-Scholars established Confucian academies to train students throughout the countryside.
-Usually established by Sarim yangban to expand their influence.
-Also during this time, a female doctor, Jang Geum, was appointed as the king's personal physician. This was actually the only time in Korean history that a woman was appointed as the king's personal doctor.
-King Jungjong died in 1544, replaced by his son, King Injong.
-Unsure as to what exactly happened, but he only ruled for 1 year.
-Either had deep depression after his father died, OR he was poisoned by the rival Yoon clan in order to have his half-brother ascend the throne.
-So, King Injong died in 1545, replaced by his half-brother King Myeongjong.
-Reign started with some bad omens... there was an avalanche at Bukhansan (near Seoul), and there was also a bunch of floods and shit in the city.
-He was also too young to rule, so his mother, Queen Moonjong, ruled as regent.
-During this time, the powerful Yoon faction had split into 2 factions- Greater Yoon and Lesser Yoon.
-Greater Yoon was led by Yoon Im, King Injong's maternal uncle.
-Lesser Yoon was led by King Myeongjong's maternal uncles, Yoon Won-hyeok and Yoon Won-ro.
-Lesser Yoon were able to win over the queen's favor.
-Greater Yoon were purged, with the leaders arrested on trumped-up charges.
-Greater Yoon members were forced to flee to the countryside to try and recuperate.
-Lesser Yoon then split into sub-factions, with the faction led by Yoon Won-hyeong having the queen's favor.
-Yoon Won-hyeong was a really shitty politician, but unfortunately no one noticed this because they were a misogynistic Confucian society that blamed everything on the fact that the regent was a queen, which I guess was something they believed the Divine Powers That Be disapproved of. Yoon Won-hyeong was able to climb the ranks of government and thus accumulated a lot of power, even though he was completely incompetent when it came to actually doing his job well.
-1548- meanwhile, a Tsushima Island representative arrived in the capital, claiming that Tsushima had nothing to do with the recent raids seemingly by Japanese troops, instead blaming the raids on waegu pirates. Therefore, the Japanese soldiers who were wrongfully imprisoned in Joseon on charges of piracy should be let go and be allowed to return to Busan.
-Also, during this time Queen Moonjong lifted the censoring or banning of Buddhism, and there was a massive Buddhism revival! Some of the art was even patronized by the crown itself.
-Only a few of these works survive today, but most of them are in Japan :(
-Also introduced a standardized test for those who wanted to be monks.
-Moral legislation was also introduced.
-A dude named Bo Woo was assigned as Chief Monk during this time, and revived an official system of training and selecting monks in both the Seon (meditation) and Gyo (doctrinal, scholastic) sects of Korean Buddhism.
-1551- Bongeun-sa became the main temple of the Jogye Seon Order and the main base for the overall restoration of Korean Buddhism.
-1554- King Myeongjong finally came of age during this time, and Queen Moonjong stepped down as regent.
-Lesser Yoon power was diminished as he tried to demonstrate his power. However, King Myeongjong was still heavily influenced by his mother, and Yoon Won-hyeong kept his position as a powerful government figure.
-There were also a variety of existential threats to Joseon at this time.
-The Jurchen hordes remained a volatile threat in the north.
-The waegu continued to be a threat.
-In Japan it was the Warring States Period (1568-1615), and many Japanese turned to piracy in order to survive.
-One notable pirate threat was in Jeolla Province, where the pirate leader had a huge white horse and cool armor and actually defeated the Joseon army sent there to fuck them up.
-Joseon was finally able to put them down by utilizing psychological warfare and their new arrow technology.
-The pirates fled to Jeju-do, where they tried to raid again, but were run off.
-Meanwhile, the Ming dynasty were fighting barbarians on all sides.
-Life was hard in China, and many Chinese turned to piracy to survive (similar to the situation in Japan).
-Joseon records falsely state that all the pirates came from Japan, when really many/most were actually from China during this time.
-The Yangban then began to grow in power and gobble up more land, which caused many families to lose their farmlands and turn to banditry themselves, which became increasingly problematic.
-1565- Queen Moonjong dies. Soon after this, Bo-woo is killed by anti-Buddhist government officials.
-1567- King Myeongjong dies but he has no heir, as his only son died when he was a young boy. Eventually, King Seonjo (King Myeongjon's half-nephew) takes the throne after several months.
-In the beginning of his reign, King Seonjo looked to secure the realm from the dangerous Jurchen hordes of the north.
-They pushed the Jurchen back, but went in too far and were ambushed and massacred. A second force was then sent in and were more successful, and the north was temporarily secured.
-1570s- There was much turmoil in the Joseon court.
-The Sarim and Hoongu factions had faded, and new political parties had formed.
-Not so much focused on dogma or philosophical differences, just more like personal alliances, and was the result of the power struggle between all the rural Confucian academies.
-The major political factions:
-Dong-in ("Easterners")
-Seo-in ("Westerners")
-Eventually, both the Dong-in and Seo-in split in half, forming:
-"The Old Party"
-"The New Party"
-Buk-in ("The Northerners")
-Nam-in ("The Southerners")
-Competition was fierce, with lots of backstabbing, character assassination, etc.
-Corruption was a horrible problem and was fucking up the government with gridlock and overall incompetence.
-Meanwhile, the Jurchen hordes were rapidly becoming more and more of a threat in the north.
-The Ming dynasty was also spending a ton of resources combating other dangerous Manchurian hordes.
-During this time, Joseon was not properly equipped to defend itself.
-The army was too small due to the people being either too poor to be soldiers, too rich to be bothered to serve (buying their way out).
-There were efforts for military reform, but these were blocked due to petty government squabbling.
-Meanwhile in Japan, around this time a low-born commoner named Toyotomi Hideyoshi had risen up to become a powerful daimyo, unifying Japan and bringing an end to the Warring States Period!
