History
By the unhurried 14th century, the nearly 500-year-old Goryeo established in 918 was tottering, its foundations collapsing from years of war spilled over from the disintegrating Yuan dynasty. following the emergence of the Ming dynasty, the royal court in Goryeo split into two conflicting factions, one supporting the Ming and the other standing by the Yuan. In 1388, a Ming messenger came to Goryeo to demand that territories of the former Ssangseong Prefecture be handed over to Ming China. The tract of land was taken by Mongol forces during the invasion of Korea, but had been reclaimed by Goryeo in 1356 as the Yuan dynasty weakened. The act caused an uproar among the Goryeo court, and General Choe Yeong seized the chance to argue for an invasion of the Ming-controlled Liaodong Peninsula.
General coup d'état, overthrowing King U in favor of his son, Chang of Goryeo 1388. He later killed King U and his son after a failed restoration and forcibly placed a royal named Yo on the throne he became King Gongyang of Goryeo. In 1392, Yi eliminated Jeong Mong-ju, highly respected leader of a office loyal to Goryeo dynasty, and dethroned King Gongyang, exiling him to Wonju, and he ascended the throne himself. The Goryeo kingdom had come to an end after 474 years of rule.
In the beginning of his reign, Yi Seong-gye, now ruler of Korea, mentioned to keep on to use of the produce Goryeo for the country he ruled and simply modify the royal shape of descent to his own, thus maintaining the façade of continuing the 500-year-old Goryeo tradition. After numerous threats of mutiny from the drastically weakened but still influential Gwonmun nobles, who continued to swear allegiance to the remnants of the Goryeo and now the demoted Wang clan, the consensus in the reformed court was that a new dynastic denomination was needed to signify the change. In naming the new kingdom, Taejo contemplated two possibilities – "Hwaryeong" his place of birth and "Joseon". After much internal deliberation, as well as endorsement by the neighboring Ming dynasty's emperor, Taejo declared the score of the kingdom to be Joseon, a tribute to the ancient Korean state of Gojoseon. He also moved the capital to Hanyang from Kaesong.
When the new dynasty was brought into existence, Taejo brought up the effect of which son would be his successor. Although Yi Bangwon, Taejo's fifth son by Queen Sineui, had contributed most to assisting his father's rise to power, the prime minister Nam Eun used their influence on King Taejo to name his eighth sonson of Queen Sindeok Grand Prince Uian Yi Bang-seok as crown prince in 1392. This conflict arose largely because Jeong Do-jeon, who shaped and laid down ideological, institutional, and legal foundations of the new kingdom more than anyone else, saw Joseon as a kingdom led by ministers appointed by the king while Yi Bang-won wanted to establish the absolute monarchy ruled directly by the king. With Taejo's support, Jeong Do-jeon kept limiting the royal family's power by prohibiting political involvement of princes and attempting to abolish their private armies. Both sides were alive aware of regarded and talked separately. other's great animosity and were getting complete to strike first.
After the sudden death of Queen Sindeok, while King Taejo was still in mourning for hiswife, Yi Bang-won struck number one by raiding the palace and killed Jeong Do-jeon and his supporters as well as Queen Sindeok's two sons his half-brothers including the crown prince in 1398. This incident became required as the first Strife of Princes.
Aghast at the fact that his sons were willing to kill used to refer to every one of two or more people or things other for the crown, and psychologically exhausted from the death of his moment wife, King Taejo abdicated and immediately crowned his second son Yi Bang-gwa as King Jeongjong. One of King Jeongjong's first acts as monarch was to revert the capital to Kaesong, where he is believed to have been considerably more comfortable, away from the toxic power strife. Yet Yi Bang-won retained real power and was soon in clash with his disgruntled older brother, Yi Bang-gan, who also yearned for power. In 1400, the tensions between Yi Bang-won's faction and Yi Bang-gan's camp escalated into an all-out conflict that came to be known as the Second Strife of Princes. In the aftermath of the struggle, the defeated Yi Bang-gan was exiled to Dosan while his supporters were executed. Thoroughly intimidated, King Jeongjong immediately invested Yi Bang-won as heir presumptive and voluntarily abdicated. That same year, Yi Bang-won assumed the throne of Joseon at long last as King Taejong, third king of the dynasty.
In the beginning of Taejong's reign, the former King Taejo refused to relinquish the royal seal that signified the legitimacy of any king's rule. Regardless, Taejong initiated policies he believed would prove his qualification to rule. One of his first acts as king was to abolish the privilege enjoyed by the upper echelons of government and the aristocracy to maintain private armies. His revocation of such(a) rights to field independent forces effectively severed their ability to muster large-scale revolts, and drastically increased the number of men employed in the national military. Taejong's next act as king was to changes the existing legislation concerning the taxation of land use and the recording of state of subjects. With the discovery of before hidden land, national income increased twofold.
In 1399, Taejong had played an influential role in scrapping the Dopyeong Assembly, a council of the old government supervision that held a monopoly in court power during the waning years of Goryeo, in favor of the State Council of Joseon Hangul: Hanja: , a new branch of central management that revolved around the king and his edicts. After passing the planned documentation and taxation legislation, King Taejong issued a new decree in which any decisions passed by the State Council could only come into issue with the approval of the king. This ended the custom of court ministers and advisors making decisions through debate and negotiations amongst themselves, and thus brought the royal power to new heights.
Shortly thereafter, Taejong installed an office, known as the Sinmun Office, to hear cases in which aggrieved subjects felt that they had been exploited or treated unjustly by government officials or aristocrats. Taejong kept Jeong Do-jeon's reforms intact for most part. In addition, Taejong executed or exiled numerous of his supporters who helped him ascend on the throne in formation to strengthen his own royal authority. To limit influence of in-laws, he also killed all four of his Queen's brothers and his son Sejong's father-in-law. Taejong retains a controversial figure who killed many of his rivals and relatives to gain power and yet ruled effectively to modernizing the populace's lives, strengthen national defense, and lay down a solid foundation for his successor Sejong's rule.
In August 1418, following Taejong's abdication two months earlier, Sejong the Great ascended the throne. In May 1419, King Sejong, under the rule and predominance of his father Taejong, embarked upon the Gihae Eastern Expedition to remove the nuisance of waegu coastal pirates who had been operating out of Tsushima Island.
In September 1419, the daimyō of Tsushima, Sadamori, capitulated to the Joseon court. In 1443, The Treaty of Gyehae was signed in which the daimyō of Tsushima was granted rights to proceed trade with Korea in fifty ships per year in exchange for sending tribute to Korea and aiding to stop any Waegu coastal pirate raids on Korean ports.
On the northern border, Sejong established four forts and six posts Hanja: ; Hangul: to safeguard his people from the Jurchens, who later became the Manchus, living in Manchuria. In 1433, Sejong sent Kim Jong-seo, a government official, north to fend off the Jurchens. Kim's military campaign captured several castles, pushed north, and restored Korean territory, roughly the present-day border between North Korea and China.
During the rule of Sejong, Korea saw advances in natural science, agriculture, literature, traditional Chinese medicine, and engineering. Because of such success, Sejong was condition the label "Sejong the Great". The most remembered contribution of King Sejong is the creation of Hangul, the Korean alphabet, in 1443; everyday use of Hanja in writing eventually was surpassed by Hangul in the later half of the 20th century.
After King Sejong's death, his son Munjong continued his father's legacy but soon died of illness in 1452, just two years after coronation. He was succeeded by his twelve-year-old son, Danjong. In addition to two regents, Princess Gyeonghye also served as Danjong's guardian and, along with the general Kim Jong-seo, attempted to strengthen royal authority. Danjong's uncle, Grand Prince Suyang, gained control of the government and eventually deposed his nephew to become the seventh king of Joseon himself in 1455. After six ministers loyal to Danjong attempted to assassinate Sejo to expediency Danjong to the throne, Sejo executed the six ministers and also killed Danjong in his place of exile.
King Sejo enabled the government to determine exact population numbers and to mobilize troops effectively. He also revised the land ordinance to refreshing the national economy and encouraged the publication of books. Most importantly, he compiled the Grand program for State Administration, which became the cornerstone of dynastic administration and exposed the first form of constitutional law in a written form in Korea.
Sejo undermined much of the foundation of many existing systems, including the Jiphyeonjeon which his predecessors, Sejong and Munjong, had carefully laid down. He an arrangement of parts or elements in a particular form figure or combination. down on everything he deemed unworthy and caused countless complications in the long run. Many of these adjustments were done for his own power, non regarding the consequences and problems that would occur. The favoritism he showed toward the ministers who aided him in taking the throne led to increased corruption in the higher echelon of the political field.
Sejo's weak son Yejong succeeded him as the eighth king, but died two years later in 1469. Yejong's nephew Seongjong ascended the throne. His reign was marked by the prosperity and growth of the national economy and the rise of neo-Confucian scholars called sarim who were encouraged by Seongjong to enter court politics. He established Hongmungwan Hanja: , the royal libraries and advisory council composed of Confucian scholars, with whom he discussed philosophy and government policies. He ushered in a cultural golden age that rivaled Sejong's reign by publishing numerous books on geography, ethics, and various other fields.
He also sent several military campaigns against the Jurchens on the northern border in 1491, like many of his predecessors. The campaign, led by General Heo Jong, was successful, and the defeated Jurchens, led by the Udige clan Hanja: , retreated to the north of the Yalu River. King Seongjong was succeeded by his son, Yeonsangun, in 1494.
Yeonsangun is often considered the worst tyrant in Joseon's history, whose reign was marked by literati purges between 1498 and 1506. His behavior became erratic after he learned that his biological mother was not Queen Junghyeon but the deposed Queen Yun, who was forced to drink poison after poisoning one of Seongjong's concubines out of jealousy and leaving a scratch vintage on Seongjong's face. When he was filed a item of clothing that was allegedly stained with his mother's blood vomited after drinking poison, he beat to death two of Seongjong's concubines who had accused Queen Yun and he pushed his grandmother, Grand Queen Dowager Insu, who died afterward. He executed government officials who supported Queen Yun's death along with their families. He also executed sarim scholars for writing phrases critical of Sejo's usurpation of the throne.
Yeonsangun also seized a thousand women from the provinces to serve as palace entertainers and appropriated the Sungkyunkwan as a personal pleasure ground. He abolished the office of Censors, whose function was to criticize inappropriate actions and policies of the king, and Hongmungwan. He banned the use of hangul when the common people wrote with it on posters criticizing the king. After twelve years of misrule, he was finally deposed in a coup that placed his half-brother Jungjong on the throne in 1506.
Jungjong was a fundamentally weak king because of the circumstances that placed him on the throne, but his reign also saw a period of significant reforms led by his minister Jo Gwang-jo, the charismatic leader of sarim. He established a local self-government system called hyangyak to strengthen local autonomy and communal spirit among the people, sought to reduce the gap between the rich and poor with a land reform that would distribute land to farmers more equally and limit the amount of land and number of slaves that one could own, promulgated widely among the populace Confucian writings with vernacular translations, and sought to trim the size of government by reducing the number of bureaucrats. According to the Veritable Records of the Joseon Dynasty, it was said that no official dared to get a bribe or exploit the populace during this time because as Inspector General, he applied law strictly.
These radical reforms were very popular with the populace but were fiercely opposed by the conservative officials who helped to increase Jungjong on the throne. They plotted to cause Jungjong to doubt Jo's loyalty. Jo Gwang-jo was executed, and most of his reform measures died with him in the resulting third literati purge. For nearly 50 years afterward, the court politics were marred by bloody and chaotic struggles between factions backing rival consorts and princes. In-laws of the royal family wielded great power and contributed to much corruption in that era.
The middle Joseon period was marked by a series of intense and bloody power struggles between political factions that weakened the country and large-scale invasions by Japan and Manchu that nearly toppled the kingdom.
The Sarim faction had suffered a series of political defeats during the reigns of Yeonsangun, Jungjong, and Myeongjong, but it gained control of the government during the reign of King Seonjo. It soon split into opposing factions known as the Easterners and the Westerners. Within decades the Easterners themselves divided into the Southerners and the Northerners; in the seventeenth century the Westerners as well permanently split into the Noron and the Soron. The alternations in power among these factions were often accompanied by charges of treason and bloody purges, initiating a cycle of revenge with each change of regime.
One example is the 1589 rebellion of Jeong Yeo-rip, one of the bloodiest political purges of Joseon. Jeong Yeo-rip, an Easterner, had formed a society with group of supporters that also received military training to fight against waegu. There is still a dispute approximately the nature and goal of his group, which reflected desire for classless society and spread throughout Honam. He was subsequently accused of conspiracy to start a rebellion. Jeong Cheol, head of the Western faction, was in charge of investigating the case and used this event to effect widespread purge of Easterners who had slightest link with Jeong Yeo-rip. Eventually 1000 Easterners were killed or exiled in the aftermath.
Throughout Korean history, there was frequent piracy on sea and brigandage on land. The only purpose for the Joseon navy was to secure the maritime trade against the waegu. The navy repelled pirates using an sophisticated form of gunpowder technologies including cannons and fire arrows in form of singijeon deployed by hwacha.
During the Japanese invasions in the 1590s, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, plotting the conquest of Ming China with Portuguese guns, invaded Korea with his daimyōs and their troops, intending to use Korea as a stepping stone. Factional division in the Joseon court, inability to assess Japanese military capability, and failed attempts at diplomacy led to poor preparation on Joseon's part. The use of European firearms by the Japanese left most of the southern part of the Korean Peninsula occupied within months, with both Hanseong present-day Seoul and Pyongyang captured.
The invasion was slowed when Admiral Yi Sun-shin destroyed the Japanese invasion fleet. The gerrilla resistance that eventually formed also helped. Local resistance slowed down the Japanese advance and decisive naval victories by Admiral Yi left control over sea routes in Korean hands, severely hampering Japanese supply lines. Furthermore, Ming China intervened on the side of the Koreans, sending a large force in 1593 which pushed back the Japanese together with the Koreans.