Joseon - Part 1

-1392- King Taejo founds the Kingdom of Joseon, named after the ancient Korean kingdom of "(Old) Joseon" (Gojoseon).  This followed the trend of renaming kingdoms after past kingdoms for legitimacy (like Goryeo and Gogoryeo).
   -Ruled also by a Neo-Confucian court.
   -However, King Taejo was old and still injured from his horse accident, so in order to maintain stability he replaced corrupt elite officials with strict technocrats who had performed well on the civil service exam.
      -These were essentially people who were aligned with King Taejo's ideological revolution.
      -Also, King Taejo was still indebted to allies who had supported him during the war effort, and unfortunately these people were granted positions based on loyalty instead of merit.
-Meanwhile, the Ming dynasty were pissed off.  How is it that the Koreans could just all of a sudden declare themselves a new kingdom without the approval of the Ming emperor??
   -Luckily, King Taejo was able to smooth things over with the Ming court, and pledged loyalty to the Ming dynasty.
-King Taejo also wanted to move the capital from Gaeseong, but he couldn't decide on Pyeongyang or Seoul.
   -Ming also moved their capital from Beijing to Nanjing.
   -King Taejo finally decided on Seoul- nicer weather, closer to agricultural land, safer, and a good spot according to Korean geomancy.
      -However, King Taejo ignored some advice to build the palace in a sacred way, which horrified the geomancers.
      -One problem also was that Seoul was designated as an administrative center, but not a cultural center, so it was kind of a boring place.
-To recognize the creation of this new kingdom, envoys were sent from many other neighboring countries, including the Ayutthaya Kingdom (Siam/Thailand), the Majapahit Empire (Indonesia), and the Ryukyu Kingdom (Ryukyu Islands).
-Joseon also began to work closely with the Ashikaga shogunate (Japan) to crack down the waegu.
-Joseon ambassadors were also able to pacify the northern Jurchen hordes who lived in Joseon territory, and were able to assimilate them into the kingdom.
-However, there was still a problem with the monks.
   -They had too much power, and were completely revered by the common folk, and acted as local lords over their region of influence.  They were very different form the Korean Buddhist monks of today.  Back in the day, these monks even had slaves who worked while the monks partied it up!
     -King Taejo began to undermine their power by declaring the revival of an old law- that all grandchildren of slaves are to be considered free.
-Prime minister Jeong Dojeon was the social architect for this new society, and a strict Neo-Confucian.  He believed that a righteous king ruled by having all of the power, but should still spend most of his time participating in Confucian rituals and delegating power to his courtiers.  The king must also study the Chinese classics and constantly engage in intellectual sparring with his ministers.
   -We actually have excellent records of the Joseon dynasty due to the numerous historical chroniclers and their epic compilation "The Annals of the Joseon Dynasty".
-One big problem though- King Taejo had 8 sons among 2 different queens.
   -Immediately there was a struggle for power, and even Prime Minister Jeong Dojeon was killed in the fighting.
      -Most of the fighting was between the clans of the two queens (Gang and Han).
      -A melee broke out in the streets and some of the people were killed.  Finally, to end the violence, King Taejo named Prince Yi Bang-gwa (King Jeongjong) as heir, and retired to his royal villa in Hamhung, officially abdicating.  However, he did return to the city as adviser sometimes.
-King Jeongjong was enthroned in 1398, although there was still a lot of family drama, including attempted coups and other crapola.
   -He immediately declared that all private militias controlled by elite lords must be given over to the crown in order to consolidate power, which of course resulted in a revolt (that was quickly squashed).  However, because of this, the aristocracy was crippled.
-1400- finally, as a result of the fighting and the fact that King Jeongjong was not a strong, driven ruler, he also abdicated (like his father) the throne.
   -He was replaced by his younger brother, Yi Bangwon (King Taejong), who was much more charismatic and powerful.  

Goryeo - Part 10

-King Woo knew that General Yi was on the march.
   -He wanted to raise a force to fight him off, but he didn't have enough men and was advised to fortify Gaeseong instead.
   -Gneral Yi then led an army to Gaeseong and besieged it.  The defenders soon gave up, and General Yi took over the city.  Then he gave King Woo a speech about how his advisors were shitty and that Goryeo should swear fealty to the Ming dynasty.
-King Woo stupidly tried to have General Yi assassinated by a gang of eunuchs (?), but this failed.
   -Finally, General Yi and his men came to the conclusion that King Woo that was the illegitimate king and was secretly the monk Shin Don's son, so King Woo was banished to go retired in obscurity at Ganghwa Island.
-Meanwhile, there were those who believed that General Yi was an usurper, and wanted King Woo's son, Chang, to be king.
   -General Yi relented and allowed the son to be king, even if maybe he wasn't royal blood (King Woo was illegitimate, after all).
   -So, King Chang of Goryeo was enthroned in 1388 at the age of 7.  Of course, General Yi had all the power.
      -Land reforms were introduced with the peasants and shit.
      -General Yi also wanted to crack down on the power of the nobility, so he took all of the land deeds of the nobility and burned them!  Thus, the aristocracy's power was completely wiped out.
      -General Yi then enforced mandatory military conscription.
-The Hongwu Emperor of the Ming dynasty thought it was really dumb that an illegitimate king's son was allowed to be the new king of Goryeo, and this really pissed him off.
-Meanwhile, General Yi wanted to crack down on the waegu.  He sent a huge fleet to Tsushima Island (their HQ) and fucked them up badly.
-In order to appease Hongwu Emperor, King Chang was sent off to live in exile at Ganghwa Island with his dad.
-King Gongyang, a distant relative of King Sinjong, was enthroned in 1389.  This was the final king of Goryeo!
   -A puppet of General Yi, he sent assassins to kill the two previous kings (King Woo and King Chang) to make sure they wouldn't try to usurp the throne later.
-At some point though, General Yi had an accident and fell from his horse, and while he was recovering, his enemies in the court took the opportunity to stage a coup and get rid of his main supporters based on trumped-up charges.
   -General Yi was still weak, but he was able to get out of bed and stop the purge.
      -He assassinated the opposition leader, a dude named Jong Mong-ju who was a renowned scholar and official, loyal to the former kings.
      -He then forced King Gongyang to sign a document saying that essentially he and the king are equal and wouldn't work against each other.
-1392, King Gongyang stepped down because he had no supporters, no power, and was clearly just a puppet.  This made him not want to be king anymore, so he resigned and went off to live near the East Sea, where he soon died in 1394.
   -THIS WAS THE END OF THE GORYEO DYNASTY.
-August 1392- General Yi took the throne in Gaeseong, and crowned himself King Taejo of Joseon.

Goryeo - Part 9

-1339- King Chunghye takes the throne, but there were those who wished to see him dethroned.  2 factions formed between the conspirators and loyalists, culminating in a street battle outside the royal palace.  Although the king was injured, the conspirators were beaten and their leader was beheaded.
   -However, one of the conspirators was a good friend with Emperor Toghon Temür of the Yuan dynasty, so he fled to him to try and draw the emperor onto their side.
      -Toghon Temür then summoned King Chunghye to his court to answer for WTF was going on exactly in Goryeo.  He then decreed that all Goryeo citizens must disarm and were not allowed to ride horses (!).
         -After this, King Chughye was acknowledged officially as King of Goryeo by the Yuan dynasty.
-1340- King Chunghye was a debauched monster.  He took a Goryeo noblewoman, Princess Deongnyeong, as his wife (instead of a Yuan princess).  However, he also kept a huge harem of women in "sewing rooms", and even went so far as to start banging the concubines of his father, King Chungsuk.
   -Heavily taxed the large rural estates owned by the nobility, as well as their industries, and spent all the money on himself instead of infrastructure.
   -Loved spending his time throwing a wooden ball at targets, especially human targets.
   -Would sometimes also go into people's houses at night and rape.
      -King Chunghye was such a piece of shit that many fled the city and/or became monks.
         -Many of these expats ended up in the town of Shenyang in China.
   -The poor were miserable, and suicide was common.
-1343- Toghon Temür finally heard about how fucked up Goryeo was at this time, and summoned King Chunghye to his imperial court at Dadu (modern-day Beijing).
   -The Yuan ambassador to Goryeo then rounded up King Chunghye's inner circle and arrested them, along with the king.  He then imprisoned King Chunghye in a box and sent him to Dadu, where he was to be scolded by Toghon Temür, strapped to a wooden board, and exiled.  At some point in all of this, of course, King Chunghye died.
-1344- King Chungmok, son of King Chunghye, was enthroned.
   -He was only a boy, so a Yuan regent was the one who really called all the shots.
-1348- King Chungmok died suddenly, and is replaced by his younger brother (still a boy), King Chungjeong.
   -During this time, the "waegu" ("Japanese/dwarf pirates") became a bad problem.
      -Although for a long time it was believed that they were only from Japan, it's entirely possible that they were not just Japanese, but also Korean (from outlying islands), Chinese, mixed ethnicity, etc.  Whatever they were, they were definitely bad actors.
-1351- King Chungjeong sucked, so Toghon Temür dethroned him and replaced him with King Chunghye's brother, King Gongmin (who had been held hostage in Dadu).
   -King Gongmin was also a painter, a romantic, and actually loved his wife!  However, it may have just been a platonic love, as King Gongmin apparently loved having sex with little boys, as he kept several court catamites around for sex.
   -During this time, the people of Goryeo began to seriously question why they were still a part of the Yuan dynasty, especially since it was clear that their Mongol overlords had lost the Mandate of Heaven.
      -Secret societies and cults began to pop up all over the kingdom, such as the White Lotus (based out of China).
         -The White Lotus actually started a rebellion in northern China.  These rebels became known as the Red Turbans.
-1355- The Red Turbans capture Nanjing, and then their ideology begins to shift from Buddhism to Neo-Confucianism.
   -Soon, all of China begins to get really rebellious.
   -During this time also, King Gongmin was having problems with both the waegu AND Red Turbans.
-1356- The Red Turban army begins to attack Dadu!  The Yuan dynasty actually desperately asks Goryeo for help.
   -King Gongmin sent troops to help fight off the Red Turbans, but many believe that this is dumb.
-1356- King Gongmin finally agrees that the Yuan dynasty is fucked, so he decides to go and retake the lands in North Korea that were once a part of the Chinese commanderies but still directly under the control of the Yuan dynasty still.
   -The Yuan troops were driven out, and now all of the Korean peninsula and traditional "Korean" lands were back under Goryeo control.
-1358- Meanwhile, the waegu raids are still getting worse.
-During this time, many citizens of the Yuan dynasty realized that the Yuan were fucked, so they began to defect to Goryeo lands.
   -Other forces, such as non-Red Turban rebels in the Yuan dynasty and random barbarian hordes in the north started to send gifts and tribute to King Gongmin.  It was obvious that in northeast Asia, Goryeo was to fill part of the power vacuum that would occur once the Yuan dynasty fell.
-1359- The Red Turbans begin to move into the Liaodong Peninsula and attack Goryeo!
   -Goryeo was able to eventually repel the Red Turban army, but soon a Red Turban naval fleet landed inside the kingdom and began to raid!
   -Also, the waegu were so bad at this point that they were a direct threat to Goryeo's capital, Gaeseong.  The court had to move to Seoul, which was easier to defend.
      -Goryeo also set up conscriptions, called "smoke house soldiers", because they enslisted men from any house that had smoke coming out of it.
-1361- The Red Turban army returned, this time with the explicit purpose of conquering Goryeo!  Goryeo was still able to defend themselves adequately, however.
   -Also during this time, the Yuan dynasty tried to get King Gongmin off the throne, but they were too weak to actually get this done.  They were able, however, to get the governor of Jeju Island to rebel!
-1364- Toghon Temür then sent 10,000 soldiers to remove King Gongmin from power.
   -Meanwhile, the Jurchen were back and on the rise!
      -They had been run out of NE Asia when the Jin dynasty had collapsed (they had fled to maybe Kamchatka or Siberia for a century or so), but now they were back!  Goryeo would end up having to deal with them soon, but for now they had to worry about the incoming Yuan troops.
         -Goryeo was strong enough at this point to repel the Yuan army, and then as a victory lap they went north and kicked the Jurchens' asses as well!  However, the reason for this may have been because the general was trying to avoid going back to the Goryeo royal court, as he didn't wish to "outshine" the king.
-1365- Queen Noguk dies with a huge, elaborate funeral.
   -Soon after this, King Gongmin began to have nightmares and maybe grew paranoid about his own mortality, so he befriended a hard-drinking, hard-partying monk named Shin Don that he supposedly envisioned saving his life in one of his dreams or something.
      -King Gongmin then just went nuts and started banging young boys and shit, and Shin Don was able to accumulate lots of power (and a harem of women, of course) in the royal court.  King Gongmin just kind of resigned himself to only participating in Buddhist rituals, and Shin Don did everything else.
-1367- Goryeo attempts to recapture Jeju-do, as it was no longer able to be protected by the Yuan dynasty.
-1368- The Yuan dynasty finally collapses, as Dadu was besieged by the Red Turbans armies.  Toghun Temür soon died while on the run in Inner Mongolia.
   -The warrior monk who had led the Red Turbans, Zhu Yuanzhang, crowned himself Emperor of China, kicking off the Ming dynasty!
   -At the same time, the Japanese tried to establish a peace treaty with Goryeo.  Goryeo could have used this as an opportunity to get the Japanese to crack down on their pirates, but Shin Don was an asshole to the Japanese ambassador and treated him badly.
      -Shin Don then began to fill the ranks of the government with his own cronies.
   -Luckily for Goryeo, King Gongmin was still able to establish good relations with the Ming dynasty during this time.
-1370- Goryeo began to expand its territory in the north, invading the land held by Jurchens and Yuan rebels.
   -There was a power vacuum in Manchuria due to the collapse of the Yuan dynasty, and the Ming dynasty hadn't pacified the region yet.
   -During this time also, Shin Don tried to stage a coup to dethrone King Gongmin!  But this failed, and, as a result, King Gongmin had Shin Don executed.
-Now that Shin Don was gone, King Gongmin was finally back in power.  The Yuan dynasty had collapsed, the Goryeo court was divided between the old guard of Yuan loyalists and the new school of pro-Ming dudes.
-1373- A Mongol rebel sent word to Gaeseong that he had just raised a big army, and was on his way to conquer Beiping (modern-day Beijing, formerly Dadu/Khanbaliq under the Yuan dynasty).
-Meanwhile, Goryeo was in serious trouble!
   -The were raiding everywhere. and alsp they destroyed a bunch of Goryeo ships in a naval battle as well.
   -In order to fight against the waegu fleets, King Gongmin developed a ship that could shoot fire arrows, but unfortunately it required gunpowder, which could only be obtained from the Chinese, and they refused to give out the secrets to its production.
-1374- the Mongol rebel army wanted to ally with Goryeo and demanded a shitload of horses from Jeju-do.  The problem was that Jeju was still controlled by Mongols too, but they weren't allied with the Mongol rebels in Manchuria.
   -Goryeo finally invaded Jeju-do and reconquered it, driving off the Mongol overlords.
-This year also brought about the death of King Gongmin, who was stabbed to death in his sleep by some conspirators over some drama with a concubine or something OR it was a plot by an anti-Ming faction, it's unclear.
   -King Woo (or U) was enthroned, although he had a military general as his regent.  However, the Ming dynasty refused to accept this boy as a legitimate ruler, especially given his dubious origins as perhaps not really the true son of King Gongmin.
   -Also, the caravan that had all of the tribute from Goryeo was raided by bandits, so they had no gifts to give the Hongwu Emperor.
   -Shit got pretty heated back in Goryeo over this, resulting in the pro-Yuan faction convincing King Woo's regent to side with the Manchurian rebels in rebellion against the Ming dynasty.
-The waegu still continued to be a blight upon the land during this time still as well.
-By 1377, Goryeo had finally stolen the secrets to its production through bribery, and were able to produce their own rockets and fire arrows, developed by Choi Mu-seon, Goryeo's Superintendent of Gunpowder.
-1378- General Yi Seong-gye, a badass who had done a bunch of successful military campaigns earlier, was appointed as supreme commander of the Goryeo military.
   -General Yi immediately decreed that all the monks must fight as warriors to defend the lands against the waegu.
   -Although at this time Goryeo did have gunpowder, they hadn't quite developed the weapon technology to use it for land battles.
      -The waegu decided at this time to mount a huge attack on Gaeseong.  Luckily, General Yi arrived just in time to attack the pirates from behind and wipe them all out.  The Japanese even sent troops to fight and help Goryeo as allies.  I guess they hated the waegu as well.
-1379- The Goryeo army and the navy finally had gunpowder!  This gave them a huge advantage against the waegu.
-1380- King Woo decides to officially side with the Ming dynasty.
   -This was a dumb move because the Ming didn't like him, and it pissed off the Manchurian rebels and their sympathizers.  It also pissed off the common folk too (for whatever reason).
   -Also, King Woo was turning into yet another drunkard ruler.
   -Meanwhile, General Yi continued to fuck up the waegu.  He also went on to defeat would-be Jurchen invaders as well.
-1380-1385- In order to accept King Woo as legit, the Ming dynasty demanded a ludicrous amount of tribute.  King Woo continued to play this game until he was finally accepted by the Ming court.
   -However, in 1385 King Woo randomly changed his mind and began to befriend the Mongol rebels in Manchuria (in hopes of betraying them and taking over their territory).
      -This was really dumb because I guess the region was occupied by Ming forces, who greatly outnumbered Goryeo's forces.  Plus, Goryeo didn't have enough money to truly finance this campaign, plus they still had the waegu to worry about.
   -The weather was also really rainy and shitty, the soldiers knew it was a suicide mission so morale was low, soldiers were deserting, and even General Yi cried because he knew that the situation was completely fucked.  General Yi decided that King Woo was going to bring the downfall of Goryeo, so he turned the army around instead and marched on Gaeseong!

Goryeo - Part 8

-1281- King Chungnyeol remains on the throne in Gaeseong, a puppet king of Kublai Khan.
   -The Mongol horde had failed to conquer Japan.
   -Kublai Khan immediately gave the orders to prepare for a third invasion, but quickly realized that this would be too costly and too much of a pain in the ass, so instead began to focus on the conquest of Vietnam.
   -It was during this time that the Samguk Yusa was published.
   -Also during this time, the Koreans began to master the art of woodblock printing, and soon improved the technology by using movable metal type- a precursor to the modern-day printing press!
      -Technically, the first "printing press" was invented in China in the 11th century.
         -The Gutenberg printing press was truly revolutionary because it used the Roman alphabet, so it was really easy to use, whereas the Korean one used Chinese characters, which was clumsy and a huge pain in the ass to use.
-Around this time also the philosophy of Neo-Confucianism began to spread.
   -A mix of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism.
   -It had the moral absolutism of Buddhism, but also synthesized some other stuff.
   -The Story of the Vinegar Tasters:
      -An attempt to work the three schools of thought in harmony, and together they can be one!
      -Reality is absolute, and people can study it and understand it.
         -Therefore, there was a revival in academic studies and exams.
   -King Chungnyeol became a convert of Neo-Confucianism,
      -His son, Crown Prince Chungseon, was a hostage at Dadu (Beijing) and grew up in the Yuan royal family.  He became a Neo-Confucian fanatic!
-Bad things happened too...it also became fashionable for polygamist Mongols to take additional "wives" (sex slaves) from Goryeo.
   -The Mongols also plundered Goryeo for all of its best scholars and engineers to go work for the Mongols elsewhere.
-1290- Mongol Chinese commanderies and Goryeo lands are invaded by mysterious brutal barbarian hordes.
   -King Chungnyeol sends 20,000 soldiers to drive them off.
-1294- Kublai Khan dies, replaced by his grandson, Temür Khan.
-1297- Queen Jangmok (also known as Princess Gyeguk/Qutlugh-kelmysh, daughter of Kublai Khan) dies.
   -Prince Chungseon returns to Gaeseong from Dadu and commits a political purge of perceived enemies who may have secretly been involved in the queen's death (which was allegedly a natural death).
      -Some were banished, others were executed, and then the Prince Chungseon returned to Dadu.
         -Because of these events, it was obvious that King Chungnyeol had very little power, so he stepped down in 1298.
-King Chungseon was then enthroned, but had problems between factions that formed between his Mongol queen and his multiple Korean queens, so he was recalled back to Dadu and his dad was re-enthroned (with, of course, a Mongol regent watching over him).
   -During this time there was also a plot to have the Mongol rulers driven out of the Goryeo, but it got fucked up when King Chungnyeol traveled to Dadu to to get involved in politics there.
      -All of this was recorded in the Goryeo-sa, written during the Joseon dynasty.
-1307- the tension subsides when Temür Khan dies around the same time that King Chungnyeol dies, and King Chungseon is restored to the throne.
   -He immediately just began to party and shit, and did another brutal purge of anyone he thought was still loyal to his father's old regime, and then just went back to Dadu (haha).
      -He obviously was an asshole because even the Mongols hated him in Dadu, so he soon retired and appointed his second son to the throne, King Chungsuk, in 1314.
      -Meanwhile, in Shinyang, there were lots of Goryeo expats of considerable political power who were plotting to overthrow King Chungsuk.
-1322- Gegeen Khan, the current emperor of the Yuan dynasty, was told that King Chungsuk had been responsible for the death of his Mongol queen.  King Chunsuk was placed under house arrest in Dadu.
   -1324- King Chungsuk was sent back to Gaeseong to rule, but he had become a changed man while under house arrest and just wanted to party and live a completely debauched lifestyle.
-1331- King Chungsuk was too exhausted from partying to rule, so he passed the crown to his son, King Chunghye, who had been living as a hostage in Dadu.
   -King Chungsuk, of course, returned to Dadu.
      -However, King Chunghye was no different than his dad, but was so crazy that he was recalled back to Dadu in 1332 and was replaced by his dad (haha just like what happened with King Chungseon and King Chungseok).
-King Chungsuk finally died in 1339, replaced by King Chunghye.
-Meanwhile, China was getting fucked up by disasters and draughts and shit, and Mongol emperors who had taken the Yuan dynasty throne began dying rapidly.
   -It was obvious, at least to the masses, that the Yuan dynasty had lost the Mandate of Heaven.  The end was nigh!

Goryeo - Part 7

-Goryeo felt like it was finally at peace, but this was not so.
   -Kublai Khan had Koreans that had been exiled from Goryeo and were living in his empire, or even acting as his courtiers.
      -Some of these Koreans hated Goryeo (probably for exiling them), probably for exiling them, and convinced Kublai Khan to distrust King Wonjong.
-1261- Mongol envoys arrive to demand a ludicrous amount of copper as tribute in order to pick a fight.
   -Goryeo successfully scrapes together enough money to buy the copper required as tribute to the Mongols.  Soon the Mongols return again and demand that Goryeo conduct a census of the land, set up a horse relay system, and get soldiers and provisions ready to incorporate into the Mongol horde for their impending invasion of Japan (among other things).
   -After some initial difficulty, the Mongols finally were able to arrive in Japan with a diplomatic meeting, claiming that Kublai Khan wanted to befriend the Japanese, and if the Japanese were to accept the Mongol Empire as their patrons, then that would be a good thing since the Mongols were inevitably going to take over the world.
      -The Japanese didn't know how to respond, so they just...didn't.  Instead, they began to fortify the coasts, knowing the the horde was going to invade ASAP.
         -Looking for an excuse to dominate Goryeo further, Kublai Khan blamed Goryeo for the Japanese refusal to talk (among other things), so he sent a general to summon the Goryeo court to Khanbaliq/Dadu (modern-day Beijing).
            -Goryeo knew that Kublai Khan was going to execute them, so they killed the general envoy instead!  Surprisingly, the Mongols didn't punish them for this, as they were distracted with another diplomatic mission that got fucked up in Japan.
-1267- Japanese fishermen are captured for being too close to Goryeo, and are sent to Khanbaliq for Kublai Khan to decide their fate.  Kublai Khan then decided to show off the splendor of the Mongol Empire by sending them back to Japan so that they could hopefully tell the Japanese shogun, Hōjō Masamura, what was up.
-1269- Meanwhile in Goryeo there was a military coup, and King Wonjong was dethroned!  General Im Yon was the mastermind behind this coup, and he placed some noob on the throne as his puppet.  King Wonjong was exiled.  However, Kublai Khan found out about what happened, and ensured that King Wonjong was reinstalled to the throne in 1271.
   -While King Wonjong had been exiled, he was in the court of Kublai Khan.  There he married a Mongol princess (or had his son marry her, it's unclear), thus cementing an alliance between the royal families of Goryeo and the Mongol Empire, now known as the Yuan dynasty, and all Goryeo kings were to be given the posthumous title of "loyal"("충").
-Following the example set by the Chinese, the Mongols set up commandery states north of Pyeongyang to monitor Goryeo.
   -All Goryeo officials had their titles downgraded and subordinated to Mongol officials.
-King Wonjong was enthroned back in Gaeseong, but he faced a rebellion by Goryeo nationalists, led by the former bodyguards of the Choi military dictatorship.
   -They were quickly defeated by King Wonjong, and they fled to the south to an island, Jindo.  However, the Jindo defenses were soon crushed, so they then fled to Jeju-do where they tried to make an alliance with the Japanese to get them in on on the fighting.  However, it looks like they were unsuccessful because they were finally defeated in 1273.
-1273- By now, Kublai Khan had crowned himself as a Chinese emperor of the Yuan dynasty.
   -He immediately began to plan for the invasion of Japan, and used Korea as his giant factory for military production.
-1274- The Mongols set up an initial force of 20,000 Mongol/Chinese troops, 6,000-8,000 Korean troops, 900 ships, and 15,000 naval crew.
   -This was actually surprisingly small for a Mongol invasion.
      -It's possible the Mongols assumed that the Japanese were weak.
   The force set sail from Busan and stopped at Tsushima Island, which was a Japanese outpost, and was easily conquered.  They then conquered the island of Iki before arriving at their main destination, Hakata Bay.
   -The Japanese apparently weren't expecting the Mongols to arrive so soon or so efficiently, most likely because they knew that the Mongols were lousy sailors, but they didn't realize how much of an aid the Koreans would be for the Mongols in terms of sailing.
      -Also, the Mongols had an advantage as warriors.  They were out to kill, and were efficient and brutal.  The samurai were proud and skilled fighters, but were all about the glory and ritual of combat.
         -Kind of like brutal technical death metal vs. symphonic power metal.
         -The Mongols had explosive/poisoned arrows, horse archers, war drums used for communication, and grenades lobbed by slings that scared the fuck out of the enemy, especially horses!  Also, the Mongols had gunpowder.  They were an essentially an alien race.
            -The Japanese were able to hold back the Mongol army, and luckily for them a typhoon began to start up.  The Mongol forces quickly tried to retreat to the ships, but unfortunately for them they lost a couple hundred ships at least in the chaos.  The Japanese then attacked the ships, as this was their area of expertise as a seafaring people, and the Mongol army was forced to retreat with about 2/3 of their initial number.
-King Wonjong died in 1274, replaced by his son, King Chungnyeol.
   -He was the first Goryeo ruler to be called "king" (왕 or "wang" (ha)).  As all the rulers before this were called "revered ancestor" (조 or 종, "jo" or "jong"), which was reserved for what were considered to be the "emperors" of Korea.  So that means that the king was now truly just a king in name only, and was truly a puppet of the emperors of the Yuan dynasty.
-King Chungnyeol, upon ascending the throne, went north to meet his Mongol princess wife, meeting her near Pyeongyang.  She was a daughter of Kublai Khan, and thus was a direct descendant of Genghis Khan.
   -She immediately redecorated the palace with sheepskin wall hangings and designated huge tracts of land for hunting.  She was apparently also insanely good at horseback riding.  She melted down Buddha statues and golden pagodas from the temples to create more gold for herself, designated other tracts of land to grow ginseng for trade with China, and started a successful sea otter fur trading business.
      -She didn't give a fuck about paying respects to King Taejo (founder of Goryeo) at his tomb.  She also publicly humiliated the king by beating him with a rod during a march, and made the entire Goryeo court go and visit her family in Khanbaliq.  Upon returning, she demanded that Goryeo change its ways and customs to better reflect Yuan dynasty culture.  Obviously, the conservatives weren't down with this, but King Chungnyeol went ahead and enforced the queen's wishes and made everyone dress and do their hair the Yuan dynasty way.
         -The conservatives also feared that Korean blood would be tainted by Mongol blood due to the lack of Goryeo men (due to all of the invasions and wars).  They thought about allowing men to have multiple wives, but this didn't pan out.
-1275- Kublai Khan again sent an envoy to try and get the Japanese to submit.  The Japanese DGAF and beheaded the envoy when he wouldn't leave.  In 1276, the exact same thing happened again.
   -Finally, Kublai Khan had had enough.  He wrapped up his conquest of the Song dynasty in 1279, uniting China under the almighty Yuan dynasty, and then began amassing an epic force to go conquer Japan.
       -The Yuan dynasty now had access to all of the Song dynasty's huge naval fleet and resources too.  He hoped to make it a 2-pronged attack, one from Goryeo and one from China.
          -Also in preparation, the Mongols used the forests of Jeju-do for a lot of the timber to make ships, and this caused the island to be deforested and thus a great place for ranch land.  As such, a shitload of war horses were raised there.
           -The Yuan dynasty also imposed heavy taxes on Goryeo to help pay for their armies.  The Goryeo population was also forced to pay in-kind since they had gone back to a barter system for some reason.
-1281- the Second Mongol Invasion of Japan!  The Yuan dynasty raised a horde of 30,000-40,000 Mongols and 10,000-15,000 Koreans (who set sail from Masan Fortress in Busan) as the northern prong.  The western prong was made up of 100,000 Chinese conscripts.
   -The ships that were made during this time were about double the size of contemporary European ships!  However, it's possible that the quality wasn't very good.
   -Some Mongol generals sensed that this was a goofy plan because it would be extremely difficult to have both fleets of ships land at the same time.  The alternative of having the Chinese fleet land in Busan first wouldn't work because the south coast of Korea during this time didn't have the infrastructure to support such a massive force.
   -The north prong began by invading Tsushima and Ika again, but encountered unexpectedly tough resistance this time.  Also, they were just trying to raid and keep busy while they were waiting for the western prong, but of course the western prong didn't show up when they were supposed to, which made the northern prong feel like they were running out of time, so they just decided to go ahead and attack mainland Japan.  The northern prong landed at Hakata Bay again, and a few weeks later the western force finally landed at Imari Bay.  While they were able to initially overcome the Japanese resistance and establish a beachhead, the Japanese were tenacious defenders.
      -Finally, the northern prong was destroyed by the kamikaze ("divine wind")!!  Then the survivors were killed by the Japanese forces, and Japan was saved!

Goryeo - Part 6

-1205- King Sinjong dies, replaced by King Huijong, his son.
   -He wanted to throw out the military bureaucracy that controlled the country, with General Choi Choong-heon at its head.  However, General Choi found out and exiled the king to Ganghwado in 1211, an island near the mouth of the Han River on Korea's west coast.  So, he was replaced by his son, King Gangjong.
      -The court then sent a diplomat to the Jin dynasty, as was customary, so that the emperor could bestow his blessing towards the new king, but this diplomat mysteriously didn't return...
-1206- Temjuin unifies 40+ Mongol horse tribes in Mongolia and is renamed Genghis Khan.
   -Began raiding the people of NW China and capturing artisans and engineers, quickly learning the art of siegecraft.
-1211- The Mongols began to eye the Jin dynasty, under whom they used to be dominated.
   -The Jin dynasty had a weakness- it was a slave society, and the commoners were ruled by "ethnic superiors", so there was a lack of unity in the social structure.
      The Mongol spies were able to infiltrate the Jin dynasty's lands and sew seeds of discontent among the masses, which made it easier for the Mongols to invade because when they did, many either fled the country or joined their Mongol liberators, bringing down the system!
-1212- The diplomat that had been sent to the Jin dynasty still hadn't returned, so the Goryeo court was confused.  However, it was eventually discovered that he had been slain by Mongolian scouts.
-1213- The Jin dynasty amassed a powerful army, even outnumbering the Mongol forces, in order to drive them off, but for some reason some of the key officers defected to the Mongol horde and gave them valuable information about the Jin dynasty's army.
   -This allowed for the Mongols to smash the army and run amok throughout the empire!
      -In the chaos, one of the Jin generals slew the emperor (Wanyan Yongji, there's a reason why he doesn't have an emperor name) and replaced him with his nephew.  The court then moved the capital south from Zhongdu (Beijing) to Kaifeng.  With them poured hundreds of thousands of refugees (the majority being ethnic Khitan) fleeing the Mongols into southern China and Goryeo.
   -The Mongol territory immediately moved into their newly conquered territory.
-Meanwhile in Goryeo, General Choi was getting old and had to choose an heir.  He had two sons worthy of the title:
   -Choi Woo- a natural leader and solid commander.
   -Choi Hyang- a badass swordsman, but not skilled in negotiations.
      -For whatever reason, Choi Hyang was chosen as successor.
         -Choi Woo felt snubbed, and this tension resulted in a duel between the two brothers...and Choi Woo won!  Choi Hyang was exiled.
-King Gangjong died in 1213, replaced by his son, King Gojong.
   -The Khitan refugees were pouring into Goryeo, overwhelming the border guards and looting and raiding the countryside.  They even managed to mob and take over Pyeongyang for some time before being driven off or pacified by the Goryeo military.
      -During this chaos there was an attempted coup against General Choi by Buddhist monks, but they failed.  As a result, General Choi had more than 1000 monks executed at Gaeseong.
   -As for the remaining Khitan refugees, they remained mostly in the Taebaek Mountains where they built their own hideouts and shit.
-Meanwhile, while pursuing the refugees fleeing from the collapsing Jin dynasty, the Mongols were led to Goryeo.  They began fighting the Khitan near Goryeo's border fortresses that had been abandoned and taken over by the Khitan refugees, so the Mongols took over these fortresses for themselves.  They then began to scour the Taebaek Mountains in search of the remaining refugees.
   -To help their cause, the Mongols sent a delegate to Goryeo demanding rice and supplies for their forces, but the Goryeo court didn't think much of this goofy-looking barbarian diplomat who was wearing animal skins and a fur hat and probably smelled terrible, along with most likely having horrible manners.
      -However, General Choi decided to give aid to the Mongols anyway.  Thus, the Mongols soon crushed the remaining Khitan, and then packed up and left!  However, the horde was still wise in leaving some men behind to learn Korean...
-Of course, the Mongol threat never actually left.  The horde soon began demanding tribute again from Goryeo.  It almost seemed like they wanted Goryeo to refuse so they would have an excuse to invade due to Goryeo's insolence.
   -In the middle on the debates of what to do, General Choi died, and Choi Woo replaced him as military ruler of Goryeo.
-Choi Woo preferred to be sweet instead of being feared, and he tried to win over everyone by giving away his father's massive treasure trove and shit, but this still did nothing to stop corruption.
   -This resulted in 2 peasant revolts in the north, comprised mostly of Khitans, who actually tried to enlist the dying Jin dynasty for help!  However, the Jin dynasty decided instead to kill the Khitan diplomats, thus ending these rebellions due to a lack of Jin support.
      -Choi Woo then replaced the corrupt officials with men that he trusted.
-1221- A diplomat from the Mongol horde returned, this time demanding that King Gojong personally go to the court of Genghis Khan and pledge submission and offer tribute.
   -While staying in Gaeseong, this diplomat actually got wasted and acted like a goofball, and it was obvious that the Mongols were planning on annexing Goryeo into their growing empire.  It was also soon clear that the horde was more powerful than Goryeo could handle, seeing as they already had fucked up both the Jin AND Song dynasties at this point.
-1222- Choi Woo pushes heavily for fortifications, but in 1223 Japanese pirates began to attack in the south.
   -This caused the peasants to flee the coasts and move inland, which hurt the economy.
-1225- A Mongol delegate comes with surprising news- that actually, the Mongols wanted less tribute this time around, and seem happy to have Goryeo just chill.
   -However, on the way out, the Mongol emissary was robbed by brigands.
      -This pissed off the horde, who claimed that if Goryeo can't control its own lands, the Mongol horde will.
         -The Mongols then begin raiding northern Goryeo, but this small force was eventually repelled by Goryeo defenses.
-Goryeo knew that the Mongols were not well-suited for a Goryeo invasion since it was so mountainous and forest-covered and shit.
-1227- Genghis Khan dies, replaced by his third son, Ogedai Khan.
-1231- The Mongols decide to mount a full-scale invasion of Goryeo!  General in charge of the invasion was a dude named Sartai.
   -The Mongol army was massive (exact size unknown) and contained other allies in addition to their own horde.
   -The Mongols quickly moved in and captured a fortress at Uiju.  They continued to move in, fighting the first battle at Anju Fortress, where they won but actually suffered pretty badly.  Then they moved onto Kusong.
   -Also, during this time the king and general of Goryeo were both united politically for once, as they faced an existential threat from the Mongol invasions!
-The Siege of Kusong lasted for 30 days.  Tons of siege weaponry was employed, complete with catapults and shit.  They even tried tunneling under the city!
   -The Mongols would boil down POWs and turn them into rendered fat, and this was essentially medieval napalm.
   -The Goryeo defense was incredibly creative and brave, and as they held off the invaders, the Mongols began to starve, as North Korea was a pretty inhospitable land as far as food and foraging went.  It was also difficult for supply lines to be effectively get maintain a reliable connection.
   -The Mongols finally gave up and just bypassed it, impressed with the tenacity of its defense.  However, they moved onto Pyeongyang, which was not well-defended, and sacked the city.
      -After they thoroughly ravaged the place they took a bunch of food and burned the rest of it, hoping that when the winter came everyone there would starve.
-The Mongols then moved onto Gaeseong.  It wasn't well reinforced either, so the government and aristocracy hid behind defenses at the core of the city while the Mongols butchered everyone outside.
   -The Mongols then left Gaeseong and continued south, destroying everything in their way.  They were finally halted by a resistance army made up peasants and slaves, who must have been fierce warriors because the Mongols got worn out fighting them and finally decided to sue for peace with Goryeo.
-The Mongols then returned to Gaeseong, where they demanded a shitload of resources and humans (children and craftsmen) who were to become slaves or artisans for the horde.
-Once the Mongols left, the Goryeo court was in an uproar.  General Choi Woo ordered an evacuation of the government off the mainland, moving the capital from Gaeseong to Ganghwado, since it would be easier to defend.  The Mongols didn't like water, so this would help Goryeo in its defense.  The island also had a bunch of mountains and natural barriers around it, and was generally just an awesome place in terms of its defensive position.  It was also a place according to Korean geomancy.
   -Also, anyone who disagreed with General Choi during this time was executed :)
-1232- It took a year, but the Jin dynasty capital of Kaifeng (Beijing) finally falls to the Mongols.  They actually spared the city's entire population (2 million) from death and destruction, so this made Goryeo feel like perhaps the Mongols could be reasonable.
-Trouble in Gaeseong started up once the Mongols left, and soon anarchy and absolute chaos took over.  Even the Mongol officials who were left in the city to supervise the Goryeo government were kicked out of the city, which, of course, provoked another Mongol invasion.
   -The Mongols quickly swept through the north and began to destroy everything, sacking Pyeongyang, Gaeseong, and even Seoul!  However, as predicted by the government, they had trouble taking Ganghwado.
      -They decided instead to push south, but soon the ran into heavy resistance at Choein Fortress, led by the monk Kim Yun-hoo, a badass archer, who was unfortunately slain by Sartai in the battle.
         -Thus, the Mongols moved back north and tried to enforce order in the cities they had pacified, but were experiencing more fierce resistance.
-During this time, the original Tripitaka Koreana had been destroyed by the Mongols in Gaeseong, so Goryeo, in order to curry favor with Buddha, re-created the Tripitaka Koreana again.
-Also during this time, the Mongols were fed up with Goryeo resistance, so they began to seriously fuck up the countryside and execute anyone who dared to resist them.  They began to restructure northern Goryeo, annexing it into the Mongol Empire.
-In the south, the Mongols continued their raids in an attempt to get the population under control.
   -The Japanese pirates were also raiding during this time in the south.
-1234- The Jin dynasty finally completely falls to the Mongol horde.
-1238- Goryeo finally agrees to sue for peace, and sent a bunch of nobles and a princess as hostages.  The Mongols then withdrew their horde from Goryeo.
-1241- Ogedai Khan finally dies, and the Mongol Empire falls into instability.  During this time, Goryeo still continues to send tribute to the Mongols, but meanwhile continue to rebuild their armed forces.
-1246- The Mongols finally get their shit together, and a new khan is enthroned- Goyuk Khan!  He renewed efforts to pacify Goryeo, but he actually died in 1248, same year as Choi Woo died.  The Mongols then withdrew their main forces as their empire entered into a new state of instability.
-Choi Woo's son, Choi Hang, succeeded him.  Goryeo resistance against the Mongols was looking grim.  Goryeo only controlled several islands a few pockets of land on the peninsula.
-1253- Mongol invasions begin again.  Goryeo nobility that had been sent to the Mongols as hostages at this point had been married into the Mongolian nobility, and they sent messages urging Goryeo to submit.  Anyway, the Mongols absolutely destroyed the Goryeo mainland, but the Goryeo government knew that the Mongols couldn't take their island.
   -See the Siege of Chuncheon for an example of Mongol brutality in Goryeo.
-Finally, the Goryeo government sued for peace and agreed to the Mongols' terms in 1254, so the Mongols withdrew.
   -This time, instead of rebuilding the infrastructure, Goryeo was probably just really pissed off and started executing anyone who had helped the Mongols, or, if they were no longer in Goryeo, punished their families instead.
      -Because Goryeo was killing off all of the Mongol moles, the Mongols invaded once again with much slaughter as punishment.
-Meanwhile, although Ganghwado was safe from Mongol attack, it was experiencing much turmoil internally.
-General Choi Hang died in 1257.
   -The Choi clan wasn't sure what to do, and King Gojang used this as an opportunity to reinsert control and take power away from the military dictatorship and back to the royal family.
      -There was a coup, and the Choi clan's control over the Goryeo government was lost.  Many members of the Choi clan were executed, and the royalty took back control over the Goryeo government!  The Choi dictatorship had lasted between 1197-1257.
-1259- King Gojang died in the middle of negotiations with the Mongol Empire.  There was a delay because when Gojang's son, King Wonjong, arrived to meet the Möngke Khan (a grandson of Genghis Khan), he wasn't even there!
   -Möngke Khan was in the south, waging war against the Song dynasty.  However, during this invasion, he died!
-1260- King Wonjong finally met up with Kublai Khan instead.
   -King Gojong was successfully able to woo Kublai Khan, so he was able to successfully return to Goryeo to rule as king of a tributary state under the Mongol Empire.
      -The people seemed happy to finally be done with the Mongol invasions; anything to stop the slaughter!  However...soon the Mongols would begin to greedily eye Japan...

Staying Together, Staying Warm - Korean Peasants

-"Bon-gwan" (본관)- nowadays in Korea it means "clan" or "ancestral home", but in Goryeo it also had administrative and legal implications.

   -Villages were designated respective industries of production.

   -Because communication was so slow, the leader of a community was the "hojeong"/"hojong", who would technically have to answer the government administrator of the area.

-The Koreans during this time also of course had ondal heating!  Unfortunately, there were also lots of house fires because of this.

-Men were technically allowed to have one concubine, but they sometimes had more if they were wealthy.  Divorce was also fairly common (obviously!).

Goryeo - Part 5

-1122- The Khitan (Liao dynasty) had fallen to the Jurchens (Jin dynasty)!
   -Also, King Yejong had died, replaced by his son, King Injong.
-King Injong was like 12, heavily influenced by the Lee clan.
   -The other courtiers didn't like the power that the Lee clan now wielded, and wanted to removed the patriarch of the Lee clan from the court.  The king was also a part of this push as well.
      -However, the clan found out and staged a coup in 1126, sacking the palace, killing a bunch of people, and sacking the king!
         -The clan now enacted an autocratic rule under the patriarch, Lee Ja-gyeom, with King Injong remaining as their puppet.  Under Lee Ja-gyeom's rule, Goryeo agreed to submit to the Jin Dynasty as a tributary state.
   -Eventually, the king was able to rally enough support to strike back and overthrow the patriarch and exile him to the south.
      -It seems like a light penalty, but like the other Goryeo kings before him, King Injong was a devout Buddhist.
-King Injong regained power in 1127, but immediately had trouble reorganizing the court because it was divided between Confucians and Buddhists.
   -The Buddhists, led by a monk named Myo-cheong, derived power from their large monastic holdings as well as rural clans with huge estates.  Favored by King Injong.
   -The Confucians, led by Kim Bu-sik, derived power from the intellectuals and the merchant class.
-Myo-cheong preached that the capital should be moved to Pyeongyang from Gaeseong due to Buddhist geomancy.  Also, conveniently enough, it was Myo-cheong's hometown and base of support, which is why he wanted Pyeongyang, and not Seoul, which was apparently equally viable as the main capital.
   -King Injong conceded and began to start projects that would make Pyeongyang a more suitable capital.  Myo-cheong also tried to make various "miracles" happen that would influence the king's attitude (but who knows if these stories are literal or exaggerated/metaphorical).
      -This made King Injong disenchanted because he saw through Myo-cheong's bullshit.
         -Obviously, Myo-cheong got butthurt, so in 1135 he called on all Korean Buddhist monks to join his army, occupying Pyeongyang, and claimed themselves to be a sovereign state.  This lasted about a month before the rebellion was quelled.
-Ever since 1018 there was a rough pattern that can be seen with the Goryeo court: the king was influenced by Buddhist monks who abused and disrespected the Confucian officials who then took out their anger on military officials.
-1145- King Injong commissions Kim Bu-sik to write a historical saga, the Samguk Sagi, which is where a ton of the previous info in these notes comes from and is the major source of what we know about about Korean history.
   -The Samguk Sagi was influenced by Han Chinese scholarly histories and compiled from Chinese sources, Silla chronicles, Hwarang records, and records from Baekje and Gogoryeo as well.  For whatever reason, Japanese sources weren't used.
      -None of the Korean sources of the Samguk Sagi draws from have survived to this day, so the Samguk Sagi is extremely important.  It has also only been partially translated into English.
         -It is also obviously biased towards Confucian thought since it was written by Confucians.  In the next century, the Buddhists would try and replace it with the Samguk Yusa.
-1146- King Injong died, replaced by his son, King Uijong.
   -Not a very devout Buddhist, he was mostly interested in building additions to the palace, gambling, drinking, and having sex!!
-1160s- A fleet was sent to Ulleongdo, an island 75 miles east of Korea.  The island had actually been conquered by Silla in 512, but it didn't actually become part of Goryeo until 930.  It had been constantly raided and fucked up by pirates in the 11th century, so King Uijong wanted to go there to see WTF the deal with the place was.  The fleet reported that the island was actually uninhabited, and so they decided not to fuck with it and didn't send settlers to repopulate it.
   -The king also decided to set up a goofy new system of tax collecting, which replaced the original tax collects with eunuchs, and whoever could collect the most taxes would be rewarded with land taken from the aristocracy (which obviously pissed off the aristocracy).
      -He also spent his time chilling with his inner circle and never bothered to invite anyone from the military or aristocracy to join him.
         -So naturally, things started falling apart, and everyone hated King Uijong, even the peasants, due to his push for ruthless tax collection and high taxes.  Slaves were being overworked, and talk of rebellion began to spread, not just against the king, but against the corrupt local lords and Buddhist monasteries.
-1170- King Uijong was captured in a military coup, and lots of eunuchs and officers were slaughtered.  They wanted to kill King Uijong, but they didn't want the Jin dynasty to find a reason to invade as their "older brother" to maintain order.  So, they exiled him to a small island and enthroned his brother, King Myeongjong.
-King Uijong tried to regain power by being re-appointed by an army official that wanted him back on the throne for whatever reason, but this army was defeated, and then King Uijong was murdered.
   -This pissed off lots of King Uijong's Buddhist monk supporters, and they staged mass protests in Gaeseong, but the military didn't give a fuck and burned several Buddhist libraries and temples, and raided several monasteries as well.
-Goryeo was becoming increasingly unstable, with regional powers in the kingdom beginning to vie for dominance.  The most powerful region outside of Gaeseong was centered around Pyeongyang.
   -So, a battle occurred between Gaeseong and Pyeongyang, with Gaeseong emerging victorious.
      -Eventually, Pyeongyang was besieged, with its population either fleeing or being executed by Gaeseong forces.
-Meanwhile, chaos was breaking out everywhere, with rebellions popping up in multiple regions.  The people were starving, turning to thievery and brigandry.
   -The military even sent troops to capture girls from the countryside to bring them back to Gaesong as sex slaves, and ancestral temples were looted.
-King Myeongjong was still the puppet ruler during this time, living a life of decadence.
   -After many years of chaos, with different rebellions, King Myeongjong was finally dethroned in 1197 and replaced by his brother, King Sinjong.
-Unfortunately, King Sinjong was completely dominated by the military, specifically by General Choi Chong-heon.  General Choi had dubbed himself Prime Minister and "Protector of the Realm".
   -One historian (Homer Halbert) called General Choi "the first shogun of Korea".
   -General Choi had a bodyguard of 3000 elite troops, each of whom were paid very well.
   -The peasants didn't like General Choi's rule, and there were numerous revolts.
      -People were starving because so many resources went to the military, and they couldn't get help from the temples because they were predatory lenders when it came to working in exchange for food.
         -They would essentially be slaves to the temples, and would also have to make up the armies of these warrior monks (thugs).
      -There was even one revolt that tried to revive Silla!
         -It was actually successful at first, but it was ultimately put down.
      -Another revolt was a slave rebellion, led by one of General Choi's slaves, but it wasn't successful either.
-During this time, Goryeo was nearing complete collapse.  However, for whatever reason no one in East Asia seemed to notice that there was an insanely powerful barbarian horde amassing in Central Asia, led by a mysterious man named Temujin...

Goryeo - Part 4

-1031- King Hyeonjong died, replaced by King Deokjong.
   -King Deokjong immediately began fortifying the north and building the Cheolli Jangseong ("thousand "li"wall) to keep out the Khitan (Liao dynasty) hordes.
      -Although Gogoryeo also built one in the 7th century, when talking about it most people are referring to the one built by Goryeo.
      -It was modeled after the Great Wall of China and Gogoryeo's Cheolli Jangseong.
-1034- King Deokjong died, replaced by his younger brother, King Jeongjong.
   -Wanted to build up Goryeo's army, but also was really into Buddhism.  Decreed that 1 out of every 4 sons MUST join a Buddhist monastery, suppressed the acquisition of luxury goods, and passed a number of other wacky laws.   He did, however, abolish the death penalty.  Then he married his sister (!).
-Meanwhile, the Jurchen hordes continued to rise in power, and began simultaneously trading with and raiding Goryeo, although they ultimately looked to Goryeo as their older, civilized brother.
-1046- King Jeongjong died, replaced by King Moonjong.  He, too, married his sister (!!).  He also became concerned about the Jurchen and Khitan, so he began to contemplate asking the Song dynasty for help.
-1056- A Japanese envoy arrives at court requesting a bunch of Buddhist relics and texts and shit, and returned a few years later with Japanese gifts.
   -Also, one of King Moonjong's sons, Uicheon, went on to a become a Buddhist thinker who founded the Cheonjae school of Buddhism.
-King Moonjong made some interesting administrative choices as king.
   -He removed the emergency iron supply from the armory and made them into nails to be distributed to build Buddhist temples all over Goryeo.
   -He donated nobles' houses (and even houses belonging to his own family members) to the Buddhist clergy.
   -1 out of every 3 sons now had to join a Buddhist monastery.
      -However, it should be noted that a lot of these policies weren't actually enforced because no one liked these laws to begin with.
-1084- King Moonjong died, replaced by his eldest son, King Soonjong.  However, King Soonjong died this same year, so he was replaced by his brother, King Seonjong.
   -King Seonjong completely abolished the civil service exam, which was heavily influenced by Confucianism, and replaced it with a version that was instead heavily influenced by Buddhism only.
      -Tried to synthesize traditional Buddhism with the new school of Korean Seon (Zen) Buddhism.
         -Seon Buddhism is still practiced at various temples today in Korea.
-1094- King Seonjong dies, replaced by his son, King Heonjong.  He was a really smart kid!
-1095- King Heonjong gets "sick" and dies, replaced by his uncle, King Sookjong.
   -Implemented a system of copper coinage around 1100, but counterfeit was rampant.
-1104- Jurchen hordes invade from the north!
   -King Sookjong sent his top general, Yun Gwan, to repel them, although they wouldn't be ready until the next year.
      -Yun Gwan was the leader of Goryeo's new Byeolmuban ("Star Army"), which was a revamped fighting force made up several divisions- cavalary, warrior monks, infantry, camp followers, slaves, and volunteers.
         -This was also the first Korean army to use gunpowder, which had been obtained from the Song dynasty.
            -It was imported by the Koreans because they didn't have the technology themselves to create it.
-Due to Korean Buddhist geomancy, King Sookjong was persuaded to order the construction of a new southern capital, since Gaeseong was "losing its magical energy", according to the Goryeo court's wizards.
   -The new southern capital was to be Seoul.
-1106- King Sookjong dies, replaced by his son, King Yejong.
   -Really into herbs and herbal medicine, so he sent a bunch of rare Korean plants to China in exchange for rare Chinese plants.
   -He was also really into Taoism, and this became trendy among the nobility.
-1107- the Star Army was ready to march!  About 170,000, they left Pyeongyang to attack the Jurchen in the north, but achieved only mixed results.  Eventually, they were recalled back into Goryeo territory for defense instead of offense.
-By 1114, the Jurchen had managed to unite themselves under a working government, and by 1115 they declared themselves a sovereign state (just like the Khitan had done), complete with their own ruler, Emperor Taizu of the Jin dynasty (not to be confused with the old Jin dynasty)!
-Meanwhile, the Liao dynasty felt threatened by the new rising power of the Jin dynasty, so they tried to get Goryeo to ally with them.
-Also during this time, the Song dynasty sent a bunch of expensive, beautiful musical instruments to Goryeo to curry favor with them, and then sent even more the next year in hopes that Goryeo would join them to attack the Liao dynasty.  Unfortunately, Goryeo weren't convinced.
-Through some diplomatic mix-ups, the Jin dynasty also agreed for Goryeo to expand its territory from the Cheolli Jangseong up to the Yalu River, but Goryeo didn't realize that the Jin dynasty was expecting for Goryeo to become their tribute state!
-1121- The Jin and Song dynasties join forces to to take out the Liao dynasty.
   -The Song army wasn't very successful, but the Jin army kicked major ass and took over a bunch of territory; they even sacked the capital Nanjing (Beijing) and killed Emperor Tianzuo, thus ending the dynasty.
      -Obviously, the Jin dynasty were now major players in the game.
      -Goryeo was divided on how to react to this- to they submit to the Jin dynasty, or fight?
-1122- King Yejong dies, replaced by his son, King Injong.
-As an aside, how was Goryeo divided?
   -8 provinces (a bit different than how Joseon dynasty divided them, though, and different names).
      -Each had over 100 prefectures.
         -Within these prefectures were over 400 sub-prefectures, which included over 900 "special villages".

Goryeo - Part 3

-993- The Khitan (Liao dynasty) send a horde to invade Goryeo!
   -Goryeo defended itself, but sent off an envoy to China to try and get help from the Song dynasty.
      -This was funny because the Song Dynasty had tried for a long time to get Goryeo's help to fight the Khitan, but Goryeo had refused.
   -The Khitan were able to successfully invade parts of Goryeo, but Goryeo forces held them at bay via guerrilla tactics.
      -The Khitan knew that they could crush Goryeo, but it would be a pain in the ass, so they tried to sue for peace and annex all of the old Balhae lands (which would be everything north of Pyeongyang) along with tribute and submission of the Goryeo crown to the Liao dynasty.
         -Goryeo refused, so the hordes marched on Pyeongyang!  Luckily, General Seo-hui (Goryeo) was able to convince the Khitan to back down by agreeing to cut off ties with the Song dynasty, who threatened Khitan territory.  Somehow, he also convinced the Khitan to allow for Goryeo to have access to the Yalu River for trade and communication purposes.
   -As soon as the Khitan packed out of Goryeo territory, Goryeo quickly built new fortresses and resumed its relations with the Song dynasty, which pissed off the Khitan immensely.
-997- King Seongjeong dies, replaced by King Mokjong, his son.
   -However, the true power lay in the hands of his aunt, Queen Heonae, who was acting as regent since Mokjong wasn't quite old enough yet.
      -Eventually, Queen Heonae decided to try and overthrow her nephew completely in a coup- the king's palace was burned and the king fled, summoning his top general to protect him.  However, the general decided to betray the king and kill him.
-1009- King Mokjong was dead, so he replaced by a grandson of King Taejo, King Hyeonjong.  Of course, King Hyeongjong was too young, so he didn't have any power.
-1010- The Khitan decide to have another go at Goryeo!  They were still pissed about what happened the first time, and also at apparently the corruption that was going on in Goryeo's court (good excuse, anyway).
   -A Khitan horde of 400,000 reached all the way to Pyeongyang (again), and the Gaeseong court fled to the south, hoping to overextend the horde.
      -During this time, the Goryeo dynasty also produced the Tripitaka Koreana, a collection of woodblock prints with a bunch of Buddhist stuff.
      -The Khitan horde continued to push into Goryeo, and they sacked Gaeseong!  In the carnage and destruction, tons of historical records and treasures and shit were destroyed, some of the treasure even dating back to the pre-Three Kingdoms period!
         -King Hyeonjong tried to sue for peace, but the Khitan only would agree if the king went up to the Liadong Peninsula and personally bent the knee to Emperor Shengzong (Liao dynasty).
-1014- Northern Goryeo was now under Khitan occupation, but far from pacified.
   -It was too much trouble to keep it under control, so the Khitan began to pull out, losing thousands of troops in the process, and finally sued for peace with Goryeo.
      -Meanwhile, northern Goryeo was in shambles.
-The aftermath of the Goryeo-Khitan Wars:
   -Goryeo saw the rise of a new powerful military class due to the conflict and need for a strong army.
   -New ethnic diversity as the Khitan conquests brought in new people and Khitan slaves.
      -These new ethnicities were usually heavily discriminated against, and usually had shitty jobs, eventually becoming the Korean version of the "untouchables" ("baekcheong"), the lowest of the low, who couldn't even serve in the military.
         -This class would actually exist all the way up into the 20th century!
   -Also caused an increase in contact with the Jurchen hordes that occupied the area of Manchuria north of the Khitan.  The Jurchen desperately wanted to become civilized and copy Goryeo society and culture (and who would eventually succeed in doing so and develop into a legit empire (the Jin dynasty)).
-1024- Arab traders arrive in Gaeseong, and it's possible some of them some of them stayed and settled in Goryeo!

Goryeo - Part 2

-The source material at this point changes to the Goryeosa, which was written during King Sejong's reign.

-King Taejo dies in 943, replaced by his son, King Hyejong.

   -Almost immediately began to face opposition from the nobility due to his "low birth", as his mother, the queen, came from a non-elite family.

      -A civil war actually broke out around this time, with the winners being King Hyejong's brothers (King Taejo's other sons), Wang Yo and Wang So.

-King Hyejong died in 945 due to stress and disease, but it's entirely possible that he was just poisoned or something.

   -The nobility came together and appointed Wang Yo, who was crowned King Jeongjong.

-King Jeonjong was really worried about a Laio dynasty invasion, so he built a massive fortress at Pyeongyang.  

   -BTW, Pyeongyang was really flourishing at this time!  Schools, education, Buddhism, art, etc.

      -King Jeonjong wanted to focus more power into the city since it was further north than its southern co-capital, Gaeseong.

-949- King Jeonjong dies, replaced by his brother, Wang So, who was crowned King Gwangjong.

   -Appointed a Chinese dude as his advisor, and then tried to set up a Chinese-style civil service exam as a pre-requisite for working in the government, as opposed to the goofy birthright crap like the bone-rank system used by Silla.

      -The new class of government workers was called the "yangban" ("men of the sacred bone"), and was divided into two sections- military and civilian.

         -In times of war, however, the civilian section actually controlled the military section, for some reason.

         -Over time, the the civilian yangban began to evolve into its own "educated elite" class.

   -Consolidated military power by conscripting warriors from the nobility's own private armies in the name of national security.

      -He actually got about 300,000 troops by doing this!

   -He also freed a bunch of slaves that allegedly were from free households before the foundation of Goryeo, but they (or their parents) had been enslaved during the wars.

      -This further undermined the power of the nobility.

   -King Gwangjong established relations with the Song dynasty in 972.

-975- King Gwangjong dies, replaced by his son, King Gyeongjong.

-King Gyeongjong set up the "Jeonsigwa" ("Land Allotment System").

   -Confiscated a bunch of private estates owned by government officials and bureaucrats, which was usually a sign of corruption.  These lands were confiscated once the owners died.  This allowed for Goryeo to use these lands as rewards for government offices, but they weren't hereditary, so a family couldn't grow too powerful with them.

   -Passed a flat tax too, only military land and Buddhist monasteries were exempt.

   -During this time, more and more Chinese scholars were brought in to work for the government.

-981- King Gyeongjong suddenly dies of an illness, replaced by his King Seongjong, another grandson of King Taejo.

   -At this point there were a ton of Chinese courtiers.  They couldn't believe that King Seongjong and the Korean kings weren't ruling as complete autocrats, and also were surprised that the provincial lords had any power at all.

      -They convinced King Seongjong to set up the Office of Remonstrance, which was meant to centralize power with the king's government and his inner circle of advisors, and thus weaken the power of the provincial lords.

      -The officials were then sent to each province to oversee its administration.

-Meanwhile. the Song dynasty began to pressure Goryeo into helping them attack the Liao dynasty, and the Liao also tried to get Goryeo to be friendly with them.

   -However, King Seongjeong felt it was too risky to attack the Liao, but he felt that they were still too savage and barbaric to be trusted with peace terms.

Goryeo - Part 1

-936- The peninsula is once again reunited.
   -Towards the former lands of Silla, Goryeo was merciful and respectful.
      -Aristocrats are able to keep their massive estates and wealth.
      -From the Silla royalty and aristocracy, King Taejo had 6 queens, 23 official concubines, and probably hundreds of other sex partners.  Because he had so much offspring from so many different mixes in bloodline, the bone rank lost its meaning and died out.
   -However, King Taejo was still pissed off at Hubaekje, and kept them isolated from power.
      -Goryeo's power was concentrated in Pyeongyang and Gaeseong in the north.
-Meanwhile, King Taejo looked to the north for invasion.
   -He had always flirted with the idea of invading Balhae, but now that the kingdom had fallen and the land was overrun with Khitan hordes.
      -The Khitans also set up shop in Manchuria/Northern China, occupying these lands as the Tang Dynasty crumbled.
         -They actually began to transform themselves into a legit empire, with lots of Chinese culture, tribal/clan chieftain bureaucracies, and even the Khitan leader crowning himself emperor of his own Khitan empire, now known as the Liao dynasty.
            -The Khitans had invaded Balhae and had used the oppressed Malgal population to rise up against their Gogoryeo overlords, and then, under Khitan rule, the Gogoryeo aristocracy who didn't flee the kingdom ended up being enslaved!
      -It's also possible that the Khitans could have invaded Goryeo, but they were more interested in invading more Chinese lands instead.
-Anyway, why were there two capitals of Gaeseong?
   -This is because Gaeseong is the very center of the Korean peninsula (hence why it's right on the DMZ).   Also, a Seon (Zen) monk prophesied that a powerful ruler would come out of Gaeseong due to its significant location in accordance with Korean geomancy.  This ruler would have the "Mandate of Heaven".
      -This was a big deal because in East Asian history, this was only reserved for Chinese emperors.  So King Taejo was comparing himself to a Chinese emperor, complete with Pyeongyang being his own imperial city.
         -Soon, Seoul and Gyeongju were made imperial capitals as well.
-King Taejo died in 943.
   -He warned future rulers of blindly copying Chinese culture and styles of governing, but obviously this was inevitable.
   -Also, before he died, the Khitans tried to make peace in order to not have to worry about Goryeo attacking them, but King Taejo had refused.  He was pissed at them for conquering Balhae, and future rulers would continue to have frosty relations with them.
   -He also died still hating Hubaekje, and decreed that the former kingdom would not have any imperial buildings built there or any government officials come from there, believing that they were a "perverse and rebellious people".
   -He also had supported Seon geomancy.  He considered present-day Jeolla Province and South Chungcheong Province to be bad places of moral decay, and this belief continued even into the Joseon Dynasty.  That's why there aren't any government official tombs built southwest of Seoul!
   -He was also very particular about respecting geomancy and keeping Korean Buddhism in line with its rules in order to have the empire last.  He took Buddhist celebrations and religious holidays out from under the control of the aristocracy (which was rife with corruption) and restored them under royal control.
   -Finally, he encouraged future rulers to be well-educated and to study history, so it could serve as a warning or guide for future rulers.

Unified Silla - Part 3

-So, Silla was in trouble...the king had been reduced to a figurehead, while the aristocracy was the real power behind the government.
   -King Aejang, son of King Seosang, ruled from 800, but was killed by his uncle (King Heondeok, see below) in 809.
      -765-809 saw unchecked growth in aristocratic power due to the absence of a strong king.
-809- King Heondeok, brother of King Soseong and uncle of ing Aejang, had taken the crown for himself!  He faced a rebellion, led by Kim Heonchang and other descendents of King Muyeol, but they were quelled.
   -However, the real power lay in the office of the prime minister, almost exclusively available to the Kim clan.
   -Many aristocrats began to move out of Gyeongju to build their own private estates and live as kings in their own right.  They built castles and fortresses, without the king's permission, and raised their own armies and ruled their domains with absolute authority.  They also kept the taxes for themselves.
      -The king couldn't do anything because he didn't have an army that could enforce his will, since the army was made up of aristocrats.  Also, the peasantry was now controlled by the aristocratic lords, since it was the aristocracy who determined the peasants' food allocation and laws.
   -Many Korean merchants began to move to the Yalu River area, or in or around Tang China to trade.  However, the Yellow Sea was a scary place- choppy waters, storms, rocky coasts, and pirates!
      -Many Korean low-status nobles also went to Tang China to study in its courts or serve in their armies, so then when they returned to Korea they would have much more respect and higher status.
-King Heondeok died in 826, replaced by his younger brother, King Heungdeok.
-King Heungdeok ruled by 826-836, and died without an heir, so he was replaced by King Wonseong's grandson, King Huigang.
   -However, in 838 there was a coup, and King Huigang was toppled by Kim Myeong, the prime minister, who then crowned himself King Minae.
-839- King Minae was dethroned in another coup, and was replaced by King Sinmu, a descendant of King Wonseong.
   -However, King Sinmu ruled like 3 seconds before dying.
-839- King Munseong is enthroned.
   -However, there were more uprisings from aristocrats and prime ministers and shit, until he died in 857.  At this point, the king truly was just a figurehead and Silla had become a kingdom divided in fiefdoms.  The king was only around in order to keep the common folk united, and to the "protector" of the 3 sacred relics of Korean Buddhism that they believed kept Silla safe from disaster and bestowed luck upon the kingdom.
      -Most notable up the uprisings is that of the ruthless naval warrior Jang Bo-go, who rose to power as a leader of Silla's naval forces in the southwest against pirate raiders, and even tried to get into the bone rank with political maneuvering even though he came from peasant origins.
-The rest of the 9th century was very turbulent.  Famine and revolt plagued the kingdom.
-King Heonan, son of King Munseong, ruled from 857-871, same shit.
-King Gyeongmun, relative of King Munseong, ruled from 861-875, same shit.
-King Jeongang ruled from 886-887, same shit, died without an heir.
-Because Jing Jeongang had died without an heir, he was replaced by Queen Jinseong, Silla's third and final queen.
   -She was the daughter of King Gyeongmun, and she was really debauched and corrupt, although this is possibly sexist, biased, and maybe even a lie.  Prude Buddhist monks hated her and encouraged a revolution.
      -Order collapsed under her reign, as famine became intolerably brutal, the queen raised taxes, people abandoned their farms and jobs, and bands of brigands and mobs began to roam the land.
-In order to try and salvage this shitty situation, the southwest of the peninsula, still maintaining a Baekje identity, decided to break away and form its own kingdom under Gyeon Hwon, a disgruntled Silla general, and set up a new capital at Sangju.
   -Pledged to avenge the death of Baekje, this new kingdom moved quickly to carve out a kingdom that included Gwangju and Jeonju.  This new kingdom was called Hubaekje ("Later Baekje"), and the capital was at Wasanju (modern-day Jeonju).
      -The Tang Dynasty actually recognized the sovereignty of Gyeon Hwon as the new king of Hubaekje.
-Meanwhile, in the north, shit was getting bad, too.
   -Around Gaesong in the north, there were 4 rebellious warlords vying for power.
      -Eventualy, a new kingdom was established by a guy named Goong-yae at Gaesong, this kingdom was likewise called Hugogoryeo ("Later Gogoryeo", also later called Taebong), and soon after this they even controlled Pyeongyang, Gyeonggi-do, Gangwon-do, and other places.
         -This period is known as the Later Three Kingdoms Period.
-Hugogoryeo and Hubaekje found themselves with lots of hungry, talented workers who couldn't find jobs in Silla due to the bone rank and were in search of opportunity.
-One problem worth noting, however, is that Hugogoryeo, when they took over the regions south of the Han River, they had some problems because the people there were culturally Sillan, and didn't like being conquered by what they saw as northern barbarians.
   -Also, Goong-yae began to get cult-like, preaching a new kind of Buddhism and referring to himself as Buddha and that he had descended from heaven to spread peace and blah blah even though he was a brutal tyrant like most of every cult leader, ever.
      -While Hubaekje was busy attacking Silla, Hugogoryeo attacked Hubaekje!  This allowed for Hugogoryeo to gain territory.
         -Finally, Goong-yae began to grow even more paranoid and insane, and was finally slain in a military coup.   Thus, Wang Geon was installed as King Taejo of Taebang (name was now changed from Hogogoryeo) in 918, thus marking the beginning of the mighty kingdom of Goryeo!
-Meanwhile, King Gyeongmyeong still held onto Silla for dear life.
-King Gyeongmyeong died in 924, replaced by King Gyeongae.
   -War had broken out between Goryeo and Hubaekje.
-Suddenly, Balhae to the north fell to barbarian hordes- The Khitans, a Mongolian/Central Asian horselord army that devastated the kingdom.
   -Many refugees fled to Goryeo, and many of these refugees were actually ethnic Gogoryeons anyway, and lots of them flocked to Pyeongyang.
-King Taejo set up 2 capitals of Goryeo - Gaesong in the south, Pyeongyang in the north.
-Meanwhile, Hubaekje led its forces to attack Silla, and actually broke through Gyeongju's forces and entered the city in 927.
   -They found Silla's king, King Gyeongae, having a party haha.
      -He ended up killing himself before Goryeo forces could capture him.  Meanwhile, the Goryeo army looted the city.  They then installed a puppet king, King Gyeongsu, as the last king of Silla.
-Goryeo tried to attack Hubaekje forces as they returned to Jeonju, but they were unable to overtake them.
-928- The beginning of many battles between Hubaekje and Goryeo.
-934- Hubaekje sacks Gaesong, but can't keep the city and is driven back.
   -Finally, King Gyeon Hwon experiences a collapse of the stability of the royal family as his son tries to take the throne, and King Gyeon Hwon flees to Goryeo, where he was warmly received in 935.  He was dying from poor health, but begged Goryeo to go south and fuck up his son, Gyeon Singeom.
-935- Goryeo goes south and conquers Hubaekje.
   -Then king Gyeongsu stepped down and abdicated his throne to King Taejo of Goryeo.
-Goryeo had now taken the whole peninsula!  Victory!
   -King Taejo's offspring married into the royal Silla fmaily, thus joining the two houses and giving legitimacy to the Goryeo throne.

Unified Silla - Part 2

-Silla's golden age!  700-800.
-King Hyoso, King Sinmun's eldest son, was crowned king in 692.
   -Bone Rank aristocrats continued to try and undermine the crown during this time.  They even tried to revolt/stage a coup in the 700.
   -Silla also continued warm relations with the Tang Dynasty, and the Tang continued to export tons of culture to Silla as Silla paid tribute.
   -Also, Silla had replaced Baekje as the middle man between China (Tang dynasty) and Japan (Yamato) for trade.
   -King Hyoso died in 702, replaced by his younger brother, King Seongdeok.
-Meanwhile, the Tang was fighting many wars- against the Tibetans, Malgal hordes, Muslim armies from the Middle East, and even Balhae.
   -The Tang dynasty asked Silla for help to attack Balhae, and Silla agreed to help.  However, Silla was held back by a brutal blizzard.
      -Also, Silla built a huge wall to the north to protect themselves from Balhae.
-In Japan, the capital moved to Nara (Heijō-kyō), marking the end of the Asuka/Yamato period and the beginning of the Nara period.
   -Balhae sent a bunch of delegations to the new Japanese government, convincing them to recognize Balhae as the legit successor state to Gogoryeo, a former Yamato ally.  
      -Balhae also convinced the Japanese to raid the Silla coastline as pirates!
         -In response to this, Silla built a massive fortress to protect Gyeongju from the Japanese raiders (Mobeol Fortress).
-King Seongdeok tried to empower the common folk and limit the power of the aristocracy, which definitely improved his standing among the peasantry.
   -King Seongdeok died in 736/737, replaced by his second son, King Hyoseong.
      -Silla was in great shape, and Gyeongju was a wealthy, cosmopolitan city.
         -It had Buddhist monks from Japan and China, Arab traders, Roman and Byzantine goods, slaves, beautiful gardens, palaces, villas, etc.
            -The flourishing of the city was even noted in Japanese and Chinese sources!
         -One historian has even argued that in the 8th century, Gyeongju was the 3rd largest city in the world behind Chang'an (Tang dynasty) and Constantinople (Byzantine empire), with about 250,000 people!
-Around 737, a huge Tang dynasty coalition showed up with a huge force and tons of gifts tto try and convince Silla to ally with them in an attack against Balhae.   However, King Hyoseong died in 742, so this caused problems in getting Silla to get its shit together enough to attack.
-742- King Hyoseong died, so he's replaced by his younger brother, King Gyeongdeok.
   -Commissioned the Bronze Bell of King Seondeok, a huge ass bell that is said to be able to be heard from miles away.
   -He also built Bulguksa Temple in 751 at the site of some other old-ass temple.
-765- King Gyeongdeok died, replaced by his son, King Hyegong.
   -King Hyegong was only a young boy, but he still had a fairly secure grasp on power due to his queen mother who acted as regent.
   -However, she wasn't quite strong enough, and faced 4 coup attempts by aristocrats in 768, 770, 775, and 780.  This was possibly due to King Hyegong possibly being gay or at least overly-effeminate, and the aristocrats used this as an excuse to kill him (!).
780- So, King Hyegong was killed, replaced by King Seondeok, a descendant of King Naemul.
-785- King Seondeok dies, replaced by King Wonseong, another descendant of King Naemul.
   -King Wonseong was really into the Tang dynasty, especially their culture and power to back him as the legit king.  So, he sent a tribute to them, and his diplomats returned with news that the Chinese had developed a new civil service exam system.
-788- King Wonseong implemented his own Korean version of the Tang's civil service exam, called "The National Civil Service Examination" (과거).
   -However, King Wonseong's version was also based on Silla's bone rank system, whereas the Tang's was built on the Confucian system of merit only.
-798- King Wonseong dies in 798, replaced by his grandson, King Soseong.
   -King Soseong married a woman from the Sook clan, which meant that the power was beginning to shift from Kim to Sook.
-800, King Soseong dies, replaced by his son, King Aejang.

Unified Silla - Part 1

-Now that Baekje and Gogoryeo had fallen, tensions escalated between the Tang dynasty and Sila over where to go from here.
   -Begs the question:  WTF were Silla thinking by allying with the Tang??
      -Obviously, the Tang dynasty wanted Korea to go back to its old commandery divisions, but this time with a unified Korean peninsula under Chinese control, the Tang dynasty set up a new government in Pyongyang called "the Protectorate General to Pacify the East".
      -In order to give the Protectorate General some legitimacy, the Tang got King Bojang (who survived the fall of Gogoryeo and had been a puppet for Yeon Gaesoman when he controlled Gogoryeo) to back them up in Pyongyang, which was the former capital of Gogoryeo).
         -Therefore, King Bojang was set up as governor of the Protectorate General, and King of Joseon.
-Pyongyang may have been pacified, but rural Gogoryeo was still hostile to the Tang dynasty, seeing them as foreign invaders.
   -This anti-Chinese resistance looked to Silla to drive off the Chinese from the peninsula.
      -General Kim Yu-sin (Silla) managed to drive off the Tang dynasty troops that were occupying the former lands of Baekje.
-673- Kim Yu-sin dies.  However, the anti-Chinese resistance looked to Silla to drive off the Tang from the peninsula.
      -Tang sources claim that the Chinese were winning the battles, but this doesn't make sense because why would the Chinese then just suddenly leave the peninsula?
         -One theory is that Emperor Gaozong's health was deteriorating at this point, and the empress, Wu Zetian, didn't seem to care much about taking over Korea.
   -Silla began to feel more nationalistic, and together due to its newfound power and its emerging Buddhist faith, thanks in large part to the success of the monk Wonhyo.
   -Also, after the war, King Munmu found himself surrounded by a powerful, militarized aristocracy...uh-oh!
-681- King Munmu died, leaving the crown to his son, King Sinmun.
   -King Sinmun tried to reign in their wealth by limiting what they could tax from their lands.
-The crown was severely indebted to the aristocracy because it was the aristocracy that had paid for the war effort, and now they looked to the crown to repay their debts.
   -King Sinmun had allowed the aristocrats to become like lords of their own domains under the crown, i.e. a feudal system, as repayment for supporting the kingdom, but this made the lords too powerful and rich, which is why the crown tried to impose restrictions on the aristocracy's taxation of the people of their lands and estates.
      -He even tried to move the capital from Gyeongju to Dalgubeol (Daegu), but this didn't work out.
         -King Sinmun's biggest political rival was a dude named Gumwong, who was essentially Silla's "prime minister".
         -King Sinmun was also opposed by "King Anseung", the would-be king of old Gogoryeo before it was conquered, but had been given rulership over the fake kingdom of Bodeok (a puppet kingdom of Silla).
         -King Sinmun then flexed his political muscle by cracking down on the aristocracy and did initiated a strong purge, arresting any people he didn't like and annexed the lands of the Gogoryeo resistance fighters.
      -King Sinmun also set up the Gukhak, or "National Academy", which was founded to train government officials in the Confucian classics.
      -He also sent a delegation to set up peaceful relations with Empress Wu of the Tang Dynasty, which allowed Silla to copy lots of Chinese culture.
-Meanwhile, the Tang Dynasty gave up on trying to maintain a puppet kingdom on the Korean peninsula, so they decided to cut their losses and fortify the Liaodong Peninsula.
   -As a result, there was a power vacuum in the former Gogoryeo lands unclaimed by Silla, so that'[s how the state of Balhae (known as Jin at the time, just to be confusing, and would change its name to Balhae in 712) came about.
      -Formed after Gogoryeo fell and occupied much of Gogoryeo's old territory, including the northern half of modern-day North Korea.
-Balhae was made up of Malgal tribes that were ruled by former Gogoryeo aristocrats.
   -Populated by many slaves as well.
   -The Malgal people kind of governed themselves, but paid tribute to their Gogoryeo overlords.
   -Many historians claim that Balhae was a Korean kingdom, but this is controversial since the Malgal people that made up most of the population weren't closely related with the Yemaek tribes that the Koreans of the peninsula are descended from.
      -Also, Balhae history is really sketchy because there are no surviving historical records from the kingdom, so who knows what the deal was.
-Silla continued to maintain the Bone Rank during this time.
   -At the top was the the "sacred" or "hallowed" bone rank- the (Gyeongju) Kim, Park, and Sook clans, AKA the founding clans of Silla.
      -When the Gaya Confederacy was incorporated into Silla in 562 (finally falling because they were allied with Baekje for a war against Silla awhile ago), the (Gaya) Kim were brought into the Bone Rank as a "sacred" clan as well.
-King Sinmun died in 692, his legacy remembered as successfully consolidating Silla's power as a government and country, upholding the crown's authority, and making peace with the Tang Dynasty.
   -Meanwhile, the aristocracy wasn't happy with how strong the crown had become, and this would prove to be problematic later on.