[1] The Mikado’s Empire, Chapters XIII. and XIV. [↑]
[2] The Identity of the Great Conqueror, Genghis Khan, with the Japanese Hero Yoshitsuné, by K. Suyematz of Japan. London, 1879. [↑]
[3] See Howorth’s History of the Mongols, London, 1876. [↑]
CHAPTER XI.
NEW CHŌ-SEN.
It will be remembered that the first Chinese settler and civilizer of Corea, Ki Tsze, gave it the name of Chō-sen. Coming from violence and war, to a land of peace which lay eastward of his old home, Ki Tsze selected for his new dwelling-place a name at once expressive of its outward position and his own inward emotions—Chō-sen, or Morning Calm.
For eleven centuries a part of Manchuria, including, as the Coreans believe, the northern half of the peninsula, bore this name. From the Christian era until the tenth century, the names of the three kingdoms, Shinra, Hiaksai, and Kokorai, or Korai, express the divided political condition of the country. On the fall of these petty states, the united peninsula was called Korai. Korai existed from A.D. 934 until A.D. 1392, when the ancient name of Chō-sen was restored. Though the Coreans often speak of their country as Korai (Gauli, or Gori), it is as the English speak of Britain—with a patriotic feeling rather than for accuracy. Chō-sen is still the official and popular designation of the country. This name is at once the oldest and the newest.
The first bestowal of this name on the peninsula was in poetic mood, and was the symbol of a peaceful triumph. The second gift of the name was the index of a political revolution not unaccompanied with bloodshed. The latter days of the dynasty founded by Wang were marked by licentiousness and effeminacy in the palace, and misrule in the country. The people hated the cruelties of their monarch, the thirty-second of his line, and longed for a deliverer. Such a one was Ni Taijo (Japanese, Ri Seiki), who was born in the region of Broughton’s Bay, in the Ham-kiung province. It is said of him that from his youth he surpassed all others in virtue, intelligence, and skill in manly exercises. He was especially fond of hunting with the falcon.