Park, Lee, and Kim...oh my!

Have you ever wondered why such a staggeringly large slice of the Korean population is named Park, Lee, or Kim? 

So have I. In fact, it used to be the most burning question I had about this peninsula, right behind what "Seoul" means. 

But not anymore. I found the answer. 

First, let me introduce you to a building:

                                                                                                               from Wikimedia Commons

It's called Gyeongbokgung ("Palace Greatly Blessed By Heaven") and it stands in central Seoul, near the intersection of Lines 3 and 5. Up the hill behind it is a famous Buddhist temple and the Blue House, the official residence of the Korean president. Gyeongbokgung was the largest and grandest of the Five Grand Palaces built by the Joseon Dynasty. Originally constructed in 1395, right after Joseon's foundation, and then later burned and abandoned for three centuries, it was reconstructed in 1867. 

Now here's where things start to get controversial. 

The official word is that Gyeongbokgung was burned to the ground by Imperial Japan shortly after their annexation of Korea in the early 20th century. But various reports and accounts I've heard tell a different story. Let me back up and do some more explaining.

Korea's surnames, like Scotland's, were all clan-based in antiquity. The Kims were a clan unto themselves back in the day, and a very powerful one. So were the Parks (or Bak, as I prefer to romanize it). The Lees, too. But there were hundreds of others: Choi, Bae, Woo, Lim, Jang, Jeong, Bang, Go, Min, Hong, Seo, Gang, Yoo, Heo, Yoon, Gwak, Gwon, Yang, Hwang, Myeong, Dong, Ryu, Noh, Na, and Pyo come readily to mind.

Here's the thing, though. Korea used to have a caste system. The Kims, Lees and Parks got so powerful that they became the rulers of some of the peninsula's mightiest kingdoms: Baekje, Silla, Goguryeo, and Joseon. Everybody else got the shaft. The Gangs and Yoos and Yangs remained commoners. Granted, any commoner could sit for the gwageo (civil service examination) and become a yangban (civil servant), entitled to an estate and aristocratic privileges...but hey, noble names were still noble names, and common ones common.

When the Japanese annexed Korea in 1910, one of the first things they did was abolish the caste system. Suddenly a Kim was no better than a Choi, and Park no worthier than a Jang. But the names themselves still retained some time-honored clout. It was a mark of prestige to be a Kim or a Park, even if the Japanese had barged in and said it didn't count for beans anymore. 

So, according to what I've heard, Gyeongbokgung wasn't burned down by the Japanese. It was burned down by the Koreans. See, Gyeongbokgung was where the Hall of Records was. Everybody's birth certificates and genealogies were in there. With those reduced to ashes, a lowly Pyo or Hong could waltz right into the nearest Japanese registrar's office and say "Hello there. I'm Mr. Kim." Or "Howdy doody, ilbon saram! I'm Mr. Lee!" 

I don't know if that's true or not, but I have to admit it's a compelling theory. Korea suffers from a deplorable excess of Kims, Lees and Parks because their granddads all wanted to put on airs and had no qualms about committing arson to do it. This is why I secretly rejoice whenever I see an extremely rare surname (such as Gwak, Yang or Pyo) because I know that that person's ancestors had enough pride in their roots not to torch the royal palace and then fake their names during the next census.

And now you know the rest of the story.

P.S. Can you think of anybody else who might be using the name "Kim" to give themselves some street cred...?

Korean History 102

The Three Kingdoms (삼국시대)
Like an amoeba splitting, the old Gojoseon Kingdom fell apart in the wake of the Han Dynasty's invasion from China in the second century B.C. After some gradual reorganization (the Proto-Three Kingdoms Period), three separate principalities rose to take the place of the old. They were Goguryeo, Silla, and Baekje.

Goguryeo
(That's pronounced GO-goo-RYUH.) Apparently after Gojoseon died there was this one little kingdom named Buyeo that tried to carry on its principles. Jumong, the son-in-.law of Buyeo's king (Geumwa), took off for the sunset with a couple of buddies and founded the Goguryeo Kingdom in 37 B.C. on the banks of the Amrok (Yalu) River. Yep, that means half of Goguryeo was in modern-day Manchuria; half of it was in North Korea. Goguryeo, it is said, was the most advanced of the three kingdoms. It got into some terrific wars with the Chinese, too. Goguryeo was more than a little responsible for the fall of the Han Dynasty. Later on the Sui and Tang Dynasties attacked, but Goguryeo had some pretty bad-ass generals: Eulji-Mundeok and Yeon Gaesomun, to name a few. A few decisive victories later, Goguryeo was sitting pretty atop all the reclaimed territories of the old Gojoseon Empire (see the map in Korean History 101) and virtually in control of Northern China. In fact, Goguryeo holds the record (as far as Korea's concerned) for most territory conquered and held.

This is unsurprising, given Goguryeo's superior military technology: its chalgap armor, a lightweight form of scale mail, was supposdly lighter than the Roman army's plate mail and a lot more flexible. (Again, this is all according to VANK. They seem to be trying to one-up the entire ancient world. So far they've claimed to have built bigger pyramids than the Egyptians, had star charts before the Mesopotamians and better armor than the Romans. What's next? Are they going to say Hangeul knocks cuneiform into a cocked hat and take a shot at the Sumerians, too?) Korean soldiers also had an edge in battle...literally. They wore spiked shoes, great for kicking out at an opponent during a sword-lock or another opportune moment. Korean cavalry also put armor on their horses and employed footstalls, special stirrups designed to hold a rider's feet better and provide more stability in the saddle for fighting or shooting.

Religion in Goguryeo (and indeed, the other two kingdoms) seems to have been shamanistic. They were a variety of sun and moon deities. A three-legged crow, Goguryeo's symbol, was believed to live in the sun. After a while Buddhism came in from the rest of Asia and largely replaced these ideas. Regardless, Goguryeo did make some impressive achievements in art, architecture and music; one frieze in a tomb at Anak depicts a 120-piece marching band parading down a city street.

Under the combined assault of the Silla Kingdom from the south and the Tang Dynasty to the west, Goguryeo eventually crumbled in 668 A.D. But survivors attempted to renew the glory that had once been theirs; one such relocation-revival resulted in the Balhae Kingdom.

Baekje
You remember the founder of Goguryeo, Jumong? Well, right after he'd got done with the whole complicated founding business, he got so comfy that he up and married the daughter of a powerful local leader. She bore him a couple of sons, Onjo and Biryu. The problem was Jumong already had a wife way back down in Buyeo on the peninsula. That wife's son, Yuri, came up to Goguryeo to visit his dad, and Jumong immediately made him the crown prince. Onjo and Biryu, seeing as they now had no shot at inheriting the kindgom, thought it prudent to hit the bricks. They got some people together, traveled to what is now Seoul and (well, heck, why not?) founded the Baekje Kingdom in 18 B.C.

Baekje (pronounced beck-JAY) had a troubled early history. Onjo settled his bunch in a place called Wiryeseong (now called Hannam). Biryu stopped in Michuhol (now Incheon). That turned out to be a bad choice. Michuhol was full of swamps and salty water. Biryu's people had a tough time of things while Onjo's were having a gay old time over in Wiryeseong. So Biryu went to Onjo and asked him for his throne. I don't know what he thought Onjo was going to say; come on, Biryu made a bad call, and now he's just going to ask his brother to hand over his own kingdom to him? Yeah, right. Onjo sent him packing. Biryu declared war on Onjo, but was defeated. In shame, he committed suicide.

All that nasty business aside, Baekje is said (by the Volunteer Agency Network of Korea) to have been the most prominent of the Three Kingdoms. This wasn't due to conquest; no, the power of Baekje was in diplomacy. Through envoys and embassies, Baekje managed to set up a system of trade and communication with the Yoseo Province (now Hebae) of Korea, the Shandong Province of China and the Kyushu region of Japan. Baekje couldn't have been more perfectly located for maritime commerce (dominating the eastern shores of the Yellow Sea and part of the northern coast of the East China Sea). Thanks to it, Baekje introduced Buddhism, scholarly texts, and the Chinese language to Japan when it sent scholars to the east for cultural exchange. There are still quite a few relics over there in the Nara Prefecture, in fact. Why, I've even heard tell the current Emperor of Japan, Akihito, is a descendant of a Baekje king. What do you know about that?

Despite this lovely cultural and commercial prosperity, Baekje, which was alternately at war with Goguryeo for territory and allied with it against Silla and China, was doomed to fall. It collapsed eight years before Goguryeo, in 660 B.C., to coalition Tang and Silla forces. There was a brief restoration movement, but that was quashed by a combined amphibious task force. It was a pretty sad affair. As the capital was overrun, over three thousand lady courtiers hurled themselves into the Baekmagang River. The rock which they leaped from is now called the Nakhwaam, the Stone of the Falling Flowers.

Baekje-goers were said to have been a peaceful, mild-mannered people. Their artwork was spectacular, particularly the Geumdongdaehyangno, a gilt bronze incense burner brought to light in 1993. The craftsmanship is so original and intricate it astounded scholars. On the lid is an exquisitely-wrought phoenix, wings raised in flight; the base is a dragon in the shape of a blooming lotus, gracefully worked. The ovoid bowl of the burner is splattered with over 42 animals; phoenixes, deer, tigers, all in lifelike poses, rendered among 74 mountain peaks, with mountain paths, rivers and streams in the intervening spaces. It is, if I may say, impressive work. You don't see incense burners like that every day, seriously. The whole affair weighs 11 kilograms and is nearly 62 centimeters tall. It'd come up to about mid-thigh on me, I'm 183 centimeters (tall). If that doesn't convince you of the worth of their civilization, consider this: most of the people in Baekje artwork are smiling. I think that says it all.

Silla
Let's talk about Silla. (That's pronounced like the English name "Sheila.") Their territory included where I'm sitting right now: all of Gyeongsang Province (North and South). Their capital was Gyeongju, a city I'll describe in more detail later. It's known as "the museum without walls," containing so many tombs, statuary, temples and graves that you could spend a week there and not see everything.

Anyway, it's appropriate that we conclude with Silla, because they ended up owning the lot. They were a warlike kingdom, but not without civilization. They fostered advancements in culture, science, and religion. Cheomseongdae, one of the world's oldest surviving observatories (touted as East Asia's oldest) still stands to this day. They had advanced knowledge of mathematics and geometry, visible in their architecture. The temple wherein resides the Bonjon Buddha (Seokguram Grotto), demonstrates adroit proportions and precise dimensions. For example, the grotto was constructed such that a monk standing before the Buddha's statue would see the dot thingy on the Enlightened One's forehead (what are those called again?) perfectly aligned with the lotus on the wall behind him. As I can personally vouch for after having seen the evidence personally, Silla metallurgy wasn't bad either. There's a whole bunch of metallic goodies that have been dug up from tombs: trinkets, jewelry, armor (for men and horses), trimmings, and perhaps most impressive of all, multiple golden crowns.

Silla got started back in 57 B.C., when it was founded by a fellow named Park Hyeokgeose, said to have been hatched from an egg laid by a white horse. The Silla Empire was quite astounding, not only for having egg-laying horses, but also for its legacy. "Park" is now one of the most common surnames in Korea, thanks to Silla's first king. Silla originally entertained diplomatic relations with Goguryeo and Baekje, but allied with Goguryeo militarily. However, when that latter kingdom began expanding southward, Silla was forced to switch allegiances to Baekje. One hundred and twenty years later, after pushing Goguryeo back north of the Han River, Silla went renegade yet again and wrested control of the region away from Baekje. As if that tergiversation wasn't enough, Silla then went and allied itself with the Tang Dynasty of China (remember them?). Allied, the two powers were unstoppable. Silla conquered Baekje in 660 A.D. and Goguryeo eight years later. It then spent an inordinate amount of time trying to kick the Tang people out, who were trying to create colonies on the peninsula (meanwhile, the remains of Goguryeo were establishing a new state called Balhae, trying to save the last remnants of their glorious empire, as was mentioned previously). Silla, now known as Unified Silla, didn't last long after this (just three hundred years or so). Internal power struggles led to their kings being reduced to mere figureheads and the aristocracy seizing power and running amok, until finally the infighting became too much and the whole outfit collapsed in the tenth century. Baekje and Goguryeo had a semi-resurgence, but this was really just armies capitalizing on name recognition.

Eventually Silla ceded power to the successor dynasty, Goryeo. But that's a story for a later time...