History Sunday: Joseon Dynasty

I can guess the reactions of people who stumble on this accidentally.....whaaat?  To those of you people that do know what this is, welcome, please feel free to look around one of the most random blogs you'll ever read.

I don't think I've ever mentioned on this blog but I am a big fan of South Korea.   It all started......well, that doesn't matter, but the love for that part of the world has been a long lived one.

South and North Korea as we in the West know it today is from the modern era and came about in the 1950s.  Before this both the North and the South were known was Joseon (Choseon, Chosun, there are different variations because there's a few anglicized versions of Korean).  The most common way of spelling it is Chosun, but in subtitles it's always Joseon and I prefer that.

Court Hanbok

The Joseon dynasty of Korea was founded in 1392 and lasted a whopping 5 centuries until 1897.  The really interesting thing about Joseon is that there was very few changes to anything during this period.  Obviously technology toddled along, but because of the strong trade links with what we now know as China everything had to really come through them first.  By few changes I meant social changes, which is always the thing I'm most interested in.

Typical male attire

The whole topic of Joseon is a large one, many kings, many politicians and nobles, some Manchu invasions.  I always find that the history of this part of the world is completely unknown to those in the West and explaining it would be a massive undertaking.  Instead, because my writing research has taken me to this period I'm going to attempt a brief explanation of the fall of Joseon and the aged culture that met with the rapidly growing 19th century.

Joseon was a "hermit kingdom" as one British newspaper called it.  Closed off for centuries, no foreign body, at least western foreign body, had been allowed in for about two hundred years.  As everyone does know during the 19th century the west really met the east of the world for the first time in history, and what a mess it was.  China seemed to have a better time of it than a many other places, but I say that because I'm ignorant.  There doesn't really seem to be a set time period when West met China, quite unlike the 1860s when West met Japan, and 1860-1870s when West met Joseon.

Imjeongjeon Hall,
Changdeok-gung (palace), Seoul

I always cringe when I watch movies like The Last Samurai because the Americans and the British were just so arrogant to Eastern cultures.  It mirrors when the Normans invaded England during the 11th century, arrogance and superior attitudes tried to stamp out the Anglo-Saxon way of life.  To be fair to the Normans the Anglo-Saxons weren't that different, they dressed slightly differently, spoke a different language, but they were at least recognisable, and the cultures weren't that different thanks to Christianity.  As everyone knows, and not to be racist, Koreans, Japanese and Chinese all look different from westerners.

Yangban

If that wasn't enough, the culture was radically different.  There was a caste system implemented in Joseon that had sustained for its 500 year existence, and even before that.  The top tier was the King (Wang), he had an absolute rule over the country, but he had a cabinet, or government body that were created to "guide the king on a wise path" and were allowed to disagree with him when they thought his decisions weren't for the best.  These men, and a few others besides, were called yangban, which roughly translates to nobles.  They were a class in themselves, and yangban status extended for three generations, or was gained by those who passed certain examinations of government.

Throne room, Changdeok-gung,
Seoul

I won't bother discussing the complexity of the Joseon government hierarchy; it's made up of  Senior and Junior ranks, numbered 1-9, and departments (I think there were about seven or eight main ones) where these officers worked.


To give you some perspective, not that you may need any, this yangban class only accounted for 10% of the entire population.  Not really that shocking when this is the same in every country in history.  What was perhaps most shocking for our 19th century ancestors was slavery.  Slaves in western countries were captives from Africa and southern places, their skin colour was darker than westerners, but Korean slaves were the same as their so called betters in every other way apart from the place in society where they were born.  Slave status was hereditary, it was used as a punishment also for yangban who had broken the law (and been caught).  It is thought that a whopping 30-40% of the population were slaves.  Don't think I mean anything different by slavery either, these people were objects, bought and sold, inherited, given away, you name it, slavery in its most basic form.  I don't mean to sound so disapproving here but it's hard not to.

The rest of the population either fell into: Sangmin, where most people fell.  This was the population, normal people who worked for a living; fishing, farming, etc.
Cheonmin status is the lowest and where the slaves were taken from sometimes, and these people usually worked in "unclean" professions, like butchers and prostitutes (Kisaengs).

typical kisaeng attire

Chungin, which I come to understand as the equivalent of Victorian "middle class".  Professionals that had made something of themselves, but were considered by upper class as being "in trade".  This was probably the least populated class.

This culture had lasted for centuries, but it took less than two decades from Joseon opening its ports to western trading for it all to collapse, probably for the better.  Unfortunately, as with every big change in history, erasing the caste system meant other radical change, and as a result Joseon lost its royal family and much of its identity until mid-20th century due to Japanese occupation of Korea.  I won't go into that here because it feels to me as though it's still a bit of a sensitive area.  All I will say is that I shudder when I read about what the Japanese did to the Koreans at the beginning of the 20th century.

traditional Hanbok

This has been a very long post and I'm not really done yet, but I promise it won't be long now.  My research focuses on 1880s Joseon when trade and foreigners were just beginning to be allowed back in after a 200 year ban.  My interest lies in what it was like for these first foreigners to enter into a country so closed off from most of the world.  There were a few rebellions and insurrections during the 1880s mostly because of the influx of foreigners and unfair treaties Joseon was making with Japan.  Who went to Joseon during this tumultuous time?  Merchants, diplomats?  Did their families go with them?

And what was it like to be Korean during this time of rapid change?  Was it unsettling to see a western face so unlike your own amongst the Korean ones?  Were they scared of foreigners, angry at them, suspicious of them?  It's hard to know what average Joe thought since most of the population were illiterate.



The tale my research is forming the base for is set in the 21st Century as well and I'm curious to find how many things have changed since the 1880s?  Do you still get stared at?  Is there still suspicion of you as a foreigner?  Obviously the culture has changed a little since the 19th century, but with the greatest respect to the Koreans, it has managed to endure nearly a century of hardship.  I love the Korean culture, I think it's awesome.  It'll be interesting to see where this tale takes me, but seeing as I'm trying to juggle two others at this point I think it will have to incubate for a while.