A History of Korea (17 page)

From early on, continuous waves of Korean settlers established the economic, political, and military foundations of the new state in Japan. At first, the small Kaya kingdoms provided Japan with people and a new civilization. Silla’s annexation of Tae Kaya, or Imna, in 562 caused more people and materials to flow into Japan. During the period when the Kaya kingdoms frequently contacted Japan, Paekche also had close ties with the Japanese. After Tae Kaya fell, Paekche emerged as Japan’s main source of new people, scholarship, technology, and arts, and introduced Confucian classics and Buddhism to the Japanese people. The Japanese welcomed and encouraged the newcomers from Paekche, granting them high-level posts in the government, social standing, and opportunities to amass wealth. Such encouragement and special treatment resulted in a flood of immigrants from Paekche to Japan. Many Paekche scholars, artists, and craftsmen migrated to Japan, seeking safety from the never-ending warfare on the Korean peninsula and responding to the Japanese government’s welcome. Some of the immigrants were members of the royalty and the aristocracy. Overall these people of Paekche became powerful forces in Japanese society.
¹⁴

The Aya, Hata, and Soga households, all immigrants from Paekche, wielded great influence in Japanese politics between the fourth and seventh centuries. The Hata household lent financial support to the Japanese “Emperor” Kammu (or Kanmu [781–806]) when he transferred Japan’s capital from Nara to Heian in 794. The Soga household practically dominated Japan for 100 years, from the sixth through the seventh century. A member of the family, Soga Noumako, built Asuka-ji (temple), the oldest Japanese temple, in the late sixth century.

From the fourth century on, the Paekche royal household forged a marriage alliance with the Japanese royal household. Paekche crown princes often went to Japan to get married to Japanese princesses. And Paekche princesses, who went to Japan, gave birth to Japanese crown princes. Accordingly, the two royal households had a shared blood inheritance. Three Paekche kings, King Ch
ŏ
nji (405–420), King Tongs
ŏ
ng (479–501), and King Mury
ŏ
ng (501–523), were born in Japan or returned home after a long stay there. The Paekche prince Ajwa painted the portrait of the Japanese crown prince Shotoku in 597, and the mother of the Japanese “Emperor” Kammu is known to have been a Paekche princess.
¹⁵
As the two states were on intimate terms, it was quite natural that Japan aided Paekche militarily at crucial moments.

Among the many Paekche people who contributed to the development of Japanese culture, the most noteworthy were the scholars Ajikki and Wang In, who introduced, in Japan, the Confucian classic
Lunyu
and
Ch’
ŏ
njamun,
or Thousand-Character Text. They tutored Crown Prince Shotoku, who established a new government structure modeled on the government of Paekche and promulgated a code of laws. Other contributions include the introduction of Buddhism by the Paekche monk Norisach’igye in 538 and the construction of magnificent temples such as Horyu-ji by the Paekche people. Sculptures produced by Koreans and preserved in these Buddhist temples are the finest art creations in Japan of any age. Paekche so influenced Japan that Japanese culture of the sixth and seventh centuries might be considered an extension of Paekche culture. The great influence Paekche had on Japan led the early Japanese people to call the Korean kingdom
Kudara,
meaning “bear,” which was an alteration of the Korean word
Ku-nara
or
K’
ŭ
n-nara,
meaning “home country” or “great country.”
¹⁶

Kogury
ŏ
and Silla also transmitted their advanced culture to Japan. The Kogury
ŏ
monk Tamjing, for instance, painted the murals at the Horyu-ji temple in 610, and monk Hyeja became Crown Prince Shotoku’s mentor. Although Silla was on bad terms with Japan, it transmitted the arts of fortification, shipbuilding, and medicine to Japan, as well as Buddhist statues and music.

The three Korean kingdoms each provided Japan with their people and civilization in different ways. These developments were recorded in the oldest Japanese history books, the
Nihon shogi,
compiled in 720, and the
Kojigi,
or Record of Ancient Matters, which appeared in 712. In a word, Koreans of the Three Kingdoms played a beneficial role in ancient Japan’s development.

Some Japanese historians have falsely argued that from the late fourth to the mid-seventh century, the Yamato government extended its control to Paekche, Silla, and Kaya, and established the “Nihon-fu” in Imna (Kaya). The mention of the “Nihon-fu” was quoted in the history book
Nihon shogi,
which recorded that, in 369, Japanese forces occupied seven states and four towns on the Korean peninsula, creating the “Nihon-fu” at Mimana (Imna). The book also noted that Imna fell to Silla in 562. According to
Nihon shogi,
Japan ruled the southern part of the Korean peninsula for some 200 years, from 369 to 562, and the “Nihon-fu” was established as a mechanism for Japan’s colonial rule in Korea.

But
Nihon shogi
essentially lacks historical reliability. Records in the history book before the fifth century are usually regarded as mythic legend. During the eighth century, when
Nihon Shogi
was written, Japan was in an inferior position in East Asia. To enhance Japan’s national image, Japanese historians at the time inserted fictitious tales, including the story of the Japanese conquest of the southern part of the Korean peninsula and the establishment of the “Nihon-fu.” First of all, the term “Nihon-fu” is invalid, as the name “Nihon” (Japan) first appeared in the seventh century. Furthermore,
Nihon shogi
did not describe its function, nor did it indicate that it was a governing body. Also, extensive Korean history texts, such as
Samguk sagi
and
Samguk yusa,
make no mention of a Japanese governing body anywhere on the Korean peninsula. If there were an important Japanese government office and military forces ruling Paekche, Silla, and Kaya, there should have been lengthy descriptions of it in these Korean historical works.
¹⁷

To demonstrate an ancient Japanese conquest of Korea, Japan’s nationalist historians have interpreted the inscription on the stone monument of the Kogury
ŏ
king Kwanggaet’o as describing a Japanese invasion in the southern portion of the Korean peninsula. The inscription was partially destroyed and was incomplete, and thus these historians have interpreted it to say that the Wae Japanese came over by sea, conquered “something” (which cannot be read but was assumed to be Paekche and Silla), and made them subjects of “something”
(which also cannot be read but was assumed to be Japan). The contents relating to Japan in the inscription are generally regarded as fiction or exaggeration. In fact, Kogury
ŏ
appears to have fabricated a Japanese invasion to justify its conquest of Paekche.

In reality, there was no Japanese conquest of Korea at that time. When the Japanese Yamato state was just beginning to consolidate its new territory in the Kinki region of Japan, the Three Kingdoms of Korea were already fully developed, centralized powers. Even Kaya (Imna) had far more advanced culture and technology than the Japanese state. It is highly unlikely that a developing state, such as Yamato, had sufficient military power to conquer Kaya or any other part of Korea. There is absolutely no evidence to support the Japanese historians’ contention. Historical evidence shows that the Japanese forces who came to the Korean peninsula were mercenaries employed by Kaya. The people of Kaya strengthened their national defense by reinforcing their insufficient military force with Japanese soldiers whom Kaya obtained in return for its export of iron to Japan. It is true that many Kaya people migrated to Japan for a new life, and they could have maintained an official diplomatic mission or a trade center in Imna. But if Japan had a strong enough military force to have conquered Paekche and Silla, Imna would not have been so easily annexed into Silla in 562. Moreover, the “Nihon-fu” story was written for the first time in 720, nearly 200 years after Imna was annexed by Silla, and therefore it has no historical value. Even many Japanese historians dismiss the “Nihon-fu” theory as false, and in March 2010 historians from both South Korea and Japan agreed that it was false.
¹⁸

The long-simmering and recent controversy over whether the ethnically Korean kingdom of Kogury
ŏ
was historically Korean or historically part of China has angered Koreans who have considered Kogury
ŏ
a source of national pride. Because the ancient kingdom has always remained a proud legacy of Korean history, Koreans have accused China of “hijacking” their history.

In 2004 the Chinese declared that the Kogury
ŏ
kingdom actually belonged to the Chinese Middle Kingdom. This claim emerged from China’s “Northeastern Project,” a state-funded program conducted by the Center for Chinese Borderland History and Geography, which was based on the belief that the
histories of all ethnic groups that live or once lived within the present national border are part of China’s legacy. This dispute between South Korea and China dates back to 2002, when China launched the five-year Northeastern Project to review the history of its northeastern region of Manchuria. Two years later, in 2004, the wrangling between the two countries was the worst it had ever been since they had normalized diplomatic ties in 1992. The flare-up arose when China registered certain Kogury
ŏ
relics with the World Heritage website, claiming they had been found in Chinese territory. Moreover, the name Kogury
ŏ
was found to have been deleted from the Korean history section on the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s Internet homepage. After the South Korean government, academia, and political groups strongly protested the Chinese move, the two nations verbally agreed, in August 2004, not to allow the row to damage their ties. But the dispute over history between South Korea and China resurfaced in September 2006 with the revelation that China had posted a blueprint of its controversial geo-historical project that allegedly rewrote Korea’s history. China has continued its history project and still refuses to recognize that the Kogury
ŏ
kingdom is part of Korea’s heritage. Kogury
ŏ
seems destined to join Taiwan, Tibet, and Mongolia on a long list of disputes involving territories on China’s periphery.

The Chinese unreasonably see Kogury
ŏ
as a Chinese state, more precisely as a Chinese provincial government rather than a sovereign Korean kingdom. To make the Kogury
ŏ
kingdom historically part of China, or to “own” the historical heritage of Kogury
ŏ
, Chinese historians argue that the people of Kogury
ŏ
were actually Chinese, thus denying Koreans any link whatsoever with Kogury
ŏ
. But Koreans, with considerable historical justification, claim that Kogury
ŏ
was a predecessor state of modern Korea with no ethnic links or political subordination to China. The people who established Kogury
ŏ
were the Yemaek people, who were quite different from the Chinese. These people originally lived in Manchuria and the northern part of the Korean peninsula far from China proper.

Chinese historians also maintain that Kogury
ŏ
was a Chinese state because it developed from the Han Chinese commandery of Hy
ŏ
ndo (Xuantu in Chinese) and because Kogury
ŏ
kings accepted investiture from Chinese emperors. In their eyes, Kogury
ŏ
at first emerged as a tribal state in the Hy
ŏ
ndo Commandery and later was raised to the status of a provincial regime belonging to the Chinese commandery. Historically Chinese dynasties diplomatically invested rulers of neighboring states with the kingship. Chinese historians emphasize
that Kogury
ŏ
kings paid tribute to Chinese emperors and were invested with the kingship. In other words, investiture of Kogury
ŏ
kings implies that they ruled the people in the Kogury
ŏ
region on behalf of Chinese dynasties. But the Chinese misinterpret the system of tribute and investiture as simply the internal political structure between the central government and provincial officials. The institution was only one of the diplomatic forms existing between Kogury
ŏ
and China. Historical records demonstrate that Kogury
ŏ
ruled itself independent of Chinese influence. If the Chinese view is justified, then Paekche, Silla, and Japan, as well as Kogury
ŏ
, must all be part of China, as all those nations had a relationship of tribute and investiture with China.

Finally, Chinese historians argue that the history of Kogury
ŏ
should be part of Chinese history because, after Kogury
ŏ
’s downfall, many of its people went over to Tang China and were assimilated by the Chinese. Actually, at the time, many Kogury
ŏ
people were sent to Tang against their will, but many more other displaced people migrated to Silla, merging into the mainstream of Korean history. Later, another Korean kingdom, that of Parhae, received most of the Kogury
ŏ
population.

Today, many Kogury
ŏ
customs remain in some form in Korean culture. Indeed, the name “Korea” has its roots in the word “Kory
ŏ
” which in turn is derived from “Kogury
ŏ
.” Kory
ŏ
is actually the more correct term for Kogury
ŏ
, as Kogury
ŏ
is mainly referred to as Kory
ŏ
in most Chinese and Japanese historical texts. The very founding of Kory
ŏ
was based on the fact that it was the descendant state of Kogury
ŏ
, which is why it adopted the name Kory
ŏ
. The view that Kogury
ŏ
was Chinese contradicts the Chinese historical records of the past Chinese dynasties. In short, Chinese arguments that Kogury
ŏ
was one of the minorities of ancient China and was merely a dependent regional authority of China are all groundless, full of distortions of historical facts.