King determines to invade Liao-tung.... why unwise.... the emperor’s
letter and the answer.... preparations.... Gen. Yi’s argument....
royal threat.... Gen. Yi marches northward.... the troops appealed
to.... the Rubicon of Korea.... an omen.... advance toward
Song-do.... the capital in Gen. Yi’s hands.... popular song.... Gen.
Yi’s demands.... attempted assassination.... king banished.... a new
king.... reforms.... the “Red Grave”.... envoy to China.... Koryŭ
takes the offensive against the Japanese.... the emperor’s offer....
a real Wang upon the throne.... the banished kings executed....
unsuccessful plot.... Gen. Yi opposes the Buddhists.... capital
moved to Han-yang.... people desire Gen. Yi to be made king.... he
is reluctant.... his son active.... Chöng Mong-ju assassinated....
all enemies silenced.... the king’s oath.... the king abdicates in
favor of Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo.
Koryŭ was now whirling in the outer circles of the maelstrom that was
destined to engulf her. So long as the king revelled and hunted only and
did not interfere with outside affairs he was endured as an necessary
evil but now in the opening of the year 1388 he determined upon an
invasion of Liao-tung, a plan so utterly foolhardy as to become the
laughing-stock of reasonable men. It was an insane idea. The constant
inroads of the Japanese demanded the presence of all the government
troops, for the sending of any of them out of the country would be the
signal for the Japanese to pour in afresh and with impunity. In the
second place the king could not hope to cope with the great Ming power
that had just arisen and was now in the first blush of its power. The
kingdom of Koryŭ was essentially bound to the Mongols and she pursued
her destiny to the bitter end. In the third place the Ming power had now
obtained a firm foothold in Liao-tung and an invasion there would look
much like a plan to finally attack that empire itself. In the fourth
place the finances of the country were utterly disorganised and the
unusual taxes that would be required to carry out the plan would take
away all popular enthusiasm for it and desertions would decimate the
army. But in spite of all these drawbacks the stubborn king held to his
point and as a preliminary measure built a wall about Han-yang where he
sent all the women and children for safety. By this act he acknowledged
the extreme hazard of the venture. It is not unlikely that he was so
tired of all other forms of amusement that he decided to plunge into war
in order to make sport for himself.
The emperor seems to have been aware of the plan for he now sent an
envoy to announce to the Koryŭ court that “All land north of Ch‘ŭl-lyŭng
belongs to the Mongols, and I am about to erect a palisade fence between
you and them.” When this envoy arrived at Song-do the king feigned
illness and would not see him. A letter was sent in reply saying “We own
beyond the Ch‘ŭl-lyŭng as far as Sang-sŭng, so we trust it will please
you not to erect a barrier there.” He then called in all the troops from
the provinces in preparation for the invasion. His ostensible reason was
a great hunting expedition in P‘yŭng-an Province for he knew the people
would rise in revolt if they knew the real purpose. The Japanese were
wasting the south, the people were fainting under new exactions to cover
the expense of the repairs at Han-yang and it is said the very planting
of crops was dispensed with, so disheartened were the people.
Having made Ch‘oe Yŭng general-in-chief of the expedition, the king
accompanied the army north to Pong-ju, now Pong-san. Gen. Ch‘oe never
divulged the fact that this was an army of invasion but told all the
troops that they must be strong and brave and ready for any work that
might be given them to do. Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo was made lieutenant-general in
connection with Gen. Ch‘oe. He made a powerful plea against the war and
the main points of his argument are preserved to us. His objections were
(1) It is bad for a small country to attack a powerful one. (2) It is
bad to make a campaign in summer when the heavy rains flood the country,
rendering the transporting of troops almost impossible and decimating
them with disease. (3) It is bad to drain off all the soldiers from the
country when the Japanese are so constant in their ravages. (4) The heat
and moisture of summer will spoil the bows and make them break easily.
To all these objections the king replied that having come thus far the
plan must be carried out. Gen. Yi hazarded his neck by demurring; still
asserting that it would mean the overthrow of the kingdom. The king in
rage exclaimed “The next man that advises against this war will lose his
head.” This was an end of the debate and as the council of war dispersed
the officers saw Gen. Yi weeping, and to their questions he answered “It
means the destruction of Koryŭ.”
The Yalu was quickly bridged and Gen. Yi in company with one other
general started north from P‘yŭng-yang with 38,600 troops, 21,000 of
whom were mounted. At the same time the king discarded the Ming
calendar, dress and coiffure. The Mongol clothes were again adopted and
the hair cut. The Japanese knowing that the troops had gone north,
entered the open door thus invitingly left ajar and seized forty
districts.
But we must follow the fortunes of the expedition that was to attack the
empire of the Mings. When Gen. Yi arrived at the Yalu his plans were not
laid as to what he should do. For one thing, he intended to make no
invasion of China. So he crossed over to Wi-ha island, in the mouth of
the Yalu, and there made his camp. Hundreds of his troops deserted and
went back home. Some of these the king seized and beheaded; but it did
not stop the defection. From that island a general, Hong In-ju, made a
dash into Liao-tung territory and was highly complimented by the king in
consequence. But Gen. Yi remained impassive. He sent a letter to the
king imploring him to listen to reason and recall the army, urging
history, the flooded condition of the country and the Japanese reasons
for it. But the king was stubborn. Rumor said that Gen. Yi had fled but
when another general was sent to ascertain whether this were true or
false he was found at his post. The two generals wept together over the
hopeless condition of affairs. At last they summoned the soldiers. “If
we stay here we will all be swept away by the rising flood. The king
will not listen to reason. What can we do to prevent the destruction of
all the people of Koryŭ? Shall we go back to P‘yŭng-yang, depose the
general-in-chief, Ch‘oe, who urges on this unholy war against the
Mings?” The soldiers shouted out acclamations of glad assent. Nothing
could please them better.
As Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo mounted his white steed and with his red bow and white
arrows stood motionless upon a mound of earth watching his soldiers
recross the Yalu to the Koryŭ side against the mandate of their king and
his, we see a new Caesar watching his army cross the Rubicon, an army as
passionately devoted to their leader as the Roman legions ever were to
Caesar. And Caesar suffers in the comparison, for he went back not to
restore the integrity of the state and prevent the waste of human life,
but rather to carry out to its tragic end a personal ambition. We have
seen how once and again Yi T‘ă-jo had plead with the king and had risked
even his life to prevent this monumental folly; and we shall see how he
used his power not for personal ends but with loyalty to his king, until
circumstances thrust him upon the throne.
The records say that no sooner had Gen. Yi followed his army across the
stream than a mighty wave, fed by mountain streams, came rolling down
the valley and swept clean over the island he had just left. The people
looked upon this as an omen and a sign of heaven’s favor, and they made
a song whose refrain runs “The son of wood will become king.” This
refers to the Chinese character for Gen. Yi’s name. It is the union of
the two characters “wood” and “son.” The whole army then took up its
march toward Song-do. A magistrate in the north sent a hasty message to
the king saying that the army was in full march back toward the capital.
The king was at this time in Song-ch‘ŭn, north of P‘yŭng-yang. He knew
many of the generals were opposed to the war and thought that they would
obey him better if he were near by, and so had come thus far north.
Hearing this startling news he immediately dispatched Gen. Ch‘oe
Yu-gyŭng with whatever force he had, to oppose the march of the
rebellious Gen. Yi. The associate of the latter urged him to push
forward with all speed and seize the person of the king, but he was no
traitor, and he replied “If we hurry forward and encounter our
countrymen many will fall. If anyone lays a finger on the king I will
have no mercy on him. If a single citizen of Koryŭ is injured in any way
I will never forgive the culprit.” So Gen. Yi came southward slowly,
hunting along the way in order to give the king time to get back to
Song-do in a leisurely manner as becomes a king. At last the king
arrived at his capital and the recalcitrant army came following slowly.
The people along the way hailed them as the saviors of the nation and
gave them all manner of provisions and supplies, so that they lacked for
nothing.
When Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo reached the neighborhood of Song-do he sent a letter
to the king saying, “As General-in-chief Ch‘oe-yŭng does not care for
the welfare of the people he must die. Send him to me for execution.”
But Gen. Ch‘oe did not intend to give up without a struggle, however
hopeless his case might be; so he took what troops were left and manned
the walls of Song-do. It was a desperate move, for all saw what the end
must be. Hundreds of soldiers who had deserted now flocked again to the
standards of Gen. Yi.
When the attack came off, Gen. Yi stormed the South Gate and Gen. Yu
Man-su the West Gate, and soon an entrance was effected. It is said that
after entering the city the first attack upon the royal forces was made
by Gen. Yu alone and that he was driven back. When this was told Gen. Yi
he seemed not to care but sat on his horse and let it crop the grass
along the path. After a time he partook of some food and then leisurely
arose, drew up his forces and in full view of them all took a shot at a
small pine that stood a hundred paces away. The arrow cut it sheer off
and the soldiers hailed it as a sign of victory, for was not the pine
the symbol of Koryŭ? So they marched on the palace. The old men and boys
mounted the city walls and cheered the attacking forces. Gen. Yi did not
lead the attack in person and his lieutenant was beaten back by the
royal forces under Gen. Ch‘oe. Gen. Yi thereupon took in his hand a
yellow flag, crossed the Sön-juk bridge and ascended South Mountain from
which point he obtained a full view of the interior of the palace. He
saw that Gen. Ch‘oe and the king, with a band of soldiers, had taken
refuge in the palace garden. Descending the mountain he led his troops
straight through every obstacle, entered the palace and surrounded the
royal party. Gen. Ch‘oe was ordered to come out and surrender but as
there was no response the garden gate was burst open and the king was
discovered holding the hand of Gen. Ch‘oe. As there was no longer hope
of rescue the king, weeping, handed over the loyal general to the
soldiers of Gen. Yi. He stepped forward and said “I had no intention of
proceeding to these extremes, but to fight the Ming power is out of the
question. It is not only useless but suicidal to attempt such a thing. I
have come back to the capital in this manner because there was no other
way open to me, because it was a traitorous act to attack our suzerain,
and because the people of Koryŭ were suffering in consequence of the
withdrawal of protection.” Gen. Ch‘oe was then banished to Ko-yang and
Gen. Yi, as he sent him away, wept and said “Go in peace.”
The records say that long before this the evil-minded Yi In-im had
foretold to Gen. Ch‘oe that one day Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo would become king,
but at the time Gen. Ch‘oe laughed at it. Now he was forced to grant
that the prophecy had been a true one. A popular song was composed at
this time, whose refrain states that
“Outside the wall of P‘yŭng-yang there is a red light,
Outside the wall of An-ju a snake.
Between them comes and goes a soldier, Yi.
May he help us.”
When Gen. Ch‘oe had thus been disposed of, Gen. Yi turned to the king
and said “It was impossible to carry out the plan of conquest. The only
thing left was to come back, banish the man who gave such bad advice and
make a new start. We must now be firm in our allegience to the Ming
emperor, and we must change back to the Ming costume.”
The emperor, hearing of the threatened invasion, had sent a powerful
army into Liao-tung, but now that the invaders had retired he recalled
the troops.
We can easily imagine how the king, who had never been balked of his
will, hated Gen. Yi. The moment an opportunity occurred he called about
him eighty of his most trusted eunuchs, armed them with swords and sent
them to kill the obnoxious dictator. But they found him so well guarded
that the attempt proved abortive.
It will be remembered that this king was the son of Sin-don and was
therefore not of the royal stock. So now the courtier Yun So-jŭng told
Gen. Yi that they ought to find some blood relative of the Wang family,
the genuine royal stock, and put him on the throne. To this the dictator
assented. As a first move all arms were removed from the palace. The
king was left helpless. He was ordered to send away one of his
concubines who had formerly been a monk’s slave but he replied “If she
goes I go.” The generals went in a body to the palace and advised the
king to leave the capital and retire into private life in Kang-wha. This
was a polite way of saying that he was banished. He plead to be allowed
to wait till the next day as it was now well along toward night. And so
this evil king took his concubines, which he had always cherished more
than the kingdom, and passed off the stage of history. He it was who
most of all, excepting only his father, helped to bring about the fall
of the dynasty.
Gen. Yi now, in 1388, was determined to put upon the throne a lineal
descendant of the Wang family, but Cho Min-su with whom he had before
conferred about the matter desired to put Chang, the adopted son of the
banished king, on the throne. Gen. Yi demurred, but when he learned that
the celebrated scholar Yi Săk had favored this plan he acquiesced. The
young king wanted to give Gen. Yi high official position but he was not
anxious to receive it and it was only by strong pressure that he was
induced to take it. So the records say, but we must remember in all this
account that hero worship and desire to show the deeds of the founder of
the new dynasty in the best light have probably colored many of the
facts which occurred at this time.
As this king was never acknowledged by the emperor nor invested with the
royal insignia, his name is dropped from the list of the kings of Koryŭ.
Neither he nor his foster-father were given the regular posthumous
title, but were known, the father as Sin-u and the son as Sin Chang.
An envoy was dispatched to Nanking telling of the banishment of the king
and the appointment of his successor. Cho Min-su who had been
instrumental in putting this new king on the throne was not so modest as
the records try to make us believe Gen. Yi was. He now held almost
unlimited power. It spoiled him as it has spoiled many another good man,
and he gave way to luxury and ere long had to be banished, a victim of
his own excesses.
Reform now became the order of the day. First they changed the unjust
and shameful manner of appointing officials that had prevailed under the
banished king. The laws respecting the division of fields was changed,
making the people more safe in the possession of their property. The
defenses of the south were also looked to, for Gen. Chöng Chi went south
with a powerful force and scored a signal victory over the corsairs at
Nam-wŭn. Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo was now general-in-chief of all the royal
forces. His first act was to have the banished king sent further away,
to the town of Yö-heung; and at the same time the banished Gen. Ch‘oe
Yŭng was executed. The old man died without fear, at the age of seventy.
He was not a man who had given himself over to luxury and he had many
good qualities, but he was unlettered and stubborn and his crime in
desiring to attack China brought him to his death. The records say that
when he died he said “If I am a true man no grass will grow on my
grave,” and the Koreans say that his grave in Ko-yang is bare to this
day and is called in consequence “The Red Grave.”
The emperor’s suspicions had been again roused by the new change of face
on the part of Koryŭ. The celebrated scholar Yi Săk stepped forward and
offered to go to the emperor’s court and smooth things over. Gen. Yi
praised him highly for this act of condescension and he was sent as
envoy. He took with him Gen. Yi’s fifth son who is known posthumously by
his title T‘ă-jong. He was destined to become the third king of the new
dynasty. He was taken to China by Yi Săk because the latter feared that
Gen. Yi might usurp the throne while he was gone and the son would then
be a sort of hostage for good behavior on the part of the father. The
two great men of Koryŭ, when it fell, were Chöng Mong-ju and this Yi
Săk. They were both men of education and experience and were both warm
partizans of the Koryŭ dynasty. They were loyal to her even through all
the disgusting scenes herein described, but their great mistake was
their adherence to the Mongol power when it had plainly retired from
active participation in the affairs of Asia. Yi Săk now sought the court
of China not so much with a view to helping Koryŭ as to find means to
get Gen. Yi into trouble. But to his chagrin the emperor never gave him
an opportunity to say what he desired to say about the great dictator.
The questions the emperor asked gave no opportunity to mention the topic
nearest his heart. His chagrin was so great that when he got back to
Koryŭ he spoke slightingly of the emperor, to the great displeasure of
the court. The king himself desired to go to Nanking and do obeisance to
the emperor but was forbidden by the latter.
The year 1389 beheld some interesting and important events. In the first
place Gen. Yi decided to take the offensive against the Japanese; so a
hundred boats were fitted out. The expedition arrived first at Tsushima
where three hundred of the enemy’s boats were burned as well as many
houses; and more than a hundred prisoners were brought away. Secondly,
the emperor, being asked to let the king go to Nanking and do obeisance,
replied, “This having a pretender on the throne of Koryŭ is all wrong.
If you will put a real descendant of the royal family on the throne you
need not send another envoy to my court for twenty years if you do not
wish.” Gen Yi, to show his good will, sent a messenger to the banished
king and gave him a feast on his birthday. The king of the Loo Choo
Islands sent an envoy to Song-do with gifts, declaring his allegiance to
Koryŭ. At the same time he sent back some Koryŭ captives who had fallen
into his hands. Gen. Yi came to the conclusion that if the dynasty was
to continue, a lineal descendant of the royal family must be put at the
head of affairs. At this time Gen. Yi was of course the actuating spirit
in the government and at his desire the young king, who had been on the
throne but a year and who had not been formally recognised by the
emperor, was sent away to Kang-wha and the seventh descendant of the
seventeenth king of the line was elevated to the seat of royalty. His
name was Yo and his posthumous title Kong-yang. He was forty-five years
old. This move on the part of Gen. Yi was doubtless on account of the
pronounced views of the emperor. A busybody named Kang Si told the newly
appointed king that Gen. Yi did this not because he cared for the Wang
dynasty but because he feared the Mings. When Gen. Yi learned of this
the man’s banishment was demanded but not insisted upon. One of the
first acts of the new sovereign was to banish Yi Săk and Cho Min-su who
had insisted upon putting the parvenu Chang upon the throne. An envoy
was also dispatched to China announcing that at last a genuine Wang was
now on the throne of Koryŭ.
The officials urged that the two banished kings be killed but when the
matter was referred to Gen. Yi he advised a more lenient policy, saying,
“They have been banished and they can do no more harm. There is no sense
in shedding useless blood.” But the king replied, “They killed many good
men and they deserve to die;” so executioners were sent and the two men
were executed at their places of banishment. It is said that the wife of
the elder of the two took the dead body of her lord in her arms and
said, as she wept, “This is all my father’s fault, for it was he who
advised the invasion of China.” The records say that for ten days she
ate nothing and slept with the corpse in her arms. She also begged rice
and with it sacrificed before the dead body of the king.
In 1390 a dangerous conspiracy was gotten up with the view to
assassinating Gen. Yi, but it was discovered in time and many men were
killed in consequence and many more were put to the torture. Yi Săk and
Cho Min-su were in some way implicated in this attempt though they were
in banishment. It was advised to put them to death but after torture
they were sent back to prison. The emperor in some way had the
impression that Gen. Yi was persecuting these two men because they had
prevented his invasion of China. Cho was executed but when the
executioner approached the cell of Yi Săk, so the records say, a
terrific clap of thunder was heard and a flood of water swept away part
of the town in which he was imprisoned. For this reason the king dared
not kill him but granted him freedom instead.
Under the supervision of Gen. Yi a war-office was established and a
system of conscription which secured a rotation of military duty. The
king, true to the instincts of his family, was a strong adherent of
Buddhism and now proceeded to take a monk as his teacher. The whole
official class decided that this must not be, and the monk was forthwith
expelled from the palace. In spite of the suffering it entailed upon the
people the king decided to move the capital again to Han-yang and it was
done, but no sooner was the court transferred to that place than the
king, with characteristic Wang fickleness, went back to Song-do. The law
was promulgated that women must not go to visit Buddhist monasteries.
This was without doubt because the looseness of the morals of the
inmates rendered it unsafe for respectable women to go to them.
The people throughout the land looked to Gen. Yi as their protector and
it was the almost universal wish that he should become king. His friends
tried to bring this about but they were always thwarted by the aged
Chöng Mong-ju, the only great man who now clung to the expiring dynasty.
He was a man of perfect integrity and was held in much esteem by Gen. Yi
himself though they differed in politics. Chong Mong-ju really believed
it necessary for the preservation of the state that Gen. Yi be put out
of the way and he was always seeking means for accomplishing this end.
When the crown prince came back from Nanking, whither he had gone as
envoy, Gen. Yi went out to meet him. He went as far as Whang-ju where he
suffered a severe fall from his horse which for a time quite disabled
him. This was Chöng Mong-ju’s opportunity. He hastened to have many of
Gen. Yi’s friends put out of the way. He had them accused to the king
and six of the strongest partisans of the general were banished. Gen. Yi
was at Hă-ju at the time and his son T‘ă-jong hastened to him and
imparted the startling news. The old man did not seem to care very much,
but the son whose energy and spirit were equal to anything and who
foresaw that prompt action at this juncture meant life or death to all
the family, had the aged general carried on the backs of men back to
Song-do. When he arrived, attempts were being made to have the six
banished men put to death, but the coming of the great dictator put a
stop to this. T‘ă-jong urged that something must be done immediately to
save the family name, but the father did not wish to proceed to
extremities. The brunt of the whole business fell upon T‘ă-jong and he
saw that if his father was to become king someone must push him on to
the throne. The first step must be the removal of Chöng mong-ju. Nothing
could be done until that was accomplished.
Gen. Yi’s nephew turned traitor to him and informed Chöng Mong-ju that
there was danger. About this time Gen. Yi gave a dinner to the officials
and Chöng Mong-ju was invited. The latter decided to go and, by watching
the face of his host, determine whether the report was true. When
T‘ă-jong saw Chöng Mong-ju come to the banquet he knew the time had come
to make the master move. Five strong men were placed in hiding beside
Sön-juk bridge which Chöng had to cross in going home. There they fell
upon him and murdered him with stones, upon the bridge. Today that
bridge is one of the sacred relics of the kingdom and is enclosed by a
railing. On the central stone is seen a large brown blotch which turns
to a dull red when it rains. This is believed to be the blood of the
faithful Chöng Mong-ju which still remains a mute reproach to his
murderers.
This dastardly deed having been committed, T‘ă-jong conferred with his
uncle, Wha, and they sent Gen. Yi’s eldest living son, who is known by
his posthumous title of Chöng-jong, to the king, to demand the recall of
the banished friends of the general. The king was in no condition to
refuse and the men came back.
Gen. Yi mourned sincerely for the death of Chöng Mong-ju for he held him
to be a loyal and faithful man, but his son saw to it that the friends
of the murdered man were promptly banished. Even the two sons of the
king who had sided with the enemies of Gen. Yi were banished. Gen. Yi
was asked to put some of the friends of Chöng Mong-ju to death but he
sternly refused and would not even have them beaten. Yi Săk was again
banished to a more distant point, the property of Chöng Mong-ju was
confiscated and so at last all opposition was effectually silenced.
The energetic T‘ă-jong next proceeded to have the king make an agreement
or treaty of lasting friendship with his father. The officials opposed
it on the ground that it was not in keeping with the royal office to
swear an oath to a subject, but the king who had doubtless been well
schooled by the young intriguer agreed to it. Gen. Yi was very loath to
go and receive this honor at the king’s hand and it was at last decided
that the king should not attend the function in person but should do it
by deputy. The oath was as follows;—
“If it had not been for you I never could have become king. Your
goodness and faithfulness are never to be forgotten. Heaven and
earth witness to it from generation to generation. Let us abjure all
harm to each other. If I ever forget this promise let this oath
witness to my perfidy.”
But soon the king began to see the ludicrousness of his position. His
sons had been banished, himself without a particle of power and the
voice of the people clamoring to have Gen. Yi made king. The pressure
was too great, and one day the unhappy king handed over the seals of
office to the great dictator Gen. Yi T‘ă-jo and the Wang dynasty was at
an end. The king retired to private life, first to Wŭn-ju, then to
Kan-Sŭng and finally to San-ch‘ŭk where he died three years after
abdicating. The dynasty had lasted four hundred and seventy-five years
in all.
END OF PART II.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PART III.
MODERN KOREA.
1392-1897.
PART THREE.
MODERN KOREA.
Chapter I.
Beginning of the new kingdom.... name Cho-sŭn adopted.... prophecies....
a man hunt.... a royal dream.... the wall of Seoul built.... capital
moved.... diplomacy in the north.... Buddhism.... three ports set
aside for the Japanese.... plot discovered.... back to Song-do....
king T‘ă-jo retires.... death blow to feudalism.... Chöng-jong
abdicates.... T‘ă-jong’s sweeping reforms.... copper type....
sorcerers’ and geomancers’ books burned.... T‘ă-jong’s claims to
greatness.... Se-jong reigns.... his habits.... literary work....
Japanese islands attacked.... gradual suppression of Buddhism....
trials for capital offenses.... numerous reforms.... wild tribe
punished.... the far north colonised.... Japanese settlement in the
south.... origin of Korean alphabet.... king Mun-jong dies from
over-devotion to Confucian principles.
It was on the sixteenth day of the seventh moon of the year 1392 that
Gen. Yi ascended the throne of Koryŭ, now no longer Koryŭ. He was an old
man, far past the age when he could hope to superintend in person the
vigorous “house-cleaning” that the condition of things demanded. He
called about him all the officials whom he knew to be personally loyal
to himself and placed them in positions of trust and authority. Those
who had contributed to his rise were rewarded, and a tablet was erected
in the capital telling of their merits. He liberated many who had been
imprisoned because of their opposition to the Wang kings and recalled
many who had been banished.
It was not long before a message came from the emperor saying, “A man
can become king only by the decree of Heaven. How is it then that the
people of Sam-han have made Yi king?” In reply the king hastened to send
an envoy to explain matters and to ask the emperor whether he would
prefer to have the new kingdom called Cho-sŭn, “Morning Freshness” or
Wha-ryŭng, “Peaceful Harmony.” The emperor probably thought there was a
great deal more morning freshness than peaceful harmony in the
peninsula; at any rate he ordered the former name to be adopted. It was
the doubtful loyalty of the Wang kings to the Chinese throne that made
it easy for king T‘ă-jo to smoothe over the displeasure of the emperor.
The seals of the Koryŭ kings were then delivered over to China and new
seals received for the new dynasty.
According to unwritten law, with the beginning of a new dynasty a new
capital must be founded, and king T‘ă-jo began to look about for a new
site. At first he determined to build his capital at Kye-ryŭng Mountain
in Ch‘ung-ch‘ŭng Province, and he went so far as to begin work on it;
but it was found that in the days of Sil-la a celebrated priest, To-sŭn,
had prophesied that in the days to come Yi would found a capital at
Han-yang, and one of the Koryŭ kings had planted many plum trees at that
place and as fast as they matured had them mutilated, hoping thus to
harm the fortunes of the Yi family; for the Chinese character for Yi is
the same as that for plum. Tradition also says that the king had a dream
in which a spirit came and told him that Kye-ryŭng San was reserved for
the capital of a future kingdom which should be founded by a member of
the Chöng family. Two commissioners were thereupon sent to Han-yang to
make surveys for a palace site. It is said that a monk, Mu-hak, met them
at Ha-yang and told them that the palace should face toward Pă-gak
Mountain and Mong-myŭk Mountain (the present Nam-san,) but they
persisted in making it face the south. “Very well” the monk replied, “If
you do not listen to my advice you will have cause to remember it two
hundred years from now.” His words were unheeded but precisely two
hundred years later, in the year 1592, the Japanese hordes of Hideyoshi
landed on the shores of southern Korea. This is a fair sample of Korean
_ex post facto_ prophecy.
The courtiers urged the king to destroy the remaining relatives of the
last Koryŭ kings that there might be no danger of an attempt at revolt.
The royal consent was given and a considerable number of those
unfortunates were put in a boat, taken out to sea and abandoned, their
boat being first scuttled. The king thought better of this, however,
before it had gone far and ordered this man-hunt to be stopped.
As the emperor still seemed to entertain suspicions concerning the new
kingdom the king was fain to send his eldest son as envoy to the Chinese
court where he carefully explained the whole situation to the
satisfaction of his suzerain.
An interesting prophecy is said to have been current at the time. The
king dreamed that he saw a hen swallow a silk-worm. No one could explain
the meaning of the dream until at last an official more imaginative than
discreet averred that it meant that Kye-ryŭng would swallow Cham-du. Kye
means “hen” and Cham-du means “silk-worm’s head.” But Kye-ryong was the
site of the future capital of the next kingdom according to prophecy,
while “silk-worm’s head” is the name of one of the spurs of Nam-san in
Seoul. So the interpretation was that the new dynasty would fall before
another founded at Kye-ryong, by Chöng. The poor fellow paid for this
bright forecast with his life.
Cho Chin was charged with the work of building the wall of the new
capital. To this end, in the spring of 1391, 119,000 men were brought
from the provinces of P‘yŭng-an and Whang-hă and they worked steadily
for two months. In the autumn 89,000 men came from Kang-wŭn, Chŭl-la and
Kyŭng-sang Provinces and finished it in a month more. The whole circuit
of the wall was 9,975 double paces. At five feet to the double pace this
would give us about nine and a half miles, its present length. It was
pierced by eight gates, the South Gate, or Suk-nye-mun, the East Gate or
Heung-in-mun, the West Gate, or Ton-eui-mun, the Little West Gate, or
So-eui-mun, the North-east Gate, or Chang-eui-mun, the Water Mouth Gate,
or Kwang-heui-mun, also called the Su-gu-mun, and finally the
Suk-chang-mun, a private gate at the north by which the king may pass in
time of danger to the mountain fortress of Puk-han. At the same time a
law was made that dead bodies could be carried out of the city only by
way of the Little West or the Water Mouth Gates. Neither of these “dead
men’s gates” were roofed at first but were simply arches.
Immediately upon the completion of the wall the court was moved from
Song-do to the new capital and the new palace was named the Kyŭng-bok
Palace. By this time the news of the founding of a new dynasty had
spread, and envoys came from Japan, the Liu-kiu Islands and from the
southern kingdom of Sam-na. It will be remembered that the Mongols had
absorbed a portion of the northern territory of Korea, especially in
Ham-gyŭng Province. This had never come again fully under Ko-ryŭ
control, so that now the new kingdom extended only as far north as
Ma-ch’ŭn Pass. Between that and the Tu-man River lived people of the
Yŭ-jin tribe. The king sent Yi Tu-ran to give them a friendly
introduction to the newly founded kingdom of Cho-sŭn, and he was so good
a diplomat that soon he was able to form that whole region into 3
semi-independent districts and in course of time it naturally became
incorporated into Cho-sŭn. The Koryŭ dynasty left a heavy legacy of
priest-craft that was not at all to the liking of the new king. The
monks had far more power with the people than seemed consistent with
good government. Monasteries were constantly in process of erection and
their inmates arrogated to themselves large powers that they did not by
right possess. Monks were not mendicants then as they are today. Each
monastery had its complement of slaves to do all menial work and the law
that declared that the grandson of a slave should be free was a dead
letter. The first of a long list of restrictions upon the priesthood was
a restatement and an enforcement of this salutary law which made
hereditary serfdom impossible.
Before his accession to the throne he had succeeded in putting down the
Japanese pirates, at least for the time. He now placed high military and
naval officials at all the great southern ports, who offered the people
still further protection. He also set aside the three ports of Ch’e-p’o,
Yŭm-p’o and Pu-san-p’o (Fusan) as places where Japanese envoys and
trading parties might be entertained. At these places he built houses
for the accommodation of such guests.
King T'ă-jo had a numerous family. By his first Queen, Han, he had six
sons, of whom the second and the fifth later became Kings of Cho-sŭn,
with the posthumous titles of Chöng-jong and T‘ă-jong respectively. By
his second Queen, Kang, he had two sons, both of whom aspired to the
crown but without hope. They were named Pang-sŭk and Pang-bon. Their
ambition led them astray, for now in the sixth year of the reign they
conspired to kill their two rival half-brothers and so prepare the way
for their own elevation. They secured the services of two assassins who
made the attempt, but being foiled they lost their heads. It was well
known that the two princes were at the bottom of the plot, and the king,
knowing that even he could not protect them from justice, advised them
to make good their escape. They fled but were caught just outside the
West Gate and put to death.
The courtiers were all homesick for Song-do and the king himself
probably missed many of the comforts which he had there enjoyed.
Merchants had not as yet come in large numbers to the new capital and
the number of houses was comparatively small. It must be noticed that
with the change of dynasty it was taken for granted that the citizens of
the old capital were loyal to the fallen dynasty and so the people of
Song-do were not allowed to move to Seoul in large numbers. That city
was reserved as the residence of the friends of the new regime. Song-do
has ever been considered less loyal than any other city in the country
and the rule has been that no native of that city could hold an
important office under the present government. But at first, the new
capital was hardly as pleasant a place to live as the old, and so the
king gave the word and the whole court moved back there for a time.
We are told that king T‘ă-jo was heartily tired of the constant strife
among his sons as to who should be the successor and he decided to
resign the office and retire to his native Ham-heung. His choice of a
successor fell upon his oldest living son, Prince Yong-an, better known
by his posthumous title Chöng-jong Kong-jŭng Tă-wang. The army and the
people all desired that his fifth son, Prince Chöng-an, who is generally
known as T‘ă-jong, who had been so active in helping his father to the
throne and who was as energetic and enterprising as his brother was
slow, should become their ruler. When they heard that they could not
have their will there was an angry demonstration at the palace. This led
the retiring king to advise that after Chöng-jong had ruled a while he
had better resign in favor of his brother, the people’s choice.
King Chöng-jong’s first act was a statesman-like one. He commanded the
disbanding of the feudal retainers of all the officials. A few who
rebelled at this as an encroachment upon their rights were promptly
banished, and the rest submitted. Thus the death blow was struck at
feudalism in the peninsula. It never gained the foothold here that it
had in Japan, for it was thus nipped in the bud. The weakness of the
fallen dynasty had been that one or more of the officials had gathered
about their persons such large retinues that they succeeded in overawing
the king and making him a mere puppet. But this was not to be a feature
of the new regime, for King Chöng-jong by this one decree effectually
stamped it out.
The retired king seemed to be determined not to be disturbed in his
well-earned rest, for when his sons sent and begged him to come back to
the capital and aid the government by his advice, he answered by putting
the messenger to death. Later, however, he relented and returned to
Seoul.
T‘ă-jo’s third son, Prince Pang, was jealous because his younger brother
had been selected to succeed king Chöng-jong, and so he determined to
have him put out of the way. To this end he conspired with one Pak-po,
but the plot was discovered, Pak Po was killed and the prince banished
to T‘o-san in Whang-hă Province. T‘ă-jong himself, the prospective king,
seems to have chafed at the delay, for we are told that King
Chöng-jong’s Queen noticed his moody looks and advised her lord to
abdicate in his favor without delay, before harm came of it. So King
Chöng-jong called his brother and handed over to him the seals of office
and himself retired to private life with the title Sang-wang, or “Great
king.”
[Illustration: _THE WHITE BUDDHA._]
It was in the centennial year 1400 that T‘ă-jong, whose full posthumous
title is T‘ă-jong Kong-jŭng T‘ă-wang, entered upon the royal office. He
was a man of indomitable will, untiring energy and ready resource. It
was he who really entered upon the work of reform in earnest. T‘ă-jo had
been too old and Chöng-jong had lacked the energy. The year 1401 gave
him an opportunity to begin these reforms. The land was suffering from
famine, and the king said, “Why is so much grain wasted in the making of
wine? Let it cease for the present.” When he found that the people would
not obey he said. “It is because I myself have not desisted from the use
of wine. Let no more wine be served in the palace for the present.” It
is said that this practical appeal was successful and the people also
desisted. From the earliest times it had been the custom for the monks
to congregate and pray for the cessation of drought, but now by one
sweep of his pen the king added another limitation to the prerogatives
of the monks by forbidding the observance of the custom. Large tracts of
land were also taken from the monasteries and given back to the people.
The king hung a great bell in the palace gate and made proclamation that
anyone who failed to have a grievance righted by the proper tribunals
might appeal directly to the throne, and whoever struck the drum was
given instant audience. This privilege was seldom abused for it soon
became known that if a man did not have right clearly on his side his
rash appeal to the king brought severe punishment.
For many a decade letters had languished in the peninsula, and now with
a view to their revival the king ordered the casting of copper types and
provided that, as fast as new characters were found in the leading
Chinese works, they should be immediately cast and added to the font.
The authenticity of this statement cannot be called in question. It is
attested by all the great historical works both public and private. The
method of use was such that the types were practically indestructible
and large numbers exist and are in active use to this day. So far as the
evidence goes these were the first metal type ever made, though
xylography had been known since the very earliest time.
In 1406 the emperor sent an envoy asking that a copper Buddha on the
island of Quelpart be brought to Seoul for the king to do obeisance to
it, and that it then be forwarded to China. The king, however, refused
to bow before it. During this same year the law was promulgated
forbidding the imprisonment of criminals for long periods of time. It
also beheld the execution of all the brothers of the Queen. We are not
told the reason of this but we may surmise that it was because they had
been implicated in seditious proceedings.
In 1409 the Japanese, Wŭn-do-jin, was sent to the Korean court to
present the respects of the Japanese sovereign.
The kings of Koryŭ had set aside large tracts of land in Whang-hă
Province for hunting purposes. These by order of king T‘ă-jong were now
restored to the people and they were ordered to cultivate them. In 1413
the land suffered from a severe drought and the courtiers all advised
that the monks and the female exorcists and fortune-tellers be called
upon to pray for rain; but the king replied, “Buddhism is an empty
religion and the exorcists and fortune-tellers are a worthless lot. If I
were only a better ruler Heaven would not refuse us rain.” He thereupon
ordered all the sorceresses, fortune-tellers, exorcists and geomancers
to deliver up the books of their craft to the government and a great
fire was made with them in front of the palace.
King T‘ă-jong’s great sorrow was his son the Crown Prince, Yang-yŭng.
This young man was dissolute and worthless. He would not pursue the
studies prescribed by his tutors but spent his time in hunting, gambling
and in less reputable pursuits. The people cried out against him and
made it known that it was not their will that he should reign over them.
The father saw the justice of the complaint and the young man was
banished to Kwang-ju and the fourth son, Prince Ch‘ung-nyŭng, was
proclaimed heir to the throne.
King T‘ă-jong retired in 1419 in favor of this son Ch‘ung-nyŭng who is
known by the posthumous title Se-jong Chang-hŭn Tă-wang.
T‘ă-jong had been a radical reformer and worked a revolution in Korean
life similar to that which Cromwell effected in England. His greatness
is exhibited in three ways. (1) He was the first king who dared to break
away utterly from customs whose only sanction was their antiquity. (2)
He was wise enough not to force all these radical reforms at once, but
spread them over a period of nearly two decades. (3) He recognised that
a king is the servant of the people. It may be in place here to call
attention to a peculiar custom of the east. We refer to the custom of
surrendering the throne to a successor before one’s death. The benefits
of this custom are soon cited. The retiring sovereign becomes the tutor
of the incoming one. The young ruler has the benefit of his practical
suggestions and of his immense influence. He thus does away with much of
the danger of revolution or rebellion which so often accompanies a
change or rulers. If the new king proves inefficient or otherwise
unsatisfactory it is possible, through the father’s influence, to effect
a change. In other words the young ruler is on trial and he undergoes a
probation that is salutary for him and for the people as well. It also
helps greatly in perpetuating a policy, for in such a case the father,
knowing that his son is to assume the reins of government while he still
lives, takes greater pains to initiate him into the secrets of
government and in forming in his mind settled principles which, while
they may not always perpetuate the same policy, at least ensure an easy
gradation from one policy to another. This perhaps was the crowning feat
of T‘ă-jong’s greatness. He knew enough to stop while his success was at
its height and spend some years in teaching his successor how to achieve
even a greater success. Let us see how these principles worked in the
case of this new king.
The young king began in a modest way by consulting with his father in
regard to all matters of importance. The retired king had taken up his
quarters in the “Lotus Pond District” where he was at all times
accessible to the young king and where he took cognizance of much of the
public business. The new ruler was characterized by great evenness of
temper, great astuteness and untiring diligence. He is said to have
risen each morning at dawn.
He ordered the making of musical instruments, including metal drums and
triangles. Under his supervision a clypsehydra was made and a work on
astronomy was published. It is said that with his own hand he prepared
works on “The five rules of conduct,” “The duties of King, Father and
Husband,” “Good Government and Peace,” and a work on military tactics.
The custom of collecting rare flowers and plants and growing them in the
palace enclosure was done away and it was decreed that no more of the
public money should be squandered in that way. He built a little straw
thatched cottage beside the palace and compelled the officials to attend
him there in council. He put a stop to the evil practice of letting
concubines and eunuchs meddle with state affairs, for when one of his
concubines asked him to give one of her relatives official position he
promptly banished her from the palace.
In the second year of his reign, 1420, the king showed his partiality
for literature and literary pursuits by founding a college to which he
invited thirteen of the finest scholars that the kingdom could furnish,
and there they gave themselves up to the pursuit of letters. In the
early summer the dreaded Japanese again began their ravages on the
coasts of Korea. Landing at Pi-in, Ch‘ung-ch‘ŭng Province, they easily
overcame the local forces and marched northward along the coast into
Whang-hă Province. They there informed the Korean generals that they did
not want to ravage Korea but that they were seeking a way into China.
They lacked provisions and promised to go immediately if the Koreans
would give them enough rice for their sustenance, until they should
cross the border into China. Forty bags of rice were given to them, but
when the king learned of it he was displeased and said, “When they
return we must destroy them.” The southern provinces were put into a
state of defense and Gen. Yi Chong-mu was put at the head of a punitive
expedition. It is said that a fleet of 227 war vessels and an army of
107,285 men rendezvoused at Ma-san Harbor. They were provided with two
month’s rations. This powerful flotilla sailed away and soon reached the
island of Tsushima. There it burned 129 Japanese boats and 1939 houses.
Over a hundred Japanese were killed, twenty-one prisoners were taken and
131 Chinese and eight Korean captives were liberated. The fleet then
sailed toward Japan and arrived at Ni-ro harbor. There, the records say,
they lost 120 men and so abandoned the enterprise. This is good evidence
that the numbers of the army are overestimated, for a loss of a hundred
and twenty men from such an immense force would not have caused an
abandonment of the expedition.
The emperor sent a messenger asking for the four jewels that are
supposed to come from the bodies of good monks when they are
incinerated.
These were said to be kept at Heung-ch‘ŭn monastery at Song-do. King
Se-jong replied that there were no such jewels in the peninsula. He
ordered the discontinuance of the custom of building monasteries at the
graves of kings, and the people were commanded not to pray to Buddha in
behalf of the king. The great expense incurred in providing for the huge
stone that covered the sarcophagus of a king made him change the custom
and it was decreed that thereafter four smaller ones should be used
instead of the one great one.
One of his most statesmanlike acts was to decree that every man charged
with a capital offense should have three trials and that detailed
accounts of each of these should be furnished for the royal inspection.
Following out the policy of a gradual suppression of Buddhism, he
interdicted the observance of the festival called the _To-ak_.
In the fourth year of his reign, his father died. It is said that at the
time of his death there was a severe drought, and on his deathbed he
said, “When I die I will go and ask Heaven to send rain,” and the story
goes that on the very day he died the welcome rain came. To this day it
is said that it is sure to rain on the tenth day of the fifth moon, and
this is called the “T‘ă-jong rain.” We see that under that father’s
tutelage he had continued the policy of reform, but what he had done was
only the beginning. The law was made that if a prefect died the prefects
along the road should furnish transport for his body up to the capital.
The eunuchs were enjoined not to interfere in any way with the affairs
of state. The term of office of the country prefects was lengthened,
owing to the expense entailed upon the people by frequent changes. It
was made a crime to delay the interment of a corpse simply because the
geomancers could not find an auspicious spot for the burial, and all
geomancers’ books were ordered burned. Every adult male was required to
carry on his person a wooden tag bearing his name. This was for the
purpose of identification to prevent the evasion of taxes and of
military service. It is but right to say that this law was never
strictly carried out. Korea has always suffered from the existence of
armies on paper. The king edited a book on agriculture telling in what
districts and in what kinds of soil different species of grains and
vegetables would thrive best. He paid attention to penal laws as well.
Beating was to be administered on the legs rather than on the back; no
murderers were to be bound in prison who were under fifteen years or
over seventy; no prisoner under ten or over eighty was to suffer under
the rod; even the king’s relatives, if guilty of crime, were not to be
exempt from punishment.
These important reforms occupied the attention of the king up to the
year 1432, the fourteenth of his reign, but now the border wars in the
north claimed his attention. At this time the wild tribes across the
Ya-lu were known under the collective name of Ya-in. These savages were
ravaging back and forth across the border, now successful and now
defeated. King Se-jong decided that the peace of the north was worth the
outlay of some life and treasure; so, early in the year 1433 an
expedition under Gen. Ch’oé Yun-dok crossed the Ya-lu in six divisions,
each consisting of a thousand men or more. These had agreed to make a
common attack on Ta-ram-no, the stronghold of the robbers, on the
nineteenth of the fourth moon. This was successfully done with the
result that 176 of the enemy were left dead, and 236 captives and 270
head of cattle were taken. All of this was at the cost of just four men.
The northern portion of Ham-gyŭng province was as yet but sparsely
settled, and reports came in that the Ming people were coming in great
numbers and settling there; so the king felt it necessary to do
something to assert his rights. A great scheme for colonization was made
and people from the southern part of the province were sent north to
occupy the land. But there were two powerful Yŭ-jin chiefs across the
Tu-man river who were constantly crossing and harrying the people along
that border line. These were Ol-yang-t’ap and Hol-ja-on. It was not
until the year 1436 that they were really silenced and then only after
repeated and overwhelming victories on the part of the Korean forces.
During these years thousands of people from the southern provinces were
brought north by the government and given land in this border country.
About this time a Japanese named Chŭng Seung was Daimyo of Tsushima. He
sent fifty boats across to the Korean shore and the trade relations were
revived which we may feel sure had been sadly interrupted by the long
period of piratical raids. The government made these people a present of
200 bags of rice and beans. Sixty “houses” of people also came from that
island and asked to be allowed to live in the three ports, Ch’ep’o,
Yŭm-p’o and Pu-san-p’o. The king gave his assent and from that time
until about the present day, with only temporary intermissions, the
Japanese have resided in one or other of these three places, although
Pu-san (Fusan) has always been the most important of them. In the year
1443 the custom of giving the Daimyo of Tsushima a bonus of 200 bags of
grain a year was instituted. The number of trading boats that could come
was strictly limited by the Korean government to fifty, but in extreme
cases where sudden need arose through piratical raids or other cause the
number could be increased. This custom continued without interruption
until 1510.
The most striking feat that King Se-jong accomplished and the one that
had the most far-reaching and lasting effect upon the people was the
invention of a pure phonetic alphabet. This alphabet scarcely has its
equal in the world for simplicity and phonetic power. He was not the
first one to see the vast disadvantage under which the people labored in
being obliged to master the Chinese character before being able to read.
We will remember that in the days of Sil-la the scholar Sŭl-chong had
invented a rough way of indicating the grammatical endings in a Chinese
text by inserting certain diacritical marks, but this had of course been
very cumbersome and only the _ajuns_ or “clerks” were acquainted with
it. Another similar attempt had been made near the end of the Koryŭ
dynasty but it too had proved a failure so far as general use by the
people was concerned. King Se-jong was the first man to dare to face the
difficulty and overcome it by the use not of modifications of the
Chinese characters but by an entirely new and different system, a
phonetic alphabet. It can scarcely be said that he had the genius of a
Cadmus, for he probably knew of the existence of phonetic alphabets, but
when we remember that the Chinese character is considered in a sense
sacred and that it had been in use in the peninsula exclusively for more
than two thousand years we can place him but little lower than the great
Phoenician.
Korean histories are almost a unit in affirming that the alphabet is
drawn from the Sanscrit and from the ancient seal character of China.
Where then did King Se-jong have access to the Sanscrit? Some have
argued that his envoys came in contact with it at the court of the
Emperor at Nanking. This is possible but it is extremely unlikely that
they gained such a knowledge of it in this way to make it of use in
evolving their own alphabet. On the other hand it is well known that the
monasteries of Korea were filled with books written in the Sanscrit or
the Thibetan (which is an offshoot of the Sanscrit) character. It is
believed by some that Buddhism was entirely crushed in the very first
years of the dynasty, but this is a great blunder. Buddhism had begun to
wane, but long after the end of King Se-jong’s reign it was still the
predominant religion in Korea. Most of the officials, following the lead
of royalty, had given it up, but the masses were as good Buddhists as
ever. The probabilities are therefore overwhelming that when the
histories refer to the Sanscrit they mean the Sanscrit contained in
these Buddhist books and which had been a common feature of Korean
religious life for centuries.
Comparison reveals the fact that the Korean consonants are mere
simplifications of the Sanscrit consonants. On the other hand there are
no similarities between the Korean and Sanscrit vowels. King Se-jong’s
genius lay in his recognition of the fact that the vowel lies at the
basis of articulate speech, and in this he was in advance of every other
purely Asiatic alphabet. Each syllable was made up of the “mother and
child” the mother being the vowel and the child being the consonant. If
we examine the ancient seal character of China with a view to
ascertaining the source from which the Koreans drew their symbols for
the vowels we shall find at a glance that they consist in the simplest
strokes of those ideographs. Every Korean vowel is found among the
simpler radicals of the Chinese. What more need be added to prove that
the statements of the Korean histories are correct?
In this work the king made use of the two distinguished scholars Sin
Suk-ju and Sŭng Sam-mun. Thirteen times the latter was sent with others
to Liao-tung to consult with a celebrated Chinese scholar Whang Ch’an,
who was in banishment in that place. For the prosecution of this
literary plan and the work growing out of it the king erected a separate
building in the palace enclosure. There he caused to be compiled and
printed the dictionary of the Korean language in the new alphabet which
was called the _ön-mun_. This celebrated dictionary is called the
Hun-min Chöng-eum.
King Se-jong died in 1450 and was succeeded by his son Hyŭn whose
posthumous title is Mun-jong Kong-sun Tă-wang. His brief reign of two
years is a good sample of what Confucianism will do for a man if carried
to excess. Upon his father’s death he refused to be comforted and
neglected the necessary precautions for preserving his health. Long
nights he lay out in the cold thinking that by so doing he was showing
respect for the memory of his father. Such excesses joined with the lack
of a proper diet soon made it clear that his health was permanently
undermined. This was a source of great anxiety to the officials and to
the people, for the heir to the throne was a young boy, and the king’s
brother, Prince Su-yang, was a powerful and ambitious man. The king
himself entertained grave fears for his son and shortly before he died
he called together the leading officials and made them solemnly promise
to uphold the boy through every vicissitude. Then he turned to the wall
and died.
Chapter II.
Tan-jong becomes king.... “The Tiger”.... conspiracy.... king’s uncle
virtual ruler.... sericulture encouraged.... king abdicates....
people mourn.... king banished.... a royal captive’s song.... king
strangled.... the usurper’s dream.... character of the new king....
reforms.... trouble with the emperor.... policy in the north....
more reforms.... official history of the land.... medicine....
hostility to Buddhism.... king’s concern for the people.... army
cared for.... literary work.... a standing Buddha.... a voluminous
work.... dangerous rebellion in the north.... emperor pleased....
king retires.... Great Bell hung.... The _Pyo-sin_.... a new
king.... foreign relations.... Buddhists driven from Seoul....
examinations.... convents broken up.... war against Buddhism.... a
termagant.... a prosperous land.... law against the marriage of
widows.... military operations in the north.... celebrated history
written.... king reproved.... a foe to Buddhism.... reform in music.
It was in 1452 that king Mun-jong died and his little son Hong-wi
ascended the throne. The title of the latter is Tan-jong Kong-eui
Tă-wang, and of all the kings of Korea, whether of this dynasty or of
any other, his fate is the most calculated to excite the pity of the
reader.
His uncle, Prince Su-yang, was a bold, unscrupulous man with whom
natural affection did not affect the balance by a feather weight. He was
at the head of a powerful faction and it was only the jealous vigilance
of the Prime Minister, Kim Chong-so, that the boy ever came to the
throne at all. The people said that “The Tiger” must be killed before
the boy could come to his rights. Prince Su-yang saw that the people
were with the young prince to a man and he knew that he must brush from
his path these powerful friends of the young king before he ever could
come to the throne himself. To this end he conspired with Kwŭn Nam, Han
Myong-whe and some thirty others. The Prime Minister was the first
object of attack for he was the most strenuous supporter of the king.
Prince Su-yang, in company with one Im Un, armed with iron bludgeons,
went to the house of the Prime Minister and there the former feigned to
have lost one of the wings from his palace hat and asked the Minister to
lend him one for the day. The Minister could not refuse and sent his
little son to bring one, but ere the lad returned the father was laid
dead by a blow from the bludgeon in the hands of Im Un. The prince then
hastened to the palace and told the boy-king that the Prime Minister had
been conspiring against the government and so it had been necessary to
put him to death. Boy though he was, King Tan-jong saw straight through
this falsehood and his first words were, “I beg of you to spare my
life.” From that moment all power slipped from the hands of the king and
the Prince Uncle was virtual ruler of the land. Placing heavy guards at
the palace gates, he sent messengers summoning the king’s best friends,
and as soon as they appeared they were cut down. In this manner Whang
Po-in, Cho Keuk-gwan, Yi Yang, Yun Cho-gong and Min Si were killed.
Besides these many others were banished, so that soon the court was
deprived of almost every supporter of the king except the aged Sŭng
Sam-mun who was such a venerable man and held in such esteem by the
whole nation that even this bold prince did not dare to lay hands on
him. This done, Prince Su-yang began to center in himself all the high
offices of the realm and became an autocrat, dispensing offices and
regulating the affairs of the country according to his own ideas. Yi
Cheung-ok, the governor of Ham-gyŭng Province, was a strong supporter of
the king and so, though far from the scene of this intrigue, emissaries
were sent who murdered him in cold blood.
The only important act of this short and unfortunate reign was the
encouragement given to sericulture. The young king sent large numbers of
silk worms to various districts and rewarded those who did well with
them and punished those who made a failure of it.
All the time the wily prince had been urging upon the king the necessity
of abdicating in his favor. We know not what threats and cajolery were
used, but true it is that early in 1456, after all the other uncles of
the king had been banished to distant parts to get them away from the
person of the king, that unhappy boy, as yet but fifteen years old,
bereft of every friend he had ever known, hedged in by the threats of
his unnatural uncle, finally called the officials to a council and
repeated the lesson he had been undoubtedly taught. “I am too young to
govern the realm rightly and I desire to put the reins of government
into the hands of my uncle, Prince Su-yang.” As in duty bound they all
went through the formality of demurring at this but the king was firm
and ordered the seals to be handed to the prince. Among these officials
there were two who looked with disfavor upon this. They were Pak
P‘ăng-yŭn and Sŭng Sam-mun. The former stepped forward as if to give the
seals to the prince, but when they were once in his hands he made a dash
for the door and tried to throw himself into a lotus pond. Sŭng Sam-mun
caught him by the garments and whispered in his ear, “Wait, all this
will be righted, but we must live to see it done.” So the young king
Tan-jong stepped down from the throne. The usurper is known by his
posthumous title Se-jo Hye-jang Tă-wang.
After King Tan-jong had abdicated he was held under strict surveillance
in the palace and was practically a prisoner. It is said the people
congregated at the Great Bell in the center of the city and wailed over
this fulfillment of their worst fears.
But the dethroned king was not left entirely without help. Six of the
officials conspired to assassinate the usurper at a dinner given to a
Chinese envoy, but someone betrayed them to him and they were seized,
tortured with red-hot irons, decapitated and dismembered. These six men
were Pak P‘ăng-yŭn, Sŭng Sam-mun, Yi Gă, Ha Wi-ji, Yu Sŭng-wŭn and Yu
Eung-bu. Their wives, parents and children perished with them.
Chöng In-ji, one of the new king’s creatures, memorialized the throne as
follows:—“All this difficulty arose about the ex-king. He should
therefore be put to death.” This was rather more than the king dared to
do but the unfortunate boy was banished to Yong-wŭl in Kang-wŭn
Province. His brother Yu was also banished at the same time. The
banished king lived beside a mountain stream and is said to have sung
this plaintive song to it:
A long, long road, a long good-bye.
I know not which way to turn.
I sit beside the stream and its waters, like me, mourn.
And together we weep without ceasing.
At last when the time seemed ripe, another of Tan-jong’s uncles
memorialized the throne urging that the banished boy be put to death so
that there might be no more cause for conspiracy on the part of any of
the officials. With apparent reluctance the king gave orders that Gen.
Wang Pang-yŭn be detailed to go and administer poison to the boy. When
that official arrived at the place of banishment his hardihood failed
him and instead of giving the boy the poison he prostrated himself
before him. The ex-king exclaimed, “What brings you here?” but before
answer could be given a man named Kong Sang came up behind the banished
king and strangled him with a cord. The story runs that as the murderer
turned to leave the room blood burst from his ears, eyes, nose and mouth
and that he fell dead beside the body of his victim.
The few palace women who remained in the suite of the banished king
threw themselves into the stream and perished. The body of the young
king would have remained unburied had not a man named Om Heung-do taken
pity on the murdered boy and buried him in Tong-eul-ji. The night the
boy was murdered the usurper dreamed that the dead mother of his victim
came from the grave, and, standing beside his couch, pronounced the
following malediction: “You have stolen the throne and killed my son.
Your’s too shall die.” It is said that when he awoke he found that the
prophecy had already been fulfilled. He therefore dug up the bones of
this prophetess of evil and scattered them upon the water of the river.
Tradition says that the next seven magistrates who were appointed to the
district where this foul murder was perpetrated died on the very night
of their arrival. The eighth made it his first duty to go to the grave
of the murdered king and sacrifice before it and write an elegy upon
him. From that time there was no more trouble.
In spite of the way in which King Se-jo obtained the throne he is not
held in ill repute among the people of Korea. The unpardonable crime
which attended his usurpation of the throne augured ill for the reign,
but the truth is there have been few kings of the dynasty who have done
so much for the advancement of the interests of the people as this same
Se-jo. Tradition says that when a boy he was looked upon with wonder
because of his skill with the bow, and he used to climb the mountains
blindfold where others dared not follow with open eyes. One story tells
how once, when he went to China with the embassy, eight elephants that
stood before the palace gate knelt as he approached, thus foretelling
his future greatness. He was a temperate man and hated luxury and
effeminacy. He would not use gold upon his table and when his little son
asked for a silver cup it was refused him.
He took up the policy of reform at the very point where his father, King
Se-jong, had laid it down five years before. He established pleasant
relations with the people of the Liu Kiu islands and of the wild
northern tribes, by treating their envoys with special attention. Those
who were obstinately unfriendly he crushed with a heavy hand. Among the
latter was an able chieftain, Yi man-su, who had formerly lived in Seoul
and had married a Korean woman but later had fled back to the Yŭ-in
tribes and raised the standard of revolt. The Korean generals were in
some trepidation on this account but Gen. Sin Suk-ju marched against him
and soon drove him back to his retreat.
By giving rank to a man of the Keum-ju tribe in Manchuria without the
previous permission of the Emperor the king came near getting into
serious trouble with his suzerain, but as it was a first offense it was
overlooked. The Emperor sent word however that a repetition of the
offense would bring down upon the king serious trouble.
The power of the central government was but weakly felt along the
northern border and so the king paid special attention to that portion
of the country, founding prefectures all along the north-eastern border.
It was doubtless because of this active policy that the Yŭ-jin tribe
came the following year and swore allegiance to Cho-sŭn. Among the
reforms which were effected during the early part of this reign the
following suffice to show the energy and wisdom of this king Se-jo.
Fruit trees were planted in the palace enclosure so that the people
might not be burdened with the duty of providing the king’s table with
fruit. Mulberry trees were planted in all available places in the
grounds of the different government offices, and even in the palace,
where the queen engaged in weaving, together with the palace women.
Dress reform was carried on to the extent of shortening the skirts of
women’s dresses so that they could be more easily distinguished from men
in the street. A school was founded for the study of the Chinese
vernacular. The criminal court was ordered to present the king each
month with a written account of its proceedings. The king saw in person
every official who came up to Seoul from the country on business. A
hospital was founded for the dispensing of medicine for indigestion.
These were but the beginning of his reforms. He punished at one time
over a hundred prefects who had been oppressing the people. The palace
inclosure was sown with grain when there was prospect of scarcity. In
this reign we find the first reference to the Kuk-cho Po-gam or the
official annals of the dynasty. The great bell which hangs in the center
of the city of Seoul today was cast in his reign and hung at first
outside the South Gate. A medical government bureau was founded and
medical works were published. The king was actively interested in
military matters and called together all the soldiers who could wield a
bow of 120 pounds weight. This was with a view to the invasion of the
territory of the troublesome wild tribes of the north. A census of the
people was taken for the purpose of making army estimates, and during
the whole reign the soldiers were practiced in sham fights both in the
palace enclosure and outside the city walls. His attitude toward
Buddhism was one of distinct hostility. One of his earliest edicts was
that no monk should attend or pray at a funeral. He invented the use of
the split bamboo as a sign between himself and the general upon the
field. He kept half and the general kept the other half and if it was
necessary to send a messenger he would take the piece of wood, which, if
it fitted the piece in the hands of the receiver of the message, showed
that the messenger was properly accredited. He seems to have been much
concerned for the welfare of the people for we find that in the fourth
year of his reign he caused the publication of a book on weaving and had
it extensively distributed among the people, together with another on
military matters and another still on women’s manners.
King Se-jo was the first of the descendants of the great T‘ă-jo to
observe carefully the precept laid down by the founder of the
dynasty—namely, to take good care of the army; this is evinced by the
fact that at one time he distributed large quantities of medicine among
the soldiers on the northern border and made generous gifts of land to
the troops, thus fostering the military spirit among the people. As a
result we see them successful on every side. The tribe of Ol-yang-hap
was destroyed, the tribes of I-man-ju, Ol-jok-heup and Yan-ba-a-gan came
and swore allegiance.
In his fifth year he codified the laws and published them. He also
extended his medical work and published a book on veterinary surgery,
and he published works on astronomy, geology, music, writing, the signs
of the times, agriculture, live-stock, foreign relations and arithmetic.
In other words this versatile man was actively interested in military,
political, social, scientific and artistic matters and caused books to
be written about these subjects for the enlightenment of the people.
It is said that in 1465 he caused the erection of a monastery in Seoul
but he made the Buddha a standing one rather than a sitting one.
Evidently he had little faith in the inanity of the sleepy sitting
Buddha, who with folded hands let the years slip by unheeded. He wanted
something more lifelike. So he set the Buddha on his legs. This image
was carried through the streets at periodic intervals accompanied by a
crowd of musicians and monks. A Japanese envoy was horrified at what he
called sacrilege and foretold that it could not endure. He was right,
not because the Buddha had gotten on its feet but because the people of
Korea had begun to cast off the shackles of Buddhism and, following in
the wake of the court, were learning to take advantage of their
emancipation. This making of a standing Buddha and the occasional
festivals seem to have been more by way of sport than through any
serious intentions on the king and this in itself accounts for the
speedy downfall of the custom. Its novelty, which was all it had to
recommend it, soon wore off.
In 1467 he ordered the two monks Sin Mi and Chuk Hŭn to cut wooden
blocks for a book to be called the Tă-jang-gyŭng. The love of
exaggeration in the Korean temperament finds play in the statement that
this book contained 8,888,900 pages. The historian evidently did not
have his abacus at hand, for he continues by saying that each of the
fifty volumes contained 7,078 pages, while the above figure would
require 167,778 pages to the volume.
The last year of King Se-jo’s reign, 1468, witnessed a serious
disturbance in Ham-gyŭng Province. A man named Yi Si-ă gathered about
him a strong body of soldiers and sent word to Seoul that it was simply
with a view to defending his district from the incursions of the
northern barbarians. The provincial general went in person to
investigate, but he was murdered by the followers of Yi Si-ă who were
aided by a courtezan who occupied the general’s room with him and who at
dead of night opened the window and gave ingress to the revolutionists.
A messenger, Sŭl Kyŭng-sin was then sent to Seoul to say that the
general had been killed because he had been conspiring against the king.
At the same time the king was asked to make Yi Si-ă the general of the
northeast. This man told the king that the three Prime Ministers were
implicated in the plot against him. The king was suspicious but did not
dare to let matters progress without investigation. He put the Prime
Ministers in prison and at the same time raised a large army to go and
oppose the too ambitious Yi. Generals Yi Chun, Cho Sŭk-mun and Hŭ Chŭng
were put in charge. The last of these three was one of the great
soldiers of Korea. Tradition says that he was of gigantic stature, that
he ate a bag of rice a day and drank wine by the bucketful. A doughty
man indeed, at least by the trencher. But his feats on the battlefield
were commensurate with his gastronomic prowess for we are told that the
sight of his face struck fear into the stoutest enemy.
This army found the enemy before Ham-heung whose governor they had
killed. The royal forces soon had the enemy on the run and at last
brought them to bay on Man-nyang Mountain which projects into the sea
and is impregnable from the land side. The royal forces took boat and
stormed it from the sea while part of the force engaged the enemy from
the landward side. The head of Yi Si-ă was taken and forwarded to Seoul.
In this fight it is said that Gen. Hŭ Chŭng found his sword too small,
so throwing it aside he tore up by the roots a pine tree twelve inches
in girth (?) and swept all before him with this titanic weapon. Of
course the king then set free the three Prime Ministers and confessed
his mistake.
The emperor called upon Korea to help in the castigation of the Keum-ju
tribe beyond the Ya-lu, so the king sent a large force and accomplished
it without the help of Chinese arms. Having destroyed the tribe the
Korean general cut a broad space on the side of a great pine and there
inscribed the fact of the victory. The emperor was highly pleased and
sent handsome presents to the generals engaged.
This same year the king resigned in favor of his son and retired to a
separate palace to prosecute a line of study in which he was greatly
interested, namely the art of estimating distances by the eye, a subject
of importance to all military engineers and one in which Napoleon
Bonaparte is said to have been an adept. But before the end of the year
he died.
His successor, Prince Hă-yang, is known by his posthumous title Ye-jong
Yang-do Tă-wang. He was so young at the time that his mother acted as
regent. During the single year 1469 that this king reigned the Great
Bell was brought into the city and hung at the central spot called
Chong-no or “Bell Street.” He also made the law that the palace gates
should never be opened at night unless the one so ordering showed the
royal signet or token, called the _su-gŭl_. This was a round piece of
ivory half an inch thick and three inches in diameter with the word
_sun-jun_ on one side and the king’s private mark on the other. To it
are appended straps of deer skin and it is used when the king wishes to
accredit a man to a certain work. The mere showing of this is accepted
as the royal command. It is commonly called also the _pyo-sin_ “The Sign
to be Believed.”
This reign saw the division of the city into north, east, south, west
and central districts. It also saw the promulgation of the Kyŭng-guk
Tă-jŭn or “The Great Laws for Governing the Country.” The system had
been inaugurated at the beginning of the dynasty but now for the first
time it was definitely adopted and written out in full for the guidance
of the official classes. It dealt with the minute divisions of
communities, each having an overseer.
This same year 1469 the young king died and his mother calling the
Ministers together, nominated to the throne Prince Cha-san the cousin of
the deceased king. As he was only thirteen years old the Queen Mother
acted as regent during the first years of his reign. His posthumous
title is Sŭng-jong Kang-jŭng Tă-wang.
Under the regency of the Queen Mother the first act was the abrogation
of the law requiring the people to wear the _ho-pă_ or wooden
identification tag, which King T‘ă-jong had promulgated. It had become a
mere matter of form and was found quite useless for the purpose
intended, namely a preventative against the evasion of the taxes.
This reign was marked by increased activity in the field of foreign
relations. First an envoy came from Quelpart with a gift of pearls.
Another came from the town of Ku-ju Si-so in the province of Kwan-sŭ
(Japan) and still another, Chöng Sŭng-hong from the town of Wŭn-jung on
the islands of Tsushima. One embassy from the Liu Kiu Islands came with
a gift of monkeys. The Japanese on the island of Sal-ma sent an envoy
who presented gifts of red pepper, incense and white silk. He asked for
Buddhist books but was refused. Envoys came also from the northern
tribes swearing allegiance to Cho-săn.
In 1472 all the sorceresses, fortune-tellers and Buddhist monks were
driven from Seoul and forbidden to enter it again. In the following year
an envoy arrived from Japan saying “When Se-jo was king I painted his
portrait and carried it to Japan, but at night a great light would
stream from the picture’s face. So I brought it back and have left it at
Che-p‘o in Chŭl-la Province.” The king immediately sent word to the
governor to build an altar and burn the picture thereon, as it had been
defiled by being carried to Japan.
Special attention was given by King Sŭng-jong to the matter of
government examinations. He sent to the provinces and commanded the
governors to hold preliminary examinations and to send the successful
men up to Seoul to attend the grand examinations held on the third day
of the third moon and the ninth of the ninth moon. Three men were to be
sent up from each of the provinces except Kyŭng-sang, Chŭl-la and
Ch‘ung-ch‘ŭng Provinces from which five each were allowed to come. This
shows that then as today the largest part of the population of Korea was
in the south.
An important change was effected in the matter of criminal procedure.
The king commanded that all men of scholarly rank who offended against
the laws should be arraigned not before the common tribunal of justice
but before the college of scholars. Thus another barrier was built up
between the common people and the nobility. King Sŭng-jong was also a
patron of letters, for besides publishing a work called Che-wang
Myŭng-gan or “The King’s clear Mirror,” and the O-ye-eui or “Five Rules
of Conduct,” he also built a library and collected in it all the
different books that could be found. He was the determined foe of
Buddhism and, having driven out the monks, he now proceeded against the
Buddhist convents in Seoul. He broke them up and made them remove to the
country. There were twenty-three of these convents in Seoul at the time.
The Queen Mother retired from the regency in 1477 and the king, assuming
his full authority, continued the work of demolishing Buddhistic
influence. He sequestered a monastery at Yong-san and made a school of
it, after throwing out the image of Buddha. He seems to have been also a
moral reformer, for he made a law against dancing-girls and commanded
that boys be taught to dance and to take the place of those unfortunate
women. It had been the custom on the king’s birth-day to have prayers
offered in Buddhist temples for the safety and peace of the kingdom, but
now this was abrogated, for the king said, “What does Buddha know? It is
a worthless custom and must be stopped.” More than this, he compelled
the monks in the country to refund to a man large sums of money which
had been paid for prayers which were intended to ward off harm from the
man’s son. The boy died and the father sued the monks for breach of
contract, and the king upheld the claim.
In 1478 the queen died and a concubine named Yun was raised to the
position of royal consort. This was destined to bring dire disaster to
the realm. She was a woman of jealous disposition and violent temper and
her hatred of the other concubines led her into trouble. On one occasion
her passions overcame her and in an angry altercation with the king she
scratched his face severely. The king desired to treat her offense
leniently but he was overruled by the officials and the woman was driven
from the palace. She had one son who is commonly known by his posthumous
title Prince Yŭn-san. When the disgraced woman was dying she charged
this son to avenge her disgrace, when he should come to the throne; for
he was the heir apparent.
The reign saw many reforms of a social character. It was decreed that
grave-plots must not be allowed to interfere with the making of fields.
This indicates that during the years of prosperity the population had
been rapidly increasing and that it was found necessary to increase the
area of arable land in like proportion. The people were reaping the
reward of many years of peace and good government. Nothing could show
more plainly the relation between King Sŭng-jong and the people than the
custom he inaugurated of helping those to marry who were too poor to do
so.
The only books he caused to be published were four; on marriage,
funerals, ancestor worship and “On Reaching Manhood.” He seems to have
been an ardent Confucianist for among other things he ordered that
widows should not be allowed to re-marry. This striking feature of
Korean life dates from the days of this king. Before this there had been
a certain amount of sentiment against the practice but it had been
common even among ladies of the higher classes up to this time. His
refusal to give books to the Japanese envoys would also lead us to
believe that he was an active Confucianist.
All these years we hear of no dealings with China on the part of
Cho-sŭn, but at this point we are told that the wild tribe of Yŭ-jin was
harrassing the people of northern China and the Emperor sent a message
to Korea calling upon her to combine with China in an attack upon this
obnoxious tribe. The military policy of his predecessors now stood the
King in good stead, for he was able to put a strong army in the field
immediately and the tribe of Yŭ-jin was speedily chastised. The Emperor
was highly pleased and sent the King a present of silk, gold thread and
cotton cloth.
In the latter years of his reign the King had the Kuk-cho Po-gam written
up to date, and he successfully withstood an invasion of the wild tribes
of the north. One of his last acts was to order that all impurity and
obscenity should be dropped from the songs and poems.
In 1482 the King built two forts on the Ya-lu near the town of Kang-gye
because of threatened outbreaks of tribes living on the further side. In
1484 he built the Ch‘ang-gyŭng Palace east of what is now known as the
“Old Palace.” In this same year the great historical work called the
Tong-guk T‘ong-gam or “Complete Mirror of the Eastern Kingdom,” probably
the most celebrated of Korean histories, was published. It brought the
annals of the peninsula down to the beginning of the present dynasty.
Its author was Sŭ Sa-ga, better known by his pseudonym Sŭ Ko-gan. He was
a thorough master of Korean history.
A little glimpse of this King’s disposition is given in a memorial
addressed to him in 1486 when, after a certain royal tomb had been
struck by lightning he, in terror, asked his officials to mention his
faults that he might mend them and so ward off the judgment of Heaven.
One official brought four charges against him. (1) Love of money; (2)
The selling of offices; (3) Cruel beating of criminals; (4)
Unwillingness to be reproved. Two years later he ordered a remeasurement
of the fields in Ham-gyŭng Province as he believed there was much
taxable property there that was yielding no revenue.
The year 1489 was marked by a terrible scourge of cholera and one of the
officials advised that the King pray to Buddha to stop it. The King
promptly banished him. This man apparently thought that because the
King’s mother was an ardent Buddhist this advice would not meet with
punishment. But in this case even filial duty did not stand in the way
of stern opposition to Buddhism. Soon a still more striking example was
given. The Queen Mother had a Buddha made and placed in a monastery
outside the East Gate, called Chöng-ok-wŭn. A man named Yi Pyŭk, passing
by, asked what they were doing with the image and when he learned that
the Queen Mother had ordered it set up he struck it and broke it in
pieces. He finished the good work by burning the fragments. It can be
imagined how angry the Queen Mother was and how she urged the King to
destroy the contumacious subject, but in reply the King said “Instead of
death he deserves a gift”, and there the matter dropped.
In 1490 one Kwŭn Chu memorialized the throne declaring that the musical
instruments in use were those made by the corrupt Sin-don and that they
were destructive of good manners. At his advice the instruments were
destroyed and others were made. The style of music also was changed and
it became purer and more serious. At this time the instrument of war
called the _so-ni_, a kind of catapult, was invented.
The years 1491 and 1492 were occupied in border wars in Ham-gyung
province, Gen. Hŭ Chŭng at last succeeding in clearing the northern
borders of the enemy. The King died in 1494.
Chapter III.
Consternation upon the accession of Prince Yŭn-san.... his character....
avenges his mother’s disgrace.... reign of terror.... concubines of
former King killed.... sporting proclivities.... noble women
dishonored.... carnival of crime.... plot against the King....
prisons opened.... King banished.... royal proclamation.... a sad
parting.... abuses corrected.... revolt of Japanese residents in the
south.... diplomatic relations with Japan severed.... reforms....
money for army made from Buddhist image.... literature.... mistake
in a Chinese history.... puritan simplicity.... color of clothes....
military activity.... Japanese pirates captured.... the first
compass.... caste.... a Korean-Chinese dictionary.... an extreme
Confucianist.... a dangerous regency.... evil advisers.... good men
murdered.... Japanese return to the southern ports ... omens ... a
Buddhist regent.... conscription.... invasions north and south....
signal victory over the Japanese.... rebellion.
It was in 1494 that Korea had the misfortune to come under the baneful
rule of Prince Yŭn-san. As we have seen, he was the son of the discarded
Queen. He inherited her evil disposition and he had sworn to her that he
would avenge the stigma that had been cast upon her name. He was twenty
years old when the load of empire was placed upon his unworthy
shoulders.
No sooner had his accession been ratified by the Emperor than the Prime
Minister resigned his position and hastened away to his country home.
When asked his reason for such precipitation he replied, “Look at the
pupil of his eye; with such a King it is difficult to keep the head on
the shoulders. So I have come to the country.” Many tales are told
illustrative of his character. Some time before the last King’s death,
while he was walking in the palace grounds with his son, a tame deer had
come and rubbed its nose on his arm. The youth in wanton cruelty had
brutally kicked the animal and was sharply reprimanded for it by his
father. Now that he had become King he sent for the harmless beast and
drove a spear through it with his own hand. Beholding this vindictive
act, and rightly gauging the evil mind that lay behind it, a high
official, Pak Yŏng, immediately left the court and retired to the
country. The next act of this King was to behead his old tutor, Cho
Chi-sŭ, whom he had learned to hate when a boy, because the faithful
instructor had tried to curb his wild excesses.
The year 1496 began with a demand for more revenue from Chŭl-la
Province, and a consequent remeasurement of the land under cultivation.
It is said that his mother, dying, had left a napkin, dyed with her
blood, and had said, “When my son becomes King, give this to him and
tell him not to forget his vow to avenge my death.” In pursuance of this
injunction the young King now gathered together all the men in any way
connected with the banishment and death of his mother, all those who
recorded the facts, all the messengers who carried the hateful commands.
In all there were several hundred people. These he decapitated and
dismembered. He also dug up the bodies of those who had been implicated
but had died in the interval, broke their bones in pieces and flung them
into the river or ground them to powder and scattered them to the winds.
The King wanted to have his mother’s picture hung in the ancestral
temple and when he proposed it all the officials assented to it but
three, who said. “She was a criminal and died a felon’s death; her
picture cannot hang in the ancestral hall.” The King in a rage ordered
their instant execution. Their families like wise perished and their
houses were razed to the ground.
We have seen that Kim Chong-jik, the Prime Minister, had fled to the
country. His enemies now accused him to the King asserting that he had
said that, as King Se-jo had killed King Tan-jong, how could the son of
the former become King. This story was believed and Kim and many of his
friends were seized and beheaded. This was the signal for an exodus of
the better class of the people from the city. The schools were all
closed and a deadly silence reigned for the most part. No one knew who
was to be taken next. As the years passed the reign of terror did not
abate. Debauchery, oppression and theft were the daily practices of the
court and the people were ground to the very lowest point. So much so,
in fact, that in 1504 the people printed placards in the native
character declaring the baseness of the King, and posted them throughout
the city. “These must be the friends of the people whom I have banished”
said the King. So he brought them back from exile and beheaded, poisoned
or beat them all to death. The people of the eight provinces besought
the King to do away with the native script which had brought such
disaster.
Two concubines of the deceased King were still living and when they were
accused to the King of having brought about his mother’s death, he sent
for them and killed them on the spot. For this he was blamed by the
widow of the dead King; so the wretch went into her apartments, ran at
her and butted her with his head, knocking her to the ground. She said
they might kill her if they wished; she did not care. Having stolen the
beautiful wife of Whang Yun-hŭn the King could not induce her to smile
upon him. So he said, “It is because her husband is still living.” He
therefore sent and had the man killed.
The King placed dancing girls in all the 369 prefectures of the country
and reserved three hundred of the fairest for the palace. For these he
built sumptuous pavilions and a hospital for their treatment when ill. A
special office was erected for the care of the dogs, falcons, nets and
other instruments of the chase. The royal stables were in Chong-dong
where the United States Legation now stands. Agents were sent into all
the provinces to hunt for fair women and swift horses. Others were sent
to wring from the people special taxes. The King thought the officials
were blaming him behind his back, so he gave each of them a wooden tag
on which was written, “The mouth is the avenue to misery. The tongue is
a sword which may pierce the body. Watch the mouth and guard well the
tongue; so shalt thou dwell in safety.” He changed the Confucian temple
into a play-house, drove out all the students from the dormitories and
put diviners and sorceresses in their places. When his grandmother died
he did not assume mourning, but as two of the officials dared to do so
he killed them. He wiped out the three districts of Ko-yang, P‘a-ju and
Yang-ju to make a hunting ground and forbade anyone to settle there.
Those who disobeyed were killed. This hunting park was then stocked with
all manner of wild beasts. He stole the people’s boats to use in sport
on the palace ponds and restricted the people to the use of a single
ferry-boat on the river. This lessened the traffic to such an extent
that the people of Seoul suffered severely and many inn-keepers were
ruined. An aged eunuch remonstrated, but the King caught up a bow and
shot him through. He taxed the people of the south a bolt of cotton a
head, and they paid it only by taking the cotton out of their clothes
and weaving it. He invited the wives of the courtiers to a feast and had
each of them wear upon the breast the name of her husband. Of these he
dishonored whom he would and gave the husbands official position. His
uncle’s wife was enticed into his net, in consequence of which she
committed suicide.
Such were a few of the acts of this depraved monarch. We need not
multiply details of his execrable career. It was one long carnival of
murder, lust and oppression. The people were simply the instrument by
which the spendthrift King could fill his coffers.
It was in the twelfth year of his reign, 1506, that the people were
brought to the limit of their patience. Three men. Song Heui-an, Pak
Wŭn-jong and Yu Sun-jong, conferred together and agreed that unless
there was a change the destruction of the kingdom was inevitable. They
determined to drive the corrupt King from the throne and put in his
place Prince Chin-sŭng, the second son of King Song-jong. One dark night
they met at the Hun-yŭn-wŭn, near the East Gate, with a number of others
who had been let into the dangerous secret. Not a light was to be seen,
and they prepared to act. With a small band of picked soldiers whom they
knew to be faithful they formed a line in front of the palace. The two
Prime Ministers came out and joined them and soon a crowd of people
gathered. Powerful men with iron bars soon forced an entrance and six of
the King’s favorites were seized and beheaded. As a next move the
prisons were all opened and crowds of innocent people were liberated.
They thirsted for revenge and, finding weapons as best they could,
joined the revolutionists. It soon appeared that there was to be no
resistance for even the King’s friends were aghast at his enormities.
The revolutionists proceeded to the Kyöng-bok Palace where the King’s
step-mother lived, the one whom he had treated so brutally, and said to
her, “The King is a wild debauchee. The people are scattered. The
ancestral temple has been desecrated. The people desire to make your son
King.” She modestly replied, “How can my son become King? The King’s son
is old enough to assume the crown.” At this there was a general cry of
dissent and all demanded that she comply and let her son become King. At
last she consented and the youth was brought out. The assembled
multitude bowed before him and swore fealty to him. They then crowned
him and brought him to the palace. The deposed King was banished with
his son to Kyo-dong Island. The honorary posthumous title was never
conferred upon him but he is known as Yŭn-san-ju, or “Lord of Yŭn-san.”
Throughout the country there was universal holiday. The first
proclamation of this new King who is known by his posthumous title
Chung-jong Kong-eui Tă-wang, gave the keynote of his reign. “The most
important thing in any country is the common people. If the people
prosper the country prospers, if they suffer the country suffers. The
late King was cruel and lawless, and so by the people’s will I have
become King. I have ordered the discontinuance of the evil customs that
have prevailed and I shall do all in my power for the people. Let
everyone rejoice.”
But a sad event marred the happiness of the new King. His queen’s father
had been on intimate terms with the deposed King and had been killed
upon the day of his banishment. The officials therefore insisted that
the Queen be put away and that another be selected. She was innocent of
any crime, and the King said, “She is the wife of my youth and I cannot
put her away.” But they insisted until finally he was forced to comply
and he tearfully parted from her.
One of his first acts was to do away with the “Dog and Falcon Bureau”
which had in charge the implements of the chase. He abolished the “Woman
Bureau” which looked after the procuring of concubines for the King. He
gave back to their owners many houses that they had been despoiled of.
He revived the law by which a written report of the proceedings of the
criminal court should be submitted to him every ten days.
Years before this in the days of King Sŭ-jong Japanese had been
permitted to settle in the three harbors, namely Ch’e-p’o, Yum-p’o and
Pu-san-p’o. They were now having a difficult time. The prefects were
oppressing them sadly, forcing them to work without wages and stealing
their fish or game. This they could not endure; so two of their number,
Ko-jo-mo and Ko-su-jang passed over to the islands of Tsushima and
raised an expedition against the oppressive prefects. Two hundred boat
loads of them crossed the straits and fell upon Fusan, killed its
prefect, attacked Ch’è Harbor and took its prefect alive. They carried
fire and sword into all that region. They ravaged the prefectures of
Ung-ch’ŭn and Tong-nă. The King sent a strong force by land and sea who
cut off the retreat of the invaders and then attacked them. Three
thousand were soon put _hors de combat_ and many hundreds were chased
into the sea where they were drowned. From this time, 1512, until 1572
diplomatic relations with Japan were practically suspended, though an
occasional envoy came. A small number of Japanese boats were however
allowed to come to the three harbors for the purpose of trade. Access to
the court was strictly denied them.
King Chung-jong was as active in matters of reform as had been his
father or grandfather. He put an end to the cruel custom of houghing
robbers. He limited the number of blows that could be administered in
the cross-examination of criminals. He published 2940 volumes of the
Sam-gang-hăng-sil and circulated them among the people as well as
another work on filial piety. He made a foundling asylum, or at least
made provision for the support of abandoned children. The custom of
punishing by striking the legs with short, thick clubs was done away,
for this process was almost sure to shatter the bone.
In the seventh year of his reign, 1512, he turned his attention to the
army and sent out an edict that arms should all be put in good order and
should be ready for use at an instant’s warning. We are not told whether
this was because of any expedition that he was contemplating or any
hostile invasion that he feared. Whichever it was it was unrealized, for
the army under his rule engaged in no offensive or defensive warfare. It
was probably with a view simply of carrying out the policy so wisely
begun by his ancestors of keeping the army in good order. He sent down
to the town of Kyöng-ju in the province of Kyŭng-sang, which had once
been the site of the capital of Sil-la, and brought up a great copper
Buddha and broke it up in order to use the metal in making new arms for
the soldiers. It was the common belief that if anyone prayed to this
image barrenness might be cured. The people cried out against its being
broken up, but the King said “Do not fear. I will take the blame.”
Nothing could show us more clearly the position that Buddhism held at
this time. It had reached its low water mark in Korea, and while it can
scarcely be said to have strengthened its position up to the present
time, it is very doubtful whether an emergency could arise so great as
to induce a King of Korea in these days to break up an image of Buddha.
The reign of this king was marked by severe disturbances at different
times. In his thirteenth year, 1518, there were severe earthquake shocks
extending over a period of four days and causing much loss of life and
property.
During his reign literature was on the increase. He ordered the
publication of various books and established a headquarters for books at
Seoul, a sort of central depot or depository. The only relations that he
had with outside countries was the reception of a Japanese envoy who
brought a gift of mirrors. They were considered very valuable.
In 1518 a historical work came from China in which it was asserted that
king T’ă-jo was not the son of Whang-jo but of Yi Im-in, a traitor, and
that he had founded the new kingdom as a result of treachery. The king
sent an envoy immediately to the court of China asking that the mistake
be corrected. The Emperor replied that it would be done in the next
edition.
The king’s teacher, Cho Kwang-jo, called “The Confucius of Korea,” told
his master that Buddhism and sorcery were alike useless and urged him to
do away with the headquarters of the diviners and sorcerers. It was done
and the teacher was given the title of “Guardian of Public Morals.” We
are told that this reign was the golden age of Korean morals. The people
revolting from the excesses of the deposed king took on a puritan
simplicity. Men and women walked on opposite sides of the street. If any
article was dropped in the road no one would touch it, but would leave
it for the owner to recover. No one had to lock his doors at night. When
the wild Ya-in of the north ravaged the border and one advised that a
force be sent disguised as laborers to chastise them, the king decided
that it was beneath his dignity to have recourse to trickery, and so
sent the troops openly. The important decennial examination called the
Hyŭn-yang-gwa was now established.
At this time white clothes were not largely worn. That custom did not
come in till about 1800. Blue, red and black predominated. The king now
established the custom of wearing very light blue at the time of
ancestral worship.
This reign saw some notable advances along certain lines. Bows were made
which were shot by putting the feet against the bow and drawing the
string with both hands. They were to be used by women in defending walls
while the men might be away. A small powerful bow was made which shot
metal arrows called “needle arrows.” They carried four times as far as
the ordinary bow, and an arrow from one of them would penetrate three
men. A kind of bomb was also invented. It was probably projected from a
catapult of some kind. A spring trap was made whose arrow weighed a
hundred and twenty pounds.
In 1521 a Japanese So I-jön sent an envoy named Song-gong Pu-su-choa
with a curious gift of three stones that resembled mirrors. The king,
however, declined to accept them. The following year a Japanese named
Teung Wŭn-jung went to the Chinese district of Yŭng-p’a and ravaged, and
on his way home landed with his booty on the coast of Whang-hă Province
in Korea. He was there captured by a Korean and his whole company were
sent to China much to the delight of the Emperor.