga sabyŏn), is therefore questionable. See Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 265–77. For an extensive discussion of this issue, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 242–59. According to Song, those who were “automatically” recognized as sajok either had a “distinguished official” (hyŏn’gwan) among their four ancestors (sajo) or were a son or grandson of a civil or military examination graduate. Taejŏn husongnok (1543), 165–56. Two more batches of merit subjects were created in 1398 and 1401. For some details, see note 123. For the data on state councilors, see Wagner, Literati Purges, 13. MTP, 1: 164b–165b. See also Kim Sa-hyŏng’s many descendants listed in STYSN 24.18a–20a. Kim Sa-hyŏng belonged to the “old” Andong Kim, who derived descent from I-ch’ŏng. See also Clark, “Chosŏn’s Founding Fathers,” 31–34. For statistical information I rely on Kim Ch’ang-hyŏn, Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa; Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl; and Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty. The numbers differ slightly from author to author, often due to the differing time periods considered. Nevertheless, the general trends emerge clearly enough. Between 1393 and 1494—Kim’s period of research—the civil service examinations were held seventy-nine times, producing 1,799 graduates. Kim Ch’ang-hyŏn, Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa, 50–51, 65–69. For name lists of all exam passers, see Chosŏn sidae munkwa paeksŏ. A quick check of the thirty-three graduates of the first examination, administered in the spring of 1393, reveals only four with identifiable fathers, and the majority seems to have come from outside the capital. Sŏng Hyŏn, Yongjae ch’onghwa, 2.39. The other group was Sŏng’s own kin group, the Ch’angnyŏng Sŏng. Yi Chip is said to have held office in late Koryŏ as well as in early Chosŏn (which is clearly not correct); he befriended such early Neo-Confucian adepts as Yi Saek and Chŏng Mong-ju. His father, Tang (n.d.), seems to have taken the Royal Academy examination (Kukchagam si), but no record about subsequent office holding exists. Ssijok wŏllyu 85; STYSN 6.22b–23a; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 215, 478. Yi Kŭk-pae (1422–95) and Yi Kŭk-kam (1427–72), examination graduates of 1447 and 1444, respectively, were named merit subjects upon King Sejo’s enthronement in 1455, and Yi Kŭk-chŭng (1431–94), munkwa of 1456, became a merit subject of King Sŏngjong (1471). See Yi T’ae-jin, “15segi huban’gi ŭi ,” 268–71. For the details, see ibid.; Kim Ch’ang-hyŏn, Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa, 60, 68–69; Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 60, 120–21. In chap. 3 of his The Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, Duncan has carefully weighed the data to demonstrate the remarkable continuation of the ruling stratum from late Koryŏ to early Chosŏn.

452

111

112 113 114

115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129

130

N o t e s t o pa g e s 5 7 – 6 2

For additional statistical information, see Yi Tong-hŭi, “Chosŏn ch’o’gi kwaninch’ŭng yŏn’gu.” In his investigation, Yi broadened his sample and included the seven councilors of state and the ministers of the six ministries in the period between 1400 and 1469 and came up with 215 men in 110 descent groups. For a list of descent groups surviving into early Chosŏn, see also Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 344–45. MTP, 2: 209b–10b; STYSN 39.43b–47a (mentions Hŭi and two of his three sons, both of whom entered office through protection; one became prime minister under King Sejo); Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 548; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 139, 141; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 97. MTP, 2: 139b–40a; STYSN 27.4a–7a; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 140; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 97. Hŏ Cho’s father was magistrate of Kaesŏng, which indicates that the Hŏ had moved to the capital sometime in late Koryŏ. For further details, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 140–41; and Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 94–97. MTP, 2: 110a–14b (there are two different Kang kin groups; Hŭi-maeng’s group allegedly started with Admiral I-sik in the late sixth century); STYSN 30.1a–23a; for their examination success, see Kim Ch’ang-hyŏn, Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa, 60 (31 passers in the fifteenth century, superseded only by the Andong Kwŏn); Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 52, 120–21 (the total number of munkwa graduates was 218); Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 139; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 117. I owe these figures to Edward W. Wagner. Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 302. For a partial translation of this edict, see Sourcebook of Korean Civilization, 1: 480–82. See table in Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 25. For more on Chŏng To-jŏn’s and other scholars’ foundation texts, see chapter 3. King T’aejo had eight sons, the first six borne by his first wife, Han-ssi, who died in 1391, the last two borne by his second wife, Kang-ssi. Following Kang-ssi’s wish, T’aejo eventually designated her second son, Pang-sŏk, as crown prince. Koryŏsa 119.29a (Chŏng To-jŏn’s biography). For the details, see Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 23–40. See also the detectivelike investigation of Chŏng To-jŏn’s life and activities by Yi Sang-baek, “Chŏng To-jŏn non.” Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 41–54. Kwŏn Kŭn (1352–1409), great-grandson of Kwŏn Pu, was the descendant of a distinguished Andong Kwŏn descent group. For his contribution to the founding of the Chosŏn, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 94 and passim 95–245. Min Che (1339–1408) was a scion of the powerful Yŏhŭng Min and an exam passer of 1357; he had an illustrious official career during the last decades of Koryŏ and early Chosŏn. MTP, 2: 142a–b. T’aejong sillok 22.31a (1411); for the details, see Kim Sŏng-jun, “T’aejong ŭi oech’ŏk chegŏ”; Clark, “Chosŏn Founding Fathers, 34–35; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 233–34. MTP, 2: 116b. Interestingly, Sim On’s son was married to a daughter of one of the Min brothers killed in 1416—testifying to the close intermarriages among royal in-laws. In 1404, King T’aejong designated his eldest son, Prince Che (1394–1462), as crown prince. But because it became clear that Che was not suited for rulership, his younger brother, the later King Sejong (1397–1450), took his place in 1418. In 1409, T’aejong abolished the enfeoffment of royal in-laws (oech’ŏk), and in 1414, he established the Royal House Administration (Tollyŏngbu) to administer them through a rank-one office. MHBG 217.2a–4b; Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 39–44. Equally, a Royal Kinsmen Administration (Chongch’inbu) and a Royal Sons-in-law Administration (Ŭibinbu) were established. MHBG 216.2b, 217.4b–5a; Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 35–44. For this misconception and its denouement, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 338n67. For the territorial dimensions of the Ming–early Chosŏn relationship, see Clark, “Sino-Korean Tributary Relations,” 273–79.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 6 2 – 6 5

453

131 Although the investiture and seal for Chŏngjong were requested in the ninth month of 1400, the transfer of the throne to T’aejong took place only two months later, was reported to the Ming shortly thereafter, and approved in the spring of 1401. 132 For a description of the tributary missions to and from Ming China, see Clark, “Sino-Korean Tributary Relations,” 279–84. 133 Morohashi Tetsuji, Daikanwa jiten, no. 26676, explains the term with “the emperor ploughs in person the fields attached to the ancestral shrines [chomyo].” 134 During Koryŏ, the sacrifice to Heaven was apparently performed on thirteen occasions, a few times in the early twelfth century and more often during the Mongol time. The most important Koryŏ work on rituals, the Rituals of Past and Present Minutely Established (Kogŭm sangjŏngnye) by Ch’oe Yun-ŭi (1102–62), is no longer extant, and the information on state rituals in the monograph (chi) on rituals in Koryŏsa, kwŏn 59ff., is fragmentary. Yi Pŏm-jik has attempted a reconstruction of the Chinese-style state rituals in his Han’guk chungse yesasang yŏn’gu, 68ff. See also Sohn, “Social History of the Early Yi Dynasty,” 93n34. 135 Breuker, When the Truth Is Everywhere, 174–75. 136 The Koryŏ royal house maintained, for example, only five, instead of seven, ancestral shrines, and the royal dragon had only four instead of the imperial five claws. 137 The Altar of Heaven (Wŏn’gu) was renamed “Round Altar” (Wŏndan)—a slight semantic change that was to signal Korea’s inferior position vis-à-vis the Ming. 138 T’aejo sillok, 6.18a–19b (1394). Chŏng To-jŏn was accompanied by Cho Chun and Kim Sang-hyŏng, all three T’aejo merit subjects. 139 The rite was performed once more by Sejo, who insisted on performing it in person. Sohn, “Social History of the Early Yi Dynasty,” 12–47; Yi Pŏm-jik, Han’guk chungse yesasang, 230–32, 307. After Sejo’s death in 1468, the rite was not performed until 1897, when Korea severed its tributary ties with China and proclaimed itself an empire. 140 The MHPG, for instance, asserts that though the sacrifice to Heaven had occasionally been performed from Silla and Koryŏ to the early Chosŏn, there was no fixed ritual program. MHPG 54.1b. In When Truth Is Everywhere, 102–6, Breuker gives a few examples of how references in Koryŏsa to the Koryŏ king and the territory he ruled over differ from contemporary ones found on steles.

Chapter 3 1 The Five Classics are the Classic of Changes (Yijing), Springs and Autumns Annals (Chunqiu), Classic of Documents (Shangshu), Classic of Poetry (Shijing), and the Records of Ritual (Liji). At times, the Rituals of Zhou (Zhouli) was included to make up the Six Classics. The English renderings of the titles are based on Elman and Kern, Statecraft and Classical Learning. Zhu Xi did not write commentaries on Springs and Autumns Annals and Records of Ritual. 2 For a discussion of the development of the Neo-Confucian tradition, see Bol, “Introduction” to “This Culture of Ours” and Neo-Confucianism in History. 3 For short notes on the early transmission of Confucianism to Korea, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 14–16. 4 A few Koreans passed the Northern Song examinations, the last in 1117. See table in Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ kwagŏ, 250. A number of Korean scholars surmise that already by the beginning of the eleventh century Neo-Confucianism was known in Korea, but there is little evidence for such an assumption. See Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 14–16, 310n30. 5 Koryŏsa 30.19b (King Ch’ungnyŏl’s reign); Koryŏsa chŏryo 21.14b. As only the name of this office is recorded, its function remains unknown. It was apparently part of the Eastern Expeditionary Field Headquarters (Chŏngdong haengsŏng) that the Mongols had established in Korea for preparing their Japan expeditions. After these ended in disastrous failure, the headquarters no longer had a mission. 6 For more details, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 15–19. 7 Koryŏsa chŏryo 24.3a–b.

454

N o t e s t o pa g e s 6 6 – 67

8 For Xu Heng, see de Bary, Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy, esp. pt. 1. See also Chan, “Chu Hsi and Yüan Neo-Confucianism.” 9 Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations, 29–38, 444–45. 10 MHBG 185.33a–35a; Ko Pyŏng-ik, Tonga kyosŏpsa, 257–59; Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ kwagŏ, 250–51; Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 78. 11 It is not certain whether the Koreans were considered as belonging to the Se-mu, “[people] of different category” (Chin. Se-mu; Kor. Saengmok, i.e., non-Han) or to the Han Chinese. Yi Chehyŏn apparently complained around 1350 that the Se-mu were ranked higher than the Koreans. I owe this information to John Duncan. Some scholars do include them among the Hanren, i.e., the Chinese, depending on whether the latter term is interpreted according to ethnic or geographical considerations. For a brief note, see Endicott-West, Mongolian Rule in China, 142n51. 12 Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations, 34–36. 13 Koryŏsa 74.8a. One of the three was Pak In-gan (?–1343), who had passed the Koryŏ exams of 1315 with top honors. There is no information about the two others. Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 458. Pak served later in high offices. 14 The “ancient[-style] prose” movement (Chin. guwen; Kor. komun) started in Northern Song China and propagated the recovery of the ancient sages’ teachings for renovating the contemporary social and political institutions. For details, see Bol, “This Culture of Ours,” intro. and chap. 5. 15 Chŏng To-jŏn, preface to Yi Sung-in, Toŭn sŏnsaeng chip, 2a–b. 16 Duncan has explored this possibility. See his Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 241–46. 17 Yi Che-hyŏn’s biography in the Koryŏsa 110.21a–42a, ends with the rather puzzling statement that Yi had two shortcomings: that he did not enjoy sŏngnihak (learning of nature and principle) and that his actions lacked rationality. In his The Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 247–48, Duncan took this statement at face value—erroneously, I think, because he read this sentence in isolation and not within the preceding context, which recalls the enmity between Yi and Sin Ton. Yi’s biography is partly based on the tomb inscription authored by Yi Saek, who noted the rift between Yi and Sin Ton, quoted verbatim in the Koryŏsa. For Yi Saek’s tomb inscription, see Yi Che-hyŏn, Ikchae munjip, chi, 1a–8a. The above “evaluation,” however, must have been added later. As is well known, the compilation of the Koryŏsa during Sejong’s reign was much contested, but it is nevertheless difficult to understand how such a misleading statement could have been left in the Koryŏsa’s final redaction of 1451. Even before that time, Yi Che-hyŏn was called the “only transmitter of Tohak after An Hyang” and mentioned as a candidate for canonization in the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo). See, for instance, Sejong sillok 59.15b–16a (1433). It is to be regretted that there is to date no comprehensive and contextualized biography of Yi Che-hyŏn. 18 Conceivably, the Koryŏ scholars came to appreciate the value of the Zhouli as a handbook of administrative reform through the Regulations of the Zhizheng Era [1341–68] (Zhizheng tiaoge), in the preface of which Ouyang Xuan (1283–1357)—a descendant of Ouyang Xiu (1007–72) and one of Yi Che-hyŏn’s teachers in Beijing—praised the Zhouli as a vital source of statutory law. See Langlois, “Law, Statecraft,” 116. 19 MHPG 246.15a, under the heading “[Korean] statutory works” (chŏnjangnyu). Kim Ku-yong’s work is known only by this brief reference. Yi Saek’s preface is in Mo’gŭn mun’go 9.10b–12a. The edition of the Zhouli, first printed in Korea with movable type in 1403, was the Illustrated and Annotated Rituals of Zhou (Zuantu huzhu Zhouli), a comprehensive Song compilation with a great number of illustrations and commentaries. See Provine, Essays on Sino-Korean Musicology, chap. 4. 20 The Chosŏn kyŏngguk chŏn is in Chŏng To-jŏn, Sambong-jip, kwŏn 7. For summaries and evaluations, see Han Yŏng-u, Chŏng To-jŏn, 38–40, and Chung, “Chŏng To-jŏn: ‘Architect.’ ” 21 Elman and Kern, Statecraft and Classical Learning, 334–45. 22 Pyŏn Kye-ryang (1369–1430), the son of a high official and a disciple of Yi Saek and Kwŏn Kŭn, passed the munkwa twice, in 1385 and 1407. Thanks to his great intellectual abilities, he served in high government positions and was famous as an expert stylist in charge of Korea’s diplomatic correspondence.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 6 8 –7 0

455

23 Kyŏngguk taejŏn sŏ (preface to the Great Code of Administration). The author of the preface was the renowned scholar Sŏ Kŏ-jŏng (1420–88). Among the compilers of this code were such eminent scholar-officials as Ch’oe Hang (1409–74), Sin Suk-chu (1417–75), and Kang Hŭi-maeng (1424–83). 24 I borrow the terms “position” and “identity” from Bol, “Neo-Confucianism and Local Society,” 241–42. 25 For a brief overview of early research sources and institutions, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 111–18. 26 An examination was apparently held in 1392, but the first full-fledged munkwa examination took place in the spring of 1393. For the slate of the successful candidates, see Chosŏn sidae munkwa paeksŏ, 1: 15–17. For a discussion of the Chosŏn examination system, see Duncan, “Examinations and Orthodoxy in Chosŏn Dynasty Korea,” 72–78. 27 Military examinations (mukwa), for which there was no precursor in Koryŏ, were first established in 1402 to recruit members for the military branch (muban) of the central officialdom. For the military examination system, see Park, Between Dreams and Reality. 28 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 212–25. The saengwŏn-chinsa examinations were collectively called sama examinations; “lower examinations” (sokwa) stood in contrast to the munkwa, called “upper examinations” (taekwa). During the Chosŏn dynasty, the saengwŏn-chinsa examinations were held 186 times and produced close to 48,000 graduates. The examinations were scheduled in such a way that a candidate could take both in the same year. For the details, see Song June-ho, Yijo saengwŏn-chinsasi, and Ch’oe Chin-ok, Chosŏn sidae saengwŏn-chinsa, esp. 40; see also Yi Sŏng-mu, Han’guk ŭi kwagŏ. 29 The Elementary Learning was presumably first brought to Korea in the early fourteenth century and adopted as a compulsory text for beginners on Kwŏn Kŭn’s recommendation in 1407. As Kelleher has pointed out, the complexity of the book’s language and contents may indicate that Zhu Xi intended it less as a primer for children than as a primary introductory text to the moral life for any beginner at any age. For a detailed description of the book’s origin and contents, see Kelleher, “Back to Basics.” 30 The Zhuzi jiali is said to have been Zhu Xi’s last work and was finished by his disciples. It outlines the four domestic rites: capping, wedding, funeral, and ancestor worship. For an extensive discussion of this work, see Ebrey, Confucianism and Family Rituals, and her translation of the Jiali, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals. 31 Whereas until the early eighteenth century, the great majority of munkwa graduates had first taken either the saengwŏn or the chinsa examination or both, toward the end of the dynasty the number of those who directly sat the munkwa examination as “young scholar” (yuhak) greatly increased. See Song June-ho, Yijo saengwŏn-chinsasi, 36–37. 32 For a study of the National Confucian Academy in early Chosŏn, see Yi Sŏng-mu, “Sŏnch’o ŭi Sŏnggyun’gwan.” 33 T’aejong sillok 2.23a (1401). Even though the sample is small, Duncan has shown that in the fifteenth century the majority of examination questions concerned statecraft/economy and border defense. See his “Examinations and Orthodoxy in Chosŏn Dynasty Korea,” 84–86. 34 Kwon, “The Royal Lecture of Early Yi Korea (1),” 61. For the literature read by Kings Yejong and Injong of Koryŏ, see list on 105. 35 Dardess, Confucianism and Autocracy, 185. 36 For detailed discussions of the Royal Lectures in early Chosŏn, see Kwon, “The Royal Lecture of Early Yi Korea (1)”; Sohn, “Social History of the Early Yi Dynasty,” 47–88; and de Bary, NeoConfucian Orthodoxy, 94. 37 De Bary, Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy, 111; for a discussion of Zhen De-xiu’s work, see ibid., 98–126. For King Sejong’s curriculum, see Kwon, “The Royal Lecture in Early Yi Korea (1),” app. 2. 38 [Yŏnan] Yi Sŏk-hyŏng (1415–77) and [Namyang] Hong Kyŏng-son (1409–81) were munkwa graduates of 1441 and 1439, respectively, served in the highest offices, and were made merit subjects by King Sejo. They thus belonged to the powerful capital ruling stratum.

456

N o t e s t o pa g e s 7 0 –7 2

39 Sŏngjong sillok 17.4b–5a (1472); 43.9a–b (1474); 76.3b–4b (1477). Yi Sŏk-hyŏng’s work was later criticized as being sacrilegious and was not printed. 40 The royal lecturers came from a wide spectrum of top bureaucratic positions. See Wagner, Literati Purges, 16–17. 41 Sejong sillok 23.29a (1424). 42 For Ryang Sŏng-ji’s “Discussion on the Kingly Way,” see Sourcebook of Korean Civilization, 1: 500–502. 43 [Sŏnsan] Kim Chong-jik’s immediate forebears were local hyangni in Sŏnsan County (Kyŏngsang Province), but his father, Kim Suk-cha (1389–1456), was a munkwa graduate of 1419. As an early student of Tohak, Suk-cha is said to have continued the teachings of Kil Chae (1353–1419), who in turn was a disciple of Chŏng Mong-ju. Kim Chong-jik received his first education from his father and followed him to Seoul, when the latter took up office there. Among Kim Suk-cha’s “teachers and colleagues” (sau) were the most illustrious officials and scholars of the time so that Chong-jik grew up in a highly educated milieu. For Kim Suk-cha’s biography (written by his son), see TYSUR 3.63–67. For an assessment of Kim Chong-jik’s economic situation, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam sarimp’a, 187–91. 44 Kim Chong-jik, “Sin’gan Churye pal,” in Chŏmp’ilchae munjip 2.3a–4a. 45 Yi Pyŏng-hyu has characterized Kim Chong-jik as a transitional figure, mainly because Kim did not repudiate literary styles. See his Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 29–31. T’oegye, too, dismissed Kim’s scholarship for being “outstanding only in flowery literary style, as evident from his munjip.” Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 4: Ŏnhaengnok 5.5a. Kim Chong-jik’s works were destroyed as part of his punishment in 1498 so that the extant oeuvre consists mainly of poetry. Wagner, The Literati Purges, 44. A few letters and short writings as well as some biographical material were later published as Collected Works (Chŏmp’ilchae sŏnsaeng munjip). 46 For a collection of essays on Kim Koeng-p’il, see Hanhwŏndang ŭi saengae wa sasang. 47 A resident of Hamyang County (Kyŏngsang Province), Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang entered the National Confucian Academy in 1480 and passed the munkwa in 1490. Afterward he held a few minor posts on recommendation, but spent most of his life outside Seoul. For his economic background, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam sarimp’a, 191–92. 48 The majority of Kim’s disciples seem to have excelled in literary styles, statecraft, and exemplary comportment. For a table of Kim Chong-jik’s disciples and their office holding, see Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 19–21. For an interesting overview of their various kin and local connections, see ibid., 15–16. For a review of Kim Chong-jik’s scholarly development and catalogues of his disciples, see also Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 311–27. 49 The censorial offices consisted of the Office of the Inspector General (Sahŏnbu) and the Office of the Censor General (Saganwŏn); they were collectively known as Taegan. A third agency, which often functioned as a censorial office, was the Office of the Special Counselors (Hongmungwan), established in 1478. The three offices were together often called the “Three Agencies” (Samsa). The Office of the Special Counselors was especially powerful since all of its officials concurrently held positions in the Office of the Royal Lectures (Kyŏngyŏn). For a study of the censorial offices, see Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn sidae ŭi taegan. 50 For name lists, see Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 37–41. 51 For the issues involved in Sŏngjong’s reign, see Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŏn’gwan-ŏllon, 220–36. Also Wagner, Literati Purges. 52 Sŏngjong sillok 169.6b (1484). Only roughly half of Kim Chong-jik’s disciples, however, hailed from Kyŏngsang Province. 53 [Kimhae] Kim Il-son, a munkwa graduate of 1486, had a father and an uncle as well as two younger brothers who were munkwa graduates. 54 For the details leading up to the Purges of 1498 and 1504, see Wagner, Literati Purges, 23–69; a list of the victims of 1498 is on 183–84. 55 Sarim is difficult to translate. If translated literally as “scholars of the forest,” it gives the wrong



56

57 58 59

60 61 62 63 64 65

66 67 68 69 70

N o t e s t o pa g e s 7 2 –7 5

457

impression that these men came from the provinces, which they did not. Sarim was used as a term for laudatory behavior of a literatus already in Koryŏ. See Ko Hye-ryŏng, Koryŏ hugi sadaebu, 32–33. It appears occasionally in the late fifteenth century, but was used as a designation of Kim Chong-jik’s and his followers’ groups most frequently—537 times—during King Chungjong’s reign. It faded out of use in the second half of the sixteenth century. For some definitions, see Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 5–10. Cho Kwang-jo, born in the capital, was a Hanyang Cho. Though his immediate antecedents had not particularly distinguished themselves, his great-great-grandfather, Cho On (1347–1417), whose mother was a daughter of King T’aejo’s father, had been made a merit subject on three occasions. Cho Kwang-jo’s grandfather, Cho Ch’ung-son, was exiled by King Sejo because of his support for Tanjong. Cho Kwang-jo passed the chinsa examination in 1510 and the munkwa in 1515. For a listing of his principal offices, see Wagner, Literati Purges, 81–82. For the Purge of 1519, see ibid., 70–120. See also Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Cho Kwang-jo. The Purge of 1545 (Ŭlsa sahwa), however, had no connection to the sarim. The Reflections on Things at Hand is an anthology of Neo-Confucian thought compiled by Zhu Xi in collaboration with his friend Lü Zuqian (1137–81). It contains excerpts from the works of Zhou Dunyi, Cheng Hao, Cheng Yi, and Zhang Zai that concern a man’s immediate spiritual and social life. Cheng Yi was the major source of quotes. For an English translation, see Reflections on Things at Hand, trans. Chan. Chungjong sillok 76.39b (1533). Ibid., 26.40a–b (1516); 29.16b–17a (1517); 31.42b–44a (1518); Cho Kwang-jo, Chŏngam-jip 3.1b, 4.8b. See also Deuchler, “Self-Cultivation.” Kang Chu-jin, “Sarim chŏngch’i wa Hanhwŏndang,” 83. Kim Chong-jik, Chŏmp’ilchae munjip, yŏnbo, 9b, 15b; purok, 1.28a. Numerous biographies in TYSUR give such evidence. Modern Korean historiography tends to make a sharp division between the “political establishment,” the hun’gup’a, and the sarimp’a, conceptualizing the two as clearly defined groups. The term hun’gu, “official of long-standing merit,” was used in the fifteenth century with some frequency to designate individuals who belonged to eminent descent groups (including the royal Yi), occupied key offices in the central government, and/or were affinally connected to the royal house. Among the special privileges they enjoyed was immunity from heavy corporal punishment. Not all high officials (taesin), however, were recognized as hun’gu. A quintessential hun’gu taesin was, for instance, Chŏng In-ji (1396–1478), the high-placed scholar-official who was prominently involved in laying the political, legal, and cultural basis of the new dynasty. Belonging to the descent group of the Hadong Chŏng, with Koryŏ roots (mentioned in Sŏng Hyŏn’s list), Chŏng’s eldest son was married to King Sejo’s daughter. Another example is Chŏng’s close friend, [Ch’ŏngju] Han Myŏng-hoe (1415–87), who, though he failed the civil examinations, advanced to high offices and gave two daughters in marriage to the royal house (one of them became King Sŏngjong’s queen). Chŏng In-ji and Han Myŏng-hoe, among a number of others, including Ryang Sŏng-ji, supported King Sejo and were therefore later disparaged as immoral power seekers. The term was less in use after Sŏngjong’s time; it always referred to certain individuals and never to a “party” (p’a). To regard the hun’gu as a party is thus a misleading construct of modern historiography. See also Chŏng Tu-hŭi, “Chosŏn chŏn’gi,” 207–15. See especially Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn sidae ŭi taegan, 124–34; Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 34–41, 66–75. These data are from Wagner, “Kinship and Power in Yi Korea.” For a description of the 1519 Examination, see Song June-ho et al., Chosŏn sidae munkwa paeksŏ, 179–82. See also Chŏng Tu-hŭi, “Chosŏn chŏn’gi,” 211–15. Kim Chong-jik’s older brother, Chong-sŏk (1423–60), also obtained a munkwa degree (1456). Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Cho Kwang-jo, 70. Zhu Xi mentioned in his preface to the Doctrine of the Mean that Zhou Dunyi and the Cheng

458

71

72 73 74

N o t e s t o pa g e s 7 6 – 8 1

brothers had “repossessed” Confucius’s way of learning, which had been lost since Mencius, and continued the “succession of the Way.” See Bol, Neo-Confucianism in History, 132. For a brief appreciation of Chŏng Mong-ju, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 99–101. For the discussions leading up to Chŏng Mong-ju’s canonization, see Wagner, The Literati Purges, 88–92. By the beginning of the Chosŏn, three Koreans had been enshrined in the Munmyo: An Hyang, the “transmitter” of Neo-Confucianism to Korea (1319), the early Sillan scholar Sŏl Ch’ong (1022), and the late Silla scholar Ch’oe Ch’i-wŏn (1020). Today the Munmyo houses the tablets of Confucius, of his two principal disciples and his grandson, of Mencius, of the “ten Confucius disciples,” of the “Six Song worthies,” and of eighteen Korean worthies. For the canonization of Kim Koeng-p’il and Ch’oe Yŏ-ch’ang in 1610, see Deuchler, “SelfCultivation,” 24–33. There is no mention of Tohak in Kim Chong-jik’s obituary. Sŏngjong sillok 268.19a–b (1492). For the details, see Deuchler, “Self-Cultivation,” 17–19. Chŏng To-jŏn’s absence from any list is also connected to the fact that he had not supported King T’aejong in the first succession struggle in 1398. Although T’aejong forgave him later, Chŏng’s works were not printed until 1492. Neither Kwŏn Kŭn nor Chŏng To-jŏn is enshrined in the Munmyo.

Part II Introduction 1 T’aejong sillok 34.6a (1417). 2 For the institution of the Rank Land Law and its successor, see Yi Kyŏng-sik, Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oji; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 206–11; for a critical assessment of the economic situation in the early Chosŏn, see Yi Hŏn-ch’ang, Han’guk kyŏngje t’ongsa, 41–92. 3 See, for example, the memorial of the Grand Chancellery in Koryŏsa 39.37b–38a. 4 For a discussion of the hyangni problem during the transition period, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 190–95. For a study of the hallyang, see Han Yŏng-u, “Yŏmal Sŏnch’o hallyang.” 5 The six provinces constituting this core area are Kyŏnggi, Ch’ungch’ŏng, Kyŏngsang, Chŏlla, Kangwŏn, and Hwanghae. 6 For a table upon which these calculations are based, see Yi T’ae-jin, “Sarimp’a ŭi yuhyangso,” 133. Prof. Yi’s figures are based on only the six provinces of the core area, with their roughly 2,800 kin groups. For coverage of all provinces, with close to 4,000 kin groups, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 87. 7 For simplicity’s sake, I refer to all magistracies as “counties,” regardless of their size and population, and differentiate only when necessary. 8 Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 243–44. The anti-hyangni law was expanded when it was promulgated as “penal measures against wicked hyangni” (wŏnak hyangni ch’ŏbŏlbŏp). See Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 478–79. 9 For a description of the myŏllije, see chapter 10. 10 Han Yŏng-u, “Yŏmal Sŏnch’o hallyang,” 44. For the early township and village system, see Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 333–35; Pak Chin-u, “Chosŏn ch’ogi myŏllije.” The “town and village system” and the “census law” were codified in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 167. 11 Other names for yuhyangso are hyangsadang, yuhyangch’ŏng or hyangch’ŏng, hoerodang, and p’unghŏndang, among others. This institution seems to be typically Korean; it does not have a clear counterpart in China. 12 Some scholars opine that the local bureau succeeded the earlier Koryŏ system of inspector generals (sasimgwan)—high central officials who were sent out to investigate and report on the social and economic conditions in their native districts. After this system was discontinued in 1318, local elements of various social and political shadings, so the argument goes, then organized themselves informally and, according to Ch’oe Sŏn-hye, cooperated with the dynastic founders of Chosŏn. The historic record is not conclusive enough, however, to draw firm conclusions. For the details, see Pak Ŭn-gyŏng, “Koryŏ ŭi sasimgwan kwa Chosŏnch’o”; Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn yangban sahoe, 225–30; Ch’oe Sŏn-hye, “Chosŏn ch’o’gi yuhyang p’umgwan,” 102–11, and her more recent “Chosŏn ch’o’gi yuhyangso.” 13 Kim Yong-dŏk and Yi T’ae-jin regard the local bureaus as emerging in early Chosŏn and empha-



14

15

16 17 18 19

N o t e s t o pa g e s 8 1 – 8 5

459

size their antigovernment stance. Kim Yong-dŏk, Hyangch’ŏng yŏn’gu; Yi T’ae-jin, “Sarimp’a ŭi yuhyangso”; Taejong sillok 11.29a–b (1406). Yi Su-gŏn has surmised that in 1406, although the inspector general’s request might have been granted, no action was taken. See Chosŏn sidae chibang, 325–56. Yi thus rejects the views of Tagawa Kōzō, Yi T’ae-jin, and Kim Yong-dŏk, presumably based on earlier work by Yu Hong-nyŏl, that the local bureaus were abolished in 1406. As evidence of their abolition the new post of “local advisor” (sinmyŏngsaek) is often, but unconvincingly, adduced; that post was anyway short-lived and terminated in 1417. See T’aejong sillok 34.33a–b (1417); Pak Ŭn-gyŏng, “Koryŏ ŭi sasimgwan,” 9–10. The date usually given for the second abolition is 1467, but the Royal Annals (Chosŏn wangjo sillok) do not record such a fact, and it can only be inferred by later discussions during King Sŏngjong’s reign (1469–94). According to Yi Su-gŏn, two incidents most likely precipitated Sejo’s decision: during the revolt of Yi Si-ae in 1467 a magistrate was murdered, allegedly with the assistance of local bureau officers; elsewhere, local bureau officers maltreated people who had wanted to complain against the local magistrate. Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 328. For the details, see chapter 4. For the concept of “homeland,” see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 40–43. Here “homeland” stands for administrative district (ŭp). An official of second rank and above had access to eight “homelands,” whereas one of rank six and above to only six (minus those of his wife), etc. Sudō Yoshiyuki, “Sensho ni okeru kyōzaisho to ryūgōsho,” 452–57; Kim Yong-dŏk, Hyangch’ŏng yŏn’gu, 29–34; Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 312–23; Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn yangban sahoe, 230–35. The capital bureaus were abolished in 1603. Sŏnjo sillok 158.11a–b (1603). For a study tracing descent group dispersal on the basis of tomb sites, see Kawashima, “Bunka Ryushi ni mirareru shizoku.”

Chapter 4 1 In Koryŏ, kun designated a local administrative unit of secondary importance, whereas pu was a major military or political center. In the course of the general reorganization of local administration in 1018, various smaller “subordinate” (sok) units not administered by centrally appointed officials were incorporated into Andong. For the details of Andong’s early administration, see YGJ 1.1a–2a; Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 367–81; Yi Su-gŏn, “17–18segi Andong chibang yurim,” 165–66. 2 Andong was the only county in the country with a special city magistrate of a senior third rank. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 116. 3 For an overview of Andong’s administrative apparatus, see YGJ 1.8b–9a; Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 117, 121. A magistrate’s tenure was nine hundred days, but statistical evidence suggests that it was rarely more than two years. 4 A special city magistrature had a contingent of 450 slaves. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 514. 5 Four gates with towers were built upon royal command in 1592. YGJ 3.25b. 6 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 161, 471. A magistrate had also to collect the various taxes, send them to Seoul, encourage agriculture, organize relief, administer justice (he had the legal authority to administer up to fifty strokes with a light bamboo stick), supervise the school system, officiate at local rituals, and keep military registers. See Yi Hŭi-gwŏn, Chosŏn hugi chibang t’ongch’i, 113–16. 7 In Andong the village was Sudong-ch’on, some twenty-five ri west of Andong City. YGJ 1.13a; Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 562–75. 8 Ibid., 565–66, 573–74. Besides the forty mat makers, ten more specialists in nine different crafts were assigned to the magistracy of Andong. 9 The eight subordinate counties (sokhyŏn) were Imha, P’ungsan, Kiran, Ilchik, Kamch’ŏn, Naesŏng, Ch’unyang, and Chaesan. STYSN 24.2a–b; YGJ 1.5a–7b. 10 These were Kaedan and Soch’ŏn. During Koryŏ, “special areas,” variously called pu’gok, hyang, so, ch’ŏ, or chang, were inhabited by strictly controlled populations engaged in the production of such special items as porcelain or metal works, among others. Although their status was perhaps not that of slaves, these producers were kept at a distance from the commoner peasant population.

460

11 12 13 14 15 16

17 18 19 20

21 22 23 24 25 26 27

28 29 30 31 32

N o t e s t o pa g e s 8 5 – 9 0

For the details, see Pak Chong-gi, Koryŏ sidae pu’gokche yŏn’gu. At the beginning of Chosŏn there were still forty-eight such units in Kyŏngsang, the highest number in the country. For a table based on the Sejong sillok chiriji, see Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 67n77. Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 135, 182 (map). For an explanation of the land measurement kyŏl, see chapter 6, note 7. Sejong sillok chiriji (1454) 150.12b–13b; Kyŏngsangdo chiriji, 75–76. Yean was an independent county (hyŏn) during the Chosŏn, but was incorporated into Andong under the general administrative reorganization in 1914. See KNJ, chap. 12. The magistrate of Namwŏn was a junior third-rank official. YSJ 1.1a–2a; Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 124. See, for instance, a statement to this effect by the Koryŏ scholar and poet Yi Kyu-bo (1168–1241) as quoted in Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 328. For a defense of Namwŏn’s reputation, see Ch’oe Si-ong, “Yongsŏng p’ungsok pyŏn,” in Tonggang yu’go, 4.21a–23b; and Ch’oe’s preface to Yongsŏngji. The original forty-eight subcounties were in the course of time reorganized into forty-five. Pang (-bang) was equivalent to county (hyŏn). Sejong sillok chiriji 151.16b–17a. Interestingly, the two lists do not completely overlap, but the Andong Kwŏn seem to have been favored in both. Two other genealogical sources are of great importance. The first is the Comprehensive Genealogy of the Ten Thousand Surnames (Mansŏng taedongbo, hereafter MTP), published in 1931. It outlines the genealogies of 119 surnames (sŏng) with 343 choronyms (pon’gwan). As Yi Su-gŏn has pointed out, these numbers cover only one-half of the 250 surnames with only one-tenth of the 4,000 choronyms known to have produced genealogical records in the Chosŏn. See his Han’guk ŭi sŏngssi wa chokpo, 67. The second important source is the earlier Origins of Descent Groups (Ssijok wŏllyu) by Cho Chong-un (1607–83), recording some 540 descent lines. Both works must, however, be verified and supplemented by the genealogies (chokpo) of individual descent groups. The other four indigenous surnames are Kang, Cho, Ko, and Yi, none of which, however, seems to have emerged as a strong descent group in Chosŏn; none is listed in MTP. Koryŏsa 1.26b–27a. They apparently were among the more than two thousand third-rank merit subjects. See Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 124. See the preface to the genealogy of the Andong Kwŏn by Sŏ Kŏ-jŏng, translated in Sourcebook of Korean Civilization, 1: 569. In Koryŏ, pu designated a major political and military administrative local unit. YGJ 8.1a–b; ADPM, 29–47. Chang Kil was also known as Chang Chŏng-p’il. All three tombs were later lost but reestablished by descendants during the Chosŏn. For details of the shrine, see YGJ 4.13b–16a. See also Kim Kwang-ŏk, Munhwa ŭi chŏngch’i wa chiyŏk sahoe, 293–300 (with photographs). An alternative name is Shrine of the Three Merit Subjects (Samgongsinmyo). Headman (hojang) and deputy headman (puhojang) represented the highest ranks in the hyangni hierarchy and were differentiated by the color of their official attire. Hereafter I use hyangni, if not otherwise indicated, to refer only to these two top ranks. Their numbers depended on the size of a county. For the details, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidaesa, 1: 132–41. In 1048, sons and grandsons of top hyangni serving at county (kun-hyŏn) level were admitted to the literary and classics examinations. Koryŏsa 73.3a. Koryŏsa 23.42b; the brief biography in ibid., 102.18b–19b, does not mention a government career. YGJ 7.2a. Pog’ya denotes an executive officer in a ministerial department. In the YGJ, however, Su-hong is listed with the same office title as Su-p’yŏng. The Koryŏ civil service examination graduates are listed in Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 325–557. For Tan, see 417.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 9 0 – 9 3

461

33 Ibid., 435. Pu’s biography is in Koryŏsa 107.14b–15b. For his funeral epitaph, written by his son-inlaw Yi Che-hyŏn, see Chōsen kinseki sōran, 1: 63–44. For the epitaph of his wife, Yu-ssi, see ibid., 635–36. 34 YGJ 7.2b–3a. Pu’s two other sons-in-law were royal princes. 35 YGJ 7.3b–4a. 36 Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 152–53. As Chŏng makes clear, Kwŏn Nam was a late starter, as he passed the munkwa only at age thirty-eight. He became a merit subject in 1453 as one of the principal sponsors of Sejo’s usurpation. Ibid., 197–98. See also Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 122–24. 37 Kwŏn Su-p’yŏng’s biography in Koryŏsa 102.18b–19a. 38 Sejong sillok 123.19a (1449); Yi Su-gŏn, “Yŏmal sŏnch’o t’osŏng ijok,” 973n23. 39 For a discussion of uncertainties in Kwŏn Haeng’s descent line down to Su-p’yŏng and Su-hong, see Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 203–5. 40 Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 160. 41 The Yŏnggaji also lists Kwŏn Pu’s second son, Chun (an examination passer of 1307), Chun’s sons Yŏm and Chŏk, and Yŏm’s grandson, Tam (exam passer of 1380), as well as Kŭn’s brothers Hwa and U (exam passer of 1385) and U’s son, Ch’ae (exam passer of 1417). 42 YGJ 7.2a. 43 YGJ 7.5b, 8.2a. His son, Hu, was also buried in Andong. YGJ 8.3a. 44 ADPM, 95–99. 45 His biography is in Koryŏsa 125.28a–31b; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 437. 46 Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 477. The Han’guk inmyŏng taesajŏn, 59–60, makes him a secondary son (sŏja). It may be for this reason that Chung-hwa is not listed in MTP. 47 There is, for instance, Kwŏn Kŭg-hwa (n.d.), who was a munkwa graduate of 1414 and held various important posts inside and outside Seoul. His son, Ch’im (n.d.), followed in his father’s footsteps and was made a first-degree merit subject by King Sŏngjong (r. 1469–94) and posthumously enfeoffed as Lord of Hwasan. YGJ 7.4b; KNJ 11.21b; MTP, 2: 54b. 48 YGJ 7.4b; ADPM, 127–29; KNJ 11.33a; MTP, 2: 54a. 49 For such marriages, see Andong Kwŏn-ssi sŏnghwabo, vol. 1 (Su-hong’s immediate posterity). Even though contracted among kinsmen, most marriages here noted seem to have been between different descent lines, i.e., distant cousins. 50 Yun Ho passed the munkwa in 1472 and had an illustrious official career. His daughter became King Sŏngjong’s second queen, and he was enfeoffed as Lord of Yŏngwŏn. 51 I owe these figures to Miyajima Hiroshi, “,” 207. Miyajima’s assertion that the Sŏnghwabo is typical for later Chosŏn genealogies is misleading. 52 Miyajima also studied the possible sources the compilers used. See ibid. For a brief sketch of the Sŏnghwabo’s compilation history, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 501–3. 53 YGJ 1.13a; 7.8a–b, 16a–b; KNJ 11.51b. The YGJ identifies Kim Si-jwa simply as “descendant of Koryŏ T’aesa Sŏn-p’yŏng.” Chŭp’s munkwa degree cannot be verified. To differentiate the two Andong Kim groups, this one is commonly referred to as the “new” Kim. 54 Some sources, for example the MHPG, list a certain Kim Il-gŭng, reportedly a descendant of the last Silla king, Kyŏngsun (r. 927–35), as the apical ancestor of this line, but the genealogical relationship to I-ch’ŏng is not explained. The MTP starts with I-ch’ŏng. 55 Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 407. 56 ADPM, 66–69; Kim Yong-sŏn, Koryŏ chibaech’ŭng, 267. 57 For a genealogical chart of the Kim in late Koryŏ, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 81; MTP, 1: 164b–5b. For biographies of Kim Pang-gyŏng and seven of his late Koryŏ descendants, see Koryŏsa 104.1a–35a. For Kim Ku-yong, see YGJ 7.3a–b; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 100. 58 YGJ 7.3b. 59 YGJ 7.4b. 60 YGJ 7.4b; Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 152–53; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 126–27. Duncan, however, did not distinguish between the two separate Andong Kim.

462

61

62

63

64 65

66

67

68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75

N o t e s t o pag e s 9 4 – 9 6

For biographical information the Han’guk inmyŏng taesajŏn was also used throughout the above paragraphs. In MTP, no descent group with the surname Chang is listed with Kil as apical ancestor. In 2: 142a, the Andong Chang start with Chang Sa-gil (?–1418), who originated from northern Ŭiju, where he is listed in STYSN 53.16b–17a. He and his younger brother, Sa-jŏng, joined Yi Sŏng-gye when the latter turned his troops around in 1388 and marched back to the capital. For their assistance, the two brothers were made dynastic founding merit subjects (kaeguk kongsin). Sa-gil had later an illustrious government career and was enfeoffed as Lord of Hwasan. For Sa-gil’s obituary, see Sejong sillok 1.34a. Another source maintains that some Andong Chang later changed their pon’gwan to Indong (Taegu), taking the Koryŏ general Chang Kŭm-yong as their apical ancestor. See Yang Man-jŏng, “Iryujae Chang T’ae-su,” 38. The MTP lists Kŭm-yong’s descendants as the second line of the Indong Chang. MTP, 2: 140b. The Sejong sillok chiriji lists eleven “indigenous surnames,” of which only six are among the nine surnames that Yi Suk-ham (munkwa graduate of 1454 and a one-time governor of Chŏlla) mentions in his preface to the genealogy of the Namwŏn Ryang (1482): Yang (“bridge” yang; hereafter Ryang), Chŏng, Chin, Yun, Yang (“willow tree” yang), and Hwang. The remaining surnames are of no importance for this study. See Sejong sillok chiriji 151.16b; Yi Suk-ham’s preface to Namwŏn Ryang-ssi chokpo in Ryang Sŏng-ji, Nulchae-jip 6.32a–35b. Among the Namwŏn Ryang, there are two separate branches: one that made Ryang Nŭng-yang, with a Koryŏ military title (pyŏngbu nangjung), its apical ancestor and thus is known as the Pyŏngbugong-p’a; and another, which is listed in MTP as Namyang Ryang-ssi, that made a midthirteenth-century individual, Ryang Chu-un, its apical ancestor and is known as Yongsŏnggongp’a. Both claim to have originated from mystical Yang Ŭl-bang. MTP, 2: 221a–222a; Han’guk sŏngssi tae’gwan, 656–57. Chun’s exam success cannot be verified independently. Ryang Sŏng-ji’s mother was the daughter of Kwŏn Tam (?–1423), a fifth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Pu, and thus a distant cousin of Kwŏn Kŭn. He passed the civil service examinations in 1380 and a year later served as magistrate of Namwŏn. At the beginning of Chosŏn, he held some high positions, among them the magistracy of Chŏnju. MTP, 2: 220a; YSJ 5.1a; Yi Suk-ham’s preface to Namwŏn Ryang-ssi chokpo in Ryang Sŏng-ji, Nulchae-jip 6.32a–35b. The YSJ also mentions as a contemporary of Ryang Sŏng-ji a Ryang Sunsŏk, an alleged munkwa graduate, who rose to become governor of Ch’ungch’ŏng Province. Sunsŏk is, however, unrelated to Sŏng-ji and represents a different descent line. See also Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 104. The story of Yun Wi is most likely apocryphal; it cannot be verified in the dynastic histories. It is told in Ssijok wŏllyu, 445. According to the Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo, 1: 1a–2a, after Yun Wi was made Earl of Namwŏn, he came to reside in Namwŏn. The MTP, 2: 277a, does not list Wi as the apical ancestor, but a “descendant,” Yŏng-ch’an, from whom the later Yun originated. For Yun Hyo-son, see Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo, 10: 3a–4b; YSJ 5.1a. He was one of the compilers of the Kyŏngguk taejŏn. The Sejong sillok chiriji lists the Yang as “commoner surname” (paeksŏngsŏng), i.e., its members did not function as local administrators. See also Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 69–71. Yang I-si’s dates are uncertain, but his birth year is likely to have been between 1334 and 1338, and his death in 1378. See Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo, 14–15. Ibid., 7–17. For a detailed history of the Namwŏn Yang, see Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo. For Yang I-si’s “red examination certificate” (hongp’ae), see Han’guk sangdae komunsŏ charyo, 212–13, 409; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 479, 511, 635–36, 641. Only four hongp’ae of late Koryŏ are preserved. Yi Su-gŏn, Han’guk chungse sahoesa, 74; Yi Su-gŏn, “Yŏmal Sŏnch’o t’osŏng ijok,“ 963. Yi Suk-ham was a Yŏn’an Yi and, as a munkwa graduate of 1454, embarked on an official career. Yi Suk-ham, preface to Namwŏn Ryang-ssi chokpo, in Nulchae-jip, 6.32a–35b. The other descent groups Yi included in his list are the Chukkye An, the Sŏngsan Yi, and the Kwangnŭng Yi.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 9 6 – 9 8

463

76 Sejong sillok 124.2b (1449). Land continued to be bestowed by the king. Sejo sillok 3.21b–22b (1456), 7.16b–18a (1457). 77 The Yŏngyang Nam are said to have originated from a Tang official who, on his way to Japan, was shipwrecked off the coast of Yŏngdŏk (Kyŏngsang Province) in 755 and decided to submit himself to the king of Silla. The latter granted him, as “the one who had come south [nam],” the surname Nam, and Yŏngyang in northeastern Kyŏngsang as his fief. Much later, the descent group segmented into three branches, the one known as Yŏngyang Nam being less prosperous than the Ŭiryŏng Nam; the third was the Kosŏng Nam. See Han’guk sŏngssi tae’gwan, 688–89. By early Chosŏn, Yŏngyang was a subordinate county (sokhyŏn) of Yŏnghae County (Kyŏngsang Province). Situated in a mountainous, not very fertile area, it had a population of only some forty households with 481 inhabitants. Nam is listed as one of its four “indigenous surnames” (t’osŏng). Sejong sillok chiriji 150.14a; STYSN 24.22a. 78 Nam Hwi-ju is not mentioned in Koryŏsa. 79 Ssijok wŏllyu, 408; YGJ 1.14b, 7.10a, 8.2a. According to MTP, 2: 159a, he was a (unverifiable) munkwa graduate. His wife was a Tanyang Yi. 80 YGJ 7.10a, 8.2a; KNJ 11.21a, 44b. 81 YGJ 1.14b, 7.5b–6a; KNJ 11.37a; Yŏngyang-Ŭiryŏng-Kosŏng Nam-ssi taedongbo (1979), 1: 39; Sejong sillok 3.29b. According to the Sejong sillok, Nam U-ryang was appointed third minister of war in 1449 and later had some further military appointments. Sejong sillok 124.7b, 8b; 125.8b–9a. Sŏ’gahyŏn was later renamed Sŏ’gi. 82 In late Koryŏ, the Chinbo County seat burned and its population dispersed because of frequent incursions of Japanese pirates. At the beginning of Chosŏn, the county therefore comprised only seventeen villages with a population of 526 in seventy-eight households. A cold climate and infertile soil contributed to the county’s poverty. Sejong sillok chiriji 150.20a. 83 For a description of Yi Cha-su’s career, see Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 612–14; YGJ 1.18b, 7.10a, 8.2b–3a; ADPM, 79–81 (the inscription on Cha-su’s tombstone does not give dates; it was erected only in 1600); Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, sokchip, 8.24b–26b. Even in T’oegye’s time, some questions about the Yi’s ancestry remained in doubt; see chapter 8. 84 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, sokchip, 8.24b–25a; Yi Chŏng-hoe, “Sejŏn yurok,” in Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip 1.11a. Cha-bang’s descendants apparently were hyangni in P’unggi. 85 YGJ 1.15a, 18b; 7.6b, 8.2b–3a; KCKM, 47; Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 47.1a–b; Kim Munt’aek, 16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi, 98–99. 86 Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 538; Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 42, 157; Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 109–10. 87 Yi Hŭi was a fourth-generation descendant of the famous scholar [Kyŏngju] Yi Che-hyŏn (1287– 1367) and a munkwa graduate of 1424. As governor of Kyŏngsang Province, he was on an inspection tour in Andong when he was taken ill and died there. He was buried in Andong. ADPM, 151–52; KNJ 11.33a. 88 YGJ 7.10b–11a, 8.8b–9b; ADPM, 153–58. 89 YGJ 3.15a–17b, 7.6a, 8.10b; ADPM, 176–80; KNJ 11.22b. Koeng served at one time as special magistrate (yusu) of Kaesŏng (senior second rank). 90 For discussion of the rise of Kim Chong-jik and his disciples, see chapters 3 and 7. 91 YGJ 7.6a–b; KNJ 11.22b; Wagner, Literati Purges, 183n60, 190n40, 192n49. According to Wagner, Chu suffered extreme posthumous indignities because he had opposed Buddhist rites for King Sŏngjong and advocated the restoration of the tomb of King Tanjong’s mother. 92 YGJ 7.6b; KNJ 11.23a. 93 YGJ 7.6b, 8.10b; ADPM, 285–87; MTP, 1: 38a. 94 Although, according to MTP, 2: 234a, the apical ancestor of the Hŭnghae Pae was a Koryŏ general, Kyŏng-bun, it was from Chŏn onward that the descent line showed more than one descendant. Chŏn is therefore regarded as the ancestor of the Andong branch of the Hŭnghae Pae, but he is not mentioned in the YGJ. The reason for this omission may be the allegation that his mother was a palace slave; Chŏn himself seems to have had a rather shady career under King Ch’unghye (r.

464

95

96 97

98 99 100 101 102

103

1 04 105 106 107 108 109

N o t e s t o pag e s 9 8 – 9 9

1330–32, 1339–44). His biography in Koryŏsa 124.13b–14a, is contained in the section of “royal favorites” (p’yehaeng); see also Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 165, 169, 176. Son Hong-nyang reportedly passed the civil service examinations (although his name is not included in Pak Yong-un’s list) and is said to have held high offices and been made a merit subject in 1349. In 1351, he returned to Andong. This biography is most likely a later construct. When King Kongmin fled the Red Turbans’ intrusion of 1362, he took refuge in Andong, where Son entertained him. Out of gratitude, the king, a renowned painter, is said to have painted Son’s portrait. Hong-nyang was buried in Andong, but his tomb disappeared later, apparently because it was not maintained by descendants. The Ilchik Son, a native surname of one of Andong’s smallest subordinate counties, are not listed in MTP, but in Ssijok wŏllyu, 707. The descent group, also known as Andong Son, was entirely populated by Hong-nyang’s descendants. YGJ 7.3b, 8.3b; ADPM, 82–86; KNJ 11.21a. There was a Son Ha of Ilchik who passed the munkwa in 1426, but I could not establish his relationship to Hong-nyang. The Pae now trace their origin back to Silla, and therefore the Kyŏngju Pae seem to have been the original source of some ten branches that eventually split off and adopted their own choronyms (pon’gwan). Han’guk sŏngssi tae’gwan, 662–67. YGJ 8.3b; MTP, 2: 54a. Kwŏn Hŭi-jŏng descended from Chi-jŏng, a hojang, whose grandson, Yangjun, married a daughter of Su-hong; because Hŭi-jŏng was thus a nonagnatic descendant of Suhong, he is recorded in the Sŏnghwabo, 3: 64. The first to pass the munkwa in 1290 was Hŭi-jŏng’s grandfather, Hyŏk. The MTP also makes Hyŏk’s father a munkwa graduate, but this cannot be verified, and according to Pak Yong-un he was a hojang. See Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 444. Hŭi-jŏng had the title of investigating censor (kyujŏng). It is clear that this branch of the Andong Kwŏn made the step into the titled officialdom rather late, and this may be the reason why only Hŭi-jŏng’s burial site is mentioned in the YGJ. The hyangni background may also be inferred by the fact that he and his son lived within the walls of Andong. Nevertheless, Hŭi-jŏng and his descendants, it will become clear, wielded considerable power at the local level. YGJ 7.5b, 10a; 8.5b; ADPM, 108–16; KNJ 11.44a. According to MTP, 2: 234a, Sang-ji was Chŏn’s third son, i.e., Sang-gong’s younger brother. But the YGJ identifies Sang-gong as the younger of the two. His wife was a daughter of a Kim Sŏng-ok, presumably an Andong Kim. According to the YGJ, Sang-gong was a munkwa graduate, but according to Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 495, it was Chŏn’s eldest son, Sang-do, who passed the munkwa in 1369. Sang-gong’s office was a supernumary office typical for late Koryŏ. YGJ 7.10a–b; KNJ 11.21a. Yu Chong-hye is said to have been a minister of works in the early years of Chosŏn. The P’ungsan Yu were one of the “indigenous surnames” (t’osŏng) of P’ungsan Subcounty. Chonghye’s great-grandfather, Paek, received a munkwa degree as a royal favor in 1290, but both his son and grandson continued to live in P’ungsan as local hyangni. KCKM, 56. For Yu Chong-hye, see YGJ 7.5b, 8.3b; KNJ 11.32b. Her father was Kwŏn Chin, Hŭi-jŏng’s son. Chin was a munkwa graduate of 1377 and served the first three Chosŏn kings, ending his career as right state councilor under King Sejong. His wife was a daughter of [Andong] Kim Tŭg-u, a seventh-generation descendant of Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng. YGJ 1.18b, 7.5b; KNJ 11.21b; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 517. YGJ 7.5b, 10a–b; 8.4b–5b, 9b; ADPM, 122–26; KNJ 11.1b; MTP, 2: 234a. Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 152–55. After success against Japanese pirates, [Sunch’ŏn] Kim Sŭng-ju had a civil as well as a military career in early Chosŏn. In 1400, he was made a merit subject and was later enfeoffed as Lord of Noksan and in 1415 as Lord of P’yŏngyang. See STYSN 40.9b. Kwŏn Chip-kyŏng, a seventh-generation descendant of Kwŏn Su-hong, passed the munkwa in 1380 and apparently served as a magistrate. YGJ 8.7a; ADPM, 117–18; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 522. YGJ, 7.11a–b; ADPM, 130–35; MTP, 1: 193a; MHPG 47.40a. UKKM, t’ongmun no. 88, 265–66 (1899).



N o t e s t o pa g e s 9 9 –1 0 1

465

110 The Ŭisŏng Kim’s apical ancestor (sijo) is a nebulous figure, Sŏk, who much later was made the fourth son of Silla’s last king, King Kyŏngsun (r. 927–35). Yong-bi is recorded as Sŏk’s fifth-generation descendant. For this reconstruction, see chapter 11. 111 A fragment of a household register (hojŏk tanja) of Kŏ-du’s son, Ch’ŏn (1362–?), dated 1390, is extant and allows the verification of genealogical links and birth dates. For a transcription, see KCKM, no. 747, 760–61. Ch’ŏn was in office at the end of Koryŏ, but, upon its fall, retreated to Andong. He is buried in Andong. For his funerary inscription, see ADPM, 119–21; KNJ 11.32b. 112 Kim Yŏng-myŏng’s fathers-in-law were, in sequence, Yi Chi-yu, Kim Mu, and Kwŏn Chŏn. [Kwangju] Yi Chi-yu was a son of Yi Chip (1314–87), who, after passing the munkwa, was a high official at the end of Koryŏ. Many of his descendants settled in the northern part of Kyŏngsang Province. MTP, 1: 99a; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 202–3. Kwŏn Chŏn was, as mentioned above, the father of King Munjong’s queen. For Kim Mu, see below. 113 Kim Han-gye passed the munkwa in 1438 and Han-ch’ŏl in 1469. Han-gye, a famous calligrapher, served under Kings Munjong and Tanjong and was involved in the compilation of the Sejong sillok. He was made a second-rank minor merit subject by Sejo (then still a prince) in 1453. For various entries in the Sillok, see Munjong sillok 3.8a; Sejo sillok 2.56b; Sŏngjong sillok 85.9b. Also UKSB, 1.16a–b. 114 Genealogical evidence on Kim Ŭi-wŏn is ambiguous: according to his tomb inscription, he was Yang-gam’s second son, but the MTP, 1: 156b, makes him the first son. Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 69. 115 For an analysis of the rise and marriage connections of the Kwangsan Kim, see Duncan, Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty, 76–77, 110 (table). 116 For a genealogical chart of the Kwangsan Kim, see KKOK, haeje, 6–9. For Kim Yŏn and Kim Chin, the two oldest extant household registers, drafted in 1281 and copied in 1301 and 1333, respectively, are preserved. For the documents and explanatory notes, see Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Han’guk komunsŏ, 223–25, 268–71. 117 Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 46. 118 Chŏng was a title bestowed on descendants of a royal prince (who had been a primary son) and carried a senior third rank. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 37. 119 Song June-ho has studied Namwŏn’s history in detail, and I am greatly indebted to his work and private instruction. For the Tundŏk Yi, see his introduction to Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏkpang ŭi Chŏnju Yi-ssi, 2–3; and Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 299–300. The Chinju Ha moved, at an undetermined point in time, to the south of Eastern Village and settled in Pangch’ukri, where they became known as the Pangch’ukkol Ha. 120 Another source, implying that Ch’oe Su-ung died in the capital, maintains that it was Su-ung’s widow, [Chinju] Ha-ssi, who after her husband’s death returned to her native Eastern Village. Yang Man-jŏng, “Iryujae Chang T’ae-su,” 39. 121 YSJ 5.2a; Song June-ho, Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk, 3–4. See also genealogical chart on 299 in Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu. 122 Hwang Hŭi, born in Kaegyŏng, started his career with a protection appointment, but in 1383 passed the chinsa and in 1389 the munkwa examinations. Although he temporarily withdrew from government during the Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition, he returned upon King T’aejo’s urging and rapidly advanced in government service. Although he suffered some setbacks—at one time he was banished to Namwŏn—he was eventually, in 1431, as one of King Sejong’s most trusted servants, appointed chief minister of state. Han’guk inmyŏng taesajŏn, 1071–72; Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 548. 123 Pang Kwi-hwa passed the saengwŏn/chinsa examinations in 1469. Famous for his literary style, he accompanied three missions to Peking as a secretary. He ended his government career as an assistant section chief (senior sixth rank) in the Ministry of Revenue. 124 Pang Ku-sŏng had married, at the beginning of Chosŏn, a daughter of [Chinju] Hyŏng Su (n.d.), a third minister in the Ministry of Punishment. Su’s great-great-grandfather had earlier moved from Chinju to Chup’o, also upon making an uxorilocal marriage.

466

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 0 1 –1 0 5

125 For information on the Changsu Hwang, see Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 1–3, 283 (with genealogical chart on page x); MTP, 2: 209b. For the Namyang Pang, see Song June-ho, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi kwagŏ chedo,” 188–89; YSJ 7.7b for Pang Ku-sŏng. The Namyang Pang are not listed in MTP. 126 Chungjong sillok 21.77a (1515). 127 Hŭngsŏng Chang-ssi sebo, 1: 3a–b, 3b–4a; MTP, 2: 141b; YSJ 7.8a; Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 321. According to Chang Kyŏng-se, “Sŏn’go pugun haengjang,” in Sach’on-jip 3.25b–26a, the Chang had for several generations served as officials in late Koryŏ; the first in Chosŏn was Hap’s father, Hŏn, an examination graduate. These claims, however, cannot be substantiated. 128 For the Chosŏn inheritance system, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 208–15. 129 Sejong sillok chiriji 150.12b–13a; STYSN 24.2a–b. In both sources the number of subordinate counties in Andong is eight. 130 Yi Su-gŏn, “Yŏmal sŏnch’o t’osŏng ijok,” 979. 131 YGJ 1.14b, 15a. 132 The wine-drinking rite and the archery rite are variously described in the Liji, the Zhouli, and the Yili. For a translation, see Steele, The I-li or Book of Etiquette and Ceremonial, chap. 4. They were performed in Korea from the mid-Koryŏ. See Koryŏsa 73.4b, 9a. Both rites are also described in Kukcho oryeŭi (1474) 4.88a–89a, 6.12b–13b. 133 Sejong sillok 84.18b (1439). The royal lecturer was An Chi (1377–1464), a friend of Kwŏn Che, and thus perhaps biased toward Andong. 134 Kwŏn Si descended from Su-hong’s third grandson, Yun-bo. He passed, as a saengwŏn, the munkwa in 1411 and advanced in office to second inspector (junior third rank) in the Office of the Inspector General. He is said to have lived within the walls of Andong—perhaps indicating hyangni ancestry. YGJ 7.6a, 8.6a–b; KNJ 11.21b. 135 YGJ 5.1a–2a; STYSN 24.3b. 136 STYSN 34.28b–29a; 39.2a–b, 3a; YSJ 1.4b. Another site mentioned in STYSN for Chŏlla Province was Yongan, well north of Namwŏn. 137 The rites of wine drinking and archery were later included in the state ceremonial, Kukcho oryeŭi 6.12b–13b. They had earlier been included in Chŏng To-jŏn’s Chosŏn kyŏngguk chŏn. 138 Sejong sillok 62.9b–10b (1433). 139 Grand Prince Anp’yŏng (1418–53) was a famous calligrapher; YGJ 5.1a. 140 Although undoubtedly an Andong Kwŏn, Kwŏn Maeng-gyŏng remains unidentified. 141 Kwŏn Maeng-gyŏng, “Ippo ki,” in YGJ 5.2a. 142 Yŏngyang-Ŭiryŏng-Kosŏng Nam-ssi taedongbo, 1.29; KNJ 11.36b–37a. 143 Kwŏn Ch’i is not recorded in the YGJ or the MTP, but in Sŏnghwabo, 3: 69b. Though recorded as a magistrate, it is likely that he in fact continued hyangni duties in contrast to his brother Chin who was a munkwa graduate. 144 Kwŏn Ch’on belongs to a collateral hyangni Kwŏn branch; he reportedly served at one time as a magistrate. According to MTP, 2: 54a, his descendants moved to Yŏnghae. 145 Helpful for the identification of these men were the genealogical tables in Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 50–53. Kwŏn Ho was recorded in the later edition of the Andong Kwŏn genealogy of 1654. 146 See Sejong sillok 40.21a–b (1428), recording Kim Hyo-jŏng’s complaint about hyangni’s disrespect for the local magistrates and the need to restrain them. 147 Kim Yong-dŏk, “Hyangŭmnye ko.” For more on community compacts, see chapter 9. 148 KNJ 11.37a. 149 Ibid. 150 Ibid. The merit subjects of 1453 were not of Tanjong’s making but of Sejo’s (then still a prince). See Chŏng Tu-hŭi, Chosŏn cho’gi chŏngch’i chibae, 196–97. Nam Ch’i-gong is indeed not on the roster. 151 Andong Kwŏn-ssi chokpo, Sŏnghwabo, 3: 56b. 152 Ibid., 56a; KNJ 11.33a.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 0 5 –1 1 0

467

153 Andong Kwŏn-ssi chokpo, Sŏnghwabo, 3: 66a. For a chart, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 51. 154 For the roster of the Uhyanggye, see Yŏngnam hyangyak, 100. 155 YGJ 7.10b–11a. 156 Nam Kyŏng-ji (1440–1518), Kyŏng-in’s younger brother, was a military exam passer and belonged to one of the Five Military Commands; he retired in 1498 and returned to Andong. KNJ 11.37a. 157 The Chŏng were originally from Ch’ŏngju (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province). Wŏn-no’s fifth-generation ancestor moved, together with his younger brother, to Hoegok village in the western township of Andong County where their maternal grandparents were living; YGJ 1.13a. Wŏn-no became the founder of the Yech’ŏn branch of the Ch’ŏngju Chŏng, whereas the descendants of his older brother, In-no, among them Chŏng Sa-sŏng, formed the Andong branch. Their paternal aunt was married to Kwŏn Kon, Pŏl’s grandfather, and Wŏn-no’s own wife was a P’ungsan Yu. 158 For the membership list, see Yŏngnam hyangyak, 101.

Chapter 5 1 The original name of the settlement seems to have been Ch’ŏnsang, “above the stream.” 2 O Kye-dong’s gravesite is located in eastern Imha Subcounty. See YGJ 8.2a. Otherwise, not much is known about him. 3 Kim Man-gŭn’s grave is located in Imha Subcounty. YGJ 8.12a; KNJ 11.37b. 4 Although Kim Man-gŭn’s eldest son, In-bŏm (n.d.), had four sons, none of them seems to have had examination success. The economic circumstances of Man-gŭn’s main-line descendants were therefore apparently precarious. No information is available about the third son, Chi-bŏm (n.d.), and his descendants. 5 Chin’s mother was a Yŏnghae Sin (1475–1540). The Sin had lived in the Andong area for generations. Chin had two younger brothers and two sisters. Both his brothers, Chŏng (1508–78) and Su (n.d.), are mentioned in KNJ 11.51b as “filial sons.” See also funerary inscription for Chŏng written by Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip 7.15b–17a. 6 Yŏnbang se’go, 1.78–89. It was written by Chin’s son, Kim Sŏng-il. There is also a lengthy funerary inscription written by Chŏng Kyŏng-se in ADPM, 293–300. 7 Kwŏn Kan (n.d.) became rusticated because of his connection to Munjong’s queen. In a document of 1517, he appeared as a witness with the title yuhak. KCKM, no. 238, 508. 8 Min Se-gyŏng was a fourth-generation descendant of [Yŏhŭng] Min Che (1339–1408), a munkwa graduate of 1357, whose daughter became King T’aejong’s queen and the mother of King Sejong. Se-gyŏng does not seem to have distinguished himself. MTP, 2: 142b (where Se-gyŏng is not listed); Pak Yong-un, Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje, 480. The dates for Chin’s wife, Min-ssi, are 1508–46. 9 For Kim In-hu, see chapter 7. 10 A legend says that a fortune-teller predicted that Chin’s posterity would prosper, whereupon Chin gave up his examination ambitions and devoted himself entirely to the education of his sons. Sunhee Song, “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 395n34. 11 For details, see Andong-gun chijŏng munhwajae p’yŏllam, 316–17, and chapter 12. 12 According to his “account of conduct” (haengjang), Chin also had one secondary son (sŏja), Yŏn-il, and two secondary daughters (sŏnyŏ) by a commoner secondary wife. They are not recorded in UKSB. 13 Even today Chin’s descendants are more numerous and more prosperous than those of his two brothers and make up some 85 percent of Ye-bŏm’s descendants. Chŏng does not seem to have had primary offspring, though he had one secondary son, whereas Su had three sons and four daughters. See Song, “Kinship and Lineage,” 392–93. See also Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi Ch’ŏnjŏnp’a munjung, a catalogue of the cultural treasures of the Ŭisŏng Kim. 14 For Kŭg-il’s biography, see Yakpong sŏnsaeng munjip in Yŏnbang se’go, 3.277–82; YGJ 7.8a. Yi Wi was a Suan Yi. Ssijok wŏllyu, 129. 15 Kŭmgye, also known as Kŭmji-ch’on, was at that time a famous multisurname village where prominent individuals such as Pae Sang-ji and Yi Chong-jun lived. Sŏng-il’s father-in-law was

468

16 17

18 19 20 21

22

23

24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 1 0 –1 1 2

[Andong] Kwŏn Tŏg-bong (n.d.). The village was known as a place that “within one thousand years never failed.” YGJ 1.13b. Kim Sŏng-il’s biography is based on the chronological biography (yŏnbo), in Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, purok, 1.1a–40a; an “account of conduct” (haengjang), written by Chŏng Ku in 1605, is in purok, 2.1a–81a; YGJ 7.8b–9a. For Pog-il’s biography, see Namak sŏnsaeng ilgo in Yŏnbang se’go, 5.451–61; YGJ 7: 9b. Pog-il’s first father-in-law was Kwŏn Chi. Kwŏn was an indigenous surname of Yech’ŏn, i.e., the Kwŏn were hyangni who started to get degrees from around 1300. All three older brothers of Chi’s grandfather were munkwa graduates; Kwŏn O-bok was a victim of the 1498 purge. Lacking numerous posterity, the descent group seems to have declined in the sixteenth century. See MTP, 2: 66b. Pog-il’s second father-in-law was a son of Kwŏn Ŭi, Pŏl’s older brother. Ssijok wŏllyu, 464. For Su-il’s biography, see Kwibong sŏnsaeng ilgo in Yŏnbang se’go, 4.307–13; YGJ (under the rubric “outstanding conduct”) 7.14b. For Myŏng-il’s biography, see Unam sŏnsaeng ilgo in Yŏnbang se’go, 4.320–55; YGJ 7.15a; Ssijok wŏllyu, 409. KNJ 11.37a. None of Yŏn-il’s descendants seems to have lived in the Andong area; they reportedly moved to Hamgyŏng Province. See Song, “Kinship and Lineage,” 401n42. [Chŏnju] Yu Sŏng’s (1533–60) father, whose family had lived for generations in Seoul, had moved to northern Kyŏngsang in making an uxorilocal marriage. Sŏng is said to have been the first settler of Su’gok (in Korean, Musil), east of Naeap. YGJ 1.16a; Sŏ Chu-sŏk, “Andong chibang ssijok VI,” 10. See also Chosŏn hugi yangban’ga ŭi saenghwalsang, a richly illustrated catalogue of the Yu’s cultural treasures exhibited in the Korean Studies Advancement Center (Andong) in 2004. YGJ 7.12b–13a; KNJ 11.54a. Yu Sŏng’s wife was not the first Ŭisŏng Kim woman to be honored for her womanly virtue. Earlier, the daughter of Kŏ-du’s son, Chŏn (1362–?), married [P’ungsan] Yi Kang and starved herself to death after her husband had died in an accident when she was only twenty. She was granted a commemorative arch (chŏngmun). T’aejong sillok 25.8a (1413); YGJ 7.17a. Yu Pong-nip died in the battle of Chinju in 1592 and was honored with a posthumous office title and a commemorative arch. Pok-ki, who lived on in Musil, had six sons and three daughters, who settled in surrounding villages and had a distinguished posterity. KNJ 11.34b, 45a; Sŏ Chu-sŏk, “Andong chibang ssijok VI,” 10–11. [Chinsŏng] Yi Pong-ch’un was a collateral kinsman of T’oegye. He passed the munkwa in 1576 and had a minor official career. For the details on which these generalizations rest, I am indebted to Sŏ Chu-sŏk and Sunhee Song. The adoption was officially certified by a writ (iban) issued by the Ministry of Rites in 1581. See UKKM, iban no. 1, 2: 1; 4: 123–24; UKSB 2.33b, 41a, 50a; KCKM, no. 256, 548–49; Yŏnbang se’go, 3.280. Yong’s wife was the second daughter of T’oegye’s eldest son, Chun. For Yong’s biography, see ADPM, 552–60 (the author of the funerary inscription was Hŏ Mok); UKSB 2.41a. The two munkwa graduates were [Andong] Kwŏn T’ae-il (1569–1631) and [P’ungsan] Kim Yŏng-jo (1577–1648). Both had illustrious government careers. For Si-on’s biography, see “P’yoŭn sŏnsaeng Kim-gong haengjang,” in Kim Si-on, P’yoŭn sŏnsaeng munjip, 665–83; KNJ 11.45b. For Pang-gŏl’s biography, see ADPM, 641–51; Sukchong sillok 6.5a–b, 18b; 8.30a, 45b. For his career, see chapter 12. For Kwŏn Sa-bin’s epitaph, see YGJ 8.8b. YGJ 1.15b. Pŏl’s elder brother, Ŭi (1475–1558), chinsa of 1507, continued to live in Togich’on-ri, but later apparently moved to Yech’ŏn. Pŏl’s younger brother, Chang (1489–1519 or 1529), was a graduate of the regular munkwa examinations of 1519. The father of King Chungjong’s second queen was Yun Yŏ-p’il (1466–1555), a Chungjong merit subject of 1506. See Kwŏn Pŏl’s chronological biography (yŏnbo) in Kwŏn Pŏl, Ch’ungjae-jip 1a–4b. For Pŏl’s



36 37

38 39

40

41 42 43 44 45 46 47

48 49 50

51 52 53

N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 1 2 –1 1 4

469

partisanship with Cho Kwang-jo, see Song Ung-sŏp, “Chungjongdae kimyo sarim,” 140–41, and chapter 7. Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng, Ch’angsŏlchae sŏnsaeng munjip 12.12a–13b. King Chungjong’s second queen, Pŏl’s matrilateral cousin, died when she gave birth to the future King Injong (r. 1544–45) in 1515. Chungjong’s third queen was also a P’ap’yŏng Yun, the daughter of Yun Chi-im, who was a third cousin of Yun Im, Yŏ-p’il’s son. She became the mother of the future King Myŏngjong (r. 1545–67). Injong died after a few months on the throne and was succeeded by Myŏngjong. The rift between Yun Im—the “great Yun”—and his distant cousins, the third queen’s brothers, Yun Wŏn-p’il and Yun Wŏn-hyŏng—the “small Yun”—eventually led to Im’s destruction. MTP, 2: 255b; Sŏnwŏn sebo, 21–22. See Kwŏn Pŏl’s yŏnbo in Kwŏn Pŏl, Ch’ungjae-jip 1a–11b, and his biography, written by Yi T’oegye in 1569, in ibid., 8.1a–11a; Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 27–41; KCKM, 19–26. Ch’oe-ssi was the daughter of a minor official, Ch’oe Se-in (n.d.), the owner of an estate in Karodong, Kŭmnŭng (Kŭmsan) County, in eastern Kyŏngsang Province. He was the grandson of famous Ch’oe Sŏn-mun (?–1455), who had served in high government positions in early Chosŏn and was an early practitioner of Neo-Confucianism. Ch’oe-ssi also was a fifth-generation nonagnatic granddaughter of Chŏng Mong-ju. YGJ 7.15a; Kwŏn Tong-bo’s literary works and biography are contained in kwŏn 1 and 2 of Amch’ŏn se’go, a collection of the works of Kwŏn Pŏl’s four immediate descendants (two sons and two grandsons) published in 1890. It is part of Taeyu munhŏn, a large collection of literary and biographical materials of Kwŏn Pŏl’s descendants (mostly in the nineteenth century), compiled by Kwŏn Sŏg-yŏng in 1986. He also had two secondary sons and one secondary daughter. Amch’ŏn se’go 3.13b–14b (funerary inscription written by Tong-bo in 1590). Ch’ae is said to have been at one point magistrate of Ŭihŭng, but this may have been a purely honorary appointment. Amch’ŏn se’go 3.16a–17a. Ibid., 3.14b, 4.29b–31b; KNJ 12.11b. He is said to have had a minor military post. Of Tong-mi’s two other sons, one did not have offspring, and the other’s line broke off in his son’s generation. The documents are analyzed by Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Chosŏn hugi sahoe sinbunsa yŏn’gu, 39–40, 52. MTP, 1:156b; KKOK, 6–9; ADPM, 192–96; KNJ 12.13b, 17a (Kim Hyo-ro’s funerary inscription was written by Yi T’oegye); KCKM, 34–36. He received posthumously the title of vice minister. KKOK, 8; ADPM, 251–60; KNJ 12.7b. For extensive biographical data, see Unam sŏnsaeng ilgo (Yŏn’s literary bequest) contained in Och’ŏn se’go, a collection of six Och’ŏn Kim men, 30–37, and the biography written by his son, Kim Pu-ŭi, Ŭpch’ŏngjŏng yu’go, 140–42. Serving in the Office of the Censor General in 1524, Yŏn is said to have had the courage to oppose the powerful minister Kim Al-lo, for which he was demoted. ADPM, 261–63. His adoptive father, Kim Man-gyun (?–1549), was the husband of Hyo-ro’s cousin. Kŭm Chae was a Ponghwa Kŭm, a descent group of local origin. Chae’s daughter became the wife of Yi T’oegye’s only son, Chun. Ssijok wŏllyu, 776. MTP, 1: 157a; ADPM, 342–48; KKOK, no. 6, 161–63; KNJ 12.8a, 9b–10a. The munjip of Pu-p’il, Pu-ŭi, and Hae are preserved in Och’ŏn se’go. Hae’s adoption is not recorded in the genealogical records, and no official adoption document exists. Because Hae was more familiar with his stepfather, he reportedly called the latter “father,” and his real father “uncle.” Nevertheless, when his stepfather died, Hae mourned for him for three years only “in heart” (simsang), whereas he mourned his own father with full rites for three years. Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 131. Och’ŏn se’go, 215–20. Yi Kye-yang married a daughter of [Yŏngyang] Kim Yu-yong. The Yŏngyang Kim had also been in-migrants to Yean County. Ssijok wŏllyu, 281. KNJ 12.13a, 17a; Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, sokchip 8.27b–29a. He is buried in Yean.

470

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 1 4 –1 1 8

54 Yi Sik’s first wife was a daughter of [Ŭisŏng] Kim Han-ch’ŏl (1430–?), a munkwa graduate, who advanced to section chief (senior fifth rank) in the Ministry of Rites. 55 For the family background of T’oegye’s first wife, the Kimhae Hŏ, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 245. Hŏ Ch’an’ s father had moved to Ŭiryŏng, where his descent line prospered. Hŏ Ch’an, a saengwŏn graduate, was known for his wealth, and it was through him that T’oegye received considerable property. 56 For genealogical charts of T’oegye’s various kin connections, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 242–45. 57 For Yi Chŏng-hoe’s biography, see Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 3.1a–6a. 58 For biographical details, see under Komunsŏ chipsŏng, Yŏnghae Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 1.3–15. For Yi Ham’s biography, see Yi Ham, Unak sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 3.1a–b. 59 I am indebted to Song June-ho’s unpublished paper “The Yangban Lineages of Namwŏn” (1982). 60 YSJ 6.3a; 7.9a. Mun-ju was the second son of Yu-hyŏng’s younger brother, Kuk-hyŏng (1592–1653). 61 For Yi Sang-hyŏng’s biography, written by Pang Tu-ch’ŏn (1654–1704), see Yi Sang-hyŏng, Ch’ŏnmukchae-jip 5.23a–32a. His tomb epitaph (myogalmyŏng) was written by Kim Chang-saeng’s son, Kim Chip. The YSJ lists him under the rubric “worthies” (hyŏn), 5.4a. For his intellectual formation and later political career, see chapter 10. 62 Yi Mun-jae’s biography is in Yi Mun-jae, Sŏktong yu’go 8.12a–19b; YSJ 5.5b–6a. 63 YSJ 7.4b. 64 MTP, 2: 6a; YSJ 7.4b. The fourth son is mentioned in YSJ as a protection appointee. 65 Ch’oe Sang-jung’s father was Ŏn-su’s first son, Yŏng, who gave up examination preparations due to illness and “hid his virtue.” 66 Ch’oe Sang-jung’s biography is in Ch’oe Sang-jung, Minŭngjae-jip 3.1a–4a. This work is contained in Taebang se’go, in which the collected works (munjip) of five outstanding Ch’oe kinsmen are united. Sang-jung is recorded in YSJ under the rubric “famous worthies” (myŏnghyŏn), 3.3b. 67 Presumably because he had no descendants, Ch’oe Po is not listed in the MTP, but, according to YSJ 7.12a, he had a military degree. 68 For Ch’oe Yŏn’s biography, see Ch’oe Yŏn, Sŏngman-jip 6.4a–9a; YSJ 5.4a. 69 Ch’oe On’s biography is in Ch’oe On, P’yŏmjae-jip 9.8a–16a; YSJ 5.4a. Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “19segi mal e chaksŏng toen Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang,” 52. 70 YSJ 6.13a. 71 Ch’oe Hwi-ji’s biography was written by his son Si-ong in 1688. See Ch’oe Hwi-ji, Oju sŏnsaeng-jip 13.5a–15b. 72 Both Ch’oe Ch’i-ong and Ch’oe Kye-ong are mentioned under the rubric “munkwa graduates” in YSJ 7.4b, 6b, 11a. Kye-ong was still alive at the time of the YSJ’s compilation. 73 For Ch’oe Si-ong’s biography, see Ch’oe Si-ong, Tonggang sŏnsaeng yu’go 8.1a–5b. In the YSJ, he is listed in the rubric “[still] living” (saengjon) (at the time of the YSJ’s compilation). 74 Yi Tŏg-yŏl, munkwa graduate of 1569, had served as a royal secretary. 75 [Ch’ŏngp’ung] Kim-ssi was the second wife Yi Tŏg-yŏl married after his adoption, which explains the great age difference between them. Because Tŏg-yŏl’s first wife had died without issue, an heir was adopted for that descent line. 76 Yi Tŏg-yŏl’s father, Chun-gyŏng (1499–1572), munkwa graduate of 1531, had three generations of lineal antecedents with munkwa degrees. Tŏg-yŏl was adopted to Chun-yŏng’s first cousin, Yi Yu-gyŏng, a saengwŏn of 1534, who had maternal relatives, the Namyang Pang, living in Chup’o. 77 Yi Sa-hŏn’s father-in-law was the mighty [Namwŏn] Yang Si-jin (1573–1615), who was both a chinsa (1605) and a munkwa graduate (1606) and advanced to a senior fifth-rank office. Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo, 60–61. 78 Of Yi Chun-gyŏng’s three sons, the eldest was sonless and had to adopt an heir and the second died before marriage, leaving Tŏg-yŏl as the only lineal offspring. 79 This information is based on Yi Hŭi-hwan, “Namwŏn ŭi Kwangju Yi-ssi,” 252–56; Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 91.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 1 8 –1 2 6

471

80 MTP, 2: 225b–6a; YSJ 5.3a, 9a (another of Chin’s great-grandsons is listed as a recluse); 6.7a, 7.2b. 81 The Sunhŭng An belonged to the capital bureaucracy since the late thirteenth century. An Ki’s father and his three brothers were all munkwa graduates. See MTP, 2: 131a. 82 YSJ 5.6a, 7.1a. Yŏng was one of General Ko Kyŏng-myŏng’s (1533–92) assistants. For Ko, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 315. 83 Chŏng Yŏn-bang’s father-in-law was Yi Nŭng-gan (?–1357), who had an illustrious military career; under King Kongmin he served as chancellor. For his biography, see Koryŏsa 110.43b–44a. 84 Ch’angwŏn Chŏng-ssi chokpo (1933?) 1.1a–2a; MTP, 2: 233b–4a. 85 Ch’angwŏn Chŏng-ssi chokpo, 1.11a–b; YSJ 5.2b; TYSUR 11.244–45 lists him as a disciple of Cho Kwang-jo. 86 For Chŏng Hwang’s biography (written by his distant cousin Yŏm), see Chŏng Hwang, Yuhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 1a–8a; Ch’angwŏn Chŏng-ssi chokpo 1.11b–12a; YSJ 5.2b–3a; TYSUR 11.245–47. 87 Hwang Yun-gil (1536–?), a munkwa graduate of 1561, advanced to head the Ministry of War in the late 1580s. In 1590, he was the chief envoy, who, together with Kim Sŏng-il as his deputy, was sent to Japan to investigate the prospect of a Japanese invasion of Korea. 88 Pang Ŭng-sŏng was the third son of Kwi-hwa’s first son, Han-jang. For a genealogical table of the Namyang Pang, see Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: xi. 89 For a discussion on marriages with matrilateral kin in early Chosŏn, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 237–38. 90 Hwang Chŏk was also a military man whose descendants moved to Suwŏl-ri (in Sadong-bang) sometime in the early eighteenth century and became known as the Suwŏl Hwang. 91 For a sketch of the Changsu Hwang, see Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 1–49; YSJ 7.11b. 92 YSJ 5.4b, 7.17a. Chang Kyŏng-se’s natal father was Kŭp’s elder brother Kŏn (?–1565). Kyŏng-se’s wife was a niece of Kŭp’s first wife. For the Chang’s marital relations, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 323–24. 93 The husband was Yi Chi-yu, a munkwa graduate of 1389. MTP, 1: 99a. 94 She was the daughter of T’oegye’s eldest son, Chun. 95 For a chart of the Ŭisŏng Kim’s marriage network, see KCKM, 53–54. 96 Kwŏn Ŭi was Sa-bin’s main-line heir and the founder of the Yech’ŏn branch of the Andong Kwŏn. He is supposed to have passed the chinsa examinations, but this cannot be verified. 97 Cho Kang-hŭi, “Yŏngnam chibang ŭi honban,” 79–121. See also Cho’s posthumously published work Yŏngnam chibang yangban kamun ŭi honin kwan’gye. 98 I was unable to determine the relationship between Yŏn’s Namwŏn Ryang wife and Hwi-ji’s Namwŏn Ryang wife. 99 The marriage data are based on MTP and genealogies. For a differently arranged chart illustrating various marital ties, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 303. 100 Han Yŏng-guk, “Chosŏn hugi ŏnŭ sajok kamun,” 533–58. Prof. Han investigated the genealogical records of the Chŏnju Sŏ-ssi, a rather undistinguished local descent group residing in the vicinity of the capital. The sample covers the period between the late sixteenth and the late nineteenth centuries and comprises 120 men and 114 women. Han did not, however, speculate about the reasons for the high mortality rate of young women. One of the most likely explanations of this phenomenon is that elite women, before marriage, were sequestered in the inner quarters of their homes and thus rarely exposed to sunshine. The consequent deficiency of vitamin D led to a fragile bone structure of the pelvis—an anomaly that endangered women in childbirth. I am indebted for this insight to Charlotte Furth. 101 In “15–16segi Yean-hyŏn sajokch’ŭng ŭi sŏngjang,” 122–23, Pak Hyŏn-sun provided additional examples for Yean sajok, and Paek Sŭng-jong observed the phenomenon in T’aein County (Chŏlla). See his Han’guk sahoesa, 55–56. 102 Kwŏn Yang, “Yŏngga kahun,” Chijoktang-jip, as quoted in Han’gukhak kich’o charyo sŏnjip, 357. Kwŏn Yang was a ninth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Kŭn. MTP, 2: 55a. 103 Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 222–23, 267–73.

472

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 2 6 –1 2 8

1 04 For a discussion of secondary wives, see ibid., 267–73. 105 T’aejo sillok 12.2b (1397). 106 T’aejong sillok 10.10a (1405). “Permanent” meant that the descendants of such a person could not again be enslaved. The Office of Maritime Affairs (Sajaegam), established in 1392, was originally in charge of procuring maritime products and fuel for the royal house. In 1414, it was joined with the Office of Naval Vessels and Water Transportation (Sasugam) and henceforth was responsible for maintaining and registering ships and supervising taxation of fishing areas. See Yŏkchu Kyŏngguk taejŏn, chusŏkp’yŏn, 99–100. 107 T’aejong sillok 29.19b–20b (1415). 108 Ibid., 11.28a–b (1406), 26.22b (1413). 109 Ibid., 27.1b–2a (1414). 110 Slave records were destroyed in Kaesŏng in 1361. The “high and low officials” (taeso wŏnin) were defined as government officials of all ranks, graduates of the civil and military examinations, graduates of the lower examinations, guard personnel of the guard units (sŏngjunggwan), and descendants of persons who had held protection appointments. See, for example, Sejong sillok 55.27a–b (1432). The term “high and low officials” was an ad hoc definition and comprised only part of the sajok. See Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 243–44. 111 T’aejong sillok 27.1b–2a, 23b–24a (1414). 112 Ibid., 28.3b, 16a–b; 29.12b–13a (1415). 113 Ibid., 29.19b–20b (1415). 114 Among the “miscellaneous offices” (chapchik) was the Office of the Royal Wardrobe (Saŭiwŏn), the Office of the Royal Stud (Saboksi), the Office of Music (Changawŏn), and others. See Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 102–12. For the chapchik in Sejong’s time, see Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn ch’o’gi yangban yŏn’gu, 110n296. 115 T’aejong sillok 29.23b–24a (1415). 116 Sejong sillok 42.4a (1428); 47.8b–9a (1430). Such a law was apparently codified in the Sok yukchŏn of 1426. 117 Later called Poch’ungdae, the Auxiliary Army Unit was established in 1415 and, according to the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, attached to the Central Army Unit (Ŭihŭngwi). Its social function was apparently more important than its military duties. T’aejong sillok 29.13b (1415), 33.47b (1417); Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 331. For a brief description, see Min Hyŏn-gu, Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŭi kunsa, 131–32; Yi Hong-du, Chosŏn sidae sinbun, 39–55. Of the five separate groups attached to this Unit, base persons who had purchased their release (sinsok) were shortly later barred from it. Sejong sillok 9.11b–12a (1420); 46.16a (1429); Sŏngjong sillok 258.21b (1491). 118 Sŏngjong sillok 40.2a–b (1474); Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 157–58, 415–16, 486–87. Poch’unggun was briefly abolished in King Sejo’s time and reestablished as Poch’ungdae in 1469. Yejong sillok 5.8b (1469). The procedure was later outlined in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn: a high or low official (or his representative) registers his base son(s) before age sixteen with the Slave Office, whereupon that office verifies the facts, registers the candidate, and sends the documents on to the Ministry of War which enlists him in the Auxiliary Army Unit. Those who were registered but fail to take up duties are automatically returned to base status. After service of one thousand days (three hundred days for sons of officials of rank three and above), the candidate is discharged as commoner and allowed to take up a “miscellaneous office” (chapchik) of junior ninth rank. His advancement, however, was limited by the rule of restricted office holding (hanp’um sŏyong). 119 According to the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 158, sons and grandsons of officials of the second rank and above were allowed to get positions in such senior third-rank offices as the Office of Astronomy and Calendar Science (Kwansanggam), the Medical Office (Chŏnŭigam), Office of Interpreters (Sayŏgwŏn), and the junior-six-rank Office of Painters and Calligraphers (Tohwasŏ), among others. 120 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 208. 121 Kaksa sugyo, 67–68; Sinbo sugyo chimnok, 482–84. 122 Sok taejŏn, 440–41, 452. A commentary stipulated further that base offspring denounced by



123

124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 1 40 141 142 143

N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 2 8 –13 3

473

someone of the primary line should not become a government slave. Clearly, this would have been an easy way to get rid of a rival. Kim Hyo-ji’s wife, Hwang-ssi, justified her gift of three slaves, among them Mundŏk, to Changyong by the latter’s filial behavior toward her and the good care he took of her when she was ill. Chang-yong, who used the family surname Kim, seems to have been well integrated in his environment, but it was unusual that a base son would talk about primary and secondary marriage. See KKOK, no. 23, 203–5. KKOK, no. 30, 210–11; KCKM, 40–41. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 500. KKOK, no. 26, 208; KCKM, no. 120, 424. Yi Chi-hyŏn was a graduate of the classics examinations (saengwŏn). MTP, 1: 143b. Yi Chi-hyŏn had a daughter, who was widowed without offspring, to whom he gave five slaves; he signed the gift record shortly before his death in 1716. KCKM, no. 206, 469. The records concerning Yi Chi-hyŏn’s secondary offspring are among fifty-four documents kept by the Yŏnghae branch of the Chaeryŏng Yi. They were cataloged by Ch’oe Sun-hŭi, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi Yŏnghae-p’a mun’gi ko.” Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 494–96; Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 208–10. KCKM, no. 25, 173. Of the sixty-eight land sales initiated by slaves, further mentioned in chapter 6, only two, however, stated that patrimonial land was involved. Both date from the sixteenth century. KCKM, no. 334, 641; no. 390, 657. For examples, see Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 220; Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong,” 264–71. KCKM, no. 12, 140–42. For the references, see chapter 6. KCKM, no. 70, 288. KKOK, no. 18, 193–98; KCKM, no. 91, 357, 364. Oksaeng’s husband, Yi Cham, was perhaps a secondary son turned commoner serving in a military unit. UKKM, punjaegi no. 31, 192. I was unable to identify Kim Sin-gi, the father. For an example, see KCKM, no. 70, 288 (1544); see also Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 187, on the mourning grade for sŏmo. UKKM, iban no. 6 (1691), 125–26; nobi mun’gi, no. 4, 234–35. According to the Sok taejŏn of 1746, 450, the price for an able-bodied slave to buy commoner status was fixed at not more than 100 yang. KCKM, no. 110, 417–18 (1718). Pae Chae-hong has made some calculations based on various inheritance documents. See his “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong,” 272–84.

Chapter 6 1 For a study of the development of the irrigation system in the sixteenth century, see Yi T’ae-jin, Han’guk sahoesa, 187–219. 2 Sejong sillok 23.37a (1424). 3 For the details, see Kim T’ae-yŏng, Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oji, 157–85. 4 For a detailed discussion of the plight of the commoners, see Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, chap. 2; Kim Kŏn-t’ae, Chosŏn sidae yangban’ga, chap. 1. 5 For an analysis of Sejong’s national survey, see Yi Ho-ch’ŏl, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp, 660–87. 6 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, sokchip, 8.27b–28a; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 72–74. Yi Kye-yang was appointed education officer in 1454. 7 As quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 74. Land was usually measured in kyŏl or turak (ma[l] jigi). Kyŏl was not a land measurement since it denoted the yield rather than the size of a particular piece of land. For tax purposes land was graded according to six categories of productivity. One kyŏl of the most fertile land measured approximately 0.9 hectare (or 2.22 acres), that of

474

8 9 10 11

12 13 14

15

16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24 25

N o t e s t o pag e s 13 4 –13 6

category six 3.7 hectares (or 9.14 acres). One kyŏl subdivided into 100 pu, and one pu into ten sok. A kyŏl is not easily translatable into majigi (or turak) because majigi specified the amount of grain necessary for sowing a particular piece of land. This differed, of course, according to whether or not the land was irrigated. Calculations, therefore, vary widely according to time and area. In sixteenth-century Andong one kyŏl roughly equaled 40 majigi (ca. 3.3 acres), that is, 40 mal of grain were necessary to sow on one kyŏl. One mal contained ca. 5.5 liters of grain. 15 to 20 mal were one sŏm. These calculations are based on Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 68–71, 95. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 51, 111; no. 58, 120. Kwŏn Pŏl, “Ch’ungjae sŏnsaeng yŏnbo,” in Ch’ungjae-jip 5a. KCKM, no. 16, 152–54. Kim Ye-bŏm distributed sixty-eight slaves, forty-nine of whom had come from his wife’s side, equally among his three sons and two daughters. KCKM, no. 24, 171; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 152. The land in Kŭm’gwangp’yŏng was last mentioned in a yangan of 1858. At that time, it still was sizable, comprising almost 61 kyŏl. It was apparently common that powerful landowners received official certificates (iban) for undeveloped land without cultivating it. A royal edict of 1688, therefore, ruled that “if someone receives a certificate for wasteland but does not bring it under cultivation within three years, he cannot launch a complaint against someone who does so after three years.” Sugyo chimnok, in Sugyo chibyo, 251–52. KCKM, no. 24, 171. There is an obvious discrepancy between the number of slaves recorded in the household register of 1528—31 (with ten missing) and that provided in the inheritance paper of 1535—62. Inheritance papers tend to be more accurate than household registers. Although regarded as commoners at the beginning of Chosŏn, “new paekchŏng” do not seem to have been sedentary peasants, but made their livelihood by hunting and shepherding. They were therefore classified as “commoners with mean occupations” (sillyang ch’ŏnin) and as such were vulnerable to exploitation by the elite. For details, see Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 191–96. The Chuch’on household register of 1528 was first analyzed by Yi Yŏng-hun and An Sŭng-jun, “1528nyŏn Andong-bu pubuk Chuch’on,” 129–43. Kim Sŏng-u also studied it in Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 189–211. Kim Sŏng-u has suggested that the three paekchŏng households, although in fact dependent on Yi Hun, were registered as independent households by Yi so that he might avoid the reputation of being a “local bully” (t’oho). Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, for instance, year 1583. KCKM, 49; Yi Ho-ch’ŏl, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp, 429–30. Yi Chae-su analyzed 171 land sale documents of the sixteenth century detailing land transactions undertaken by the Chinsŏng Yi, the Yangdong Son, and the Chaeryŏng Yi (all contained in KCKM). In the mid-sixteenth century, land was sold especially frequently by commoners to yangban, not only in Andong but also in other areas of Kyŏngsang Province. For the details, see Yi Chae-su, “16segi chŏndap maemae,” 51–103. See also Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 113–16. Yi Ho-ch’ŏl, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp, 306–30; Kim Kŏn-t’ae, Chosŏn sidae yangban’ga, 144–54. Besides t’oho p’umgwan there are a variety of other terms indicating local “strongmen” or “local bullies.” But it is not easy to determine their exact meaning in each case. For an exploration, see Yi Chae-ryong, “Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oho.” Chungjong sillok 17.12b (1512); 21.35a (1514), 77a (1515); 64.21b, 22b–23a (1528). Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 164–65, 188–89. YGJ 1.24b. YSJ 7.17a–b. Sŏngjong sillok 236.17b (1490). Various nomenclatures have been developed by modern scholars to categorize the different types of slaves. Yi Yŏng-hun suggested that the mode of a slave’s economic task be made the sole basis of classification. Consequently, he calls slaves who live away from the slaveholder, till their own land or, as tenants, till the latter’s fields, and pay “tribute” (sin’gong) “tribute slaves” (napkong



26 27

28 29 30

31 32

33

34

35

N o t e s t o pa g e s 13 6 –13 7

475

nobi), and those who directly or as tenants cultivate the owner’s land “resident slaves/tenants” (solgŏ nobi/sojangnong). See his “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi,” 165–68. Yi Yŏng-hun’s economically focused view has been variously criticized. See, for example, Palais, “Slave Society,” 23–47. The issue is also discussed by Chi Sŭng-jong, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi sinbun, 162–75; and Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 15–19. Recently, Kim Kŏn-t’ae suggested that the private slaves should be classified according to the place of their registration: those registered in their owner’s household register should thus be regarded as resident, those not so registered as nonresident slaves. See his “Chosŏn hugi sanobi p’aak pangsik.” Yi Ho-ch’ŏl, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp, 448–89; Yi Yŏng-hun, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi,” 131–32. Although using the same documents, their figures are not identical. These estimates are based on Yi Yŏng-hun, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi,” 114–15, and Yi Ho-ch’ŏl, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp, 428–33. Because of the various grades of soil quality, it is difficult to come up with estimates. One sŏm, the Korean bushel, weighed about 50 kilos and had a volume of roughly 120 liters. For a list of landed property and slaves held by the major Andong descent groups in the sixteenth century, see Yi Yŏng-hun, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi,” 110. For a brief discussion of the debates on land limitation (hanjŏllon) under King Chungjong at the beginning of the sixteenth century, see Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 174–75. Kim Yong-man has tabulated the slaves/places and found that in 136 locations there were single slaves, in 73 two slaves, and in 303 three slaves; only in 49 locations were there larger groups of between four and thirty-seven slaves. See his Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 191–94. The document has also been studied by Mun Suk-cha, Chosŏn sidae chaesan, 190–94. Ch’oe Sun-hŭi, “Kwŏn Tae-un chedongsaeng,” 31–43; her tabulations of land and slaves have been reprinted in Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 195–96. For a detailed analysis of chakkae, see Kim Kŏn-t’ae, Chosŏn sidae yangban’ga, 57–112. Earlier, Yi Yŏng-hun showed that the term chakkae appeared as early as 1392 and thus is not an innovation of the sixteenth century. Yi seems to give the system a rather positive gloss by stressing slave owners’ paternalistic attitude toward their slaves, providing them with their own land to till, even though the land remained the master’s property. See Yi Yŏng-hun, “ ko,” 1–17. See also Yi Yŏng-hun and Yang Tong-hyu, “Chosŏn nobije,” 293–336. There are two Andong documents dated 1540 and 1620 that clearly evidence landownership by slaves and their ability to pass the land on to their children. See KCKM, no. 15, 152, and KCKM, no. 13, 143–45, analyzed by Yi Yŏng-hun, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi,” 154–56; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 139–40. Yi Su-gŏn collected some 400 land sale documents in the Andong area, 68 (or 17 percent) of which give slaves as the sellers (sixty males and eight females), with the bulk of the transactions taking place in the sixteenth century. See KCKM, nos. 313–717, 636–747. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 203–4. The law set the amount at one bolt (p’il) of cotton cloth and twenty bills of paper money (chŏhwa) (equivalent to two tu of rice) for a male slave, and one bolt of cotton cloth and ten bills of money for a female slave, payable from age sixteen to sixty. These stipulations, though applicable to public slaves, were apparently also taken as guidelines for private slaves. The levies converted to cloth only amounted to roughly two p’il for a male and one p’il for a female slave. In the second half of the sixteenth century, one p’il was roughly equivalent to five tu of grain. Chi Sŭng-jong concluded that two p’il of cotton cloth had become the norm for middynastic Chosŏn. See his Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi, 226–31. This is confirmed by the Sok taejŏn that set the penalty payment of a recaptured slave at two p’il per lost year. Sok taejŏn, 441–42. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 489–90, 500. With the value of a slave’s work per day set at six pieces of paper money, the price of 4,000 pieces was equivalent to 666 working days. For a price table from Koryŏ to the late fifteenth century, see Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 279. A valid sale’s certificate consisted of several documents; for a sample, see Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Han’guk komunsŏ yŏn’gu, 407–9. Trading in slaves was subject to government control in early Chosŏn, with the price for a slave fixed (in 1398) at 400 p’il of cloth. It was “unreasonable,” it was argued, that the earlier price

476

36 37 38 39 40 41 42

43 44

45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59

N o t e s t o pag e s 13 8 –1 4 1

of 150 p’il had been equivalent to only one-third of that of a horse—“weighing a domestic animal higher than a human being.” T’aejo sillok 14.15a (1398). Later, the Kyŏngguk taejŏn set the price for a slave aged between fifteen and fifty at 4,000 pieces of paper money (equivalent to 20 sŏm of grain or 40 p’il), approximately equal to that of a horse. To be legally valid, the buying or selling of a slave had to be reported to the authorities (either to the Slave Office or to the local magistrate). Sin nobi in inheritance papers stood, according to Kim Yong-man, for “bridal” rather than for “new” slaves. See his Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 21–24. KKOK, iban no. 5, 16–17. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 496; for a discussion of this law, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 222. Kaksa sugyo, 87–88. KCKM, no. 258, 550–56. See Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 207. These estimates are based on the Ulsan census register of 1609, the oldest statistical evidence available, and household registers of the Puan Kim dating from 1672 to the early nineteenth century. See Han Yŏng-guk, “Chosŏn chungyŏp ŭi nobi,” 186–97; Chŏn Hyŏng-t’aek, Chosŏn hugi nobi, 52–56. T’aejong sillok 10.17a (1405). Mixed offspring of public and private slaves had been treated differently: those of the former had to follow the father’s, those of the latter the mother’s status. The ruling of 1454 made the law uniform, but at the same time clearly catered to the interests of private slave owners. It anticipated the ruling later incorporated in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn. Tanjong sillok 11.6b–7a (1454); Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 490. In 1414, a royal edict reversed the original matrifilial rule and determined that the offspring of slave women with commoner husbands would henceforth follow their father’s status and become automatically commoners. T’aejong sillok 27.1b–2a (1414); Sejong sillok 50.22b (1430). These documents were studied by Yang Yŏng-jo, “Yŏmal-Sŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon,” 3–52; and Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 136–38; Chŏng Ku-bok, “Kim Mu ŭi punjaegi (1429),” 19–73 (with facsimile of the original document). KCKM, no. 64, 266–71; Yang Yŏng-jo, “Yŏmal-Sŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon,” 26–27. See KCKM, no. 3 (1452) and no. 4 (1455), 128–29. They are tabulated in Yang Yŏng-jo, “YŏmalSŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon,” 27–28. KCKM, no. 65, 271–73. KCKM, no. 66, 273–80. KCKM, no. 70, 289–90; tabulated by Yang Yŏng-jo, “Yŏmal-Sŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon,” 40. It was the inheritance that Kwŏn Pŏl’s wife, Ch’oe-ssi, received. Yi Ŭn-bo (1520–80) was Yi Ae’s eldest son. KCKM, no. 71, 289–90. An analysis of the slaves’ years of birth reveals that the large majority were born in the sixteenth century. See Yang Yŏng-jo, “Yŏmal-Sŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon,” 42. KCKM, no. 80, 316–20; tabulated by Yang Yŏng-jo, “Yŏmal-Sŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon,” 44. Han Yŏng-guk, “Chosŏn chungyŏp ŭi nobi,” 192–97. Prof. Han pointed out that the partners of nonresident slaves came from diverse backgrounds, including government slaves and commoners with special labor obligations. Some of these “commoners” were upwardly mobile slaves. The reason why unions between slave women and commoner men do not appear in inheritance papers is because their offspring would have automatically become the property of the woman’s owner—an unattractive option for a commoner. Yi Hyŏng-sang (1653–1733), Pyŏngwa-jip 13.44b. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ sokchip 8.82b. The slave-related passages in T’oegye’s corre­ spondence with Chun are collected in Yi Su-gŏn, “T’oegye Yi Hwang kamun ŭi chaesan,” 676. The original correspondence is contained in Tosan chŏnsŏ, 4: 229–78. For illustrative examples, see Chi Sŭng-jong, Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi, 212–20. The number of slaves officials were allowed to take with them was fixed according to their ranks by the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 194–95.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 4 2 –1 4 6

477

60 Kyŏngsangdo chiriji, 84–85; Sejong sillok chiriji 150.13a. During Koryŏ, Naesŏng had been a “special area” (pu’gok). YGJ 1.2b. 61 Yi Sŭng-jik was a Kyŏngju Yi. Because he had a distinguished government career, concluding as inspector general (junior second rank), he was buried in Kwangju (Kyŏnggi), his original place of residence. His wife, Pae-ssi, however, was buried in Andong. Ssijok wŏllyu, 42; YGJ 8.5b–6a; ADPM, 174–75. 62 Because his elder brother Chong-jun (?–1499), a disciple of Kim Chong-jik and a munkwa graduate of 1485, was a victim of the Purge of 1498, Hong-jun was forced to leave the capital. See Wagner, Literati Purges, 75, 193n51. 63 ADPM, 191. The Yŏnggaji repeatedly mentions Hong-jun as skillful calligrapher of hanging boards (hyŏnp’an) and tomb inscriptions. YGJ 3.21b; 7.6a, 11a, 14b; 8.12a. 64 Pae I-sun was a fifth-generation descendant of Pae Sang-ji. KNJ credits him with a (unverifiable) chinsa degree. KNJ 11.37b. He was the father of Pae Hŏn. 65 Nam Myŏng was a fourth-generation descendant of Nam U-ryang. He did not have a degree, but is said to have been well versed in the classics, so that students flocked to his door. YGJ 1.21b; Yŏngyang-Ŭiryŏng-Kosŏng Nam-ssi taedongbo, 1: 40–41. 66 For the original compact and its various extensions, see Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 137, 330–58. 67 Yi Hŭi-dong’s grandfather, Hŭng-yang, was the older brother of T’oegye’s grandfather, Kye-yang. MTP, 1: 131a. 68 [Yŏngyang] Nam Chung-myŏng was a fourth-generation descendant of Nam Pu-ryang, Nam Min-saeng’s first son. Chung-myŏng and Myŏng thus were third cousins. 69 KNJ 11.37b. Pae Hŏn passed the chinsa in 1516. 70 One pair of brothers is [Tanyang] U In-son and U Ŭi-son; the latter was apparently a magistrate (pusa). MTP, 2: 222b. 71 Sondo, literally “injured fellow,” was a colloquial expression for someone who was ostracized from the community and thus no longer enjoyed the benefits of the compact. There was also a temporary ostracism. 72 When this ward compact was drawn up, Kwŏn Pŏl was in office. 73 Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 127, 312; no. 137, 330–31. 74 Ibid., no. 137, 132–33. Yi Mun-gyu was the fourth son of Yi Hŭi-dong, who was listed on the original compact roster as one of Yi Hong-jun’s sons-in-law. Due to his filiality, Mun-gyu received through recommendation a royal tomb keeper position, but did not serve. Among his elder brothers, two were chinsa graduates, one a saengwŏn. MTP, 1: 131a; Yi Hwang, “Tosan munhyŏllok,” in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 4: 4.34b. The community compacts are more fully discussed in chapter 9. 75 YGJ 1.21b. Only Kwi-su’s chinsa degree is recorded in the KNJ. Yŏngyang-Ŭiryŏng-Kosŏng Nam-ssi taedongbo, 1: 40–41; KNJ 11.37b. 76 YGJ 1.22a, 7.8b; KNJ 11.23b. Chŏng Yu-il’s pon’gwan was Tongnae. For more, see chapter 7. 77 YGJ 7.8b; KNJ 11.23b. For the tomb inscription, written by Yu Sŏng-nyong, see Kukcho inmul ko, 35–37. For more, see chapter 7. 78 YGJ 8.11a. Pae Hŏn was given a posthumous title of left royal secretary. 79 YGJ 1.21b–22a. 80 I borrow this term from Levi, “On Microhistory,” 94. 81 For a discussion of inheritance practices, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 203–30. The inheritance law, encoded in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn of 1485, that laid down equal inheritance among all offspring—male and female—remained unchanged until the end of the dynasty. 82 KCKM, no. 24, 171. 83 UKKM, punjaegi nos. 1–3, 2: 126–28; no. 14, 4: 183. 84 See Kim Sŏng-il’s yŏnbo (chronological biography) in Hakpong-jip, purok, 1.8b. For Sŏng-il’s landed wealth, see UKKM, wanŭi no. 20, 2: 102; no. 20, 4: 171–72 (1692). 85 Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, purok, 2.1a–81a; 3.31a. His biographer was the famous scholar Chŏng Ku. 86 KCKM, no. 25, 172–75; Yŏnbang se’go, 5.456–60; UKSB 3.1b. 87 KCKM, no. 143, 437.

478

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 4 6 –15 1

88 KCKM, no. 89, 340–52; Yi Su-gŏn, “T’oegye Yi Hwang kamun,” 652–66. The original division paper was drafted in 1586. 89 Kim Pang-gŏl’s wife was a Tongnae Chŏng; she was well-connected on her mother’s side. 90 UKKM, punjaegi no. 10, 2: 132; no. 10, 4: 181–83. 91 UKKM, punjaegi no. 22, 2: 145; no. 22, 4: 186. 92 For a discussion of Kwŏn Pŏl’s inheritance documents, see Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 57–79; explanatory diagram on 56 (Japanese edition). 93 KCKM, no. 70, 287–88. 94 KCKM, no. 75, 298–305. A table of the 1550 document is in Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 161. The shares of the secondary daughters were smaller than those of the secondary sons. 95 KCKM, no. 18, 155–59. 96 KCKM, no. 32, 188–97; Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 154. Miyajima counted 341 slaves, whereas Yi Su-gŏn counted only 318. See table in KCKM, 28. 97 KCKM, no. 40, 215–44; Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 154–55, 163 (table). Yi Su-gŏn counted only 507 slaves; I have adopted Miyajima’s figures. 98 KCKM, no. 777, 796–97. The document is partially translated in Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 227. 99 KCKM, no. 103, 401–5; no. 104, 405–8; Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 155, 165–68. 100 KKOK, no. 1, 150–56; KCKM, no. 1, 120–26. See chart on KCKM, no. 38. A part of the inheritance had already been handed on in 1418, but was included again in the document of 1429. The document has also been analyzed by Chŏng Ku-bok, “Kim Mu ŭi punjaegi (1429),” 19–73. 101 This is Yi Su-gŏn’s conjecture. KCKM, nos. 39–40. 102 KCKM, nos. 91–92. 103 According to the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, the legal share would have amounted to merely one-seventh of the full share. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 496–97. 104 KKok, no. 2, 156–57; no. 21, 201–2; no. 28, 208–9; KCKM, nos. 39–40; no. 6, 131–33; no. 8, 136–37; no. 237, 506–8; Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 142–43. 105 See also Pak Hyŏn-sun, “15–16segi Yean-hyŏn sajokch’ŭng,” 125–33. 106 KKOK, no. 24, 205–7; KCKM, no. 40. 107 KKOK, no. 25, 207–8; no. 29, 210; KCKM, 41, no. 9, 137–38. 108 KKOK, no. 30, 210–11. 109 KKOK, no. 3, 158–59; KCKM, no. 41. At the same time, Yŏn’s two sons were each given one slave as a special gift. 110 KKOK, no. 26, 206; no. 32, 211–12; KCKM, no. 120, 424. In fact, Yŏn had passed the munkwa in 1519. 111 KKOK, no. 33, 212; no. 35, 212; no. 37, 212–13; no. 38, 213. 112 KKOK, no. 8, 163–68; no. 9, 168–70; KCKM, 42, no. 17, 154–55; no. 74, 293–97; Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 143–44. 113 KKOK, no. 11, 171–76; no. 12, 176–79; KCKM, 43, no. 77, 307–12; Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 147. 114 KKOK, no. 14, 179–82; KCKM, no. 84, 325–31. 115 KKOK, no. 6, 161–63; no. 15, 182–87; no. 16, 188–91; KCKM, no. 86, 333–37; no. 254, 543–46. The estimate of Hae’s wealth is based on Chŏng Ku-bok’s calculations, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 148–50. There are no inheritance papers extant after 1619, but some later household registers indicate that the numbers of slaves held by Kwang-gye’s son and grandson were still considerable (at least on paper). 116 Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 247–57. 117 Tosan chŏnsŏ, yujip, as quoted by Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 259. 118 Some 551 letters to Chun are extant among T’oegye’s copious correspondence. Epistolary Korea, 277. 119 KCKM, no. 89, 340–52; Yi Su-gŏn, “T’oegye Yi Hwang kamun,” 641–80; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 247–57. Three thousand majigi are roughly 75 kyŏl or 480 acres. 120 For the details, see Mun Suk-cha, “Andong Chuch’on ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssiga,” 8.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 15 1 –15 9

479

121 For an analysis of the inheritance papers left by the Chaeryŏng Yi and the Kosŏng Yi, see Mun Suk-cha, Chosŏn sidae chaesan, 179–242. 122 Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 72–77. Of the 190 places mentioned, Miyajima was able to identify 151. 123 KCKM, no. 89, 340–52. 124 See, for example, Kim Yong-sŏp’s studies on yangan in his Chosŏn hugi nongŏpsa yŏn’gu. 125 For a brief description of the Koryŏ tradition, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 51–55. 126 T’oegye’s letter to Chun, as quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 260. 127 Yi Hon was the third son of Yi Tam-son’s elder brother, Ch’ilsan-jŏng, and was adopted by the sonless Tam-son. Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 299–300. 128 For the division document of Tam-son’s father’s wealth among nine siblings, see Chŏnju Yi-ssi Korimgun-p’a 16a–17b. The document’s date is uncertain, but is probably 1537. Instead of Tam-son, who had died, Hon signed the document. 129 For the documents, see Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang, 1: 182–86. 130 Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang, pun’gŭp munsŏ nos. 1 and 2, vol. 2. For this as yet unpublished second volume of the Tundŏk Yi documents, I am grateful to Chŏn Kyŏng-mok. The 1679 document is also discussed by Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 206–7. 131 Yi Mun-ju was Yi Yu-hyŏng’s (1586–1656) adopted lineal heir. His natural father was Yu-hyŏng’s younger brother, Kuk-hyŏng (1592–1653). 132 For the 1688 document, see Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang, 1: 192–95. 133 For the documents, see Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 279, 296, 301–3, with analysis and commentary by Song June-ho. In 1604, those slaves who were noted as missing in 1582 but had in the meantime been retrieved were divided between the two heirs. See ibid., 1: 315. 134 Ibid., 1: 317–21. Tax exemption (pokho) meant that land and service taxes were no longer levied. 135 Yang Si-ik, who lived in Kwimi village (Sunch’ang County), was one of the seven sons of Yang Sa-min (1528–93). Sa-min did not take the exams, but earned a reputation as a scholar. He died during the first Japanese invasion. For details, see Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo, 174–77. 136 Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 324–32. 137 It is possible that Suk-ku received this appointment because he was Hwang Chin’s great-grandson. 138 Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 335–39; Hyŏnjong kaesu sillok 24.42a (1671). 139 These data, which rely on research by Yi Ho-ch’ŏl and Chŏn Sŏng-ho, seem to contradict Yi T’aejin’s assessment, based on two Sillok records of 1491 and 1515, that land ownership in Namwŏn was generally larger than in Andong, where small and middle landowners supposedly constituted the majority. This discrepancy, Yi T’ae-jin speculated, explains why in Andong Neo-Confucian instruments of moral cultivation such as the community compact were more easily introduced than in Namwŏn, where “dark cults” (ŭmsa) were widespread. See Yi T’ae-jin, Han’guk sahoesa yŏn’gu, 165. 140 For an example, see UKKM, punjaegi no. 17, 4: 183. The custom of special gifts is discussed by Yi Mun-hyŏn, “16segi ŭi pyŏlgŭp kwanhaeng,” 33–68. 141 The land registers (yangan) of 1720 for Tundŏk and two further subcounties have been studied by Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 189–204.

Part III Introduction 1 [Chinju] Ha Yŏn (1376–1453), one of Chŏng Mong-ju’s disciples and a munkwa passer of 1396, had an illustrious government career and wrote his preface to Kyŏngsangdo chiriji in 1425, when he was the governor of Kyŏngsang Province. 2 Kyŏngsangdo chiriji, 2–3. 3 Cho Yong was a native of Chinbo and a munkwa passer of 1374. Famous for his literary styles, he also earned great popularity as a teacher at the National Confucian Academy. For his obituary, see Sejong sillok 24.34b–35a; STYSN 25.27b; TYSUR 3.62–63. 4 Yun Sang was of hyangni background of Yech’ŏn and graduated from the regular civil service examinations in 1396. He served in local teaching posts and also at the National Confucian Acad-

480

5 6 7

8 9 10 11 12 13

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 6 0 –1 6 4

emy. In 1450, he was stripped of office as a deputy director (junior second rank) of the Office of Royal Decrees, most likely because of his hyangni background. Yun Sang’s yŏnbo in Pyŏltong-jip 3.1a–5b; myogalmyŏng in ibid., 3.5b–8b; STYSN 24.41b; TYSUR 3.74–75; Munjong sillok 2.28a–29a. The MTP, 1: 281b, lists only Yun’s father, grandfather, and great-grandfather—all with honorary titles likely received on the basis of Yun’s merits. Sang was the only munkwa passer among the Yech’ŏn Yun, and his posterity seems to have been insignificant. For the early Tohak thinkers in Yŏngnam, see also Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 305–10. For Kim An-guk, see chapter 7, note 7. Kim In-hu passed the sama in 1531 and, while studying at the National Confucian Academy, also befriended Yi T’oegye. He passed a special munkwa examination in 1540. He held some minor posts in the Office of Diplomatic Correspondence (Sŭngmunwŏn) before he retired to his country seat. TYSUR 11.256–62.; Han’guk inmyŏng taesajŏn, 159–60. His enshrinement in the Munmyo took place in 1796. For Ch’oe Pu, see chapter 7, note 15. For intellectual portraits of Kim In-hu and Yu Hŭi-ch’un, see Ko Yŏng-jin, Honam sarim ŭi hangmaek kwa sasang, 171–221. The other two were No Chin (see chapter 7) and the scholar Yi Hang (1499–1576). For the details of this debate, see Kalton, The Four-Seven Debate. For a summary of Chŏlla’s various intellectual strains, see Ko Yŏng-jin, Honam sarim ŭi hangmaek kwa sasang, 28. For the details, see Deuchler, “Ritual and Order,” 294–97.

Chapter 7 1 Yi Chu was one of the five sons of Yi Chŭng’s first son, P’yŏng. He won fame for his poetic talents. YGJ 7.6a–b; KNJ 11.22b; TYSUR 5.118; Wagner, Literati Purges, 65, 66, 190n40, 192n49. 2 Kwŏn Min-su and Kwŏn Tal-su belonged to a branch of the Andong Kwŏn that was connected neither to Su-p’yŏng nor to Su-hong. Min-su, a munkwa graduate of 1494, was banished in 1504 for reasons I could not discover, but in 1512, he served in the Office of the Special Counselors, where he was a colleague of Kwŏn Pŏl. YGJ 7.5a. Kwŏn Tal-su, a munkwa graduate of 1492, led, as a member of the Office of the Special Counselors, the opposition against bestowing further honors on Lady Yun, Yŏnsan’gun’s mother, and was beheaded in 1504. YGJ 7.5a; Wagner, Literati Purges, 187n26. 3 [Kwangsan] Kim Yong-sŏk received his chinsa degree in 1472, the same year as Kwŏn Pŏl’s father. His elder brother, Yŏ-sŏk (1445–93), munkwa graduate of 1465, was the inspector general in 1492. Only he is mentioned in MTP, 1: 157a. Yong-sŏk retired to Kudam village, originally developed by Kwŏn Chip-kyŏng, because he had married the granddaughter of Kim Yu-on, who was Kwŏn’s son-in-law. Yong-sŏk was buried in Andong. For Yong-sŏk, see YGJ 7.14a–b; ADPM, 184–85; KNJ 11.37b. 4 Kwŏn Chang (1489–?) passed the regular munkwa examination held in the third month of 1519. He later served as a magistrate. 5 Three major rosters list the names of those who were victimized in 1519. The oldest one, the Kimyo tangjŏk, was compiled by Kim Chŏng-guk, himself a victim of 1519; it contains 94 names. The authors of the two other lists are descendants of victims; they supplement Kim’s list, so that in toto 218 names are recorded. For the details, see Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 97–102. For a more recent analysis of the rosters, see Song Ung-sŏp, “Chungjongdae kimyo sarim.” 6 Other issues concerned the designation of ritual heirs for Tanjong and Yŏnsan’gun, the exclusion of female musicians from palace functions, and the elimination of fake merit subjects from Chung­ jong’s merit subject list. 7 Kim An-guk (1478–1543) and his younger brother, Chŏng-guk (1481–1541), belonged to a capitalbased branch of the Ŭisŏng Kim, originating from Yong-bi’s younger brother, Yong-p’il. As principal disciples of Kim Koeng-p’il and close associates of Cho Kwang-jo, both were stripped of office in 1519, but rehabilitated in 1537. Kim An-guk, a munkwa graduate of 1503, held several



8 9 10

11

12 13

14 15

16 17

18 19 20 21

22

N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 6 4 –1 6 6

481

low-level offices before he was appointed governor of Kyŏngsang Province in 1517. There he was instrumental in arranging the printing of many Confucian classics and distributing them to local schools. For biographical materials, see TYSUR 7.156–77. For Kwŏn Pŏl’s career, see Kwŏn Pŏl, Ch’ungjae-jip, yŏnbo, 1a–11b; Yi Pyŏng-hyu traced Pŏl’s career in “16segi chŏnban’gi ŭi chŏngguk.” See Kwŏn Pŏl, Ch’ungjae-jip, haengjang, 8.1a–11b; YGJ 7.7a. Kwŏn Chu belonged to Su-hong’s line, residing in Kail (Andong), and thus was a distant collateral kinsman of Kwŏn Pŏl. Well known for his literary style and knowledge of the Chinese language, Kwŏn passed the munkwa in 1481 and moved through the Censorate to the position of fifth royal secretary in 1498. Later he also served as provincial governor and visited China and Tsushima. He was killed because he had taken the poison to Lady Yun, Yŏnsan’gun’s mother, with which she had to take her own life after being deposed by King Sŏngjong. Kwŏn Chu was buried in Andong. ADPM, 197–209; YGJ 7.5a, 8.6a; KNJ 11.22b. Kwŏn Chu’s wife was the daughter of [Kosŏng] Yi Ch’ik, a munkwa graduate of 1462 and nephew of Yi Chŭng. YGJ 7.7a; KNJ 11.23a; Wagner, Literati Purges, 90, 203n72. Kwŏn Chŏn was involved in the “defamation case” of 1521 when two high officials, who had seized power after 1519, were accused of plotting against the sarim and the throne. The Sillok historians were fierce in their defamation of Chŏn’s character. [Yŏngch’ŏn] Yi Hyŏn-bo married an Andong Kwŏn and was buried in Andong. KNJ 12.7b; ADPM, 215–29. According to the Wagner-Song Munkwa Project’s statistics, the percentage of Chŏlla men who passed the munkwa examination in the fifteenth century was only 11.2, compared to 24.1 percent in Kyŏngsang. It increased to 12 percent in the sixteenth century. I am grateful to Prof. Wagner for allowing me to use these statistics, which have not yet been published. Kim Chong-jik’s tenure lasted only one year. He mentioned the activities of robbers and wild markets as other serious problems in Chŏlla Province. For his report to the king, see Sŏngjong sillok 204.15a–b; Yi T’ae-jin, Han’guk sahoesa yŏn’gu, 162–64. Ch’oe Pu served at one time in the Office of the Special Counselors. He is perhaps best known for his report about the shipwreck he suffered on the Chinese coast in 1488. He had been sent on a special mission to Cheju Island and, upon his father’s death, wanted to rush back to the mainland, when his ship was driven by bad storms across the Yellow Sea. TYSUR 5.107–8. For an English translation of Ch’oe’s report, see Meskill, Ch’oe Pu’s Diary. [P’ungch’ŏn] No U-myŏng was the ancestor of the No of Twinnae (Namwŏn); see chapter 5. For a brief biography, see TYSUR 8.185–86; Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 148, 260. No Su-sin (1515–90) was a second-generation disciple of Kim Koeng-p’il. A munkwa graduate of 1543, he embarked on an official career, but, caught in factional strife in the mid-sixteenth century, he spent close to twenty years in exile. During that time he devoted himself to scholarship and had exchanges with T’oegye, Ki Tae-Sŭng, and Kim In-hu. For a biography of No Chin, see TYSUR 14.315–9; Kukcho inmul ko, 1: 744–47; YSJ 5.3a. See also chapter 5. Pang Kwi-on was a son of [Namyang] Pang Ku-sŏng’s second son and thus a cousin of Pang Kwihwa, who lived in Chup’o-bang. Kwi-on seems to have lived in Naju. Ssijok wŏllyu, 770; Yi Pyŏnghyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 243, 246, 253, 256. For An Ch’ŏ-sun’s biography, see Kukcho inmulgo, 2: 1434–36; YSJ 5.2b; Chungjong sillok 32.18a–b (1518); Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 100. One of the so-called eight worthies of 1519, Kim Sik (1482–1520) placed first in the Recommendation Examination of 1519 and, as a close associate of Cho Kwang-jo, had a meteoric career in the Office of the Special Counselors. In the wake of the purge, he was exiled and, before harsher punishment was meted out, he fled the place of exile and hanged himself. See TYSUR 9.200–204; Wagner, Literati Purges, 108; Yi Pyŏng-hyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 226. [Namyang] Hong Sun-bok’s father was Sa-wŏn, a county magistrate. Sa-wŏn’s line is not recorded in the MTP, but the Ssijok wŏllyu, 419, connects him with a fifth-generation ancestor who belongs

482

23 24 25 26

27 28

29 30 31 32 33 34 35

36 37

38 39 40 41

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 67 –1 6 9

to the Namyang Hong main line. A first cousin of Sa-wŏn, Sa-bu, residing in the capital, was one of the candidates recommended for the Recommendation Examination of 1519. According to the TYSUR, Hong Sun-bok was denounced by another of Kim Sik’s disciples (supposedly a former slave turned Buddhist monk) in 1520; as a result, his punishment with exile was changed into the death penalty. He was thus venerated in Nobong Sŏwŏn as a victim of 1519. TYSUR 14.324–5; YSJ 5.2b; Wagner, Literati Purges, 106, 209n104. TYSUR 11.244–45, 245–47. The YSJ 5.2b–3a does not connect them with Cho Kwang-jo. For Hwang’s biography, see Chŏng Hwang, Yuhŏn sŏnsaeng-jip, purok, 1a–8a; his tomb epitaph was written by Song Si-yŏl. For a full picture of Chŏlla’s Confucian scene, see Ko Yŏng-jin, Honam sarim. The eleven victims from Chŏlla Province accounted for 12 percent of all victims of 1519. Yi Pyŏnghyu, Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a, 105. For Chŏng Yŏm’s biography, see Chŏng Yŏm, Manhŏn-jip 4.18a–27b; YSJ 5.3a. Nothing much is known about [Kyŏngju] Yi Tae-wi, a tenth-generation descendant of the famous late Koryŏ scholar, Yi Che-hyŏn. His mother was a Ch’angwŏn Chŏng, and because he grew up in his maternal home, he had close relations with the Namwŏn elite. For a short biography, see Yi Tae-wi, Hwalgye sŏnsaeng yu’go 31a–41a; YSJ 5.3b. Chŏng Yŏm was a chinsa (1549) and a munkwa (1560) graduate and held several offices; Yi Tae-wi was a saengwŏn of 1570. Chang Kyŏng-se, Sach’on-jip 3.25b–30b (Kŭp’s haengjang); 4.22a–26a (Kyŏng-se’s funerary inscription). The education officers (junior sixth rank) were originally selected from among munkwa graduates, but such appointments to the countryside were soon shunned, and candidates with lesser qualifications were ordered to take the posts, with the result that the education in the local schools gradually deteriorated. There were twelve such officers in Kyŏngsang and eight in Chŏlla. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 121, 128. Kim An-guk’s poem is in Andong hyanggyo chi, 145. [Haeju] Yun Pok (1512–77), a chinsa (1534) and munkwa (1538) graduate, was the magistrate of Andong from 1565 to 1567, when he resigned from his post due to illness. YGJ 6.22a. Kwŏn Sim-haeng (1517–69), saengwŏn of 1552, was the son of Kwŏn Ŭi, Pŏl’s elder brother. I was unable to identify Kwŏn Kyŏng-jŏn, the second supervisor. For a description of the school and its ceremonial and educational rules, see YGJ 4.1a–13a. For a Korean translation of the regulations, see Andong hyanggyo chi, 148–50. For a Korean translation of Yun Pok’s “commemorative record,” see Andong hyanggyo chi, 146–47. The original text is appended in ibid., n. 7, 157–58. The local school is marked as Munmyo, i.e., Shrine of Confucius, on the map of Andong County proper in the Yŏnggaji. YGJ, map 1. The school was completely destroyed during the Korean War in the early 1950s, but later reconstructed. A child’s studies would start with the Thousand Character Primer (Ch’ŏnjamun) of which a vernacular version was prepared in the early sixteenth century. Also popular as an introductory text was Pak Se-mu’s (1487–1564) First Lessons for the Young and Ignorant (Tongmong sŏnsŭp), a brief text introducing the five cardinal human relationships. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 4: Ŏnhaengnok, 2.1a. YGJ 7.14b–15a; ADPM, 349–57; KNJ 11.38a; Tosan kŭmmun chehyŏllok (see note 45), in Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 4: 1.22a; Kim Ŏn-gi, Yongsan se’go, 1: 2.4a–13b, 13b–24b for a list of his disciples (munillok). Ŏn-gi’s wife was a Yŏngyang Nam, a sixth-generation descendant of Minsaeng’s fourth son, U-ryang. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 4: Ŏnhaengnok, 2.1b, 7b, 11b. The Selection of Master Zhu’s Letters is a unique collection from Zhu Xi’s over two thousand letters. The preface is dated 1556. It was Yu Chung-yŏng, Yu Sŏng-nyong’s father, who apparently pressed for its first printing. KNJ 11.23a. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 4: Ŏnhaengnok, 2.17a. The Classic of the Mind-and-Heart is by the Song scholar Zhen Dexiu (1178–1235). For a discussion,



42 43 44 45

46 47 48 49 50 51 52

53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65

N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 6 9 –17 2

483

see de Bary, Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy, 73–83. For T’oegye’s evaluation, see Deuchler, “Reject the False and Uphold the Straight,” 387–88. Kwŏn Ho-mun, Songam sŏnsaeng chip, purok, 2b. Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 46.3a–b. Ibid., yŏnbo, 3: 1.17b–18a. Several sources provide short biographies of T’oegye’s disciples. The most comprehensive is Record of All Worthies Attending Tosan (Tosan kŭmmun chehyŏllok, by Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng [1654– 1725]; hereafter Tosan munhyŏllok), in Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, vol. 4. See chapter 12. A more selective compendium focusing on the practioners of “nature and principle” is Pak Se-ch’ae’s (1631–95) Record of Korean Confucian Teachers and Colleagues (Tongyu saurok); it contains the biographies of seventy-two T’oegye disciples and was printed in 1682. Also called Chukkye Sŏwŏn, Paegun-dong Sŏwŏn was established by Chu Se-bung (1495–1554), then magistrate of P’unggi, to commemorate An Hyang (1243–1306). It was renamed Sosu Sŏwŏn, when it received, on T’oegye’s initiative, a royal charter in 1550. Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, purok, 1.2b, and Ŏnhaengnok, 3.33b; Tosan munhyŏllok 3.2a–5a. Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, purok, 2.75a. Tosan munhyŏllok 1.26a; 2.23b–24b, 34a; 3.2a–5a. Kim Pog-il, Namak sŏnsaeng ilgo, 422–30, 455–56; YGJ 7.9b. Preserved to this day in Tosan Sŏwŏn, the armillary globe was first constructed by T’oegye’s disciple Yi Tŏk-hong (1541–96); because it did not turn properly, T’oegye asked Kim Pu-ŭi to adjust it. Kim Pu-ŭi, Ŭpch’ŏngjŏng yu’go, 147–49; TYSUR 28.622. “Mourning in heart” meant the observance of abstinence and frugality during a fixed period of time “as if in mourning,” though without wearing formal mourning attire; this was done as a sign of special respect for a revered person such as a teacher. Kim Pu-ryun, Sŏrwŏltang-jip, purok, 6.1a–3a; Tosan munhyŏllok 1.31a–35a; TYSUR 28.620. Pu-ryun was the third son of Kim Yu. Kŭm Ŭng-hyŏp and Ŭng-hun were Chae’s sons and Yi Chun’s (T’oegye’s son) brothers-in-law. As sama (1555) and chinsa (1575) graduates, respectively, they received low-level appointments on recommendation. For brief biographies of the two Kŭm, see TYSUR 28.623–25. For Chŏng Ku, see introduction to part IV. Tosan munhyŏllok 4.17a–b, 34b–35b. Injae was Kwŏn Tae-gi’s pen name (ho). YGJ 1.14b, 7.15a; Tosan munhyŏllok 1.28a–b; KNJ 11.38a; Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip, yŏnbo, 3a. Kwŏn Tae-gi’s ancestry could not be clearly traced. The KNJ says that he was a great-grandson of a Kwŏn Ching, identified only as a descendant of Kwŏn Haeng. KNJ 11.22a. YGJ 7.9b; ADPM, 536–40; Tosan munhyŏllok 4.6b–7a. The contemporary eulogist was no other than Chang Hyŏn-gwang. Kwŏn Ho-mun was the great-grandson of Kwŏn Kae, the older brother of Kwŏn Pŏl’s grandfather. YGJ 1.13b. Also called Songp’a-ch’on, this village was founded by Kwŏn In, a fifteenth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Haeng, and thus Kwŏn Pŏl’s direct sixth-generation ancestor. YGJ 4.22b–24a, 7.8b; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.30a–31b. Kwŏn Ho-mun’s collected works are the Songam sŏnsaeng munjip. He is also known as a sijo (short lyric poem/song) poet. See Lee, A History of Korean Literature, 178. YGJ 4.22a–b, 25a–b; 7.9a; Tosan munhyŏllok 3.22a–25b; TYSUR 27.593–97; Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, yŏnbo, 1.8b, 2.29a. The two other regrets were that he was unable to repay the king’s personal favors, and that, due to his many official duties, he could not retire early. The Record of Worthies Attending Sŏae’s School (Sŏae sŏnsaeng munhyŏllok) is contained in Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, vol. 4. [Chinju] Chŏng Kyŏng-se was Yu Sŏng-nyong’s principal disciple. He grew up in nearby Sangju (Kyŏngsang). He passed the chinsa in 1582 and the munkwa in 1586 and then embarked on an

484

66 67 68 69

70 71

72

73 74 75

76 77

78 79 80 81 82 83 84

N o t e s t o pag e s 17 2 –17 5

illustrious government career. He did not fully subscribe to T’oegye’s philosophy and also revered Yulgok Yi I. He was intensely interested in ritual matters. His wife was a nonagnatic granddaughter of [Kwangsan] Kim Pu-ŭi. YGJ 7.9a; Tosan munhyŏllok 3.7a–10a; TYSUR 27.610–11; Yu Un-nyong, Kyŏmam-jip 7.2a, 8.1a–7b. [Hoengsŏng] Cho Mok’s ancestors had served in high offices since early Koryŏ. Mok’s father, upon marrying an Andong Kwŏn, moved to Wŏlch’ŏn (Yean). Cho Mok’s posterity ends with his son, Sŏk-pung, a munkwa graduate of 1615. MTP, 2: 93a. Cho Mok, Wŏlch’ŏn-jip, yŏnbo, kwŏn 1; ADPM, 365–78; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.1a–5a; TYSUR 26.577– 82. That he is not mentioned in the YGJ may be connected to the fact that his relationship with Yu Sŏng-nyong was often strained. For a detailed discussion of Cho Mok’s understanding of the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart, see Yun Sa-sun, Chosŏn sidae sŏngnihak, 207–13. For a list of appointments, see Kŭm Chang-t’ae, T’oegye hakp’a, 1: 35. Kŭm’s cataloguing work is not recorded in his chronological biography, but in his diary, Sŏngjae ilgi. The large majority of the books were Chinese works—the classics, commentaries, philosophical and historical works, poetry, and legal works. Barely one-third of the books were Korean— collected works, philosophical works, literary collections, and legal compilations. For the details, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 336–37. Kŭm Nan-su was a Ponghwa Kŭm, but his relation to Kŭm Ŭng-hyŏp and Kŭm Ŭng-hun is uncertain. Nan-su’s great-great-grandfather is said to have moved to Yean. Nan-su’s mother was a Yŏngyang Nam. MTP, 2: 245b; Ssijok wŏllyu, 776; Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip, yŏnbo, 3.1a–18a; ADPM, 408–16; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.25b–28a; TYSUR 28.625–26. Eight of the letters T’oegye collected in his “Record of Self-Reflection” (Chasŏngnok) were in response to Chŏng Yu-il’s queries. YGJ 1.22a, 7.8b; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.31b–33b; TYSUR 27.603–5; Chŏng Yu-il, Munbong sŏnsaeng munjip 6.1a–5a. YGJ 7.8b; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.34a–35a; TYSUR 28.626–27; Kukcho inmul ko, 2: 35–37. YGJ 1.11a, 4.26b, 7.8a; ADPM, 390–402; Ku Pong-nyŏng, Paektam-jip, purok, 1a–12a; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.7b–9a; TYSUR 27.607–9. Ku Pong-nyŏng passed the sama in 1546 and the munkwa in 1560. Ku’s pon’gwan (choronym) was Nŭngsŏng, MTP, 2: 170b. I was unable to trace his connection to Andong. Chŏng T’ak came from an illustrious Ch’ŏngju kin group. YGJ 1.11a, 7.8a; ADPM, 379–87; Tosan munhyŏllok 2.11a–13a. He was born in Chinae-dong, in the eastern township of Andong proper, but later moved to Kop’yŏng-dong in Yech’ŏn. Chŏng Sa-sŏng belonged to the Andong branch of the Ch’ŏngju Chŏng and thus was a collateral kinsman of Chŏng T’ak. Chŏng Sa-sŏng, Chihŏn sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 1a–5b; ADPM, 518–23; Tosan munhyŏllok 3.38a–40a. Sa-sŏng’s wife was a Yŏngyang Nam, a sixth-generation descendant of Min-saeng’s second son, Ŭi-ryang. His younger brother, Chŏng Sa-sin (1558–1619), a munkwa graduate of 1582, is listed as one of Yu Sŏng-nyong’s disciples. He had an official career and organized local forces during the Imjin War. YGJ 7.9b; ADPM, 512–17; Tosan munhyŏllok 3.33a–34a; TYSUR 26: 582–84. For T’oegye’s kinsmen, see Tosan munhyŏllok, kwŏn 4. Yi An-do (1541–84) was Chun’s eldest son and a saengwŏn graduate of 1561. In honor of T’oegye, he was appointed royal tomb keeper in 1574. MTP, 1: 131a; Tosan munhyŏllok 4.32b–34a; KNJ 12.11b. Yi Yŏng-do (1559–1637) was Chun’s third son; he was married to Kwŏn Tong-mi’s daughter. Without earning a degree, he was recommended for office and subsequently had a long government career. MTP, 1: 131a; Tosan munhyŏllok 4.34b–35b; KNJ 12.11b. Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip, haengjang, 3.1a–6a; Tosan munhyŏllok 4.34b–35a. Chŏng-hoe’s younger brother, Chŏng-baek (1553–1600), was also a T’oegye disciple. Tosan munhyŏllok 4.25b–26a. T’oegye’s correspondence comprises some three thousand letters, written between 1533 and 1570. Epistolary Korea, 277. For the correspondence between T’oegye and his disciples, see Cho Hwisang, “The Community of Letters.” For a tabulation of the disciples’ places of origin, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 340. A few



85 86 87 88 89

90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106

107

108 109 110 111 112 113 114

N o t e s t o pa g e s 17 5 –1 8 0

485

scholars, marginally linked to T’oegye, like Yu Hŭi-ch’un and Ki Tae-sŭng, originated from Chŏlla Province. I borrow the term “fellowship” from Tillman, Confucian Discourse, 3. YGJ 4.22a–28a. For details on the compilation of Ŏnhaengnok, see chapter 12. For a content analysis of T’oegye sŏnsaeng ŏnhaeng t’ongnok, see Yi Sang-ŭn, “Hakpong sŏnsaeng ŭi hangmun,” 84–85. Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip 2.11b–13b. According to the chronological biography, this work was written in 1584, i.e., after T’oegye’s death. In the Tosan munhyŏllok 2.26a, it is simply titled Discourse on Principle and Mind-Matter (I’gibyŏn). Hwadam Sŏ Kyŏng-dŏk (1489–1546), saengwŏn graduate of 1531, followed the Song thinkers Zhou Dunyi, Zhang Zai, and Shao Yong in emphasizing mind-matter (ki) as the most important element in all things. For an English translation of this debate, see Kalton et al., The Four-Seven Debate. For Cheng Yi’s formulation of jing (kyŏng), see Bol, “This Culture of Ours,” 319; for a discussion of key concepts in the Heart Classic, see de Bary, Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy, 73–83. Chang Kyŏng-bu presumably refers to Zhu Xi’s friend Zhang Shi (also called Zhang Jing-fu; 1133–80). Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 4: Ŏnhaengnok, 2.19b. For an analysis of Zhu Xi’s view of learning, see Bol, “Chu Hsi’s Redefinition of Literati Learning,” 157. Chŏng Yu-il, Munbong sŏnsaeng munjip 6.3b. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 16.2a–7b (letter to Ki Tae-sŭng). Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip, yŏnbo, 2b. The letter is dated 1552. Yi Hwang, “Yŏngbong sŏwŏn ki” (1560), in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.30b–34b. This passage is from a letter to Ki Tae-sŭng. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 16.2a–4b. Kwŏn Ho-mun, Songam sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 2a. Chŏng Sa-sŏng, Chihŏn-jip 4.3b. For a comparable phenomenon in China, see Mote, “Confucian Eremitism in the Yüan Period.” A newer study is Berkowitz, Patterns of Disengagement. Ch’ŏsa was a term current already in Koryŏ. Mencius 7.A.9; Lau, Mencius, 183. “Humble scholar” (hansa) does not necessarily imply economic destitution; it could also mean someone who did not have a network of powerful patrons and friends, especially in the central government. See also chapter 10. Kim Si-on, P’yoŭn sŏnsaeng munjip, kwŏn 4.667–68, 671, 675. Chang Hŭng-hyo was an Andong Chang, but his ancestry is, according to the MTP, 2: 142a, shallow. His mother was an Andong Kwŏn. ADPM, 570–75; Chang Hŭng-hyo, Kyŏngdang sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 1a–9b. His daughter, Chang-ssi, became [Chaeryŏng] Yi Si-myŏng’s wife and the mother of a number of well-known scholar-officials. Sŏnjo sillok 7.64b (1573); Kim Pu-p’il, Hujodang sŏnsaeng munjip, 100. Most often such an appointment, coming late in life, was to royal tomb keeper (ch’ambong), a junior ninth-rank office. The one who refused to follow the royal summons was called “summoned official” (chingsa). For a summary, see Chŏng Ku-sŏn, Chosŏn sidae chŏn’gŏ, 163–75. Chŏng Yu-il, Munbong sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 6.3b. Kim Hak-pae, Kŭm’ong sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 6.6a–b. Kim Hak-pae was Myŏng-il’s great-greatgrandson. Buddhist monks are known to die in a sitting posture. See Birnbaum, “The Deathbed Image of Master Hongyi,” esp. 186. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 23.21a. Chŏng Sa-sŏng, Chihŏn sŏnsaeng munjip, purok (sang), 1b. [Ch’angnyŏng] Cho Sik was the son of Cho Ŏn-hyŏng (1469–1526), a munkwa graduate of 1504. My understanding of Cho Sik’s thought is principally based on Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 327–33, 343–66; Chosŏn yuhak ŭi hakp’adŭl, 166–85. See also Hŏ Kwŏn-su, Nammyŏng Cho Sik. As quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 328n97.

486

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 8 1 –1 8 3

115 Ibid., 131n102. 116 [Ŭisŏng] Kim U-ong was a descendant of Yong-bi’s fourth son, Yŏng, and thus was a collateral kinsman of the Naeap Kim. He was born and later active in the Sŏngju area. For a short biography, see T’oegye hangmaek, 392–400. 117 The TYSUR lists forty-five disciples; a more recent count lists seventy-eight. See Nammyŏnghak kwallyŏn munjip haeje, 1: x–xii. 118 The 1604 edition of the Nammyŏng-jip (no longer extant) was revised soon after that date, and reprinted in 1622; in 1640 a “supplement” (pyŏlchip) was added. The authoritative edition seems to be that of 1897, which also contains a detailed chronological biography (p’yŏnnyŏn). 119 It seems to be indicative of the degree to which T’oegye overshadowed his southern counterpart that most modern studies concentrate on T’oegye and only briefly, if at all, mention Nammyŏng Cho Sik. Serious research on Nammyŏng has started only recently. 120 For T’oegye’s views on sŏwŏn, see Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 33–48, 60–81. 121 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 9.4a–8b; Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 33–47; Chŏng Man-jo, “T’oegye Yi Hwang ŭi sŏwŏllon.” A chartered academy received three kyŏl of tax-free land. Sok taejŏn, 141. 122 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 23.10a–11a. 123 U T’ak was born in Tanyang (modern-day North Ch’ungch’ŏng). At seventeen, he passed the chinsa examinations and in 1290 the munkwa. Thereafter he held various high posts in the central government. From a mission to China, he brought back the Classic of Change, Yijing (Kor. Yŏksŏ or Chuyŏk), which he studied so assiduously that he became known as “Mister Yŏksŏ of the East” (yŏktong sŏnsaeng). Late in life, he retired to Yean, where his tomb is situated. ADPM, 73–78; for a brief biography, see O Sŏg-wŏn, “Yŏktong U T’ak sasang ŭi yŏn’gu,” 5–12. 124 Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip, yŏnbo, 4b; Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, yŏnbo, 1.14b. 125 Cho Mok recorded the construction of the academy in great detail. See his Wŏlch’ŏn sŏnsaeng chip 5.9a–15a. Commemorative records were also authored by T’oegye, “Yŏktong sŏwŏn ki,” in Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.44b–48b; and Kŭm Po, “Yŏktong sŏwŏn kisa,” in U T’ak sŏnsaeng ŭi sasang, 45–49. 126 [Ponghwa] Kŭm Po (1521–84) belonged to a descent line different from that of Kŭm Nan-su. A sama graduate of 1546, he was a T’oegye disciple; he left many scholarly works and was famous as a calligrapher. Ssijok wŏllyu, 775; KNJ 12.13b; Tosan munhyŏllok 1.23b–25a. 127 Yi Wan (1512–96) was the eldest son of T’oegye’s older half-brother Ha. Because of his great talents, T’oegye regarded him as the potential “[spiritual] heir of the house.” After passing the sama, he held a minor post. He was also known for his elegant calligraphy. KNJ 12.13b; Tosan munhyŏllok 4.36b–37a. 128 For a brief discussion of the sŏwŏn’s economic position and organization, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Yean Yŏktong sŏwŏn ŭi yŏn’gu,” 29–39. 129 For explanations and descriptions of the various buildings, see Tosan chŏnsŏ, 3: 604–7. 130 Isan Sŏwŏn was established in Yŏngju (north of Andong) in 1559. Originally, it did not have an enshrined scholar, but in 1574 T’oegye’s spirit tablet was installed there. T’oegye’s interest in sŏwŏn as educational institution is expressed in his “Isan sŏwŏn ki” (1559), Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.27b–30b. 131 Yi Hwang, “Yŏktong sŏwŏn ki” (1568), in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.44b–48b; Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip, yŏnbo, 7b. The Yŏktong Sŏwŏn received a royal charter in 1684. By order of the Tae­ wŏn’gun it was destroyed in 1868, but rebuilt in 1969. 132 Kim Pu-ŭi, Ŭpch’ŏngjŏng yu’go, 148. 133 Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 40–41; Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 19–20, especially the chart of sŏwŏn construction from Myŏngjong to Sukchong on 20. 134 For a brief official announcement of T’oegye’s death, see Sŏnjo sillok 3.43b. 135 For the details, see Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “16segi T’oegye hakp’a,” 66–71. 136 Cho Mok, “T’oegye sŏnsaeng munjip kosŏng mun,” in Wŏlch’ŏn-jip 6.10b–12a. For Cho Mok’s part in securing T’oegye’s works, see also Kŭm Chang-t’ae, T’oegye hakp’a, 1: 46–47.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 1 8 3 –1 8 8

487

137 Sŏnjo sillok 7.40b (1573). 138 For detailed studies of the editorial process and the conflict between Cho Mok and Yu Sŏngnyong, see Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “16segi T’oegye hakp’a,” 86–98; Sŏ Chŏng-mun, “ ŭi ch’o’gan,” 217–53. 139 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 4: Ŏnhaeng t’ongnok 1.24a–25b; Ki Tae-sŭng, Kobong chŏnjip, 3.1a–5a; ADPM, 303–8. 140 Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏnjae-jip, yŏnbo, 8b–9b; Sŏnjo sujŏng sillok 10.8a (1576). T’oegye was also honored with an honorary title of prime minister. 141 Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, sokchip 4.17b–18a. 142 A rare document dated 1591 details the landed property of Tosan Sŏwŏn and lists the donors’ names. A slave roster of the same year shows that there were initially eleven slaves (three males and eight females). Chŏng Chin-yŏng has first identified both documents as pertaining to Yŏktong Sŏwŏn, but, on the basis of their date, it is more likely that they were indeed inventories of property given to or held by Tosan Sŏwŏn. See Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Yean Yŏktong sŏwŏn ŭi yŏn’gu.” Besides donated land, there were other kinds of land making up a sŏwŏn’s landed property: purchased land, land transferred from public (government) land, and land presented in lieu of corvée. According to the law, a chartered sŏwŏn received three kyŏl of tax-exempt land. In the course of time, however, the entire land owned by a sŏwŏn came to enjoy tax-free status with the result that sŏwŏn, like Buddhist monasteries in earlier times, became large land owners. 143 Yi Hwang, “Isan sŏwŏn ki,” in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.30a. 144 Besides the Chinsŏng Yi (79.7%), the Kwangsan Kim and, to a lesser degree, the Ponghwa Kŭm held the headship. For a table, see Pak Hyŏn-sun, “17–18segi Yean-hyŏn sajok sahoe,” 85. For a discussion of the headship of sŏwŏn run by the Namin, see Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 104–17. It became customary that the headship of Yŏktong Sŏwŏn and Tosan Sŏwŏn was concurrently held by the same scholar. 145 YGJ 2.8a–b, 4.16b–19b; Kim Ŏn-gi, Yongsan se’go 2.5b–6a; Kim Pog-il, “Yŏgang sŏwŏn chŏngmun” (1574), in Namak sŏnsaeng ilgo, 430–43; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 445–46. The academy was destroyed under the Taewŏn’gun, but was reestablished seven years later. 146 For an illuminating discussion on the redefinition of the shih in Song China, see Bol, “Chu Hsi’s Redefinition of Literati Learning.”

Chapter 8 1 Myŏngjong sillok 19.31b–32a (1555). See also ibid., 1.37a (1545); 22.70b–71a (1557). 2 For a brief description of Koryŏ funeral customs, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 76–79. See also Chŏng Kil-cha, “Koryŏ kwijok ŭi choripsik sŏkkwan”; Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ pulgyosa, 25–28; Ch’oe Chae-sŏk, “Koryŏ sidae ŭi sang-je.” 3 Sem Vermeersch maintains that in Koryŏ cremation was principally practiced by the Buddhist clergy and was in fact not so common among the laity. See his “Funerary Practices in Koryŏ.” For a few examples of cremation among the upper class, see Ch’oe Chae-sŏk, “Koryŏ sidae ŭi sang-je,” 149–52. Cremation was prohibited in 1395. 4 T’aejo sillok 7.14a (1395). 5 Sŏngjong sillok 3.3a (1469). 6 Besides putting the corpse directly into a grave, it was also common to wrap it in mats and grass and place it on a tree, called “grass tomb” (ch’obun). After about three years, the bones were cleaned and finally interred. For an example, see Sejong sillok 22.22b–23a (1423). This was a practice attested to in Korea’s southeast until recent times. 7 Sŏngjong sillok 3.3a (1469). For an explicit expression of this belief, dated early seventeenth century, see HPYP, 457. 8 A popular term for yŏmyo was “life [devoted to] serving the grave” (simyo sari). For an early example of yŏmyo, see Koryŏsa 99.29a (biography of Yŏm Sin-yak [1118–92]). No explanation for Yŏm’s unusual act was given. 9 According to the preface written by the famous late Koryŏ scholar Yi Che-hyŏn in 1346, Kwŏn

488

10

11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32

N o t e s t o pag e s 1 8 8 –19 2

Chun (1280–1352) ordered a painter to draw the pictures of the twenty-four filial sons, whose stories were collected in the Chinese Record of Filial Acts (Xiaoxinglu), and presented them, together with Yi’s approbations (ch’an), to his father, Kwŏn Pu. The latter, obviously pleased, selected some thirty-eight additional filial stories from various Chinese sources and added them to the original twenty-four. Whether this collection was ever published in late Koryŏ is unknown, but in early Chosŏn Kwŏn Kŭn, Pu’s great-grandson, revised it and added a postface in 1405. This Annotated Record of Filial Acts (Hyohaengnok chusŏk) was widely known throughout Chosŏn. Several of its lead stories refer to vigils at parental gravesites. For a brief discussion of the Hyohaengnok, see Kim Mun-gyŏng, “Koryŏ kwa Chungguk ŭi ” Also see Kim Hun-sik, “Koryŏ hugi ŭi po’gŭp.” The earliest evidence dates from 987, but at that time a slave kept the vigil for his master and was rewarded with manumission at the end of the mourning period. The record is thin for the fifteenth century. See Koryŏsa 85.18a–b, 42b; 110.7a–b; 112.31b, 32a; Sejong sillok 58.19b (1432); Tanjong sillok 12.6b (1454); Sŏngjong sillok 234.14a (1489). The customary holidays were the Lunar New Year, Hansik (105 days after the winter solstice), Tano (fifth day of the fifth lunar month), and Ch’usŏk (fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month). Yi I, “Kyŏngmong yogyŏl,” in Yulgok chŏnsŏ 27.32b–33a. Koryŏsa 61.41a, 69.11b, 84.4a. In his Various Ceremonies Concerning the Veneration of Ancestors (Pongsŏn chabŭi), Yi Ŏn-jŏk endorsed the performance of grave rites on the customary holidays. Yi I, “Ch’ŏngsong Sŏng sŏnsaeng haengjang,” in Yulgok chŏnsŏ 18.40a–b. For a similar text, see Myŏngjong sillok 29.67a–69a (1563). For rotating ancestor worship, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 168, 171. HPYP, 457. For an example, see Yi Chŏng-hoe, “Sejŏn yurok,” in Songan sŏnsaeng munjip 1.12a–b. For a detailed description of the Confucian descent group structure, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 129–34. It was Cheng Yi who critically linked descent traced from the great-great-grandfather to the mourning grades and thus created a compact worshiping group. For the details, see Chow, The Rise of Confucian Ritualism, 100–102. For a discussion of the mourning system, see ibid., 179–91; for its Chosŏn adaptation, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 179–96. Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 5. For the practicalities of shrine rituals, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 169–72. The seasonal sacrifices were to be held on a chosen day in the second month of each of the four seasons. For this reason, they were also called the “four middle rites” (sajungje). KCKM, no. 66, 273–80. With his eight siblings Yi Ae shared 755 slaves. KCKM, no. 127, 428; Mun Suk-cha, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi,” 98–99. KCKM, no. 80, 316–20; Mun Suk-cha, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi,” 99. Kim Chin’s biography in Yŏnbang se’go, 77, 82–83, 88–89; KCKM, no. 24, 171. His testamentary will is dated 1577. The spirit was that of Yŏm Hŭng-bang, a villain of late Koryŏ who had made common cause with Yi In-im and was killed by Yi Sŏng-gye. See chapter 2. Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip 7.23b–24a. KCKM, no. 6, 131–33. KCKM, no. 17, 154–55; no. 74, 293–97; no. 77, 307–12; KKOK, no. 11, 171–76. KCKM, no. 75, 298–305; Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 161. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 37.17a–18b (answer to Kwŏn Ho-mun, 1564). As Cohen maintains, the dichotomy between the yin (or paek) soul in the grave and the yang (or hon) in the tablet may be too simplistic; yet there is no consistent conceptualization of the soul. See his “Souls and Salvation.” As in China, in Korea there is uncertainty about what happens with the deceased’s soul(s). See Janelli and Janelli, Ancestor Worship, 59–60.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 19 2 –19 4

489

33 I follow Ebrey’s translation of ritual terms. In contrast to Zhu Xi’s prescription that the spirit tablet be installed (puje) in the ancestral shrine as the final act of the funeral, Cheng Yi preferred to have the tablet kept in the main hall for the remainder of the mourning period. See Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 132n189. It was Cheng’s interpretation that seems to have become the norm in late Chosŏn. For a description of the ritual procedure of the funeral and its subsequent rites, see ibid., 103–39; Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 37.17a–19a (answer to Kwŏn Ho-mun); Kim Mun-t’aek, “Sangnye wa simyo sari,” in Chosŏn sidae saenghwalsa, 2: 48–54. 34 The term puje thus changed its meaning from “associating rite” to “installing rite.” It is given in this meaning in Korean dictionaries. 35 Even though in mourning, Yi Chŏng-hoe frequently left his temporary graveside shelter to conduct business and supervise agricultural work; he also received guests and students at the gravesite. 36 The “second sacrifice for good fortune” (taesang) was performed after two full years of mourning. 37 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, 24 (his mother’s death on 1578/5/1), 30 (starting to erect a temporary shelter, here called pinso, after deciding the date of the funeral on 1578/9/7), 59 (“calling the soul back” on 1580/5/1), 62 (”peace sacrifice” on 1580/7/8) (lunar dates, like those in the same form below, giving year, month, and day). 38 For the procedure, see Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 175–77. 39 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 39.8a–b (answer to Chŏng Ku). 40 Yi Hwang, “Su’gogam ki” (1557), in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.25a–27b; Kim Sŏng-il, “T’oegye sŏnsaeng sajŏn,” in Hakpong-jip, sokchip 6.44a. A Buddhist notion is suggested by calling these halls am or amsa, terms usually designating small Buddhist retreats. For a similar document in Yulgok’s tradition, see Yun Chŭng, Myŏngjae sŏnsaeng yu’go 37.6a–9b. 41 See the example of Yun Ku-saeng in chapter 2. Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ pulgyosa, 539–42; Kim Munt’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 122–24. 42 Glahn, The Sinister Way, 139–40. Although Zhu Xi donated land to the graves of his ancestors, he did not approve of gravesite temples because of their Buddhist connotation. Ebrey, Confucianism and Family Rituals, 115. 43 The Sŏnsŏngji records fourteen chaesil in the Yean area alone; Sŏnsŏngji, 94–95. 44 Hŏ Hŭng-sik, Koryŏ pulgyosa, 742. 45 KCKM, no. 66, 273–80. 46 Yi Hwang, “Su’gogam ki” in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.25a–27b. 47 Ironically, Buddhist monks resided at the purification hall on Kach’ang Mountain until the late nineteenth century. Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 125, 131–39. 48 Yi Hwang, “Su’gogam ki,” in Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.25a–27b. 49 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 37.20a–b (letter to Kwŏn Ho-mun, 1564); ibid., 42.26b. 50 Yi Chong-do passed the chinsa exams only in 1579. KNJ 12.13b. 51 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 40.30a–32a (letters to Wan); Kim Sŏng-il, “T’oegye sŏnsaeng sajŏn,” in Hakpong-jip, sokchip 5.44a–45a. Only a small part of T’oegye’s correspondence with Wan and Chong-do is contained in T’oegye chŏnsŏ. A fuller selection is in Tosan chŏnsŏ, vol. 2 songnaejip, 57.14a–36a. For a summary, see Pak Hyŏn-sun, “16segi sadaebu’ga ŭi ch’injok chilsŏ,” 94–96. 52 Most authoritative outside Kyŏngsang were Kim Chang-saeng’s ritual works, the Essentials of Funeral Rites (Sangnye piyo) of 1583 and the Various Commentaries on the Jiali (Karye chimnam) of 1599. Kim’s Questions and Answers on Doubtful Rites (Ŭirye munhae) was edited by his son, Kim Chip, and printed together with Kim Chang-saeng’s munjip (collected works) in 1685. For the details, see Chang Se-ho, Sa’gye Kim Chang-saeng ŭi yehak sasang. 53 Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip 7.1a–5b; Kim Ŏn-jong, “Hakpong sŏnsaeng ŭi yehak,” 130. 54 Cho Chin (1543–?) was a saengwŏn of 1576 and entered the bureaucracy by recommendation. For a brief note, see TYSUR 28.629. 55 The Sangnye kojŭng is a compilation of excerpts from Zhu Xi’s Jiali, Du You’s (735–812) Tungdien, and Qiu Jun’s (1421–95) Jiali yijei. Kim also consulted the Liji. See Kim Sŏng-il, Ŏnhaengnok, in Hakpong-jip, purok, 1.12a; 3.20. See also Kim Ŏn-jong, “Hakpong sŏnsaeng ŭi yehak,” 177–80.

490

N o t e s t o pag e s 19 4 –19 9

56 The work is extant only as a fragment. Together with other writings by Cho Mok, it burned during the Imjin War, and remnants were later pieced together. Cho Mok, Wŏlch’ŏn-jip 4.35b–36b. 57 Yu Un-nyong, Kyŏmam-jip 4.1a–8a. 58 For the Sinjongnok, see Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 128–72. It contains interesting illustrations of various grave layouts. The Sangnye kojŭng is no longer extant. 59 Chŏng Ku’s biography (haengjang) in TYSUR 25.548–49. 60 Kim Sŏng-il, “[Chosŏnguk yŏnhyŏk] p’ungsok koi,” in Hakpong-jip 6.14b–23b; Kim Ŏn-jong, “Hakpong sŏnsaeng,” 181–90. 61 The Kyŏngguk taejŏn prescribed graded worship: three generations of ancestors for civil and military officials of sixth rank and above, two for officials of the seventh rank and below, and one for persons without rank. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 276. 62 Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, sokchip 3.2a–b. 63 The Kyŏngguk taejŏn stipulated that for an ancestor with merit-subject status ancestral rites should be perpetuated, that is, after his “generation is fulfilled” (i.e., when his ancestral tablet was to be buried at the grave), in a separate hall. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 276. 64 “Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok,” in CYCK, 2: 600–603 (presumably a later expanded handwritten version); a shorter version is in Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip 1.14b–16b. For a paraphrase, see Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 102–6. “Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok” and other originally handwritten documents by Yi Chŏng-hoe are collected in CYCK and are not listed separately in the bibliography. 65 Kim Sŏng-il, “Pongsŏn chegyu,” in Hakpong-jip, 7.1a–3b. 66 Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 175–77. 67 Yi I, “Cheŭi ch’o,” in Yulgok chŏnsŏ 27.32b–33a. 68 “Pongsŏllok,” in CYCK, 2: 616–17. 69 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, 281 (1603/8/15, 16); 335 (1608/1/1); 339 (1608/5/4); 362 (1609/12/27, 30); 363 (1610/1/1). See also the table listing Yi Chŏng-hoe’s visits to graves in Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 155–56. 70 Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, purok, 2.11a–b. 71 It was Cheng Yi who introduced the two ritual programs for the “first ancestor” (ch’ojo) and “early ancestors” (sŏnjo), and Zhu Xi included them apparently reluctantly in his sacrificial rites (cherye). He considered them presumptuous for an ordinary descent group and thus did not think they should be performed. For a discussion of Cheng Yi’s ideas, see Chow, The Rise of Confucian Ritualism, 102–3; Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 167–72; Ebrey, Confucianism and Family Rituals, 63–64, 159n64. Though Qiu Jun’s Ming version of the Jiali omitted these two rites, they were included in the Great Compendium of Human Nature and Principle (Xingli daquan) and the Reflections on Things at Hand—works with which the early Korean Confucians were well familiar. The rites are mentioned neither in Yi Ŏn-jŏk’s Pongsŏn chabŭi nor in the early eighteenth-century Easy Manual of the Four Rites (Sarye pyŏllam) by Yi Chae. 72 Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 170. 73 The main line of the Ŭisŏng Kim in Andong was the line of In-bŏm (n.d.), Man-gŭn’s eldest son. It is likely that by the early 1580s In-bŏm’s first son and grandson had either moved away or died. Only In-bŏm’s fourth son, Paek, is listed in the MTP, 1: 183a, however, without his three sons. 74 For the document, see UKKM, wanŭi no. 17, 171; KCKM, no. 773, 794–95. 75 Yu Un-nyong, Kyŏmam-jip, 4.8b–10a. 76 Chinese dictionaries give as the only source for the term munjung a passage in Yan-shi jiaxun (Family Instructions of the Yan) by Yan Zhi-tui (531–?91 or later) in which it refers to a group of close agnatic kinsmen of a deceased. Morohashi Tetsuji, Daikanwa jiten, 41208/186. The term, however, did not become current in China. In Korea, it was occasionally used in the nonspecific meaning of “house” from the early Chosŏn. 77 Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip, purok, yŏnbo, 1.16a. 78 UKKM, wanŭi no. 1, 2: 61–65. The signers were graphically distinguished as to their generation. Su-il’s son Yong wrote a day-by-day progress report of the works.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 19 9 – 2 0 4

491

79 I borrow this term from Myron Cohen. See his “Lineage Organization in North China.” 80 Kwang-Kyu Lee has early recognized the structural difference between these two principles. See his “Ancestor Worship and Kinship Structure in Korea.” 81 Kwŏn Ong (n.d.) was a fifth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Pu; he was buried in Andong. MTP, 2: 54a; YGJ 8.16a. 82 For genealogical information on [Hŭnghae] Pae So, see chapter 4. 83 The Yŏji sŭngnam is the oldest compact gazetteer of Chosŏn, completed in 1482. 84 The tomb tablets (chisŏk) were ceramic tiles on which the life data of the deceased were recorded; they were usually buried in front of the grave. 85 Yu Un-nyong, “Ch’ŏndŭngsan ki,” in Kyŏmam-jip 5.6a–b. 86 Yu So was the great-great-grandfather of Yu Un-nyong and Yu Sŏng-nyong; he was buried in Andong. YGJ 8.1a–b; ADPM, 34–41. 87 Kim Chin, “Ot’osan ipsŏk palmun,” in P’yoŭn munjip, 75–77. The tombs of closer antecedents— Kŏdu, Ch’ŏn, and Yŏng-myŏng—were recovered only during the seventeenth century. 88 The rare surname Sa’gong originated in Kunwi County; it is not recorded in MTP. See Sejong sillok chiriji 150.27a. 89 Yu Un-nyong, “Songhyŏn myosin ki,” in Kyŏmam-jip 5.7a–9a; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 439–40. 90 HPYP, soji no. 50, 330–32. 91 Yu Un-nyong’s great-great-grandfather was the above-mentioned Yu So. So’s son and greatgrandson were also buried there. So’s grandson, Kong-jak, as an in-marrying son-in-law of the Yŏnan Yi, came to rest on Songhyŏn Mountain. 92 ADPM, 498–507. 93 Chŏng Po-mun (n.d.) was a Ch’ŏngju Chŏng, the great-great-grandfather of famous Chŏng T’ak (1526–1605), a T’oegye disciple. MTP, 1: 248a. 94 For the details, see Kim Kyŏng-suk, “Chosŏn hugi ch’injok chilsŏ,” 143–48; Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 178–88. 95 “Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok,” in CYCK, 2: 595. 96 Yi Ch’an-han, a munkwa graduate of 1648, was the great-great-grandson of T’oegye’s older brother Ŭi. MTP, 1: 131a. 97 For the details, see Kim Kyŏng-suk, “Chosŏn hugi ch’injok chilsŏ,” 148–50; Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 188–99. According to Kim Mun-t’aek, the story of T’oegye’s performing rites “from afar” is apocryphal. 98 Kwŏn Yang, “Yŏngga kahun,” in Han’gukhak kich’o charyo sŏnjip, kŭnse 2 p’yŏn, 356–61. 99 A less common burial mode was to inter the wife either in front of or behind (sang-ha hapchang) the husband’s grave. For sketches of the graveyards of the Andong Kwŏn (Pog’ya-p’a) and the Yŏngyang Nam (Suŭi-p’a), where the various modes are represented, see ADPM, 22, 24. It should be noted that in ritual affairs directions were reversed: whereas in secular life, east (representing yang) or the lefthand side was superior to west (representing yin) or the right-hand side, the opposite principle was observed in the sacred realm. 100 Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 141n213; Yi Chae, Sarye pyŏllam (1967), 162. 101 Yi Chae, Sarye pyŏllam (1967), 162; MHPG 88.4a–5b. On the basis of the epitaphs (myobimun) of 1,097 graves (dating from 1392 to the early years of the twentieth century) that Kim U-rim investigated in the Seoul-Kyŏnggi area, 871 graves were joint burials (of which 103 were with two wives, and seven with three wives). See his “Sŏul-Kyŏnggi chiyŏk ŭi Chosŏn sidae sadaebu myoje,” 67–84. 102 See Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 197–200. 103 T’aejong sillok 12.13a (1406). 104 Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 107–8; Kukcho oryeŭi 8.80a–81a. 105 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 37.16b–17a. 106 Early Chosŏn grave construction is described in the excavation report of a grave, dated 1566, that was discovered and excavated in P’aju (Kyŏnggi Province) in the autumn of 2002. See P’ap’yŏng Yun-ssi moja mira, chonghap.

492

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 0 4 – 2 0 9

107 For an architectural study of Chosŏn-dynasty limestone tomb construction, see Kim U-rim, “Sŏul-Kyŏnggi chiyŏk ŭi Chosŏn sidae sadaebu myoje,” 151–71. 108 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, 30–34 (1578/9/7 to 11/9). 109 For such examples, see KCKM, no. 331, 640ff. 110 Quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam sarimp’a, 220. 111 Yi Ham’s testament (yuŏn), KCKM, no. 779, 797–98. 112 KCKM, no. 42, 226–28. 113 KCKM, nos. 99 and 100, 388–91. 114 Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 133; KCKM, no. 795, 806 (1637?). 115 Yŏngnam komunsŏ chipsŏng, 1: 451–63. Dated only by cyclical dates. 116 Chang Hyŏn-gwang (1554–1637) was one of the most outstanding scholars in the post-T’oegye era. Although called many times to serve in the government, he declined and instead led a life of scholarship and teaching. He was close to Chŏng Ku, but distanced himself from the common T’oegye-oriented Namin position. 117 Chang Hyŏn-gwang, “Moyŏndang-ki,” in Yŏhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 9.26a–30a. 118 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, sokchip, 8.24b–26b; Yi Chŏng-hoe, “Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok” and “Chokchung wanŭi” (1612), in CYCK, 2: 595–608; Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 42–54. 119 O Un (1540–1617), a nonagnatic grandson of Yi U (T’oegye’s uncle) and a nephew of O Su-yŏng, obtained a munkwa degree in 1566 and subsequently had an official career. He was closely connected to T’oegye as well as to Cho Sik. 120 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip, yŏnbo, 2.26a. O Un’s preface to Chinsŏng Yi-ssi chokpo of 1600 is reproduced in Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sebo of 1981. See also Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 54–59. 121 Preface by O Un in Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sebo. 122 Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 61, esp. the chart outlining the contents of the three chokpo volumes. 123 O Un’s preface. 124 Yi Chŏng-hoe, “Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok” and “Chokchung wanŭi” in CYCK, 2: 595–608.

Chapter 9 1 Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice, 168. 2 Besides tonggyu, there were many other terms, such as tongyak and tonghŏn. 3 Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 280. According to YGJ, however, a tong also meant at times a subdivision of a “natural village” (ch’on). YGJ 1.13a. 4 Faure, Structure of Chinese Rural Society, 5. 5 CYCK, 41: 453. 6 The complete set of documents is reproduced in Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 58, 120–25. 7 For a table of the membership, see Pak Hyŏn-sun, “16segi sadaebu’ga,” 82. 8 See Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, yŏnbo, 1.9a–b. His chronological biography does not mention the Ward Regulations of On’gye. Although dated 1554, the likely date for their initiation is 1546–47, when T’oegye spent more than a year at home. Moreover, the first roster of compact officers (yusa) is dated 1548. T’oegye’s name, however, does not appear on the document. 9 The rosters of officers are extant for the years 1548 to 1628. 10 Yi Ping (1520–92), the grandson of T’oegye’s uncle U, studied under T’oegye and received a minor post through recommendation. Tosan munhyŏllok 4.39b–40a, in Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, vol. 4; KNJ 12.10a. 11 [Koch’ang] O Su-yŏng’s (1521–1606) mother was one of T’oegye’s patrilateral cousins (daughter of uncle U). Su-yŏng passed the chinsa examination in 1555 and was a famous calligrapher. Tosan munhyŏllok 1.25a–26a; KNJ 12.13b. 12 The Koch’ang O in Andong descended from O Yŏng (n.d.), who, at the end of the fifteenth century,



13 14 15

16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

26

27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 0 9 – 2 13

493

was the first Koch’ang O to settle as an in-marrying son-in-law in the Andong area. For the details, see MTP, 2: 109b; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 197–200. The munkwa graduate was Kim Chung-ch’ŏng (1567–1629), who, as the only candidate from Andong, earned the highest honors (kapkwa) in the regular examinations of 1610. He was a sonin-law of one of the fund’s original members, Yi Yŏng-sŭng (n.d.). Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 40.34a, 34b–35a. The ward laws were apparently drawn up in response to some crimes perpetrated by one slave. T’oegye may have referred to the private settlement of homicide discussed in the Tae Myŏngnyul chikhae, 440–41. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 57, 125–29. Kyesang Tonggye’s regulations (kyuyak) are dated 1677. The membership was later occasionally replenished, but in 1808 it was decided that with a membership of forty-six, posthumous admissions (ch’uip) would no longer be permitted; in 1844 and 1846, two men, however, were posthumously admitted, apparently against payment. Ten sŭng made up one mal (or tu), which for dry grain equaled roughly six liters. See Paek Sŭngjong, Han’guk sahoesa, xiii. Such provisions were required for the funerals of a member’s parents, wife, and son(s), and for the member’s own. Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip 2.16a–17a; ibid., purok, yŏnbo, 7a; Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 51, 111–12. Kim Pu-ryun, “Tonggyu husik,” in Sŏrwŏltang-jip 4.15a–16a; Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 49, 111. Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 204, 206. There seems to be no evidence that the Hahoe Compact survived after 1618. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 54, 117; CYCK, 41: 462–68; Kim Mun-t’aek has analyzed this document in “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 69–81. For examples, see Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, 115 (1583/3/24), 129 (1584/2/16), 161 (1585/10/21). CYCK, 41: 469–71. Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, 26 (1578/6/3). There are unfortunately no descriptions of “ward rituals” performed at that time, although they are mentioned in Yi Chŏng-hoe’s diary when Yi attended them in different places. For examples, see Songgan ilgi, 114 (1583/+2/14), 349 (1609/3/2,5), 396 (1612/3/3,4,5). Kim T’aek-kyu studied the tongje in Hahoe in the 1960s; see his Tongjok purak ŭi saenghwal, 236–43. Other terms for hyangan are sajŏk, hyangmok, or hyangjŏk, all denoting a “register.” The term hyangan cannot be found in any Chinese dictionary and is also not listed in Morohashi’s Daikanwa jiten. Early prototypes of hyangan dating from the mid-fifteenth century are all related to Hamgyŏng Province—King T’aejo’s home province—and were apparently instituted on royal initiative. They are briefly discussed by Tagawa Kōzō, “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” pt. 1, 36–37. According to Kim Hyŏn-yŏng’s count, there are thirty-two hyangan extant from Kyŏngsang, eleven from Chŏlla, three from Ch’ungch’ŏng, and six from other places. They all originated around 1600. See his Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 68. Chŏng Kyŏng-se, “Sangju hyangannok sŏ” (1617), in Ubok-jip 15.8b. Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice, 131. Samch’am was an equivalent of “three homelands” (samhyang). Hŏ Kyun, “Sŏngongjik sorok,” in Sŏngsobokpu’go 23, as quoted by Tagawa Kōzō, “Gōan ni tsuite,” 269–70. A high-ranking official with a checkered career, Hŏ Kyun is best known as a literatus. Chŏng Sa-sŏng, “Hyangyak,” in Chihŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 3.3b–5b. Although Chŏng’s title states hyangyak, it is clear that it contains rules for admission to hyangan. Ibid. Chŏng Kyŏng-se, Ubok-jip 15.8b–9a. Fujiya Kawashima has analyzed various local rosters. See his “The Local Gentry Association in Mid-Yi Dynasty Korea,” 113–37; also by Kawashima, “A Study of the Hyangan,” 3–38, and “A Yangban Organization in the Countryside,” 3–35. This roster is preserved in manuscript form in the library of the National Institute of Korean History, Seoul. I was unable to see it. For the statistical data I rely on Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae

494

37 38 39

40 41 42 43 44 45

46 47 48 49 50 51 52

53 54 55 56 57

58

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 1 4 – 2 17

hyangch’on, 63–69 (whose membership counts I follow), and Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 243–66. YGJ 7.6b. [Ch’ŏngju] Chŏng Kyo, a saengwŏn of 1496, retired to his estate in Musan during the Yŏnsan’gun period. He was Chŏng T’ak’s grandfather. The Records of the Hyangni Descendants of Andong (Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongrok) was published in 1824 to justify the hyangni’s drive for social recognition. For details, see chapter 14 and Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 81–98. Chŏng Chin-yŏng kindly gave me a copy of the document. This pointed to the possibility of marriage to someone of non-yangban ancestry, i.e., of either commoner or base background. For a chart of the fifteen names, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 67. Nam Kyŏng-ji is included in this list, but he had died in 1518. Kim In-gŏl counted twelve “hyangni grandsons” (hyangson) on the 1530 roster; see his “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe,” 14. Chŏng Sa-sŏng, “Hyangyak,” in Chihŏn-jip 3.4a. YGJ 7.6b; ADPM, 285–87. See also chapter 14. Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 60. The document is hand-written and preserved in the Yŏngmo’gak in Hahoe Village. It is transcribed in Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 59, 129–32. It has been analyzed by Yi Su-gŏn in KCKM, 20; Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 69–76; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 258–60. “High official” (hyŏn’gwan) indicates civil and military officials above rank five, for example the section chiefs in the six ministries or county magistrates. See Kyŏngguk taejŏn chuhae, 12. In the Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok, Chong was labeled “hyangni son-in-law.” KNJ 11.33b. Listed under “officials by recommendation,” Ch’ik apparently held an office without remuneration, but retired in the wake of the 1498 disaster. He lived in Andong City. I am indebted for the details of this paragraph to Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 72–75. The story is told by Yi Ŭi-hyŏn (1669–1745) as an example of how difficult it was to be admitted to a local roster in Yŏngnam. See MHBG 235.20b. The real reason for the reluctance to admit Chŏng T’ak, however, remains unclear. These figures are based on Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 257–58. A comprehensive study of “local regulations” has been made by Tagawa Kōzō in “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” pt. 1, 35–76; pt. 2, 45–88; pt. 3, 179–210. Kim In-gŏl rejects Tagawa’s differentiation between hyanggyu as rules binding only for the hyangan members and hyangyak (community compact) on the ground that hyanggyu survived in certain places even after the hyangan had disappeared. See Kim In-gŏl, “Chosŏn hugi hyangan,” 531n25. For the full text of T’oegye’s Yean Compact, see Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 42.8b–12a. Pak Ik-hwan suggested that T’oegye’s model was the Kwangju Community Compact (Kwangju hyangyak) of 1451 because the penal stipulations of the Yean Compact are virtually identical. See Pak Ik-hwan, Chosŏn hyangch’on, 190–91. The Kwangju Compact, too, was likely inspired by the Zhouli. The instruction with the “three meritorious acts” included education in the “six virtues,” in the “six [proper] conducts” (among them filiality), and in the “six arts” (among them rites, music, and archery). The “eight [kinds of ] punishment” included those for lack of filiality and brotherly love, making up rumors, and disturbing the people, among others. See “Department of the Multitude” (Jigwan) in Zhouli; Biot, Le Tcheou-li, 1: 177–78. The Lü Family Community Compact was devised by Lü Dajun (1031–82) in 1077. It was later amended and revised by Zhu Xi, and it was Zhu’s version that was first translated into Korean by Kim An-guk in 1517 and served as a basic guide to Korean compact authors. For a discussion of Korean community compacts, see Deuchler, “The Practice of Confucianism.” Kŭm Nan-su, “T’oegye sŏnsaeng hyangnip yakcho hujik,” in Sŏngjae-jip 2.13b. The most likely



59 60

61 62 63

64

65 66

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 17 – 2 1 8

495

reason for the document’s rejection was the inclusion, under “medium punishment,” of two rules that censured practices favored by many elite landowners: withholding “dependent households” from corvée service and laxity in paying taxes. These two rules were omitted in the compact text reproduced in T’oegye’s collected works. According to Chŏng Chin-yŏng, they were discovered in a hand-written version contained in a pre-Imjin collection of community compacts. See his Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 132–34. Later compact authors such as Yi I and An Chŏng-bok relied more than T’oegye on the Lü Compact, but also included a few punitive measures. See Deuchler, “The Practice of Confucianism.” The Old Regulations have been studied by Tagawa Kōzō, “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” pt. 1, 43–48. Tagawa regarded the authorship and date of the Old Regulations as uncertain and thus was inclined, on the basis of linguistic evidence, to date them to the second half of the fifteenth century. Newer research, however, casts doubt on such an early dating. See Pak Ik-hwan, Chosŏn hyangch’on, 125–70. Pak has a convenient chart of the Old Regulations on 134. Pak’s numeration of the regulations—he counts twenty-five rules—differs from Tagawa’s. The text is in YGJ 5.3a–4a. Kang Yun (pen name Kŏm’am) was a Sinch’ŏn Kang—the only Kang on the roster of 1589. He was a T’oegye disciple, a sama graduate, and served as the head of the Local Bureau from 1587 to 1588. See Sipcho hyanggyu in Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 63, 137. Kim U-ong served as magistrate of Andong in 1588. YGJ 6.23a. His community compact is reproduced in Andong hyanggyo chi, 178–93. He assigned leaders who were to enforce the regulations in every one of Andong’s districts. Sondo, a colloquial Korean term literally meaning “injured fellow,” here means that a person no longer enjoys the benefits of the compact. See An Chŏng-bok, “Kwangju-bu Kyŏngan-myŏn iri tongyak,” in Sunam ch’ongsŏ, 1: 330. For a discussion of the term, see also Chŏng Ku-bok, Komunsŏ wa yangban sahoe, 251–57. According to the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, there were strict time limits within which a deceased had to be buried. Officials of fourth rank and above had to be buried within three months, those below fifth rank just after the end of the month of death. If someone was destitute and thus missed the proper time, the Ministry of Rites, upon receiving notification, supplied the necessary materials. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 279. Equally, a young man was to marry before age thirty, and a woman before age twenty. This was stipulated in the Jiali and the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 277. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 63, 137. Sŏngjong sillok 166.3a (1484); 196.17a (1486); 198.4a (1486); 215.17a (1488); 216.7b–8b (1488). Yi T’aejin and Kim Yong-dŏk have argued that the local bureaus were restored sixty years earlier, namely in 1428, when the Rules Concerning the Restoration of the Yuhyangso were supposedly issued. See Yi T’ae-jin, Han’guk sahoesa, 143–66; Kim Yong-dŏk, Hyangch’ŏng yŏn’gu, 16–26. The Royal Annals (Sillok), however, do not record such an event in 1428. Circumstantial evidence led Sudō Yoshiyuki to assume their existence in 1430. See his “Sensho ni okeru kyōzaisho,” 458–59. The above-mentioned Yuhyangso rules are contained in a collection of documents, Hyanghŏn, published in 1903, and are there dated “the tenth year of Sejong,” i.e., 1428. On the basis of collateral evidence, Yi Su-gŏn has argued—convincingly in my view—that 1428 should be corrected to 1488. For the details, see Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 324–31. I follow Yi’s dating for the following reasons: the intense debates that took place in the 1480s, during which these rules were alluded to, and the fact that the rules were dated “the twenty-seventh day of the fifth month,” i.e., only a few days after the decision to restore the local bureaus had been taken, make 1488 the far more likely date. Moreover, the life dates of the royal secretary involved in the promulgation of the Rules Concerning the Restoration of the Yuhyangso, Ch’oe Ŭng-hyŏn (1428–1507), support 1488 as the correct date. See also MHPG 235.18b, which dates the reestablishment to 1489. And, finally but equally importantly, there is no mention of such rules in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn. Yi Sŏng-mu accepts Yi Su-gŏn’s reconstruction. See his Chosŏn yangban sahoe, 235–39. In a recent article, Pak Ik-hwan tried to refute Yi Su-gŏn’s dating and argued that the compilers of Hyanghŏn did not get the date wrong, but erroneously brought in Ch’oe Ŭng-hyŏn’s name—a not very convincing reconstruction. See his “Sŏnch’o yuhyangso.”

496

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 1 8 – 2 2 2

67 For the Rules Concerning the Restoration of the Yuhyangso, see Kim Yong-dŏk, Hyangch’ŏng yŏn’gu, 19. 68 Taejŏn songnok, 70. Here, the number of bureau officers is smaller: four for counties of pu size and larger, three for kun, and two for hyŏn. The code calls the bureau officers “those in charge” (saekchang). See also MHPG 235.19a. 69 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 42.9a. 70 YGJ 4.13b, 5.1a–3a, 6.21a. 71 YGJ 1.9a. The term chipkang seems to have been the preferred designation of the four principal officers of the Local Bureau in Andong, whereas the bureau’s subordinate officials were called “ranked officials” (p’umgwan). See Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 63, 136. This nomenclature was not unique to Andong. In later times, however, p’umgwan or yuhyang p’umgwan became (with the exception of Andong) the commonly used general term for all bureau officers, a change that seems to indicate their loss of social status. 72 For a slate of the subaltern officers, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 270. Although this list is an eighteenth-century document, it may not have been that different in the previous centuries. It shows that the Local Bureau was supported by a small administration similar to that of the local magistrate. 73 The Old Regulations contained twelve more rules concerned with practical administrative matters; they were not included in the text as reproduced in YGJ. They are detailed in Chŏng Chinyŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 81–82. 74 Yi Su-gwang, Chibong yusŏl 2.43b–44a. 75 YGJ 7.6b. 76 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip, yŏnbo, 2.21b. 77 Yi Su-gwang, Chibong yusŏl 2.43b–44a. There is no other source confirming this story. 78 According to Kim Sŏng-il’s chronological biography, he held the post of first secretary several times. It is therefore difficult to pinpoint the date of this occurrence. It is likely, however, that it happened in 1586 when Kim received leave to return home. He then was forty-nine years old. See Hakpong-jip, purok, 1.14b. 79 Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 4: Ŏnhaengnok, 2.26b. 80 For a detailed description of these proceedings, see Deuchler, “The Practice of Confucianism.” 81 YGJ 5.7a–9a; Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip, yŏnbo, 2.7a–10b. The then head of the Local Bureau, T’oegye disciple Yi Ŏn-gi, had the memorial copied twice, with one copy stored in the magistrate’s office, the other in the Local Bureau. 82 These functionaries are here called p’umgwan, subaltern officials, also called chwamok p’umgwan. They were in charge of police duties and the grain loan system and were chosen for a one-year term of duty. They were thus clearly not members of the sajok elite, but presumably of hyangni status. 83 Chungjong sillok 96.67b (1541). 84 This fund was mentioned in the Old Regulations as well as in the appendix to the Ten New Regulations. No details about its format, however, are known. 85 A glimpse of the various activities of local bureau officers is also provided by Yi Mun-gŏn’s diary, Mukchae ilgi. 86 For an example, see Pak Ik-hwan, Chosŏn hyangch’on. Although Prof. Pak has chach’i in the title of his book, he does not explain the term or problematize its role in connection with the state. 87 See, for example, Chang Hyŏn-gwang, “Hyangsadang ki,” in Yŏhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 9.23b–26a. In order to avoid conflicts of interest, the “law of avoidance” (sangp’i) prohibited the appointment of a magistrate to his home district. 88 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 484. 89 Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 84. 90 Chungjong sillok 97.59b (1542); Injo sillok 12.46b–47a (1626). 91 Sŏngjong sillok 216.7b–8b (1488). 92 Taejŏn songnok, 70; for examples, Chungjong sillok 26.48b (1516); 55.7b–8a (1525).



N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 2 2 – 2 2 4

497

93 Yi Chŏng-hoe took part in discussions on the hyangni problem in the early fourth month of 1583. See his Songgan ilgi, 116 (1583/4/1). 94 See the appendix to the Ten New Regulations in Yŏngnam hyangyak no. 63, 137. For a general overview of the hyangni’s organization and functions, see Kim P’il-tong, “Chosŏn hugi chibang isŏ, sang,” 79–116. 95 Other terms for hyangni were ajŏn, “in front of the yamen,” because their offices were located in front of the magistrate’s yamen (office), or illi, “the people’s officials.” 96 A separate “Record of Wrongdoings of Hyangni and Yamen Personnel” (Illi che’gwansok ki’gwa) lists their misdeeds in seventeenth-century Andong. For the full text and explanations, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 269–82. 97 An example is Kwŏn Ho-mun, who recorded how he drafted carpenters for building his retreat. Kwŏn Ho-mun, “Songam hansŏjae ki” (1551), in Songam sŏnsaeng munjip, sokchip, 6.15a–16b. 98 Kŭm Nan-su, “T’omin ch’imjŏm changing chŏnji kŭmdan kyuyak,” in Sŏngjae-jip 2.19b–21a. 99 For the details, see Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 324–32. 100 I owe this term to JaHyun Kim Haboush. 101 For the first invasion, see Elisonas, “The Inseparable Trinity,” 273–78. For a definition of ŭibyŏng, see Ch’oe Yŏng-hŭi, Imjin waeran, 49–51. 102 According to Cho Chŏng’s (1555–1630) diary, Imnan ilgi, news of the appearance of Japanese ships off Pusan and Tongnae reached Sangju on the fourteenth of the fourth month, i.e., on the very first day of the invasion. Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 336n58. [P’ungyang] Cho Chŏng was Kim Kŭg-il’s son-in-law and resident in Sangju. See Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 188. For a concise description of both Japanese campaigns, see Yi Sang-baek, Han’guksa, kŭnse chŏn’gi-p’yŏn, 606–69. 103 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, 245 (1592/5/6). At that time Yi was the magistrate of Hoesŏng (Kangwŏn Province). 104 Sin Chi-je (1562–1624), a munkwa graduate of 1589, had an official career inside and outside the capital. As a local magistrate, he was reportedly known for his considerate treatment of the populace. 105 Kim Hae’s wife was the daughter of the second son of T’oegye’s older brother Ŭi. 106 Kim Ki (1547–1603) was the third son of [Kwangsan] Kim Pu-in. He studied under T’oegye and was well known for his devotion to scholarship and for his filial conduct. He was appointed royal tomb keeper (ch’ambong) by recommendation. KNJ 12.10a–b. 107 Kim Ki and Kim P’yŏng (1563–1617) were Hae’s second cousins. Both their fathers were sons of Kim Yu. 108 Yi Sung-nyang (1543–92) was the sixth son of Yi Hyŏn-bo and a T’oegye disciple. 109 For the text, see Andong hyanggyo chi, 872–75. A second appeal was sent out one month later. Ibid., 875–78. 110 For the complete slate of the Yean leadership, see ibid., 864. 111 Pae Yong-gil (1556–1609) was a son of Pae Sam-ik; he was a chinsa of 1585 and later, in 1602, also passed the munkwa. For his biography, see Kŭmyŏktang munjip 7.3a–16a. 112 YGJ 1.19b. 113 Sŏnjo sujŏng sillok 26.4b (1592); Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip 3.38b–44a; ibid., purok, yŏnbo, 1.26b– 30b; see also Andong hyanggyo chi, 878–81, 890–93; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 467, 473–74. For a translation of Kim’s “Letter of Exhortation,” dated June 14, 1592, see Epistolary Korea, 126–30. Kim Sŏng-il was appointed army commander (pyŏngma chŏltosa) of Kyŏngsang Right Province (west of the Naktong River) in the fourth month of 1592, but was dismissed soon after, because he had wrongly predicted the probability of a Japanese invasion after his trip with Chief Envoy Hwang Yun-gil to Japan to fathom Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s intentions in 1590. Hwang, a Sŏin, was convinced that the Japanese were about to attack Korea, whereas Kim Sŏng-il, a Tongin, thought that this was not the case; Kim’s opinion prevailed at court. Later reinstated, Kim Sŏng-il was concurrently appointed governor of Kyŏngsang Right Province. For the Japan mission, see Yi Sang-baek, Han’guksa, kŭnse chŏn’gi-p’yŏn, 601–3.

498

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 2 4 – 2 2 7

114 Later, in the autumn of 1593, Kim Yong managed to rejoin the king in Ŭiju to resume his post as a diarist in the Office of Royal Decrees (Yemun’gwan). It is then that he wrote his “Diary of Assisting the King” (Hojong ilgi), a day-by-day chronicle of events. The text extant today covers only twenty-six days, from the early eighth to the early twelfth months, 1593. For a brief description, see Hwang P’ae-gang, Imjin waeran, 27. 115 For Yi Chŏng-baek’s (1553–1600) activities during the war, see his biography in Yi Chŏng-baek, Nakkŭmhŏn munjip 2.8a–13b (written by his grandson). 116 Kim Yun-sa (1552–?) and his older brother, Yun-myŏng (1545–?), who briefly held the overall command, were seventh-generation descendants of [Sunch’ŏn] Kim Yu-on (1367–1413), who had settled in Kudam. 117 Kwŏn T’ae-il (1569–1631) belonged to a collateral line of Kwŏn Pŏl. He passed the munkwa in 1599. KNJ 11.24b. 118 [Chŏnju] Yu Pok-ki (1555–1617) was one of Kim Chin’s nonagnatic grandsons, and a disciple of Kim Sŏng-il. His younger brother, Pong-nip (1558–1593), accompanied Kim Sŏng-il south and died in the battle of Chinju. 119 [Kwangsan] Kim Tŭg-yŏn (1555–1637) was a son of Kim Ŏn-gi, a sama graduate, and a disciple of Yu Sŏng-nyong. 120 Yi Ham, Unak sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 1b–2a; Yi Chae, Miram-jip 23.25a–b; Kwŏn Ch’ae, Amch’ŏn se’go 3.16b. 121 For the complete roster of the Andong yŏrŭp hyangbyŏng, see Andong hyanggyo chi, 866–68; Kim Hae, Kŭnsijae sŏnsaeng munjip 4.2b–3a. 122 For a chronology of the activities of the Andong yŏrŭp hyangbyŏng, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Andong chiyŏk ŭi Imnan ŭibyŏng,” 38–42. 123 For details of the second invasion of 1597, see Elisonas, “The Inseparable Trinity,” 285–90. 124 Yi Chin (1555–1628), a grandson of [Yean] Yi Hun (saengwŏn of 1534), was a disciple of Yu Sŏngnyong. Sŏae sŏnsaeng munhyŏllok, in Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ 4: 488. He is said to have played a leading role in the defense of the Hwawang mountain fortress near Ch’angnyŏng in 1594. Chin left a diary, Siŭndang ilgi, that describes in great detail his fate during and after the war. 125 Kim Sŏng-u calculated and tabulated Yi Chin’s contributions in 1597 in Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 367–70. To feed 100,000 Chinese soldiers for one month some fifty thousand sŏm of grain were reportedly necessary. 126 In early 1593, Kim Sŏng-il wrote a moving letter in han’gŭl to his wife, who had stayed behind in the Andong area, in which he expressed his concern about her and his family’s safety. For a reproduction of this letter, see Unjanggak, 28–29. 127 Kim Pu-ryun, Sŏrwŏltang-jip, purok, 3b. 128 Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 147–48, 158. 129 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip, yŏnbo, 2.21b; see also “Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok,” in CYCK, 2: 600. 130 As reported by Yu Sŏng-nyong, quoted in Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 381. 131 The documents are in KCKM, no. 261, 565–78, and analyzed by Mun Suk-cha, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi Yŏnghaep’a kamun,” 106–9. 132 Yi Su-gŏn, “17–18segi Andong chibang yurim,” 184. 133 Kim Si-on’s biography in his P’yoŭn sŏnsaeng munjip, 677. Abandoned children (yu’gia) could normally be adopted (suyang) up to age three following official approval, but, according to a royal edict of 1643, in hardship times children up to eight or nine years could be “adopted.” King Sukchong’s Regulations Concerning the Adoption of Abandoned Children (Yu’gia suyang samok) of 1681 was later incorporated in the Sok taejŏn. Sugyo chimnok, 161, in Sugyo chibyo; Sok taejŏn, 247–48. 134 Chŏng Ku-bok, “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban,” 149. 135 Yi Chŏng-hoe, Songgan ilgi, entries from 1604 to 1609, excerpted by Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 391–92. 136 Yu Chin (1582–1635), Suam sŏnsaeng yŏnbo, 342. 137 Kŭm Nan-su, “T’omin ch’imjŏm changin chŏnji kŭmdan kyuyak,” in Sŏngjae-jip 2.19b–21a (1593).



138 139 140 141 142 143 1 44 145 146 147 148 149 150 151

152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 2 7 – 2 3 1

499

See Yi Chŏng-hoe’s diary entries in Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 416–20. Ibid., 383. Ibid., 420. Between 1604 and 1612, Yi Chŏng-hoe slaughtered a total of six cows and three calves! [P’ungsan] Kim Ch’ang-jo (1581–1637) was Kim Pong-jo’s (1572–1630) younger brother. Both were Yu Sŏng-nyong’s disciples. Kim Ch’ang-jo, Changam-jip, 536–46; Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 538. [Kwangsan] Kim Yŏng (1577–1641) was Kim Pu-ryun’s only son. A munkwa graduate of 1612, he entered government service, but retired to Andong when he witnessed Kwanghae’gun’s abuses of power and never resumed office. See his Kyeam sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 6.3a–b. For examples, see [Hŭngyang] Yi Chŏn (1558–1648), a saengwŏn of 1603, Wŏlgan-jip, purok, 1a–9a; [Ŭisŏng] Kim Hyu was Kim Yong’s grandson. See Kim Hyu, Kyŏngwa sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 8.2a–b. See the graphs in Mun Suk-cha, “T’oegye hakp’a,” 92–93. Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 403–7. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 59, 132. The version of the 1589 roster extant today is thus this new edition. [Andong] Kwŏn Haeng-ga (1553–1623) was the adopted son of Kwŏn Ho-mun. MTP, 2: 56a. Kwŏn Ch’un-nan was a collateral kinsman of Kwŏn Pŏl and a T’oegye disciple. He passed the chinsa in 1561 and the munkwa in 1573 and eventually became the second censor (junior third rank). MTP, 2: 56a; KNJ 11.24a. Although the Yŏnggaji states that Yu Sŏng-nyong authored the Ten New Regulations, Yu’s chronological biography does not mention it. However, a postscript written by Kwŏn Haeng-ga in 1605 makes this clear. See Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 63, 137–38. Pak Ik-hwan believes that Yu Sŏng-nyong compiled the document during his absence from government between 1600 and 1605. Pak Ik-hwan, “Chosŏn chŏn’gi Andong chibang,” 132. For the text, see YGJ 5.4a–7a. The version in the Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 63, 136–38, entitled Sipcho hyanggyu and preserved in Hahoe, gives some valuable additions to the Yŏnggaji version. It is probable, as Chŏng Chin-yŏng suggests, that the text in the Yŏnggaji in fact was a shortened version engraved on a hanging plaque (hyŏnp’an). See Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 92. For discussions of the various rules, see Tagawa Kōzō, “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” 48–54, and Pak Ik-hwan, “Chosŏn chŏn’gi Andong chibang,” 132–44. Pak tabulated the rules on 132–35. Sŏnjo sillok 89.7b–8a (1597). The local bureaus’ counterparts, the capital bureaus, were abolished in 1603, and some of the latter’s responsibilities, such as the vetting of aspiring examination candidates, seem to have been shifted to the local bureaus. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 63, 138. For a reproduction of the Roster of 1615, see Andong hyanggyo chi, 156–231. The name list is arranged according to administrative areas of residence. It is preserved in the Unjanggak in Kŭmgye. I owe the statistics to Kawashima, “The Andong Hyangan.” For the Roster of 1647, see UKKM, 7: 463–71. For a table listing all Andong rosters, see Kim Hyŏnyŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 260. I was unable to verify Yi Chin’s minor merit subject status. Kim Yong, Unch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 2.8b. Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 336–67. Kŭm Nan-su, “Tongjung yakcho ibŭi sojik,” in Sŏngjae sŏnsaeng munjip 2.17a–19a; Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 52, 112–13. Ibid.; Kŭm Nan-su, Sŏngjae-jip, yŏnbo, 15a. Kŭm Nan-su, “Chŏbyu Ponghwa hyangsŏdang mun,” in Sŏngjae-jip 2.19a–b. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 53, 113–17. An example is the compact of Miryang of 1648. See Ch’oe Ho, “Chosŏn hugi Miryang ŭi sajok,” 159–60. Mencius, 3A.18; Lau, Mencius, 99–100. Kim Yong, “Tongjung ibyak sŏ,” in Unch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 3.11a–13a; Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 55, 118.

500

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 3 1 – 2 3 9

168 Yi Hae-jun was one of the first to pay attention to these nonelite associations, which, as “hamlet funds” (ch’on’gye), may have centered on shamanic village cults. Because of the lack of documentation, it is difficult to trace their organization and history, but Yi Su-gwang already thought that the mutual fund association (kye) had its origin in religious organizations (hyangdo). Chibong yusŏl 2.43b. For further details, see Yi Hae-jun, Chosŏn sigi ch’ollak, chap. 3. 169 Ibid., 55–56; Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 334–35. 170 Bourdieu, In Other Words, 138. 171 Chŏng Yŏm, Manhŏn-jip 4.21b. For a study of Chŏng Yŏ-rip, see Kim Yong-dŏk, “Chŏng Yŏ-rip yŏn’gu.” 172 [Tŏksu] Yi Kwang (1541–1607) was a saengwŏn (1567) and a munkwa (1574) graduate and had an official career inside and outside the capital. 173 “Private armies” (sabyŏng) were outlawed as a threat to the throne and abolished as early as 1400. Chŏngjong sillok 4.4a–5a (1400). 174 Yi Tae-wi, Hwalgye sŏnsaeng yu’go 34a–b. 175 Song Chŏng-hyŏn, Chosŏn sahoe, 52. 176 Yang Sa-hyŏng (1547–99) was a Namwŏn Yang residing in Sunch’ang. A saengwŏn of 1579 and a munkwa graduate of 1588, he held minor military posts and for his services during the Imjin War was posthumously rewarded with merit subject status. His older brother, Sa-min (1528–93), died during the war. Namwŏn Yang-ssi, 49–50. 177 Sŏnjo sillok 36.2b (1602); U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 62–66. For a comprehensive description of militia activities in the Honam region, see Song Chŏng-hyŏn, Chosŏn sahoe, 70–87. 178 Kim Sŏng-u, Chosŏn chunggi kukka, 387. 179 Ch’oe Sang-jung, Minŭngjae-jip 3.1a–4a. 180 Honam chŏrŭirok, kwŏn 2, no pagination. This compilation, though focused on the heroes of 1592, also includes militia raisers of the four later “calamities” (nansa) of 1624 (Yi Kwal rebellion), 1627 (first Manchu invasion), 1636 (second Manchu invasion), and 1728 (Yi In-jwa rebellion). The preface was written by Ko Chŏng-hŏn, a seventh-generation descendant of the war hero Ko Kyŏngmyŏng (1533–92), in 1799. 181 YSJ 7.1a. In 1591, Hwang Chin had accompanied Hwang Yun-gil (his father’s first cousin) on the fact-finding mission to Japan. For a brief description of the battle of Chinju, see Song Chŏnghyŏn, Chosŏn sahoe, 109–13.

Part IV Introduction 1 The term “faction” is, according to Harold Lasswell, a very old political concept that denotes a body that “seems to subordinate the public good to private gain, and thus the term takes its place in the dialectic of political struggle especially as a means of defense and counterattack by those in power.” Quoted in Nicholas, “Factions: A Comparative Analysis,” 22. Nicholas holds “factions as a special form of political organization” that arise during social conflict. For his characterizations, see ibid., 22, 27–29. I follow Nicholas’s definition. 2 The position of section chief (senior fifth rank) was not a high office in the Ministry of Personnel, but was nonetheless influential, with the power to vet the civil and military candidates for office in the general bureaucracy. When a section chief retired, he had the right to appoint his own successor—a measure that was meant to curb the power of the high officialdom. 3 For a brief outline of the origin of factional strife, see, for example, Chŏng Man-jo, “Chosŏn chunggi yuhak.” 4 Chŏng Yŏ-rip (1546–89), a chinsa (1567) and munkwa (1570) graduate from Chŏnju, owed his first appointments to Yi I, but after the latter’s death in 1584, he transferred to the Tongin. The circumstances of Chŏng’s “plot” against the throne remain obscure and were most likely trumped up by Chŏng Ch’ŏl and colleagues as a pretext to go against the Tongin. 5 A small pocket of Pugin loyalists pursuing Nammyŏng Cho Sik’s scholarship remained in the Chinju area in southern Kyŏngsang.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 3 9 – 2 40

501

6 For a list of the 1623 merit subjects, see Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 86–87. Five of the original fifty-three merit subjects were later stripped of this status because of their involvement in Yi Kwal’s rebellion in 1624. 7 Hattori Tamio, Kankoku, 40–51. Ku Sa-maeng (pon’wan Nŭngsŏng), munkwa graduate of 1558, served in various high offices, and his fifth daughter became the consort of King Sŏnjo’s fifth son (posthumously elevated to King Wŏnjong) and the mother of later King Injo. The Nŭngsŏng Ku had been in office since mid-Koryŏ, are listed among Sŏng Hyŏn’s most prominent descent groups at the beginning of Chosŏn, and were moving into pŏryŏl status during Injo’s reign. MTP, 2: 170b; Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 60, 87. 8 Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 80–89. Besides the Nŭngsŏng Ku, descendants of the Sinp’yŏng Sin and the old Andong Kim, among others, emerged as founders of military aristocratic houses. The Nŭngsŏng Ku were among the highest military examination achievers. See Park, Between Dreams and Reality, app. A. 9 Tangsang designated the highest bureaucratic stratum of upper-senior third rank and above. There were roughly one hundred tangsang-rank positions, among them the seven state councilors, the three ministers in each of the six ministries, the inspector general, the censor general, the director of the National Academy (Sŏnggyun’gwan), and the top office holders of the Office of the Royal Lectures, the Office of the Special Counselors, the Bureau of State Records, and the commanding generals of the Five Military Commands. 10 In a few of these forty descent groups, for instance the Chŏnju Yi, more than one descent line distinguished itself so that the total adds up to fifty-seven descent lines. For a comprehensive study, see Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl. 11 The term “distinguished houses” (pŏryŏl) stands here as a generic designation for a variety of similar terms denoting the highest levels of social and political power and prestige in the capital, such as kapchok, munbŏl, myŏngjok, kwŏnmun, among many others. See Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 17. 12 Ch’a Chang-sŏp worked out the following criterion for pŏryŏl status: a descent line had to produce continuously at least one official of tangsang rank in the course of three generations and within a radius of second cousins. See Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 26–41. 13 Of the four pŏryŏl descent lines with Pugin background, only one managed to maintain high office throughout the period because it cooperated with the Sŏin. 14 Ch’a Chang-sŏp developed the following criteria to determine the most prosperous period(s) of a given descent line: at least one tangsang-rank official over the course of ten years, with a minimum of ten such officials from Injo to Kyŏngjong (ninety-nine years), eight from Yŏngjo to Chŏngjo (seventy-six years), and eleven in the nineteenth century. For a useful chart showing the prosperous periods of the fifty-seven pŏryŏl, see his Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 59–60. 15 Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl, vol. 1. Yi Ik (1681–1763), an eminent Namin scholar, failed the civil service examinations in 1705 and thereafter retired to the countryside and, though recommended for office a couple of times, never served in government. 16 It must be remembered that there were two unrelated Andong Kim descent groups. The one whose apical ancestor was Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng, Wang Kŏn’s merit subject, remained undistinguished throughout Koryŏ and early Chosŏn, but started to prosper with Kim Sang-hŏn’s grandfather, Kim Saeng-hae, an early sixteenth-century chinsa graduate and magistrate. See MTP, 1: 170a. They were called the “new” Andong Kim to distinguish them from the “old” Andong Kim who traced their ancestry from Kim I-ch’ŏng and produced a number of prominent scholars and high civil officials, among them Kim Sa-hyŏng, at the end of Koryŏ and the beginning of Chosŏn, but who were later less prominent. From the late sixteenth century, however, a distinguished military branch emerged with Kim Chi-sa (n.d.) whose two sons passed the military examinations (mukwa) and thus laid the foundation for their descendants to produce some thirty tangsang-rank military officials from Injo’s time on, founding one of the hereditary military houses (hunmu sega) in the capital. For the details, see Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 200–204.

502

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 4 0 – 2 4 1

17 [Ŭnjin] Song Si-yŏl (1607–89), a saengwŏn of 1633, towered over the seventeenth century with his outstanding scholarship, political acumen, and prolific writings. A disciple of Kim Chang-saeng, he served at one time as the tutor of later King Hyojong. 18 [P’ap’yŏng] Yun Chŭng (1629–1714) studied under Song Si-yŏl. His father was a nonagnatic grandson of Sŏng Hon. Chŭng won great fame as an outstanding scholar, but never served in the government. 19 [Pannam] Pak Se-ch’ae (1631–95), chinsa of 1648, was one of the most important Confucian scholars and ritualists of his time. Although his son-in-law was Song Si-yŏl’s grandson, after the Noron-Soron split, he sided with Yun Chŭng. 20 For tables of Noron and Soron pŏryŏl, see Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 188–89, 194. 21 For a list of prominent Namin in the capital, see Yi Su-gŏn, “17–18segi Andong chibang yurim,” 200. The list comprises sixteen descent lines. 22 Hŏ Chŏk and Hŏ Mok were distant kinsmen; both belonged to the Yangch’ŏn Hŏ, one of the four Namin pŏryŏl in the capital. Hŏ Chŏk, a munkwa graduate of 1637, rose to high offices (in 1671 briefly to that of chief state councilor) and orchestrated the Namin takeover in 1674; he also traveled several times to Qing China. In contrast to Hŏ Mok, Chŏk led the ideologically more moderate branch of the capital Namin. He and Yun Hyu became victims of the Sŏin reversal of 1680. Hŏ Mok’s intellectual background was more complex. His family originally belonged to the “small Pugin” (Sobuk), and his father, Kyo (1567–1632), was a Taoism specialist. At age twenty-three, Mok studied with Chŏng Ku in Sŏngju and also was close to Yi Ik. Although born in Seoul, he lived for many years in his native Yŏnch’ŏn (Kyŏnggi Province). He loved “ancient rites” and was skilled in seal script. 23 [Namwŏn] Yun Hyu, a resident of Kyŏnggi Province, was a scion of a family with a long-standing sarim tradition. Though in his youth not factionally committed, during the rites controversies, he clearly took the Namin’s side. 24 Chŏng Ku’s grandfather was a disciple and son-in-law of Kim Koeng-p’il. Ku collected the scattered materials on Kim and Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang, whose works were destroyed during the Purge of 1504. Ku confidently embraced the learning of T’oegye as well as of Nammyŏng Cho Sik. He left several ritual works, among them an annotation of Zhu Xi’s Domestic Rites, the Karye chimnam puju, and the monumental compilation Ritual Theories of the Five Gentlemen (Osŏnsaeng yesŏl pullyu), in which, from the ritual thought of Sima Guang, Zhang Zai, Cheng Hao, Cheng Yi, and Zhu Xi, he developed ritual prescriptions for the royal house as well as for the sajok elite. Chŏng designed the funeral arrangements for King Sŏnjo. 25 For a brief sketch of Hŏ Mok’s life and thought, see Kŭm Chang-t’ae, T’oegye hakp’a, 1: 219–41; U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 173–77. 26 Kwŏn Hyŏp (1542–1618), a direct descendant of Kwŏn Pu, laid the basis for the capital Andong Kwŏn to prosper in the seventeenth century. Hyŏp (he and his two brothers were munkwa graduates) earned special merits during the Imjin War and in 1604 was made a merit subject. One of his grandsons, Tae-im (1595–1645), became King Sŏnjo’s son-in-law, and his younger cousin, Taeun (1612–99), advanced to the high office of left state councilor, but, as a Namin, was stripped of office in 1680. He made a comeback in 1689 as chief state councilor, insisting on Song Si-yŏl’s death. He himself fell victim to the Purge of 1694. Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 197–98 and table on 120. 27 The only Namin pŏryŏl who survived into the nineteenth century was the line of [P’ungsan] Hong I-sang (1549–1615), a munkwa graduate of 1579, who had a distinguished government career under King Sŏnjo and continued to serve under Kwanghae’gun. All four of his sons and many of his grandsons passed the munkwa. Besides the Namin pŏryŏl, there were some thirty less distinguished capital kin groups who supported the Namin cause. See Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim,” 293–94. 28 For the details, see Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 68–80. 29 Sŏnjo’s father was Tŏkhŭng’gun, the seventh sŏja son of King Chungjong; as the father of a king, he was the first to receive the title grand prince (taewŏn’gun). Sŏnjo was chosen as Myŏngjong’s successor because Myŏngjong’s crown prince (an only son) died at age thirteen.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 4 1 – 2 4 6

503

30 For the social and ritual implications for royal succession, see Yi Yŏng-ch’un, Chosŏn hugi wangwi kyesŭng, esp. 87–99. For the rites controversies, see Haboush, “Constructing the Center.” Kings Kyŏngjong and Yŏngjo were half-brothers, the sons of Sukchong’s two secondary consorts. 31 Hongnam Kim, “Exploring Eighteenth-Century Court Arts,” 42–43 (with color photos). 32 For measures against factions/pŏryŏl, see Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 204–34. 33 For the Taewŏn’gun’s reforms, see Ching Young Choe, Rule of the Taewŏn’gun, and Palais, Politics and Policy. 34 It was the eminent scholar and ritualist Kim Chang-saeng, regarded as Yulgok’s successor, who on the instruction of King Injo sent an eight-point memorandum to the early Sŏin power holders. One means suggested by Kim for restoring state and society after the Kwanghae’gun regime was the “right use of men.” Injo sillok 1.27b–29a (1623). 35 The five new sallim positions were created in sequence: in 1623, 1646, and 1658. They ranged from senior seventh rank to senior third rank. It was not unusual for sallim appointees to have earlier served upon recommendation or to move later to regular high-ranking offices. For the details, see U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 20–31. 36 For a list of sallim appointees from Sŏnjo to Kyŏngjong, see ibid., 28. Only eight scholars from Kyŏngsang and three from Chŏlla were so honored in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. 37 The major study of the sallim scholars is U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim. 38 Song Chun-gil (1606–72) was Song Si-yŏl’s kinsman, but belonged to a different descent line. Chun-gil’s line reached pŏryŏl status and flourished during the eighteenth century, and some of Si-yŏl’s descendants continued to be appointed as sallim scholars. Both houses, however, declined in the nineteenth century. Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 192–93. 39 Yi I, Yulgok chŏnsŏ 7.14b–15a. Yulgok’s discussion of “public discourse” arose from his concern about the impending split between Sŏin and Tongin in 1575. 40 Injo sillok 25.34b (1631). T’oegye’s pronouncement was quoted during a discussion of striking students of the National Confucian Academy in 1631. 41 I borrow the terms “localist” and “localism” from Robert Hymes.

Chapter 10 1 Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl, 1: 276. 2 Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 30, 42–44. 3 The so-called irregular examinations, given on special occasions such as a royal birth or the king’s visit to the National Shrine of Confucius, were held 582 times between 1392 and 1894, producing 62 percent of all munkwa graduates. 4 Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl, 1: 282; Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 24, 42–45. 5 Park gives some examples in Between Dreams and Reality, 91–97. 6 [Kyŏngju] Yi Hang-bok (1556–1618), munkwa 1580, was one of the most illustrious officials during King Sŏnjo’s reign. He held high military positions during and after the Imjin War. He also authored an introductory ritual handbook. 7 Yi Chung-hwan, T’aengniji, 1: 104, 235. 8 Kyŏngsang was given a saengwŏn/chinsa quota of 100, and one of 30 for the munkwa. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 210, 213. There are slight differences in the numbers provided for each category of examination graduates: whereas Ch’oe Chin-ok worked with a total of 40,649 saengwŏn/chinsa graduates, Song June-ho counted a total of 47,748; this discrepancy must have resulted from different documentary evidence. The total number of munkwa graduates stands at 14,620. See Ch’oe Chin-ok, Chosŏn sidae saengwŏn-chinsa, 40; Song June-ho, Yijo saengwŏn-chinsasi, app. 1. For military examination graduates from Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla, see Park, Between Dreams and Reality, table on 97. 9 These figures are based on Sŏ Chu-sŏk, “Uri kojang ŭi saengwŏn-chinsa-munkwa kŭpcheja,” 6, and Ch’oe Chin-ok, Chosŏn sidae saengwŏn-chinsa, 167. Those munkwa graduates whose residence was given as Andong and Yean in the Kukcho pangmok (according to the Wagner-Song Munkwa

504

10 11 12

13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

27 28

29

30 31 32 33 34 35 36

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 4 7 – 2 5 1

Project) number, however, only 196. It is, moreover, interesting to note that a relatively small number of localities produced an extraordinarily large number of examination graduates, indicating a significant local clustering of graduates even outside Seoul. For lists of Andong and Yean chinsa-saengwŏn and munkwa graduates, see Sŏ Chu-sŏk, “Uri kojang ŭi saengwŏn-chinsa-munkwa kŭpcheja,” 11–56. These figures are based on Ch’oe Chin-ok, Chosŏn sidae saengwŏn-chinsa, 198–200. The three munkwa graduates are Kim Se-hŭm (1649–1720) in 1687, Kim Se-ho (1652–1722) in 1690, and Kim Ch’ang-sŏk (1652–1720) in 1690; they were cousins. Se-hŭm and Ch’ang-sŏk had first passed the chinsa, Se-ho the saengwŏn examinations. Some of the above data are based on the Wagner-Song Munkwa Project. Kim Yong served in the Office of Diplomatic Correspondence and the Office of Royal Decrees. KNJ 11.25a. Sungjŏng was the last reign-period (yŏnho) of the Ming, 1628–44. Kim Si-on, P’yoŭn sŏnsaeng munjip, 669–74. ADPM, 641–51; Kim Pang-gŏl, Chich’on sŏnsaeng munjip, haengjang, 4. 22a–32a; Sukchong sillok 20.29b–30a (1689). For more details, see chapter 9. Kim Hak-pae, Kŭm’ong sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 6.1a–9a. Kim Se-ho was a great-great-grandson of Yong. Kim Se-ho, Kuju-jip, purok, 10. 40a–43a; Sukchong sillok 27.13a (dismissal from office in sixth month, 1694). KNJ 11.27a. The other two were Kim Ŭng-ryŏm (1710–62) and Kim Ki-ch’an (1748–1812). In the nineteenth century, there were five saengwŏn/chinsa and six munkwa graduates, one of whom sat the very last examination conducted in 1894. Kwŏn Chu was the eldest son of Ch’ae’s second son, Se-ch’ung (n.d.). Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 198. Through generations, T’oegye’s direct ritual heirs held, presumably on recommendation, magisterial positions without, however, ever taking an examination degree. Se-t’aek (1753) descended from Yi Chun’s second son, Sun-do. MTP, 1: 131a–2a; KNJ 12.8b. Yi Chung-hwan, T’aengniji, 1: 122; 2: 298. Ironically, Yi’s mother hailed from a well-established Chŏlla kin group, the Hamyang O. Song June-ho traced Yi’s maternal family and his factional affiliation in Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 326–73. The quotas for Chŏlla were ninety candidates for the saengwŏn/chinsa and twenty-five for munkwa. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 210, 213. For a table of munkwa graduates with residence in Namwŏn, see Chŏng Hun, “Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn chiyŏk munkwa kŭpcheja,” 9–10. Of the forty-two surname groups, twenty-eight brought forth only one graduate each. For Ch’oe Yŏn’s biography, see Ch’oe Yŏn, Sŏngman-jip 6.4a–9a; YSJ 5.4a. Ch’oe On is commonly regarded as a disciple of Chŏng In-hong, the chief ideologue of the Pugin, who was killed at Kwanghae’gun’s demise. Ch’oe On’s biographer, his grand-nephew, the Soron Ch’oe Si-ong, however, denies any link between On and Chŏng. See Ch’oe On, P’yŏmjae-jip 9.9a–b. U In-su lists him as a Chŏng disciple. See his Chosŏn hugi sallim, 41. Yi Kwal (1587–1624), a military officer, was made a second-rank Injo Restoration merit subject, but angry about receiving a lower rank than he had expected, he rose in revolt, briefly occupied Seoul, and even attempted to install a rival king to Injo. Finally, overwhelmed by government troops, he fled the capital and was murdered by one of his underlings. Some of his men fled to Manchuria and encouraged the Manchus to invade Korea. Han’guk inmyŏng taesajŏn, 598. Ch’oe On, P’yŏmjae-jip, 9.8a–16a; YSJ 5.4a; U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 24, 41. Ch’oe Hwi-ji, Oju sŏnsaeng-jip 13.5a–15b. For the biographical data on the Tundŏk Ch’oe, see Taebang se’go. Some of these statistical data I owe to Song June-ho. Yi Sang-hyŏng, Ch’ŏnmukchae-jip 5.23a–32a; YSJ 5.4a. Yi Mun-jae, Sŏktong yu’go 8.12a–19b; YSJ 5.5b–6a. The Namwŏn Yang residing in Kwimi (Sunch’ang) have been extensively studied by Yang Manjŏng; see Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo, ed. Yang Man-jŏng.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 5 2 – 2 5 5

505

37 No Hyŏng-mang was one of No Chin’s great-grandsons. 38 According to the Sok taejŏn, the local authorities of the three southern provinces could once every three years recommend to the king three individuals who were either former officials, sama graduates, or simply “young scholars” (yuhak) for special consideration. See Sok taejŏn, 109–10; Chŏng Ku-sŏn, Chosŏn sidae ch’ŏn’gŏ, 163–69. 39 YSJ 5.6a–9b. 40 Hyojong sillok 11.8b–9a (1653). The memorialist was the first minister of the Office of Ministers without Portfolio Yi Kyŏng-yŏ (1585–1657). 41 Sukchong sillok 30.44a (1696). [Chŏnju] Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng (1646–1715) was a grandson of Ch’oe Myŏng-gil (1586–1647), a merit subject of King Injo’s restoration in 1623. A Soron, Sŏk-chŏng (munkwa 1671), too, experienced the ups and downs of factional politics, but was able to stay at the center of power for a remarkably long time. 42 According to Song June-ho, until the seventeenth century over 25 percent of lower-examination graduates moved on to get a munkwa degree; thereafter, this percentage declined to often less than 4 percent—an indication of the changing significance of the lower degrees. Song June-ho, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi kwagŏ,” 44–45. 43 “Director Yi” cannot be identified. 44 [Ŭisŏng] Kim Han-dong (1740–1811) passed the sama in 1763 and the munkwa in 1789. After serving as governor of Chŏlla, he was appointed royal secretary in 1798 before he was apparently elected deputy head of the Andong Local Bureau. Kim was closely associated with Chŏng Tasan, his classmate of 1789. In 1801, accused of being a Christian, he was exiled to Myŏngch’ŏn (north Hamgyŏng), but released in 1805. His serving as a deputy head cannot be verified. 45 Chŏng Yag-yong, Mongmin simsŏ, in Chŭngbo Yŏyudang chŏnsŏ, 5: 373. Chŏng thought that since the local bureau officers were the assistants of the local magistrate, only the best individuals of a locality should be selected to serve. 46 [Chŏnŭi] Yi Sŏl (1598–?) passed the saengwŏn and the munkwa in 1618. Unfortunately, no name lists of bureau personnel exist for the latter part of the seventeenth century. 47 [Tongnae] Chŏng Mun-bo (1618–?) passed the saengwŏn and the munkwa in 1657. 48 Yu Wŏn-gan was undoubtedly a P’ungsan Yu, but I could not identify him more closely. 49 The controversies surrounding the revisions prior to 1677 are briefly described in the roster’s postface of 1678. For the original text, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 262n25. 50 Kim I-hyŏn was a sixth-generation descendant of Kim Sŏng-il. 51 For the original text of the 1711 postface, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 263n26. 52 For details, see chapter 12. 53 In 1748, there were apparently two versions of the roster, a draft (ch’oan) and a regular roster (chŏngan); from the latter, 148 individuals who had been on the draft were dropped. Chŏng Chinyŏng, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on yangban sahoe II,” 253–54. 54 For the original text of the 1773 postface, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 264n29. 55 Ibid., 258, 260; Chŏng Chin-yŏng counted 462 members in 1774 (“Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on yangban sahoe II”). 56 For a discussion of King Yŏngjo’s decision of 1772, see Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 152–55. The emergence of secondary sons on the local scene will be further discussed in chapter 14. 57 The Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok has been analyzed by Kim Yong-dŏk, “Andong chwasu ko”; Kawashima, “The Local Yangban of Andong”; and Song June-ho, “Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok ŭi haeje.” A second list, the Hyangchipkangnok, covering the period from January 1802 to March 1906, used by Kim Yong-dŏk, is judged by Song June-ho to be an earlier rough draft of the Tŭngnok. Prof. Song appended the complete Tŭngnok to his article, just cited. The Tŭngnok consists of several parts, but for this study the following are most important: (1) “Former Officials” (chŏn cho’gwan), listing eighty officials who, as munkwa graduates, served in the central bureaucracy between 1728 and 1882; (2) name lists of bureau heads and their deputies according to place of origin/residence; and (3) chronological list of office holding of all bureau heads and their deputies between 1766 and 1906; because there are some omissions, only 115 years are actually covered.

506

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 5 6 – 2 5 9

58 There were gaps within the periods 1850–62 and 1869–76. Song June-ho interprets them as transcription errors. See Song June-ho, “Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok ŭi haeje,” 138. See also Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Chosŏn hugi yangban sahoe (1),” 278–79. 59 Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 288. I follow the numbers given by Prof. Song. Kim Hyŏnyŏng comes up with a total of 1,707, Kawashima with 1,724, and Kim Ho-il with 1,659. 60 The various editions of the Namwŏn roster are until this day kept in the Local School (hyanggyo) of Namwŏn. They were collected into one volume and published in a movable-type version by the Local School in 1935. Kim Ho-il, “Chosŏn hugi hyangan,” 232. The hand-written rosters are reproduced in Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 3–269. 61 For a table of the descent groups entered in the rosters from 1601 to 1700, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 126. For tables listing membership numbers, see ibid., 123–24, 131; Kawashima, “A Study of the Hyangan,” 12, 29–30. 62 Yuhak was a title traditionally used by yangban without a rank or a link to the officialdom, but later it was more and more arrogated by individuals who did not belong to the bona fide elite, for instance, by secondary sons. For a discussion of the term’s elastic meaning, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 119–27. 63 This is based on Song June-ho, “The Composition of Namwŏn Hyangan,” unpublished, dated 1982. 64 [Yangch’ŏn] Hŏ Hang (1568–1634), a munkwa graduate of 1618, was born in Namwŏn and affinally related to the Tundŏk Yi. Despite his official career, predominantly as magistrate, he took great interest in Namwŏn’s local affairs. 65 YSJ 3.9a–10b; Tagawa Kōzō, “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” pt. 2, 62–63. 66 P’unghŏn was a collective term designating the various categories of roster officers: “distinguished gentleman” (hyang sŏnsaeng) (an honorary title for a still-active government official), roster head (hyanghŏn), deputy head (puhŏn), and officer (yusa). 67 P’umgwan was a collective term for the top officials of the local bureau: the head (chwasu) and his deputies (pyŏlgam). See Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 148. 68 For the text of Yi Sang-hyŏng’s document, see YSJ 3.9a–10b; Tagawa Kōzō, “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” pt. 2, 60–61; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 74–76. 69 The drafters took as their model the Kwangsan (Kwangju) constitution (hyanggyu) as well as Yi I’s Haeju community compact. 70 For the text, see Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 280–83; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 76–77. 71 Ch’oe Sang-gyŏm was a first cousin of Ch’oe Sang-jung. 72 For a selection of lists of roster heads (p’unghŏn’an) from 1640 to 1706, see Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 277–79. 73 Ch’oe Yŏn was by that time second magistrate of Seoul (junior second rank), but resigned and thus was at home in late 1643. 74 The reconstruction of the conflicts surrounding the roster revisions is extremely difficult. A glimpse of the clashes between Ch’oe Yŏn and the “native” opponents is provided in [Puan] Kim Hyŏn’s (1593–1653) diary, Man’gyŏng ilgi. See, for instance, the entry of 1643/5/11 on 117–18. I thank Chŏn Kyŏng-mok for giving me a copy of this diary. 75 The rules of 1645 are in Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 406; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 85–89. 76 The rules of 1655 are contained in a “resolution” (wanŭi). See Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 408–10. 77 Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 131. 78 For an analysis of the entries of 1721, see ibid., 111–16; Kim Ho-il, “Chosŏn hugi hyangan,” 242–44. 79 This was the Rules Governing Garrison Commanders (Yŏngjang samok) of 1654. 80 Yi Mun-jae, Sŏktong yu’go, kwŏn 6, as quoted by Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 150–51, and Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 150. 81 For an analysis of Chang Ŏp’s letter to Ch’oe Kye-ong, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosôn sidae ŭi yangban, 95–98.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 5 9 – 2 6 3

507

82 Ch’oe Si-ong, Tonggang yu’go 2.35a–36b. See also YSJ 3.3a–4a; Tagawa Kōzō, “Richō no gōki ni tsuite,” pt. 2, 65–67. 83 YSJ, “Hyangsadangjo.” 84 Colloquially, the bureau officers were referred to as p’umgwan chip or hyangso chip, the “house of the chief bureau officer.” See Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 148. 85 The title “monthly officer” (chigwŏl) seems to have replaced sometime after 1678 the earlier one of “roster administrator” (hyang yusa). Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 136–39. For the relevant documents related to the chigwŏran, see Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 284–367. 86 For the relevant document, see Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 519. 87 For these documents, see ibid., 299–367. The top officers were still called “head” (hyanghŏn) and “deputy head” (puhŏn); they nominally confirmed the chigwŏl in their “office.” For a chart listing the roster officers by descent group from 1640 to 1895, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 158. For a summary of the organization of the chigwŏran, see ibid., 135–40. 88 For these documents, see Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn), 373–85; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 159. 89 Yi Chung-hwan, T’aengniji, 2: 407, 462. 90 Chŏng Yag-yong, Mongmin simsŏ, in Chŭngbo Yŏyudang chŏnsŏ, 5: 475. 91 Injo sillok 30.2a, 34b–35a (1634). 92 Pibyŏnsa tŭngnok, 2: 409–10. For a discussion of Hyojong’s military measures, see Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 396–98. 93 For the debates on the Five-Household Control Law under Hyojong and Hyŏnjong, see O Yŏnggyo, “Chosŏn hugi oga chakt’ong chedo,” 85–88. 94 Sukchong sillok 2.19a (1675). 95 The earlier scheme was the Five-Household Control Law (Oga chakt’ongbŏp) of 1408, which was promulgated in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 167. For a description of this earlier scheme, see O Yŏng-gyo, “Chosŏn hugi oga chakt’ong chedo,” 74–82. 96 Han Yŏng-guk believes that ho does not denote a “household,” but rather a residential house (chip) that gave shelter to one family, part of a family, or several families. See his “Chosŏn wangjo hojŏk,” 196–201. 97 Five to ten quarters (t’ong) formed a “small village” (sori), eleven to twenty quarters a “medium village” (chungri), and twenty-one to thirty quarters a “large village” (taeri). 98 The English tag “township” for myŏn is awkward, but widely used; it does not connote an urban area. 99 Sukchong sillok 2.21b, 4.48b–50a (1675). For a complete listing and discussion of the twenty-one articles of the Five-Household Control Law, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 263–74. See also O Yŏng-gyo, “Chosŏn hugi oga chakt’ong chedo,” 88–90; Kwŏn Nae-hyŏn, “Sukchongdae chibang t’ongch’iron.” The individual Tag Rules (Hop’ae samok) was introduced in 1677. 100 See Kim Chun-hyŏng, “18segi ijŏngbŏp ŭi chŏn’gae.” 101 The statutory length of a magistrate’s term of office was five years, half that if the appointee was a tangsang-rank official, who was allowed to be accompanied by his family. It was rare, however, that these rules were observed. By 1700, average tenure in Namwŏn was not more than 1.35 years, often even considerably shorter, so that the people called the magistrate a “passing guest.” For a table showing the average tenures of the Namwŏn magistrates from 1573 to 1788, see Kim Hyŏnyŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 55; Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 404n. 102 Yŏngjo sillok 9.37a (1726). Yi Pong-ik (1661–?) was a saengwŏn (1683) and munkwa (1710) graduate, but nothing more is known about his political career. In late Chosŏn, magistracies were often given to protection appointees (ŭmsa). 103 Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 332–33; Yi Hŭi-gwŏn, Chosŏn hugi chibang, 166–76. 104 Sukchong sillok 14 (sang), 27b–28a (1683). 105 Chŏng Yag-yong, Mongmin simsŏ, in Chŭngbo Yŏyudang chŏnsŏ, 5: 475; Yŏkchu Mongmin simsŏ, 4: 79. The translation of t’ojok is tricky; it seems to include here local bureau personnel as well as hyangni—two groups whose origins differed.

508

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 6 3 – 2 7 0

106 Mudan and t’oho are equally murky, used according to the situation for elite and nonelite alike in the meaning of “people harming the common good.” 107 There were two townships in each of the four cardinal directions, called “Eastern Front Township” (Tongsŏnmyŏn) and “Eastern Back Township” (Tonghumyŏn), and so on. 108 YGJ 1.10b–24a; Ho’gu ch’ongsu, 264–66; Yi Su-gŏn, Chosŏn sidae chibang, 141–42. 109 For the details, see Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang, 11–14. Prof. Song does not have an explanation for these “omissions.” 110 Chŏn Kyŏng-mok has analyzed the three extant Tundŏk household registration drafts (chungch’o) of 1888, 1891, and 1894. See his “19segi mal e chaksŏng toen Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang.” 111 Chŏng Chin-yŏng has analyzed a number of localities in several Tansŏng-hyŏn hojŏk of the first half of the eighteenth century and has come to similar results. Although he found in one place great consistency with the law, in another he discovered considerable discrepancies, similar to those in Tundŏk. See Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 293–302. Yi Hae-jun investigated eighteenth-century household registers of the Chinju area and found similar trends there. See Yi Hae-jun, Chosŏn sigi ch’ollak, 30–42. 112 No government household register has survived from the pre-1600 period, and even later in the dynasty it is rare indeed that several registers are extant from the same area and from consecutive periods. Underreporting of male adults was common, and children, in particular girls, were routinely omitted. It is commonly held that no more than 40 percent of the total population was registered—one reason why these registers furnish no safe basis for modern demography. 113 The original formulation of household registration in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn was greatly expanded in the Sok taejŏn of 1746, suggesting that the system came into full operation only in the late seventeenth century. Punishment for a sajok who failed to register was permanent banishment. See Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 167, 327; Sok taejŏn, 131–32. The stipulation that an examination candidate had to be registered in a household register appeared newly in the Sok taejŏn, 192.

Chapter 11 1 KCKM, no. 89, 340–52; Yi Su-gŏn, “T’oegye Yi Hwang kamun ŭi chaesan,” 652. This was an inheritance division between T’oegye’s three grandsons and two granddaughters; it was delayed from 1585 because of various absences and deaths. 2 KCKM, no. 31, 355–65; and KKOK, no. 18, 193–98. This document recorded the division of [Kyŏngju] Yi San-ak’s (n.d.) wealth in which [Och’ŏn] Kim Kwang-gye’s wife as the fourth daughter had a stake. 3 UKKM, punjaegi no. 6, 2: 130–31; 4: 180–81. The eldest of the siblings was Yi Yu-jang, a chinsa of 1660. For funerary inscription, see ADPM, 652–64. 4 Yi Hae was Yi Ham’s great-grandson and a munkwa graduate of 1657. 5 KCKM, no. 52, 247–49. Similar concern about decreasing a daughter’s landed share is expressed in a document dated 1687, although her ultimate inheritance was only slightly smaller than her brother’s. KCKM, no. 51, 245–46. 6 UKKM, punjaegi no. 30, 4: 191–92. 7 UKKM, punjaegi no. 18, 4: 183–84. 8 UKKM, punjaegi no. 28, 4: 188–90. 9 KCKM, no. 58, 259–60. An P’il-ch’ang was a Sunhŭng An, married to an Andong Kwŏn. The Sunhŭng An had been living in P’ungsan Subcounty for generations after a tenth-generation ancestor had moved into the subcounty as a son-in-law of the P’ungsan Yu in the late fifteenth century. They settled in Kalchŏn-ch’on. YGJ 1.19b. 10 Chŏng Ku-bok, “1744nyŏn Andong Kosŏng Yi-ssi.” 11 Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang ŭi Chŏnju Yi-ssi, 186–87. 12 Ibid., 188–90. 13 Ibid., 195–97. 14 Ibid., 197–98. 15 For the documents, see Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ (1), 1: 317–21, 335–39.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 7 0 – 2 7 7

509

16 The ritual basis for switching the main line to a second son is unclear. The Chōsen saishi sōzoku hōren, josetsu, 562, maintains that it was a practice prevalent in Yin and Chou times. In Koryŏ, fraternal succession was widely practiced, and this tradition was carried over into Chosŏn. See also Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 45–47. 17 Ch’oe Yŏn, Sŏngman-jip, purok, 6.6a; Ch’oe Hwi-ji, Oju sŏnsaeng-jip, purok, 13.10a. 18 See also Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 168–69; “General Rules,” in Zhu Xi, Wen-gong jiali; Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 11. 19 Attributed to Ch’oe Hŭng-wŏn (1705–86) in his biography by An Chŏng-bok, Sunam ch’ongsŏ 24.15b. 20 Kim Sŏng-il, “Pongsŏn chegyu,” in Hakpong-jip 7.2a–b. 21 Letter to his nephew Wan of 1564. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 40.30a–31a. 22 Kim Hak-pae, “Tonggŏ chabŭi,” in Kŭm’ong sŏnsaeng munjip 3.12b–13b; Chŏn Kyŏng-ch’ang (1532–85), “Kahŏn,” in Kyedong sŏnsaeng chip 1.13a–16a. 23 Rites were suspended to prevent the spread of infectious diseases. This was called “customary prohibition” (sokkŭm) or “epidemic prohibition” (yŏkkŭm). 24 [Kwangsan] Kim Yŏng (1577–1641) left a diary, the Kyeam illok, which covers the period from 1603 to his death in 1641. 25 This year has been chosen arbitrarily. Because Pu-ryun had died in 1598, Yŏng had become the ritual heir of his descent line. The dates are lunar calendar dates. 26 In Panggŭm, major graves of the Kwangsan Kim were located. 27 The “sacrifice to fathers,” an autumnal rite, could, according to the Jiali, be performed by any descent line that was heir to a father or higher. See Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 172–73. 28 This was an intercalary month. 29 Kim Yŏng, Kyeam illok, 1: 9–32. The ritual cycle was more or less the same for the subsequent years. 30 See also Kim Kyŏng-suk, “16segi sadaebu chib’an ŭi chesa,” for a description of ancestral rites as depicted in Yi Mun-gŏn’s (1494–1567) diary, the Mukchae ilgi. 31 Kim Yŏng, Kyeam illok, 1: 12. 32 Ibid., 2: 414–15. 33 Yo-rip, Kim Yŏng’s eldest son, is not mentioned in MTP, 1: 157b. Barely a year later, Yo-hyŏng, who is listed in MTP, took Yo-rip’s place, presumably upon Yo-rip’s early death. 34 Kim Yŏng, Kyeam illok, 1: 586–87. 35 Sin Yong-gae’s (1463–1519) critique in Chungjong sillok 26.45b; Chŏng Ku’s biography in Chang Hyŏn-gwang, Yŏhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 13.3b; Pak Se-ch’ae, “Changbŏp somok sŏl,” in Namgye-jip 55.9b–14b. 36 For a discussion of nonagnatic succession, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 161–64. 37 Yi Wŏn-bae (1745–1802) was not an Andong or a Namwŏn man, but was highly respected for his classical scholarship and ritual expertise. Yi Wŏn-bae, Kuam-jip 6.31a–b. 38 Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 165–68. There was a follow-up division in 1687 in which this land for the maternal grandparents, however, was no longer mentioned. See KCKM, no. 104, 405–8. 39 Pak Se-ch’ae, Namgye yesŏl 1.31b–32a. According to the Jiali, “associated offerings” were made to collateral relatives who died without heir, and whose tablets were installed in the main-line ancestral shrine. See Ebrey, Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals, 10. Pak Se-ch’ae seems to have interpreted this as including maternal grandparents. 40 [Ch’ŏngju] Chŏng Ch’ik (1601–63), “Isŏng pulgasa pongsa,” in Uch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 4.15a–16a. Ch’ik, a native of Andong, was a saengwŏn graduate of 1627. 41 UKKM, punjaegi no. 6, 4: 180–81. 42 UKKM, punjaegi no. 22, 4: 186. In contrast, death anniversaries were still rotated among agnates and nonagnates. The Haenam Yun, for instance, continued to do so even at the end of the seventeenth century. “Death anniversary ritual schedules” (kije ch’arye) show that during 1680–83 the performance of these rituals rotated among ten houses, calling them to duty two or three times per year. For an analysis of these lists, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, “Honam chibang komunsŏ,” 253–57. 43 Such separation meant that the son-in-law no longer had ritual obligations to his former in-laws. 44 KCKM, no. 42, 226–28; no. 100, 390–91. In a document dated 1641 Yi Ham’s widow made sure that

510

45 46 47 48 49 50 51

52

53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65

66

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 7 7 – 2 8 0

the offspring born by the slaves given to her daughter’s former husband in 1634 were to be returned to her control. See KCKM, no. 43, 229. Yi Mun-gŏn, Mukchae ilgi, 1: 358, 393. Yi’s wife was an Andong Kim. Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 270. KCKM, no. 40, 215. For ritual succession of secondary sons, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 150–55. Yi I had two sons and a daughter of his secondary wife, Yi-ssi, who is not mentioned in the Tŏksu Yi-ssi sebo of 1930. For genealogical details, see Peterson, Korean Adoption, 97n18. Kim Chang-saeng, Ŭirye munhae 1.13. Kim’s view seems to have been supported by the 1555 Taejŏn chuhae, 269. Unlike his father, Chang-saeng, who held a great variety of offices on recommendation, Kim Chip (1574–1656) passed the chinsa examination at age eighteen and embarked on a distinguished political career. He is, however, best known as a scholar and ritualist. Both were enshrined in the National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo)—Chang-saeng in 1717, Chip in 1883—the only father-son pair so honored. Kim Chang-saeng’s eldest son, Ŭn, died during the Imjin War. Pan (1580–1640) was a sama (1605) and munkwa (1624) graduate and advanced to the highest offices of the realm. Chip’s second secondary son, Ik-ryŏn, is listed in MTP as a saengwŏn graduate; this cannot be verified. Ik-ryŏn’s two sons, Man-sŏng (1631–?) and Man-je (1640–?) both were chinsa graduates in 1666 and 1660, respectively. Man-sŏng apparently entered the examination as “admitted” (hŏt’ong), whereas Man-je entered as “young scholar” (yuhak). Their two younger brothers are not listed in MTP. It is clear that Pan’s descent line was the more successful: four of his six sons were munkwa graduates. In contrast, Chip’s descent line is, despite Chip’s great renown, no longer recorded after his fourth-generation descendant. MTP, 1: 157b, 158b. Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 276. For more details, see Han Ki-bŏm, “17segi sŏŏl ŭi chongpŏpjŏk chiwi”; Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 126–33. This is also the view of Pak Pyŏng-ho, Han’guk pŏpche sa’go, 381. KCKM, no. 6, 131–33. Yŏnbang se’go, 1.89 (biography of Kim Chin). Kim Sŏng-il, Hakpong-jip 7.15b–17a (Kim Chŏng’s tomb inscription). Chŏng is not recorded in MTP. In UKSB of 1901, kwŏn 3.7a, Hong-il is recorded without indication that he was a sŏja, but only five generations of his posterity are listed. UKKM, punjaegi no. 4, 6: 129; Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 248–49. [Chaeryŏng] Yi Si-ch’ŏng (1580–1616) was Yi Ham’s eldest son. He married a Muan Pak whose parents lacked a primary son. For the document, see KCKM, no. 97, 372–73. It is discussed by Ch’oe Sun-hŭi, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi Yŏnghaep’a mun’gi ko, sang,” 44–45; Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi yŏn’gu, 228–29. Sŏng-no had an elder brother, Sŏng-il, who, however, seems to have been a base secondary son and therefore likely ineligible for ritual heirship. Ch’oe Ch’i-ong had primary daughters and an adoptive son, Yŏ-jŏk. Han Ki-bŏm, “17segi sŏŏl ŭi chongpŏpjŏk chiwi,” 123. I am indebted to Chŏn Kyŏng-mok for letting me use these unpublished materials intended for publication in a second volume of Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang. Yi Mun-wŏn’s tomb epitaph was written by Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng. Pae Chae-hong has analyzed cases of conflict surrounding ancestral responsibilities between primary and secondary parties. Most often the conflicts started over land. Typically, the state did not want to get involved in what it considered “private” affairs. See Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong,” 253–60. Pak Pyŏng-ho has analyzed the Suyang sŭngjŏk ilgi that records adoptions and secondary-son heirships for the period 1843 to 1894. Whereas cases of adoption were most numerous in and around the capital, the number of secondary-son heirships was especially large in Chŏlla and P’yŏngan and comparatively modest in Kyŏngsang. Petitions for establishing secondary heirships



67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83

84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 8 0 – 2 8 7

511

were submitted even by former office holders, but typically by middle- and low-level personnel. See Pak Pyŏng-ho, Han’guk pŏpche sa’go, 383–84. Similar conclusions were reached by Pae Chaehong, “Chosŏn hugi ka’gye kyesŭng esŏ sŏŏl,” 17–27. There are a variety of terms in the documents denoting mungjung: mundang, chongjok, chonggye, etc. I do not try to give it an English gloss. The Namp’yŏng Mun-ssi of Yŏngnam (North Chŏlla) started a kye in 1664 with the income of which they bought land from 1743 onward. See Kim Kŏn-t’ae, Chosŏn sidae yangban’ga, 346–57. Kim T’aek-kyu, Ssijok purak ŭi kujo, 152–55. Han was the younger brother of Yŏn, the ancestor of the Chuch’on branch. For the details, see Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 199–206. Such terms started to appear from the beginning of the seventeenth century. Ibid., 84. Ibid., 161–63. According to my informants, there was (and still is) no uniform rule of how the individuals were selected for offering the libations. The first one, however, seems to be always offered by the chongson; for the two others, individuals were selected each year. Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 155. Kwŏn Tu-in passed the chinsa examination in 1677 and later held some minor offices through recommendation. In 1692, he was appointed magistrate of Yŏngch’un (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province), where he was praised for his able administration. KNJ 11.31a. Yŏngnam komunsŏ chipsŏng, no. 40, 1: 465. KCKM, no. 781, 799. Chi-hyŏn was married to a great-great-granddaughter of Kim Sŏng-il. For the details, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 161. Hwang Chong-hae (1579–1642), “Munjung wanŭi sŏ” (1642), in Huch’ŏn-jip 7.13b–16a. Hwang, a disciple of Chŏng Ku, was reputed for his scholarship and ritual knowledge. For adoption strategies of the Ŭisŏng Kim, see Ŭn Ki-su, “Kagye kyesŭng ŭi tayang sŏngkwa.” See also Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 139–50; Peterson, Korean Adoption. UKKM, iban no. 2, 4: 124; Yi Wŏn-bae, Kuam-jip 6.34b–35a. A similar case was approved in 1724. See UKKM, iban no. 5, 4: 125. The value at this time of a yang, a copper coin, is uncertain because it fluctuated greatly. Paek Sŭng-jong states that in the nineteenth century one yang amounted to three tu of rice. With close to six liters of rice to one tu, the total would thus be approximately eighteen liters of rice. See Paek Sŭng-jong, Han’guk sahoesa, xiii. UKKM, t’oji mun’gi nos. 219, 221, 222, 4: 231. KCKM, no. 606, 717; no. 618, 721; Miyajima Hiroshi, Yanban, 183–84. Yŏngnam komunsŏ chipsŏng, no. 39, 1: 464. The document is undated and does not include signatories. Ibid., no. 41, 1: 466. For an analysis of cultivators of munjung land, see Kim Kŏn-t’ae, Chosŏn sidae yangban’ga, 358–63. For a brief description of this genre, see Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Han’guk komunsŏ, 498; Kim Kyŏng-suk has surveyed the different kinds of t’ongmun in “Chosŏn hugi munjung t’ongmun.” An example of a unanimous decision is in KCKM, no. 27, 178 (dated 1580). Such deliberations among kinsmen that had to end with a unanimous vote are reminiscent of tribal councils of earlier times. See, for example, “An-ssi munjung wanŭi” (1731), KCKM, nos. 784 and 785, 801–2. Taejŏn hoet’ong, 367; Pak Pyŏng-ho, Han’guk pŏpche sa’go, 383–84. For this information I am indebted to the field research done in the early 1980s by Sunhee Song. See her “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 445–57. Due to the vagueness of proprietary rights over munjung-held land, it remains difficult to gather information. For lists of all gravesites and their respective rituals performed by the Ŭisŏng Kim, see Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 65, 93. ADPM, 34–35; Im Ton-hŭi, Chosang cherye, 45.

512

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 8 7 – 2 9 1

96 The chokhoeso, equivalent to a “higher-order” munjung, is said to have been established by Yu Sŏng-nyong and his elder brother to prevent the disappearance of the ancestral tombs. Kim T’aekkyu, Ssijok purak ŭi kujo, 153–55. 97 Ibid., 153–58. This endowment still existed in the early 1990s. See Kim Ho-t’ae, “P’ungsan Yu-ssi munjung myoje hyŏnjang chosa.” Kim also gives the schedules of the rites. 98 Paek Sŭng-jong has analyzed a number of documents detailing the expenditures of the Kangjin Kim from 1658 to 1669: by far the largest expenditure—some 70 percent—was incurred through ancestral rites, followed by costs for the upkeep of graves and gravesite buildings. See Han’guk sahoesa, 191–92. 99 Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice, 131. 100 It is important to note that a genealogical segment (p’a) did not necessarily coincide with a munjung. Recent studies of Korean society, which are based on fieldwork rather than on historical research, reflect such an erroneous identification. In her “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” Sunhee Song did not define the lineage and referred to segments as so, a term unique to Andong and designating munjung property. For his “Quest of Social Recognition,” Shima Matsu­ hiko used genealogies and information gathered in the field. He interpreted what he called a munjung/lineage as a segment of a p’a and thus mistook the ritual heir (chongson) for the munjung head. Both authors most likely were misled by their respective informers. This may be evidence as to how blurred the terminology—if not the institutions—had become in late traditional times. 101 For genealogical charts of all five branches, see UKKM, 1: 3–19; and appendix B. 102 The Ch’ŏnggye-p’a itself was, of course, a subbranch of Man-gŭn’s branch, which was in turn a subbranch of Kŏ-du’s, and ultimately of Yong-bi’s main line. 103 For a detailed discussion of segmentation in the other sublineages of the Ch’ŏnggye-p’a, see Song, “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 410–17; for summaries of each branch’s descendants, see Ŭn Ki-su, “Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi’ga kajok.” 104 For a chart of the internal segmentation of the P’ungsan Yu, see P’ungsan Yu-ssi sebo; Kim T’aekkyu, Ssijok purak ŭi kujo, 143–50, 174–80. 105 The “five phases” are wood, fire, earth, metal, and water. 106 For a “lineage resolution” (chongjung wanŭi) discussing and settling the problem of hangnyŏl, see Yun Chŭng (1629–1714), Myŏngjae sŏnsaeng yu’go 31.23b–24b. 107 See Faure, Structure of Chinese Rural Society, esp. 30–44; and Faure, “The Lineage as a Cultural Invention.” 108 Zenshō Eisuke, in the survey of single-surname villages that he conducted in the early 1930s, counted in the entire country 1,685 sajok villages among a total of 14,672 villages surveyed. See his Chōsen no shūraku, 3: 217–18. 109 Yi Chung-hwan, T’aengniji, 1: 105. For a list of representative single-surname villages in Kyŏngsang Province during the Chosŏn period, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 69–71. 110 Kim Hyŏn (1593–1653) was a Puan Kim whose grandfather, Hyŏp (n.d.), had moved to Chidang as a son-in-law of the local Namwŏn Chin around 1565. 111 Pang Tu-wŏn (n.d.) was a Namwŏn Pang. The Pang were variously affinally related to the Changsu Hwang and the Puan Kim, all resident in Chidang. For a description of the close kin relations between the six surname groups, of which only the Chin were “native,” living in Chidang, see Pang Wŏn-chin’s preface to “Chup’o tongjunggye,” quoted in Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 306. 112 Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 36. 113 Kwŏn Hang belonged to the descent line of Cha-yŏ’s third son, Yun-bo. MTP, 2: 54b; YGJ 8.4a; ADPM, 146–50. 114 KCKM, no. 4, 129–30 (second half of the fifteenth century). Land was typically not recorded. 115 KCKM, no. 65, 271–73. 116 Kwŏn Chu and his son, Chŏn, were victims of the Literati Purges. See chapter 7. Chu’s granddaughter became T’oegye’s wife! 117 YGJ 1.19a (there, Kail is called Chi’gok). For some details, see Yi Hae-jun, “Maŭl ŭi hyŏngsŏng,” 3–24. See also the new monograph, Chu Sŭng-t’aek et al., Ch’ŏnhye ŭi ttang ŭiyŏnhan salm. As



118 119 1 20 121 122 123 124 125

126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134

135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143

N o t e s t o pa g e s 2 9 1 – 2 9 7

513

both authors point out, the Sunhŭng An also claim a substantial contribution to Kail’s prosperity. In the 1930s, Zenshō Eisuke listed Kail as the Kwŏn’s single-surname village. See his Chōsen no shūraku, 3, 477. In the 1930s, Naeap had eighty-five Ŭisŏng Kim households and seventy-one unrelated households. Zenshō, Chōsen no shūraku, 3: 833–34. For a description of Hahoe’s settlement, see Kim T’aek-kyu, Tongjok purak, 17–40; Im Chae-hae, Andong Hahoe maŭl, 36–39. There are several legends explaining the difficulties of the Yu to settle in Hahoe. For a summary, see HPYP, 15: 3–5. Hahoe tonggye as quoted by Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 331. Yu Chung-yŏng passed the munkwa in 1540 and ended his official career as a royal secretary. KNJ 11.23a. YGJ 1.18b–19a. For brief summaries of Hahoe’s history, see KCKM, 56–61; Chŏng Chin-yong, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 328–33. Faure, Emperor and Ancestor, 4. The nonelite are designated in the Hahoe rosters as “middle people” (chungin); in this context, this term is not likely to denote hyangni (who lived predominantly in the county seat) and is here interpreted as meaning secondary sons. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to identify these people through alternative sources such as genealogies. See also Han Yŏng-u, “Chosŏn sidae chungin,” 183–84. For this, see KCKM, no. 796, 806 (dated 1749?). The relevant documents are scattered in various publications: Yŏngnam hyangyak, nos. 60 and 61, 133–34; Komunsŏ chipsŏng, Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn-p’yŏn, 63: 625–26, 680–82. In the 1930s, Haehoe counted 158 P’ungsan Yu households and 132 unrelated households. For these data, see Pak Hyŏn-sun, “16segi sadaebu’ga ŭi ch’injok chilsŏ,” 82–85. In 1888, the Tundŏk Yi lived in 36 of the 78 elite households counted in Tundŏk; by that time there were only four Sangnyŏng Ch’oe households left. See Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, “Chosŏn hugi sajok ŭi ch’ollak chibae,” 253. For a detailed description of Tundŏk and its surroundings, see Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏkpang, 1: 5–15. See also Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “19segi mal e chaksŏng toen Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang.” HPYP, 2: 700–703. For an example, see KCKM, no. 25, 172–73 (1579). For a study of secondary-son villages in the Tansŏng area, see Kwŏn Nae-hyŏn, “Chosŏn hugi hojŏk kwa chokpo.” Song, “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 121. The Yŏnggaji, unfortunately, does not indicate who the inhabitants of the “side villages” were, but they likely were secondary sons. YGJ 1.16a, 16b. Sunhee Song reports that in the 1970s one fourth of all Naeap households were “illegitimate households” of the Ŭisŏng Kim who had recently moved back to Naeap after having resided elsewhere for many generations. “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 119. Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Samgye kangsa,” 72n37. See Yangjwadong yŏn’gu, 78. Kwŏn Nae-hyŏn, “Chosŏn hugi tongsŏng ch’ollak.” This figure emerges from the land survey (yangan) of 1720. See Kim Kŏn-t’ae, “Chosŏn hugi-Ilche sigi chŏnt’ong tongsŏng ch’ollak.” This is suggested by many land sale documents contained in KCKM. YGJ 1.22a; 3.19b–21a, 24b–25a; Yi Chung-hwan, T’aengniji, 2: 395; Kwŏn Sang-il, Ch’ŏngdae ilgi, 1: 10. Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ, 1: 38. Chŏng Yag-yong, “Pal T’aengniji,” Yŏyudang chŏnsŏ 1, as quoted in Yangjwadong yŏn’gu, 48n53. Characteristically, the Chinese-character names of many villages had a pure Korean equivalent, like Naeap for Ch’ŏnjŏn, or Taksil for Yu’gok. Many villages had, moreover, besides their formal names, “popular names” (songmyŏng). For a study of place names, see Zenshō Eisuke, Chōsen no shūraku, 1: 85–89.

514

N o t e s t o pag e s 2 9 7 – 3 0 1

144 Hwang Chul-lyang (1517–63), a saengwŏn of 1537 and munkwa of 1540, was married to a daughter of Yi Hyŏn-bo’s second son and resided in Yean. He was a T’oegye disciple. MTP, 1: 148a; TYSUR 26.584–88; KNJ 12.11b. 145 Kim Sŏk should not be confused with the Chinsŏng Yi’s apical ancestor Sŏk. The Chinese characters of their names differ; see genealogical charts B.4 and B.7. 146 It was a big event when the tomb site of King Kyŏngsun in Changdan, a short distance from the former Koryŏ capital Kaesŏng, was reidentified in the fall of 1746 and King Yŏngjo ordered its repair. The Ŭisŏng Kim sent a circular to the many distinct Kim descent groups (among them the Kyŏngju Kim, the Andong Kim, the Kangnŭng Kim, etc.) who claimed the king as the progenitor of their respective first ancestors. UKKM, t’ongmun no. 84, chŏngsŏbon, 261; Yŏngjo sillok 64.16b (1746); 25.21b (1747). 147 See Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi sebo and MTP, 1: 183a. The uncertainty about Sŏk’s immediate posterity is also clearly reflected in the various descent lines depicted in the mid-seventeenth-century Ssijok wŏllyu, 259–61. MHPG 47.37b, makes Yong-bi a seventh-generation descendant of Sŏk. 148 Kim Wang (1606–81), munkwa graduate of 1639, was a great-great-grandson of Man-hŭm, Mangŭn’s younger brother, residing in Yech’ŏn. Kim Sŏng-gu (1641–1707), munkwa graduate of 1669, was a descendant of Yong-bi’s third son, Yŏng, residing in Andong. 149 UKKM, kyean no. 3, 3: 342–47. 150 Wagner estimated that up to 20 percent of a yangban descent group’s membership was not included in its genealogy. A large contingent of this high percentage, however, seems to have been secondary sons who were not accepted as bona fide yangban. Wagner, “The Korean Chokpo as a Historical Source,” 142. 151 The prefaces are collected in the 1901 edition of the Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi sebo. 152 The number of segments (p’a) of the Andong Kwŏn is disputed until this day; some claim that there are fourteen, others that there are fifteen p’a. The 1794 edition of the Andong Kwŏn-ssi sebo lists fourteen p’a. The origin of segmentation is traced back to the tenth generation (ca. early thirteenth century), but is obviously a much later construct. For a list of the Andong Kwŏn genealogies and tables of their segmentation, see Yŏngga ŏnhaengnok, 1: 543–51. 153 For the documents, see Kim Si-hwang, “Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi hwayŏ se’gye.” Sunhee Song reports that in the 1970s Kim Si-gwa’s descendants, forming their own branch, were still not fully accepted as yangban. “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 438. 154 The pyŏlmyo seems to be a uniquely Korean institution. The term cannot be found in Morohashi’s dictionary. 155 According to his chronological biography, Kim Sŏng-il was made a “service-in-battle meritsubject” (sŏnmu wŏnjong kongsin) and received posthumous office titles of junior second rank, but this is neither recorded in the Sillok nor in the original merit subject records—presumably due to the fact that Kim Sŏng-il’s reputation was tarnished by his misjudgment of the probability of a Japanese attack in 1591. 156 Sukchong sillok 8.41a (1679). 157 UKKM, wanŭi no. 20, 4: 171–72; 6: 102. 158 UKKM, wanŭi no. 22, 2: 103–4. The spirit tablet of Sŏng-il’s eldest son, Chip, was coinstalled. For a detailed description of the document, see Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 361–64. 159 For a list of the ritual performances of the Ŭisŏng Kim, see Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 93. Sunhee Song thought that the perpetual rites were a reason for segmentation. See her “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 375–57. It seems, however, that high office holding, which resulted in perpetual rites, was the more decisive reason for branching, as exemplified by Kim Pang-gŏl. Song wrote that the latter was not granted perpetual rites because the Confucian community felt that since he had advocated Song Si-yŏl’s death, such an honor would offend Song’s descendants. 160 Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, yŏnbo, 3: 293; he had been made a merit subject in 1604. Im Chaehae, Andong Hahoe maŭl, 58–64; Im Ton-hŭi, Chosang cherye, 66–95 (contains a series of photographs documenting the performance of a perpetual rite in the Hahoe main house in 1989).



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 0 1 – 3 0 6

515

161 YGJ 1.22a; 4.19b–22a. 162 In 1650, a revision of the compact took place, and the membership was steadily growing so that at the beginning of the eighteenth century it stood roughly at 150, with the Andong Kwŏn and the Hŭnghae Pae as the dominant surnames. Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 137, 336–39. 163 It is noteworthy that Kwŏn Tu-in obviously did not think that Kwŏn Pŏl had merit subject status. According to Pŏl’s chronological biography, however, Pŏl was made a first-class merit subject in 1591, with the privilege of perpetual rites, as a reward for helping to correct the distortion of the Yi royal genealogy in Ming China. Kwŏn Pŏl, Ch’ungje-jip, yŏnbo, 10b. This must be a later ascription, however, since Kwŏn Pŏl is not listed in the official merit subject roster of 1590. 164 Yŏngnam komunsŏ chipsŏng, 1: 482–4. Kwŏn Tu-in and his cousin, Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng, also initiated the last major revision of the Naesŏng compact in 1716. 165 Song June-ho has also emphasized this point repeatedly. See his Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu. 166 Only the tombs of high officials or official title holders were supposed to have spirit way stelae (sindobi). For an elaboration, see Kim U-rim, “Sŏul-Kyŏnggi chiyŏk ŭi Chosŏn sidae sadaebu myoje,” 45–59. 167 For a study of tombstones and tomb architecture, see ibid. It is noteworthy that the renovation and expansion of old ancestral tomb sites and the building of new ones continues unabated in modern South Korea and reached boom proportions in the 1990s. During 1993–94, the descendants of Kwŏn Su-hong (known as Pog’yagong-p’a), for example, constructed a monumental gravesite-like memorial (tanso) for Su-hong, their p’ajo, because the location of Su-hong’s actual grave is unknown. The construction work was financed with contributions from munjung and individual descendants scattered over the southern half of the Korean peninsula. The construction process and the ritual inauguration of the site are described in Andong Kwŏn-ssi Pog’yagong-p’a P’ajo sŏltan silgi. 168 Kwŏn U (1610–75) was a twelfth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Pu and a capital resident; he thus belonged to the Ch’umilgong-p’a with Su-p’yŏng as p’ajo. A munkwa graduate of 1629, he had a distinguished official career. MTP, 2: 55b. 169 Kwŏn Si-gyŏng (1625–1708), munkwa graduate of 1675 and capital resident, was appointed governor of Kyŏngsang Province in 1682. MTP, 2: 57b. 170 Kwŏn Tu-in, “Chaesa kimun,” in Andong Kwŏn-ssi chŏn’go, 110–15. The chaesa burnt in 1753, but was immediately rebuilt and repeatedly repaired and enlarged at the beginning of the nineteenth century. It burnt once more in 1836, but was fully reconstructed by 1839. 171 UKKM, t’oji mun’gi nos. 10 and 11, 4: 194. In 1897 and 1903, two dispatches regarding the upkeep of Ot’osan chaesa were sent to different branches of the Ŭisŏng Kim. See Kim Kyŏng-suk, “Chosŏn hugi munjung t’ongmun,” 122. 172 In the 1790s, Yi Wan, Yi Chŏng-hoe, and Yi Hyŏng-nam (1556–1627; he was the focal ancestor of a branch of the Chuch’on Yi) were coenshrined here. For the details, see Kim Mun-t’aek, “16– 17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi,” 125–31.

Chapter 12 1 Among the Yean victims was the son of T’oegye’s prominent disciple, Yi Tŏg-hong, Yi Kang (1573–1623). As one of Cho Mok’s principal disciples, Kang was executed. The extralegal “local punishment” was thought to have originated in the Chinju area (southern Kyŏngsang), the core area of Cho Sik’s discipleship. Sŏnjo sujŏng sillok 3.5a–b (1569); Yi Su-gŏn, “17–18segi Andong chibang yurim,” 228n147; Yi Su-gŏn, “Sŏae Yu Sŏng-nyong,” 9–12. 2 Yi Hyŏn-il was the grandson of [Chaeryŏng] Yi Ham; his father, Yi Si-myŏng (1590–1674), was not an examination graduate, but due to his outstanding scholarship and moral rectitude he was recommended for an appointment as royal tomb keeper. For a biography of Yi Si-myŏng, see Yi Hyŏn-il, Karam sŏnsaeng munjip 27.12b–22a. 3 The roster of Yi Hyŏn-il’s disciples contains 358 names. Although the largest contingent hailed from the Andong area, the rest was dispersed over most of Yŏngnam. Only very few entered government service. For a table, see Kim Hak-su, “Karam Yi Hyŏn-il yŏn’gu,” 105; U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 53.

516

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 0 6 – 3 0 7

4 For a brief analysis of Yi Hyŏn-il’s thought, see Kŭm Chang-t’ae, T’oegye hakp’a, 1: 272–82; Kim Hak-su, “Karam Yi Hyŏn-il yŏn’gu.” See also An Pyŏng-gŏl, Karam Yi Hyŏn-il. 5 See Chōsen tosho kaidai, 664–65. 6 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng (1654–1725), a sixth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Pŏl and married to Kim Sion’s youngest daughter, passed the sama in 1679 and the munkwa in 1710 and even after 1694 held a number of government positions inside and outside the capital. He was reputed for his elegant literary style and his poetry. KNJ 11.25b–26a; Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng, Ch’angsŏlchae sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 17.1a–3a; Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, haeje, 1: 7–8. 7 A possible model might have been Master Zhu’s Words Classified (Zhuzi yulei). 8 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng listed thirty-three memoranda, in particular those of Cho Mok, Kim Sŏng-il, Chŏng Yu-il, and Yi I, that he used for this work. See Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, vol. 4. Kwŏn’s version is known as the Andong copy (Hwasan-bon). 9 On Cho Hyŏn-myŏng, see note 143. 10 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng’s work became part of the final student register, the Tosan kŭmmun chehyŏllok. Later amended three times, this list now contains some 309 names arranged according to seniority. For brief bibliographical notes, see Yi Ka-wŏn, “Haeje,” in Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 1: 7–9. 11 Yi Su-yŏn (1693–1748) was a fifth-generation descendant of [Chinsŏng] An-do; he was married to a daughter of Kim Hak-pae. A saengwŏn of 1723, he entered office on recommendation. MTP, 1: 131b; KNJ 12.10b–11a. 12 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng, “Ŭi Andong sarim t’ong Yean saumun,” in Ch’angsŏlchae sŏnsaeng munjip 11.1a–3b. For the conflict between Yean and Andong scholars, see also Cho, “The Community of Letters.” 13 [Hansan]Yi Sang-jŏng was a distant descendant of famous Yi Saek. He passed the munkwa in 1735 and held some minor offices until he was, upon recommendation, promoted to third minister in the Ministry of Punishment (senior third rank, yet below tangsang rank). 14 His epitaph was written by Ch’ae Che-gong, Pŏn’am-jip 51.35b–40a. 15 A tenth-generation descendant of [Chŏnju] Yu Pok-ki, Yu Ch’i-myŏng was a munkwa of 1805 and eventually rose to minister of war. His mother was the daughter of Yi Sang-jŏng’s son, Wan (1740–89). Ch’i-myŏng’s teacher was the renowned classics scholar Yu Chang-wŏn (1724–96), also descended from Yu Pok-ki. Ch’i-myŏng was buried in Andong. ADPM, 821–31; KNJ 11.28b. 16 Yu Ch’i-myŏng’s principal heir in the latter part of the nineteenth century was Kim Sŏng-il’s eleventh-generation descendant, Kim Hŭng-nak (1827–99). The activities and thought of Confucian scholars in the nineteenth century are awaiting intensive research. 17 Here I trace Yu Sŏng-nyong’s scholarly line through his descendants according to the “Record on the Origin of [Our] Family Learning” (Kahak yŏnwŏllok), reproduced in Komunsŏ chipsŏng, 43: 701–9. For a list of representative Yu disciples, see the “Record of Sŏae Students” (Aemun chejarok) containing sixty-seven names appended in ibid., 711–26. See also Yi Su-gŏn, “Sŏae Yu Sŏngnyong,” 15. 18 Her father was Kwŏn Tong-mi’s eldest son, Ch’ae (1557–99). 19 No Kyŏng-im’s ancestral seat was An’gang. He passed the munkwa in 1591. MTP, 2: 226b; Sŏae sŏnsaeng munhyŏllok, in Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 519–20. 20 This cousin was Yu Un-nyong’s younger daughter. 21 For Yi Chŏn, see Sŏae sŏnsaeng munhyŏllok, in Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 477–78. 22 Suffering disgrace and self-imposed isolation during Kwanghae’gun’s reign, Yu Chin entered office after 1623, but does not seem to have remained in his local postings for long. He initiated a communal compact at home and mobilized troops against the Manchus in 1627. For Yu Chin’s biography, see Suam sŏnsaeng munjip, in HYMJ, 553: 204–6; yŏnbo and haengjang, 324–86. Another version of Chin’s biography is by Yu Wŏn-ji in his Cholchae sŏnsaeng munjip, 2: 374–88. In 1617, Yu Chin moved to Sangju but died in Yŏngju. 23 Among [P’ungsan] Kim Tae-hyŏn’s nine sons four were munkwa graduates. Yu Chin’s eldest daughter married a son of Tae-hyŏn’s second son, Yŏng-jo (1577–1648). MTP, 1: 197a–8a.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 0 7 – 3 13

517

24 For a brief summary of Yu Wŏn-ji’s political and philosophical career, see An Pyŏng-gŏl, “Cholchae-jip,” introduction to vol. 32 of T’oegyehak charyo ch’ongsŏ. 25 For Yu Se-myŏng’s biography, see his Uhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip, 520–33. 26 For Yu Hu-jang’s biography, see his Chuilchae munjip, 414–26. His biographer was his kinsman, Yu Chu-mok (1813–71). 27 Of the roughly 900 academies and shrines constructed between 1500 and the late nineteenth century, only 270 received a royal charter. For a list, see Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 141. According to the Sok taejŏn, three kyŏl of tax-free land was officially granted. Sok taejŏn, 141. 28 For layouts of several sŏwŏn types, see Chŏng Myŏng-sŏp, “Kyŏngbuk chiyŏk ŭi sŏwŏn,” 265. 29 The head of a sŏwŏn was often also called wŏnjang or tongju. The Sŏin and Namin academies were quite differently structured. See Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 104–30. 30 Chŏng Sun-mok, Han’guk sŏwŏn kyoyuk, 170–207; Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 169–72. 31 For a description of these rites, see Chŏng Sun-mok, Han’guk sŏwŏn kyoyuk, 142–69 (with photographs). 32 YGJ 4.16b–28a. 33 In the early seventeenth century, the academy’s yearly income amounted to an extraordinary one thousand sŏm of rice. For a brief description of Tosan Sŏwŏn’s economic basis and income from slave tribute, see Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 190–97; Yi Su-hwan, “Tosan sŏwŏn nobi sin’gong,” in Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 222–80. 34 [Andong] Kwŏn Kyŏng-jŏn (n.d.) was a saengwŏn graduate of 1537 (not verifiable). YGJ 4.22a–b. 35 Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 163–64. 36 Yu Chin, Suam sŏnsaeng munjip, yŏnbo, 337. 37 Ibid., 357. 38 Chungin, here presumably meaning support staff of the local bureau, were also excluded. These exclusions were not explicitly mentioned in the admission rules of Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn, but in those of Sosu Sŏwŏn adhered to in most Namin academies. Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 169. 39 Ibid., 176–97; see also for a study of the Pyŏngsan slave registers. 40 Kwŏn Kang (1567–1626) belonged to an Andong Kwŏn line collateral to that of Kwŏn Pŏl. Despite sama success in 1589, he had no intention to aim higher and instead became Sŏae’s disciple, concentrating on the “learning for oneself.” Kwŏn Kang, Pangdam sŏnsaeng munjip, 226–52; Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 514. 41 Imch’ŏn Sŏwŏn was rebuilt in 1847, demolished in 1868, but reconstructed by local literati in 1908. Andong ŭi sŏwŏn, 56. It is not listed in MHPG; according to KNJ 11.11b, Imch’ŏn Sŏwŏn was built in 1742, a date that is rather unlikely. According to the draft version of YGJ, Kim Sŏng-il’s spirit tablet was venerated in Sangdŏksa, a shrine built by local literati in 1603. See also Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 164. 42 Yu Wŏn-ji, Cholchae sŏnsaeng munjip, 499–502. 43 Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 163–64. 44 Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, yŏnbo, 3: 293. Sŏae’s posthumous title was Mun-ch’ung, “literate and loyal.” 45 Yi Yu-do had served as one of the officers of the On’gye ward regulations in 1615. He also was a kinsman of Chŏng Kyŏng-se’s wife. 46 [Ch’ogye] Chŏng On (1569–1641), originally a disciple of Chŏng In-hong, later associated himself with the moderate Chŏng Ku. A chinsa (1606) and munkwa (1610) graduate, he held important offices after 1623. Opposing peace with the Manchus in 1637, he withdrew from office. For details, see Chōsen jimmei jisho, 1760. 47 Injo sillok 12.35a, 46b–47a; 13.18a, 22a–23a (1626). 48 Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 176. 49 These numbers are based on Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 20. For a list of sŏwŏn in Kyŏngsang Province, see MHPG 213.470–82.

518

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 13 – 3 1 6

50 Quoted in Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 145. The memorialist was the Noron Kim Manjung (1637–92), a great-grandson of Kim Chang-saeng. 51 For the details, see Deuchler, “Self-Cultivation for the Governance of Men.” The Five Worthies were Kim Koeng-p’il, Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang, Cho Kwang-jo, Yi Ŏn-jŏk, and T’oegye Yi Hwang. 52 The Yŏngnam advocates were Chŏng Kyŏng-se, who wrote a memorial on behalf of the “Confucian students [yusaeng] of the whole province” (see his Ubok-chip 3.38b–42a), and Yi Chŏn, who, recognized as their leader, submitted a memorial on behalf of the “Yŏngnam Confucians” in 1608. See Yi Sang-jŏng, “Wŏlgan Yi sŏnsaeng haengjang,” in Taesan-jip 49.29b. 53 [P’ungsan] Kim Pong-jo, a munkwa graduate of 1613, had received, together with his six brothers, instruction from Yu Sŏng-nyong. Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 526–27. 54 For the details, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 516–17; Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, Chosŏn sidae yusaeng sangso, 180–90. 55 Yu Chin, Suam sŏnsaeng, yŏnbo, 333–36. Chin wrote “A Record of the Events of 1612” (Imjarok). In the Purge of 1613 Kwanghae’gun and the leader of the Taebuk, Yi I-ch’ŏm, eliminated the Sobuk (Little Northerners) who opposed Kwanghae’gun’s rule. 56 For the exchanges between the two factions of Sŏnggyun’gwan students, see Hŏ Kwŏn-su, Chosŏn hugi Namin kwa Sŏin, 9–119. 57 Hyojong sillok 2.36b–37b (1649). 58 For Yu Chik’s biography, see his Paegjoram sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 1a–5a; KNJ 11.38b. Yu’s collected works contain a detailed diary of this mission, Soch’ŏng illok. 59 According to the mission diary, various drafts were received, but in the end the one written by the Sangju recluse Yi Ku (1613–54) was chosen. Yi Ku was a well-known scholar of principle and mind-matter, and his draft reportedly was not only forcefully worded but also clear in meaning. Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 506n115; Chōsen jimmei jisho, 677. 60 For a general discussion of memorials submitted by Yŏngnam Confucians, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 503–11. 61 Hyojong sillok 3.10a–b (1650). 62 For the memorial, see ibid., 3.10a–11b (1650). 63 Ibid. 4.1a–3b (1650); Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 521–22. For more on Sin Sŏk-hyŏng and the P’yŏngsan Sin, see note 104 and the text at that note. 64 Being struck off the Confucian register (sakchŏk) meant that a lower-degree holder (chinsa or saengwŏn) was unable to qualify for the higher civil service examinations (munkwa) unless he was later pardoned. The authority to mete out this drastic punishment lay entirely with the Confucian Academy. “To apply a yellow [paper] [puhwang]” was a severe method of public censure. A drummer marched the streets with a yellow piece of paper attached to his drum, detailing the name of the culprit and the nature of his crime. 65 Hyojong sillok 4.1a–3b, 12a–13a, 27a, 33b; 5.18b–20b (1650); Yu Chik, Paegjoram sŏnsaeng munjip, haengjang, 210–11. 66 Hong U-wŏn belonged to the capital Namin Namyang Hong. Due to factional upheavals, his government career was often disrupted. In 1651, he served as magistrate of Yean and thus was well acquainted with the Andong-Yean Namin literati. He was among the Namin who received preferential advancement from King Sukchong in 1674. Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 35, 230. 67 Hyŏnjong sillok 6.37a–39b, 40b, 45b–46a, 46b–47a; 7.1a (1663). In the same year, two more memorials protesting the enshrinement of Yulgok and U’gye were submitted by Yŏngnam men: [Ŭiryŏng] Nam Chung-yu (1627–1701), a chinsa of 1660 residing in Yŏngyŏl, and [Yean] Kim Kang (1609–?), a saengwŏn of 1635 residing in Yŏngju. Both were punished by being barred from the munkwa examinations. For a list of memorials sent in by Yŏngnam Confucians in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 571. 68 Yu Se-ch’ŏl, fourth son of Wŏn-i, was adopted as main-line heir to Wŏn-i’s elder brother, Wŏn-jik, who had died young without issue. 69 A detailed diary is attached to the collected works of Yu Se-ch’ŏl; see Such’ŏng ilgi in his Hoedang



70

71 72

73 74

75 76 77

78

79

80 81 82

N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 17 – 3 19

519

sŏnsaeng munjip. There are excerpts in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 505, 526, and Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim,” 294–307. [Namyang] Hong Myŏng-ha (1608–68) and [Andong] Kim Su-hang (1629–89) belonged to the highest stratum of “distinguished houses” and continuously held tangsang-rank offices. Hong (munkwa 1644) was appointed left state councilor in 1665 and shortly thereafter advanced to chief state councilor. He was a renowned sŏngnihak scholar and calligrapher. Kim Su-hang and his older brother, Kim Su-hŭng (1626–90), were grandsons of Kim Sang-hŏn (1570–1652), the “founder” of the “new” Andong Kim. Both served in exalted posts, among them as chief state councilors, and both perished as the result of the Sŏin defeat in 1689. All three were staunch Song Si-yŏl supporters. [Kwangsan] Kim Man-gi (1633–87) was the father of King Sukchong’s first wife, In’gyŏng Wanghu, and a Song Si-yŏl partisan. The memorial is reproduced full-length with appendix in the Namin-redacted Hyŏnjong sillok 12.4b–20a, and slightly shortened in the later Sŏin-amended Hyŏnjong kaesu sillok 15.2a–18a. This extensive coverage testifies to the impact it had in 1666 and later in 1674. Although the Sillok clearly identifies Yu Se-ch’ŏl as the leader of the memorial mission, the memorial text is not included in his Collected Works. Instead, it is found in Yu Wŏn-ji’s Cholchaep sŏnsaeng munjip 3.1a–9a, with the remark “written in 1666 on behalf of the Confucian students [yusaeng].” Wŏn-ji was Se-ch’ŏl’s teacher, and it is likely that Wŏn-ji was indeed involved in the drafting of the memorial, but because in 1666 he served as the superintendent of the post station of An’gi, he was unable to accompany the mission to Seoul. Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, however, suggests that it was not Wŏn-ji, but Kwak Se-gŏn (1618–86), a Hŏ Mok disciple and minor official in the capital, who was the principal drafter, relying on Wŏn-ji’s ritual understanding. See Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim,” 314–17. The memorial the Ch’ungch’ŏng yusaeng submitted was composed by the eminent Sŏin scholarritualist, Yun Chŭng (1629–1714). See Yun Chŭng, Myŏngjae sŏnsaeng yu’go, 2: 155–65. For the evidence of the above paragraphs, see the Sillok entries, too numerous to be enumerated, for the third to fifth months of Hyŏnjong’s seventh reign year (1666), kwŏn 12; 13.6b. The largest number of memorials submitted during Hyŏnjong’s time dealt with the canonization issue. See Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, Chosŏn sidae yusaeng sangso, 312, 446. Hyŏnjong sillok 22.32a (1674); Yu Se-ch’ŏl, Hoedang sŏnsaeng munjip, 321–22. Sukchong sillok 12.18b–19a, 21b–22b, 51a–b (1681); 13sang.29a–30b (1682); 20.25a–b (1689); 26.40a–b (1694). [Hanyang] Cho Kyŏng (1586–1669), a sama (1612) and munkwa (1626) graduate, was a Namin and minister of rites in early 1650. Because, as the second censor in 1636, he had vehemently argued against peace with the Manchus, the Qing demanded his punishment; he was therefore exiled in the third month of 1650. Cho Kyŏng proposed [Ŭisŏng] Kim Hyu (1597–1638), a grandson of Kim Yong, for office when King Injo ordered his ministers to recommend “country scholars for their scholarship.” Kim was appointed royal tomb keeper in 1637, but did not serve due to illness. Kim Hyu, Kyŏngwa sŏnsaeng munjip, haengjang, 511. O Chŏng-il (1610–70) was the eldest son of O Tan (1592–1640), whose daughter became the consort of King Injo’s third son, Inp’yŏng taegun. In 1635, Chŏng-il memorialized against the enshrinement of Yulgok and U’gye. Together with his two brothers, Chŏng-wi (1616–92) and Chŏng-ch’ang (1634–80), all of whom were munkwa graduates, he held prominent government posts although they did not belong to the “distinguished houses.” Hyŏnjong kaesu sillok 15.20b (1666). Interestingly, Hŏ Chŏk’s argument is not recorded in the Namin version of the Sillok. For the details, see Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim,” 317–23. Kim Su-hong (1601–81) was a grandson of [Andong] Kim Sang-yong and thus belonged to one of the most distinguished houses in the capital. Although a Sŏin, he kept a critical distance to Song Si-yŏl.

520

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 19 – 3 2 3

83 Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim,” 320–21. 84 O Chŏng-ch’ang (1636–80), a younger brother of O Chŏng-il, was a munkwa graduate of 1662 and became in 1676 the headmaster of the National Confucian Academy. He was killed in 1680. 85 Sukchong sillok 4.14b–15a (1675). 86 Whereas Hŏ Mok and Yun Hyu represented the hardliners (Ch’ŏngnam) insisting on Song’s death, Hŏ Chŏk, then the chief state councilor, led the moderates (T’angnam), who opposed such punishment. 87 Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim,” 327–28. Yu Se-ch’ŏl’s judgment was correct: during the Namin administration, both Hŏ Chŏk and Yun Hyu were actively engaged in reorganizing the military, which, they felt, had deteriorated after King Hyojong’s plans for a northern expedition against Qing China had been abandoned. 88 Queen Min, Inhyŏn Wanghu, was the daughter of the influential [Yŏhŭng] Min Yu-jung (1630– 87), a disciple of Song Si-yŏl and Song Chun-gil. She became Sukchong’s second queen in 1681 after his first queen had died one year earlier. Due to false charges brought forward by Chang-ssi, the mother of the future King Kyŏngjong, Queen Min was expelled from the palace and demoted to commoner status in 1689, but restored to her royal position in 1694. Childless, she died suddenly in 1701, reportedly by Chang-ssi’s black magic. Accused of this crime, Chang-ssi had finally to take her own life in 1702, and her entire family of Namin background was liquidated. 89 ADPM, 641–51; Kim Pang-gŏl, Chich’on sŏnsaeng munjip, haengjang, 4.22a–32a; Sukchong sillok 20.29b–30a, 38a–b (1689). 90 For a list of capital and Yŏngnam Namin holding office during Sukchong’s early years, see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 427. From Andong, there was Kwŏn Tu-gi (1659–1722), Tong-bo’s greatgreat-grandson and a munkwa graduate of 1696, and Yu Chin’s son Ch’ŏn-ji (1616–89). 91 U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 80–86; Kim Hak-su, “Karam Yi Hyŏn-il yŏn’gu,” 106–19. 92 Kim Se-ho (1652–1722) was a sixth-generation descendant of Kim Su-il and a sama (1681) and munkwa (1690) graduate. Kim Se-ho, Kuju-jip, purok, haengnyak, 10.40a–43a; Sukchong sillok 26.7a; 27.13a (1694). 93 Sukchong sillok 4.15a, 16a (1675). 94 Similar conclusions were drawn by U In-su, Chosŏn hugi sallim, 82. 95 Chŏng Kae-ch’ŏng (1529–90) may have been of slave or perhaps of hyangni origin. A disciple of the famous Chŏlla scholar-official Pak Sun (1523–89), Chŏng, himself famed for his learning, was recommended for office and eventually served in and out of Seoul. He is said to have had more than four thousand disciples. For a portrait, see Kim Tong-su, “16–17segi Honam sarim,” 46–53. 96 Yang Mong-gŏ (1643–1712) was a saengwŏn of 1669. All the Namwŏn Yang in Sunch’ang were Sŏin, and it is not clear why Mong-gŏ aligned with the Namin; he corresponded with Hŏ Mok. Sukchong sillok 6.11a–b (1677); Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo, ed. Yang Man-jŏng, 138–45. 97 For a detailed study of these events and the marital relations of the Namin concerned, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 334–57; Kim Tong-su, “16–17segi Honam sarim,” 43–104. 98 An Pang-jun (1573–1654), a native of Posŏng, was a disciple of Sŏng Hon and closely connected to Chŏng Ch’ŏl. Though renowned for his scholarship, he never held an office. 99 Sukchong sillok 23.38a–b (1692); 24.12b (1692); MHPG 212.3a, 8a; Kim Tong-su, “16–17segi Honam sarim,” 77–78, 83. 100 Ch’oe Kye-ong, Uwa sŏnsaeng munjip, yŏnbo, 442, 445, 450–51; Sukchong sillok 27.57a–58a (1694). Although nowadays regarded as a Noron (personal communication from Yang Man-jŏng), Kyeong’s closeness to Pak Se-ch’ae suggests that he had in fact allied himself with the Soron under whose administration he ended his career as royal secretary. 101 Ch’oe Si-ong, Tonggang sŏnsaeng yu’go 2.12b–13b (dated 1691); haengjang, 8.1a–b; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 58n. 102 Kwŏn Sang-il, Ch’ŏngdae ilgi, 1: 310–20 (1721). For a numerical count of memorials sent in from Kyŏngsang during Sukchong’s and Kyŏngjong’s reigns, see Sŏl Sŏk-kyu, Chosŏn sidae yusaeng sangso, 447–49. 103 Yi Chun (1560–1635), a munkwa graduate of 1591, was the compiler of the gazetteer of Sangju, the



104

105 106 107

108

1 09 110

111 112

113

114 115

116

N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 2 4 – 3 2 5

521

Sangsanji of 1617. For a biographical sketch, see Sŏae sŏnsaeng munhyŏllok in Yu Sŏng-nyong, Sŏae chŏnsŏ, 3: 478–78. The P’yŏngsan Sin and the Ch’angnyŏng Sŏng resident in Sangju had sided with the Pugin during Kwanghae’gun’s reign and later joined the Sŏin camp. Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 521–22. Sin Sŏk-pŏn’s collected works, Paegwŏn sŏnsaeng munjip, contains the large correspondence he had with such Sŏin luminaries as Song Si-yŏl and Song Chun-gil. Hyojong sillok 4.10a (1650). For example, see Kwŏn Sang-il, Ch’ŏngdae ilgi, 1: 315 (1721); Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 294–97. Ka’gu, situated some fifteen ri from Andong City, had a satellite village, Ŭmgok, where some of An Yŏn-sŏk’s relatives lived. YGJ 1.11a. Yŏn-sŏk’s great-great-grandfather, Che (1538–1602), studied under T’oegye and passed the sama (1561) and munkwa (1580) and served as magistrate of Yonggung. During the Imjin War, he is said to have materially supported the military. He was close to many Andong scholars, and was buried in Andong. ADPM, 464–73; MTP, 2: 133a–b; Waryong-myŏn chi 4.7a–b. For basic data on An Yŏn-sŏk, see MTP, 2: 133b; KNJ 11.26b; Waryong-myŏn chi 4.21b; Chōsen jimmei jisho, 239. The latter source is based on the unofficial history, Yakp’a mallok (Random jottings of Yakp’a) by Yi Hŭi-ryŏng (1697–1777). An’s father, An Chung-hyŏn (n.d.), was well known for his literary style and scholarship, and two of his brothers were saengwŏn graduates. In 1659, Chung-hyŏn reportedly protested, with some like-minded men, against the “wrong rites.” KNJ 11.39a; for An’s relatives, see Waryong-myŏn chi, 4: 22bff. Yi Su-hwan, “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn,” 168. The radical Soron minister Kim Il-gyŏng (1662–1724) instigated an assassination attempt on Kyŏngjong’s half-brother, the future King Yŏngjo, who was supported by the Noron. As the chief architect of the purge of the Noron in 1721–22, Kim was killed two years later, when the Noron regained power upon Yŏngjo’s accession in 1724. Pak Mun-su (1691–1756), munkwa graduate of 1723, was one of King Yŏngjo’s confidants and had a distinguished government career. Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 14 [1738]/8/10 (accessed on sjw.history/ .go.kr); Yŏngjo sillok 47.23a (1738). For a brief biography, see Haboush, Heritage of Kings, 158–59. This work seems to have survived only in a hand-written copy, which is now preserved in the Kawaii Collection in the Library of Kyoto University. I am indebted to Anders Karlsson for photocopying it for me. This short history of factionalism does not go beyond recording well-known data and does not reflect a distinct Namin or Noron point of view. It also contains biographical sketches of major sarim scholars. Kwŏn Tae-un (1612–99) was an exponent of the capital Namin Andong Kwŏn, who had their heyday as one of the “distinguished houses” in the seventeenth century. Tae-un had a prominent government career that climaxed with his appointment as chief councilor of state in 1689. But after 1694, the Kwŏn fell on hard times—which explains why his son, Kyu (n.d.), and grandson, Chung-gyŏng (1642–1728), sided with the Soron to regain office. Chung-gyŏng, whose paternal aunt was the grandmother of Yi In-jwa (see below), ended his own life in 1728. See Ch’a Changsŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 197–98. Yi Chae (1680–1746), a munkwa graduate of 1702, was a disciple of the Noron scholar Kim Ch’anghyŏp and had a brilliant government career. He is also known as a ritualist and author of Easy Manual of the Four Rites (Sarye pyŏllam). The so-called Pyŏnsan bandits were apparently escaped slaves who had fled to the Pyŏnsan Peninsula in western Ch’ungch’ŏng Province and the many offshore islands. “Hiding during daytime and raiding by night,” these bandits were especially active at the beginning of the eighteenth century. See Yi Chong-bŏm, “1728nyŏn musillan,” 175–78. [Chŏnju] Yi In-jwa (1695–1728) was born to a prominent capital Namin family and was variously connected to powerful capital families. His paternal grandmother was the daughter of Kwŏn Taeun, his mother came from a prosperous Yŏngnam family, and In-jwa married a granddaughter of Yun Hyu. He entertained relations with many eminent sajok in Kyŏnggi, Honam, and Yŏngnam.

522

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 2 5 – 3 2 8

117 King Yŏngjo came to the throne after his half-brother, King Kyŏngjong, had died, allegedly by having been poisoned by Yŏngjo. Yŏngjo was a secondary son and this fact, in addition to the allegation of fratricide, made him “illegitimate,” a label that threw doubt on the legitimacy of his rule throughout his life. For the details, see Haboush, Heritage of Kings, 30–33. 118 Chŏng Hŭi-ryang (?–1728) was the great-great-grandson of Chŏng On. He had close contacts with Yi In-jwa, but his principal motive in joining the rebellion seems to have been his frustration about the neglect that his native Right Kyŏngsang had experienced since the Injo Restoration. His original home was Anŭm, close to Chinju, which had been the center of Nammyŏng Cho Sik’s school. 119 For a detailed study of the Yi In-jwa Rebellion, see Yi Chong-bŏm, “1728nyŏn musillan ŭi sŏngkyŏk,” 171–234; Yi Sang-bae, Chosŏn hugi chŏngch’i wa kwaesŏ, 122–32; see also Haboush, Heritage of Kings, 136–40. 120 For Chŏlla details, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 368–69; Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Uban-dong, 219–45. 121 Yŏngjo sillok 16.40a (1728). 122 Kwŏn Ku (1672–1749) belonged to the Andong Kwŏn line resident in Chi’gok (also known as Kail). His mother was the daughter of Yu Wŏn-ji, making him a nonagnatic great-grandson of Yu Sŏngnyong. A disciple of Yi Hyŏn-il, he married a daughter of the latter’s second son. Shortly before the rebellion, he had been recommended for office. For his biography, see “Pyŏnggok sŏnsaeng Kwŏn-gung haengjang,” in Yi Sang-jŏng, Taesan-jip, 7: 297–321. Kwŏn recollected his experiences of 1728 in Report of Musin (Musillok). See Kwŏn Ku, Pyŏnggok sŏnsaeng munjip 7.1a–27a. 123 Yu Mong-sŏ (1680–1750), saengwŏn of 1713, was Yu Se-ch’ŏl’s grandson and a sixth-generation descendant of Yu Un-nyong. Kwŏn Tŏk-su (1672–1760) was a fifth-generation descendant of famous Kwŏn Ho-mun, resident in Soya (west of Andong City, YGJ 1.13b); and Kim Min-haeng (1673–1737) was the fifth-generation main-line descendant of Kim Si-on, resident in Kŭmgye. 124 Yi Chŏng-so (1674–1736), a chinsa (1696) and munkwa (1714) graduate, was exiled in the Soron coup against the Noron in 1721–22, but released after 1725 to continue his government career. He served in Andong in 1727–28. 125 Yŏngjo sillok 17.34a (1728). 126 Yi In-jwa lived at that time in Mun’gyŏng, west of Yech’ŏn. 127 The Musillok records in detail King Yŏngjo’s interrogation of Kwŏn. A briefer version is in Yŏngjo sillok 17.14b–15b (1728). 128 [Talsŏng (Taegu)] Sŏ Myŏng-gyun (1680–1745), resident of Seoul, was a saengwŏn (1705) and munkwa (1710) graduate and belonged to one of the most prosperous “distinguished houses.” 129 Chŏng Hŭi-ryang and Yi Ung-jwa were captured on the second day of the fourth month and immediately decapitated. Their heads were pickled and sent to the capital. The king received, however, only their ears in a ceremony called “presenting the rebels’ ears” (hŏn’goengnye). 130 Kwŏn Ku’s Musillok vividly reports his ordeal in the capital and is a valuable description of the anxious atmosphere of the time. 131 Yu Sŭng-hyŏn (1680–1746) was a sixth-generation descendant of [Chŏnju] Yu Pok-ki, a disciple of Yi Hyŏn-il, and a munkwa graduate of 1719. In 1728, he was a former ministerial section chief (senior fifth rank); he later advanced to third minister in the Ministry of Works and died while serving as magistrate of P’unggi. MTP, 2: 19a; KNJ 11.26b. 132 Kwŏn Man (1688–1749) was a seventh-generation descendant of [Andong] Kwŏn Pŏl. He was a sama (1721) and munkwa (1725) graduate and was reputed for his scholarship. In 1728, he was a lowly copyist in the Office of Diplomatic Correspondence. For his loyal acts, Man was posthumously honored by King Chŏngjo with the title of third minister of the Ministry of Personnel. KNJ 11.26b. 133 Yŏngjo sillok 17.7a–b (1728). 134 Song In-myŏng (1689–1746), munkwa graduate of 1719, was one of King Yŏngjo’s favorites and was instrumental in developing the policy of “grand harmony.” See Haboush, A Heritage of Kings, 159. Nevertheless, in 1728, as censor general, he demanded that Yun Hyu’s descendants living in Yŏju



135 136 137 138 139 1 40

141 142 143

144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159

N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 2 9 – 3 3 2

523

be exiled to far-off islands because Yi In-jwa was the husband of Yun’s granddaughter. The latter was first imprisoned in Ch’ŏngju and later strangled. Yŏngjo sillok 17.12b–13a (1728). Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 4 [1728]/4/24 (accessed on sjw. history.go.kr). Yŏngjo sillok 17.34a–b (1728). Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 4 [1728]/4/22, as quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 564n296. Yŏngjo sillok 17.4b; 19.9a (1728). For the genesis of the t’angp’yŏng policy, see Haboush, Heritage of Kings, 129–36. I could not identify Kwŏn Noe. Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on yangban sahoe, I,” 270n54. According to Prof. Chŏng, the first magistrate on Andong’s local roster was Hong Man-jo (1645–1725), when he served as Andong magistrate in 1706–8; Hong, a munkwa graduate of 1678, belonged to the mighty Noron capital P’ungsan Hong. By the late seventeenth century, however, no Hong was left in Andong. For a list of Kyŏngsang governors during Yŏngjo’s first fourteen years, see Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 220n25. Yŏngjo sillok 18.43a–b (1728). [P’ungyang] Cho Hyŏn-myŏng (1690–1752), chinsa (1713) and munkwa (1719) graduate, was made a merit subject for his efforts to put down the Yi In-jwa Rebellion. With his older brother, Munmyŏng (1680–1732), Cho established himself as a powerful Soron pŏryŏl in the eighteenth century. Hyŏn-myŏng was a great supporter of Yŏngjo’s reconciliation policy. Ch’a Chang-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl, 195–96; Haboush, Heritage of Kings, 158–60. Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 9 [1733]/1/13, as quoted in Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 214n9; Yŏngjo sillok 29.9b, 33.3a–b (1733). Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 9 [1733]/3/4, as quoted in Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 215n11. Na Hak-ch’ŏn (1685–1731), resident in Yŏngch’ŏn, is a rather obscure figure, although he died as second royal secretary (senior third rank). He was a munkwa graduate of 1683 and apparently attacked King Yŏngjo’s policy of “grand harmony.” Yŏngjo sillok 18.43a–b (1728). Ibid., 11.19b (1727). [Kyŏngju] Kim Hŭng-gyŏng (1677–1750), munkwa graduate of 1699, was the right state councilor in the first month of 1733. He opposed King Yŏngjo’s policy of “grand harmony.” Yŏngjo sillok 25.2a–3a, 35.1a–2b (1733). Ibid., 29.2b (1731); 33.3a–b (1733). Ibid., 36.41a–42a (1733). Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 93. Kim Sŏng-t’ak was listed as taking the examinations as magistrate. Yŏngjo sillok 36.7a (1733); 39.14a (1734); 40.27a, 28a, 46a (1735). [Hŭngyang] Yi In-ji (1683–?) was a saengwŏn of 1721 and resident in Sangju. MTP, 1: 147b. That he was said to be the son-in-law of a former rebel was presumably a fabrication of his adversaries, to make him look suspect. Yŏngjo sillok 41.9b–10a, 15b, 16b, 27b (1736); Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 216–17. Song Si-yŏl and Song Chun-gil were enshrined in the Munmyo in 1756. [P’yŏngsan] Sin Hŏn (1688–?), was a chinsa of 1735 and resident in Yonggung, west of Andong. MTP, 2: 45a. [Ch’ŏngp’ung] Kim Chae-ro (1682–1759) came from a strong Noron pŏryŏl background with many of his antecedents and descendants in high office. He himself had a distinguished government career. Yŏngjo sillok 42.11a (1736); 43.27a; 44.2b, 6b–8b, 9b–11b, 12a, 17b–18a; 45.30b (1737); 47.23b–24a, 29a (1738); ADPM, 735–52; Kim Sŏng-t’ak, Chesan sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 1a–14a; UKKM, soji no. 58, 5: 362 (in which Sŏng-t’ak’s son, Nak-haeng, pleads in 1745 for medical assistance for his ill father). The funerary inscription was compiled by the eminent Namin scholar-official Ch’ae Che-gong. Kim Sŏng-t’ak was rehabilitated by King Chŏngjo in 1795.

524

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 3 2 – 3 3 6

160 Min Ŭng-su (1684–1750), a munkwa graduate of 1725, had a distinguished career as a Noron official. 161 Yŏngjo sillok 44.16b–17a (1737); Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 11 [1735]/2/29, as quoted by Chŏng Manjo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 220n24. 162 There is practically no biographical information on An T’aek-chun; he is listed neither in MTP nor in Waryong-myŏn chi. He had at least two brothers: Pok-chun (1698–1779), Yŏn-sŏk’s third son, who was “sharp and intelligent” and passed the munkwa in 1728 before holding office (up to senior second rank), and Kuk-chun. MTP, 2: 13b; KNJ 11.26b; Waryong-myŏn chi 4.23b–24a. 163 The Waryong-myŏn chi identifies An U-sŏk (1676–1748), Yŏn-sŏk’s youngest brother, as one of the principal builders. Kang Wŏn-il is not further identifiable; [P’yŏngsan] Sin Sa-guk (1696–?), a chinsa of 1723, resided in Mun’gyŏng, west of Andong. MTP, 2: 47a; Waryong-myŏn chi 4.22b. One more name is known: Kim Ch’ang-jŏk, son of the royal guardsman Kim Su-mun. 164 Yu Ch’ŏk-ki (1691–1767), munkwa graduate of 1714, was a disciple of Kim Ch’ang-jip (1648–1722), a great-grandson of Kim Sang-hŏn. 165 Ŏ Yu-ryong (1678–1764), munkwa graduate of 1713, had a long government career. 166 Kim Mong-nyŏm (1675–1751) was a seventh-generation descendant of Kim Sŏng-il. Kim Kyŏnghŏn belonged to a collateral line of the Ŭisŏng Kim of Naeap; he was a chinsa of 1723. KNJ 11.40a. 167 Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 14 [1738]/6/20 (accessed on sjw.history.go.kr). 168 Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 14 [1738]/6/23, as quoted and discussed in Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 224–28. 169 Yun Yang-nae (1673–1751), a Noron, had a long career in government and was well acquainted with Kyŏngsang, where he had served as a secret inspector and in 1728 briefly as magistrate of Andong. 170 Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 14 [1738]/7/16, as quoted by Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 136n124. 171 Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi, Yŏngjo 14 [1738]/8/10 (accessed on sjw.history.go.kr); Chŏng Man-ju, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 229–43. 172 MHPG 210.16b, 18b–19a; Yŏngjo sillok 53.21a (1741); Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 265–67; for a detailed study of 1741, see ibid., 269–300. According to MHPG some three hundred academies and shrines were demolished. 173 MHPG 212.2a; Chosŏn sidae Yŏngnam sŏwŏn charyo, 44. According to Waryong-myŏn chi 4.24a, a grandson of An Ku-sŏk, Kyŏng-wŏn (1706–75), petitioned for the reestablishment of Kim Sanghŏn’s shrine, Sŏ’gan Sŏwŏn; there was an earlier Sŏ’gan Sŏdang. YGJ 4.26b. 174 Yŏngjo sillok 36.15b, 42a (1733). For works read by King Yŏngjo during royal lecture periods, see Haboush, A Heritage of Kings, app. 3. He had spent seven months in 1731 reading (for the first time?) Yulgok’s Sŏnghak chibyo. 175 Yŏngjo sillok 80.11a (1753); 106.16a (1765); 120.13b (1773). The others were Yi Se-chin, Se-sa, and Set’ae (1698–1760). With Se-t’aek, they were all eighth-generation descendants of T’oegye. 176 For the circumstances leading to Sado’s death, see Haboush, A Heritage of Kings, 166–233. 177 Kwŏn Chŏng-ch’im (1710–67) was an eighth-generation descendant of Kwŏn Pŏl. A chinsa (1754) and munkwa (1757) graduate, in 1762 he served as a fourth tutor in the Crown Prince Tutorial Office. 178 Kwŏn Chŏng-hŭm (1713–?) was Chŏng-ch’im’s younger brother and a chinsa of 1738. KNJ 11.41a. 179 In 1762, the Noron split into two camps: the “Party of Principle” (Pyŏkp’a) supported Yŏngjo’s killing of his son, whereas the “Party of Expediency” (Sip’a) opposed it. 180 Chŏngjo sillok 2.2b–8b, 9a, 14a–b (1776); Andong hyanggyo chi, 622–23; Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 537. Andong was reestablished as a great county (pu) in the first month of 1785. Chŏngjo sillok 19.6a (1785). Kwŏn Chŏng-ch’im was apparently later rewarded for his sacrifice with a posthumous name and title by King Chŏngjo. 181 Yi Sang-jŏng was appointed fourth minister of the Ministry of War in the spring of 1780, and a year later third minister of the Ministry of Punishment. Because of old age, he could not take up these posts, but he sent in a lengthy memorial. Chŏngjo sillok 10.27b (1780); 12.1a–3b (1781). 182 Kim Koeng (1739–1816), a descendant of [Ŭisŏng] Kim Man-hŭm, passed the sama in 1773 and the



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 3 6 – 3 4 3

183 184 185 186 187

188

189 190

191

192 193 194 195

196

525

munkwa in 1777, whereupon he served in the government, ending his career as minister of rites in 1815, an office he could not take up due to old age. MTP, 1: 184b; KNJ 11.27b–28a; for his tomb epitaph, see ADPM, 794–801. Ch’ae Che-gong had a remarkable official career. Though not in office between 1780–88, he served as the right state councilor in 1788, and between 1790–92 as the left state councilor; in 1793 he briefly advanced to chief state councilor. Chŏngjo sillok 25.22a–23b (1788). Ibid., 26.25a–b, 25b–26a (1788); Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 538–39. The Musin ch’angŭirok was later printed on Chŏngjo’s order in Andong. Chŏngjo sillok 34.16b, 26b–27a (1792). Special higher exams outside the capital (oebang pyŏlkwa) were occasionally held in P’yŏngan and Hamgyŏng Provinces and on Kanghwa and Cheju Islands. These “provincial exams” (tokwa) were instituted for showing royal benevolence to otherwise neglected areas. For P’yŏngan, see O Such’ang, Chosŏn hugi P’yŏngando sahoe, 187–89. Kim Hŭi-rak (1761–1803) was a collateral kinsman of the Naeap Kim. In early 1792, he passed the saengwŏn and a few months later earned highest honors in the Tosan exam. He was well-known for his literary talents and became one of the compilers of King Chŏngjo’s literary works. MTP, 1: 184b; KNJ 11.28a. Ch’ae Che-gong, Pŏn’am-jip, 380–82; KNJ 12.20a–21a. This stele is still extant today, but was removed from its original site for the construction of the Andong Dam in 1974. Among the signers of the memorial were 88 former officials, 110 chinsa and saengwŏn graduates, and 9,888 Confucian students (yusaeng) hailing from almost all of the seventy-one counties of Kyŏngsang Province; the majority, however, came from Andong, Yean, Sangju, and Yŏngju. Yi Su-gŏn has analyzed the social and geographical origin of the participants. See Yŏngnam hakp’a, 550–55. In 1764, King Yŏngjo had made Chŏngjo an adopted son of Prince Hyojang (1719–28), Sado’s older half-brother, thus denying Sado’s paternity. Ten days after he had ascended the throne, Chŏngjo conferred upon his father the posthumous honorary title of Prince Changhŏn. But it was only in 1899 that Sado was given the royal temple name Changjo, at last fitting him into the long genealogy of Chosŏn kings. For a detailed study of the “Memorial of the Ten Thousand,” see Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 531–49. Yu Kyu’s biography is in his Imyŏjae sŏnsaeng munjip, 378–402; Chŏngjo sillok 53.24a (1800). Between various offices, Yu Kyu served in the Andong Local Bureau as deputy head in 1791 and as head in 1798. Ch’ae Che-gong’s epitaph of Yi Ik, as quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 419n289. Ch’ae Hong-wŏn was Ch’ae Che-gong’s adoptive son. A munkwa graduate of 1792, he rapidly advanced to third minister in the Ministry of Personnel and then to royal secretary. Because of his close friendship with Chŏng Yag-yong, he was stripped of office in 1801 and exiled, but later reinstated. See also Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 420. Chōsen tosho kaidai, 327; preface by Kang Chu-jin to Yŏngnam inmul ko. The names were arranged according to counties. The extant version in ten parts is, as Kang thinks, most likely incomplete, as the Munhŏn pigo mentions a version in seventeen parts, thus presumably accounting for important areas such as Yech’ŏn or Indong, among others, that are missing in the ten-part edition.

Part V Introduction

1 2 3 4

Yŏngjo sillok 42.27b–28a (1736); 105.6a (1765). For example, tomb inscription in ADPM, 189–90. Bourdieu, In Other Words, 135–36. Yi Hŏn-ch’ang, Han’guk kyŏngje t’ongsa, 47–52. A general overview is given by Ki-Joo Park and Donghyu Yang, “The Standard of Living in Chosŏn.” For a tabulation of natural disasters occurring

526

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 4 3 – 3 4 7

between 1593 and 1888 based on the Chŭngbo munhŏn pigo, see Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Samgye kangsa e sojang toeŏ innŭn tonggyean,” 94–95. See also Karlsson, “Famine, Finance and Political Power,” and Yi T’ae-jin, “ ‘Sobinggi’ (1500–1750) ŭi ch’ŏnch’e hyŏnsangjŏk wŏnin.” 5 Ch’oe Yŏng-hŭi, Imjin waeranjung ŭi sahoe tongt’ae, 113–18. 6 For an example, see Kye Sŭng-bŏm, “Chosŏn hugi Tansŏng chibang Hyŏpch’ŏn Yi Hu-nam.” 7 Thompson, “Class and Class Struggle,” 137.

Chapter 13 1 The land registers list each plot of land under the name of a kiju—a term that does not denote the owner (as Kim Yong-sŏp erroneously assumed), but the cultivator. I follow here Yi Yŏng-hun’s interpretation. For a critique of Kim Yong-sŏp’s work, see Yi Yŏng-hun, “Yangan ŭi sŏngkyŏk,” 1–4. 2 Hyŏnjong sillok 16.6b; Hyŏnjong kaesu sillok 20.20b–21a (1669); Sok taejŏn, 436; MHPG 162.19a–b, 23b–24a; Song Si-yŏl, Songja taejŏn, 13.32b–33a; Song Chun-gil, Tongch’undang-jip, pyŏlchip 6.2b. In fact, the revision of the law was originally requested by Cho Ik (1579–1655), who thought that the commoners’ low birthrate was due to their carrying an ever-greater corvée burden and therefore pleaded for reversing earlier anticommoner legislation. Cho Ik, P’oje-jip 10.8b–12a; 13.18b– 24a. In 1659, Song Si-yŏl propagated a revision of the law. The law of 1669 thus canceled an earlier law in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, according to which a child of a mixed male slave–female commoner union had to inherit its father’s service obligations. 3 Sok taejŏn, 436. It is doubtful that 1675, as given in the Sok taejŏn, is the correct date of this reversal. As both Hiraki Makoto and Chŏn Hyŏng-t’aek have pointed out, such a date is mentioned neither in the Sillok, nor in the Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi or the Pibyŏnsa tŭngnok. The correct date is likely to be 1678. 4 During King Sukchong’s reign, the law was rescinded in 1678 (1675), reinstated in 1684, and again rescinded in 1689. For the details, see Hiraki Makoto, Chosŏn hugi nobije, 132–37; Chŏn Hyŏngt’aek, Chosŏn hugi nobi, 212–16. Both Hiraki and Chŏn mention economic rather than ideological reasons for the frequent changes. 5 For a study of three subcounties (Pungnae, Chŏ’gok, and Chego’gok) in the yangan of Yech’ŏn, see Yi Yŏng-hun, “Yangan ŭi sŏngkyŏk.” The Land Register of 1720 measured land in kyŏl, pu, and sok. The conversion to majigi, taking 45 majigi per kyŏl, is approximate. 6 Kwŏn Yun passed the saengwŏn in 1630, the munkwa in 1651. 7 KCKM, no. 55, 255–57. 8 KCKM, no. 111, 419–20. 9 In 1719–20, the last comprehensive cadastral land registers were compiled before the end of the nineteenth century. The one for Andong is not extant, but the Tundŏk register is preserved. 10 Yi Yŏng-hun, “Yangan ŭi sŏngkyŏk,” 24–26, suggests that the apportionment of land in 1720 was arbitrary, indicating joint management. He does not take into consideration corporately owned lineage land, which, of course, was also often jointly managed. 11 Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Chosŏn hugi sansong yŏn’gu,” table on 65. 12 Whereas the land registers of Kyŏngsang Province indicate the social status of the kiju (i.e., the cultivator) by providing his service title (chigyŏk), those of Chŏlla and Ch’ungch’ŏng Provinces do not, making it more difficult to determine the cultivator’s social status. Slave ownership is generally interpreted as indicating sajok status. 13 “Yech’ŏn” here means the three subcounties (myŏn), Pungnae, Ch’ŏgok, and Chego’gok, studied by Yi Yŏng-hun. 14 According to Yu Hyŏng-wŏn (1622–73), someone in a mountainous region cultivating some twenty majigi or roughly one-half of a kyŏl was able to live well. See Paek Sŭng-jong, Han’guk sahoesa, 7. It is of course not easy to assess the subsistence limit because this would differ according to topographical circumstances and soil condition from region to region. Generally, however, it is assumed that 25 pu or one quarter of a kyŏl (roughly equal to ten majigi) demarcated the subsistence line. See also Shin, “Land Tenure and the Agrarian Economy,” 44.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 4 7 – 3 4 9

527

15 These calculations are based on Yi Yŏng-hun, “Yangan ŭi sŏngkyŏk,” 6, and Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 194–96. Chŏng Chin-yŏng has shown that this trend is also clear in other parts of Korea. See his tables in Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 352–53. 16 These data are from Kim Kŏn-t’ae, “17–18segi chŏndap soyu kyumo.” 17 Yi I-si was a grandson of Yi Sang-hyŏng’s fifth son, Mun-gye. 18 Yi I-gi was a grandson of Yi Sang-hyŏng’s third son, Mun-jae. 19 Yŏngjo sillok 61.29a–b (1745); Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 60, 200–203. Prof. Kim surmises that Yi was punished so heavily because he might also have been involved in the Yi Injwa rebellion. 20 For a chart comparing land ownership of primary and secondary offspring, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 203. 21 Kwangsan Kim household registers (ho’gu tanja) are extant from 1585 to 1897. They are, of course, not completely trustworthy because they include slaves who must have died between census takings, and runaway slaves continued to be recorded up to fifty years. See Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 109–15, 370. 22 UKKM, 3: 325–27. Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 78–86. 23 See Shin, “Some Aspects of Landlord-Tenant Relations,” 74. 24 Kim Yong-sŏp, “Chosŏn hugi yangbanch’ŭng ŭi nongŏp,” 2: 259. 25 In the 1930s, the cultivation patterns in Naeap (Andong) were as follows: owner-cultivator households 42 (26.5%), cultivator-tenant households 77 (50%), and tenant households 37 (23.5%); in Hahoe, 72 (29.5%), 70 (29%), and 100 (41.5%) respectively. The respective figures for Kumi (Sunch’ang) are 15 (9%), 20 (12%), and 135 (79%). A great regional disparity is evident here. The figures are based on Zenshō Eisuke, Chōsen no shūraku, 3: 785, 833, 834. 26 Quoted by Yi Hŏn-ch’ang, Han’guk kyŏngje t’ongsa, 75. The tenancy rate would, of course, vary from region to region and according to time period. For late Chosŏn, see Paek Sŭng-jong’s estimates: 4–7 percent wealthy landowners, compared with some 75 percent poor tenants: Han’guk sahoesa, 177–78. 27 For a detailed discussion of the taedong system, see Palais, Confucian Statecraft, chap. 21; Ching Young Choe, “Kim Yuk.” 28 Through the tribute tax, levied on households, local products (kongmul) were regionally collected by government-licensed merchants for the use of the royal house and the central government. 29 The cloth tax amounted to two bolts (p’il) for each able-bodied male. The cloth was, of course, produced by female domestic labor. 30 Yŏngjo sillok 71.26a–b (1750). 31 For the details of the debates, see Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 550–68. 32 Karlsson argues that the fact that in the late eighteenth century the government still extracted between 85 and 90 percent of tax liabilities despite severe crop failures indicates that not crop failures but state exploitation accounted for the high number of starving people. Karlsson, “Famine, Finance and Political Power,” 573. 33 For the details, see Yi Yŏng-hun, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, 249–344; Yi Se-yŏng, “18–19segi yangban t’oho.” Yi Yŏng-hun points out that “lean-on households” existed already in early Chosŏn and thus were not a phenomenon emerging in late Chosŏn. Nevertheless, their numbers apparently increased significantly from the late seventeenth century on. For an alternative view, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “18segi hojŏktaejang .” 34 Shikata Hiroshi, “Richō jinkō ni kansuru mibun”; Chŏng Sŏk-chong, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, 234–300; Kim, “The Enduring Institution”; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 285–424. 35 The thirty-two extant Kwangsan Kim household registers are in KKOK; they are tabulated in Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 109; see also Ch’oe Sun-hŭi, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi,” ha. 36 According to Yi Ho-ch’ŏl, technical innovations played a greater role in increasing rice production than improved irrigation, so that the rapid population increase in the eighteenth century is attributable largely to the expansion of rice fields and the increase of their productivity. See Nongŏp kyŏngjesa yŏn’gu, 376. Palais tried to assess productivity in terms of yield/seed ratios and

528

37 38

39 40 41 42 43 44

45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 4 9 – 3 5 2

concluded that productivity in Korea lagged behind that of either China or Japan. See Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 362–66. For a table showing the duration of tenancy in southern Chŏlla Province in the late nineteenth century, see Honam chibang komunsŏ, 348; Chŏng Tasan as quoted by Kim Yong-sŏp, “Chosŏn hugi yangbanch’ŭng,” in Chosŏn hugi nongŏpsa yŏn’gu, 2: 277 (1990). There is a general lack of data on the village economy. The recent discovery of household diaries and related documents preserved by the Hamyang Pak, who resided (and still do) in Chŏ’gok (Yech’ŏn), popularly called Matchil, was therefore a happy event. These records give a detailed picture of the Pak’s economic activities from the early nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. They were analyzed by a team of scholars in Matchil ŭi nongmindŭl. A few years earlier, a cache of similar documents originating from the Honam area were examined by a group of researchers in Honam chibang komunsŏ. Yi Ham, Unak sŏnsaeng munjip, purok, 5b–6a. Yi Hwang, Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ, 4: Ŏnhaengnok, 2.25b. Kim Pog-il, Namak sŏnsaeng ilgo, in Yŏnbang se’go, 456. Ch’oe Si-ong, Tonggang sŏnsaeng karye, ha, 11b. Kim In-gŏl collected some of these documents. See his “Chosŏn hugi chaeji sajok.” In 1688, for instance, Pak Se-ch’ae reminded King Sukchong of the usefulness of the community compact. See Sukchong sillok 19.15b; 27.29a. During Yŏngjo’s reign, Yi Yulgok’s compact was repeatedly praised for its effectiveness. Yŏngjo sillok 61.6b (1745); 63.15b (1746). See also Deuchler, “Ritual and Order.” Yŏngnam hyangyak, no. 56, 118–19; Yi Sang-jŏng, “Pyŏnggok sŏnsaeng Kwŏn-gong haengjang,” in Taesan-jip 50.29a–b. Ch’oe Yu-ji, Kanho-jip, purok, 17.4a, 12b–13a. Soa-bang and Chungbang-bang were situated in the southern corner of Namwŏn County, and Paegam-bang in its eastern part. Ch’oe Si-ong, “Yŏ Chŏng chiju,” in Tonggang sŏnsaeng yu’go 2.33a, 34a–b; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 218–19. Ch’oe Si-ong, “Yŏ Yi chiju” (1712), in Tonggang sŏnsaeng yu’go 2.35a, 36a–b; Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 106–7. Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 282–84; Paek Sŭng-jong, Han’guk sahoesa, 30–34; for a description of the order and sequence of such a compact meeting, see Deuchler, “Ritual and Order,” 306–12. This prohibition was first codified in 1666 (Sugyo chimnok, 217), and later repeated in the Sok taejŏn, 217. [Ŭisŏng] Kim Si-t’aek (1765–99), a great-great-grandson of Kim Pang-gŏl, lived in Chirye, east of Naeap, in Imha Subcounty. YGJ 1.16b. This village was recorded as a single-surname village in Zenshō Eisuke, Chōsen no shūraku 3: 477; it is located there, erroneously, in Kiran County. UKKM, wanŭi no. 10, 2: 85–92. The kind of Chinese characters appearing in the personal names of the tenants reveals them as nonelite, perhaps even slaves. The separation of wards (pundong) was especially frequent from the eighteenth century. For the details, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on, 501–20. Yi Mu’s memorial (1676), as quoted in Yi Sang-baek, “Sŏŏl kŭmgo simal,” 243. Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl 1: 365. Kim Pang-gŏl, Chich’on sŏnsaeng munjip, 2: 4.29b. UKKM, soji 96, 4: 886. Kim Yong-bo was the ninth-generation direct-line descendant of Kim Myŏng-il. Kim To-haeng, U’go sŏnsaeng munjip, 456. The author of the “Ode to the Red Cliff” was the great Song poet Su Shi (1037–1101). He wrote this piece while living in retirement as a result of his opposition to Wang Anshi’s policies. Kim Ch’ang-sŏk, Changgo se’go, 3: 8.43a–47a. Ch’ang-sŏk was a sixth-generation descendant of [Ŭisŏng] Kim Su-il.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 5 2 – 3 5 7

529

62 Kim T’ae-jung was a fifth-generation descendant of Kim Kŭg-il and Sŏng-t’ak’s father. 63 Kim Sŏng-t’ak, “Chongsukpu Chŏg’am sŏnsaeng ŏnhaengnok,” in Chesan munjip 15.23b–28b. 64 See the biography of Kim-ssi, [Ŭisŏng] Kim Min-haeng’s third daughter (1705–58), in Kim Nakhaeng, Kusadang sŏnsaeng, sokchip 3.23b–28b. The sale of land because of the high cost of funerals is evident in many extant sale documents. 65 For an interesting table listing the frequency of ritual occurrences and gift-giving as recorded by the Chŏ’gok (Matchil) Pak from the mid-nineteenth to the early twentieth centuries, see Matchil ŭi nongmindŭl, 342. 66 Ibid. 67 Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl, 1: 394. 68 For a “charitable fund,” see, for instance, Yi Sang-jŏng, “Ŭigye wanŭi pal,” in Taesan-jip 45.20a–b. 69 For the concept of “ownership” of mountains, woods, and marshes, see Pak Pyŏng-ho, Han’guk pŏpche, 198–99, esp. n. 150. 70 See, for example, the memorial of Yi T’an (1669–1718), governor of Kyŏngsang Province. MHPG 88.108. 71 Chŏng Ch’ik, “Non kŭmsan chi p’ye,” in Uch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 4.11b–13a. In 1999, one percent of the total land mass in South Korea was covered with burial sites. Newsreview, Nov. 20, 1999. 72 It is not clear whether or not sacrificial land was registered in the land registers (yangan) and under whose name. According to the Minji kanshū kaitō ishū, 160, the grave mounds (punmyo) belonged to the ritual heir (chongson), whereas the grave land (myowit’o) was the common property of the munjung. 73 For a comprehensive study of conflicts over grave land in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, see Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Chosŏn hugi sansong.” 74 Ch’ugwanji, 506–8; Sok taejŏn, 458–61. It is worth noting that the section “Adjudicating litigations” (ch’ŏngni) was a new addition in the Sok taejŏn. 75 KCKM, no. 786, 803. 76 Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang, 46–48, 223–24. 77 The kinsman in question was Yŏng, a fifth-generation descendant of Sang-hyŏng, that is, genealogically quite distant from Chong-hwan. Yŏng was a second son, which may explain his landlessness, and one generation above Chong-hwan. 78 For the document with Song June-ho’s explanatory notes, see Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang 48–51. 79 See ibid., 51–52, for the controversy surrounding the transfer of sacrificial land for Tae-yun. 80 UKKM, t’ongmun no. 86, 5–7: 264 (1990). 81 UKKM, wanmun nos. 1–12, 4: 168–70; Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang, maemae munsŏ. This document is in volume 2, which has not yet been published. I thank Prof. Chŏn Kyŏng-mok for letting me use it in manuscript form. 82 Sukchong sillok 30.20b, 32.10b–11a (1704); Sok taejŏn, 458–59. For a comprehensive study of disputes around graves, see Kim Sŏn-gyŏng, “Chosŏn hugi sansong.” 83 Taejŏn hoet’ong, 194. 84 YGJ 2.3a, 6.9a. 85 Yi Myŏng-o was a great-grandson of Kim Chin’s second daughter, married to Yi Pong-ch’un. 86 Kisan or Hwangsan are in Imha Subcounty. YGJ 2.3a. 87 For a membership list and chart, see Kim Hak-su, “Hwangsan’gye rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn hugi chaeji sajok,” 291–99. 88 Yi Po (1629–?), a former official, was a great-grandson of Kim Chin’s second daughter and a core member since 1687. 89 The documents related to the Hwangsan Association are reproduced in UKKM, kyean no. 4, 3: 348–58. They were studied by Kim Hak-su, “Hwangsan-gye rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn hugi chaeji sajok.” Kim Myŏng-sŏk was a disciple of Yi Hyŏn-il and famous for his scholarship and comportment.

530

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 5 8 – 3 61

90 There are more than a dozen records pertaining to the Samgye compact up to the early twentieth century. For lists of the extant documents, the membership rosters from 1623 to 1851, the revisions and amendments, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 217, 222–26, and Kim Hyŏnyŏng, “Chosŏn hugi sajok ŭi ch’ollak chibae,” 292–99; also Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Samgye kangsa.” 91 The Four Imperatives are (1) encourage one another’s virtuous deeds, (2) correct one another’s wrongful conduct, (3) associate with one another according to rites and customs, and (4) offer one another assistance in case of illness and calamities. See Deuchler, “Ritual and Order,” 294–95. 92 For the membership list and landholdings in 1724, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 227–28. Kim’s numbers differ slightly from those in Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Samgye kangsa,” 75. 93 The compact has survived until this date. The documents are preserved in the newly built Lecture Hall of the Three Rivulets (Samgye Kangsa) in Tundŏk. 94 Several terms were used for this kind of shrine: besides myou and sau, the most common were “portrait hall” (yŏngdang), pyŏlmyo, and simply sa. For an analysis of the different terms and their geographic distribution, see Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 92–93, 289. 95 Yi Hae-jun uses the term munjung sŏwŏn for the munjung-sponsored sŏwŏn. See his Chosŏn hugi munjung sŏwŏn yŏn’gu. Such a term does not, however, emerge from the contemporary sources. 96 Chang Hyŏn-gwang, “Sŏwŏn sŏl,” in Yŏhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 7.10a–12b. Chang (1554–1637) was Chŏng Ku’s major disciple, but was throughout his life an independently thinking scholar; under King Injo he received a sallim position and was variously appointed to high-level offices, which he usually declined. For a brief characterization, see Kŭm Chang-t’ae, T’oegye hakp’a, 1: 195–217. 97 Im Tam (1596–1652), a munkwa passer of 1635. Injo sillok 45.41a–b (1644). 98 For tables listing shrine construction from Myŏngjong to Sunjo and according to provinces, see Pak Chu, “Chosŏn Sukchongjo ŭi sau”; Chŏng Man-jo, Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 142–44, 190; Yi Haejun, Chosŏn hugi munjung sŏwŏn, 56–57. Their numbers differ, but until the end of the dynasty there was a total of close to five hundred shrines nationwide. 99 KNJ 11.11a–12b. Significantly, the YGJ was compiled before the building boom of private shrines set in. 100 [P’yŏngsan] Sin Ch’i-gŭn (1694–1738) was a munkwa passer of 1719 and, in 1728, a commentator (senior sixth rank) in the Office of the Royal Lectures. 101 Yŏngjo sillok 18.22a (1728). 102 The original text of the “Record of Sabin” (Sabinji) was introduced and reproduced by Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Sabinji,” 145–232. 103 Sŏn’yujŏng was built by Kim Chin. YGJ 3.20a. 104 The descendants represented Kŭg-il’s main line and Su-il’s line residing in Naeap, Sŏng-il’s line in Kŭmgye, and the nonagnatic Yu of Musil (Su’gok). 105 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng wrote the commemorative inscription on the main beam of the Portrait Shrine; “Sabin yŏngdang i’gŏn sangnyang-mun,” in Ch’angsŏlchae sŏnsaeng munjip 13.4a–5b. 106 Yi Myŏng-ŏn (1674–1738), chinsa (1699) and munkwa (1712) passer, belonged to the powerful Noron capital Hansan Yi and had a distinguished government career. 107 Sukchong sillok 59.15a; 60.1a (1717). 108 Cho To-bin (1665–1729) belonged to the powerful capital Yangju Cho. A chinsa (1691) and munkwa (1702) passer, he had a distinguished government career. 109 Sabin Sŏwŏn was destroyed on order of the Taewŏn’gun in 1869, but rebuilt in 1882 by Kim descendants and local Confucians. Because of the construction of the Andong Dam, it was relocated to Imha-ri in 1989, but rituals are no longer performed there. 110 Pun’gang Sŏwŏn, completed in 1702, developed out of Yi Hyŏn-bo’s study retreat (chŏngsa). A diary details the construction history: Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 452–53. It was destroyed during the Taewŏn’gun period, but reconstructed in 1967 and moved to its present site in 1976. 111 Ch’ŏngsŏng Sŏwŏn was built in 1608–12, destroyed under the Taewŏn’gun, but reconstructed in 1909. 112 Kim Si-on moved to scenic Toyŏn in 1640, and plans to build a memorial shrine for him there were drawn up in 1693, but realized only in the early nineteenth century. Kim Hak-bae was coen-



113 114

115 116 117 118 119 120 121

122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132

133 134 135 136

N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 61 – 3 6 4

531

shrined. Toyŏn Sŏwŏn was destroyed under the Taewŏn’gun. For the details based on Diary of Toyŏn (Toyŏn ilgi), see Kwŏn O-yŏng, “19segi Andong yurim.” I thank Prof. Chŏng Sun-u for providing me with a photocopy. For a list of Andong sŏwŏn and shrines, see MHPG 213.470–71. A more comprehensive list is in Andong ŭi sŏwŏn, 17–20; it lists forty-five sŏwŏn and sixteen diverse shrines. The Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok, compiled in 1973, lists eighty sŏwŏn in North Chŏlla with detailed information on their building history and biographical data of the enshrinees. Today, forty-five are still standing; the others were destroyed during the Taewŏn’gun period. I thank An T’ae-sŏk for providing me with a copy of Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok. O Pyŏng-mu, “Chŏnbuk chiyŏk ŭi p’yesŏwŏnji,” 144–46. See also Kim Yŏng-hyŏn, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, table on 128. For the list of “famous worthies,” see YSJ, kwŏn 5; Kim Yŏng-hyŏn, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 127–28. Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok, 44a–b; YSJ 3.7a–b. For Hong Sun-bok, see chapter 7, note 22. O Chŏng-gil (1558–?) passed the saengwŏn (1591) and munkwa (1603) and was famed for his filial behavior. He apparently fought Yi Kwal in 1624 and raised a militia force during the Manchu invasions. Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok 44b–45a; YSJ 3.5b–7a (includes the royal eulogy [chemun] of 1697); O Pyŏng-mu, “Chŏnbuk chiyŏk ŭi p’yesŏwŏnji,” 163–66; Kim Yŏng-hyŏn, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 127. Nobong Sŏwŏn was destroyed in 1868 and never rebuilt. Today, only a few foundation stones remain. Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok, 57b; YSJ 3.3b–5a (includes the royal eulogy of 1686). For biographical data, see chapter 5. For a fascinating study of the factional rift between Kwangsan Kim (Noron) and P’ap’yŏng Yun (Soron) in Nonsan (Ch’ungch’ŏng Province), see Yi Chŏng-u, “17–18segi chaeji No-Soron ŭi punjaeng”; for a similar study of Naju (South Chŏlla), see Kim Mun-t’aek, “16–17segi Naju chibang ŭi sajok.” Reports quoted in Yi Hae-jun, Chosŏn hugi munjung sŏwŏn, 148. According to Chŏng Man-jo, in the roughly seven hundred academies and shrines built during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries some fifteen hundred individuals were venerated. See his Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn, 148–49. Only sŏwŏn with a royal charter (saaek) were tax-free, but it is possible that even nonchartered sŏwŏn claimed this privilege. Yŏngjo sillok 47.38a–b (1738). The Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok lists eight sŏwŏn in all (of which three were chartered) and nineteen shrines, many of which were built in the Chosŏn’s last century. The statistical data are from Kim Myŏng-ja, “Chosŏn hugi Andong ŭi munjip.” For a list of munjip printing sites, see ibid., 89; UKKM, wanŭi no. 8, 6: 76–78; Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 382–87, 411–12. For an overview of chokpo production, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 31–41. Yun Tŏk-chun (1658–1717), a munkwa passer of 1679, rose to high offices and was also famous as a calligrapher. MTP, 1: 277b. MTP, 1: 278. Yun Haeng-im (1762–1801), munkwa passer of 1782, belonged to the sip’a Noron, who rallied around King Chŏngjo, and had a distinguished government career. In 1793, he was exiled to Namwŏn, and it is likely that he then initiated or assisted the revision of the genealogy. Suspected by the capital Andong Kim of being a Christian, he was executed in 1801. Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo, prefaces of 1706 and 1805, and “general editorial rules” (pŏmnye). Kim Ch’ang-hŭp was a grandson of Kim Sang-hŏn and a younger brother of the powerful Ch’angjip and Ch’ang-hyŏp. MTP, 1: 170b. The apical ancestor of these Andong Kim is Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng. See chapter 4. Kim Yŏng-jŏn is in MTP, 1: 170a, but without further descendants. He was an elder brother of Yŏng-su, the fifth-generation ancestor of Kim Sang-hŏn.

532

137 138 139 140 141

142 143 144 145 146

147 1 48 149 150 151 152 153 154

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 6 4 – 3 7 1

I was unable to identify this individual. Andong Kim-ssi sebo, “general editorial rules” (pŏmnye) of the 1719, 1790, and 1833 editions. Andong Kwŏn-ssi sebo of 1734 and 1794. For a discussion of chokpo falsification, see Yi Su-gŏn, “Chosŏn sidae sinbunsa kwallyŏn charyo.” See, for example, the graphic depiction of a kin group’s different descent branches (p’a) that is usually included in a chokpo’s introductory matters. The pŏmnye of the 1683 edition of the Pannam Pak-ssi sebo, for instance, notes that “to emphasize the agnatic principle” (chongpŏp), full information (courtesy name, life dates, official career, wife, gravesite) is given only for the senior main line (taejong chikp’a), and thus not for the collateral lines (chip’a). See Pannam Pak-ssi sebo, pŏmnye, 1b. A daughter’s name is never recorded; instead, her husband’s name is listed. See pŏmnye of Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo. For an additional discussion, see Deuchler, Confucian Transformation, 166–67. Postface written by Han Kwang-sŏp (1707–?), munkwa passer of 1747, to P’algojo to, in Ch’ŏngju Han-ssi sebo, 1: 8b. For this source, I am indebted to Song June-ho. Such diagrams were at times also compiled for mothers and wives. For illustrations of both types of documents, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 50–53. Because such personal records were usually handwritten, not many seem to have been preserved. In Song June-ho’s document collection, I saw a kwa’galbo compiled by the Wŏnju Wŏn-ssi in the late nineteenth century. In that record, the Wŏn listed their marriage relations with eight other kin groups. For this section on chokpo, I am indebted to Prof. Song, who generously let me use his collection. I also studied the chokpo collections of the Kyujanggak Archives and the National Central Library. The strong correlation between chokpo compilation and exemption from military service is a frequent topic of discussion. For sources, see Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 40. Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl yusŏn, 9ha, 313; Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 142–43. For the statistics, see Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on I,” 259–62. Prof. Chŏng counted forty-six surnames listed in the various Andong registers. Yi Chung-hwan, “Samin ch’ongnon,” in T’aengniji, 1: 35–38. See, for instance, Yŏngjo sillok 71.26a–b (1750). Yi Hyo-sun (1777–?) was an eighth-generation descendant of Yi Chun’s third son, Yŏng-do, and a chinsa passer of 1805. MTP, 1: 132a. KKOK, soji nos. 4–7, 84–86. For a discussion of these disputes, see Sin Sŏk-ho, “Heiko zehi ni tsuite,” pts. 1 and 2. Both the Yu Sŏng-nyong partisans (Pyŏng-p’a) and the Kim Sŏng-il partisans (Hop’a) issued their own accounts to justify their points of view. See Chosŏn sidae Yŏngnam sŏwŏn charyo, 27n42. Ho’gye Sŏwŏn was reconstructed in 1878.

Chapter 14 1 The government’s provisions for tax exemption or tax relief in famine years, for example, were clearly biased by factional politics, with Kyŏnggi and Ch’ungch’ŏng Provinces, the Noron heartland, being usually more generously treated than Kyŏngsang. In his analysis Karlsson did not take factional biases into account; see his otherwise interesting “Famine, Finance and Political Power.” 2 Chŏng Sil (1701–76), a munkwa graduate of 1739, served as Andong magistrate from 1755 to 1757. He was a disciple of Yi Chae. 3 UKKM, wanŭi no. 5, 6: 68–73; Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 403–7. 4 Yu Sŭng-hyŏn, Yongwa-jip, as quoted in Yi Su-gŏn, Yŏngnam hakp’a, 585n355. Yu was a sixthgeneration descendant of Yu Pok-ki, a munkwa graduate of 1719, and a militia recruiter in 1728. MTP, 2: 19b. 5 It is important to note that the Sunhŭng An were a widely dispersed descent group, so that the genealogical connections of the many branches do not seem to have always been clear. Ssijok wŏllyu, 379–85, shows many separate lines.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 3 7 2 – 3 7 5

533

6 This branch is known as the Kalchŏn An. See Andong Kalchŏn Sunhŭng An-ssi p’yŏn, 43. I was unable to establish a genealogical link between the Ka’gu and Kalchŏn An. 7 See tables in Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on (2),” 259, 262–63. From the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries there were only seven munkwa and twenty-two sama graduates. 8 For An Pok-chun’s biographical data, see chapter 12, note 162. 9 Besides An Pok-chun, two other An—An Sa-jun and an An Ik-chun—were listed as heads and deputy heads of the Local Bureau in 1748, but I was unable to identify them; they presumably were Pok-chun’s cousins. Chŏng Chin-yŏng, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on (1),” 276 (table). 10 Kim Sŏng-no (n.d.) was Andong magistrate from 1747 to 1750. 11 UKKM, t’ongmun no. 28, 5–7: 258 (dated pyŏngin, 1746?) (1990). 12 An Sang-ch’im (1718–90) belonged to a descent line collateral to that of An Chung-hyŏn. Waryongmyŏn chi 4.25a, 26b, 28a. Kim To-haeng (1728–1812) was a nephew of Kim Sŏng-t’ak. 13 An Kyŏng-wŏn (1706–75) was a grandson of An Yŏn-sŏk’s older brother, Ku-sŏk. Waryong-myŏn chi 4.24a; KNJ 11.11b; Andong ŭi sŏwŏn. 14 Although the term “middle people” (chungin) is generally used for the graduates of the miscellaneous technical examinations (chapkwa) and their descendants, predominantly residing in the capital, chungin was also used for the local hyangni in the countryside. I heard this term still used in this way some forty years ago in Andong. See also Han Yŏng-u, “Chosŏn sidae chungin,” 181–88. 15 Kwŏn Sang-il, Ch’ŏngdae ilgi, 2: 48 (1736/8/13). 16 UKKM, t’ongmun no. 24, 5–7: 256 (1990). This undated missive was sent to Sangju, probably around the mid-eighteenth century. 17 Yi I, Yulgok chŏnsŏ 7.49b–50a; Sŏnjo sillok 17.11b (1583); Kyusa, 11; Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 139. Kyusa (History of Sunflowers) contains official and unofficial historical materials relating to the secondary sons’ struggle for social recognition from the beginning of the Chosŏn until 1859, the year of its compilation. The author is unknown. Its title derives from a poem written by King Sŏnjo: “Sunflowers face the sun without choosing [growing] side branches; [the ruler’s] subjects strive toward loyalty—do really [only] primary sons do so?” 18 KCKM, no. 774, 795. There were in fact a few secondary sons who earlier passed the munkwa: the first under King Sejo, followed by one graduate in each of the next three reigns. There were two sŏja among the 472 munkwa graduates during King Myŏngjong’s reign. See Song June-ho, “Chosŏn sidae ŭi kwagŏ,” 135. 19 For a table showing the amounts of contributions and their effect, see Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong,” 111, 112–15. 20 Ibid., 112–21. 21 Low-level appointments meant “reputable posts” (yojik), i.e., junior positions up to senior fifth rank in the less prestigious Ministries of Revenue, Punishment, and Works and in some other government agencies. 22 For the details of this summary, see Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 142–45; Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong,” 124–29. 23 Mencius 4B.20; Lau, Mencius, 131. 24 Hong U-wŏn and Yi Mu (1599–1683) both had high government careers that closely followed the factional ups and downs. In 1675, Hong was the minister of personnel and Yi the inspector general; Yun Hyu seems to have served as the acting inspector general. 25 Sukchong sillok 4.20b, 27b–28a (1675). The full text of Yi Mu’s memorial cannot be found in the version of Kyusa I used; it is reproduced in Yi Sang-baek, “Sŏŏl kŭmgo simal,” 231–35. Although found guilty by the Sŏin of having aided Hŏ Chŏk in getting his secondary son into the bureaucracy, Hong U-wŏn and Yi Mu were spared capital punishment due to their old age, whereas Hŏ Chŏk and Yun Hyu became victims in the Namin purge of 1680. Sukchong sillok 13sang.10a (1682). 26 Yi Ik, Sŏngho sasŏl, 1: 261. 27 Yu Hyŏng-wŏn, a saengwŏn of 1654, suffered from the fact that his father had been a Pugin partisan

534

28 29 30 31 32 33

34 35

36 37

38

39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47

48

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 7 5 – 3 7 8

supporting Kwanghae’gun; suspected of plotting Kwanghae’gun’s restoration, he was killed in 1623. Hyŏng-wŏn lived most of his life as a recluse in Puan County (Chŏlla) where he wrote his famous A Miscellaneous Account of the Man from Pan’gye (Pan’gye surok). He had close contacts to such Namin scholars as Yun Hyu and Hŏ Mok. Yu Su-wŏn, munkwa graduate of 1718, sided with the Soron in 1722 and thus came under Noron suspicion later. He held only minor offices and spent most of his time as a recluse in the countryside. In 1755, suspected of rebellion, he was executed and his family enslaved. Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 147–50. For translated excerpts of writings by Yu Hyŏng-wŏn, Yi Ik, and Yu Su-wŏn on the secondary-son problem, see Sourcebook of Korean Civilization, 2: 194–207. Yu Su-wŏn’s work, Usŏ, had been submitted to Yŏngjo in 1737. Yŏngjo sillok 2.53a–54b (1725); Kyusa, 88–90. Deuchler, “Heaven Does Not Discriminate,” 152. Yŏngjo sillok 119.18b (1772); Kyusa, 112–13. “Prestigious offices” (ch’ŏngjik) were middle and lowerrank positions in such offices as the Office of the Censor General, the Office of the Inspector General, the Office of the Special Counselors, and the Office of Royal Decrees—offices that served as stepping stones to the highest bureaucratic appointments. They are only recorded in Kyusa, 113–14, and cannot be otherwise verified. Yŏngjo sillok 122.9a (1774); Kyusa, 127–28. According to field research conducted by Sunhee Song in the Andong area in the 1970s, sŏja used to be addressed neither with the appropriate kinship terms nor with due honorific forms of speech. For addressing their primary kinsmen, sŏja used the same terms of address and reference as servants and even slaves used toward their masters. Song, “Kinship and Lineage,” 318, 321. Also see Hwang, Beyond Birth, chap. 5. Pae Chae-hong arrived at these percentages by analyzing sama rosters. See his “Chosŏn hugi ka’gye kyesŭng esŏ sŏŏl,” 16. This kind of evidence is obviously limited. See also Peterson, Korean Adoption, chap. 9. Sunhee Song reports that the Ŭisŏng Kim decided in the 1930s to admit sŏja into full lineage membership (sujok) and to call them by kinship terms. Nevertheless, discriminatory practices began to disappear only after the Second World War and remained strongest in marital arrangements. Song, “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society,” 319–20. I rely here on the statistics collected from sama rosters from Injo’s reign onward by Pae Chae-hong in his “Chosŏn hugi sŏŏl kwagŏ.” They differ only slightly from the calculations of Song June-ho, “Chosŏn sidae ŭi kwagŏ,” 135. According to Song June-ho, there is no information about a sŏja graduate’s mother or maternal grandfather in the examination roster (personal communication, June 12, 1986). For the details, see Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi sŏŏl kwagŏ.” Kyusa, 135–36; Taejŏn hoet’ong, 174. Students of local schools (hyanggyo) and academies (sŏwŏn) were registered in rosters, kyoan and wŏnan, respectively; together with the local roster (hyangan), these rosters were collectively known as the “three rosters” (samso chi an). Yŏngjo sillok 119.41b (1772); Kyusa, 115–20; Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe esŏ sŏŏl,” 45–46. Kyusa, 121–22; Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe esŏ sŏŏl,” 47–48. See chapter 10. Chŏngjo sillok 3.23a–24a (1777). The kyoan was also called “green collar list” (ch’ŏnggŭmnok), a term that was also used for student lists of the National Confucian Academy and private academies. Yi Su-gŏn, “17–18segi Andong chibang yurim,” 190–91; Pak Hyŏn-sun, “17–18segi Yean-hyŏn sajok sahoe,” 63–73. See also Chŏn Kyŏng-mok, “Chosŏn hugi kyosaeng.” I have visited local schools where the east study hall was built on a higher platform than the west study hall in order to accentuate the social difference of their respective occupants architecturally. Chosŏn sidae Yŏngnam sŏwŏn charyo, 24; Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 291, 310n81. There is no



49 50 51 52

53 54 55 56

57 58 59 60

61 62

63 64 65 66

67 68

N o t e s t o p a g e s 3 7 8 ­– 3 8 3

535

such rule among the regulations that T’oegye established for Isan Sŏwŏn, which were usually observed by most Yŏngnam sŏwŏn. Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 81–82. Yi Chŏn-in (1516–68) was known for his filiality, serving his father devotedly when the latter, after being implicated in a plot against King Chungjong’s second queen, was exiled to far-off Kanggye (Hamgyŏng Province), where he died. The memorialist was Yi Nŭng-mo (1834–87), a secondary son of the Yi main line and a saengwŏn of 1867. For the details, see Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 283–320. The secondary line of Yi Hyŏn-bo started with the latter’s sŏja son, Yun-yang, who apparently was a chapkwa graduate of 1552; one of the ringleaders of 1884 was Yun-yang’s ninth-generation descendant, Kyu-sŏp (1850–1926). T’oegye’s secondary line started with the sŏja son of Chun’s great-grandson, Chŏn; Yi Man-hong (1852–1910) was a seventh-generation descendant of Chŏn. Both sŏja lines had brought forth civil and military officials. For genealogical tables, see ibid., 335. Cho Yang-sik (n.d.) was an eleventh-generation sŏja descendant of Cho Mok. Yi Man-do (1842–1910), munkwa graduate of 1866, ended his official career as a royal secretary. For the details, see Yi Su-hwan, Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn, 331–43. For an example, see Pae Chae-hong, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe esŏ sŏŏl,” 55–65; KCKM, no. 796, 806, dated with the cyclical date kisa, presumably 1749 or 1809. Kim Hŭi-yong (1767–?), a saengwŏn graduate of 1801, belonged to a Ŭisŏng Kim descent line that traced its origin from Yong-bi’s third son, Yŏng. He was the sŏja of T’aek-tong (1708–?), a saengwŏn of 1741. Hŭi-yong had two primary half-brothers (chŏkhyŏng), the elder of whom, Hŭi-sŏng (1741–1804), was a munkwa degree-holder of 1790. Note the discrepancies of the birth years. MTP, 1: 184b. Sunjo sillok 26.27b–28a (1823). Ibid., 26.31a–32b. Ibid., 26.42b–43a. Kim Hŭi-yong’s son, Tu-myŏng (1789–1882), passed, as saengwŏn, the munkwa examinations in 1825 and was first appointed to a magistracy; later he advanced to the office of a fourth censor in the Office of the Censor General. Tu-myŏng’s adopted son, Chin-su, passed the saengwŏn in 1840 at age seventy-four, and Chin-su’s son, U-yŏng (1846–96), a munkwa graduate of 1871, eventually also reached the office of a fourth censor. These data are based on MTP, 1: 184b, 185b. Kim Hŭi-sŏng belonged to a collateral line descending from Yong-bi’s third son, Yŏng. Paek Sŭng-jong, Han’guk sahoesa, 175–76. Paek bases his estimate on ward rosters (tongan) and household-size estimates. In contrast, Yi Chong-il’s view that the sŏja outnumbered the primary population rests on the hazardous assumption, based on genealogies, that primary wives could not remarry after the death of their husbands, whereas secondary wives were not thus restricted and therefore may have produced more offspring. See his “18–19segi ŭi sŏŏl sot’ong undong,” 32–39. For the sŏja’s contribution to Korea’s modernization, see Hwang, Beyond Birth, chap. 5. For a general study of hyangni nomenclature and functions, see Kim P’il-tong, “Chosŏn hugi chibang isŏ chiptan,” sang. See Kwŏn Ki-jung, “Chosŏn hugi Sangjumok hyangnich’ŭng,” and Chŏn U-ch’ŏl, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe.” Among the fifteen branches (p’a) of the Andong Kwŏn, who trace their descent from Kwŏn Haeng, three are hyangni branches. In the Pujŏnggong-p’a, there were sajok as well as hyangni descent lines, whereas the Tongjŏnggong-p’a seems to be a pure hyangni branch. See Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 108, 109n57, 126–31; Ppuri kip’ŭn Andong Kwŏn-ssi, 115, 120, 124–25. Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok, 2b. The Andong Kwŏn are still in charge of the administrative affairs of the shrine today, even though their sajok brethren perform the biannual sacrificial rites. For T’oegye’s piece, see YGJ 4.13b–16a. Related documents are preserved in the Samt’aesamyo and are reproduced in Chosŏn hugi hyangni

536

69

70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77

78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87

88

89

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 8 3 – 3 8 6

kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng. For a description of the Samt’aesamyo and its history, see Kim Kwang-ŏk, Munhwa ŭi chŏngch’i wa chiyŏk sahoe, 293–324, 400–404. For the two persons who receive “side offerings” in Anmyodang, a small shrine in the precinct of the Samt’aesamyo, and are commemorated on a hanging board installed by the powerful Kwŏn Ch’ang-sil (1729–97), see Sŏ Chu-sŏk, “Anmyodang so’go.” Yŏnjo ku’gam 3.7a–b; Tosan munhyŏllok, songnok, 8b. The name list of T’oegye’s disciples does not identify Kang Han or Kwŏn Min-ŭi as hyangni or hyangni descendants. Both are, however, also listed in Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok 5a–b. Kang was a non-Andong man (his pon’gwan was Chinju); his chinsa degree cannot be verified. Kwŏn Min-ŭi took the exam as kongsaeng, a general title used by hyangni descendants. Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok 3b; Yŏnjo ku’gam 1.6b; 2 (pyŏlbu), 5a–b. The term chung in chung-sŏ (hyangni and secondary sons) seems to point in this context to ordinary low-ranking hyangni. The catalogue listed crimes committed between 1621 and 1651. For the document’s full text and analysis, see Kim Hyŏn-yŏng, Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban, 266–82. For the various memorials, see Yŏnjo ku’gam 1.17a–37b. The memorial of 1774 was titled “Memorial of the hojang” (Hojang so). Both works have been studied by Yi Hun-sang in his Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni. I am indebted to his research. I was given a copy of the Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok by Prof. Chŏng Chin-yŏng. The Records contains the portraits of sixty-six individuals. For genealogical tables and biographical profiles of top hyangni, see apps. B and C in Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 126–37. For a cache of documents relating to Kwŏn Yŏng-hŭp’s family, see Yi Hun-sang, “Chosŏn hugi Kyŏngsangdo hyangni se’gye.” They were members of the powerful Kwŏn Tongjŏnggong-p’a. For a genealogical table, see Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 97. The provincial hyangni (kamyŏng yŏngni) were originally selected in rotation from all districts of a province. Versed in administrative matters, they were to assist the provincial governor principally with inspecting the local magistrates and in fiscal matters. The number of local hyangni with the proper qualifications to serve in this capacity was small, and in late Chosŏn the system was nearly monopolized by hyangni from particular areas, for instance, by the Andong Kwŏn and the Andong Kim from Andong. For the details, see Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 98–118. For a list of the writers, see ibid., 86. For Yu Kyu (1730–1808), see chapter 12. Kwŏn Hŭi-hak was a member of the hyangni Tongjŏnggong-p’a. Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng was sent to thank the Chinese for sending relief foodstuffs to the starving populace in the northwest. [Haeju] O Myŏng-hang (1673–1728), munkwa graduate of 1705, had an illustrious career as a Soron official. After the suppression of Yi In-jwa’s rebellion in 1728, he was made a first-class merit subject. For the relevant documents, see Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng, 405–42. Kwŏn Hŭi-hak, “Chŏnmin kuch’ŏ mun,” in Kamgodang-jip, 297–98. Kamgodang-jip, 293. Ch’oe Hong-gan (1717–?) was a saengwŏn of 1740. The kinsmen were the above-mentioned Kwŏn Yŏng-hŭp, Yong-ch’ing, and Sim-do. Kwŏn Hŭihak’s collected works, Kamgodang-jip, comprise the three diaries, biographical records, and transcripts of royal poems and citations. It is extant in a hand-written copy and reproduced in Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng. For the records detailing the construction process, the individual contributions, and a list of the participants at the inauguration and later ceremonies, see Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng, 443–502. Transferred to a new site in Ch’unyang in 1861, the hall was destroyed under the Taewŏn’gun one year later. Song Myŏng-hŭm (1705–68) was a descendant of Song Chun-gil to whom Hŭngam Sŏwŏn, built



90 91 92 93 94 95

96 97

98 99 1 00 101

102 103 104 105 106 107 108 1 09 110

N o t e s t o p a g e s 3 8 6 ­– 3 8 8

537

in 1702 and chartered in 1726, was dedicated in Sangju. The Song were connected to Sangju through Chun-gil’s father-in-law, Chŏng Kyŏng-se, who originated in Sangju. See Hyangni ŭi yŏksasŏ , 243–46. Sin Sŏg-u (1805–65) belonged to the mighty pŏryŏl branch of the P’yŏngsan Sin and held multiple high offices, in 1855 that of governor of Kyŏngsang Province. There were two Noron, one Soron, and two Namin. For the name list, see Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 227. Yi Hwi-jae (1795–1875) and Yi Hwi-nyŏng (1788–?) were distant cousins and important early nineteenth-century links in T’oegye’s scholarly lineage. Hwi-jae, in particular, is known to have excelled as a sŏngnihak scholar. For profiles of late nineteenth-century hyangni, see Kyung Moon Hwang, Beyond Birth, 181–207. Kwŏn Paek-chong (n.d.) belonged to Pujŏnggong-p’a, one of the Andong Kwŏn’s three hyangni branches. He seems to have been an early fourteenth-century figure. For the damaged text of the resolution, see UKKM, wanŭi no. 7, 2: 75–76. It is transcribed and analyzed, in Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban, 366–71, 409–11. It is possible, as Kim Kwang-ŏk surmises, that Kwŏn Paek-chong received such ritual attention because he was venerated by the hyangni as a kind of guardian spirit. Ibid., 367–68. Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 186n21. For lists of the places of origin of the incumbents, see ibid., 119–23. Typically, in each place from which provincial officials originated, they came predominantly from one indigenous hyangni descent group: the Kobu Ŭn in Kobu, the Kimje Cho in Kimje, or the Naju Na in Naju, etc. The two former are not listed in the MTP. For a graph showing the time spans of the lists, see Yi Hun-sang, “Chosŏn hugi isŏ chiptan,” 185. Similar name lists are extant in Kyŏngju and Sangju. See also Cho Kwang, “Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on chibae kujo ŭi ihae.” What are here called the Namwŏn Ryang hyangni descended from an individual in the twentythird generation of the Pyŏngbugong-p’a (see chapter 4). For genealogical tables, see Yi Hun-sang, “Chosŏn hugi isŏ chiptan,” appendices following 194. The Yŏngch’ŏn Yi are not listed in MTP. Were they a pure hyangni descent group? For the details, see Yi Hun-sang, “Chosŏn hugi isŏ chiptan,” 181–85. Honda Hiroshi has studied the history and activities of the Namwŏn hyangni in the nineteenth century and under Japanese colonial rule. Their sense of constituting a distinct social group has remained strong until recent times. See Honda Hiroshi, “Sinbun kyech’ŭngjŏk munhwa chŏnt’ong kwa kŭndae chiyŏk sahoe,” and “Kankoku no chihōyū ni okeru shūdan.” For some statistical data based on the Tansŏng census register, see Chŏn U-ch’ŏl, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe,” 59. For the Sangju hyangni, see Kwŏn Ki-jung, “Chosŏn hugi Sangjumok hyangnich’ŭng ŭi chonjae yangt’ae”; for a somewhat wider spread of hyangni surnames in top positions in Tansŏng, see Chŏn U-ch’ŏl, “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe,” 64. Documents concerning the Anilban (or -bang) of Andong from 1725 to 1891 are collected in Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng, 1–52. For an analysis of the Anilbang in Kyŏngju, see Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 40–71; for related documents, see Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye chipsŏng, 107–57. For a description of the Sangju hyangni, see Kwŏn Ki-jung, “Chosŏn hugi Sangjumok hyangnich’ŭng.” For hyangni settlement patterns in Namwŏn, see Honda Hiroshi, “Sinbun kyech’ŭngjŏk munhwa chŏnt’ong,” 417. Also see Yi Hun-sang, Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni, 204–7. For the development of markets, see Son Chŏng-mok, Chosŏn sidae tosi sahoe, 80–92. According to the MHPG, there were some 1,061 markets in the country, most of them in Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla Provinces. For a summary of these developments, see Yi Hŏn-ch’ang, Han’guk kyŏngje t’ongsa, 102–34. Kim Yong-sŏp, Chosŏn hugi nongŏpsa 2: 428–40 (1990).

538

N o t e s t o pag e s 3 8 8 – 3 9 2

111 Kwŏn Sang-il, Ch’ŏngdae ilgi, 2: 168 (1746/1/24); 456 (1757/9/29); 472 (1758/6/27 and 7/1). 112 The diversification of occupations in the eighteenth century is clearly reflected in the household registers of Sanŭm and Tansŏng analyzed by Yi Chun-gu, Chosŏn hugi sinbun. See especially app. 1, 268–70. 113 Yŏngjo sillok 32.3a (1732). The “Award Scheme for Encouraging the Rich” (Kwŏnbun pumin sisang chŏlmok) imposed contributions from 10 to 1,000 sŏm of grain. The abuses of the scheme got so severe that the “squeezing of the rich” was later prohibited. Yŏngjo sillok 121.13a (1773). 114 For napsok titles and the “price lists” for 1659 and 1661, see Ch’a Mun-sŏp, “Imnan ihu ŭi yangyŏk,” 100–102. See also Yi Chun-gu, Chosŏn hugi sinbun, 19–22. 115 According to a note in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 327, if commoners did not know their “four ancestors,” they did not need to record them—in early dynastic days this was presumably the case for most commoners. With the enforcement of the Five-Household Control Law, however, even commoners and slaves had to provide information about their ancestors and indicate their choronym. Lacking a choronym, they usually chose the locality of residence as their pon’gwan. 116 Pibyŏnsa tŭngnok, Yŏngjo 5/+7/7 (1729). 117 For such a suggestion, see Yi Chong-il, “Chosŏn hugi sasŏjŏk ŭi sinbun.” 118 U Ha-yŏng (1741–1812), Ch’ŏnillok, as quoted by Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, 70–71. 119 For the details, see Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, chap. 5, 175–207. For further examples of status change, see Yi Chun-gu, Chosŏn hugi sinbun, 226–32. 120 The percentage of examination graduates who entered the examinations as yuhak drastically increased during the Yŏngjo period. Song June-ho, Yijo saengwŏn-chinsasi ŭi yŏn’gu, 35–37; also Song June-ho, Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu, 120–22. The meaning of titles such as yuhak, haksaeng, and kyosaeng changed over time; they are therefore unreliable indicators of social change. See Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, 59–96. 121 The mid-dynasty code, the Sok taejŏn of 1746, introduced drastic punishment for false registration and evasion. Sok taejŏn, 132–33; Ch’ugwanji, 829. 122 This assumption, which unfortunately often continues to be uncritically accepted in modern Korean historiography, goes back to Shikata Hiroshi’s work on the Taegu household registers, which he analyzed merely on the basis of shifting titles. See his “Richō jinkō ni kansuru mibun kaikyū betsuteki kansatsu.” 123 Kat is the traditional headgear and top’o the wide white coat—both essential elements of the elite gentleman’s fashion. 124 Ilsŏngnok, Chŏngjo 10 [1786]/1/22, as quoted by Chŏng Sŏk-chong, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, 254. 125 UKKM, t’ongmun no. 86, 5–7: 264 (1990). 126 Sukchong sillok 47.24a (1709); Ch’ugwanji, 670–71; Sok taejŏn, 424. 127 See the stimulating considerations in Walraven, “Buddhist Accomodation.” 128 Sukchong sillok 7.12b–13a (1678). 129 Sugyo chimnok, 172–73. For the details, see Hiraki Makoto, Chosŏn hugi nobije, 142–47; Chŏn Hyŏng-t’aek, Chosŏn hugi nobi, 214–16. 130 At the end of the seventeenth century, the price for government slaves to free themselves was 160 sŏk of grain. A slave between fifteen and thirty years of age had to pay the highest price. The prices were calculated on the basis of the product a slave could have delivered through his/her service (sin’gong). Grain contributions were converted to money in the mid-eighteenth century. Sok taejŏn, 449–50; Sukchong sillok 61.1b (1718). 131 See Chŏng Sŏk-chong, Chosŏn hugi sahoe, 292. 132 Chŏn Hyŏng-t’aek, Chosŏn hugi nobi, 120–56. 133 Ibid., 82–118. The women’s personal tribute tax (sin’gong) was abolished in 1774. 134 Ibid., 238–45. Slaves attached to the Ministries of Works and War, to the offices of provincial and county administrations and to post stations were not included. 135 For the thirty-two extant Kwangsan Kim household drafts (ho’gu tanja), see KKOK, tabulated by Kim Yong-man, Chosŏn sidae sanobi, 109. 136 Ch’oe Sun-hŭi, “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi, ” ha, 84–92.



N o t e s t o p a g e s 3 9 3 ­– 4 0 4

539

137 See Karlsson, The Hong Kyŏngnae Rebellion, and Kim, Marginality and Subversion in Korea. See also Hwang, Beyond Birth, 265–69. 138 For a discussion of Yu Hyŏng-wŏn’s views on slavery, see Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 232–43. 139 Ibid., 252–53. 140 Ibid., 252–57. 141 Tung-tsu Ch’ü, Law and Society in Traditional China, 131–33. 142 Yŏngjo sillok 27.25a (1730). Cho Mun-myŏng (1680–1732), munkwa graduate of 1713, was a member of the P’ungyang Cho, a powerful pŏryŏl of late Chosŏn. He visited China in 1725. Besides having a distinguished government career, his daughter became the consort of King Yŏngjo’s first son. 143 Sok taejŏn, 436–37. For the details of the debates leading up to the law of 1801, see Chŏn Hyŏngt’aek, Chosŏn hugi nobi, 228–45; Hiraki Makoto, Chosŏn hugi nobije, 192–204. For an English summary, see Palais, Confucian Statecraft, 265–68. 144 Sunjo sillok 2.20a–21b. 145 Sunjo (1790–1834) acceded to the throne at age eleven and was guided by Queen Dowager [Kyŏngju] Kim (Yŏngjo’s second queen), who acted as regent until 1804. Sunjo’s queen was the daughter of the powerful [Andong] Kim Cho-sun (1765–1831). 146 See, for example, the “Memorial on Domestic Political Reforms” submitted by Pak Yŏng-hyo (1861–1939) to King Kojong in 1888, translated in Sourcebook of Korean Civilization, 2: 354–60. 147 Pibyŏnsa tŭngnok, 263: imo 1882/7/22; Hwang, Beyond Birth, 32. 148 MHPG 162.36b–7a. 149 The article repeated verbatim an earlier clause in the Kyŏngguk taejŏn of 1485. 150 For the Kabo Reform, see Hwang, Beyond Birth, 59–67, and Yu Yŏng-ik, Kabo kyŏngjang yŏn’gu. For a list of the resolutions, see Yu, ibid., app. 3, 229–39.

Concluding Reflections 1 I borrow these terms from Pye, Asian Power and Politics, 85. Pye’s understanding of the Chosŏn yangban is, however, a caricature. 2 It would be interesting to see how far factional interpretations influenced the examination questions and answers—a future research topic. 3 For the details, see Deuchler, “Despoilers of the Way.” 4 For a discussion of this tendency, see Koo, “Center-Periphery Relations and Civil Society in Korea,” 249–55. For a supporting view, see Haboush, “Academies and Civil Society in Chosŏn Korea.” For a discussion of the pro- and anti-Confucian arguments in Korea, see Duncan, “The Problematic Modernity of Confucianism.” 5 A lively discussion on whether or not the concept of “civil society” was applicable to China took place in the 1990s. For authoritative views, see Rowe, “The Public Sphere in Modern China,” and Rankin, “The Origins of a Public Sphere.” Both authors are critical of applying Habermas’s concepts to conditions of late imperial China. 6 Walton, Academies and Society in Southern Song China, 84–86. 7 Pye, Asian Power and Politics, 292. 8 Faure, “The Lineage as a Cultural Invention,” 29. 9 Nicholas, “Factions,” 28. 10 Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life, 48. 11 Zenshō Eisuke, Chōsen no shūraku, 3: 46–47. For Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla, 382 and 329 singlesurname villages were identified respectively, whereas for Ch’ungch’ŏng the number was 265, and for Kyŏnggi, 235. Documentation is also most abundant for Kyŏngsang and Chŏlla; it is difficult to account for the paucity of documents in Ch’ungch’ŏng and Kyŏnggi, except for greater war damage. 12 Chŏng Man-jo et al., Chosŏn sidae Kyŏnggi pukpu chiyŏk. Chŏng emphasizes that the investigations of his research team are preliminary. 13 For the details, see Kim, Marginality and Subversion in Korea, and O Su-ch’ang, Chosŏn hugi P’yŏngan-do sahoe.

540

14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

31 32 33

N o t e s t o pag e s 4 0 5 – 4 1 1

See Bol, “Neo-Confucianism and Local Society.” Faure, Emperor and Ancestor, 9–11. Szonyi, Practicing Kinship. Zheng, Family Lineage Organization. R. Watson, Inequality among Brothers. Beattie, Land and Lineage in China, 111–26. Cohen, Kinship, Contract, Community, and the State, chap. 6, esp. 165–68. Zheng, Family Lineage Organization, 284. Ebrey, Confucianism and Family Rituals, 56 and passim. Brook, “Family Continuity and Cultural Hegemony,” 32. I use Brook’s characterizations of the Chinese elite lineage as a foil for reviewing some particularities of the contemporary Korean elite. Ibid. See Palais, review of Yi Sŏng-mu’s Chosŏn ch’ogi yangban yŏn’gu, 206–7. Merchants were not allowed to enter the officialdom in Han times and were first admitted to the examination in the Ming. Ch’ü, Law and Society in Traditional China, 129n2; Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations, 132. For a good summary on the Chinese merchant class, see Mann, Local Merchants and the Chinese Bureaucracy, chap. 2. For the role of hyangni and secondary sons in Korea’s modern transformation, see Hwang, Beyond Birth. For the details, see Brockmeyer, Antike Sklaverei, esp. 156. For historical data, see Ch’ü, Law and Society in Traditional China. In Qing China, for example, even manumitted slaves were not admitted to the government examinations; only descendants of the third generation of a manumitted slave (provided that the manumission had been reported by the master to the government) were entitled to sit the exams. The punishment of a slave who seriously injured a commoner was strangulation, from Tang to Qing. Ibid., 132n6, 186–200. Watson, “Transactions in People.” The manual is Extended View of Rites (Kwangnyeram) of 1893. See Mun Ok-pyo, “Yesŏ e nat’anan yugyosik kwanhon-sangjerye ŭi ŭimi punsŏk.” It is appended to Yi Chae, Sarye pyŏllam (1977). The term “yangbanization” seems to have been first used by Kwang-kyu Lee, “Confucian Tradition in the Contemporary Korean Family.” It has subsequently been used as an analytical device in several studies included in The Anthropology of Korea. See especially Watson, “Yangbanization in Comparative Perspective,” 213–27.

Appendix A 1 There is no generally accepted classification of these documents. Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi was the first to describe them in a systematic way. According to him, komunsŏ comprise private and official documents, excluding printed books, diaries, memoranda, etc., produced before 1910. See his Han’guk komunsŏ yŏn’gu. The Academy of Korean Studies has been publishing such documents under the title of Collections of Documentary Material (Komunsŏ chipsŏng) since 1982. See also Yi Hae-jun, “Chibangsa yŏn’gu.” 2 Idu uses Chinese characters for their sound values to write Korean particles, endings, and auxiliary verbs in order to facilitate the reading of a text written in Chinese. 3 Cyclical dates consist of a combination of the ten Heaven’s stems (ch’ŏn’gan) and the fourteen Earth’s branches (chiji), making a cycle of sixty combinations. Because such a cycle repeats itself after sixty years, a date can be ascertained only in conjunction with a reign period. For example: kapcha (the first combination of the cycle) can stand for the twenty-sixth reign year of King Sejong, 1444, or the tenth reign year of the Yŏnsan’gun, 1504, etc. 4 There are two major reprint collections of munjip: Han’guk munjip ch’onggan and Han’guk yŏktae munjip ch’ongsŏ, published since 1989. Whereas the first collection principally contains the collected works of Seoul-based high officials, the second one also includes the works of lesser known rural scholars.



N o t e s t o pa g e s 4 1 2 – 4 1 4

541

5 Ch’oe Sang-jung, Minŭngjae-jip, purok, 3.3b. 6 Bloch, How We Think They Think, 116. 7 The materials on which epitaphs (myoji) were written varied greatly. Some were inscribed on stone, marble, or porcelain tablets, others on bowls, dishes, and jars. For illustrations, see Yŏngwŏn mannam Han’guk sangjangnye. 8 Sŏ Chu-sŏk collected tomb epitaphs of the Andong region in Andong ŭi punmyo. Although there are earlier compendia of funerary inscriptions collected from all parts of the country such as Chōsen kinseki sōran, more regional collections would be of great interest and usefulness to the historian. 9 In 1424, King Sejong ordered the compilation of local gazetteers for each province. The Kyŏngsangdo chiriji was compiled by Ha Yŏn, who was the provincial governor of Kyŏngsang Province in 1425. It is Korea’s oldest gazetteer and the only extant example of Sejong’s effort. It was supplemented in 1469. 10 The Sejong sillok chiriji, completed in 1454, served as a source for the Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam. 11 While serving as local magistrate, Chŏng Ku is known to have compiled seven different local gazetteers, but only the Hamjuji is extant. Because of the Imjin War it was printed only in 1603 by O Un (1540–1617), a T’oegye disciple. 12 Yŏngga was one of the many old names of Andong. 13 Kwŏn Ki, an Andong Kwŏn, was one of Yu Sŏng-nyong’s many disciples. He took the provincial exams (ch’osi) sixteen times, but never advanced to the final stages of the civil service examinations (munkwa). He therefore devoted himself to local tasks and is well known for his poetic talents. KNJ 11.30b. He also edited the revision of his kin group’s genealogy, the Andong Kwŏn-ssi sebo of 1605. 14 A hand-written version of the Yŏnggaji was completed in 1608, but it drew national attention only in the mid-eighteenth century, when the central government ordered each county to compile a local gazetteer for assisting a further revision and updating of the Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam that resulted in the Comprehensive National Gazetteer with Maps (Yŏji tosŏ) in 1760. A slightly shortened woodblock version of the Yŏnggaji was printed in 1899. It is appended to the Kug’yŏk Yŏnggaji published by the county magistrate of Andong in 1991. The original hand-written version was reprinted by Andong munhwawŏn in 1993. For a detailed publication history of the Yŏnggaji, see “bibliographical notes” (haeje) in Kug’yŏk Yŏnggaji, 20–30. All references to the Yŏnggaji refer to the printed version. 15 For a discussion of Song-dynasty local gazetteers, see Bol, “The Rise of Local History.” 16 Kwŏn Si-jung was an Andong Kwŏn well-known for his scholarship and filial devotion; he was one of Cho Mok’s disciples. His work has a “Kwŏn slant.” For the details, see Kug’yŏk Sŏnsŏngji, 8–15. 17 Information on Andong and Yean is also contained in the later Comprehensive National Gazetteer with Maps (Yŏji tosŏ), the Gazetteer of Kyŏngsang Province (Kyŏngsangdo ŭpchi) of 1832, and the Gazetteer of Yŏngnam (Kyonamji), compiled by Chŏng Wŏn-ho in 1940. 18 Yongsŏng is an old name for Namwŏn. 19 A revision of the Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam was first ordered in 1699/1700. Sukchong sillok 33.22b–23a (1699). The two scholars were Yi To (1639–1713) and Ch’oe Yŏ-ch’ŏn (n.d.). For the details, see Pang Tu-ch’ŏn’s (1655–1704) postface to the Yongsŏngji. 20 For Ch’oe Si-ong’s preface, see YSJ 1a–3b; Ch’oe Si-ong, Tonggang yu’go, 3.2a–5b. 21 The Yongsŏngji, reproduced (incompletely) in vol. 25 of Chosŏn sidae sach’an ŭpchi, was originally printed with woodblocks in 1708 and 1752. I thank Song Man-o for providing me with a complete copy. There is a newer and better printing with movable type, done in 1923, kept in the HarvardYenching Library.

Bi bl iogr a ph y Accessed via the Internet db.history.go.kr db.itkc.or.kr people.aks.ac.kr sillok.history.go.kr sjw.history.go.kr

Database of the National Institute of Korea History Database of Korean Classics Biographical database of the Academy of Korean Studies Chosŏn wangjo sillok Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi

Bibliographic Resources Ahn, Juhn-young. “The Merit of Not Making Merit: Buddhism and the Late Koryŏ Fiscal Crisis.” Seoul Journal of Korean Studies 23.1 (June 2010): 23–50. ———. “This Way of Ours: Buddhist Memorial Temples and the Search for Values during the Late Koryŏ Dynasty.” Han’guk pulgyohak 한국불교학 54 (2009): 35–82. Amch’ŏn se’go 巖泉世稿 (1890). In Taeyu munhŏn 大酉文獻, edited by Kwŏn Sŏg-yŏng 權錫穎. N.p., 1986. An Chin-o 安晋五. Honam yuhak ŭi t’am’gu 湖南儒學의 探究. Seoul: Ihoe munhwasa 以會文化社, 1996. An Chŏng-bok 安鼎福. Sunam ch’ongsŏ 順菴叢書. In HMCK, vols. 229–30. An Pyŏng-gŏl 안병걸. Karam Yi Hyŏn-il—kyŏngse ŭi ttŭt ŭl p’umŭn k’ŭn sŏnbi 가람 이현일—경세의 뜻을 품은 큰 선비. Andong: Korean Studies Advancement Center 한국국학진흥원, 2002. An Pyŏng-jik 安秉直 and Yi Yŏng-hun 李榮薰, eds. Matchil ŭi nonmindŭl 맛질의 농민들. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2001. An Pyŏng-uk 安秉旭. “19segi imsul millan e issŏsŏ ŭi wa ” 19세기 壬戌民亂에 있 어서의 와 . Han’guk saron 韓國史論 14 (Feb. 1986): 181–205. An Sŭng-jun 安承俊. “Chosŏn sidae sanobi ch’uswae wa kŭ silche—Yŏngju Indong Chang-ssi sojang komunsŏ rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮時代 私奴婢 推刷 와 그 實際—榮州 仁同 張氏 所藏 古文書를 中心으로. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 古文書硏究 8 (March 1996): 1–39. ———. “1554nyŏn chaegyŏng sajok ŭi nongŏp kyŏngyŏng munsŏ—An-ssi ch’i’ga pŏpche” 1554 年 在 京士族의 農業經營文書—安氏治家法制. Sŏji hakpo 書誌學報 8 (Dec. 1992): 37–48. Andong Chŏnju Yu-ssi p’yŏn (Su’gok chongt’aek) 安東全州柳氏篇 (水谷宗宅). In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vol. 44. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn 韓國精神文化硏究院, 1999. Andong Chuch’on Chinsŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 安東周村眞城李氏篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vols. 41–42. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1999.

544

Bibliogr aphy

Andong hyanggyo chi 安東鄕校誌. Andong: Andong hyanggyo, 1992. Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok 安東鄕孫事蹟通錄. N.p., 1824. Andong Kalchŏn Sunhŭng An-ssi p’yŏn 安東葛田順興安氏篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vol. 43. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1999. Andong Kim-ssi sebo 安東金氏世譜. 13 vols. Seoul: Andong Kim-ssi chung’ang hwasuhoe, 1982. Andong Kwŏn-ssi chokpo, Sŏnghwa pyŏngsin-bo 安東權氏族譜, 成化丙申譜, 1476. Andong Kwŏn-ssi chŏn’go 安東權氏典故. Andong, 1982. Andong Kwŏn-ssi Pog’yagong-p’a p’ajo sŏltan silgi 安東權氏 僕射公派 派祖設壇實記. Andong, 1994. Andong Kwŏn-ssi sebo 安東權氏世譜. 17 vols. 1734. Andong Kwŏn-ssi sebo 安東權氏世譜. 34 vols. 1794. Andong Pŏphŭng Kosŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 安東法興固城李氏篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vol. 49. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 2000. Andong ŭi punmyo 安東의 墳墓. Compiled by Sŏ Chu-sŏk 徐周錫. Andong: Andong munhwawŏn 安 東文化院, 1994. Andong ŭi sŏwŏn 安東의 書院. Andong: Andong munhwawŏn, 1994. Andong-bu ŭpchi 安東府邑誌. N.p., 1899. Andong-gun chijŏng munhwajae p’yŏllam 안동군 지정문화재편람. Andong: Andong munhwawŏn, 1994. Andong-si sa 安東市史. 5 vols. Andong: Andong-si sa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe 安東市史 編纂委員會, 1999. Armstrong, Charles K. Korean Society: Civil Society, Democracy, and the State. London: Routledge, 2002. Balandier, Georges. Political Anthropology. London: Allen Lane, Penguin Press, 1970. Barnes, Gina L. State Formation in Korea: Historical and Archaeological Perspectives. Richmond, England: Curzon Press, 2001. Beattie, Hilary J. Land and Lineage in China: A Study of T’ung-ch’eng County, Anhwei, in the Ming and Ch’ing Dynasties. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979. Bell, Catherine. Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. Berkowitz, Alan J. Patterns of Disengagement: The Practice and Portrayal of Reclusion in Early Medieval China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000. Biot, Edouard. Le Tcheou-li ou Rites des Tcheou. 2 vols. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1851. Birnbaum, Raoul. “The Deathbed Image of Master Hongyi.” In The Buddhist Dead: Practices, Discourses, Representations, edited by Bryan J. Cuevas and Jacqueline Stone, 175–207. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2007. Bloch, Maurice. How We Think They Think. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1998. Bol, Peter K. “Chu Hsi’s Redefinition of Literati Learning.” In Neo-Confucian Education: The Formative Stage, edited by Wm. Theodore de Bary and John Chaffee, 151–87. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. ———. “Examinations and Orthodoxies: 1070 and 1313 Compared.” In Culture and State in Chinese History, edited by Theodore Huters, R. Bin Wong, and Pauline Yu. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997. ———. “Local History and Family in Past and Present.” In The New and the Multiple: Sung Senses of the Past, edited by Thomas H. C. Lee, 307–48. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press, 2004. ———. “Neo-Confucianism and Local Society, Twelfth to Sixteenth Century: A Case Study.” In Smith and Glahn, The Song-Yuan-Ming Transition in Chinese History, 241–83. ———. Neo-Confucianism in History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2008. ———. “The Rise of Local History: History, Geography, and Culture in Southern Sung and Yuan Wuzhou.” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 61.1 (2001): 37–76. ———. “This Culture of Ours”: Intellectual Transitions in T’ang and Sung China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992. Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Translated by Richard Nice. London: Routledge, 1989. ———. In Other Words: Essays towards a Reflexive Sociology. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990.



Bibliogr aphy

545

———. The Logic of Practice. Translated by Richard Nice. Cambridge, England: Polity Press, 1990. Breuker, Remko E. “When Truth Is Everywhere: The Formation of Plural Identities in Medieval Korea, 918–1170.” Ph.D. diss., Leiden University, 2006. Brockmeyer, Norbert. Antike Sklaverei. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1979. Brook, Timothy. “Family Continuity and Cultural Hegemony: The Gentry of Ningbo, 1368–1911.” In Chinese Local Elites and Patterns of Dominance, edited by Joseph W. Esherick and Mary B. Rankin, 27–50. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990. Brown, Philip C. Central Authority and Local Autonomy in the Formation of Early Modern Japan: The Case of Kaga Domain. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993. Buswell, Robert E., Jr., ed. Religions of Korea in Practice. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. Cannadine, David. Aspects of Aristocray: Grandeur and Decline in Modern Britain. London: Penguin Books, 1995. Certeau, Michel de. The Pratice of Everyday Life. Translated by Steven Rendall. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984. Ch’a Chang-sŏp 車長燮. Chosŏn hugi pŏryŏl yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期閥閱硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1997. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi munbŏl” 朝鮮後期의 門閥. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 朝鮮史硏究 2 (1993): 223–72. ———. “Sa’gwan ŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi sarimp’a” 史官을 통해 본 朝鮮前期 士林派. Kyŏngbuk sahak 慶北史學 8 (Sept. 1985): 1–39. Ch’a Mi-hŭi 車美姬. “16segi munkwa kŭpcheja paech’ul ŭi chŭngga” 16세기 文科及第者 배출의 증가. Chosŏn sidae hakpo 朝鮮時代學報 6 (Sept. 1998): 29–59. Ch’a Mun-sŏp 車文燮. Chosŏn sidae kunje yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代軍制硏究. Seoul: Tan’guk taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu 檀國大學校 出版部, 1977. ———. “Imnan ihu ŭi yangyŏk kwa kyunyŏkpŏp ŭi sŏngnip” 壬亂以後의 良役과 均役法의 成立. Sahak yŏn’gu 史學硏究 10 (April 1961): 115–30, and 11 (July 1961): 83–146. Ch’ae Che-gong 蔡濟恭. Pŏn’am-jip 樊巖集. Translated by Nam Man-sŏng 南晩星. Seoul: Taeyang sŏjŏk 大洋書籍, 1975. Ch’ae Sang-sik 蔡尙植. “18–19segi tongjok-t’ŭksu purak ŭi silt’ae” 18–19세기 同族-特殊部落의 實態. (Pusan University) Inmun nonch’ong 人文論叢 26 (Dec. 1984): 427–52. Chan, Hok-lam, and Wm. Theodore de Bary, eds. Yüan Thought. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982. Chan, Wing-tsit. “Chu Hsi and Yüan Neo-Confucianism.” In Chan and de Bary, Yüan Thought, 197–231. Chang Ch’ŏl-su 張哲秀. “Yugyo sangnye ŭi ch’ohon e taehayŏ—yugyo ŭi yŏnghon’gwan yŏn’gu sŏsŏl” 儒敎喪禮의 招魂에 대하여—儒敎의 靈魂觀 硏究序說. In Ŭimin Yi Tu-hyŏn paksa hoegap kinyŏm nonmunjip 宜民李杜鉉博士回甲紀念論文集, 394–418. Seoul: Hag’yŏnsa 學硏社, 1984. Chang Hŭng-hyo 張興孝. Kyŏngdang sŏnsaeng munjip 敬堂先生文集. 1878. In the collection of HarvardYenching Library. Chang Hyŏn-gwang 張顯光. Yŏhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 旅軒先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 60. Chang Kyŏng-se 張經世. Sach’on-jip 沙村集. 1806. In the collection of Kyujanggak Library. Chang Se-ho 張世浩. Sa’gye Kim Chang-saeng ŭi yehak sasang 沙溪金長生의 禮學思想. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa 景仁文化社, 2006. Changgo se’go 長皐世稿. 10 kwŏn in 4 vols. Andong. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Changsu Hwang-ssi sebo 長水黃氏世譜. 1848. Ch’angwŏn Chŏng-ssi chokpo 昌原丁氏族譜. 1872. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Chi Sŭng-jong池承鍾. Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi sinbun yŏn’gu 朝鮮前期 奴婢身分硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1995. Chi Sŭng-jong and Kim Chun-hyŏng 金俊亨. “Sahoe pyŏndong kwa yangban kamun ŭi taeŭng— Sanch’ŏng-gun Tansŏng-myŏn Kangnu-ri Andong Kwŏn-ssi kamun ŭi kyŏng’u” 社會變動과 兩班 家門의 對應—山淸郡 丹城面 江樓里 安東權氏家門의 경우. Kyŏngnam munhwa yŏn’gu 慶南文化 硏究 19 (1997): 217–94. Chinsŏng Yi-ssi Sanggye-p’a sebo 眞城李氏上溪派世譜. Edited by Yi Ka-wŏn 李家源. 1988.

546

Bibliogr aphy

Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sebo 眞城李氏世譜. 1981. Chiyŏksa yŏn’gu ŭi iron kwa silche 지역사 연구의 이론과 실제. Han’guk saron 32 (2001). Cho, Hwisang. “The Community of Letters: The T’oegye School and the Political Culture of Chosŏn Korea.” Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 2010. Cho Ik 趙翼. P’oje-jip 浦渚集. In HMCK, vol. 85. Cho Kang-hŭi 趙康熙. “Munjung chojik ŭi yŏnsok kwa pyŏnhwa—Sangju chiyŏk han munjung ŭi sarye rŭl chungsim ŭro” 문중조직의 연속과 변화—상주지역 한 문중의 사례를 중심으로. Han’guk munhwa illyuhak 韓國文化人類學 21 (1989): 401–18. ———. Yŏngnam chibang yangban kamun ŭi honin kwan’gye 嶺南地方 兩班家門의 婚姻關係. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 2006. ———. “Yŏngnam chibang ŭi honban yŏn’gu—Chinsŏng Yi-ssi T’oegyep’a chongson ŭl chungsim ŭro han ch’ujŏk chosa” 嶺南地方의 婚班硏究—眞城李氏 退溪派 宗孫을 中心으로 한 追跡調査. Minjok munhwa nonch’ong 民族文化論叢 6 (1984): 79–121. Cho Kwang 趙珖. “Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on chibae kujo ŭi ihae—hojang sŏnsaengan-sangsomunsŏnsaengan-kangmudangsŏnsaengan” 朝鮮時代 鄕村支配構造의 理解—戶長先生案-上詔文-先生 案-講武堂先生案. Chindan hakpo 震檀學報 50 (1980): 189–257. Cho Kwang-jo 趙光祖. Chŏngam-jip 靜庵先生集. Reprint in Yijo ch’oyŏp myŏnghyŏn chipsŏn 李朝初 葉名賢集選. Seoul: Sŏnggyungwan taehakkyo, Taedong munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1959. Cho Mok 趙穆. Wŏlch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 月川先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 38. Cho Sik 曺植. Nammyŏng-jip 南冥集. In HMCK, vol. 31. Ch’oe Chae-sŏk 崔在錫. “Chosŏn sidae ŭi munjung ŭi hyŏngsŏng” 朝鮮時代의 門中의 形成. Han’guk hakpo 韓國學報 32 (1983): 2–44. ———. Han’guk kajok chedosa yŏn’gu 韓國家族制度史硏究. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1983. ———. Han’guk nongch’on sahoe yŏn’gu 韓國農村社會硏究. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1975. ———. “Koryŏ sidae ŭi sang-je” 高麗時代의 喪祭. In Tongyanghak nonch’ong 東洋學論叢, 145–71. Compiled by Namsa Chŏng Chae-gak paksa kohŭi kinyŏmhoe 藍史鄭在覺博士古稀記念會. Seoul: Koryŏwŏn, 1984. ———. “Nongch’on ŭi pansang kwan’gye wa kŭ pyŏndong kwajŏng” 農村의 班常關係 와 그 變動 過程. Chindan hakpo 34 (1972): 149–86. ———. “17segi ch’o ŭi tongsŏnghon—Sanŭm changjŏk ŭi punsŏk” 17世紀초의 同姓婚—山蔭帳籍의 分析. Chindan hakpo 46–47 (1979): 163–74. Ch’oe Chin-ok 崔珍玉. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi Sŏul sajok ŭl t’onghae pon chung’ang chŏngch’i seryŏk ŭi tonghyang” 조선전기 서울사족을 통해본 중앙정치세력의 동향. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 27 (Dec. 2003): 67–97. ———. Chosŏn sidae saengwŏn-chinsa yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代 生員進士 硏究. Seoul: Chimmundang 集文堂, 1998. ———.“Chosŏn sidae Sŏul ŭi sajok yŏn’gu” 朝鮮時代 서울의 士族硏究. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 朝鮮 時代史學報 6 (Sept. 1998): 1–28. ———. “Chungjongjo hyangyak sŏngnip e kwanhan yŏn’gu” 中宗朝 鄕約 成立에 관한 硏究. Han’guk sahak 韓國史學 6 (1985): 43–66. Choe, Ching Young. “Kim Yuk (1580–1658) and the Taedongbŏp Reform.” Journal of Asian Studies 23.1 (Nov. 1963): 21–35. ———. The Rule of the Taewŏn’gun, 1864–1873: Restoration in Yi Korea. East Asian Research Center, Harvard University, 1972. Ch’oe Ho 崔虎. “Chosŏn hugi Miryang ŭi sajok kwa hyangyak” 朝鮮後期 密陽의 士族과 鄕約. In Chosŏn hugi hyangyak yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 鄕約硏究, 145–68. ———. “18segi ch’o Sangju chibang sajok ŭi kyŏngjejŏk chiwi—Sangju yangan ŭl chungsim ŭro” 18세 기초 尙州地方 士族의 經濟的 地位—尙州量案을 中心으로. Han’guk saron 21 (1991): 145–76. Ch’oe Hwi-ji 崔徽之. Oju sŏnsaeng-jip 鰲州先生集. In Taebang se’go. Ch’oe I-don 崔異敦. Chosŏn chunggi sarim chŏngch’i kujo yŏn’gu 朝鮮中期 士林 政治構造 硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1994.



Bibliogr aphy

547

Ch’oe In-gi 최인기. “Cholchae Yu Wŏn-ji ŭi ŭi nongŏp kisul e taehayŏ—17segimal chibyak nongbŏp ŭi ch’idalchŏm kwa sŏngnyŏk nongbŏp ŭi tansŏ” 拙齋柳元之의 의 農 業技術에 대하여—17세기말 集約農法의 致達點과 省力農法의 端緖. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 22 (Sept. 2002): 75–126. Ch’oe Kye-ong 崔啓翁. Uwa sŏnsaeng munjip 迂窩先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 2516. Ch’oe On 崔薀. P’yŏmjae-jip 砭齋集. In Taebang se’go. Ch’oe Sang-jung 崔尙重. Minŭngjae-jip 未能齋集. In Taebang se’go. Ch’oe Si-ong 崔是翁. Tonggang sŏnsaeng yu’go 東岡先生遺稿. 3 vols. 1858. Ch’oe Sŏn-hye 崔先惠. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi yuhyang p’umgwan yŏn’gu” 朝鮮初期 留鄕品官 硏究. Ph.D. diss., Sŏgang taehakkyo, 1998. ———. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi yuhyangso wa kukka chibae ch’eje ŭi chŏngbi” 조선초기 留鄕所와 국가지배 체제의 정비. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 22 (Sept. 2002): 5–26. Ch’oe Sun-hŭi 崔淳姬. “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi Yŏnghaep’a mun’gi ko: Chosŏn sidae sangsok chedo charyo non’gu” 載寧李氏 寧海派 文記考—朝鮮時代 相續制度 資料論究. Sŏji hakpo 4 (1991): 25–61, and 5 (1992): 57–101. ———. “Chosŏn sidae chŏn-min maemae ŭi silsang: Tosan sŏwŏn sojang mun’gi (myŏngmun) ŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮時代 田-民賣買의 實相: 陶山書院 소장 文記 (明文)을 中心으로. In Chungjae Chang Ch’ung-sik paksa hoegap kinyŏm nonch’ong (yŏksahak p’yŏn) 中齋張忠植 博士 回甲紀念 論 叢 (歷史學篇), 267–80. Seoul: Tan’guk taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1992. ———. “Chosŏnjo sangsok chedo: Kwangsan Kim-ssi Yeanp’a punjaegi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮朝 相 續制度—光山金氏 禮安派 分財記를 中心으로. Sŏji hakpo 書誌學報 2 (Sept. 1990): 43–74. ———. “Kwŏn Tae-un chedongsaeng hwahoe sŏngmun” 權大運 諸同生 和會成文. Munhwajae 文化財 13 (1980): 31–43. Ch’oe Sŭng-hŭi 崔承熙. Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŏn’gwan-ŏllon yŏn’gu 朝鮮初期 言官-言論 硏究. 1976. Reprint Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1984. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hyangni sinbun idong yŏbu’go” 朝鮮後期 鄕吏身分 移動與否考. In Kim Ch’ŏlchun paksa hwagap kinyŏm sahak nonch’ong 金哲埈博士 華甲紀念史學論叢, 487–524. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1983. ———.“Chosŏn hugi hyangni sinbun idong yŏbu’go 2—Ch’ogye Pyŏn-ssi hyangni kamun komunsŏ e ŭihan sarye yŏn’gu” 朝鮮後期 鄕吏身分 移動與否考2—草溪卞氏 鄕吏家門 古文書에 의한 事例 硏究. Han’guk munhwa 韓國文化 4 (Dec. 1983): 39–68. ———. Chosŏn hugi sahoe sinbunsa yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 社會身分史硏究. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 2003. ———. “Chosŏn hugi sinbun pyŏndong ŭi sarye yŏn’gu—Yonggung-hyŏn Taegu Paek-ssiga komunsŏ ŭi punsŏk” 朝鮮後期 身分變動의 事例硏究—龍宮縣 大邱白氏家 古文書의 分析, 821–50. In Pyŏn T’aesŏp paksa hwagap kinyŏm sahak nonch’ong 邊太燮博士 華甲紀念史學論叢. Seoul: Samyŏngsa, 1985. ———. “Chosŏn hugi yangban ŭi sahwan kwa kase pyŏndong—Sŏnsan muban’ga No Sang-ch’u ŭi sarye rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 兩班의 仕宦과 家勢變動—善山 武班家 盧 尙樞의 事例를 中 心으로. Han’guk saron 19 (Aug. 1988): 355–84. ———. “Chosŏn hugi - ŭi sinbunsajŏk ŭimi” 朝鮮後期 -의 身分 史的 意味. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 國史館論叢 1 (Dec. 1989): 85–118. ———. “Chosŏn sidae yangban ŭi taegaje” 朝鮮時代 兩班의 代加制. Chindan hakpo 60 (Dec. 1985): 1–32. ———. Han’guk komunsŏ yŏn’gu 韓國古文書硏究. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1981. Rev. ed. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1999. Ch’oe Sŭng-no sangsŏmun yŏn’gu 崔承老上書文硏究. By Yi Ki-baek 李基白, No Yong-p’il 盧鏞弼, Pak Chŏng-ju 朴貞柱, and O Yŏng-sŏp 吳瑛燮. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1993. Ch’oe Yŏn 崔葕. Sŏngman-jip 星灣集. In Taebang se’go. Ch’oe Yŏng-hŭi 崔永禧. Imjin waeranjung ŭi sahoe tongt’ae—ŭibyŏng ŭl chungsim ŭro 壬亂倭亂中의 社會動態—義兵를 中心으로. Seoul: Han’guk yŏn’guwŏn 韓國硏究院, 1975. ———. “Imnan ŭibyŏng ŭi sŏngkyŏk” 壬亂義兵의 性格. Sahak yŏn’gu 8 (Nov. 1960): 1–35. Ch’oe Yu-ji 崔攸之. Kanho-jip 艮湖集. In Taebang se’go.

548

Bibliogr aphy

Chŏlla munhwa ŭi maek kwa Chŏnbuk inmul 全羅文化의 脈과 全北人物. Chŏnju: Chŏnbuk tae­ hakkyo, Chŏlla munhwa yŏn’guso 全羅文化硏究所, 1990. Chŏn Hyŏng-t’aek 全炯澤. Chosŏn hugi nobi sinbun yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 奴婢身分硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1989. ———. “ Chŏllado inmulcho ŭi punsŏk ŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŭi chibae seryŏk” 全羅道 人物條의 分析을 통해 본 朝鮮初期의 支配勢力. Yŏksahak yŏn’gu 歷史學硏究 10 (Dec. 1981): 105–31. Chŏn Kyŏng-ch’ang 全慶昌. Kyedong sŏnsaeng chip 溪東先生集. 1859. In the collection of HarvardYenching Library. Chŏn Kyŏng-mok 全炅穆. “Chosŏn hugi kyosaeng ŭi sinbun e kwanhan chaegŏmt’o” 朝鮮 後期 校 生의 身分에 관한 再檢討. In Song Chun-ho kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm nonch’ong 宋俊浩敎授 停年 紀念論叢, 213–52. Chŏnju: Kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe, 1987. ———. “Chosŏn hugi sansong yŏn’gu” 朝鮮後期 山訟 硏究. Ph.D. diss., Chŏnbuk taehakkyo, 1996. ———. “Ilgi e nat’ananŭn Chosŏn sidae sadaebu ŭi ilsang saenghwal—O Hŭi-mun ŭi ŭl chungsim ŭro” 日記에 나타나는 朝鮮時代 士大夫의 일상생활—吳希文의 을 중심 으로. Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’gu 65 (1996): 45–71. ———. Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Uban-dong kwa Uban-dong Kim-ssi ŭi yŏksa 고문서를 통해 본 愚 磻洞과 우반김씨의 역사. Chŏnju: Sin’a ch’ulp’ansa, 2001. ———. “Samgye kangsa e sojang toeŏ innŭn tonggyean kwa komunsŏ rŭl t’onghaesŏ pon Chosŏn hugi Namwŏn-bu Tundŏk-pang ŭi myŏt kaji mosŭptŭl” 三溪講舍에 소장되어 있는 洞契案과 古文 書를 통해서 본 조선후기 南原府 屯德坊의 몇 가지 모습들. Chŏnju sahak 全州史學 2 (Dec. 1993): 55–96. ———. “18segi no-chu punjaeng ŭi han sarye yŏn’gu—Chosŏn hugi pyŏnhwa toen sahoesang kwa kwallyŏn hayŏ” 18세기 奴-主紛爭의 한 사례연구—조선후기 변화된 사회상과 관련하여. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 26 (Feb. 2005): 143–71. ———. “19segi mal e chaksŏng toen Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang ŭi hojŏk chungch’o wa kŭ sŏngkyŏk” 19 세기말에 작성된 南原 屯德坊의 戶籍中草와 그 성격. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 古文書硏究 3 (Dec. 1992): 35–55. Chŏn U-ch’ŏl 全宇哲. “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe e issŏsŏ ŭi isŏ kyech’ŭng yŏn’gu—Tansŏng hojŏk ŭi punsŏk ŭl t’onghan sarye yŏn’gu” 朝鮮後期 鄕村社會에 있어서의 吏胥階層硏究—丹城 戶籍의 分析을 통한 事例硏究. Chindan hakpo 60 (Dec. 1985): 57–78. Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi komunsŏ 全北地方의 古文書. 3 vols. Chŏnju: Chŏnbuk hyangt’o munhwa yŏn’guhoe, 1993. Chŏnbuk wŏn’urok 全北院宇錄. Chŏnju: Hyanggyo chaedan, 1973. Chŏng Ch’ik 鄭 . Uch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 愚川先生文集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Chŏng Chin-yŏng 鄭震英. “Andong chiyŏk ŭi Imnan ŭibyŏng” 安東地域의 壬亂義兵. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 4 (Jan. 1990): 25–44. ———. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi Andong-bu chaeji sajok ŭi hyangch’on chibae” 朝鮮前期 安東府 在地士族의 鄕村支配. Taegu sahak 大邱史學 27 (1985): 51–88. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on yangban sahoe ŭi chisoksŏng kwa pyŏnhwasang, I—Andong hyangan ŭi chaksŏng kwajŏng ŭl chungsim ŭro” 조선후기 향촌 양반사회의 지속성과 변화상 I—안동향안의 작성과정을 중심으로. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 大東文化硏究 35 (Dec. 1999): 253–83. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on yangban sahoe ŭi chisoksŏng kwa pyŏnhwasang, II—Andong hyangan ŭi imnok inmul kŏmt’o” 조선후기 향촌 양반사회의 지속성과 변화상 II—安東鄕案의 入錄인물 검토. Taedong munhwa 38 (June 2001): 247–84. ———. “Chosŏn hugi kukka ŭi ch’ollak chibae wa kŭ han’gye” 조선후기 국가의 村落支配와 그 한계. Kyonam sahak 6 (1994): 81–108. ———. Chosŏn sidae hyangch’on sahoesa 朝鮮時代 鄕村社會史. Seoul: Hangilsa, 1998. ———. “Sabinji” 泗濱志. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 4 (Jan. 1990): 139–232.



Bibliogr aphy

549

———. “Yean Yŏktong sŏwŏn ŭi yŏn’gu” 禮安 易東書院의 硏究. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 安東文化 硏究 3 (Feb. 1989): 25–41. ———. “16segi Andong chibang ŭi tonggye” 16世紀 安東地方의 洞契. Kyonam sahak 嶠南史學 1 (Dec. 1985): 217–37. ———. “16segi hyangch’on munje wa chaeji sajok ŭi taeŭng— ŭl chungsim ŭro” 16 世紀 鄕村問題와 在地士族의 대응—을 중심으로. Minjok munhwa nonch’ong 民族文 化論叢 7 (1986): 85–112. ———. “18segi hojŏk taejang kirok ŭi kŏmt’o—-yu wa ŭi pigyo” 18세기 戶籍臺帳 기록의 검토—-類와의 비교. In Yi Su-gŏn kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm, Han’guk chungsesa nonch’ong 이수건교수 정년기념, 한국중세사논총, 735–68. Seoul: Kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe, 2000. ———. “18–19segi hojŏk taejang kirok ŭi kŏmt’o” 18–19세기 호적대장 기록의 검토. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 39 (Dec. 2001): 97–124. ———. “18–19segi sajok ŭi ch’ollak chibae wa kŭ haech’e kwajŏng—Taegu Puin-dong tongyak ŭi pun­ jaeng ŭl chungsim ŭro” 18–19세기 士族의 村落支配와 그 해체과정—大邱 夫人洞 洞約의 紛爭을 중심으로. In Chosŏn hugi hyangyak yŏn’gu, 185–236. Chŏng Ch’ŏng-ju 鄭淸柱. Sillamal Koryŏch’o hojok yŏn’gu 新羅末高麗初 豪族 硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1996. Chŏng Hun 정훈. “Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn chiyŏk munkwa kŭpcheja e taehan koch’al” 조선시대 남원 지역 문과급제자에 대한 고찰. Chŏnbuk sahak 全北史學 29 (Oct. 2006): 5–30. Chŏng Hwang 丁熿. Yuhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 遊軒先生文集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Chŏng Hyŏn-jae 鄭鉉在. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŭi nobi e taehan il koch’al—nobi in’gu munje rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮初期의 奴婢에 대한 일 考察—奴婢人口 問題를 中心으로. Kyŏngsang sahak 慶尙史學 4–5 (June 1989): 49–87. Chŏng Kil-cha 鄭吉子. “Koryŏ kwijok ŭi choripsik sŏkkwan kwa kŭ sŏn’gakhwa yŏn’gu” 高麗貴族의 組立式石棺과 그 線刻畵 硏究. Yŏksa hakpo 歷史學報 108 (Dec. 1985): 1–50. Chŏng Ku-bok 鄭求福. “Kim Mu ŭi punjaegi (1429) e kwanhan yŏn’gu” 金務의 分財記 (1429) 에 관한 연구. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 1 (Oct. 1991): 19–73. ———. “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo yangban ŭi ŭisik—Kwangsan Kim-ssi Och’ŏn komunsŏ rŭl chungsim ŭro” 古文書를 통해 본 朝鮮朝 兩班의 意識—光山金氏烏川 古文書를 中心으로. Han’guk sahak 10 (1989): 121–67. ———. Komunsŏ wa yangban sahoe 古文書와 兩班社會. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2002. ———. “1744nyŏn Andong Kosŏng Yi-ssi’ga ŭi —sojonggye ŭi ch’angnip munsŏ” 1744 년 安東 固城李氏家 의 —小宗契의 창립文書. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 13 (June 1998): 61–95. Chŏng Ku-bok et al. Chosŏn sidae yŏn’gusa 朝鮮時代 硏究史. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1999. Chŏng Ku-sŏn 鄭求先. Chosŏn sidae ch’ŏn’gŏ chedo yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代 薦擧制度硏究. Seoul: Ch’orokpae 초록배, 1996. Chŏng Kyŏng-hŭi 정경희. “16segi huban–17segi ch’oban T’oegye hakp’a ŭi yehak—Chŏng Ku ŭi yehak ŭl chungsim ŭro” 16세기후반–17세기초반 退溪學派의 禮學—鄭逑의 禮學을 중심으로. Han’guk hakpo 101 (Winter 2000): 92–120. Chŏng Kyŏng-se 鄭經世. Ubok-jip 愚伏集. In HMCK, vol. 68. Chŏng Man-jo 鄭萬祚. “Chosŏn chunggi yuhak ŭi kyebo wa pungdang chŏngch’i ŭi chŏn’gae, I” 朝鮮 中期 儒學의 系譜와 朋黨政治의 展開 I. Chosŏn sidaesa yŏn’gu 17 (June 2001): 85–110. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on kyohak chinhŭngnon e taehan kŏmt’o—chibanggwan ŭi hŭnghakch’aek ŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 鄕村敎學振興論에 대한 檢討—地方官의 興學策을 中 心으로. Han’gukhak nonch’ong 10 (1987): 127–52. ———. Chosŏn sidae sŏwŏn yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代 書院硏究. Seoul: Chimmunsa, 1997. ———. “T’oegye Yi Hwang ŭi sŏwŏllon—kŭ ŭi kyohwaron kwa kwallyŏn hayŏ” 退溪李滉의 書院

550

Bibliogr aphy

論—그의 敎化論과 관련하여. In Han U-gŭn paksa chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm sahak nonch’ong 韓 劤 博 士 停年紀念 史學論叢, 371–91. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1981. ———. “Yŏngjo 14nyŏn ŭi Andong Kim Sang-hŏn sŏwŏn kŏllip sibi—t’angp’yŏngha No-Soron ­punjaeng ŭi iltan” 英祖14년의 安東 金尙憲書院建立是非—蕩平下 老-少論 紛爭의 一端. Han’gukhak yŏn’gu 1 (1982): 49–83. Chŏng Man-jo et al. Chosŏn sidae Kyŏnggi pukpu chiyŏk chipsŏngch’on kwa sajok 조선시대 경기북부 지역 集姓村과 士族. Seoul: Kungmin taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2004. Chŏng Myŏng-sŏp 鄭明燮. “Kyŏngbuk chiyŏk ŭi sŏwŏn kŏnch’uk” 慶北地域의 書院建築. Hwech’ŏl sŏwŏn chosa po’go 훼철서원조사보고 4 (1993): 257–81. Chŏng Ok-cha 鄭玉子. Uriga chŏngmal arayahal uri sŏnbi 우리가 정말 알아야 할 우리 선비. Seoul: Hyŏnamsa, 2002. ———. “17segi sasanggye ŭi chaep’yŏn kwa yeron” 17세기 思想界의 再編과 禮論. Han’guk munhwa 10 (Dec. 1989): 211–39. Chŏng Sa-sŏng 鄭士誠. Chihŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 芝軒先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 56. New character p. 550 in bibliography: Chŏng Sŏk-chong 鄭奭鍾. Chosŏninsert hugi2 for sahoe pyŏndong yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 社會變動 硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1983. ———. “Sukchong tae kapsul hwan’guk kwa chŏngbyŏn ch’amyŏ kyech’ŭng punsŏk” 肅宗代 甲戌換 局과 政變參與階層 分析 . In Chosŏn sidae chŏngch’isa ŭi chaejomyŏng 朝鮮時代 政治史의 再照明. Edited by Yi T’ae-jin, 131–70. Seoul: Pŏmjosa, 1985. Chŏng Sun-mok 丁淳睦. Han’guk sŏwŏn kyoyuk chedo yŏn’gu 韓國書院敎育制度硏究. Yŏngnam taehakkyo, minsok munhwa yŏn’guso, 1980. ———. “Sŏwŏn ŭi kyoyuk munhwajŏk sŏngkyŏk” 書院의 敎育文化的 性格. Han’guk saron 8 (1985): 115–36. Chŏng Sŭng-mo 鄭勝謨. “Sŏwŏn-sau mit hyanggyo chojik kwa chiyŏk sahoe ch’e’gye” 書院-祠宇 및 鄕校組織과 地域社會體系. T’aedong kojŏn yŏng’u 泰東古典硏究 3 (1987): 149–92 and 5 (1989): 137–79. ———. “T’onghon’gwŏn kwa chiyŏk sahoe pon’gye yŏn’gu” 通婚圈과 地域社會本系 硏究. Han’guk munhwa illyuhak 15 (Dec. 1983): 121–37. Chŏng To-jŏn 鄭道傳. Sambong-jip 三峯集. Reprint. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1961. Chŏng Tu-hŭi 鄭杜熙. Cho Kwang-jo. Silch’ŏnjŏk chisig’in ŭi salm isang kwa hyŏnsil sai esŏ 조광조. 실 천적 지식인의 삶 이상과 현실 사이에서. Seoul: acanet, 2000. ———. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi” 朝鮮前期. Yŏksa hakpo 104 (Dec. 1984): 201–24. ———. Chosŏn ch’o’gi chŏngch’i chibae seryŏk yŏn’gu 朝鮮初期 政治支配 勢力硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1983. ———. “Chosŏn ch’ŏn’gi chibae seryŏk ŭi hyŏngsŏng kwa pyŏnch’ŏn—kŭ yŏn’gusajŏk in sŏngkwa wa kwaje” 朝鮮前期 支配勢力의 形成과 變遷—그 硏究史的인 成果와 課題. In Han’guk sahoe palchŏn saron, 89–128. ———. “Chosŏn kŏn’guk ch’o’gi t’ongch’i ch’eje ŭi sŏngnip kwajŏng kwa kŭ yŏksajŏk ŭimi” 朝鮮建 國初期 統治體制의 成立過程과 그 歷史的意味. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 67 (1989): 53–75. ———. Chosŏn sidae ŭi taegan yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代의 臺諫硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1994. Chŏng Tu-hŭi and Edward J. Shultz, eds. Han’guksa e issŏsŏ chibang kwa chung’ang 한국사에 있어서 지방과 중앙. Seoul: Sŏgang taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2003. Chŏng Yag-yong 丁若鏞. Chŭngbo Yŏyudang chŏnsŏ 增補與猶堂全書. 5 vols. Seoul: Kyŏngin mun­ hwasa, 1970. ———. Tasan nonsŏl sŏnjip 茶山論說選集. Translated by Pak Sŏng-mu 朴錫武 and Chŏng Hae-ryŏn 丁海廉. Seoul: Hyŏndae sirhaksa 現代實學社, 1997. ———. [Yŏkchu] Mongmin simsŏ [譯註]牧民心書. Vols. 4, 5. Edited by Tasan yŏn’guhoe 茶山硏究會. Seoul: Ch’angjak kwa pip’yŏngsa, 1984. ———. Yubaeji esŏ ponaen p’yŏnji 유배지에서 보낸편지. Translated by Pak Sŏng-mu 박석무. Seoul: Ch’angjak kwa pip’yŏngsa, 2000. Chŏng Yŏm 丁焰. Manhŏn-jip 晩軒集. In HYMJ, vol. 873. Chŏng Yu-il 鄭惟一. Munbong sŏnsaeng munjip 文峯先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 42.



Bibliogr aphy

551

Ch’ŏngju Han-ssi sebo 淸州韓氏世譜. 1796. Chŏnju Yi-ssi Korimgun-p’a sŏnjo yumunjip 全州李氏高林君派 先祖遺文集. Chŏnbuk, Imsil-gun: Ch’ilsan-gun p’a chongch’inhoe 全北, 任實郡: 漆山君派宗親會, 1975. Chŏnju Yi-ssi sebo 全州李氏世譜. 5 vols. N.p., 1949. Chōsen jimmei jisho 朝鮮人名辭書. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1937. Chōsen kinseki sōran 朝鮮金石總覽. 2 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 1974. Chōsen saishi sōzoku hōren, josetsu 朝鮮祭祀相續法論序說. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1939. Chōsen tosho kaidai 朝鮮圖書解題. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, 1919. Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng 朝鮮後期 鄕吏關係資料集成. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo minjok munhwa yŏn’guso, 1990. Chosŏn hugi hyangyak charyo chipsŏng: Yŏngam, Haenam, Naju 朝鮮後期 鄕約資料集成: 靈巖, 海南, 羅州. Compiled by Kim Ho-il 金鎬逸 et al. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe 國史編纂委員會, 1997. Chosŏn hugi hyangyak yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 鄕約 硏究. Edited by Hyangch’on sahoesa yŏn’guhoe 鄕村社 會史硏究會. Seoul: Minŭmsa 民音社, 1990. Chosŏn hugi nonmun sŏnjip 朝鮮後期論文選集. Seoul: Samgwi munhwasa 三貴文化社, 1994. Chosŏn hugi yangban’ga ŭi saenghwalsang 조선후기 양반가의 생활상. Andong: Han’guk kukhak chinhŭngwŏn 한국국학진흥원, 2004. Chosŏn sahoesa charyo 1 (Namwŏn) 朝鮮社會史資料 1 (南原). Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1990. Chosŏn sidae munkwa paeksŏ 朝鮮時代 文科白書. Compiled by Song June-ho and Song Man-o 宋萬 午. Seoul: Sam’uban, 2008. Chosŏn sidae Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang ŭi Chŏnju Yi-ssi wa kŭdŭl ŭi munsŏ 朝鮮時代 南原 屯德坊의 全 州李氏와 그들의 文書. Edited by Song June-ho and Chŏn Kyŏng-mok. Chŏnju: Chŏnbuk taehakkyo pangmulgwan, 1990. Chosŏn sidae sach’an ŭpchi 朝鮮時代私撰邑誌. 55 vols. Seoul: Han’guk inmun kwahagwŏn, 1989–90. Chosŏn sidae saenghwalsa 조선시대 생활사. 2 vols. Edited by Han’guk komunsŏ hakhoe. Seoul: Yŏksa pip’yŏngsa, 2000. Chosŏn sidae Yŏngnam sŏwŏn charyo—hyŏnhwang mit haeje 朝鮮時代嶺南書院資料—現況 및 解題. Edited by Yi Su-gŏn 李樹健 et al. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1999. Chosŏn sŏŏl kwan’gye charyojip 朝鮮庶孼關係資料集. Edited by Yi I-hwa 李離和. Seoul: Yŏgang ch’ulp’ansa 驪江出版社, 1985. Chosŏn ŭn chibang ŭl ŏttŏk’e chibaehaennŭn ka 조선은 지방을 어떻게 지배했는가. Edited by Han’guk yŏksa yŏn’guhoe Chosŏn sigi sahoesa yŏn’guban 한국역사연구회 조선시기 사회사 연구반. Seoul: acanet, 2000. Chosŏn wangjo sillok 朝鮮王朝實錄. 48 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1955–58. Chosŏn yuhak ŭi hakp’adŭl 조선유학의 학파들. Edited by Han’guk sasangsa yŏn’guhoe. Seoul: Yemun sŏwŏn, 1996. Chow, Kai-wing. The Rise of Confucian Ritualism in Late Imperial China: Ethics, Classics, and Lineage Discourse. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994. Chu Se-bung 周世鵬. Murŭng chapko 武陵雜稿. In HMCK, vols. 26–27. Chu Sŭng-t’aek 주승택 et al. Ch’ŏnhye ŭi ttang ŭiyŏnhan salm—Kail maŭl 천혜의땅 의연한 삶, 가일 마을. Seoul: Minsog’wŏn, 2007. Ch’ü, Tung-tsu. Law and Society in Traditional China. The Hague: Mouton, 1965. Ch’ugwanji 秋官志. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1937. Chung, Chae-sik. “Chŏng To-jŏn: ‘Architect’ of Yi Dynasty Government and Ideology.” In The Rise of Neo-Confucianism in Korea, edited by Wm. Theodore de Bary and JaHyun Kim Haboush, 59–88. New York: Columbia University Press, 1985. Chŭngbo munhŏn pigo 增補文獻備考. 3 vols. Seoul: Tongguk munhwasa 東國文化社, 1959. Clark, Donald N. “Chosŏn’s Founding Fathers: A Study of Merit Subjects in the Early Yi Dynasty.” Korean Studies 6 (1982): 17–40.

552

Bibliogr aphy

———. “Sino-Korean Tributary Relations under the Ming.” In The Cambridge History of China, edited by Denis Twitchett and Frederick W. Mote, vol. 8.2: 272–300. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Cohen, Myron L. “Lineage Organization in North China.” In Kinship, Contract, Community, and State: Anthropological Perspectives on China, 165–94. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005. ———. “Souls and Salvation: Conflicting Themes in Chinese Popular Religion.” In Death Ritual in Late Imperial and Modern China, edited by James L. Watson and Evelyn S. Rawski, 180–202. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. Dardess, John W. Confucianism and Autocracy: Professional Elites in the Founding of the Ming Dynasty. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983. de Bary, Wm. Theodore. Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy and the Learning of the Mind-and-Heart. New York: Columbia University Press, 1981. Deuchler, Martina. The Confucian Transformation of Korea: A Study of Society and Ideology. HarvardYenching Institute Monograph. Cambridge, MA: Harvard-Yenching Institute, 1992. ———. “Despoilers of the Way, Insulters of the Sages: Controversies over the Classics in SeventeenthCentury Korea.” In Culture and the State in Late Chosŏn Korea, edited by JaHyun Kim Haboush and Martina Deuchler, 91–133. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 1999. ———. “The Flow of Ideas and Institutions: James Palais, His Critics and Friends.” Seoul Journal of Korean Studies, 21.2 (Dec. 2008): 313–22. ———. “ ‘Heaven Does Not Discriminate’: A Study of Secondary Sons in Chosŏn Korea.” Journal of Korean Studies 6 (1988–89): 121–63. ———. “The Practice of Confucianism: Ritual and Order in Chosŏn Dynasty Korea.” In Rethinking Confucianism, edited by Benjamin A. Elman, John B. Duncan, and Herman Ooms, 292–334. UCLA Asia Pacific Monograph Series. Los Angeles: University of California, Los Angeles, 2002. ———. “Propagating Female Virtues in Chosŏn Korea.” In Women and Confucian Cultures in Premodern China, Korea, and Japan, edited by Dorothy Ko, JaHyun Kim Haboush, and Joan R. Piggott, 142–69. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003. ———. “Reject the False and Uphold the Straight: Attitudes toward Heterodox Thought in Early Yi Korea.” In The Rise of Neo-Confucianism in Korea, edited by Wm. Theodore de Bary and JaHyun Kim Haboush, 375–410. New York: Columbia University Press, 1985. ———. “Self-Cultivation for the Governance of Men: The Beginning of Neo-Confucian Orthodoxy in Yi Korea.” Asiatische Studien 34.2 (1980): 9–39. Duara, Prasenjit. Culture, Power, and the State: Rural North China, 1900–1942. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988. ———. Rescuing History from the Nation: Questioning Narratives of Modern China. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995. Duncan, John B. “Confucianism in the Late Koryŏ and Early Chosŏn.” Korean Studies 18 (1994): 76–102. ———. “Examinations and Orthodoxy in Chosŏn Dynasty Korea.” In Rethinking Confucianism, edited by Benjamin A. Elman, John B. Duncan, and Herman Ooms, 65–94. UCLA Asia Pacific Monograph Series. Los Angeles: University of California, Los Angeles, 2002. ———. The Origins of the Chosŏn Dynasty. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2000. ———. “The Problematic Modernity of Confucianism: The Question of “Civil Society” in Chosŏn Korea.” In Korean Society: Civil Society, Democracy, and the State, edited by Charles K. Armstrong, 36–56. London: Routledge, 2002. Ebrey, Patricia B., trans. Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals: A Twelfth-Century Chinese Manual for the Performance of Cappings, Weddings, Funerals, and Ancestral Rites. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991. ———. Confucianism and Family Rituals in Imperial China: A Social History of Writing about Rites. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991.



Bibliogr aphy

553

Ebrey, Patricia B., and Peter N. Gregory, eds. Religion and Society in T’ang and Sung China. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1993. Elisonas, Jurgis. “The Inseparable Trinity: Japan’s Relations with China and Korea.” In Early Modern Japan, edited by John W. Hall and James McClain, vol. 4 of The Cambridge History of Japan, 235–300. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. Elman, Benjamin A. A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. Elman, Benjamin A., and Martin Kern, eds. Statecraft and Classical Learning: The Rituals of Zhou in East Asian History. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Endicott-West, Elisabeth. Mongolian Rule in China. Local Administration in the Yuan Dynasty. Cambridge, MA: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1989. Epistolary Korea: Letters in the Communicative Space of the Chosŏn, 1392–1910. Edited by JaHyun Kim Haboush. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. Faure, David. Emperor and Ancestors: State and Lineage in South China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007. ———. “The Lineage as a Cultural Invention: The Case of the Pearl River Delta.” Modern China 15.1 (Jan. 1989): 4–36. ———. The Structure of Chinese Rural Society: Lineage and Village in the Eastern New Territories, Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1986. Faure, David, and Helen F. Siu, eds. Down to Earth: The Territorial Bond in South China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995. Faure, David, and Tao Tao Liu, eds. Town and Country in China: Identity and Perception. Houndmills, England: Palgrave, 2002. Fortes, Meyer. Kinship and the Social Order: The Legacy of Lewis Henry Morgan. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969. Fried, Morton H. The Evolution of Political Society: An Essay in Political Anthropology. New York: Random House, 1967. Glahn, Richard von. The Sinister Way: The Divine and the Demonic in Chinese Religious Culture. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004. Haboush, JaHyun Kim. A Heritage of Kings: One Man’s Monarchy in the Confucian World. New York: Columbia University Press, 1988. ———. “Academies and Civil Society in Chosŏn Korea.” In La société civile face à l’État, edited by Léon Vandermeersch, 381–90. Paris: École Française d’Extrême Orient, 1994. ———. “Constructing the Center: The Ritual Controversy and the Search for a New Identity in Seventeenth-Century Korea.” In Culture and the State in Late Chosŏn Korea, edited by JaHyun Kim Haboush and Martina Deuchler, 46–90. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 1999. Haedong chido 海東地圖. 3 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo, Kyujanggak, 1996. Hahoe P’ungsan Yu-ssi p’yŏn 河回豊山柳氏篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vols. 15–19, 52. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, (vols. 15–19) 1994 and (vol. 52) 2000. Hahoe P’ungsan Yu-ssi p’yŏn 河回豊山柳氏篇, chŏngsŏbon 正書本. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vol. 59. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 2000. Haley, John Owen. Authority without Power: Law and the Japanese Paradox. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991. Han Ki-bŏm 韓基範. “17segi sŏŏl ŭi chongpŏpchŏk chiwi— ŭi punsŏk ŭl chungsim ŭro” 17世紀 庶孼의 宗法的地位—의 分析을 中心으로. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 81 (1998): 111–42. Han Mun-jong 韓文鐘. “Chŏnbuk chibang ŭi sŏwŏn-sau e taehan si’go— ŭl chungsim ŭro” 全北地方의 書院-祠宇에 대한 試考—을 중심으로. Chŏnbuk munhwa nonch’ong 3 (Dec. 1989): 157–86.

554

Bibliogr aphy

Han Myŏng-gi 韓明基. “Kwanghae’gundae ŭi taebuk seryŏk kwa chŏngguk ŭi tonghyang” 光海君代의 大北勢力과 政局의 動向. Han’guk saron 20 (Nov. 1988): 269–342. Han Sang-gwŏn 韓相權. “16–17segi hyangyak ŭi kigu wa sŏngkyŏk” 16–17세기 鄕約의 機構와 性格. Chindan hakpo 58 (Dec. 1984): 17–68. Han U-gŭn 韓 劤. Sŏngho Yi Ik yŏn’gu 星湖 李瀷 硏究. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1980. Han Yŏng-guk 韓榮國. “Chosŏn chungyŏp ŭi nobi kyŏrhon yangt’ae” 朝鮮中葉의 奴婢結婚樣態. Yŏksa hakpo 75–76 (Dec. 1977): 177–97. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŏnŭ sajok kamun ŭi chanyŏ saengsan kwa sumyŏng” 朝鮮後期 어느 士族家 門의 子女生産과 壽命. In T’aegwa Hŏ Sŏn-do sŏnsaeng chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm, Han’guk sahak nonch’ong 擇窩 許善道先生 停年紀念, 韓國史學論叢, 533–58. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1992. ———. “Chosŏn wangjo hojŏk ŭi kich’ojŏk yŏn’gu” 朝鮮王朝 戶籍의 基礎的 硏究. Han’guk saron 6 (1985): 191–398. Han Yŏng-u 韓永愚. Chŏng To-jŏn sasang ŭi yŏn’gu 鄭道傳思想의 硏究. 1973. Rev. ed. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1983. ———. Chosŏn chŏn’gi sahoe kyŏngje yŏn’gu 朝鮮前期 社會經濟硏究. Seoul: Ŭryu munhwasa, 1983. ———. “Chosŏn sidae chungin ŭi sinbun-kyegŭpchŏk sŏngkyŏk” 朝鮮時代 中人의 身分-階級的 性 格. Han’guk munhwa 9 (Nov. 1988): 179–209. ———. Chosŏn sidae sinbunsa yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代 身分史 硏究. Seoul: Chimmundang, 1997. ———. Chosŏn susŏnggi chegallyang—Yang Sŏng-ji 조선 수성기 제갈량—양성지. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 2008. ———. “Yŏmal Sŏnch’o hallyang kwa kŭ chiwi” 麗末鮮初 閑良과 그 地位. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 4 (1969): 33–75. Han’guk chibangsa yŏn’gu ŭi hyŏnhwang kwa kwaje 韓國地方史 硏究의 現況과 課題. Edited by Han’guksa yŏn’guhoe. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 2000. Han’guk ch’injok chedo yŏn’gu 韓國親族制度硏究. Edited by Yŏksa hakhoe. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1992. Han’guk chungse sahoe haech’egi ŭi chemunje 韓國中世 社會解體期의 諸問題. Edited by Kŭndaesa yŏn’guhoe 近代史硏究會. 2 vols. Seoul: Tosŏch’ulp’an han’ul 도서출판한울, 1987. Han’guk inmyŏng taesajŏn 韓國人名大事典. Seoul: Sin’gu munhwasa 新丘文化社, 1967. Han’guk munjip ch’onggan 韓國文集叢刊. Seoul: Minjok munhwa ch’ujinhoe, 1988–2005. Han’guk sahoe palchŏn saron 韓國社會發展史論. Edited by Chu Po-don 朱甫暾 et al. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1992. Han’guk sangdae komunsŏ charyo chipsŏng 韓國上代古文書資料集成. Edited by Yi Ki-baek. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1987. Han’guk sŏngssi tae’gwan 韓國姓氏大觀. Seoul: Ch’angjosa 創造社, 1973. Han’guk ŭi hyangch’on minsokchi I—Kyŏngsang pukto p’yŏn. 韓國의 鄕村民俗誌 I—慶尙北道篇. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1992. Han’guk yŏktae munjip ch’ongsŏ 韓國歷代文集叢書. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 1989–. Han’gukhak kich’o charyo sŏnjip, kŭnse 2 p’yŏn 韓國學基礎資料選集, 近世 2 篇. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1995. Hanhwŏndang ŭi saengae wa sasang 寒暄堂의 生涯와 思想. Edited by Pae Chong-ho 裵宗鎬 and Kang Chu-jin 姜周鎭. Seoul: Hanhwŏndang sŏnsaeng kinyŏm saŏpsa, 1980. Hattori Tamio 服部民夫. Kankoku: Nettowāku to seiji bunka 韓國: ネツトワクト 政治文化. Tokyo: Uni­ versity of Tokyo Press, 1992. Hiraki Makoto 平木 實. Chosŏn hugi nobije yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期奴婢制硏究. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1982. Hŏ Hŭng-sik 許興植. Koryŏ kwagŏ chedosa yŏn’gu 高麗科擧制度史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1981. ———. Koryŏ pulgyosa yŏn’gu 高麗佛敎史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1986. Hŏ Kwŏn-su 許捲洙. Chosŏn hugi Namin kwa Sŏin ŭi hangmunjŏk taerip 朝鮮後期 南人과 西人의 學 問的 對立. Seoul: Pŏbin munhwasa 法仁文化社, 1993. ———. Nammyŏng Cho Sik 남명 조식. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 2006. Ho’gu ch’ongsu 戶口總數. Reprint. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo, Kyujanggak, 1996. Honam chibang komunsŏ kich’o yŏn’gu 호남지방 고문서 기초연구. By Chŏng Ku-bok et al. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1999.



Bibliogr aphy

555

Honam chŏrŭirok 湖南節義錄. 6 vols. In the collection of Kyujanggak Library. Preface dated 1799. Honam inmul chi 湖南人物志. Edited by Honam inmul chi p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe. N.p., 1991. Honam ŭpchi 湖南邑誌. 10 vols. In the collection of Kyujanggak Library. 1871. Honda Hiroshi 本田 洋. “Kankoku no chihōyū ni okeru shūdan to bunka dentō—shokuminchiki Namwŏnyū no toshika to zaichi seiryoku no dōkō” 韓國の 地方邑における集團と 文化傳統—植民地期南原邑の都市化と 在地勢力の動向. Ajia-Ahurika gongo bunka kenkyū 58 (Sept. 1999): 119–202. ———. “Rizoku to minbun dentō no keisei: Namwŏn chiiki no jirei kara” 吏族と身分傳統の形成—南 原地域の事例から. Kankoku-Chōsen no bunka to shakai 韓國-朝鮮の文化と社會 3 (2004): 23–72. ———. “Sinbun kyech’ŭngjŏk munhwa chŏnt’ong kwa kŭndae chiyŏk sahoe—Namwŏn ijok ŭi sarye rŭl chungsim ŭro” 身分階層的 文化傳統과 近代 地域社會—南原 吏族의 事例를 中心으로. In Exploring the Origin of Homo Koreanus, 414–34. Proceedings of the Keimyung International Conference on Korean Studies in Commemoration of the 500th Anniversary of T’oegye’s Birth, Taegu, 2001. Hong Sŭng-gi 洪承基. Koryŏ sahoesa yŏn’gu 高麗社會史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2001. ———. Koryŏ sidae nobi yŏn’gu 高麗時代 奴婢硏究. Seoul: Han’guk yŏn’guwŏn, 1981. Hŭnghae Pae-ssi chokpo 興海裵氏族譜. 3 vols. Andong, 1992. Hŭngsŏng Chang-ssi sebo 興城張氏世譜. 1931. Huters, Theodore, R. Bin Wong, and Pauline Yu, eds. Culture and the State in Chinese History: Conventions, Accomodations, and Critiques. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997. Hwang Chong-hae 黃宗海. Huch’ŏn-jip 朽淺集. 4 vols. 1713. Hwang, Kyung Moon. Beyond Birth: Social Status in the Emergence of Modern Korea. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2004. Hwang P’ae-gang 黃浿江. Imjin waeran kwa silgi munhak 壬辰倭亂과 實記文學. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1992. Hwang Ul-lyong 黃雲龍. Koryŏ pŏlchok e kwanhan yŏn’gu 高麗 閥族에 관한 硏究. Taegu: Ch’inhaksa 親學社, 1978. Hwech’ŏl sŏwŏn chosa pogo 毁撤書院調査報告. Hyangt’osa yŏn’gu ch’ongsŏ no. 4 鄕土史硏究叢書 no.4. Compiled by Han’guk hyangt’osa yŏn’gu chŏn’guk hyŏbŭihoe 韓國鄕土史 硏究全國協議會. N.p., 1993. Hyangni ŭi yŏksasŏ kwa kŭ sokp’yŏn ŭl p’yŏnch’an han Sangju ŭi hyangni chisig’in Yi Myŏng-gu kamun kwa kŭdŭl ŭi munsŏ 鄕吏의 歷史書 과 그 續編을 編纂한 尙州의 鄕 吏 知識人 李明九 家門과 그들의 文書. Edited by Yi Hun-sang. Seoul: Sŏgang taehakkyo inmun­ kwahak yŏn’guso 西江大學校 人文科學硏究所, 1992. Hymes, Robert P. Statesmen and Gentlemen: The Elite of Fu-chou, Chiang-hsi in Northern and Southern Sung. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. Hyŏn Sang-yun 玄相允. Chosŏn yuhaksa 朝鮮儒學史. Seoul: Minjung sŏ’gwan 民衆書館, 1960. Im Chae-hae 임재해. Andong Hahoe maŭl 安東河回마을. Seoul: Taewŏnsa, 1992. Im Ton-hŭi 임돈희. Chosang cherye 조상제례. Seoul: Taewŏnsa, 1990. Imamura Tomo 今村 とも. Chōsen no seimei shizoku ni kansuru kenkyū chōsa 朝鮮の姓名 氏族に關 する硏究調査. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1934. Janelli, Roger L., and Dawnhee Yim Janelli, Ancestor Worship and Korean Society. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1982. Kaksa sugyo 各司受敎. In Sugyo chibyo, 1–101. Kalton, Michael C. “Korean Neo-Confucian Thought.” Unpublished paper. Kalton, Michael C. et al., trans. The Four-Seven Debate: An Annotated Translation of the Most Famous Controversy in Korean Neo-Confucian Thought. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994. ———, trans., ed., and comm. To Become a Sage: The Ten Diagrams on Sage Learning by Yi T’oegye. New York: Columbia University Press, 1988. Kang Chu-jin 姜周鎭. “Sarim chŏngch’i wa Hanhwŏndang ŭi tohak” 士林政治와 寒暄堂의 道學. In Hanwŏndang ŭi saengae wa sasang 寒暄堂의 生涯와 思想. Edited by Pae Chong-ho 裵宗鎬, 59–109. Seoul: Hanhwŏndang sŏnsaeng kinyŏm saŏpsa, 1980.

556

Bibliogr aphy

———. “Sŏwŏn kwa kŭ sahoejŏk kinŭng” 書院과 그 社會的 機能. Han’guk saron 8 (1980): 58–88. ———. Yijo tangjaengsa yŏn’gu 李朝黨爭史硏究. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1971. Kang, Hugh W. “Institutional Borrowing: The Case of the Chinese Civil Service Examination System in Early Koryŏ.” Journal of Asian Studies 34.1 (Nov. 1974): 109–25. ———. “The Development of the Korean Ruling Class from Late Silla to Early Koryŏ.” Ph.D. diss., University of Washington, 1964. ———. “The First Succession Struggle of Koryŏ, in 945: A Reinterpretation.” Journal of Asian Studies 36.3 (May 1977): 413–28. Kang Ŭn-gyŏng 강은경. “Koryŏ hugi hojangch’ŭng ŭi pyŏndong kwa ŭi chŏngni—kukpo hojŏk ŭl chungsim ŭro” 고려후기 戶長層의 변동과 의 정리—국 보호적을 중심으로. Tongbang hakchi 東方學志 97 (Sept. 1997): 41–91. ———. Koryŏ sidae hojangch’ŭng yŏn’gu 고려시대 호장층 연구. Seoul: Hyean, 2002. Karlsson, Anders. “Famine, Finance and Political Power: Crop Failure and Land-Tax Exemptions in Late Eighteenth-Century Chosŏn Korea.” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 48.4 (2005): 552–92. ———. The Hong Kyŏngnae Rebellion 1811–1812: Conflict between Central Power and Local Society in 19th-Century Korea. Stockholm: Institute of Oriental Languages, Stockholm University, 2000. Kawashima, Fujiya 川鳥藤也. “A Scholar of the Mountain-Grove (sallim) in the Eighteenth-Century Korean Society and State: A Case of Pak P’il-ju (1680–1748).” Tongbang hakchi 66 (June 1990): 135–78. ———. “A Study of the Hyangan: Kin Groups and Aristocratic Localism in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth-Century Korean Countryside.” Journal of Korean Studies 5 (1984): 3–38. ———. “A Yangban Organization in the Countryside: The Tansŏng Hyangan of Mid-Chosŏn Dynasty Korea.” Journal of Korean Studies 8 (1992): 3–35. ———. “Bunka Ryushi ni mirareru shizoku no idō to sono seikaku—jukyō-teki kanryō taisei to kettōshudan” 文化柳氏にみらるれ氏族の移動と その性格—儒敎的 官僚體制と血統集團. Chōsen gakuhō 70 (1974): 43–74. ———. “Clan Structure and Political Power in Yi Dynasty Korea: A Case Study of the Munhwa Yu Clan.” Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1972. ———. “ e taehayŏ” 에 대하여. Ch’ŏnggye sahak 淸溪史學 4 (June 1987): 185–213. ———. “The Andong Hyangan in the Mid-Chosŏn Dynasty: 1589–1647.” Paper presented at the NEH Conference on Confucianism and the Late Chosŏn Dynasty Korea, Los Angeles, January 5–8, 1992. ———. “The Local Gentry Association in Mid-Yi Dynasty Korea: A Preliminary Study of the Ch’angnyŏng Hyangan, 1600–1839.” Journal of Korean Studies 2 (1980): 113–37. ———. “The Local Yangban in Andong: Village Bureau Heads and Their Deputies in Late Chosŏn Dynasty Korea.” In Korean Studies: Its Tasks and Perspectives, 209–52. Papers of the 5th International Conference on Korean Studies, Academy of Korean Studies, 1988. ———. What Is Yangban? A Legacy for Modern Korea. IMKS Special Lecture Series no. 7. Seoul: Institute for Modern Korean Studies, Yonsei University, 2002. Kelleher, M. Theresa. “Back to Basics: Chu Hsi’s Elementary Learning (Hsiao-hsüeh).” In Neo-Confucian Education: The Formative State, edited by Wm. Theodore de Bary and John W. Chaffee, 219–51. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. Ki Tae-sŭng 奇大升. Kobong chŏnjip 高峰全集. In HMCK, vol. 40. Kim Ch’ang-hyŏn 金昌鉉. Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa kŭpcheja yŏn’gu 朝鮮初期 文科及第者硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1999. Kim Ch’ang-jo 金昌祖. Changam-jip 藏庵集. In HYMJ, vol. 1695. Kim Chang-saeng 金長生. Ŭirye munhae 儀禮問解. In the collection of Kyujanggak Library. Kim Ch’ang-sŏk 金昌錫. In Changgo se’go, kwŏn 8. Kim Chin 金璡. P’yoŭn munjip 瓢隱文集. In Yŏnbang se’go, 71–118.



Bibliogr aphy

557

Kim Chong-jik 金宗直. Chŏmp’ilchae munjip 佔畢齋文集. In Yijo myŏnghyŏn chip 李朝名賢集. Vol. 2, 227–558. Seoul: Sŏnggyungwan taehakkyo, Taedong munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1977. Kim Chun-hyŏng 金俊亨. Chosŏn hugi Tansŏng sajokch’ŭng yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 丹城 士族層硏究. Seoul: Asea munhwasa, 2000. ———. “18segi ijŏngbŏp ŭi chŏn’gae—ch’ollak ŭi kinŭng kanghwa wa kwallyŏn hayŏ” 18세기 里定 法의 展開—村落의 기능 강화와 관련하여. Chindan hakpo 58 (Dec. 1984): 69–96. Kim Chun-hyŏng et al., eds. Chiyŏksa yŏn’gu ŭi iron kwa silche 지역사 연구의 이론과 실제. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 2001. Kim Ch’ung-yŏl 김충열. “Nammyŏng Cho Sik sŏnsaeng ŭi saengae wa hangmun chŏngsin” 남명조식 선생의 생애와 학문정신. In Nammyŏng Cho Sik 남명조식, edited by O I-hwan 吳二煥, 49–78. Seoul: Yemun sŏwŏn, 2002. Kim, Ellen J. “The Enduring Institution: A Case Study of Slavery in Traditional Korea.” B.A. thesis, Harvard University, 1991. Kim Hae 金垓. Kŭnsijae sŏnsaeng munjip 近始齋先生文集. In Och’ŏn se’go. Kim Hak-pae 金學培. Kŭm’ong sŏnsaeng munjip 錦翁先生文集. 2 vols. N.p., n.d. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kim Hak-su 金鶴洙. “Hwangsan’gye rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn hugi chaeji sajok ŭi kyŏrhap yangsang” 黃山契를 통해 본 조선후기 在地士族의 결합양상. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 16–17 (June 2000): 291–338. ———. “Karam Yi Hyŏn-il yŏn’gu—chŏngch’i hwaltong ŭl chungsim ŭro” 葛菴李玄逸 硏究—政治 活動을 중심으로. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 4 (March 1998): 85–125. ———. “17segi Yŏngnam hakp’a ŭi chŏngch’ijŏk punhwa” 17세기 嶺南學派의 政治的 분화. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 40 (March 2007): 215–80. ———. “17segi Yŏngnam hakp’a yŏn’gu” 17세기嶺南學派 硏究. Ph.D. diss., Han’gukhak chungang yŏn’guwŏn, 2007. Kim Ho-il 金鎬逸. “Chosŏn hugi hyangan e taehan il koch’al—Yongsŏng hyangan ŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 향안에 대한 一考察—龍城鄕案을 中心으로. Han’guk sahak 9 (1987): 221–70. ———. “17segi ŭi imnok kijun mit chŏlch’a e taehayŏ” 17세기 의 入 錄基準 및 節次에 대하여. In Chosŏn hugi hyangyak yŏn’gu, 31–65. Kim Ho-t’ae 김호태. “P’ungsan Yu-ssi munjung myoje hyŏnjang chosa” 풍산유씨 문중묘제 현장조 사. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 10 (Dec. 1996): 41–58. Kim, Hongnam. “Exploring Eighteenth-Century Court Arts.” In Korean Arts of the Eighteenth Century: Splendor and Simplicity, 35–57. New York: Asia Society Galleries, 1993. Kim Hun-sik 金勳埴. “Koryŏ hugi ŭi po’gŭp” 高麗後期의 孝行錄 보급. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 73 (June 1991): 21–48. Kim Hyŏn 金 㮟. Man’gyŏng ilgi 萬頃日記. Namwŏn: Puan Kim-ssi Chikchanggong-p’a Sŏ’gyegong munjung 扶安金氏直長公派西溪公門中, 2003. Kim Hyŏn-mok 金玄穆. “Chosŏn chunggi chapkwa ipkyŏkcha ŭi sinbun kwa sŏngkyŏk—16segi chapkwa tanhoe pangmok ŭi punsŏk” 朝鮮中期 雜科入格者의 身分과 性格—16세기 雜科單回榜目의 分析. Yŏksa hakpo 139 (Sept. 1993): 35–66. Kim Hyŏn-yŏng 金炫榮. “Chosŏn hugi sajok ŭi ch’ollak chibae—Namwŏn Tundŏk-pang ŭl chungsim ŭro” 조선후기 士族의 촌락지배—남원 둔덕방을 중심으로. Han’guk munhwa 12 (Dec. 1991): 249–320. ———. Chosŏn sidae ŭi yangban kwa hyangch’on sahoe 朝鮮時代의 兩班과 鄕村社會. Seoul: Chimmunsa, 1999. ———. “Chosŏn sigi ŭi saeroun chŏnmang—16segi Kyŏngsangdo Sŏngju chibang ŭl sojae ro hayŏ” 조선시기 의 새로운 전망—16 세기 慶尙道 星州地 方을 소재로 하여. Han’guk munhwa 23 (June 1999): 147–84. ———. “Honam chibang komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn sidae ŭi kajok kwa ch’injok” 호남지방 고문서를 통해 본 조선시대의 가족과 친족. In Honam chibang komunsŏ kich’o yŏn’gu 호남지방 고 문서 기초연구, by Chŏng Ku-bok et al., 243–99. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1999.

558

Bibliogr aphy

———. “17segi Andong chibang ŭi akchŏk e taehayŏ” 17세기 安東地方의 惡籍 에 대하여. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 1 (Oct. 1991): 75–113. ———. “17segi huban Namwŏn hyangan ŭi chaksŏng kwa p’ach’i” 17세기후반 남원 향안의 작성과 罷 置. Han’guk saron 21 (1991): 109–43. ———. “17segi Yŏn’gi chibang ŭi hyanggyu wa hyangch’on sahoe kujo” 17세기 燕岐地方의 鄕規와 鄕 村社會構造. Han’guk hakpo 61 (Fall 1990): 135–56. Kim Hyu 金烋. Kyŏngwa sŏnsaeng munjip 敬窩先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 1717. Kim In-gŏl 金仁杰. “Chosŏn hugi chaeji sajok ŭi pyŏnhwa” 조선후기 재지사족의 변화. Yŏksa wa hyŏnsil 역사와 현실 11 (1994): 156–83. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hyangan ŭi sŏngkyŏk pyŏnhwa wa chaeji sajok” 조선후기 鄕案의 성격변화와 在地士族. In Kim Ch’ŏl-chun paksa hwagap kinyŏm sahak nonch’ong 金哲埈博士華甲紀念史學論 叢, 525–60. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1983. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe pyŏndong e kwanhan yŏn’gu—18–19segi tamdangch’ŭng ŭi pyŏnhwa rŭl chungsim ŭro” 조선후기 鄕村 社會 變動에 관한 연구—18–19세기 담당층의 변화를 중심으로. Ph.D. diss., Seoul taehakkyo, 1991. Kim Ki-dŏk 金基德. “14segi huban kaehyŏk chŏngch’i ŭi naeyong kwa kŭ sŏngkyŏk” 14세기 후반 개 혁정치의 내용과 그 성격. In Sipsa segi Koryŏ ŭi chŏngch’i wa sahoe, 446–506. Kim Kŏn-t’ae 金建泰. “Chosŏn hugi-Ilche sigi chŏnt’ong tongsŏng ch’ollak ŭi pyŏnhwasang” 조선후 기-일제시기 傳統同姓村落의 변화상—全羅道 南原 屯德里 사례. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 62 (June 2008): 295–319. ———. “Chosŏn hugi sanobi p’aak pangsik” 朝鮮後期 私奴婢 파악방식. Yŏksa hakpo 181 (March 2004): 99–129. ———. Chosŏn sidae yangban’ga ŭi nongŏp kyŏngyŏng 조선시대 양반가의 농업경영. Seoul: Yŏksa pip’yŏngsa, 2004. ———. “Kapsul-kyŏngja yangjŏn ŭi sŏngkyŏk—Ch’ilgok Sŏkchŏn Kwangju Yi-ssi’ga chŏndab’an ŭl chungsim ŭro” 갑술-경자 양전의 성격—칠곡 석전 광주이씨가 전담안을 중심으로. Yŏksa wa hyŏnsil 31 (March 1999): 72–117. ———. “17–18segi chŏndap soyu kyumo ŭi yŏngsehwa wa yangbanch’ŭng ŭi taeŭng” 17–18세기 田畓소 유규모의 영세화와 양반층의 대응. Han’guksa hakpo 9 (Sept. 2000): 57–96. Kim Kŭg-il 金克一. Yakpong sŏnsaeng munjip 藥峯先生文集. In Yŏnbang se’go, 119–288. Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl 金光哲. Koryŏ hugi sejokch’ŭng yŏn’gu 高麗後期世族層硏究. Pusan: Tonga taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1991. Kim Kwang-ŏk 김광억. Munhwa ŭi chŏngch’i wa chiyŏk sahoe ŭi kwŏllyŏk kujo: Andong kwa Andong Kim-ssi 문화의 정치와 지역사회의 권력구조: 안동과안동김씨. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’an munhwawŏn, 2012. Kim Kyŏng-suk 金景淑. “Chosŏn hugi ch’injok chilsŏ wa chongsan punjaeng” 朝鮮後期 親族秩序와 宗山紛爭. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 14 (Sept. 2000): 137–66. ———. “Chosŏn hugi munjung t’ongmun ŭi yuhyŏng kwa sŏngkyŏk” 朝鮮後期 門中通文의 類型과 性格. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 19 (2001): 105–46. ———. “Chosŏn sidae yubaehyŏng ŭi chiphaeng kwa kŭ sarye” 朝鮮時代 流配刑의 執行과 그 事例. Sahak yŏn’gu 55–56 (Sept. 1998): 369–93. ———. “16segi sadaebu chib’an ŭi chesa sŏlhaeng kwa kŭ sŏngkyŏk—Yi Mun-gŏn ŭi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 16세기 사대부 짐안의 제사설행과 그 성격—이문건의 를 중심으로. Han’guk hakpo 98 (Spring 2000): 2–39. ———. “18segi huban nobi chaengsong ŭi sarye punsŏk—P’ungsan Yu-ssi komunsŏ rŭl chungsim ŭro” 18세기후반 奴婢爭訟의 事例分析—豊山柳氏 古文書를 中心으로. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 8 (March 1996): 69–103. Kim Mi-yŏng 김미영. “Chosŏn hugi sangnye ŭi misijŏk yŏn’gu—Chŏngjae Yu Ch’i-myŏng ŭi sangnye ilgi ŭl chungsim ŭro” 조선후기 상례의 미시적 연구—정재 유치명의 상례일기 을 중심으로. Sinch’ŏn minsokhak yŏn’gu 12 (Aug. 2008): 237–75. Kim Mu-jin 金武鎭. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi ŭi hyangni yŏn’gu” 朝鮮前期의 鄕吏硏究. In Koryŏ-Chosŏn



Bibliogr aphy

559

chŏn’gi chungin yŏn’gu, edited by Yŏnsei taehakkyo kukhak yŏn’guwŏn, 311–80. Seoul: Tosŏ ch’ulp’an sinsŏwŏn, 2001. ———. “Chosŏn chunggi sajokch’ŭng ŭi tonghyang kwa hyangyak ŭi sŏngkyŏk” 조선중기 士族層의 動向과 鄕約의 性格. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 55 (1986): 11–46. Kim Mun-gyŏng 김문경. “Koryŏ kwa Chungguk ŭi ” 高麗 과 中國의 . In The Flow of Ideas and Institutions: Korea in the World and the World in Korea, 121–30. First Kyujanggak International Symposium on Korean Studies, October 16–17, 2008. Kim Mun-t’aek 金文澤. “Andong Chinsŏng Yi-ssi’ga chaesa ŭi kŏllip kwa unyŏng” 安東 眞城李氏家 齋舍의 건립과 운영. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 27 (Dec. 2003): 99–129. ———. “Sangnye wa simyo sari” 상례와 시묘살이. In Chosŏn sidae saenghwalsa 2: 47–63 (2000). ———. “16–17segi Andong Chinsŏng Yi-ssi’ga myoje yangsang kwa yugyojŏk i’nyŏm” 16–17세기 安東 眞城李氏家 墓祭양상과 儒敎的 이념. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 26 (Feb. 2005): 173–208. ———. “16–17segi Andong ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssi munjung yŏn’gu” 16–17세기 安東의 眞城李氏門中硏 究. Ph.D. diss., Han’gukhak chungang yŏn’guwŏn, 2004. ———. “16–17segi Naju chibang ŭi sajok tonghyang kwa sŏwŏn hyangjŏn” 16–17世紀 羅州地方의 士 族動向과 書院鄕戰. Ch’ŏnggye sahak 11 (Dec. 1994): 117–85. Kim Myŏng-il 金明一. Unam sŏnsaeng ilgo 雲巖先生逸稿. In Yŏnbang se’go, 320–76. Kim Myŏng-ja 김명자. “Chosŏn hugi Andong ŭi munjip kanhaeng hyŏnhwang kwa kŭ ŭimi” 朝鮮後 期 安東의 文集刊行 現況과 그 意味. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 16 (2007): 75–102. Kim Nak-haeng 金樂行. Kusadang sŏnsaeng munjip 九思堂先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 222. Kim Ŏn-gi 金彦璣. Yongsan se’go 龍山世稿. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kim Ŏn-jong 金彦鍾. “Hakpong sŏnsaeng ŭi yehak” 鶴峯先生의 禮學. In Hakpong ŭi hangmun kwa ku’guk hwaltong 鶴峯의學問과 救國活動, 127–99. Seoul: Hakpong Kim Sŏng-il sŏnsaeng sun’guk sabaek chunyŏn kinyŏm nonmunjip 鶴峯金誠一先生殉國四百周年 紀念論文集, 1993. Kim Pang-gŏl 金邦杰. Chich’on sŏnsaeng munjip 芝村先生 文集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kim P’il-tong 金弼東. “Chosŏn hugi chibang isŏ chiptan ŭi chojik kujo” 朝鮮後期 地方吏胥 集團의 組織構造. Han’guk hakpo 28 (Fall 1982): 79–116, and 29 (Winter 1982): 87–116. Kim Pog-il 金復一. Namak sŏnsaeng ilgo 南嶽先生逸稿. In Yŏnbang se’go, 408-68. Kim Pu-p’il 金富弼. Hujodang sŏnsaeng munjip 後凋堂先生文集. In Och’ŏn se’go. Kim Pu-ryun 金富倫. Sŏrwŏltang-jip 雪月堂集. In HMCK, vol. 41. Kim Pu-ŭi 金富儀. Ŭpch’ŏngjŏng yu’go 挹淸亭遺稿. In Och’ŏn se’go. Kim Se-ho 金世鎬. Kuju-jip 龜洲集. In Changgo se’go, kwŏn 9-10. Kim Si-bak 金時璞. Ch’ŏnjŏn soji 川前小志. [Andong]: Ch’ŏnjŏn chonghoe 川前宗會, 1972. Kim Si-hwang 金時晃. “Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi hwayŏ se’gye” 義城金氏 火餘世系. Han’guk ŭi ch’ŏrhak 韓國 의 哲學 21 (Dec. 1993): 83–102. Kim Si-on 金是榲. P’yoŭn sŏnsaeng munjip 瓢隱先生文集. In Yŏnbang se’go, 469–728. Kim Sŏk-hyŏng 金錫亨. “Yijo ch’o’gi kugyŏk p’yŏnsŏng ŭi kijŏ” 李朝初期 國役編成의 基底. Chindan hakpo 14 (1941): 159–208. Kim Sŏn-gyŏng 김선경. “Chosŏn hugi sansong kwa sallim soyu’gwŏn ŭi silt’ae” 조선후기 山訟과 山 林 所有權의 실태. Tongbang hakchi 77–79 (1993): 497–535. Kim Sŏng-il 金誠一. Hakpong-jip 鶴峯集. In HMCK, vol. 48. Kim Sŏng-jun 金成俊. “T’aejong ŭi oech’ŏk chegŏ e taehayŏ—Min-ssi hyŏngje ŭi ok” 太宗의 外戚除 去에 대하여—閔氏兄弟의 獄. Yŏksa hakpo 17–18 (June 1962): 571–623. Kim Sŏng-t’ak 金聖鐸. Chesan munjip 齊山文集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library and in HMCK, vol. 206. Kim Sŏng-u 金盛祐. Chosŏn chunggi kukka wa sajok 조선중기 국가와 사족. Seoul: Yŏksa pip’yŏngsa, 2001. ———. “Chosŏn sidae chiyŏk kaebal kwa chibae ellitŭch’ŭng ŭi kŏjuji sŏnt’aek chŏllyak—Kyŏngsangdo Taegu-bu rŭl chungsim ŭro” 조선시대 지역개발과 지배엘리트층의 거주지 선택전략—慶尙道 大 邱府를 중심으로. In In’gusajŏk ch’ŭngmyŏn esŏ pon Han-Pul ellit’ŭ 인구사적 측면에서 본 한-불엘

560

Bibliogr aphy

리트. Proceedings of the International Conference at Sungkyunkwan University, Academy of East Asian Studies, Oct. 2007. ———. “16segi sajŏkch’ŭng ŭi kwanjik tokchŏm kwa pansangje ŭi taedu” 16세기 士族層의 관직독점 과 班常制의 대두. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 106 (Sept. 1999): 121–62. ———. “18–19segi toegi ŭi tayanghan chokŏndŭl” 18–19세기 되기의 다양한 조건들. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 49 (2005): 169–95. Kim Su-il 金守一. Kwibong sŏnsaeng ilgo 龜峯先生逸稿. In Yŏnbang se’go, 289–320. Kim, Sun Joo. Marginality and Subversion in Korea: The Hong Kyŏngnae Rebellion of 1812. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2007. ———, ed. The Northern Region of Korea: History, Identity, and Culture. A Center for Korea Studies Publication. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2010. Kim T’ae-yŏng 金泰永. Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oji chedosa yŏn’gu 朝鮮前期 土地制度史硏究. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1983. Kim T’aek-kyu 金宅圭. Ssijok purak ŭi kujo yŏn’gu 氏族部落의 構造硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1981. ———. Tongjok purak ŭi saenghwal kujo yŏn’gu 同族部落의 生活構造硏究. [Taegu]: Ch’ŏnggu taehak, Silla-Kaya munhwa yŏn’guwŏn 靑丘大學, 新羅伽倻 文化硏究院, 1964. Kim Tang-t’aek 金塘澤. “Ch’oe Sŭng-no ŭi sangsŏmun e poinŭn Kwangjongdae ŭi kwa Kyŏngjong wŏnnyŏn chŏnsikwa” 崔承老의 上書文에 보이는 光宗代의 과 景宗元年 田柴 科. In Koryŏ Kwangjong yŏn’gu 高麗光宗硏究, edited by Yi Ki-baek 李基白, 47–73. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1981. ———. “Ch’ungnyŏlwang ŭi pogwi kwajŏng ŭl t’onghae pon ch’ŏn’gye ch’ulsin kwallyo wa ch’ulsin kwallyo ŭi chŏngch’ijŏk kaltŭng— ŭi kaenyŏm e taehan kŏmt’o” 忠烈王의 復位 과정을 통해 본 賤系출신 관료와 출신관료의 정치적 갈등—의 개념에 대한 검 토. Tonga yŏn’gu 東亞硏究 17 (Feb. 1989): 195–232. ———. “Ch’ungsŏnwang ŭi pogwi kyosŏ e poinŭn ‘chaesang chi chong’ e taehayŏ” 忠宣王의 復位敎 書에 보이는 ‘宰相之宗’에 대하여. Yŏksa hakpo 131 (Sept. 1991): 1–29. Kim To-haeng 金道行. U’go sŏnsaeng munjip 雨皐先生文集. Compiled by Kim Ch’un-dae 金椿大. Andong, 1993. Kim Tong-su 金東洙. “Sejong sillok chiriji sŏngssijo ŭi kŏmt’o” 世宗實錄 地理志 姓氏條의 檢討. Tonga yŏn’gu 6 (Oct. 1985): 441–71. ———. “16–17segi Honam sarim ŭi chonjae hyŏngt’ae e taehan il koch’al” 16–17世紀 湖南 士林의 存 在形態에 대한 一 考察. Yŏksahak yŏn’gu 歷史學硏究 7 (March 1977): 43–104. Kim U-rim 金右臨. “Sŏul-Kyŏnggi chiyŏk ŭi Chosŏn sidae sadaebu myoje yŏn’gu” 서울-京畿地域의 朝鮮時代 士大夫 墓制 硏究. Ph.D. diss., Koryŏ taehakkyo, 2007. Kim Yŏn 金緣. Unam sŏnsaeng ilgo 雲巖先生逸稿. In Och’ŏn se’go. Kim Yong 金涌. Unch’ŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 雲川先生文集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kim Yŏng 金坽. Kyeam illok 溪巖日錄. 2 vols. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1997. ———. Kyeam sŏnsaeng munjip 溪巖先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 84. Kim Yong-dŏk 金龍德. “Andong chwasu ko” 安東座首考. Chindan hakpo 46–47 (1979): 177–84. ———. “Chŏng Yŏ-rip yŏn’gu” 鄭汝立 硏究. Han’guk hakpo 4 (Fall 1976): 40–83. ———. Hyangch’ŏng yŏn’gu 鄕廳硏究. Seoul: Han’guk yŏn’guwŏn, 1978. ———. “Hyanggyu yŏn’gu” 鄕規硏究. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 54 (1986): 27–57. ———. “Hyangŭmnye ko. Sŏngjongdae ŭi hyangyak e taehayŏ” 鄕飮禮考. 成宗代의 鄕約에 대하여. Tongbang hakchi 46–48 (1985): 75–83. Kim Yong-jik 金容稷. Andong Hahoe maŭl 安東河回마을. With photos by Kwŏn Pu-mun 權富問. Misul mun’go 美術文庫 no. 59. Seoul: Yŏrhwadang 悅話堂, 1981. Kim Yong-man 金容晩. “Chosŏn sidae Changnyewŏn yŏn’gu sŏsŏl” 朝鮮時代 掌隷院 硏究序說. Kyonam sahak 嶠南史學 3 (Dec. 1987): 111–40. ———. Chosŏn sidae sanobi yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代 私奴婢硏究. Seoul: Chimmunhak, 1997. Kim Yong-sŏn 金龍善. “Koryŏ chibaech’ŭng ŭi maejangji e taehan koch’al” 高麗 支配層의 埋葬地에 대한 考察. Tonga yŏn’gu 17 (Feb. 1989): 255–79.



Bibliogr aphy

561

———. “Koryŏ munbŏl ŭi kusŏng yokkŏn kwa ka’gye” 高麗門閥의 構成要件과 家系. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 93 (June 1996): 1–25. ———. “Koryŏ ŭmsŏjedo ŭi yŏn’gu” 高麗蔭敍制度의硏究. Ph.D. diss., Sŏgang taehakkyo, 1985. Published, Seoul: Ilchogak, 1991. Kim Yong-sŏp 金龍燮. Chosŏn hugi nongŏpsa yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期農業史硏究. 2 vols. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1970. 2nd rev. ed. (chŭngbop’an 增補版), 2 vols., Seoul: Ilchogak, 1990. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi Taegu Puin-dong tongyak kwa sahoe munje” 朝鮮後期의 大邱 夫仁洞洞 約과 社會問題. Tongbang hakchi 46–48 (June 1985): 125–51. Ko Hye-ryŏng 高惠玲. Koryŏ hugi sadaebu wa sŏngnihak suyong 高麗後期 士大夫와 性理學 受容. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2001. ———. “Yi In-im chŏngkwŏn e taehan il koch’al“ 李仁任 政權에 대한 一 考察. Yŏksa hakpo 91 (Sept.1981): 1–55. Ko Pyŏng-ik 高柄翊. Tonga kyosŏpsa ŭi yŏn’gu 東亞交涉史의硏究. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1970. Ko Sŏk-kyu 高錫珪. “Chŏng In-hong ŭi ŭibyŏng hwaltong kwa sallim kiban” 鄭仁弘의 義兵活動과 山林基盤. Han’guk hakpo (Summer 1988): 32–60. ———. “18segimal 19segich’o P’yŏngando chiyŏk hyanggwŏn ŭi ch’ui” 18세기말 19세기초 평안도지 역의 鄕權의 추이. Han’guk munhwa 11 (Dec. 1990): 341–406. ———. “19segi chŏnban hyangch’on sahoe seryŏkkan taerip ŭi ch’ui—Kyŏngsangdo Yŏngyang-hyŏn ŭl chungsim ŭro” 19세기전반 鄕村社會勢力間 對立의 推移—慶尙道 英陽縣을 중심으로. Kuksa­ gwan nonch’ong 8 (1989): 147–81. Ko Sŭng-je 高承濟. Han’guk ch’ollak sahoesa yŏn’gu 韓國村落社會史硏究. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1977. Ko Tong-hwan 高東煥. Chosŏn hugi Sŏul sangŏp paltalsa yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 서울商業發達 史硏究. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1998. Ko Yŏng-jin 高英津. Chosŏn chunggi yehak sasangsa 조선중기 예학 사상사. Seoul: Han’gilsa, 1995. ———. Honam sarim ŭi hangmaek kwa sasang 호남사림의 학맥과 사상. Seoul: Hyean, 2007. ———. “15–16segi Chuja karye ŭi sihaeng kwa kŭ ŭimi” 15–16世紀 朱子家禮의 施行과 그 意味. Han’guk saron 21 (1989): 73–173. ———. “16segimal saryesŏ ŭi sŏngnip kwa yehak ŭi paltal” 16세기말 四禮書의 성립과 禮學의 발달. Han’guk munhwa 12 (Dec. 1991): 445–509. Kŏgwan taeyo 居官大要. Seoul: Pŏpchech’ŏ, 1983. Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn. Andong Chŏnju Yu-ssi p’yŏn (Su’gok chongt’aek) 安東全州柳氏篇 (水谷宗宅) 44 (1999). Andong Chuch’on Chinsŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 安東周村眞城李氏篇 41–42 (1999). Andong Kalchŏn Sunhŭng An-ssi p’yŏn 安東葛田順興安氏篇 43 (1999). Andong Pŏphŭng Kosŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 安東法興固城李氏篇 49 (2000). Hahoe P’ungsan Yu-ssi p’yŏn 河回豊山柳氏篇 15–19 (1994); 52 (2000). Hahoe P’ungsan Yu-ssi p’yŏn 河回豊山柳氏篇, chŏngsŏbon 正書本 59 (2000). Kwangsan Kim-ssi Och’ŏn komunsŏ 光山金氏烏川古文書 82.2 (1982). Namwŏn-Kurye Sangnyŏng Ch’oe-ssi p’yŏn 南原-求禮 朔寧崔氏篇 72, 75 (2004). Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn p’yŏn 屛山書院篇 20 (1994); chŏngsŏbon 正書本 63 (2002). Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi Ch’ŏnsang kakp’a p’yŏn 義城金氏川上各派篇 5–7 (1989–90); chŏngsobon 正書本 5–7 (1990). Yŏnghae Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 寧海載寧李氏篇 33 (1997), 69 (2004). Koo, Hagen. “Center-Periphery Relations and Civil Society in Korea.” In The Periphery and Center in Korean History, edited by Chŏng Tu-hŭi and Edward J. Shultz, 245–60. Seoul: Sŏgang taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2003. Koryŏ Chosŏn chŏn’gi chungin yŏn’gu 高麗 朝鮮前期 中人 硏究. Edited by Yŏnse taehakkyo, Kughak yŏn’guwŏn. Seoul: Tosŏch’ulp’an sinsŏwŏn 圖書出版 新書苑, 2001. Koryŏ myŏnghyŏn chip 高麗名賢集. 5 vols. Seoul: Sŏnggyun’gwan taehakkyo, Taedong munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1973. Koryŏsa 高麗史. 4 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Yŏnhŭi taehakkyo, Tongbanghak yŏn’guso, 1955.

562

Bibliogr aphy

Koryŏsa chŏryo 高麗史節要. Reprint. Seoul: Tongguk munhwasa, 1960. Ku Pong-nyŏng 具鳳齡. Paektam-jip 柏潭集. In HMCK, vol. 39. Ku Wan-hoe 具玩會. “Chosŏn chungyŏp sajok ŏlchanyŏ ŭi songnyang kwa honin— rŭl t’onghan sarye kŏmt’o” 朝鮮中葉 士族 孼子女의 贖良과 婚姻—를 통한 사례 검토. Kyŏngbuk sahak 8 (Sept. 1985): 41–79. [Kugyŏk] Och’ŏn se’go. See Och’ŏn se’go. [Kugyŏk] Sŏnsŏngji. See Sŏnsŏngji. [Kugyŏk] Yŏnggaji. See Yŏnggaji. Kukcho inmul ko 國朝人物考. 3 vols. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1978. Kukcho munkwa pangmok 國朝文科榜目. 4 vols. Seoul: T’aehaksa 太學社, 1988. Kukcho oryeŭi 國朝五禮儀. Reprint. Seoul: Kyŏngmunsa, 1979. Kŭm Chang-t’ae 琴章泰. T’oegye hakp’a ŭi sasang 退溪學派의 思想. 2 vols. Seoul: Chimmundang, 1996. ———. T’oegyesŏ pullyu saeg’in 퇴계서 분류색인. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2002. ———. Yuhak kŭnbaengnyŏn 儒學近百年. Seoul: Pag’yŏngsa 博英社, 1984. Kŭm Chang-t’ae 琴章泰 and Ko Kwang-jik 高光稙. Chŏng Yag-yong 丁若鏞. Seoul: Sŏnggyun’gwan taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2002. Kŭm Nan-su 琴蘭秀. Sŏngjae-jip 惺齋集, 1909. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kwangsan Kim-ssi chokpo 光山金氏族譜, 1933. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kwangsan Kim-ssi Och’ŏn komunsŏ 光山金氏烏川古文書. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vol. 82.2. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1982. Kwangsan Kim-ssi Yean p’abo 光山金氏禮安派譜. Andong, 1977. Kwŏn Ho-mun 權好文. Songam sŏnsaeng munjip 松巖先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 41. Kwŏn Hŭi-hak 權喜學. Kamgodang-jip 感顧堂集. In Chosŏn hugi hyangni kwan’gye charyo chipsŏng. Kwŏn In-ho 權仁浩. Chosŏn chunggi sarimp’a ŭi sahoe chŏngch’i sasang—Nammyŏng Cho Sik kwa Naeam Chŏng In-hong ŭl chungsim ŭro 朝鮮中期 士林派의 社會政治思想—남명조식과 내암정인 홍을 중심으로. Seoul: Han’gilsa, 1995. Kwŏn Kang 權杠. Pangdam sŏnsaeng munjip 方潭先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 2572. Kwŏn Ki 權紀. Yŏnggaji 永嘉誌. Reprint. Kugyŏk Yŏnggaji 國譯永嘉誌. Andong: County Magistrature, 1991. Kwŏn Ki-jung 權奇重. “Chosŏn hugi Sangjumok hyangnich’ŭng ŭi chonjae yangt’ae” 조선후기 尙州 牧 鄕吏層의 存在樣態. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 28 (March 2004): 47–67. Kwŏn Ku 權榘. Pyŏnggok sŏnsaeng munjip 屛谷先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 188. Kwŏn Nae-hyŏn 權乃鉉. “Chosŏn hugi hojŏk, ho’gu ŭi sŏngkyŏk kwa saeroun chaengjŏm” 조선후기 호적, 호구의 성격과 새로운 쟁점. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 135 (Dec. 2006): 279–303. ———. “Chosŏn hugi hojŏk kwa chokpo rŭl t’onghan tongsŏng ch’ollak ŭi pogwŏn” 조선후기 호적과 족보를 통한 同姓村落의 복원. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 47 (Sept. 2004). ———. “Chosŏn hugi tongsŏng ch’ollak kusŏngwŏn ŭi t’onghon yangsang—Tansŏng-hyŏn Sindŭngmyŏn Andong Kwŏn-ssi sarye” 조선후기 동성촌락 구성원의 통혼양상—단성현 신등면 안동권씨 사례. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 132 (March 2006): 109–35. ———. “Sukchongdae chibang t’ongch’iron ŭi chŏn’gae wa chŏngch’aek unyŏng” 숙종대 지방통치론 의 전개와 정책운영. Yŏksa wa hyŏnsil 25 (Sept. 1997): 87–112. Kwŏn O-yŏng 權五榮. “19segi Andong yurim ŭi yuhoe wa kŭ hwaltong” 19세기 安東儒林의 儒會와 그 活動. In Yi Su-gŏn kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm, Han’guk chungsesa nonch’ong 李樹健교수정년기념, 韓國中世史論叢, 793–832. Seoul: Kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe, 2000. Kwŏn Pŏl 權橃. Ch’ungjae-jip 冲齋集. In HMCK, vol. 19. Kwŏn Sang-il 權相一. Ch’ŏngdae ilgi 淸臺日記. 2 vols. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 2003. Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng 權斗經. Ch’angsŏlchae sŏnsaeng munjip 蒼雪齋先生文集. In HMCK, vol. 169; in the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Kwon, Yon-Ung (Kwŏn Yŏn-ung). “The Royal Lecture of Early Yi Korea (1).” Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities 50 (Dec. 1979): 55–107. Kye Sŭng-bŏm 桂勝範. “Chosŏn hugi Tansŏng chibang Hyŏpch’ŏn Yi Hu-nam ka’gye ŭi chigyŏk kwa sinbun” 朝鮮後期 丹城地方 陜川 李後男 家系의 職役과 身分. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 3 (Dec. 1992): 1–21.



Bibliogr aphy

563

Kyonamji 嶠南誌. Edited by Chŏng Wŏn-ho 鄭源鎬. 1940. Kyŏngbuk chibang komunsŏ chipsŏng 慶北地方古文書集成. 1981. Edited by Yi Su-gŏn 李樹健. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1984. Kyŏngguk taejŏn 經國大典. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1934. Kyŏngguk taejŏn chuhae 經國大典註解. Reprint. Seoul: Tan’guk taehakkyo pusok Tongyanghak yŏn’guso, 1979. Kyŏngsangdo chiriji 慶尙道地理志. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1938. Kyŏngsangdo ŭpchi 慶尙道邑誌. Reprint. Seoul: Han’guk chiriji ch’ongsŏ, 1982. Kyusa 葵史. In Chosŏn sŏŏl kwan’gye charyojip. Langlois, John D., Jr. “Law, Statecraft, and The Spring and Autumn Annals in Yüan Political Thought.” In Chan and de Bary, Yüan Thought, 89–152. Lau, D. C. Mencius. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books, 1970. Lee, Kwang-Kyu. “Ancestor Worship and Kinship Structure in Korea.” In Religion and Ritual in Korean Society, edited by Laurel Kendall and Griffin Dix, 56–70. Korea Research Monograph 12. Berkeley: Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, 1987. ———. “Confucian Tradition in the Contemporary Korean Family.” In The Psycho-Cultural Dynamics of the Confucian Family: Past and Present, edited by Walter H. Slote, 3–18. Seoul: International Cultural Society of Korea, 1986. Lee, Peter H., ed. A History of Korean Literature. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Levi, Giovanni. “On Microhistory.” In New Perspectives on Historical Writing, edited by Peter Burke, 93–113. Cambridge, England: Polity Press, 1991. Li, Bozhong. “Was There a ‘Fourteenth-Century Turning Point?’” In Smith and Glahn, The Song-YuanMing Transition in Chinese History, 135–75. Maema Kyōsaku 前間 恭作. “Shogetsuko” 庶孼考. Chōsen gakuhō 5 (1953): 1–27. Man’gi yoram, chaeyong-p’yŏn 萬機要覽, 財用篇. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1937. Mann, Susan. Local Merchants and the Chinese Bureaucracy, 1750–1950. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987. Mansŏng taedongbo 萬姓大同譜. 3 vols. 1931. Reprint Seoul: Hangmungak 學文閣, 1972. Vols. 1 and 2 photocopied and annotated by Edward W. Wagner (n.d.). Matchil ŭi nongmindŭl—Han’guk kŭnse ch’ollak saenghwalsa 맛질의 농민들—韓國近世 村落生活史. Edited by An Pyŏng-jun and Yi Yŏng-hun. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2001. McDermott, Joseph P. “Emperor, Elites, and Commoners: The Community Pact Ritual of the Late Ming.” In State and Court Ritual in China, edited by Joseph P. McDermott, 299–351. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Meskill, John. Ch’oe Pu’s Diary: A Record of Drifting across the Sea. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1965. Min Hyŏn-gu 閔賢九. “Cho In-gyu wa kŭ ŭi kamun” 趙仁規와 그의 家門. Chindan hakpo, pt. 1, 42 (1976): 17–28; pt. 2, 43 (1977): 5–32. ———. Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŭi kunsa chedo wa chŏngch’i 朝鮮初期의 軍事制度와 政治. Seoul: Han’guk yŏn’guwŏn, 1983. ———. Koryŏ chŏngch’i saron—T’ongil kukka ŭi hwangnip kwa tongnip wangguk ŭi siryŏn 高麗政治 史論—統一國家의 확립과 獨立王國의 시련. Seoul: Koryŏ taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2004. ———. “Koryŏ esŏ Chosŏn ŭro ŭi wangjo kyoch’e rŭl ŏttŏk’e p’yŏngkahal kŏsinga” 고려에서 조선으 로의 왕조 교체를 어떻게 평가할 것인가. Han’guksa simin kangjwa 40 (2007): 124–43. ———. “Sin Ton ŭi chipkwŏn kwa kŭ chŏngch’ijŏk sŏngkyŏk” 辛旽의 執權과 그 政治的 性格. Yŏksa hakpo 38 (Aug. 1968): 46–88, and 40 (Dec. 1968): 53–119. Min, Jung. “The Shadow of Anonymity: The Depiction of Northerners in Eighteenth-Century ‘Hearsay Accounts’ (kimun).” In The Northern Region of Korea—History, Identity, and Culture, edited by Sun Joo Kim, 93–115. Center for Korea Studies Publication. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2010.

564

Bibliogr aphy

Min Pyŏng-ha 閔丙河. “Chosŏn sŏwŏn ŭi kyŏngje kujo” 朝鮮書院의 經濟構造. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 5 (Aug. 1968): 75–96. Min Sŏn-hŭi 閔善姬. “Chosŏn hugi Tongnae ŭi hyangban sahoe wa much’ŏng” 朝鮮後期 東萊의 鄕 班社會와 武廳. Yŏksa hakpo 139 (1993): 95–148. Minji kanshū kaitō ishū 民事慣習回答彙集. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1933. Miyajima Hiroshi 宮嶋博史. “ rŭl t’onghaesŏ pon Han’guk chokpo ŭi kujojŏk t’ŭksŏng” 를 통해서 본 한국 족보의 구조적 특성. Taedong munhwa yŏn’gu 62 (June 2008): 201–41. ———.“Chosŏn sidae ŭi sinbun, sinbunje kaenyŏm e taehayŏ” 조선시대의 신분, 신분제 개념에 대하 여. Tongbang munhwa yŏn’gu 42 (June 2003): 289–308. ———. Yanban: Richō shakai no token kaisō 兩班—李朝社會 特權階層. Tokyo: Chūo kōron shakan, 1995. Morohashi Tetsuji 諸橋轍次. Daikanwa jiten 大漢和辭典. Tokyo: Daishūten shoten, 1955. Mote, Frederick W. “Confucian Eremitism in the Yüan Period.” In The Confucian Persuasion, edited by Arthur F. Wright, 202–40. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1960. Mun Ok-p’yo 문옥표. “Yesŏ nat’anan yugyosik kwanhon-sangjerye ŭi ŭimi punsŏk” 禮書에 나타난 유교식 관혼상제례의 의미분석. Reprinted in Han’guk illyuhak ŭi sŏngkwa wa chŏnmang—Songhyŏn Yi Kwang-gyu kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm nonch’ong, 181–201. 1998. Mun Ok-p’yo et al. Chosŏn yangban ŭi saenghwal segye—Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi Ch’ŏnjŏn-p’a charyo rŭl chungsim ŭro 조선양반의 생활세계—義城金氏 川前派 고문서 자료를 중심으로. Seoul: Paeksan sŏdang, 2004. Mun Suk-cha 文叔子. “Andong Chuch’on ŭi Chinsŏng Yi-ssiga wa kŭ sojang komunsŏ ŭi sŏngkyŏk” 安東 周村의 眞城李氏家 와 그 所藏 古文書의 性格. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng: Andong Chuch’on Chinsŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn, 3–14. ———. “Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi Yŏnghaep’a kamun ŭi punjaegi punsŏk” 載寧李氏 寧海派 家門의 分財記 分析. Ch’ŏnggye sahak 9 (Dec. 1992): 69–137. ———. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi mujanyŏ mangch’ŏ chaesan ŭi sangsok ŭl tullŏssan sosong sarye” 朝鮮前期 無子女亡妻財産의 相續을 둘러싼 訴訟事例. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 5 (May 1994): 39–60. ———. “Chosŏn hugi chesa sŭnggye pangsik ŭi sŏnt’aek kwa ŭimi—hyŏngmang chegŭp ŭl sŏnt’aekhan Ch’ŏngju Chŏng-ssiga ŭi sarye” 조선후기 祭祀承繼 방식의 선택과 의미—兄亡弟及을 선택한 淸州鄭氏家의 사례. Sahak yŏn’gu 77 (March 2005): 203–33. ———. “Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn nobi ŭi sinbunjŏk sŏngkyŏk—Tosan sŏwŏn komunsŏ rŭl t’onghan kŏmt’o” 朝鮮後期 書院奴婢의 身分的 性格—陶山書院 古文書를 통한 검토. T’oegyehak yŏn’gu 11 (Nov. 1997): 71–87. ———. Chosŏn sidae chaesan sangsok kwa kajok 조선시대 재산상속과 가족. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 2004. ———. “T’oegye hakp’a ŭi kyŏngjejŏk kiban—chaesan hyŏngsŏng kwa soyu kyumo rŭl chungsim ŭro” 退溪學派의 經濟的 基盤—財産形成과 所有規模를 중심으로. Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’gu 85 (Fall 2001): 75–96. ———. “Ŭijanyŏ wa ponjok kan ŭi chaesan sangsok punjaeng—1584nyŏn Hakpong Kim Sŏng-il ŭi Naju-mok p’allye punsŏk” 義子女와 本族간의 財産相續分爭—1584년 학봉金誠一의 羅州牧 判例 分析. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 8 (March 1996): 41–68. Nam Yŏn-suk 南延淑. “Chosŏn hugi hyangban ŭi kŏjuji idong kwa sahoe chiwi ŭi chisoksŏng— Miryang Mosan’gol Ch’angnyŏng Sŏngssi kamun ŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 鄕班의 居住地 移 動과 社會地位의 持續性—密陽 못안골 昌寧成氏 家門을 中心으로. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 83 (Dec. 1993): 57–86 and 84 (March 1994): 47–81. Nammyŏng Cho Sik 남명조식. Edited by O I-hwan 吳二煥. Seoul: Yemun sŏwŏn, 2002. Nammyŏnghak kwallyŏn munjip haeje 南冥學 關聯 文集 解題. Edited by Nammyŏnghak yŏn’guso. 3 vols. [Taegu]: Kyŏngsang taehakkyo, 2006–8. Namwŏn-Kurye Sangnyŏng Ch’oe-ssi p’yŏn 南原-求禮 朔寧崔氏篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vols. 72, 75. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 2004.



Bibliogr aphy

565

Namwŏn Ryang-ssi sebo 南原梁氏世譜. 1938. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Namwŏn ŭpchi 南原邑誌, 1872. Reprint. Han’guk chiriji ch’ongsŏ 韓國地理志叢書, vol. 4. Seoul: Han’guk chiriji ch’ongsŏ, 1983. Namwŏn Wŏndong hyangyak 南原源洞鄕約. [Chŏnju]: Chŏnbuk hyangt’o munhwa yŏn’guhoe 全北 鄕土文化硏究會, 1994. Namwŏn Yang-ssi sejŏk chibyo 南原楊氏世蹟輯要. Edited by Yang Man-jŏng 楊萬鼎. Chŏnju: Namwŏn Yang-ssi taejonghoe 南原楊氏大宗會, 1975. Namwŏn Yun-ssi chokpo 南原尹氏族譜. Edited by Yun Kyŏng-sik 尹璟植. 13 vols. 1861. Namwŏnji 南原誌. N.p., 1950. Nicholas, Ralph W. “Factions: A Comparative Analysis.” In Political Systems and the Distribution of Power. Edited by Michael Banton. A.S.A. Monographs 2. London: Tavistock Publications, 1965. No Myŏng-ho 盧明鎬. “Sanŭm changjŏk ŭl t’onghae pon 17segich’o ch’ollak ŭi hyŏryŏn yangsang” 山 陰帳籍을 통해 본 17世紀初 村落의 血緣樣相. Han’guk saron 5 (1977): 305–434. O Hŭi-mun 吳希文. Swaemirok 瑣尾錄. 2 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1962. O Pyŏng-mu 오병무. “Chŏnbuk chiyŏk ŭi p’yesŏwŏnji e kwanhan yŏn’gu” 전북지역의 폐서원지에 관 한 연구. In Hwech’ŏl sŏwŏn chosa pogo 훼철서원조사보고, vol. 4, 1993, 141–208. O Sŏg-wŏn 吳錫源. “Yŏktong U T’ak sasang ŭi yŏn’gu” 易東禹倬 思想의 硏究. In U T’ak sŏnsaeng ŭi sasang kwa Yŏktong sŏwŏn ŭi yŏksa 禹倬先生의思想과易東書院의 歷史, edited by Andong munhwa yŏn’guso, 3–36. Andong: Andong taehakkyo, 1992. O Sŏng 吳星. “Koryŏ Kwangjongdae ŭi kwagŏ hapkyŏkcha” 高麗 光宗代의 科擧合格者. In Koryŏ Kwangjong yŏn’gu 高麗光宗硏究, edited by Yi Ki-baek, 31–46. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1981. O Su-ch’ang 吳洙彰. Chosŏn hugi P’yŏngando sahoe palchŏn yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 平安道 社會發展 硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2002. ———. “Injodae chŏngch’i seryŏk ŭi tonghyang” 仁祖代 政治勢力의 動向. Han’guk saron 13 (1985): 49–119. O Yŏng-gyo 吳永敎. Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on chibae chŏngch’aek yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 鄕村支配政策 硏 究. Seoul: Hyean, 2001. ———. “Chosŏn hugi oga chakt’ong chedo ŭi kujo wa chŏn’gae” 朝鮮後期 五家作統制度의 構造와 展開. Tongbang hakchi 73 (Dec. 1991): 71–130. Och’ŏn se’go 烏川世稿. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1982. Korean translation [Kugyŏk] Och’ŏn se’go [國譯] 烏川世稿, 2 vols. Andong: Han’guk kukhak chinhŭngwŏn, 2005. Pae Chae-hong 裵在弘. “Chosŏn hugi hyangch’on sahoe esŏ sŏŏl ŭi chonjae yangt’ae wa hyangjŏn” 朝 鮮後期 鄕村社會에서 庶孼의 存在樣態와 鄕戰. Kyŏngbuk sahak 15 (Aug. 1992): 39–67. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ka’gye kyesŭng esŏ sŏŏl ŭi chiwi” 朝鮮後期 家系繼承에서 庶孼의 地位. Kyŏngsang sahak 7–8 (Oct. 1992): 1–38. ———. “Chosŏn hugi sŏŏl kwagŏ hapkyŏkcha ŭi sŏngbun kwa kwallyŏk” 朝鮮後期 庶孼 科擧合格 者의 成分과 官歷. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 2 (1993): 183–221. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong” 朝鮮後期의 庶孼許通. Kyŏngbuk sahak 10 (Aug. 1987): 97–149. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi sŏŏl hŏt’ong kwa sinbun chiwi ŭi pyŏndong” 朝鮮後期의 庶孼許通과 身分 地位의 變動. Ph.D. diss., Kyŏngbuk taehakkyo, 1994. ———. “Chosŏn sidae ch’ŏnch’ŏp chanyŏ ŭi chongnyang kwa sŏŏl sinbun kwisok” 朝鮮時代 賤妾子 女의 從良과 서얼신분 귀속. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 3 (1994): 33–58. Pae Sang-hyŏn 裵相賢. Chosŏnjo Kiho hakp’a ŭi yehak sasang e kwanhan yŏn’gu 朝鮮朝 畿湖學派의 禮學思想에 關한 硏究. Seoul: Koryŏ taehakkyo minjok munhwa yŏn’guso, 1996. Pae Yong-gil 裵龍吉. Kŭmyŏktang munjip 琴易堂文集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Paek Sŭng-jong 白承鐘. Han’guk sahoesa yŏn’gu 韓國社會史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1996. ———. “16segi Chosŏn sarim chŏngch’i wa Kim In-hu—pijŏngch’ijŏk ilsang ŭi chŏngch’isŏng” 16세 기 조선의 士林政治와 金麟厚—非政治的 日常의 政治性. Chindan hakpo 92 (Dec. 2001): 93–129. ———. “18–19segi Chŏlla-do esŏ ŭi sinhŭng seryŏk ŭi taedu—T’aein-hyŏn Kohyŏnnae-myŏn ŭi sŏryu”

566

Bibliogr aphy

18–19세기全羅道에서의 新興勢力의 擡頭—泰仁縣 古縣內面의 庶類. In Yi Ki-baek sŏnsaeng kohŭi kinyŏm, vol. 2, 1339–67. ———. “1893nyŏn Chŏlla-do T’aein-hyŏn yangin nongmin tŭl ŭi chose pudam” 1893년 全羅道 泰仁 縣 良人農民들의 租稅부담. Chindan hakpo 75 (June 1993): 57–89. Pai, Hyung Il. Constructing “Korean” Origins: A Critical Review of Archaeology, Historiography, and Racial Myth in Korean State-Formation Theories. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2000. Pak Chin-u 朴鎭愚. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi myŏllije wa ch’ollak chibae ŭi kanghwa” 朝鮮初期 面里制와 村 落支配의 강화. Han’guk saron 20 (Nov. 1988): 117–200. Pak Chong-ch’ŏn 박 종천. Tasan Chŏng Yag-yong ŭi ŭirye iron 다산정약용의 의례이론. Seoul: Sin’gu munhwasa, 2008. Pak Chong-gi 朴宗基. Koryŏ sidae pu’gokche yŏn’gu 高麗時代部曲制硏究. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1990. Pak Chu 朴珠. “Chosŏn Sukchongjo ŭi sau namsŏl e taehan koch’al” 朝鮮肅宗朝의 祠宇濫設에 대한 考察. Han’guk saron 6 (Dec. 1980): 171–249. Pak Hong-gap 朴洪甲. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi munkwa kŭpcheja ŭi pun’gwan kwa chinch’ul” 조선초기 문 과급제자의 분관과 진출. Sahak yŏn’gu 50 (Dec. 1995): 181–216. Pak Hyŏn-sun 朴賢淳. “15–16segi Yean-hyŏn sajokch’ŭng ŭi sŏngjang kwa hyangch’on sahoe ŭi chaep’yŏn” 15–16세기 예안현 사족층의 성장과 향촌사회의 재편. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 26 (Sept. 2003): 115–46. ———. “16segi sadaebu’ga ŭi ch’injok chilsŏ—Yi Hwang chiban ŭl chungsim ŭro” 16세기 士大夫家의 親族秩序—李滉 집안을 중심으로. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 107 (Dec. 1999): 77–106. ———. “17–18segi Yean-hyŏn sajok sahoe wa hyangan-wŏnsaengan-kyosaengan” 17–18세기 禮安縣 士 族社會와 鄕案-院生案-校生案. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 30 (Feb. 2007): 57–92. Pak Ik-hwan 朴翼煥. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi Andong chibang ŭi hyanggyu wa hyanggyuyak ko” 朝鮮前期 安東地方의 鄕規와鄕規約考. Tongguk sahak 東國史學 19–20 (1986): 115–62. ———. Chosŏn hyangch’on chach’i sahoesa—yuhyangso wa hyanggyu, hyangch’on chach’i kyuyak ŭl chungsim ŭro 朝鮮鄕村自治社會史—留鄕所와鄕規, 鄕村自治規約을 중심으로. Seoul: Samyŏngsa 三英社, 1995. ———. “Chosŏnjo Kyŏngsangdo hyangch’on chach’i chojik pyŏnch’ŏn” 朝鮮朝 慶尙道 鄕村自治 組 織變遷. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 104 (March 1999): 145–79. ———. “Sŏnch’o yuhyangso ŭi ch’ip’ye kyŏngwi chae’go” 鮮初 留鄕所의 置廢經緯 再考. In Such’on Pak Yŏng-sŏk kyosu hwagap kinyŏm, vol. 1, 769–85. Pak Kwang-yong 朴光用. “T’angp’yŏngnon kwa chŏngguk ŭi pyŏnhwa” 蕩平論과 政局의 變化. Han’guk saron 10 (Feb. 1985): 177–271. Pak Kyŏng-ha 朴京夏. “18segi chuhyŏn hyangyak ŭi sŏngkyŏk—Kim Hong-dŭk ŭi ŭl chungsim ŭro” 18세기 州縣鄕約의성격—金弘得의 을 중심으로. In Chosŏn hugi hyangyak yŏn’gu, 169–84. Pak Kyŏng-ja 박경자. Koryŏ sidae hyangni yŏn’gu 고려시대 향리연구. Seoul: Kukhak charyowŏn 국학 자료원, 2001. Pak No-uk 朴魯昱. “Chosŏn sidae komunsŏsang ŭi yongŏ kŏmt’o—t’oji-nobi mun’gi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮時代 古文書上의 用語檢討—土地-奴婢文記를 中心으로. Tongbang hakchi 68 (Oct. 1990): 75–121. Pak Pyŏng-ho 朴秉濠. Han’guk pŏpche sa’go—kŭnse ŭi pŏb kwa sahoe 韓國法制史考—近世의 法과 社 會. Seoul: Pŏmmunsa 法文社, 1974. Pak Se-ch’ae 朴世采. Namgye-jip 南溪集. In HMCK, vols. 138–40. ———. Namgye yesŏl 南溪禮說. In the collection of Kyujanggak Library. Pak Sun 朴焞. “Chosŏn chunggi sajok ŭi hyangch’on chibaegwŏn hwangnip—16–17segi ijok paeje rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮中期 士族의 鄕村支配權 確立—16–17세기 吏族 배제를 중심으로. In Chosŏn hugi hyangyak yŏn’gu, 67–95. ———. “Chosŏn hugi Haenam chibang tonggye ŭi il yŏn’gu” 조선후기 海南地方 洞契의 一 硏究. Han’guk saron 21 (1991): 69–108.



Bibliogr aphy

567

Pak Ŭn-gyŏng 朴恩卿. “Koryŏ hugi chibang p’umgwan seryŏk e kwanhan yŏn’gu” 高麗後期 地方品 官勢力에 관한 硏究. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 44 (March 1984): 47–73. ———. “Koryŏ hugi hyangnich’ŭng ŭi pyŏndong— chiriji soksŏng punsŏk ŭl chungsim ŭro” 高麗後期 鄕吏層의 變動— 地理志 續姓 分析을 중심으로. Chindan hakpo 64 (Dec. 1987): 95–111. ———. “Koryŏ ŭi sasimgwan kwa Chosŏnch’o ŭi yuhyangso e taehayŏ” 高麗의 事審官과 朝鮮初의 留鄕所에 대하여. Yŏksa hakpo 168 (Dec. 2000): 1–26. Pak Yong-un 朴龍雲. “Koryŏ hugi kwŏnmun ŭi yongnye wa kŭ sŏngkyŏk e taehan chaegŏmt’o” 高麗후 기 權門의 用例와 그 성격에 대한 재검토. Han’guksa hakpo 14 (2003): 41–75. ———. Koryŏ sahoe wa munbŏl kwijok kamun 高麗社會와 門閥貴族家門. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 2003. ———. Koryŏ sidaesa 高麗時代史. 2 vols. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1985. ———. Koryŏ sidae ŭmsŏje wa kwagŏje yŏn’gu 高麗時代 蔭敍制와 科擧制 硏究. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1990. Palais, James B. Confucian Statecraft and Korean Institutions: Yu Hyŏngwŏn and the Late Chosŏn Dynasty. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1996. ———. “Confucianism and the Aristocratic/Bureaucratic Balance in Korea.” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 44.2 (1984): 427–68. ———. Politics and Policy in Traditional Korea. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975. ———. Review of Yi Sŏng-mu, Chosŏn ch’ogi yangban yŏn’gu. Journal of Korean Studies 3 (1981): 191–212. ———. “Slave Society.” In Views on Korean Social History, edited by Institute for Modern Korean Studies, 23–47. Seoul: Yonsei University, 1998. Pangjŏk sehŏn 邦適世獻. Andong Ŭisŏng Kim, Sungŭijae kwalli wiwŏnhoe 崇義齋 管理委員會, 1997. Pannam Pak-ssi sebo 潘南朴氏世譜. 1825. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. P’ap’yŏng Yun-ssi moja mira, chonghap yŏn’gu nonmunjip 坡平尹氏 母子 미라, 종합연구 논문집. 2 vols. Seoul: Koryŏ taehakkyo pangmulgwan, 2003. Park, Eugene Y. Between Dreams and Reality: The Military Examination in Late Chosŏn Korea, 1600– 1894. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2007. ———. “Military Examinations in Late Chosŏn, 1700–1863: Elite Substratification and Non-elite Accomodation.” Korean Studies 25.1 (2001): 1–50. ———. “Military Examinations in Sixteenth-century Korea: Political Upheaval, Social Change, and Security Crisis.” Journal of Asian History 35.1 (2001): 1–57. Park, Ki-Joo, and Donghyu Yang. “The Standard of Living in Chosŏn in the 17th to the 19th Centuries.” Paper presented at a conference at Stanford University, Oct. 2005. Passin, Herbert. “The Paekchŏng of Korea.” Monumenta Nipponica 12 (1956): 195–240. Patterson, Orlando. Slavery and Social Death: A Comparative Study. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982. Peterson, Mark. Korean Adoption and Inheritance: Case Studies in the Creation of a Classic Confucian Society. Ithaca, NY: East Asian Program, Cornell University, 1996. Pibyŏnsa tŭngnok 備邊司謄錄. 28 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1959. Pit ŭl namgin Andong Kwŏn-ssi 빛을 남긴 안동권씨. Edited by Kwŏn Yŏng-han權寧漢. Andong: Sion ch’ulp’ansa, 2005. Ppuri kip’ŭn Andong Kwŏn-ssi 뿌리 기픈 안동권씨. Edited by Kwŏn Yŏng-han 權寧漢. Seoul: Chŏnwŏn munhwasa, 1999. Provine, Robert C. Essays on Sino-Korean Musicology: Early Sources for Korean Ritual Music. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1988. P’ungsan Yu-ssi sebo 豊山柳氏 世譜. Compiled by P’ungsan Yu-ssi sebo kanhaengso 豊山柳氏 世譜刊 行所. Taejŏn,1965. P’ungyang Cho-ssi munjip ch’ongsŏ 豊壤趙氏 文集叢書. Seoul: P’ungyang Cho-ssi taejonghoe 豊壤趙 氏 大宗會, 1995. Pye, Lucian W. Asian Power and Politics: The Cultural Dimensions of Authority. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985.

568

Bibliogr aphy

Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn p’yŏn 屛山書院篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成. Vols. 20 and 63. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, (vol. 20) 1994 and (vol. 63) 2002. Rankin, Mary Backus. “The Origins of a Chinese Public Sphere: Local Elites and Community Affairs in the Late Imperial Period.” Études chinoises 9.2 (Autumn 1990): 13–60. Reflections on Things at Hand: The Neo-Confucian Anthology Compiled by Chu Hsi and Lü Tsu-ch’ien. Translated with notes by Wing-tsit Chan. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967. Robinson, David M. Empire’s Twilight: Northeast Asia under the Mongols. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2009. Rowe, William T. “The Public Sphere in Modern China.” Modern China 16.3 (July 1999): 309–29. Ryang Sŏng-ji 梁誠之. Nulchae-jip 訥齋集. Reprint. Seoul: Asea munhwasa, 1973. Ryu Ch’ang-gyu 류창규. “Koryŏmal-Chosŏnch’o chaeji p’umgwan ŭi yuhyŏng kwa kŭ chiwi” 高麗 末-朝鮮初 在地品官의 유형과 그 지위. Chŏnnam sahak 17 (Dec. 2001): 23–55. Sangnyŏng Ch’oe-ssi chokpo 朔寧崔氏族譜. 1648 and ca. 1954. Sewell, William H., Jr. Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. Shikata Hiroshi 四方 博. “Richō jidai gōyaku no rekishi to seikaku” 李朝時代 鄕約の歷史と性格. Keijō: Keijō teikoku daigaku, hōgakkai ronshū 14.4 (1943): 421–96. ———. “Richō jinkō ni kansuru mibun kaikyū betsuteki kansatsu” 李朝人口に關する身分階級別的 觀察. Chōsen keizai no kenkyū 3 (1938): 363–482. Shima, Mutsuhiko. “In Quest of Social Recognition: A Retrospective View on the Development of Korean Lineage Organization.” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 50.1 (June 1990): 87–129. Shima, Mutsuhiko, and Roger L. Janelli, eds. The Anthropology of Korea: East Asian Perspectives. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology, 1998. Shin, Susan S. “Land Tenure and the Agrarian Economy in Yi Dynasty Korea: 1600–1800.” Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1973. ———. “Some Aspects of Landlord-Tenant Relations in Yi Dynasty Korea.” Occasional Papers on Korea 3 (June 1975): 49–88. Shultz, Edward J. Generals and Scholars: Military Rule in Medieval Korea. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2000. Sin Pyŏng-ju 申炳周. Nammyŏng hakp’a wa Hwadam hakp’a yŏn’gu 南冥學派와 花潭學派 硏究. Seoul: Ilchisa, 2000. Sin Sŏk-ho 申奭鎬. “Heiko zehi ni tsuite” 屛虎是非に就いて. Seikyū gakusō 1 (Aug. 1930): 85–104, and 3 (Feb. 1931): 79–97. Sinbo sugyo chibyo 新補受敎輯要. In Sugyo chibyo, 261–508. Sinjŭng Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam 新增東國輿地勝覽. Reprint. Seoul: Tongguk munhwasa, 1958. Sipsa segi Koryŏ ŭi chŏngch’i wa sahoe 14세기 고려의 정치와 사회. Compiled by 14segi Koryŏ sahoe sŏngkyŏk yŏn’guban. Seoul: Minŭmsa, 1994. Skinner, G. William. Marketing and Social Structure in Rural China. Ann Arbor: Association for Asian Studies, 2001. Smith, Paul J., and Richard von Glahn, eds. The Song-Yuan-Ming Transition in Chinese History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2003. Sŏ Chŏng-mun 徐廷文. “ ŭi ch’o’gan kwa Wŏlch’ŏn-Sŏae sibi” 의 初刊과 月 川-西厓是非. Pug’ak saron 北岳史論 3 (Dec. 1993): 215–65. Sŏ Chu-sŏk 徐周錫. “Andong chibang ssijok ŭi chŏngch’ak kwajŏng” 安東地方 氏族定着科程. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 6 (June 1992): 6–10. ———. “Anmyodang so’go” 安廟堂 小考. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 10 (Dec. 1996): 1–8. ———. “Uri kojang ŭi saengwŏn-chinsa-munkwa kŭpcheja nŭn ŏlmana toenŭnga” 우리 故庄의 生 員-進仕-文科及第者는 얼마나 되는가. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 9 (Dec. 1995): 3–56. Sohn, Pow-key. “Social History of the Early Yi Dynasty, 1392–1592: With Emphasis on the Functional Aspects of Governmental Structure.” Ph.D. diss., University of California at Berkeley, 1963.



Bibliogr aphy

569

Sok taejŏn 續大典. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1938. Sŏl Sŏk-kyu 薛錫圭. Chosŏn sidae yusaeng sangso wa kongnon chŏngch’i 朝鮮時代 儒生上疏와 公論 政治. Seoul: Sŏnin, 2002. ———. “Hyŏnjong 7nyŏn Yŏngnam yurim ŭi ŭiryeso pongip chŏnmal” 顯宗7年 嶺南儒林의 議禮疏 捧入顚末. Sahak yŏn’gu 50 (Dec. 1995): 277–332. ———. “Kwanghaejo yuso tonghyang kwa Taebuk chŏnggwŏn ŭi sahoejŏk kiban” 光海朝 儒疏動向과 大北政權의 社會的 基盤. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 2 (1993): 65–136. ———. “16segi T’oegye hakp’a ŭi punhwa wa Yu Un-nyong ŭi yŏkhal” 16세기 退溪學派의 分化와 柳 雲龍의 役割. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 9 (2000): 63–101. Son Chŏng-mok 孫禎睦. Chosŏn sidae tosi sahoe yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代都市社會硏究. Seoul: Ilchisa, 1977. Song Ch’an-sik 宋贊植. Yijo hugi sugongŏp e kwanhan yŏn’gu 李朝後期 手工業에 관한 硏究. Seoul: Han’guk munhwa yŏn’guso, 1973. Song Chŏng-hyŏn 宋正炫. Chosŏn sahoe wa Imjin ŭibyŏng yŏn’gu 朝鮮社會와 壬辰義兵 硏究. Seoul: Hag’yŏn munhwasa 學硏文化社, 1998. Song Chun-gil 宋浚吉. Tongch’undang-jip 同春堂集. In HMCK, vols. 106–7. Sŏng Hyŏn 成俔. Yongjae ch’onghwa 慵齋叢話. Reprint. Taipei: Oriental Cultural Service, 1971. Song June-ho 宋俊浩. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi kwagŏ chedo” 朝鮮後期의 科擧制度. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 63 (1995): 37–191. ———. Chosŏn sahoesa yŏn’gu 朝鮮社會史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1987. ———. “Chosŏn sidae ŭi kwagŏ wa yangban mit yangin” 朝鮮時代의 科擧와 兩班 및 良人. Yŏksa hakpo 69 (1976): 101–35. ———. “Chosŏn sidae ŭi munkwa e kwanhan yŏn’gu” 朝鮮時代의 文科에 관한 硏究. Conference on traditional Korean society, sponsored by Social Science Research Council, New York, in Yusŏng, Korea. Sept. 1975. ———. “Dynamics of Elite Lineage Structure and Continuity in the Confucian Society of Traditional Korea.” In The Psycho-Cultural Dynamics of the Confucian Family: Past and Present, edited by Walter H. Slote, 145–63. Seoul: International Cultural Society of Korea, 1986. ———. “Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok ŭi haeje” 鄕廳事例謄錄의 解題. Andong munhwa yŏn’gu 3 (Feb. 1989): 133–40. ———. “Sinbunje rŭl t’onghayŏ pon Chosŏn hugi sahoe ŭi sŏngkyŏk ŭi ilmyŏn” 身分制를 통하여 본 朝鮮後期社會의 性格의 一面. Yŏksa hakpo 133 (March 1992): 1–62. ———. “The Yangban Lineages of Namwŏn.” Paper presented at the conference “Social Changes in Korean History,” sponsored by Chintan Society and International Cultural Society of Korea, Puyŏ, Aug. 1982. ———. Yijo saengwŏn-chinsasi ŭi yŏn’gu 李朝生員進士試의 硏究. Seoul: Taehan min’guk kukhoe tosŏ’gwan 大韓民國國會圖書館, 1970. Sŏng Pong-hyŏn 成鳳鉉. “Kosŏng Yi-ssi wa kŏmt’o” 固城李氏 와 檢討. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 24 (Feb. 2004): 205–36. Song Si-yŏl 宋時烈. Songja taejŏn 宋子大 全. 7 vols. Seoul: Samun hakhoe 斯文學會, 1971. Song, Sunhee. “Kinship and Lineage in Korean Village Society.” Ph.D. diss., Indiana University, 1982. Song Ung-sŏp 宋雄燮. “Chungjongdae kimyo sarim ŭi kusŏng kwa ch’ulsin paegyŏng” 中宗代 己卯 士林의 構成과 出身背景. Han’guk saron 45 (June 2001): 135–92. Sŏnsŏngji 宣城誌. Korean translation [Kug’yŏk] Sŏnsŏngji [國譯] 宣城誌, Andong: Kug’yŏk Sŏnsŏngji palgan ch’ujin wiwŏnhoe 國譯宣城誌 發刊推進委員會, 1993. Sŏnwŏn sebo 璿源世譜. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Sourcebook of Korean Civilization. 2 vols. Edited by Peter H. Lee. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993. Sŏwŏn 書院. Text by Yi Sang-hae 李相海; photos by An Chang-hŏn 安章憲. P’aju: Yŏrhwadang 悅話 堂, 2004. Ssijok wŏllyu 氏族源流. Reprint. Seoul: Po’gyŏng munhwasa 保景文化社, 1991. Steele, John. The I-li or Book of Etiquette and Ceremonial. Translated from the Chinese with introduction, notes and plans. London: Probstain, 1917.

570

Bibliogr aphy

Such’on Pak Yŏng-sŏk kyosu hwagap kinyŏm, Han’guk sahak nonch’ong 水邨朴永錫敎授 華甲紀念, 韓 國史學論叢. 2 vols. Seoul: T’amgudang 探求堂, 1992. Sudō Yoshiyuki 周藤吉之. “Kōrai makki yori Chōsen shoki no itaru nuhi no kenkyū” 高麗末期より 朝鮮初期に至る奴婢の硏究. Rekishigaku kenkyū 9 (1939). ———. “Raimatsu Sensho ni okeru nōjō ni tsuite” 麗末鮮初に於ける 農場に就いて. Seikyū gakusō 17 (Aug. 1935): 1–80. ———. “Sensho ni okeru kyōzaisho to ryūgōsho to ni tsuite” 鮮初に於ける京在所と 留鄕所とに就い て. In Katō [Shigeru] hakushi kanreki kinen Tōyōshi shūsetsu 加藤 [繁] 博士 還曆記念 東洋史集說, 447–64. Tokyo: Fuzanbō, 1942. Sugyo chibyo 受敎輯要. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1943. Sŭngjŏngwŏn ilgi 承政院日記. At http://sjw.history.go. kr. Szonyi, Michael. Practicing Kinship: Lineage and Descent in Late Imperial China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002. Tae Myŏngnyul chikhae 大明律直解. Reprint. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1937. Taebang se’go 帶方世稿. 1 vol. Namwŏn: Nobong Sŏwŏn, 1800. Taejŏn hoet’ong 大典會通. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1939. Taejŏn songnok kŭp chuhae 大典續錄及主解. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, Chūsūin, 1935. Tagawa Kōzō 田川孝三. “Gōan ni tsuite” 鄕案に就いて. In Yamamoto hakushi kanreki kinen Tōyōshi ronsō 山本博士 還曆記念東洋史論叢, 269–89. Tokyo: Yamakawa shuppansha 山川出版社, 1972. ———. “Richō no gōki ni tsuite” 李朝の鄕規に就いて. Pt. 1, Chōsen gakuhō 76 (July 1975): 35–72; pt. 2, ibid., 78 (Jan. 1976): 45–88; pt. 3, ibid., 81 (Oct. 1976): 179–210. Tillman, Hoyt. Confucian Discourse and Chu Hsi’s Ascendency. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1992. Tilly, Charles. Durable Inequality. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997. Thompson, E. P. “Class and Class Struggle.” In Class, edited by Patrick Joyce, 133–42. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. To Hyŏn-ch’ŏl 都賢喆. Koryŏmal sadaebu ŭi chŏngch’i sasang yŏn’gu 高麗末 士大夫의 政治思想硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1999. T’oegyehak charyo ch’ongsŏ 退溪學資料叢書. 40 vols. Andong: Andong taehakkyo, T’oegyehak yŏn’guso, 1994–99. T’oegye hangmaek ŭi chiyŏkchŏk chŏn’gae 퇴계학맥의 지역적 전개. Edited by T’oegye yŏn’guso. Seoul: Po’gosa, 2004. Tongyu saurok 東儒師友錄. Edited by Pak Se-ch’ae 朴世采. Reprint. Han’guk kyoyuksa yŏn’guso. [Seoul]: Purham munhwasa 弗咸文化社, 1977. Tosan chŏnsŏ 陶山全書. 4 vols. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1980. U In-su 禹仁秀. Chosŏn hugi sallim seryŏk yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 山林勢力硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1999. ———. “17segi sallim ŭi chinch’ul kwa kinŭng” 17세기山林의 進出과 機能. Yŏksa kyoyuk nonjip 歷 史敎育論集 5 (Nov. 1983): 143–77. U T’ak sŏnsaeng ŭi sasang kwa Yŏktong sŏwŏn ŭi yŏksa 禹倬先生의思想과易東書院의 歷史. Edited by Andong munhwa yŏn’guso. Andong: Andong taehakkyo, 1992. Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi Ch’ŏnjŏnp’a munjung 義城金氏 천전파 문중. Andong: Han’guk kukhak chinhŭngwŏn, 2006. Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi Ch’ŏnsang kakp’a p’yŏn 義城金氏川上各派篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vols. 5–7. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1989–99; chŏngsŏbon 正書本 5–7, 1990. Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi sebo 義城金氏世譜. 1901. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi taedongbo 義城金氏大同譜. 13 vols. Seoul, 1992. Ŭn Ki-su 은기수. “Kagye kyesŭng ŭi tayang sŏngkwa ‘chongjok chŏllyak’” 가계계승의 다양성과 ‘종 족전략’. In Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban ŭi saenghwal segye, 103–37. ———. “Ŭisŏng Kim-ssi’ga kajok ŭi pyŏnhwa—hogu tanja kirok ŭi haeje rŭl chungsim ŭro” 의성김



Bibliogr aphy

571

씨가 가족의 변화—호구단자 기록의 해제를 중심으로. In Mun Ok-p’yo et al., Chosŏn yangban ŭi saenghwal segye, 139–206. Unjanggak 雲章閣. Andong: Unjanggak kŏllip ch’ujin wiwŏnhoe, 1987. Vermeersch, Sem. “Funerary Practices in Koryŏ: The Buddhist Legacy.” Unpublished paper. ———. The Power of the Buddhas: The Politics of Buddhism During the Koryŏ Dynasty (918–1392). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2008. Wagner, Edward W. “Kinship and Power in Yi Korea: A Critique of the Sarim Theory.” Paper presented to the Ninth International Academic Seminar on Neo-Confucianism. Kyungpuk National University, Taegu, Oct. 1981. ———. “The Korean Chokpo as a Historical Source.” In Studies in Asian Genealogy, edited by Spencer J. Palmer, 141–52. Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 1972. ———. “The Ladder of Success in Yi Dynasty Korea.” Occasional Papers on Korea 1 (April 1974): 1–8. ———. The Literati Purges: Political Conflict in Early Yi Korea. Cambridge, MA: East Asian Research Center, Harvard University, 1974. ———. “Two Early Genealogies and Women’s Status in Early Yi Dynasty Korea.” In Korean Women: View from the Inner Room, edited by Laurel Kendall and Mark Peterson, 23–32. New Haven, CT: East Rock Press, 1983. ———. “Yijo sarim munje e kwanhan chaegŏmt’o” 李朝士林問題에 관한 再檢討. Chŏnbuk sahak 4 (April 1980): 163–73. Wagner-Song Munkwa Project. Unpublished statistics of all munkwa passers in the Chosŏn dynasty, compiled by Edward W. Wagner and Song June-ho. Courtesy of Prof. Wagner. Walraven, Boudewijn. “Buddhist Accomodation and Appropriation and the Limits of Confucianization.” Journal of Korean Religions 3.1 (April 2012): 105–16. Walton, Linda. Academies and Society in Southern Song China. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1999. ———. “Charitable Estates as an Aspect of Statecraft in Southern Sung China.” In Ordering the World: Approaches to State and Society in Sung Dynasty China, edited by Robert P. Hymes and Conrad Schirokauer, 255–79. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993. Waryong-myŏn chi 臥龍面誌. Edited by Kim Yŏng-gyu 金永奎 (ca. 1933). Reprint. Han’guk kŭndae ŭpchi, vol. 18. Seoul: Han’guk inmun kwahagwŏn, 1991. Watson, James L., ed. Asian and African Systems of Slavery. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. ———. “Of Flesh and Bones: The Management of Death Pollution in Cantonese Society.” In Death and the Regeneration of Life, edited by Maurice Bloch and Jonathan Parry, 155–86. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. ———. “Transactions in People: The Chinese Market in Slaves, Servants, and Heirs.” In Watson, Asian and African Systems of Slavery, 223–50. ———. “Yangbanization in Comparative Perspective: The View from South China.” In The Anthropology of Korea: East Asian Perspectives, edited by Mutsuhiko Shima and Roger L. Janelli, 213–27. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology, 1989. Watson, Rubie S. Inequality among Brothers: Class and Kinship in South China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. Wigen, Kären. “Culture, Power, and Place: The New Landscapes of East Asian Regionalism.” American Historical Review 104.4 (Oct. 1999): 1183–1201. Yang Man-jŏng 楊萬鼎. Chŏngnyŏn t’oeim kinyŏm Hyŏn’gok Yang Man-jŏng hyangt’osa nonmunjip 停 年退任紀念 玄谷楊萬鼎 鄕土史 論文集. Chŏnju: Kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe, 1994. ———. “Chosŏn sidae ŭi Honam ch’ulsin munkwa kŭpcheja e taehan koch’al” 朝鮮時代의 湖南出身 文科及第者에 대한 考察. Chŏlla munhwa yŏn’gu 全羅文化硏究 11 (Dec. 1999): 27–73.

572

Bibliogr aphy

———. “Iryujae Chang T’ae-su ŭi ch’ungjŏl kwa saengae” 一逌齋張泰秀의忠節과 生涯. Chŏlla munhwa yŏn’gu 15 (2003): 37–50. ———. “Sunch’ang chibang ŭi yangban kamun e taehan koch’al” 淳昌地方의 兩班家門에 대한 考察. In Song June-ho kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm nonch’ong 宋俊浩敎授停年紀念論叢, 333–62. Chŏnju: Kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe, 1987. Yang Yŏng-jo 梁寧祚. “Koryŏ sidae ch’ŏnja sumobŏp e taehan chaegŏmt’o” 高麗時代 賤子隨母法에 대한 再檢討. Ch’ŏnggye sahak 6 (Dec. 1989): 1–35. ———. “Yŏmal-Sŏnch’o yangch’ŏn kyohon kwa kŭ sosaeng e taehan yŏn’gu” 麗末-鮮初 良賤交婚과 그 所生에 대한 硏究. Ch’ŏnggye sahak 3 (Dec. 1986): 3–52. Yangjwadong yŏn’gu 良佐洞硏究. Edited by Yŏngnam taehakkyo inmun kwahak yŏn’guso 嶺南大學 校 人文科學硏究所. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1990. Yi Chae 李栽. Miram-jip 密菴集. In HMCK, vol. 173. Yi Chae 李縡. Sarye pyŏllam 四禮便覽. With reading notes and comments (hyŏnt’o chuhae 懸吐註解). Seoul: Sech’ang sŏgwan 世昌書館, 1967. ———. Sarye pyŏllam 四禮便覽. Pu Kwangnyeram 附 廣禮覽. Seoul, 1977. Yi Chae-ryong 李載龒. Chosŏn ch’o’gi sahoe kujo yŏn’gu 朝鮮初期社會構造硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1984. ———. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oho ŭi silt’ae wa sŏngkyŏk” 朝鮮前期土豪의 實態와 性格. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 68 (1996): 1–23. Yi Chae-su 李在洙. “16segi chŏndap maemae ŭi silt’ae—Kyŏngbuk chibang chŏndap maemae myŏngmun ŭl chungsim ŭro” 16世紀 田畓賣買의實態—慶北地方 田畓賣買 明文을 中心으로. Yŏksa kyoyuk nonjip 歷史敎育論集 9 (Dec. 1986): 51–103. ———. “16–17segi nobi ŭi chŏndap soyu wa maemae silt’ae” 16–17세기 奴婢의 田畓所有와 賣買實態. Chosŏnsa yŏn’gu 9 (2000): 135–86. Yi Ch’ang-gŏl 李昌杰. “Chosŏn chunggi chibae elit’ŭ ŭi ch’ungwŏn e kwanhan silch’ŭngjŏk yŏn’gu” 朝鮮中期 支配엘리트의 充員에 관한 實證的 硏究. Ph.D. diss., Koryŏ taehakkyo, 1993. Yi Che-hyŏn 李齊賢. Ikchae munjip 益齋文集. In Koryŏ myŏnghyŏn chip, vol. 2, 133–387. Yi Chŏn 李㙉. Wŏlgan-jip 月澗集. In HYMJ, vol. 803. Yi Chŏng-baek 李庭柏. Nakkŭmhŏn munjip 樂琴軒文集. In HYMJ, vol. 2273. Yi Chong-bŏm 李鍾範. “1728nyŏn musillan ŭi sŏngkyŏk” 1728年 戊申亂의 性格. In Chosŏn sidae chŏngch’isa ŭi chaejomyŏng 朝鮮時代 政治史의 再照明, edited by Yi T’ae-jin 李泰鎭. Seoul: Pŏmjosa 汎潮社, 1985. Yi Chŏng-ho 李正浩. “Koryŏ hugi Andong Kwŏn-ssi kamun ŭi kyŏngjejŏk kiban—Kwŏn Chung-si— Kwŏn Su-p’yŏng kyeyŏl ŭl chungsim ŭro” 高麗後期 安東權氏 家門의 經濟的 基盤—權仲時-權守 平 계열을 중심으로. Han’guksa hakpo 21 (Nov. 2005): 333–66. Yi Chŏng-hoe 李庭檜. Songgan ilgi 松澗日記. Han’gukhak charyo ch’ongsŏ 韓國學資料叢書 18. Sŏngnam: Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1998. ———. Songgan sŏnsaeng munjip 松澗先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 1453. Yi Chong-il 李鍾日. “Chosŏn hugi sasŏjok ŭi sinbun kujo pyŏndong e kwanhan sarye yŏn’gu—Taegubu Habung-myŏn-Hasŏ-myŏn ŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 士庶族의 身分構造變動에 관한 事例 硏究—大邱府 河北面河西面을 중심으로. In Hasŏk Kim Ch’ang-su kyosu hwagap kinyŏm sahak nonch’ong 何石 金昌洙 敎授 華甲紀念史學論叢, 377–405. Seoul: Kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe, 1992. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi chŏksŏ sinbun pyŏndong e taehayŏ—Nŭngsŏng Ku-ssi chwajŏngsŭng­gongp’a ŭi chŏksŏ sibi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期의 嫡庶身分變動에 대하여—綾城具氏 左政丞公 派의 嫡庶是非를 중심으로. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 65 (June 1989): 77–117. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi mollak yangban e kwanhayŏ—Taegu changjŏk sang ŭi Haengju Ŭn-ssi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期의 몰락양반에관하여—大邱帳籍上의 幸州 殷氏를 중심으로. In Such’on Pak Yŏng-sŏk kyosu hwagap kinyŏm, vol. 1, 919–45. ———. “16–17segi ŭi sŏŏl sot’ong nonŭi e taehayŏ” 16–17世紀의 庶孼疏通 論議에 대하여. Tongguk sahak 19–20 (Dec. 1986): 163–90. ———. “18–19segi ŭi sŏŏl sot’ong undong e taehayŏ” 18–19世紀의庶孼疏通運動에 대하여. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 58 (Oct. 1987): 23–82. Yi Chŏng-u 李政祐. “Chosŏn hugi chaeji sajok ŭi tonghyang kwa yurim ŭi hyangch’on chibae—



Bibliogr aphy

573

Chŏlla-do Kŭmsan-gun sŏwŏn-hyanggyo ŭi ch’ip’ye wa komunsŏryu ŭi chaksŏng ŭl chungsim ŭro” 조선후기在地士族의 동향과 儒林의 향촌지배—전라도 錦山郡 書院-鄕校의 치폐와 古文書類의 작성을 중심으로. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 7 (Dec. 1998): 177–208. ———. “17–18segi chaeji No-Soron ŭi punjaeng kwa sŏwŏn kŏllip ŭi sŏngkyŏk—Ch’ungch’ŏng-do Nonsan chibang Kwangsan Kim-ssi wa P’ap’yŏng Yun-ssi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 17–18세기 在地老-少 論의 분쟁과 書院建立의 성격—충청도 論山地方 光山金氏와 坡平尹氏를 중심으로. Chindan hakpo 88 (Dec. 1999): 209–29. ———. “17–18segich’o Ch’ŏngju chibang sajok tonghyang kwa sŏwŏn hyangjŏn” 17–18세기초 淸州地 方 士族動向과 書院鄕戰. Chosŏn sidaesa hakpo 11 (Dec. 1999): 97–139. Yi Chong-uk 李鐘旭. Silla kolp’umje yŏn’gu 新羅骨品制硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1999. ———. “Silla sidae ŭi hyŏlchok chiptan kwa sangsok” 新羅時代의 血族 集團과 相續. In Han’guk ch’injok chedo yŏn’gu 韓國親族制度硏究, 1–35. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1992. Yi Chun-gu 李俊九. Chosŏn hugi sinbun chigyŏk pyŏndong yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期身分職役變動硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1993. ———. “Chosŏn hugi sinbun kujo ihae ŭi chemunje kŏmt’o” 朝鮮後期 身分構造 理解의 諸問題 檢 討. Taegu sahak 34 (June 1988): 1–28. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi yuhak kwa kŭ chiwi” 朝鮮後期의 幼學과 그 地位. Minjok munhwa nonch’ong 12 (1991): 71–107. ———. “Chosŏn hugi yangban sinbun idong e kwanhan yŏn’gu” 朝鮮後期 兩班身分 移動에 관한 硏 究 (上). Yŏksa hakpo 96 (Dec. 1982): 139–84. Yi Ch’un-hŭi 李春熙. Chosŏnjo ŭi kyoyuk mun’go e kwanhan yŏn’gu 朝鮮朝의 敎育文庫에 관한 硏究. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 1984. ———. Yijo sŏwŏn mun’go mongnok 李朝書院文庫目錄. Seoul: Taehan minguk kukhoe tosŏgwan, 1969. Yi Chun-hyŏng 李俊亨. Chosŏn hugi Tansŏng sajokch’ŭng yŏn’gu—sahoe pyŏnhwa wa sajokch’ŭng ŭi taeŭng yangsang ŭl chungsim ŭro 朝鮮後期 丹城 士族層硏究—社會變化와 사족층의 對應樣相을 중심으로. Seoul: Asea munhwasa, 2000. Yi Chung-hwan 李重煥. T’aengniji 擇里誌. 2 vols. Translated and annotated by No To-yang 盧道陽. Seoul: Myŏngji taehak ch’ulp’anbu 明知大學出版部, 1982. Yi Hae-jun 李海濬. “Chibangsa yŏn’gu e issŏsŏ komunsŏ charyo ŭi hwalyong” 地方史 硏究에 있어서 古文書資料의 活用. Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’gu 46 (1992): 51–69. ———. “Chosŏn hugi Hosŏ chibang han yangban’ga ŭi nobi soyu silt’ae—Kongju chungho Kyŏngju Yi-ga sojŏn hogu tanja punsŏk” 朝鮮後期 湖西地方 한 兩班家의 奴婢所有實態—公州中湖-慶州 李家所傳 戶口單子分析. Hosŏ sahak 湖西史學 8–9 (Dec. 1980): 65–90. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ‘munjunghwa’ kyŏnghyang kwa ch’injok chojik ŭi pyŏnjil” 조선호기 ‘문중화’ 경향과 친족조직의변질. Yŏksa wa hyŏnsil 48 (June 2003): 169–90. ———. “Chosŏn hugi munjung sŏwŏn paltal ŭi ch’ui—Chŏnnam chiyŏk chosa sarye rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 門中書院 發達의 推移—全南地域 조사사례를 중심으로. In T’aekwa Hŏ Sŏn-do sŏnsaeng chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm Han’guk sahak nonch’ong 擇窩許善道先生 停年紀念 韓國史學論叢, 559–81. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1992. ———. “Chosŏn hugi munjung sŏwŏn ŭi kaenyŏm kwa sŏngkyŏk munje” 朝鮮後期 門中書院의 槪 念과 性格問題. In Yi Su-gŏn kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm, Han’guk chungsesa nonch’ong 이수건교수 정 년기념, 한국중세사논총, 543–62. Seoul: Kan-haeng wiwŏnhoe, 2000. ———. Chosŏn hugi munjung sŏwŏn yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 門中書院 硏究. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 2008. ———. Chosŏn sigi ch’ollak sahoesa 조선시기촌락사회사. Seoul: Minjok munhwasa, 1996. ———. “Kwangsan Kim-ssi pun’am ‘Yŏngsaam’ charyo ŭi sŏngkyŏk—Ch’ungnam Nonsan chiyŏk Kwangsan Kim-ssi sarye” 광산金氏 墳菴 ‘永思菴’資料의 性格—충남논산지역 광산김씨 사례. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 25 (Aug. 2004): 139–70. ———. “Maŭl ŭi hyŏngsŏng kwa pyŏnch’ŏn” 마을의 형성과 변천. In Han’guk hyangch’on minsok chi (I)—Kyŏngsang pukto p’yŏn 韓國鄕村民俗誌 (I)—慶尙北道篇, 3–24. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1992.

574

Bibliogr aphy

———. “17–18segi sŏwŏn ŭi tangp’ajŏk sŏngkyŏk—Chŏnnam chiyŏk sarye rŭl chungsim ŭro” 17–18세 기 書院의 黨派的 性格—全南地域 事例를 중심으로. In Ch’anghae Pak Pyŏng-guk kyosu chŏngnyŏn kinyŏm sahak nonch’ong 창해박병국교수 정년기념 사학논총, 365–80. Seoul: Sahak nonch’ong, 1994. Yi Ham 李涵. Unak sŏnsaeng munjip 雲嶽先生文集. Edited by Unak sŏnsaeng munjip kugyŏk kanhaengso. 1992. Yi Ho-ch’ŏl 李鎬澈. Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp kyŏngjesa 朝鮮前期 農業經濟史. Seoul: Han’gilsa, 1986. ———. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi nongŏp ŭi chŏnt’ong kwa pyŏnhwa” 조선전기 농업의 전통과 변화. Nongŏpsa yŏn’gu 3.1 (June 2004): 25–48. ———. “Nongjangje esŏ pyŏngjakche ro ŭi ihaeng—Chosŏn sidae nongŏp saengsan kwan’gyeron ŭi chaegŏmt’o” 농장제에서 병작제로의 이행—조선시대 농업생산관계론의 재검토. Nongŏp kyŏngje yŏn’gu 農業經濟硏究 38.2 (Dec. 1997): 157–86. ———. Nongŏp kyŏngjesa yŏn’gu 농업경제사연구. Taegu: Kyŏngbuk taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1992. Yi Hŏn-ch’ang 李憲昶. Han’guk kyŏngje t’ongsa 韓國經濟通史. Seoul: Pŏmmunsa, 1999. Yi Hong-du 李弘斗. Chosŏn sidae sinbun pyŏndong yŏn’gu 朝鮮時代 身分變動 硏究. Seoul: Hyean, 1999. Yi Hŭi-gwŏn 李羲權. “Chosŏn hugi chibang t’ongch’i chedo yŏn’gu” 朝鮮後期 地方 統治制度硏究. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 22 (1991): 73–110. ———. Chosŏn hugi chibang t’ongch’i haengjŏng yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 地方統治 行政硏究. Seoul: Chimmundang, 1999. ———. “Sejong sillok chiriji ŭi sŏngssijo yŏn’gu” 世宗實錄地理志의 姓氏條 硏究. Yŏksa hakpo 149 (March 1996): 35–68. Yi Hŭi-hwan 李熙煥. “Namwŏn ŭi Kwangju Yi-ssi rŭl t’onghaesŏ pon Chosŏn malgi sajok ŭi ch’abyŏlhwa” 南原의 廣州李氏를 통해서 본 조선말기 士族의 차별화. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 99–100 (Dec. 1997): 251–74. Yi Hŭi-ryŏng 李希齡. Yakp’a mallok 藥坡漫錄. 1764. In the collection of Kyujanggak Library. Yi Hun-sang 李勛相. “Chosŏn hugi chibang isŏ chojik ŭi pigyosajŏk koch’al” 朝鮮後期 地方吏胥組 織의 比較史的 考察. Chindan hakpo 90 (Dec. 2000): 85–120. ———. “Chosŏn hugi isŏ chiptan kwa muim chiptan ŭi chojik unyŏng kwa kŭ t’ŭksŏng—Chŏlla-do Namwŏn ŭi kakchong sŏnsaengan” 朝鮮後期 吏胥集團과 武任集團의 組織運營과 그 特性—全羅 道 南原의 各種 先生案. Han’gukhak nonjip 17 (1990): 179–94. ———. “Chosŏn hugi Kyŏngsang-do hyangni segye e issŏsŏ Andong ijoktŭl ŭi tŭkse wa hyangni chisigin ŭi tonghyang” 朝鮮後期 慶尙道 鄕吏世界에 있어서 安東 吏族들의 得勢와 鄕吏知識人의 動向. Kogo yŏksahak chi 3 (May 1987): 171–234. ———. Chosŏn hugi ŭi hyangni 朝鮮後期의 鄕吏. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1990. ———. “Chosŏn hugi ŭpch’i sahoe ŭi kujo wa cheŭi—hyangni chiptan ŭi chŏngch’esŏng hollan kwa ŭpch’i cheŭi yuhŭihwa” 朝鮮後期 邑治 社會의 構造와 祭儀—鄕吏集團의 正體性 혼란과 邑治祭 儀의 遊戱化. Yŏksa hakpo 147 (Sept. 1995): 47–94. Yi Hwang 李滉. Chŭngbo T’oegye chŏnsŏ 增補退溪全書. 5 vols. Seoul: Sŏnggyungwan taehakkyo, Taedong munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1971. Yi Hye-ok 이혜옥. “Koryŏ sidae ŭi ka wa kaŭisik” 고려시대의 家와 家意識. Tongbang hakchi 129 (March 2005): 1–48. Yi Hyŏn-il 李玄逸. Karam sŏnsaeng munjip 葛菴先生文集, 1909. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Yi Hyŏng-sang 李衡祥. Pyŏngwa-jip 甁窩集, 1772. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Yi I 李珥. Yulgok chŏnsŏ 栗谷全書. 2 vols. Seoul: Sŏnggyungwan taehakkyo, Taedong munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1971. Yi I-hwa 李離和. “Chosŏnjo tangnon ŭi chŏn’gae kwajŏng kwa kŭ kyebo” 朝鮮朝 黨論의 展開過程과 그 系譜. Han’guk sahak 8 (1986): 45–92. Yi Ik 李瀷. Sŏngho sasŏl 星湖僿說. 2 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa,1970. ———. Sŏngho sasŏl yusŏn 星湖僿說類選. Seoul: Kyŏngmunsa, 1976. Yi Ki-baek 李基白. Han’guksa sillon 韓國史新論. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1990 (1967). ———. Koryŏ kwijok sahoe ŭi hyŏngsŏng 高麗貴族社會의 形成. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1990.



Bibliogr aphy

575

———. Silla chŏngch’i sahoesa yŏn’gu 新羅政治社會史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1974. Yi Ki-baek sŏnsaeng kohŭi kinyŏm Han’guk sahak nonch’ong 李基白先生 古稀紀念 韓國史學論叢. 2 vols. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1994. Yi Ki-dong 李基東. Silla kolp’um sahoe wa hwarangdo 新羅骨品社會와 花郞徒. Seoul: Han’guk yŏn’guwŏn, 1980. Yi Kok 李穀. Kajŏng-jip 稼亭集. In Koryŏ myŏnghyŏn-jip 高麗名賢集, vol. 3, 1–147. Yi Kyŏng-sik 李景植. Chosŏn chŏn’gi t’oji chedo yŏn’gu 朝鮮前期土地制度硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1986. Yi Man-yŏl 李萬烈. “Koryŏ Kyŏngwŏn Yi-ssi kamun ŭi chŏn’gae kwajŏng” 高麗 慶源李氏 家門의 展 開過程. Han’guk hakpo 21 (Winter 1980): 2–29. Yi Mun-gŏn 李文楗. Mukchae ilgi 默齋日記. 2 vols. Seoul: Kuksa p’yŏnch’an wiwŏnhoe, 1998. Yi Mun-hyŏn 李文鉉. “16segi ŭi pyŏlgŭp kwanhaeng—Hwang Sin ka ŭi sarye rŭl chungsim ŭro” 16세 기의 別給慣行—黃愼家의 사례를 중심으로. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 14 (Dec. 1998): 33–68. Yi Mun-jae 李文載. Sŏktong yu’go 石洞遺稿, 1935. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Yi Ŏn-jŏk 李彦迪. Pongsŏn chabŭi 奉先雜儀. 1550. Yi Pŏm-jik 李範稷. Han’guk chungse ye sasang yŏn’gu—orye rŭl chungsim ŭro 韓國中世 禮思想硏 究—五禮를 中心으로. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1991. Yi Pyŏng-hyu 李秉烋. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi Yŏngnam-Kiho sarim ŭi chŏpch’ok kwa kŭ ch’ui—sarimp’a ŭi sŏngbun kwa kwallyŏn hayŏ” 朝鮮初期 嶺南-畿湖 士林의 接觸과 그 推移—士林派의 性分과 관 련하여. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 26 (Oct. 1979): 63–115. ———. Chosŏn chŏn’gi Kiho sarimp’a yŏn’gu 朝鮮前期畿湖士林派硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1984. ———. “16segi chŏnban’gi ŭi chŏngguk ŭi Ch’ungjae Kwŏn Pŏl ŭi taeŭng” 16世紀 前半期의 政局과冲 齋權橃의 對應. In Yi Ki-baek sŏnsaeng kohŭi kinyŏm, vol. 2, 1089–1115. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1994. Yi Saek 李穡. Mog’ŭn mun’go 牧隱文藁. In Koryŏ myŏnghyŏn chip, vol. 3, 796–973. Yi Sang-bae 李相培. Chosŏn hugi chŏngch’i wa kwaesŏ 朝鮮後期 政治와 掛書. Seoul: Kukhak charyowŏn, 1999. Yi Sang-baek 李相佰. “Chŏng To-jŏn non—muillan sŏrwŏn ŭl chungsim ŭro” 鄭道傳論—戊寅亂 雪 寃을 中心으로. In Chosŏn munhwasa yŏn’gu non’go 朝鮮文化史硏究論攷, 249–339. Seoul: Ŭryu munhwasa, 1948. ———. Han’guksa, kŭnse chŏn’gi-p’yŏn 韓國史, 近世前期篇. Edited by Chindan hakhoe. Seoul: Ŭryu munhwasa, 1962. ———. “Sŏŏl kŭmgo simal” 庶孼禁錮始末. Tongbang hakchi 1 (1954): 159–329. ———. Yijo kŏnguk ŭi yŏn’gu—Yijo ŭi kŏnguk kwa chŏnje kaehyŏk munje 李朝建國의 硏究—李朝의建 國과 田制改革問題. Seoul: Ŭryu munhwasa, 1949. Yi Sang-hyŏn 李相賢. “Wŏlch’ŏn Cho Mok ŭi Tosan sŏwŏn chonghyang nonŭi—17segi Yŏngnam sajok tonghyang ŭi iltan” 月川趙穆의 陶山書院 從享論議—17세기 嶺南士族 動向의 一端. Pug’ak saron 8 (2001): 37–93. Yi Sang-hyŏng 李尙馨. Ch’ŏnmukchae-jip 天默齋集. In HYMJ, vol. 543; HMCK, sok, vol. 21. Yi Sang-jŏng 李象靖. Taesan-jip 大山集. In HMCK, vols. 226–27. Yi Sang-ŭn 李相殷. “Hakpong sŏnsaeng ŭi hangmun sasang ŭi kyŏnghyang” 鶴峯先生의 學問思想의 傾向. In Hakpong ŭi hangmun kwa ku’guk hwaltong 鶴峯의學問과 救國活動, 75–96. Seoul: Hakpong Kim Sŏng-il sŏnsaeng sun’guk sabaek chunyŏn kinyŏm nonmunjip, 1993. Yi Se-yŏng 李世永. “18–19segi yangban t’oho ŭi chiju kyŏngyŏng” 18–19세기 兩班土豪의 地主經營. Han’guk munhwa 6 (Dec. 1985): 75–119. Yi Sik 李植. T’aektang-jip 澤堂集. 17 vols. 1747. Yi Sŏng-im 李成姙. “16segi Chosŏn yangban kwallyo ŭi sahwan kwa kŭ e ttarŭn suip—Yu Hŭi-ch’un ŭi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 16세기 朝鮮 兩班官僚의 仕宦과 그에 따른 收入—柳希春의 를 中心으로. Yŏksa hakpo 145 (March 1995): 91–143. Yi Sŏng-mu 李成茂. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi ŭi hyangni” 朝鮮初期의 鄕吏. Han’guksa yŏn’gu 5 (1970): 65–96. ———. Chosŏn ch’o’gi yangban yŏn’gu 朝鮮初期 兩班硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1980. ———. Chosŏn yangban sahoe yŏn’gu 朝鮮兩班社會硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1995. ———. Han’guk ŭi kwagŏ chedo 韓國의 科擧制度. Rev. and enlarged ed. [kaejŏng chŭngbo]. Seoul: Chimmundang, 1994.

576

Bibliogr aphy

———. “Sŏnch’o ŭi Sŏnggyun’gwan yŏn’gu” 鮮初의 成均館硏究. Yŏksa hakpo 35–36 (Dec. 1967): 219–68. Yi Su-gŏn 李樹健. “Chosŏn chŏn’gi sŏnggwan ch’egye wa chokpo ŭi p’yŏnch’an ch’eje” 朝鮮前期 姓 貫體系와 族譜의 편찬체제. In Such’on Pak Yŏng-sŏk kyosu hwagap kinyŏm, vol. 1, 739–67. ———. Chosŏn sidae chibang haengjŏngsa 朝鮮時代 地方行政史. Seoul: Minŭmsa, 1989. ———. “Chosŏn sidae sinbunsa kwallyŏn charyo ŭi pip’an—sŏnggwan, ka’gye, inmul kwallyŏn wijo charyo wa wisŏ rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮時代 身分史 관련 자료의 비판—姓貫-家系-人物 관련 僞 造資料와 僞書를 중심으로. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 14 (Dec. 1998): 1–32. ———. Han’guk chungse sahoesa yŏn’gu 韓國中世社會史硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1985. ———. Han’guk ŭi sŏngssi wa chokpo 한국의 성씨와 족보. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2003. ———. “Hoejae Yi Ŏn-jŏk kamun ŭi sahoe-kyŏngjejŏk kiban” 晦齋李彦迪家門의 社會-經濟的 基盤. Minjok munhwa yŏn’gu nonch’ong 12 (1991): 21–70. ———. “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏnjo sahoesa ŭi il yŏn’gu—Kyŏngbuk chibang chaeji sajok ŭl chungsim ŭro” 古文書를통해 본 朝鮮朝社會史의 一硏究—慶北地方 在地士族을 중심으로. Han’guk sahak 9 (1987): 5–89. ———. “Koryŏ sidae yŏn’gu” 高麗時代 硏究. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 3 (1989): 59–102. ———. “Sŏae Yu Sŏng-nyong ŭi hangmun kwa hakp’a” 西厓柳成龍의 學問과 學派. Han’guk ŭi ch’ŏrhak 韓國의哲學 23 (Dec. 1995): 1–14. ———. “T’oegye Yi Hwang kamun ŭi chaesan yurae wa kŭ soyu hyŏngt’ae” 退溪李滉 家門의 財産由 來와 그 所有形態. Yŏksa kyoyuk nonjip 13–14 (Feb. 1990): 652–66. ———. “Yŏmal Sŏnch’o t’osŏng ijok ŭi sŏngjang kwa punhwa—Andong Kwŏn-ssi rŭl chungsim ŭro” 麗末鮮初 土姓吏族의 성장과 분화—안동權氏를 중심으로. In Yi Ki-baek sŏnsaeng kohŭi kinyŏm, vol. 1, 957–83. ———. Yŏngnam hakp’a ŭi hyŏngsŏng kwa chŏn’gae 嶺南學派의 形成과 展開. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1995. ———. Yŏngnam sarimp’a ŭi hyŏngsŏng 嶺南士林派의 形成. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo minsok munhwa yŏn’guso, 1979. ———. “17–18segi Andong chibang yurim ŭi chŏngch’i-sahoejŏk kinŭng” 17–18세기 安東地方 儒林의 政治-社會的 機能. Taegu sahak 30 (Nov. 1986): 163–237. Yi Su-gŏn, Yi Su-hwan, Chŏng Chin-yŏng, and Kim Yong-man. “Chosŏn hugi Kyŏngju chiyŏk chaeji sajok ŭi hyangch’on chibae” 朝鮮後期 慶州地域 在地士族의 鄕村支配. Minjok munhwa nonch’ong 15 (1994): 59–150. Yi Su-gwang 李睟光. Chibong yusŏl 芝峰類說. Reprint. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 1970. Yi Su-hwan李樹煥. Chosŏn hugi sŏwŏn yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期書院硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 2001. ———. “Sŏwŏn ŭi chŏngch’i-sahoejŏk koch’al” 書院의 政治-社會的考 察. Kyonam sahak 1 (Dec. 1985): 239–74. ———. “17–18segi Andong Pyŏngsan sŏwŏn ŭi sahoe-kyŏngjejŏk kiban” 17–18세기 안동 屛山書院의 社會-經濟的 基盤. Kyonam sahak 3 (1987): 159–99. Yi Sun-gŭn 李純根. “Silla sidae sŏngssi ch’widŭk kwa kŭ ŭimi” 新羅時代 姓氏取得과 그 意味. Han’guk saron 6 (Dec. 1980): 3–65. Yi Sun-hyŏng 李順炯. Han’guk ŭi myŏngmun chongga 한국의 명문 종가. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2000. Yi Sung-in 李崇仁. Toŭn sŏnsaeng chip 陶隱先生集. In Koryŏ myŏnghyŏn chip 高麗名賢集, vol. 4. Yi T’ae-jin 李泰鎭. “Chosŏn hugi yangban sahoe ŭi pyŏnhwa—sinbunje wa hyangch’on sahoe unyŏng kujo e taehan yŏn’gu rŭl chungsim ŭro” 朝鮮後期 兩班社會의 變化—身分制와 鄕村社會 운영구 조에 대한 연구를 중심으로. In Han’guk sahoe palchŏn saron 韓國社會發展史論, edited by Chu Po-don 주보돈 et al., 129–226. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1992. ———, ed. Chosŏn sidae chŏngch’isa ŭi chaejomyŏng—sahwa-tangjaeng-p’yŏn 朝鮮時代 政治史의 再 照明—士禍黨爭篇. Seoul: Pŏmjosa, 1985. ———. Han’guk sahoesa yŏn’gu—nongŏp kisul paltal kwa sahoe pyŏndong 韓國社會史硏究—農業技 術發達과 社會變動. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 1986. ———. “Sarimp’a ŭi yuhyangso pongnip undong” 士林派의 留鄕所 復立運動. In Han’guk sahoesa yŏn’gu, 125–85.



Bibliogr aphy

577

———. “ ‘Sobinggi’ (1500–1750) ŭi ch’ŏnch’e hyŏnsangjŏk wŏnin— ŭi kwallyŏn kirok punsŏk” ‘小氷期’ (1500–1750)의 天體現象的 원인—의 관련기록 분석. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 72 (1996): 89–126. ———. “Sŏŏl ch’adae ko—Sŏnch’o chŏpcha che ŭi sŏngnip kwajŏng ŭl chungsim ŭro” 庶孼差待考—鮮初 妾子制의 成立科程을 中心으로. Yŏksa hakpo 17 (April 1965): 65–104. ———. “15segi huban’gi ŭi kwa myŏngjok ŭisik— inmulcho ŭi punsŏk ŭl t’onghayŏ” 15世紀後半期의 과 名族意識— 人物條의 分析을 통 하여. Han’guk saron 3 (Aug. 1976): 229–319. ———. “18segi Namin ŭi chŏngch’ijŏk soet’oe wa Yŏngnam chibang” 18세기 남인의정칙적 쇠퇴와 영 남지방. Minjok munhwa nonch’ong 11 (1990): 195–205. Yi Tae-wi 李大༩. Hwalgye sŏnsaeng yu’go 活溪先生遺稿, 1880. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Yi Tong-hŭi 李東熙. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi kwaninch’ŭng yŏn’gu—Koryŏ wa Chosŏn chibae seryŏkkan ŭi kwan’gye kyumyŏng ŭi ilhwan ŭro” 朝鮮初期 官人層硏究—高麗와 朝鮮 支配勢力間의 關係 규명 의 일환으로. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 72 (1996): 1–50. Yi U-sŏng 李佑成. “Han’guk yuhak sasang T’oegye hakp’a ŭi hyŏngsŏng kwa kŭ chŏn’gae” 韓國儒學 史上 退溪學派의 形成과 그 展開. T’oegye hakpo 26 (1979): 8–12. ———. “T’oegye sŏnsaeng kwa sŏwŏn ch’angsŏl undong—Yijo sŏngnihak ŭi t’och’akhwa wa ak’ademijŭm” 退溪先生과 書院創設運動—李朝性理學의 土着化와 아카데미즘. T’oegye hakpo 19 (1978): 203–10. Yi Wŏn-bae 李元培. Kuam-jip 龜巖集. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Yi Yŏng-ch’un 李迎春. Chosŏn hugi wangwi kyesŭng yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 王位繼承 硏究. Seoul: Chimmundang, 1998. Yi Yŏng-hun 李榮薰. “Chosŏn chŏnho ko” 朝鮮佃戶考. Yŏksa hakpo 142 (June 1994): 77–127. ———. Chosŏn hugi sahoe kyŏngjesa 朝鮮後期社會經濟史. Seoul: Han’gilsa, 1988. ———. “Chosŏn sidae sahoe kyŏngjesa yŏn’gu ŭi ch’oegŭn tonghyang kwa komunsŏ ŭi ŭiŭi” 朝鮮時 代 社會經濟史硏究의 最近 動向과 古文書의 意義. Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’gu 46 (1992): 37–49. ———. “Chosŏn sidae ŭi chuho-hyŏpho kwan’gye chaeron” 朝鮮時代의 主戶-挾戶關係 再論. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 25 (Aug. 2004): 1–32. ———. “Chosŏn sidae ŭi sahoe kyŏngjesa yŏn’gu e issŏsŏ myŏt kaji kich’ojŏk nanjedŭl” 朝鮮時代의 社會經濟史硏究에 있어서 몇 가지 基礎的 難題들. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 37 (1992): 111–33. ———. “Han’guksa e issŏsŏ kŭndae ro ŭi ihaeng kwa t’ŭkchil” 韓國史에 있어서 近代로의 移行과 特 質. Kyŏngje sahak 21 (Dec. 1996): 75–115. ———. “Han’guksa e issŏsŏ nobije ŭi ch’ui wa sŏngkyŏk” 한국사에 있어서 奴婢制의 추이와 성격. In Nobi-nongno-noye—yesongmin ŭi pigyosa 노비-농노-노예—隸屬民의 比較史, edited by Yŏksa hakhoe 歷史學會, 304–422. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1998. ———. “Honam komunsŏ e nat’anan changgi ch’use wa chunggi p’adong” 湖南 고문서에 나타난 長 期趨勢와 中期波動. In Honam chibang komunsŏ kich’o yŏn’gu 호남지방 고문서 기초연구, edited by Chŏng Ku-bok 정구복 et al., 301–50. Sŏngnam: Han’guk Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1999. ———. “Komunsŏ rŭl t’onghae pon Chosŏn chŏn’gi nobi ŭi kyŏngjejŏk sŏngkyŏk” 古文書를 통해 본 朝鮮前期 奴婢의 經濟的 性格. Han’guk sahak 9 (1987): 91–172. ———. “ ko” 太祖賜給芳雨土地文書考. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 1 (Oct. 1991): 1–17. ———. “Yangan ŭi sŏngkyŏk e kwanhan chaegŏmt’o—Kyŏngsang-do Yech’ŏn-gun kyŏngja yangan ŭi sarye punsŏk” 量案의 性格에 관한 再檢討—慶尙道 醴泉郡 庚子量案의 事例分析. Kyŏngje sahak 8 (1984): 1–59. Yi Yŏng-hun and An Sŭng-jun. “1528nyŏn Andong-bu pubuk Chuch’on hojŏk tanp’yŏn” 1528년 安東 府府北 周村戶籍斷片. Komunsŏ yŏn’gu 8 (March 1996): 129–43. Yi Yŏng-hun and Yang Tong-hyu 梁東烋. “Chosŏn nobije wa Miguk hŭg’in noyeje: pigyojŏk koch’al” 朝鮮奴婢制와 美國黑人奴隸制: 比較的 考察. Kyŏngje nonjip 經濟論集 37.2–3 (Sept. 1998): 293–336.

578

Bibliogr aphy

Yi Yŏng-hwa 李英華. “Chosŏn ch’o’gi pulgyo ŭirye ŭi sŏngkyŏk” 朝鮮初期 佛敎儀禮의 性格. Ch’ŏnggye sahak 10 (Dec. 1993): 3–49. Yŏji tosŏ 輿地圖書. 2 vols. Reprint. Seoul: T’amgudang, 1973. Yŏkchu Kyŏngguk taejŏn 譯註經國大典. 2 vols. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1985–86. Yŏnbang se’go 聯芳世稿. Andong: Ch’ŏnsang ch’ongsŏ kanhaenghoe 川上叢書刊行會, 1991. Yŏngga ŏnhaengnok—Andong Kwŏn-ssi ilch’ŏnnyŏnsa. 永嘉言行錄—安東權氏一千年史. 3 vols. Seoul: Andong Kwŏn-ssi munhŏn kanhaeng wiwŏnhoe 安東權氏 文獻刊行委員會, 1989. Yŏnggaji 永嘉誌. With original woodblock edition, [Kugyŏk] Yŏnggaji [國譯]永嘉誌. Andong: Andong kunsu, 1991. Yŏnggaji, wŏnbon yŏngin 永嘉誌, 原本影印. Andong: Andong munhwawŏn, 1993. Yŏnghae Chaeryŏng Yi-ssi p’yŏn 寧海載寧李氏篇. In Komunsŏ chipsŏng 古文書集成, vols. 33, 69. Sŏngnam: Han’guk chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, (vol. 33) 1997 and (vol. 69) 2004. Yŏngnam hyangyak charyo chipsŏng 嶺南鄕約資料集成. Compiled by O Se-ch’ang 吳世昌 et al. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1986. Yŏngnam inmul ko 嶺南人物考. Compiled by Ch’ae Hong-wŏn 蔡弘遠 et al.; translated by Kang Chujin 姜周鎭. Seoul: Sŏul taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1967. Yŏngnam komunsŏ chipsŏng 嶺南古文書集成. 2 vols. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1992. Yŏngnam munhŏllok 嶺南文獻錄. Edited by Chŏng Yŏng-sik 鄭瑩植. 10 vols. Taegu: Yŏngnam munhŏllok kanso, 1939. Yŏngnam munjip haeje 嶺南文集解題. Edited by Minjok munhwa yŏn’guso 民族文化硏究所. Kyŏngsan: Yŏngnam taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 1988. Yongsŏngji 龍城誌. 1752. Yŏngwŏn mannam Han’guk sangjangnye 영원만남 韓國喪葬禮. Kungnip minsok pangmulgwan 國立 民俗博物館. Seoul: Mijinsa, 1990. Yŏngyang-Ŭiryŏng-Kosŏng Nam-ssi taedongbo 英陽-宜寧-固城 南氏大同譜. Preface dated 1979. 4 vols. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Yŏnjo ku’gam 椽曹龜鑑. Reprint. Seoul: Sŏgang taehakkyo inmunkwahak yŏn’guso, 1982. Yŏrŭp wŏn’u sajok 列邑院宇事蹟. Reprint. Seoul: Minch’ang munhwasa 民昌文化社, 1991. Yoshida Mitsuo 吉田光男. “Shizoku to yanban no oide—rekishi no jikan-bunka no jikan” 士族と兩班 のおぃで—歷史の時間-文化の時間. Kankoku Chōsen no bunka to shakai 韓國朝鮮の文化と社會 1 (Oct. 2002): 9–26. Yu Chik 柳稷. Paegjoram sŏnsaeng munjip 百拙庵先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 1692. Yu Chin 柳袗. Suam sŏnsaeng munjip 修巖先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 553. Yu Hu-jang 柳後章. Chuilchae munjip 主一齋文集. In HYMJ, vol. 1206. Yu Hŭi-ch’un 柳希春. Miam-jip 眉巖集. In HMCK, vol. 34. Yu Kwŏn-jong 劉權鐘. “Chosŏn sidae T’oegye hakp’a ŭi yehak sasang e kwanhan ch’ŏrhakchŏk koch’al” 朝鮮時代 退溪學派의 禮學思想에 관한 哲學的 考察. T’oegye hakpo 102 (June 1999): 27–72. Yu Kyu 柳 ௏. Imyŏjae sŏnsaeng munjip 臨汝齋先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 1680. Yu Mi-rim 유미림. “Chosŏn hugi ŭi chŏngch’i sasang” 조선후기의 정치사상. Seoul: Chisik sanŏpsa, 2002. Yu Pong-hak 유봉학. “18–19segi kyŏng-hyang hakkye ŭi pun’gi wa kyŏnghwa sajok” 18–19세기 京-鄕 學界의 分岐와 京華士族. Kuksagwan nonch’ong 22 (1991): 111–36. Yu Se-ch’ŏl 柳世哲. Hoedang sŏnsaeng munjip 悔堂先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 671. Yu Se-myŏng 柳世鳴. Uhŏn sŏnsaeng munjip 寓軒先生文集. In HYMJ, vol. 2502. Yu Sŏng-nyong 柳成龍. Sŏae chŏnsŏ 西厓全書. 4 vols. Seoul: Sŏae chŏnsŏ p’yŏnjip wiwŏnhoe, 1991. Yu Un-nyong 柳雲龍. Kyŏmam-jip 謙庵集. In HMCK, vol. 49. Yu Wŏn-ji 柳元之. Cholchae sŏnsaeng munjip 拙齋先生文集. In T’oegyehak charyo ch’ongsŏ, vol. 32. Yu Yŏng-ik 柳永益. Kabo kyŏngjang yŏn’gu 甲午更張硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1990. Yun Chŭng 尹拯. Myŏngjae sŏnsaeng yu’go 明齋先生遺稿. 2 vols. Reprint. Seoul: Kyŏngin munhwasa, 1974.



Bibliogr aphy

579

Yun Haeng-im 尹行恁. Taebang se’ga ŏnhaengnok 帶方世家言行錄. Translated by Yi Pong-nae 李鳳 來. Seoul: Kyomunsa, 1986. Yun Hŭi-myŏn 尹熙勉. Chosŏn hugi hyanggyo yŏn’gu 朝鮮後期 鄕校硏究. Seoul: Ilchogak, 1990. Yun Hun-p’yo 윤훈표. “Koryŏ sidae myŏngye wa such’isim ŭi sahoejŏk paegyŏng kwa kijun— chibaech’ŭng ŭi kwanjik kwa sasaenghwal ŭl chungsim ŭro” 고려시대 명예와 수치심의 사회적 배 경과 기준—지배층의 관직과 사생활을 중심으로. Tongbang hakchi 135 (Sept. 2006): 47–90. Yun Sa-sun 尹絲淳. Chosŏn sidae sŏngnihak ŭi yŏn’gu 조선시대 성리학의 연구. Seoul: Koryŏ taehakkyo, Minjok munhwa yŏn’guwŏn, 1998. ———. “Hanhwŏndang sŏnsaeng ŭi sŏnbi chŏngsin” 寒暄堂先生의 선비精神. In Hanwŏndang ŭi saengae wa sasang 寒暄堂의 生涯와 思想, edited by Pae Chong-ho 裵宗鎬, 111–24. Seoul: Hanhwŏndang sŏnsaeng kinyŏm saŏpsa, 1980. Yun Sang 尹祥. Pyŏltong-jip 別洞集, 1900. In the collection of Harvard-Yenching Library. Zenshō Eisuke 善生永助. Chōsen no shūraku 朝鮮の聚落. 3 vols. Keijō: Chōsen sōtokufu, 1933–35. Zheng, Zhenman. Family Lineage Organization and Social Change in Ming and Qing Fujian. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2001. Zhu Xi 朱熹. Wengong jiali 文公家禮. Shanghai, 1918.

Gl os sa ry-I n de x : De scen t Grou ps Andong Chang 安東張, 89, 93 Andong Kim 安東金, 35, 37, 89, 92–93, 387; “new” Andong Kim, 240, 333, 364 An’gang No 安康盧, 105 Ansan Kim 安山金, 26, 37 Ch’angnyŏng Sŏng 昌寧成, 451n106 Chinbo Paek 眞寶白, 115 Chinju Ha 晋州河, 57, 293 Chinju Kang 晋州姜, 57 Ch’irwŏn Yun 漆原尹, 34 Chŏngan Im 定安任, 33, 37 Chŏngju Yu 貞州柳, 22 Ch’ŏngju Chŏng 淸州鄭, 53 Ch’ŏngju Han 淸州韓, 53, 357 Ch’ŏngju Yi 淸州李, 37 Ch’ŏngp’ung Kim 淸風金, 118 Ch’ŏrwŏn Ch’oe 鐵原崔, 33, 37, 52, 446n14 Choyang Im 兆陽林, 118 Ch’unch’ŏn Pak 春川朴, 114 Haeju Ch’oe 海州崔, 25–31 passim, 37 Haengju Ki 幸州奇, 52 Hansan Yi 韓山李, 448n48 Hanyang Cho 漢陽趙, 110 Hayang Hŏ 河陽許, 57 Hoengsŏng Cho 橫城趙, 33, 37, 52 Hwasun Ch’oe 和順崔, 112 Ilchik Son 一直孫, 98 Indong Chang 仁同張, 462n61 Kangnŭng Kim 江陵金, 21, 26, 29, 31 Kimhae Hŏ 金海許, 291 Koch’ang O 高敞吳, 209, 492n12 Kongam Hŏ 孔巖許, 37, 52

Kwangju An 廣州安, 291 Kyŏngju Ch’oe 慶州崔, 25, 26, 29 Kyŏngju Kim 慶州金, 22–29 passim, 31, 37, 260, 367 Kyŏngju Yi 慶州李, 41, 57 Kyŏngwŏn (Inch’ŏn) Yi 慶源 (仁州) 李, 26–31 ­passim, 37 Munhwa Yu 文化柳, 37, 57, 58, 74, 206 Namp’yŏng Mun 南平文, 33 Namwŏn Chin 南原晉, 101, 256 Namyang Hong 南陽洪, 37, 39 Nŭngsŏng Ku 綾城具, 105 Ŏnyang Kim 彦陽金, 33, 35, 37, 52 P’ap’yŏng Yun 坡平尹, 28–38 passim, 57, 112 Ponghwa Chŏng 奉化鄭, 53, 57 Puan Kim 扶安金, 279 P’ungsan Kim 豊山金, 311 P’ungsan Sim 豊山沈, 152 P’yŏnggang Ch’ae 平康蔡, 33, 37, 52 P’yŏngsan Pak 平山朴, 25–29 passim P’yŏngyang Cho 平壤趙, 34, 37, 53, 57 Sinch’ang Maeng 愼昌孟, 57 Sinch’ŏn Kang 信川康, 495n61 Sŏngju Yi 星州李, 37, 52, 53 Suju Ch’oe 水州崔, 29 Sunch’ŏn Kim 順天金, 99, 100, 152, 357 Taegu Paek 大邱白, 389 Tongnae Chŏng 東萊鄭, 387 Ŭiryŏng Nam 宜寧南, 53

582

Yangch’ŏn Hŏ 陽川許, 240 Yangdong Son 良洞孫, 474n18 Yangsŏng Yi 陽城李, 52 Yean Yi 禮安李, 215, 267

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Yech’ŏn Kwŏn 醴泉權, 110, 146 Yŏhŭng (Hwangnyŏ) Min 驪興 (黃驪) 閔, 32, 37, 56, 57 Yŏngch’ŏn Yi 永川李, 378

Gl os sa ry-I n de x : Per sona l Na m e s A r r a nged A l ph a betica l ly Accor di ng to Choron y ms (pon’gwa n) Andong Kwŏn 安東權 in capital, 240, 319, 325 and exams, 55 genealogy of, 58, 90, 92, 104, 206, 299, 365 graves, 200, 202, 206 hyangni, 382, 383, 387 Residential branches Chŏ’gok Kwŏn 渚谷權, 347 Yu’gok Kwŏn 酉谷權, 107, 121, 130, 170, 191, 297 Genealogical branches Ch’umilgong-p’a 樞密公派, 90 P’ansŏgong-p’a 判書公派, 91, 112 Pog’yagong-p’a 僕射公派, 90, 112 Individual members Kwŏn Cha-gyŏm 權自謙, 105 Kwŏn Cha-yŏ 權子輿, 91 Kwŏn Ch’ae1 權採, 91 Kwŏn Ch’ae2 權采, 113, 121, 215, 225 Kwŏn Chang 權檣, 164 Kwŏn Che 權踶, 90, 91 Kwŏn Ch’i 權輜, 103, 104 Kwŏn Ch’ik 權勅, 215 Kwŏn Chip-kyŏng 權執經, 99 Kwŏn Ch’ŏk 權頙, genealogical chart B.1. Kwŏn Chŏn1 權專, 92 Kwŏn Chŏn2 權磌, 164 Kwŏn Ch’on 權忖, 104 Kwŏn Chŏng-ch’im 權正沈, 335 Kwŏn Chŏng-hŭm 權正欽, 336 Kwŏn Chu1 權柱, 164, 291 Kwŏn Chu2 權霔, 249 Kwŏn Chun 權準, 90 Kwŏn Ch’un-nan 權春蘭, 228 Kwŏn Chung-hwa 權仲和, 91 Kwŏn Haeng 權幸, 89, 91, 200, 303

Kwŏn Haeng-ga 權行可, 219, 228 Kwŏn Han-gong 權漢功, 91 Kwŏn Hang 權恒, 291 Kwŏn Ho 權豪, 104 Kwŏn Ho-mun 權好文, 172, 184, 303, 361 Kwŏn Hu [Chae] 權煦 [載], 42 Kwŏn Hŭi-jŏng 權希正, 98 Kwŏn Hwa 權和, genealogical chart B.1. Kwŏn I 權邇, 139 Kwŏn In 權靷, 91 Kwŏn Kae 權玠, 105 Kwŏn Kan 權幹, 108 Kwŏn Ki 權紀, 172, 215, 224, 413 Kwŏn Ko 權皐, 90 Kwŏn Kon 權琨, 105 Kwŏn Ku 權榘, 325–26, 350 Kwŏn Ku-gyŏng 權九經, 103, 104 Kwŏn Kŭn 權近, 60, 67, 76 Kwŏn Kye-gyŏng 權啓經, 142 Kwŏn Kyŏng-jŏn 權景 , 311 Kwŏn Man 權萬, 328 Kwŏn Mok 權 , 282, 283 Kwŏn Nae 權來, 113, 147–48, 267 Kwŏn Nam 權擥, 90, 91 Kwŏn Ong 權雍, 200 Kwŏn Pan 權攀, 90 Kwŏn Pŏl 權橃, 91 career of, 112–13, 134, 301, 363 as Cho Kwang-jo sympathizer, 164 descendants of, 248, 282, 328 economic situation of, 136, 139, 147, 151 sarim credentials, 164 Kwŏn Pu 權溥, 42, 95, 240 Kwŏn Sa-bin 權士彬, 105, 112, 214 Kwŏn Sa-su 權士秀, 147

584

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Andong Kwŏn Individual members (continued) Kwŏn Sa-yŏng 權士英, 105 Kwŏn Sang-ch’ung 權尙忠, 148 Kwŏn Se-yŏng 權世英, 215 Kwŏn Si 權偲, 103, 104 Kwŏn Sim-haeng 權審行, 168 Kwŏn Su-hong 權守洪, 90, 91, 92, 112 Kwŏn Su-p’yŏng 權守平, 90, 91, 92 Kwŏn Su-wŏn 權壽元, 346 Kwŏn Suk-hyŏng 權叔衡, 105 Kwŏn Suk-kyun 權叔均, 105 Kwŏn Tae-gi 權大器, 172 Kwŏn T’ae-il 權泰一, 224 Kwŏn Tae-un 權大運, 325 Kwŏn Tan 權㫜, 90 Kwŏn Tŏk-su 權德秀, 326–29 passim Kwŏn Tong-bo 權東輔, 112, 113, 143, 147, 215 Kwŏn Tong-mi 權東美, 113, 144, 171 Kwŏn Tu-gyŏng 權斗經, 306, 335 Kwŏn Tu-in 權斗寅, 282, 301, 302, 303, 307 Kwŏn U 權堣, 303 Kwŏn Ŭi 權檥, 121, 221, 346 Kwŏn Uk 權旭, 121 Kwŏn Ŭng-do 權應度, 285 Kwŏn Wan 權 , 346 Kwŏn Yang 權讓, 125, 203 Kwŏn Yu 權濡, 249 Kwŏn Yun 權鈗, 346 Kwŏn Yun-bo 權允保, genealogical chart B.1. Kwŏn Yun-p’yŏng 權允平, genealogical chart B.1. Chaeryŏng Yi 載寧李 of Yŏnghae 寧海, 108, 283 Yi Ae 李 , 136, 139, 190, 193 Yi Chae 李栽, 306, 332 Yi Chi-hyŏn 李之炫, 129, 283 Yi Hae 李楷, 267 Yi Ham 李涵, 115, 138, 173, 204, 225, 226, 350 Yi Hyŏn-il 李玄逸, 116, 306–7, 320, 322, 323, 327, 332, 371 Yi In-bae 李仁培, 129 Yi Kwang-ok 李光玉, 283 Yi Maeng-hyŏn 李孟賢, 115 Yi Man-bae 李萬倍, 130 Yi Sang-jŏng 李象靖, 307, 336, 338, 369 Yi Si-ch’ŏng 李時淸, 279 Yi Si-sŏng 李時成, 129

Yi Su-gwi 李壽龜, 129 Yi Su-hak 李壽鶴, 129 Yi Ŭn-bo 李殷輔, 140, 190, 283 Changsu Hwang 長水黃 of Chup’o 周浦, 57, 116, 152, 159 Hwang Chin 黃進, 119, 153, 233 Hwang Chŏk 黃 , 119, 153 Hwang Chŏng-jik 黃廷稷, 119, 153, 257 Hwang Chŏng-yŏl 黃廷說, 119, 153 Hwang Hŭi 黃喜, 57 Hwang Kae 黃塏, 101, 119, 135 Hwang Suk-ku 黃俶龜, 154 Hwang Wi 黃暐, 119, 154, 290 Hwang Yun-gil 黃允吉, 119 Hwang Yun-gong 黃允恭, 119, 153 Ch’angwŏn Chŏng 昌原丁 of Tarisil (Wŏlgok) 다리실 (月谷), 116, 119, 256 Chŏng Han-u 丁旱雨, 119 Chŏng Hwan 丁煥, 119, 362 Chŏng Hwang 丁熿, 119, 362 Chŏng Yŏm 丁焰, 167, 232, 233 Chŏng Yŏn-bang 丁衍邦, 119 Chinsŏng Yi 眞城李, 97, 107, 121, 137, 202, 205, 247, 303, 355, 378 Residential branches Chuch’on Yi 周村李, 115, 195, 205 On’gye 溫溪李, 302 Individual members Yi An-do 李安道, 174, 306 Yi Cha-bang 李子芳, 97, 206 Yi Cha-su 李子脩, 97, 114, 205, 303 Yi Ch’ae 李寀, 115 Yi Cham 李潛, 193 Yi Ch’an-han 李燦漢, 203 Yi Ching 李澄, genealogical chart B.8. Yi Ch’ŏl-son 李哲孫, 211 Yi Chŏng 李禎, 97, 195, 303 Yi Chŏng-baek 李庭栢, 206, 224, 225 Yi Chong-do 李宗道, 193–94, 210 Yi Chŏng-hoe 李庭檜, 115, 151, 174, 192, 196, 204, 206, 211, 227 and Andong matters, 215, 219, 220, 226, 228 Yi Chun 李寯, 115, 140, 150, 174, 205, 209 Yi Chŭng-hyo 李曾孝, 281 Yi Ha 李河, genealogical chart B.8. Yi Hae 李瀣, genealogical chart B.8. Yi Han 李漢, 214, 281 Yi Hŭi-an 李希顔, 135



Personal Names Arr anged by Choronym

Yi Hŭi-dong 李希侗, 143 Yi Hun 李壎, 134–35, 214 Yi Hŭng-yang 李興陽, 206 [T’oegye] Yi Hwang [退溪] 李滉, 114, 115, 160, 168, 238, 350, 400 and ancestral graves, 202–4 and community compacts, 209–10, 216–17, 231 economic situation of, 150–51 and genealogy, 205 legacy of, 183–86, 238, 304, 323, 331, 369 and munjip, 183 and private academies, 181–82, 310 and rituals, 191–94 passim as slave owner, 140 as teacher, 160, 169, 175–77 Yi Hyo-sun 李孝淳, 368 Yi Kye-yang 李繼陽, 121, 133, 209, 368 Yi Kyŏng-jun 李敬遵, 281 Yi Mun-gyu 李文奎, 143 Yi Ping 李憑, 209 Yi Pyŏk 李擘, 135 Yi Se-t’aek 李世澤, 249, 335 Yi Sik 李植, 114, 121, 150, 170 Yi Sŏk 李碩, 97, 202–3, 206 Yi Su-yŏn 李守淵, 306 Yi U 李堣, 114, 164, 165, 168 Yi U-yang 李遇陽, 115, 206, 211 Yi Ŭi 李漪, genealogical chart B.8. Yi Un-hu 李云侯, 97, 102, 202, 205, 281 Yi Wan 李完, 184, 209 Yi Yŏn 李演, 214 Yi Yŏng-ch’ŏl 李英哲, 282 Yi Yŏng-do 李詠道, 113, 121, 171, 174, 205 Yi Yu-do 李有道, 210, 312 Chŏnju Yi 全州李 of Tundŏk 屯德, 55, 100, 116, 251, 256, 260, 264, 293, 345, 347, 358, 367 Hyoryŏng taegun 孝寧大君, 100 Yi Chong-hwan 李宗煥, 269, 355 Yi Hon 李渾, 152, 269, 355 Yi I-gi 李頣期, 347, 358 Yi I-si 李頣時, 347, 358 Yi Kuk-hyŏng 李國馨, 252 Yi Mun-gyu 李文規, 252 Yi Mun-jae 李文載, 116, 123, 251, 259 Yi Mun-ju 李文胄, 116, 152 Yi Mun-wŏn 李文源, 123, 152, 279, 280 Yi Sang-hyŏng 李尙馨, 116, 251, 257–59 passim, 295, 323 Yi Sŏng-no 李聖老, 279, 295

Yi Tae-yun 李大胤, 116, 152, 233 Yi Tam-son 李聃孫, 100, 152, 269, 355 Yi Yŏp 李曄, 116, 269 Yi Yu-hyŏng 李惟馨, 116, 269, 355 Yi Yun-hwa 李潤華, 355 Chŏnju Yu 全州柳 of Musil (Su’gok) 무실 (水谷), 229, 247, 255, 357, 362 Yu Ch’i-myŏng 柳致明, 307 Yu Chik 柳稷, 314–16, 319, 324 Yu Pok-ki 柳復起, 111, 146, 224 Yu Pong-nip 柳復立, 111 Yu Sŏng 柳城, 110, 293, 357 Yu Sŭng-hyŏn 柳升鉉, 328 Hŭngdŏk Chang 興德張 of Chup’o 周浦, 101, 256, 357 Chang Hap 張合, 101, 119 Chang Kŭp 張伋, 119, 167 Chang Kyŏng-se 張經世, 119, 167, 251 Chang Ŏp 張 𢢜𢢜 , 120, 259 Chang Yun-sin 張允愼, 101 Hŭnghae Pae 興海裵 of Andong 安東, 98, 170, 216, 247, 301 Pae Chŏn 裵詮, 98 Pae Hŏn 裵巚, 143 Pae I-sun 裵以純, 142 Pae Kye-jong 裵繼宗, 99 Pae Sam-ik 裵三益, 174, 144 Pae Sang-gong 裵尙恭, 98, 99, 291 Pae Sang-ji 裵尙志, 98, 104, 159 Pae So 裵素, 98 Pae Yong-gil 裵龍吉, 224, 225, 229 Kosŏng Yi 固城李 of Andong 安東, 97, 151, 247, 255, 269 Yi Chu 李胄, 98, 163 Yi Chŭng 李增, 97, 104, 105 Yi Ko 李股, 98, 214, 219 Yi Koeng 李浤, 98 Yi Myŏng 李洺, 98 Yi Wŏn 李原, 97 Yi Yŏ 李膂, 98 Kwangju Yi 廣州李 of Sarib’an 사립안, 99, 116, 121, 256 Yi Chun-gyŏng 李浚慶, 118 Yi P’il-mu 李必茂, 251 Yi Sa-hŏn 李士獻, 118, 252 Yi Sa-yŏng 李士穎, 252 Yi Tŏg-yŏl 李德悅, 118, 251

585

586

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Kwangsan Kim 光山金 of Och’ŏn 烏川, 99, 100, 107, 113, 121, 136, 170, 171, 184, 191, 226, 305, 311, 348, 367, 378, 392 Kim Chin 金稹, 100 Kim Chu 金籌, 213 Kim Hae 金垓, 114, 151, 223, 225 Kim Hoe 金淮, 128, 191, 278 Kim Hŭng-gwang 金興光, genealogical chart B.9. Kim Hyo-ji 金孝之, 113, 128 Kim Hyo-ro 金孝盧, 113, 138, 148, 149, 368 Kim Hyo-wŏn 金孝源, 128, 129, 149 Kim Ki 金圻, 223, 229 Kim Kwang-gye 金光繼, 114, 226 Kim Mu 金務, 100, 113, 133 Kim Ŏn-gi 金彦璣, 169, 174, 184 Kim Pu-in 金富仁, 169, 211 Kim Pu-p’il 金富弼, 114, 150, 169, 179, 182, 368 Kim Pu-ryun 金富倫, 169, 171, 182, 184, 211 Kim Pu-ŭi 金富儀, 114, 150, 171, 182, 184, 211 Kim P’yŏng 金坪, 223 Kim Sung-ji 金崇之, 113 Kim Tŭg-yŏn 金得硏, 224 Kim Ŭi-wŏn 金義元, 99 Kim Yang-gam 金良鑑, 99 Kim Yŏn1 金璉, 100 Kim Yŏn2 金緣, 113, 149 Kim Yŏng 金坽, 227, 273–76 passim, 305 Kim Yong-sŏk 金用石, 163, 169 Kim Yu 金綏, 114, 128, 149 Namwŏn Ryang 南原梁, 57, 94, 96, 256, 293, 357, 387 Ryang Chun 梁俊, 94 Ryang Nŭng-yang 梁能讓, 94 Ryang Sŏng-ji 梁誠之, 15, 57, 58, 70, 76, 94 Namwŏn Yang 南原楊, 94, 251, 256 Yang I-si 楊以時, 94 Yang Sa-hyŏng 楊士衡, 233 Yang Si-ik 楊時益, 153 Yang Su-saeng 楊首生, 95 Namwŏn Yun 南原尹, 94, 256, 263 Yun Ch’ung 尹冲, 123 Yun Haeng-im 尹行恁, 363 Yun Hyo-son 尹孝孫, 94 Yun I-yŏl 尹以悅, 363

Yun Tŏk-chun 尹德駿, 363 Yun Wi 尹威, 94 Namyang Pang 南陽房 of Chup’o 周浦, 101, 118, 256 Pang Ku-sŏng 房九成, 101 Pang Kwi-hwa 房貴和, 101 Pang Kwi-on 房貴溫, 166 Pang Tu-ch’ŏn 房斗天, 541n19 Pang Tu-wŏn 房斗元, 290 Pang Ŭng-sŏng 房應星, 119, 153 Pang Wŏn-jin 房元震, 257 Ponghwa Kŭm 奉化琴 of Och’ŏn 烏川, 108 Kŭm Chae 琴榟, 114 Kŭm Nan-su 琴蘭秀, 172–84 passim, 210, 217, 230, 305 Kŭm Po 琴輔, 182, 184, 209 Kŭm Ŭng-hun 琴應壎, 171, 223 Kŭm Ŭng-hyŏp 琴應夾, 171, 223 P’ungch’ŏn No 豊川盧 of Twinnae 뒷내, 116, 118, 166, 260 No Chin 盧禎, 118, 119, 251, 361 No Ch’ŏl 盧 , 117 No Hyŏng-ha 盧亨夏, 118 No Hyŏng-mang 盧亨望, 252 No Hyŏng-myŏng 盧亨命, 125 No Hyŏng-sul 盧亨述, 125 No Sik 盧 ඤ , 118 No U-myŏng 盧友明, 166 No Uk 盧郁, 118 P’ungsan Yu 豊山柳, 107, 201, 211, 214, 216, 255, 292, 311, 312, 362, 368 Residential branch Hahoe Yu 河回柳, 151, 170, 199, 256, 286–88 passim, 302 Genealogical branches Kyŏmam-p’a 謙庵派, 288 Sŏae-p’a 西厓派, 288 Individual members Yu Cha-on 柳子溫, genealogical chart B.11. Yu Chin 柳袗, 226, 308, 311, 314 Yu Chŏl 柳節, 287 Yu Chong-hye 柳從惠, 98, 291 Yu Chung-yŏng 柳仲郢, 291, 301 Yu Hong 柳洪, 291, 293 Yu Hu-jang 柳後章, 308 Yu Kong-jak 柳公綽, 201, 214 Yu Kong-sŏk 柳公奭, 214



Personal Names Arr anged by Choronym

Yu Kyu 柳 ௏, 337, 384 Yu Mong-sŏ 柳夢瑞, 326, 328, 329 Yu Se-ch’ŏl 柳世哲, 316–20 passim, 326 Yu Se-myŏng 柳世鳴, 308, 320 Yu So 柳沼, 200, 291 [Sŏae] Yu Sŏng-nyong [西厓] 柳成龍, 169, 184, 215, 220, 225, 229, 252, 287, 301, 313, 362 ancestor of branch, 288 conflict with Cho Mok, 183, 305, 306 enshrinement of, 311, 312 and factions, 238, 247, 314 as leader of Andong, 211, 228 and private schools, 172, 311 and rituals, 194 scholarly lineage of, 305, 307, 308, 337 as T’oegye student, 172, 173, 175 upstaging of Kim Sŏng-il, 312, 369 Yu Un-nyong 柳雲龍, 172, 173, 198, 201, 211, 215, 220, 288, 292, 316, 329 Yu Wŏn-ji 柳元之, 257, 307, 308, 312 Sangnyŏng Ch’oe 朔寧崔 of Tundŏk 屯德, 100, 116, 256, 258, 260, 293, 322, 350, 357, 367 Residential branch Nobong Ch’oe 露峯崔, 117, 293 Individual members Ch’oe Ch’i-ong 崔致翁, 117, 279 Ch’oe Chŏk 崔 , 293 Ch’oe Hang 崔恒, 100 Ch’oe Hwi-ji 崔徽之, 117, 123, 250, 270, 361 Ch’oe Kye-ong 崔啓翁, 117, 258, 322 Ch’oe On 崔蘊, 117, 257, 293, 361 Ch’oe Ŏn-su 崔彦粹, 116 Ch’oe Po 崔葆, 117, 270 Ch’oe Sang-gyŏm 崔尙謙, 257 Ch’oe Sang-jung 崔尙重, 116, 123, 167, 233, 250 Ch’oe Si-ong 崔是翁, 117, 258, 259, 260, 322, 350, 351, 358, 414 Ch’oe Sŏ-ong 崔瑞翁, 125 Ch’oe Su-ung 崔秀雄, 100, 116, 250, 251, 293 Ch’oe Yŏn 崔葕, 117, 257, 258, 270 Ch’oe Yu-ji 崔攸之, 117, 123, 250, 251, 350 Sunhŭng An 順興安 of Andong 安東, 311, 324, 371 An Kyŏng-wŏn 安慶遠, 372 An Pok-chun 安復駿, 372 An Sang-ch’im 安尙沈, 372

587

An T’aek-chun 安宅駿, 333, 334, 372 An U-sŏk 安禹石, 333 An Yŏn-sŏk 安鍊石, 324, 330, 331, 371 Sunhŭng An 順興安 of Namwŏn 南原, 116, 118, 256 An Ch’ŏ-sun 安處順, 118, 166, 251, 362 An Chŏn 安 , 119 An Hyang 安珦, 65, 118 An Ki 安璣, 118 An Yŏng 安瑛, 119 Ŭisŏng Kim 義城金 of Naeap (Ch’ŏnjŏn) 내앞 (川前), 99, 107, 114, 121, 170, 199, 200, 226, 247, 255, 256, 297–300 passim, 301, 312, 357, 362, 368 Residential branch Kŭmgye Kim 金溪金, 110, 255, 302 Genealogical branches Chesan-p’a 霽山派, 288 Chich’on-p’a 芝村派, 288 Ch’ŏnggye-p’a 靑溪派, 108, 247, 288 Hakpong-p’a 鶴峯派, 111, 288 Kwibong-p’a 龜峯派, 111, 288 Namak-p’a 南嶽派, 111, 288 Unam-p’a 雲巖派, 111, 288 Yakpong-p’a 藥峯派, 111, 288 Individual members Kim Ch’ang-sŏk 金昌錫, 352, 357 Kim Chin 金璡, 108, 278 descendants of, 247, 288, 291, 293, 303, 357 economic wealth of, 134, 145, 146 honored, 359, 360, 363 and rituals, 191, 200 as teacher, 110, 168 Kim Chip 金潗, 215, 229 Kim Ch’ŏl 金澈, 111 Kim Ch’ŏn 金洊, genealogical chart B.4. Kim Chŏng 金珽, 278, 279 Kim Chu-guk 金柱國, 386 Kim Hak-pae 金學培, 179, 248 Kim Han-ch’ŏl 金漢哲, 99, 121 Kim Han-gye 金漢啓, 99, 286 Kim Hŭi-rak 金熙洛, 337, 338 Kim Hŭi-sŏng 金熙成, 381 Kim Hŭi-yong 金熙鏞, 381 Kim Hŭng-nak 金興洛, 516n16 Kim Hyŏn-un 金顯運, 300 Kim Hyu 金烋, 227 Kim I-hyŏn 金以鉉, 254, 298 Kim In-bŏm 金仁範, 198 Kim Kŏ-du 金居斗, 99, 286, 386

588

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Ŭisŏng Kim Individual members (continued) Kim Koeng 金㙆, 336 Kim Kŏn-su 金建銖, 381 Kim Kŭg-il 金克一, 110, 111, 145, 170, 173, 255, 288, 293, 298 Kim Kyŏng-hŏn 金景 ᇾ, 333 Kim Kyu 金 ௏ , 254 Kim Man-gŭn 金萬謹, 108, 121, 198, 199, 286, 291, 371 Kim Man-hŭm 金萬欽, genealogical chart B.4. Kim Man-sin 金萬愼, 121 Kim Min-haeng 金敏行, 284, 326, 329, 361 Kim Mong-nyŏm 金夢濂, 333 Kim Myŏng-il 金明一, 110, 111, 146, 288, 293, 298 Kim Myŏng-sŏk 金命錫, 357, 361 Kim Paek 金珀, 198 Kim Pang-ch’an 金邦 ㋨, 276 Kim Pang-gŏl 金邦杰, 111, 146, 248, 288, 301, 320, 352, 357, 360 Kim Pang-gyŏm 金邦謙, 147 Kim Pog-il 金復一, 110, 111, 121, 145, 146, 170, 215, 277, 288, 293, 298, 350 Kim Se-ho 金世鎬, 248, 321 Kim Se-jung 金世重, 131 Kim Si-ch’u 金是樞, 121 Kim Si-gŏn 金是楗, genealogical chart B.6. Kim Si-gwa 金是果, 299–300 Kim Si-gwŏn 金是權, 121, 247 Kim Si-jŏng 金是楨, genealogical chart B.6. Kim Si-ju 金是柱, 111, 247 Kim Si-nŭng 金是 គ, genealogical chart B.6. Kim Si-on 金是榲, 111, 146, 178, 247, 288, 296, 359, 361 Kim Si-sang 金是相, genealogical chart B.6. Kim Si-t’aek 金始宅, 351 Kim Sin-gi 金信基, 268 Kim Sŏk 金錫, 298 Kim Sŏng-gu 金聲久, 298 [Hakpong 鶴峯] Kim Sŏng-il 金誠一, 111, 145, 238, 288, 293, 302, 362 career of, 110 conflict with Yu Sŏng-nyong, 311–12, 369 economic situation, 145 head of branch, 111 during Imjin War, 224, 225, 230, 301

as leader of Andong yurim, 183, 184 and local politics, 219 and munjung, 197–99 and rites, 194–96, 271 scholarly lineage of, 304–6, 323 as T’oegye disciple, 170, 175, 176, 194 Kim Sŏng-t’ak 金聖鐸, 248, 307, 327–32 passim, 363, 371 Kim Su 金璲, 198 Kim Su-il 金守一, 110, 146, 180, 219, 286, 288 Kim Sun-ch’ŏn 金順天, 300 Kim T’ae-jung 金泰重, 352, 353 Kim To-haeng 金道行, genealogical chart B.5. Kim Tŏk-ha 金德河, 284 Kim Tu-myŏng 金斗明, 381 Kim U-ong 金宇顒, 181, 217 Kim Ŭi 金宜, genealogical chart B.4. Kim Wang 金迬, 298 Kim Ye-bŏm 金禮範, 108, 214 Kim Yŏn-il 金衍一, 110, 198, 199 Kim Yong 金涌, 111, 151, 215, 224, 230, 231, 299, 306, 308 Kim Yŏng 金英, genealogical chart B.4. Kim Yong-bi 金龍庇, 99, 200, 286, 297– 98, 303 Kim Yong-bo 金龍普, 352 Kim Yŏng-myŏng 金永命, 99, 108, 113, 121, 148, 286, 386 Kim Yong-p’il 金龍弼, 298 Yŏngyang Nam 英陽南 of Andong 安東, 96, 98, 102, 107, 174, 215, 216, 357 Nam Ch’i-gong 南致恭, 105 Nam Ch’i-jŏng 南致晶, 105 Nam Ch’i-ri 南致利, 169, 174 Nam Chong 南琮, 215 Nam Chung-myŏng 南仲命, 143 Nam Hwi-ju 南輝珠, 96, 102 Nam Ki-su 南麒壽, 143 Nam Kwi-su 南龜壽, 144 Nam Kyŏng-i 南敬彛, 174 Nam Kyŏng-in 南敬仁, 105 Nam Kyŏng-ji 南敬智, 105, 215 Nam Kyŏng-sin 南敬身, 105 Nam Min-saeng 南敏生, 96, 110 Nam Myŏng 南溟, 142, 143 Nam Pu-ryang 南富良, 103, 104 Nam Se-ch’im 南世琛, 143 Nam U-ryang 南佑良, 97

Gl os sa ry-I n de x : Gen er a l Na m e s a n d Ter ms The reader is advised that, if the title of a work appears in this glossary-index without its Korean equivalent, the Korean title will be listed in the bibliography. If a ruler’s name appears without its Korean equivalent, the Korean form of that name will be found in the Chronology of Korean Kings at the front of the book. Finally, a cross-reference reading “See under [choronym] in the Personal Names/Choronym Glossary-Index” refers to that person’s entry under his choronym in the ­Glossary-Index: Personal Names Arranged Alphabetically According to Choronym (Pon’gwan). Abridged Extended Meaning of the Great ­Learning (Taehak yŏnŭi chimnyak 大學衍 義輯略), 70 adang 我黨. See kinship adoption (iphu 入後), 125, 276–79 passim, 284, 285, 376, 396 aeg’oe 額外. See local school ae-gun u-guk 愛君憂國, 237, 250 affines, 31, 106, 120–25 passim, 141, 208, 216, 293, 295, 356–57, 402; genealogy of, 366, 403; separation from (ŭijŏl 義絶), 276 agnation, 187, 190, 207, 280; agnatic kinsmen (tongjong chi in 同宗之人), 198, 365; agnatic principle (chongpŏp 宗法), 193, 203, 206; shift to, 207. See also nonagnates a’guk kŏjok 我國巨族, 52 ajok 我族, 298 Altar to Heaven (Wŏndan 圓壇 or Wŏn’gu 圓丘), 62 Altar to the Spirits of Soil and Grain (Sajik 社稷), 62, 63, 223 amun 我門, 207 an ch’e-baek 安體魄, 188. See also ancestral rites An Chŏng-sŏ 安井瑞, 268 An Hyang 安珦, 65, 118, 313 An Kye-jong 安繼宗, 130 An Pang-jun 安邦俊, 322 An P’il-ch’ang 安必昌, 268 Analects (Chin. Lunyu 論語), 30, 65, 168, 169, 373

ancestor: apical (sijo 始祖), 22, 29, 89–92, 189, 206, 282, 358; of a branch (p’ajo 派祖), 288, 300; early (sŏnjo 先祖), 107; great-greatgrandfather (kojo 高祖), 197; intermediate (chungjo 中祖), 99, 298; pioneer ancestral settler (iphyangjo 入鄕祖), 96 ancestor worship, 2 176, 190, 200, 404; by non­ agnates, 275. See also ancestral cult; ancestral rites ancestral cult, 190. See also ancestral rites ancestral grave, 200, 203, 273, 286, 297, 302. See also grave; graveyard ancestral rites (chesa 祭祀): “associate offerings” (panbu 班祔), 276; clearing away of leftovers (chullye 餕禮), 274; death anniversary (kije 忌祭, or kiilche 忌日祭), 192, 195, 267, 271; “eat on the side” (pusik 附食), 277; enshrinement of soul (puje 祔祭), 192; extra offering (kagong 加貢), 271; grand (hoejŏn 會奠), 303; at grave of sijo (sihyangje 時鄕祭), 282, 287; in perpetuity (pulch’ŏnwi pongsa 不遷位奉祀), 195, 301–2; ritually install (pongan 奉安), 184; rotation of (yunhaeng 輪行), 189; rubric for (pongsajo 奉祀條), 190, 267; sacrificial meal (ŭmbok 飮福), 274, 282; seasonal (sije 時祭), 190, 195, 196, 271; shrine (sadang 祠堂 or kamyo 家廟), 49, 111, 187, 271; special shrine (pyŏlmyo 別廟), 301; spirit tablet (sinju 神主, sinwi 神位, or wip’ae 位牌), 190, 271

590

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

ancestral seat (pon’gwan 本貫), 21, 29, 264, 297; loss of knowledge of, 364; restoration of (pokkwan 復貫), 300. See also choronym ancient institutions (koje 古制), 68 ancient rites (korye 古禮), 278 Andong 安東, 260; demoted to county, 220, 336; examination rates of, 120, 246; marriages in, 120–23 passim; single-surname villages in, 290; state penetration of, 263 Andong Kim, “new,” 240, 364 Andong Kwŏn-ssi chokpo, Sŏnghwa pyŏngsin-bo, 92, 104 Andong Kwŏn-ssi sŏnghwabo (1476). See Andong Kwŏn-ssi chokpo, Sŏnghwa pyŏngsin-bo Andong yŏrŭp hyangbyŏng 安東列邑鄕兵, 225 Anp’yŏng, Grand Prince 安平大君, 219 antiquity, Chinese, 67 Anŭm 安陰, 165 Auxiliary Army Unit (Poch’unggun 補充軍), 127–31 passim Balandier, Georges, 21 Beattie, Hilary, 405 Beijing, 65, 66 bilaterality, 2, 3, 7, 20, 24, 29, 92, 126, 209, 276, 397, 402; in genealogy, 206, 365, 366; shift to agnation, 207 Bol, Peter K., 67, 405 bone rank system (kolp’umje 骨品制), 19–21, 30, 54, 397; chin’gol 眞骨, 19, 20, 25; sŏnggol 聖骨,19, 20; yuktup’um 六頭品, 19, 21, 25 Bourdieu, Pierre, 208, 212, 232, 287, 342 Breuker, Remko E., 62 Brook, Timothy, 405 brothers: fraternal equality, 197, 199, 402; fraternal solidarity, 287; younger as joint heirs, 280 Buddhism, 19, 20, 45, 195; funeral rites of, 188; as heresy, 50; Neo-Confucians’ critique of, 49; purification hall, 193 bureaucracy, 19, 63, 69; in Chosŏn, 69, 265; as envisaged by Cho Chun and Chŏng To-jŏn, 53, 59, 60; in Koryŏ, 24, 30, 32; actual office (silchik 實職), 54; prestigious office (ch’ŏngjik 淸職), 376; in Silla, 19; sinecure (sanjik 散職), 54; supernumerary office (ch’ŏmsŏlchik 添設 職), 40; tangsang-gwan 堂上官, 54 burial rites, 188; “calling spirit back” (panhon 反魂), 192; “cessation of wailing” (cholgok 卒哭), 192; earth burial (t’ojang 土葬), 188; of husband and wife (hapchang 合葬), 203; moving of (ch’ŏnjang 遷葬 or ch’ŏnmyo 遷墓), 356; peace sacrifice (tamje 禫祭), 192; “returning

to wail” (pan’gok 反哭), 192; “second sacrifice for good fortune” (taesang 大祥), 192. See also mourning cadastral survey (yangan 量案): of 1429, 85; of 1603, 227; of 1634–35, 261, 374; of 1720, 346–47 capital bureau (kyŏngjaeso 京在所), 81, 82, 217– 22 passim; abolition of in 1603, 257, 262. See also local bureau center-periphery, 9–10 Ceremonial Rituals (Chin. Yili 儀禮), 67 chach’i 自治, 221 chadŭk 自得, 167, 176, 178, 401. See also Confucian learning Ch’ae Che-gong 蔡濟恭, 336, 337 Ch’ae Hong-wŏn 蔡弘遠, 338 chae 齋, 195 chaech’u 宰樞 (chaesang 宰相), 24, 25, 30, 36, 38, 42 Chaesan 才山, 459n9 chaesang chi chong 宰相之宗 (“ministerial descent groups”), 36 chajemyŏng 自製銘, 184 Chakch’ŏng 作廳, 262 ch’ambong 參奉, 112, 154, 166, 174 Chang Hŭng-hyo 張興孝, 178, 306, 307 Chang Hyŏn-gwang 張顯光, 205, 359, 369 Chang Kil 張吉, 89, 93 Chang Kyŏng-bu 張敬夫, 176 Ch’angju Sŏwŏn 滄州書院, 361 Changsŏng Mountain 長城山, 292 Chasan Sŏwŏn 紫山書院, 322 ch’e 體, 178 ch’ech’ŏndap 遞遷畓, 355 chegi 祭器, 271 chehu 諸侯 (feudal lord), 62 Cheng Hao 程顥, 171. See also Cheng brothers Cheng Yi 程頣, 64, 175, 180, 195, 203, 324. See also Cheng brothers Cheng brothers (Cheng Hao 程顥 and Cheng Yi 程頣), 75, 167 Cheng-Zhu learning, 65–69 passim, 167, 180, 315 chesa 祭祀. See ancestral rites ch’e-yong 體用, 169 Chi Yun 池奫, 43, 44, 48 chich’i 至治, 73 chich’ŏ pimi 地處卑微, 245 Chidang 池塘, 101, 290 chigwŏran 直月案, 260. See also local roster chihon 地魂, 290 chik 職 (“occupation”), 4 chiksŏ 直書, 257. See also local roster



General Names and Terms

ch’ilsa 七事, 84. See also magistrate Chin Kyŏng-ik 晉卿益, 101 Chin Yun-gŏm 陳允儉, 43 Chinae-dong 池內洞, 174 Chinbo [Chinsŏng] 眞寶 [眞城], 97, 159, 202 Chindo 珍島, 98, 163 Chinese classics, 47, 67, 73, 169, 393. See also Five Classics and Four Books Chingbirok 懲毖錄, 225 ch’in’guk 親鞫, 326 Chinjŏn-bang 眞田坊, 119 Chinju 晋州, 160, 181, 225 Chinsŏng Yi-ssi chokpo 眞城李氏族譜, 205, 206 Chinsŏng Yi-ssi sejŏn yurok 眞城李氏世傳 遺錄, 206 chinŭn kunja 眞隱君子, 178, 247. See also recluse chinyu 眞儒 (“true Confucian”), 73, 167 chipp’il 執筆, 268 Chiri Mountain 智異山, 85 Chirye 智禮, 351 Chisa-bang 只沙坊, 362 Cho Chin 趙振, 194 Cho Chŏng 趙靖, 497n102 Cho Chong-un 趙從耘, 460 Cho Chun 趙浚, 50, 51, 59, 60, 67, 76; reform ­proposals of, 53, 79 Cho Hyŏn-myŏng 趙顯命, 306, 330, 332, 335, 386 Cho Ik 趙翼, 526n2 Cho In-gyu 趙仁規, 34, 38 Cho Kwang-jo 趙光祖, 75, 163; and Recommendation Examination of 1519, 72, 74; as sarim leader, 72, 73 Cho Kyŏng 趙絅, 319 Cho Mok 趙穆, 172, 182–84, 194, 311; as T’oegye disciple, 173, 304, 305 Cho Mun-myŏng 趙文明, 394 Cho, Queen Dowager 趙大王大妃, 318. See also Sinjŏng wanghu [Nammyŏng] Cho Sik [南冥] 曺植, 160, 180, 314 Cho To-bin 趙道彬, 361 Cho Tŏng-nin 趙德隣, 326 Cho Yang-sik 趙養植, 379 Cho Yong 趙庸, 159 Cho Yŏng-in 趙永仁, 33 ch’ŏch’ŏp 妻妾, 126. See also wife, primary; wife, secondary Ch’oe Cha 崔慈, 66 Ch’oe Ch’ung-hŏn 崔忠獻, 32, 34 Ch’oe Hae 崔瀣, 49, 66 Ch’oe Hang 崔恒, 100, 455n23 Ch’oe Hong-gan 崔弘簡, 386

591

Ch’oe Kye-bang 崔繼芳, 29 Ch’oe Pu 崔溥, 165 Ch’oe Sŏk-chŏng 崔錫鼎, 252, 384, 386 Ch’oe Sŏm 崔暹, 24 Ch’oe Sŭng-no 崔承老, 23 Ch’oe U 崔瑀, 33 Ch’oe Yŏng 崔瑩, 41, 43, 50, 52, 201 Ch’oe Yu-ch’ŏng 崔惟淸, 37 Ch’oe Yun-dŏk 崔潤德, 97 choebŏm kangsang 罪犯綱常, 390 cho’ga 朝家 (“state”), 237 chok 族. See descent line chŏkchŏn 籍田, 62 chokchung 族中. See munjung chokchung ibŭi 族中立議. See munjung Chŏkkwa-bang 迪果坊, 118 chŏk-sŏ 嫡庶. See descent line chŏlche 節祭 (end-of-year rite), 274. See also ancestral rites Chŏlla Province 全羅道, 9, 133, 199, 218, 326; ­single-surname villages in, 290 chŏllye 奠禮 (mid-monthly rite), 273. See also ancestral rites chŏlmok 節目 (“regulations”), 285, 381 ch’on 村. See village ch’ŏn 賤 (“base”), 5, 6 Chŏn Sŏng-ch’ŏn 全性天, 377, 378 chon-bi 尊卑 (“noble” and “base”), 4 Chondŏksa 尊德祠, 311 Chondosa 尊道祠, 184 Ch’ŏndŭng Mountain 天燈山, 200 Chŏng Ch’ŏl 鄭澈, 238, 239, 252, 321, 322 Chŏng Ch’ong 鄭摠, 53 Chŏng Hŭi-ryang 鄭希亮, 325, 326, 327 Chŏng I-hŭng 鄭以興, 214 Chŏng In-hong 鄭仁弘, 181, 238, 239, 305, 314 Chŏng In-ji 鄭麟趾, 457n65 Chŏng Kae-ch’ŏng 鄭介淸, 321, 322, 323 Chŏng Ku 鄭逑, 171, 173, 178, 180, 181, 204, 240, 338, 369, 413 Chŏng Kyo 鄭僑, 214 Chŏng Kyŏng-se 鄭經世, 172, 212, 213, 307, 312, 314, 323 Chŏng Mong-ju 鄭夢周, 47–49, 313; demand for ancestral shrine (sadang 祠堂), 75, 76, 164 Chŏng Mun-bo 鄭文輔, 254 Chŏng On 鄭蘊, 313 Chŏng Po-mun 鄭普文, 202 Chŏng Sa-sŏng 鄭士誠, 169, 174, 212, 214, 215 Chŏng Sil 鄭實, 371 Chŏng T’ak 鄭擢 (Koryŏ), 53 Chŏng T’ak 鄭琢 (Chosŏn), 174, 181, 215, 229

592

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Chŏng To-jŏn 鄭道傳, 48–53 passim, 59, 60, 62, 66, 67, 76 Chŏng Tu-hŭi, 74 Chŏng Wŏn-no 鄭元老, 105, 214 [Tasan] Chŏng Yag-yong [茶山] 丁若庸, 9, 253, 260, 262, 296 Chŏng Yŏ-ch’ang 鄭汝昌, 71–76 passim, 165 Chŏng Yŏ-rip 鄭汝立, 239, 233, 323, 321 Chŏng Yu-il 鄭惟一, 144, 174, 179 chŏn’gaek 田客. See tenancy Ch’ŏngamjŏng 靑巖亭, 295 chŏngbun 正分 (determination of status), 4. See also status chongga 宗家. See ritual heir Ch’ŏnggi 靑杞, 134 Chŏnghae chwamok 丁亥座目 (Roster of 1647), 229 chŏnghak 正學, 177, 401 chŏnghun 庭訓 (“domestic rules”), 142 ch’ongjae 冢宰 (“prime minister”), 59 Chŏngjo, King (Chosŏn), 241, 335–36, 362, 377 Chŏngjong, King (Chosŏn), 60, 62, 93 Chŏngju 貞州, 22 Ch’ŏngju 淸州, 325, 326 chongmang 族望, 29 chŏng-mun 情文, 231 chŏngmun 旌門, 95, 111 chŏngmyŏng 正名 (“rectification of names”), 4. See also status chŏng-ni 情理, 277 ch’ŏn’gŏ 薦擧, 252 Ch’ŏngp’ung 淸風, 98 chŏng p’ungsok 正風俗, 220, 222 chongsa 宗師 (“ancestral teacher”), 76 chŏngsa 精舍, 111, 175, 310 chŏngsa kongsin 定社功臣, 60 chŏng-sam p’um 正三品, 54 chŏngsim 正心, 70 chongson 宗孫. See lineal heir Ch’ŏngsong 靑松, 121, 299 Ch’ŏngsŏng Sŏdang 靑城書堂, 172 Ch’ŏngsŏng Sŏwŏn 靑城書院, 361 chŏng wangbŏp 正王法, 320 chŏnham p’umgwan 前銜品官, 80 ch’onhan 村漢, 388 Ch’ŏnjŏn 川前 (Kor. Naeap 내앞), 108, 291, 297 chŏnmin 田民 (“land and slaves”), 144 chŏnsŏ 典書, 99, 291 ch’ŏpchi 牒旨, 374 choronym, 23. See also ancestral seat chŏrŭi sajin 絶意仕進, 342 Choryŏng Mountain 鳥嶺山, 315

Chosŏn kyŏngguk chŏn 朝鮮經國典, 67 ch’oyumun 招諭文, 224 ch’oyusa 招諭使, 224 Christianity, 336, 337 chuch’i 主治, 90 Chuch’on 周村, 205, 206, 390 ch’uip 追入, 143 Chujasŏ chŏryo 朱子書節要, 169, 173 Chuksan 竹山, 28, 325 ch’ulch’ŏ 出處, 306 ch’un-ch’u hyangsa 春秋享祀, 310 ch’ung 忠, 63 Chung-bang 中方, 94 ch’ungbun 忠憤, 104 Ch’ungch’ŏng Province 忠淸道, 10 Chungjong, King (Chosŏn), 72, 73 ch’ungjŏng 忠定, 112 Ch’ungju 忠州, 91, 315 Ch’ungnyŏl, King (Koryŏ), 34, 41, 45 chungsin 重臣, 46 chung-sŏ 中庶. See hyangni chungso kongji 衆所共知, 55, 257 Ch’ungsŏn, King (Koryŏ), 36, 41, 65 chungsu’gi 重修記, 168 Ch’unyang 春陽, 134, 147 Chup’o-bang 周浦坊, 101 ch’urok 追錄, 229, 258 churon chi wŏn 主論之員, 257 Churye yug’ik 周禮六翼, 67 Chusŏ ch’o 朱書抄, 173 Chusŏ kangnok kanbo 朱書講錄刊補, 306 Ch’usŏk 秋夕, 197 chuŭp 主邑, 85 Ch’uwŏn chabŭi 追遠雜儀, 164 chwamok 座目, 143, 351 chwamyŏng kongsin 佐命功臣, 60, 90 Classic of Changes (Chin. Yijing 易經), 182, 307 Classic of Documents (Chin. Shangshu 尙書), 251 Classic of Filial Piety (Chin. Xiaojing 孝經), 30, 65 Classic of the Mind-and-Heart (Kor. Simgyŏng; Chin. Xinjing 心經), 169–82 passim, 248, 308 clerkly stock (ijok 吏族). See hyangni Club of the Like-Minded of Injae (Injae tongjigye 忍齋同志契), 172 Club of the Like-Minded of Kaya (Kaya tongjigye 伽倻同志契), 169 Club of the Upright (Chinsolhoe 眞率會), 105, 214 Cohen, Myron L., 405 “cold” (han 寒), 245, 348. See also “humble scholar”



General Names and Terms

collective memory, 212, 279 commoners (yangin 良人, p’yŏngmin 平民, or sŏin 庶人), 3, 4, 5, 126, 210, 213, 341–44, 346– 51 passim, 378, 388–91 passim; as secondary wives, 126 community compact (hyangyak 鄕約), 104, 143, 160, 161, 220, 350–51, 403; after Imjin War, 230–32; controlled by state, 261 Community Rules (Hyangnip yakcho 鄕立約條), 216 Complete Literary Works of Zhu Xi (Chin. Zhuzi daquan 朱子大全), 164 Comprehensive Population Register (Ho’gu ch’ongsu 戶口總數), 263 Confucian classics, 45, 51, 173, 396. See also ­Chinese classics Confucian community (yurim 儒林), 301, 359, 361, 362, 369, 371 Confucian learning, 10, 25, 68, 155; in Andong, 159–60; in Chŏlla, 160–61. See also Tohak Confucian register (yujŏk 儒籍), 315, 318 Confucius, 160 Court of Retirees (Anilbang 安逸房). See hyangni cremation (hwajang 火葬), 188. See also burial rites Crown Prince Tutorial Office, 242, 322 Da Ming huidian (Chin.) 大明會典, 115 Daoxue (Chin.) 道學, 64, 65, 159–62, 169, 243, 399. See also Tohak daughters: in genealogies, 206, 365; decreasing inheritance share of, 145, 146, 148, 152–53, 154– 55; inheritance by, 144; losing inheritance share, 267, 268, 270, 276, 277; ritual performances for, 276–77 death anniversary rituals. See ancestral rites de Bary, Wm. Theodore, 70 descent group (chok/ssijok 族/氏族), 2, 4, 20, 23, 31, 54, 398; affiliation (choksok 族屬), 4; agnatic reorganization of, 207, 282; in Andong and Chŏlla, 95–96; capital branch (kyŏngp’a 京派), 249, 298; under Ch’ungsŏn, 36–37; decline of, 342; differentiation of affiliation of (pyŏn choksok 辨族屬), 55; dispersal of, 82, 189, 289–99, 347–48; in early Chosŏn, 51–52, 58; famous (myŏngjok 名族), 31; “foremost” (kapchok 甲族), 29; “great” (taejok 大族), 29, 31, 263; localized branch (hyangp’a 鄕派), 298; longstanding (koga sejok 古家世族), 356, 370; main line (chongp’a 宗派), 279, 287; outstanding (mangjok 望族), 94, 367; segmentation (punp’a

593

分派) of, 111, 287–89; subbranch/segment (p’a 派), 108, 287–88, 365; survival of, 296, 342, 366; territorial (t’osŏng 土姓), 21, 25, 51, 58, 89, 94. See also surnames; territorial descent groups descent line: bilateral, 29; family line (ka’gye 家 系), 4; generational (segye 世系), 4; kye 系 (“line”), 4, 6, 7; main (pon’gye 本系), 364; primary (chŏk 嫡 or ponjong 本宗), 7, 278, 365; primary and secondary descent lines (chŏk-sŏ 嫡庶), 375; secondary (sŏp’a 庶派 or chwajok 左族), 7, 290, 347, 374; subordinate (sojong 小 宗), 189; superordinate (taejong 大宗), 189; usurpation of main (t’alchong 奪宗), 280 Diagram of the Eight Ancestral Pairs (p’algojo to 八高祖圖), 366 Directorate for Reclassification of Farmland and Farm Population (Chŏnmin pyŏnjŏng togam 田民辨正都監), 49 discrimination, 8, 128, 131, 373 distinguished/worthy ancestor (hyŏnjo 顯祖), 55, 94, 118, 119, 301, 342, 358; cult of worthies, 312; cult of worthies in Chŏlla, 361 distinguished houses (pŏryŏl 閥閱): in early Koryŏ, 29; and factions, 239, 241; rise of in Chosŏn, 238–42 passim; and royal house, 241. See also munbŏl Domestic Rites (Karye). See Jiali domestic-shrine lineage, 190, 197, 199, 207, 208, 266, 267, 282. See also lineage Duncan, John B., 25, 38, 57 Ebrey, Patricia B., 405 education, of the king, 69–70. See also Office of the Royal Lectures Elementary Learning (Kor. Sohak; Chin. Xiao­ xue 小學), 65, 67, 73, 167–69 passim elite, 2–7 passim, 54, 373, 375, 396; military, 239; “noble” and “base” (kwi-ch’ŏn 貴賤), 2, 3–4, 5, 341, 373, 375, 396; “pŏryŏl-ization” of, 366. See also sajok; sejok Elman, Benjamin A., 66 entertainment of guests, 352, 353 Equalized Tax Law (Kyunyŏkpŏp 均役法), 348. See also taxation estates, landed: building of, 133–35 passim, 141– 44 passim, 154, 155; fragmentation of, 151; reaching zenith, 345 examinations: civil service (munkwa 文科), 54, 57, 68, 69, 95, 252; classics exams in Koryŏ (myŏnggyŏngkwa 明經科), 24, 40, 65; in early Chosŏn, 48, 54, 55–57; introduction of Chinese, 2, 23; literary exams in Chosŏn (chinsa

594

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

examinations (continued) 進士), 8, 68; literary exams in Koryŏ (chesulkwa 製述科), 24, 40, 56; metropolitan (hoesi 會試), 66; military (mukwa 武科), 54, 246; provincial (hyangsi 鄕試), 66; purchase admission to (nammi pugŏ 納米赴擧), 374; Recommendation Examination of 1519, 72, 74, 164, 166; saengwŏn-chinsa 生員進士, 8, 68; sama [si] 司馬 [試], 377; secondary sons barred from, 127; special (pyŏlsi 別試), 337; special examination at Tosan Sŏwŏn, 337; special examinations under Mongols (Kor. Chekwa; Chin. zhike 制科), 66; spe­ cialist (chapkwa 雜科), 8; Yuan system of, 66 Extended Meaning of the Great Learning (Chin. Daxue yanyi 大學衍義), 69, 70, 164 factional discourse (tangnon 黨論), 323, 331, 371 factionalism (pungdang 朋黨), 238, 319, 321–23, 331, 359, 362, 372, 399, 400–401 Faure, David, 208, 289, 292, 405 fellowship, Confucian (odang 吾黨), 175, 306; we Confucians (oyu 吾儒), 171 Field and Woodland Rank System (Chŏnsikwa 田柴科), 31, 49 Five Classics, 28, 41, 47, 65, 66, 68, 169, 174 Five Classics and Four Books, 41, 66, 68, 75. See also Chinese classics; Five Classics; Four Books Five-Household Control Law (Oga chakt’ongbŏp 五家作統法), 261, 263 264 “Five Worthies of Honam,” 161, 166 four ancestors (sajo 四祖), 24, 25, 29, 264 Four Books, 47, 65, 68, 75, 90, 169, 181 Four-Seven Debate, 161, 175, 189, 306, 373 Friends’ Home Association (Uhyanggye 友鄕 契), 104, 213, 214 funerals, 143, 208, 209, 349, 353, 355. See also burial rites genealogy (chokpo 族譜), 289, 297, 300, 363, 365; of affinal ties (Kwa’galbo 瓜葛譜), 366; appendix to (purok 附錄), 364; bilateral arrangement of, 206; boundaries between agnates and nonagnates in, 365; of a branch (p’abo 派譜), 288, 299, 365; commoners in, 390; “higher-order genealogy” (taedongbo 大同譜), 288, 299, 365; hyangni in, 387; of matrilateral ancestral lines (sŏnse oega chokpo 先世外家族譜), 365; “newly added separate record” (sinjŭng pyŏlbo 新增別譜) to, 365;

research section of (kojŭngnok 考證錄), 364; scholarship of (pohak 譜學), 363; separate record of (pyŏlbo 別譜), 365, 387 Geographic Gazetteer Appended to the Annals of King Sejong (Sejong sillok chiriji 世宗實錄 地理志), 51, 80, 89, 413 Geographic Gazetteer of Kyŏngsang Province (Kyŏngsangdo chiriji), 89, 413 Geographic Survey of the Eastern Country (Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam), 52, 414 geomancy, 356 grand harmony (t’angp’yŏng 蕩平). See policy of grand harmony grandparents, nonagnatic, 268, 276 grandson, nonagnatic (oeson 外孫), 276, 280, 365; worship of (oeson pongsa 外孫奉祀), 276 grave: burial chamber of (sŏksil 石室), 203; construction of, 203–4; epitaph (myoji 墓誌), 412; forming of mound (pongsik 封式), 202; inscription (myogalmun 墓碣文), 184; keeper of (myojik 墓直), 204, 356; land (myojŏn 墓田 or wit’o 位土), 189, 203, 267; makeshift hut at parental (yŏmak 廬幕), 192; mountain (myosan 墓山), 267; mourning at (yŏmyo 廬墓), 188; moving of (ch’ŏnjang 遷葬 or ch’ŏnmyo 遷墓), 356; rites at (myoje 墓祭), 192, 196, 271, 273, 282; rotating rites at, 189; site in chokpo (ch’ongmyo 塚墓), 414; “spirit way stele” (sindobi 神道碑) leading to, 302, 303, 412; stone (myobi 墓碑), 412; tomb tablet (chisŏk 誌石), 202; wife buried on husband’s left side (pujwa 夫左), 203. See also ancestral rites; burial rites graveyard, 202–4, 286, 297, 354 Great Compendium on Human Nature and ­Principle (Chin. Xingli daquan 性理大全), 171, 181 Great Learning (Chin. Daxue 大學), 65, 67, 70–73, 169, 180, 331 Ha Chung-nyong 河仲龍, 100 Ha Yŏn 河演, 159 Ha Yun 河崙, 57, 60, 67 Haedong kapchok 海東甲族, 29 haengjang 行狀, 164, 412 Hahoe 河回, 98, 200 Hahoe Ward Compact (Hahoe tonggye 河回 洞契), 231 hain kwŏnjingsa 下人勸懲事, 230 Hakki yup’yŏn 學記類編, 181 hakp’a 學派, 160, 238, 305 Hakpong hakp’a 鶴峯學派, 306



General Names and Terms

Hall for Communal Archery (Hyangsadang 鄕射堂), 102–6 passim, 213, 215–18 Hall of Great Achievement (Taesŏngjŏn 大成殿), 168 Hall of Nourishing Old Age (Yangnodang 養老堂), 387 Hall of the Ten Thousand Scrolls (Man’gwŏn­ dang 萬卷堂), 65 Hall of Worthies (Chiphyŏnjŏn 集賢殿), 69, 91 hallyang 閑良, 80 Haman 咸安, 413 Hamch’ang 咸昌, 130 Hamgyŏng Province 咸鏡道, 9, 153 Hamjuji 咸州志, 413 Hamyang 咸陽, 75, 165 hamyang 涵養, 178 Han Sang-gyŏng 韓尙敬, 53 Han Yu 韓愈, 66 hangnyŏl 行列, 289 hanp’um sŏyong 限品敍用, 126 Hansŏng 漢城, 58 Hanyang 漢陽, 9, 43 Hapch’ŏn 陜川, 160 heir. See lineal heir; ritual heir heredity, 8, 375, 393, 395; of secondary sons, 381; of slaves, 395 Historical Mirror of the Clerks’ Department (Yŏnjo ku’gam), 383, 386. See also hyangni History of Korea (Koryŏsa), 23, 63 ho 號 (pen name), 288 Hŏ Ch’an 許瓚, 115 Hŏ Cho 許稠, 57 Hŏ Chŏk 許積, 240, 319, 320, 375 Hŏ Kyun 許筠, 212 Hŏ Mok 許穆, 223, 240, 242, 319, 322, 338 Hoengsŏng 橫城, 115 Hoeryŏng 會寧, 97 ho’gang p’umgwan 豪强品官, 262 Ho’gye Sŏwŏn 虎溪書院, 184, 312, 369 hojok 豪族, 21, 24, 28, 89 holmyo-sungya 忽廟崇野, 192. See also grave hon 魂, 192 Honam 湖南, 249 Honam chŏrŭirok, 233 Hong Cha-hyŏng 洪自亨, 201 Hong Kyŏng-son 洪敬孫, 70 Hong Myŏng-ha 洪命夏, 317 Hong Ŏn-bak 洪彦博, 39, 40, 48 Hong Sun-bok 洪舜福, 166, 361 Hong U-wŏn 洪宇遠, 316, 319, 375 hongp’ae 紅牌, 69, 95. See also examinations hosŏng kongsin 扈聖功臣, 229

595

hŏt’ong 許通. See secondary son household (ho 戶), 261; head of (hoju 戶主), 264; “lean-on” (hyŏpho 挾戶), 349 household register (hojŏk 戶籍), 84, 137, 264, 389, 390; draft of (ho’gu tanja 戶口單子), 129, 204 Household Registration Law (Hojŏkpŏp 戶籍法), 81, 264 hoyŏn 浩然, 175 Huch’ŏn [Twinnae] 後川 [뒷내], 118 huiryun 厚彛倫, 220 “humble scholar” (hansa 寒士), 178, 248, 321 Hŭngdŏk 興德, 101 hun’gu[p’a] 勳舊 [派], 74 Hwang Chul-lyang 黃俊良, 297 Hwang Hŭi 黃喜, 101 Hwang, Kyung Moon, 7 Hwanghae Province 黃海道, 10 Hwangjŏn-ch’on 黃田村, 142 Hwangsan Fund Association (Hwangsan’gye 黃山契), 256 hwan’guk 換局, 241 Hwasan Mountain 花山, 291, 311 hwasŏng yesok 化成禮俗, 188 hwega ch’urhyang 毁家出鄕, 305, 351 hwi 諱 (personal name), 289 hyangan 鄕案. See local roster Hyangan of the Kajŏng Period (Kajŏng hyangan 嘉靖鄕案), 213 hyangban 鄕班, 266 hyangdang 鄕黨, 378 hyanggog’in 鄕曲人, 245 hyanggok saho mudan 鄕曲士豪武斷, 342 hyanggwŏn 鄕權, 333, 342 hyanghwa 鄕化, 10 Hyanghyŏnsa 鄕賢祠, 368 hyangin 鄕人, 212, 219, 252, 253 hyangjok 鄕族, 259, 260. See also chok hyangmang 鄕望, 219 hyangni 鄕吏, 7, 9, 25, 80–81, 90, 213, 222, 341, 343, 356, 362, 370–82 passim, 407; Anilbang 安 逸房, 388; attire of (hŭkchuk pangnip 黑竹方 笠), 7; in chokpo, 387; of clerkly stock (ijok 吏 族), 382; county administrator (hyŏlli 縣吏), 97; deputy headman (puhojang 副戶長), 443n32, 460n27; elite fearing to become, 265; headman (hojang 戶長), 92–93, 382, 387; Hojang-ibang sŏnsaengan 戶長吏房先生案 of Namwŏn, 387; hyangni and secondary sons (chung-sŏ 中庶), 378, 383; as “hyangni grandsons” (hyangson 鄕孫), 384; as “local administrators” (hyang taebu 鄕大夫) in Koryŏ, 208, 216, 218, 383; on local roster, 214–16; low-level

596

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

hyangni (continued) (hari 下吏), 262; opening of higher bureaucracy to, 392, 395; peripheral administrative post (oeri 外吏), 90; as personnel officer (ibang 吏房), 383; as provincial hyangni (kamyŏng yŏngni 監營營吏), 384; roster of (tan’an 壇案), 214, 222, 383; square hat (pangnip 方笠), 7; “[three] public elder brothers” ([sam]gong­ hyŏng [三]公兄), 382; as T’oegye disciples, 383; “transferred” (kari 假吏), 382; “wicked” (angni 惡吏 or wŏnak hyangni 元惡鄕吏), 218, 222 Hyangnok ch’oan 鄕錄草案 of 1615, 229 hyangp’a 鄕派, 298 hyangsi 鄕試. See examinations hyangsok 鄕俗, 275 hyangŭi 鄕議, 220 hyangyŏk 鄕役, 7 Hyejong, King (Koryŏ), 28 hyo 孝, 63 Hyohaengnok (Chin. Xiaoxinglu 孝行錄). See Record of Filial Acts hyŏlsok 血屬, 280 hyŏn 縣, 80 Hyŏndŏk, Queen 顯德王后, 92 hyŏngmang chegŭp 兄亡弟及, 270 hyŏn’gwan 顯官, 55, 215, 342 hyŏnjo 顯祖. See distinguished ancestor Hyoryŏng taegun 孝寧大君, 100 i 理 (“principle”), 159 i (or -ri) 里 (administrative village). See village iban 立案, 129, 134 Ich’ŏn 利川, 24 idan 異端, 50 identification tag (chip’ae 紙牌 or hop’ae 戶牌), 261 idu 吏讀, 411 i-gi 理氣, 306 I’gisŏl 理氣說, 307 I’gye-ch’on 伊溪村, 172 I’gye Sŏdang 伊溪書堂, 172 Ilchik 一直, 111 ilgi 日記, 412 Illustrated Guide to the Three Relationships (Samgang haengsilto 三綱行實圖), 188 Illyang-ri 仁良里, 115 Im Kyŏn-mi 林堅味, 43, 44, 52 Im Pak 林樸, 40, 47, 48 Im Po 任溥, 33 Im Tam 林墰, 359 Im Ŭi 任懿, 33 Im Wŏn-hu 任元厚, 33

Imch’ŏn Hyangsa 臨川鄕祠, 311 Imch’ŏn Sŏwŏn 臨川書院, 311 Imha 臨河, 85, 108 Imjin waeran (壬辰倭亂). See Imjin War Imjin War, 154, 162, 234, 237, 415; and hyangni, 383; and secondary sons, 374 imnae 任內, 85 Indong 仁同, 225 inequality: among brothers, 207, 280; between master and slave, 140; social, 4, 5, 6, 341, 396 inheritance: from ancestors (chosang chŏllae 祖 上傳來), 130; customary, 144, 151; documents (hŏyŏ mun’gi 許與文記 or hwahoe mun’gi 和 會文記), 145, 147; equal, 151, 155, 189, 402; to give to others than grandchildren (sonoe yŏt’a 孫外與他), 149; received share (kŭmdŭk 衿 得), 130; special gift (pyŏlgŭp 別給), 130, 148, 155, 269; threat of partible, 146, 267; through wives, 145–53 passim Injo, King (Chosŏn), 237, 238 Injo Restoration (Injo panjŏng 仁祖反正) of 1623, 239, 246, 399 in-law politics, 241 inmul 人物, 51, 89, 290 iphyŏn mubang 入賢無妨, 375 irye 禰禮, 274 Isan Sŏwŏn 伊山書院, 182, 184 Japanese invasions. See Imjin War Jiali (Chin. [Kor. Karye]) 家禮, 68, 74, 145, 167, 187–97 passim, 203. See also Zhuzi jiali Kabo Reform of 1894 (Kabo kyŏngjang 甲午 更張), 395–96 Kach’ang Mountain 可倉山, 202, 303 Kaedan 皆丹, 263 kaeguk kongsin 開國功臣, 52, 53, 93 Kaegyŏng 開京, 24, 40 Kaesŏng 開城, 9 Ka’gu Mountain 佳丘山, 202 Kahak yŏnwŏllok 家學淵源錄, 516n17 Kail 佳日, 291 kalmun-wang 葛文王, 20 Kamch’ŏn 甘泉, 459 Kang Han 姜翰, 383 Kang Hŭi-an 姜希顔, 57 Kang Hŭi-maeng 姜希孟, 57, 455n23 Kang Yun 康崙, 217 Kang Yun-ch’ung 康允忠, 41 Kangnŭng 江陵, 29 kangsin 講信, 211 kangsin chi sok 講信之俗, 103



General Names and Terms

Kangwŏn Province 江原道, 9, 80 kansin 姦臣, 43 kapchok 甲族. See descent group Karlsson, Anders, 393 Karye 家禮. See Jiali Karye ŭiŭi 家禮疑義, 194 Khubilai Khan, 34, 36, 65 ki 氣 (mind-matter), 6, 161 ki 記 (note), 44 Ki Ch’ŏl 奇轍, 39, 42, 52 Ki Hyŏn 奇顯, 43 Ki Tae-sŭng 奇大升, 161, 166, 175, 180, 184, 257 Ki’gok Mountain 岐谷山, 202 Kiho Namin 畿湖南人, 240, 336. See also Namin Kija 箕子, 5, 393, 394 Kil Chae 吉再, 456n43 killye 吉禮, 63 kilsa 吉士, 217 [Kim] Alchi [金] 閼智, 297 Kim An-guk 金安國, 160, 164, 168, 169 Kim Chae-ro 金在魯, 332, 333 Kim Ch’ang-hŭp 金昌翕, 364 Kim Ch’ang-jo 金昌祖, 227 [Sa’gye] Kim Chang-saeng [沙溪] 金長生, 251, 278, 324 Kim Chip 金集, 215 Kim Chi-u 金之祐, 22 Kim Chŏng-guk 金正國, 164 Kim Chong-jik 金宗直, 73–76 passim, 165, 218; rise of 71, 72 Kim Chŭp 金緝, 93 Kim Ch’wi-ryŏ 金就礪, 33, 35, 37 Kim Hŭng-gyŏng 金興慶, 330 Kim Hyo-in 金孝印, 93 Kim Hyŏn 金 㮟 , 290 Kim I-ch’ŏng 金利請, 93 Kim Il-son 金馹孫, 72 Kim In-hu 金麟厚, 108, 160, 161, 166, 167 Kim Koeng-p’il 金宏弼, 71, 73, 76, 164 Kim Kŏn-t’ae, 137 Kim Ku-yong 金九容, 47, 48, 67, 93 Kim Kwang-ch’ŏl, 37 Kim Man-bo 金萬寶, 100 Kim Man-gi 金萬基, 317 Kim Man-jung 金萬重, 518n50 Kim Nan 金蘭, 42 Kim Pan 金槃, 278 Kim Pang-gyŏng 金方慶, 35 Kim Pong-jo 金奉祖, 314 Kim Sa-haeng 金師幸, 42 Kim Sa-hyŏng 金士衡, 53 Kim Sa-wŏn 金士元, 138

597

Kim Sang 金賞, 103, 104 Kim Sang-hŏn 金尙憲, 240, 364; shrine for, 333–35, 371, 372 Kim Sang-jun 金尙寯, 240 Kim Sang-yong 金尙容, 240 Kim Si-jwa 金時佐, 93 Kim Sŏn-p’yŏng 金宣平, 89, 92 Kim Sŏng-il 金誠一. See under Ŭisŏng Kim in the Personal Names/Choronym Glossary-Index Kim Sŏng-no 金省魯, 372 Kim Su-hang 金壽恒, 317 Kim Su-hong 金壽弘, 319 Kim Su-hŭng 金壽興, 317 Kim Su-ryŏng 金壽寧, 93 Kim Suk-cha 金叔滋, 456n43 Kim Sun-go 金舜皐, 99 Kim Sun Joo, 393 Kim Sŭng-ju 金承霔, 99 Kim Tae-hyŏn 金大賢, 307 Kim Ton 金墩, 93 Kim U-ong 金宇顒, 181, 217 Kim Yong-dŏk, 104 Kim Yŏng-jŏn 金永銓, 364 Kim Yu-on 金有溫, 99 Kim Yun-sa 金允思, 224 kimaek 氣脈, 205 kinship, 287, 307; changing idiom of, 207; “distant” (wŏnson 遠孫), 303; kin funding association (chokkye 族契), 281, 298; kins­ men (ch’inch’ŏk 親戚), 210; matrilateral, 365; “near kin” (chongin 宗人), 303; nonagnatic, 189, 200, 202, 275, 276; “our surname relatives” (asŏng ch’in 我姓親), 282; roster (chog’an 族 案), 293; and territory, 290. See also bilaterality; descent group; nonagnates kingship, 35, 397; in Chosŏn, 59, 61–63, 241; kingly education, 69–70, 71; in Koryŏ, 35, 41, 45, 50; legitimacy, 62, 241, 316; rivalry of with aristocracy, 45, 50, 59; royal despotism, 63; weakness of, 71, 241 Kiran 吉安, 263 Ko Yong-bo 高龍普, 44 Koch’ang 古昌, 89 Kŏch’ang 居昌, 325 koga sejok 古家世族. See descent group kohyang 故鄕, 289 kŏhyang 居鄕, 350 Kŏhyang chabŭi 居鄕雜儀, 350 Kojong, King (Chosŏn), 241, 395 kŏjuji 居住地 (residence), 299 komun 古文 (Chin. guwen), 66, 67

598

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

komunsŏ 古文書, 411 kongga-gwanwi 公家官位, 375 konggong 公共, 360 kongji 公知, 212 Kongmin, King (Koryŏ), 39–43 passim, 45, 47, 413; executions under, 39–40; reform plans, 40, 41 kong-sa 公私, 375 kongsin 功臣. See merit subject Koryŏ 高麗, 45, 61, 62 Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition period, 51, 64, 80, 120, 398 Koryong 古龍, 85 kŏsil chaje 巨室子弟, 51 koyŏk 苦役, 137, 259 Ku Pong-nyŏng 具鳳齡, 174, 184 Ku Sa-maeng 具思孟, 239 Kudam 九潭, 99, 163 kug’yŏk 國役. See taxation kuhyul 救恤, 226 kuk chi wŏn’gi 國之元氣, 243 kukchŏn 國典, 301 Kŭman-bang 金岸坊, 118 Kŭmch’ŏn 衿川, 152 kŭmdan kyuyak 禁斷規約, 222 Kŭmgok 琴谷, 110, 170 Kŭmgye 金溪, 110, 145, 204, 255 Kŭmsŏng 金城, 19, 24 kun 郡, 84, 218 kung-ni 窮理, 180 kŭn-gŭn 謹勤, 179 kun-hyŏn 郡縣, 25, 263 kunjagam 軍資監, 225 kunja-ri 君子里, 171 kunja-yu 君子儒, 182 Kunwi 軍威, 201 Kurye 求禮, 112, 166 kwaesŏ 掛書, 325 Kwa’galbo 瓜葛譜. See genealogy kwagŏ chedo 科擧制度. See examinations kwangguk wŏnjong kongsin 光國原從功臣, 115 Kwanghae’gun (Chosŏn), 82, 114, 227, 239, 241, 242 Kwangjong, King (Koryŏ), 23, 24, 28 Kwangju (Chŏlla) 光州, 99, 257, 322 Kwangju (Kyŏnggi) 廣州, 22, 56 Kwangnyeram 廣禮覽, 540n32 kwanmun 關文, 327 kwanwi 官威, 323 kwijok 貴族, 2, 16, 263. See also elite Kwimi 龜尾, 251 Kwiraejŏng 歸來亭, 98

Kwŏn Ch’i 權輜, 103, 104 Kwŏn Chip-kyŏng 權執經, 99 Kwŏn Hŭi-hak 權喜學, 384–85 Kwŏn Hŭi-jŏng 權希正, 98 Kwŏn Kye-wi 權啓緯, 384 Kwŏn Kyŏng-yong 權景龍, 384 Kwŏn Kŭn 權近. See under Andong Kwŏn in the Personal Names/Choronym Glossary-Index Kwŏn Maeng-gyŏng 權孟慶, 103 Kwŏn Min-su 權敏手, 163 Kwŏn Min-ŭi 權敏義, 383 Kwŏn Mun-hae 權文海, 146 Kwŏn Nae-hyŏn, 295 Kwŏn Paek-chong 權佰宗, 386 Kwŏn Pŏl 權橃. See under Andong Kwŏn in the Personal Names/Choronym Glossary-Index Kwŏn Sang-il 權相一, 388 Kwŏn Si-jung 權是中, 414 Kwŏn Sim-do 權心度, 384 Kwŏn Tae-un 權大運, 325 Kwŏn Tal-su 權達手, 163 Kwŏn U 權宇, 172 Kwŏn Yong-ch’ing 權龍稱, 384 Kwŏn Yŏng-hŭp 權永翕, 384 kwŏn 權, 36, 140 kwŏnmun 權門. See “opportunistic houses” kwŏnse 權勢, 36, 46 kwŏnse chi ka 權 勢 之家, 36 kwŏnsin 權臣, 46 kye 系 (“descent line”). See descent line kye 契 (mutual fund), 98, 208 kyegŏ 溪居, 290 Kyemi Regulations (Kyemi chŏlmok 癸未節目) of 1823, 381, 395 Kyemun chejarok 溪門諸子錄, 306 Kyesang 溪上, 292 kyŏl 結. See land Kyŏn Hwŏn 甄萱, 89 Kyonamji, 359 kyŏng 敬, 41, 46 Kyŏngch’ul Mountain 景出山, 359 Kyŏngdŏksa 景德祠, 360 Kyŏnggi Province 京畿道, 9 Kyŏngguk taejŏn, 6, 8, 68, 71, 127, 139, 187, 195, 278 kyŏnghwain 京華人, 245, 252 kyŏnghyŏn sangdŏk 景賢尙德, 360 Kyŏngjin choyak 庚辰條約 of 1640, 257 Kyŏngjinjŏk ch’urog’an 庚辰籍追錄案, 258 Kyŏngju 慶州, 9, 19, 24, 29 Kyŏngmong yogyŏl 擊蒙要訣, 271 kyŏngmun 檄文, 223 Kyŏngsangdo chiriji, 89, 159, 413



General Names and Terms

Kyŏngsangdo hososa 慶尙道號召使, 326 Kyŏngsang Province 慶尙道, 9, 24, 35, 58, 133, 160, 246 Kyŏngsang sŏnbaedang 慶尙先輩黨, 72 Kyŏngsin taech’ulch’ŏk 庚申大黜陟, 244, 318 kyŏngsul chi sa 經術之士, 47 Kyŏngsun, King 敬順王 (Silla), 298 kyŏre 겨레, 20 kyosu 敎授, 84, 168 kyu manmin 糾萬民, 216 land: ancestral (chosang chŏllae 祖上傳來), 130; “correcting field boundaries” (kyŏnggye chi chŏng 經界之正), 49; “equalization of land on well grid” (kyŏngji chi kyun 井地之均), 49; fragmentation of, 154, 155, 347; grave (myojŏn 墓田), 198, 203, 267, 282–86 passim, 301, 346, 355, 385; inherited (chŏllaedap 傳來沓), 284; measurement of (kyŏl 結), 85, 473n7; privatization of, 44; public (kongjŏn 公田), 79; sacrificial (chejŏn 祭田), 191; scarcity of, 280, 285 land cultivation patterns, 348. See also tenancy land registers (yangan 量案). See cadastral survey Law Investigating Wicked Hyangni (Hyangwŏn ch’uhae pŏp 鄕愿推劾法), 81. See also hyangni Law on Following the [Commoner] Mother’s Corveé (Chong[yang]moyŏkpŏp 從[良]母役法) of 1669, 346; reinstatement of in 1731, 391, 394. See also matrifilial rule “learning of ancient prose” (komun chi hak 古文 之學), 66 Learning of Principle (ihak 理學), 75, 76, 159 Learning of the Way (Chin. Daoxue [Kor. Tohak] 道學), 64, 65. See also Tohak liege man (mun’gaek 門客), 386 Liji (Chin.) 禮記, 65, 67, 300 lineage, 3, 155, 207, 266–67, 287, 289, 402; assembly (chonghoe 宗會), 285, 303; building of, 243, 402; compared to China, 404–6; competition between subsegments of, 288–89; domesticshrine, 190, 197, 199, 207, 208, 266, 267, 282; land, 348; member of (chongin 宗人), 303; resources contested, 354–55; restitution of membership (hwan’gwan pokchong 還貫復 宗), 300; ritual (tangnae 堂內), 190, 198, 199, 280, 287, 289; separate line of (pyŏlp’a 別派), 364; splitting of (punp’a 分派), 287–89; trust, 270, 347. See also descent group lineal heir (chongson 宗孫), 121, 189, 206, 266, 280, 271, 282, 287, 349. See also eldest son; main-line heir; ritual heir

599

lineal principle (chongpŏp 宗法), 190, 206, 241, 278. See also agnation literati. See sa Literati Purges, 74, 82, 160, 163, 399; of 1498 (Muo sahwa 戊午士禍), 72, 98; of 1504 (Kapcha sahwa 甲子士禍), 75, 164; of 1519 (Kimyo sahwa 己卯 士禍), 73, 74, 112, 118 local bureau (yuhyangso 留鄕所 or yuhyang­ ch’ŏng 留鄕廳), 7, 81–82, 104, 209, 217, 261– 63, 367, 387; in Andong, 253–56; “controllers of [government] principles” (chipkang 執綱), 219; deputy head (pyŏlgam 別監), 219, 253; head (chwasu 座首), 219, 253; in Namwŏn, 257–60; officers (hyangsŭng 鄕丞), 260; Rules Concerning the Restoration of (Yuhyangso poksŏl maryŏn chŏlmok 留鄕所復設磨鍊節 目), 218; Rules and Register Pertaining to (Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok 鄕廳事例謄錄), 255; staff of (yuhyang p’umgwan 留鄕品官), 81; top officals of (hyangim 鄕任 or p’umgwan 品官), 80, 217–21, 257, 259, 260, 378 localism, 243 locality, 21, 29, 58, 101, 125, 202, 212, 243, 289, 287, 299, 302; inhabited through generations (segŏji 世居地), 297; physiographical environment of, 55, 290 localization process, 11, 107, 125, 207, 293, 295, 302, 399; in early Chosŏn, 82, 101; influence on marriage patterns, 295; of Tohak, 401 Local Register of 1589 (Mallyŏk kich’uk hyangnok 萬曆己丑鄕錄), 214, 222, 228 local roster (hyangan 鄕案), 208, 212, 213, 265, 377; admission criteria (samch’am 三參), 212, 254; assembly (hyanghoe 鄕會), 218, 220, 255, 257; constitution (yaksok chomok 約束 條目), 257; deputy head (puhŏn 副憲), 257; expelled forever from (yŏngson 永損), 258; head (hyanghŏn 鄕憲), 257; membership (hyangwŏn 鄕員), 212; officers (p’unghŏn 風 憲)257; “people corresponding to admission criteria” (ŭngch’am chi in 應參之人), 254; point system (kwŏnjŏm 圈點), 257; revision of in Andong, 228, 253–56, 367, 378; revision of in Namwŏn, 256–60 local school (hyanggyo 鄕校), 75, 84, 168, 310, 324, 372, 373; clearing function of, 378; Confucian student (yusaeng 儒生), 378; dormitories (tong-sŏjae 東西齋), 310, 378; “outside the quota” (aeg’oe 額外), 378; side wings (yangmu 兩廡), 168; student in (kyosaeng 校生), 378 local warfare (hyangjŏn 鄕戰), 344 Lu 魯 (Confucius’s home state), 63, 105

600

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Lu Jiuyuan 陸九淵, 180 Lü Family Community Compact (Chin. Lüshi xiangyue 呂氏鄕約), 217, 356, 358 Maeng Sa-sŏng 孟思誠, 57 magistrate (suryŏng 守令), 80, 85, 161, 181, 218, 223, 255, 259; increased power of, 262–64; not interested in lineage affairs, 289, 403 main-line heir, 121, 189, 266, 270–71, 282. See also ritual heir; eldest son Malch’ŏn-bang 末川坊, 152 Manchu invasions, 82, 234, 237, 399 Mandate of Heaven, 61; in Chosŏn, 62; in Koryŏ, 62. See also kingship mansi 挽詩, 307 Manual of the Five State Rites (Kukcho oryeŭi), 63, 241 marginalization, 9, 403; of sajok, 252, 342, 399; of secondary sons, 8; of Yŏngnam, 321 marriage: after Imjin War, 225; changing patterns of, 295; with in-migrating son-in-law, 120–125 passim; networks within community, 213; networks in early Chosŏn, 58, 60–61; networks in early Koryŏ, 31; with royal house, 26–28, 31, 60–61; among T’oegye’s disciples, 175; uxorilocal, 82, 101, 120, 189, 200, 267, 289, 292, 402 maternal grandparents, 125, 276, 280 matrifilial rule, 5, 6, 127, 346, 393. See also Law on Following the [Commoner] Mother’s Corveé memorial hall (sau 祠宇), 193, 285, 359, 361 “Memorial of the Ten Thousand” (Maninso 萬人疏), 337 “Memorial Opposing the Canonization of U’gye and Yulgok” (U-Yul sŭngmu pandaeso 牛栗陞 廡反對疏). See National Shrine of Confucius Mencius, 64, 65, 105, 160, 169 Mencius (Chin. Mengzi 孟子), 65, 169, 178 merit subject (kongsin 功臣), 79, 195, 301; in early Chosŏn, 53, 55, 56; under Chŏngjong, 60; under Chungjong, 72; in early Koryŏ, 22, 31, 36 middle people (chungin 中人), 8, 382. See also hyangni migration, 80, 82, 96 Military Rule (in Koryŏ), 17, 32–34 Min Che 閔霽, 60 Min Hyŏn-gu, 40 Min Mu-gu 閔無咎, 60 Min Mu-jil 閔無疾, 60 Min Se-gyŏng 閔世卿, 108 Min Se-jŏng 閔世貞, 108

Min Ŭng-su 閔應洙, 332 Min Yŏng-mo 閔令謨, 32 Ming dynasty, 15, 50, 69, 111, 404; during Imjin War, 223, 225; suspicious of Yi Sŏng-gye, 62 Miryang 密陽, 74 mo’gok pyŏltan 募穀別單, 374 mohyŏn chonsa 慕賢尊師, 362 mollak yangban 沒落兩班. See yangban Mongols, overlordship of, 34–39 passim, 40, 46, 65, 66 mourning: in heart (simsang 心喪), 469; period, 49; rites (sangnye 喪禮), 195. See also burial rites Muan 務安, 321 muban 武班, 24. See also yangban mudan 武斷, 263 mudang 巫堂, 179, 191 muhak chedok 武學提督, 84 muhyŏn 誣賢, 315 mun 門 (“house”), 283 mun 文 (“civility”), 160 munban 文班, 24. See also yangban munbŏl 門閥, 16, 29–33 passim, 56, 125, 341. See also distinguished houses Mun’gyŏng 聞慶, 315 Munhwa Yu genealogy of 1565, 58, 74, 206 munji 門地. See status munjip 文集, 183, 311, 362–63, 411 Munjong, King (Chosŏn), 61 munjung 門中 (also chokchung 族中), 189, 198, 199, 207, 277, 279, 289, 359, 402; in Andong, 197–99; in Chŏlla, 199; grand kin council (chokhoeso 族會所), 287; grand rite (hoejŏn 會奠), 303; head of (munjang 門長), 284, 285, 385; “higher-order” (chongjung 宗中 or taemunjung 大門中), 281; meeting of (munhoe 門會), 285; resolution of (munjung ibŭi 門中立議 or munjung wanŭi 門中完議), 198, 283, 301; rules of (mun’gyu 門規), 285 Munmyo 文廟. See National Shrine of Confucius Muryŏl, King 太宗武烈王 (Silla), 20 Musin ch‘angŭirok 戊申倡義錄, 336 Musin Rebellion of 1728 (Musillan 戊申亂), 325 myoji 墓誌. See grave myŏn 面, 85, 261 Myŏnggyodang 明敎堂, 182 myŏnghyŏn 名賢, 167, 361 Myŏngnyundang 明倫堂, 168 myŏnyŏk 免役. See slaves



General Names and Terms

Na Hak-ch’ŏn 羅學川, 330, 331 Naeap 내앞 (Chin. Ch’ŏnjŏn 川前), 108, 263–97 passim. See also Ch’ŏnjŏn Naegi [Ant’ŏ] 內基 [안터], 118 Naemul, King 奈勿王 (Silla), 19 Naesŏng 奈城, 102, 112, 134 Naju 羅州, 165 Nakch’ŏnsa 洛川祠, 368 Naktong River 洛東江, 172, 290 Nam Chae 南在, 53 Nam Ŭn 南誾, 53, 59 Namin 南人, 239, 240, 369; in Andong, 246, 249, 314, 319; in capital, 319, 320; in Chŏlla, 249, 321–23; defeat of, 370–71; in Kyŏngsang, 236; on sŏja as heirs, 278, 373–74; weakness of, 320– 21; in Yŏngnam, 308, 312–18 passim, 319, 320, 323–25 passim Namin p’yejok 南人弊族, 325 Namjŏng illok 南征日錄, 385 nammi pugŏ 納米赴擧. See examinations Namwŏn 南原, 10, 103, 119, 199, 218, 252, 269, 292–93, 348, 367, 404; hyangni of, 387–88; inheritance documents of, 145, 152; marriages in, 123; segmentation of society in, 260 Namwŏn roster (Namwŏn hyangan 南原鄕案), 256. See also local roster nanhyang pŏmbun 亂鄕犯分, 380 nanjin yŏkt’oe 難進易退, 352 napsok 納粟 (submission of grain), 225, 343, 374, 389; for shedding base status (napsok myŏnch’ŏn 納粟免賤), 391; titles (kasŏn 嘉善 or t’ongjŏng 通政), 389. See also examinations “nation” (chongsa 宗社), 237, 243 National Confucian Academy (Sŏnggyun’gwan 成均館), 40, 47, 67, 69, 75, 159, 168, 242 National Shrine of Confucius (Munmyo 文廟), 69, 75, 76, 161; canonization in, 75–76, 242–43, 246, 331, 400; canonization of Chŏng Mongju, 75–76; canonization of Yi T’oegye, 209; canonization of Yulgok-U’gye, 242–43, 313– 14; “Memorial Opposing the Canonization of U’gye and Yulgok” (U-Yul sŭngmu pandaeso 牛栗陞廡反對疏), 314 Neo-Confucianism, 17, 39, 398, 399, 402; under Mongols, 39; role of in Koryŏ-Chosŏn transition, 45 Neo-Confucian learning, 16, 39. See also Confucian learning Nicholas, Ralph W., 404 No Ch’aek 盧頙, 42 No Kyŏng-im 盧景任, 307

601

No Su-sin 盧守愼, 166 “noble” and “base” (kwi-ch’ŏn 貴賤). See elite Nobong 露峯, 293 Nobong Sŏwŏn 露峯書院, 166, 361 nonagnates (oeson 外孫), 189, 198, 199, 203, 365; eliminated from patrilineal genealogy, 365–66; rites of to maternal grandparents (oeson pongsa 外孫奉祀), 280, 276. See also agnates; kinship nonelite, 3, 4, 8, 35; as actors of change, 293. See also commoners; elite; “noble” and “base”; slaves nongjang 農莊. See estates, landed Noron 老論, 240, 241, 244, 325, 394; harassment of Andong, 371 nosa sug’yu 老師熟儒, 184 Nŭng-dong 陵洞, 303 Nŭngju 綾州, 322 O Chŏng-gil 吳廷吉, 361 O Chŏng-il 吳挺一, 319 O Hŭi-sang 吳熙常, 386 O Kye-dong 吳季瞳, 121, 149 O Myŏng-hang 吳命恒, 385 O Su-yŏng 吳守盈, 209, 210 O Un 吳澐, 205 Ŏ Yu-ryong 魚有龍, 333 ŏbyu 業儒, 374 Och’ŏn [Oenae] 烏川 [외내], 113, 114, 171, 226 Odam 鼇潭, 182 Office for the Promotion of Confucian Studies in Korea (Koryŏguk yuhak chegŏsa 高麗國 儒學提擧司), 65 Office Land Law (Chikchŏnbŏp 職田法), 80 Office of Maritime Affairs (Sajaegam 司宰監), 126, 127 Office of Royal Lectures (Kyŏngyŏn 經筵), 69, 70, 72 officialdom, 24, 30, 31. See also bureaucracy Oksan 玉山, 295 Oksan Sŏwŏn 玉山書院, 336, 379 Old Community Regulations (Hyanggyu kujo 鄕規舊條) of 1588, 217, 219 ŏmmu 業武, 374 On’gye 溫溪, 107, 114, 133, 170, 290 Ŏnhaengnok 言行錄 (“Record of Pronouncement and Deeds”), 175, 183 “opportunistic houses” (kwŏnmun 權門), 35–36; and Buddhism, 44; as competitors of sajok, 38; and economic excesses, 41, 44; rise of, 28, 36 orthodoxy, Confucian, 69, 242, 243, 304, 313, 401

602

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

orye 惡禮, 316 Osu 獒樹, 251 Osu River 獒樹川, 292 Ot’osan 五土山, 297 Ouyang Xiu 歐陽修, 66 p’a 派. See descent group Pae Chŏn 裵佺, 41 Paegun-dong Sŏwŏn 白雲洞書院, 181, 310 Paegunjŏng 白雲亭, 295 paehyang 配享, 22, 173, 305, 360. See also private academy paek 魄, 192 Paekche 百濟, 24, 85, 89 paekp’ae 白牌, 95, 253. See also examinations paesan imsu 背山臨水, 290 Pai, Hyung Il, 19 Pak Chi-yun 朴遲胤, 28 Pak Chig-yun 朴直胤, 28 Pak Chŏg-o 朴赤烏, 28 Pak Il-lyang 朴寅亮, 28 Pak Mun-su 朴文秀, 324, 329–34 passim, 362 Pak Sa-su 朴師洙, 326, 328, 333 Pak Sang-ch’ung 朴尙衷, 47, 48 Pak Se-ch’ae 朴世采, 276, 322, 375 Pak Sun 朴淳, 252, 520n95 Pak Yŏng-hyo 朴泳孝, 539n146 Pak Yong-un, 36 Palais, James B., 393 pang 坊, 85 Pang Sin-u 方臣祐, 44 Pangch’uk 防築, 264, 292 Pan’gye surok 磻溪隨錄, 534 panyŏk 叛逆, 42 Parhae, 23 patrilineality/patriline, 7, 20, 155, 161 190, 207, 266, 287, 295, 366, 402, 404. See also descent group; descent line patrimony (yuŏp 遺業), 148 Pibyŏnsa 備邊司, 327 pobon ch’uwŏn 報本追遠, 199 pok a chojong chi pŏp 復我祖宗之法, 39 pokchi 福地, 290 pokko 復古, 45, 67 policy of grand harmony (t’angp’yŏng 蕩平), 241, 242, 329, 372, 376, 399. See also Yŏngjo, King policy questions (Kor. ch’aek or ch’aengmun 策問; Chin. ce 策), 47, 66. See also examinations pŏmnye 凡例, 414 pongan 奉安. See ancestral rites Ponghwa 奉化, 112, 133 pongjak 封爵, 22

Pongnim, Prince 鳳林大君 (later King Hyojong), 250 Pongsŏn chabŭi 奉先雜儀, 488n13 Pongsŏn chegyu 奉先諸規, 195, 271 pon’gwan 本貫. See ancestral seat Pŏphŭng, King 法興王 (Silla), 19, 20 pŏryŏl 閥閱. See distinguished houses primogeniture: ending fraternal equality, 155; heir, 189, 197, 205; ritual, 189, 197, 207, 287 princely coup: First, of 1398, 59; Second, of 1400, 60 Prison Affair of 1589 (Kich’uk oksa 己丑獄事), 183, 232, 239, 321 private academies (sŏwŏn 書院), 181, 310, 359, 362; coenshrined (paehyang 配享) in, 173, 305; cult of worthies in, 312; destruction of, 369; royal charter for (saaek 賜額), 181, 310 “protection privilege” (ŭmsŏ 蔭敍 or ŭmjik 蔭職): in Chosŏn, 54; in Koryŏ, 30, 46 Puam Sŏdang 傅巖書堂, 168 “public discourse” (kongnon 公論), 186, 243, 323 Pugae Community Compact (Pugae hyangyak 北厓鄕約), 231 Pugin 北人, 239, 247, 305, 311. See also Tongin pu’gok 部曲, 85, 102, 263, 414 puhwang 付黃, 315 Pumin koso chi kŭmji pŏp 部民告訴之禁止法, 81 pun 分. See status P’ungak Sŏdang 豊岳書堂, 172, 311 Pun’gang Sŏwŏn 汾江書院, 361 P’unggi 豊基, 170 P’ungsan 豊山, 85, 200 Pup’o-dong 浮浦洞, 210 purification hall (chaesa 齋舍 or chaesil 齋室), 190, 193, 199, 203, 204, 227, 302, 404 purok 附錄, 364, 412 pu sŏnjo sik 祔先祖食, 202. See also ancestral rites pusowŏn 陪疏員, 315 p’yehaeng 嬖幸, 34 Pyŏn Kye-ryang 卞季良, 67 P’yŏngan Province 平安道, 9 P’yŏngch’ang 平昌, 200 pyŏnggi talgwŏn 炳幾達權, 89 Pyŏng-Ho sibi 屛虎是非, 368–69 Pyŏngsan 甁山, 89 Pyŏngsan Sŏwŏn 屛山書院, 311, 313, 369 Questions on the Classic of the Mind-and-Heart (Simgyŏng p’umjil 心經稟質), 173 Rank Land Law (Kwajŏnbŏp 科田法), 79, 132 recluse (ch’ŏsa 處士 or yuil 遺逸), 119, 171, 178,



General Names and Terms

247, 252, 308; “hide one’s virtue and not serve” (ŭndŏk pulsa 隱德不仕), 178, 252 Recommendation Examination of 1519. See examinations Record of Filial Acts (Hyohaengnok 孝行錄), 188 Records of Hyangni Descendants of Andong (Andong hyangson sajŏk t’ongnok), 214, 484, 494n39. See also hyangni Record of Wrongdoings of Hyangni and Yamen Personnel (Illi che’gwansok ki’gwa 人吏諸官 屬記過), 383. See also hyangni Red Turbans, 40, 97, 413 Reflections on Things at Hand (Kŭnsarok 近思錄), 73, 166, 169, 178 Resolution on the Kin Mutual Fund in On’gyedong (On’gye-dong chung ch’in’gye ibŭi), 209 Revised Rules for Commoner Service (Yangyŏk pyŏnt’ong chŏlmok 良役變通節目), 262, 384 “right learning,” 243, 313, 373. See also orthodoxy, Confucian rites controversies (yesong 禮訟) of 1659 and 1674, 242, 241, 316, 318, 400 ritual handbooks, 195, 287, 301 ritual heir (sŭngjung[ja] 承重[者], sŭngjungwi 承重位, or chongson 宗孫), 155, 190, 270–75 passim, 287; economic status of, 190; residence of (chongga 宗家 or chongt’aek 宗宅), 194, 268, 288; ritual heirship (sŭngjŏk 承嫡), 153, 278. See also main-line heir; sons Roster of the Resistance Leaders of 1728 (Musin ch’angŭirok 戊申倡義錄), 336 Royal Ancestral Shrine (Chongmyo 宗廟): in Koryŏ, 22, 36, 62; in Chosŏn, 233 royal house. See kingship Royal University (Kukchagam 國子監), 25 Rules and Register Pertaining to the Local Bureau (Hyangch’ŏng sarye tŭngnok 鄕廳事 例謄錄). See local bureau Rules Concerning the Restoration of the Yuhyangso. See local bureau Rules Governing Garrison Commanders (Yŏngjang samok 營將事目), 261 rule of the in-laws (sedo chŏngch’i 世道政治), 242 sa 士, 46, 54, 73, 180, 186; “literati opinion” (saron 士論), 243, 323. See also sadaebu; sajok saaek 賜額. See private academies Sabin Sŏwŏn 泗濱書院, 359–63 passim sadaebu 士大夫, 46, 51, 54, 58, 248, 260, 329; as bureaucrats in early Chosŏn, 187, 188; rise of, 59, 68; as royal lecturers, 69–70. See also sajok

603

Sado, Prince 思悼世子, 335, 337 Sadong-bang 巳洞坊, 117 saenggangjo 生講條, 143 saga-chongjok 私家宗族, 375 sa’gangjo 死講條, 143 Sahyŏn-ch’on 沙峴村, 301 sain ho’gang 士人豪强, 330 sajok 士族, 120, 161, 234, 262, 300, 341, 342, 346, 349; alienation from center, 242, 243; in Andong, 334–35; economic decline of, 154– 55; fearing hyangni status, 265; during Imjin War, 223, 225, 227; and lineages, 289; as local leaders, 208, 212–13; pŏryŏl-ization of, 342, 366; poverty of, 349, 353–54; responsibilities of, 352; rivalry among, 368; split in Namwŏn, 259; strategies of survival, 296, 342; as T’oegye disciples, 160. See also elite; yangban Sakchu 朔州, 112 sallim 山林, 242 samch’am 三參. See local roster Samch’ŏk 三陟, 112 Samgye 三溪, 293 Samgye Sŏwŏn 三溪書院, 363, 301 Samhan kongsin 三韓功臣, 28 Samhan taejok 三韓大族, 29. See also descent group Samt’aesa 三太師, 89, 214, 382; shrine of (Samt’aesamyo 三太師廟), 89, 214, 224, 383 samun 斯文, 170, 373 samun chi chong 斯文之宗, 182 Sangbok kojŭng 喪服考證, 317 Sangdŏksa 尙德祠, 184 sang-ha chi in 上下之人, 230, 292 sanghan 常漢, 390 sang-ha t’onghaengsa 上下通行事, 230 Sanghyŏnsa 尙顯祠, 182 Sangju 尙州, 314 Sangnye kojŭng 喪禮考證, 194 Sangsanji 商山誌, 414 sanjang 山長 (academic director), 184, 310. See also private academy sanjang 山莊 (mountain estate), 112, 134. See also estates, landed sansong [samok] 山訟 [事目], 354 Sarib’an 사립안, 118 sarim 士林: in Andong, 163; in Chŏlla, 165; identity of, 73, 74; philosophy of, 74–75; profile of, 73 sarye 四禮, 353 sasŏl 邪說, 187, 373 sasuk 私淑, 170, 338 sasŭng 邪僧, 41

604

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

se 世 (“longevity”), 54 secondary son (sŏja 庶子 or sŏŏl 庶孼), 7, 8, 281, 292, 343, 370, 373, 380, 407; admission of to examinations (hŏt’ong 許通), 377; admission of to hyangan, 212, 254, 255; assaulting primary kin (ŏlban nŭngjŏk 孼反凌嫡), 380; banned from sŏwŏn, 311, 378; of base origin (ŏlcha 孼子 and ŏllyŏ 孼女), 126, 127, 147; commoner, 127; in Kabo Reform, 395–96; “miscellaneous offices” (chapchik 雜職) for, 127; mother of (sŏmo 庶母), 131, 277; spatial segregation of, 293–94. See also ritual heir; sons Security Council (Ch’umilwŏn 樞密院), 90 segmentation (punp’a 分派). See descent group segŏ[ji] 世居[地], 11 Sejo, King (Chosŏn), 57, 71, 82 sejok 世族, 2, 31, 35–37 passim, 41, 79; reemergence of in early Chosŏn, 39; replaced by sajok, 54; transformed to sadaebu, 58. See also munbŏl; sajok Sejong, King (Chosŏn), 57, 61, 70, 103 Sejong sillok chiriji 世宗實錄地理志. See ­Geographic Gazetteer Appended to the Annals of King Sejong service obligations (chigyŏk 職役, yŏk 役, or kug’yŏk 國役), 4, 6, 132, 389. See also taxation sesin taejok 世臣大族, 42. See also descent group settlement law (t’och’akpŏp 土著法), 261 seyu 世儒 (“wordly Confucians”), 178 sharecropping (pyŏngjak 竝作). See land cultivation patterns shrine (samyo 祠廟), 181. See also memorial hall Shuang Ji 雙冀, 23 Shundi 順帝 (last Mongol emperor), 40 siho 諡號 (posthumous name), 112, 184, 234 sije 時祭. See ancestral rites sil 實 (pragmatic, practical), 67 silch’ŏn 實踐, 176, 180 Silla 新羅, 2, 16, 367 Sim Chong 沈淙, 61 Sim On 沈溫, 61 sin 信, 41, 143 Sin Ch’i-gŭn 申致謹, 359 Sin Chi-je 申之悌, 223, 224 Sin Hŏn 申 𨯶𨯶 , 331 Sin Sa-guk 申思國, 333 Sin Sŏg-u 申錫愚, 386 Sin Sŏk-hyŏng 申碩亨, 315, 324 Sin Sŏk-pŏn 申碩蕃, 324 Sin Ton 辛旽, 43, 48–50 passim; demise of, 41, 42; rise of, 40 sinbae 新輩, 370, 373

Sin’gi [Saet’ŏ] 新基 [새터], 293 Sin’gok 申谷, 145 sinhŭng sadaebu 新興士大夫, 16–17, 398 Sinjongnok 愼終錄, 194 Sinjŏng wanghu 神貞王后. See Cho, Queen Dowager sin paekchŏng 新白丁, 134 sinsim chi hak 身心之學, 47 sinyang yŏkch’ŏn 身良役賤, 126 sirhak 實學 (“practical learning”), 67, 399 siŭn pulsa 始隱不仕, 108. See also recluse Six Classics, 47, 65, 67 Six Ministeries (Yukcho 六曹), 54, 60 Skinner, G. William, 10 Slave and Land Act of 956, 23 Slave Office (Changnyewŏn 掌隷院), 129, 131, 394 Slave Review Board (Nobi pyŏnjŏng togam 奴婢 辨定都監), 126 slaves (nobi 奴婢), 126, 343, 346–49, 370, 388, 391, 392, 407–8; [agricultural] labor slave (ibyŏk nobi 立役奴婢), 136; ancestral, 126, 130; changing laws regarding, 392; domestic (kanae sahwan nobi 家內使喚奴婢), 141, 392; end of public, 393–94, 396; exempt from base status (myŏnch’ŏn 免賤), 131; exempt from forced labor (myŏnyŏk 免役), 129, 131; fixedrent cultivation (chakkae 作介) of, 137; forever “good” (yŏngyŏng hŏryang 永永許良), 129, 130; head slave (suno 首奴), 136; hired (yongnam 傭男), 392; and Imjin War, 226; masterslave relationship, 136, 140; miscellaneous ­services (chabyŏk 雜役), 137, 228; “new” slave (sin nobi 新奴婢), 138; nonresident (oebang nobi 外方奴婢 or oegŏ nobi 外居奴婢), 136; origin of, 5–6; patrimonial (choŏp sangjŏn nobi 祖業相傳奴婢 or chosang chŏllae 祖上 傳來), 138; private (sa nobi 私奴婢), 5, 135; public (kong nobi 公奴婢), 5, 84, 135, 392; purchase of (maedŭk 買得), 137; reenslavement (amnyang 壓良), 391, 395; release upon payment (napsok myŏnch’ŏn 納粟免賤), 391; resident (solgŏ nobi 率居奴婢), 136, 210; rewarded with commoner status (hŏryang 許良or songnyang 贖良), 343, 391; ritual (pongsa nobi 奉祀 奴婢), 279; runaway (tomang nobi 逃亡奴婢), 226, 391; sales documents (maemae mun’gi 賣買文記) for, 137; as tribute bearers (sin’gong 身貢 or sugong 收貢), 137, 311, 348 So, Prince 昭 (later Koryŏ King Kwangjong), 23, 28 Sŏ Hŭi 徐熙, 24 Sŏ Kŏ-jŏng 徐居正, 92, 105



General Names and Terms

Sŏ Kyŏng-dŏk 徐敬德, 175 Sŏ Myŏng-gyun 徐命均, 328 Soch’ŏn 小川, 263 Sŏ’gahyŏn-ch’on 西可峴村, 102 Sŏhaeng illok 西行日錄, 384 Sŏin 西人, 238, 239, 312, 314–18 passim; in Chŏlla, 249, 252, 322; Namin-Sŏin conflicts, 323; “newly rising” Sŏin (sinch’ul Sŏin 新出 西人), 324, 372; re secondary sons, 278, 373– 76 passim; split into Noron-Soron, 238. See also Noron; Soron soji 所志 (petition), 129, 355 sokchŏl 俗節 (customary holidays), 188 Sŏkch’ŏn Chŏngsa 石泉精舍, 113 sokhyŏn 屬縣, 85, 102, 141, 263 Sok taejŏn, 128, 264, 354, 374 Son Hong-nyang 孫洪亮, 98 sondo 損徒 (“injured fellow”), 217 sŏng 誠, 46 Song China, 65, 193, 401 Song Chun-gil 宋浚吉, 242, 324, 331, 386 [U’gye] Sŏng Hon [牛溪] 成渾, 161, 238, 324; ­canonization of, 314, 315 Sŏng Hyŏn 成俔, list of, 52, 58, 100 Song In-myŏng 宋寅明, 328, 334 Song Myŏng-hŭm 宋明欽, 386 Song Si-yŏl 宋時烈, 240, 242, 278, 316–20 ­passim, 375, 394; canonization of, 331 Songan 松安, 97 Songgan ilgi 松澗日記, 115 Sŏnghak chibyo 聖學輯要, 335 Songhyŏn Mountain 松峴山, 201 Songhyŏn myosan ki 松峴墓山記, 201 Sŏnghyŏn tohak yŏnwŏn 聖賢道學淵源, 335 Sŏngjong, King (Chosŏn), 70, 73, 163 sŏngju 城主. See magistrate Sŏngju 星州, 58 sŏngnihak 性理學, 64, 167, 183. See also Confucianism son-in-law, in-marrying, 96, 101, 200, 290 sŏnmu kongsin 宣武功臣, 230 Son of Heaven, 62 sons: eldest son (changja 長子), 189–90, 268, 270, 275; privileging of eldest son, 191, 270; real son (ch’inja 親子), 138; “sons and grandsons” (chason 子孫), 8; spatial segregation of, 293–94; stepson (ŭija 義子), 138; younger, 189. See also secondary son Sŏnsŏngji 宣城誌, 414 Sŏn’yujŏng 仙遊亭, 359 Soron 少論, 240, 333, 334. See also Noron Sosu Sŏwŏn 紹修書院, 181

605

Sources of Factional Disputes (Tangnon wŏllyu 黨論源流), 325 statecraft learning, 66, 68, 69, 71, 75 status (myŏngbun 名分 or munji 門地), 2, 3, 4, 356, 390, 395, 405–6, 409; bilaterally ascribed, 2, 7, 92, 126, 365, 366; change of, 389–90; discrimination, 128, 131, 375, 377; distinguishing strata (pyŏltŭng 別等), 263; exams for confirming, 69; gradation of (myŏngmok 名目), 367, 389; kol 骨 (status group), 19; legal con­ firmation of, 55, 397; legitimacy of transmitted by primary wife, 402; loss of status, 353; low status (munji pich’ŏn 門地卑賤), 245; obsession with (sangbŏl 尙閥), 245; overstepping of (pŏmbun 犯分), 35, 380, 390; social station (分), 127 “succession of the Way” (Kor. tot’ong; Chin. dao tong 道統), 75, 76, 313, 400 Sudong-ch’on 水東村, 93 sugi ch’iin 修己治人, 71, 73 sugi i’gyŏng 修己以敬, 176 Su’gok 水谷 (Kor. Musil 무실), 110, 255, 293, 357 Sunch’ang 淳昌, 95 sungjŏng ch’ŏsa 崇禎處士, 247 surname (sŏng 姓), 5, 21, 22, 51; continued (sok­ sŏng 續姓), 51; defunct (mangsŏng 亡姓), 51; different (isŏng 異姓), 276; in-migrating (naesŏng 來姓), 51; kinsmen of the same (sŏngjok 姓族 or tongsŏng 同姓), 282; surname group (sŏngjok 姓族), 207, 282; territorial (t’osŏng 土姓), 51. See also descent group suyang 修養, 175 Suyŏn Chŏngsa 數椽精舍, 173 System of townships and administrative villages (myŏllije 面里制), 81, 262; in Andong, 263; in Chŏlla, 264 Szonyi, Michael, 405 T’aebaek Mountain 太白山, 9 taebang 大防, 4 Taebuk 大北, 341 taech’ŏng 大廳, 199, 282 taedoho pusa 大都護府使, 84 taegaje 代加制 (compensation system), 54 taega sejok 大家世族, 15 Tae’gok 大谷, 101 T’aejo, King (Chosŏn), 53, 59–64 passim. See also Yi Sŏng-gye T’aejo, King (Koryŏ), 21, 22, 26. See also Wang Kŏn Taejŏn chuhae 大典註解, 8 T’aejong, King (Chosŏn), 60–62, 69, 126 Taejŏn husongnok 大典後續錄, 8

606

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Taejŏn songnok 大典續錄, 218 Taejŏn t’ongp’yŏn 大典通編, 285 T’aengniji 擇里誌, 246, 290, 295, 296 Taewŏn’gun, 242, 369 Tang China, 19, 22–24 passim, 47, 62, 64, 68, 398 Tang literary styles (sajang 詞章), 68, 71 t’angp’yŏng 蕩平. See policy of grand harmony Tanjong, King (Chosŏn), 99, 105 tanso 壇所 (“offering altar”), 287 Tansŏng 丹城, 295 Tao Yuanming 陶淵明, 98 taxation, 4, 132; as commoners’ curse (yangyŏk 良役), 389; corvée/military service (kug’yŏk 國役), 4, 132, 262, 343, 351; equalization of (kyun yoyŏk 均徭役), 228; exemption from (pokho 復戶), 153; tribute (kongbŏp 貢法), 348. See also service obligations tenancy, 348, 349, 407, 408; tenant (chŏn’gaek 田客 or chŏnjak 田作), 136, 348; tenant household (chŏnho 田戶), 137 Ten New Regulations (Sinjŏng sipcho 新定十條) of 1605, 219, 228 Thomson, E. P., 344 Tilly, Charles, 4 Todang (都堂) (Top’yŏngŭisasa 都評議使司), 35, 38, 40 T’oedo sŏnsaeng ŏnhaeng t’ongnok 退陶先生言 行通錄, 306 T’oegye. See [T’oegye] Yi Hwang T’oegye discipleship, 123, 171, 182, 184, 191, 240, 362 T’oegye sangjerye tammun 退溪喪祭禮答問, 194 T’oegye sŏnsaeng munjip 退溪先生文集, 183 T’oegye sŏnsaeng ŏnhaengnok 退溪先生言行錄, 306, 335 T’oegye sŏnsaeng sokchip 退溪先生續集, 306 Tohak 道學, 64–66 passim, 69, 159–69 passim, 187, 238, 243, 399, 400; as concrete learning, 67; as “identity,” 67, 68; as “learning of principle,” 75; as “position,” 67; student of, 75. See also Daoxue t’oho 土豪, 135, 221, 263, 312 toksŏ ch’isim 讀書治心, 248 tomyŏng kise 盜名欺世, 180 Tongch’on 東村, 100, 264 Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam 東國輿地勝覽. See ­Geographic Survey of the Eastern Country Tonghak 東學, 393 Tongin 東人, 139, 238, 305, 322. See also Namin; Pugin tongje 洞祭. See ward t’ongmun 通文, 224, 285

Tosan kŭmmun chehyŏllok 陶山及門諸賢錄, 482 Tosan sisadan pimyŏng 陶山試士壇碑銘, 337 Tosan Sŏdang 陶山書堂, 160, 170, 173 Tosan Sŏwŏn 陶山書院, 183, 184, 305, 310–12, 335, 337–79 passim t’osŏng 土姓. See surname tot’ong 道統. See “succession of the Way” Toyŏn Sŏwŏn 陶淵書院, 361 toyun 都尹, 261 transitions, dynastic, 15, 16, 51, 56, 58, 80, 89, 95 Tundŏk-pang 屯德坊, 100, 116, 264, 292, 293, 347 U, King (Koryŏ), 43 U T’ak 禹倬, 182 Ubŏn 雨翻, 264, 292 u’gŏ 寓居 (temporary sojourn), 96 U’gok-ch’on 雨谷村, 295 ŭi 義 (“moral principle”), 178 ŭibyŏng 義兵, 223, 326, 374 ŭigye 儀契 (charitable fund), 354 Ŭihŭng 義興, 225 Ŭijŏngbu 議政府, 54 Ŭiju 義州, 94 ŭiri 義理 (principle and righteousness), 73, 197 Ŭiryeso 議禮疏, 317 Ŭiryŏng 宜寧, 150 ŭmsa 淫祀 (wanton rituals), 165, 218 ŭndŏk pulsa 隱德不仕. See recluse Un’gok 雲谷, 295 Uniform Land Tax Law (Taedongbŏp大同法), 348, 349 ŭp 邑, 459n17 ŭpchi 邑誌, 413 ŭpsa 邑司, 25, 382 village: administrative (i, -ri 里), 208, 261, 262, 263; multisurname, 290, 291; natural (ch’on 村), 10, 81, 263; natural setting of, 290, 295; relocating to (t’oech’on 退村), 388; remote­ ness of from administrative control, 296; shift from multisurname to single-surname, 292; “side” (pangch’on 傍村), 295; single-­ surname, 297; taking up residence (pokkŏ 卜居), 100, 290 Village Quota System (Ijŏngbŏp 里正法), 262 Wagner, Edward W., 10, 74 Wang Kŏn 王建, 21–22. See also T’aejo, King (Koryŏ) Wang Kyu 王規, 22 Wang Yangming 王陽明, 172, 180 wanmun 完文 (“official writ”), 204



General Names and Terms

wanŭi 完議 (“resolution”), 199, 206, 214, 257, 281, 285 ward (tong 洞), 142, 208; assembly (tonghoe 洞會), 351; compact (tongyak 洞約), 142, 351; fund association (tonggye 洞契), 208, 292, 351; hall (tongsa 洞舍), 351; laws (tongnyŏng 洞令), 210; member (tongwŏn 洞員), 209; regulations (tonggyu 洞規), 208, 292; rituals (tongje 洞祭), 212, 351; roster (tongan 洞案), 292 Ward Compact of Naesŏng (Naesŏng tongyak 奈城洞約), 141, 174, 211 Ward Compact of the Three Rivulets (Samgye tonggye 三溪洞契), 356 Ward Fund of Kyesang (Kyesang tonggye 溪上 洞契), 210 Ward Kin Fund (Tongjung chokkye 洞中族契), 210 Ward Regulations of On’gye (On’gye tonggyu 溫溪洞規), 209, 210; record of assistance (pujobu 扶助簿), 209 Watson, James L., 407 Watson, Rubie S., 405 weddings, 1–3, 208, 209, 217, 231, 285, 322, 349, 353, 368. See also wife, primary; wife, secondary widow, 120, 144, 193, 268, 276; of ritual heir (ch’ongbu 冢婦), 284, 285 wife, primary (ch’ŏ 妻 or chŏk 嫡), 7, 126; burial site of, 203; as called by husband’s secondary son (chŏngmo 嫡母), 279; chaste (yŏlbu 烈婦), 95; of main-line heir (chongbu 宗婦), 271; as second wife (kyebae 繼配), 203; as transmitter of social status, 402 wife, secondary (ch’ŏp 妾), 7, 126, 277, 408; of base origin (pich’ŏp 婢妾), 7, 126; of commoner origin (yangch’ŏp 良妾), 126; title of commoner (sosa 召史), 129 wigi chi hak 爲己之學 (“learning for oneself”), 167, 170, 177 wine-drinking rite (hyangŭmjurye 鄕飮酒禮), 103, 104 Wŏlch’ŏn Sŏdang 月川書堂, 173 Wŏlgok 月谷 (Kor. Tarisil 다리실), 119 wŏlgyŏngji 越境地, 85 women: agency of, 95, 117, 118, 120, 146, 149; burial site of, 203; chaste (yŏllyŏ 烈女), 117; fashions of, 285; high mortality rate of, 125; royal women kept within kin group, 22, 36. See also wife, primary; wife, secondary Wŏnch’ŏn-bang 源川坊, 118 Wŏnji Chŏngsa 遠志精舍, 172 worthy (hyŏnja 賢者), 9, 73, 179, 353, 365, 367

607

Xu Heng 許衡, 65 yakhaeng 約行 (“compact behavior”), 143 yakkye 約戒 (“compact admonitions”), 143 Yan Yuan 顔淵, 174 Yang I-si 楊以時, 94 Yang Mong-gŏ 楊夢擧, 322 Yang Su-saeng 楊首生, 95 yangban 兩班, 242, 245, 249, 260, 265, 349, 390, 391, 398, 409; definition of, 2–9 passim, 24, 54, 55, 265; fallen (mollak yangban 沒落兩班), 367; not legally defined, 55; poverty of, 151, 152, 154, 213, 245, 352, 353, 354; wishing to become (yogwi yangban 欲爲兩班), 372, 333. See also elite; sajok “yangban crescent,” 10 yanggun 兩君 (“double rulership”), 42 Yangjae 良才, 315 yangmu 兩廡. See local school Yangnodang 養老堂, 387, 388. See also hyangni yangno-songsa 養老送死, 387. See also hyangni Yangsan 梁山, 324 Yao Sui 姚燧, 65 Yao and Shun, 49, 68, 73 Yean 禮安, 85 Yean Community Compact (Yean hyangyak 禮安鄕約), 216, 217, 228 Yech’ŏn 醴泉, 85, 121, 202 Yemun ch’unch’u’gwan 藝文春秋館, 94 Yi Cha-gyŏm 李資謙, 26, 28 Yi Cha-ŭi 李資義, 26, 28 Yi Cha-yŏn 李子淵, 26 Yi Chae 李縡, 33, 325 Yi Che 李濟, 52 Yi Che-hyŏn 李齊賢, 39, 40, 46, 66, 67, 90; career of, 41–42, 65; and komun, 66, 67 Yi Chi-jik 李之直, 56 Yi Chi-yu 李之柔, 28 Yi Chik 李稷, 52 Yi Chin 李珍, 225, 227, 229 Yi Chin-hŭng 李震興, 383, 386 Yi Chip 李集, 56 Yi Ch’ŏm 李詹, 48 Yi Chŏn 李㙉, 227, 307, 323 Yi Chŏn-in 李全仁, 379 Yi Chon-o 李存吾, 48 Yi Chŏng 李頲, 26 Yi Chun1 李埈, 323, 414 Yi Chun2 李浚, 374 Yi Ch’un-bu 李春富, 42, 52 Yi Chung-hwan 李重煥, 246, 249, 260, 290, 367

608

G l o s s a r y- I n d e x e s

Yi Hang-bok 李恒福, 246 Yi Hŏ-gyŏm 李許謙. See fig. 1.1 Yi Hong-jun 李弘準, 142, 143 Yi Hŭi 李暿, 98 Yi Hŭi-sŏng 李希誠, 379 [T’oegye] Yi Hwang [退溪] 李滉. See under Chinsŏng Yi in the Personal Names/ Choronym Glossary-Index Yi Hwi-jae 李彙載, 386 Yi Hwi-nyŏng 李彙寧, 386 Yi Hyŏn-bo 李賢輔, 165, 168, 361, 379 Yi Hyŏng-nam 李亨男, 515n172 Yi Hyŏng-nye 李亨禮, 201 [Yulgok] Yi I [栗谷] 李珥, 161, 196, 238, 335, 400; canonization of, 314, 316, 318; on secondary sons, 278, 473 Yi Ik 李瀷, 240, 338, 353–54, 367, 393 Yi In-bok 李仁復, 48 Yi In-im 李仁任, 41–45 passim, 48, 52, 62 Yi In-ji 李麟至, 331, 333 Yi In-jwa 李麟佐, 254, 330, 371 Yi In-jwa Rebellion, 254, 329 Yi In-min 李仁敏, 52 Yi Kang 李茳, 515n1 Yi Ki-baek, 23 Yi Kok 李穀, 44, 46, 66 Yi Kwal 李适, 250 Yi Kwang 李洸, 232 Yi Kyŏng-bŏn 李慶蕃, 383 Yi Kyu-bo 李奎報, 33 Yi Kyu-sŏp 李奎燮, 379 Yi Man-do 李晩燾, 380 Yi Man-hong 李晩弘, 379 Yi Man-ŭng 李晩應, 380 Yi Mu 李袤, 375 Yi Myŏng-gu 李明九, 386 Yi Myŏng-ŏn 李明彦, 360 Yi Ŏn-jŏk 李彦迪, 113, 278, 295, 314, 374, 379 Yi Pang-gan 李芳幹, 60, 61 Yi Pang-sŏk 李芳碩, 59 Yi Pang-wŏn 李芳遠 (later Chosŏn King T’aejong), 60 Yi Po 李簠, 357 Yi Pong-ch’un 李逢春, 111 Yi Pong-ik 李鳳翼, 262 Yi Saek 李穡, 47–51 passim, 66 Yi Si-rip 李時立, 202 Yi Si-sŏng 李時成, 129 Yi Sŏk-hyŏng 李石亨, 70 Yi Sŏl 李渫, 254 Yi Sŏng-gye 李成桂, 41, 50–53, 61–62, 64, 69, 79, 398. See also T’aejo, King (Chosŏn)

Yi Su-gŏn, 25, 58, 95 Yi Suk 李潚, 297 Yi Suk-ham 李淑瑊, 95 Yi Sun-sin 李舜臣, 223 Yi Sung-in 李崇仁, 47, 48, 66 Yi Sŭng-jik 李繩直, 142 Yi Sung-nyang 李叔樑, 223 Yi Tae-wi 李大 ༩, 167, 233, 362 Yi Tal-jon 李達尊, 42 Yi To-hyŏn 李道賢, 336 Yi Tŏg-hong 李德弘, 515n1 Yi U 李 ␀, 337 Yi Ŭn-bo 李殷輔, 140 Yi Ung-jwa 李熊佐, 326 Yi Ŭng-wŏn 李應元, 335 Yi Wi 李葳, 110 Yo, Prince 堯 (later Koryŏ King Chŏngjong), 23, 28 Yŏgang Sŏwŏn 廬江書院, 184, 310–12, 369 yŏk 役. See service obligations; taxation Yŏktong Sŏwŏn 易東書院, 184, 378 Yŏktong sŏwŏn kisil 易東書院記實, 182 Yŏm Hŭng-bang 廉興邦, 43, 44, 52 yŏnbo 年譜 (chronological biography), 183, 412 yong 用, 103 Yŏngch’ŏn 永川, 150 Yŏngch’ŏn Sŏwŏn 寧川書院, 362 Yongdubong 龍頭鋒, 290 Yongdujŏng 龍頭亭, 295 Yŏnggaji, 89–100 passim, 163, 252, 290, 413 Yŏngga kahun 永嘉家訓, 203 Yonggung 龍宮, 224 Yŏnghae 寧海, 121 Yongin 龍仁, 315 yongin 用人, 4, 8 Yŏngjo, King (Chosŏn), 243, 254, 255, 304, 325; “broadening of harmony” (kwangt’ang 廣蕩), 254; destruction of Sŏwŏn by, 331, 334; legitimacy of, 328, 329; and secondary sons, 376–78. See also policy of grand harmony Yŏngju 榮州, 182 Yŏngnam 嶺南, 159, 221, 249 Yŏngnam anmusa 嶺南按撫使, 326 Yŏngnam inmul ko, 338 Yŏngsan 靈山, 98 Yongsŏngji, 89, 116, 120, 163, 290, 361, 414 Yongzheng 雍正 (Chinese emperor), 394 Yŏnhaeng illok 燕行日錄, 384 Yŏnsan’gun, 72, 101, 112 yŏrŭp samin 列邑士民, 223 yu 儒, 373 Yu Ch’ŏk-ki 兪拓基, 333, 334



General Names and Terms

Yu Ch’ŏn-gung 柳天弓, 22 Yu Hŭi-ch’un 柳希春, 161, 167 Yu Hyŏng-wŏn 柳馨遠, 375, 393 Yu Ji 虞集, 65 Yu Nan 柳蘭, 111 [Sŏae] Yu Sŏng-nyong [西厓] 柳成龍. See under P’ungsan Yu in the Personal Names/ Choronym Glossary-Index Yu Su-wŏn 柳壽垣, 375, 376 Yu Wŏn-gan 柳元幹, 254 yuan 儒案, 378 Yuan China, 65 Yu’gok [Taksil] 酉谷 [닥실], 107, 112 yuhak 幼學, 129, 256, 311, 374, 377, 389, 390 yu-hyang 儒鄕, 370 Yulgok-U’gye canonization. See National Shrine of Confucius Yul-gye sanggyŏng 栗溪喪經, 167 Yun Chŭng 尹拯, 240 Yun Haeng-im 尹行恁, 363 Yun Ho 尹壕, 92 Yun Hwan 尹 , 34 Yun Hyo-son 尹孝孫, 94 Yun Hyu 尹鑴, 240, 242, 261, 319, 320, 375 Yun In-ch’ŏm 尹鱗瞻, 32 Yun Ku-saeng 尹龜生, 49 Yun Kwan 尹瓘, 28, 52 Yun Pok 尹復, 168

609

Yun Sang 尹祥, 159 Yun So-jong 尹紹宗, 48, 50 Yun Sŏn-jwa 尹宣佐, 35 Yun Su 尹秀, 34, 35 Yun T’aek 尹澤, 48, 49 Yun Tal 尹達, 29 Yun Tŏk-chun 尹德駿, 363 Yun Wi 尹威, 94 Yun Yang-nae 尹陽來, 334 yunŭm 綸音, 336 yuŏn 遺言, 148, 269 yurim 儒林. See Confucian community yusa 有司 (“officer”), 209, 211, 285 yusul 儒術, 373 Zhang Zai 張載, 324 Zhao Mengfu 趙孟頫, 65 Zhen Dexiu 眞德秀, 70 Zheng Zhenman, 405 Zhongyong (Chin.) 中庸, 65 Zhou Dunyi 周敦頣, 75, 324 Zhou 周 (Mencius’s home state), 105 Zhouli 周禮 (Chin.), 54, 67, 71, 216 Zhu Xi 朱熹, 64, 65, 108, 145, 169, 181, 186, 203 Zhuzi daquan (Chin.) 朱子大全, 164 Zhuzi jiali (Chin.) 朱子家禮, 68, 455n30. See also Jiali Zisi 子思, 174

H a r va r d E a s t A s i a n M o n o g r a p h s

329. Miryam Sas, Experimental Arts in Postwar Japan: Moments of Encounter, Engagement, and Imagined Return 330. H. Mack Horton, Traversing the Frontier: The Man’yōshū Account of a Japanese Mission to Silla in 736–737 331. Dennis J. Frost, Seeing Stars: Sports Celebrity, Identity, and Body Culture in Modern Japan 332. Marnie S. Anderson, A Place in Public: Women’s Rights in Meiji Japan 333. Peter Mauch, Sailor Diplomat: Nomura Kichisaburō and the Japanese-American War 334. Ethan Isaac Segal, Coins, Trade, and the State: Economic Growth in Early Medieval Japan 335. David B. Lurie, Realms of Literacy: Early Japan and the History of Writing 336. Lillian Lan-ying Tseng, Picturing Heaven in Early China 337. Jun Uchida, Brokers of Empire: Japanese Settler Colonialism in Korea, 1876–1945 338. Patricia L. Maclachlan, The People’s Post Office: The History and Politics of the Japanese Postal System, 1871–2010 339. Michael Schiltz, The Money Doctors from Japan: Finance, Imperialism, and the Building of the Yen Bloc, 1895–1937 340. Daqing Yang, Jie Liu, Hiroshi Mitani, and Andrew Gordon, eds., Toward a History beyond Borders: Contentious Issues in Sino-Japanese Relations 341. Sonia Ryang, Reading North Korea: An Ethnological Inquiry 342. Susan Huang, Picturing the True Form: Daoist Visual Culture in Traditional China 343. Barbara Mittler, A Continuous Revolution: Making Sense of Cultural Revolution Culture 344. Hwansoo Ilmee Kim, Empire of the Dharma: Korean and Japanese Buddhism, 1877–1912 345. Satoru Saito, Detective Fiction and the Rise of the Japanese Novel, 1880–1930 346. Jung-Sun N. Han, An Imperial Path to Modernity: Yoshino Sakuzō and a New Liberal Order in East Asia, 1905–1937 347. Atsuko Hirai, Government by Mourning: Death and Political Integration in Japan, 1603– 1912 348. Darryl E. Flaherty, Public Law, Private Practice: Politics, Profit, and the Legal Profession in Nineteenth-Century Japan 349. Jeffrey Paul Bayliss, On the Margins of Empire: Buraku and Korean Identity in Prewar and Wartime Japan 350. Barry Eichengreen, Dwight H. Perkins, and Kwanho Shin, From Miracle to Maturity: The Growth of the Korean Economy 351. Michel Mohr, Buddhism, Unitarianism, and the Meiji Competition for Universality

352. J. Keith Vincent, Two-Timing Modernity: Homosocial Narrative in Modern Japanese Fiction 354. Chong-Bum An and Barry Bosworth, Income Inequality in Korea: An Analysis of Trends, Causes, and Answers 355. Jamie L. Newhard, Knowing the Amorous Man: A History of Scholarship on Tales of Ise 356. Sho Konishi, Anarchist Modernity: Cooperatism and Japanese-Russian Intellectual Relations in Modern Japan 357. Christopher P. Hanscom, The Real Modern: Literary Modernism and the Crisis of Representation in Colonial Korea 358. Michael Wert, Meiji Restoration Losers: Memory and Tokugawa Supporters in Modern Japan 359. Garret P. S. Olberding, ed., Facing the Monarch: Modes of Advice in the Early Chinese Court 360. Xiaojue Wang, Modernity with a Cold War Face: Reimagining the Nation in Chinese Literature Across the 1949 Divide 361. David Spafford, A Sense of Place: The Political Landscape in Late Medieval Japan 362. Jongryn Mo and Barry Weingast, Korean Political and Economic Development: Crisis, Security, and Economic Rebalancing 363. Melek Ortabasi, The Undiscovered Country: Text, Translation, and Modernity in the Work of Yanagita Kunio 364. Hiraku Shimoda, Lost and Found: Recovering Regional Identity in Imperial Japan 365. Trent E. Maxey, The “Greatest Problem”: Religion and State Formation in Meiji Japan 366. Gina Cogan, The Princess Nun: Bunchi, Buddhist Reform, and Gender in Early Edo Japan 367. Eric C. Han, Rise of a Japanese Chinatown: Yokohama, 1894–1972 368. Natasha Heller, Illusory Abiding: The Cultural Construction of the Chan Monk Zhongfeng Mingbenό๵ᕥᘪ (1263–1323) 369. Paize Keulemans, Sound Rising from the Paper: Nineteenth-Century Martial Arts Fiction and the Chinese Acoustic Imagination 370. Simon James Bytheway, Investing Japan: Foreign Capital, Monetary Standards, and Economic Development, 1859–2011 371. Sukhee Lee, Negotiated Power: The State, Elites, and Local Governance in Twelfth-Fourteenth China 372. Ping Foong, The Efficacious Landscape: On the Authorities of Painting at the Northern Song Court 373. Catherine L. Phipps, Empires on the Waterfront: Japan’s Ports and Power, 1858–1899 374. Sunyoung Park, The Proletarian Wave: Literature and Leftist Culture in Colonial Korea, 1910–1945 375. Barry Eichengreen, Wonhyuk Lim, Yung Chul Park, and Dwight H. Perkins, The Korean Economy: From a Miraculous Past to a Sustainable Future 376. Heather Blair, Real and Imagined: The Peak of Gold in Heian Japan 377. Emer O’Dwyer, Significant Soil: Settler Colonialism and Japan’s Urban Empire in Manchuria 378. Martina Deuchler, Under the Ancestors’ Eyes: Kinship, Status, and Locality in Premodern Korea 379. Joseph R. Dennis, Writing, Publishing, and Reading Local Gazetteers in Imperial China, 1100–1700 380. Cathy Yeh, The Chinese Political Novel: Migration of a World Genre 381. Noell Wilson, Defensive Positions: The Politics of Maritime Security in Tokugawa Japan 382. Miri Nakamura, Monstrous Bodies: The Rise of the Uncanny in Modern Japan