Corea: The Hermit Nation

by William Elliot Griffis

KORAI, OR UNITED COREA.

The fertile and well-watered region drained by the Amur River and its tributaries, stretching from the Pacific Ocean to Lake Baikal, covers the ancestral seats of many nations, and is perhaps the home of nations yet to arise. It may be likened to a great intermittent geyser-spring which, at intervals, overflows with terrific force and volume. The movements of population southward seem, on a review of Chinese and Corean history, almost as regular as a law of nature. As the conquerors from the central Asian plateaus have over and over again descended into India, as the barbarians overran the Roman empire, so out of the region drained by the Amur and its tributaries have burst forth, time and again, floods of conquest to overwhelm the rich plains of China. Or, if we regard the flowery and grassy lands of Manchuria and beyond as a great hive, full of busy life which, from the pressure of increasing numbers, must swarm off to relieve the old home, we shall have a true illustration. Time and again have clouds of human bees, with the sting of their swords and the honey of their new energy, issued from this ancient hive. The swarms receive different names in history: Hun, Turk, Tartar, Mongol, Manchiu, but they all emerge from the same source, giving or receiving dynastic names, but being in reality Tungusic people of the same basic stock.

A tribe inhabiting one of the ravines or rich river flats of the Sungari region increases in wealth and numbers. A powerful chief leads them to war and victory. Tribes and lands are annexed. Martial valor, wealth, and strength increase. Ambition and the pressure of numbers tempt to farther conquest. Over and beyond the Great Wall is the ever-glittering prize—teeming China. The march begins southward. After many a battle, and only, it may be, after a generation of war against the imperial legions beyond the frontiers, the goal is reached. The Middle Kingdom is conquered and a new dynasty sits on the Dragon [[64]]Throne, until long peace enervates and luxury weakens. Then out of the old northern seats of population rolls a new flood of conquest, and a new swarm of conquerors is hived off.

Thus we see the original land embracing the Amur and Sungari valleys has had its periods of power and decay, of historical and unhistorical life. Unity and movement make history, disintegration and apathy cause the page of history to be blank. But the land is still there with the people and the possibilities of the future.

In spite of the associations of hoary antiquity that cluster around Asiatic countries, the reader of history does not expect to hear of single empires enduring through many centuries. With the exception of Japan, no nation of Asia can show a dynastic line extending through a millennium. The empires founded by Asiatic conquerors are short-lived. The countries and the people remain, but the rulers constantly change, and the building up, flourishing, decay, and dissolution suggest the seasons rather than the centuries. No enduring political fabrics, like those of Rome or Britain, are known in Asia. Though China and India abide like the oak, their rulers change like the leaves. Socially, these countries are the symbols of petrifaction, politically they are as the kaleidoscope. From this law of continuous political mutation, Corea has not been free.

In one of these epochs of historical movement, at the opening of the eighth century, there arose the kingdom of Puhai, the capital of which was the present city of Kirin. Its northern boundaries first touched the Sungari, and later the Amur, shifting to the Sungari again. Its southern border was at first the Tumen River, and later the modern province of Ham-kiung was included in it. Lines drawn southwardly through Lake Hanka on the east, and Mukden on the west, would enclose its longitude. Its life lasted from about 700 to 925 A.D. This kingdom was continually on bad terms with China, and the Tang emperors for nearly a century attempted to crush it into vassalage. Puhai made brave resistance, being aided not only by the large numbers of Koraians, who had fled when beaten by the Chinese across the Tumen River, but also by the Japanese, whose supremacy they acknowledged by payment of tribute. With the latter their relations were always of a peaceful and pleasant nature, and the correspondence and other documents of the visiting embassies to the mikado’s court are still preserved in Japan. [[65]]

Yet though Puhai was able to resist China and hold part of the old territory of Korai, it fell before the persistent attacks of the Kitan tribes, whose empire, lasting from 907 to 1125 A.D., stretched from west of Lake Baikal to the Pacific Ocean. In the early part of the tenth century this Puhai kingdom, whose age was scarcely two centuries, melted away again into tribes and villages, each with its chief. The country being without political unity returned to unhistorical obscurity, as part of the Kitan empire. Without crossing the Tumen, to enter China by way of Corea, the Kitans marched at once around the Ever-White Mountains and down the Liao Tung valley into China.

The breaking up of Puhai was not without its influence on the Corean peninsula. As early as the ninth century thousands of refugees, driven before the Kitans or dissatisfied with nomad life on the plains, recrossed the Tumen and a great movement of emigration set into Northern Corea, which again became populous, cultivated, and rich. With increasing prosperity better government was desired. The worthlessness of the rulers and the prospect of a successful revolution tempted the ambition of a Buddhist monk named Kung-wo who, in 912 A.D., left his monastery and raised the flag of rebellion. He set forth to establish another political fabric of mushroom duration, which was destined to make way for a more permanent kingdom, and, in the end, united Corea.

With his followers, Kung-wo attacked the city of Kaichow (in the modern Kang-wen province), and was so far successful as to enter it and proclaim himself king. His personal success was of short duration. His lieutenant, Wang-ken, that is Wang the founder, was a descendant of the old kingly house of Korai. During all the time of Chinese occupancy, or Shinra supremacy, his family had kept alive their spirit, traditions, and claims. Thinking he could rule better than a priest, Wang put the ex-monk to death and proclaimed himself the true sovereign of Korai. All this went on without the interference of China, which at this time was torn by internal disorder and the ravages of the same Kitan tribes that had destroyed Puhai. Wang made Ping-an and Kaichow the capitals of his kingdom, and resolved to take full advantage of his opportunity to conquer the entire peninsula and unite all its parts under his sceptre.

Circumstances made this an easy task. With China passive, Shinra weak, through long absorption in luxury and the arts of [[66]]peace, and with most part of the population of the peninsula of Koraian blood and descent, the work was easy. The whole country, from the Ever-White Mountains to Quelpart Island, was overrun and welded into unity. The name of Shinra was blotted out after a line of fifty-six kings and a life of nine hundred and ninety-three years. For the first time the peninsula became a political unit, and the name Korai, springing to life again like the Arabian phœnix out of its ashes, became the symbol alike of united Corea and of the race which peopled it. Even yet the name Korai (Gauli or Gori in the vernacular) is generally used by the people.