Andrew Pratt

This is the second part of a series of articles that will trace the development of ChosOn military techniques, the influences on them, and the implications for the development of ChosOn martial arts.Although I will be concentrating on the military side of things, this does not mean that the military should be seen as more important than the civilian/ political/ economic spheres. Civilian politics was the main shaper of ChosOn society. Most of what follows can easily be found in Nahm's Korea: Tradition and Transformation, and Lee's A New History of Korea. I have also made use of my BA dissertation In Search of Clues to the Development of Korean Martial Arts During the Yi Dynasty and papers by David Jewell, A History of TaeKwon-Do and Dakin Burdick, People and Events of T'aegwondo's Formative Years. A modified form of the McCune-Reishauer system has been used for romanization.

In the last issue, we looked at the formation of the ChosOn kingdom and how the new kings tried to centralize the private armies and create a national military structure. It was shown that although Yi SOng-gye was a military man, this may have had little bearing on him becoming king. The military threats to the new kingdom were examined and it was suggested that these threats were serious enough to mean that the new kingdom maintained a large and skilled military machine. Finally, we looked at the martial art called subak which was practised at this time and examined the evidence for who was practising it and the form of this martial art.

The Rise and Fall of Early ChosOn

The next king to reign was King Sejong (r: 1418-1450) and he turned out to be the greatest king the Yi line was to produce. King Sejong is justly remembered for, amongst other things, improving agricultural techniques and inventing a script to express the sounds of Chinese ideographs with the aim of being an aid to learn Chinese ideographs. In a modified form, this script is now known as hangul and is the writing system used in modern Korea.

He also expanded ChosOn's borders to the Tumen River in the far north-east.That is, ChosOn now encompassed the area that is modern Korea. Although the area was 'subjugated' in 1434, the Jurchens were probably still the majority group in the area and were to cause the ChosOn forces problems over the following centuries. As a response, a number of garrison towns (at least six) were established in the region. They were 'surrounded by massive defensive walls with gates and watchtowers.'

Solving the Pirate Problem:

King Sejong also successfully resolved the pirate problem which the ChosOn state had inherited from KoryO. Sejong used the age-old carrot-and-stick approach. The Ashikaga Shogunate had requested suzerainty from the Ming in 1401. Ming responded in 1404 by sending seals and talleys that allowed Japan to trade with Ming. Recognition by Ming meant that ChosOn could also recognize the Ashikaga Shogunate.¹ In 1419 a raid was launched on Tsushima, the base for most of the pirates.² The damage caused by this raid is disputed, but it seems to have been severe enough to force the daimyo of Tsushima (the So family) to the negotiating table. Within a year, agreement had been reached. The So family was licensed to manage the Japanese 'traders.' The ChosOn state gave the So daimyo seals which had to be presented to the ChosOn authorities when ships arrived, or required a letter from the So daimyo authorizing the trader. That is, ChosOn adopted a policy of using one barbarian to rule another. Although the So family were burdened with having to police the traders, they could probably also have raised taxes from the traders. In return, the So family was given almost monopoly rights for trade and diplomatic relations between Japan and ChosOn. Slowly, traders from Kyushu and the Japanese mainland came to trade with ChosOn through Tsushima. Three ChosOn ports were designated for trade, including the town that would become Pusan. In these towns, 'Japan Houses' were built, though probably the old meaning of'factor' or 'factory' is closer to the use of these buildings.

Military Reorganization:

Although the military institutions were now stable, there were a number of small, but important, changes in organization. In 1418, an archery test was introduced for membership of the Royal Guard. Since archery was mainly practised by the yangban class, this change can be seen as restricting the membership of this unit to lords and their offspring. Recruitment was by the mukwa examination. However, this was partially a written examination. Since the examination texts were written in Chinese ideographs, it is obvious that such examinations severely limited the potential intake to those with idle time, i.e. the yangban class. That is, the Royal Guard became less of a military unit and more of an honorary position for the yangban.

Sejong was succeeded by Munjong (r: 1450-1452). Munjong did not reign for very long, and little is said about him in the history books. However, he did initiate a reform of the military. The UihUng samgunbu system was replaced by an organization composed of Five Guards (owi). Nahm writes that, 'The Privy Council (Chungch'uwOn), and the Supreme Headquarters for the Five Guards (owi toch'ongbu), along with the Military Training Institute (HullyOnwOn) were established in order to strengthen national security. The local constabulary (hyanggun) performed both military and police duties. '(Nahm 1996, p.99) However, Lee Ki-baek dates the formation of the owi toch'ongbu as 1464 (see below for the implications of this).

The Fracturing of ChosOn:

With the ending of external threats, there was less need for the state to be strong and united in facing external threats. Slowly, but inexorably, politics began to focus on internal issues and clan manoeuvrings, factionalism and political strife became more intense.

Tanchong (1452-1455) followed Munjong, but was a boy-king and political forces swirled around the young king. In particular, one of his uncles schemed against Tanchong. Not only was his uncle against him, but a rebellion occurred in the north-eastern territories. Yi Ching-ok, a former military commander in the Hamgil(do) province, (the north-eastern province) sided with local(?) Jurchen tribesmen to try and establish a new Jurchen state in the north-east. This attempt was to fail, but it was not the last military action by the Jurchen.

Tanchong and his supporters were unable to keep the machinations of his nephew at bay and in 1455, Tanchong was deposed and exiled (and eventually killed). King Sejo (r: 1455-1468), being a branch to the main line, had little legal claim to the throne and could only remain in power with the backing powerful men (i.e. those with swords). Sejo's actions sent shock waves through the Confucian yangban. Here was a man who had seized the throne and murdered his genealogically senior relation. The yangban were mostly split between the pragmatists who were willing to let Sejo rule and those who opposed Sejo, and his descendant's rule. Of course, there were some yangban who did support his rule. There was one final repercussion of Sejo's seizure of the throne. This was that the elite Neo-Confucian yangban ideologues came to realize that the project had faltered. That is, the ChosOn kingdom did not represent the ideal that they were aiming for. The elite minds of ChosOn, thus, slowly retreated from Court life and went to the countryside to study the Chinese classics and criticize the government from without.

Therefore, politics took on a new, divisive dimension. Since there was doubt as to the legitimacy of the right to rule for any of Sejo's descendants, none of the descendants could command with authority or gain the support of a significant majority of the yangban. Therefore, Sejo, and his descendants, could only rule with the backing of those who one of my tutors called, 'the men with swords.' In time the backers of the kings became known as the merit subjects. Moreover, the intellectual elite of ChosOn now avoided government appointments (though they did often teach at the state university in the capital). In other words, politics revolved around the fluctuating these three actors. At the top was the king. He was normally supported by the merit subjects. Opposing them was the bureaucracy, normally acting through an organ called the censorate which analysed and criticized policy.

Military Corruption:

Sejo also reorganized the military several times. Palais notes that in 1457 for every peasant on military duty, two to three other peasants were allocated to supply that peasant with cloth and food. However, this system of conscription was soon corrupted and became associated with simply paying a cloth tax. I noted that, 'this originated with both the garrison commanders, as an income-raising scam, and with peasants as a way of avoiding military duties' (see Palais, Confucian Statecraft and Korean Institutions, University of Washington Press, 1996, p.400-3). The military was officially 180,000 men strong, but the figures can not be trusted because the officials were producing figures for tax purposes, not for assessing military strength. That is, officials would try to have as many names on their rolls (including dead people) regardless of whether they were fit to serve or not. Moreover, the yangban officials themselves avoided conscription through manipulation of the law. The law stated that anyone who was in, or had a relative in, government service or were studying university did not have to serve in the military. This included all family members, such as brothers or father. In other words, all one had to do to avoid military service was to get one member of the family per generation into government or university. Unsurprisingly, university education became very popular. The law even excluded the yangban, the richest class, from paying military taxes.

Later, in 1464, Sejo made the owi toch'ongbu the main military organ (note the clash in dates with those given in the paragraph on King Munjong above). This was presumably an attempt to ensure that his men were in charge of the military.In my dissertation I noted that it was around this time that subak disappears from usage. I postulated that this indicated that selection for officers were no longer conducted on the basis of capability, but officers were selected on other basis, i.e. on political affiliation.

The north-eastern province continued to be a hot-bed of intrigue during Sejo's rule, and Jurchens based in Manchuria twice tried to re-establish control over the north-eastern province. However, both attempts, in 1460 and 1467, were defeated. These incursions were the last time the ChosOn military would face external organized aggression for over one hundred years. Another ChosOn émigré to Hamgil(do) province, one Yi Si-ae (Nahm actually says that he was a 'wealthy native,' but I suspect that the majority of the province were Jurchen, with a layer of ChosOn military and administrative personal, and perhaps some ChosOn farmers who had been encouraged to emigrate to this frontier region), who had been a magistrate in the region, also mounted a rebellion. Because it was obvious that the north-eastern region was unstable and if a native of a particular region was allowed to become a powerful official of that region, they could build a powerbase and challenge the centre, the system of official appointments was changed. Now, officials were barred from being appointed to their own area (this practise may already have been introduced before this date). This stopped officials building a powerbase in the area they were appointed to, but had the side effect that officials had no interest in the welfare of the area they administered and, instead, they tended to just seek the engrandment of their status and wealth. In the Hamgil(do) province, in particular, senior military commanders were not posted to the region. Instead, they were kept in capital (again to stop them developing a powerbase in the region). When trouble occurred in the province, the local military commanders had to send someone to the capital to request a senior commander to be sent out. The local commanders could not respond to the incident until the senior commander had arrived. This, of course, limited the military capability to respond quickly to trouble in any area.

Political Purges:

For forty-eight years from 1468 to 1506 there seems to have been no rebellions or external threats to ChosOn and political developments assume increasing importance. Neither Yejong (r: 1468-1469)nor SOngjong (r: 1469-1494) seem to have achieved much of note. The next ChosOn king, YOnsan (r: 1494-1506) a descendent of Sejo, is recorded in the official ChosOn histories merely as a prince (kun). This was because YOnsan was a 'despot.' In reality, YOnsan took exception to the increasing criticism and political power of the censorate. Aligning the merit subjects behind him he purged the bureaucracy in 1498 and 1504. However, he then realized that the merit subjects were becoming too powerful behind him. YOnsan, therefore, turned his sight on his political backers. However, the merit subjects were jealous of their power and sided with the censorate to remove YOnsan. The next king, Chungjong (r: 1506-1544) however, still needed the support of merit subjects to rule. After their success in removing YOnsan, the censorate again began to exert excessive power. The officials controlling the censorate began to fight amongst themselves for posts. Chungjong was thus forced to purge the censorate again in 1519. King Injong (r: 1544-1545) did not rule long enough for anything to occur in his reign, but the censorate was again troublesome when more political manoeuvrings brought King MyOngjong (r: 1545-1567) to the throne. Therefore, the triangular politics of this period led to conflict in government between the king, his supporters, and the bureaucracy. The main weapon of the bureaucracy were strikes, resignations, criticizing policy and questioning appointments and refusing to pass laws. The king, of course, had recourse to violence to get his way. But by the end of the period, splits and disagreements were emerging from within the bureaucracy, and the king could exploit this. That is, the censorate was becoming a political actor in its own rights. We will come to the reason for this in a moment, but we should again review the military situation.

Return of Piracy:

Although Lee Ki-baek has asserted that almost all positions of authority in the military, from generals to specialists became hereditary in nature, with many descendants neglecting their duty to practise their supposed skills after several generations, resulting in the country possessing 'no military force worth mentioning' (Lee (1984) p.174-5, 225) during this period, military activity did occur. By the early years of the 16^th century, ChosOn found that it was selling too many valuable goods to Japan, and so tried to reduce the volume of trade. However, the Japanese wanted to continue trading, if not increase trade.The first sign of trouble occurred in 1506 when pirates returned to ChosOn waters and attacked KadOk Island. After this incident the So daimyo seems to have schemed to force ChosOn to increase trading rights. His idea was simple, two of the Japan Houses would rebel while So would attack KOje Island.³ The plan was put into effect in May 1510. The ostensible reason for protest was a proposed tax on the Japanese traders. The Japanese residents in Pusan and Naeip'o attacked the magistrates' office in the towns and So sailed on KOje Island. However, perhaps to the Japanese's surprise, the ChosOn military quickly responded.⁴ Aftertwo weeks, the Japanese had been defeated with the loss of over three hundred men.⁵ For So, the campaign was a disaster. All the Japanese traders were expelled and ChosOn refused to have any contact with the Japanese.

However, for ChosOn too, the repercussions of this incident would lead to disaster. The problem was that ChosOn now had no relations with Japan. No contact with the Japanese meant that ChosOn was largely in the dark over political developments that were occurring in Japan.The Ashikaga Shogunate was beginning to disintegrate. This probably resulted in lower harvests and more starvation as farmers were required to take up arms and the daimyos began to confiscate the farmer's crops. By 1522 Japanese piracy along the ChosOn coast had returned and was causing problems. Moreover, Chinese pirates were also appearing off ChosOn shores (they were probably looking for salt). The worst Chinese pirate raid was the Tallyang raid of 1555. Such raids prompted King MyOngjong to reorganize the administration of the military. As a result,the Privy Council was replaced by a new office called the 'Office in Charge of Frontier Security (PibyOnsa) in 1555.

Fundamentally though, the latest civil war in Japan was bringing to Asia revolutionary changes in military technology. The main catalyst for this was Portuguese traders selling the opposing daimyos muskets and canon. ChosOn knew of the Portuguese through their presence at the Ming Court, where some ChosOn officials had met them during tributary missions to Ming. ChosOn does not, however, seem to have been aware of the military technology the Portuguese had brought. These new weapons forced the daimyos to move from wooden forts to heavy stone castles (such as the famous Osaka Castle). The Japanese had soon copied the muskets and were producing them for themselves. Furthermore, since ChosOn had no contact with the various contenders for the Shogunate, ChosOn had no way of being able to assess the abilities and capabilities of these daimyos. This would prove fatal when ChosOn did re-establish contact with Japan and the new power in Japan, Hideyoshi.

Northern Problems:

Trouble also began to brew again in the north-eastern province of Hamgil(do). In 1562, Lim KO-jOng (it is unclear from the spelling whether this is a Korean or a Jurchen name) led an uprising. Twenty-one years later, in 1583, a Jurchen named Ni-t'ang-gae managed to capture many of the forts that ChosOn had built on the Tumen River. He was finally subdued, though, by Sin Ip, a man who we will soon meet again. However, the Jurchen could not easily be suppressed and it was only after a 'hard struggle' that Ni-t'ang-gae was defeated. Such statements, of course, reflect badly on the abilities of the ChosOn military at that time. Sin Ip defeated the Jurchen by developing cavalry tactics and arming his cavalry troops with a metal flail. The experience of this campaign was not lost on the military administrators either and the system of appointments was changed. As noted above, at that time, local commanders were not allowed to respond on their own initiative to trouble and had to wait for a senior commander to arrive from Seoul. This, of course, limited their ability to respond to problems. General Yi Il changed this system when he was appointed to this area in the 1580s and allowed the local commanders to respond to any threat without waiting for a commander to arrive from the capital. This improved the army's ability to respond to crises. However this system was not be extended to other parts of the country because local commanders continued to abuse the system to enrich themselves to such an extent that central control was essential to maintain even limited preparedness.

Further Political Change:

Before concluding this section, one more political development needs to be mentioned. We left the political developments at the stage where the king was supported by merit subjects and opposed by the bureaucracy. However, from 1574, the bureaucracy started to break up into factions. Ostensibly, the disagreement was over a point of Confucian philosophy. However, the real reason was that the educational establishment was producing too many officials and there were not enough posts for them all. These officials were forced to align themselves with major political actors to obtain promotion. The major political actors, meanwhile, had to find posts for their supporters. The result of this tension was that when an official achieved a high post, he would attack and remove incumbents who belonged to rival factions, and promote members of his own faction. Political promotion, therefore, began to depend on factional affiliations and not personal ability. Also, clan based affiliations remained important. Later, the system would develop further by reducing the time officials spent in each appointment to allow more officials to serve in a post. Factional politics would be the main political system for the next 150 years and it's development would be a major cause for the impending disaster that was about to engulf ChosOn.

We started this issue with King Sejong, possibly the greatest king ever to rule on the Korean peninsula. He expanded ChosOn's borders to the north, and solved the pirate problem. He also developed the native script, hangul. The rule of King Sejo was then discussed and how his seizure of the throne caused a major change in the political system and its affects would reverberate for the rest of the ChosOn period. King Sejo also had to deal with continuing troubles in the newly gained north-eastern areas. We then concentrated on political developments during the rule of the next six kings. The resurgence of piracy and rebellions in Hamgil(do) province during the later years of early ChosOn was then discussed. Finally the last political development of this period was described.

In the next issue only a seven year period and one event will be discussed. This event was the Hideyoshi invasion from 1592 to 1598.

² It is thought that other pirates came from Kyushu.

³ There is dispute about how organized this incident was. That is, whether it was planned as suggested here, or whether So just attempted to take advantage of a riot.

⁴ There was a fort outside Pusan, I don't know if a similar facility existed near Naeip'o.

⁵ I have not yet found the records detailing how many ChosOn soldiers died.