A History of Korea (19 page)

In the reign of King Mu (719–737), Parhae greatly extended its territory to encompass the whole of northeastern Manchuria. Wary of Parhae’s territorial expansion, Silla constructed a defensive wall along its northern frontier in 721. After Parhae was established, its rulers and people, unable to forgive Silla for siding with Tang to destroy Kogury
ŏ
, viewed Silla with distrust. Because of the inhumane treatment of the people of Kogury
ŏ
by the Tang Chinese after Kogury
ŏ
’s fall, Parhae also bore a deep resentment toward Tang for some decades.

Parhae’s hostility culminated in a direct military attack on the Chinese dynasty. In 732 King Mu sent a force led by the commander Chang Mun-hyu by sea to attack the port of Dengzhou on the Shandong peninsula. This military action was carried out partly to recover residents of Kogury
ŏ
who had been kidnapped by Tang forces when Kogury
ŏ
fell; as many as 200,000 had been taken prisoner and traded as slaves, with the Shandong peninsula serving a slave trade center. Parhae forces succeeded in returning many of these people home to Parhae. At this time Parhae established close ties not only with the neighboring peoples of Tujue and Qidan but also with Japan in order to cope with a pincer attack by Tang and Silla.

In the ensuing reign of King Mun (737–793), Parhae took advantage of the An Lushan and Shih Siming rebellions (755–761) in China and extended its territory as far as the Liao River. King Mun also subjugated many Malgal people in the northeastern region. In 755 he moved the capital northward to Sang-gy
ŏ
ng. By the latter part of the eighth century Parhae harbored little anger toward Tang and Silla, and therefore established peaceful diplomatic relations with the Chinese dynasty. King Mun began to exchange diplomatic representatives with Tang, eventually dispatching envoys to Tang as many as 98 times. To greet Parhae envoys, Tang set up a reception center at the port town of Dengzhou. Parhae enthusiastically accepted Tang institutions and culture, and conducted trade with Tang within the framework of China’s tribute system. It exported
raw materials such as horses, and imported a large number of books and art works. With the importation of Chinese civilization, Parhae culture blossomed. Silla sent its envoys to Parhae to promote a better relationship in 790. Parhae maintained close contact with Japan, and diplomatic, trade, and cultural exchanges between the two states continued for several centuries. In the reign of kings Mu and Mun, Parhae sent its envoys to Japan as many as 12 times.

In terms of both territorial expansion and cultural achievement Parhae civilization reached its zenith in the time of King S
ŏ
n (818–830), when its territory had expanded beyond Kogury
ŏ
. Under King S
ŏ
n, almost all the Malgal people were forced into submission, and the Liaodong peninsula also came under Parhae’s dominion. Parhae was then in control of the northernmost areas of the Korean peninsula and much of Manchuria, and further expanded its territory into the present-day Maritime Province of Russia. Parhae’s level of civilization was so elevated at this time that the Chinese designated Parhae as the “Flourishing State East of the Sea.”

Since the end of the ninth century the Parhae kingdom rapidly declined. After enjoying a long peace, its military preparedness relaxed. Finally, in 926, it was invaded and destroyed by Qidans. A people of Mongoloid ethnic stock, the Qidan people became increasingly strong under the able military leadership of Yelu Abaoji (Yehlu Apochi) and conquered neighboring tribes in Mongolia by 916, when he proclaimed himself emperor of the state of Liao which had been established in 907. Once this was accomplished, Yelu Abaoji turned his forces toward the east and crushed Parhae. Because its population was comprised of two disparate elements, the ruling elite of Kogury
ŏ
descent and a subjected class of people from Malgal, Parhae’s social fabric was inherently weak and it easily succumbed to the Qidans attack. In fact, Qidans officially recorded that it was able to destroy the kingdom without warfare because of the restlessness that prevailed among the people of Parhae. One recent theory suggests that Parhae’s fatal weakness was the result of the catastrophic volcanic eruption in the tenth century at Paektu-san (mountain) at the center of the Parhae territory. This massive explosion completely devastated the kingdom’s capital, Sang-gy
ŏ
ng, located not far from the volcanic mountain, and damaged the agricultural and even societal integrity of the state. Qidans took advantage of this natural disaster, and the Parhae kingdom, which lasted 228 years, finally came to an end.

After the fall of the kingdom, the displaced people of Parhae began the restoration movement, establishing “Later Parhae.” Taking the place of the royal Tae family, the Y
ŏ
l house later controlled the nation and changed its name to the
State of Ch
ŏ
ngan. The Parhae aristocracy, which numbered more than 50,000 including the royal family of Tae, sought refuge in the nascent Kory
ŏ
kingdom on the Korean peninsula, contributing to that state’s reunification of the Korean people. Parhae was the last state in Korean history to hold any significant territory in Manchuria. Later Korean dynasties continued to regard themselves as successors of Kogury
ŏ
and Parhae, and pursued their northward expansion.

The people of Parhae called their king
kadokpu,
from a native word meaning “great king,” and often added the honorific title of
hwangsang
(emperor) or
taewang
(great king). From the start, the succession to the throne in Parhae was from father to son, and its kings instituted the names of their own eras independently of China. After resuming relations with Tang and exchanging diplomatic representatives with the Chinese dynasty, Parhae accepted many of the Tang institutions, including its system of government. Parhae’s administrative system was indeed modeled after that of Tang. The basic organs of the central government consisted of three chancelleries and six ministries. Among the three chancelleries, the Ch
ŏ
ngdang-s
ŏ
ng, equivalent to Tang’s Shangshusheng, was responsible for the actual administration of state affairs. The S
ŏ
njo-s
ŏ
ng, the counterpart of Tang’s Webxiasheng, functioned as the royal secretariat, promulgating royal edicts and reviewing government policies. Equivalent to Tang’s Zhongshusheng, the Chungdae-s
ŏ
ng initiated royal edicts and government policies. Under the Ch
ŏ
ngdang-s
ŏ
ng, there were six ministries—the Ch’ung-bu for personnel administration, the In-bu for taxation, the
Ŭ
i-bu for rites, the Chi-bu for military affairs, the Ye-bu for judiciary affairs, and the Sin-bu for construction.

Parhae’s central administrative structure did not entirely conform to that of Tang. In China the Zhongshusheng, the Imperial Secretariat, was the chief originator of government policies and imperial orders. The Webxiash-eng, the Imperial Chancellery, had the right to review these orders and was the stronghold of bureaucratic power. The Shangshusheng, the Secretariat of State Affairs, had the duty of executing the orders that had been agreed upon by the two other bodies. Thus the three chancelleries had almost equal power. In Parhae, however, the chief minister of the Ch
ŏ
ngdang-s
ŏ
ng, whose title was
taenaesang,
or “great minister of the court,” occupied a superior position to that of the “chief minister of the left” or “chief minister of the right” who headed the other two chancelleries. This form of administrative structure was inherited
from the tradition of the Three Kingdoms in which a prime minister exercised much stronger power than his colleagues in the officialdom and was succeeded by the later Kory
ŏ
and Chos
ŏ
n kingdoms. Parhae also was distinctive in its use of Confucian terminology for the names of its ministries—
ch’ung
,
in
,
ŭ
i
,
chi
,
ye
, and
sin
. They were all major virtues of Confucianism, meaning, respectively, loyalty to the king, good heartedness or benevolence, uprightness, wisdom, politeness, and faithfulness.

In addition to these three chancelleries and six ministries, Parhae had several other offices or agencies. The Chungj
ŏ
ngdae served as the inspection-general, and the Ch
ŏ
njung-si functioned as the court secretariat. The Chongsok-si was responsible for the business transactions of royalty. The Munj
ŏ
kw
ŏ
n was the national library, and the Chujagam the national academy. The T’aewang-si took charge of ancestral rites, and the Sabin-si was in charge of receiving foreign envoys. The Taenong-si was empowered to administer nationally owned ware-houses, and the Sas
ŏ
n-si administered food provisions furnished to the royal court. Finally, the Sasang-si managed national finance, and the Hangbaekkuk was the agency of eunuchs.

Parhae had a well-established structure for provincial and local administration. Modeled on the Tang’s five-capital system and succeeding the five-pu institution of Kogury
ŏ
, the kingdom established five capitals. Its capital, Sang-gy
ŏ
ng, or the High Capital, was located at present-day Dongjingcheng in Heilongjiang province, Manchuria, and there were four secondary capitals: Chung-gy
ŏ
ng, or the Central Capital, at present-day Hualong in Jilin province, Manchuria; Tong-gy
ŏ
ng, or the Eastern Capital, at Hunchun in Jilin province, Manchuria; Nam-gy
ŏ
ng, or the Southern Capital, at present-day Pukch’
ŏ
ng, in South Hamgy
ŏ
ng province, North Korea; and S
ŏ
-gy
ŏ
ng, or the Western Capital, at Linjiang in Jilin province, Manchuria. Fifteen other major towns, called
pu
, were created throughout the country. Parhae also established 62 provinces for local administration. In the kingdom ten divisions called
wi,
or defenders, were formed as the central army, and, comprising this nucleus army were local military forces conscripted from the local population.

Parhae was founded by the people of Kogury
ŏ
ethnic stock, and they monopolized political power in the kingdom. Even most of the village heads, called
sury
ŏ
ng,
or chief, were men of Kogury
ŏ
descent. Parhae’s ruling class was composed of such aristocratic families as Ko, Chang, O, Yang, Tu, and Yi, including the royal house of Tae, all of Kogury
ŏ
lineage. The majority of the general populace ruled by this elite class were the people of Malgal. Only a
small minority of them succeeded in moving upward into the ruling elite; one such individual was K
ŏ
lsabiu, who helped Tae Cho-y
ŏ
ng in founding Parhae. These Malgal men held the title of
sury
ŏ
ng
and were on the periphery of Pae-hae’s elite stratum. Some of the Malgal were reduced to becoming laborers or slaves. Parhae’s social structure was so sharply divided along ethnic lines that it accounted for the kingdom’s inherent fragility.

Because Parhae was situated in the vast plains of Manchuria, cold weather prevented the cultivation of rice. Instead, dry-field farming thrived, and the people raised millet, beans, barley, and Chinese millet. They also hunted and raised livestock. Parhae produced horses, hemp cloth, silk, fur, young antlers, musk, ginseng, and pottery, exporting them to Tang China and Japan.

Like the preceding Kogury
ŏ
culture, Parhae culture vigorously embraced Tang culture. In fact, the kingdom developed a more advanced culture than that of its predecessor, and its cultural level equaled the standard of its southern neighbor, unified Silla. The kingdom established the Chujagam as a national academy to teach Confucian ethics and Chinese classical literature. Students at the national academy were children of the aristocracy. Parhae also created the Munj
ŏ
kw
ŏ
n, which functioned as a national library. A large number of students were sent to Tang to study, and many of them passed the Tang civil service examinations reserved for foreigners. Parhae students competed with those from Silla to achieve the highest standing in the examinations. The level of Parhae’s Confucian culture was so high that the names of its six ministries, as noted above, all include the major Confucian virtues: ch’ung, in,
ŭ
i, chi, ye, and sin. Parhae’s high level of Chinese classical literature is well demonstrated in the memorial inscriptions on tombs of princesses Ch
ŏ
nghye and Ch
ŏ
nghyo, the daughters of King Mun, which contain passages from five Confucian classics,
Shijing, Shujing, Yijing, Chunqiu,
and
Liji,
and from Chinese historical works such as
Shiji
and
Hanshu.
Parhae also met high standards in the fields of astronomy, mathematics, and medicine.

The remains uncovered in Parhae’s capital, Sang-gy
ŏ
ng, demonstrate the kingdom’s advanced cultural level. The capital city was organized in a manner similar to that of the Tang capital Changan. Residential sectors were laid out on either side of the palace surrounded by a rectangular wall. Nine sites of Buddhist temples found in the remains of the capital show that Parhae was also a Buddhist state where the belief in Buddhism was encouraged by the king.

Many elements of Kogury
ŏ
culture are found in Parhae culture. The most typical example is the ondol installation, Korea’s traditional heating system, which was uncovered in the inner citadel of the palace and many others adjacent to it. Parhae tombs, modeled on those of Kogury
ŏ
, had the stone burial chamber structure with a horizontal entranceway, seen in the tomb of Princess Ch
ŏ
nghye unearthed at Dunhua, in Jilin province, Manchuria, in 1949.